Trapped in a Thesis

...Jew makes graphically clear the multiformity at the center of Jewish identity formation in the United States today...

...In this instance Freedman's journalistic instincts have betrayed him, however, for he exaggerates his line of argument so wildly as to render it ludicrous...

...How sad, then, that Freedman deflects attention from this by spinning a fantasy thesis about a Jewish "civil war...

...On the other side, an assertive, charismatic and increasingly purist Orthodoxy boasts the highest birth rate within Judaism and a sense of triumphalism to match...

...and "Beachwood, Ohio, 1997-1999" examines Si Wachsberger's successful crusade to prevent the building of an Orthodox synagogue complex in his neighborhood...

...Five pages into Jew vs...

...Jew is nothing short of terrific...

...Hardly...

...Freedman has now come forward with a new book that promises to attract a large audience...

...To the degree that they are aware of problems of religious coercion and lack of religious pluralism in the Jewish State, Jews in the United States react variously with indifference, confusion, embarrassment, and—increasingly—anger...

...Freedman indicates in the Prologue his intention of "bearing witness" to a "struggle for the soul of American Jewry" that pits "secularist against believer, denomination against denomination, gender against gender, liberal against conservative, traditionalist against modernist within each branch...

...Jew by 58year-old Daniel Greer, who started out as a modern Orthodox graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School, but has become an Orthodox traditionalist of furious intensity...

...for the latter, the mainstream pull is something to be resisted through increased isolation...

...But this in no way impinges on the ability of the individual American Jew to conduct a Jewish life exactly as he or she sees fit...

...He solemnly announces: "The ancient bond no longer holds in modern America," setting the stage for an American Jewish life "volatilely reshaped and destabilized...

...Sensing a hot topic for a book—after all, Jews are typically thought to be exemplars of solidarity—Freedman waded in...

...Wachsberger cannot abide the "holier than thou" attitude of the Orthodox, who make it plain that he is "being judged, scorned, found deficient as a Jew...

...There is no civil war raging—this is a sheer fantasy...

...Freedman sees American Jews "pulling toward the extremes," thus making any coming together on these questions most unlikely...

...Who decides what is authentic and legitimate Judaism...

...But Greer has also taken out an insurance policy of sorts: He is the person behind the "Yale Five" lawsuit that opposes requiring Orthodox college students to live in coed dormitories...

...By now, of course, all forms of Jewish secularism are completely moribund, leaving the various branches of Judaism in a monopoly situation...

...Toward that end, he has provided his children with an ultra-Orthodox yeshiva education from kindergarten through high school...

...Finally, until the 1950s, secular Yiddishkeit was a serious rival to the religious denominations in the attempt to forge an American Jewish identity...

...On one flank, rampant interfaith marriage and declining religious observance leave a plurality of American Jews with that husk of identity that sociologist Herbert Gans has called 'symbolic ethnicity...

...He explains: "For one of the few times in Jewish history, the forces of assimilation and segregation, secularism and fundamentalism, are simultaneously ascending...

...Were Freedman more attentive to the facts of American Jewish history, he would realize that Jewish communal life has become, relatively speaking, a rather placid affair...

...In the end, Wachsberger gets his revenge when he forces a public referendum that denies a building permit for the complex...

...Taken together, do they substantiate his claim about a Jewish "civil war" in the United States...

...As part of his effort to give heft to his dire view, Freedman conflates the Jewish situation in the United States with that in Israel...

...And what is the Jewish compact with America...

...Without doubt, this story is effective in getting the reader's adrenaline going, but it demonstrates next to nothing about the "struggle for the soul of American Jewry...

...Jew, but one may readily surmise...

...Freedman is certainly correct to point to increased polarization on the American Jewish scene, and the role this plays in exacerbating interdenominational tensions...

...It is precisely the clannishness of the Orthodox, who are moving into the area in large numbers, that drives him to distraction...

...What does exist is tension between the various Jewish religious denominations at the institutional level...

...Eschewing systematic analysis, he relies instead on the telling example...

...Los Angeles, California, 1987-1989" traces Rachel Adler's successful attempt to introduce radical feminist language into her congregation's religious services...

...Jew: The Struggle for the Soul of American Jewry features all the elements one has come to expect in his brand of writing—a major theme, a catchy title, strong narration, striking vignettes, etc...

...But when you bring all the baggage with you—two more synagogues, the mikvah, the school, the whole shtick—you're taking over...

...By stressing that for "six thousand years" Jews have exhibited a "nearly sacred devotion to the concept of Klal Yisrael, the community of Jews," the author can turn around and depict present-day American Jewish tensions as "unique...

...In sounding the alarm bells, he maintains that the current level of intracommunal conflict is unprecedented in modern Jewish history...

...There is only one problem with his thesis: It is dead wrong...

...Greer exemplifies the new, muscular Orthodoxy that is a growing component of the American Jewish scene...

...Only if an American Jew chooses to settle in Israel—and there is almost no aliyah from the U.S.—does the situation there take on genuine significance...

...Yet for all of his energy and effort, Freedman managed to grossly misread the situation of American Jewry today...

...American Jews, he would have his readers believe, are engaged at a "furious pitch" in a religious "civil war" that is tearing apart the fabric of Jewish life in the United States...

...in many respects...

...Prior to the creation of the State of Israel, for instance, it was marked by furious ideological strife, with Zionists, Bundists and Communists at one another's throats...

...Freedman shows this to good effect in his "Beachwood" chapter, where Si Wachsberger, a member of a Reform congregation, led the charge against the construction of the Orthodox complex...

...That leaves two chapters that are at least germane to the subject, even if it takes considerable puffing to turn them into "'civil war" material: "Denver, Colorado, 1977-1983" looks at Stanley Wagner's frustrated attempt to create a joint panel of Orthodox, Conservative and Reform rabbis to handle conversions...

...Freedman does not tell us how he came to write Jew vs...

...Reviewed by David Singer Co-editor, "American Jewish Year Book" Samuel Freedman is a gifted journalist with an eye for a story that grabs...

...The Jewish intensification model is best represented in Jew vs...

...Jacksonville, Florida, 1993-1997" focuses on Harry Shapiro's attempt to bomb a synagogue so as to prevent then Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres from speaking...

...Wachsberger is a proud Jew, but he defines his Jewishness in terms of "community service...

...The fact is that twothirds of American Jews have never been to Israel...

...Greer once dreamed of an Orthodoxy that would embrace the larger American culture...

...his sons sport "peyes and tzitzis," and his daughters wear "skirts to mid-calf and sleeves to the wrist...

...now he looks upon that as a nightmare to be avoided at all costs...

...For the former, full integration into the American mainstream is a must...

...political liberalism, and frowning on any expression of clannishness...

...Let us turn now to Freedman's forte: the six individual case studies that constitute virtually his whole book...

...Every prospective solution to the Jewish identity crisis sparks a whole new set of problems...

...By comparison, arguments among American Jews today about the Israel-Arab peace process are small potatoes...

...Greer's priority is to protect his college-age children from the "secular orthodoxy" he sees as infecting mainstream American society and threatening to undermine traditional Jewish morality...

...The potential for intracommunal conflict is greatest when Orthodox Jewsofthistype interact with Jews of lesser Jewish intensity...

...Seen from this perspective, Jew vs...

...Today, in contrast, more than 80 per cent of American Jews are happily settled in the Democratic camp...

...Jew, he describes his experience in joining a group of American Conservative Jews at Jerusalem's Western Wall for a gender mixed prayer service and coming under verbal as well as physical attack by ultraOrthodox Jews...

...In his presentation, though, reference to polarization is linked to a cartoon version of the Jewish past that completely eliminates ideological conflict...

...and "New Haven, Connecticut, 1995-1999" examines Daniel Greer's switch from modern to "black hat" Orthodoxy...

...Fueling this roiling conflict, he contends, are the opposing answers being advanced by Jews of every stripe to three "fundamental" questions: "What is the definition of Jewish identity...

...If Freedman were less intent on pushing his thesis, he might have realized that what his case studies actually speak to is the multiformity of Jewish identity under conditions of American freedom...

...Four of the six chapters prove to be irrelevant: "Camp Kinderwelt, New York, 1963" chronicles the decline of Sharon Levine's world of secular Jewishness...

...His strong suit is the ability to get a handle on a big issue by exploring its individual human dimensions, a talent well on display in such books as Small Victories: The Real World of a Teacher, Her Students, and Their School and The Inheritance: How Three Families and America Moved From Roosevelt to Reagan and Beyond...

...In functional, day to day terms, intracommunal conflict is a completely marginal phenomenon...

...At an earlier point in American Jewish life great debates between Socialists and liberals were also very much in evidence...

...It vividly illustrates the options American Jews are exercising in responding to the present unprecedented openness of American society: While the vast majority of Jews display shrinking Jewishness, a small minority is seeking Jewish intensification...

...He read widely on the subject (as evidenced by his extensive Bibliography), and spoke to a large and diverse group of people about the matter (his interview list carries more than 80 names...

...But the key point, once again, is that developments in Israel along the secularreligious divide have zero direct impact on the shape of Jewish life in the United States...

...As a former New York Times reporter, his attention was no doubt drawn to a string of articles in that newspaper in the 1990s about Jewish conflict over the issues of religious pluralism and "Who is a Jew...

...Wachsberger is blunt about this: "If you want to move in, move in...