Parashat Lech-Lecha, 2017
Rabbi Gerald C. Skolnik
Forest Hills Jewish Center
Coming back to the Torah portions of Bereishit is a gift. It's like reading a great book and then you keep re-reading it, plumbing the same stories and drawing new inspiration from them, new insight. In Parshat Lech Lecha, we're introduced to Abraham and Sarah, each of whom individually and together led lives of saga, of epic adventure, of spiritual highs and human lows, and they're enormously interesting characters. And there’s more.
This morning, however, I want to focus on one small aspect of Lech Lechathat is alluded to in a verse in the opening passages. Here the Torah tells us of God's command to Abram to leave Ur Kasdim and make his way to Eretz Cana’an, to the land that God promised in perpetuity to him, his children, his ancestors.The Torah says that Avram took with him Saraiishto, his wife Sarah, his nephew Lot, all of their assets, their physical property, and Ha’nefesh asher asub’Haran.This is an intriguing phrase. Literally it means the soul that they had made in Haran. The Rabbis interpreted that this refers to all of the people that Abraham and Sarah had broughttachatkanfeihashechina- under the wings of God's presence by bringing them to a belief in one God.
To put it another way, Abraham and Sarah were the founders of the Keiruvmovement. They were the first people who really brought strangers who were outside of their immediate circle into the fold. They succeeded in convincing them that their idolatry that was so systemic in Ur Kasdimwas not reflective of the true order of the world, and that there was a better, more coherent and more compelling belief system based on the one true God. The Midrash comments beautifully in Bereishit Rabbahon Ha’nefesh asher asub’Haran . It addresses the meaning of “the souls that they had made in Haran,”compared to our understanding that God alone creates souls, or creates people. The Midrash says that one who brings a nonbeliever into the fold is considered to have given birth to him or her: you are the creator of that soul. The Rabbis address this aspect of Abraham and Sarah's work in the early chapters of Genesis, in Parshat Lech Lecha. They say that they became the parents of countless Jews by choice, and indeed every person who converts to Judaism takes on the name of Abraham and Sarah; they adopt theirHebrew name and they are Ben or Bat Avraham V’Sarah. They are the spiritual children of Abraham and Sarah.
I wanted to highlight that topic this morning, because our movement is getting a lot of attention lately about the issue of intermarriage in a variety of ways, (including a front page article in The Jewish Week this week). Looking more broadly, it’s not just intermarriage, but also how we relate to interfaith couples, to the relatives of interfaith couples, to the relatives of people who are celebrating simchasin our congregation who have non-Jewish members in their family. I dare say that not all, but the overwhelming majority of us, myself included, have family members who have married out of our faith. In many instances, some have non-Jewish partners who are raising their children Jewish in good faith, though they're reluctant to convert.
This is a significant issue in our movement. The front pagearticle in last week’s Jewish Week highlights a pastoral letter that was authored by my friend and colleague Rabbi Brad Artson who is the Dean of the Rabbinical School at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles. The thrust of this letter affirms our movement's belief in the covenantal nature of marriage within the Jewish tradition. In simpler terms, it means that a Jewish marriage is to be between two Jews. That could be a Jew by choice and a Jew, but a Jew by choice is a Jew, so it's between two Jews. The letter was promoted jointly by all of the major arms of the movement, including AJU, the Jewish Theological Seminary, the Rabbinical Assembly, the Federation of Jewish Men's Clubs… all of the major organizations supported this statement.
The reason why this is affirmed, or why it became an issue altogether, is the current discussion about Rabbis who officiate at intermarriages. A few months ago, The Jewish Week ran a story on thiswhich remains a big issue in my Rabbinical Assembly. There are a few very prominent Rabbis who are not steeped in the same tradition of endogamy, of marrying within the faith, and who really believe that for the sake of Keiruv, of bringing people closer and not alienating families, that Rabbis should be officiating, or co-officiating at these ceremonies of mixed faith.
Attendance at an intermarriage for a member of the Rabbinical Assembly is grounds for expulsion. We're really talking about a very severe prohibition, and there's a lot of discussion, a lot of agitation within the Rabbinic community and the lay community. The Jewish Week article points out that there are increasing numbers of congregations that question this when they interview new Rabbis for a position in the Synagogue, whether or not they'll officiate at an intermarriage as a litmus test for whether they will be hired. The litmus test used to be: "Would you travel on Shabbat to get to a Bar Mitzvah reception at a neighboring hotel?" That's so yesterday. Now the issue is, "Will you officiate at an intermarriage?"
The time had come for the movement to really make a coherent statement, and it came out squarely affirming that Jewish marriage is about two Jews marrying each other. Some months agoI wrote an article in The Jewish Week affirming the importance of in-marriage and affirming the standard of not officiating at an intermarriage. This earned me numerous responses from some of my younger colleagues who differ with me. The statement continued on to say that, while our movement has affirmed this standard, that a Jewish marriage is for two Jews, it is incumbent upon us to stretch ourselves to the outermost limits of what we can do, and we might do, to make those not of our faith feel comfortable in our synagogues.
This is a loaded statement, and it sounds easy to understand. Absolutely, we're welcoming. No one walking into the synagogue is asked, "Are you Jewish, or are you not Jewish?" Thank God. We don't check your faith or denomination. Everyone's welcome to walk into the synagogue. We say to people that we want you to be here. We welcome you. The doors are open. Our spiritual community is open and large, and in the tradition of Abraham and Sarah, we want to be M’kareiv. We want to bring you closer.
The issue has come into finer focus here in our synagogue with regard to the participation of non-Jewish partners or members of the extended family in the ritual life of the congregation, particularly around a Simcha, a Bar Mitzvah, anaufruf,a baby naming, or any of the events that bring non-Jewish members of the immediate family, or the extended family, or patrilineal Jews into the synagogue, looking to participate. Basically, what we who are charged with spiritual leadership have learned is that the standards that we have in the synagogue are a barrier to people feeling welcomed.
Now, there are some standards that cannot be compromised:an aliyah to the Torah, literally being called to the Torah, and taking your tallit and kissing the Torah and making a blessing that says, "Praised Are You, oh Lord our God, Sovereign of the universe who has sanctified us with His commandments." A non-Jew can't make that B’racha. It's a non-starter for us. Some time ago, in recognition of this issue, our ritual committee modified our standards ever so slightly and allowed for non-Jewish members of the family, or the extended family, to recite the prayer for our country, or the prayer for America's military personnel, and at the time, that was viewed as a vehicle for allowing them to feel welcomed, empowered, a part of the community, etc.
But for today’s interfaith families, that is not enough. The situation in our synagogue today is more reflective of the general population than we ever allowed ourselves to believe. If you read the literature about intermarriage in America, you'll know that somewhere hovering around 50% of American Jews marry out of the faith. Here in Forest Hills and in New York in general, it's not quite 50%, but let's say it's 30%.
In ever-increasing measures, mixed families or interfaith families are evermore a percentage of our religious school, of our nursery school and of our synagogue membership. They are us, and we are them. They are a part of our community. Our practice for a Bar Mitzvah or a Bat Mitzvah is that when the Torah is returned to the Ark, the parents stand with the child, and when one parent is not Jewish, the non-Jew is left in the pews. They can't go up to the Ark. The Jew goes up and the non-Jew is left in the pews, and it sends a message of unwelcoming. Both the Hazzanand Lynn Lancaster, our education director, will attest that when we meet with parents and we discuss with them the morning of their Bar or Bat Mitzvah, and we talk to them about the standards of the synagogue, they are up in arms because they believe that this is not true to the message of inclusion.
“If you really want us to feel welcome, then you have to give us an opportunity to participate in some way.”
This grates most on the parents of the Bar or Bat Mitzvah, when one is not Jewish.
I must emphasize that this is not a Halachic issue. There's no legal issue, according to Jewish law, where the person not of the Jewish faith is prohibited from being on the Bimah, or being near the Ark with the Ark open and the Torah on full display. It's an issue of how the congregation understands the parameters of its religious life, the message it wants to send, and how we understand community and what we're trying to accomplish.
The ultimate message of the pastoral letter is a hard line on officiating at intermarriage. It left a lot of people in my Rabbinical Assembly very upset. I have no problem with that, you can be upset all you want, I think they made the right decision. I always thought so and I still think so, despite the statistics. You have to stand for something, and religion without norms is not religion. That's a critique of our movement that we've suffered from. If you make one change, you're going to make another change, and you're going to make another change, and then you're left with nothing. You need to have rules. Any time you have a standard, there's going to be someone who's left on the other side of the standard and that is, by definition, exclusionary. It's unpleasant.
The pastoral letter also, however, affirms very clearly the responsibility of congregations such as ours, to do the best that we can do and the most that we can do to ensure that those members of our families celebrating a Simcha are welcomed and are sent the message that they have a place here.
I am proposing to the Ritual Committee that we amend our standard and allow non-Jewish family members, or patrilineal Jews, to stand by the Ark on the morning of their Simcha. I promise you that it's not a Halachic issue. As you know, even in our movement, sometimes it is a Halachic issue, and we struggle with whether to change it or to modify it. But this is not an Halachic issue.
We don't check anyone's tzitziswhen they walk in. We don't ask their faith, and we cannot afford to be alienating families who are doing what they should be doing. We have had instances in the pastwhere we’ve been less than welcoming. This includes a time when a Bat-Mitzvah family had a Jewish mother, a non-Jewish father and a young girl who used to wear sweatpants from Our Lady Queen of Martyrs to religious school. When itcame to the morning of the Bat Mitzvah, the father was not allowed on the Bimah. This caused tremendous pain to the family, because the reality behind the Bat-Mitzvah was contrary to the norm. The Jewish mother didn't really care about the child's Jewish education, and it was the non-Jewish father who made sure that the child was brought to religious school every week. He was the one who was, in essence, the guarantor of that child's Jewish identity, and then it came to that morning of their Simcha where we're saying, "Not you, not you. You cannot come up here." We can't afford to be doing this.
We're not violating any sacred norm by making a change such as this. We're modifying a standard for the sake of Abraham and Sarah's legacy. Their tent was open wide, that's why we have a Chuppah at a Jewish wedding. It's open on all sides because they brought people in, just like we want a married couple to do. If we want to be faithful to the charge of bringing people in and stand firm against enormous odds, we have to have a realistic chance to make them feel comfortable here. Maybe they’ll even make a decision to become Jews by choice, or at the very least to make a decision to be supportive of raising a child within the Jewish faith. We have tostretch beyond our comfort level and make ourselves truly welcoming. We fail to do that at our own peril. To my mind, there's no good excuse not to do it.
Lech Lecha on Interfaith Participation / Page 1 of 5