Opening the Gates: How Proactive Conversion Can Revitalize the Jewish Community by Gary Tobin
Jossey-Bass Publishers. 1999. 216 pp. $25.00

By Bruce Phillips

The premise of Gary Tobin's new book is that there are "millions who would be Jews" in America, and that the Jewish community is missing an opportunity by not "Opening The Gates," as the book is titled. Tobin suggests numerous reasons why the Jewish community should make conversion a priority: (1) "Conversion has helped Jews survive and grow over the millennia." (2) "New blood adds a great deal to Jewish life. " (3) "The world would be a much better place if so many individuals were practicing Judaism." (4) Many non-Jews are already married to Jews and many Jewish children are growing up in mixed households. (5) Jews would "have to learn more themselves to explain Judaism to others." (6) The enterprise of conversion would revitalize the Jewish institutional structure. (7) "The increased ability of Jews to relate to other groups" as members of other groups become Jews. (8) "The exponential growth of a [Jewish] population that would restore the "critical mass" for communal viability, and political influence.

Tobin criticizes the Jewish community for not promoting conversion. He attributes this failure to the American Jewish inability to formulate "a set of beliefs, behaviors, and institutional structures that define what it means to be a Jew in the pluralistic society." Tobin argues that American Jews have falsely limited their choices to "sameness" or "withdrawal." He also attributes this reticence about conversion to what he sees as irrational fears. For example: Jewish conversionary efforts would encourage other religious groups to harass Jews with conversion efforts of their own; non-Jewish relatives of converts would subvert Jewish families; and that the desire to remain special would be compromised by too many converts.

Tobin argues that proactive conversion efforts would move Jewish policy makers beyond the current (and to Tobin, fruitless) debate between prevention of intermarriage and outreach to intermarried families. Prevention will not work, says Tobin, and "the focus on preventing intermarriage saps our creative energy..." Limiting outreach to the intermarried population is less desirable than developing "comprehensive, overall strategies to build the Jewish community..."

I found the book intriguing but frustrating. The book is provocative in the best sense of provoking thoughtful discussion, and Tobin makes dozens of challenging observations throughout. I was frustrated that he does not reference studies that either support or contradict his case. He states, for example, that "studies show a small percentage [of intermarried parents] raising their children only as Christians or Muslims, for example, with no Jewish upbringing." The studies with which I am familiar show the opposite, so I would have liked to know which ones were referred to. Tobin likewise dismisses an assertion by Wertheimer, Liebman, and Cohen that converts produce one-generation Jews as having "no empirical substantiation.". But Steve Cohen has published empirical findings to this effect as part of the JTS Conservative Judaism study. Rather than dismiss the findings, Tobin might have critiqued that research. In a similar vein, the historical examples of previous calls for Jewish conversionary activities would have been more compelling if there were a discussion of parallel historical contexts. Finally, I would have enjoyed reading more about the research that Tobin did with converts to better grasp his understanding of the process of becoming Jewish. The book does reference many conversion internet sites, most of which were new to me.

It may be that I am too specialized an audience for this book, but I suspect that other Sh'ma readers may share some of my frustrations. On the other hand, it presents the single most accessible case for conversion, and I am planning to assign at least two chapters next year to my students.

Bruce A. Phillips is Professor of Sociology and Jewish Communal Service at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles. His most recent research is Re-Examining Intermarriage, published by the Wilstein Institute, and "Children of Intermarriage: How "Jewish?" in Peter Medding (ed), Studies in Contemporary Jewry.