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Sulzbergers & Jewishness March 5, 2004 I am in the middle of reading Ed Pawlick's book Libel . Currently, I'm in the section where Libel discuss the Sulzbergers' Jewish background, and I feel an error's been made here. The error pertains to the Sulzbergers' sense of Jewish identity, and in the end, may reflect the Sulzbergers' own ambivalences about their origins. Libel states correctly on Page 135 that to the Sulzbergers, Jewishness "has always come down to wombs. From whose womb did you come from? Under Jewish religious law, the womb had to belong to a Jewish woman." I don't doubt that the Sulzbergers believe(d) this. The question is, were they correct to do so? Libel then states on the next page that (Pinch's) "forebears believed that they were Jews only because of their faith in the God of their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They did not believe that being a Jew was simply a matter of being a member of a race. It was not just a matter of womb. You had to believe in God or you were not a Jew. If that were not true, they believed that would be racism." This is at most only partially correct, and could be said to be totally incorrect. In the first place, Pinch's forebears include Punch, Arthur Hays Sulzberger, and Adolph Ochs who, even according to Libel , believed that a Jewish womb conferred Jewishness onto the child. But secondly, Orthodox Judaism - which is to say, authentic Judaism - DOES, in fact, hold that being born of a Jewish mother makes the child Jewish - whether or not that child believes in the God of Abraham, or Jesus, or Karl Marx. In practice, if a child of an Orthodox Jewish family were to leave Judaism, his family would indeed feel some sense that the child had lost an essence of his Jewishness, but the family would always hold out hope for t'shuvah , or return to the fold. They would never dream of feeling that he'd become a gentile. So, even to the European ancestors of the Ochs and the Sulzbergers, lack of belief in God would not turn the Jew into a non-Jew. It was not faith , as such, in the God of their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which made them Jews, but more their own literal descent from these patriarchs that made the difference. Libel correctly stated that if Pinch would desire to be accepted as a Jew by an Orthodox community, he'd have to convert. But this is NOT true of Punch . I assure you, Punch could go into any Orthodox synagogue on earth and be counted as a valid member of a minyan, which is to say, a prayer quorum. In the Orthodox synagogue, communal prayer may not commence unless and until a minimum of ten recognized Jews are present. Punch could be counted as one of the ten, but his son Pinch could not be so counted, because his mother was a gentile, and in Judaism, Jewishness is conferred by the status of one's mother. What happens if a gentile woman converts to Orthodox Judaism? In this case, her "Jewish" womb, though still genetically a gentile womb, is considered just as Jewish as any "genetically authentic" Jewish woman. And, presumably, such a gentile woman would convert because of her decision to follow the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, so in THIS case, passing along Jewishness to the next generation could be considered a matter of religious identity. The TRUTH is, "Jewishness" is BOTH a matter of belief and of descent from a Jewish womb - but the Jewishness of the womb is paramount. Libel says further down on Page 136 that Arthur Hays Sulzberger "rejected the idea that Jews were members of a 'race,' as did Adolph...Arthur was vehemently against collective phrases such as the Jewish People ..." and that expressions such as "Jews" could subtly convey "the notion that being Jewish was something one could freely choose, like being a Methodist or a Presbyterian." If you say so, I'm sure that old Arthur felt this way. But, isn't it odd that he didn't REALLY believe what he was saying, and perhaps didn't realize it either? The proof of this is what you said on Page 135 - that "Pinch's family" has always defined Jewishness by the Jewishness of the womb. For of what relevance is the Jewish womb if a "Jew" can freely move in and out of his religion? Why would old Arthur believe in the ability of a Jewish womb to confer Jewishness if a Jew could freely "become" Methodist or Episcopalian or Jewish, as though it were solely a matter of his adherence to a certain set of abstract beliefs? Libel mentions that Pinch may have a psychological hang-up in that he may feel that as a half-Jew, he is neither Jew nor gentile. You could very well be correct. But I submit to you that this hang-up, if it exists, is not solely Pinch's hang-up. I submit that this is a common hang-up that many Jews have, and in particular, the German Jews who arrived here before the masses of Polish and Russian Jews around the turn of the 20 th Century. They want to be Jewish and exclusive - hence, the importance of a Jewish womb - but at the same time, they wish to be gentile too. They seek to have their cake and eat it. And it can be worse for half-Jews whose mothers are gentiles, for these persons are accepted as Jews by most non-Orthodox synagogues, but aren't accepted by any Orthodox synagogues, and to such half-Jews, there's always a sneaking insecurity that the Orthodox are the real Jews, the ones, indeed, the only ones, who take the dictates of Judaism seriously, and it's their acceptance that counts. These half-Jews don't really feel at home anywhere in the Jewish world. For all these reasons, I submit that this is why secular Jews may be prone to psychological hang-ups, and why these Jews are so eager to assimilate into the mainstream of the culture. I think this explains too why so many Jews are involved in "progressive" and Socialist causes. They become involved because they hope that this will buy the approval and the esteem of the gentile majority. It's a futile wish. If the gentile is inclined to despise Jews, no amount of progressivism will mitigate that. Furthermore, these Jews are out of touch with the great gentile masses. Rabbi Meir Kahane used to say that if he could have it his way, he'd take the Sulzbergers and other fat cat Jews of America and take them to a bar. Not a nice bar or trendy bar, either, where educated, trendy, and decent people congregate, but just a "bar - bar." He'd take them to a gin mill in places like South Boston ,where people don't attempt to hide their prejudices, and here, he would hope to open the eyes and ears of Comfortable Jews by exposing them to AUTHENTIC Americans, and how they STILL don't like Jews and never will. It could be very well true that Pinch hopes that by supporting gay causes, he will win esteem in America . It just shows how out of touch he is, and how little he REALLY understands America . James Nollet PS: Back in the '70's, when I was driving a cab in NYC, I used to listen to the New York Times' classical music station, WQXR. On Friday afternoons around 5:30 , they'd interrupt the music programming to broadcast live the service from one of the major Reform Jewish synagogues of mid-town Manhattan Mr. Pawlick's Response: I agree with my friend, Jim Nollet. I obviously had no desire to get into this subject but I had no choice if I were to present the facts to the reader. As Jim points out, this is a point of serious debate in the Jewish community, and I am not sure that I made an “error” when trying to explain this complicated debate for the average reader |
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