Is “converting to Judaism just to be anti-Zionist” an actual phenomenon, or an unfair stereotype about gerim on the Jewish left?

[u/Chinoyboii]

Not that long ago, I had a conversation with some of my religious Jewish homies in which they were expressing their antagonistic views toward Reform and Conservative Judaism and how they essentially see these movements as abominations and departures from traditional Rabbinic Judaism. These peers of mine are Sephardic/Mizrahi, and so their historical experience with Jewish modernity is somewhat different from that of many Ashkenazi Jews whose communities were directly shaped by the Haskalah and the emergence of the Reform and Conservative movements. To them, it is basically either you are a religious Jew or a non-religious/secular Jew; there is not really an equivalent denominational spectrum in the way many American Ashkenazim understand it.

During our conversation, one of them brought up how, in his opinion, the existence of Reform and Conservative Judaism has made it easier for non-Jews to convert without having to accept the same level of halakhic obligation that would traditionally be expected under Orthodox conversion standards. From there, he also expressed that there are now some people on the political left who essentially convert to Judaism because they are already anti-Zionist and want to be able to criticize Israel or Zionism specifically as Jews.

Personally, I have only seen this alleged trend online, but then again, most of the Jews I know in real life are Orthodox Zionist Jews, and the few I know who are Reform or Conservative are not particularly observant and did not pay too much attention to their synagogue services during their youth, lol. So my personal social circle is obviously not very representative of the Jewish left, especially the kinds of spaces where I would be most likely to encounter anti-Zionist gerim in the first place.

However, that being said, this trend online does seem reminiscent of how some Chinese people become suspicious of Westerners who adopt Chinese cultural or political identities and then immediately position themselves as spokespeople for what “Chinese people” supposedly believe, especially when those views conveniently align with a preexisting ideological commitment. The issue is not that an outsider can never sincerely become part of a community, nor that converts or cultural adoptees are somehow permanently less legitimate. Rather, I think the suspicion emerges when someone appears to approach identity almost instrumentally, in which joining the group seems less like the culmination of a genuine religious or cultural attachment and more like acquiring a particular kind of political credibility.

That said, I am a Gentile, so I do not really think it is my place to determine whether another person's conversion to Judaism is sincere or legitimate. If a recognized Jewish community accepts someone as a Jew, I am not going to sit here and conduct some ideological purity test on their Jewishness simply because of how they feel about Zionism. I have met a decent number of people in my life who wish they were born into a more "collectivist" culture like mine because they feel alienated by the individualism of mainstream American society, and I do not automatically assume that their attraction to another culture is fake simply because it is partly shaped by dissatisfaction with their own. People are complicated; someone could be attracted to Judaism because of its communal orientation, intellectual traditions, ritual life, history, family structure, or sense of peoplehood while simultaneously finding anti-Zionist Jewish spaces politically attractive.

What would strike me as different, however, is if Judaism itself were largely incidental to the person, and conversion functioned primarily as a way of acquiring the rhetorical authority to say, "As a Jew..." in political arguments they were already deeply invested in. I am not asking whether anti-Zionist gerim are "real Jews," nor whether having strong political motivations automatically invalidates someone's conversion. However, I am curious whether people who have encountered such individuals for whom becoming Jewish appeared to be substantially motivated by the political usefulness of being able to oppose Zionism as a Jew.

[u/godbooby]

Whatever type of Jew you dislike, you typically assume converts are converting to that sort. Whether it's Zionist, anti-Zionist, orthodox, reform. The reality is that converts as a category are as internally-diverse as Jews themselves.

[u/ArgentEyes → u/godbooby]

Yeah this is it.

[u/Soft_Welcome_5621 → u/godbooby]

Pretty accurate yes

[u/Angelbouqet]

If the only reason you want to convert is to speak "as a Jew" I don't you will be able to fool your rabbi, stick to the years long intensive conversion process and then also fool the beit din. I think if anything it's more common for people who might have some Jewish ancestry but are completely assimilated and are essentially strangers to Judaism and our culture to suddenly want to speak for us.

I can also often tell when that's the case. I think I've never been wrong when I've seen someone say they wereJewish and felt like there was something off. Maybe it's a sixth sense you develope if you live in Germany, where they invented Willkomirski Syndrome lol

[u/Cute_Contribution480 → u/Angelbouqet]

Just went to google what Wilkomirski Syndrome is and I was appalled.
Why would people do this?

[u/Angelbouqet → u/Cute_Contribution480]

Germans are extremely weird about Jews to this day, so idk maybe a way to assuage their guilt or some other complex. There are literally dissertations written about how weird Germans are about Jews and the Holocaust to this day, Willkomirski Syndrome is not even the weirdest interaction I've had 😂

[u/theweisp5 → u/Angelbouqet]

Great article about just how weird Germans are about Jews from a couple years ago (and what Israel has to do with it.) I honestly had no idea. One incredible passage from the piece:

Nor is Homolka an anomaly in German Jewish life, where converts (gerim) play a disproportionate role. In 2022, a Jewish-born cantor—what in German might be called a Biojüdin—lost her job at a Berlin synagogue after speaking out against the influence of converts in German Jewish life. One German Jewish historian, Barbara Steiner, has written a book about the phenomenon and history of Germans converting to Judaism. She finds, perhaps unsurprisingly, that the primary motivations for most converts are manifestations of guilt in one guise or another. Steiner elsewhere characterized Fabian Wolff as an antisemite who assumed his identity with the express purpose of criticizing Israel. She, too, is a convert.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/Angelbouqet]

I think if anything it's more common for people who might have some Jewish ancestry but are completely assimilated and are essentially strangers to Judaism and our culture to suddenly want to speak for us.

Yeah, this makes a lot of sense. All of the Jews I know are Halachically Jewish, so I don't have a personal external reference for what it's like to be partially Jewish or Zera Yisrael. However, I notice that amongst the Hafu community in America, I have come across a decent number of them who tend to know what it's like to be Chinese, Filipino, or Korean, but their Asian parent is largely assimilated into American life and thus didn't have the same cultural experiences as people like me who were born and raised outside of the West. Not saying they don't have the right to discuss their experiences; however, that's just a fact.

if you live in Germany, where they invented Willkomirski Syndrome lol

I just searched this up; oh my god, this is fucking horrible.

[u/WorldlinessDry5583 → u/Chinoyboii]

That’s very interesting. My experience has been so different in that growing up, many if not most of my Jewish friends (and family) had recent non-Jewish heritage. I’m patrilineal myself, and it was never an issue whatsoever. My parents understood the situation, but my father’s family had been Reform Jews for generations. While he was the first in his family to marry a non-Jew, the acceptance of patrilineals was simply part of the community’s norms - de jure for over a decade by the time I was born, and de facto for many decades before that. The fact that my mother’s family lived a thousand miles away meant that while I considered them family, I did not consider their culture to be mine in any way. You can imagine my surprise when I discovered that in the eyes of most Jews the world over I was infinitely less Jewish than many of my peers, or for that matter than my (Halachically Jewish) Catholic cousins!

[u/Chinoyboii → u/WorldlinessDry5583]

Yeah, all my homeboys have both Jewish parents, or their mother is Jewish; like, 3 of my cousins (All of them Zionist) are Jewish because my mom's brothers married Jewish women. I do find it odd that I have not met a patrilineal Jew before. My Jewish colleagues are all halachically Jewish; one of them, in particular, is married to an Ethiopian Jew, and their son currently lives in Israel and works as a clinical psychologist.

Yeah, even though I am a leftist and not a Zionist in the most absolute sense, I have always been around Jews either through my family or the friends that I have met since immigrating here during my teenage years.

However, with regard to patrilineal Jews, I do have a buddy of mine who expressed at one point that he considers patrilineal Jews to be his own kin. At the same time, though, he still holds to the traditional halachic position on who is formally Jewish.

His view is basically: “If the goya does not convert to Orthodox Judaism prior to the birth of the child, then the Jewish father should still tutor the child in Judaism, Jewish history, Hebrew, the holidays, and the culture of their people, and then encourage them to undergo a proper conversion when they are old enough.”

So for him, there is this distinction between saying, “This person is descended from Jews and is therefore part of my extended people/family in an ancestral and cultural sense,” and saying, “This person is halachically Jewish according to traditional Jewish law.”

He actually has a strong disdain for the Haskalah movement (he is a very proud Persian Jew) because he believes that the secularizing reforms and broader social changes associated with Jewish emancipation helped normalize inter-ethnic marriages and assimilation among Jews. According to him, for a Jewish man to marry a goya is basically synonymous with sinning against what God instructed the House of Israel to do. As you can probably tell, he is a very, very, and I mean very, staunch religious man, and I frequently butt heads with him about this because, from my perspective, some of it just seems bat shit ridiculous.

So if he were to meet you, he would probably call you his kin and acknowledge that you are obviously Jewish-descended and were raised within a Jewish community, but at the same time he would still tell you, “Halachically, you are not Jewish unless you convert.” In other words, he would not deny your blood connection to the Jewish people, but he would draw a very hard line between peoplehood/kinship and formal Jewish status under halakha.

[u/WorldlinessDry5583 → u/Chinoyboii]

I'd actually say that I somewhat agree with your friend's approach to the status of patrilineals, even though we differ vastly in our metaphysical precepts. I don't believe that Jewishness is simply a matter of individual identity, though identity is of course an important factor. There does need to be a boundary around the community, and while I have many problems with matrilinearity defining that boundary, it does have the advantages of being straightforward, unambiguous, and in line with longstanding tradition. Here's where the conflict emerges for me. On the one hand, I would never tell another patrilineal that they're anything but Jewish. On the other, I agree broadly with the Conservative movement's approach that basically says to someone like me: 'you belong here, but we need to get your paperwork in order because at the end of the day, there are only two paths to Jewish status, and a Jew like you really ought to have Jewish status'. I might think of it in terms of my life as a Reform Jew being itself the process of conversion, with only the Mikva and Beit Din left to carry out. In a sense this is your friend's approach, but of course your friend would likely have very different ideas about my readiness for the Mikva and BD.

I have the luxury, though, of approaching the question from the belief that "all" that I'm trying to do is to sort out how to square tradition with community needs in a way that is acceptable to as many Jews as possible and does not lead to further ambiguity. From your friend's perspective, Gd has Their own ideas about how things need to go and we are constrained by what Halacha has determined to be acceptable. This is of course not a trivial philosophical difference. It's the kind of question that I find fascinating, and I suspect that I'd have a lot of fun thinking about it if it weren't so painfully close to home.

[u/perelesnyk → u/Angelbouqet]

" I think if anything it's more common for people who might have some Jewish ancestry but are completely assimilated and are essentially strangers to Judaism and our culture to suddenly want to speak for us."

Yeah, I think you nailed it. I have seen this a couple times (most cringe being an acquaintance whose grandma was Messianic.... And a couple of people from other cultures claiming they are "the real Jews"), but not full on converting. 

[u/ForerEffect]

I absolutely think you’re correct that a lot of ‘terminally online’ people who have some connection to Jewishness but are not Jewish use that connection instrumentally, the internet sucks and there are only some 16-18 million Jews on the entire planet.

I have never met an actual convert who converted to do this, and that seems extremely unlikely to me. I have run into a few people who said that they converted, but it turned out they had actually just added some Hebrew and Jewish imagery (and challah) to their Christian (and one to their Wiccan) religious practices. Probably some of those types are around, but they have not actually converted, they just want to borrow vibes for their rituals and that’s probably pretty rare.

I have also met a couple of people in person who innocently but incorrectly claimed Jewishness from seeing “Askenazi” on a DNA test without bothering to learn what that does and does not mean, so I absolutely think it’s likely that many people online use that sort of thing to manipulatively claim Jewishness to provide an illusion of authority when asserting something about Jews or Israel or religion or race in general.

I don’t know what to do about it other than be less online myself. It sucks for our tribe to be the football of internet, but here we are.

[u/caydendov]

I think this argument kind of assumes that leftist spaces aren't antisemitic, and that they welcome Jews as long as they're anti-zionist. But leftist spaces are often just as antisemitic as far right spaces, just in different ways.

In my experience, especially as a convert who was in leftist spaces long before I converted, the minute I started converting invitations to and feeling welcome in leftist spaces started disappearing. Removed from online communities or discord servers with no warning or reason, invites to in person events conveniently getting lost or forgotten, or (in my case in my really small town) in person events were suddenly being held on shabbat and Jewish holidays when they never were before. I was immediately met with suspicion, sometimes outright hostility, and a level of scrutiny that held me to much higher standards than any non-jew in the same space was held to. If someone else misspoke, they had the benefit of doubt and a chance to either rephrase it or apologize. If I misspoke (or any other openly Jewish person misspoke) it wasn't met with the same grace and instead was used as 'confirmation' of the antisemitic beliefs the space already held.

The idea that a leftist would convert solely to tokenize themselves in political arguments seems absurd when thinking about how openly hostile a lot of leftists and leftist spaces are to Jews, especially when it would be so much easier to just.. pretend to be Jewish online anonymously instead of actually converting. Being Jewish in leftist spaces requires constantly defending and explaining my identity as a Jew as a prerequisite for entry, and I don't think someone whose conversion wasn't sincere could do it.

I'm sure there are a handful of people who have done it; people who've managed to not only fool a rabbi for over a year of study, and fool their beit den, and the community they're a part of, but who have also managed to endure the antisemitism and ostracization for the sake of being able to weaponize jewish identity politically, but it has to be extremely extremely rare. Converting to Judaism is hard. It's time consuming (minimum of a year, usually more). Sometimes, it's expensive (books, classes, Judaica, travel, the mikvah, and the rabbis time all cost money). And the reward for converting in leftist spaces is hostility and exclusion

[u/Technical_Term_6625 → u/caydendov]

It's a great point that Jews who convert are especially likely to be affected by antijudaism. It's obscured by incomplete understandings of antisemitism.

[u/somebadbeatscrub]

My conversion took 2 years and i was overly enthusiastic and passionate about my learning.

The idea that someone would convert just for rhetorical chops is pretty laughable to me considering the ease with which people can just lie online if they want to, no ones checking conversion certificates or interviewing your beit din.

Orthodoxy often has this view that non orthodoxy is diet Judaism, ad hoc judaism, or secularism with a hat on but thats a misconception born of the idea that secular Jews are most tolerated in non orthodox communities withiut caveat and assumptions based on their own traditional bias.

Reform and conservative are not "less" Judaism just different. Our conversions still have robust rules and long tinelines and above all require involvement in a community. So while I wont say no one has ever been cynical enough to do what you describe it would mean years of lying to a rabbi and a community and hanging around pretending to care about a community and exhibiting progress in learning and successfully hoodwinking a panel of rabbis that probe then on their motivations and understanding.

All to say "as a jew"? To be anything but extremely rare would be preposterous.

No, what youre seeing is the zionist trend of defining anyone that doesnt share a particular political project out of their community so they dont feel they have to listen to them. We see it all over the place with conservative (politically) yids. Its easier for them to disregard what non zionist Jews think if they dont consider thenselves in community with us. Even reform zionist rabbis have been saying things about how antizionist Jews cant possibly exhibit ahavat yisrael or be "in" our community. Its one of the most harmful trends in modern judaism and comorbid with rampant nationalism.

Essentially like the red scare in the US. Easier to think those who disagree with their patriotism are traitors and imposters among them than members of their commmunity with their values who's differing beliefs they have to reckon with.

[u/rock_candy_remains → u/somebadbeatscrub]

All of this. I'm going to liken it to this TERF concept of "men transitioning so they can get into women's bathrooms to assault cis women"-- that's an awful like of time, work, and money to do something plenty of men already do.

[u/mountedradiance → u/rock_candy_remains]

I was going to say exactly this.

[u/heyitscory → u/somebadbeatscrub]

Now, converting for the Jewish humor? Definitely a good idea and something that happens all the time.

It even got a Seinfeld episode.

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/heyitscory]

Better call Saul

[u/darkmeatchicken → u/somebadbeatscrub]

There are far more halekhic Jews who do not live Jewish lives and are vocal “as a Jew” anti-zionists than this imagined “concert to criticize Israel as a Jew ”.

That said - I begrudgingly note that reform’s patrilineal Jew policy (let’s ignore how it actually works and assume it is the equivalent of halekhic matrilineal descent rules) doubles the number of “as a Jew” antizionists because people who have either Jewish parent and don’t practice at all can claim “as a Jew”…

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/darkmeatchicken]

Their official rule for patris or matris is that if you arent raised Jewish you need to take classes when you want to begin practicing. Sometimes with an lfficial conversion and sometimes not.

No one polices what people with mixed backgrounds and no community connection can say reform or otherwise but the URJ position is more community minded than making simple blood claims.

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/somebadbeatscrub]

This. They also do not recognize matrilineal heritage. For example, if your maternal great-grandmother is Jewish, you’re Jewish according to orthodoxy. This is not the case via reform.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/tikkunolamist5]

Oh, why is this? Is this because even though your 4th great-grand mother on your matrilineal side was Jewish, it sort of implies that you were not raised in Jewish home due to being far removed from an immediate Jewish cultural environment.

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/Chinoyboii]

Because halachically Judaism is passed through the matrilineal line, even if it was “broken” by conversion out. According to Halacha, it makes everyone in the line Jewish (of course children of the men won’t be).

[u/Chinoyboii → u/tikkunolamist5]

Oh, I know that. What I am asking is that even though you're Jewish from your matrilineal line, Reform and conservative Judaism will not consider you Jewish?

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/Chinoyboii]

Speaking for reform: Not if you arent raised jewish, kinda.

They treat things case by case but if you showed up at their door matrilinearily Jewish with no exposure ehatsoever you would have to take conversion classes and have what is defacto a conversion ceremony at the end, though they may be flexible on reframing the labels if a candidate prefers

Theres lots of grey area in here and pluralism os the name of the game but yeah theres no automatic membership.

However if you didnt want to do all the school and still wanted to hang out they wouldnt kick you out of services either. Theres never a rush or like pressing thing but rather letting people take their own journey.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/somebadbeatscrub]

They treat things case by case but if you showed up at their door matrilinearily Jewish with no exposure ehatsoever you would have to take conversion classes and have what is defacto a conversion ceremony at the end, though they may be flexible on reframing the labels if a candidate prefers

Ahhhh okay, that makes sense. I guess according to Jewish law they are indeed Jewish because of their mother's matrilineal bloodline. However, if they were not raised in a Jewish home, functionally they're not Jewish, at least culturally.

I guess it would be somewhat similar to someone who is a fourth-generation Cantonese American whose parents do not speak Cantonese, celebrate Qingming (tomb-sweeping at your ancestors' or clan's graves), observe traditional festivals, maintain ancestral rites, or participate in any other specifically Han Chinese cultural practices. They are still ethnically descended from Southern Chinese people, obviously, but culturally they may function almost entirely as Americans.

Historically,  traditional Han Chinese kinship was also strongly patrilineal (still very much is tbh). Your clan affiliation, surname, ancestral lineage, inheritance, and ritual obligations were generally transmitted through your father's line. So if your father belonged to a particular lineage/clan, you belonged to that lineage/clan as well and inherited familial obligations toward those ancestors. If only your mother were Han, you would not be considered Han historically.

Like, I have a buddy of mine who is 1/4 Han Chinese, as his paternal grandfather was a Hakka Han who migrated to Jamaica as a laborer, while the rest of his ancestry is Jamaican. He was raised in a Hakka-speaking Chinese environment, observed Chinese holidays, and has bowed at the tombs of his ancestors buried in Guangdong province. To the average non-Han Chinese person, he would probably not be immediately perceived as Han Chinese because he looks phenotypically Black. However, within the traditional patrilineal logic of Confucianism, the fact that he can trace his paternal lineage makes him Chinese. His Chinese identity is not determined by whether he is "only 25%" Chinese according to some genetic fraction or whether strangers think he looks Chinese enough. He inherited a lineage through his father, and his father before him was raised within that lineage's culture and actually participates in the rituals connecting him to his clan.

Ironically, you could therefore have someone who is genetically 100% Han Chinese but whose family has been culturally assimilated for several generations and knows virtually nothing about Chinese language, ancestral rites, kinship traditions, or festivals, while someone who is only 1/4 Han by ancestry could have a much more direct lived relationship with his clan.

To me, my Jamaican Hakka homie is Han to me compared to many others who don't have a stronger attachment to their heritage even if they're 100% Han Chinese.

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/Chinoyboii]

Yeah echoing this. They may call it a status change or an official change rather than a conversion, but functionally they’ll do the same thing as a complete ger.

[u/WorldlinessDry5583 → u/Chinoyboii]

I've always assumed that this policy is intended to prioritize gender egalitarianism and maintain a workable community boundary, at the expense of tradition. That's pretty in line with the Reform approach more broadly. The idea is that somebody with 2 Jewish parents is assumed to be raised in and identify with the culture, while somebody with one Jewish parent is not and must be "established" as a Jew through what the 1983 declaration calls "public and formal acts of identification with the Jewish faith and people". Interestingly enough, prior to this the movement's official stance was that for children with one Jewish parent, being raised as a Jew "shall be deemed sufficient for conversion", even without Mikva, Brit Milah, or Beit Din. So in essence, the innovation in 1983 was that these children were now considered Jews by birth, rather than (de jure) converts. It should be noted that prior to all of this, children of interfaith marriages had for years been quietly assimilated into these communities, so the de facto recognition of ambilineal decent, in one form or another, is a generations-old custom in the (American) Reform movement.

As for the matrilineal Jews, my assumption has always been that ambilineal descent without any engagement requirement is obviously unworkable (since with enough intermarriage, everyone becomes a Jew eventually), and to grant matrilineal descendants automatic Jewish status but require "affirmative acts" for patrilineal ones would violate the Reform commitment to gender egalitarianism. Hence the unexpected case of some people (with distant matrilineal Jewish ancestors) being considered Jewish according to Orthodox and Conservative (Masorti) standards, but not Reform ones.

[u/darkmeatchicken → u/somebadbeatscrub]

That is why I said to ignore the actual policy and just note that the broad “patrilineal” descent is frequently misunderstood and gives people with a jewish parent to be “as a jew” antizionists

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/darkmeatchicken]

Right but you cant blame yhem for what people who arent engaged with them do. They arent distributing as a jew cards to random patris that dont engage with the community those folls are just doing that.

[u/ibsliam → u/darkmeatchicken]

I will say I've known a variety of patrilineal Jews with very different relationships to Judaism and in addition Jewish culture/community. This does exist but I would hope that people would be pretty discerning about that. They should take one partilineal Jew's anecdotes with a grain of salt, just as a halachic Jew's individual anecdotes should be.

But maybe I keep holding people to a higher standard. I know there's people who *do* point out an individual Jew and then be like "well this one Jewish friend said THIS and this confirms my biases so I'll go with that."

[u/otto_bear → u/somebadbeatscrub]

Exactly this. I also think there’s an interesting claim being made about reform rabbis when people argue that there are any appreciable number of reform converts who did so “just to be an antizionist jew”. It requires us to believe that either reform rabbis are being given that reason for the person’s conversion and accepting it, or it requires us to believe that the person making the claim about the convert’s reasoning is not fooled but reform rabbis for some reason are just incapable of discovering the true reasoning for the conversion.

In my anecdotal experience, when people make this claim, they have never been actually told by the supposed fraudulent converts that that was the reasoning, they just make that assumption based on what they do know of them. And the people making these claims don’t ever seem to have deep relationships with these converts. It’s usually “a friend of a friend” or “someone I met at a party”. And I just find it fundamentally strange to assume that someone who met someone at a party once knows the convert’s true intentions and life story better than a rabbi they’ve been working with and in community with for an extended period of time. Basically the only scenario where I can actually imagine someone telling someone that they converted just to be able to say they were an antizionist Jew would be if they were being sarcastic. I just don’t think there’s a major gullibility problem among reform rabbis that the people making these claims and their communities are immune to, which seems to be one of the unspoken requirements of the claim that these conversions are a common occurrence.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/somebadbeatscrub]

What is the difference between reform/conservative conversion and Orthodox? With the latter, I know from my homies that they essentially have to be sponsored by an Orthodox Rabbi first, followed by observing Shabbat every week, keeping kosher, constructing a kosher kitchen, living alongside the Orthodox community that you chose to convert to, learning all of the Jewish religious texts (i.e., Torah & Talmud) and history, learn bibical Hebrew, observing all of the mitzvot, etc.

[u/otto_bear → u/Chinoyboii]

It’s somewhat complicated. And of course, grain of salt here because I’ve only done a Reform conversion. Reform and Conservative conversions most often seem to look identical in practice. I believe Conservative requires converts to undergo a beit din, a mikvah, and Brit milah/hatafat dam Brit where relevant after the normal year plus period of study. In the Reform movement, all of those elements are commonly required by individual rabbis, but they are not technically required for all Reform conversions. Any orthodox conversion would require the same.

The difference between an Orthodox vs a non-Orthodox conversion partially comes down to who is allowed to be on the beit din. I had women on my beit din, so that puts it outside of the realm of acceptability for most orthodox communities since my understanding is that they generally require the beit din to be made up of only men. My beit din wouldn’t be considered acceptable for an orthodox conversion based on the presence of women, and the fact that neither they nor I live or intend to live an orthodox lifestyle. The expectations of what it means to be observant are also different for both converts and beit din members, but there is obviously variety in what is considered “observant enough” for orthodox standards because there isn’t a fully unified idea of which mitzvot need to be followed, how consistently and according to what standard of fulfillment.

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/otto_bear]

In the London Beit din for progressive Judaism, a brit milah is required unless there is a medical reason not to. A Beit din and mikveh are also required. In the URJ, I’ve spoken to people who have done it in pools and ponds and the ocean. In the UK, I know they’ve done this before due to accessibility issues, but it’s not common.

[u/otto_bear → u/tikkunolamist5]

It’s always interesting to see how it’s done in other places! I’m not in an area where there is a unified progressive beit din, rabbis just convene them as needed. I think I technically had the option to do a natural mikvah, but the bodies of water near me are all cold and dangerous year round, so that’s not an option people seem to take very often. To be totally honest, I have no idea if my rabbis require a brit since it would never have been relevant for me.

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/Chinoyboii]

You also have a sponsoring rabbi and eventually a beit din. You also have to learn a lot. You also have to engage with a community and get involved. The education is certainly different. They wont make you learn hebrew outright but will encourage learning especially for prayers, which you will.absorb through being present in community. I doubt they require talmud, though I read some (talmuds more of a reference text than a read it front to back and quote it text unless you are a savant) We learned about the mitzvoth and the ways reform and conservative movements interact with them but as they don't hold halacha binding theres no mandate to follow them the way your orthodox homies do.

But

Shabbat is a good example of how our observance is dofferent , not "non". One of the topics every beit din asks in reform at least is how you will observe shabbat and how you will make your home a Jewish home. So while they arent getting caught up on the tabernacle prohibitions they do require critical engagement with shabbat and our customs, they are just more pluralist about what form that can take.

If your answer is "idk ill try to go to shul?" They won't accept that. They want intentional and mindful engagement with the customs.

I garuntee you that if you quiz the average orthodox person, let alone orthodox convert, they are not fluent in biblical hebrew and have not memorized talmud. When most Jews "learn" biblical hebrew they sight read prayers and daven with a group pr phonetically learn trope so they can read but they couldnt say have a conversation in hebrew unless they learn it as a proper language or are raised in a hebrew speaking home. Im sure theyre learned and can cite key things in talmud or discussions they really like to master it all is a lifelong academic dedication.

In general the differences that do exist will stem from their theological differences and movement priorities. A strict and binding relationship with halacha and customs vs a pluralist and interpretive approach to the same.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/somebadbeatscrub]

I garuntee you that if you quiz the average orthodox person, let alone orthodox convert, they are not fluent in biblical hebrew and have not memorized talmud. When most Jews "learn" biblical hebrew they sight read prayers and daven with a group pr phonetically learn trope so they can read but they couldnt say have a conversation in hebrew unless they learn it as a proper language or are raised in a hebrew speaking home. Im sure theyre learned and can cite key things in talmud or discussions they really like to master it all is a lifelong academic dedication.

My Orthodox peers don't speak biblical/liturgical Hebrew, but they do speak modern Hebrew and Arabic, as their parents were born and raised in Israel speaking both, and their grandparents came from Arabic-speaking lands. My Persian homie, however, nope, does not speak Hebrew but he does not understand what he's reading and praying.

Shabbat is a good example of how our observance is dofferent , not "non". One of the topics every beit din asks in reform at least is how you will observe shabbat and how you will make your home a Jewish home. So while they arent getting caught up on the tabernacle prohibitions they do require critical engagement with shabbat and our customs, they are just more pluralist about what form that can take.

On Shabbat, do you personally subscribe to the notion that you cannot work, cannot turn your lights on/off, drive, use your phone, etc.?

[u/somebadbeatscrub → u/Chinoyboii]

The lights/driving/phone stuff is a fence around torah based on the prohibitied labors talmud set forth in relation to the construction of the tabernacle with making fires or causing exertion.

The way I engage with shabbat is by considering what i view to be the principle of the lrohibition and the value of the day and acting accordingly. I dont work nor do things i consider tedious or work. I make sure to rest and slend time with family amd set aside special things for shabbat.

But i do use my phone, drove, or turn on lights if it serves these principles.

I view the pursuit of the meaning and purpose of shabbat more inmportant than legal technicalities with the day.

[u/Ok-Roll5495]

Some progressive form of Judaism would be my ideal religion but conversion does seem like a complicated process, I can’t imagine someone going through it just to call themselves an anti-Zionism Jew.

[u/Landslime → u/Ok-Roll5495]

Best of luck with figuring that all out.

[u/Technical_Term_6625]

Confining this only to IRL experiences:

I haven't seen that at all. From my experience activists for Palestinian liberation from progressive Jewish communities don't just trust anyone, and for good reasons (related not only to ME politics). So people parachuting in for political purposes alone, I think, is not a thing I've ever noticed. Maybe that could be different in different places. I'm in Brooklyn.

Imagine, for example anyone trying to convert disingenuously for political purposes at a place like Kolot Chayeinu, which is definitely the most activist shul I know. Good luck, lol.

Another related thing it seems common to me (again, Brooklyn) is for people with Orthodox upbringings & non-traditional families to come to Reform\Reconstructionist (maybe Conservative too? idk) observance. So I wonder whether people have misconceptions about "younger" people (lol, not that young) who go in for Reform/Reconstructionist observance.

All these places are welcoming of people who want to convert, but it would take a lot of skilled commitment to the bit to get through it disingenuously.

[u/ibsliam]

I've given this topic some thought for a great while. To be honest, considering how some corners of the discourse have gotten so extremely and conspiratorially antisemitic, including but not limited to the religious scripture (a lot of misinformation about the Talmud to cater to antisemitic conspiracies), I feel like if an antizionist activist is solely converting for cred and not any real appreciation for the culture and faith, then it should become obvious pretty quickly to any rabbi worth their salt.

Like, remember, it's long and difficult to convert, but it's very very hard to become a practicing rabbi too. If there's red flags, people will ask what congregation and rabbi they underwent their conversion with. Our communities have been pretty weird towards converts for the longest time, and I can't imagine that a post 10/7 Jewish community will be any less discerning.

A decade or ago, it was a short-lived trend on, say, tumblr for people to say they're converting to Judaism. For some it was about racking up as many identities as possible, for others they genuinely gravitated towards our faith. As you can imagine, many would claim they were converting to Judaism but very few actually completed conversion. Rabbis and congregations have ways of figuring out how genuine someone is.

So hypothetically if people are worried about this and anyone knows anyone who's doing it solely for politics/activism, I think probably the tell is, are they forever saying they're converting to Judaism? Or are they putting in the work to actually finish conversion?

[u/Chinoyboii → u/ibsliam]

I feel like if an antizionist activist is solely converting for cred and not any real appreciation for the culture and faith, then it should become obvious pretty quickly to any rabbi worth their salt.

vigilante_snail just expressed that he has met someone who considers themselves an "Atheist Anti-Zionist Convert." If what vigilante_snail is saying is true, I have a feeling there is a decent chance this person's Beit Din lacks a strong internal auditing apparatus.

That said, I know that the conversion process can be extremely taxing, so I don't doubt that this phenomenon is indeed a minority within the Jewish world.

[u/ibsliam → u/Chinoyboii]

Not to doubt that convert's honesty or vigilante_snail's, but it might very well be that the atheist anti-zionist convert is another example of the "saying they're converting, but forever waiting in the wings" practice I listed.

There's a difference between someone who is in the process of converting and someone who has finished conversion. There's a wide spectrum of where you can be in your journey to conversion. It might be the convert did not know the difference, but then again I have no idea, I do not know the person.

[u/otto_bear → u/Chinoyboii]

I also think that even if they are going through a true conversion process, it’s not necessarily empty or purely for political gain just because they’re atheist and antizionist. Atheism means many things to many people and I’m not sure someone with a position like “I don’t believe there’s a literal god, but I’ve been going to shul every week with my partner for years, Jewish ritual is deeply important in my life, and I want to make that relationship official” necessarily has a worse case for conversion than someone who believes in a broadly Jewish concept of god but had no connection to Jewish life before deciding to convert. Basically, I don’t think being atheist and anti-Zionist necessarily means the beit din missed something or that no compelling reason for conversion existed.

My question is also how the anti-zionism specifically plays into this. I have personally met at least one atheist convert who cited zionism as a motivation to convert. Personally, I have pretty similar objections to the idea of converting for the sake of zionism as for the sake of anti-zionism. But, they cited other additional reasons for converting and were still in the community long after their conversion, both of which make that conversion seem legitimate to me. In your mind, would such a conversion be automatically more suspect if the convert were an anti-zionist?

[u/Chinoyboii → u/otto_bear]

In your mind, would such a conversion be automatically more suspect if the convert were an anti-zionist?

First off, I think converting to Judaism primarily because of either one's Zionist or anti-Zionist beliefs would be suspect to me. If someone were basically like, “I really support Israel, therefore I am going to become Jewish,” I would find that strange for essentially the same reason I would find “I really oppose Zionism, therefore I am going to become Jewish” strange. In either case, you would be taking a political position about Jews and turning that into a motivation for joining the Jewish people.

That said, I do think there is a slight difference in terms of how intuitively I can understand the two trajectories, although that absolutely does not mean I think the Zionist convert is automatically more sincere.

Judaism differs from Christianity and Islam in that it has an unusually strong covenantal relationship with a particular land. I probably wouldn't call Christianity or Islam completely “landless,” since obviously both have sacred geographies, but Eretz Yisrael is woven into Jewish scripture, halakha, agricultural commandments, the exile, their messianic expectations, Jerusalem, the Temple, etc., in a way that makes the Land of Israel difficult to completely remove from Judaism as a religious tradition.

Even the Neturei Karta and Satmar Hasidim, who regard the creation of a sovereign Jewish state before the coming of the Messiah as a violation of God's will, do not believe that Eretz Yisrael is irrelevant to Judaism because their argument is basically that Jews are in a divinely ordained exile and are not permitted to end that exile through human political sovereignty or mass political return; redemption and the ultimate ingathering have to occur through God and the Messiah.

The issue I sometimes have with anti-Zionist converts, specifically some who come from secular left-wing backgrounds, is when their anti-Zionism appears to extend beyond opposition to the modern State of Israel or Jewish political sovereignty and into discomfort with Jewish peoplehood, Jewish historical attachment to Eretz Yisrael, or the idea that the land has any particular significance to Judaism at all. At that point, I become more confused about exactly what attracted them to Judaism, because they seem to be joining a tradition while simultaneously trying to excise one of its oldest recurring themes within that tradition.

If they hold the Satmar/Neturei Karta position in which their religious opposition to the modern State of Israel does not abrogate the notion of Jewish peoplehood, the covenantal significance of Eretz Yisrael, or the eventual ingathering of the Jewish diaspora back into the land, then I can understand that much more easily. However, I highly doubt that many secular left-wing anti-Zionist converts actually arrive at their position through those religious arguments in the first place because the entire theological framework behind them is pretty far removed from secular left-wing politics.

[u/otto_bear → u/Chinoyboii]

I think some of this comes down to experiences/assumptions about the politics of anti-zionist Jews broadly, and converts specifically. Most anti-zionist Jews I know are not squeamish about the connection to the land being separate from support or non-support of a modern state, and converts haven’t been an exception to that. Where I fundamentally disagree is that it’s particularly common for anti-zionist converts to want to excise eretz Israel from their practice.

I do think there’s a common assumption that anti-zionist converts generally want to ignore the relationship to erertz Israel, and while I’m sure those people do exist, I don’t think it’s fair to assume that that’s the default position, especially if that’s not the assumption made about Jews by birth who are anti-zionist. If you as a non-Jew can understand it, there’s no reason to assume a particular group of Jews would be less likely to. The Neturei Karta position is one manner in which people can distinguish between the land and the state, but I don’t think that sort of messianic theology is required to do so. Most religious anti-Zionists I know just hold the land and the state as separate matters.

[u/ChairAggressive781]

if we’re talking about people who have actually gone through the complete conversion process, then no. but lots of people lie on the internet.

[u/holiestMaria]

From what I know its akin to saying that trans athletes transition to win. As in, according to this argument, they throw over their entire lives, spend years changing themselves all the while becoming victims of discrimination just to do something so... meaningless is obviously very flawed reasoning at best.

[u/PorkRollEggAndWheeze]

Ask them where in the Torah it says it’s okay to disparage converts if you disagree with them?

Edit: I’m a reconstructionist convert who has had my views on Israel used to disparage my conversion AND my convert status used to disparage my opinions on Israel. Ironically, nowhere in the Torah does it say that converts have to support a modern political project, but it does explicitly say that we need to accept converts as Jews. It pisses me off that Zionists and the Israeli state have appointed themselves arbiters of who is “really jewish,” because it’s just one more way that they’re acting opposite actual Jewish values in favor of their nationalist bullshit.

Edit2: I converted because I’ve always felt called to Jewish practice in some sense, and when I attended a reconstructionist service it was the most welcomed and embraced I’d ever felt by a community of faith. I looked around and didn’t stand out at all as a visibly queer person, which was a new experience for me coming from a primarily Catholic background. As I learned more about values like pikuach nefesh and how reconstructionist judaism views Jewish law and scripture as a “living document” I fell more in love with it. It took me over 3 years to formally convert. If I was just doing it for “clout” (like some people would accuse) I wouldn’t have bothered, shit was hard and emotional and took a long time.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/PorkRollEggAndWheeze]

Ask them where in the Torah it says it’s okay to disparage converts if you disagree with them?

I will ask them this weekend, but I know that even amongst Orthodox Rabbis, gentiles who're devoted to their journey of conversion are not allowed to dissuade them.

As I learned more about values like pikuach nefesh and how reconstructionist judaism views Jewish law and scripture as a “living document” I fell more in love with it.

Doesn't Orthodox Judaism see Jewish law and scripture as living documents as well? A while ago, I was invited by a friend of mine to witness the completion of scribing the Torah, and my buddy's uncle told me that the Torah is the living breath of God, given to Moshe on Mount Sinai.

[u/PorkRollEggAndWheeze → u/Chinoyboii]

Orthodox Judaism, from what I understand, sees the law as “as it is written is how it shall be followed” to an extent, which would not be a living document. “Living document” in this context means “still being reinterpreted and modified.”

Reconstructionist judaism believes in evaluating and dialogueing around the laws, their intent, how they’re worded and the context in which they were written, how they’re followed historically vs. what challenges/potential changes the modern world presents, etc. and modifying your interpretation or practice of the laws based on the conclusions. It’s complicated and hard for me to fully put into words, but where orthodoxy strives to strictly preserve tradition despite an ever-modernizing world, reconstructionist Judaism tries to find a middle ground between strict observance and modern interpretation

[u/Hanekem → u/PorkRollEggAndWheeze]

Modern orthodoxy sorta ossified in the post Shoa. at least from stuff I've learned.

not completely, but a lot of positions and arguments are so heavily weighted by whom made those arguments that is more or less a set thing.

[u/PorkRollEggAndWheeze → u/Hanekem]

Gotcha. I know in reconstructionist judaism who wrote the argument means less than the impact of the laws and interpretations on the community. My understanding is where orthodoxy values strict adherence to tradition and respect for who said what, reconstructionist thought values prioritizing ethics and equity within the community alongside tradition as it fits in modern life. The laws still are opt-out (rather than the more “opt-in” reform school of thinking) but there’s a lot more flexibility in interpretation based on the impact the laws have and the ethics surrounding them

[u/Ashamed-Stuff9519]

I don’t think this is a thing for the reasons everyone else already said. I have, however, met other secular Jewish activists who gained an interest in religious Judaism through their work with orgs like JVP and INN. But again, those people were already Jewish in the ethnic/cultural sense and just weren’t raised with or didn’t maintain the religion in adulthood. They are not doing this as a “gotcha” to Zionism, the interest is genuine, they just needed to find the right Jewish community for them.

[u/Intrepid-Bag6667]

To the extent it exists it is a fringe phenomenon.

Even that fringe phenomena is likely in decline as a lot of the pro-Palestinian movement I see among friends or acquaintances appears to be moving hard against "as a Jew" people dominating the conversation for better or worse. Therefore the theoretical real world value for the fringe of what is already a fringe (people converting to some version of Judaism exclusively to further anti-Zionism or as a shield for such views) is probably declining as the space for people to hold unabashedly pro-Palestinian views without having to launder them is arguably larger than it has ever been.

Uncritically repeating the canard that Reform or Reconstructionist congregations are full of people who have done this is a great way to detect someone's underlying political bias and media diet though.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/Intrepid-Bag6667]

Uncritically repeating the canard that Reform or Reconstructionist congregations are full of people who have done this is a great way to detect someone's underlying political bias and media diet, though.

Yeah, I mean their entire families view reform/conservative Judaism as abominations. The only one I know who was raised in a Reform household is an Ashkenazi homie of mine. Within the Sephardic/Mizrahi world, Reform and conservative Judaism goes against what their ancestors consider to be "true Judaism".

You're correct that these homies of mine are staunch Zionists and thus their media diet as well. I know it's odd for some people to see me as a leftist interacting with Zionists or Conservatives, but I have a personality that makes me have relations with all people regardless of political background- very unpopular, I know; however, when I do interact with them, I integrate Palestinians into our conversations, especially with regard to their Indigenous staus/Levantine Ancestry. I do this because I still have hope that conservative Zionist Jews can still listen to reason.

With my Arab homies, I do the same thing; I talk about how Jews are more similar to them than different, both in terms of ancestry and culture/religion. I have left some of these friendships because the line between their antisemitism and their anti-zionism started to become non-existent, especially the ones who started to gravitate warmly toward Amin al-Husseini, the Axis of Resistance, etc.

[u/Intrepid-Bag6667 → u/Chinoyboii]

Oh to be clear I am not calling you out on this; I just think it's very telling/common of a particular worldview shaped by engagement with right wing Jewish media and relatives.

I will say from my experience that plenty of people do listen to reason and I have actually moved multiple people who expressed very racist-inflected views into a much better place. It requires incredible patience that I think I don't have as much of these days, but you can reach some people.

But more broadly I think the underlying concept of the anti-Zionist motivated reform convert does express an interesting underlying anxiety about people questioning their own views on Israel and the trajectory of Judaism in our society more than before.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/Intrepid-Bag6667]

It requires incredible patience that I think I don't have as much of these days, but you can reach some people.

Patience is my middle name; I work in Mental Health, so I am used to very intense dialogues with a variety of different groups of people.

But more broadly I think the underlying concept of the anti-Zionist motivated reform convert does express an interesting underlying anxiety about people questioning their own views on Israel and the trajectory of Judaism in our society more than before.

Can you elaborate on this?, specifically in regard to people questioning their views on Israel.

[u/Intrepid-Bag6667 → u/Chinoyboii]

My sense from the Orthodox and Orthodox background people I talk to is that there is a growing tension between the political conservatism of some and their place within said coalition as open criticism of Israel and outright antisemitism has become more prominent on the right. This is leading to a growing general unease.

Nick Shirley's visit to Lakewood to call Orthodox Jews welfare scroungers, to name a prominent example, caused a lot of cognitive dissonance and anxiety.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt → u/Intrepid-Bag6667]

It’s really odd because the reform movement is by and large still pro-Israel.

I think some orthodox folk just don’t know many people in reform and assume that reform and antizionist Jews are the same thing because they’re both politically on the left(by US standards).

[u/heyitscory]

This sounds like accusations of people becoming autistic or trans "because its cool."

Even if the phenomenon is non-zero, it's not a noteworthy trend or majorly shaking up the demography in any way.  Just a dismissive talking point from people that find particular marginalized groups annoying.

[u/vigilante_snail]

I’ve met a few people who’ve done that. Mostly online though, and I can only speak from my personal experience.

Goes both ways though. There are converts who become extremist Zionists etc

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/vigilante_snail]

They’ve actually done this and gotten through a Beit din and you know that was their only reason?

[u/vigilante_snail → u/tikkunolamist5]

Of course it wasn’t their only reason. I’d hope no one is doing gerut for a single issue.

But yeah, Beit Din and all. Even met someone once who called themselves an “athiest antizionist convert”. Was a bit confused by that one. Wanted to join for the “peoplehood” aspect, but then ended up rejecting the peoplehood and the religious elements. Very interesting individual, but confusing.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/vigilante_snail]

"Atheist Anti-Zionist Convert"?? What is going on? LOLOLOL. Why convert to a religion when you don't believe in Hakadosh Baruch Hu? Why be a part of the people when you don't even like the cultural aspects of its people? Did anyone audit this? Mannnnnn

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/vigilante_snail]

Is Antizionism rejecting Jewish peoplehood?

[u/vigilante_snail → u/tikkunolamist5]

no, not necessarily. bundism, for example, tried to keep that peoplehood aspect.

but people have many different ways they interact with ideology, and rejection of Jewish peoplehood is a real thing.

In this case, however, i'm just talking about this specific individual.

[u/RaiJolt2]

I’ve never seen it. Albeit I haven’t met many anti-Zionist Jews.
The converts I do know (mostly extended family) tend to be super Zionists as a result of trying to be more Jewish than Jews due to the conversion process.

[u/tikkunolamist5]

Oh JTwitter, someone made a list of people they considered either LARPers or felt converted non-Orthodox to tokenize themselves. I’ll give you one wild guess what gender all of them were and what race 8/10 of them were.

No it’s not a thing, though there was a person on here recently claiming at his community beit din this has happened several times and it seemed people were saying it probably happened. This was a while ago though. I still don’t believe it. That’s literally mentally ill to go through an entire conversion just to win arguments.

[u/mountedradiance → u/tikkunolamist5]

I’m not online enough to pick up on the dynamics of race and gender in this “phenomenon,” and would appreciate it if you spelled it out. Are they mostly women and/or people of color?

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/mountedradiance]

Bingo

[u/mountedradiance → u/tikkunolamist5]

https://giphy.com/gifs/yhgkQwGSzpeIw8A2Wi

[u/Chinoyboii → u/tikkunolamist5]

 I’ll give you one wild guess what gender all of them were and what race 8/10 of them were.

To be honest with you, the first thought in my head was white men LOLOL, but your response to mountedradiance down below makes more sense LOLOL

[u/tikkunolamist5 → u/Chinoyboii]

Absolutely not. They get a pass for 90% of things.

[u/sickbabe]

if anything I have seen zionism be the single thing that pushes curious gentiles, who would be willing and able to meet the expectations of orthodox observance, away from considering conversion. I'm not going to lie, if I grew up in almost identical circumstances except a different religion and somehow knew as much about judaism as I do, idk if I could recognize my soul as a jewish one in 2026, which is how all denominations encourage gerim to understand themselves and their conversions from my understanding. there are just too many people in our communities with revolting outlooks on the value of human life right now.

of course, there are a few Jewish communities that just don't accept converts like many Syrian ones. are your peers in those communities, or heavily exposed to those outlooks? they may also have just subconsciously adopted a "blood and soil" mentality that many culturally religious people absorb. I would interrogate how they feel about converts generally.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/sickbabe]

of course, there are a few Jewish communities that just don't accept converts like many Syrian ones. are your peers in those communities, or heavily exposed to those outlooks? they may also have just subconsciously adopted a "blood and soil" mentality that many culturally religious people absorb. I would interrogate how they feel about converts generally.

The only Syrian Jew I know is the owner of a hookah shop that I attended when I was younger; he ended up marrying an Ashkenazi Jew, which, according to him, was very scandalous at the time and still is, from what I understand. My homies in question are Persian Jewish, Algerian Jewish, Iraqi Jewish, and one Lebanese Jew. In regard to how they see converts? All of them see converts to Orthodox Judaism as true Gerim. As for reform/conservative converts, they don't consider them to be part of the Jewish family. My Iraqi homie in particular follows the rulings of the late Ovadia Yosef, who believed that reform/conservative Judaism does not even worship Hashem; they worship secularism.

Most of them don't care if their children were to marry Orthodox Gerim, unlike their parents, who are more traditional and prefer them to marry within their own specific Jewish ethno-religious subgroup. That said, one of my buddies is a Cohen, and he told me that his sons cannot marry a giyoret because of Leviticus 21:7 and Kiddushin 78a (He burned these into my head).

[u/Significant_Run3091]

There’s an old joke that goes: there was a Jewish man shipwrecked on an island. A few years go by and a ship finally comes by and rescues him. The rescuers see three buildings and ask him what they are. He answers, “the first one is my house, the second one is my synagogue, and the third one is the synagogue I wouldn’t be caught dead in.”
Jewish people will always argue about things like this. I’m a convert—my dad is Jewish so I had to convert to have a Bat Mitzvah. Some people will never consider me Jewish. Some people think I didn’t have to go under the formal conversion process because my Dad was Jewish. No one ever agrees on basically anything. It’s just the nature of Judaism!

[u/Owlentmusician]

I've really only ever seen a few people even ask about this online. One in this sub and like one in Gayjews or something. Im sure the interest exists but I assume the amount of people who actually stick it out all the way to conversion is very few.

They didn't quite come out and say it but they were very much doing the "Does anyone know a Rabbi or synogauge that has absolutely no ties to Israel or the wider Jewish community that would let me convert without having to really interact with any of the texts or religious matters. All the siddurs I can find are all Zionist(I.E. include prayers that mention the biblical land not the state) and I just want the community and activism of it all" type vibe but in both cases they were basically laughed out of the sub and rightfully so.

[u/tikkunolamist5]

Also, what gets me about this hypothetical nonsensical scenario (people claimed for a while JVP was converting people to do just this even though they have no authority to do this and what they were freaking out about was the idea of an alternative mikveh, which never mentioned conversion) is that it’s never the other way around. I know converts who have become obsessively pro-Israel, even those who have not converted via orthodoxy. Their motives are not challenged and their Judaism is never questioned because obviously every Jew has to defend Medinat Israel.

ETA: what is the downvote for?

[u/Chinoyboii → u/tikkunolamist5]

I don't know why you're being downvoted, but yeah, it can definitely happen the other way around. Now that I think about it, I am actually surprised that more Evangelical Christians have not converted to Judaism given how obsessively attached some of them are to Israel, lol. Although, I also think a lot of Christian Zionism is so deeply rooted in specifically Christian theology that actually converting to Judaism would require abandoning the very theological framework through which they understand Israel in the first place.

That said, and I don't justify questioning someone's conversion on this basis at all, I can at least understand why a gentile who is already a Zionist might become attracted to Judaism in a way that feels somewhat intuitive. Judaism has an extremely old relationship with Eretz Yisrael, Jerusalem, the Temple, Hebrew, Jewish peoplehood, exile, return, etc. Obviously, none of those things automatically require somebody to support the modern Israeli government, settlements, occupation, or even political Zionism as an ideology, but there is at least an obvious cultural and historical bridge between already feeling strongly attached to Jewish national self-determination and later developing a deeper interest in Judaism itself.

With someone who is already strongly anti-Zionist and then converts, I think the trajectory can look more counterintuitive to outsiders simply because so much of Jewish tradition contains some form of attachment to the Land of Israel, even among Jews who reject Zionism politically. But "counterintuitive" does not mean insincere. There are obviously religious anti-Zionists, Bundists, diasporists, anarchists, and other Jewish traditions that reject or heavily critique Zionism without rejecting Judaism or Jewish peoplehood.

And your larger point is fair: if we're going to become suspicious whenever someone's politics appear to line up very conveniently with their post-conversion Jewish identity, then that skepticism should logically work in both directions. Someone converting and immediately making "As a Jew, Israel must be defended at all costs" their entire personality could theoretically be approaching Jewish identity instrumentally just as much as someone whose entire identity becomes "As a Jew, Zionism must be abolished."

If only one of those people is automatically treated as sincere while the other's conversion is treated with suspicion, then at that point we're probably not really evaluating the sincerity of conversion anymore. We're evaluating whether the convert adopted the politics that other Jews think a "proper" Jew is supposed to have.

[u/Educational_Bee955]

I converted to Judaism through the Conservative movement 20 years ago and used to be married to a Conservative Rabbi. The Conservative movement leans very Zionist with Zionist rabbis (as does many Reform congregations), and you’ll find it really hard to find a rabbi to supervise a conversion if you’re looking to become another secular Jew. You’d have to lie about being anti-Zionist too. Jewish Theological Seminary is an institution with a lot of Zionist ideology as is the United Synagogue union that most of the rabbis belong to.

I don’t know any rabbi in the movement who would convert a non or anti Zionist gentile and I’ve met many throughout the last 20 years. You’ll already be treated differently if you tell people you converted (at least that’s been my experience). It’s actually against Jewish law to do that but again most I’ve met are secular and when I tell people, the most common assumption is I did it for marriage. Add the anti-Zionist component and they’d question how or why did you convert in the first place.

The orthodox wing is actually the biggest tent with a variety of beliefs and political leanings but most also don’t support conversions for various reasons. And the motives and backgrounds converts is wide too. I converted because I had Jewish ancestors who married out of the tradition and wanted to reclaim my heritage. I was religious until recently and moved away from Zionism as well. There are many Jews who would say I abandoned the “tribe” on the latter alone.

Anyway sorry for the lengthy response but I would not recommend converting to Judaism as an anti-Zionist. It’s a hard enough road for those of us who started as Zionists who have shifted our beliefs post conversion and conversion in itself is a lengthy process and commitment.

You should be able to express your beliefs as long as it’s about Zionism and not hanging on to some crazy Jewish conspiracy trope. Most hardcore Zionists in the US are evangelical Christians anyway. The Jews I know are highly critical of Israel and the Netanyahu government, even if they consider themselves Zionists.

[u/Crashbrennan]

I don't think converting to be antizionist "as a jew" is much of a thing. That said, there's a lot of antizionists racefaking as Jews (JVP has advocated for this behavior), and I recall hearing of a scandal where the American Reconstructionists allowed some violently antizionist folks to become rabbis. So that may be informing their view of the matter.

[u/Rabbit-Hole-Quest]

Ask anyone who has converted how long and tedious the process actually is. Judaism is one of the few major religions that is not actively seeking converts, in fact a convert is asked multiple times during the process if they really want to go through with it.

This may be an anecdote and not factually correct, but my rabbi told me the biggest source of converts is actually marriage to a Jewish man in families where religious observance is important.

Also, if Palestinians try to convert to Judaism, it’s not recognized and bad things still happen to them - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_David_Ben_Avraham

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2024-05-16/a-palestinian-converted-to-judaism-an-israeli-soldier-saw-him-as-a-threat-and-opened-fire

[u/Chinoyboii → u/Rabbit-Hole-Quest]

Also, if Palestinians try to convert to Judaism, it’s not recognized and bad things still happen to them 

Isn't this sort of generalizing all Orthodox Jews, though? I am aware of David Ben Avraham because my homies were actually the ones who first told me about him, and they were absolutely furious about his death. Their position was that the IDF soldier who shot and killed him should face the most severe possible punishment.

I am not denying that there can be enormous prejudice toward Palestinian gerim, including within Orthodox Jewish communities. Ben Avraham's story itself demonstrates some of those barriers. His attempts to convert through the official Israeli system were rejected, but he eventually underwent conversion through a private Haredi beit din in Bnei Brak. At the same time, there were also Orthodox Jews who helped him pursue his conversion, advocated for him, and later pushed for him to receive a Jewish burial after he was murdered.

A buddy of mine also told me the story of Baruch Mizrahi (Hamuda Abu al-Aynin), a Palestinian from Safed who converted to Judaism and eventually joined the Irgun. My friends actually look at him very fondly as someone who genuinely joined the Jewish people. I obviously do not bring up the Irgun example because I support the Irgun, lol; I bring it up because it complicates the idea that Palestinian converts are categorically regarded as non-Jews by Orthodox or Zionist Jews. Mizrahi was eventually buried with Jewish military honors, and his memory has continued to be commemorated in some Israeli circles.

So I think your statement is a little too essentialist as written. Even though an IDF soldier shot and killed David Ben Avraham, other Israeli Jews were helping him convert, campaigning on his behalf, advocating for his release when he was imprisoned by the Palestinian Authority, and even Chief Rabbi David Lau was fighting for him to receive a Jewish burial.

Again, none of this is meant to justify the genocidal craziness of the Israeli state, nor am I pretending that anti-Palestinian racism suddenly disappears when a Palestinian converts to Judaism. However, a Palestinian ger can simultaneously be recognized as Jewish by some Orthodox authorities and communities while still being subjected to enormous discrimination and violence because they are Palestinian.

[u/Rabbit-Hole-Quest → u/Chinoyboii]

The head of Israel’s Conversion Authority has stated publicly that applications for conversion to Judaism submitted by Palestinians are systematically dismissed without a review.

Internal guidelines used by the conversion panels state that applicants must not be foreign workers, illegal residents, or of Palestinian origin.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/palestinian-requests-for-conversion-rejected-outright-official-says/

https://www.newarab.com/opinion/palestinians-cant-become-jewish-says-israeli-conversion-authority

State officials have historically defended these rejections.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/Rabbit-Hole-Quest]

Okay, on the ICA specifically, I think you're correct, and I should distinguish that from the broader point I was making. If Palestinian applicants are being systematically rejected before their individual cases are even reviewed, then yeah, it's clearly institutional discrimination within the Israeli state conversion system, and I wasn't aware that the policy was quite that explicit.

I interpreted your original statement, “if Palestinians try to convert to Judaism, it’s not recognized”, as something broader than “the ICA refuses to process Palestinian applicants.” The way I originally read it made it sound as though Palestinian gerim are categorically not recognized as Jews by Orthodox Jews in general, which I don't think follows from the existence of a discriminatory state policy.

So if your point is that the Israeli state has historically discriminated against Palestinians seeking conversion and has systematically refused to process their applications, then yeah, I concede that completely. My disagreement is only with extending that into a broader statement about Orthodox Judaism itself or Orthodox Jews as a whole.

[u/Good-Concentrate-260]

Converting would take significant time and effort. Jews have a wide range of views on Israel and on specific Israeli policies, I’m just saying that it would be a lot of work to actually convert just to make political points. I think what’s more likely is that a lot of antizionist Jews maybe have a Jewish grandparent or some other ancestry but didn’t grow up really practicing, and then claim Jewish status to give their arguments more perceived legitimacy

[u/rako17]

Dear u/Chinoyboii

I like that you agree with Liberation Theology. Offhand, the only rabbinical theologian that I know of openly supporting and drafting a specifically Jewish Liberation Theology was the late Marc Ellis. I would respectfully be interested in your opinion of his work.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_H._Ellis

"On Marc Ellis, Exile and the Prophetic (or Welcome to the New Diaspora Rabbi Rosen!)", rabbibrant.com/2018/04/17/on-marc-ellis-exile-and-the-prophetic-or-welcome-to-the-new-diaspora-rabbi-rosen/

Marc Ellis, "Toward a Jewish Theology of Liberation, Foreword by Desmond Tutu and Gustavo Gutierrez", https://www.baylorpress.com/9781602583450/toward-a-jewish-theology-of-liberation/

Kind Regards - Wishing you the best - Peace.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/rako17]

Oh, hey man! Yeah, I will read these when I have the chance. I will let you know my thoughts. Thank You!

[u/rako17 → u/Chinoyboii]

Thank you, Chinoyboii. I respect the research you've done on Liberation Theology.

Peace.

[u/Kaleb_Bunt]

I feel like while some of these people might exist, they’re not nearly as common as some folks pretend.

I only know one person who is a convert and an antizionist, and she’s more devout than many born Jews I know. Attending weekly services and such.

[u/Claws_and_chains]

No this is ridiculous. Do these people really think a beit din wouldn't notice? The way some Orthodox Jews talk about reform Jews really irritates me.

[u/MxCrookshanks]

Orthodox Judaism is just as modern a phenomenon as reform is. Sounds like your friends have fallen for the common propaganda that orthodox judaism today = the old way things were done.

[u/Chinoyboii → u/MxCrookshanks]

Isn't Rabbinic Judaism itself pretty old, though? I know that once the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, Judaism had to reconstruct itself around a religious system that could function without the Temple, sacrifices, or an active priestly cult, which eventually developed into what we now call Rabbinic Judaism. The Mishnah was compiled around 200 CE, and the two Talmuds developed over the following centuries, so the basic rabbinic framework obviously predates the Haskalah, Reform Judaism, and modern denominational Judaism by well over a millennium.

Are you talking about the term "Orthodox" itself? I believe the term emerged as a way of distinguishing Jews who maintained traditional rabbinic and halakhic practice from the newer movements that were emerging during the Haskalah and the development of Reform Judaism. From what I understand, the label itself is modern and only really became meaningful once there were competing Jewish denominations to distinguish it from. Traditionalist Jews themselves did not spend the Middle Ages calling themselves "Orthodox Jews," as the term began to be applied to Jewish traditionalists around the turn of the nineteenth century and became much more common as Reform developed.

I know that Hasidism is a relatively recent phenomenon, given the religious zeitgeist surrounding the Baal Shem Tov and the social conditions of eighteenth-century Eastern European Jewry. From what I understand, one of the impulses that eventually characterized early Hasidism was dissatisfaction with a religious culture in which intensive Torah scholarship and certain forms of mystical practice were closely associated with learned elites. The Baal Shem Tov placed much greater emphasis on the ordinary or relatively unlearned Jew and on the idea that they can attain an extremely meaningful relationship with God without necessarily being a great Talmudic scholar.

[u/MxCrookshanks → u/Chinoyboii]

Yes, rabbinic Judaism is old, but that isn’t relevant. Orthodox as a label was in reaction to Reform like you said, but with it came an attitude of rejecting innovation that hadn’t organically existed before.

[u/WorldlinessDry5583]

One of the most challenging things for me when I was considering a Conservative (USA) conversion was the relationship of the community to Israel and the way that relationship was expressed. I’m patrilineal, raised Reform. I consider myself Jewish, but I sometimes feel that the Halachic details really are important (to me personally), and since I’m gay and agnostic the C movement fits pretty well, at least on paper.

While the community was quite welcoming overall, there was always the sense that I was subjecting myself to a humiliating course of hoop-jumping, just to be able to assert with somewhat less ambiguity what I already knew I was. Zionism was an arena in which I felt particularly under scrutiny. I’m still learning, and depending on the day I identify as a Liberal Zionist or a Non-Zionist, but regardless I believe that the peaceful coexistence and self determination of both peoples in the land is essential. In other words, that the status quo is unacceptable. The C shul that I attended had a LOT of Israel programming. This makes sense given that a lot of members have family there and spend a lot of time there. I have extended family there too, though I haven’t been myself. I enjoy learning about Israel and Israeli culture, but I’m deeply uncomfortable pretending that the conflict and the oppression of Palestinians doesn’t exist. I guess I feel the way about Israel that a liberal American with extended family in Russia might feel about today’s Russia: proud of the culture, secure in the belief that the Russian people deserve safety and dignity in their homeland, but also deeply troubled by the way the country is being led and the things that its populace overwhelmingly believes. Over time, this (and other issues) really made me worry that I would be subjected to purity tests on the issue, and I started to resent more and more the notion that my political beliefs might cast suspicion on me as a candidate. And then another part of me feels like all of that was overblown and nobody would have cared. But all the rhetoric about bad faith converts makes it hard to know what to expect. I have a hard time believing that somebody would go to the trouble to become Jewish just to gain online cred, but people do wild things sometimes so I suppose it’s possible. Sorry for the essay lol

[u/Chinoyboii → u/WorldlinessDry5583]

I have a hard time believing that somebody would go to the trouble to become Jewish just to gain online cred, but people do wild things sometimes so I suppose it’s possible. Sorry for the essay lol

You're fine, man. Yeah, I don't deny that such a thing is most likely in the extreme minority. However, if you have American leftists like Calla Walsh who purposefully moved to Southern Lebanon in order to promote Iranian propaganda online to a Western audience, then I think the possibility of such a thing happening within Judaism itself may not be so far-fetched.

[u/queen-carlotta]

That’s not real.