Dear Rabbi Lamm, I enjoyed your letter, courtesy American Airlines, and I’m estopped to criticize anyone’s penmanship. The person who advances a proposition characterized as fundamental must answer, I think, to several questions: 1. Is the proposition truly fundamental? Were there no processes of reason, based on history, experience, precedent, logic or whatever, that led to the original formulation of the proposition. 2. When, and in what circumstances, was the proposition first stated? Is there authority directly on point in the Bible or in ancient formulations of the oral law? Or does the proposition depend on later formulation and, if so, upon what exegeses? 3. Can or should there by any adjustment, by the legislators receiving the position advocated, with other social needs?My supposition in putting these questions is that many propositions, though they may be styled as fundamental and perhaps believed to be fundamental by those holding to them, are "less" fundamental than they seem, at least in terms that are relevant to the finding of a public consensus. In terms of the abortion debate, answers to the several questions above may expose to public debate the inner processes of legal (religious) decision and the methods and circumstances by which the rights and immunities of a human fetus were articulated in the first instance. Laying bare the considerations for, and the exegeses yielding, the first and successive formulations of the proposition that all fetuses are entitled equally with choate humans to the equal protection of the laws will remove the "fundamental" halo immunizing the proposition from attack, and will enable the legislature to weigh the religious argument against other aspects of the public weal – e.g., the disproportionate number of fatalities arising from abortions sought out by the poor because of lack of safer alternatives.The question, in my opinion, is not "when is a living object considered a human being." I would formulate it as whethe…

Dear Rabbi Lamm: Your essay “Law and Love” in the February 23, 1968 edition of the "Bulletin" has filled me with disquiet and I should like to deliver myself of some thoughts. You say “We are discharging our responsibility to them [our fellow Jews who have abandoned Jewish marriage law] and to their children. . .and to generations yet unborn, informing them and cautioning them about the Torah's law of marriage and legitimacy." I gather you mean that we, the Orthodox, are responsibly upholding the letter of our law of marriage and divorce and woe to those who do not heed. In my opinion, this view is irresponsible, not responsible, in terms of real problems with which people become involved. If, as I believe is the case, people are asked to decide whether to submit to a set of laws in circumstances where applications are manifestly unjust and harsh or ignore the law, the law will be ignored and held up to ridicule, and indifference and disrespect to all its precepts will be encouraged. As I suggest below, the law regarding divorce is in immediate need of reform and it is not seemly to caution others unless there is a will and intention to bring such a reform about. Let us take the case of a woman, wronged by an adulterous husband who abandons her and their children and moves to a distant state, perhaps to remarry or otherwise to take up life anew. From every point of view, the best course for the woman, for herself and her children, would be to divorce herself from her husband and remarry. Civil law permits this. With the husband's consent, Jewish law permits this. In times of old, consent of the husband could often be compelled for by custom and law a man could only with difficulty escape the jurisdiction of the rabbis. Consent cannot be compelled today. Should not law recognize this changed condition? Was God at Sinai deficient in his omniscience so as not to foresee such a changed condition? I cannot believe that religious institutions can be so paralyzed as not t…

Dear Rabbi Lamm: Your essay “Law and Love” in the February 23, 1968 edition of the "Bulletin" has filled me with disquiet and I should like to deliver myself of some thoughts. You say “We are discharging our responsibility to them [our fellow Jews who have abandoned Jewish marriage law] and to their children. . .and to generations yet unborn, informing them and cautioning them about the Torah's law of marriage and legitimacy." I gather you mean that we, the Orthodox, are responsibly upholding the letter of our law of marriage and divorce and woe to those who do not heed. In my opinion this view is irresponsible, not responsible, in terms of real problems with which people become involved. If, as I believe is the case, people are asked to decide whether to submit to a set of laws in circumstances where applications are manifestly unjust and harsh or ignore the law, the law will be ignored and held up to ridicule, and indifference and disrespect to all its precepts will be encouraged. As I suggest below, the law regarding divorce is in immediate need of reform and it is not seemly to caution others unless there is a will and intention to bring such a reform about.Let us take the case of a woman, wronged by an adulterous husband who abandons her and their children and moves to a distant state, perhaps to remarry or otherwise to take up life anew. From every point of view, the best course for the woman, for herself and her children, would be to divorce herself from her husband and remarry. Civil law permits this. With the husband's consent, Jewish law permits this. In times of old, consent of the husband could often be compelled for by custom and law a man could only with difficulty escape the jurisdiction of the rabbis. Consent cannot be compelled today. Should not law recognize this changed condition. Was God at Sinai deficient in his omniscience so as not to foresee such a changed condition?I cannot believe that religious institutions can be so paralyzed as not to r…

Dear Rabbi Lamm: As requested by your letter of December 2, 1971, I reviewed the master plan for New York City, published in 1969. Volume 4 of that plan deals with Manhattan, and pages 96 through 104 of Volume 4 deal with the West Side/Lincoln Square/Upper West Side area, that comprehended by Manhattan Community Planning District 7. That portion of the plan was republished and available at the hearing I discuss below, and I enclose a copy. The 1969 plan, except for a few changes that do not appear to be significant, is the one in effect.Community Planning District 7 extends from 59th St. to 110th St., from Central Park West to the Hudson River. In our particular area, you are familiar with the Urban Renewal activities from 87th St. to 97th St. There is no public housing planned south of 87th St. and north of 72nd St., with the possibility of a few exceptions that do not seem to be significant.With respect to the Urban Renewal Project between 87th and 97th St., the 1969 plan proposed for 2,500 low income units, 5,421 middle income units and 151 luxury units. In addition, 485 brownstones were slated for renovation.Within the past several months, a modification to this proposal has been seriously discussed, resulting in various proposals to the applicable city agency. I am not familiar with the details of the proposals. From the opposition that was expressed by a number of speakers at the hearing I attended, I gather that no substantial changes are intended to the allocations established by the 1969 plan.On January 10, 1972, at Brandeis High School a public hearing was held with respect to the plan for Community Planning District 7. I attended that meeting between approximately 9:30 and 11:00 and heard a number of different speakers. Most of the speakers who addressed themselves to housing expressed concern that the area between 72nd St. and 96th St. was witnessing a substantial shift from low income groupings to relatively high income groupings.Based on my study of t…

To: Alvin Hellerstein, Ira Kellman; From: Rabbi Norman Lamm; RE: Planetarium Neighborhood Council. After consultation with Mr. Max Stern, we are very anxious to have you accept appointments as our Jewish Center delegate to the Planetarium Neighborhood Council. You will notice that the meeting described in the enclosed papers has already passed, but I am mailing them anyway, just to give you an idea of the kind of work that the Council is doing.Both Mr. Stern and I feel that it is very important that the Center be represented on this group, if for no other reason than that we be kept informed of what is happening in the neighborhood because of the obvious effects that such a trend has on the nature and the future of The Jewish Center.Please let me know that you have accepted. All my warmest regards to your respective spouses.cc: Mr. Max Stern

Dear Rabbi Lamm, It is after Yom Kippur, and I thought that I should set down for you some of my misgivings about your recent sermon on Jewish women. These came into better focus following some reading today, in the El Am discussion of Berakhoth 20b. If I remember correctly, your position was: (a) Jewish women are not required to perform mitzvot conditioned by time, (b) a minyan cannot depend on an onan for he is not required to say the Shema (or the prayers requiring the presence of a minyan), (c) a minyan cannot depend on the presence of one not commanded to say the Shema, (d) hence women cannot be counted towards a minyan.

Dear Rabbi Lamm, Your congregants could have much simplified the task of Yeshiva's search committee. Indeed, as far as we were concerned there was no need for a committee, for in the end they would have had to, as they did, come to the choice that was inevitable from the beginning. I am glad that a larger community can now be moved by your ideas and inspired by your leadership. Notwithstanding the heavy responsibilities you will have as president of Yeshiva University, I hope that you will still find the time to share your scholarship and your thoughts with us to whatever degree possible, in sermons and especially in the Saturday afternoon series that so many of us enjoyed. Sincerely, Alvin K. Hellerstein