Liberal Judaism is stuck between two foundational intellectual problems: inauthenticity and irrelevancy. They usually manifest themselves in an attack from the right and an attack from the left. I do not think the problems are intractable. But rather than arguing in generalities, I will take a ritual that is easily subject to both of these attacks---counting the omer--- and see if we can not only defend against the attacks but show how counting the omer can be meaningful and important, regardless of its historical origins.
Here's the basic problem. Liberal Judaism generally accepts the conclusion of modern Bible scholarship that the Torah was written well after Moses and by multiple authors. In doing so, it rejects the traditional historical claim that the Torah was literally written by God. It adopts a more flexible approach to halacha and rituals, and in doing so runs into two quite serious foundational problems.
The religious right argues this type of Judaism must be inauthentic. If liberal Jews do not believe in the literal historical truth of the foundational story of Judaism---God gave the Torah to the Jews on Mt. Sinai---then nothing solid remains of Judaism. Under that view, the Torah is just a bunch of stories and laws written by ordinary people a long time ago. There is no compelling reason to do any of it. Sure, it might contain some wisdom or good ideas here and there, but Jews cannot take it too seriously if they do not believe that God told us to do these things.
The non-religious left makes the opposite argument. Jews should do certainly do the parts of Judaism that are "good" ideas, like don't steal, be nice, and give charity. But one should do them because they are good ideas, not because Judaism says to do them. And there is no reason to do the "bad" ideas, or the "neutral" ideas, or most rituals. That knocks out things like keeping kosher, fasting on Yom Kippur, and putting on tefillin. And once a Jew does the good practices because they are good, and avoids doing the other practices because there is no reason to do so, there is nothing left of Judaism. Thus, the non-religious left argues that Judaism is irrelevant.
This is the scylla and charybdis of liberal Judaism: inauthenticity and irrelevancy. And these two manifests themselves in much of liberal Judaism. I attend a Conservative synagogue, and I certainly see both of them. Many Jews my age (mid 40s) simply opt out of many traditional Jewish practices. They do not keep kosher, attend synagogue, celebrate many holidays, daven, wear tefillin, etc. The attitude of many of my friends is simply that it seems irrelevant, sort of silly, and a little strange to do these things. After all, God did not literally said to do these things, and there just does not seem to be a good reason to do so. And when they do do these things (for whatever reason), it lacks authenticity. So someone might to go synagogue (say, for a bar-mitzvah), but will not feel elevated by the davening, does not know what the Torah parsha says, and does not expect these things. They feel a little like a religious tourist, watching and even going through the motions without really participating.
The result is what we see in the Conservative movement. Synagogue membership is declining, and adults who were raised Conservative become less religious and unaffiliated with a synagogue (in lots of cases) and Orthodox (in a handful of cases).
The solution to the twin problems of inauthenticity and irrelevancy is (not surprisingly, and, in fact, definitionally) authenticity and relevancy. The issue is how to achieve these.
For liberal Judaism to be relevant, Jewish practices and beliefs must reflect divinity (however understood), elevate us spiritually, help Jews live much deeper and richer lives, and contain some insights into life that are not generally available in secular culture. And to be authentic, it must not be dependent on the historical origins of the Torah, but on how it has evolved and been interpreted for the past 3000 years, regardless of its historical origins. Jews must be able to feel fully engaged when doing these things.
I think that Judaism for the most part meets these challenges. The problem, as I see it, is that most liberal Jews lack even the most basic education about what Judaism is, and this ignorance is too often (but fortunately, not always) fostered by ineffective religious schools. The problem is not inherent in liberal Judaism itself.
I have detailed some general thoughts on these ideas in many other blog posts. But rather than arguing from a general level, I thought I would take a particular example of a simple mitzvah and show this works in practice. My example is counting the omer. In the next few blog posts, I will explain the mitzvah itself, it biblical and historical origins, and its subsequent history. In doing so, I hope to show how this seemingly odd mitzvah is highly relevant to life and how liberal Jews can authentically count the omer.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
The Two Foundational Problems With Liberal Judaism (And the Solution)
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Mitzvot - Which Are the Low Hanging Fruit?
Until fairly recently, the Conservative and Reform movements were comprised of people who had at least some knowledge of the basics of traditional Judaism. Many had more observant or traditional parents or grandparents, had grown up in more observant homes and in primarily Jewish neighborhoods, and in some way or another were exposed to the basic traditions, rituals, beliefs, and holidays of Judaism. However, many Jews today in these movements have virtually no knowledge of, or experience with, some of the basic ideas and practices in Judaism.
Fifty years ago and earlier, these movements could operate with what I will call subtractive Judaism. They could take the existing set of traditional beliefs and decide what practices to relax, modify, or eliminate. For example, the Reform movement in the 19th century could switch from Hebrew to English (or German) in prayerbooks. The Conservative movement in the 1950s could liberalize some of the stringencies of shabbat and kashrut. But in both cases, they were starting with people who observed, or at least were familiar with, the traditional way of doing things.
That is no longer true. A substantial percentage of people in Conservative and Reform synagogues simply do not have any substantial knowledge of Judaism. They have not read the Torah, have no idea what it says, have not read other traditional texts, do not daven, do not attend services, do not keep any level of kashrut, do not know about most rituals, and do not know about, let alone observe, most holidays other than Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Chanukah, and Passover. The challenge facing the Conservative and Reform movement is not what to subtract from traditional Jewish practices. It is what to add to no traditional Jewish practices. In many ways, this is the same issue that Orthodox kiruv groups face.
Given that, what are the low-hanging fruits in Judaism? That is, what are some mitzvot, holidays, rituals, or types of learning that interested but not very knowledgeable Jews might do at relatively low cost and obtain relatively large benefits. Where do you get the biggest Jewish bang for the buck. This is really a very practical question.
For example, Chabad started a campaign 50 years ago or so to get less observant Jews to wear tefillin. My (no doubt ill-informed) opinion is that this is a really odd mitzvah to start with. Non-observant Jews often view tefillin as strange and meaningless, and it reinforces the idea that traditional Judaism is full of bizarre arcane rituals. But Chabad has had some success with this, so what do I know?
I have a few other ideas, and I would be interested in other people's thoughts.
Shabbat evening. It is simply nice to be with family and friends, to light candles, for husbands to say something nice about or to their wives and kids, to drink wine, and to eat challah. And maybe even talk about something important and meaningful.
Shabbat day. More of a challenge, given the rest of life. But carving out time to be with family and friends, not to answer phones or e-mail, not to be distracted by video games or television, and not to worry about work or chores is a good thing.
Sukkot. A really nice holiday. I have no idea why it has fallen out of favor with many Reform and Conservative Jews. It might have something to do with Jewish men and their inability to use tools, but now there are lots of nice kits around. (I like building my own sukkah, but I may be exceptional here. I think I am the only Jewish man on the planet with a tablesaw and several routers.)
Counting the Omer. My kids and I think it is cool, but my wife thinks it a bit silly. There's all sorts of interesting interpretations and things to think about while counting the omer, and it all makes you better and wiser. And I told the kids that if we make it through all 49 days withing skipping a day, we'll go out for ice cream after Shavuot. So far, we are on track.
Reading the Torah. No substitute for that. And lots of good English translations available.
A Really Interactive Seder. Seders do not have to be boring exercises where people take turns reading paragraphs from the Maxwell House haggadah. A little reading and planning ahead of time (and some willing participants), and it can turn into a pretty meaningful performance art, a fun time for the kids, and a great intellectual discussion on the ideas of freedom.
Any other thoughts?
UPDATE: (here's more)
The Rules of L'shon Hara. Judaism takes a very strong position against truthful gossip. One is forbidding to say something negative about someone, even if it is true, with some limited exceptions. (Saying something false and negative falls into a different and worse category.) American culture does not place much value on this idea. People gossip, and much popular entertainment is devoted to this. Judaism is refreshing counter-cultural here.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Will Your Grandchilden Be Commited Jews (Regardless of Denomination)?
The well-known article "Will Your Grandchildren Be Jews?" claims that only Orthodoxy can save American Judaism from extinction caused by high intermarriage rates and lower birthrates among non-Orthodox Jews. This article addresses a real problem, but in a slipshod way. In Will Your Grandchildren Be Reform?, I have criticized this article for ignoring the relatively high Orthodox interdenominational switching rates. As noted there, a much higher percentage of Jews raised Orthodox switch to other denominations than Jews raised in other denominations. In the comments section, commentators have criticized my critique for not distinguishing between the more nominal Orthodoxy of 50 to 100 years ago (with a presumably higher switching rate) and the deeper Orthodoxy of today (with a presumably lower rate). I think that critique is correct as far as it goes, but the original article is still deficient for failing to include any adjustment for interdenominational switching.
In A Tale of Two Jewries: the “Inconvenient Truth” for American Jews Sociologist Steven M. Cohen has examined the data and reached a a much more nuanced conclusion: the overall denominational averages masks the presence of "two Jewries". And this conclusion has startling implications.
Cohen notes that American Jews tend to fall into two broad categories:
In short, there is a Jewishly committed group, and a Jewishly uncommitted group. Or perhaps a core and a periphery. (Cohen refers to them an the in-married and the inter-married, although the groups seem to me to capture much more than simply choice of spouse.)
What is largely missing in a middle, or a moderately committed group. In the past, this group may have been by less observant people with a strong ethnic sense of Judaism. But in the past several decades, ethnicity as a force in Judaism has strongly declined. Cohen notes that we have experienced "ethnic decline but religious stability."
Cohen found that the committed group tends to raise children who are themselves committed, and the uncommitted group tends to raise children who are themselves uncommitted. But his most interesting conclusion is that the committed group is dispersed throughout the denominations in approximately equal numbers. That is, in absolute numbers, there is about the same number of committed Jews who are Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform. But since the Reform movement is the largest, followed by Conservative Judaism, followed by Orthodoxy, the percentage of "committed" Jews is very high in Orthodoxy, smaller in Conservativism, and smaller still in Reform.
Because of this, the overall averages for the denominations picks up and masks the averages of two very different sub-populations within that denomination. So a much smaller percentage of Reform Jews (say) attend a passover seder than Orthodox Jews, but that is because Reform Jews have a relatively low number of "committed" Jews (who do attend seders in high numbers) and a relatively high number of uncommitted Jews (who do not).
The implications of this are striking. Contrary to the Orthodox claims, the "solution" to the "problem" of Jewish continuity is not for Jews to become Orthodox; it is for Jews to become religiously knowledgeable, committed, and involved. That is, if a Reform of Conservative Jew really takes Judaism seriously --- that is, has a high level of Jewish knowledge, observance, and belief, affiliates with a synagogue, marries another Jew (by birth or conversion), and sends his or her children to Jewish institutions --- that Jew has a relatively high chance of that Jew's children doing the same.
An important warning: this is not grounds for complacency. Reform and Conservative Jews cannot simply join a synagogue and send their kids to camp and think that they have ensured Jewish continuity. They need to strive for a serious and deep understanding of Judaism, actually practice it, and teach this diligently to their children. The v'ahavta has it right, and v'shenantam l'vanecha is at the core. The challenge for Conservative and especially Reform Jews is to be able to do this in a synagogue where only some of the members have similar beliefs and practices.
What does this involve? More in future posts.
Friday, September 5, 2008
The Limits of Reform Judaism and Non-Halachic Halacha
The Union for Reform Judaism has an interesting ongoing essay series called "Eilu V'eilu." Two knowledgeable people (generally rabbis, sometimes others) post on a particular issue, respond to each other's points, and respond to reader's e-mails. The archives are here.
In the most recent series (Volume 30 - with 4 weekly posts and 1 supplemental post), Cantor Dana Anesi and Rabbi Samuel M. Stahl address the the limits of Reform Judaism in general, and more specifically the following question:
Some people say that Reform Jews can believe just about anything and do just about anything, as long as they still call themselves Jews. Others disagree. They insist that there are indeed identifiable boundaries in Reform Judaism. Is there anything I have to believe or do in order to call myself a Reform Jew?
The question is a great one. Reform Judaism claims to be a non-halachic movement, and its primary and perhaps overriding value is individual autonomy. There is much to commend as to this approach, but one drawback is that it lacks a structured and deterministic ideology that can supply definitive answers. It cannot say that people who believe or do X are not Reform Jews. One the other hand, such limits are necessary. Certainly a Jew, or Jewish congregation, that believed and practiced the negation of all the mitzvot would fall outside the scope of Reform Judaism. But how does one determine these limits?
Cantor Anesi and Rabbi Stahl offer some insights, and both draw on an interesting Reform Responsum dealing with whether a humanistic Jewish congregation that omits all references to God should be admitted to the UAHC. I'll discuss the Responsum first, the arguments of Cantor Anesi and Rabbi Stahl's arguments, and then a few thoughts or why Reform Judaism is not really a non-halachic movement.
Reform Responsum 5751.4
Reform Responsum 5751.4 dealt with the issue of whether a humanistic Jewish congregation could be admitted to the UAHC. Rabbi Gunther Plaut wrote the responsum excluding the congregation. The congregation had adopted its own liturgy that deliberately omitted all mention of God and well as the Kiddush, Kaddish, Barekhu, Shema, Ve'ahavta, Amidah and Aleinu. Rabbi Plaut noted that although Reform Judaism has always been "an open-ended and variegated movement," it has always grounded itself in a belief in God at least in some form, as reflected in the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform, the 1935 Columbus platform, and the 1976 Centenary Perspective. (I just have to note that the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform most ofter refers to an undefined "God-idea" rather than "God".) Thus, "[t]he Congregation has cut itself loose from the three platforms that define Reform Judaism for their times."
Rabbi Plaut then asks the next logical question: even though it is outside "the realm of historical Reform Judaism," "should we not open the gates wide enough to admit even such concepts into our fold? Are not diversity and inclusiveness a hallmark of Reform? To this we would reply: yesh gevul., there are limits. Reform Judaism cannot be everything, or it will be nothing."
In this dicussion, Rabbi Plaut makes two important distinctions. Individuals can have doubts or disbelief and still belong to a Reform congregation. And congregations can have doubts and still be a Reform congregation. But when a congregation explicitly and affirmatively removes God from the liturgy, it is crossing this limit.
This responsum was not unanimous, and Prof. Eugene Mihaly issued a dissent arguing that the congregation should be admitted. The dissent and the response are summarized at the bottom of the responsum.
Cantor Anesi
Cantor Anesi starts by discussing this responsum, notes that the more recent 1999 Pittsburgh Platform reinforced the centrality of God, Torah, and Israel to Reform Judaism, and added social justice as an important concept. Her conclusion:
And so, this is Reform Judaism: one eye on the tradition; the other on the contemporary needs of our members: lay people and clergy alike, as together we create an evolving consensus as to where our boundaries lie.
Rabbi Stahl
Rabbi Stahl focuses on custom, or minhag, as providing guidance in setting these boundaries. He cites Rabbi Solomon B. Freehof, who argued that minhag, which "emerged creatively, anonymously and spontaneously throughout world Jewry," can help define these boundaries.
It is through minhag that we can discover our boundaries as Reform Jews today. Minhag is what serious and learned Reform Jews at a particular time and place consider necessary for us to be responsible partners in our covenant with God. It is through our minhagim that we can discern what is obligatory and what is optional.
He then makes a clever move. Boundaries to the left, he notes, "are thus shaped as classical, traditional halachah (Jewish law) continues to encounter modernity." But Reform Judaism's commitment to certain modern principals, such as egalitarianism, also set a boundary on the right.
"Can we, in good conscience, support a plan that will not allow a woman to sit on a beit din (Jewish law court) or to act as a witness at a conversion? If we are truly committed to egalitarianism, can we really sacrifice this principle as a matter of conscience, even to advance the interests of K’lal Yisrael (community of Israel)?"Rabbi Stahl does not actual advocate kicking a congregation out of the UAHC if it adopted more traditional gender roles, such as excluding women from a bet din or (perhaps more likely, although still quite unlikely) having a mechitzah. But the point remains; there are some limits on the right as well.
Further Thoughts - Reform Judaism's Non-Halachic Halacha
Both authors are almost completely in agreement. They both focus on specific criteria (God, Torah, and Israel), on traditional beliefs and practices, and on the current consensus of Reform Jews about how far is too far. And they both avoid (as they must) a specific list of disqualifying criteria.
What they have described, simply put, is halacha. A more moderate or liberal form of halacha, no doubt, but halacha nonetheless. They have described an organized process or rulemaking, based on some combination of first principles and public policy concerns. In fact, Cantor Anasi quotes the Talmud in her analysis of this situation:
"This is not new; in the Talmud (Bavli, Eruvin 14b), we read: “Said Raba son of R.Hanan to Abaye: What is the law? ‘Go,’ the other told him, ‘and see what is the usage of the people.’""This is a more moderate or liberal view of the law, as reflected in modern times by Solomon Schechter's claim that the locus of authority of Judaism resides in "Catholic Israel" (that is, the Jewish people considered as a whole, or k'lal Yisrael).
In the Supplement to this series, Ben Dreyfus (who, coincidentally, is the blog-meister at Sefer Ha-Bloggadah, where Steve, Diane, and are part of a large team blogging on aggadah) asked a perceptive question:
Rabbi Stahl writes that "egalitarianism often conflicts with halachah", and that "we cannot compromise those values of human equality that we Reform Jews have come to regard as sacrosanct, even when they contradict halachic demands." As a Reform Jew, why do you accept an Orthodox understanding of halachah as the authoritative one? Why not say that our Reform understanding of halachah must incorporate egalitarianism, and that values of human equality *are* halachic demands for us?
Exactly.
If Reform Judaism took its supposed non-halachic status seriously, it would be incapable of making even the most minor prescriptive or normative statements. At most, it would simply offer a list of things that Reform Jews might want to consider as they go about making their own autonomous decisions. But Reform Judaism does not do this, and does not claim to do this.
In short, the method by which Reform Judaism makes recommendations or advocates positions, all under the label of "not halacha" is similar to the method by which Conservative Judaism makes recommendations or advocates positions, under the label of "halacha". I think the Conservative label is more accurate and appropriate.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Will Your Grandchildren Be Reform?
Some Orthodox advocates view Reform and Conservative Judaism as dying denominations. In a article with the provocative title "Will Your Grandchildren Be Jews?" the two authors contrast Orthodox Judaism's relatively high birthrates and relatively low intermarriage rates with lower Reform and Conservative birthrates and higher intermarriage rates. Their conclusion: after a few generations, Reform and Conservative Jews will practically disappear, and everyone will be Orthodox. Their recommendation to Reform and Conservative Jews: become Orthodox, or at least sent your children to Orthodox Jewish day schools.
An intriguing idea. However, the "WYGBJ" model is inconsistent with the actual observed data over the past 38 years. The reason for this inconsistency is that the model ignores the high Orthodox inter-denominational switching rate, despite this data being published in the same studies that it cites. Nonetheless, the two factors this model is based on (intermarriage and birthrates) are obviously important but require more complex analysis than WYGBJ provides.
If the WYGBJ model were correct, we should have already started seeing this effect in massive numbers. But in fact we do not.
According to the WYGBJ model, 100 Chassidic and Yeshiva Orthodox Jews will grow to 324 such Jews in one generation. 100 Centrist Orthodox Jews should grow to 163 such Jews in a generation. In contrast, 100 Conservative Jews will shrink to 66 Conservative Jews after a generation, and 100 Reform Jews will shrink to only 46 Reform Jews. Thus, in a single generation, the ratio of Chassidic and Yeshiva Orthodox Jews to Reform Jews will increase approximately 7 times (324/46 is about 7), and the ratio of Centrist Orthodox to Reform Jews will increase about 3.5 times. (Technically, a slight adjustment has to be made for changes in total population, but this adjustment does not significantly change the ratios.) Orthodox populations should be soaring.
But that's not what the data show. In 1971, 1990, and 2000-2001, demographers published a National Jewish Population Study (NJPS). (There was no study in 1980.) The data on religious denominations reveals some interesting trends. I'll present the data first and then analyze how it pertains to issue at hand. (Accessing the 1971 and 1990 data requires free registration.)
The 1971 NJPS (Jewish Identity Report) shows the following percentage for the Head of Household:
Orthodox Jews: 11.4%
Conservative Jews: 40.4%
Reform Jews: 30.0%
Just Jewish and Other: 15.0%
The 1971 report estimated there were 5.4 million Jews total.
If (as is likely) Orthodox families had more children than non-Orthodox Jewish families, the percentage of Orthodox Jews (as opposed to just Orthodox Jewish heads of household) would have been higher in 1970.
The 1990 NJPS Study Highlights, Part 2 (Table 25, Current Jewish Denominational Preference of Households) showed the following percentages:
Orthodox: 6.8%
Conservative: 40.4%
Reform: 41.4%
Other: 11.4%
This study used various definitions of who is a Jew, but found a core Jewish population of 5.5 million, with more people of Jewish ancestry who now practice other religions.
The 2000-2001 NJPS breaks down the more recent data in a slightly different but more informative way. American Jewish Religious Denominations, Table 2, contains the following data:
Jewish Adults (18 or older)
Orthodox 10%
Conservative 27%
Reform 35%
Reconstructionist 2%
Just Jewish 26%
Jewish Children (17 or younger)
Orthodox 23%
Conservative 24%
Reform 35%
Reconstructionist 3%
Just Jewish 21%
Total Jews
Orthodox 13%
Conservative 26%
Reform 34%
Reconstructionist 2%
Just Jewish 25%
The 2000-2001 NJPS estimated a total population of 5.2 million Jews.
Although the definition of Jews varied in these three studies, and thus the percentages in different reports are not strictly comparable, they are nonetheless close enough for these purposes. In the years 1971, 1990, and 2000-2001, the adult Orthodox population percentage went from 11.4% to 6.8% to 10%. It was relatively constant. The adult Conservative population percentage went from 40.4% to 40.4% to 27%. (The two 40.4%s are a coincidence, not a typo.) It remained relatively constant through 1990, but declined after that. The adult Reform population percentage went from 30.0% to 41.4% to 35%. It increased.
There is no sign here of a dramatic increase in Orthodox population nor of a dramatic decrease in Reform population. (The decrease in the Conservative population is the result of some odd demographics, and I may blog on this separately.)
But the 2000-2001 NJPS does show a marked increase in the percentage of Orthodox children. While only 10% of Jewish adults are Orthodox, 23% of Jewish children are Orthodox. This suggests that we are on the verge of an Orthodox "breakout". As soon as these children reach adulthood, there will be a lot more Orthodox Jews.
However, there is a problem with this conclusion. Orthodox Jews also had a significantly higher birthrate than non-Orthodox Jews in 1970 and 1990 (and all years in between). Why didn't those children raise the percentage of Orthodox adults in the 1990 and 2000-2001 NJPS?
The answer is also contained in the study. Orthodox Judaism has a very high attrition rate, as the following table (Table 4 from the 2000-2001 NJPS American Jewish Religious Denominations Report shows: Denomination Raised Orthodox Conservative Reform Just Jewish % % % % Current Denomination Orthodox 42 3 2 3 Conservative 29 56 7 11 Reform 17 28 78 17 Just Jewish 12 13 14 70 Total 100 100 101 101
Of all children raised Orthodox, only 42% have remained Orthodox as adults. 29% become Conservative adults, 17% become Reform adults, and 12% become "Just Jewish". In contrast, 56% of children raised Conservative become Conservative adults, and 78% of children raised Reform become Reform adults. Thus, Reform Judaism is more successful than Conservative Judaism in keeping children within the denomination, and Conservative Judaism is more successful at this than Orthodoxy.
Of the children who switch denominations when they become an adult, most become more liberal. Only 2% or 3% of non-Orthodox children become Orthodox as adults, while 17% of Orthodox children and 28% of Conservative children become Reform adults.
A short paper reviewed the 2000-2001 data and concluded there has been a shift away from Orthodoxy. "Viewing Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Judaism and a fourth “non-specific” group as categories that range from the most traditional to the least traditional respectively, . . . [¶] We found that 62% stay within the same group, 29% move away from tradition, and 9% move to a more traditional denomination."
This is not new information. A similar table (Table 24) appeared in the 1990 NJPS. The authors note, "Table 24 shows that nearly 90 percent of those now Orthodox were raised as such, thus indicating any movement toward Orthodoxy is relatively small. In contrast to the Orthodox, the Conservative and Reform drew heavily from one or both of the major denominations; one-third of the Conservatives were raised as Orthodox and one-quarter of the Reform as Conseratives with an additional 12 percent having been raised Orthodox."
However, the WYGBJ model simply ignores this critical demographic statistic.
Thus, the basic demographic facts are clear. Orthodox Jews have a lower intermarriage rate and a higher birthrate than more liberal or moderate Jews, but a much higher denominational-switching rate. Of all Jewish adults who were raised Orthodox, fewer than half are now Orthodox. No other Jewish denomination has such a high switching rate.
What do we make of all this? I see several points that are worth noting.
1. The Orthodox Attrition Rate. I am not a demographer, but I would expect the Orthodox switching rate to increase. There are many reasons why people leave Orthodoxy, but one reason (as illustrated by many commentators on this blog) is skepticism about Orthodox factual claims. Many Orthodox communities limit access to critical or non-Orthodox information or argument, especially for young people. (This might be good or bad, but my point here is simply to note the fact, not debate its merits.) This lack of access to information prevents some young Orthodox Jews from learning about more critical and skeptical points of view, and this in turn makes it less likely that they will choose to leave Orthodoxy.
But the internet has changed that.
In the 1980s, when I first started investigating many of the Orthodox claims (as a non-Orthodox Jew), I had a very difficult time obtaining information. I was in college at the time and fortunately had access to UCLA's extensive libraries. But even that was less than ideal. Finding the information I was looking for was quite time consuming, and virtually no one else that I knew was interested in these somewhat obscure topics. However, this situation is quite different today. A quick google search on any of these controversial topics (the documentary hypothesis, the Kuzari argument, Bible codes, evolution and creationism, Biblical archeology) yields a wealth of information, arguments pro and con, and a large community of people who are interested in these topics.
My point here is not to debate the merits of these critical arguments, but simply to note that some people find them persuasive and switch from Orthodoxy to non-Orthodoxy. And with greater access to this information and these arguments, more Orthodox Jews are likely to find this information, and some of these are then likely to switch.
Of course, Orthodoxy may respond in several ways, and these responses may decrease the attrition rate. Determining the net effect may be much more complex.
2. Birthrates. Despite overlooking the inter-denominational switching rate, the basic point that the WYGBJ chart made is still largely (but not completely) valid. Jews having fewer children will certainly result in fewer Jews in the next generation. Jews who care about this should certainly take this fact into account, at least in some way, when considering how many children to have.
3. Intermarriage. Intermarriage is much more complicated. I am going to ignore the halachic issue of who is a Jew and focus solely on demographics. I know several intermarried couples, some of whom strongly identify as Jews, raise their children as Jews, and have solidly Jewish families. Others do not and are essentially secular. And the same is true for in-married Jewish couples as well.
The overriding factor in whether parents practice Judaism and raise their children as Jews is whether the parents find Judaism important and meaningful. Thus, intermarriage may frequently be the result of a lack of interest in Judaism, not an exogenously determined cause of assimilation. The "solution" to intermarriage may be to focus first on how to make Judaism important and meaningful to Jews. Jews who find Judaism important either do not intermarry or do so and raise their children Jewish.
There are numerous other issues here, and I will leave them for a future post.
4. The Math The WYGBJ math is simply wrong. Including inter-denominational switching shows that the process is a complicated web, not a simple linear progression. It cannot be modeled by a simple chart showing Orthodoxy increasing exponentially and Reform and Conservative Judaism falling into oblivion. Technically, it would have to be modeled with Markov chains. (The basic matrix is provided above, but it needs to be flipped.)
The problem with such a model here is the same as the problem with all models that try to predict well into the future. All these rates (birth rates, intermarriage rates, inter-denominational switching rates) are likely to change over time.
One can do the arithmetic without too much trouble. (For the interested reader, simply take the 4x4 matrix above, flip it along its diagonal, multiply it by 1x4 vectors representing the intermarriage rate and birth rate, and then raise that matrix to the nth power. This will give you the matrix predicting population distributions in generation n. When you multiply a 1x4 initial population vector by that matrix, it will give you the estimated population in generation n.)
However, the result is virtually meaningless. These rates are likely to increase or decrease, perhaps substantially, and such extrapolations multiple generations into the future are simply not reliable.
5. Recommendations: We're All Interconnected The data show that we are all much more interconnected than we might think. I think all branches of Judaism would benefit from strengthening all other branches of Judaism. I will have a separate post on the details and implications of this.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Tradeoffs in Judaism Between Truth and Goodness. Or Not.
XGH has another interesting post called Massively Conflicted. His problem, simply put, is he thinks there is a lot of good in Orthodoxy but a lot of stupidity as well. And he keep cycling through different resolutions of this problem, with little success.
I think he is looking at the problem wrong. As XGH frames the issue, there are trade-offs between truth and goodness and XGH simply needs to optimize. But (as we argue in various ways in this blog), once Judaism is understood from a more moderate or liberal perspective, there might not really be any trade-offs and in fact the optimum is a more moderate form of Judaism. Let me analyze the problem first, and then try to argue for a solution.
The Orthodox world has a lot of goodness: solid communities, commitment to good things, meaningfulness, etc. It also has some badness (agunah problem, crazy obsession with trivial things, etc.). And it advocates things that many people like XGH believe are false, like the Mosaic / Divine authorship of the Torah. It tries to be a complete worldview (or a totalizing discourse, as the post-moderns call it).
As one shifts into more moderate or liberal forms of Judaism, the particularly Jewish aspects of goodness are fewer and less pronounced. There are fewer people committed to Jewish practices and community, and there is less learning and knowledge. Judaism is only somewhat important to moderate and liberal Jews, or as Arnold Eisen has argued, the commitment of more liberal Jews to Judaism partial. But with less emphasis on Judaism comes a greater emphasis on secularism, for all its good (science, good secular entertainment, pluralism, democracy) and bad (bad secular entertainment, nihilism). But it is easier to square moderate and liberal forms of Judaism with truth, at least from XGH's perspective: the idea that the Torah is literally from God and written by Moses is rare in moderate and liberal circles. It certainly will not get you kicked out.
As you shift to complete secularism, you find all of the good and bad of secularism and little or no of Judaism's good (real communities) and bad (agunah problems).
That's the problem. For some people, there is a corner solution, as economists put it. Traditional Orthodox Jews think that Orthodoxy is a lot better than other forms of Judaism and secularism and think that God really did give the Torah to Moses. Their choice is easy. Secular Jews think that traditional religious practices are outmoded and silly and God did not give the Torah to Moses. Their choice is easy as well. Moderate to liberal Jews (like me) think that a more moderate form of Judaism encompasses both the best of tradition and modernity, as well as being based on true premises. Our choice is easy too.
But what about someone like XGH, who thinks that traditional practices are mostly good with some bad mixed in, but that Orthodoxy believes false things?
Three options.
First, one can argue that truth always trumps goodness, and move away from Orthodoxy.
Second, one can argue that goodness always trumps truth, and move towards Orthodoxy.
Third, one can conclude that there is some tradeoff between the two and then optimize.
There's really no getting around this tradeoff if one values both truth and goodness. One should simply think about it, make a decision, recognize its imperfections, and live with it. That's life.
But let me go back a minute and argue for my position: this tradeoff might not be a real one.
As I have argued in The Theory of the Other Theory, a moderate or liberal Jew must ask what the biblical interpreters and Talmudic rabbis were actually doing, regardless of what they thought they were doing. I think they were wrestling with the great questions in life and came up with lots of really great ideas. They expressed these ideas through through particularly religious modes, but it is the ideas themselves that are great, not the religious expression. This provided the basis for a cohesive Jewish community that has lasted for 2,000 years. As the ideological heirs to this tradition, we can try to understand it in more current ways. And if one accepts the DH, for example, one can try to understand the divinity of the Torah in a different way than chazal literally did, but still understand it as divine in the broader or structural or functional way that chazal did.
This approach is pretty mainstream in Conservative and Reform Judaism, is the sine qua non of Reconstructionism, but is completely marginalized in Orthodoxy. (Think Louis Jacobs, if not the reaction to James Kugel.)
From an Orthodox perspective, this approach is some sort of half-way measure for people who are just not committed enough to practice "Torah true" Judaism. Although this belief is not universally held, it is frequently held in the Orthodox world, and I view this belief as one of the great failings of Orthodoxy. I see this viewpoint subconsciously expressed in several of the regular commentators here who grew up Orthodox, rejected Orthodoxy, but still equate Orthodoxy with "true" Judaism and thus reject all of Judaism. This belief has energized a huge percentage of Israeli Orthodox Jews, and it has caused most of Israeli Jews to reject most of Judaism completely. It is sad to me that a more moderate approach to Judaism is both ideologically sound and the answer to many problems.
One might object to this argument on the ground that more liberal Judaism does not have "real" communities like Orthodoxy does. That's mostly true. But Orthodox communities are based on a shared set of beliefs and practices, and those practices include things like TMH. Thus, one might be a member of an Orthodox community, but some percentage of that community might believe that dinosaurs did not exist, that evolution did not occur, that the flood is literally true, and that the universe is 6,000 years old. There are downsides to a community based on false or problematic beliefs. But it is certainly true that moderate and liberal Jewish comminities, with fewer common beliefs and practices, are less coherent.
There is no perfect solution. As I previously wrote, I agree with XGH's overall strategy for moving Judaism forward. And one thing that XGH (and me, and you) can do is to work to make these places better. The issue is whether one starts in a more moderate or liberal place and tries to make it more serious, scholarly, and communal, or whether one starts in a more Orthodox place and tries to make it more rational and reasonable. There is no easy answer to that question.
Friday, July 18, 2008
The Future of American Judaism?
There's an interesting post over at "Angstgnostik Reconstructodox Modern Orthoprax" (or XGH or whatever he is calling his blog today) called Our Strategy. XGH is an orthoprax Jew who likes Orthodox practices but accepts the DH and many other modern beliefs that, in one way or another, undermine traditional Orthodox beliefs. For the past few years, he has been taking widely disparate ideas and crashing them together in am intellectual Judaism-modernity supercollider, in the hopes of generating new super-particles ideas that might reconcile this conflict.
His most recent post sets out a broad program for what he is doing. In short, it is an attempt to bring in a more critical, open, and modern understanding of Judaism while at the same time keeping a more traditional orthoprax lifestyle. This is left-wing Modern Orthodoxy, with a bit of Reconstructionism thrown in.
I think he has identified the broad outlines of the future of American Judaism, and it is similar to the one that I (and Steve and Diane, I think) advocate, at least in very general terms. Here's why.
Some current RW Orthodox thinking requires shutting out some contemporary ideas, even if they are true or useful or powerful. Instead of dealing with these head-on, these thinkers and communities simply ignore them. This sort of head-in-the-sand approach might build communities, but the communities face the ever-present risk of being undermined as soon as people are exposed to contrary ideas. That works for a while, but it is no way to hold a community together in the long run.
At the other extreme, it is not clear to me that secular / cultural / non-halachic / non-traditional approaches to Judaism can survive as Judaism. These movements may end up doing much good, but by untethering themselves from the essential characteristics of Judaism, they risk drifting too far from anything that we might meaningfully think of as Judaism.
That leaves the broad middle. A type of Judaism dedicated that embraces the important and good aspects of modernity but remains "a people that dwells apart, not reckoned among the nations" as last week's parsha put it. Taking halacha and tradition seriously, but retaining the flexibility to chance halacha when there is a compelling need. In short, a dedication to both tradition and change. Sound familiar?
It should. This is the same approach as the one advocated by Conservative Judaism in the first half of the 20th Century. That movement worked well in many respects and did not work well in other respects. Part of the problem with Conservative Judaism today, as people have noted, is that many lay people have very little understanding of, and thus little interest and involvement in, the greatness of traditional Judiasm. Reversing this is one of the challenges facing Conservative synagogues.
There is an open question as to whether this approach to Judaism will emerge as a more modern shift in Orthodox thinking or as a more traditional shift in Conservative practice. It may even come from the Reform movement if it could re-embrace halacha and tradition, and subordinate its radical individualism, in a serious way. But whereever it comes from, I think it is the future of American Judaism.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
The Theory of the Other Theory
Part of the problem that liberal Jews face is they accept traditional Judaism as "authentic" Judaism and then reject both, leaving themselves with a self-created self-defined inauthentic form of Judaism. I know I was stuck with this conceptual problem for a long time. But I broke out of this way of thinking, and I think others should do the same. One way of doing this is to understand what I call the theory of the other theory.
Orthodox Judaism has the following (greatly oversimplified) theory of liberal Judaism. God commanded us to keep the mitzvot. But this is difficult, and understanding why is sometimes complicated. Some people are confused, and they create confusing doctrines like liberal Judaism. Others don't like the "yoke of mitzvot", or have a strong yetzer harah, or are lazy, or are just evil, and so they create doctrines like liberal Judaism that let they avoid doing the right thing and keeping the difficult mitzvot and instead allow them to "pick and choose" what they want to do. They might be nice people, but their doctrines are just misguided. If you want "Torah true" Judaism — that is, authentic Judaism — stick with Orthodoxy.
(BTW, why is it always "pick and choose". Wouldn't "picking" by itself be sufficient? Once someone is already "picking" what else does he get by also "choosing"?)
I understand why Orthodox Jews accept this view. It follows from the Orthodox worldview. There is one right way, more or less, of thinking about Judaism, and a partial form of this is only partially good.
But liberal Jews should not accept this theory, and in fact it does not fit in with a liberal Jewish worldview. But many liberal Jews do in fact accept this understanding of their own religious beliefs, and it leads to problems. Perhaps part of the reason for this is that the liberal Jewish worldview is undertheorized, as a philosopher might put it, and this simply leads to a lot of confusion. But liberal Jews need a theory of liberal Judaism, as well as traditional Judaism.
Fortunately, I have one.
The Biblical writers might have had a lot of different reasons for writing the different parts of the Bible. Some were lofty and elevated, and others were the result of politics or self-interest. Some were just story telling. Put all that aside. A more relevant question — as James Kugel has argued here and in his book "How to Read the Bible" — is what were the early religious interpreters (more or less from the 3rd Century BCE to Talmudic times) doing? After all, they were the ones who turned the bible in to The Bible.
They were wrestling with some of the great questions in life. Some were philosophical: what does it all mean? what is the purpose of life? how do we balance between individualism and communitarianism? Some were ethical: how do we treat others? what moral virtues should we have and what moral vices should we avoid? Some were more practical: how do we have a good relationship with our parents, our spouses, our children, our friends, our business associates and customers, and even strangers and enemies? Some were legal: what property do we own? what can we do with it? and what happens if I accidentally harm you or your property? And some were scientific (in a prescientific age): how did the earth and the whole universe come into being? where did language come from?
They came up with a lot of different answers, practices, beliefs, stories, and rituals. Some were great. Some were just OK. And some were terrible. But things were sufficiently fluid and flexible that good ideas grew, bad ideas got weeded out, mediocre ideas improved. Note that some books were canonized; others were rejected. Some practices were adopted; others were rejected. Some movements thrived, others died out. Things were sufficiently flexible that after the destruction of the Second Temple, Yochanan ben Zakkai could reconceptualize the Temple sacrifices as prayer, the priests and prophets as rabbis, and convert sacrifice-based Jerusalem-centric Judaism into a portable religion that people could take not just to to Jamnia or the Galilee, but also to Babylon or Rome and even ultimately to America.
Many of these earlier Jewish answers and practices and beliefs do not work, or at least do not work well, in modern (or post-modern) society. For example, science answers a lot of the scientific questions very differently, and much more persuasively, than the Bible does. Idol-worshiping child-sacrificing Caananites might have made terrible neighbors and we might have wanted nothing to do with them, but 21st Century non-Jewish Americans make pretty swell neighbors overall. But many of the answers to the great issues that Judaism has considered and addressed over the past several thousand years remain valid and meaningful, and often spectacularly so.
A little Burkean conservativism helps a lot here. Judaism has produced some great results. We should change what we need to change, but we should be be very cautious about it.
In short, the liberal Jewish theory would be that many Jewish practices are good simply because they are good, not because a supernatural God said they are good. In fact, they might be divine because they are good, not the other way around. (We'll get to God in a separate post.) And they all hang together in a cohesive and mutually reinforcing way. This is so, regardless of what early interpreters or chazal thought they were actually doing.
This theory is based on the idea that Judaism is an evolving process, not a static set of beliefs and practices. And given this understanding, a liberal Jewish community that makes changes to Jewish beliefs and practices in light of changed circumstances or new and better understandings of things is acting in accord with "Torah true" Judaism. An Orthodox Jew who sticks to outmoded ways of thinking about things is standing still when he should be moving forward.
Of course, on any particular issue, there can be a vigorous debate about whether our current thinking is better than the traditional thinking. But as a general matter, that debate should occur, not be precluded by ideology.
Take a slightly corny analogy. The American founding fathers came up with some great ideas about how to run a democracy. We have modified the original structural rules only a handful of times in the 220 years since the Constitution was adopted. Most of these ideas are good simply because they are good, but some ideas (like slavery) were not. Now suppose that some movement in American thought that God literally appeared to the drafters in Philadelphia and told them what to write. Suppose further that we reject that claim and think that great people, but people nonetheless, wrote the Constitution. We would not view being an American as anything less than great, and we would not view changing the Constitution as bad. It would be a serious undertaking, requiring a lot of thought and consideration, but not something that would be off the table.
An important caveat here: the purpose of my analysis is not to bash the Orthodox. I am a firm believer in Jewish pluralism and diversity, and that includes believing that the Orthodox worldview (that ironically rejects such pluralism and diversity) has an important place is the marketplace of Jewish ideas. My claim is simply that it does not have the only place in this marketplace.
Liberal Jews who adopt this (or some other) affirmative theory of both liberal and Orthodox Judaism will avoid viewing their own Jewish practices and beliefs as incomplete or inauthentic.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Judaism's Intellectual Crisis.
Ever since the Enlightenment, Judaism has been in a state of intellectual confusion and perhaps crisis.
From the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE until the Enlightenment, Rabbinic Judaism or traditional Judaism was the prevailing ideology. Traditional Judaism taught that God entered into an eternal covenant with the Jewish people at Mount Sinai over 3,000 years ago, as set forth in the written Torah. God also gave Moses an oral law to accompany the written law, and that oral Torah was passed down orally until it was written about 200 CE, as the Mishnah, the core of the Talmud. A Jew's goal in life was simply to obey God's commandments.
This viewpoint came under sharp attack during the Enlightenment, and the attack has intensified since then. Bible criticism, archeology, philosophy, history, individualism, feminism, and numerous physical sciences have undercut, and in some cases decimated, many of the premises of traditional Judaism. At the same time, Jews in Europe were able to leave their segregated societies and, to varying degrees, entered broader western society. These new idea and new roles for Jews forced Jews to confront the central question of what Judaism was and how it could be reconciled with Western culture.
Different groups responded to this problem in different ways, but no dominant alternative understanding has taken the place of traditional Judaism. Many good ideas have resulted from this crisis, but many problems have as well, including factionalized Judaism, intellectual confusion, and unfortunately much infighting.
At one extreme, Orthodox Judaism has tried to defend traditional Judaism against these attacks, much of the time with little success. The charedi world has dealt with this problem largely by ignoring it and shutting out Western civilization and much of modernity. But ignoring a problem is not likely to work, at least not in the long run.
The modern Orthodox world, broadly defined, has attempted to reconcile modernity with Judaism, as reflected most clearly in Yeshiva University's existence first of all (a yeshiva and a university?) and its motto "Torah U'madda" (Torah and Science). But while there is some compatibility between traditional Judaism and modernity, these two worldviews are quite difficult to reconcile in their entirety. Orthodox Judaism, confronted with these difficult problems, sometimes has resorted to creative readings of the Torah and farfetched and sometimes disingenuous arguments. These problems have manifested themselves most strongly where Orthodox Jews have attempted to defend the literal truth of the creation and flood stories.
But these problems occur in a much more serious way when Orthodox Jews try to defend the Mosaic / God authorship of the Torah. Modern scholarship has amassed complicated but overwhelming evidence, supported strongly by archeology, linguistics, and history, showing that multiple authors, much later than Moses, wrote the Torah. Although there are significant debates over exactly which sections were written when, no serious Bible scholar has argued that the Torah was written as early as Moses or by a single author. Orthodoxy has either ignored Bible criticism or employed simplistic and unpersuasive counterarguments.
Moreover, some of the beliefs and practices of traditional Judaism are difficult to reconcile with the modern world. Some traditional Jewish ideas about non-Jews, the role of women in society, and (more controversially) the treatment of gays and lesbians are difficult to adopt today, to say the least.
There is much that Orthodoxy has done well, and sometimes phenomenally well. It has fostered deep faith among Orthodox Jews, strong communities, and holiness. But it has not successfully come to grips with much of the modern criticism of the underlying premises of Judaism. And as a result, Orthodoxy has suffered. Many Orthodox Jews love their Judaism, but harbor deep doubts about both the truth and goodness of many aspects of traditional Judaism.
At the other extreme, liberal Judaism (that is, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist Judaism) in many ways suffer from the opposite problem. These movements have largely accepted the modern critique of Judaism and have tried to modify traditional Judaism to meet these problems. However, these efforts have not been very persuasive. There is no clear understanding of what Judaism is, or what it should be, if it is not based on the literal truth of the Torah.
The result is that many Jews equate, either implicitly or explicitly, traditional Judaism with authentic Judaism. Since they reject traditional Judaism, they view liberal Judaism as an inauthentic or incomplete form of "real" Judaism. This viewpoint is reflected when, for example, a less observant Jew notes that he does not keep a particular mitzvah or observe a particular holiday, because "I am not Orthodox," as if only the Orthodox could have a higher level of observance. It is also reflected by the humorous Israeli maxim that the synagogue I don't attend is an Orthodox synagogue.
Liberal Judaism, faced with these difficult religious problems and incoherent religious core, has often responded by focusing on important — but religiously more peripheral — issues, like support for Israel, the holocaust, anti-Semitism, and social justice. And this has turned liberal Judaism (in varying proportions, depending on the movement) into universal ethical rules, broader social issues, and ethnic culture. As admirable as these ideas are, they do not add up to much of a religion. One does not need Judaism for universal ethical rules or broader social issues, and ethnic culture is a weak basis for grounding Judaism.
As a consequence, many liberal Jews simply do not see much value in Judaism. It is fine for children: pleasant holidays (at least most of them), arts and crafts projects, and simple Bible stories with ethical teachings. But no serious adult would take such Judaism seriously. And much liberal Judaism in practice has turned into child-centered activities, the lack of serious commitment to Jewish activities and rituals, and the widespread abandonment of serious text-based learning. Children understand their parents' indifference, and grow up with little attachment to Judaism. While some liberal Jews find Judaism compelling and meaningful (including me), many unfortunately do not.
These two extremes present the central Jewish dilemma that I at least find myself in. I cannot accept the Orthodox or traditional viewpoint because — despite its many admirable qualities — I believe its underlying premises are demonstrably false and its results are in many ways bizarre and sometimes unjust. On the other hand, there is much weight to the Orthodox critique of liberal Judaism: a watered-down Judaism that elevates individual autonomy and “picking and choosing” as its highest goal, with little grounding in Jewish tradition. The problem — and my goal in this blog — is to develop an understanding of Judaism that avoids both of these problems.
I have many ideas — some my own, some advocated by great Jewish thinkers — about how to escape this dilemma and create this Jewish understanding. That is, how to understand Judaism so that it is robust, meaningful, and coherent, without being based on falsities or being religiously trivial.
I belong to a Conservative synagogue, and I think the Conservative movement is best situated to respond to these issues. My two blog-mates Steve and Diane have wrestled with these issues, read about them, and thought seriously about these problems as well. And they have taken different paths than I have. Steve belongs to a Reform synagogue, and Diane belongs to an unaffiliated egalitarian shtiebel. We have much in common, and some important differences, and we are looking forward to some great blogging.
While it would be futile to try to define or limit the scope of this blog, I see several general areas that we are likely to discuss.
Our central goal certainly will be to write about why and how Judaism is meaningful and important, while avoiding the problems of the two extremes. There are many great ideas that both Orthodoxy and liberal Judaism have developed or advocated, and we will be drawing on many of these as well some of as our own.
Although we do not base our Judaism on what we reject, it is still important to understand what we reject and why. To this end, we will be discussing and criticizing positions and practices from both the left and the right. We will be thorough and rigorous, but also fair and polite. There is too must nastiness in these types of discussions as it is, and we certainly intend to have no part of that and ask that readers who leave comments do the same. But there is plenty of room between obsequiousness and arrogance for a forceful but respectful debate.
And there are many smaller issues we will likely discuss, including current news items, issues floating around the blogosphere, and pretty much whatever else strikes our fancy.
So welcome to our blog, and we are looking forward to some interesting and engaging discussions.
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