The denominational structure is still important.  And having the resources for congregations that a denomination provides is a good thing but service delivery and that content may be different. Just as the Jewish family structure has changed we have to reflect those dramatic changes as well.

Liberal Denominations Face Crisis as Rabbis Rebel, Numbers Shrink – Forward.com.

But institutions are slow to change. And people’s turf wars sometimes make it nearly impossible to get to the task of re-imagining.  I think the Reform movement is in process and good changes have been made but they haven’t gone far enough yet.  And I hope that the leaders will be bold in thinking out of the box.  But that kind of thinking isn’t their strong suit.

I am ready to re-imagine. Are you?

My head is swirling. Three panels, two keynotes, and a story in song. An aliyah at Shacharit, making new friends, and reconnecting with a classmate. Had the opportunity to hear Rabbi Maya Leibovic, to learn from Rabbi Miriam Berkowitz, whose teshuvah on mikveh I have long admired, and Rabba Sara Hurwitz, who was every bit amazing as I’d imagined.

It has been, in a word, amazing.

But it has also contributed to a heaviness in my heart as I realize that there is no place for me. At least not yet. For although the Reform movement has embraced the use of the mikveh to mark transitional moments, our leadership is largely silent on the monthly use of the mikveh. Seeing a woman as niddah, and the subsequent immersion in the mikveh, was among the numerous “orientalisms” that were discarded by the early Reformers.

I am troubled, as I have noted in prior posts, about the rush toward innovation at the expense of tradition. Why can’t the laws concerning a woman, her menstrual cycle, and immersion in a ritual bath be a meaningful part of liberal Jewish life. At the very least, it ought to be a part of our conversation.

And so, it is by these living waters that I have wept. Wept that I seem to belong everywhere and yet nowhere. Wept because I yearn for a community who struggles with what it means to be an observant, liberal Jews.

This will be the great struggle for Israel’s soul: will the Jewish state recognize the beauty and vitality of Jewish pluralism, or will it allow Judaism to sink into ruin by recognizing only the most backward and misogynistic form?

Can we, Diaspora Jews/liberal Jews, fix our relationship with Israel? Read my recent thoughts.

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Please bear in mind that this was written in mid-May (pre-Gaza Flotilla-gate) and is consequently dated in some ways. Events sure do change quickly in the Middle East.

George Mitchell is now conducting proximity talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, but it looks like there may soon also be a need for proximity talks between Israel and liberal Zionists in the United States. Israel has survived for 62 years in a state of conflict with the Palestinians. The bigger question: can it survive in conflict with American Jews?

Peter Beinart wrote that “Saving liberal Zionism in the United States—so that American Jews can help save liberal Zionism in Israel—is the great American Jewish challenge of our age,” in his article, “The Failure of the American Jewish Establishment,” in the latest issue of The New York Review of Books, and immediately met with a flood of criticism and debate. Almost all the ensuing discussion centered on the utility and fate of liberal Zionism in terms of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, but none of it addressed its critical role in protecting the freedom of Jews in their own homeland, a supposed democracy that allows gender segregation on public buses.

"Mehadrin" bus line poster states, "This is a "Mehadrin Kosher" bus stop. Accordingly, men shall enter and sit at the front of the bus. Women and all others shall enter through the rear door and sit at the back. Thank you."

Israeli women who find themselves riding any one of 2108 buses running on 56 of the public bus lines throughout Israel are de facto required to sit in the rear third of the vehicle. Although seating on these buses is ostensibly voluntarily gender-segregated to ensure the “purity” of the primarily Ultra-Orthodox male riders, some women who have violated this arrangement – either purposely or accidentally – have met with insults and blows.

A noticeable rise of anti-democratic tendencies within Israel’s governing parties and the growing radicalism of the religious settler movement and its increased influence within the government and military establishment, have caused concern about the erosion of the civil rights of Israeli-Palestinians and Palestinians in the West Bank. Less attention, however, has been paid in the U.S. media to their deleterious effects on the religious freedoms of Israeli Jews. If Israeli society becomes increasingly inhospitable to Jewish religious pluralism, many American Jews will find the Jewish homeland less personally compelling. When it comes to religion and civil status in Israel, the personal could not be more political, and the State, in its quest to remain both Jewish and democratic, cannot afford to alienate liberal American Jews.

Israeli society has benefited greatly from both the political support and the immigration of American Jews, but will the support be as strong or the stream of immigrants continue when the government-sanctioned Israeli religious establishment refuses to recognize the denominations to which most American Jews belong? Marriages performed by Reform and Conservative rabbis are not recognized by the State (there is no civil marriage in Israel), and conversion is solely in the hands of the local Orthodox-dominated conversion courts. A bill introduced by Member of Knesset David Rotem (of the nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party), supposedly meant to make it easier for non-Jewish Israelis to convert to Judaism, would consolidate the power over conversions in the hands of the Orthodox Chief Rabbinate and offer no guarantee for the recognition of conversions done overseas.

It would be of no help to Jessica Fishman who, after becoming an Israeli citizen and living in Israel for seven years – two of them as an enlisted soldier in the Israel Defense Forces – has returned to the United States after being denied the right to marry in Israel, because her mother was converted before Jessica’s birth by a Reform rabbi in St. Louis. Fishman, an observant Conservative Jew, is good enough to risk her life for Israel, but not good enough to marry a Jewish Israeli. She is by far not the only young immigrant who has found herself in this untenable situation. “Seven years ago, I arrived here as a Jewish and Zionist woman. Now I am leaving Israel because in the eyes of the Chief Rabbinate I am not a Jewish woman, and when I myself am already not so sure I am so Zionistic,” she is reported as saying.

Women of the Wall conduct egalitarian prayer services at the Western Wall.

Noa Raz has also been in the news lately. Raz, an Israeli-born Conservative Jew was physically attacked last week by an Ultra-Orthodox man for wearing tefillin (black leather straps and boxes bound on the head and arm, traditionally worn only by men, but now also worn by some liberal Jewish women) during prayer. The attacker did not even see her wearing them. The noticeable marks left on her arm by the straps were sufficient justification for him to verbally intimidate, grab and kick her.

Raz is a friend of Nofrat Frenkel, the young woman who was detained by police for reading from the Torah at the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem last fall. She is a member of Women of the Wall, a group of Israeli and other Jewish women who hold egalitarian prayer services at the Western Wall, which is controlled by Ultra-Orthodox authorities. For their efforts to do something that is normative for hundreds of thousands of Jewish women in America, they have been heckled, pelted with projectiles, and even arrested by their fellow Jews.

One could argue that Israel, under pressure from the Obama Administration to renew negotiations with the Palestinians and show some real progress toward the establishment of a Palestinian state, has bigger fish to fry than accommodating egalitarian, pluralistic Jewish denominations that have far more followers outside the country than within. But Israel cannot afford to leave the issue of religious freedom and civil rights on the back burner.

The Ultra-Orthodox and religious nationalists may be appeased, and continued political support and immigration may come from the Orthodox Jewish American camp, but the Zionist dream of a sovereign, democratic Jewish homeland will unravel. So much depends on Israel’s retaining its commitment to democracy and civil rights, not the least of which are its close and unique strategic relationship with the United States and its centrality to world Jewry, especially the six and a half million Jews living in the U.S. who hold liberty and personal freedoms dear.

It is clear demographically that Israel’s democratic nature is in imminent jeopardy if it holds on to large areas of the West Bank. But even if a two-state solution is eventually reached and Israel relinquishes control over land heavily populated by Palestinians, there is still a lot of work to be done by it so that no one will be left sitting at the back of the bus.

© 2010 Renee Ghert-Zand. All rights reserved.

Richard Kuper (JFJFP), Jeff Halper (ICAHD), Rabbi Danny Rich (Liberal Judaism)

Halper is an American who has lived in Israel for 40 years. His talk was titled The Problems of a Peacenik in Israel: Attacking the messenger.

Before Halper spoke Rabbi Danny Rich made the following statement:

“Jews For Justice For Palestinians have booked the Montagu Centre on a number of occasions. They pay more than an economic rent. It is not our custom to censor speakers. We have come under pressure both formally and informally to cancel this meeting. It is not appropriate to cancel this meeting as JFJFP have booked our hall many times before without any problem and we do not believe that calling for a one-state solution, and I believe that Jeff does not call for that anyway, is anti-Semitic.”

So Halper does not call for a one state solution? Some of his his words:

“There’s only one government in Israel and Palestine which is an Israeli government. There’s only one army, one electrical system, one highway system and one water system. Israel has made that, now we can’t blame the Arabs for that. They accepted the two-state solution publicly in 1988. We made this a binational state and we have to accept responsibility for what we do. We made our bed and we have to lie in it, which means a one-state solution which is either binational or a democratic unitary state. I’m not advocating it. I think a one-state solution is a challenge, I think it’s just, I would like to go that way. You can’t keep advocating for a two-state solution when Israel has eliminated the two state solution.”

Extraordinarily, at the end Halper came over to me to specifically state for the record that he “supports boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel” and he agreed that he is going round British universities both calling for those and describing Israel as an apartheid state.

As for the rest of his talk Halper:

1. Quoted General Petraeus’ recent statement on Israel’s behaviour in not allowing the West to make an accommodation with the Muslim world: “Judaizing Jerusalem isn’t some local issue. Jerusalem is the epitome of the clash of civilisations. It has tremendous implications in the world.”

2. Said the population of Israel is only 70% Jewish. 30% are not Jewish including Russian immigrants and foreign workers and their families. Adding four million Palestinians has made Israel a binational reality. Jews in the diaspora must let Israel go. What Zionism did to the Jewish people was terrible. It negated diaspora Jews.

3. Told us that if diaspora Jews respect Israel they have to respect its right to evolve as a country and find its own place in the Middle East. It isn’t in Europe. After World War One Chaim Weizzman said: “We want the Land of Israel to be as Jewish as England is English.” That made sense in 1919 in England but England could evolve and go somewhere else. England has become a very different country. Bradford has a majority non-white population. You can now become British even if you are from China.

4. Said he thinks Israel intends to keep “Judea and Samaria”: “I can’t explain why we did that if we want a Jewish state. Whoever planned these settlements must be the most anti-Zionist of them all, possibly Ariel Sharon.”

5. Stated that the majority of Jews have always lived in the diaspora and that their national identity is based on the Torah and the book of Joshua (the book of conquest) which is tribal and genocidal and which is where Zionism took its Judaism from. The prophets, however, articulated human rights and liberal humanism. The values Israel talks about are unacceptable to diaspora Jews and that Jerusalem should be Jewish is a racism people would never accept in Britain.

Halper never mentioned the spectre of Islamic Fundamentalism, twisted history by saying the Jews had rejected a two-state solution in 1948 and said that Jewish children were being “brainwashed” by the likes of Birthright Israel. This brainwashing accusation is becoming a common theme against anyone who puts forward Israel’s position.

Finally, after two-hours of advocating a one-state solution, despite his ridiculous denials, Halper even gave us its name: Palestein.

For example, we heard yesterday from Joe Green, the founder of the Facebook CAUSES application. (That’s the one where you can raise money or awareness or invite people to join your particular cause. The causes on my profile include the camp where I grew up, our sister Reform congregation in Israel, rebuilding New Orleans, saving Darfur, and something called the Crayon Campaign that I don’t remember joining.) Green spoke about that application as a kind of grassroots community organizing, which allows regular people to organize their friends and others for the good of causes that matter. He challenged synagogues to be able to think in those terms, and not to be afraid of the immense power of social media.

Green also challenged our notion of the role of the internet as somehow separate from real life. He said that in the past (i.e. 2 or 3 years ago) we used to talk about “going online,” as though “online” was somewhere different – somewhere to go. Today, we talk instead about “using the internet.” We’re not going anywhere, because the the internet is in our pockets all the time! And what’s more, we’re no longer using pseudonyms and handles and email addresses – which mask our true identities – to connect to others online. Instead, on Facebook, you are your true self and your friends (for the most part) are your real friends with whom you have some level of relationship in real life also.

So what does this mean for Judaism. First of all, people of my generation don’t know what it means not to be connected to the internet. It’s the way that we make plans, make friends, and make connections. It also means that social networking media have the potential to be a very powerful organizing tool for Jewish life – to bring people together in very real ways around causes and events and ideas that are important to them. And to allow organic, grassroots efforts to happen more easily and more effectively. (Another big topic here is the “independent grassroots minyanim cropping up in big cities – a topic for another post.)

This week’s Torah portion is Vayakhel, we means “he (Moses) gathered the people.” The word Vayakhel comes from קהל or “community.” When we gather people around Judaism – no matter how we gather them – then we create holy community. In that way, technology and social media are an instrument of holiness, and “the new becomes sacred.”

So I started going to Conservative shul every Shabbat. It was mostly old people, but the rabbi was a young JTS guy with little kids running around (his family and I were the only people under 50 in that place). They were very welcoming and had lots of food at kiddush. I was the only one there who didn’t drive to shul, which I suppose is reasonable enough; after all, if their responsa say that it’s okay, then why shouldn’t they follow the leniency? But then I started seeing some other signs that perhaps the shul didn’t adhere to the strictest halachic standards of the Conservative movement: the rabbi turned lights on after services (no timer), or gave his permission for someone to take pictures. I left when I realized that if a place didn’t even keep Shabbat, even to Conservative standards, I couldn’t learn from them about keeping the other mitzvot.

And that’s the problem with Conservative Judaism that Eisen identifies: there is a philosophical difference between Conservative and Reform Judaism, but there are precious view members of the Conservative laity who know the difference. In practice, neither branch holds itself obligated to perform the mitzvot, even though the institution of Conservative Judaism is closer to halacha than that of Reform, which holds that the mitzvot are not obligatory. You cannot count yourself as a legitimate movement if your members’ practice does not match at all what you say is incumbent on them.

Many commentators say that the responsum about driving on Shabbat was when the Conservative and Orthodox communities ceased to coexist in the halachic spectrum and, in a way, the example of driving on Shabbat is a good instance of what went wrong with Conservative Judaism. Conservative halacha responded to what it perceived as a need of the people (to get to shul to daven) by allowing the desecration of Shabbat, one of the holiest mitzvot. Driving breaks a d’oraita prohibition, and no situation that is not pikuach nefesh will justify that.

So, would I go back to the Conservative movement if it regained halachic legitimacy and it actually had followers? No. As much as I may value egalitarianism, and I do with all my heart, the Conservatives’ arguments are unpersuasive; I have read the responsa, and they do not represent a continuation of halachic tradition so much as cherry-picking to achieve a desired outcome. If there comes some way to permit the egalitarianism that the Conservatives have permitted, but within Orthodoxy, I would be enthusiastic, but I will always be Orthodox.

Best of luck to the Conservatives. They have a lot of work to do.

I had never heard of Miriam’s Cup at the seder before and I set out to find out what it means, is it feminist, conservative, reform, or modern orthodox?

I came across this website (not sure which brand of Judaism the writer is from) which I think takes it a little to the extreme – what with dancing at the seder with tambourines and all. (Also there is a section for the feminization of some brachot….) But I do like that it encourages the celebration of women in our history. The cup is apparently filled with water, not wine, based on the Legend of Miriam’s Well and is not meant to replace Elijah’s cup during the seder. From what I understand the whole point of it is that women in our history, according to this website, have not been acknowledged enough – “their stories have been too sparingly told”. The whole Miriam’s cup idea started out as a Shabbat ritual and evolved to have a place at the seder.

I am still researching. I have to say there are parts of this that really sound interesting and different, and parts that just will not gel with our celebration of Passover. From the reading I have done so far it seems a liberal tradition. Perhaps if I would ever have a women only Seder I would include Miriam’s Cup. But then again, isn’t the seder long enough without it?

I have to read more – just read (on the same site) about some people putting an orange on the seder plate as a gesture of solidarity with Jewish lesbians and gays and others marginalized within the Jewish community…..An orange?!!

Please let me know your thoughts on Miriam’s Cup, if you know anything more, have been to a seder where there has been one, would you include it in your seder, and as usual, your thoughts on this subject.

PS I am a little surprised that Eichler’s carries them, in my mind they are a RW Orthodox store, but I guess they have to cater to everyone.  But it’s a pleasant surprise nonetheless.

I have yet to put a note in the cracks of the Kotel.

I have never really spoken to people much about the fact that I have rarely felt spiritually moved while at the Kotel, the Western Wall (the only remnant of the Holy Temple of Jerusalem’s compound). I’ve found it hard to do so when so many of my fellow Jews talk about what a special, profound experience a visit to the Kotel has been for them. It would surprise people to know that on many occasions when I was in the Old City of Jerusalem, I hung back at the far end of the plaza in front of the Kotel, not venturing up to the wall to pray or press a folded up note to God into the cracks between its huge, ancient stones.

The Western Wall has always served for me as a reminder of the great, long sweep of Jewish history of which I am part. By standing back and gazing upon the kotel’s structure in its entirety, I am able to connect with it in this way. I can vividly recall my experiences and emotions as I paraded and stood in military formation on three different summer nights, one in each of 1983, 1984 and 1985, during the dramatic closing ceremonies of the Chetz VeKeshet programs I participated in. I was moved to tears each time, overcome by my pride at surviving the rigors of a six-week Gadna challenge, but more so because of my realization in those moments that I was truly part of something bigger than myself: The Jewish People.

Nofrat Frenkel, wearing her tallit, carrying a sefer Torah from the police station.

And that is something I do not feel in the religious sense when I stand at the Kotel as a liberal Jew (I feel most closely aligned with the Conservative movement, but that is irrelevant here – what matters in this context is that I am not an adherent of fundamental Orthodox Judaism). As I stand there watching people whose heads, if they are not sporting a cardboard kippah (these are the generally non-religiously observant tourists), are covered with a black hat, shtreiml (Hassidic hat with fur trim), or sheitl (wig worn by some Orthodox women to cover their natural hair), I don’t see myself among them. And they, in turn, don’t see – and don’t have any interest in seeing – the kind of Jew that I am.

The real problem is that this lack of acceptance of liberal Jewish sensibilities and practices at the Kotel goes beyond simply how different kinds of Jews feel about each other. Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist and other liberal Jews are barred by Orthodox authorities from gathering in minyanim and holding egalitarian and/or women’s-only prayer services in this most holy site. One could say that this is only a problem for residents of Jerusalem, or for groups like Women of the Wall – only it’s not. It is a problem, and a lamentable situation, for the entire Jewish people.

Anat Hoffman showing her inked finger after police took her prints.

When women are taunted, harassed and physically attacked for forming a minyan or wearing tallitot (even discreetly hidden under closed coats), and when davening medical student Nofrat Frenkel is arrested (in November) and Israel Religious Action Center director and attorney Anat Hoffman is detained, interrogated and fingerprinted by the police (two days ago), it is not good for the Jews. What will eventually come to pass if what is considered perfectly acceptable to the majority of American Jews continues to be considered criminal activity by those who control religious life in the Jewish State? What will become of us as a global, if not unified, people if what is normative for one half of us is anathema to the other?

The reunification of Jerusalem following the Six Day War in 1967 turned the opportunity to pray at the kotel – to stand in the presence of God at the one and only surviving part of the Temple that was once, not only the spiritual, but also the physical center of Judaism – into the birthright of every living Jew. It is regrettable that each of us does not yet have the right to exercise that birthright in the way in which we see fit for ourselves. I, for one, will not feel as connected to the Kotel as I possibly could be, until it truly becomes the Wall for us all.

© 2010 Renee Ghert-Zand. All rights reserved.

I’m not here to rail against organized religion (it wouldn’t be good for my career!) or to disparage religious movements. The movements play an importance role in organizing the Jewish world, providing resources, educating leadership. My question is: Is there still a distinctive social or ideological gap between the Reform and Conservative movements?

Historically there have been at least three (and probably more) important distinctions:

• The ethnic: Reform Judaism was founded by German Jews, who were largely assimilated and were looking for a more assimilated Judaism. The earliest Conservative Jews were immigrants from Eastern Europe who were interested in more traditional Judaism in an American context).
• The ritual: Reform rejected traditional practices – such as kashrut and kippah – that were aesthetically or ideologically out of sync with modernity, while Conservative maintained them (if only because they provided a sense of “Jewish authenticity”).
• The ideological: Conservative Judaism remains halachic – i.e. it continues to embrace the binding nature of Jewish law (within the scope of modernity) – while Reform affirms that halacha is nonbinding or optional.

There is truth to all of these. There is no question that German-dominated Reform Judaism was quick to discard ritual that many Eastern European Jews found necessary/meaningful/ endearing/nostalgic/authentic. The Conservative movement probably owes its existence to that fact. But it is a largely irrelevant fact three generations later. Today, if anything, the Reform world is moving toward the right, taking on Hebrew prayer, rituals like kippah, mikveh, and aspects of kashrut.

It is also true that the Conservative movement continues to speak in the language of halacha (it has a law committee and teshuvot) while Reform speaks in the language of personal autonomy. But even here, the divide is not so wide. The Conservative movement has always referred to itself as “Positive-Historical Judaism” – i.e. Judaism that is rooted in divine revelation (which is the meaning here of the word “positive”), and simultaneously shaped by historical evolution. But Reform Judaism similarly embraces the notion that Judaism is based both on eternal divine (however you define it) commands – the ethical mitzvot – and on historically evolving culture and folkways – the ritual mitzvot. From the 1999 Pitsburgh Principles of Reform Judaism:

We are committed to the ongoing study of the whole array of (mitzvot) and to the fulfillment of those that address us as individuals and as a community. Some of these (mitzvot), sacred obligations, have long been observed by Reform Jews; others, both ancient and modern, demand renewed attention as the result of the unique context of our own times.

Furthermore, the Reform movement has a Responsa Committee (of which I happen to be a member), which deliberates on matters of Jewish law. The difference is that those responsa are non-binding. The Reform way to talk about Jewish tradition is to use the language of “Choice Through Knowledge” – we make choices about our ritual practice based on our study and our understanding of the meanings of those traditions. Contrary to the notion that Reform is “non-halachic,” I believe that this is a type of halachic process. And let’s be honest – Conservative Jews also make choices. Conservative rabbis know this, which is why they often operate on the assumption that the more knowledge their congregants amass, the more they will choose to fulfill the mitzvot.

So while differences between the two movements remain, I think it’s more useful to think of a continuum of liberal Judaism that includes the Conservative and Reform movements with significance points of connection between them. Every continuum has its extremes, but there is too much in common here to think of them as being really separate.

The Kotel is considered an open-air synagogue. But it is not, by definition, a synagogue. It is, by definition, a wall. The outer retaining wall and last remaining fragment (or so we thought until recently) of the ancient Temple complex. Throughout the centuries, it has been a place for Jews to come and weep for the loss of Jerusalem (hence the now-outdated name “Wailing Wall.”) Only since 1967 has the rabbinate formalized the Kotel’s status as an official synagogue that follows Orthodox customs such as gender separation and requiring head coverings for men.

But at the same time, the Wall retains important national significance. It is a symbol of Jerusalem’s reunification; a symbol of the rebirth of Jewish sovereignty in Israel. It is the site of important national ceremonies – most notably the annual IDF Memorial Day ceremony. And because of its extraordinary religious, national, and historical significance, it has also been the place where new olim were presented with their Israeli identity cards.

That is about to change.

“This is a purely administrative question about the character of the Western Wall. The Wall is not a banquet hall,” [Rabbi] Rabinovitch [of the Western Wall Heritage Foundation] told the Israeli daily Ha’aretz. (JTA, October 13, 2009)

First of all, the Wall may not be a banquet hall, but it is a civic site. In Israel, Judaism is civic. Ask the average Israeli how they observe Judaism and they won’t talk about tefillin and synagogue; they will describe their Jewish identity in terms of living in Israel, speaking Hebrew, and serving in the army. In the Jewish state, religion is civic and civics are religious. The Memorial Day commemoration at the Kotel is the perfect example.

Second, the Kotel is not solely a religious place – it is a Jewish place. It is the most recognizable, most emotion-soaked, most special place in the Jewish world. Its significance is – yes – due largely to the fact that it was once a site of worship and sacrifice, but its significance transcends religion. (Try to tell Naomi Shemer, the secular composer of “Jerusalem of Gold,” that the Kotel is only a religious site. Tell it to Yitzhak Rabin, the general who oversaw the reunification of Jerusalem in 1967.)

The Western Wall is, and has always been, a place of Jewish hope and tears, laughter and prayers – a place of Judaism and Jewishness. The fact that in the last 40 years it has been given over to become a narrow, restrictive, discriminatory synagogue with separate men’s and women’s entrances to the outer plaza is a travesty. The fact that women can be arrested or harassed for wearing a tallit there is shameful. The fact that liberal Jews often opt to pray at the Southern Wall (a recent excavation) or at Robinson’s Arch, or on the rooftop of the Hebrew Union College overlooking the Old City, because they cannot fully express themselves at Judaism’s oldest holy place is a infuriating. The fact that secular Jews think of it as a makom dati – a place for the Orthodox – is tragic.

The Kotel no longer belongs to the secular Jews or the liberal Jews. Now it will no longer belong to new
olim. Yet for many, the act of making aliyah is a religious act – an expression of deepest Jewish identity and faith. In that sense, there is no more appropriate place for these ceremonies than the Jewish world’s holiest religious site. Just because the ceremony does not involve a siddur and tallit, just because it allows men and women to stand together, does not remove it from the realm of religion.

As long as we continue to define “religious” in the narrow terms of ultra-Orthodoxy, the Jewish state cannot truly flourish Jewishly. This Kotel incident is a step backwards in a country that is begging to move forwards. In recent years, studies show that for the first time, more Israeli Jews identify with Reform Judaism than with any other religious sect. (This doesn’t mean they necessarily affiliate, of course.) More and more Israelis are coming into contact with liberal Judaism and discovering that it speaks to them, it expresses a religious truth with which they identify, and it helps them break down the artificial wall between “religious” and “secular.”

There are dozens of congregations working to bring liberal Judaism to the Jewish state. (Check out the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism and the Masorti Movement.) They are fighting a fight for the soul of the Jewish state. Israel needs Reform and Conservative Judaism – and Orthodoxy and secular Judaism – if it is to be the a Jewish state. And we liberal Jews need Israel – for its culture, language, music, history, vitality, and holiness.

L’shanah Haba-ah Biy’rushalayim – Next Year in Jerusalem… at the Kotel.