An Open Letter to Conservative Rabbis
CommentsI’ve been concerned that more than 100 rabbis affiliated with Conservative Judaism, the movement in which I was a member and leader for my entire life until 2003, have been quoted in the press or signed statements opposing the man-woman definition of marriage. Same-sex marriage is forbidden by both Conservative and Orthodox Jewish law. So I have written rabbis who have done so (whose E-mail addresses I could find) the following letter:
Dear Rabbi-
I’ve been surprised at the large number of Conservative rabbis (I count at least 115) who are openly supporting same-sex civil marriage. The list includes some rabbis I have known and respected for many years (I was an observant Conservative Jew until 2003 when I became Orthodox). Given our tradition’s clear opposition to same-sex civil marriage, I was hoping you might explain to me why you think it is legitimate to support something our tradition suggests that G-d rejects.
Of course, I know there are many Conservative rabbis who think halacha is binding unless it conflicts with the platform of the Democratic Party. But the list of Conservative rabbis supporting same-sex civil marriage includes many rabbis who I know to be far more sophisticated and committed to the halachic process than that. The Committee on Jewish Law and Standards has never endorsed same-sex civil or religious marriage, so I would like to hear your intellectual and religious bases for flouting halacha in this area. The facts, as I understand them, are as follows:
1. The Talmud in Chullin 92a quotes Ulla as saying “This verse (Zacharia 11:12) refers to the 30 commandments which the Noahides have accepted. But they keep only three of them,” one of which is not drawing up marriage contracts between men.
2. The Sifra on Acharei Mot discusses the pasuk (Vayikra 18:3) warning us against the “deeds of the Land of Egypt” and the “deeds of the Land of Canaan.” It says that the deeds in question include that “a man would marry a man, a woman would marry a woman, and a woman would be married to two men.”
3. The midrash in Bereishit Rabbah (25:6) quotes Rav Huna: “The generation of the flood was not obliterated until they wrote marriage contracts for males and animals.”
4. The notion that Jews must try to establish the Noahide laws for everyone is well established. For example, the Lubavitcher Rebbe insisted that we enforce Noahide laws by any means at our disposal: “We must do everything possible to ensure that the seven Noahide laws are observed. If this can be accomplished through force or through other kinder and more peaceful means through explaining to non-Jews that they should accept God’s wishes [we should do so]…Anyone who is able to influence a non-Jew in any way to keep the seven commandments is obligated to do so, since that is what God commanded Moses our teacher.” (”Sheva Mitzvot Shel Benai Noach,” Hapardes 59:9 7-11, 5745)
Clearly, Jewish law calls on committed Jews to oppose same-sex civil marriage. Taking the above rabbinic texts seriously, I do not see how one can conclude anything other than that G-d wants us to fight “marriage equality.” Could you please explain your thought process in coming to the opposite conclusion?
Unless you ask me not to, I will happily post your answer at my Web site, GaysDefendMarriage.com.
Yours,
David Bianco Benkof
So far I have heard back from ten rabbis, none of whom has given a substantive reason relating to Jewish law as to why it’s OK to advocate something Conservative and Orthodox Jewish law oppose.
Yet to be heard from are four LGBT rabbis (Jill Hammer, J.B. Rosen, Benay Lappe, and Tracee L. Rosen), six rabbis who have written pro-gay legal opinions - though no opinion approving of same-sex marriage has ever been approved by the movement’s Law Committee (Avram Reisner, Brad Artson, Daniel Nevins, David Fine, Elliot Dorff, and Gordon Tucker), and six rabbis I have known for a long time (Amy Eilberg, Elianna Yolkut, H. David Rose, H. David Teitelbaum, Marvin Goodman, and Sheldon Lewis). In all, 91 rabbis have yet to respond. Rabbis are busy people, of course, and many go on vacation during the summer. As the responses come in, I will post them, along with my reactions, in the comments section below.
It is a real shame that you are such a self-hating homosexual. Why do you speak for God? My God is totally fine with homosexuality.
http://www.queersunited.blogspot.com
I don’t speak for G-d. The religious texts I cited, which Judaism believes originated in the encounter with G-d at Mount Sinai, speak for G-d.
I completely respect that your god is fine with same-sex marriage. I urge you to speak out - including in the comments section on my blog - and to lobby your representatives and to vote consistently with your beliefs about the morality or immorality of same-sex marriage. All I ask is that you respect my choice to do the same, and in a free society whoever’s point of view gets the most votes will win.
I respect your freedom to say whatever you want. I just don’t understand how someone who used to be a gay rights activist could have such a change of heart. Why would God create you gay and create gay animals if it were a sin? I personally do not believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible but you should read it contextually. You would not be in favor of stoning non-virgin brides would you? The bible does support that. We need to read it and understand that it was written in the context of the time by many ancient scholars.
Thank you. I will deal with how I know G-d does not create anyone gay in a future installment of my “Fabulously Observant” column. In the meantime you can go to http://www.shemayisrael.com/isjudaism/ to get a preliminary response. I have already finished a column slated for July that explains why it is perfectly consistent to listen to the Jewish texts that say marriage is between a man and a woman but not to advocate stoning non-virgin brides. If you, or any other reader, wants to read the draft of that column on a confidential basis, E-mail me at DavidBenkof@aol.com. As for gay animals, there is no evidence that the animals engaging in same-sex behaviors are oriented toward homosexuality rather than choosing same-sex activity. How would you know? My guinea pig Gertrude never liked orange slices, although she loved spinach and carrots. Is Gertrude oriented toward vegetables and away from fruit? Or is that just her preference? I don’t know how a person could tell.
David that is scientifically inaccurate as zoologists have tried to pair gay animals with others in the species of the opposite sex. The gay animals usually do not cooperate, shocker because they are gay. Bisexuality does exist though, so some will make the swap.
Hmm, maybe those gay animals had a domineering mother or absent father or were abused as babies or whatever. In any case, it doesn’t entitle them technological intervention using genetic engineering so they can have offspring with another animal of the same sex.
People should only be allowed to reproduce using their actual unmodified gametes, which means only with someone of the other sex. That means there is a right that a man and a woman should have together that two men or two women should not have. And that right is the sine qua non of marriage since time immemorial. Marriage should continue to protect the couples right to attempt to conceive children together using their own genes.
queerunity, why would describe David as “a self-hating homosexual”?
Just because he disagrees with you on SSM, you’d impugne his motivation and his character?
As for context, David clearly has described how these pro-SSM rabbis have openly disagreed with the The Committee on Jewish Law and Standards. As David put it, these pro-SSM rabbis approved something that “the tradition suggests that G-d rejects”.
David did NOT accuse them of being self-hating Conservative Jews, just because they disagreed with Conservative Judaism. He asked for substantive reasons for THEIR disagreement with their own tradition’s teachings.
But in your comment you seemed to be in a rush to accuse David of hating himself merely for disagreeing YOU on this particular issue. Is that your way of trying to coerce another person based on gay identity politics?
I hope not. I do hope you have good answers to these questions.
—
Note: I have tried to ask these questions without rancor. It’s not easy to show this sincere effort through the typed word, here, so I want to be clear that the questions are sincere and not intended to ignite a flame war of any kind.
Chairm David seems like an intelligent person and so I want to get to the bottom of how someone can be gay and oppose their own human rights? The conservative Jewish leaders who support gay marriage are not going against God. Tradition is subject to change. The bible advocates polygamy but you would be hard pressed to find people who support that viewpoint today. If we were to follow the bible on a literal basis we would be stoning non-virgin brides, killing pagans, and would be allowed multiple wives.
http://www.queersunited.blogspot.com
Chairm, ever notice that people like QueerUnity really appreciate the chance you always give them to ignore the issue I put in front of them? It’s really easy for them to answer your points, it’s really hard for them to answer mine. How about not bothering to ask QueerUnity questions that have been rehashed over and over and let’s move the conversation forward to new ground?
QU, you don’t need to claim that same-sex couples should have full equality to a man and a woman, you don’t need to claim a right to conceive together, do you? It is vain and dangerous, and there are things you know you need more, things that people are ready to give you, but you demand too much. It is much smarter and better to eschew full equality and accept that people should only be allowed to procreate with someone of the other sex. Accepting that will enable equal protections on all the other areas through civil unions that have a practical and principled and permanent difference from marriages.
And David, I don’t know what Maggie told you about me or what gag orders she put on you, but forget them. Please let’s start to address this issue, it is time.
John Howard are you proposing marriage only be for those who can conceive? That would eliminate infertile, impotent, and the elderly. Marriage is not about the ability to procreate, it is about love, financial security, and family (whether that be through conception or adoption). Marriage has zero to do with procreation, one can procreate outside of marriage. Your argument is weak.
No, I’m proposing that we prohibit same-sex conception and other forms of genetic modification, and make a law that people can only conceive with someone of the other sex, using their own genes.
Even infertile people have a right to attempt to procreate, but people should not have a right to attempt to conceive with someone of their same sex. Same-sex conception should be prohibited by any means.
Marriage should continue to mean that the couple is allowed to attempt to conceive, no marriage should be prohibited from conceiving by any means. Certain methods can be prohibited if they are unsafe, but not all methods. Marriage says that we approve of children coming fro that couple. We should not approve of children from same-sex couples.
QueerUnity, perhaps I need to explain that same-sex conception using stem-cell derived gametes is actively being researched and many LGBT groups are insisting on it being a right. Thought they could attempt it without having to seek marriage rights first today, due to the prevalence of out-of-wedlock births, marriage would protect it and make it harder to prohibit (which we need to do because of how unwise and unethical allowing it would be). If we prohibit the use of modified gametes, but still have same-sex marriage, then we will have changed marriage so that it no longer protects the right to conceive children together, which would threaten everyone’s individual conception rights.
Do you have any article sources on this? Two men cannot reproduce. I do know that two women can through some scientific procedure which I am unfamiliar with. I don’t see any reason why that would be dangerous though.
My website http://www.eggandsperm.org has some articles, and there is a new pro-SSP website called http://www.samesexprocreation.com that has a lot of articles also.
It’s funny, some researchers i’ve seen interviewed say that two men will be easier than two women, because genes on the Y chromosome are needed to create a sperm from stem cells. And yet, so far the only successful birth from same-sex parents is a mouse born from two mothers, with no sperm. So I don’t know whether to trust any particular researcher’s opinion on how soon this might happen. I just know that they are working on it and it will be a contentious issue, and as we are discussing same-sex rights and marriage, we might as well cut to the chase and decide if we should allow it right now. However we decide that should be how we decide the SSM issue also. If we decide to allow SSP, we should allow SSM (that is the status quo), but if we decide to prohibit use of modified gametes, we should not allow SSM and consider CU’s for couples that do not have a right to conceive together, in order to preserve marriage’s conception rights.
I’d much prefer gay couples to adopt, since many children need homes. But this new research seems exciting and promising. I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t embark on this scientific journey.
Queerunity, SSM argumentation depends on the relatively new tradition of romantic love so you should probably not diss tradition so breezily. Nor should you so irrationally resort to namecalling. You answer to my query is no answer at all.
And I see that John Howard has run aground your leaky vessel. Marriage does indeed entail the liberty to attempt to procreate together. The merger of marriage with SSM would lead to the sort of confusion that you have demonstrated in your responses to John Howard. What he has referred to as “same-sex procreation” is not human procreation, but rather human manufacture. And that should not be given license via an SSM-merger.
QU, we shouldn’t embark on it because there is no need, and there are so many things we DO need. And even if there were no opportunity cost to developing it, it would have a terrible effect on how people view child birth, we would start to view children as products, as Chairm notes. This would also open the door to genetic engineering of traits and abilities and anything else people felt like doing, which would also denigrate the idea that all people are created equal and each person a blessing no matter their traits and qualities. And then there’s the issue of needlessly putting children at so much risk of birth defects, a lifetime of follow-up testing, psychological issues from having no biological mother or father (plus having two fathers or mothers)… I also tremble thinking about the number of animals that would be sacrificed to test it, and the poor people that have to conduct those tests on them.
It’s totally unnecessary. Let’s explore the beautiful future that would open up if we eschewed genetic engineering and embraced a universal right to natural conception.
Queerunity-
What is your proof that the animals won’t mate with the opposite sex because of an orientation rather than a preference? You could put avocado in front of me time after time and I won’t eat it even once. Is that proof I’m “oriented” against avocado? Isn’t it just as possible I just don’t prefer to eat it? Since we can’t ask the animals, how can we know when same-sex behavior is a preference, and when it’s a mark of an orientation?
I’m a little annoyed that you keep using this Biblical argument when you have not taken me up on my offer to send you my Leviticus column. I can’t publish it here because of my arrangement with gay newspapers; it can’t be put on the Web until July. But if you don’t read it then you’re just harping on a point I have a very good answer for that you refuse to listen to.
John H.-
Maggie has given me no gag orders for you or anyone, nor would she have the right to. This is my blog. I have let you post whatever you like, even though I don’t find your gamete theory all that compelling. I spend most of my energy in the comments section explaining my point of view to people who support same-sex marriage. Those who agree with me can post all they want but shouldn’t expect lots of comments from me, since my time is limited.
Queerunity, I too would much prefer same-sex couples to adopt. That means children with no parents will have two parents. But the science fictiony same-sex procreation movement, while it should be legal, is horribly unethical and terribly cruel. It means a lesbian couple, for example, prioritizes the selfish preference that their child share both of their DNA sequences over the possibility that their own offspring will have a father. I wouldn’t want such lesbians to be arrested or fined for such an act, but I certainly wouldn’t want to be their friend, and I reserve the right to blog about their unbelievable mistreatment of their own flesh and blood.
But David, if you are looking for a way to preserve marriage and also advance protections for same-sex couples, I’m telling you: look no further. Perhaps I just need to explain it better, because if you could endorse the Egg and Sperm Civil Union Compromise, then it could gain some serious momentum.
I trust you agree with me about the basics. But perhaps I need to ask: What is your position on whether we should allow same-sex couples to attempt to conceive together? What is your position on whether marriages should have a right to conceive together?
Hopefully you don’t insist on same-sex conception being a right, and would accept a law that prohibited it, even if you didn’t really care about the need for the law. And hopefully you you don’t insist on that married couples should not have a right to attempt to conceive children together, even if you don’t think it is all that important that the right is preserved.
Are we in agreement about that, so far?
Sorry, I should have kept reading: “But the science fictiony same-sex procreation movement, while it should be legal,”
Why should it be legal? If you think that a gay couple should be allowed to attempt to conceive children together, then why shouldn’t they be allowed to marry? Doesn’t that go against the idea that couples should marry before they have children?
Please explain why you don’t think we should prohibit it. Most other countries have prohibited it, England for example, and that’s why they are able to achieve their Civil Partnerships which give most of the protections of marriage but do not give conception rights. We need to get Congress to prohibit use of modified gametes, we can’t be ambivalent about this issue.
Queerunity said: “Marriage has zero to do with procreation, one can procreate outside of marriage.”
Is that some sort of rule? That if something can occur outside of marriage, then, it has zero to do with marriage?
Because that rule would destroy what you said the sentence before:
“Marriage [...] is about love, financial security, and family (whether that be through conception or adoption).”
And to borrow another pro-SSM rule, there is no legal requirement that each and every marriage pass a love test or provide financial security or include adopted children. The lack of a legal requirement means that these things have zero to do with marriage.
Right?
Regarding children, we ought to point to the core of marriage rather than outside of marriage. The marriage presumption of paternity applies to all unions of husband and wife.
It is rebuttable, as a legal presumption, however in the case of a combination that lacks one or the other sex there would be nothing to rebut. The presumption can not apply.
A man does not impregnate another man. A woman is not impregnated by another woman. The marriage presumption is of paternity not of maternity and it is based on the conjugal relations of husband and wife. So it cannot fit the all-male nor the all-female arrangement.
The marriage presumption protects the particular married couple and it protects the social institution as a whole. But a merger with the one-sexed type of relationship would deeply discount, or negate entirely, the basis of the presumption — sexual relations between man and woman. In some jurisdictions, there is a presumption of paternity in unwed scenarios provided that there is opportunity for the man to have impregnated the woman. But the state has to be far more intrusive to establish paternity than it does with the conjugal relationship type.
To loose this essential of marriage is no small thing. Of course for the one-sex type of relationship, or perhaps for the subset that is gay-identified in particular, nothing is lost in the merger. I think advocates of SSM ought to consider the value to society of protecting marriage by showing preference for responsible procreation and by ensuring that each marriage entails the consent to the marriage presumption of paternity. It is not valueless, surely, even in the eyes of the most gaycentric among SSMers.
When people point to adoption, they point outside of marriage to a means by which a shortfall is made-up for the child in need. The contingency for responsible procreation works to avoid that shortfall in the first place. This contingency begins before a couple engage in conjugal relations and it extends beyond conception and childbearing to entail the well-being and the education and the socialization of the children they helped create together. Adoption is not procreation, responsible or otherwise, nor does it bestow marital status. It is related to marriage but is not based exclusively on marriage. In fact, marital status is a legitimate basis upon which to prioritize potential adoptors.
When people point to third party procreation, they point to extramarital procreation even where married couples use the method. They point not the core of marriage but outside of marriage.
And when SSMers talke of infertility they strongly imply a false equivalency between the experience of a disability and the choice made to form an arrangement that lacks the other sex. A one-sex scenario is not infertile because it cannot be fertile — without the other sex. Both fertility and infertility are both-sexed, not one-sexed. Infertility is usually resolved through changes in behavior rather than third party procreation.
About 10% of married couples experience infertility. Half of these couples already have children and so they experience subfertility. Of those who don’t have children and experience infertility (about 1/2 of one percent of married couples) less than 2% use IVF/ARTs to conceive and bear children (about 1/10th of one percent of married couples). And of those who use these lab interventions less than 10% use gametes other than their own (about 1/100th of married couples).
Each one-sex scenario (a lone individual, two men or two women, or a group of individuals of the same sex) rely on going outside of that scenario to attempt to procreate. That’s 100% of the one-sex-short scenarios.
So there is a legitimate issue of proportionality when discussing infertility (10% of married versus the nonfertility of 100% of the one-sex-short scenarios) and the use of third party (i.e. extramarital) procreation (1/100th of 1% versus 100% of one-sex-short scenarios). The marriage law ought not be led by the nose by the use of methods for nonmarital procreation.
This goes to show that SSMers who point to adoption and to infertility and to 3rd party procreation serve to remind us that they point not to the core of the conjugal relationship type nor to the definitive legal requirements of marriage, but rather they point outside of marriage to the non-requirements of SSM.
They remind us that SSM is not marriage. It has a different core but one which the SSMers strongly suggest exists outside of marriage.
Thusfar, I think the indications are that the core of the SSM-merger is identity politics but perhaps there are SSMers who can show otherwise.
Chairm-
I must say I found your lattest message a little complex and hard to follow. But I do disagree with the implication of “The marriage presumption protects the particular married couple and it protects the social institution as a whole.” Those two protections may be true, but the main reason for the marriage presumption is to protect the children of every marriage. Without it, children would regularly find two men arguing not over who gets to be their father - but over who gets to *not* be their father. It would be ugly and hurtful, but it’s obviated by our society’s agreement that the father of a child born in wedlock is the man married to its mother.
Those presumption of paternity laws are falling by the wayside anyhow. Now, married men CAN argue that they are not the father. The only thing the presumption does these days is allow a married couple to pretend that the child is theirs together and keep the bio-father away, though I bet that soon a bio-father will break through that barrier also, and extract a claim for paternity.
btw Chairm, the first part of your post is a great rebuttal to the “if it can happen outside it, then it has nothing to do with marriage” argument. I wish you wouldn’t be relying on the “same-sex couples can’t procreate” fallacy, though. They can, Kaguya proved it, all it takes is enough tries and enough utter disregard for the health of the child and what is best for society.
David says: “Queerunity, I too would much prefer same-sex couples to adopt. That means children with no parents will have two parents. But the science fictiony same-sex procreation movement, while it should be legal, is horribly unethical and terribly cruel. It means a lesbian couple, for example, prioritizes the selfish preference that their child share both of their DNA sequences over the possibility that their own offspring will have a father. I wouldn’t want such lesbians to be arrested or fined for such an act, but I certainly wouldn’t want to be their friend, and I reserve the right to blog about their unbelievable mistreatment of their own flesh and blood.”
This is a major disagreement with me about marriage and same-sex rights and the future of the world. Where does your opinion that “it should be legal” come from? It is absolutely in contradiction to healthy marriage and your whole pragmatic approach to improving the lives of gay people. It’s also strange that you have a position on something you claim not to be interested in. If it’s not important to you, why not play along with me and support the Egg and Sperm Civil Union compromise? At least show me some courtesy by visiting my website so you know what I’m talking about. Leave a comment on the compromise, I won’t even delete it.
We can choose a brighter future by prohibiting labs from creating people from lab-created gametes. You say you don’t want to punish the lesbian couple that tries it, but how about the doctor that tries it? I think all parties involved should be punished.
John Howard-
I’m a conservative. I think the government should stay out of people’s business unless it has a compelling reason to do so. When it comes to intimate decisions like sex and reproduction, I particularly want Big Brother to mind his own business. I know you think this issue is central to the same-sex marriage debate. I happen to think it’s utterly marginal. Feel free to make your case here or elsewhere as much as you want. But I’m going to focus on the aspects of the same-sex marriage debate that I think are more important, thanks.
David said: “Those two protections may be true, but the main reason for the marriage presumption is to protect the children of every marriage.”
The children are protected by protecting the social institution and the particular married couple from the potential intrusions you mentioned. I agree with you that the marriage presumption makes of marriage the most pro-child social institution we have.
John Howard, you say the marriage presumption is falling away because it is rebuttable. But it has always been subject to rebuttal. You are correct in that family law courts have sometimes undermined marriages, and the social institution, by allowing a man outside of the marriage to intrude. But that’s a recent development. Generally, the presumption stands strong where a marriage exists rather than where divorce or a seperation has taken place.
* * *
My previous comment took on the false equivalencies that SSMers discuss when they discount the connection between procreation and the social institution of marriage. For example, contrary to SSM argumentation, infertility is not the equivalent of the lack of the other sex, much less the choice to exclude the other sex. Whereas the nonfertility of the one-sexed combo is constant, the nature of fertility is variable due to all kinds of factors that are irrelevant to the one-sexed combo.
I can illustrate this by way of John Howard’s remark that same-sex couples might procreate. What he has named “same-sex procreation” is manufacture, not procreation. Yet it mimics human procreation in that it tricks an ova into treating another as if it were sperm. That mimickry reminds that human procreation is both-sexed, just like fertility, and just like infertility. Neither is one-sexed.
And if it were to be used by married couples it would be as extramarital as the available forms of third party procreation via IVF/ARTs. It points outside of marriage.
John Howard’s useful primary point, I believe, is that confusing nonmarriage with marriage provides the basis for confusing manufacture with procreation.
I can forsee how advocates of manufacture would seek to redefine the meaning of procreation just as advocates of SSM assume that they are entitled to use the word, marriage, and the societal esteem for the social institution, but deeply discount if not abolish the essentials of marriage. Just swap out the word, marriage, and insert the word, procreation, and you can see no end of confusions that would arise.