Wherever there are borders, there will be border disputes--and Jews are not exempt from this simple fact.
For any reader who might dispute the fact that Jews have borders as do other nations (see, for example, this segment of a Jewcy debate in which a claim to Jewish borders is rejected as mere ethnocentrism), let me remind you: when Rabbi Donniel Hartman spoke several years ago at Beth Tzedec, he asserted several bases for determining inclusion within the Jewish community (such as the Jewish calendar). He remarked that without common agreed borders, there is no coherent community.
To make his point fully grasped he said that he could envision a universe in which Jews for Jesus were included within the Jewish people - they observe mitzvot, the Jewish calender is central to their lives, etc. [For anyone unaware, Jews for Jesus is one of several messianic movements, claiming Jewish identity while accepting Jesus as messiah.] Given the collective gasp in the audience at Rabbi Hartman's words--even without an articulated policy--many Jews do accept that there are definitive borders: the disagreement is where the borders lay, not their existence.
One of the key areas in dispute is (understandably) conversion. What is interesting is the fact that the fiercest debate at the moment is occurring within the Orthodox world. Start with Rabbi Marc Angel's piece last month in The Forward entitled: Slamming the Door on Converts. He is deeply concerned with the Israeli Chief Rabbinate's new control over conversion in North America. Note, this does not simply impact converts who wish to make aliyah, but anyone seeking an Orthodox conversion in North America. Also note: Rabbi Angel is a past president of the Rabbinical Council of America (i.e., no small fish).
The debate then takes off, especially in the online Orthodox journal Cross-Currents. The first response is entitled "Halacha is Not a Chinese Menu," yet the debate remains civil (you can follow the strand by reading here and here). Although the interlocutors make reference to halakhic terms and hermeneutics, it is not for the traditionally literate only. It is fascinating to see the way in which history is either accepted or rejected as relevant in Jewish decision-making, as well as the underlying tensions between Ashkenazi and Sephardi identities.
The issues around conversion and community borders are also popping up these days in media sources intended for the general Jewish audience. Read Blu and Yitz Greenberg's contribution in The Forward's Bintel Blog (on a Conservadox Jewish convert's acceptance within Orthodox congregations) and this editorial in Haaretz on the issues of conversion amongst olim from the FSU.
While there have been several attempts by Reform, Conservative and Modern Orthodox colleagues in certain cities to develop communally agreed upon conversion process, I fear that that time has come and gone. In the liberal Jewish world, however, the response to these quandaries must not be Reform triumphalism: that is living on an island of one's faith. Instead--with much soul searching on the question of who is a Jew--we must enter the debate anew and work ever the harder to develop our shared borders. Schengen is not a bad idea.
Comments