Rabbi Pete Stein has written us in response to Cole’s recent post on Conservative proselytization, and asked that we share his remarks with our readers.
[Update] UJ’s former dean of rabbinic studies, Aryeh Cohen, asked that I relate this message to R’ Stein.

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Dear Cole,
I am sorry that you chose to write an entry on your blog without first contacting me to learn more about my outreach efforts in New York. Had you taken the time to write or call me (and, these days, it’s not so hard to find people when you really want to) you would know that your characterization of my outreach effort as “proselytizing” that “talks ‘to’ people” instead of listening to them bares no resemblance to what actually went on this year at the corner of 112th Street and Broadway.
First off, “Torah Minute” was not at all an effort to proselytize. When I approached people on the street, I would say “Hi. Are you Jewish? Do you have a moment for the Torah?” The entire point of starting out this way was to avoid the appearance of proselytizing. Many passersby said “No, I am not” and I would just say “thank you,” wish them a good day and step away. Never for a moment did I give them the impression that I was trying to convert people to Judaism, and nobody that I was aware of thought that I was. On the other hand, there were actually quite a number of non-Jews who stopped who were interested in speaking with me because they had genuine questions about Judaism and about the Torah and I was a resource to whom they could direct their questions. I had some very interesting conversations with devout Christians who were simply curious about our religion. Anybody who stood and watched me for even five minutes or who had taken the time to ask me about my experience would know that the charge of proselytizing is completely unfounded.
The larger issue seems to be the discomfort you and some others feel about this kind of outreach work. I understand that there are people who feel that way and I can respect that. But there are also many, many Jews out there who are in fact very appreciative of this kind of outreach work and who are open to sincere Jews who take the time to reach out and show an interest in their lives.
Let me start by sharing with you what did go on by my little card table on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. When my initial question turned up a Jew, that person, or group of people, would stop and ask me what I was doing. I told them that I was learning a bit of the week’s Torah portion with Jews on the street (thus the name “Torah Minute”) and asked them if they would like to learn. If they said yes (which most did), I handed them a source sheet that had a few verses of the week’s parsha, a Rashi and a few follow up questions. We would read the verses together and discuss them and then read Rashi’s comment and discuss it. The conversation was always two-way, and many of them came up with interpretations or angles I had never thought of. For each parsha, I would try to wrap up the “minute” by learning a moral message relevant to our day out of the verses and Rashi on the page.
Sometimes a Jew would stop briefly, express interest in learning, but lament that he/she did not have the time to learn. For these occasions, I came prepared with an alternate form of my source sheet that presented the texts, Rashi and moral message in a narrative form. I watched many people read this sheet as they walked down the block away from my table.
The response to this effort was overwhelming. While I am generally not one to measure success by numbers, in this case, I do think they say something important about the nerve I touched on. Each time I went out, I stood on my corner for about two and a half hours and, in that time, upwards of twenty people, on average, stopped to learn the parsha with me. On one outing, that number got as high as 30. Another 20-25 would take the narrative version of my sheet to read on the run.
And the people who stopped were not people in kippahs or long skirts. They ranged the entire spectrum from regular shul-goers to people completely disconnected from the Jewish community. They were 20 somethings, college students, middle-aged, young mothers with their kids. They were high school students, college professors, activists. Most were American, some were Israeli, a few were British. Most were white Jews, but one was a black Jew, and several others were Black Hebrews. Some had grown up in yeshivas and gotten away from Jewish practice. Others had never studied Torah before. But no matter their background, the one thing they had in common (besides being Jewish) was that, for some reason, the opportunity to stop and learn Torah for a few minutes appealed to them.
Far from being offended by my presence, most of these people thanked me and many went out of their way to tell me that they thought this was a great idea. A number even told me they were happy to see davka a Conservative rabbi doing this type of outreach. In fact, I can only think of two people who did not have positive reactions. One was a 20-something woman who expressed some discomfort with what I was doing, but who was willing to spend 20 minutes talking about it. The other was an elderly woman who told me that it was rude to ask people their religion and then walked off.
One might ask what I hoped to accomplish by this means of outreach. My objectives were three-fold:
1) I believe that any amount of Torah study, even two minutes on a street corner, is an inherently valuable thing.
2) I was trying to provide a meaningful, accessible Jewish experience with no strings attached for Jews who might not set foot in a synagogue or adult education class on their own initiative.
3) I did all this with the belief that one never knows what small experience will ignite a flame within somebody’s neshama that someday may turn into a desire for greater Jewish learning or practice. For so many of us who did not grow up religious, myself included, we can trace our Jewish involvement back to a simple gesture or seemingly insignificant experience that made something click. It could be that two minutes of Torah on the street will be just that spark. Most likely, I’ll never know. But if that does happen for even one person, it would make the entire effort worthwhile seventyfold. And if not, it was still worth it simply to engage people in those few moments of learning Torah.
The only thing I lament about this effort is that I could not do better follow up. Had I not been a student about to graduate, living in a dorm with modest resources, I would have set up a larger program of classes and Shabbas meals for those people who expressed interest in learning more.
The thing that concerns me most about your post is that it criticizes my efforts without presenting any alternative for how to find and engage those unaffiliated Jews who aren’t setting foot in our shuls. One of the standard complaints about the Conservative Movement has always been that its leaders, specifically the faculty and administration of JTS, exist in an ivory tower, oblivious to the realities of Jews out in the real world. Unfortunately, as ‘grassroots’ and ‘alternative’ as the internet and blogosphere might seem, they run the risk of being just as much of an ivory tower as JTS has ever been. I applaud the existence of forums for discussing and debating the pressing issues of our day, but at some point the discussion needs to leave the chat room and produce results on the street. It’s easy to write scathing posts about my effort. But please tell me what you think would work better. And then go and do it.
In the meantime, I remain more convinced than ever of the need to do this sort of street outreach. My experience at 112th and Broadway showed just how powerful these efforts can be and just how many people are out there waiting for someone to share with them a few words of Torah. If you don’t believe me, just try it. I would invite you to come out with me (assuming you are in NYC), however, I have recently moved to New Haven, where I plan, with God’s help, to start a new outreach effort, very much based on the Chabad model. If you or any of your readers would like to try Torah Minute for yourselves, please contact me and I will help you get set up. It’s not too hard and can be extremely rewarding.
All my best,
Rabbi Pete Stein