The Jewish “establishment,” and let’s include in that term rabbis, synagogues, Jewish institutions and local and national Jewish leaders as well as academics, has been involved in what feels like a verbal full-court press lately, urging Jewish singles to marry each other. But what they haven’t provided yet is a financial incentive, in acknowledgment of the high cost of Jewish dating. Well, until now.

As USA Today reports, Rabbi Donald Weber, rabbi of a Marlboro, NJ Reform congregation, has put his money where his matches are, or rather, where he hopes they will be:

Six weeks ago, in his Yom Kippur sermon at Temple Rodeph Torah, Weber offered to personally pay for six-month memberships to JDate, the popular Jewish online dating service, for any singles in the congregation who asked. JDate charges $149 for a six-month membership, and so far, nine people have taken the rabbi up on his offer. He and his wife, Shira Stern, initially pledged $1,000 but just donated a second $1,000 as more people came forward.

Apart from my initial reaction (“$149??”) over the skyrocketing price of JDate membership, I was extremely impressed by this gesture, which indicates a commitment to the prospect of encouraging Jewish marriage that other Jewish leaders have not yet offered. Sure, occasionally Michael Steinhardt offers to pay for someone’s honeymoon if they meet at an event he’s involved with, but that rewards the outcome instead of constituting an investment in the process.

“We need you to look at Jewish people when you’re dating,” Weber said on Yom Kippur. “There aren’t a lot of us around. … You’re going to have to look in specific places. Number one? JDate. No joke. Half the weddings I’m doing now are people that met on JDate.”
Weber, rabbi at Rodeph Torah for 24 years, told the single Jews in the pews that the survival of American Judaism in its current form depends on their decisions. “Do we believe that it’s important enough that it must go on, that we make a difference in the world? That if there are no Jews in the world that the world will be poorer than it is now? If we believe that, then we’re going to need to do some things about it,” he said.

Also interesting was the fact that Weber’s synagogue is Reform, a denomination within which many intermarried couples have found a home. Having just spoken at the PLP ThinkTank at a session about intermarriage, I know first-hand what a touchy subject this can be; even the encouragement to intra-marry can be perceived as a condemnation of those who didn’t. Saying–as I did at the PLP session–“I want to marry a Jew,” can be heard in a different context than the intended one.

Still, for those who believe it is important for them to marry other Jews, this kind of incentive program is extremely encouraging. Rabbis aren’t major investors in Jewish causes financially because they can’t afford to be. But this small commitment of funds can make a difference to the singles in his community, and should be a lesson to people who produce studies that attempt to scare us into dating co-religionists instead of encouraging us within a positive framework.