This is my piece published in this week's thejc.com - but unfortunately not yet in the online edition.
I’m about to head out to Limmud conference, where literally
thousands of Jews of every conceivable stripe spent five days learning,
debating, celebrating and socialising together.
Coming hot on the heels of that other winter highlight, Hanukah, Limmud
set out a particularly fashionable message about contemporary Jewish
existence.
The Hanukah story is a narrative of cultural tension and
ultimately civil war within the Jewish people.
Sectarianism threatened their existence whereas unity brought salvation. So too, the Limmud version of Judaism
preaches the values of coexistence, mutual respect and learning from each other
as vital for the Jewish future. In
recent weeks, this message has had a galvanising effect: those Orthodox rabbis
who called for a boycott of Limmud have been roundly criticised by most
mainstream communal leaders.
This welcome support for better relationships among
different kinds of Jews, however, reflects a more radical, controversial view:
the idea that denominationalism is necessarily destructive. In the face of exciting new cross-communal
initiatives, traditional institutions such as Masorti, Reform, Liberal and the
United Synagogue often seem to be on the back foot - if not actively softening
at the edges. Perhaps this explains the
development of multi-denominational community centres in Oxford and Hatch End,
the emergence of alternative, ‘partnership’ minyanim within Orthodoxy, or the fact
that for the very first time, the Chief Rabbi felt the need to attend Limmud.
In the United States, denominational Judaism also seems to
be in retreat. The recent Pew Research Center’s survey, ‘A Portrait of Jewish Americans,’ shows that whereas 75% of
Jews aged 50+ affiliate with particular denominations (Reform, Conservative,
Orthodox or ‘other’), in the 18-29 age bracket that number shrinks to 59%, with
the remaining 41% identifying as Jews of no denomination.
While there is much to celebrate here - Jews getting along
better with other Jews is certainly no bad thing - the post-denominational
trend has a more troubling side. The Pew
figures show that as American Jews assimilate, they tend to switch allegiance
from the traditional to the progressive strands of Judaism, from there to
non-denominational affiliation, and finally to identifying as ‘Jews of no
religion.’ This is not to say that you
can’t be a committed Reform or post-denominational Jew – plenty of those
certainly exist. But the emergence of
non-denominationalism seems primarily to reflect a process of disengagement
from Judaism.
But does assimilation leads to the loss of denominational
identity, or is the relationship the other way around? In a recent article, Daniel Gordis (a
Conservative rabbi who has moved towards modern-Orthodoxy) blames the synagogue
movements – and Conservative Judaism in particular – for failing to stem the
tide of assimilation through their inability to articulate a compelling message
for modern Jews. Gordis believes that
too much compromise and the abandonment of principles has driven people
away. Yet we’re all too aware that very
few contemporary Jews want to engage with a Judaism they see as dogmatic or
intolerant.
So what are our options?
Here and there in the Jewish world there are exceptions to the
sectarian/assimilation polarity. Chabad
Hasidim, for example, are well known for combining passion and commitment with
genuine love and openness. But while
Chabad’s outreach strategy reflects tolerance of all Jews, it does not imply a
fundamentally accepting attitude towards different expressions of Judaism.
My own movement, Conservative/Masorti Judaism, provides a
different twist to this model. A
slightly cynical Masorti rabbi friend from Israel recently commented to me that
our problem is that we invest all our energy in the future of the Jewish
people, while neglecting our own movement. It’s true that in the States, at a time when
official Conservative Judaism is undergoing a period of organisational decline,
hundreds of independent minyanim, educational projects and social change
initiatives are being led by people who’ve grown up in Conservative synagogues
and summer camps and who are now expressing their values in the wider Jewish
world.
In this country too, Masorti Jews are disproportionately
represented in the leadership of cross-communal Jewish institutions of all
kinds. On a personal level, I’ve recently been part of the initiative to
set up a new Jewish school – Alma Primary in Finchley. Although many of
the initial founders were members of New North London Synagogue, we took the decision
to make Alma a cross-communal school, not a Masorti one.
And, unlike Chabad, this commitment to diversity goes all
the way down into Masorti theology. Our
rabbis are committed to the idea that halacha, Jewish law, is inherently pluralistic.
Masorti synagogues are well known for
combining a clear, recognisable ethos with a remarkable tolerance for
difference – often within the same community.
My own shul, New North London, has both traditional (separate seating,
male-led service) and fully egalitarian minyanim, with very little tension between
them. And all this takes place in a
synagogue community where people meet week in week out for prayer, Jewish
learning and the building of meaningful relationships. Are there any post-denominational frameworks
in the country that can offer the same?
It turns out that there is a third option beyond intolerant
sectarianism and the abandonment of specific ideological commitments. The kind of ‘soft’ denominationalism represented
by Masorti and other like-minded communities might be our best way forward. Certainly without it, the post-denominational
institutions we’re so proud of will have very little to sustain them.
