Hardie only knows his pull toward Judaism is “intuitive, natural” and that his faith is unwavering. “I only believe in one God — HaShem” he says. “I’ve been a Jew since Sinai.”
The 25-year-old Hardie is about to take his connection to Judaism one giant step further.
In August, once he has completed his studies at Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco and taken the California bar exam, he will make aliyah.
“I love the United States; this country has given so much to me,” Hardie says. But “Israel is on a different plane. It’s my spiritual, ancestral homeland. I’m married to Israel. I’ll never get a divorce.”
Hardie, who officially converted to Judaism in December 1995 though San Francisco’s Congregation Beth Israel-Judea, first visited Israel last summer to attend an intensive law course at Hebrew University’s law school. While in Jerusalem, he met and fell in love with Laetitia, a French Jewish graduate student who also plans to make aliyah in 1997.
“I’m here on borrowed time,” says Hardie, who grew up in Southern California and now lives in San Francisco. “I miss Israel, that sense of belonging, that sense of repose.”
On returning to Israel for good, Hardie — who wears a kippah, keeps kosher and peppers his speech with Hebrew and Yiddish expressions — plans to enter the Israel Defense Force, then seek work either in the country’s military courts or its Ministry of Justice.
“I can’t wait `til the IDF,” he says. “I’m going to be a good soldier because I have two things: love for Israel and chutzpah. And I’m looking forward to the discipline. It’ll make me a better leader, a better person.”
Of course, those who know Hardie would already call him a leader. As an undergraduate at U.C. Riverside, he served as philanthropy chairperson of his fraternity, Beta Theta Pi. He is an elected representative of the Associated Students of Hastings.
Active in the National Black Students Association, he is also chair of the National Jewish Law Students Association’s Northern Ninth Circuit. He is, in fact, the first African American to hold such a position in the organization.
When it comes to serving as a bridge between the African American and Jewish communities, “I don’t preach,” he says. “For me, it’s action. That’s the way to serve as a bridge.”
In fact, one of Hardie’s goals is bringing reasons to support Israel to the attention of African Americans — the country’s airlifts of endangered Ethiopian Jews, for example, and its humanitarian support of various African nations. He is planning on writing a book titled “Zionists Come in All Colors.”
But Hardie, who celebrates Shabbat and holidays at various area synagogues, also believes he can motivate Jews. “I really rejuvenate people,” he says. “I think I can imbue a lot of people with the sense of pride in just being Jewish.”
Earlier this year, Hardie spent several months volunteering at the Jewish Community Information & Referral Service of the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation. Before that, he volunteered at the city’s Jewish Home for the Aged, socializing with residents and helping them draft various documents.
“He was very warm, very dedicated. People really enjoyed his visiting,” says Gail Green, the Jewish Home’s former associate director of volunteers. “Within a very short time, you could see how he was just embracing Judaism and so enthusiastic for it.”
Well aware that his journey is an unusual one, Hardie says friends have been supportive. As for his family, they have always seen him as an adventurer who marches to the beat of his own drum, as a “Rambo,” he says with a smile, “an Indiana Jones.”