• Home
• About
  • About
  • Contact
  • Mission
• Datebook: Events Calendar
• Women's Philanthropy
• Subscribe to e-newsletter
• Young Adults
• Contribute
• Where Your Money Goes
  • Where Your Money Goes
  • Annual Report (PDF)
• Professional Groups
  • Legal Professionals
  • Healthcare Professionals
  • Jewish High Tech
  • Business & Bagels
  • Professional Directory
• Community Resources
  • Community Resources
  • Community Rabbi
  • JCRC
• Volunteer
• Local Jewish News
• Search
•  

Jewish Community News

Ask the Rabbi: February 2007

Ask the Rabbi:

Can I apply to rabbinical school as a proud homosexual?

Question: Rabbi, I am a gay man who is interested in becoming a Conservative rabbi. I know that there have been some developments in the movement recently. What are they, and can I finally apply to rabbinical school as a proud homosexual?

Answer:
Your question comes on the heels of the passage of three responsa or Teshuvot, addressing various aspects of the issue, by the Committee of Jewish Laws and Standards (CJLS) of the Rabbinical Assembly (RA). The CJLS is composed of 25 rabbis and six non-voting members. The RA is the international association of Conservative rabbis. They gather regularly to discuss the every- day application of Jewish law and the standards of practice for the Conservative movement. The synagogues and agencies of the movement can choose to uphold any Teshuva that is passed. There is some confusion around this, because several Teshuvot can be passed at the same time, and each agency and rabbi can choose to affirm any from a number of Teshuvot. Their last meeting this past December is where those Teshuvot were passed.

As I am sure you are well aware, the Conservative movement has been very ambivalent about the issue of openly ordaining homosexuals since it first came before the CJLS in the early nineties. It wasn’t much earlier that openly gay and lesbian rabbinic students were welcomed at the seminaries of the Reform and Reconstructionist movements. I should tell you that when I was at the Zeigler School at the University of Judaism in Los Angeles, and later the Jewish Theological Seminary, there was “more than one” closeted students in a “don’t ask-don’t tell” environment.

Indeed there are Conservative rabbis of colors of the rainbow! KeshetRabbis.org is the association of gay friendly Conservative rabbis, and there is a gay student organization at JTS also called Keshet.
While not all three of the responsa which were passed are favorable to your situation to pursue the rabbinate, at least one of them seems to have opened a crack in the door to broader acceptance and full participation for homosexual Jews. I’m not doing justice to the amazing work that these rabbis have produced, and their extensive scholarship can hardly be distilled to a single notion, but for the sake of simplicity I will give you what I see as the relevant points.

To take a look at the three Teshuvot which were passed, I will refer to them by the names of their primary authors. The Dorff, the Levy and the Roth, after rabbis Elliot Dorff, Leonard Levy and Joel Roth. In a very real way I believe that they are a collective “step forward,” a “step backward” and a “remain in your place” respectively. Before explaining, I want to share my joy that at least we appear to be dancing, if not marching ahead!

Let’s begin by standing in our places. The Roth Teshuva basically re-affirmed the status quo. More specifically he says that while homosexuality might not be a choice, it still is a negative commandment from the Torah that one may not actively participate in. The problematic biblical reference to homosexuality is this verse from Leviticus 18:22: “Thou Shalt not lay with a man as thou dost with a woman, it is taboo!” (To which one of my gay friends, who happens to be a rabbi, reminds me that he would never lie with a woman the way he lies with a man, nor could he!) Thus it is incompatible with the role of the rabbi as community leader and exemplar of Jewish family life. I disagree. Roth says that we should be welcoming of gays into our congregations, but their ordination as clergy is beyond Halacha.

In contrast, the Dorff Teshuva calls for the full normalization of the status of gay and lesbian Jews at all levels of the Conservative movement. He argues that ordination should be based on scholarship and not orientation. The way that he deals with that pesky little verse from Leviticus 18 is that he claims that this is a prohibition on a specific sex act, so he would ask you as a gay man to refrain from that act as you enter the rabbinate. Shall we dance?

Which leads me to the Levy Teshuva which affirmed the need for more educational programs to achieve the level of compassion and dignity for all Jews as the law requires. He then goes on to betray those very words by suggesting that psychotherapy for homosexuals should be encouraged. Suggesting, if only by innuendo, that homosexuality can be cured! Oy vey! An embarrassing step in the wrong direction for sure.
What this means for you as a rabbinical applicant is that we’ll have to wait and see how it plays out in the various rabbinical seminaries. One scenario has the Ziegler School at the U.J. as the gay-friendly campus, while it might take a little while for JTS to completely let its guard down and shake a leg! I fear that the Jerusalem and Buenos Aires campuses might also be lagging in their open acceptance of sexual diversity. How this plays out in the congregations, is another unanswered question. Time will tell.

In the meantime, I encourage you to become more involved in your local synagogue. Your Hebrew, prayer skills and Jewish knowledge will all help you down the road in the Conservative movement. Oh yeah, if you don’t know already, I would learn how to dance!

Behatzlacha!