Behind the Headlines: Diversity of Conservative Movement Has Precipitated an Identity Crisis

Conservative Judaism has been called a movement of both tradition and change, a midpoint between Orthodoxy and Reform Judaism, and an example of unity that allows for diversity.

But as the Conservative movement has strived to be all these things simultaneously, it has left many confused about what the movement stands for and where it is headed.

In fact, the very identity and future of Conservative Judaism was at the core of discussions during the recent 90th meeting of the Rabbinical Assembly, Conservative Judaism’s 1,300-member central body of rabbis.

“On this 90th year of the Rabbinical Assembly, we are struggling with the forces of dissension, doubt and dismay. Critical observers have opined that our movement is in disarray,” Rabbi Irwin Groner, the newly elected president of the assembly, said in an address to more than 600 rabbis gathered at the Concord Hotel here.

“We are challenged by an assertive and triumphalist Orthodoxy on our right and by a vigorous, growing Reform movement on our left,” he said. “We are dissatisfied with the state of our movement, we fall short in our own eyes, we are pessimistic about our future.”

Groner attributed this perceived malaise to the centrist position of the movement. Stressing the importance of halachah and tradition, while also affirming the value of adaptations to modernity, Conservative Judaism has often defined itself by what it is not.

‘SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN’

As Rabbi David Nelson of Temple Beth Shalom in Oak Park, Mich., put it: “There is a knowledge of who we are: We’re not Reform or Orthodox; we buffet somewhere in between.”

Conservative rabbis point to the movement’s membership of over 1.5 million congregational members — making it possibly the largest branch of Judaism in the United States and Canada — as testament to the success of Conservative Judaism’s centrist position.

“Our strength is that we can serve a whole range of thought, which is where people are at,” said Nelson.

But many Conservative rabbis today feel that such diversity of thought and halachic observance has been a mixed blessing, leaving congregants confused as to where the movement stands on ideological and spiritual issues.

“If you don’t adapt, you ultimately dry up. But if you fall for every fad, you stand for nothing,” observed Rabbi Arnold Goodman, a past president of the Rabbinical Assembly and religious leader of Ahavath Achim Congregation in Atlanta.

Rabbi Neil Gilman, associate professor of philosophy at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, criticized the movement in general, and JTS in particular, for its emphasis on thought and scholarship, at the expense of spirituality and theology.

According to Gilman, JTS has trained generations of Conservative rabbis to be academicians — scholars untrained to fulfil their role as spiritual leaders and therefore unable to transmit that spirituality to their congregants.

With this in mind, the seminary has unveiled a new academic curriculum to emphasize the spiritual aspects of Judaism.

The rabbinical seminar, for example, will have students listening to each other’s personal position papers and diary entries on deep religious and philosophical questions.

‘A THIRST FOR FAITH’

“We have to learn how to be passionate believers,” Rabbi Joel Rembaum of Temple Beth Am in Los Angeles said during a plenary session on the contemporary rabbinate. “We have succeeded in touching the intellect of our congregants, but not the heart.”

Rabbi Robert Abramson, director of education at United Synagogue of America, concurred. “We’re now seeing an articulation of a thirst for faith. We’re seeing renewals of religion all over,” he said.

Indeed, rabbis from the four corners of the United States are all telling similar stories of young, unobservant Jews returning to Judaism in search of a spiritual experience.

“Our people complain that we don’t speak enough about our feelings about God. And that’s a valid criticism. We’ve neglected the subject, because these are areas where everyone is unsure. It’s hard to talk about,” said Nelson, the rabbi from Michigan.

“The problem is that we have lost the initiative in creating new forms of Jewish experience,” said Rabbi Alex Graubart of Congregation Beth Sholom in San Francisco. “We have lost the ability to reach our best lay people, who are rejecting formalism in worship to develop chavurot,” or non-traditional worship groups.

Conservative Judaism evolved in the latter half of the 19th century as a form of halachic or traditional Judaism, closely related to Orthodoxy, but that allowed some modern innovations.

These innovations included the introduction of organ and family pews, the omission of a few portions of the liturgy and the interpolation of English prayers. Halachic requirements, like kashrut or not traveling on the Sabbath, originally were not altered.

PEOPLE DON’T KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT

Now Conservative Jews may drive to shul for Saturday services; most Conservative synagogues allow men and women to sit together; and women have become Conservative rabbis and cantors.

“When a person joins a Conservative synagogue, he doesn’t know what to expect anymore,” acknowledged Rembaum of Los Angeles.

Two years ago, in an attempt to establish a formal ideological focus for the movement, a committee of Conservative rabbis and lay people compiled “Emet Ve-Emunah,” (Truth and Faith), the first collective statement of principles of Conservative Judaism.

But in fact, ” Emet Ve-Emunah” is more a compendium of the various positions taken in Conservative Judaism on such issues as God, revelation, halachah and evil.

“I wasn’t personally greatly helped by the pamphlet, and it hasn’t had any circulation among my congregants,” admitted Nelson of Michigan.

But if the Conservative movement has failed so far to define itself successfully, it nevertheless remains one of American Judaism’s most popular and populous movements.

As Goodman of Atlanta put it, “We’re not the failure that everyone thinks we are either.”