"... Loves You More Than You Will Know..."

The other night I began singing Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs. Robinson" to a group of friends. As for the reason for this serenade, I know not. I was quite high. Anyway, as I approached the line in the chorus, "Jesus loves you more than you will know," I hesitated slightly before I said the name of the son of God. This pause is hardly intentional. It is a habit born years ago back when I was in middle school.

My mother used to play the Forrest Gump soundtrack in our car's cassette deck, which at the time seemed to be the height of technology since it had auto reverse. (What do you mean that I don't have to take the tape out and flip it over?) We would sing along as we did our errands around Canarsie.

When Mrs. Robinson came on, my mother became wistful for the days of Simon and Garfunkel, but I was disturbed. True, the harmonies were beautiful and the melody was catchy. But why all this talk about Jesus? To further confuse me, my mother told me that the two singer/songwriters were Jewish boys themselves. I could not understand why they were singing about their not savior.



Well, we were not that kind of Jew, the one that sings about Christ or Christmas (I'm talking to you, Bing Crosby). Instead of saying Jesus, we'd insert "God" or "Hashem" (which is Hebrew speak for the name, a common term used by Orthos who do not want to take the Lord's name in vain). And sometimes, we'd say nothing. We'd pause for a second until "Jesus" had rolled off of Paul and Simon's tongues and out of our car's speakers, before jumping back into the lyrics. And years later, the habit persists in part. Though I now utter Christ's name while singing along, I pause, as if to wonder if he really loves me.

Jesus loves Jew?

(On a semi-related note: Some Jewish bands have had a tendency to "borrow" tunes from the mainstream culture, something I did not learn until later. There was one song, frequently played at weddings and bar mitzvahs called "Gila v'Rina," which was done to the tune of "The Land Down Under," by Men at Work. The first time I heard the original on the radio, I became convinced that the Jews had, once again, been taken advantage of by the Gentile world. I'm not sure when I learned it was actually the other way around.)