Reform Jews Plan a Shift to Tradition

The governing body of Reform Judaism--the largest of the country’s Jewish denominations--is expected today to approve a new statement of principles that would ratify a historic shift back toward religious traditionalism.

When Reform began in the 19th century, leaders of the movement did away with such religious obligations as observing kosher dietary laws, wearing yarmulkes or using Hebrew in services.

The expected vote of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, which comes after several years of sometimes contentious debate, is intended to ratify and encourage what is already happening in many Reform temples. Rituals once scorned in Reform circles as marks of foreignness, such as the wearing of yarmulkes and talitot--head coverings and prayer shawls--during services would be officially endorsed as an option for congregants. So, too, would be kosher observance in the home. The use of Hebrew in services would be supported.

Religious leaders say that what is happening among Reform Jews is characteristic of a broader shift among Americans of many faiths--or no religious upbringing at all--a disillusionment with modernity and a corresponding desire to go back to the future in their searches for meaning.

Just as evangelical Protestants in growing numbers are adopting Roman Catholic and Episcopal rituals, such as marking their foreheads with ashes at the beginning of Lent, Reform Jews are adopting tangible symbols rooted in Jewish memory to deepen their religious practices and sense of connection with God.

“The [new principles] reflect a shift in American religious life in general,” said David Ellenson, professor of Jewish religious thought at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles. “It isn’t simply that it affirms ritual acts. It’s the very use of language. The whole tone is reflective of a kind of inward turning and emphasis.”

Rabbi Harvey J. Fields of Wilshire Boulevard Temple, a leading Reform congregation, said: “There is no doubt about it in my mind that congregations are responding to an openness to tradition. . . . Congregants are looking for how Jewish tradition can play a role in their lives, and particularly in their homes.”

The expected vote would cap a gradual movement in recent years by Reform Jews toward religious observances and rituals usually associated with Conservative and Orthodox Jewry.

For example, at the 1987 convention of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the Reform movement’s congregational body, few delegates wore prayer shawls and head coverings. Ten years later, at the 1997 convention, those who choose not to were in the minority.

“For a while when one wore a kippot or a tallis in a Reform synagogue you were very often self-conscious,” said Rabbi Richard Levy of Los Angeles, the outgoing president of the Central Conference, the Reform movement’s rabbinical organization--and the chief architect of the proposed statement of principles.

More broadly, the change marks a major turning away from what was once Reform’s almost exclusive emphasis on rationalism.

“What it says is there is an emotional component that has not been taken seriously enough,” said Rabbi Charles A. Kroloff, incoming president of the rabbinical body. Until recently, if a religious practice was not “absolutely rational and doesn’t make perfect sense . . . it would have been thrown out and not taken seriously,” he said.

Despite the existing trend toward ritual within Reform, the proposal expected to be approved today has created considerable controversy.

“It clearly has created a firestorm,” Ellenson said.

Rabbi Robert M. Seltzer, professor of Jewish history at the City University of New York, termed the proposal “Conservative lite” when an earlier draft was unveiled last November. He and others were especially troubled by what they saw as an attempt to bolster the level of piety and traditionalism at the expense of Reform’s historical distinctiveness.

Levy says he believes he has met many of the objections by rewording some parts of the declaration. And even with the changes, a major difference will remain between Reform and Conservative approaches to religious practice.

Reform leaders stress that the new principles are neither binding on individuals or congregations. Those who adopt traditional ways will do so because tradition and ritual observances can help them navigate their lives.

By contrast, Conservative Judaism teaches that many traditional practices, observing the kosher dietary laws, for example, remain the expected norm for Jews, even though many Conservative Jews do not observe them.

“I hope that Reform Jews will take seriously the invitation that this document proffers, to listen to and attend to the whole of the Torah and the whole of Jewish tradition and feel that all of it is open to them,” Levy said.