Aftermath of Intermarriage Battle Raa Urges Orthodox Rabbis to Resign from New York Board of Rabbis

The Rabbinical Alliance of America, an Orthodox group, called today on Orthodox rabbis who are members of the New York Board of Rabbis to resign from the Board because of its failure to bar from its membership those rabbis who perform mixed marriages. Only Reform rabbis perform such marriages. The New York Broad of Rabbis claims to represent 1000 Reform, Conservative and Orthodox rabbis in the Greater New York area.

The vote at a stormy NYBR meeting last week was on an amendment to the organization’s constitution which would bar membership to rabbis performing mixed marriages. Approval of an amendment requires a two-thirds vote of those present and the total in favor fell three votes short. Foes of the proposed amendment argued that approval would adversely affect efforts of a majority of Reform rabbis to deal with the problem at the annual convention next June of the Central Conference of American Rabbis. Delegates at the CCAR convention last June vote to postpone action on the issue for a year.

Rabbi William Berkowitz, NYBR president, said a mail survey of the membership indicated overwhelming approval of the proposed amendment but that the by-laws required members to be present for such votes. The attending rabbis did approve a resolution which “unequivocally” condemned rabbis who perform mixed marriages and urged them to stop doing so immediately.

The resolution also called on rabbinic bodies throughout the country, and on the Synagogue Council of America, which represents the major Orthodox, Conservative and Reform rabbinic organizations, to join in the condemnation. Rabbi Berkowitz called adoption of the resolution “the first time a group consisting of 1000 rabbis–Orthodox, Conservative and Reform–has taken a strong position on the eradication of this evil.”

SHATTERING BLOW TO HALACHA

Rabbi Abraham Gross, president of the Rabbinical Alliance, said his group was not surprised by the failure to approve the amendment “but we are surprised and shocked over the lack of a massive exodus from the New York Board of Rabbis by those Orthodox rabbis who believed that they could ‘contain’ the Board from such a flagrant assault upon the integrity of the Jewish family.” Rabbi Gross’ statement made no reference to the resolution condemning rabbis who officiate at mixed marriages.

He asserted that “the small segment” of Orthodox rabbis in the NYBR had justified their membership with “various rationalizations,” one of them being that the NYBR would stay out of issues of Jewish religious law and therefore was “not really a rabbinic organization in the traditional sense of the word.”

But, he said, “the record” of the NYBR “and especially this latest grave breach of the sanctity of the Jewish home” should make Orthodox members realize that “such an action is not only an involvement in balachic matters but is a shattering blow at the halacha itself.”

Rabbi Gross said his group was also “astounded” by a statement last week by Rabbi Louis Bernstein, president of the Rabbinical Council of America, that the Council would aim at the elimination from leadership roles in Jewish public life of all those who marry out of their faith and rabbis who perform mixed marriages. Asking how any Orthodox rabbi could draw a distinction between leaders and Jews who are not in leadership, Rabbi Gross declared: “We have one Torah which is equally applicable to all Jews without exception.”