JPPI's Jewish World Dialogue

Exploring the Jewish Spectrum in a Time of Fluid Identity

Thursday December 15, 2016


This year’s Dialogue Process marks the third year that JPPI has been building a structure for a systematic discourse on issues that are at the core of the collective interests of the Jewish people globally.

Exploring the Jewish Spectrum in a Time of Fluid Identity, discussing together how the different streams approach Judaism, is a main component of our project on Pluralism and Democracy in Israel and the Diaspora. We are grateful to the William Davidson Foundation for supporting this endeavor and encouraging a deeper understanding among Jews globally.

The 2016 Jewish World Dialogue was co-headed for the first time by an Israeli JPPI Senior Fellow in tandem with an American one. Shmuel Rosner and John Ruskay, representing the two largest Jewish communities in the world, started a personal conversation before widening it to 49 different seminars worldwide. They didn’t neglect the smaller communities, which many times present the most difficult challenges.

JPPI’s effort to enhance pluralism in the Jewish world has, from its inception, enjoyed the encouragement of Israel’s leaders, such as former President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and JAFI’s Chairman Natan Sharansky as well as the participating communities and Jewish organizations abroad. President Reuven Rivlin, who is dedicated to bridging gaps in Israel and world Jewry, launched a tradition with JPPI to bring together representatives of all the streams to study together Jewish texts. The Dialogue is approaching the point when it should culminate in a deeper results-oriented conversation at the highest echelons of leadership on how we should fulfill our common destiny.

The Jewish people is undergoing a period of radical change in its internal dynamics: generational transitions; the promise of some normalization of Israel’s situation in the Middle East; a shift in Jewish Identification and sense of community. The external environment of the Jewish people is changing radically as well: globalization; geostrategic shifts; value transformations; scientific and technological innovations; new manifestations of anti-Semitism. All these create new realities and challenges that provide the Jewish people unprecedented opportunities for thriving but also pose serious risks of decline.
Enriching the dialogue in the Jewish world between different communities, streams, and political orientations may help us take advantage of opportunities and avert dangers and threats.

We are continuing in making an effort to internalize and implement the lessons learned from each year of JPPI’s Structured Dialogue Process.

I want to thank the Institute’s leadership, and especially Stuart Eizenstat, Dennis Ross, and Leonid Nevzlin, who head our Professional Guiding Council, for their continuing commitment to, and support of, our work. Special thanks, once again, to the William Davidson Foundation for its confidence and trust.

Avinoam Bar-Yosef

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Exploring the Jewish Spectrum in a Time of Fluid Identity

As mentioned in an earlier chapter, the meaning of Jewishness as understood by individual Jews, Jewish institutions, and by the State of Israel has far-reaching legal and procedural implications. The already discussed Law of Return, which confers Jews with the right to settle in Israel depends on a particular definition of “Jew.” As we have seen, Dialogue participants were by and large in agreement that the Law should not become more vague because of the changing circumstances in Diaspora communities. On the contrary, many argued that there is ample reason to make it somewhat stricter than it is today to counter trends that could lead it to become too loose for Israel to sustain.

We have also demonstrated how definitions of Jewishness can impact how Jewish institutions assign certain roles (for example, rabbis, members of certain committees, and federation executives) based, among other things, on their understanding of the type of Jewishness required for these roles. Some communities emphasize involvement in Jewish life as the basic sign of Jewishness while others opt for the traditional definitions of lineage (born to a Jewish motherparent) or conversion. In some communities a job candidate’s Jewishness plays a minor role among all other considerations (professionalism, personality, etc) while in other communities, at least for certain roles, adherence to a particular definition of Jewishness is a precondition for even being considered for the job.

All in all, Jews tend to want their local communities and institutions to define the type of Jewishness that is desirable in different situations. As an ideal, they may agree that it would be advantageous to have a broader understanding of Jewishness, but when it comes to their synagogue’s rabbi, the criteria is more rigorous. “I don’t see the congregation taking orders from a distant authority if they find these orders offensive or inappropriate,” as one rabbi in Dallas put it.238 JPPI’s Dialogue survey also shows that in all countries except Israel, Jews chose the “Jewish community in which s/he lives” as best situated to “determine who is Jewish.”

Based on the research and as a consequence of these sentiments we recommend taking the following points into account:

  1. There is not going to be a single agreed upon definition of Jewishness embraced by all institutions, which means that Jewish institutions have to learn to work alongside each other even when their respective understandings of Jewishness differ markedly.
  2. Local bodies are, indeed, best situated to determine the type of Jewishness they ought to apply to their institutions. However, it would not be unwise to urge local communities and institutions to make their determinations with an eye on the larger Jewish world and its understanding of Jewishness. If gaps between Jewish bodies become very wide, their ability to work jointly for the Jewish future will be impaired.
  3. The same lesson applies to Israel and Diaspora communities. Israel should not further compound the already notable differences between its definition of Jewishness and that of Jews living elsewhere by adopting stricter standards based on Orthodox interpretations of Jewishness. Diaspora communities should also be wary of adopting standards Jewish Israelis would not be able to accept – especially actions that frame assimilationist trends as desirable rather than tolerable.
  4. While connected Jews – represented in the Dialogue – understand that current trends require flexibility and the acceptance of a wide variety of tastes and beliefs with respect to the meaning of Jewishness, they also still seem to want certain norms, vague as they might be, to remain in place. As Jewish communities tackle issues and challenges that involve ascribing Jewishness criteria, it is not mandatory to always choose the least demanding, most equivocal, option.
  5. It is necessary to further investigate what the future holds for the Law of Return. It must not be canceled, as it remains a cornerstone of Israel’s Jewish character. But changing times require fresh thinking about the criteria of Jewishness as defined by Israel today, and their applicability to a Jewish world that evolves over the coming decades.
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