San Quentin was host to the first rabbi of an African tribe with a century-old history in Judaism.
In 2003, Gershom Sizomou was trained as a rabbi at Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles, said Danielle Meshorer of Be’chol Lashon in San Francisco.
Last November Sizomou visited San Quentin’s Jewish Synagogue to speak about his journey in Judaism. “I was born and raised in a village in East Uganda, and the history of my people, the Abuyadaya tribe, can be traced back 100 years,” he said. Abuyadaya means the People of Judah.
Sizomou said he wants to share his journey of peace, hope and perseverance with San Quentin’s diverse Jewish community. “Coming in here is a lot less scary than I thought it would be. I’ve traveled all over the world. I’ve been through checkpoints in Israel and Egypt. So this wasn’t that bad.”
However, due to a security issue, Sizomou had to change his shoes. “I wasn’t going to let something like that get in the way. I was looking forward to this because I knew that it would be very interesting to meet Jewish men in prison,” he said.
Sizomou explained that as a child growing up in Africa, his tribe was already observing Judaism. “The Abuyadaya chose Judaism, we self-converted much in the way that Ruth the Moabite did with Naomi, the Israelite woman.”
“With the history of my community, being Jewish was the natural way of our lives. It was who we were; it’s who we are,” Sizomou said.
Judaism began to take root in the Abuyadaya tribe around 1919, when the British selected Semei Kakungulu to be a Christian missionary. “The missionaries gave Kakungulu a Bible to read but he was drawn to the five books of Moses. And after reading the Torah, Kakungulu gave the New Testament back,” said Sizomou.
According to Sizomou, Kakungulu studied the Torah and trained himself according to the laws of Leviticus; he began by observing Judaism straight and with determination.
Being Jewish and growing up in Uganda came with many challenges, Sizomou said.
As an example, he said, when Idi Amin rose to power in January 1971 Judaism was outlawed. People were calling the Abuyadaya, Christ Killers. They were doing everything to dissuade them from being Jewish.
“That didn’t work because we were Jewish in everything we did in our hearts and souls. We went underground, and we continued learning and studying Torah and living as Jewish people,” he said.
After Amin’s regime fell in 1976, Judaism was practiced more openly.
