February 19, 2009

The late Holocaust survivor Emil Fackenheim was one of the 20th century’s most important Jewish theologians, known for his “614th commandment”: Do not hand Hitler any “posthumous victories.”

Last August, Fackenheim’s son, Yossi Fackenheim, stood in the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court for a proceeding relating to his divorce. The court was probing his status as a Jew — Yossi’s mother was not Jewish at the time of his birth, and Yossi himself was converted to Judaism at age two by an Orthodox rabbinical court in Toronto. Yossi was able to produce a ream of documents attesting to his legal status — including official recognition, by Israel’s Chief Rabbinate, of his conversion by Jerusalem’s Rabbinate Marriage Registrar.

Nevertheless, the Rabbinical Court in Jerusalem declared his conversion invalid, explaining that because he underwent conversion as an “infant,” his decision to convert was not conscious. Yossi told The Jerusalem Post that he intends to fight to “get my Jewishness back.”

Stories like these often discredit Israel’s Orthodox rabbinic establishment in the eyes of many in Israel’s secular majority and of Diaspora Jews across the denominational spectrum. Although the rabbis’ defenders say they are merely upholding the integrity of the Jewish legal process, too many similar stories suggest the kinds of abuses of authority that are bound to occur when any group is given a monopoly.

This week Conservative Judaism’s Rabbinical Assembly is taking up a resolution calling for the dissolution of Israel’s Chief Rabbinate. Conservative rabbis here and in Israel have long complained that the Orthodox establishment monopolizes state religious resources, blocks legitimate religious activities by non-Orthodox rabbis and institutions, and, more recently, has needlessly encumbered the conversion process for immigrants who are eager to become part of the Jewish people. According to a draft of the RA resolution, the Chief Rabbinate has had an “unfortunate impact on Israeli society.”

No one likes to see one group of rabbis hurling invective at another, and this resolution itself might further deepen a divide it is meant to heal. And yet it and the heat that is generated by stories like Yossi Fackenheim’s should be seen as an opportunity for Israel’s Orthodox establishment, and all who accept or appreciate its authority, to examine the ways it can accommodate the diverse and changing nature of world Jewry. Rabbis in Israel and the Diaspora, Orthodox as well as non-Orthodox, have been working on creative solutions to challenges of personal status — such as conversion and divorce — within a rigorous legal framework. Authorities too often reject these accommodations, sometimes on the basis of small-c conservative jurisprudence and sometimes, sad to say, as a result of turf battles.

The time is ripe to open a trans-Atlantic discussion of these issues. Israel, under fire in more ways than one, cannot afford a further erosion of global Jewish peoplehood. Traditional Judaism deserves a better image among Jews in Israel and abroad. Israel’s secular government and state-sanctioned rabbinate need to hear the critics’ voice, especially those raised in good faith.

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