Baltimore's First Secular Humanistic Rabbi

By Melissa Goldman, Baltimore Jewish Times, October 31, 2003

"I love this recipe — it starts with three cups of sugar. How can you not love it?" asks Judith Seid, poised with massive amounts of Domino's over a large bowl of pumpkin bread batter. She has already pulled two apple pies out of the oven and is making plans for the remaining pumpkin she purchased at the local farmers' market near her home in Towson, Maryland.

"Eat more, we're going on vacation!" she implores, cutting a huge slab of steaming pie. The spiritual leader of the 35-family Baltimore Jewish Cultural Chavurah, she was getting in some last-minute baking before traveling to the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism in Farmington Hills, Mich., where she became Rabbi Seid in October.


“It's taken just about forever," says Rabbi Seid, a part-time CPA and mother of three, who completed a good part of her rabbinic studies program long distance over the past eight years. "One of the years I was here, I flew out every Thursday, and I flew back every Friday. My great uncle Charlie died and left me $10,000, so that's what I used."

Secular Humanistic Jews approach Judaism through community and celebration of Jewish history and culture, rather than the traditional prayers and God-centered rituals of the other Jewish movements.

"I consider myself observant. I just observe different stuff," says Rabbi Seid, author of "God-Optional Judaism: Alternatives for Cultural Jews Who Love Their History, Heritage and Community" (Citadel Press). "We recognize the same holidays, and I think some of our ethical teachings are the same. The real difference is the authority under which we operate. Our authority is a more universal morality, which we learn from Jewish history."

But how can Judaism be God-optional? "Jewishness can be God-optional because Jews are not a religion," says Rabbi Seid, whose parents, grand-parents and one great-grandparent were also Jewish secularists. "Certainly they're not a religion as anyone who has sat down with two Jews can tell you. Religion is what divides us. What unites us is our common historical consciousness and our sense of peoplehood."

To earn her rabbinical ordination, Rabbi Seid and fellow students studied classical Jewish texts as well as contemporary Yiddish, Hebrew and English literature.

"What can I tell you — my Aramaic stinks," she confesses. "We don't do a lot of Talmud. ... We do holidays and life cycles. We have to take classes on education and philosophical counseling, and we have a ton of history. Plus, you have to have a master's degree in Jewish studies from an accredited university."

The Michigan-based International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism ordained its first rabbi four years ago, and Rabbi Seid is now one of only a half-dozen of the movement's rabbis. "We were originally an anti-clerical movement, so I had no interest in being a rabbi," says Rabbi Seid. "Our movement realized that we had to have people that the outside world would come to call on. They didn't have legitimacy in the outside world, so we decided we had to have rabbis."

Rabbi Dr. Miriam Jerris, who was ordained two years ago, serves the Society for Humanistic Judaism as community development coordinator. She signed Rabbi Seid's ordination papers last week, along with those of Sivan Malkin Maas, the movement's first Israeli rabbi.

"Judith has been a leader in this movement for so many years. She'll just continue to do the good work she's been doing for so many years," says Rabbi Jerris. "My joke is, the only thing that's different is you lose your first name. You do have to take that title [of rabbi] with all its history, with all the meaning that you yourself have imposed on the title, and you have to try it on and make it fit you."

Rabbi Seid agrees that her current role will change little ("I can stop telling the photographers at weddings not to call me rabbi!" she notes happily), though she does hope to establish closer ties with other area spiritual leaders. "I hope to join the Board of Rabbis, become a part of that community," she says. "Nobody knows more than the rest of the rabbis how diverse the Jewish community is."

Rabbi Rex D. Perlmeter of Baltimore Hebrew Congregation, who serves as president of the Baltimore Board of Rabbis, says they have not received an application from Rabbi Seid but noted the organization's requirements for membership.

"The Baltimore Board of Rabbis, in its bylaws, specifies that one is eligible for membership by virtue of being eligible for membership in a recognized national rabbinic body, such as the Central Conference of American Rabbis or the Rabbinical Assembly," says Rabbi Perlmeter, who does not know Rabbi Seid and admitted a lack of familiarity with the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism. He did say, however, that if and when she submits an application, it would be brought before the executive committee.

At least one of the board's members says he has reservations. "There are so many sides to this," says the rabbi, who chose not to be identified. "I would be uncomfortable voting into membership of the Baltimore Board of Rabbis a quote-unquote rabbi who claims to represent the Jewish tradition without believing in God, since God is at the heart of Judaism."

But the rabbi allows that an organization that supports Israel and participates actively in Jewish traditions does have a place in the Jewish community — he's just not sure where.

"The question is, do [the Board of Rabbis] represent the totality of the Jewish community, which is a legitimate point," he says. "To say I have mixed feelings is to say the least. I really am ambivalent about this."

Several years ago, a Secular Humanistic congregation in Cincinnati sought to join the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the governing body of the Reform movement, which denied membership, saying that it was a requirement to believe in God to belong to the Reform movement. Rabbi Jerris is now a member of the Michigan Board of Rabbis, but she said there were obstacles initially.

"It wasn't just a shoo-it-through kind of thing. It wasn't immediately accepted," she says. "There's an acceptance on the part of other denominations that there's a different philosophical and ritual base [among the different streams]. The convincing argument was that we have made ourselves part of the United Jewish Communities, and the United Jewish Communities recognizes the movement of Secular Humanistic Judaism as a legitimate option in Jewish life."

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