Jewish Matrilineal Descent Challenged in British Court

A recent article appeared the the New York Times entitled, "Who is a Jew" (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/08/world/europe/08britain.html?_r=1&em). It dealt with a decision by a British appellate court that a Jewish School (state-supported as are all religious schools in Britain) cannot refuse to accept a student because it doesn't consider him a Jew since his mother was converted to Judaism in other than the Orthodox tradition. In fact, the court went further by saying that admissions criteria must depend not on family ties, but “on faith, however defined.” It proposes that belief and practice define religion rather than heritage. The British Supreme Court will take up the issue soon and make a final decision.

As I have mentioned before, the Orthodox tenet of defining Jewish identity as transmitted by the mother alone was not always part of Jewish law and is a major factor in keeping Jewish numbers low, as well as creating a division between Jews of the Orthodox/Conservative persuasions who follow the rule and the Reformed/Reconstructionist persuasions who don't. Despite claims to the contrary, the rule is not a 5,000 year-old tradition. It was instituted in about 70 AD at around the time of the destruction of the Second Temple and may have been intended to identify the children of raped Jewish women as Jews.

Why does Judaism seem to be the only religion in which belief and practice of the religion is not considered enough for membership? What do bloodlines have to do with religion? Was Hitler correct in thinking that Jews are a race more than a religion? The sooner we get away from that notion, the better. Fortunately, Judaism's genetic distinctiveness is diminishing due to intermarriage, adoption of children from non-Jewish backgrounds, and immigration to Israel of Jews from Africa and West Asia. Just as with other religions, Judaism would do well to reach the point where one cannot recognize a Jew by the shape of his nose or the combination of his skin/hair/eye color. The antiquated, arbitrary, divisive rule of matrilineal descent that weakens Judaism should find its way to the trash can. Let religion be defined by belief and practice! And let ethnic identity be up to the individual.

Birthright Israel Helps Keep Jews in the Fold

The Jewish Advocate newspaper of October 30, 2009 reported that a study of the Birthright Israel program verifies the program's effectiveness in keeping young Jews in the fold. Supported by charitable foundations, the program sends Jews up to age 25 on free trips to Israel. The Brandeis University study compared Jewish-related outcomes between a group of people who had been on the trip and a group who had applied for the trip but were not able to go for whatever reason. All study subjects were non-Orthodox Jews. Seventy-two percent of those who had been on the program later married Jews compared to 46% if the non-participants. In summary, compared to non-participants, those who went through the program were 57% more likely to marry Jews, 30% more likely to feel that raising children as Jews is very important, 23% more likely to feel very connected to Israel, and 28% more likely to attend religious services monthly or more. For the Jewish member of intermarried couples, program participants were 93% more likely to say that raising children as Jews was very important. The spouses of intermarried participants were 4 times as likely to have converted to Judaism. At its peak, the program sent 45,000 young people on the program annually. But the sagging economy and Madoff swindle of Jewish philanthropists has reduced that number to 25,000.

Atonement?

Although I have only attended High Holiday events sporadically for several years, I felt like attending some this year. I went to a Rosh Hashannah service that did not require temple membership. Everyone met at a wooded site and hiked up a hill to a cabin facing a beautiful pond. The service was conducted outdoors, in front of the cabin, facing the pond. It was a pleasant experience and I enjoyed hearing and singing some of the songs I used to sing when I attended temple during my childhood. I also attended Kol Nidrei service conducted by a Jewish workshop. I enjoyed hearing the traditional song that begins the Yom Kippur holiday. However, I could not get into the prayers and did not stay much after Kol Nidrei was sung.
I have difficulty understanding the concept of atoning in one day for sins you committed during a whole year. First of all, I think it is difficult or impossible to really atone for sins against people. I know that the prayer book distinguished between sins against God and sins against people. If the sins against God involve breaking religious rules such as keeping the sabbath, putting on tfillin, or keeping kosher, then I can understand atonement. However, how can you really make up for sins against people like beating your wife or child, breaking trust, or committing crimes? It seems to me that you should not be doing such things in the first place and, if you do them, you should not be let off the hook so easily. This is the same feeling I have about Catholic confession. Once the damage is done, it is almost impossible to reverse. I think it would be better if people knew that they could never be absolved of their sins and that, in the final accounting, all the good and bad they did over the course of their lives would be weighed. As an agnostic, I do not particularly believe in the concept of a heavenly being judging whether we should go to heaven, hell, or purgatory. However, I think that for those who do believe, their behavior would be better influenced if they felt they could not get off for their sins.

Increase in "Cultural" Rather than Religious Jews

The August 14, 2009 edition of The Jewish Advocate, a venerable Boston-area Jewish weekly newspaper, reported that the proportion of "cultural Jews" has doubled over the past two decades to 37% of the U.S. Jewish population. "Cultural Jews" are defined as those answering the question "What is your religion, if any?" with, "no religion, atheist, agnostic, secular, or humanist", while qualifying themselves as Jews because their parents were Jewish or they had a Jewish upbringing. This sounds pretty close to what I define as "Ethnic Jews", except that some of these people may feel reluctantly Jewish, while I consider Ethnic Jews to at least somewhat enjoy the cultural aspects of Judaism. The rise in this group is attributed in the article to intermarriage and disaffection with Judaism. However, the latter must be the primary cause because people for whom religion plays a prominent role would not intermarry.

The Advocate article also reported that 500,000 out of the 3.6 million adults with a Jewish mother followed another religion, generally Christianity. The article paralleled the increase of secular Jews to the general increase in non-religious U.S. adults, which has climbed from 8% to 15% over the last 2 decades. However, the numbers show that, while secularism has risen by a similar percentage among both Jews and Christians, the proportion of the Jewish population that is secular is more than double that of the Christian population.

There seems to be two strong forces in the Jewish community that conflict with each other. One is the religious force, encouraging Jews to join synagogues and temples and to engage in Jewish prayers, rituals, and rules of behavior. The other is a tendency toward the worldly rather than the spiritual and mystical, towards the scientific rather than the dogmatic, towards open-mindedness rather than provincialism, and to reason and logic rather than blind obedience to rules. The latter cultural inclinations have no doubt greatly influenced Jewish contributions to science, medicine, academia, the creative arts, and the media. As an ethnic Jew, I admire these aspects of the culture. On the other hand, I feel some disappointment that a lack of emphasis on the spiritual and mystical in mainstream Judaism has left so many Jews indifferent about religious services. Christian religious services place an unabashed emphasis on God and spirituality, while mainstream Jewish temples emphasize humanistic values more than interaction with God.

Taglit Birthright Israel program

My son just got back from a trip to Israel sponsored by the Taglit Birthright Israel program. Even in this time of diminished charitable contributions, the Birthright program attracts philanthropic funds because of its effectiveness in enhancing Jewish identity and support for Israel. In my son's case, I would say that the trip indeed accomplished the program's goals. He got to see religious and cultural sites like Yad Vashem, the Old City of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Tsvat, Kibbutzim, and Masada, as well as other places of interest including the Golan Heights, Sea of Gallilee, and the Dead Sea. A few Israeli contemporaries traveled with the group, giving the opportunity for friendships to develop. I think my son came away with a greater sense of being part of the Jewish People, a knowledge of Israelis as people, friends, and brothers, and a view of Israel in the context of history and present day world politics and power struggles. So, I salute the Taglit Birthright Israel program and thank those contributing funds to keep the program vibrant and available to most of those who want to participate.

More Evidence of Self-defeating Attitude Among Religious Jews

An article in The Jewish Advocate newspaper of July 3, 2009 states that Jewish religious schools prefer to exclude students who don't have a Jewish mother, while some allow such students as long as they convert ASAP. What hogwash! One can readily see why Jews are so low in number in the U.S. and represent a rapidly shrinking proportion of the country's population. What is the purpose of this exclusionary attitude? Don't the schools' leaders recognize that any student and his/her family willing to bear the burden of tuition as well as the extra daily school hours needed for Jewish studies is quite motivated to be Jewish. Isn't that enough? The religionists seem to feel that someone is a Jew if his mother was Jewish, even if he knows absolutely nothing about Jewish teachings. But they feel that someone with only a Jewish father is not Jewish even if he/she bears the burden of daily Jewish study. This attitude is maddening!! Judaism would be much stronger and more dynamic if Jewish schools and congregations welcomed those who want to be Jews rather than setting up roadblocks for them.

Rabbinical Schools Bar Students in Taboo Relationships

I just read in the Jewish Advocate weekly newspaper that entry to rabbinical school in all branches of Judaism is barred to people who are married or in a committed relationship to non-Jews. This is despite the fact that intermarried families are now welcome to join, as lay members, all Jewish congregations but the Orthodox. It is also despite the fact that the Reformed and Reconstructionist branches recognize children with Jewish fathers but non-Jewish mothers as Jews, going against centuries of tradition. The reason given for barring entry to rabbinical school, even in the latter two branches of Judaism, to those in hetero-religious relationships is "the importance of family modelling."
It seems to me that Judaism is on a self-destructive path. A recent survey of Americans has determined that a very large percentage have changed religions, although many of the switchers have jumped from one Protestant denomination to another. Catholicism has lost many non-Hispanic whites to Protestantism, but Latin-American immigrants have filled the deficit. Given the large degree of religious fluidity in the U.S., a religion that only worries about people leaving but does nothing to welcome newcomers, or even deters potential converts, will inevitably shrink in numbers. It's like trying to plug a large leak in a swimming pool with chewing gum while closing the intake valve to allow no more that a drip to come in. If Judaism is to survive and thrive, this attitude has to change. Conversion to Judaism should be based on sincerity of motivation and belief and little else.
The basis for matrilineal descent and difficulty of conversion appears to lie in the notion that the Jewish People are a race rather than a religion. This is basically hogwash because a large percentage of Jews cannot be physically distinguished from non-Jews. Too much interbreeding within a group leads to genetic problems as evidence by Tay-Sachs disease that befalls only those of Jewish descent. I say, let Judaism welcome all who have a sincere interest in joining the religion. Let Judaism be a true religion, not a race, and do not try to fight the religious fluidity that characterizes a free society. Yes, Judaism will lose some adherents, but will also gain some. And by being more welcoming, it is likely that Judaism will expand in numbers and regain its vitality.