Wednesday evening, about 150 people gathered at the Chapel of Memories on the Mississippi State campus for a vigil of remembrance for 11 people murdered in a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania synagogue on Oct. 27 — an act believed to be the worst attack on Jews in the nation’s history.
But even at Wednesday’s event, Jews were what they have long been in Mississippi — a distinct, but accepted minority.
“I love Mississippi State and these moments especially,” said John Cohen, who as MSU’s Director of Athletics and standout baseball player and coach at State is best-known of a Jewish population that numbers only in the dozens. “To see how our campus, our president and this institution embraces folks who are different, it’s really inspiring.”
According to a 2017 survey by the Jewish Virtual Library, there are 1,560 Jews currently living in Mississippi, which has a population of almost 3 million.
“Generally speaking, we will be the only Jewish person our immediate friends know,” said Tyler Daniel, president of Hillel at Mississippi State, the Jewish student organization found on college campuses throughout the country. “As a byproduct of that, we are viewed as the spokesperson of Judaism, even for those who aren’t particularly observant.”
Seth Oppenheimer, a professor of mathematics, moved to Starkville in 1988 from his home in Austin, Texas. For the past 11 years he has also served as the spiritual leader of the Jewish community in the Golden Triangle as a rabbinical student. In January he will become a full-fledged rabbi.
“It’s much like being ordained as a minister,” Oppenheimer said.
Over the past 30 years, Oppenheimer said he’s encountered little anti-Semitism and certainly nothing approaching the violence that shook the nation last week.
“I would say that folks are generally generous and welcoming,” Oppenheimer said. “I would venture to say that it’s much harder to be an atheist in Mississippi than to be a Jew. People here generally respect religious attitudes.”
At Mississippi State, there are 20 to 30 students who are actively involved in the Hillel group, said Daniel. Oppenheimer said about the same number are affiliated with the lone synagogue in the Golden Triangle, Temple B’nai Israel in Columbus. Since students make up part of that congregation, the entire Jewish population is likely to be less than 100.
“We’re a small group,” Daniel said. “But we are prominent on campus because we are active in so many areas of campus life.”
Being Jewish in the South
The same could be said of the broader Jewish population since the first Jewish congregation held its first religious service in Natchez in 1800. At its peak in 1927, there were 6,420 Jews living in the state, according to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
Paul Lasky’s family has been part of that history going back to the 1890s. The family operated Lasky’s Department Store in Aberdeen for 103 years. After closing the business in 1996, Paul moved to Columbus where he runs his own insurance services company.
“Most of the Jews who moved to Mississippi in the 1800s were first- and second-generation immigrants, mostly from Eastern Europe,” said Lasky, who serves as the board president at B’nai Israel, where he has worshiped since he was a child. “They came for opportunities they didn’t have in their home countries. Like any group, you do what you know. For them, they were shopkeepers. So that’s what they did. They came, opening shops, and became part of their communities.”
The merchant-class Jews were prominent store owners in Starkville and Columbus as well as the Delta, which was home to the largest Jewish population in the state during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
“They built their businesses, were successful and sent their children to college,” Oppenheimer said. “But their children didn’t want to go home and run the business in many cases. They moved away.”
Indeed, since 1927, the Jewish population has fallen by almost 5,000.
“I think they just moved to areas with larger Jewish populations, Atlanta, New Orleans, Austin, Texas,” said Joseph Metz, a graduate student in history at MSU.
Metz, from Clinton, said that for the most part, being identified as Jewish is mostly a curiosity on campus.
“The Jews in the South have done a good job fitting into Southern culture, by necessity and by choice,” Metz said. “They are less likely to keep kosher. They do fried chicken and on the coast, they’ll have shrimp boils. The Jewish community is tight-knit, but it has also adopted the culture. When people do meet Jews, their reaction is very much like one of my friends said, ‘You are just like us except you go to a different church.'”
‘Everyone has a story’
That is not to say that Mississippi’s Jews haven’t encountered anti-Semitism.
“Every Jewish boy and girl has a story,” Metz said.
For Metz, an encounter with a student when he was in seventh grade inspired him to embrace his Jewish identity.
“A kid shoved me up against a locker and used a Jewish slur,” Metz said.
Metz didn’t fight back but was still sent to the principal’s office because school policy said anyone involved in a fight had to.
“There were witnesses that heard what the kid said,” Metz said, “so when my dad asked the principal about that — and I’ll always remember this — the principal said, ‘That’s not what we’re discussing here.’
“That was the moment for me,” Metz continued. “I had always been proud of my Jewish heritage — my grandfather was a Holocaust survivor from Auschwitz and Dachau. But it was at that moment that I decided that if that’s how people are going to see me, as a Jew, I would embrace that wholeheartedly.”
Lasky, who said his family spent years being an active, supportive member of the community, said there was only one time when the family felt it was dangerous to be a Jew.
“Back in the Civil Rights days, there was a group of Ku Klux Klan who came to town, looking to stir up things,” Lasky said. “That didn’t last long. The people wouldn’t stand for it and the FBI came in and took control. That was really about it. I think one time, someone said something to me that was anti-Semitic, but that’s all been forgiven.”
‘Almost all people are good people’
Although Jews in the Golden Triangle feel welcomed and accepted, the rise in anti-Semitism in the country — The Anti-Defamation League said incidents of anti-Semitic acts increased by 57 percent last year — has caught their attention.
“We have an obligation not to become complacent,” Daniel said. “I know even here at Mississippi State where the climate is very supportive, what has happened, especially in Pittsburgh, has caused us to start talking about security at our events. We haven’t had an incident, but after what’s happened, you can’t help but think about who might be coming through the door when you’re having an event.”
Oppenheimer has sensed that, too.
“For most folks, consciousnesses have been raised,” Oppenheimer said. “For people in the Jewish community, that sense of personal complacency that ‘I’ll be OK,’ is being challenged to some degree.”
Lasky sees the echoes of history in the recent violence, but he remains hopeful.
“The way I feel about it is that there are a lot of good people in this country,” Lasky said. “Almost all people are good people, but there has always been a small group of bad people in every generation. I think the important thing is just to educate people. I think that’s the answer.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 37 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.