In 1999, Edah organized its first of several conferences on the state of Modern Orthodoxy. It was an exciting time for the Orthodox community—more than 1,000 people attended that conference, in which cutting-edge topics such as the halachic prenup, women reading the Megillah, halachic conversion and personal autonomy/religious authority were discussed. Its motto was “The Challenge to be Modern … and Orthodox.”
For those who may not know or remember, Edah was a Jewish educational organization and community network that focused on fostering innovation and engagement within Modern Orthodoxy. It was founded by Rabbi Saul Berman to promote a vibrant, inclusive and intellectually open form of Orthodox Judaism. Edah aimed to address challenges within the Modern Orthodox community, such as balancing tradition with modern values, promoting gender equality, and engaging with broader societal issues through a Jewish lens.
I was privileged to serve on the board of Edah for several years, and we made some significant contributions, challenging some of the norms of Orthodoxy and encouraging innovative thinking. The organization’s conferences and publications were well-regarded for their intellectual rigor and open discussions on sometimes controversial topics.
The organization had some fierce and well-respected critics, though. Rabbi Moshe Tendler said that the organization was “outside the pale of Orthodoxy,” and Rabbi Herschel Schachter deemed Edah as “a sort of internal Amalek.”
In 2006, the organization folded, but many of its ideas and initiatives influenced other Modern Orthodox institutions and the broader Jewish community.
I had a chance to speak to Steve Bayme, a keen observer of the Modern Orthodox world, who served as the director of contemporary Jewish life at the American Jewish Committee and taught history at Yeshiva University, about Edah and its impact on Modern Orthodoxy. Below are his thoughts.
What would you say were the major accomplishments of Edah, as you reflect back on those years?
Edah demonstrated the existence of a strong grassroots Modern Orthodox constituency dissatisfied with the Orthodox status quo and particularly its steady drift rightward since 1970 or thereabouts. That constituency remains waiting to be energized. A recent Nishma poll found, for example, that about a third of self-defined Modern Orthodox Jews favored greater roles for women in Orthodoxy, including clergy. Edah conferences gave voice to calls for directional shifts within Modern Orthodox ideological thinking and within key Orthodox institutions. To some extent, it succeeded, to some extent it failed. The Edah Journal, for example, was an excellent organ of Jewish scholarship and thought on issues critical to thinking and open-minded Orthodox Jews. Conversely, however, the drift rightward within Orthodoxy continues—and in some respects has become even more pronounced in recent years, both here and in Israel.
What were some of the things that you would have liked Edah to have accomplished but didn’t?
Edah contained considerable intellectual strength within its ranks but was never able to mobilize it as a force for change. I often commented that JOFA, the movement for securing greater equality for women within Orthodoxy, was relentless in pursuit of its aspirations for Modern Orthodoxy. By contrast, Edah failed to follow up on its very successful conferences and was not nearly as relentless in pursuit of its goals. For example, Edah failed to provide an Orthodox counter-voice to growing extremism and incipient messianism within the Orthodox community.
The publication of the Mendel Shapiro article on partnership minyanim created some controversy within the Modern Orthodox world. In fact, many Orthodox rabbis who generally are sympathetic to the plight of observant women believe that partnership minyanim are halachically problematic. In retrospect, do you think the article should have been published, even though it upset many Edah supporters who otherwise agreed with its mission? What do you see as the future for partnership minyanim?
Mendel Shapiro’s excellent piece certainly should have been published. If you recall, R’ Henkin, z”l, wrote a rejoinder, in which he commented that a partnership minyan was not likely to “remain Orthodox for long.” Well, here we are a generation later, and partnership minyanim have grown significantly and have spread globally within the Jewish world. Most Orthodox rabbis do object to partnership minyanim, but few would challenge the scholarship or authority of someone like R” Daniel Sperber, who has served as the group’s spiritual guide. Moreover, the sustaining power of the partnership minyan has been demonstrated repeatedly over the years since the publication of Shapiro’s article.
Are you personally pleased with the direction that Modern Orthodoxy has taken in the last couple of decades, since Edah closed its doors? What have you enjoyed witnessing? What things have happened that you would have preferred not to have been associated with Modern Orthodoxy? What things are you surprised have not happened yet?
The institutions of Modern Orthodoxy, which are so critical to sustaining Modern Orthodox communities, remain largely in the hands of Centrist Orthodoxy. Even the term “Centrist” represents at best a vague mid-point somewhere between Satmar and “Open Orthodoxy,” forfeiting the more value-laden term “Modern” that suggests a true synthesis of values of Torah and modernity. To his credit, my former teacher, Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm, in the preface to his superb collection, “Seventy Voices,” conceded that the change in nomenclature most likely had been an error. More specifically, day school education constitutes a wonderful opportunity to nurture leadership for the future of Orthodoxy and American Jewry generally. For example, when I was a senior at Maimonides in 1967, a rosh yeshiva assigned us to write a paper comparing the Joseph narrative in traditional commentaries with Thoman Mann’s “Joseph and His Brothers.” For me it comprised Jewish education at its finest. But notwithstanding some key exceptions, day schools today increasingly have trouble recruiting faculty willing and capable of undertaking such a project with their students.
Who do you see as the emerging young rabbinical leaders in the Modern Orthodox world today?
In terms of rabbinical leadership, the question I usually ask is whether rabbis have something to say to well-educated Modern Orthodox Jews who are both knowledgeable Jewishly and actively engaged with the key questions confronting world Jewry and American society today. The numbers of such rabbis, however, are painfully few. I have taught at both YCT and Yeshivat Maharat in recent years and have been very impressed with their students. Few, however, occupy pulpits, for reasons that are well known. To be sure, for decades I was quite literally dazzled by the caliber of students at Yeshiva University, where I taught for some 25 years. Therefore, I don’t think the problem is lack of talent in the Orthodox world. Rather the near-universal norm of spending a gap year at an Israeli yeshiva both shortchanges college education as three or even fewer years and encourages a largely instrumentalist view of secular education (Torah U’ Parnassa rather than Torah U’Mada). Thankfully, we have witnessed in recent years the emergence of new gap year yeshivot (for example, Oraita and Ma’alei Ha-Gilboa), which have taken their place alongside the long-established Gush Etzion as Modern Orthodox institutions whose faculty value the importance of university education. So, I think there is considerable hope for the future coming from their graduates.
Do you think Yeshivat Chovevei Torah (YCT) has adequately replaced Edah as a voice for the more liberal wing of Orthodoxy? Where has it succeeded? Where has it failed?
Has YCT assumed the functions of Edah? To some extent, yes, working along parallel lines as JOFA and Yeshivat Maharat on issues of Orthodox Jewish feminism. YCT leadership touts the values of pluralism. Rabbi Dov Linzer, president of YCT, recently published a book, “It Takes Two to Torah,” a wonderful example of a Modern Orthodox rosh yeshiva dialoguing together over Torah text with a thoughtful Reform lay leader. Moreover, YCT has sponsored seminar programs with Israeli rabbinical students, thereby strengthening Modern Orthodoxy both here and in Israel and enhancing the Israel-Diaspora partnership. So considerable progress has occurred in the areas of intra-Jewish relations, gender equality, and even religious Zionism. Of course, much remains to be done in terms of wrestling with the challenges posed by modern culture, including the theological questions of theodicy, revelation and biblical criticism, and the political questions of West Bank settlements, political extremism and threats to democracy, as well as social issues of personal status, such as conversion to Judaism and homosexuality. So the agenda remains incomplete, but the strides made by JOFA, YCT, Yeshivat Maharat and parallel developments in Israel point to a dynamic Modern Orthodox future—with the most exciting chapters still remaining to be written.
Michael Feldstein, who lives in Stamford, Connecticut, is the author of “Meet Me in the Middle” (meet-me-in-the-middle-book.com), a collection of essays on contemporary Jewish life. He can be reached at [email protected].
