Why Has My Yeshiva Not Revoked Steven Greenberg's Semichah?

In his fascinating biography of Rabbi Dr. Bernard Revel, Rabbi Aaron (then Rothkoff) Rakeffet chronicles some of the issues that challenged the newly ordained rabbis which the Yeshiva sent out to communities across the United States. Among the most vexing was the issue of mechitzah. Congregations were removing the partitions between the mens' and women's sections at an alarming pace, yet still sought out the young Orthodox rabbis that the Yeshiva was producing.
According to the book, while Dr. Revel refused to allow his graduates to take pulpits in shuls with mixed pews, he did make exceptions in cases where he felt that the rabbi might succeed in bringing the shul back "into the fold" and reintroducing a mechitzah over the course of one year.If the rabbi failed, Revel insisted that the young man leave his pulpit and seek a new shul. What if a rabbi failed to convince his shul to install a mechitzah, but nonetheless insisted on staying at his position? Rakeffet writes,

When a Yeshiva graduate refused Revel's request to leave a position which had both mixed pews and a mixed choir, his ordination was revoked. Revel wrote to a graduate on September 19, 1933: "It grieves me to inform you that since you refuse to leave Temple...where the sacred laws of traditional Judaism are violated, I urgently request that you return the conditional document of ordination that you received from the Yeshiva. The basic purpose of the Yeshiva is to guard the sanctity of Jewish Law in this land. If you will not return the document of ordination, I will be obligated to publish newspaper announcements declaring the nullification of your ordination." The rabbi did not heed Rabbi Revel's request, and the Yeshiva publicly announced the cancellation of his ordination and proclaimed that "one can no longer rely on his answers to inquiries of Jewish Law." (Bernard Revel, pp 165-166)

In light of this short historical vignette, I find myself wondering how Rabbi Steven Greenberg still has his ordination from my yeshiva, Yeshivat Rabbeinu Yizchak Elchanan. (RIETS).
I have no intention of debating the issue of homosexuality and Orthodoxy on my blog. I recently signed a petition that stated, among other things, that, "By definition, a union that is not sanctioned by Torah law is not an Orthodox wedding, and by definition a person who conducts such a ceremony is not an Orthodox rabbi." I thought that would be enough. Apparently, I thought wrong.
In a recent article in the New York Jewish Week, Rabbi Greenberg explained that while he did not officiate at a "Gay Orthodox Wedding", "I officiated at a ceremony that celebrated the decision of two men to commit to each other in love and to do so in binding fashion before family and friends." He did so using Jewish language, symbolism, rabbinic concepts and halachic principles - but admits himself that it wasn't a Jewish wedding, per se. (At least we can agree about that.) Anyone with any sense of fealty to halachah readily sees just how far his stance on homosexuality has veered from Traditional Torah Judaism.
The most upsetting part of the piece to me was the fact that he is, "a Modern Orthodox rabbi."  While that might not be true ideologically, it remains true technically, because he continues to enjoy the benefits of his RIETS ordination, which, for some reason I cannot understand, has not yet been revoked.
I am a very proud musmach of Yeshiva and the grandson of another proud musmach of Yeshiva. Both of  our semichah documents hang on the wall in my home. I find myself consistently amazed at the great work of both the Yeshiva and its graduates, who have spread Torah literally to the four corners of the earth. Yet, the documents themselves mean very little. I learned some Torah - OK, a lot of Torah, and I took some tests which I passed. But the document states that I am worthy to teach and make pronouncements on matters of halachah. Essentially, its a document that confers status. Whether I'm smart enough to pass a test is beside the point. The point of the semichah is to instill trust: my Yeshiva, having taught and nurtured me, trusts me to use my education and intuition to protect and uphold Jewish tradition. I will take what I have taught and uphold it, protect it, nurture it and help it grow.
Yet, Rabbi Greenberg has taken that trust and warped it into something vulgar. He uses his knowledge and erudition not to defend tradition, but to bastardize it. He uses his halachic familiarity to create "halachically informed" ceremonies which he knows violates all accepted halachic and Jewish norms. His actions represent the very opposite of what his Semichah intended. He is misusing it, and thereby violating not only its implied terms, but every other Semichah that my Yeshiva has conferred.
The powerful words written by Dr. Revel almost eighty years ago still resonate strongly. "The basic purpose of the Yeshiva is to guard the sanctity of Jewish Law in this land." That must be as true today as it was then, and if Yeshiva revoked a Semicha because a rabbi refused to leave a mix-pew congregation, it can and must do the same for a musmach who openly promotes values that violate very basic tenets of the Torah.
The time has come for Yeshiva to revoke Steven Greenberg's semichah, and if you agree with me, I urge you to contact Rabbi Yonah Reiss, the RIETS Dean, and tell him so.

Statement of Principles: Why I Haven't Signed

About six months ago, I received an email from Rabbi Nati Helfgot about a "Statement of Principles" that he was working to draft about how Orthodoxy should relate to homosexuality and people with homosexual tendency. I chose then not to get involved in the process, mostly because I'm not in the active rabbinate. The statement has been the topic of heated, respectful discussion on internal rabbinic email lists, but I must admit that I had not been following close attention. Then, yesterday, I received an email asking whether my name is, "intentionally missing", and whether I wanted to sign on.

Now I feel the need to respond to the statement, and why I did not - and do not plan on signing it.

First and foremost, I agree with the vast majority of the statement. I take issue with some of the language in the section about the children of openly gay couples which states that,

...communities should display sensitivity, acceptance and full embrace of the adopted or biological children of homosexually active Jews in the synagogue and school setting

Of course the children did not make their parents' choices. But how does a shul "fully embrace" a child while at the same time rejecting that child's parents' relationship? What is the rabbi supposed to say at the Bat Mitzvah? Does he acknowledge the parents (and laud them for their chessed, kindness, activism, what have you - common rabbinic practice), and indirectly project an approval for their family structure? (You could argue with that assumption of indirect approval, but I feel it would be there. You could also argue that we do precisely the same thing for parents who are not Shomer Shabbat. Fair point, but I see a difference.) I am not comfortable with the language in the statement, and probably would not have signed it for that reason alone. Or maybe they would have softened it if I had asked. Who knows?

Yet, I won't sign the statement for a more nuanced reason: I don't want to single out homosexual people at all. We live in a culture where a person's homosexuality is, by definition, a defining attribute of their identity. Every gay person, Western Culture says, should "Come out of the closet" and express their sexual identity with pride. Torah Judaism obviously sees things differently, and views homosexual tendencies as a spiritual challenge that one must struggle to overcome.That being the case, a paragraph like this troubles me.

Accordingly, Jews with homosexual orientations or same sex-attractions should be welcomed as full members of the synagogue and school community. As appropriate with regard to gender and lineage, they should participate and count ritually, be eligible for ritual synagogue honors, and generally be treated in the same fashion and under the same halakhic and hashkafic framework as any other member of the synagogue they join. Conversely, they must accept and fulfill all the responsibilities of such membership, including those generated by communal norms or broad Jewish principles that go beyond formal halakhah.

Mima Nafshach: If a Jew keeps his or her sexual orientation private, then she or he should of course be welcomed as a full member of the community. Who doesn't struggle to overcome sinful inclinations, be they the desire to surf porn on the internet or cheat on one's taxes? That's why we come to shul. But if a Jew has declared that lifestyle to be part of their identity, then they also insist that the community embrace their unacceptable behavior as part of the communal norm. That I cannot accept.

The statement bothers me because the very notion of singling out people with homosexual tendencies and their place in the community highlights the very thing that I feel is no one's business but their own. I (community member) don't want to know. I should not know, and should ask the single man to daven for the amud, lein, give shiurim, and live a full and productive life. I don't want to treat him as a "male with homosexual tendencies." I want to relate to him like a fellow Jew. To do that requires that he keep his personal struggles, as strong as they are, private.

Note here: I am not speaking as his rabbi. If he seeks spiritual guidance, he should turn to the rabbi who can offer counsel, advice, and listen to his pain. He might tell his parents, so that they don't nudge him about getting married. But the private should remain so, and must not become an aspect of a person's public persona, especially in the context of a Torah community.

This is where we digress from today's popular culture. It was once acceptable to promote a policy of "Don't ask, don't tell." (That's pretty much what I'm advocating.) But gays in broader society wonder, justifiably so, why they should hide a core component of what they view as their identity. It's a fair question.

But Judiasm cannot view homosexual tendencies in this way. It absolutely prohibits homosexual behavior, and demands that we fight to overcome those tendencies. It can never view these inclinations as a core aspect of one's identity. So to release a statement of principles which seems to counter this attitude is, in my view, counterproductive.

There is another, more sinister element to the list. It will now create a split in the Orthodox community between those who signed, and those who will not, for whatever reason. "Why did Rabbi So-and-So sign? Why did Rabbi Such-and-Such not sign? What if I was still in the pulpit but did not want to sign the statement for the reasons I outlined above? What would a congregant struggling with homosexuality think of me? Am I now "against" him - despite the fact that I've been very public about how we should respect and admire people who struggle with homosexuality. The very appearance of this list, while well-meaning, will undoubtedly cause rifts between community members within communities and between rabbis and their congregants.

Is it worth it?

I really don't know.

Because I Said So: An Old Drashah That's Still Relevant

After writing my last post, somewhere in the back of my head I knew that I had written about this before. A quick search on my hard drive revealed that I had spoken of the notion of obedience and submission before, as it turned out, specifically regarding the controversial and difficult subject of homosexuality.
In 2004, homosexuality and Judaism took center stage in Michigan, including a controversial agenda that made the ballot which attempted (ultimately successfully) to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. At the same time, the Detroit Jewish News broke its longstanding policy and announced that it would announce homosexual unions. I gave this as a drashah at the Young Israel of Oak Park in response. I find it interesting that the piece seems to combine both the parenting issues that we struggle with, and the challenge to Orthodoxy specifically in the area of homosexuality.

The Rush to Judgment

Last week an unknown gunman rushed into a community center for homosexuals in Tel Aviv and murdered six people in cold blood.
Let me first put priorities in order: Murder is terrible and must be condemned in the harshest of terms. The victims, their personal lifestyle choices, their sexual orientation - make not one bit of difference. We must mourn and combat violent crime with all our strength.
At the same time, the Torah still forbids homosexuality. I cannot and will not change that fact simply because teenagers in a gay center were the victims of a violent crime.
And, most surprisingly, while the perpetrator is still at large, everyone seems to know who is to blame. It's God. Or anyone who believes in the Torah. And the more you seem to adhere to the Torah, the more blame you deserve.
The rush to judgment seemed to begin even before the police arrived at the scene of the crime. It was a chareidi - at least it probably was. And if it wasn't, the mass killings resulted in the anti-gay rhetoric spewed by chareidim, most notably Shas. At least that's what you heard here in Israel. Don't get me wrong, but I haven't really heard Shas officials, rabbis, politicians - anyone - make much of any comment about the gay community in Israel. When the gay community insists on having a gay pride parade in Yerushalayim, then people from numerous political parties respond. But can someone point to a comment, lecture, speech or tirade where a chareidi incited violence against the homosexual community?
But the rush to judgment didn't just come from the secular Israeli press. Apparently, it also exists in the Orthodox community as well.
Take a look at this prayer penned by Rabbi Dov Linzer, the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Chovevei Torah in New York City. The prayer (which is rather long) states,

"Help us to value every member of our society for whom he or she is, to care for them, to support them, and to recognize that they are an equal part of our community כגר כאזרח יהיה. Give us the strength to fully actualize – in our speech and in our actions – the maxim that כל ישראל ערבים זה בזה, that the entirety of the Jewish people, straight and gay, is interwoven with and responsible for every one of its members.
We cannot change the past, but we can work to change the future, so we pray, O Lord, that You accept our mourning and our prayers, and give us the strength to change."

At face value, the prayer is right. Leaders of a community must take responsibility for terrible crimes and ask what went wrong, and how murder could happen in their midst. But which leaders? The prayer assumes that the "cause" of the murders was of course religious intolerance. We have no idea who committed this crime and why he or she did it. We don't know if it was a hateful anti-gay activist, as everyone assumes, or someone else entirely. While the press here would love it to end up being an ultra-Orthodox kollel student with a big beard and long payos, what if it turns out to be a gay teenager angry at his or her friends in the center, or a someone who frequented the center and for whatever reason took out his frustrations on those who he knew best? (Truth be told, shooting up anything doesn't really seem very chareidi. Throwing diapers? Lighting garbage? That I could believe. But most chareidim wouldn't know how to take the safety off an automatic weapon.)
Rabbi Linzer believes that the ultimate culprit of the violence is our belief that homosexuality is against the values of the Torah. In our unwillingness to accept homosexuality as a lifestyle, we are guilty of planting the seeds that sprouted this terrible violence.
Well I'm sorry, but I disagree. I can stand against a lifestyle without hatred - and I do. I stand against murder of any Jew. But I will not apologize for the values of the Torah that instill in us a sense of holiness and sanctity - no matter how unpopular they may seem today.