Are there Jewish antecedents or precedents for the rather extravagant notions/edicts we have designated Ascending Lineality, or for Paternal Descent, and the status of the Settled Sojourner?
There is ample evidence for the Settled Sojourner in the biblical narrative; so many husbands and wives of prominent figures like Ruth, and Moses’ wife Zipporah, are good examples. Indeed, the Exodus experience was shared by Hebrews as well as non-Hebrews called the erev rav – the mixed multitude - who joined the people Israel as Settled Sojourners (or, given that their journey entailed four decades of wilderness wandering, “Unsettled Sojourners”). Jews say, “they are our ancestors no less than the ‘original’ Hebrews. We are their descendents just as we derive from the Hebrew core community returning to their homeland in Canaan.”
There is also ample evidence for patriarchal descent in Scripture’s historical narratives related in the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Torah. Joseph, beloved son of Jacob, Rachel’s first-born, (the most unflawed of biblical heroes according to Allan Bloom) had two sons, Ephraim and Manassah, by his Egyptian wife, Asenath. Her grandmother was Potphera, a priest of On who worshipped the Egyptian sun–god Ra. Ephraim, founder of one of the most influential Jewish tribes in the northern Kingdom of Israel often referred to as the “House of Ephraim,” was the offspring of an unconverted non-Hebrew mother.
Reform Jews are inclined to point out that the biblical Book of Ruth attests to the accepted practice of patrilineal descent. The only “conversion” which Ruth evidently underwent was to accompany her mother-in-law Naomi to her village in Judah pledging her devotion in the memorable words, “wither thou goest I shall go, your people shall be my people and your God, my God and I with thee shall be buried.” And marrying Boaz, a Hebrew, their children took on the religious and ethnic identity of the father.
There is a legion of biblical personalities – Israelites - descended from non-Jewish mothers. They would not be accorded Jewish status by contemporary Orthodox authorities. These include Ephraim and Menasseh, the sons of Joseph, Gershom and Eliezer, the two sons of Moses, born to Zipporah. There is a tradition suggesting that prior to her change of heart (and circumcising her son in an act establishing his Israelite status), Moses and Zipporah “compromised” by agreeing to raise one son to be an Israelite and the other to be a follower of the mother’s religious tradition. Jethro, Zipporah’s father was a priest of Midian.
Others who are also included in this category are Rehoboam, son of King Solomon and Na’ama, an Ammonite, Ahazaia, king of Israel, the son of Ahab and the Phoenician Jezebel. King David was the great grandson of Ruth, a Moabite. Clearly, in biblical days Jewish descent was passed on through the father’s line, as attested to in the first chapter of the book of Numbers.
There was no such thing as an official ritualized conversion then. Rather, wives left the home of their families for their husband’s home. The non-Israelite woman joined her Israelite husband’s clan and became integrated into his community. Their children were Israelites. Clearly, patrilineality was the rule in the early biblical period.
At some time between then and the mishnaic period – which began some two centuries before the Common Era - a shift to maternal descent occurred. Some scholars think it was instituted about three hundred years before the mishnaic period by Ezra the Scribe who required Israelite men to take Israelite wives exclusively and to divorce foreign wives. The reason for such a blatant overturning of biblical law, although theories abound among historians, is still unclear.
Some scholars attribute the change from following the father’s line to following the mother’s line to the influence of Roman and Athenian law whereby a child born to a Roman man and a non-Roman woman was not considered a Roman citizen. But a child of a Roman woman and a non-Roman male received the status of the mother.
There has also been some scholarly speculation that the change from patriliniality to matriliniality became necessary because of the sacred obligation of ransoming slaves (pidyon shevuim. It was incumbent on the Jewish community to redeem women made captive and raped by Roman soldiers whose offspring were then considered Jews. Mothers were not expected to abandon their children. Instead they were brought into the Jewish community out of compassion for them and their children.
Scholars, such as Rabbi Frank Hellner, maintain that the decision by the Talmudic rabbis recognizing Jewish identity by maternal descent was a necessary response to the social crises of their time. In response to the realities in effect then, it was a courageous and correct decision. But the problems necessitating the change in Jewish law no longer exist. Instead of captive Jewish women being violated, in our day we have deliberate and volitional interfaith marriages. A similarly courageous response to today’s reality would recognize the profound biblical conception that Jewishness is a product of nurture as well as nature, upbringing as well as biology, conversion as well as reproduction.
To embrace the realities of our own day, we need to employ the concept of equalineality which affirms that a child born of a Jewish parent, either parent, has a “presumptive Jewish status” that will be confirmed as the child is being raised and educated Jewishly. The bilinear path makes sense for the contemporary Jewish community. It is also the most compassionate and welcoming approach to many individuals who would otherwise be lost to Jewish continuity.
In the words of 13-year-old Melanie Sachs, “how can Judaism teach that my bar and bat mitzvah classmates are Jews depending on the good luck or bad luck of a parent? I know that they all think of themselves as Jews and all of us have been growing up Jewish and educated Jewish year after year. And we know they are Jews. And every one of us is equally proud to be Jews and will say so at our bar and bat mitzvah Sabbath services. Regardless of whose mother is Jewish or whose father is or isn’t Jewish. There’s no difference between them. That’s a Jewish view most kids hold.”