Don't Write Off The Intermarried
Newton, Mass./JTA
C
harles Dickens' classic A Tale
of Two Cities begins with the
famous opening line: "It was the
best of times, it was the worst of times:'
Sociologist Steven Cohen's new study on
intermarriage has a similar title, but a dif-
ferent spirit.
Ignoring positive recent evidence from
Boston and elsewhere
that more intermarried
families are raising their
children as Jews, Cohen's
"A Tale of Two Jewries"
sees only the worst of
times when it comes to
intermarriage.
It is uninformative
to compare the Jewish
behaviors and attitudes
of inmarried couples
with all intermarried couples, as Cohen
does. Sadly, one-third of intermarried cou-
ples are raising their children in another
religion. It necessarily follows that inter-
married couples, taken as an undifferenti-
ated whole, are less Jewishly engaged than
inmarried counterparts.
Cohen sets up a straw identity chasm
between inmarried and all intermarried
families, and then knocks down inter-
marriage as "the greatest single threat
to Jewish continuity" — the sound-bite
headline for which his paper will be
remembered.
What is productive is to compare the
Jewish behaviors and attitudes of inmar-
ried couples with those of intermarried
couples who are rais-
ing their children as
Jews. When sociologists
Benjamin Phillips and
Fern Chertok made
that comparison in
a 2004 paper titled
"Jewish Identity Among
the Adult Children of
Intermarriage: Event
Horizon or Navigable
Horizon?" they found
greatly reduced gaps.
Identity Core
A child's Jewish identity is determined
not simply by the fact that the parents are
intermarried but largely by the environ-
ment the family creates, and in particular
by their decision to raise the children as
Jews. Phillips and Chertok conclude that
"Tarring all intermarriages with the same
brush" makes the loss of Jewish identity "a
self-fulfilling prophecy."
The logical conclusion for policymak-
ers to draw from an analysis that focuses
on "two Jewries" is to write off the inter-
married and support only increasing the
Jewish engagement of the inmarried.
In contrast, the logical conclusion to
draw from an analysis showing that inter-
married families raising their children
as Jews are closer to inmarried families
in their Jewish engagement is to support
encouraging more interfaith families to
raise their children as Jews.
Cohen concludes in "A Tale of Two
Jewries" that Jewish education experiences
work." In that respect, he undoubtedly is
correct, but measuring their success by the
degree to which they reduce intermarriage
is a serious mistake.
Cohen acknowledges that Jewish educa-
tion experiences "exert salutary effects
even in the event of intermarriage....
[They serve] to further chances of Jewish
continuity [including]
by increasing the likeli-
CC
Stop Sugarcoating Intermarriage
N
New York/JTA
of many years ago, it was taken
as axiomatic that intermarriage
constitutes a significant threat to
Jewish continuity. For individual families,
we understood that, more often than not,
the children of the intermarried would be
raised as non-Jews. And since intermarry-
ing Jews have fewer children, and
141
because most of their children
won't identify as Jews, intermar-
riage implied fewer Jews in the
next generation.
The community responded
admirably, albeit inadequately,
to this challenge. For many good
reasons, it expanded funding for
day schools and trips to Israel.
Synagogues and JCCs became
more welcoming and accepting
of intermarried families. It supported a
variety of "Jewish outreach" efforts aimed
at bringing families closer to Jews and
Judaism by teaching Jewish practices and
values.
In contrast, "interfaith outreach" seeks to
make all mixed-married couples feel more
accepted, even when they choose to cel-
ebrate Christian and Jewish holidays in the
same household.
Social scientists, myself included, have
charted — and implicitly celebrated — the
growing and exhilarating diversity of
Jewish identities, communities and inno-
vation. Since the early days of American
Jewish sociology and its founder, Marshall
Sklare, of blessed memory, we have docu-
mented the rises, falls and rises
of Jewish identity over the life
course. Jewish identities today
are more varied, fluid and
mobile than ever.
But, with this said, we need to
recognize that as a group, inter-
married Jews are far less active
in Jewish life — however one
measures it — than inmarried
Jews. The large gaps cover num-
ber of Jewish friends, raising
one's kids as Jews, belonging to synagogues
and JCCs, living with Jewish neighbors,
attending worship services, celebrating
Jewish holidays, giving one's children a
Jewish education, caring about Israel, giv-
ing to Jewish causes and their own assess-
ment of the importance of being Jewish.
When we ask intermarried Jews, "How
hood that the mixed married couple will
raise its children exclusively in Judaism:' It
would be far wiser to publicize the success
of Jewish education experiences on that
basis.
The reason is that recruitment — how
to promote the use of Jewish education
— is the "true challenge as Cohen says.
But Jewish education can't be "sold" to the
intermarried on the basis that the experi-
ences will reduce the chances that their
child will intermarry.
"Send your children to our day school/
camp/etc., and they won't succumb to
intermarriage, the greatest single threat to
Jewish continuity" is not a message that
resonates with parents who did intermar-
ry and who are raising their children as
Jews. Promoting those experiences on the
basis that they increase the chances that
the children will make the same Jewish
choices as those parents did — that is a
message that is credible, open and invit-
ing.
Half of the children who identify
as Jews today have one Jewish parent.
Transformative Jewish education experi-
Point on page 36
At Issue: How
Threatening Is
Intermarriage?
important is being
Jewish to you?" as a group they score far
lower than inmarried Jews.
While Jewish religious engagement is
steady or rising, Jewish connections and
"collective identity" trends are clearly
declining. While the inmarried are leading
more intensive Jewish lives, the intermar-
ried as a group remain much less engaged.
Varying Views
Every time we hear of an intermarried
child who maintains an active Jewish life,
we must remember that the more Jewishly
engaged — people reading this column,
for example — raise children with the best
chances of maintaining Jewish continuity,
even when they out-marry.
Thus, some Jewishly engaged parents
assume that the wonderful experiences
of their Jewishly committed intermarried
children must be a sign that we're "winning
the battle." In reality, most intermarried
Jews come from weak Jewish educational
backgrounds, often with only one Jewish
parent.
Some outreach advocates say intermar-
riage is a fact, feeding the fatalistic view
that there's nothing that can be done to
influence the rate. Yet
there's much that is being done to affect
the rate.
Some speculate that because Jewish
identities are fluid, or because the inter-
married have become so numerous, the
intermarried as a group may well move
toward significant Jewish engagement. Yet
no study shows the gap narrowing.
Jewish identities are changing — but
the basic import of intermarriage is not.
San Francisco, for example, reports that
from 1986 to 2004, observance patterns by
the inmarried climbed, while those for the
intermarried fell, further widening the gap
between inmarried and intermarried.
Study Findings
The Steinhardt Foundation/Jewish Life
Network published my study, "A Tale of
Two Jewries: The Inconvenient Truth
for American Jews',' to refute the wish-
ful thinking and false optimism that has
grown up around the intermarriage ques-
tion. (See www.jewishlife.orgipdfi
steven_cohen_paper.pdf.)
For anybody who's been reading and
writing the scientific analyses over the last
Counterpoint on page 36
March 15 2007
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