JewsByChoice.Org Forum

1. 

   Mensch
   Member
   Posted 8 months ago #
   

   The Jewish Free School has lost its appeal to the House of Lords (whom are the British Supreme court). The court decided that their entrance criteria determining who is a Jew breaches discrimination laws. I wonder how things will develop from here.

   At the core of the judgement was the question whether a person can be considered Jewish if they are descended from a non-orthodox convert. The JFS said that conduct was entirely irrelevant, and only the status of the mother of the applying-child was important.

   Interestingly enough, the JFS also didn't recognise orthodox Israeli conversions conducted 15 years earlier. There are claims that this is a political issue regarding the London Beth Din wanting control over British Jewry, and rejecting conversions done abroad without their supervision.

   Where is God in all of this? Where is the importance of God-fearing behaviour in all of this?

   Below are a few articles regarding the JFS rejection of children. JFS claimed these children weren't Jewish.

   http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/when-faith-isnt-enough-506818.html

   http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/955040.html

2. 

   Mensch
   Member
   Posted 8 months ago #
   

   I find this a good development on behalf of the Jewish non-orthodox authorities:
   http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/25317/convert-challenge-chief-after-jfs

3. 

   usuario
   Member
   Posted 8 months ago #
   

   The government should not be funding religious schools, period. But while the JFS and any other religious school is receiving public money, they have to submit to the law of the land, no matter what their religion / halacha says.

4. 

   Zeev
   Member
   Posted 8 months ago #
   

   I'm pretty sure minhag if not halacha dictates that we follow the law of the land. All the same, laws in England are not the same as in the US. I think over there the same rules apply regardless of whether you are public or privately funded. Anyway, I don't think it was a racial discrimination case. To the Orthodox, non-Orthodox conversions are invalid, we all know that, so why try to force them to accept what they consider to be "un-kosher"? To change Groucho Marx's line a little, "Why would I want to belong to a club that doesn't want me as a member?"

5. 

   Mensch
   Member
   Posted 8 months ago #
   

   ....because non-Orthodox Jews consider themselves Jews too. In the JFS, all Jews were welcome except Jews from non-Orthodox female converts. It didn't matter whether their style of observance was Orthodox.

   http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/25818/jfs-fight-collapses-board-retreats

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