“When My Colleagues Wished They Were Me”

   It was about two years ago or so that I received a few “mazel tov” emails from colleagues. I had no idea why they were “mazel toving” me When I found out I was floored.

    They had read in some periodical that I was among Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, even Orthodox rabbis, who were condemned by the Israeli rabbinate. I was in good company as persona non grata. Those who congratulated me wanted to be on that list as well.

    So why?

    Apparently, we had affirmed the Jewishness of men and women who wanted to make aliyah but when the rabbinate checked out, not our affiliation, but the “Jewishness” of the mother of those people, they found out they weren’t Jewish either by birth or conversion. And again, let me point out that the sponsor of the conversion didn’t matter; a few of those for whom I wrote a letter had mothers converted under Reform auspices.

    What got me was that I had no idea what they were talking about. For all intents and purposes, I knew each and every one planning aliyah and asking for my affirmation. Ahhhh, but then thinking about it, after going through the copies of those letters I had written, there was one guy who had become Bar Mitzvah years before and whose family dropped out soon after. I really didn’t know them at all. I bet he was the one. 

     Now let it be said that the request for me to officiate at a wedding in Israel is minimal; as a matter of fact, I’ve never been asked, nor in my retirement do I ever expect to be asked (of course I never expected to have a congregation again and look what happened!). That the mom wasn’t Jewish – according to the great sages on the rabbinical court of Israel – you’d assume be dictated by whether a pagan like me signed the document. But again (and I repeat it since it absolutely surprises me like few other things), they didn’t care that I was Reform; they knew I was.

   It seems to me that this designation, that I and maybe one hundred other rabbis are on their “no-no” list is so weird, especially since some are well-known Orthodox rabbis! It just proves once again that the King of Siam, Yul Brynner, was right when he sang about…Is a puzzlement!

I’m not sure whether I’ve written about this before. If I did, perhaps you hadn’t read it...or forgot it. If I didn’t, here it is.