THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

Ordination of Women Is Not a Dead Issue

NEW YORK (JTA) — Dr.
Gerson Cohen, chancellor of
the Jewish Theological
Seminary of America, de-
clared that the vote last
month by a majority of the
seminary's Faculty Senate
to table a proposal to admit
women to the seminary as
rabbinical candidates
"must not be taken as a de-
feat of the idea of women in
the rabbinate" and he urged
a long-range effort to
"create a climate of opinion"
in the Conservative move-
ment to bring about semi-
nary approval of such ordi-
nation.
The 25-19 vote on Dec. 20
ended for the time being a
battle in the movement, led
by a majority of the mem-
bers of the Rabbinical As-
sembly, the association of
Conservative rabbis, for
seminary agreement to ac-
cept women for ordination.
Cohen gave his assessment
at a plenary session of the
seminary's faculty and stu-

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GERSON COHEN

dent body last week which
he had called to discuss the
significance of the Faculty
Senate vote. The proposal
that women be admitted for
ordination had been the key
recommendation for a re-
port by a 14-member com-
mission which Cohen had
named, with himself as
chairman, representing
what he said was the entire
spectrum of opinion in the
movement.
The chancellor held
that what the vote "really
means is that the major-
ity of the Senate — the 25
members who voted to
table — did not sense the
existence of a climate of
opinion" in the move-
ment "for a major
change" on the issue. He
added that "any major
change in the structure of
religion requires a sort of
populist recognition of a
need for change."
"Such a climate of opinion
presupposes a laity with full
knowledge of both the pre-
sent practice and the impli-

Israel Honors
U.S. Journalist

JERUSALEM — Bill
Moyers, American jour-
nalist and former White
House Press Secretary dur-
ing President Lyndon B.
Johnson's administration,
has been awarded the first
Jerome L. Joss Prize of IL
50,000 (about $16,000), es-
tablished at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem,
"for his film on the Nes
Amim -commune in north-
ern Israel."
Joss, founder of the prize
and a retired advertising
and communications execu-
tive of Sherman Oaks,
Calif., won a Cannes Film
Festival Award for excel-
lence in film production and
has also won the Chicago
Art Directors Top Award for
commercial film produc-
tion.
The annual prize he es-
tablished at the Hebrew
University is awarded for
an outstanding achieve-
ment in communications re-
lating to a significant aspect
of contemporary Israel that
has impact outside of Israel.

cations of change," Cohen
said, adding that the major-
ity of the Faculty Senate felt
that the Conservative
movement was seriously di-
vided on the issue.
He said the Faculty Se-
nate, in the Dec. 20 vote,
had placed a higher priority
on preserving the integrity
of the movement than on
the ordination of women.
He said those Conserva-
tive Jews who believe
women should be ordained,
"who feel that such change
is theologically and
halakhically permissible
and ethically and spiritu-
ally mandated, now have
the task of creating the cli-
mate of opinion" in the
movement "which will
make such change possi-
ble."
Commenting that while
"the challenge" con-
fronts all who favor that
change, Cohen asserted
that "the task will inevit-
ably fall most heavily on
the women themselves,"
who had been denied
"immediate fulfillment of
their dearest aspira-
tions." He added that, "in
living with that frustra-
tion," he hoped the
women would "find the
courage to serve the
Jewish community in
pare-rabbinic func-
tions." He said this would
help to teach Conserva-
tive Jews "the impor-
tance" of accepting
women "in new roles."
The battle on the issue
began when delegates to the
1977 Rabbinical Assembly
convention approved a reso-
lution calling on the semi-
nary to admit women as
rabbinical candidates. The

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SF Mayor Weds

SAN FRANCISCO —
Mayor Diane Feinstein and
Richard Blum were married
in a private City Hall cere-
mony Sunday by Rabbi
Martin Weiner and Cantor
Martin Feldman.
A reception followed for
1,000 invited guests and
then the party was opened
to the public.

resolution was withdrawn
when Cohen promised to
name the commission, with
the additional promise that
he would bring its findings,
which he clearly expected to
be pro-ordination, to the Fa-
culty Senate early in 1979.
But last April, Cohen an-
nounced he had agreed to a
request by seminary faculty
members to defer until
early 1980 action on the
commission's report, which
declared that the commis-
sion found nothing in
Jewish Law barring women
from the rabbinate.
Mounting pressure from
seminary faculty members
and from a substantial
number of RA members,
who opposed seminary ac-
ceptance of women for the
rabbinate, forced Cohen to
schedule the Faculty Senate
vote for Dec. 20, instead of
in January.

Friday, binary 25, 1980 1

WWII/4 R:CCO

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