Who Needs Denominations, Indeed?

[Spengler]

Who Needs Denominations, Indeed? on the Spengler Blog


by David P. Goldman


A friend points out that the rate of attrition of American Jews is much higher than the standard estimates suggest. After a million Russian Jewish immigrants and perhaps half that number of Israelis, the numbers of American Jews remain static -- which implies that a comparable number of American Jews have fallen off the radar. The sociologists employed by the American Jewish organizations, for all their pessimism, have not caught up with the implosion of the liberal wings of American Judaism. Orthodoxy (both Modern and haredi) is flourishing, but little else.

There still is a lot of wishful thinking out there. Today's Jewish Ideas Daily leads with a defense of non-denominational Judaism, under the rubric, "Who Needs Denominations?" Author Yehudah Mirsky wonders whether the Reform and Conservative denominational structure makes sense in today's world:

If one feature of modern life is the ascendance of reason and science as sources of knowledge and authority, another is expressiveness, the conviction that the truth is to be found in one's own subjectivity and in the recesses of one's own experience and passions. This impulse, helped along by new technologies and forms of organization that make for more diffuse structures of authority and belief, and by currents like feminism that link the expressive ideal with the demand for equality, has powerfully reworked all of contemporary religion. In Western societies today, even the most stringent form of traditionalism is chosen; if it does not find an echo in the subjective experience of the individual, it will not long endure.

In short, Rabbi Mirsky thinks that in the modern world every Jew will make up her or her own Judaism to suit "the subjective experience of the individual," in a free-form sort of organization that allows for such things.

That is substantially what the Reform movement has been doing for years, as I wrote in the Feb. 2010 First Things. The Reform movement has lost a third of its members in the past decade. If you are looking for something the validates your subjective experience, there are lots of other things besides Judaism that will accommodate you. The founder of the ultra-liberal Jewish denomination of Reconstructionism, Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan, was himself a Jew of traditional habits, who did not believe in God. The synagogue, he said, is where we say kaddish (act as mourners) for the religion of our fathers. An older generation of Jews felt obligation without believing; their children and grandchildren fall away from Judaism altogether.

Rabbi Mirsky adds,

Today's American Jewish denominations are very much the products of their time and place and of the specific circumstances of American religious life as a whole, heavily shaped as that life has been by essentially Protestant nomenclature and modes of organization. Interestingly, the denominational structure is dramatically different from that prevailing in Israel or other places in the world. No less interestingly, the denomination registering the greatest current growth, or at least the greatest internal retention rate, is the one with the least centralized structure and the most thoroughgoing demands on the faithful—namely, Orthodoxy.

Jewish denomination structure does indeed derive from Protestant nomenclature, because the liberal denominations are a response to liberal Protestantism in the first place. The founding premise of Reform Judaism is the abandonment of Election and the consequent messianic hope of restoration of the Temple. Conservative Judaism emerged from the German society "Wissenschaft des Judentums" (Science of Judaism) which wanted to keep the outer form of observance with a rationalist inner core. Both are shaped by Christian culture. And that is why neither has any purchase in Israel, where there are few Christians to whom to accommodate. For Israelis, the synagogue is simply normative, traditional Judaism; you go, or you don't.

[ellens]

Reform and Conservative Judaism essentially tried to remake traditional Judaism in the image of liberal suburban Protestantism of the 1950s' because that is when mainstream Protestantism was fashionable and Orthodox Judaism (or traditional Judaism) was at it weakest point. Anyone who is familiar with traditional Judaism can see the total disconnect between the two, even at the architectural and organizational level. Jewish religious life was traditionally organized around extended family and closely knit communities, typically in small towns (shtetls) where everyone knew each other. The strength of the religious life and community came from this fact - the closeness and concern of people for each other and the fact that the rabbi knew his congregation members very well and genuinely felt a personal connection to them and their well-being. The concept of "the people of Israel" can be strongly felt in this sort of surrounding where you really feel that you are part of a people, not in a large hall where people who are essentially strangers to each other come to worship twice a year, and rarely more.

The suburban synagogue with its huge paper membership, rabbi who resembles a social worker or JCC administrator, rather than religious guide, and impersonal social relationships among congregants who rarely see each other, had nothing in common whatsoever with traditional Jewish forms of religious life. It could only do well as long as the role model it was imitating, mainstream Protestantism, was doing well. When the latter began to die in the 1960's, liberal Judaism followed suit.

I see this very clearly in my own suburban county of New York City where Orthodox Judaism is now the biggest branch of Judaism, with a multiplicity of small schuls, while the large Reform and Conservative ones are merging and dying. The official membership statistics of the 3 branches are all lies, inaccurate, or out-of-date, so I don't look at them at all. What I look at is the observable reality around me and in other Jewish communities.

This is not to underestimate the challenges facing Orthodox Judaism as it grows and becomes the dominant Jewish religious voice. There are lots of challenges for any subculture that runs head-on into a powerful secular culture that promotes many values exactly opposite to what it stands for. Every traditional religion, or even high culture itself, faces a great struggle to survive and thrive in the current environment. However, the least of the challenges of Orthodox Judaism in America over the next 50 years will be the attraction of liberal Judaism. That period is in the past, and is now over.

[Spengler]

Ellen,

Your point about bogus membership numbers is important.

A friend of mine belongs to a Conservative shul (on the traditional side) in Brooklyn and brought his four-year-old to start kindergarten there last month. What he saw took him aback: more than half the families were Russian or Israeli. They are not quite observant, but they have no interest at all in emulating liberal Protestantism. They want to be Jewish. The old American Jewish constituency of Conservative Judaism is melting away; the more serious immigrants replaced them at this shul. That's Brooklyn, to be sure, but it emphasizes a point: the catastrophe of liberal Judaism is far greater than the mainstream Jewish organizations are willing to acknowledge.

[ellens]

You are right, David, to call liberal Judaism a catastrophe. Hyperbole here is not out of place. They have fudged and fiddled with statistics for years to cover a dismal reality which you and I know from personal experience.

Smallness, in these matters, is better, not largeness. Many small congregations, each with its own character and social network, is the way a Jewish community should be organized. Not large impersonal museum-like buildings called "temples" (a Greek word, by the way, not at all Jewish). In my town, there are 7 orthodox shuls to choose from, none terribly large. This is the way Judaism always was, if you go and travel through Europe and see what used to be. I was in Dubrovnik over the summer taking a vacation, and visited the beautifully preserved synagogue in the old walled city. The guide told us that at its peak, the Dubrovnik Jewish community had no more than 300 members (about 60 families), yet the community survived for centuries amidst the shifting fortunes of this small city-state and played an active role in its commercial life. The Jews all lived in a "ghetto" area which was either side of a narrow alley way with nice-looking apartments. Not too bad. Nowadays that sort of accommodation in a densely populated city in a developed country would be known as gentrification. Preferable in my view, to the barren wasteland of much of American suburbia.

[MarcH]

Ellen wrote, "What I look at is the observable reality around me and in other Jewish communities". I think this is spot on. Another "observable reality" might be the backgrounds of the knowledgeable laypeople in Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, etc. synagogues. I would guess that many of these folks come from Orthodox families and had the benefit of Orthodox religious training. I would also guess that a fair number of those laypeople who serve as baal koreh (ritual Torah reader), gabbi (coordinator of services), and shliach tzibbur (prayer leader of a minyan) in non-Orthodox synagogues had the benefit of Orthodox background and training.

Of course, Orthodoxy also has some hurdles such as an irritating insularity and the very high cost of items such as kosher food, Jewish parochial schools, and a house inside the eruv (neighborhood in which greater activity is permitted on the Sabbath). I'm coming around to the conclusion that Jewish life outside of Israel, while it has great rewards, is a major schlep, mostly for the wealthy and/or those (peaceful) fanatics who don't mind life in a cocoon.

[ellens]

MarCH,

You are absolutely right that especially in the case of Conservative Judaism, they relied for years on a committed minority of people who were raised in nominally Orthodox families and background to supply their synagogues with Torah readers and reliable attenders at Shabbat services. Any thoughtful person can see that this strategy is not going to be viable as a long-term survival strategy unless the Orthodox continue to survive and hemorrhage people into the Conservative movement.

Yet, the Conservative leadership for years claimed their movement was the best positioned for viability in American society due to the NONviability of the Orthodox. Well, how does that make sense? If the Orthodox are nonviable, then so are the Conservatives. If the Orthodox turn out to be viable, then the Conservatives won't get the attrition from them and still won't be viable. Either way, the Conservative movement turns out to be nonviable. I figured that out at the age of 13, yet decades passed before the official leadership of the Conservative Movement finally admitted they have a viability problem. Oy veh.

[Spengler]

MarcH,

I forget who made this point, but it's worth retelling: when Conservative Judaism approved travel on Shabbat for the purpose of synagogue attendance, an important dimension of Jewish life went down the drain. In Orthodox communities Shabbat is a day of socializing--everyones spend some time at kiddush, people eat at each others' homes, kids get to know each other. The shul is close to home so it's no burden to daven mincha (afternoon prayers), and maybe stick around for the communal seuda shlishi (third meal) and ma'ariv (evening prayers). If you have to drive to shul, very few people will do this.

This can be difficult in the suburbs (and there are famous cases in Cleveland and Great Neck where liberal Jews objected to Orthodox construction plans). Suburban day schools can be dreadfully expensive. I live in Manhattan, which makes things easier. Plenty of poor Jews live in Brooklyn and get along well enough, although the haredi yeshivot often are dreadful.

I attended conservative shuls (Park Avenue Synagogue and Or Zarua) for years--never really got to know anyone. Or Zarua's rabbi Harlan Wechsler is a pious and generous man, a serious scholar of Torah commentary and a wonderful preacher. Orthodox Jews sometimes daven at his shul to hear his sermons. Conservative congregations even at their best (and Or Zarua is one of the most traditional) are composed of people who invent observance for themselves. There is no standard. This means that everyone looks over their shoulder and everyone else to see whether they are doing the right thing, which of course no-one can do, because there is no right thing. This splinters the community.

For any number of reasons, Conservative Judaism doesn't seem to work. As you note, the leaders in Conservative congregation usually have Orthodox training. As this generation passes away, there's no-one to replace them.

[ellens]

I agree with Spengler's previous comments. However, there is something to be said for a generosity of spirit when it comes to lax observance. This is the one thing that the Conservative Movement did get right, to some degree. Not everybody can be totally pious and totally observant (including yours truly). For a long time it wasn't really clear whether traditional Judaism could survive in an open society where observance can't be completely mandated by social pressure, as was possible in the shtetl communities of Europe. In such a small environment where assimilation into the gentile society is not possible, you can blundgeon people into being observant, just by social pressure. This is how all traditional societies work, as Spengler has written about many times before. It is not how modern, urban and educated societies work, though.

This was the real conceptual barrier, I believe, for Orthodoxy to overcome in the modern world. How do you make observance normative and desirable, but not absolutely mandatory, in every community. This is still the essential problem that Orthodox Judaism faces and you see it everywhere, in every day school and synagogue. It requires, I believe, good leadership, a variety of synagogues with different approaches, and most important, the human connection provided by serious religious life to keep people observant, when the natural tendency is to backslide. It's always iffy, even when it succeeds. Somehow, Orthodox Judaism and certain right wing brands of Conservative Judaism are succeeding, but I attribute this partly to the horror story that much of secular culture and lifestyles have become. Having an unattractive alternative lifestyle as the default option does always help.

[Pastaneta]

Ellens:

my husband is an unbeliever but he is from Transylvania (before coming to Israel). He has no problem reading in Hebrew but when I can drag him to shul, it must be an orthodox one. I remember when we were at a Bar Mitzva in New Rochelle in a reform synagogue, he was horrified at the rabbi playing the guitar on Shabbat...

He says that if he has to go to shul, then it must be a real one, by which he means an orthodox one.

OTH, he has told me that the largest and most beautiful synagogue in his native town of Szatmar (and no - he is not a haredi) was a reformed one. After the war it was closed as not enough Jews returned to Szatmar (or Satu Mare now). His father went to the orthodox one that was still open.

Which is to say that you had reform streams in Central Europe before the war.

[ellens]

In Hungary there was a little bit of Reform perhaps, because of the German influence. Look, Orthodox Judaism in Eastern Europe was in a decrepit state by the late 19th century, which is why we got Reform and Conservative altogether. No reasonable person doubts that. I can't see the purpose of Reform Judaism at all anymore, though, since it's main original purpose was social - to encourage Jews to acculturate and be part of the larger society. That seems to be the problem these days, not the solution, so Reform has really outlived its usefulness.

Conservative Judaism did have a purpose and in theory still does, of providing competition and new ideas for the Orthodox, so they will not become stagnant, close-minded (more than necessary), and impervious to the world around them, as is their tendency. I would hope something survives of Conservative Judaism so it can play that role in a credible way, and I think in America something will survive, but not the Movement as a whole. A movement can't only be based on opposing an existing norm, it must also stand for something positive on its own. The Conservatives opposed the Orthodox for being backward and uninterested in the learnings of secular culture. It also opposed the Reform for being so unJewish in all respects. They were right on both counts. Fine. But what did they stand for and believe other than being against the other extremes? Wasn't clear 130 years ago, when the movement was founded, and is still not clear today. A movement that doesn't know what it stands for after 130 years of bureaucratic functioning, really needs to rent out its space and go into another line of business. Large swaths of liberal Christianity are in the same bucket and might well take the same advice.

[CognitiveDistoibance]

... But what did they stand for and believe other than being against the other extremes? Wasn't clear 130 years ago, when the movement was founded, and is still not clear today. A movement that doesn't know what it stands for after 130 years of bureaucratic functioning, really needs to rent out its space and go into another line of business. Large swaths of liberal Christianity are in the same bucket and might well take the same advice.

Amen.

Unfortunately, organizations that are bereft of real purpose still retain a purpose: self-perpetuation--despite delivering anything of real value.

A friend of my wife's decided to change her mainline protestant church. Why? Well, they weren't all that involved themselves (for like 15 years) and then when her mother died and no one from the church responded. It's my wife's friend, so I bite my tongue, but that says much about what little that family values in a church (social services?) and the bankruptcy (on multiple levels) of the church as well.

I am reminded of an old M*A*S*H episode (can't find it on YouTube ) where Colonel Potter's jeep is disabled, and old calvary man that he was, he pulls out his pistol and puts the jeep out of it's misery...

[ellens]

CD,

Self perpetuation for its own sake is the hallmark of all bureaucracies everywhere and in all times, but what is unique about contemporary America is how even in the voluntaristic sphere such things exist. I can understand government employment becoming nothing but early retirement passes, but nonprofit organizations and religious organizations are supposed to exist explicitly for a purpose because they rely on the donations of enthusiastic people who support "the cause." Governments aren't burdened by that necessity.

We live in a large society where people are detached from the things they ostensibly support, and so we see large organizations withering away to nothing yet still receiving annual dues payments and other philanthropic support from well-meaning people, even though they have no raison d'etre left. There are many, many Jewish organizations in this category, because Jews (in the past) were very philanthropic and supported more organizations per capita than just about anybody else. One day, years ago, I was looking for freelance writing work and called up a well-known Jewish woman's organization that in its heyday was a really influential and valuable organization. The lady who answered the phone sounded like a parody from Seinfeld of one of its older Jewish female figures (Lenore Sokol, I believe). Completely disinterested in her job, unhelpful, whining tone of voice. I was appalled that such a person would be the PR Director of such an organization, but this told me what sort of condition the organization was in. When you become a parody of yourself worthy of Seinfeld, it's time to lock the doors and rent out the space.

[Frodo]

Spengler,

You should bear in mind that a lot of Conservative and Reform Jews don't want to be Orthodox and if you push them too hard they'll go Unitarian on you.

There are three types of people you meet quite often at Unitarian congregations: old school yankee Unitarians, people with a Catholic background and people with a Jewish background.

[Pastaneta]

May be true of Reform, but not of Conservative...

Actually in the last years, both have been moving toward more orthodoxy. I am member of a conservative shul where you have a mechitza...

[Frodo]

May be true of Reform, but not of Conservative...

The tendency may be stronger among the Reform than among the Conservative.

Actually in the last years, both have been moving toward more orthodoxy.

There are currents and counter-currents. However, there are many people of Jewish background among the growing number of people classifying themselves as "spiritual rather than religious" or "of no particular religion".

I am member of a conservative shul where you have a mechitza...

I know that such shuls exist; but do you remember how many Conservative and Reform Jews there were a generation ago?