“How does a traditional faith remain viable in the modern world?” asked Elliott Malamet right before the educational organization Torah in Motion kicked off its 15th annual conference at Toronto’s Shaarei Shomayim Congregation.
“That’s really the key to it all. That’s what we started with,” Malamet continued in an interview. The educator founded Torah in Motion with Rabbi Jay and Ilana Kelman and while he currently lives in Jerusalem, he flew in to Toronto to moderate a panel for the event’s opening night program on Nov. 5.
Called Renewing Our Spirit 2016, the conference, which continued on Nov. 6, brought together speakers from Canada, Israel and the United States to examine issues facing modern Orthodoxy today.
Malamet assembled a panel featuring Rabbi Adam Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University; Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, Rabbi Emeritus at Kehilath Jeshurun Congregation in New York; and Shuli Taubus, the chair of Jewish philosophy and a Tanach teacher at SAR High School in New York.
Shaarei Shomayim’s Rabbi Chaim Strauchler took to the podium first and assured the audience about the state of modern Orthodoxy. He recounted a story when nine years ago, the shul’s board asked him to define what the denomination meant to him. His reply? “Modern Orthodoxy is Judaism,” a way to live halachically without eschewing contemporary society and its ideologies.
Afterwards, Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, addressed the crowd of about 175, before the panelists launched into a nearly 1-1/2-hour discussion, boldly touching on subjects such as feminism, activism and how to keep young people engaged in religious life.
Rabbi Lookstein, for instance, noted how after 1945, modern Orthodoxy grew in North America due to immigration, the day school movement, the development of synagogues, the increased proliferation of well-kept mikvahs as well as the influence of Rabbi Joseph Ber Soloveitchik.
“He was the driving intellectual force behind the development of modern Orthodoxy,” he said.
Taubus started with what modern Orthodoxy gets right. “What Orthodox Judaism does for us is it gives us layers upon layers of significance to even the smallest actions that we do and I think all human beings are really looking to lead a meaningful and happy life,” she said.
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But, she admitted, it still has some work to do in terms of its leadership, especially in regards to rabbis who violate morals codes, materialism and mediating the impact of technology.
She also called for an end to the demonization of those with opposing views. “It’s ridiculous, it breeds contempt and it I think it turns young people off to the entire enterprise.
“When a discussion about women’s leadership roles or the place of LGBT Jews in our community sounds like an America presidential debate, it demeans religion,” she said.
Rabbi Ferziger noted the history of denominational Judaism isn’t as prevalent in Israel. “Judaism is part of the street,” he said. “It’s much less compartmentalized, it’s much less the sense that one’s Jewish citizenship is reflected through one’s synagogue membership.”
As the panelists conversed, they touched on topics from the importance of having women in leadership positions to the role social activism can have in cementing a young person’s Jewish identity as well as the concept of social Orthodoxy – being Orthodox for social reasons without really believing in God.
And that’s just what Malamet intended. “Jewish communities are very preoccupied with surviving,” says Malamet. “But when you get to the end of that question, the bigger question is, for what? To do what? To be what? To produce what?”
And while fears of longevity and survival certainly percolated through the panel, the speakers weren’t focused simply on keeping modern Orthodoxy alive. Instead, they honed in on Malamet’s deeper questions.
“I think if conferences and speakers can help you with your own individual search, your quest, it’s useful,” he said. “And I think that what’s it about.”