Conservative Jews to
Consider Ending a Ban
on Same-Sex Unions
and Gay Rabbis
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN,
NYTimes on the Web, March 6, 2006
In a closed-door meeting this week in
an undisclosed site near Baltimore, a committee of Jewish legal experts who set
policy for Conservative Judaism will consider whether to lift their movement's
ban on gay rabbis and same-sex unions.
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Jacqueline Bohnert for The New York Times
Rabbi
Elliot N. Dorff has written a proposal that he says will "enable
gays and lesbians to have a love life sanctioned by Jewish law." |
In 1992, this same group, the
Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, declared that Jewish law clearly
prohibited commitment ceremonies for same-sex couples and the admission of
openly gay people to rabbinical or cantorial schools. The vote was 19 to
3, with one abstention.
Since then, Conservative Jewish leaders say, they have watched as relatives,
congregation members and even fellow rabbis publicly revealed their
homosexuality. Students at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York
City, the movement's flagship, began wearing buttons saying "Ordination
Regardless of Orientation." Rabbis performed same-sex commitment
ceremonies despite the ban.
The direction taken by Conservative Jews, who occupy the centrist position in
Judaism between the more liberal Reform and the more strict Orthodox, will be
closely watched at a time when many Christian denominations are torn over the
same issue. Conservative Judaism claims to distinguish itself by adhering
to Jewish law and tradition, or halacha, while bending to accommodate modern
conditions.
"This is a very difficult moment for the movement," said Rabbi Joel H. Meyers, a
nonvoting member of the law committee and executive vice president of the
Rabbinical Assembly, which represents the movement's 1,600 rabbis worldwide.
"There are those who are saying, don't change the halacha because the paradigm
model of the heterosexual family has to be maintained," said Rabbi Meyers, a
stance he said he shared. "On the other hand is a group within the
movement who say, look, we will lose thoughtful younger people if we don't make
this change, and the movement will look stodgy and behind the times."
Several members of the law committee said in interviews that while anything
could happen at their meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday, there were more than
enough votes to pass a legal opinion (a teshuvah in Hebrew) that would support
opening the door to gay clergy members and same-sex unions. The law
committee has 25 members, but only six votes are required to validate a legal
opinion.
Committee members who oppose a change may try to argue that the decision is so
momentous that it falls into a different category and requires many more than
six votes to pass, even as many as 20, the members said. Other members may
argue that no vote should be taken because the committee and the movement are
too divided.
The committee may even adopt conflicting opinions, a move that some members say
would simply acknowledge the diversity in Conservative Judaism. The
committee's decisions are not binding on rabbis but do set direction for the
movement.
"I don't think it is either feasible or desirable for a movement like ours to
have one approach to Jewish law," said Rabbi Gordon Tucker of Temple Israel
Center, in White Plains, a committee member who has collaborated with three
others on a legal opinion advocating lifting the prohibition on homosexuality.
Even if the five Conservative rabbinical schools — in New York, Los Angeles,
Jerusalem, Buenos Aires and Budapest — adopted different approaches, Rabbi
Tucker said, "I don't think that would necessarily do violence to the movement."
The Conservative movement was long the dominant one in American Judaism, but
from 1990 to 2000 its share of the nation's Jews shrank to 33 percent from 43
percent, according to the National Jewish Population Survey. In that same
period, the Reform movement's share jumped to 39 percent, from 35, making it the
largest, while Orthodox grew to 21 percent, from 16 percent. Estimates are
difficult, but there are five to six million Jews in the United States.
Jonathan D. Sarna, a professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University
and author of "American Judaism: A History," said, "In the 1950's when
Americans believed everybody should be in the middle, the Conservative movement
was deeply in sync with a culture that privileged the center. What happens
as American society divides on a liberal-conservative axis is that the middle is
a very difficult place to be."
Rabbi Meyers, vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, said he worried that
any decision on homosexuality could cause Conservative Jews to migrate to either
Reform, which accepts homosexuality, or Orthodoxy, which condemns it. But
Dr. Sarna said some studies suggested that many Jews who were more traditional
began abandoning the Conservative movement more than 20 years ago, when it began
ordaining women.
Few congregants are as preoccupied about homosexuality as are their leaders,
said Rabbi Burton L. Visotzky, a professor of Talmud and interreligious studies
at the Jewish Theological Seminary, who spends weekends at synagogues around the
country as a visiting scholar.
"There are so many laws in the Torah about sexual behavior that we choose to
ignore, so when we zero in on this one, I have to wonder what's really behind
it," Rabbi Visotzky said.
The ban on homosexuality is based on Leviticus 18:22, which says, "Do not lie
with a male as one lies with a woman; it is an abomination," and a similar verse
in Leviticus 20:13.
The law committee now has four legal opinions on the table. Although the
reasoning in each is different and complex, two opinions essentially oppose any
change to the current law disapproving of homosexuality, and one advocates
overturning the law.
A fourth, authored by Rabbi Elliot N. Dorff, rector and a professor of
philosophy at the University of Judaism in Los Angeles, argues that the passages
in Leviticus refer only to a prohibition on anal sex and that homosexual
relationships, rabbis and marriage ceremonies are permissible.
"What we're really trying to do is to maintain the authority of halacha, but
also enable gays and lesbians to have a love life sanctioned by Jewish law and
guided by Jewish law," said Rabbi Dorff, vice chairman of the law committee.
A change in the ban on homosexuality has been staunchly opposed by the longtime
chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Rabbi Ismar Schorsch. But
Rabbi Schorsch is retiring in June after 20 years, and his successor could
greatly affect the policy. Rabbi Schorsch declined to be interviewed for
this article. Several Conservative officials said that while Rabbi
Schorsch is not a member of the law committee, he is very involved in its
deliberations on this issue.
If the law committee does not vote to change the prohibition, some rabbis said,
the issue could resurface at the Rabbinical Assembly's convention March 19-23 in
Mexico City.
Many students at the seminary say they find the gay ban offensive and would
welcome a change, said Daniel Klein, a rabbinical student who helps lead Keshet,
a gay rights group on campus. "It's part of the tradition to change, so
we're entirely within tradition," he said. Mr. Klein said that even if the
law committee did not lift the ban this week, change would come eventually.
"Imagine what will happen 10 years from now when some of my colleagues are on
the law committee, when people from my generation are on the law committee," he
said. "It's not going to be a close vote."
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