 |
| Havdalah ceremony at a Crown Heights campus outreach event (RNS) |
What should the goal of Orthodox outreach be to non Orthodox
Jews? At first blush one might be tempted to say to convince them to become observant.
Obviously it would be an ideal scenario to be able to convince God’s chosen
people to obey His directives. Which He set forth in His Torah as interpreted by
rabbinic leaders throughout history.
In some cases that does happen. But as Lubavitch-Chabad will
tell you a very tiny slice of non Orthodox Jew that they reach out to, actually
become fully observant. What Chabad will also tell you, somewhat surprisingly,
is that full observance is not necessarily their goal. Or at least not their
only goal.
‘Who is actually fully observant anyway?’ …they might ask. Every
Jew sins. Some more. Some less. Even Moshe, the greatest prophet who ever lived –
sinned, as the Torah quite explicitly tells us.
Their goal is to connect Jews to their Judaism enough so
that they will want to do more. They start small and hope that Jews looking for
truth will seek to constantly improve their level of observance – as we all
should. The best way for someone to become fully observant is do it incrementally
– at their own pace. Doing it all at once is often disastrous. Going from no
observance at all to becoming fully observant all at once is a prescription for
failure in many cases. The change is too drastic.
This is a lesson all outreach organizations must learn, if
they don’t already know it. I believe the successful ones do.
Which brings me to an article by Menachem Wecker in Religion News Service about a study of 2,400 Jewish graduates and their interactions with Chabad. It was led by Mark Rosen, an associate professor at Brandeis University. It might surprise people to find that so many of the Jews Chabad
caters to, are not observant at all. And yet Chabad never harangues them for not
making any progress towards further observance. Chabad believes that whatever
progress they make – even if it is just instilling pride in their Jewishness
where it wasn’t there before – is considered a success.
Only 15 of the 2,400 respondents said they joined ranks and identify as Chabad. About 88 percent of those who visited Chabad at least once do not identify as Orthodox.
According to the article, Chabad has 3500 centers in more than 85 countries!
That is quite an accomplishment. If the percentages of Jews becoming observant
through Chabad is the same as it is with the graduates of Brandeis, that is
less than one percent! One might therefore question whether all that effort is
worth it.
Well, of course it is. 1% is better than 0%. And that 1% adds up
to a lot of Jews.Aside from that - their goal of just instilling pride in fellow
Jews about their heritage is alone worth the effort. It is also true that any successful
outreach first requires instilling pride in one's heritage. And even if they never become personally
observant at all, they may be motivated to better educate their children Jewishly.
If they don’t do that - at the very least they will appreciate their kindness and
their not being judgmental thus in many cases becoming Chabad supporters for
life.
There may be some that are turned off by Chabad and will go
the other way. But my guess is that this is a very small percentage of those
Chabad comes into contact with.
What many people don’t realize is that when Chabad sees a
Jew becoming observant through their efforts, they consider that a milestone no matter which
Hashkafa they choose. This does not mean they don’t prefer that Jew become a
Lubavitcher. They do. And they work towards that goal, too.
To that end, their outreach is specifically designed toward
Chabad Chasidism. Their outreach includes teaching Jews uneducated about their
Judaism - customs specific to Chabad but
not necessarily mainstream. Without making that distinction.
An example of that
is their view that every woman in a household (even young girls under the age
of 12) should light candles for Shabbos. Signs to that effect can be seen everywhere. However, the prevailing mainstream custom is
that only the female head of the household (usually the mother) light candles. Chabad's approach steers their outreach prospects unwittingly to
include Chabad customs without their realizing it is only a Chabad custom.
If I have any quibble with them (aside from the Messianism
issue which is beyond the scope of this post) it is that. The vast majority of
the Jews they have successfully convinced to become observant - become Lubavitchers.
Chabad will argue that since they are doing the outreach, they have the right
to persuade them to become Lubavitchers too.
I get that. But I just wish they would explain that not all
the customs of Lubavitcjh are universal to all Orthodox Hashkafos – and show
them all the options. This is what NCSY does in their outreach work. Those who
become observant through NCSY can be found in just about all Hashkafic segments
of Orthodoxy including Chabad. NCSY does not favor one Hashkafa over another.
They favor only the ‘fit’ of an individual to a Hashkafa. In my view this is a
better approach.
But you can’t argue with success. Nor can you argue with the
kinds of religious goals they set. Nor the fact that they retain a positive
relationship with every single Jew with they have had any interaction. Even
if they do not become observant at all. Nor with the massive numbers of Jews that
have become observant through them which probably outnumbers all the Jews that
became observant through other outreach programs combined! On this level we all
have a lot to learn from them.
