c. 1997 Religion News Service

UNDATED _ In 1817, Germany’s Orthodox Jewish establishment, outraged at the radical innovations in Jewish beliefs and practices instituted by the new Reform movement, convinced the Prussian government to prohibit Reform services in Berlin.

One-hundred-eighty years later, Orthodox Jews are still trying to label Reform Judaism beyond the pale of acceptable Jewish religious practice. The only difference now is that Conservative Judaism _ developed in the late 19th century as a middle ground between Orthodoxy’s demands and Reform’s radicalism _ is also being attacked by Orthodox leaders.

The latest flare up in this ongoing fight is the widely reported announcement by the New York-based Union of Orthodox Rabbis that it will formally declare”that Reform and Conservative are not Judaism at all.” Contrary to some press reports, the union did not _ and could not under Jewish law _ declare individual Jews who belong to Reform and Conservative synagogues to no longer be Jews.

By itself, the statement by the union _ an ultra-right group dismissed even by other Orthodox rabbinic groups as on the fringe _ represents nothing new. Moreover, the group’s authority is limited to its supporters, which the union puts at some 500 rabbis and their followers.

However the union’s action _ and the angry counterstatements issued by Reform and Conservative leaders _ is indicative of the vitriol that now dominates Judaism’s internal struggle to define itself. It also underscores how fragile the links between Judaism’s main religious movements have become.

Perhaps more than any time since the initial break between Orthodox and Reform _ between traditional rabbinic Judaism and attempts to square the faith with modernity _ the possibility exists of the rift becoming irreparable.”This is very, very serious stuff,”said Memphis Rabbi Rafael Grossman, president of the 1,000-member Rabbinical Council of America, the nation’s largest Orthodox rabbinical body which quickly distanced itself from the union’s declaration.”We’re talking about the bonds that have sustained us, Orthodox and non-Orthodox, and kept us one family. That’s now in danger.” The dispute is by no means limited to the 5.6 million-member American Jewish community, more than 90 percent of which is non-Orthodox.

In Great Britain, the leading Orthodox rabbi _ who as that nation’s chief rabbi is the official representative of all British Jews _ recently refused to attend the funeral of a respected Reform rabbi. To attend, said Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, would have conferred legitimacy on Reform Judaism, which he called a”false grouping.” In Israel, the”who is a Jew?”dispute is being played out in the caldron of national politics. Orthodox political parties have introduced legislation that would codify their de facto religious hegemony in Israel over conversion and other areas of Jewish life.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who needs the Orthodox parties to maintain his ruling coalition but who personally is secular, has sided with the Orthodox demands to the degree that during a recent visit to New York he refused to be photographed with Reform and Conservative leaders.

That so angered non-Orthodox leaders that one _ Rabbi Ismar Schorsch, chancellor of the Conservative Jewish Theological Seminary _ sent an emotional letter to thousands of his colleagues urging them to send some $150 million in donations to Israel to strengthen Reform and Conservative institutions there to”level the playing field.” The current state of affairs, which has slowly reached the boiling point over the past decade, is attributable to several developments.

From the Orthodox perspective, the most important of these was the Reform movement’s 1983 decision to break with centuries of Jewish tradition and recognize as Jews the offspring of Jewish fathers and non-Jewish mothers, provided the children are raised as Jews.

Under halacha _ the code of traditional Jewish law followed closely by Orthodox Jews but which is to varying degrees altered, if not rejected, by non-Orthodox Jews _ only someone born to a Jewish mother or converted according to halacha is a Jew. The Reform move was in response to the growing number of Jews marrying non-Jews.”That destructive, horrible decision broke the paper-thin facade of Jewish unity,”said Rabbi David Hollander, an executive board member of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis (not to be confused with the much better-known Orthodox Union, a congregational body).”By counting as Jews individuals who are not Jews, Reform will ultimately split the Jewish community. In a generation or two we won’t know who is and who is not a Jew. They are destroying the Jewish people.” In Israel, the Orthodox establishment fears a similar result from the massive immigration in recent years of Jews from the former Soviet Union, many of them intermarried. By some estimates, more than a quarter of the immigrants are not Jews according to halacha.

That Orthodox concern in Israel _ coupled with liberal court decisions that opened the door to official recognition of non-Orthodox Judaism _ is the reason for the current Orthodox legislation supported by Netanyahu. From the Reform and Conservative perspectives, this is a religious freedom issue and the primary cause of the current tensions.

Ironically, the psychological security gained by American Jews with the decline of widespread anti-Semitism and the existential security gained by Israel through military might and the Middle East peace process _ as tattered as it might currently be _ also have contributed to the crisis.

Free from worry about what non-Jews will think, American Jews have become far more willing to air their dirty linen in public. Free from worry about Israel’s immediate destruction, Jews in Israel and the diaspora have dropped the commandment to put their disputes on hold so as to concentrate on the Jewish state’s survival.”Freedom from fear has turned out to have a downside,”said Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Reform Union of American Hebrew Congregations.

Hollander, the Union of Orthodox Rabbis official, said the group decided to issue its declaration in part to prod Reform and Conservative Jews into abandoning those movements and returning to the Orthodox fold.

A more likely outcome is that the declaration will only further alienate the average Reform and Conservative Jew from their Orthodox co-religionists and induce their leaders to further confront the growing Orthodox militancy ever more forcefully.

That means no end to Judaism’s internecine struggle.

MJP END RIFKIN