The Big Tent
As the first-ever convening of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered Jews got underway in California at the tail end of June, conference funder and philanthropist Lynn Schusterman threw down the gauntlet — in her Tulsa, Oklahoma way, of course. She’s too polite and Southern to pick a real physical fight, but her words were plenty provocative.
To promote LGBT inclusion and equality within Jewish life, she wrote in a column distributed by JTA, her family foundations — giving away tens of millions every year — “will only consider funding organizations that have non-discrimination policies covering both sexual orientation and gender identity and expression.”
Then she went a step further and asked “all Jewish organizations to join our foundation in adopting non-discrimination hiring policies that specifically mention sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression.” And: “We are also challenging donors to join us in holding organizations accountable for doing so.”
In a follow-up interview, Schusterman said this was a natural extension of her personal experiences with traumatized closeted gay people, and her belief that Jewish values mandate this kind of diversity. “I believe we have to have a big tent,” she said.
But how big?
That was the question posed by Nathan Diament, director of the Institute for Public Affairs of the Orthodox Union, and it’s a fair one. His concern that Jewish federations around the country will suddenly stop funding Orthodox day schools if they don’t have policies guaranteeing rights for transgendered teachers is slightly overblown. The federation world doesn’t move that fast.
But Diament’s deeper point is that traditional, halachic Judaism does not condone homosexual behavior, and therefore its institutions could not adopt policies that recognized sexual orientation as a protected status akin to race, ethnicity or gender. Agree or disagree with that interpretation of Jewish law, or believe (as we do) that it is superseded by a more modern imperative — it ought to be respected.
If the tent is big enough to include Jews of varying sexual orientations and identities, shouldn’t it also be big enough to shelter those who hew to more traditional norms?
These questions inevitably go beyond LGBT inclusion. In our embrace of pluralism, who is in the welcoming circle and who is not? Where are the parameters drawn — around women’s issues or political positions, or should they be drawn around the most radioactive topic of the day, views on Israel? If one philanthropist can require organizations to adopt policies regarding LGBT Jews, can another philanthropist insist on only funding efforts that promote a certain kind of Zionism? Who gets to decide what is an essential Jewish value, or what is so outside the mainstream — be it anti-Zionism or anti-gay rights — as to be unacceptable?
That these questions are difficult to answer does not diminish their importance. Schusterman and Diament deserve thanks for engaging the issue; our columnist Jay Michaelson approaches it from a different, equally thoughtful angle elsewhere on these pages in his discussion on the choices between Zionism and Peoplehood.
“How goodly are your tents…” Balaam proclaimed in a recent Torah portion, leaving us to grapple with whether we want a good tent, or a big one.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 3
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 4
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Jerusalem Post editor Zvika Klein, arrested in ‘Qatar-gate,’ says he’s being unfairly prosecuted for his reporting
-
Fast Forward Trump fires national security officials, reportedly at urging of Laura Loomer, far-right Jewish ‘Islamophobe’
-
Fast Forward Display honoring Jewish women graduates of naval academy removed ahead of Hegseth visit
-
Yiddish טשיקאַוועסן: מיידעלע געפֿינט 3,800־יאָריקע קמיע לעבן בית־שמש, ישׂראלTIDBITS: Little girl finds 3,800-year old amulet near Beit Shemesh, Israel
אַן עקספּערט פֿון פֿאַרצײַטיקע קמיעות האָט באַשטעטיקט אַז די קמיע איז געלעגן אויפֿן אָרט פֿונעם אַמאָליקן לאַנד כּנען.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.