Box Folder 69 17 Jewish Disappearance. Articles and Notes
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
MS-763: Rabbi Herbert A. Friedman Collection, 1930-2004. Series I: Wexner Heritage Foundation, 1947-2004. Subseries 2: Writings and Addresses, 1947-2003. Box Folder 69 17 Jewish disappearance. Articles and notes. 1996-2003. For more information on this collection, please see the finding aid on the American Jewish Archives website. 3101 Clifton Ave, Cincinnati, Ohio 45220 513.487.3000 AmericanJewishArchives.org THE RESURRECTION OF AROCK AGENT By Michael Gross JULY 14 , 1997 Are American Jews Disappearing? BY CRAIG HOROWITZ .. ... .. ; :. :; f ·.· $2.95 1ca ..da 53.951 ·.. .. -.· . ... ·. i. 1• t •t t *"" c ' t l\ ~"'c "" ....... J"°"""~ 8', ~'1- he fundamenrai :Zionist anaiysis has naen 'Jinciica1eri: ~ • 1'" ...... YI CL ~'"'~ ... ')... • .... ""t .. -. ~ith Th e iaij o'f 1h e gneTTOw ails. ~he r e c: n be no furure for a s ec~ i a r. srateiess I ! .A -t t ~ ~ ~ _y)-l (}~ Vanishing ./ {·l .J / As American je,,·s fail to reproduce. and as they intermarry, they are facing cultural extinction. By Ari Shavit ,~stt(C IS RAEL ~ ~ jw''l!t(~ mother, 2.6; hardly any inter House, 2 Supreme Court jus- bold attempts at a countcr marriages), Jewish America cices and the president of the offensive - proclaiming a Jew seems to be engaged in a process Federal Reserve Board - it ish Revival, gathering again ir of demographic suicide (average seems American Jews have fi- the synagogues - the overal age, 39; average number of births nally arrived. With scores of trend is unquestionable: the rat< per mother, 1.6; a rate of inter Nobel Prize winners and Wall of intermarriage keeps climb marriage exceeding 52 percent). Street barons, anti-Semitism on ing; the number of affiliatct If present trends persist - the wane and Judaism accepted Jews stays low; hundreds o and barring a major c:i.wtrophe as part of American culture, thousands are being lost frou . in the Middle Ease - Israel's American Jc:ws have made it in America.nJewry every decade. Jewish population will surpass the mosc extravagant way. This is all but surprising. A America's before 2010. A gen There is no doubt about it: for the old Yiddish culrure dis eration later, it is expected to 20th-century Jews, Ellis Island appears, as Holocaust-era gui1 be 50 percent larger than was the right choice. But for feelings die out, as the pro America's. By rnidcenrury it 21st-cenrury Jews, America of- Zionist "blue box" gcneracio1 might actually dwarf American fers a far less promising pros- ages, as third- and founh-gener Jewry altogether. pCCL It is now highly likely that ation Americans lose the rem As American Jews fail to re the demographic collapse cxpe- nants of whatever shtetl back produce, as they find it impossi rienced by Europe's Asbkenazi ground their parents and grand en I was in kinder- ble to keep their young within communities over the last 50 parencs had, there is very litt.I irartcn, in the early the faith, they are t.he ones now years - some of them were ac- that could maincain the secula 960's, there were l.9 facing the threat of cultural ex tually halved - will be expe- Jewish culture of the Diaspon million Jews in fsrael. There tinction. At the rum of the 21st rienccd by American Jewry over As American Jews find accept were almost three times as ccorury it is non-Orthodox the next SO ye3l'S. At chc 6.n of ance and success, and as chei manyJews in America. As Isnc1 J ewisb Americans who arc be chis si~dc - whether or not the own Jewish idencicy become was scill a shaky republic sur coming an endangered S?ecics. Zionist experiment succ~eds - more and more vague, there j rounded by a hostile Arab True, Israel itself is having its the fundamental Zionist analysis not enough spiritual cement t world, Israeli-born Jews like own aJarming identity prob has been vin.clicared: with che fall keep them together. Curious!: myself were taught to think of lems. As its Tel Aviv-centered of the ghetto walls, there can be it is precisely America's virtue American Jewry as some kind of secular population grows more no furure for a secular, stateless - ics generosity, freedom an strategic hinterland. A safc, secular, its Jerusalem-centered, Jewish community anywhere. tolerance - that arc now soft.I everlasting, sutura.l resource. ultrareligious zealots grow Not even in America. killing the lase of the grea"t Dw An enorm.ous human reservoir. more zealous. Since the assassi The evidence is all over the poras. It is because of its ver Now, as Zionism is celebrat nation of Prime Minister Yitz place: every year the mail brings virtues that America is in dang( ing its 1OOth birthday, things hak Rabin, the country has been to Jewish-American mailboxes of becoming the most luxurioi: look a bit clifferent. While Is in danger of being tom apart by more and more invitations to burial ground ever of J ewis rael's Jewish population has sky cultural divisions that strain its ml'xcd weddings, indicating that cultural existence. rocketed (growing by nearly 150 fragile democracy. Yet even in the younger, non-Orthodox At the rum of this ccnrur percent, co 4.6 million), the such trying times, Liberal Israelis Jewish generation is largely mosc American and Israeli Je" American Jewish population has cannot rely on what used to be marrying out. Every year the are f.acing a common challenf hardly grown at all (5.7 million their country's demographically shock Allan Dershowicz. went ing question: whether a mcar today). While Jewish Israel has rich uncle across the seas. through when his son told him ingful non-Orthodox existcnc proven to be the most demo Demography aside, of course, that he planned to marry a fine is possible in the third millenn graphically vibrant sociery in the the flamboyant uncle never had Irish-Catholic girl is being du- um; whether we can all aVO! Western world (average age, 29; it so good. C ount the IO plicated in Jewish homes across being the last of the nor average number of births per. senators, 25 members of the America. While there are a few OrthodoxJews. The oun College Kids Who Don't "Do,, Jewish MARCELLA KOGAN Tracy Rabin didn't need B'rith YouLh Organization (BBYO) "This is the dynamic of Jewish to be "saved" again. chapter to which she belonged in high identity in the late 20th century,~ says school. "Why do Jewish leaders panic Rabbi Gerald Serona, director of trying to get more people interested in Hillel at George Washington It was bad enough that the pre Judaism?Thosewhowantco beJewish University (GWU) in Washington, med jmlior at the College ofWilliam will come back to it," says Rabin, who D.C. "Most kids on campus have no and Mary, in Williamsburg, Va., had had just pulled an all-nighter to study formal jev.~sh education. They may already been approached by the fora biology exam, "'They (Jewish lead have pride in theirJewish identity, but Baptist minister-a doctor with ers] ·hould recognize you don't need little background. There is also an whom she had worked while doing to be pan of Hillel to care about your intimidation factor. They're afraid an internship-who tried to convince religion." the people in Hillel and organized her thatJ esus Christ is the savior. William and Mary, a small public Jewish life will find them deficient" Now representatives of the cam liberal ans college, is hardly a cen Rabin, whose father was raised pus Hillel organization who noticed ter ofJ e\>'lish life; its Hillel office Orthodox but now practices she hadn't come to many events doesn't even print a brochure about Reform, says she had enough of were throwing he r a rope to haul ics programs. "That should tell you organized religion in high school. her back to shore. But Rabin-who something," said a Hillel staffer She is tired of the people who rep has taken classes in both J ewish from the college. resent religious institutions. She'd thought and the New Testament to But Rabin's reaction is common simply prefer to explore her Jewish try to figure out her feelings about among J ewish students, even at identity on her o>vn terms. God-dido 't feel she was drowning. schools that have large Jewish pop The desire to get away from the "I consider Judaism a personal, ulations. Many of Lhese students familiar and experiment with dif i..ndividual thing. I don 't feel a need to acknowledge their J ewish identity ferent ideas is common-even desir join aJewish group to feel Jewish," said but don't want to go to socials, able-in college, says Bernard Rabin, a ReformJew from Alexandria, Shabbat dinners, hamenlaschen-latke Reisman, Khuznick Professor of Va., who still remembers what she felt debates, or other institutionally nm Contemporary J ewish Studies at lo be the "cliquishnes.s" of the B'nai activities. Brandeis University. "The major 40 M O MEN T • OCTOBER 1996 Jewish population undercounted, '- JEWISH WORLD experts say after new British census By R.icharcl Allen Greene Mus lim c leri c found gui lty ALondon -based Muslim de<iroccused or support- LONL>ON (JTA)- Then: may be far more k'"-s m Orear Bricain than previously rng Osomo bin Loden was found guihy of urging his belic!ved. experts said this month, following the releas~ of 200 I census dara. followers to kill lo kill Jew, ond others. Sheik Abdullah ' The census foundJU."(!llldet 267 ,000 kw$ m England, Scotland and W~Jcs , malun~ Foi~I wos con•icled of rhree charges ol mcirement to them slighrly kss than 0.5 pen;cnt of the British populatiort.