Male Call: Two Views of Jewish Descent

...Founders of sectarian offshoots are usually consumed by strong religious passions and an ardent faith in the God who called them to their mission...

...No matter how you do it—even if you do it my way—it doesn't count," there can be no dialogue...

...Since the destruction of Temple and State in the year 70 CE, the Jews have been a worldwide religious community without a supreme ecclesiastical authority recognized by all of its scattered members...

...Talmud Torah is the test—not birth...

...Joining a Reform temple went hand in, hand with acquiring a suburban split-level home and membership in the country club...

...They may resent that description when it is applied to them by Orthodox or Conservative Jews, but, in unguarded moments, they will apply that description to themselves...

...Will Reform Judaism become a sect of minimalists...

...It is silly to suppose that Jews have been waiting for this resolution in order to decide to marry a non-Jew...

...Galilean rabbis were at odds with Judaean rabbis, Palestinian rabbis with Babylonian rabbis, Maimunists with anti-Maimunists, mystics with rationalists, Chassidim with mitnagdim, champions of Enlightenment with determined obscurantists, and so on...

...At its March 1983 convention, which again took up a suggestion originally made by Rabbi Alexander Schindler, the CCAR's majority voted in favor of recognizing the "Jewish status" of the offspring of marriages in which the father is Jewish and the mother is not...

...But we go on to say— and here we part from the halachah— that birth is not sufficient to establish identity...

...This is hardly the stuff of which enthusiastic sectarians and self-sacrificing missionaries are made—in spite of the recent call (again by Rabbi Schindler) that Reform Judaism preach its gospel to the unchurched Gentiles...

...For one thing, tracing Jewish descent through the father may well correspond to the sociological realities on the American scene...

...After all, as long as one partner of the marriage is Jewish, the children will be Jewish, too...

...We have, of course, our share of minimalists...

...As long as "belonging to the church of your choice" was an essential ingredient of American respectability (a la Protestant, Catholic, Jew by the late Will Herberg), Reform Judaism could confidently count on the minimalist Jews to swell its ranks...

...For us, the historical reality does not require that the mother and the mother alone be the source of identification...

...But the fact is that we live in an open society, and mixed marriage is a pattern of our times...

...This is Jewish unity...

...At the same time, a person born of two non-Jewish parents is unambiguously not a Jew...

...Whether Reform Judaism will succeed in maintaining itself as a sect is another question altogether...

...There are undoubtedly religiously devoted and active members in every Reform congregation, but, on the whole, Reform Jews are less likely to give their children an intensive (read: day school) Jewish education than Orthodox and Conservative Jews are...

...This we do, and then, for them and for all of us, we get a higher standard, a richer vision of what Jewish life can and should be...

...Yet the Orthodox community of that city accords no legitimacy to Reform conversions...

...But the fact is that if we were to rest with requiring the conversion of a child of a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother—that is, with the traditional position—who would recognize our action...

...If it has, then the March 1983 decision of the CCAR is more than a coming-to-terms with the sociological realities of 20th century America...

...Mixed marriage, often involving Jewish men and non-Jewish women, goes on despite our best efforts to prevent it...

...When there is no acceptance by one side or the other, when Jewish unity is defined as, "I do it my way or it doesn't count...

...Will we fall by the wayside of Jewish history...

...We live in a period when those who are really and truly interested in religion tend to be quite serious about the religion that elicits their loyalty...

...Will they disavow the decision reached by the CCAR for American Reform Judaism, placing loyalty to the total Jewish community above the "sectarian" interests of the American Reform Jewish Establishment...

...They are not looking for a religion that is wishy-washy, that accepts all views and notions as "equally true" (or equally false...

...The notion that the religion of the child is determined solely by the religion of the mother derives from three historical circumstances: (1) The rape of Jewish women by foreign soldiers...

...The patriarchal line itself—Joseph's marriage to an Egyptian woman and yet the Jewishness of his children, Moses' marriage to the daughter of a Midianite priest and yet the Jewishness of his children—these cases (among others) illustrate the dominance of patrilineal descent in ancient Israel...

...Children of one Jewish parent are now treated in exactly the same fashion, accorded exactly the same status, no matter which of the parents is Jewish...

...If she wishes to become a Jew, she must convert to Judaism, a procedure that involves both behavior and belief...

...And will Reform Judaism really be able, in the long run, to retain the minimalist Jews who now make up a sizable proportion of its membership...

...Be that as it may, the fact remains that those who are most obviously animated by sectarian zeal and a willingness to suffer privations for a religious cause do not, as a rule, swell the ranks of Reform Judaism, while those who make up the bulk of Reform's membership do not seem to be possessed of the personality traits which gave the world an Anan ben David (the founder of the Karaite sect), a Martin Luther, or a Shabbatai Zevi...

...Obviously, I can tell the child of a non-Jewish mother and a Jewish father that her status is in question in the eyes of the Orthodox—and if that is important to her, steps can be taken to resolve the matter...

...Now, however, the conscience has been assuaged...

...That is our hope, that is our goal and that is the true meaning of our decision...

...One wonders whether the Reform rabbis, who, in March 1983, took the step into sectarianism and determined to "go it alone" in a matter affecting the whole of world Jewry, had previously ascertained whether Reform Judaism was religiously strong enough to do so or not...

...Or are they so dependent upon the purse-strings held in New York that they humbly submit to the inner-Jewish pariah status to which the March 1983 decision of the CCAR has inevitably condemned them...

...The Reform rabbis' decision may have been motivated by all kinds of considerations, by no means all of negligible weight...

...Yet in many cases, the parents want to raise them as Jews...

...We say, with the halachah, that birth creates a claim to Jewishness...

...Indeed, most American Jews, whatever their denominational affiliation, are today minimalists...

...Depending on circumstances (according to the age or setting, parents should consult a rabbi to determine the specific mitzvot which are necessary), mitzvot leading toward a positive and exclusive Jewish identity will include entry into the covenant, acquisition of a Hebrew name, Torah study, bar/bat mitzvah and Kabbalat Torah (Confirmation...

...Will British Reform rabbis marry American visitors whose claim to Jewish status is solely based on the March 1983 CCAR decision...

...Everything goes...

...It will be interesting to watch the reactions of Reform Jews beyond this continent, not least in the State of Israel...

...One could despise a fellow Jew's theology, criticize his religious practice (or lack thereof) and even hurl bulls of excommunication against him...

...For another, tracing Jewish descent through the mother may not have been the universal practice throughout the entire biblical period...

...But is the collective wisdom of the American Reform rabbinate really adequate in a matter like this...

...And why the controversy...

...But that was before American Reform Judaism assumed the leadership of world Reform Judaism...

...The latest American Reform prayerbook, Gates of Prayer, is a striking illustration of this...

...Jakob J. Petuchowski is the Sol andArlene Bronstein Research Professor of Judaeo-Christian Studies at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio...

...It provides materials for believers and unbelievers alike...

...Here it may help to note that the traditional halachic view, holding that the child's religion foIlows,\hat of the mother, has not always been the dominant view within Judaism...

...By doing away with the Jewish divorce procedures (get), by abolishing the requirements of circumcision and immersion for converts to Judaism, and by increasingly countenancing mixed marriages (without prior conversion of the non-Jewish partner), American Reform Judaism has created situations in which it became impossible for non-Reform religious Jews to intermarry with some Reform Jews...

...And while, in theory, one can indeed justify the assertion that it is harder to be a Reform Jew than an Orthodox or a Conservative one, in practice Reform congregations tend to attract the minimalist, rather than the maximalist Jews...

...That was certainly not the intention of the 19th-century founders of Reform Judaism...

...It always has been, and it likely always will be, and it is therefore up to each generation of Jews to impose its own considered interpretation on the matter of definition...

...Our critics claim that throughout the ages, one element of our people's unity has been the universal adherence to the laws of personal status—in the case at hand, to the transmission of Jewishness through birth to a Jewish mother or by acceptable conversion...

...Thus: A person born of two Jewish parents is, unambiguously, a Jew...

...The majority of Orthodox Jews in this country do not accept the validity of Reform conversions...

...And now, at last, I will not be expected to tell a young child in my religious school that because her mother is not Jewish, she has no claim to Jewishness...

...But not under all conditions...

...Here the tradition has been that if the Jewish parent is the mother, the child is considered in the same category as if he were the offspring of two Jewish parents, while if it is the father who is the Jewish parent, the child is considered as if neither parent is Jewish...

...And second, a new category, midway between the automatic Jewishness of the child of two Jewish parents and the unambiguous non-Jewishness of the child of non-Jewish parents, has been established...

...Today, atheists, agnostics, and non-theistic humanists are members in good standing of the Central Conference of American Rabbis...

...For those beyond childhood claiming Jewish identity, other public acts or declarations may be added or substituted after consultation with their rabbi...

...When, in the last century, Felix Adler realized that he no longer shared the theological presuppositions of even Radical Reform Judaism, he gave up the pulpit of Manhattan's prestigious Congregation Emanu-El, and, in 1876, he founded the Society for Ethical Culture...

...And it is well to recall that Ruth's was not an elaborate ritual...

...The performance of these mitzvot serves to commit those who participate in them, both parent and child, to Jewish life...

...If the non-Jewish partner happens to be the woman, then the offspring of that union would hitherto have been regarded as non-Jewish— something of a burden on the conscience of the "officiating" rabbi...

...The one link, that of Jewish birth, which had hitherto still bound the most radical Reform Jew to the most ultra-Orthodox pietist, has now been sundered...

...however justified the practice might have been at the time when the early rabbis incorporated it into the Jewish laws of personal status, its retention in the 20th century does have something arbitrary about it...

...2) the inability to resolve "who is the father" with certainty in a polygamous society (as contrasted to our ability to be certain regarding the identity of a biological mother...

...Indeed, from the standpoint of Jewish law, he remains a Jew no matter what he does...

...It will continue in the face of all our resolutions and declarations...

...Were the charge true, it would be serious...

...This presumption of the Jewish status of the offspring of any mixed marriage is to be established through appropriate and timely public and formal acts of identification with the Jewish faith and people...

...But what of a person bom of a non-Jewish parent and a Jewish parent...

...But we are holding up a standard, a vision of what can be...

...your choice" is no longer de rigueur for attaining respectability in American civil life...

...But Will Herberg's scenario is on its way out...

...The attraction that some Chassidic groups and yeshivot for ba'alei t'shuvah seem to hold for American Jewish youngsters from non-Orthodox homes may be the Jewish counterpart of this...

...The process of secularization in American life (aided and abetted, incidentally, with great enthusiasm by both the rabbinical and the lay leadership of American Reform Judaism) is bringing about a climate of opinion in which "belonging to the church of Today, atheists, agnostics and non-theistic humanists are members in good standing of the Central Conference of American Rabbis...

...Moreover—and I write here as, a rabbi who does not officiate at mixed marriage's—I believe that our decision will encourage rather than discourage conversion...

...It must be seen as a major personal and religious act, an act of faith and commitment comparable to what Ruth did thousands of years ago...

...Some say that this decision will encourage mixed marriages and discourage conversion...

...It was this kind of unilateral action on the part of American Reform Judaism that was also partly responsible for the legal inability of Reform rabbis to officiate at marriages in the State of Israel...

...Our decision derives, first of all, from our perception of the problem...

...At least, one had to reckon with that principle as long as the person with whom one disagreed was the offspring of a religiously valid Jewish marriage...

...So with us: Instead of drawing a circle of exclusion that leaves the children of (some) mixed marriages outside, we draw a circle that brings them (all of them) in...

...Those who did not recognize it made up the membership of sects that moved to the periphery of Judaism and beyond...

...If, however, theological differences also led to unilateral changes made in the laws governing personal status, then those born after such changes had been effected were no longer deemed to be suitable marriage partners by the rest of Jewry...

...We have decided, therefore, to give the father's religion a vote...

...an Orthodox conversion is always available...

...It turns out that the ambiguity is built into our lives and our understanding...

...The most significant part of our resolution follows the first sentence, where we assert our acceptance of the Jew who acts in ways that assert his or her acceptance of Judaism...

...3) the fact that the union of a Jewish woman and a non-Jewish man, or a non-Jewish woman and a Jewish man, was considered illicit and could not lead to marriage, which in turn meant that the mother had to return to her own community and people—together, of course, with her offspring...

...Ideally, such unity will move to a higher and still higher level...

...In order to maintain and increase its numbers, Reform Judaism has turned from being a manifestation of Liberal Judaism into the Establishment of Jewish Liberalism...

...And we require that commitment equally from the children of Jewish mothers and the children of Jewish fathers...

...it was enough that she identified herself publicly and verbally with our people, our faith and our heritage...

...MALE CALL: TWO VIEWS OF JEWISH DESCENT With its controversial decision last March, the Central Conference of American Rabbis sparked a wide-ranging debate on the status of children born to Jewish fathers and non-Jewish mothers...

...This is not to say that there were no differences in religious practice among the world's Jews...

...of necessity, the circles in which the changes were made developed into sects that were bypassed by the future developments of Judaism...

...One would hardly be able to blame non-Reform rabbis for wanting to avoid that bother simply by prohibiting intermarriage with Reform Jews...

...it can mean being attacked in a synagogue in Rome or Paris...

...American Reform Judaism's Central Conference of American Rabbis has finally done it...

...Kurt Wilhelm and the late Dr...

...This, and more, will be interesting—and, I fear, quite depressing—to watch...

...A generation or two from now, a non-Reform rabbi, having to deal with the marriage of a non-Reform Jew with a Reform Jew, will have to go to considerable trouble in investigating whether the Reform Jew is, in fact, "Jewish" in any sense other than the Reform sectarian understanding of that adjective...

...We now extend our circle to include those whom history has placed in our midst—and we shall then try to raise all our sights to the enduring commitments of a meaningful Jewish life...

...A Judaism that rejects the demands of history and the necessity for halachic responsiveness, that mocks and dismisses alternative views—such a Judaism can hardly be thought to preserve Jewish unity or be its arbiter...

...in Toronto, the Reform Bet Din (rabbinic court) requires immersion, circumcision and ritual observance from converts—that is, requires a halachic conversion...

...One segment of the world Jewish community has taken a unilateral step in changing the laws of personal status that are accepted by the rest of religious Jewry...

...The offspring of Reform marriages will just have to pick their marriage partners from the ranks of Reform Jews, of non-religious secular Jews, or—what seems most likely if present trends continue—from the ranks of the non-Jewish majority...

...Or will British Reform rabbis (some of whom are members of the CCAR) act against the decision of their American colleagues...

...From a traditional hatachic point of view, the children of such marriages are not Jews...

...We say that identification requires Torah and mitzvot—Jewish life-actions that bind us to God and to our people...

...The collective wisdom of the American Reform rabbinate has so ruled...

...I think not...

...These historically cogent reasons linked the child inseparably to its mother...

...Others may be satisfied, so far as mixed marriages are concerned, with the accident of birth...

...Many Reform Jews, in fact, will justify their belonging to a Reform congregation by claiming that they are "not very religious...

...In the case of the child of a Jewish mother, therefore, no test is required...

...And now, the March 1983 decision would seem to be the final step in this process...

...The bottom line of the great freedom of thought and the considerable leeway granted in matters of practice by traditional Judaism was the universal acceptance of the laws of personal status, the ability to recognize one another as Jews...

...Thus in one resolution—a resolution that was preceded by prolonged and thoughtful debate, and the adoption of which was followed by intense controversy—the Reform rabbinate sought to accomplish two goals...

...The CCAR declares that the child of one Jewish parent is under the presumption of Jewish descent...

...Once this change of climate is more generally perceived by minimalist Jews, there may quite possibly be a drop in the membership figures of Reform congregations...

...There is no test of behavior or belief he must pass in order to qualify...

...in the case of the child of a Jewish father, full-scale conversion is required...

...The major criticism of our action has come from those who argue that we are thereby creating an irreconcilable division in the unity of the Jewish people...

...Now, under some conditions, "being all things to all people" can be a very effective policy for an Establishment...

...More will now be expected of the child of one Jewish parent than has traditionally been required of the child of a Jewish mother...

...Prior to the CCAR decision, the Israeli rabbinate regularly checked out the "Jewishness" of American Jews who wished to be married in Israel— and required, as part of the checking, certification by Orthodox American rabbis...

...Traditional Jewish law, on the other hand, insists upon tracing Jewish descent in mixed marriages through the mother, and not through the father...

...Indeed, many of the children have themselves become involved in the life of our faith and our people...

...Why can't we get our act together...

...Reform Judaism is all things to all people...

...Aharon Phillip, were authorized to solemnize marriages in Jerusalem...

...The halachic responsiveness for which we yearn and for which we now speak is both inclusive and demanding...

...Whatever may be said about the God-intoxicated religious leaders of the Reform Jewish past, an intimate relationship with the God of Israel hardly appears to be the main characteristic of today's American Reform Judaism, whether lay or rabbinical...

...The cohesion and the survival of that community were primarily due to a system of religious law, halachah, which was recognized by all...

...Is this the "Jewish unity" we are now charged with disrupting...

...In other words, by making marriage with other religious Jews (of a non-Reform variety) practically impossible in the long run, Reform Judaism has now taken a decisive step on the road to becoming a sect...

...That being the case, it is time to act in accord with our sense of yosher, fairness, to replace the one-sided transmission with a more balanced approach...

...First, the peculiar distinction between the children of Jewish fathers and the children of Jewish mothers has been erased...

...No wonder, then, that the history of Judaism is also a history of inner-religious conflicts...

...Such would be a benevolent evaluation of the CCAR's decision...

...Jewish unity is a vision, not a reality...

...In our own day, we have to take account of our own history and circumstances as well...

...Less benevolent observers might point to the increasing number of Reform rabbis who "officiate" (with or without the assistance of Christian clergy) at marriages in which one partner is not Jewish...

...Our resolution requires a clear commitment by both parents and by their child(ren)—and, in this sense, we are raising the standards for Jewish identification...

...Being a Jew today can mean ending up in an airport in Uganda separated off from the other passengers...

...They are less likely to let Sabbaths and festivals interfere with their pursuit of business and pleasure, and less likely to pay more for their food in order to abide by biblical and rabbinical dietary restrictions...

...Here, two Reform rabbis argue the issues...

...This is, in many respects, an anomalous situation, and it was in an effort to repair the anomaly that at its convention in March 1983, the Central Conference of American Rabbis adopted the following resolution: Sheldon Zimmerman, rabbi of Central Synagogue in New York City, is co-chairman of the Task Force on Reform Jewish Outreach for the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and the Central Conference of American Rabbis...

...We recognize a claim to Jewish descent that has not been recognized for many centuries, and we declare that we are ready and willing to embrace those who fall within the scope of that claim...

...It could, of course, be that the question of religious strength did not arise at all in this connection, and that the rabbinical leadership of American Reform Judaism is quite content to regard Reform Judaism as one more secular manifestation (which has no business being concerned with religious laws of personal status) of American Jewish "ethnicity" or "sociological Judaism," taking its chances of survival alongside the other secular institutions that serve Jews on the American scene...

...And you...

...it merely worked out that way...

...And let us be more than straight, let us make clear to the child that our vision of Judaism extends beyond birth, to mitzvot, to Jewish life and commitment...

...Reform Judaism's current enthusiasms—the supposed "central-ity" of the State of Israel in Jewish life and the support of leftist political programs—are essentially secular, rather than religious enthusiasms, and they are unlikely to guarantee Reform Judaism's survival as a distinct religious sect—whatever other positive role the institutions of Reform Judaism may yet be destined to play in the secular life of American Jewry...

...Is this the "Jewish unity" we are now charged with violating...

...Why the decision...

...But let us be straight with the child: There are those who are accepting and drawing him in, not holding him back because of the accident of birth to a non-Jewish mother...

...That is why, in contemporary Christianity, the "liberal" Protestant denominations are steadily losing out to the more fundamentalist versions of the faith...

...I will not deign to tell a child about to celebrate his Bar Mitzvah that he cannot be called to the Torah because his mother is not a Jew...

...And has the collective wisdom of the American Reform rabbinate taken into account that the March 1983 decision retroactively justifies many of the attacks launched against Reform Judaism by the Orthodox rabbinate, as well as the "non-recognition" of Reform rabbis that is built into the law of the State of Israel...

...The leading Orthodox legal authority, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, has ruled that Reform rabbis are not rabbis—that the marriages they perform are not valid, nor the conversions...

...But one could not deny his Jewish status, because one still had to reckon with the talmudic principle that "even "a sinful Jew is a Jew" (Sanhedrin 44a...

...Reform Judaism, particularly in its American version (the European Reform Jews, with some notable exceptions, have always been more attuned to the cohesion of the total Jewish community), had already, before March 1983, strained the bonds linking Reform Jews to the rest of religious Jewry almost to the breaking point...

...we require visible commitment...

...The desire and decision to be a Jew and to live as a Jew cannot, in this post-Holocaust age, be lightly regarded...

...But those were all quarrels within the family...

...After 4,000 years of Jewish history, and all that, there is still disagreement about who is a Jew...

...For the substance of our decision is to hold up to us all a higher vision of what it means to be a Jew and of what Judaism is about—and it is vision and meaning for which so many people are these days searching...

...There was a tjme when two German Liberal rabbis,' the late Dr...

...There always were, even as the theologies of Jews tended to vary according to time and place...

...It becomes a conscious step taken by the Reform rabbinate to establish Reform Judaism as a sect on the periphery of Judaism...

...yet less than formal conversion will now be required than has traditionally been required of the child of a Jewish father...