Carmen, every day, Americans show up at the Western wall, Americans who know not a word of Hebrew, not a thing about Judaism. And up sidles someone from Heritage House with the inevitable question, which must be answered before any other discussion can proceed: “Are you Jewish?” The kids can answer that question, because the one thing they do know is that Jewishness is determined by whether your maternal grandmother is Jewish. You find it absurd to suppose that Madonna becomes Jewish merely because she’s made an effort to learn Hebrew, to study some Jewish texts, et cetera. I only point out that it’s nowhere as vacuous and absurd as to suppose that someone becomes a Jew because they discover that, lo and behold, grandma Mabel’s mother’s maiden name was Berkowitz!

As for Maimonides, pikuach nefesh, et cetera you're only repeating my own point. Of course Jewish scripture and commentary offer much insight into modern problems. What I am telling you is that rabbis and other Jewish thinkers should be busting their ass to determine the appropriate application of these ideas to the real-world problems of most American Jews. They should be doing that instead of fretting about Jewish continuity and intermarriage and "Who is a Jew" and other parochial, archaic concerns that are of no interest to anyone but themselves.

My generation can't read Hebrew, and yours can't read Aramaic. You managed with translations, and so can we.