Correspondence
Letter to Japanese Convert Planning to Intermarry (1972)
Dear [redacted], I am writing to you at the request of Dr. Samuel Bavli, whose letter reached me just last night, as soon as we broke our Yom Kippur fast. I really do not know what to say to you. I would like to sugar-coat what for me as well as for you is a bitter pill, but I believe that you too will prefer forthrightness and honesty from me. Let me say, first, that no matter what my opinion of the validity of your actions according to Torah, I personally wish you every happiness. I think that that is understood. I must tell you, [redacted], that there is no way that Judaism can sanction your marriage to a non-Jew. Once you were accepted into the fold, you were recognized as a full Jewess, without reservations. As such, your proposed marriage to a non-Jew is no different from the inter-marriage of any other Jewess. Hence, the Halakhah simply does not recognize you as married to this man, but considers it an illicit liaison. There is simply no way out of it. From a Jewish point of view, therefore, I have no choice but to urge you most strongly to change your mind, no matter what the consequences, and no matter how fine a man he may be personally. Should you, however, decide to marry this man – and the word “marriage” I here use exclusively in the civil and not the religious sense – that does not relieve you from your moral, spiritual, and religious obligations to observe all the other mitzvot of the Torah. That, from the point of view of Jewish religion and law, is all that I can say at the present moment. I will never presume to judge you. If there is any judgment involved, it is against myself. If you remember, as I am sure you do, I pleaded with you during the many months that I guided your preparation for conversion, to desist. I predicted for you the troubles you would have in finding a proper mate, I was deeply worried that you would be injuring yourself, despised as was to your obvious love of Judaism. Yet, you persisted and demonstrated a powerful desire t…
