by shamirpower · Monday, May 5th, 2008
Jewschool would like to congratulate our colleagues at Jewcy and Zeek on their new partnership:
Zeek, an online journal that has helped shape modern Jewish-American culture, today announced that it is joining forces with Jewcy.com, one of the web’s most innovative and rapidly-growing online communities. Beginning today [May 1], Zeek’s online content will be published at www.jewcy.com/zeek.
Zeek joins Jewcy as the first content partner in Jewcy’s initiative to create a publishing network of editorial sites serving the YoCo psychographic – young, culturally omnivorous Americans looking for meaning and community.
“We are joining strength with strength,” said Jo Ellen Green Kaiser, chief editor of Zeek and formerly the managing editor of Tikkun magazine. “We’re a leader in Jewish intellectual, cultural, artistic, and spiritual life, and Jewcy is the largest and most dynamic Jewish community on the internet.”
“Zeek is the first of many partnerships to come in our effort to assemble an all-star team of the nation’s most original, creative voices,” said Tahl Raz, CEO and founding editor with Joey Kurtzman. Kurtzman added: “Zeek consistently publishes daring, groundbreaking work. This had to happen.”
Zeek will retain its editorial independence and continue to publish its print journal. Its most recent issue, published last month, is a 120-page anthology of Russian-Jewish art, fiction, and poetry.
The venture is the first such merger among the publications and organizations collectively known as the ‘new Jewish culture,’ and represents a joining of two of the leading forces in independent Jewish media. Said Kaiser, “This is a natural evolution of the work all of us have been doing, and we’re thrilled to be joining forces.”
We applaud the proliferation of indy-Jew-media. Mazal tov!
by masthead · Monday, March 31st, 2008
Some stories have been floating around the media with varying levels of accuracy, but Jewschool has obtained the full (or fuller) story from reliable sources. The real story here isn’t about gay and lesbian rabbis in the Conservative movement (that was last year’s story); it’s about the lengths to which people and institutions will go out of fear, demonizing their own students and losing all perspective.
The story begins a year ago this week, when the Jewish Theological Seminary announced that it would begin admitting openly gay and lesbian students to its rabbinical and cantorial schools. (The American Jewish University, formerly the University of Judaism, is now also admitting gay and lesbian students.) One year later, to mark the anniversary, JTS held a program on Wednesday called Hazak Hazak V’nithazek: Celebrating Strength Through Inclusion, a full day of study, conversation, and celebration.
Several JTS students studying this year at Machon Schechter (the Conservative rabbinical school in Jerusalem where American Conservative rabbinical students are required to spend a year) wanted to participate in the celebration going on in New York in some way, and since they couldn’t attend physically, they organized a small parallel event in Israel. According to email invitations sent to the Conservative Yeshiva and other rabbinical students in Jerusalem, the students invited Yonatan Gher, former Director of Communications for the Masorti (Israeli Conservative) movement, incoming director of the Jerusalem Open House, and a member of Masorti congregations his whole life (and recently profiled in the New York Times because he and his partner are having a child via a surrogate mother in India), to speak over lunch about his personal experiences as a member of a GLBT family in the Masorti movement.
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by chillul Who? · Friday, January 18th, 2008
These articles from the New York Jewish Week and the Jewish Daily Forward do a wonderful job telling us what happened. The usual suspects are all there: a faith-based organization, a homosexual scandal, a Facebook protest group.
What it doesn’t properly convey is, how did we get here? So a gay alumnus was barred by his yeshivah high school’s administration from attending his 10-year reunion with his same-sex partner — so what?
The Orthodox don’t like the gays. Isn’t that all we need to know?
Not really.
I’m trying to collect my thoughts about high school, about openness, about sexuality and spirituality and about the history of the Yeshivah of Flatbush, at one time a standard-bearer of Modern Orthodoxy in America. But I keep coming back to the prophet Yeshayah.
In chapter 55, towards the start of the Haftara reading for public fast days, Yeshayah haNavi speaks in God’s name: “ëÌÄé ëÌÇàÂùÑÆø éÅøÅã äÇâÌÆùÑÆí åÀäÇùÌÑÆìÆâ îÄï-äÇùÌÑÈîÇéÄí, åÀùÑÈîÌÈä ìÉà éÈùÑåÌá–ëÌÄé àÄí-äÄøÀåÈä àÆú-äÈàÈøÆõ, åÀäåÉìÄéãÈäÌ åÀäÄöÀîÄéçÈäÌ; åÀðÈúÇï æÆøÇò ìÇæÌÉøÅòÇ, åÀìÆçÆí ìÈàÉëÅì. ëÌÅï éÄäÀéÆä ãÀáÈøÄé àÂùÑÆø éÅöÅà îÄôÌÄé, ìÉà-éÈùÑåÌá àÅìÇé øÅé÷Èí: ëÌÄé àÄí-òÈùÒÈä àÆú-àÂùÑÆø çÈôÇöÀúÌÄé, åÀäÄöÀìÄéçÇ àÂùÑÆø ùÑÀìÇçÀúÌÄéå.” ( Just as the rains and the snows fall from the sky and do not return without saturating the earth that it may sprout and blossom, giving seeds to the sower and bread to the diner: so will these words exiting my mouth not return to me empty, but they will complete their mission and accomplish my will .)
Therein lies the difference between us and God. God, it is traditionally asserted, knows the inner thoughts of every living thing, and sees the future to its farthest conclusion. We rarely know the end results of any of our actions.
Flatbush was a great place for me. I grew up in Brooklyn in a Modern Orthodox family. I was a smart kid with a vivid imagination and a bit of a passive-aggressive streak. I believed in fairness, in the Judaism I was taught, and that God was truly good and was looking out for all of us.
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by BZ · Thursday, January 3rd, 2008
(Crossposted to Mah Rabu.)
This post addresses popular misconceptions concerning classical halachic sources about playing musical instruments on Shabbat. The purpose of this post is not to promote a particular stance about halacha (what should and shouldn’t be done) or meta-halacha (how one should determine what should and shouldn’t be done). I’m not suggesting (chas veshalom) that the only (or the best) way to justify one’s practices is by finding a pre-modern halachic text that supports them; I’m just clarifying what those pre-modern texts do and don’t say. Of course, people may have all sorts of reasons for their practices, including aesthetic preferences, mimetic traditions, logical arguments, and cultural/denominational/communal identities. My goal is not to invalidate those reasons, but to knock them off their “halachic” high horse. The intended result is that when we’re discussing questions about musical instruments on Shabbat — in distinguishing one community from another, or talking about where we will and won’t daven, or determining policies for our pluralistic communities — we’ll have to be explicit about those aesthetic preferences, mimetic traditions, logical arguments, and cultural/denominational/communal identities, rather than simply playing the “I’m halachic and you’re not” get-out-of-jail-free card. (No, I don’t think such a card should exist in the first place, whether it’s the “forbidden” card of Stage 1 or the “uncomfortable” card of Stage 2, but I can’t change the world overnight.) If you find factual inaccuracies in the post, please post corrections in the comments (with appropriate citations), and I’ll update the post. If you have a stance on the issue that differs from mine, then that’s swell — I totally support your right to have different aesthetic preferences, mimetic traditions, logical arguments, or cultural/denominational/communal identities, or to come up with new and innovative halachic interpretations.
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by TheBarkin · Saturday, December 15th, 2007
This week, the lay leadership (and most of the professional leadership) of the Union for Reform Judaism converged on San Diego, CA for the 69th (heh heh) Biennial. Basically, this is the big conference where Reform leaders educate themselves and each other, meet to talk about pressing issues, conduct the business of the Reform movement, and launch new products and initiatives.
Some Biennial news bites:
• Delegates (or, rather, anyone who managed to be at this morning’s Shabbat services) got to take home their own copy of the new siddur, Mishkan T’filah, which is now — after quite a few delays — officially out and available for temples or individuals to purchase. Fully discussing the new siddur would take a separate post, but I think it’s fair to say that most people here are pretty excited about it.
• Michael J. Fox received the Eisendrath Bearer of Light award for his activist work. People seemed to be inspired by his speech. I rode in an elevator with him when he was leaving his hotel to go to the award reception thing. He is, indeed, short.
• URJ Press and the Women of Reform Judaism (the movement’s sisterhood wing) released a new women’s Torah commentary. It is a hefty book and is the product of some serious scholarship. I don’t know who’s going to use it (and for what), but the buzz is that it’s a good thing.
Of course, one of the big highlights was the traditional Shabbat morning sermon from Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the URJ. In these sermons, Yoffie basically picks some big issues that the Union should be focusing on, and then unveils initiatives and programs that the Union is embarking on in order to address them. You can read the whole sermon (which took him an hour to deliver) here, but here are the big points, with some commentary:
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by BZ · Friday, December 14th, 2007
(Crossposted to Mah Rabu)
Last week I posted some initial thoughts on the Spiritual Communities Study survey results, and then ZT posted a second round. Since then, they’ve made some revisions to the report, incorporating suggestions from us and other bloggers, so the squeaky wheel has gotten the grease. As crazy as it sounds, I’m now posting a third round of commentary on the survey.
As Desh has pointed out, these results should silence those who claim that independent minyan participants are motivated by selfishness and narcissism, in contrast with conventional synagogues and their participants who are committed to the broader community. In addition to the data that Desh cites, the results show that independent minyan participants have higher “yes” rates than synagogue members on the questions “I have a strong sense of belonging to the Jewish people” and “I have a special responsibility to take care of Jews in need around the world”. (The report didn’t list the results for the question “I have a Jewish responsibility to care for people in trouble (as with Darfur or Katrina)”, which would also be interesting to see.) Moreover, though there are no comparable numbers for synagogue members, the survey also shows that 95% of independent minyan participants have been invited to a Shabbat meal by someone in their community in the last year, and 86% have invited others. These results come within a few days of another study showing that people are leaving conventional congregations because this sense of community is missing. (Of course, this isn’t true of all synagogues. Kol hakavod to any community of whatever structure whose participants are committed to each other and to the larger world.)
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by LastTrumpet · Wednesday, December 12th, 2007
JTA reports:
Leaders of Reform synagogues don’t always get what their members want, according to a new study by the movement.
The study shows a marked disconnect in several areas between what the leaders think their members are looking for and what the members say they actually want.
In general, the synagogue leaders seem to underestimate their members’ interest in Jewish practice and worship. And they overestimate the synagogue’s importance in the religious lives of their families.
The study is being released at the URJ Biennial, which just began. The article gives a bunch of info about what’s going on at Biennial, and the emphasis on outreach and membership. Some more findings:
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by zt · Thursday, December 6th, 2007
Thanks to BZ for sharing his initial thoughts on the recent “Emergent” community study.
I’ll start by sharing two surprises.
Surprise 1: Lots of the Communities are in Places Other than NY or LA
Only 40% of communities in the study were in NY or CA. According to the 2006 Jewish Year Book about 2.8M of the US’s 6.5M Jews (43%) live in NY or CA. The numbers don’t quite match because the yearbook numbers aren’t by city, but it is clear that the popular myth that independent minyanim only exist in NYC is unfounded.
Surprise 2: They Used the Phrase Had Romance With a Non-Jew.
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by Rooftopper Rav · Wednesday, December 5th, 2007
One year ago today, the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards (CJLS) began its final deliberations on whether or not to ordain openly gay and lesbian rabbis. On December 6 the CJLS approved three teshuvot (rabbinic responsa): the Dorff, Nevins, Reisner teshuvah (which passed by a majority of 13 votes and permitted gay ordination), the Roth teshuvah (which also passed by a majority of 13 votes and prohibited ordination), and the Levy teshuvah (which was passed by 6 votes and was not only anti-ordination in its underlying attitude but was also considered offensive by many for its references– among other things– to the potential of reparative therapy.) Several months later, then JTS Chancellor-elect Arnie Eisen declared that the JTS rabbinical and cantorial schools would now accept openly gay and lesbian rabbis.
In reflecting back on the turmoil of that time, I came across a statement made by Rabbi Joel Roth during discussions on the first day of the CJLS meeting. I had forgotten all about it, but it’s particularly interesting in light of the fact that a pro-ordination teshuvah actually received a majority of votes. Did he truly mean what he said? Was it just a political strategy to get the papers off the table? How would he react now to his words? To wit:
Rabbi Roth began by (in his own words) “begging” the law committee to move the discussion out of the realm of whether or not the papers under consideration were takanot. He claimed that there was a different consideration that was “more important to me.” Numbers of votes, he said, were what mattered. “Takanot or not, what matters is whether the decisions have enough support to validate them in any but the most formalistic of ways… To [change halachah] on the basis of so small a number of votes would do a disservice to the halakhic process, the decisions themselves, the institutions, and the Conservative Movement.” Rabbi Roth acknowledged that change was coming eventually anyway, but said “It won’t help the view of the permissive papers to be validated by so few votes…. Their legitimacy will be impugned by the paucity of the number of those who vote in favor.” Rabbi Roth consequently made several appeals to the authors of the “permissive papers” (”I plead, implore, beseech the authors…”) to withdraw their papers if they believed that– as he strongly suggested they would– they would receive a very small minority of votes.
Of course Rabbi Joel Roth cares deeply about the halachic issues as he sees them and participated in the arguments on technical/halachic grounds as well. But I still find his emphasis and his words (which were written down with general permission at the CJLS meeting) intensely surprising. It also goes without saying that I’m thrilled he was wrong.
by BZ · Monday, December 3rd, 2007
(Crossposted to Mah Rabu)
This will probably be the first of multiple posts about the Preliminary Findings from the 2007 National Spiritual Communities Study (by the S3K Synagogue Studies Institute and Mechon Hadar), since everyone has something to say about it. The JTA and Ha’aretz have already run stories summarizing the results, so I’m going to focus on color commentary here. For the play-by-play, I recommend going to the report itself.
The survey organizers have said that this report is just the beginning, and that more detailed analysis will be released later, including data about individual communities. This is good news, because even though this survey provides valuable information about a demographic that has not been studied quantitatively before, the value of lumping Kol Zimrah and Darkhei Noam together into the same pool is still limited. I eagerly await the fuller results, so that we can read about the diversity among independent minyanim, just as we have now had a chance to see how their populations differ from synagogue populations.
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by rokhl · Wednesday, November 28th, 2007
I’ve had Communists on the brain the last couple of weeks. On November 7, I gave my lecture, Mechanics of the Blacklist, 1946-1954, as part of the Jewish Currents Morris U. Schappes lecture series. Jewish Currents is the magazine for which I am a regular contributor. It started publishing in 1946 as Jewish Life. Back then, Jewish Life was published by the Morgn Freiheit, the Yiddish language Communist newspaper. Morris Schappes was the editor of Jewish Life and its second incarnation, Jewish Currents. Today, Jewish Currents is published by the Workmen’s Circle, an interesting development seeing as the politics of the two organizations have been at odds for a very long time. (Workmen’s Circle or Arbeter Ring has been passionately anti-Communist since they pushed the Communists out of the organization in the 1920s.)
Given that I’ve been writing for Currents for almost three years, I’ve become very interested in the trajectory of Yiddish Communists in this country. Two summers ago I gave a talk on the history of Currents in the context of other Jewish and radical magazines. I learned some pretty interesting things about Jewish radicals, and human nature. But that’s for another post. (Or you can hire me to give my talk about Jewish Currents.)
But I wasn’t interested in the topic of blacklisting until I saw The Front last year. As a movie it’s kind of a failure, but as a topic, it’s fascinating. Woody Allen plays a nebbishy bartender (I know, get out!) who gets drawn into a scheme to act as a ‘front’ for blacklisted writers in the 1959s. Back in those days of ‘McCarthyism’ and Communist persecution, a writer who had been identified as a Communist, or a sympathizer, or a dupe, or a fellow traveler, would find him or herself unemployable at all of the major networks and studios. In ‘The Front’, these blacklisted writers use Woody to sell their scripts and Woody, for putting his name on the work, gets a cut. Hijinks ensue.
The coolest part of the movie is that much of the talent involved with it (it was made in 1976) was in fact blacklisted during that time. Zero Mostel gives a particularly riveting performance as a comic who can’t get work, and in the end, is driven to desperate measures.
It was one of Zero’s scene which caught my attention. Desperate to work again, Hecky Green (Mostel) tries to defend himself against allegations that he is a Communist. He meets with an FBI agent and pleads for help. Pathetically, he explains, on his knees, that the only reason he went to that May Day parade (which is what got him on the blacklist) was his desire to nail one of the chicks who was marching.
Ultimately unable to clear his name, and unable to work, Hecky jumps out a window. His tragic death is based on the death of Philip Loeb, the real life actor (the Goldbergs) who was also persecuted for supposed Communism and, with nowhere to go, ended his life by jumping out a window.
I had heard about the blacklist before, but I never thought to wonder how exactly it was promulgated, or enforced. As portrayed in The Front, it appeared to be something nebulous, a government taking without opportunity for a hearing and without appeal. I started to wonder about the due process implications and the government’s ability to destroy lives based not on concrete charges but on rumor and whisper.
Our government has a long history of persecution of Communists, starting with the Palmer Raids of 1919. I mention these only because it was a large scale, systematic assault on Communists which ended up with thousands of arrests, and served as a proving ground for a young J. Edgar Hoover.
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by LastTrumpet · Wednesday, November 28th, 2007
In non-Annapolis news, the Times this morning reports:
Without a building and budget, Tikkun Leil Shabbat is one of the independent prayer groups, or minyanim, that Jews in their 20s and 30s have organized in the last five years in at least 27 cities around the country. They are challenging traditional Jewish notions of prayer, community and identity.
In places like Atlanta; Brookline, Mass.; Chico, Calif.; and Manhattan the minyanim have shrugged off what many participants see as the passive, rabbi-led worship of their parents’ generation to join services led by their peers, with music sung by all, and where the full Hebrew liturgy and full inclusion of men and women, gay or straight, seem to be equal priorities.
Members of the minyanim are looking for “redemptive, transformative experiences that give rhythm to their days and weeks and give meaning to their lives,” said Joelle Novey, 28, a founder of Tikkun Leil Shabbat, whose name alludes to the Jewish concept of tikkun olam, or repairing the world. It is an experience they are not finding in traditional Jewish institutions, she said.
In my mind, there’s nothing in the article most of us don’t already know, but hopefully publicity on this level will help the broader Jewish institutional world wake up a bit. That being said, while the Havurah movement has had notable impact on institutional Judaism, it is still around, and still countercultural. So who knows what the future will hold.
Full story.
by YehuditBrachah · Sunday, November 18th, 2007
Okay, so this new magazine just came out. It’s called Jewish Living.
Over here at Jewschool we had a little debate about the magazine, because we got a press release about its launch from the publisher. And frankly, the release makes most of us cringe. Noteable quotables from it:
For the first time ever, a smart, stylish and thoroughly modern magazine will celebrate Jewish home, family and cultural life. *Jewish Living* takes the focus off of religion and places it squarely on the cultural. And in doing so, it seeks to acknowledge and enrich the changing lives of modern Jewish women and their families.
Er… wait, modern Jewish women don’t want to get all bogged down in stuff like religion and politics, so let’s give them recipes?
The concept came to Zimerman, a former senior creative advertising executive at Foote Cone Belding, one wintry Toronto afternoon while making what would prove to be a life-changing stop by a newsstand. “There was an abundance of red and green magazine covers touting the joys of Christmas. I thought ‘Where are all the dreidels? Where are the latkes?’” said Zimerman. “It wasn’t the first time I felt like the only boy without a Christmas tree, but it was certainly the first time I decided to do something about it.”
Wait, the magazine is in response to being jealous that there isn’t a bunch of Chanukah crap all over North American consumer outlets to the same degree there is Christmas crap?
Relocating to New York with his family, including wife and *Jewish Living* Creative Director Carol Moskot, Zimerman designed the magazine to offer inspirational style ideas and practical, how-to information on a wide range of topics. *Jewish Living* aims to make each day more meaningful, functional and beautiful for its targeted demographic of affluent and influential readers…. Headquartered in New York City, *Jewish Living* targets a well-educated urban professional woman between the ages of 25-54 with a median household income of over $125,000.
Ohhhhh, it’s about living a beautiful rich mildly Jewish life without being bogged down with religion or politics. I get it. How narrow-minded and ridiculous!
Or at least, that was the general take on the press release.
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by BZ · Tuesday, November 13th, 2007
Dan “Mobius” Sieradski, founder of Jewschool, gave this speech yesterday at the GA.
Yet it is my belief that the next big Jewish idea will not be hatched inside a board room. It will not be the result of a research study. It will not come from within an institution at all. Rather, the next big Jewish idea will be the work of a young, independently minded individual seeking to address the needs of his or her own self or his or her own immediate community.
But the next big Jewish idea will not meet institutional funding guidelines — or at least, that’s what the rejection letters will say. It will be for any number of reasons: The project is too local; too global; too narrow; too ambitious; the subject too political; the creators too eccentric. Perhaps they’re more creatively-minded than business-minded and are thus bad at writing grants. Maybe they’re too young, or too idealistic.
And sometimes the grantmaker themselves are so disconnected from the realities of what the Jewish public needs — like the funders who don’t even have a computer on their desks — that you’re done before you’ve even started. Sometimes funders just don’t get it; or they do get it and they feel threatened by it. They’re afraid to give up too much control. They want safer bets.
Read on.
by masthead · Saturday, October 27th, 2007
A Jewschool exclusive, written by Rabbi Elie Kaunfer
It is clear to any baseball fan, and to anyone with a sense of history, that the Red Sox are the Jews, and the Yankees are Ancient Rome, Assyria, or pick your classic nation-state villain. The Yankees are a world-class dynasty, always pull it out, conquer the world with their braggadocio. And the Red Sox are the band of rebels that always find a way to come close to redemption, but blow it in the end. Think Bar Kochba: sure they attain independence for a few years (win the division title) but when it comes to restoring the monarchy (World Series), not a chance.
Until 2004. That year was “next year.” The first World Series victory since 1918. It was the year I got married, and my brother joked in his toast (in mid-July), that I am a true-believer, and “this is the year” for the Sox. But it turned out to really be the year: Johnny Damon and the Sox crew
pulled off the greatest baseball comeback of all time, down 3-0 against the Yankees, with perhaps the most exciting week of baseball yet.
Yet here we are, still living in an unredeemed world. How can it be? As a kid, religion and baseball were always intertwined. I got Bar Mitzvahed during the 1986 World Series, when the Sox lost to the Mets in stunning fashion. That was the year Peter Gammons wrote a column that began: “How will it feel if the Red Sox ever win?…How in God’s name will it feel?”
It felt great. Incredible, in fact. Celebrating at a “Red Sox bar” in the heart of NYC, all the fans finally coming out of hiding. But what do you do afterward? This is baseball, after all, so shouldn’t everything change when the Sox win? I find myself wondering: Is it better to be crushed by the near-misses or to be lulled by victory?
There are those who are getting used to the Sox winning ways. Time to cast off the tragic New England mindset, and grow into a dynasty. But that ignores the essence of the Sox, their Jewish neshama. As Mike Barnicle once wrote: “Baseball is not a life and death matter, but the Red Sox are.” Are they, though, if they turn into Rome?
So I am watching this World Series with confusion. Of course I am pulling for the Sox, and I am astounded at their comeback against Cleveland. But when the New York Times publishes a column calling the Red Sox the new Yankees, all cannot be right. The cosmos seems out of order. One can only hope that true Messianic redemption will feel different.
Rabbi Elie Kaunfer, a Sox fan living in exlile, is executive director of Mechon Hadar: An Institute for Prayer, Personal Growth and Jewish Study. Mechon Hadar has launched the first full-time independent egalitarian yeshiva in the United States: Yeshivat Hadar To see some highlights of our 2007 summer, click here.
by BZ · Sunday, October 14th, 2007
“The Ministry of Magic is undertaking a survey of so-called “Muggle-borns”, the better to understand how they came to possess magical secrets. Recent research undertaken by the Department of Mysteries reveals that magic can only be passed from person to person when wizards reproduce. Where no proven wizarding ancestry exists, therefore, the so-called Muggle-born is likely to have obtained magical power by theft or force. The Ministry is determined to root out such usurpers of magical power, and to this end has issued an invitation to every so-called Muggle-born to present themselves for interview by the newly appointed Muggle-born Registration Commission.”
–Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
“Your people shall be my people; your God shall be my God.” –Ruth 1:16
Today’s New York Times Magazine reports on the Syrian Jewish community of Brooklyn. Since 1935, the community has had an “Edict”, banning marriage to non-Jews. Sounds like lots of other Jewish communities, right? Wrong. One key provision of the Edict sets a unique standard of Jewishness: “No male or female member of our community has the right to intermarry with non-Jews; this law covers conversion, which we consider to be fictitious and valueless.” While other Jewish streams may disagree explosively about the nature and process of conversion, all agree that such a thing exists. But the Syrian community has adopted a purely racial standard of Jewishness, where one drop of non-Jewish blood is sufficient to invalidate someone. Not only are converts placed outside the community by the Edict; so are their descendants, and if there is any distinction between matrilineal and patrilineal descendants, the Times article doesn’t mention it.
In addition to the strictures imposed by the Edict in instances of proposed intermarriage, any outsider who wants to marry into a Syrian family — even a fellow Jew — is subject to thorough genealogical investigation. That means producing proof, going back at least three generations and attested to by an Orthodox rabbi, of the candidates’ kosher bona fides. This disqualifies the vast majority of American Jews, who have no such proof. “We won’t take them — not even if we go back three or four generations — if someone in their line was married by a Reform or Conservative rabbi, because they don’t perform marriages according to Orthodox law,” Kassin said. Even Orthodox candidates are screened, to make sure there are no gentiles or converts lurking in the family tree.
The Syrian Jewish community feels so strongly about this policy that they even stood up to Ovadia Yosef:
According to the rabbi, the community’s refusal to recognize the woman’s conversion drew the ire of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, at the time the chief Sephardic rabbi of Israel. Rabbi Yosef, a man of volcanic temperament, came all the way from Jerusalem to Brooklyn and informed the local rabbis that he, himself, vouched for the girl’s Jewish authenticity. “There he was, in person, in Shaare Zion” — the largest [Syrian] synagogue — “dressed in his robes and vestments,” the rabbi, who was there, told me. “He gave an oath that he had personally affixed his name to the girl’s conversion document. She was as Jewish as he was, and he wanted her recognized as a member of our community.”
“And the answer was?” I asked the rabbi.
“No.”
“No? You turned down the chief rabbi of Israel?”
“We felt it was necessary,” the rabbi explained. “If we let our kids marry gentiles, they’ll try to slip their kids back into the community via conversion. And then the Edict will lack teeth.”
Full story.
by Kung Fu Jew · Monday, October 8th, 2007
Deliberate faith and faith led unconsciously are not equally valued in Jewish tradition, said best by the parable of the little boy who couldn’t even read the Yom Kippur prayers on an eve of God’s severe judgment over his village. “I do not know which prayers to say, Lord, so here, I give you the whole book!” The boy’s sincere effort annuls Heaven’s decree above the practiced prayers of the town’s learned men. This is the point I make.
These thoughts come from putting up my Sukkah last week. Twice. I walked a couple blocks to “Sukkah Depot” in Crown Heights and surveyed the typical Lubavitch pre-holiday bustle. Sukkah kits of all varieties were selling like hot cakes. But it seemed to me that buying a kit was the easy way out — did Moses have a kit? Surely the wandering Israelites MADE kits but it sure as hell wasn’t PVC piping and water-proof tent fabric. I opted for the wood planks. More »
