This past August, around 150 rabbis and community leaders from a dozen countries gathered at the UJA-Federation in New York for the second Sephardic Rabbinic Conference. There were representatives from over 13 U.S. States and delegations from Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and, of course, Israel.

The Sephardic Rabbinic Conference is, of course, concerned with strengthening Sephardic communities and leadership. However, more than ancestry or representation, it is inspired by a distinct worldview —one that emerged from the Sephardic experience but which, I believe, extends far beyond Sephardic Jewry and is urgently needed in the wider Jewish world.

It is an approach to Jewish life that upholds Torah and Halakha, but is sensitive to reality, human complexity, and scientific progress. It is engaged with the modern world without surrendering to it. It cares deeply about society, the Jewish people as a whole, the Jewish state and the Israeli Defence Forces—and indeed hopes to spiritually elevate them—but is not judgemental or coercive in its attempt to do so. It is principled and demanding, but eschews black-and-white rigidity and sectarianism. It is guided by the Maimonidean middle path and by the proverb, derakheha darkhei noam vekhol netivoteha shalom—“her paths are paths of pleasantness and all her ways are peace” (Mishle 3:17).

As society and the wider world grow ever more polarised and are pulled towards extremes — and as the Sephardic world, in particular, is increasingly drawn towards Haredism from one end and cultural absorption on the other — Rabbi Haim Sabato, Rosh Yeshiva of Birkat Moshe in Ma’ale Adumim, reminded us in the opening remarks of the conference that the balanced approach at the heart of the Sephardic way are not projections of weakness. They are, in fact, the very source of our strength and durability.

The Sephardic Alternative: Big Tent Judaism

The Jewish conversation today is too often dominated by binaries: religious or secular. Traditional or modern. Conservative or liberal. Frum or frei. Retreat or assimilate.

The Sephardic tradition offers another way—one that refuses to make these binaries the defining feature of communal life. Jews may live very different kinds of Jewish lives, yet still belong to the same synagogue, school, and communal gathering.

This “big tent” is not a euphemism for a free-for-all. It has a strong center of gravity: Torah is our constitution and Halakha our framework. Shabbat, kashrut, family, and synagogue remain indispensable sacred institutions of Jewish life.

But the tent is Abrahamic. Historically, Sephardic communities made room for the Jew who prayed three times a day and the Jew who had bacon for breakfast; for the learned and the less learned; for the pious rabbi and even for those who drove to synagogue on Yom Kippur.

The instinct was not to redraw Judaism’s boundaries every time Jews failed to live up to halakhic standards, nor to create separate denominations for different levels of observance. Darkhei noam – The pleasant path means there is indeed a defined path, but it is wide, inviting, and forgiving. The wandering Jew may still be on a journey, but is never off the derekh. The Sephardic Rabbinic Conference: Applying the Vision

The theme of this year’s conference was the ‘Art of Leadership’ and over two days we explored what it means to lead a Jewish community today with all these values in mind. We discussed the role of the Rabbi as a spiritual leader but also as CEO, as posek, as an educator, as........

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