Toppling a Jewish Tradition

A Conservative seminary votes to ordain women rabbis

When Susannah Heschel was growing up as a rabbi's daughter in New York City, she once attended a Simhat Torah celebration, during which men traditionally dance for joy while holding scrolls of Scripture. She wanted to join the dance, which is forbidden to women, and under the disapproving eyes of many in the crowd, joined her father in the festivities. When asked who had given her permission, Susannah snapped, "God."

Her father was the legendary philosopher Abraham Joshua Heschel, who for 27 years was a professor at New York City's Jewish. Theological Seminary of America: J.T.S. is the only institution in North America that trains and ordains rabbis fdr the Conservative branch of Judaism. Shortly before he died in 1972, Heschel urged his daughter to apply to the seminary as a candidate for ordination as a rabbi. "I think things might change," he said. Though women had long studied and taught at J.T.S., none had ever tried to become a rabbi. Susannah's request was denied.

Last week Susannah Heschel was back on campus as the seminary's faculty voted 34 to eight to admit women for rabbinical training, despite strong opposition from some of the institution's leading scholars. The first women candidates will be admitted next September, and those who complete the four-or five-year course will be ordained. Susannah, a doctoral student at the University of Pennsylvania, has not decided whether to join them.

There was exultation among activist Jewish women that the change had finally come. "This is one of those days when you have a sense of participating in Jewish history, not just teaching it," said Paula Hyman, dean of the seminary's undergraduate division. Judith Hauptman, a professor of Talmud at the seminary who has long taught rabbinical students, declared that "now I'm going to have the option of becoming one myself."

The Conservatives, however, still lag behind Judaism's Reform wing, which began ordaining women in 1972, and the tiny, liberal Reconstructionist movement, which first accepted women rabbis in 1974. Today there are 73 female rabbis in the U.S. and Canada, and a number of them, in fact, are serving in Conservative synagogues. Although the 1,200-member Rabbinical Assembly, the organization of Conservative rabbis, has favored the ordination of women for years, it left the final decision to J.T.S., the intellectual center of the 100-year-old Conservative movement. In 1979 the seminary's faculty put off making a decision indefinitely, even though there were ample votes to make the change. Reason: fear that bringing women into the rabbinate would divide not only the school but also Conservative Judaism as a whole.

The problem is that traditionalists in the Conservative branch believe, along with Orthodox Jews, that Halakhah (religious law) clearly rules out women rabbis. According to the Talmud (teachings of religious sages compiled more than 14 centuries ago), women may not perform certain functions reserved to men, such as witnessing betrothals and marriages and leading congregations in prayers. J.T.S. Chancellor Gerson D. Cohen, who presided over the vote, left little doubt that he rejects the Orthodox view and believes that women should be allowed to perform these functions. Said Cohen: "I believe it is incumbent upon us to do away with discrimination against women in Judaism, especially when it is not mandated by Halakhah."

Four leading faculty members refused to attend last week's meeting, and Israel Francus, former chairman of the seminary's department of Talmud and Rabbinics, said angrily, "We have committed suicide by handing over the whole Conservative movement to the Reform wing." But to many Jewish women the risk of schism is the price of revolution. Declared Susannah Heschel, now 28 and editor of a recent anthology, On Being a Jewish Feminist: "It is so important and noble to be a rabbi." This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.