Rabbi Dovid Eliezrie, the shliach to Yorba Linda, CA, and sort of an occasional unofficial media representative for Lubavitch, has been working in his area of Southern California towards increasing inclusion with the local Federation. He has an essay in this week’s Forward that could be seen as a call for the national Jewish community to endeavor towards similar cooperation (although, seeing as he doesn’t cite his work there, it could be a nudge to his counterparts at Federation that they’re not meeting their end of the deal, either).
He lays out a set of facts that are largely correct, and portray a stark contrast in how mainstream Jewish organizations deal with the larger Jewish community and how they deal with the Orthodox.
Simply put, these organizations are uncomfortable with much of Orthodoxy, in particular the Haredi community, and time and again they have proved themselves to be unwilling to truly engage it.
The very forum in which Bayme participated was indicative of this discomfort. The scholars at the AJCommittee seminar, all of a liberal bent, made repeated reference to “fundamentalism and extremism” in the Jewish world. It seems that if you observe Shabbat, keep kosher and follow the Shulchan Aruch you are automatically labeled a member of a fringe group.
Quite true, although Eliezrie’s stretching his argument beyond believability with his next graf:
Just imagine if Orthodox scholars had a major seminar and referred to the AJCommittee as “liberal extremists,” “ultra liberal” or “being on the fringe.” The front-page headlines would scream, “Orthodox attack AJCommittee.”
Point me to a gathering of Orthodox scholars that doesn’t do that (other than perhaps the recently defunct Edah), and you get a prize.
But the fact remains that the big centers of Jewish energy and money that aren’t explicitly Orthodox have very little, if any, concern for the Orthodox. This is a reality that’s increasingly changing, as Eliezrie’s own interaction in Southern California reveals. But there’s also something much broader going on: the Orthodox are about to become the by-far-dominant faction in American Judaism, with a demographic dominance, constituency retention, and institutional loyalty that isn’t nearly paralleled by any other movement. And the Orthodox are slowly but persistently beginning to knock at the gates: they want cash for their schools and Jewish money to fund primarily Jewish activities. This doesn’t create a natural match-up with an institutional Judaism that is increasingly unconcerned with religious observances and catering ever more to populations that are essentially not Jewish (as in the case of JCCs, where many have majority non-Jewish populations), but in the end all the Orthodox have to do is vote with their feet, and it’s quite likely that a lot of large non-denominational institutions will soon be run by Orthodox Jews.
With that said, how would Orthodox Jews run institutional life differently? Eliezrie posits:
Much of the Orthodox community is not too interested in the agendas of the alphabet soup of Jewish groups. They look with angst as the Anti-Defamation League champions gay rights and other positions in total contradiction to Jewish values. They wonder why AJCommittee gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to rebuild churches in New Orleans, something that stands — unlike helping non-Jews themselves — in contradiction to Judaism.
The ADL is one organization in no danger of a takeover, and it will likely always advocate for gay marriage (about which there’s very little consensus even amongst the Orthodox that its “in total contradiction to Jewish values”). Eliezrie’s likely right about rebuilding churches; that wouldn’t happen if the Orthodox were allocating funds, and it’s further unclear whether the Orthodox in charge would spend much money at all on non-Jews facing crises. After all, the perpetual claim of all of institutional Judaism is that Judaism’s in constant crisis; the difference that the Orthodox bring to the table is that they’ve got lots of things to spend the money on.
Nor can many Orthodox understand how the AJCommittee claims to represent the Jewish world in fighting for restitution by countries in which the organization has never had a presence, such as Lithuania.
Pretty hilarious side-point that most readers assuredly don’t understand, as Chabad rabbis fight with other rabbis and Jewish organiations in Europe for control of restitution funds, in which Lithuania’s been particularly contentious [1, 2, 3, 4].
Haredim shudder when these groups attack any effort to gain government support, such as vouchers for Jewish day schools — a norm in most other Western democracies.
Quite right, and especially when that attack stems from a specific First Amendment reading that a lot of Jews take as a given.
And Orthodox wonder what makes the National Council for Jewish Women representative of Judaism when its liberal policies challenge traditional Jewish family values.
When did the NCJW become a big deal on the Jewish scene? Also, taking a look at its platform, it’s hard to say how it can be read to “challenge traditional Jewish family values” in any specific or objective sense.
We believe that Jews need to connect more with Jewish learning and experience, and not just with Israel and the Holocaust. This view of Jewish identity makes a lot of people in the communal establishment uncomfortable. Orthodox groups are not going to compromise Halacha — and organizations that recognize and accept this fact will quickly find that the Orthodox can bring to the communal debate a vitality, passion and richness of tradition that at times is sorely missing.
To be fair, it’s not just the liberal establishment that needs to confront its prejudices. The Orthodox community tends to think in a narrow parochial fashion. Many Orthodox fail to recognize the achievements of the federations, the defense agencies and other groups. They need to start looking beyond their world and understand the broader Jewish community.
Reading between the lines of Eliezrie’s essay, what appears is not so much an agenda for the Orthodox community as it’s traditionally rendered, but a vision for how the Jewish organizational world can embrace Chabad. After all, Chabad, as an Orthodox organization with a largely non-Orthodox constituency, is the best-equipped to serve the role as ambassadors of Orthodoxy to Jewish institutions. They’ve already got one foot in the door.
This entry was posted on Thursday, June 29th, 2006 at 12:21 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
4 Responses to “Chabad Rabbi Calls for More Orthodox in Jewish Groups”
1. Ari Kinsberg Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
Steven,
The most realistic way to alleviate (but probably not to solve) the “tuition crisis” is to demand that federations fund day schools. This should be not be a hard sell, as it is the day schools that best guarantee Jewish continuity. (I completely disagree with Gary Rosenblatt’s recent editorial stating that camps might be even better at transmitting Yiddishkeit.) But I would feel a bit uncomfortable demanding that federations support Orthodox day schools, as many Orthodox Jews would on principle never give a penny to a federation. Do you have any stats on the federations’ donor base?
Kol tuv
2. Thanbo Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 3:22 pm
1) NCJW, looking at their platform, supports gay marriage and abortion on demand. For most Orthodox, these are family-values issues. Further, they oppose Pres. Bush’s “faith-based initiative” on the grounds that faith-based social service agencies would be allowed to discriminate on the basis of religion. Maybe Jewish agencies should give preference to Jews?
2) How many Orthodox support gay marriage? Civil unions or domestic partnership, perhaps, why shouldn’t they have spousal rights to health insurance, but gay marriage? It’s an explicit midrash brought down lehalacha in Rambam Hilchot Issurei Biah 21:18 (or is that 18:21?) - “you shall not do like the ways of Egypt - where men married men, women married women, etc.”
3) Orthodox spending money on non-Jews in crisis: there are always earmark funds. Now that the IRC has deigned to allow Israel to join, maybe those who want to give to Katrina relief or tsunami relief will be able to give through them, rather than American Jewish World Service or other vaguely-liberal Jeiwsh-organized charities.
3. Michelle Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 5:43 pm
B”H
This is a stretch. Why would orthodox belong to a JCC that only gives two hours a week to single-gender swimming, is overrun by children who have come in “So-and-so Baptist” Church busses, and perform plays on Saturday?
4. Itzik_s Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 8:17 pm
There is no point in bothering to cooperate with these federations. They are dying. The goal of Chabad is to keep the Jews who are involved with these federations from dying as Jews - not to bother cooperating with them, but rather to reach out to their members.
He lays out a set of facts that are largely correct, and portray a stark contrast in how mainstream Jewish organizations deal with the larger Jewish community and how they deal with the Orthodox.
Simply put, these organizations are uncomfortable with much of Orthodoxy, in particular the Haredi community, and time and again they have proved themselves to be unwilling to truly engage it.
The very forum in which Bayme participated was indicative of this discomfort. The scholars at the AJCommittee seminar, all of a liberal bent, made repeated reference to “fundamentalism and extremism” in the Jewish world. It seems that if you observe Shabbat, keep kosher and follow the Shulchan Aruch you are automatically labeled a member of a fringe group.
Quite true, although Eliezrie’s stretching his argument beyond believability with his next graf:
Just imagine if Orthodox scholars had a major seminar and referred to the AJCommittee as “liberal extremists,” “ultra liberal” or “being on the fringe.” The front-page headlines would scream, “Orthodox attack AJCommittee.”
Point me to a gathering of Orthodox scholars that doesn’t do that (other than perhaps the recently defunct Edah), and you get a prize.
But the fact remains that the big centers of Jewish energy and money that aren’t explicitly Orthodox have very little, if any, concern for the Orthodox. This is a reality that’s increasingly changing, as Eliezrie’s own interaction in Southern California reveals. But there’s also something much broader going on: the Orthodox are about to become the by-far-dominant faction in American Judaism, with a demographic dominance, constituency retention, and institutional loyalty that isn’t nearly paralleled by any other movement. And the Orthodox are slowly but persistently beginning to knock at the gates: they want cash for their schools and Jewish money to fund primarily Jewish activities. This doesn’t create a natural match-up with an institutional Judaism that is increasingly unconcerned with religious observances and catering ever more to populations that are essentially not Jewish (as in the case of JCCs, where many have majority non-Jewish populations), but in the end all the Orthodox have to do is vote with their feet, and it’s quite likely that a lot of large non-denominational institutions will soon be run by Orthodox Jews.
With that said, how would Orthodox Jews run institutional life differently? Eliezrie posits:
Much of the Orthodox community is not too interested in the agendas of the alphabet soup of Jewish groups. They look with angst as the Anti-Defamation League champions gay rights and other positions in total contradiction to Jewish values. They wonder why AJCommittee gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to rebuild churches in New Orleans, something that stands — unlike helping non-Jews themselves — in contradiction to Judaism.
The ADL is one organization in no danger of a takeover, and it will likely always advocate for gay marriage (about which there’s very little consensus even amongst the Orthodox that its “in total contradiction to Jewish values”). Eliezrie’s likely right about rebuilding churches; that wouldn’t happen if the Orthodox were allocating funds, and it’s further unclear whether the Orthodox in charge would spend much money at all on non-Jews facing crises. After all, the perpetual claim of all of institutional Judaism is that Judaism’s in constant crisis; the difference that the Orthodox bring to the table is that they’ve got lots of things to spend the money on.
Nor can many Orthodox understand how the AJCommittee claims to represent the Jewish world in fighting for restitution by countries in which the organization has never had a presence, such as Lithuania.
Pretty hilarious side-point that most readers assuredly don’t understand, as Chabad rabbis fight with other rabbis and Jewish organiations in Europe for control of restitution funds, in which Lithuania’s been particularly contentious [1, 2, 3, 4].
Haredim shudder when these groups attack any effort to gain government support, such as vouchers for Jewish day schools — a norm in most other Western democracies.
Quite right, and especially when that attack stems from a specific First Amendment reading that a lot of Jews take as a given.
And Orthodox wonder what makes the National Council for Jewish Women representative of Judaism when its liberal policies challenge traditional Jewish family values.
When did the NCJW become a big deal on the Jewish scene? Also, taking a look at its platform, it’s hard to say how it can be read to “challenge traditional Jewish family values” in any specific or objective sense.
We believe that Jews need to connect more with Jewish learning and experience, and not just with Israel and the Holocaust. This view of Jewish identity makes a lot of people in the communal establishment uncomfortable. Orthodox groups are not going to compromise Halacha — and organizations that recognize and accept this fact will quickly find that the Orthodox can bring to the communal debate a vitality, passion and richness of tradition that at times is sorely missing.
To be fair, it’s not just the liberal establishment that needs to confront its prejudices. The Orthodox community tends to think in a narrow parochial fashion. Many Orthodox fail to recognize the achievements of the federations, the defense agencies and other groups. They need to start looking beyond their world and understand the broader Jewish community.
Reading between the lines of Eliezrie’s essay, what appears is not so much an agenda for the Orthodox community as it’s traditionally rendered, but a vision for how the Jewish organizational world can embrace Chabad. After all, Chabad, as an Orthodox organization with a largely non-Orthodox constituency, is the best-equipped to serve the role as ambassadors of Orthodoxy to Jewish institutions. They’ve already got one foot in the door.
This entry was posted on Thursday, June 29th, 2006 at 12:21 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
4 Responses to “Chabad Rabbi Calls for More Orthodox in Jewish Groups”
1. Ari Kinsberg Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
Steven,
The most realistic way to alleviate (but probably not to solve) the “tuition crisis” is to demand that federations fund day schools. This should be not be a hard sell, as it is the day schools that best guarantee Jewish continuity. (I completely disagree with Gary Rosenblatt’s recent editorial stating that camps might be even better at transmitting Yiddishkeit.) But I would feel a bit uncomfortable demanding that federations support Orthodox day schools, as many Orthodox Jews would on principle never give a penny to a federation. Do you have any stats on the federations’ donor base?
Kol tuv
2. Thanbo Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 3:22 pm
1) NCJW, looking at their platform, supports gay marriage and abortion on demand. For most Orthodox, these are family-values issues. Further, they oppose Pres. Bush’s “faith-based initiative” on the grounds that faith-based social service agencies would be allowed to discriminate on the basis of religion. Maybe Jewish agencies should give preference to Jews?
2) How many Orthodox support gay marriage? Civil unions or domestic partnership, perhaps, why shouldn’t they have spousal rights to health insurance, but gay marriage? It’s an explicit midrash brought down lehalacha in Rambam Hilchot Issurei Biah 21:18 (or is that 18:21?) - “you shall not do like the ways of Egypt - where men married men, women married women, etc.”
3) Orthodox spending money on non-Jews in crisis: there are always earmark funds. Now that the IRC has deigned to allow Israel to join, maybe those who want to give to Katrina relief or tsunami relief will be able to give through them, rather than American Jewish World Service or other vaguely-liberal Jeiwsh-organized charities.
3. Michelle Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 5:43 pm
B”H
This is a stretch. Why would orthodox belong to a JCC that only gives two hours a week to single-gender swimming, is overrun by children who have come in “So-and-so Baptist” Church busses, and perform plays on Saturday?
4. Itzik_s Says:
June 29th, 2006 at 8:17 pm
There is no point in bothering to cooperate with these federations. They are dying. The goal of Chabad is to keep the Jews who are involved with these federations from dying as Jews - not to bother cooperating with them, but rather to reach out to their members.
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