To the Editor:

. . . David Singer’s “Living with Intermarriage” [July] treats an extremely complex issue in an overly polemical manner, typified by his use of charged terms such as “accommodationist” to label those of differing opinion. In his reference to the article by Samuel Lieberman and myself in Midstream (November 1978), he fails to distinguish among the descriptive, analytical, and prescriptive elements in our discussion.

Mr. Singer claims that we “manage to argue simultaneously for a low birth rate and a high intermarriage rate—and to do this, moreover, in the name of Jewish survival!” We do no such thing. As we write in our conclusion: “We are not advocating high intermarriage rates or low fertility rates.” We take as given the facts of rising intermarriage and declining fertility rates for American Jews, and assess the consequences for the Jewish population in terms of quantity, quality, and the “variety of tasks on its collective agenda.”

To summarize briefly, we identify low (past and present) fertility, and not intermarriage, as the major contributor to the expected decline in Jewish population, since a significant minority of intermarried Jews, through conversion or other forms of affiliation, seek to identify with the Jewish community. Obviously, these Jews, and certainly their children, are attempting to acquire legitimate status as Jews outside of halakhic definitions. Orthodox Jews and others have every right to deny these claims to legitimacy, and to reflect this in policy for Orthodox organizations or synagogues and in their own private lives. What is not immediately obvious is why the halakhic definition must apply when enumerating the total population of American Jews, in which the Orthodox are, for better or worse, a clear minority. Our concern was with the impact of alternative counting rules on any estimate of Jewish population size. . . .

Mr. Singer also takes strong objection (emotional but neither logical nor factual) to our argument that intermarriage and low fertility may have some unforeseen benefits, as well as the well-known costs, for the Jewish community. These benefits, which sociologists call “latent functions,” derive from their role in creating an educated, affluent, middle-class Jewish community, in turn conducive to tasks such as the funding of Jewish communal institutions or the sophisticated defense of Jewish political interests. . . .

How much diversity can the community accommodate? Since the Jews have no Pope, the answer will be a popular, democratic one: it is emerging from the aggregated actions of individual Jews. Those who prefer their community boundaries tightly drawn are no doubt dismayed by the ensuing confusion. Since the Jewish community speaks with many voices, one finds support for both the “open-door” and the “hard-line” positions on intermarriage.

My view is that the social forces leading to intermarriage may be too powerful for Jewish community policy to counteract. At any rate, the case for spending on Jewish education, for example, should be made on intrinsic merits and not linked to anticipated reductions in intermarriage. The best policy payoff for the community would lie, I suggest, in ameliorative, “post-hoc” policies, as is suggested by the numerous conversions which occur following intermarriages.

Finally, in discussing intermarriage, we are discussing human beings in love. Intermarrying Jews often agonize over their decisions and are torn among the conflicting loves of partner, parents, and, yes, (the Jewish) people. Some make sincere attempts to perpetuate their Jewish commitment, others seek expedient Reform intermarriages with little Jewish content. No constructive purpose is served by Mr. Singer’s describing this latter group as “the community’s dirty laundry.” Moreover, by discounting even the possibility of a collective Jewish population gain through intermarriage, Mr. Singer casts doubt on the integrity of all converts, those of convenience and those of commitment.

Morton Weinfeld
McGill University
Montreal, Canada

_____________

To the Editor:

David Singer points out the problem, and it is very real indeed, but he leaves us with little or no solution, other than to confront the phenomenon of assimilation as it affects the Jewish community.

What is required is a removal of those blinders the Jewish community conveniently keeps in its back pocket for just such unpleasant emergencies. . . . Whether we like it or not, the number of marriages involving a Jewish and a non-Jewish partner will continue rising for many years to come. Crying gevalt will not help, berating the synagogue and the rabbi will not help, attempting to dissuade the couple will not help. What is required is a greater effort to involve the individual couples. . . . It is beneficial neither for the couple nor for Judaism to make rules and regulations so rigid that the couple either cannot enter the world of Judaism at all, or else can enter it so easily and with so little commitment that Judaism appears worthless. Both these extremes—the strict halakhists and the rabbinical “marrying Sams”—are to be avoided. . . .

Conversion of the non-Jewish partner-to-be is the ultimate goal, but that conversion cannot be based on trying to make “the Jewish side” happy. Real conversion comes only after study, after living with Judaism, and after the Jewish partner rediscovers the impact of Judaism on his or her life. No hard and fast timetable should be established . . . because one cannot designate the precise minute or hour when one suddenly “wants to be Jewish.” The prospective bride and groom need to be shown how vital they are to the Jewish future, and how greatly their lives could be enhanced if they chose to practice Judaism. . . .

Slogans won’t bring this about, citing statistics won’t do it, and studies regarding assimilation won’t do it. The only way two people of differing religions will be guided to the point of resolving those differences is by finding some individual, one would hope a rabbi, who cares enough to study with them, learn with them, explain to them all aspects of Judaism. . . . It takes time. It is not easy. It will not work for all, but it does hold out some positive promise for the future of Judaism.

[Rabbi] Howard A. Simon
Congregation Beth Israel
Margate, New Jersey

_____________

To the Editor:

David Singer states in his article that “we do not know” what the effects are of secular and religious education, residential segregation, etc. upon the formation of Jewish intermarriages. If Mr. Singer had consulted my article, “Studies of Jewish Intermarriage in the United States,” in the 1963 issue of the American Jewish Year Book. . . he would have found some of the answers. A more recent paper of mine, entitled “Intermarriage Among Jewry: A Function of Acculturation, Community Organization, and Family Structure,” printed in Movements and Issues in American Judaism (Bernard Martin, ed., Greenwood Press, 1978), brings my earlier work up to date and considers the effects of such factors as individualism, narcissism, and the women’s liberation movement upon Jewish intermarriage.

Erich Rosenthal
Queens College
Flushing, New York

_____________

To the Editor:

In his welcome addition to the continuing discussion on intermarriage, David Singer notes that the current discussion is characterized by increasing concern but deficient information. . . . The main obstacle to acquiring such information . . . appears to be a persistent unwillingness on the part of the Jewish community to face up to unpleasant realities and the shift in priorities and resources that they demand.

As Mr. Singer observes, most of the available information—like the National Jewish Population Survey, for example—reports attitudes rather than actual behavior: how people react (or say they do) to intermarriage rather than what actually happens as a result of it. The few studies that report on behavior are enlightening, but so far limited in scope, covering one or two random communities, or a small population sample. The inevitable result of this limited information is speculation on the consequences of intermarriage, involving demographic projections which inevitably reflect the biases, and hopes, of their authors.

In the face of this obvious need for better information, it continues to be a mystery why the national Jewish institutions have not responded. . . . And it is deplorable that one such institution, the Institute for Jewish Policy Studies in Washington, which demonstrated a capability and commitment to serious research in this area, was forced to close its doors for lack of support in the summer of 1979.

Elihu Bergman
Washington, D.C.

_____________

To the Editor:

David Singer, . . . like a growing number of Jewish scholars, recognizes the problem posed to the Jewish community by intermarriage and yet he falls into what would seem to be an obvious trap: . . . the trap of creating a message for those who don’t need it. . . .

I do not agree with Mr. Singer and other scholars who cite the need for finely honed statistics. What does it matter? Will we accurately predict our own demise? . . . What we have is an issue of passion, of emotion. Let it be dealt with passionately and directed to those who can do something about if unmarried Jews approaching childbearing age and those younger products of intermarriage also looking to establish their families. . . . The message of our future, which includes the message of our past, must be brought with reason and passion to our youngsters: life is long; children and careers are possible; Judaism and Jewishness are a wondrous bounty worth having and holding. . . . The hard part is doing it—reaching the right audience. . . . I firmly believe, however, that the message will be well received, if only it is carried. . . .

William A. Gralnick
American Jewish Committee
Atlanta, Georgia

_____________

David Singer writes:

Stripped of its academic jargon—“latent functions,” “ameliorative ‘post-hoc’ policies,” etc.—Morton Weinfeld’s letter, like his Midstream article, is a call for accommodation to intermarriage, pure and simple. Why he seeks to deny this, or the fact that he sees zero population growth as an important element in an “alternative survivalist perspective on the Jewish future,” is beyond me.

Rabbi Howard A. Simon believes that an effort to reach out to intermarried couples “hold[s] out some positive promise for the future of Judaism.” I think that it will only serve to encourage yet more mixed unions.

Erich Rosenthal, whose articles I did in fact read before preparing my essay, may be interested in what Calvin Goldscheider, an outstanding Jewish demographer, has to say: “It is obvious that the centrality of the intermarriage issue for Jewish survival . . . has not been matched by a comparable emphasis in social-science research. Indeed, one is amazed that such limited, often biased, superficial data, based on a small number of cases, in a limited number of Jewish communities have been the source of speculation, reanalyses, summaries, and reviews in hundreds of articles.”