A lot has been made of the new Pew Study on the Jewish population. I am enjoying reading the various blogs and articles about it. It seems every Jewish professional feels the need to weigh in, even before they have read the full report. In many ways I think this is much ado about nothing. As Rachel Gurevitz , in her post here last week so eloquently stated “correlation does not always mean causation.” The numbers are a snap shot of time today, and they reflect the biases of the authors of the questions themselves. They are not portents of the future.
We cannot answer the age old question, “Is Judaism dying out?” based on the numbers in this study. Yet, the hand wringing and moaning continue, particularly from people in the Conservative Movement whose numbers show a deep decline. Dr. Jack Wertheimer, himself a professor at the Conservative Movements flagship institution, The Jewish Theological Seminary is one of the loudest naysayers. He was quoted in the New York Times as saying, “It’s a very grim portrait of the health of the American Jewish population in terms of its Jewish identification.”
Perhaps it is this very negativity that is part of the problem. Stop finding doom and gloom and instead have a little faith..
Yes faith – 75% of people in this study say they believe in God. I wish the social scientists and the handwringers commenting had as much faith as these respondents. I personally have a lot of faith in both God and the Jewish people. If God wants there to be Jews in the world, then there will be Jews in the world. The numbers may go up and down, but we will still exist. It actually is not up to us.
But even if it were up to us, I also have faith in the Jewish people. After all we have survived a long time already. If nothing else, we are an inventive and creative group. The practices of Judaism have changed and will continue to change over the years, but the essence remains, a belief in one God, a focus on family and community, a constant struggle to find ways to make life more meaningful, and the unique ability to simultaneously survive great tragedies like the Holocaust and be known for our humor. We are going to be alright.
Have a little faith.
