Out of My Jewish Mind

            The point here bears repeating: while lineage, or identity as a Jew, was once transmitted only from father to child, then only from mother to child, in our time the Reform and Reconstructionist movements have ruled that, given other required conditions such as a Jewish upbringing, Jewish identity can be conferred by either parent. This ruling is without question a radical but logical innovation of great magnitude and consequence.

At first this change – recognizing (again, as in biblical times) paternal descent as establishing Jewish identity – was put in effect and practiced in Reform synagogues unofficially. Theological justifications were not thought necessary. For decades, Reform Rabbis and their congregations would simply ignore maternity or paternity issues altogether once a child was enrolled in a synagogue’s religious school and the family made clear its decision to raise exclusively Jewish children.

The welcoming ceremony of Consecration for all children at the time of enrollment, documented in the annals and archives of a congregation (invariably Reform), sufficed to establish and authenticate Jewish identity regardless of which parent was Jewish. Jews, throughout their relatively lengthy history, have been less concerned with abstract principles than matters of conduct and ever-evolving behavioral norms – which realistically and humanely address new conditions and novel circumstances. These judicious and compassionate acts of inclusion preceded any theoretical justification or supporting theology of the sort being presented in this essay.

Consistent with this profound and fundamental innovative ruling by Reform and other Polydox movements that Jewish identity may now resolutely and validly be conveyed by either parent, women “gave up” sole possession of its transmission. It might be said that relinquishing their monopoly they advanced equality!

            Since ancient times, god has been described in anthropomorphic, human, terms. Rabbi Donna Berman writes, “We all know that God is neither male nor female, King or Queen.  God is defined as beyond human conception and understanding, and all words used to praise this Divine Mystery or to address It are merely a ‘pointing toward’ that which cannot be comprehended or named.

            “The feminine aspect of the Oneness of God, according to tradition, is known as the Schechinah or the Divine Presence.  This is one of the ten phrases for god used in both traditional and contemporary prayerbooks.  Many of these designations like Hashem (the Divine Name) and Mekor Chayenu (the Source of our life) are understood to incorporate masculine as well as feminine dimensions of the divine, who is not less than both god and goddess. Any words and images we use, therefore, are limited as well as limiting.  Utilizing only masculine pronouns and images in the English translations of our liturgy is especially limiting since it excludes and marginalizes women.”

         Drawing on Karl Barth’s analogy that doing theology is like trying to paint a bird in flight, Rabbi Berman maintains that “confining ourselves to the limited use of the metaphors and language with which we’ve named and described God is like painting with a limited palette of colors.  God deserves nothing less than a full palette. To resist broadening the images we use to describe God is to…proclaim, ‘I’d rather continue painting with three shades of green than introduce blues and grays and azure and purple and gold’.”[1] Judith Plaskow wrote, “…the God who supposedly transcends sexuality, who is presumably one and whole, is known to us through language that is highly selective and partial.  The images we use to describe God, the qualities we attribute to God, draw on male pronouns and male experience and convey a sense of power and authority that is clearly male in character” [2]

         Female rabbis have helped us come to realize that the female dimension of god, along with the male, must be present for providing and offering Her power and goodness to us all. Not for the sake of balancing, equalizing, or setting aside matters of gender. But, to state the obvious, the masculine and the feminine dimension of god combined, more fully discloses our own best – most comprehensive and most complete – potential for mending the world. 

       Many women have echoed the Jewish feminist sentiment. Some have feminized the name of the Almighty by calling upon Elah instead of El while others lift their voices to the “Goddess.” Contemporary liturgist Marcia Falk wrote, “If God is not really male, why should it matter if we call God ‘she’? If we are all created in the image of Divinity, the images with which we point toward Divinity must reflect us all.”[3] God–language should therefore be gender neutral, expansive, all-embracing, all-inclusive: Parent, Sovereign, Eternal, Friend, the masculine He as well as the feminine She/Shechina (Presence).

           Jewish feminists teach, in the words of Carol B. Balin,[4] that “authentic monotheism does not mean belief in a God who is ‘other than the world’ but rather One who, as the Source of the flow of all life, is partnered with that which was created.”

 _________________________________________

 Bibliography:

1.   Donna Berman, Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones But Words May Destroy My People (1993).

2.   Judith Plaskow, “The Right Question is Theological,” On Bring a Jewish Feminist (1983).

3.   Marcia Falk, “What About God?” Moment Magazine (1984).

4.   Carol B. Balin, “Feminism and Messianism” Tikkun (Vol. 11, No. 6, November/December, 1996) p. 66.

My advice is, taking your position at square one, first declare yourself to be an “Ignostic god-seeker” a term “built upon ignorance” – an erudite, educated ignorance unscrambled and unpacked more fully further along in this page.  An ignostic is here defined as one who not so much admits as avows and professes up front to being ignorant or uninformed and unknowledgeable of what is meant by god and what is being referred to in god talk. Ignosticism, a solid if provisional conviction entails an active pursuit of understanding – like venturing to read this site thus far in the first place. Ignosticism also serves as a philosophical way-station meant to provide a stepping-stone on the route to growth whether leading to convictions or toward denials. An ignostic requires clarification of how the term “god” is to be defined. An ignostic is not an “agnostic” who takes a leap of faith, rather than a leap of uncertainty (that’s the leap taken by the ignostic! ), and asserts that god (however defined) can never be known.

As an ignostic it is therefore also necessary, even required, to go shopping, do the research. Visit the room.  There are schools of philosophy and history, metaphysical speculations and great theories of knowledge arranged among the furniture.  For a Jew, seeking out the right synagogue and a compatible rabbi may be the best way to begin to become familiar with the contents of all the rooms including the God-room of the Jewish Mansion.

 There is in Judaism spirituality, but there is more to Judaism than spirituality.  Remember always, the question “Does god exist?” is not as significant as questions such as “How shall I think about god?”  “How shall I prepare myself for a visit to the God-room?”  “How long the visit?”  “What baggage do I carry in and out?”  “What intellectual preconceptions do I leave behind?”  “How do I carry what I acquire there elsewhere?”  “How can the room and its content enhance my life?”  These are the kinds of questions an ignostic god-seeker asks. Further along we will attempt to identify the most critically relevant distinctions among the ignostic, the agnostic, the theist and the atheist.

 One of the most fundamental principles uniting virtually all Reform, Reconstructionist, and most Conservative congregations (that is, most American Jews) is that of egalitarianism.  Hence at a Reform synagogue it is taken for granted that its members would not join a Jewish congregation which was not gender neutral, one which falls short of being fully egalitarian.

 Reform, Reconstructionist and many Conservative congregations mean by this that no privileges, duties, ritual honors and positions of importance in the synagogue will be determined, affected, or influenced in any way, by gender. Men and women are equal in all respects.  As it has been stressed previously, by now the commitment and devotion to gender equality has become a 21st century axiom.

Prayer books for Jewish worship are gender neutral. Contemporary women have written new prayers for important milestones, events, and rites of passage that they alone experience: for the onset of menses and menopause, for giving birth as well as for infertility, miscarriages, abortions and still births, for surviving the trauma of rape, for becoming a mother in law and grandmother, and even for separation and divorce. Today Jews refer to God in feminine (for example, “Shechina,” translated as Presence, Providence) as well as in masculine terms. Women can become – and have become – cantors, educators and presidents of congregations.

And rabbis! Regina Jonas in Germany became the first ordained woman rabbi in 1935. In the United States the Reform movement’s Yeshiva/Rabbinical Seminary began ordaining women in 1972, the Reconstructionist movement in 1974 and Conservative Jews ordained their first woman rabbi in 1985.

            It is also useful to remember now and again that there has never been an “obey” clause at a Jewish wedding ceremony in any of the streams of Judaism.  Mothers as well as fathers accompany their sons and daughters to the marriage canopy together and at their side.  Brides are never “given away” by the father as the mother watches from elsewhere on the aisle as though she were a second level parent.

          More than a few non-Jewish brides are brought up anticipating the fulfillment of their romantic childhood fantasy of processing toward their groom on the arm of their father. Mothers watch but do not accompany their daughter down the isle. Most Jewish brides and grooms understand that being escorted by both parents to the wedding canopy is a statement expressing equality. It is egalitarian. For a Gentile bride the accommodation that positions her mother walking beside her represents a significant reevaluation of her values, mores, and principles.  Non-Jewish brides soon realize that they are undergoing a major adjustment to overarching cultural changes in their way of life. Many understand their future as symbolized by the overarching canopy beneath which, as brides, they choose to pronounce their vows to a beloved Jewish groom. In addition, increasingly, wedding ceremonies climax with brides as well as grooms joyfully stomping upon and crunching glass underfoot. They are proclaiming that their marriage is of equal partners. Either one can make or break it.

            Nowhere does it say in any Jewish sacred text that women cannot be religious leaders, rabbis, or cantors, although with few exceptions that didn’t happen until the late 20th Century.  It was with the advent of Reform and Reconstructionist (non-Orthodox) Judaism that women in relative short order – given the span of Jewish history – officially counted as part of the minyan (quorum) of ten adult Jews required for a religious service, acquired the honor of reciting the Torah blessings, celebrated bat mitzvah ceremonies before their congregations at Sabbath morning services, became cantors and were ordained rabbis.

            Today, every Reform and Reconstructionist rabbi would support these rights vigorously. The Orthodox would counter by pointing out that women are given different and no less honorable responsibilities than those required of men and that their duties are centered in the home rather than the synagogue.  Not surprisingly, gender issues often underscore the major differences between Orthodoxy and Polydoxy. But even within the Orthodox community the question arises, “How far can Orthodoxy accommodate the needs of the new Jewish woman without losing its Orthodoxy?”

“There are also myriad specific questions:  Will every girl in the community be expected to study Talmud?  Will Orthodox women become rabbis; make halachic decisions as yoatzot, advisors, or poskot, decisors? Will they be dayanot, judges in the rabbinic courts of law, presiding over matters of divorce?  Will the gendered language of the prayerbook undergo a transformation or will the original language be preserved, with commentary and caveat sensitive to kavod hatzibbur, the honor (of women) in the congregation?  And most of all, who will prepare for Pesach?  (Just kidding.)

“Who would have imagined that women … would serve on Israel religious councils, or as congregational interns in Orthodox shuls? Who would have pictured a woman reading the Torah portion at a woman’s tefillah (prayer) group?” [1]

            In the various non-Orthodox (Polydox) congregations I have served as rabbi, gender issues have never surfaced. For over forty years I have shared the pulpit with as many female presidents and cantors as male, and every congregation treated all members equally in the life of the synagogue and did so well before I arrived on the scene.

            As is the case with other rabbis, I would not consider taking a pulpit as rabbi of a synagogue that followed non-egalitarian traditions. Increasingly, this principle of equality is being applied also to the line of religious descent of children, otherwise known as lineality or lineage.  Progressive rabbis today use the term equalineality, or co-lineality, to mean that Jewish identity can be conferred by either the father or the mother. Gender equality requires as much.

A Jew maintains that no one can atone for a sin except for the sinner. The relevant Jewish viewpoint has been that you don’t send another party to jail for someone else’s crime. Nor may another person stand in for or take upon him or herself the misdeeds and transgressions committed by someone else. That would not reflect the concept of justice, at the heart of a covenant. It is a purely Christian idea that we cannot realize our own atonement because we were conceived in original sin and, in a fallen world, are incapable of overcoming our sinful nature without a surrogate who is a Savior. 

The Jewish tradition teaches that a sin is a wrongful act not an inherited or intrinsic condition and that everyone is conceived morally neutral – born with a good urge and an evil urge – a yetzer tov and a yetzer ra. Consequently, a parent’s job is to cultivate and train the good drive in a child to predominate. It is up to the children themselves, however, (as it is up to all of us) to conduct their lives according to their understanding of God’s will and to do so increasingly on their own as they grow. Most important, in Judaism sin is not original and you don’t come by it automatically ‑ you have to earn it! You start out with a blank slate, and what you write on it is your own composition for good or otherwise.

For Jews, as for many Christians, what you do, not what you think, is what counts. Action not words. At virtually every synagogue service Jews recite, often aloud and in unison, the biblical words of the Shma text, the core of the service, “Be mindful of all my Mitzvot, and do them; so shall you consecrate yourself to your God.” By what you do!

Judaism teaches that God would prefer an atheist who does good deeds to deeply faithful disciples of the Lord who fail to translate good thoughts into conduct. Many Christians would feel the same way – not surprising given the Jewish roots of Christianity. For Jews bad thoughts are of no consequence if one does not act on them. The tenth commandment is interpreted by tradition to mean that If you covet your neighbor’s wife but keep your hands to yourself, no sin has occurred. And justice requires that sin never be inherited ‑ that would not be just. To this way of thinking, therefore, a Savior is unnecessary and “gets in the way” of reaching up directly to the Source of the ultimate.

In any case, to a Jew the idea simply does not make sense that even if you have led an exceptionally moral life, a loving God would not let you into Heaven, if Heaven exists, because you don’t have the right thinking/beliefs. Such a notion, from the Jewish perspective, is not consistent with human equity or our sense of fairness. A Jew’s religion is founded upon the concept of “brit” a covenant, a contract, based on justice.

Christianity teaches that salvation is awarded by God’s grace alone and cannot be earned in any way ‑ it is a pure benefaction. That is what makes God great in compassion. God in His grace sent His only begotten Son to die for us on the cross so we can be absolved of our sins and enter Heaven. On the other hand, Judaism, is founded upon a covenant and therefore intellectually at war with such a notion. Judaism understands the covenant conception as a binding contract (brit) that “we enter into with one another and God, the details of which are in the Torah”. And this covenant, like all contracts, is based not on grace or mercy but on fairness and justice as defined by a negotiated relational interaction – or a negotiated interactive relationship (“I-Thou”) – between God and man. And that relationship is disclosed or “revealed” in the words, verses and chapters of the Torah Teaching Text.

 The small print of the contract – writ large as Torah/Judaism – tells us how to live. If we follow it – Torah/Judaism – we may not necessarily achieve salvation in the next world – because a world following this one may not be real. It is not even a subject brought up in the Hebrew Bible. But this world is assuredly and unquestionably real. And we, its denizens, must do what we can to create a good and moral world right here on Earth – a messianic kingdom.

In fact, Jews often say, “the next world (if it exists at all) will take care of itself. Meaning, if it does exist and if I live, as a decent person should, I’ll be there too, as will all people of good will from all the nations of the world. But the focus of right minded and good hearted people must be directed on what we do here.”

> In short, Christianity and most believing Christians have an otherworldly emphasis. Some Christians understand “the “Kingdom” to be not of this world in the sense that it is a spiritual kingdom. Judaism and most Jews have a this-worldly focus and orientation. Over the centuries, the this-worldly/other-worldly distinction has become a rather high profile contrast. It is listed prominently among the polarities – the schedule that we have referred to below as “issues of contrast.” (This schedule has been organized to help us compare Judaism and Christianity’s opposing attitudes towards the world and towards our understanding of our selves in the world.) Theologies, by their very nature, come at you from angles of opposition.

The way in which we think about god has also become rather self-conscious. We (can) now say to ourselves, “Very well, how can I think about god?” rather than, “I have faith in god, I believe in god, or I do not believe in god.” That is a totally different way of thinking, an entirely new manner of introspective reasoning. It sets aside certainty for clarity. As a consequence, we find ourselves constantly considering and reconsidering, stating and restating, defining and redefining the meaning of god – how we might conceive/connect to god – and accepting or rejecting each and every contemporary interpretation, every current understanding, every new revelation, as well as their various alternatives. The conclusions derived from the process may at times prove to be permanent and fixed; at other times provisional and fluid.

Following the wisdom of simplification, we may benefit from the teaching of Rabbi Arthur Green that the singular, if not the single, question to be asked now of Jews and others is, “In what sense do you use the word ‘God’?”

              If you think of god as a great human-like figure with stern or sparkling eyes, sitting on a throne sporting a long white beard, intensely alert to our actions that are registered on a mammoth scoreboard in the sky, you’re probably not reading this website.  If you are reading this website and you find there are vestiges of that image and attitude within you, you would be well advised to think again and to reexamine your thoughts especially if you plan to raise Jewish children. They are likely to be, and as members of a minority are encouraged to be, more critical and skeptical about commonly held prevailing ideas than most kids.

      It might be a good thing to replace this anthropomorphic idea of god with an image that will work better for this day and age.  You may consider many theologies from which to make your selection. You may be soothed, strengthened and untroubled intellectually affirming a Personal God of the kind that existentialists like Martin Buber espouse (a “Thou” who is ever awaiting your deepest self and most authentic “I” in relationship). Or perhaps you’d be more open to – that is, more persuaded by – an abstraction-like concept, a god best understood as a Process, Power or Force in the universe as Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan and other contra-traditional religious thinkers who have abandoned classically-rooted interpretations profess.  You might, over the course of time, find that you have been able, artfully and handily or cautiously and deliberately, to uphold several assorted, even contradictory, god ideas at once – and never feel the need to reach any final conclusions. Or you may determine that there are no final conclusions that you, or anyone, can reach in god thinking.

            What I have seen is that there are times in life when it seems best to think of god in a particular way.  For example, thinking of god as a Person – although totally Other, of course – is very helpful, especially when we need a personal Friend or Parent to turn to as when we are going through particularly difficult times.  That’s self-evident.  We can then conceive of the deity as hovering in some manner above us and attentive to us. Such a god hears and may choose to answer our prayers. Such an idea of god meets real human needs.

 There are other times when thinking of god as a Process rather than a Person is most useful.  After all, many readers of this site have had impressive academic schooling in the humanities, liberal arts, and sociology as well as professional training, requiring scientific and technical education. Our thinking has become sophisticated and modern (or post-modern) and many people you meet have been “turned off by organized religion.” They often mean by it that they prefer god ideas which are beyond or post “Big-Guy-in-the-Sky.” They would rather think of god in terms of the Mind or Process behind the organizing principles of the universe or of “reality.”

            You will see Process written here with a capital “P.” The capital “P” in Process represents a god-symbol or a god-code, something like a computer icon, evincing rather abstract layers of religious thought, philosophy and theology. Why with a capital “P”? The answer is so that in this context we know that Process references divinity. We will elaborate on the multiple layers, implications and applications of god as abstract Force, Power, Principle and Process further on in this and other articles. In fact that is what, for the most part, this post is all about.

       Also, and perhaps more important for reasons of affirming identity, apart from the meanings we wish to impute to our god ideas, many of us feel it is important to take our stance within a particular tradition to which we are committed and wish to preserve – Jewish, Christian, Islamic or whatever. Clearly, certain religious traditions accommodate abstract god ideas better than others. But, the ever-evolving, regenerating and trans-shaping traditions conceiving of god in recognized, established perceptions, as well as in convincing, progressive, non-traditional conceptions have, in different ways, served to preserve continuity and connectedness to the past.  Arguably, it helps to use god language that is malleable and interpretable, just as some rabbis would suggest, contrary to important Jewish philosophers, including Maimonides, that it helps to think about god as advancing, enlarging, “growing.” My own teacher who powerfully influenced many Reform Rabbis as students in his Hebrew Union College- Jewish Institute of Religion classes, Dean Professor Henry Slonimsky taught the god of the Midrash, a god who, perhaps by conscious divine intent, is limited in capacity, primarily and most conspicuously, in preventing evil – a god, based on rabbinic literature, who suffers anguish and sorrow from the wounds his creatures endure.

     Why, Jewish tradition asks, does the liturgy at the centerpiece of every Jewish prayer service, employing the image of The God of Our Ancestors, refer to “the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob?” (And now, in the Reform prayer book, the matriarchs Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah).   Why is the prayer not expressed more simply as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; why the repetition of god three times, once for each of the Patriarchs?  The answer provided by tradition is: to indicate that the term god, or the reality of god, and the experience of god’s presence, as understood by one generation, will be perceived differently by the next. Abraham had his way of apprehending and relating to the divine, his son Isaac had his, Jacob his, subsequent generations theirs and we, ours. And our children, surely, will have new ways that are distinctly their own.

     The words “father” and “king” are also quite different in meaning than the usage of the words in the past when both kings and parents possessed absolute authority and could decree death to children and subjects. Fathers and kings no longer possess the right of required obedience to their command that they held in previous centuries.  And yet we have retained the terms even as their definitions have changed radically. The meaning of the term god, how we perceive god and how we define deity, similarly evolve and develop through time.

I have served in the past as the rabbi of the National Institutes of Health where scientists conduct research and provide medical service impartially to individuals of all varieties of faith, nationalities, cultural traditions and every religious stripe across the board.  My fellow chaplains and I in the Spiritual Ministry Department of the N.I.H. worked as a team dedicated to addressing the religious and spiritual needs of all patients, their families and loved ones in a health care clinical setting. In times of personal crises and at various stages of a patient’s illness, through uncertain worrisome times and fluctuating degrees of recovery and return to health, as well as at life’s closure, chaplains provide spiritual and emotional support, and an attentive ear.

          Over a number of years I have conducted research on the affects of crises, trauma and catastrophe upon individuals who have walked through the valley of the shadow of death. My book, The Faith and Doubt of Holocaust Survivors, is based on an in-depth survey of over seven hundred Jews who endured the devastation of Hitler’s Europe. In that previous study conducted for the most part in Israel, I applied the most rigorous sociological research methodology to examine and determine how, why, where and when, concentration and death camp survivors were spiritually, religiously and in other ways, changed by their ordeal.

Often enough, issues arising from interfaith marriages and the agonizing but necessary decisions on the identity of children of interfaith households, develop into crises of critical impasse, entanglement and deadlock. Terms such as catastrophe and disaster may not apply to interfaith issues. Interfaith couples, whatever the challenges they must overcome and whatever the perils of their chosen pathway – even one that presents itself as a potentially explosive minefield to traverse – are not in danger of losing their lives or the lives of loved ones. But the life and death of a relationship and the breakup of a household amount to severe and formidable crises nevertheless! A kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome accompanies not a few who have gone through them for many years after.

I have served over four decades as rabbi of Jewish congregations with numerous interfaith families as members. My duties included guiding many of them around and over the countless crises looming like imposing obstacles and shepherding others through and past the decisive turning points in the pathway of life upon which they have embarked. These responsibilities have motivated and perhaps even inspired me to develop the approaches presented in these chapters that were conceived to best address, realistically confront and resolve the hazards of their interfaith predicament at critical junctures in their lives: preparing for marriage, for parenthood, for their children’s life-cycle milestones, for the times of the death of loved ones.

 I have been encouraged by interfaith families of every stripe and description to share what I have learned with others who must decide among the several pathways arrayed before them, and with their loved ones as well, that they too understand the dynamics at play: The obstructions, stumbling blocks and complications likely to build up along whichever road they choose as well as the comfort, gratifications and blessings that may be realized during journeys down the various byways. That is, I have written this book for you, the personally affected, deeply interested and solicitous reader. You, who love your family! Perhaps it can serve as a kind of beacon pilot to steer by.

The question whether a particular interfaith union is to be seen as an Inter-marriage, an Intra-marriage, a Mitzvah-marriage or a Mixed marriage will be reviewed in the forthcoming pages. The many couples/families/households of the greater Washington area and beyond I have come to know over the years have taken every path described in this book.  It is upon their feedback that I base my counsel, the advice and the recommendations I offer.  They helped me formulate the approaches to the subjects, issues, themes and propositions this book advances. They have contributed extensively and indispensably to the development of the guidelines and directions I advocate.

Jews don’t have a salvational message; they have a survival message to deliver. Christians talk truth and salvation. Jews talk culture and continuity. My own teacher Rabbi Henry Slonimsky taught that if you look carefully at the tradition you understand that God promised not that it would be easy but that the Jewish people would endure and persevere. The people would go on preserving and enhancing the Jewish way of life from generation to generation. They would strengthen Judaism and pass it on. Jews have always used words such as legacy, heirship, patrimony, ancestry, birthright (birth-rite) and inheritance. The Jewish covenant commands that Jews must engage the world to affect the repair of the world’s ills and to put an end to all conflict and suffering (therefore so high a percentage of Jewish attorneys, Jewish physicians). Creative Survival is what the Covenant is about. Creative alludes to Torah living and Covenant means living Torah.

 Sometime before a conversion is planned a rabbi would say to the prospective proselyte who was brought up Christian, “You wish to become a Jew? Do you still harbor any lingering uncertainty as to whether or not the Messiah has come or that salvation is achieved by belief in Jesus? Was he the son of God as other humans are not? Is God to be understood as a Trinity or a Triune composite? Do not undertake to become a Jew while still perhaps a Christian or if you are likely to ‘need Jesus’ in your life sometime in the future. Remember, Jews do not put forth the promise of salvation or offer Judaism as the truth.

         Rabbis are likely to admonish the candidate forthrightly along these lines:

 “By your conversion to Judaism and taking on Jewish identity, by most standards, you don’t get much. You not only don’t get much in the way of promises in the next world but you may discover tough times for Jews in this world. My duty is to discourage you three times and to advise you, ‘shvare tzu zahn a yid,’ – It’s not easy to be a Jew. We are a tiny minority, numerically insignificant and outnumbered. We are often the opposition, the nay-sayers, out of the mainstream, representing the uncommon. That’s not always so easy. We are a stiff-necked stubborn people profoundly disinclined to throw in the towel and disappear. We willingly prostrate ourselves to The Eternal alone who is One. So don’t even think of becoming a Jew unless and until you are prepared to take on the negatives as well as the positives of your new identity.”
 The rabbis of the Talmud some two thousand years ago taught: “In our time, should a person wish to become a proselyte, one must ask: What prompts you to become a convert? Do you not know that, in our time, Jews are scorned, oppressed, humiliated, and made to suffer? If he replies that he is aware of it, one shall admit him immediately.”

 Rabbi Reuven Bulka writes that rather than subjecting the would-be convert to a possibly traumatic experience in the future, “we insist on discouraging the convert. This discouragement forces the convert to take a more sober look at the situation. If, in spite of the discouragement, the convert still pushes forward, we can at least be more confident that the convert is making this significant change fully aware of its implications.

 “Jews must stand in awe and admiration of individuals who make an obviously overwhelming gesture to embrace Judaism. As excited as the community may be about the prospect, it cannot be so eager for this boost to its ego that it is oblivious to the ultimate welfare of the prospective convert. If, through discouragement, the convert actually rethinks the matter and has a change of heart, then the discouragement has done exactly what it was intended to do – to screen out those whose understanding of the implications of the conversion is minimal.” [1]

 At some point prior to the conversion process, the presiding rabbi of the bet din – a tribunal of rabbis or responsible laymen convened to supervise the proceedings – will likely meet with the candidate and will explain and illustrate an unwritten but immemorial gesture. The motion the presiding rabbi makes is a kind of sign language. Although not specifically prescribed, it is a conventional and well established pantomime that begins with a pose: left hand held forward and upward in a vertical position signaling, “Stop! Halt! Don’t approach.” 

 The second hand however is held closer to the chest and moves in a beckoning motion towards the heart signifying, “come forward, should you decide to proceed despite the stop sign and its warning of all the many hazards and down-sides to the move being contemplated, you will be embraced. Come forward.”

 Then words such as these are uttered: “Are you sure you want to do this? Why would you wish to become a Jew? There are at least three good reasons why you should give second and third thoughts to this plan of yours. This gesture you see with my left hand says reconsider, recoil, stop! You will see my left hand brought up before you three times. You must wave my stop sign away indicating that you wish to proceed despite your clear understanding of the many drawbacks and disadvantages to your decision to join the people Israel and become a Jew.”

 Included among the three foremost negatives likely to confront a convert, which the presiding rabbi or one of the other judges must fully describe and elucidate, may be the minority social outsider status the Jew often represents, the financial costs connected with the educational requirements of a Jewish upbringing and the Jewish way of life. And, of course, anti-Semitism! 

 Despite the very real downsides, “conversion happens.” Rabbis of the Orthodox as well as of the Polydox persuasions report on the Introduction to Judaism classes they offer, the kinds of programs they have organized for prospective proselytes, the guidelines they have established to reduce tension and anxiety in preparation for the conversion process and rituals, and other assignments and procedures they have instituted for Gentiles considering adopting Judaism as their way of life. In no way denigrating Christianity, Rabbi Bob Saks in a High Holyday address, pointed out that there are “millions of people in this country who were raised in Christian homes, for whom Christianity simply doesn’t work…Over the years I’ve led a steady stream of them into Judaism.

“What do they see?”  Rabbi Saks lists:

 “An approach to God that is simple and clear, spiritually nourishing and intellectually satisfying.

  “A tradition which is not satisfied with words or ideas unless they result in action;  that honors learning;  that doesn’t hit them over the head with heaven and hell;  that honors human beings;  that encourages us to enjoy life, and recognizes the stages of life.

 “A religion that says we sin but does not call us sinners.

 “A tradition and a people, small in size but outstanding in its devotion to social justice.”

My conversion catalogue of mitzvot that prospective converts should undertake as part of the process includes the following responsibilities organized in the form of a to-do checklist:

1) Choose a Hebrew name with great care. It may derive from your own non-Hebrew name (like Stav, meaning autumn, from Steve and Keren meaning ray from Karen and Rae); a deceased family member or friend; or a biblical name such as Ruth, Sarah, Abraham or Joel.

 2) Select the conversion site.  It may be a lake, stream, pond, ocean or other body of water. Or you may prefer a Jewish community’s mikvah, a ritual bath carefully and aesthetically designed to enhance the sense of the importance of the occasion.

3) Before the open Ark the convert is publicly blessed, and the chosen Hebrew name conferred. You, the convert, are encouraged to bring family and dearest friends as witnesses of the event. And you should regard the occasion as a profoundly significant milestone in your life and the life of your loved ones. Make plans to celebrate.

4) Go to temple or synagogue that night or soon thereafter – as an authentic, irrefutable and fully qualified Jew, one of the minyan, the quorum of ten adult Jews.  For the first time, count yourself among them.

5) Consider sponsoring a kiddush (special festive collation) in honor of the occurrence marking your personal transformation and membership “in the tribe” either that night if the conversion is on a Friday or at a subsequent Sabbath evening.

6) Consider an appropriate generous contribution to charity in honor of the experience and your new-born-like status.

7) Prepare in advance your study regimen for the next three years including books, magazines and course work for your ever-increasing knowledge and intellectual growth as a Jew.

8 ) Join a congregation that is in accord with your thinking: Egalitarian, Equalineal, etc.

9) Meet with your rabbi to review your ceremony and your participation in it as well as the public affirmations and declarations you are to proclaim in connection with your conversion.

10) Start saving significant dollars with which to educate yourself and your family jewishly.

A prospective convert should be expected to answer the following questions in the affirmative:

Questions to be asked the Convert:

1) Is it of your own free will that you seek admittance into the Jewish fold?

2) Do you renounce your former faith?

3) Do you pledge your loyalty to Judaism?

4) Do you promise to cast in your lot with the people of Israel amid all circumstances and conditions?

5) Do you promise to lead a Jewish life?

6) Should you be blessed with children, do you agree to rear your children according to the Jewish faith?

7) Do you also agree to have male children circumcised?

When all these questions have been answered in the affirmative, the convert is to take the following pledge:

I do herewith declare in the presence of God and the witnesses here assembled, that I, of my own free will, seek the fellowship of Israel and that I fully accept the faith of Israel.