Y E A R

The Fear That Jewry
May Not Survive Here

F

or the first time in
decades, serious Jews
worried about the survival
of American Jewry into
the 21st century, largely
based on the findings of a major
study this year that found
assimilation and intermarriage
increasing at an alarming rate.
The study, by the Council of
Jewish Federations, also noted that
culture and ethnicity have replaced
religion as the prevailing basis for
Jewish identity. More than 90
percent of the approximately 5.5
million Jews in the United States
define being Jewish as belonging
to a particular cultural or ethnic
group, while less than five percent
said it meant belonging to a
religious group.

In addition, more than half of
those Jews who married since 1985
married non-Jews, and less than
five percent of the non-Jewish
spouses have converted to Judaism.
"A majority of the American
Jewish public doesn't regard this
as tragic," noted Barry Kosmin,
who coordinated the CJF study.
"They seem to be supporting
marriage more than identity."
He added that the study does not
bode well for the future of a clearly
defined, cohesive Jewish
community, in part because "no
clear:cut boundaries exist anymore
between Jews and gentiles.
"The old assumptions are falling
away," Mr. Kosmin said. "Perhaps
the most significant finding of the
survey is that the American

Jewish population has become so
diverse. It's become difficult to
draw lines around it anymore
because it's become so jelly-like."
Such findings re-enforce the idea
that the gravest danger to Jewish
survival is not from external
forces, such as anti-Semitism, but
Isaac Bashevis Singer: blending the new
from within. And that the more
world and the old in his writings.
Jews are accepted into American
society, the greater the chance for
them to cast off their Jewish
identity.
There is much debate within the
Jewish community as to how to
deal with these and other statistics
showing an increase in
IlAr hen Isaac Bashevis
assimilation and, in particular, a
Singer died in late
sense that Jewish parents want
July
at the age of 87,
their children to marry — even if
an era of rich Yiddish
that means accepting
writing died with him.
intermarriage.
Mr.
Singer's
career was
Should outreach programs to
remarkable
not
only for the fact
intermarrieds be expanded, in the
that he wrote of modern-day New
hopes of attracting non-Jewish
York as easily as pre-Holocaust
spouses to Judaism, or should the
Poland,
but that his deeply Jewish
barriers be tightened rather than
themes
were
read by millions of
loosened in the hopes that Jews
Americans in Playboy and The
will follow the religious
New Yorker as well as the Yiddish
requirements of the Torah?
The CJF report was but the most daily Forward.
Scion of a rabbinic family, Mr.
recent, and statistically rich, study
Singer studied in yeshivas in his
of this nature, but the fact is that
native Poland for seven years
the American Jewish community
before
becoming a writer, as his
has sensed these conclusions, based
older brother, Israel, had before
on similar findings, for some time.
him. Isaac came to America in
Until now, the organized
1935 and struggled as a Yiddish
community has been better
writer
in New York, submitting
equipped to fund studies indicating
serious problems than to deal with pieces to the Forward. It was not
those problems, which speak to the until the 1950s that he achieved a
wider audience with the English
core of Jewish survival.
translation of his novel, The
Most American Jews appear
Family Moskat.
willing to sacrifice ritual over
Since then, his stories of angels
family continuity, creating a
and
demons, witches and
challenge to the religious and
dybbukks,
of both pious and
communal leaders of American
passionate characters, became
Jewry to convince young Jews to
acclaimed to the point that in 1978
marry other Jews.
he
was awarded the Nobel Prize for
The key question to answer: why
Literature.
is it so important to marry another
As he explained in Stockholm
Jew, or in other words, why be
when he received the prize, he felt
Jewish?
compelled to write in Yiddish for
While American Jewish organi-
the' "millions of Yiddish-speaking
zations have excelled in raising
-corpses who will rise from their
funds for Israel and local
graves one day asking their first
communal needs, they have not, it
question: 'Is there any new Yiddish
seems, been able to address the
book to read?'
soul of the issue of Jewish
"I like to write ghost stories;'
continuity.
said the author, "and nothing fits a
ghost better than a dying
language. The deader the
language, the more alive the
ghost."

The End
Of An Era

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With assimilation on the rise, what will motivate young Jews to maintain their heritage?

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