Big Kiruv Creates Family Tension and Isolates the Baal Teshuvah From His Family
One of the issues that should be a concern to the secular and liberal Jewish community about Big Kiruv is intermarriage. Much of liberal Jewry’s blind eye to the fundamentalism, deception, and promotion of downward (“You can’t do it!”) mobility that Big Kiruv advocates stems from the community’s fear of hemorrhaging numbers due to intermarriage. In fact, how Big Kiruv deals with intermarriage is itself a major problem.
The ultra-Orthodox, and to a large extent, even the right-wing Modern Orthodox, utterly cut off those who intermarry. Or at least, that is their official position and party line. This is in-line with Europe (supposedly), so we can’t say this has changed all that much in terms of policy. Intermarriage, as we know, is not a popular phenomenon in the FFB (frum from birth) Orthodox world.
But the situation has changed dramatically for the rest of American Jewry. Most American Jews who are secular or liberal have large segments of their families that are intermarried, particularly those of us who have been here for many generations already. Baal Teshuvahs have cousins and siblings that intermarry all the time. The policies advocated by Big Kiruv for dealing with this reality are all too frequently brutal.
On Beyond BT, Elihau Levenson wrote,
“Spiritual attacks today are not coming in forbidding adherence to Jewish law so much as something else, something far more insideous and more difficult to understand; enticements toward intermarriage and assimilation. These are the “nice” attacks, the “sweet” attacks, the “sugared-coated poison” attacks.
To keep this piece from going too long I will focus the rest of this narrative on intermarriage.”
What did he mean? See comment seventy-two for further explanation on this post, where Levenson explained that the statement,
““If anything, the very fact that it’s not that big of a deal for a typical Gentile to welcome a Jew into their family via intermarriage indicates that most people out there aren’t anti-Semitic…”
was incorrect, because
“It is the opposite. This IS anti-semitism. Read carefully Devarim (Deuteronomy) 13:8-11.
There are mean anti-semites, and there are lovely and wonderful anti-semites. There are anti-semites who know they are anti-semites, and there are anti-semites who think they are benefitting the Jews, and don’t have a clue that it is the opposite.”
Beyond BT will delete comments deemed to contain skeptic content, but authors calling intermarried spouses of Jews “anti-semites” is apparently kosher mehadrin l’mehadrin. You can do that on Beyond BT. Because it is a kiruv site. A kiruv site that spoons hardline haredi groups.
Baal Teshuvahs are told they may not attend the weddings of the intermarried, even if they are non-denominational in content. This creates a lot of bad blood. Ultra-Orthodox Jews do not even recognize intermarried couples as actually married. They also do not recognize a biological gentile father of a Baal Teshuvah as his “real” father. In their eyes, no gentile relatives are truly relatives.
Also problematic is forbidding attendance at even liberal Jewish congregations for family occasions such as bar/bat mitzvahs even if not a problem in terms of getting there on Shabbos.
This produces heart-wrenching results. I know that when I personally think back to the intermarried relatives I estranged many years ago, I am filled with shame and regret. Someone else in my family does the same thing, perhaps worse in a certain ways, and I am horrified as I watch it happen over and over.
Such behavior and freezing out of family members creates misery and estrangement. Neither is a problem for Big Kiruv. The contempt for those outside of Judaism does not have to be as blatant and vulgar as “Shwartzie” for it to have deleterious results for the Baal Teshuvah and his family when he adopts these intolerant policies.
36 comments
This isn’t just a kiruv problem. I have emphatically not-orthodox relatives who didn’t attend their own son’s wedding because his bride wouldn’t go to a mikveh. She went through a full reform conversion process (and they’ve since raised their kids with strong Jewish identities at a reconstructionist shul), but she found the concept of the mikveh insulting and therefore refused to go.
Jewish women go to the mikvah once a month when they’re married. Many men go every week, some even every day. She’s insulted about going once in her life, but it is the mean Jews who are divisive?
“they’ve since raised their kids with strong Jewish identities at a reconstructionist shul”
I don’t mean to come off as a jerk, but I feel compelled to point out that there is no such thing as a strong reconstructionist identity. I’ve worked for reconstructionists in a Jewish educational setting for 4 years now; they are basically Unitarians. Not to say that they aren’t well intentioned, good people. Their big thing is tikkun olam. That’s all great but if you’re going through months of Hebrew school and youth group barely grazing major concepts of Torah, and Jewish history, than you aren’t endowing kids with a Jewish identity. Almost all of the 40 kids I work with (ages 12-18) couldn’t even tell me what the Talmud is. That’s because this stuff is less of a priority than environmental and human rights concerns. In my opinion there is a time and place for everything. Hebrew School is for teaching the kids to be Yids, and public school is for teaching them how to be greater citizens of the world. Sure we can replace kashrut with vegetarianism, like the recons, but let’s not pretend it’s to instill any Jewish identity in anyone.
Maybe the mikvah thing would be easier to digest for people if they understood the symbolic value of the spiritual cleansing it portrays in the conversion - and if they could at least put some swimwear on as e.g. Anabaptists do during their adult baptism.
themicah wrote,
I have emphatically not-orthodox relatives who didn’t attend their own son’s wedding because his bride wouldn’t go to a mikveh.
What people do in their own families is one thing. What outsiders impose is another.
Ron Coleman wrote.
Many men go every week, some even every day.
So f’ing what? Ron, I think the woman could have gone to the mikvah myself if she claims to be converting, but your point about the Chassidim? Why should we care what they do? Chassidim don’t count, Ron. Okay?
Halfsours wrote,
“they are basically Unitarians.”
I have no problem with that.
“Their big thing is tikkun olam.”
Okay, that shit gets annoying.
Impose on others? Screw that. Nobody tied this lady down and threatened to sever her pinky toe from her foot if she didn’t go to the mikvah. They were rightfully insulted that she rejected a completely innocuous ritual that was important to them. She took a stand on something that she found (I’m guessing) to be misogynistic, maybe a even primitive, at the price of alienating her new family. Did she refuse to dip even during the “full reform conversion process” [heh]? That’s even more ridiculous. Why bother converting to Judaism if you can’t even bother going through the conversion without having qualms?
DK,
I’m guessing that you don’t mean that actual Tikkun Olam is annoying, but rather the people who’ve eradicated all the nuances of a vast entire system of beliefs in favor of the simplest common denominator. Am I right?
Halfsours,
Kinda.
DK, you have such a talent for seizing on the utterly irrelevant.
Observant Jews of both sexes use (what on earth is the misogyny point? male converts also must immerse) the mikvah voluntarily, happily, and often. So the idea that it is an “insult” to use it once in order to perform a religious ritual is preposterous — unless you want to demonstrate your contempt for your new “religion.”
Mikvot as known now are fairly recent considering that the oldest ones are in Cologne, Speyer, Worms and Andernach. Before that, people dipped into rivers etc., but the concern not to offend christian fews on nudity eventually led to the construction of mikvot. BTW, I’ve occasionally heard rabbis claim that deep “cellar” on Massada was a mikva and built for that purpose. The fortress was built for non-Jews, the cellar was a water cistern. Whether the Zealots under siege later used the cistern as a mikva can only be assumed as it’s not documented. I suppose they were smart enough though to not ruin their water supplies. To use them in the conversion process though was a later invention that reflected the influence of full-body baptisms as were common till Modern Days in the Western Churches and still are among the Eastern Churches and Anabaptists.
views*
Ack..
Froylein,
I don’t know how old the mikvaot in Cologne, Speyer, Worms and Andernach are, but I’m guessing that they don’t date back to the 2nd temple period. According to Professor Rivka Duker-Fishman, of Hebrew University, there were mikvaot right outside of the temple complex during that time, and in the homes of the Cohanim. If you go to the old city you can see the remnants of them yourself.
What is the source for this?
Rabbi Dr. Michael Hilton; Jewish historian.
Prof. em. Meier Schwartz, Hebrew University.
Now this is the level of discourse I expect to see on Kvetcher from now on!
She didn’t object to the mikveh on misogynistic grounds but to the idea that she had to “cleanse” herself of her “dirty” gentile upbringing. She was excited about becoming a Jew but not about undergoing a ritual she considered to be demeaning to her past identity. Obviously her in-laws disagreed, and apparently nobody was able to present the mikveh in sufficiently less-offensive terms to convince her to just do it.
My original point, however, was that all kinds of inflexibility (not just haredi kiruv sensibilities) can create these kinds of family conflicts. While DK has a point distinguishing one family’s stubborn parents (who don’t observe niddah themselves, but feel their daughter-in-law isn’t really converting if she doesn’t go to the mikveh) from an organizational ethos that encourages BTs to shun other family members, both have the same result (familial discord), and both have origins in differing opinions about how to prioritize halachot.
As for the digs at Reconstructionism, well… obviously liberal judaism isn’t for everyone. But where I come from a kid who goes to shul and regularly volunteers to help out with Jewish projects has a strong Jewish identity, even if she doesn’t have basic Jewish “literacy” in the orthodox sense. But I suspect I’ll be in the minority here on that one.
“…but feel their daughter-in-law isn’t really converting if she doesn’t go to the mikveh”
Mikvah dipping, along with Shabbat and Kashrut, is one of the three largest mitzvot a woman is responsible for according to traditional Jewish thought. She has a right to turn around and say; “man this religion is wack”, and reject the whole thing on those grounds. But again, my question is: why bother converting if you are fundamentally opposed to one of the pillars of a belief system? If the answer is for marriage purposes (i.e. to assuage the in-laws), then this isn’t a very emotionally honest choice. Judaism in its history, liturgy, and sacred text presents innumerable demands and maxims that someone prone to being offended is bound to reject. Like I said earlier- if she can’t even go through the conversion process without being offended by something, then I can’t imagine her having a very healthy relationship with Judaism throughout the rest of her life.
“where I come from a kid who goes to shul and regularly volunteers to help out with Jewish projects has a strong Jewish identity, even if she doesn’t have basic Jewish “literacy” in the orthodox sense.”
Ok, well I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree on that one. I wish the whole family luck, happiness, and health, but staunchly disagree with some of their choices I read about.
HalfSours,
You said : “They were rightfully insulted that she rejected a completely innocuous ritual that was important to them”.
Its not clear why you wholeheartedly believe that they have a “right” to sulk and act insulted (speaking of sensitive & insensitive souls) about AnotheR individual’s intimate personal spiritual bath water bathing/level of religious choices.
Especially, when it’s clear that there is sincere effort involved.
It’s also not clear why the parents chose not to attend/ what message they were hoping to convey. And who they were hoping to control.
Also, your “innocuous ritual” allegations are subjective conjecturing at best.
What is offensive to others, may not be offensive to you, that doesnt make it any less offensive to those that it offends.
And speaking of the hardcore/ bedrock /actual foundations of halacha concepts, that you seem to be quoting and touting about so fondly, there are some pretty harsh punishments for public displays of embarrassment in addition to that versatile “derech eretz kadmah latorah”.
Not sure how this would play into a do not attend scenario, like the one themicah described in particular.
Reading themicah’s explanation for the non-dunking, it doesn’t appear to be a case of the sensitive souls, it’s not clear why you insist on pretending that it is.
I totally understand the non-dunking bride actually.
“taharas hamishpacha” is a concept that’s exceedingly difficult to understand in depth.
And the reasons she didnt want to dunk are almost universally applicable, give or take a variable or two.
Instead of advocating a rough and tough or tough luck approach, it might make more sense to focus on the in depth actual reasons for mikvah dunking especially in the “taharas hamishpacha” context.
but your point about the Chassidim? Why should we care what they do? Chassidim don’t count, Ron. Okay?
counting penguins, that’s the second time you’ve been gratuitously offensive to an entire group of people that I remember in the last month or two. Why don’t you stick to spics, wops, chinks, japs, pakis, niggers, or any other group of people whos members don’t generally read your blog? Dumb kike.
“Why don’t you stick to spics, wops, chinks, japs, pakis, niggers, or any other group of people whos members don’t generally read your blog?”
You answered your own question. Because they don’t read my blog!
I will be happy to explain my line of thinking further if you will contemplate the question that I posed earlier:
Why bother converting if you are fundamentally opposed to one of the pillars of a belief system?
HalfSours
You initially mentioned “shabbat/kashrut/mikvah dipping as the woman’s main responsibility. I’m assuming this is what ure referring to, when you say “pillars”.
I believe it’s the candle lighting/mikvah dunking/doing the challah dividing thing, these are the special opportunities/must do’s generally reserved for the women in Judaism.( I know candlelighting is not exclusively a female thing.)
If someone had issues with candle lighting or a particular abhorance for anything baking related, I dont think that would be an “issue” in terms of embracing Judaism ?
I’m applying that same logic to the mikvah thing.Many Jewish women in 2008 from all kinds of Jewish backgrounds/religious affiliations/disassociations , blissfully in love with their traditional Judaism, have the very same qualms about mikvah dunking and related uncomfortable, mystifying relationship laws.
Give or take a variable or two, depending on the background.
The concept of being rendered “impure” and having to dunk in water, is not a unique/ newcomer thing.
In addition to never being classified as a comforting state of being, whether one is born Jewish/Hypsistarian/Atheist or Agnostic and or converting/living/loving/embracing the same.
I dont see why this discomfort with mikvah dunking, which is quite the mystifying must do in and of itself, should by default, be classified as a disqualifier for judaism living and loving.
I think you’d have a hard time finding women (or men) in liberal Judaism who believe that niddah/kashrut/shabbat observance are the pillars of spiritual fulfillment.
Those three things may be at the forefront of Orthodox women’s observance, but in liberal Judaism the focus is simply not on ritual observance, but rather on things like moral values and community.
Obviously there is a huge difference between Orthodox Judaism and liberal Judaism. And it’s not that liberal Jews aren’t Jews, but that liberal Jews aren’t orthodox. There are millions of Jews out there who observe almost none of the ritual halachot, and not all of us are non-observant out of laziness or ignorance. There are plenty of us who have a reasonable level of Jewish literacy, yet believe that orthodoxy is the wrong approach for our lives.
When a person chooses to convert with a reform rabbi, it’s because he or she wants to convert to reform Judaism. So quit pretending that it’s orthodoxy or bust.
themicah,
Maybe you’re right; I’m coming at this from the wrong angle. I have a bias against many aspects of the reform movement, especially their laxness when it comes to conversion. To me a real Jewish convert is somebody who was compelled to do it. They see truth in Judaism, and couldn’t imagine their life any other way. I don’t believe that conversion for marriage purposes is valid because I feel that it is disingenuous. That’s obviously a different issue all together. This woman might have been very genuine in her desire to be reform. Bottom line: I don’t know this woman. It isn’t fair to speculate on why she made her choices.
Jaded Topaz,
“Its not clear why you wholeheartedly believe that they have a “right” to sulk and act insulted…”
It is their right to take a stand on something they disagree with, just as it is hers. I happen to empathize more with the parents.
“Especially, when it’s clear that there is sincere effort involved.”
Conversion shouldn’t be about effort to please anybody. Conversion should be about one’s own convictions.
“…sensitive souls, it’s not clear why you insist on pretending that it is.”
I don’t believe that I was insisting anything. This is all conjecture.
Also, when I say that mikveh dunking is one of the three pillars of (Orthdox) Judaism, it is from the teachings of our rabbi in seminary. I unfortunately can not site for you a textual source. From what I remember, challah baking and such other Mitzvot are not as fundamental as the three aformentioned ones.
Shabbat Shalom,
Halfsour
The thing called “challah” knows lots of names in Central Europe, where it’s from originally. It was the Sunday bread of the pauper, and Jews adopted that “Sunday” treat.
Sarah/frpylein,
Thanks for the factoid. What made you bring that up?
halfsours,
I didn’t understand how the personal decision for non-dunking became the subsequent basis for the “rightfully insulted” claim.
For the life of me I cant understand why “anyone” would get “insulted” if “someone” important in their life was having a difficult time understanding an independent third party complex concept/contract/doctrine. and the “someone” subsequently made personal choices based on opinions or facts, the first “anyone” didn’t agree with and or feel the same way about?
Unless I guess , the first “anyone”, was the one who created the facts/concepts or rules being dissed by the “someone” ……..
But even then “insulted” would be the wrong word, if real caring and unadulterated understanding were part of the equation.
(Yeah I watched too much care bears when I was a kid )
Lets not forget that many teachers/leaders/laymen in nowadays have a bad habit of presenting concepts/laws/ideologies in flawed/ flowery/subjective/ agenda riddled/distinctly dishonest and or ignorant English.
I meant “sincere effort” as in Merriam Webster’s definition #5 “the total work done to achieve a particular end” .
This doesn’t contradict your lofty conversions cuz of convictions statement actually.
Religion is quite the work oriented initiative .
Not sure where you’re reading the “pleasing others” definition.
In fact her refusal to dunk would definitely indicate “pleasing others” was not the spiritual objective.
When reading the “pillars” you had classified under “largest mitvot for women” I misunderstood this sentence to be focusing specifically on orthodox women and not orthodox judaism, hence my mikvah/challah snipping thing/candle lighting reference.
My (subjective) point was that you clearly suggesting (ok not insisting !) that a discomfort with mikvah dunking will most likely lead to a discomfort with all that Judaism has to offer, is well just questionable.
Especially cuz I find the whole concept of “pure” and “impure” exceedingly difficult to understand.
Sarah/Froylein
The “challah dividing thing ” I was referring to was the snippet of dough put aside when baking bread.
There are different symbolic/halachic reasons for this separating, that escape me at the moment.
Also the root word for challah is chol = ordinary.
I had misunderstood halfsours reference of “largest mitzvot for woman kashrut/shabbat/mikvah”
and had understood it as meaning the main responsibilities/opportunities for orthodox women, candlelighting/hafrashat challah/keeping the family pure laws…….
HalfSours, dividing challah came up as a Jewish woman’s duty above. Yet it’s a fact, not a factoid, that challah was unknown to Jews of the Middle East. Etymological roots of a word not necessarily go in line with the cultural origin of a subject it addresses. Jews of the Middle Ages still knew Hebrew afterall.
Froylein,
“Yet it’s a fact, not a factoid”
I wasn’t saying it wasn’t true. I was earnestly asking what made you bring it up.
Froylein,
Gah! Yes I was saying it wasn’t true. I misused the word terribly, and I wasn’t even education in a yeshiva setting! Kudos to you for teaching a native English speaker English.
fac·toid Audio Help [fak-toid] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1. an insignificant or trivial fact.
2. something fictitious or unsubstantiated that is presented as fact, devised esp. to gain publicity and accepted because of constant repetition.
A factoid, can be a fact that is trivial and irrelevant as per definition 1 above or http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/factoid
Not sure if Oxford added that definition but Merriam Webster offers that definition as an option.
Sarah/Froylein
Are you connecting the history of the braided loaves and how they began baking about, to the “law of challah” ?
I understood the law of challah to refer to the setting aside, of a specific section of dough, when one begins the kneading process.Not an actual kind of braided bread delicacy.
Bamidbar 15:20 has the actual source.
As for the connection to the braided bread, Rashi defines “challah” using the Old French “tortel” definition.
Tortel is part of torte family of foods .
According to wikipedia “Tortes are Central European in origin. The word torte is derived from the German word “Torte”, which was derived from the Italian word torta which was used to describe a round cake or bread”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torte .
It might be possible to connect that to the french definition of torte as an adjective= twisted http://www.wordreference.com/fren/torte
and then you got the twisted round bread……….
not to be confused in any way with the way more fun , twistable and intellectually stimulating, tort , http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tort
Torts are so much more fun to argue about than baked goods though.
Half-Sours wrote: “I’ve worked for reconstructionists in a Jewish educational setting for 4 years now; they are basically Unitarians.”
Such an open-minded, insightful perspective. I’m sure Mordechai Kaplan would be gratified to know his movement is being taught by a person of such theological wisdom, a person who took the time to really understand Reconstructionism from the inside.
In any event, It might please you to know that I’ve worked with Modern Orthodox Jews for several years now; they are basically Muslim fundamentalists.
HalfSours, I often teach people English; that’s what pays my bills.
I’ve been, however, aware of the ambiguous semantics of factoid, but since your initial question did not convey which of the two meanings you were aiming at, I thought I’d make you clarify. And it has worked.
EV, stop spilling secrets.
DK, the pics from Antwerp are up on Facebook.
“Such an open-minded, insightful perspective. I’m sure Mordechai Kaplan would be gratified to know his movement is being taught by a person of such theological wisdom, a person who took the time to really understand Reconstructionism from the inside.”
Sticks and stones can break my bones, but snarky words from Eli Valley can’t hurt me.
this blog is weird. do you guys just attack anything you dont agree with? what is the source of your position. i dont mean Torah source, just where are you coming from. i guess im asking you, dk, for the point of this blog?
Moshe,
The point of this blog is to discuss and illuminate the problems of non chassidic haredi-kiruv (also known as the B’nai Torah Movement) and their deceptive and fundamentalist practices.
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