I am not a Jew. What a shocking thing for me to say considering my last name is Cohen and I went to Israel to study Torah in orthodox yeshivas. However, the name Cohen is the give-away: I am from the tribe of Levi, not the tribe of Judah.

Now, some of you might think I am being nit-picky about this. And some of you might be wondering what I am talking about. So, let me try to explain.

Once upon our time, our ancestor, Avraham, was referred to as Ivrit or Hebrew. Ivrit is the Hebrew word that we translate as Hebrew, and it means to cross over. Avraham was so named because he crossed over the Jordan river and into the holy land. This term continued to be used through his grandson, Yisrael. Then something happened. Yaakov had 12 sons, and we started to be referred to as: The children of Yisrael. It is interesting, that we were not called Yisrael, but the children of Yisrael. I asked myself why this was so.

The answer I got was because each son, each tribe, lived in a different part of the land, and so followed the laws in the Torah in a slightly different way. In other words, by calling us the children of Yisrael, there was an acknowledgment that there is more than one way to “do” the Torah, the divine instruction manual. If we had continued to be called Ivrit, or if we had been referred to simply as Yisrael, the implication would have been that there was only one way to do things.

So, why am I making a big stink about being a Levi and not a Jew? Usually, I don’t. The term Jew, as I said, come from the tribe of Judah, which was the biggest tribe that was not lost when we went into exile. Since most of us were from the tribe of Judah, we became known as Jews. However calling us Jews leads to the problem I outlined above that would have happened if we were called Yisrael: we would have thought there was only one way of keeping the Torah. And a lot of people seem to have fallen into that trap. Most of the time I am content to call myself a Jew, even though technically I am not one; it is easier not to make waves. Besides, Jew has become the common term for us (though I wish we would bring back “Bnay Yisrael,” or, “The Children of Yisrael”). However, when I come across a Jew who is inflexible in his view of the Torah, at that point, I will make the point of saying I am not a Jew; that I am a Levi – in order to make the point that we are not one tribe, but many. And as such, we have more than one way of following Torah.

About the Author

Shmuel Shalom Cohen spent 10 years studying Torah in Jerusalem. Six years ago, he started Conscious Torah to help Jews connect to their tradition in ways they didn’t think possible. Shmuel also started, and is the executive directory of Jewish Events Willamette-valley, a non-profit whose mission is to build Jewish community, pride, and learning. In his free time, Shmuel likes walks in nature, playing music, writing poetry, and time with good friends.