Guest Blog: Intermarriage - straight talk or just more of the same?

With a challenging title like "Time for Straight-Talk about Assimilation," I expected some real ground-breaking stuff from this article. Instead, it ended up being just more of the same; another sad "How 'Ya Gonna Keep 'Em Down on the Farm?" lament about the disappearance of American Jewry in the face of assimilation and intermarriage.

Albert Einstein is purported to have said, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Another definition might be: asking the same question over and over again and expecting a different answer. Let's see if we can ask some different questions and perhaps come up with some slightly different answers.

Are assimilation and intermarriage the fundamental issues confronting the Jewish people today?

No. Both are simply facts of life in an open society. And if you perceive open societies to be a threat, then the solution is provided by the Ghettos and Shtetls of the Haredim and Hassidim, who by all accounts have a very low dropout rate.

The reason why both assimilation and intermarriage (they are related but not identical) have come to be seen as threats is that mainstream Judaism fails to provide basic, relevant, satisfying and timely answers to the question "why be (or remain) Jewish?" It then largely fails to provide paths for those who choose or have a non-Jewish partner - but who wish to remain within the Jewish fold - to integrate him/her and their offspring into the Jewish community.

Should Judaism even have anything to say regarding your choice of a partner of spouse?

Probably not. Some will search for a life partner based on certain characteristics, one of which may be his/her Jewishness. Often life intervenes, though, and people end up falling in love with someone who is "not." Does that need to be the end of their involvement with Judaism, even if the partner chooses not to convert? Our patriarchs and matriarchs were the original inter-married households. Surely modern Judaism in all its forms can be no less successful in finding ways to sanctify those relationships and integrate those families and households seamlessly into Jewish life?

There is a “common sense” or common understanding that almost everyone subscribes to: that anyone “marrying out” is lost to the Jewish people. Until that common sense is replaced by another, more positive one, we’ll be fighting a losing battle.

For close to 2,000 years, the coercive power of the Kehilla, a culture of endogamy and (probably) lack of opportunity have kept this trend within manageable proportions. Judaism could afford to sit Shiva for those few who defied convention.

All these factors have now disappeared (or at least diminished in impact), however. Instead of bemoaning the new realities, we need to come to terms with them and deal with them in a constructive manner.

If Judaism insists on standing in the path of attraction, love or companionship, it should expect to be trampled in the stampede.

Should we be surprised that many of the offspring of intermarried families don’t identify as Jewish?

Not at all. In fact, considering the shocking reception that they and their parents receive from most of organised Jewish life, it's nothing less than a miracle that ANY of them choose a Jewish path. Likewise the non-Jewish parent, or anyone contemplating conversion to Judaism for any reason. I know there are many very praiseworthy exceptions to the rule, but generally speaking the Jewish community shows an indifferent, or even outright hostile face to those not born into it. Orthodoxy at least has the excuse that this is subject to Halacha. We have no such excuse; this is sociological.

Don't believe me? Carry out a mystery shopper test, either in real life or simply in your imagination: send a sample (preferably thick-skinned) intermarried family out to a random synagogue and to a random church. See which of the two gives your fragile little (potential) Jewish family the warmest, no-questions-asked welcome and acceptance. You already know the answer, don't you? Based on that welcome, the Jewish partner would need some very powerful motivation for going with the synagogue option anyway. Until the pendulum has swung completely the other way, we have little chance of winning the assimilation contest.

So, why be Jewish?

Not everyone needs a coherent, consistent answer to this question. We all know people - sometimes even quite observant people - who don't think about this question and answer; they simply are.

Others find their answer in the Holocaust, in Zionism and Israel, in secular Jewish culture, even in Jewish cuisine. Many others are still secure in the old ethnic Jewish paradigm. Our shrinking numbers, though, and shrinking affiliation tell us that that ethnic or social Jewishness is no longer enough or is no longer relevant for many.

We can argue about whether the Jewish people is a tribe, a collection of tribes, a nation, an ethnic group, a religio-nation or even a race. The fact is, though, that the entrance ticket to the Jewish people (albeit not necessarily the definition) is a religious one, i.e. Judaism. (Once you're in, it's a different matter.)

Is Judaism (the religion) the answer? If so what kind of Judaism can stem the tide?

We already know that ultra-Orthodoxy mostly "works," at least insofar as holding onto its progeny is concerned. Most of us, though (me included) are simply not prepared to pay that price for the sake of continuity. (And it’s not just that I see open, democratic societies as attractive. I also see them as the best environment for the growth of Judaism; in many ways even an expression of the best within Judaism.)

On the other hand, the theology of the non-Orthodox streams of Judaism largely "works," allowing one to reconcile Judaism with science, reason and conscience; to reconcile what we believe with what we know. Why then are they the worst affected by assimilation?

My belief is that most of us are not absorbing an Adult Judaism by the time we need it to sustain us. We start off with an age-appropriate version of Judaism filled with miracles and God's intervention in history. Our Jewish upbringing is usually stalled at Bar/Bat-Mitzvah age, though, before our Childhood Judaism can be replaced by a more mature, robust version.

In many cases, our Judaism of wide-eyed wonder is simply no match for the questions, doubts, challenges, education, philosophy and people we will encounter long before adulthood. For that, we need an Adult Judaism.

Adult Judaism

This is not another Jewish denomination (although I’m very much in favour of a multitude of denominations within Judaism (unity does not mean or need uniformity), but rather an irreducible minimum in terms of both Jewish belief and understanding. I see it consisting of the following components.

• That we came into being as a people with a set of laws through an epic encounter with the Divine (however we care to understand that).
• That our acceptance of those laws obligates us to act in a certain way towards the rest of Creation (this is encapsulated in the story of the person who approached Hillel, saying “Convert me on the condition that you teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot.” Hillel converted him, saying: “That which is despicable to you, do not do to your fellow, this is the whole Torah, and the rest is commentary, now go and learn it.")
• That this in turn results in a whole body of customs, rituals and practices, which differ somewhat from place to place and era to era. These rituals are not Judaism, although they often manifest some aspect of it.
• That the ethical requirements cannot be taught academically, but must be embodied practically in families and societies. This is ultimately the reason for Jewish peoplehood, and the reason why Judaism puts so much emphasis on doing.
• That the laws inherited from our encounter with the divine are now ours to modify, keep or discard, with all due care. (There is an obligation to abolish those that have become abhorrent to our developing sense of understanding.)

We need an exposure to that Adult Judaism at a much earlier stage; before we've begun to question the parting of the Red Sea. We need to make it clear that Judaism is not contingent on miracles. We need to teach basic theology, i.e. what it is we should believe, not just some Aleph-Bet, some history and traditions and our Torah portion.

This is very much a first pass at defining the bullet points for an Adult Judaism, one that can carry us through the personal, intellectual and moral challenges we inevitably encounter on the path to adulthood and throughout our lives. If we want to stem the tide of assimilation, we need to define and educate for an Adult Judaism that looks at least something like this.

For those well-versed in Jewish learning and texts, this may look like primary school stuff. For those whose Jewish education ended at 12 or 13 (or even before it began) this may well be a revelation. It may also make the difference between staying or going, being anchored or drifting.

Only an Adult Judaism - in both definition and education - will allow us to juggle belief and reason without the danger of dropping or compromising either. Only an Adult Judaism will sustain us spiritually and allow us to assimilate the best of what the world has to offer, without forgetting who we are.

We need to understand clearly that it's beyond the power of organised Judaism to stop intermarriage to any meaningful extent. Instead, what it needs to focus on is a Jewish upbringing that gives answers to the question why be/remain Jewish. It also needs to put emphasis on allowing people to remain firmly within the Jewish fold, irrespective of their choice of life partner.

Outreach

The second part of my two-part answer to the challenges of assimilation and intermarriage is Outreach, which we should really be thinking of as Acceptance. This Acceptance needs to encompass not just the "usual suspects" (the intermarried), but all those who tend to drift or be edged towards the fringes of Jewish society.

We need to reframe the issue. Rather than saying "Intermarriage is the greatest threat to Jewish survival, etc.," ad nauseum, we should be saying "integrating the intermarried into our communities is our greatest challenge, and our greatest need."

Instead of just paying lip service to Outreach (or questioning whether there should be funding for Outreach at all), we need to dedicate a substantial portion of our budgets to it. It needs to be almost taken for granted as one of the major line items on the communal Jewish budget.

The kinds of attitudes and programs that should be included in a meaningful Outreach campaign have been addressed by organisations such as The Jewish Outreach Institute (JOI) and its Big Tent Judaism initiative, as well as InterfaithFamily.com, so I won't attempt to duplicate that work here, just note that it needs to front and centre in our thinking, actions and budgets.

One final point: As noted by one of the better commenters on the article that inspired this post (Dottie Goldman), we also need to look at the cost of Jewish living. In our post-global economic crisis economy, we need to find ways to smooth out the cost of the big-ticket items, e.g. education and synagogue membership.

To sum up:

Intermarriage then is not a problem (or not THE problem). It is more an indicator of a far larger problem; the failure to address some fundamental questions:

• Why should it be important to remain Jewish?
• Why should it be important to marry within the faith?
• Why is doing otherwise considered damaging to the Jewish people?
• What are the options if you love and want to marry someone who's not Jewish, but want to remain connected to Judaism, and want your offspring to be Jewish?

There are two parts to the answer:

• An Adult Judaism.
• A complete, unambiguous welcome (acceptance) for those in inter-faith relationships, with suitable budgeting and programs to go along with it. Both attitudes and priorities need to be addressed.

You've heard my straight talk, now let's hear yours.