In Conversation with David Goa18 Nov 2019

8: Norton Mezvinsky

Some years ago I hosted Norton in Edmonton for several lectures on the demanding geo-political issues that so often frame our understanding of Israel/Palestine. We also traveled and lectured in Syria and Turkey and engaged colleagues in the Muslim community.

Norton is a considerable critic of Israeli political policy toward the Palestinians. This has often garnered the ire of supporters of the Government of Israel and the favour of supporters of Palestinians. I have also watched as he carefully and forcefully responded to his audiences and taught them to distinguish between political criticism and the kind of anti-Semitism such critique can mask.

In our conversation we explore his childhood formation in a loving Orthodox Jewish family in Ames, Iowa, his study with a teacher of Hebrew and Bible several days a week in Des Moine beginning when he was five and continuing through his eighteenth birthday. His reading of Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of the Reconstructionist movement, and author of the seminal book, Jewish Civilization was the beginning for his thinking about the implications Zionism and his thinking developed through his friendship and work with Rabbi Elmer Berger of the American Council for Judaism.

Norton’s father came to Ames, Iowa, from Ukraine in 1912 aspirating to live as an Orthodox Jew among non-Jews. As Norton took me back thought his life to his childhood it was his father’s vision that I began to see as the affective kernel unfolding through his life and work. I welcome you to our conversation.

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