We think of Rosh Hashanah as one of the most Jewish days of the year. We blow the shofar to jolt us awake and eat special fruits to sweeten the mark of the “Jewish New Year.” But what we’re celebrating, really, is the birthday of Adam, who wasn’t even Jewish but is the father of all of us.  

Especially now, Rosh Hashanah draws my attention toward the increasingly visible tension in Jewish life between our particularism and our universalism. 

When I look at the various segments of the Orthodox world, I see that universalism has receded into the background. If pressed, many will say we should encourage non-Jews to follow the Noahide Laws, but that is a minimal moral framework, not a covenantal vision of humanity participating together in a grand divine project. Universalism becomes what we want from “them” and can teach “them” rather than what we can do for them or achieve together. 

Orthodox Jews today have warm relationships with Evangelical Christians, but they’re often based on overlapping political goals rather than a shared sacred vision of an inspired divine plan that includes us all.

Among my friends on the more modernizing side of the Jewish world, I see that the universalism that has carried their movements for decades is also falling apart. The rising prevalence of........

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