Glory Be to God Most High
You’d think we had cracked the code on inclusion, the idea that Jews can be LGBTQ+ and still be full members of our fractious tribe. Most of the Jewish world has voted yes, to our lasting credit as modern Jewish citizens. But there have always been holdouts on the retrograde right. Can a gay charedi boy, living in B’nai Brak, study at a yeshiva in the Orthodox mold? Think ham and Gruyere. Think shopping on Shabbat. Think any forbidden combination you like.
Until recently, that was true right here in American, at one of the flagship Orthodox institutions in the country. I have a complicated relationship with Yeshiva University. Until a conclusive shift away from traditionalism, the synagogue I served in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was a kind of battleground state between Yeshiva and its rivals. The big guns in Tulsa wanted it to remain in the fold, while the Young Turks wanted a more moderate alternative. The Turks prevailed, but my immediate predecessor has a named professorship at Yeshiva in his honor. I think it was the parting gift from our most prominent members. You can’t have us, but you can have a bunch of our money.
But Yeshiva has also been at war with itself. Its motto is the confounding Torah u-Mada, meaning “Torah and Science,” or “Torah and Secularity.” In a polarized world, good luck with that. You can have one or the other, but you can’t have both. Yeshiva is not a black-hat institution. In fact, it’s one of the places you go when you are not charedi, and charedi luminaries tend to regard it as a renegade. It accepts students from across the ideological spectrum and, in the case of some programs, students who are not Jewish at all.
That’s turned out to be a kind of linchpin. For years, Yeshiva has been in a face-off with students who wanted to form an association for queers. The issue escalated from meetings and petitions to a step ladder of cases that have been moving through the courts. As a matter of public relations, it tried to do the right thing, with seminars and panel discussions, sanctioned and not. Then it did the wrong thing by suspending all student groups. Imagine it as a battle of the titans. On one side, Modernity. On the other side Leviticus, with its apparent rejection of homosexuality as an abomination. At every juncture, the rabbis held firm. That meant a whole lot of rabbinic blood on the floor.
But there are some forces that will not be stopped up. Feminism is one. Sexuality is another. I did not expect to see it in my lifetime, but Yeshiva announced in the aftermath of Purim that it would credential an association of LGBTQ+ students. It said that it had been willing to do that two years earlier, but there’s a general consensus that that is not the case. The association will be called by an innocuous name that does not call obvious attention to its purpose. But Yeshiva had already seen the writing on the wall. The courts have already pointed out the essential fact that Yeshiva was not, after all, a seminary. It was more like the Jewish equivalent of Notre Dame, a university with a strong religious identity. In any case, it could not suppress its gay students and expect support from the world in which it operates.
Like many people, I’ll continue to look on with interest. We have entered a perilous period in politics where bad is good and good is MAGA. Someone may decide that the rabbis had it right and Yeshiva can discriminate against its students after all. In the meantime, I say Happy Purim, and have a lovely, kosher, inclusive Passover.