In response to David Klinghoffer’s call for Mexican immigrants to assimilate, Charlie Hall correctly notes the double standard on display. Klinghoffer, who not only identifies as an Orthodox Jew but also tries to ground his argument in the biblical story of Ruth, would never suggest that religious Jews abandon their traditional customs in order to be good Americans. I would go further and say that Klinghoffer’s comparison of the current immigration dilemna with the religious conversion of Ruth stems from a deep misunderstanding of both citizenship and religious identity.
According to the Bible, Ruth’s time was one of “famine” in the land of Israel… A wealthy Israelite, Elimelech, his wife, Naomi, and their two sons fled for nearby Moab…
Elimelech died soon after, and his sons decided to intermarry, wedding a pair of Moabite girls, Ruth and Orpah. When the sons also died, Ruth resolved to return to Israel with Naomi. While the mother-in-law protested that Ruth would be better off staying put, Ruth responded with the beautiful and timeless declaration that she no longer wished to be a Moabite at all:
“For where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people are my people, and your God is my God; where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the Lord do to me, and so may He do more, if anything but death separates me from you” (1:16-17).
Klinghoffer is of course right that Ruth’s statement of devotion to Israel is a paradigm for Jewish conversion. But the analogy to citizenship is completely inappropriate. Joining a religious community entails more than mere geographic relocation and social assimilation. The covert is joining a community of ideas - in this case a community of particular theological ideas. Their presumed divine nature requires full acceptance. Conversion is the creation of a new relationship with God and thus, it makes perfect sense that the convert be required to accept His authority.
An immigrant to a democratic country is in a different position entirely. The United States in particular has traditionally been accepting of immigrants who maintain strong ties to their country of origin. Unlike Halakhah, America doesn’t require its immigrants to surrender previous loyalties.
Perhaps more importantly, there isn’t a fixed American culture to which immigrants can pledge their full support. Ruth, in coverting to Judaism, committed herself to a divine authority that exists independently of her. (Yes, individuals do influence the development of Jewish practice and custom but the authority of God and the Halakhah by which He communicates with His people remain absolute.) American culture, on the other hand, is determined and sustained by the intersection of cultures and values from all corners of the earth. The reason French and German expressions, for instance, are regularly incorporated into American English is because we don’t insist on linguistic purity. To be sure, immigrants will influence and change the very culture to which Klinghoffer demands they assimilate. The thriving of our nation depends on it.