Three Movements of Judaism Working to Reach Solution to Convert Problem

Negotiations among representatives of Orthodox, Conservative and Reform Judaism reportedly are close to developing a joint formula for dealing with converts that could begin to resolve the “Who Is a Jew” controversy.

The talks have been going on for the last six months, outside the glare of publicity, under the auspices of the Israeli government. They are apparently still touch-and-go and could fall apart without an accord being reached.

The discussions were initiated last winter by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to develop a mechanism for dealing with converts to Judaism who seek to settle in Israel.

The problem stems from demands by the Orthodox to amend the Law of Return in a way that would require converts to be converted “according to halacha,” or traditional rabbinic law.

In effect, the change would recognize only conversions performed by Orthodox rabbis as valid, thereby delegitimizing Conservative, and Reform Judaism in Israel.

Persistent attempts by the Orthodox bloc in Israel to push the amendment through the Knesset have failed, due in large measure to bitter protests from American Jewry.

Israel, anxious to end the conflict with a crucial segment of the Diaspora, hopes the dispute can be resolved by coming up with an arrangement satisfactory to all streams of Judaism.

So far “various proposals exist, but no final agreement has been reached,” according to Rabbi Walter Jacobs of Pittsburgh, vice president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, who is negotiating on behalf of the Reform movement.

“Negotiations are going on,” he said.

‘SINCERE COMMITMENT’ BY ALL SIDES

But according to reports from Jerusalem, the talks may be doomed by fierce opposition from Orthodox circles in Israel and their adherents in the United States.

Negotiators said they decided to keep the talks secret after an earlier round of talks was leaked to the press last fall and quickly collapsed in disarray.

All requests for details of the plan under consideration were turned down. But reports from Israel said that plan calls for the creation of an Orthodox-Conservative-Reform panel that would screen those who are contemplating converting to Judaism and settling in Israel.

“I can only tell you that we’re working on it, that we’ve met in Jerusalem and in the United States, and that there’s a sincere commitment to resolve the problem by all sides,” said Rabbi Louis Bernstein of Queens, a professor at Yeshiva University who represents mainstream U.S. Orthodoxy in the talks.

Negotiators include one representative from each of the principal branches of U.S. Jewry and two ranking Israeli government officials.

Rabbi Shamma Friedman of Jerusalem represents the Conservative movement, and Zev Rosenberg, assistant director of Israel’s Ministry of Religious Affairs, acts as liaison to the Chief Rabbinate.

Cabinet Secretary Elyakim Rubinstein, representing Shamir, has chaired the talks. Rubinstein himself is Orthodox.

Bernstein emphasized that the proposals under consideration deal only with the narrow issue of potential converts who intend to settle in Israel and do not touch on broader relations between Orthodox and non-Orthodox Judaism.

But a rumor that they did, spread by the New York-based Yiddish weekly Algemeiner Journal, threatened to derail the talks.

OPPOSITION AMONG ORTHODOX

The newspaper, considered close to the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement, reproduced what it claimed was a memorandum of agreement signed by the negotiators.

It reported they agreed to establish a “joint Beth Din,” or rabbinic court, of all three movements to oversee the conversions of potential immigrants to Israel. That would amount to an extraordinary concession by the Orthodox rabbinate.

Negotiators insist there has been no such agreement and are calling the Algemeiner Journal report “fraudulent.”

But the paper’s report has already prompted Orthodox rabbis in Israel and the United States to condemn the negotiations.

Among them is Rabbi Aaron Soloveitchik of Chicago, dean of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary at Yeshiva University in New York.

Soloveitchik was quoted as saying he would oppose not only a joint Beth Din, but any “joint commission” to interview applicants for conversion.

Sources said the agreement still requires substantial refinement and has yet to be ratified by the negotiators’ parent movements.

The public explosion on the Orthodox side could prompt moderate Orthodox forces to unite behind their negotiators’ position, according to Bernstein.

The Conservative movement also is said to be relatively united behind the tentative agreement. But that is not the case with the Reform movement.

Several Reform leaders questioned on the matter insisted they would not accept any system that required their converts to be “reconverted” by an Orthodox Beth Din.

Nonetheless, Reform leaders agreed they would have to compromise to reach an agreement.