Well, it could have been worse.
Mar. 8th, 2006 05:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rymenhildThe news from the CJLS (the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, in charge of determining religious law for the rabbis of Judaism's Conservative Movement, in case you haven't been following along here) regarding same-sex marriages and ordination of gay and lesbian clergy is apparently no news. The committee asked the authors of the submitted opinions to revise their proposals; the issue will be treated again the next time the CJLS convenes in December.
ETA: The Forward has more details, including news of a recent change in the CJLS policies that requires 80% unanimity, instead of the more usual 24%, to approve legal opinions on "particularly momentous" issues (i.e., given the issues facing the Conservative Movement lately, gays, gays and gays!).
Edited again, on March 7, to add: Either the Forward article was unclear or I misread it. The New York Times article post-non-vote explains that only the most radical proposal on the table, which advocated a complete change (takanah) in Jewish law, would require an 80% vote to pass. The other three opinions only need the normal 24%.
ETA: The Forward has more details, including news of a recent change in the CJLS policies that requires 80% unanimity, instead of the more usual 24%, to approve legal opinions on "particularly momentous" issues (i.e., given the issues facing the Conservative Movement lately, gays, gays and gays!).
Edited again, on March 7, to add: Either the Forward article was unclear or I misread it. The New York Times article post-non-vote explains that only the most radical proposal on the table, which advocated a complete change (takanah) in Jewish law, would require an 80% vote to pass. The other three opinions only need the normal 24%.
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no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 02:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 03:07 am (UTC)The committee's current consideration of the homosexual issue began with last spring's submission of nine separate opinions, which over the past year were culled down and combined into four opinions. Ultimately, rabbis Gordon Tucker, Ben Zion Bergman, Robert Fine and Myron Geller collaborated on the decision overturning the ban on gay sex, while Dorff was joined by rabbis Avram Reisner and Daniel Nevins on his decision [which prohibits anal sex but otherwise permits gay relationships]. Rabbi Joel Roth, who authored the 1992 decision that prohibited gay relations completely, has authored an opinion expanding on that argument. His 1992 opinion passed by a margin of 14 to 7 with three abstentions. Rabbi Leonard Levy has also authored an opinion banning gay relationships.
If any readers have access to more detail (perhaps some of you associated with the JTS community?) please feel free to share.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 03:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 04:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 09:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 03:52 am (UTC)From a halakhic standpoint, I don't know why male and female homosexuality are being treated the same way when it comes to these tshuvot, since one's a d'oraita issue of reinterpretation and the other is a d'rabbanan issue of reworking. I suppose that from a real world position, permitting lesbian rabbis but not gay ones would just be weird and implausible.
If you want I can see if I still have to Dorff draft (if I didn't put it in the box that I shipped to myself and got lost in the mail), and send it to you if you'd like...
no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 05:15 am (UTC)I suspect any rabbi liberal enough to want to legalize any form of homosexuality would also be too liberal to want to impose an immediate double standard on two variations on homosexuality, but I see where you're coming from.
As far as the tshuvah, I don't know how long it is or what facilities you have, but would you be willing to scan it and send it as a graphics file of some sort?
no subject
Date: 2006-03-09 12:45 pm (UTC)Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-09 05:38 am (UTC)And is there anyone else who's annoyed that they spend this much time obsessing over homosexual sex and say NOTHING FOR FIFTY YEARS on heterosexual sex without going to the mikveh first? When, exactly, did that Torah law get revoked? And do they talk about it? And how many congregants who get all riled up about homosexual sex have any idea about how to count white days, or what veset days are?
E
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-09 04:29 pm (UTC)I think you're a bit confused. The Reconstructionist movement predated the Conservative debate by decades, and the "UTJ" that formed in response to the decision to admit women was the Union for Traditional Judaism, not United Torah Judaism. (The Union for Traditional Judaism currently consists of a handful of faculty members operating out of a house in Teaneck. Barring unforeseen changes, it won't last another generation.)
Though it is entertaining to thing of the next right-wing splinter: "the movement that's OK with women in the rabbinate but draws the line at gays"
Much of the opposition to ordination of gay rabbis, like most of the lay support for female rabbis, is based on societal norms rather than halakhah. Of course, there are those who base such views on halakhic arguments, but they seem to be few and far between. It would be interesting to see the makeup of such a group, which would probably be a combination of homophobic women's libbers, strict halakhists who accept egalitarian theory, and some folks who mix the two just a bit (i.e., those who believe that the Torah forbids homosexual rabbis but can't coherently explain why they count women in a minyan).
And is there anyone else who's annoyed that they spend this much time obsessing over homosexual sex and say NOTHING FOR FIFTY YEARS on heterosexual sex without going to the mikveh first? When, exactly, did that Torah law get revoked? And do they talk about it? And how many congregants who get all riled up about homosexual sex have any idea about how to count white days, or what veset days are?
You're mistaken as to the way the CJLS works. Note that they've never in their history issued a statement on the kashrut status of pork. Does that mean that the Conservative Movement permits bacon consumption? No. It means that either (1) they are tacitly supporting the traditional halakhah or (2) any innovations or leniencies have been ruled upon by individual rabbis who did not feel the need to contact the CJLS for a ruling.
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-09 07:11 pm (UTC)The problem with tacitly supporting the traditional halakha of mikveh, as I understand it, is that traditional Orthodox halakha of mikveh involves all sorts of interesting superstitions and weirdnesses. Those non-Orthodox mikveh-observant women of my acquaintance whom I've talked to about the issue have all told me stories about how they're sure something's wrong with the Artscroll mikveh rules, but they have no idea what. In almost all cases, these women went to their rabbis and asked for specific rulings on what they were supposed to do -- and the rabbis were nearly as confused as they were. I think a ruling on how the Conservative movement treats mikveh, for those people who do observe it, would make matters much clearer. It wouldn't surprise me if the CJLS just doesn't want to go there, though.
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-09 08:33 pm (UTC)Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 02:34 am (UTC)Wow. You win a cookie.
At the very least, though, some kind of educational outreach on taharat ha-mishpacha would be a Good Thing.
That's . . . kind of complicated. The problem is that a lot of people (including many JTS students) find the notion of taharat hamishpahah to be offensive at best. It is therefore a difficult subject to broach in any kind of public forum without alienating gobs and gobs of congregational biomass.
Variations of the practice are spreading within the Conservative movement on a grassroots level, which is probably a better vector than anything the USCJ could come up with.
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 04:18 pm (UTC)(P.S.: On my personal Scale of Offensiveness, fear of Icky Girl Parts actually comes in somewhat lower than pervasive xenophobia -- which, in an indirect way, is precisely the thrust of our recent Biennial, nu?)
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 05:18 pm (UTC)Agreed, but there not everyone feels that way. One of the approaches favored by certain outreach people is to make Judaism seem as palatable as possible to the uneducated laity, presumably in the hopes that they'll drop everything and kasher their kitchens. (I shouldn't be so cynical about this, but I have to admit that I haven't seen anything work too well just yet.)
(P.S.: On my personal Scale of Offensiveness, fear of Icky Girl Parts actually comes in somewhat lower than pervasive xenophobia -- which, in an indirect way, is precisely the thrust of our recent Biennial, nu?)
My perception is that xenophobia is a major motivating factor in the faulty sociological theory that was, in turn, the thrust of the Biennial. The whole notion that ending intermarriage — retroactively, no less! — will end assimilation reminds me of all sorts of interesting "facts" that have been discredited throughout the ages, but to which people have clung out of a need to believe that the old ideas were right.
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 04:21 pm (UTC)Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 05:25 pm (UTC)The nature of these bottom-up initiatives is that one has to be in the right place, of course. In this case, one also has to be in a place with a mikveh, and one that is sufficiently attractive not to drive away people who would otherwise be committed. (The major reason why so many mikva'ot are so ratty is that the average clientele has no leverage at all. They can complain all they want, but they're going to keep showing up anyway. Most heterodox Jews do exercise a right not to patronize the institution, which may be why Mayyim Hayyim is so pretty and sanitary.)
Re: Can't say I'm surprised
Date: 2006-03-10 02:29 am (UTC)I do know that individual Conservative rabbis, including some rather staunch halakhic constructionists, have worked out simplified and more lenient guidelines.
where's the science
Date: 2006-03-09 10:31 pm (UTC)The explosion of discussion in the Conservative movement about homosexuality is not because homosexuality is more open and commonplace. If that was the case, there would be a similar argument about Jews eating pork. The reason homosexuality is different it that solid research has shown that some people are biologically homosexual and cannot change (with genetic or environmental causes or a mixture of both). This is the real reason there is halachic discussion on this topic and any halachic rules that doesn't include this rational for changing past traditions will be flawed.
Re: where's the science
Date: 2006-03-09 10:49 pm (UTC)Actually, the biggest flaw I saw in the 1992 Roth opinion (the one urging straight people to be compassionate towards --not gays-- people who desire to perform homosexual acts, and urging people who desire to perform homosexual acts to practice celibacy) was its misuse of scientific sources. That tshuvah picked and chose among the available studies of sexuality. It cited only those studies (most of which were already severely dated by 1992) that led to the bizarre conclusion that homosexuals remove themselves from the gene pool in order to support the family structures of their heterosexual friends and relations, so it would be wrong to let homosexuals form their own family structures.
My point, in this digression, is that rabbis, even in our movement, have not always known how to engage with science. I understand that they've been teaching themselves over the last several years, but still, presumably their fields of expertise are more likely to be in halacha than in biology and human sexuality. Maybe, because of that, they just feel more confident in speaking about the halachic angles at the moment.
(PS. Far be it from me to say that I have any expertise at all in biology or human sexuality studies; if I've said something stupid, and any reader around knows better, feel free to correct me.)
Re: where's the science
Date: 2006-03-09 11:30 pm (UTC)It doesn't take a lot of science knowledge to realize that for some people, homosexuality is not a choice. In some ways I respect the blurb on the Leviticus verse in the Orthodox Stone chumash which recognizes this point and then says that for some people alcholism isn't controllable and they need to fight their natural instincts (I might be using the wrong analogy). It's not the conclusion I would arrive at, but it doesn't deny the science of the issue.
Re: where's the science
Date: 2006-03-17 10:33 pm (UTC)Show me the science!
Date: 2006-03-17 10:24 pm (UTC)Additionally, I beg to differ- I think you know quite a bit more about human sexuality and biology than you think you do (or are giving yourself credit for).
Re: where's the science
Date: 2006-03-10 02:53 am (UTC)I disagree. One of the common threads of Conservative halakhic rulings — I would not go so far as to call it a "core principle" — is that as we learn more abou thow the world works, we better understand the meaning of scientifically-oriented halakhot. The CJLS's teshuvah on eating fish and meat together is a good example.
The explosion of discussion in the Conservative movement about homosexuality is not because homosexuality is more open and commonplace. If that was the case, there would be a similar argument about Jews eating pork. The reason homosexuality is different it that solid research has shown that some people are biologically homosexual and cannot change (with genetic or environmental causes or a mixture of both). This is the real reason there is halachic discussion on this topic and any halachic rules that doesn't include this rational for changing past traditions will be flawed.
But couldn't one argue that the revelation (which I accept, but not everyone does) that people aren't simply homosexual by choice is part of the reason why it's become socially acceptable? This is far too complicated a sociological phenomenon for us to talk about the single "real" reason behind it all.
The difficulty here is far deeper than a scientific argument about the cause(s) of homosexual attractions. What most modern Americans (that I know, anyway) fail to realize is that the very notion of more than one sexual orientation is a young one, historically speaking. Neither the society of the Bible, nor the rabbis of the Talmud, nor any of the rishonim seem to have had any notion that there were people who were exclusively attracted to the same sex, both sexually and romantically. (Ramba"m prohibited sex between women because it constituted promiscuity, which suggests that the idea of two women in a monogamous relationship never occurred to him.)