Intermarried Rabbis, No Longer Banned: Judaism Unbound Episode 445 - Dan, Miriam, and Lex
On June 20th, 2024, Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion eliminated its ban on interfaith relationships for rabbinical students. This landmark decision comes on the heels of decades of many years of organizing and advocacy, and Judaism Unbound is thrilled to celebrate it! In this episode, Dan, Miriam, and Lex speak about what this shift means for Jewish leadership — and for Jewish life more broadly. They also name the ways in which the ban on intermarried (and inter-partnered) rabbinical students did real damage — to Jews and Jewish-adjacent non-Jews — and call for active forms of teshuva (righting of wrongs) by the institutions that inflicted that damage.
[1] For a past Judaism Unbound episode that explored the non-Jewish partner ban for rabbinical students at HUC-JIR, see Episode 94: Reform Reflections - Dan and Lex.
[2] For some recent coverage of HUC-JIR’s policy shift, see this piece in The Forward from Samira Mehta, this JTA piece by Philissa Cramer, and this NPR segment from Weekend Edition (featuring Lex!).
[3] Lex mentions a historical moment in the early 1970s where Bridget Loves Bernie, a TV show on CBS, was cancelled due to its positive portrayal of a Jewish-Christian interfaith relationship. Take a look at some of the articles published at the time (including in the New York Times) via these links: 10/24/1972 - JTA, 2/7/1973 - New York Times, 2/11/1973 - New York Times
[4] For the Talmudic narrative cited in this conversation, see Berakhot 28a. For episodes on The Oral Talmud that featured it, see Oral Talmud Episode 7: Impeachment and Removal - Berakhot 28a part 1 and Episode 8: Letting Everybody In - Berakhot 28a part 2.
[5] For another piece exploring the impact of this policy shift at HUC — along with further work they could do to affirm interfaith families — see this piece by Edmund Case, featured in JTA.
