Asking for forgiveness from the convert

When Yom Kippur opens, more than millions of Jews will inaugurate the holiest day of the year with the biblical phrase" ve-nislach le-chol adat bnei yisrael, ve-lager hagar btocham," Loosely translated, we beseech God to forgive the sins of the entire congregation of Israel, and the converts who dwell among them.  But this year, as my colleague Aliza Lavie recently wrote, the Orthodox Jewish world might think strongly about begging God for forgiveness for what we have done to the convert among us.
 
In the past year, the momentum has shifted. Though the Torah insists on protecting the convert, on making him or her a full member of the community, and on never reminding a convert of his or her past, institutional orthodoxy has condemned converts to a never-ending set of tests and examinations, to assessments and evaluations, and ultimately to a level of scrutiny unprecedented in Jewish history.

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Rabbi Lamm's fight for tolerance must be recognized

In his recent, and much talked about interview with The Jerusalem Post, Rabbi Norman Lamm was cited as saying that "...we will soon say Kaddish on the Reform and Conservative movements." This comment can obfuscate the greatness of Rabbi Lamm, as it portrays him as adopting the triumphalism that is so characteristic of ultra-orthodoxy. 

My colleague Andy Sacks has already sought to counter Rabbi Lamm's claim stating that Conservative Judaism is alive and well. Though my temptation is to question whether the Kaddish [the prayer for the dead] we will be saying will be a Kaddish Yatom [literally, Orphan's Kaddish], memorializing these movements, a Kaddish Titkabel [Complete Kaddish], beseeching God to accept them or a Kaddish D'Rabanan [Rabbi's Kaddish], which would glorify their scholars and scholarship, I prefer instead to correct the imbalance that may have inadvertently developed by this citation of Rabbi Lamm, and highlight instead how Rabbi Lamm has championed a Jewish life that is not only moderate in ethos, but life affirming in practice.

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Criticizing Israel is hard work

In last week's NY Times, columnist David Brooks noted that Israeli public culture "is one
long cacophony of criticism. The politicians go at each other with a fury we can't even fathom in the US. At news conferences, Israeli journalists ridicule and abuse their national leaders. Subordinates in companies feel free to correct their superiors."

In his essay, he confesses that he finds Israel by turns exhausting, admirable, annoying, impressive and foreign. Finally, he suggests that Israel's argumentative culture nurtures a sense of responsibility.

I have recently come under serious criticism for my outspokenness against abuses in the Israeli rabbinate. I have not hesitated to raise my voice against what I perceive to be the injustices being meted out to converts, or the fact that burial authorities capitalize on the vulnerability of mourners in their darkest hour to impose upon them either financial or religious burdens. I am vocal about the way in which new immigrants (and those seeking to emigrate) are treated by the Ministry of Interior and I do not tolerate the inability of the Orthodox community to open its doors to the non-Orthodox.

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Orthodox Jews should support civil marriage in Israel

After years of working within the rabbinate, I'm convinced that Orthodox Jews should support some form civil marriage in Israel. In fact, Orthodox Jews should probably be at the lead of such an initiative.

In many ways, the adoption of British Mandatory law within Israeli legal culture has denigrated Judaism in the eyes of the general public. In Israel, Jews can only be married with the approval of the religious leader of their religious group, which is identified with the chief rabbinate. Since the majority of Israelis are not Orthodox, the process of marriage can be humiliating and in some cases impossible, as Orthodoxy limits legal unions. Though the majority of Israelis still marry through the rabbinate, more and more couples are choosing not to marry at all, or to marry in civil ceremonies abroad.

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Rethinking 'recognized conversions'

Israel's immigration policy needs some serious rethinking, particularly if critical decisions are left in the hands of clerks.

While the law of return allows Jews - both those born Jewish and those who converted - to immigrate to Israel and receive citizenship automatically, it does not specify the threshold for proving one's Jewishness. While much has been written about this (see for example the NY Times article from last March), there is little question that the State has to rely on recognized Jewish communities abroad for Jewishness certification.  

In recent months, I have encountered a new problem - staggering in its implications. It seems that no one is quite sure how to define the term "recognized Jewish community." I know this sounds like a joke, but it isn't.

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The divorce statistics: What they don't show

This week, the rabbinical courts held their annual press conference which highlighted the growing divorce rate in Israel. Unlike 2007 when 9,765 couples ended their marriages with the issuance of a get [divorce decree] (down from 9,963), in 2008, more than 10,000 gets were given (the actual number is 10,225). In some of the younger cities in Israel like Shoham, divorces increased by more than 100%, while among cities with diverse populations such as Bet Shemesh, divorces were down by more than 22%. All in all, these statistics are worrying. Divorces increase of almost 5% over the past year.

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