Any Love Will Do
Morality and Torah both preach love.
Several big JInsta accounts are ranting about interfaith marriage again, this time because of Benny Blanco. Honestly, I wasn’t even sure Blanco was Jewish before this. I assumed he was because of the TV show Dave, where he’s featured next to everyone’s famous Jewish camp counselor. Whatever.
Anywhoodles, Melissa Chapman, a friend, jumped in to complain. She previously made the controversial comment that ‘we lost more Jews to marriage than the Holocaust,’ which set off the usual JInsta crowd. I thought it was inappropriate whether one agrees or not. Another account, Andean.zion—a proud woman converting to Judaism—implied she was disappointed by this music producer (she had just learned about). My favorite right-wing Jews, LEZM (low effort zionist memes), didn’t weigh in on this “who cares” story, but they too have rejected the idea that interfaith marriage has merit. Personally, I think this whole topic is a bad look. So I’ll keep this short.
If I saw Christian or Muslim accounts saying “don’t marry Jews,” I wouldn’t like it. That’s my view. I don’t even mind them having the opinion. I just think it’s weird to declare every take on social media. But as Lauren Lapkus once said, “Everyone who writes stuff online is Shutter Island.” [I am a Shutter Island!]
The optics of intolerance aside, here’s why I disagree with these conservatives. First and foremost, love is love. Telling people to ignore love for the sake of identity politics is sad. We should be encouraging more love, not less. Any true love is better than hate.
Second, the people complaining about intermarriage are going off personal opinions, not rabbinic or talmudic teachings. I’m not a Torah or Talmud expert, but here are a few examples:
Joseph marries Asenath, the daughter of an Egyptian priest. Their sons Ephraim and Manasseh become two of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Moses marries Zipporah, the daughter of Jethro, a Midianite priest, and she even saves his life in one dramatic moment.
King Solomon, remembered for his wisdom, married many foreign wives. If it’s good enough for Solomon, it’s good enough for Benny Blanco. Let the man marry three Selena Gomezeseses.
Ruth, a Moabite, marries Boaz and becomes the great-grandmother of King David. That’s the Messianic line itself beginning from an intermarriage.
Esther marries King Ahasuerus of Persia, and we literally celebrate this marriage every year on Purim.
The fact that Purim itself involves an interfaith marriage should tell the love haters: “You’re wrong.” Sure, there are Jewish stories warning against it too, but those discussions exist only because it kept happening. People fall in love.
I don’t think any good rabbi would tell someone to ignore their heart because Instagram told them to.
So if you think intermarriage is a recent “threat,” you need to go back and read your sources. Judaism’s foundational stories are full of freaky, interfaith loving. Sometimes it was welcomed, sometimes it was criticized, but it was there.
Third, my interpretation of Judaism emphasizes education, not proselytizing. Not converting other is honestly one of my favorite parts of the identity. These complaints do the opposite: they don’t educate, they just push opinions. We don’t know how the people marrying practice, or if they’re even proud to be Jewish in the first place. And if someone wants out, let them go. It’s not our business. And we don’t need more kapos.
Finally, most of the time the Jew in these intermarriages wasn’t observant anyway. Again—who knew Benny Blanco was Jewish? In plenty of cases, the non-Jewish partner is the one curious about Jewish practice. I personally know couples where the converted Jew ended up more spiritual and traditional than the born-Jewish spouse.
We can’t predict long-term outcomes: maybe the Jewish partner becomes more Jewish, maybe the non-Jew converts, maybe they raise interfaith kids, maybe they save the Persian Jews and every year we wear costumes and drink because of it.
For me, morality isn’t about religion. It’s about doing good. It’s about loving relationships.
So no, intermarriage isn’t the biggest deal. The biggest deal is how we treat each other—especially when it comes to love. And we need Jewish influencers leading by example on that.
