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| THE CHRONICLE
Extended Singlehood
Today, reflecting a world-wide pattern, most
non-Orthodox Jewish adults under the age of
forty are not married. In the recent past, Jews
used to marry five to seven years after leaving
university. This now happens after ten to fif-
teen years, if at all. There are also somewhat
higher divorce rates than at mid-century. All
this means that among non-Orthodox Jews
there is a large percentage of unmarried peo-
ple, almost always without children. In the
past, childrearing has brought Jews to con-
gregations and JCCs.
Since this younger generation is spend-
ing many more years unmarried and without
children, the Jewish community must develop
institutions they can use. Few will come to
JCCs, synagogues, or federations as currently
constructed. There they would find mainly
married people, most of them married to
Jews, and often with young children of their
own, or middle-aged and older empty-nesters.
Strengthening the Jewish Collective
&
Ties to Israel
The decline in commitment of many Jews to
the Jewish people, Israel, and the Jewish com-
munity is deeply worrying. Fewer Jews see
themselves as obligated to support the collec-
tive interests of the Jewish people, to feel
attached to Israel, or even to relate personally
to the very notion of the Jewish people at all.
The interplay between intermarriage and
declining ties with the Jewish collective can
be seen in recently collected data among non-
Orthodox American Jews that makes three
powerful points:
•
However measured, younger Jews are much
less attached to Israel than older Jews.
•
The intermarried are far less attached to Is-
rael than the in-married or single Jews.
•
Younger intermarried Jews are even more
alienated from Israel than their older coun-
terparts.
In fact, were it not for the statistical in-
clusion of the intermarried, overall rates of
attachment to Israel among the non-Ortho-
dox would be holding steady. This is not to
say that intermarriage brings about alienation
from Israel. It is to say that whatever brings
about intermarriage, plus whatever impact in-
termarriage may have on its own, operates to
depress attachment to Israel and, by exten-
sion, to the Jewish community and the Jewish
People.
The interpersonal and intimate ties of
Jews with non-Jews poses major questions as
to how one can strengthen, preserve, or make
meaningful the Jewish commitment to the
collective, without seeming or being racist.
How does one argue for and promote Jewish
marriage and friendship in this world without
appearing bigoted and insular? Causes such as
Israel, building the Jewish community, or car-
ing about Jews locally and all over the world
demand, at least empirically, the establishment
and nurturing of strong Jewish networks of
friends and family. Yet, to many Jews, younger
somewhat more than older, teaching to forge
and pursue such in-group ties seems so un-
postmodern and un-American.
Taking Hold of Torah
If Judaism is a matter of norms, of right and
wrong, one can teach one’s children that Jew-
ish involvement is right, and distancing from
Jewish life is wrong. But if to be Jewish is a
matter of aesthetics, then one can only teach
that Jewish engagement is akin to the love of
music and art. Such engagement can lend
purpose and meaning and spiritual enrich-
ment, but it is by no means a moral decision.
In fact, many Jews now see being Jewish
the same way as loving music or art. It is a
good thing to do, but for them it is not a mat-
ter of right or wrong. They have no sense that
for a Jew to be Jewish is the right way to be,
akin to one’s patriotic duty as an American or
other nationalities.
Such morally laden language and con-
cepts, while Judaically authentic, are
admittedly not for indifferent contemporary
Jews. We need to develop a third way of
speaking, modeling, and teaching, one that
combines the normative and aesthetic ap-
proaches, that appeals to Jews so that they will
find it meaningful to be obligated, or to quote
the title of Arnold Eisen’s book, that they en-
gage in
Taking Hold of Torah.
We need both
individual autonomy (taking hold) and a turn
to Torah, in the broadest sense.
Rabbis and other leaders in all three
Movements and beyond are working on
blending the Judaism of meaning with the Ju-
daism of obligation. They are struggling to
bridge the longstanding gap between the Ju-
daic mission to which they are committed
and the reality of the American Jewish mar-
ketplace in which they work. To the extent
that they succeed, the future of American
Jews and Judaism will be assured. Fortunately
and unfortunately, the diversity of American
Jews and the inevitability and rapidity of
change makes the task of bridging Judaic mis-
sion and Jewish market an ongoing and
never-finished challenge.
–
Fortunately and unfortunately, the diversity of American
Jews and the inevitability and rapidity of change makes
the task of bridging Judaic mission and Jewish market
an ongoing and never-finished challenge.
–––––––––––
Changes in American Jewish
Identities Since 1948
(
continued)
