By Donald H. Harrison  

Rabbi David Rosen serves as both the international director for inter-religious affairs of the American Jewish Committee and as a president of the World Conference of Religion and Peace.  The latter organization  brings together representatives of 30 different religions from 70 different countries. 

He was part of the delegations from Israel’s chief rabbinate that negotiated diplomatic relations with the Vatican. With Prince Hassan of Jordan, who is the uncle of King Abdullah, Rosen has frequent and friendly discussions concerning ways to improve Jewish-Muslim relations.

Helpful in dealing with such heavy topics is a lively sense of humor, which Rosen displayed frequently during a talk on Thursday, Dec. 2, at the La Jolla home of Avra and Barry Kassar. 

Although born and raised in England, Rosen had served from 1975 to 1979 in Cape Town as senior rabbi of the Seapoint Hebrew Congregation, which was South Africa’s largest Orthodox congregation with 10,000 members and 1,500 regular attendees.  So Rosen was relaxed and at home with  an audience who, like his hosts, were mostly South African expatriates.

In South Africa, Rosen formed an Inter-Faith Forum to which he attracted the leadership of English, Indian, and Dutch religious groups.  One of the participants was a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church who initially told Rosen he would “burn in hell” because he rejected Jesus.  Rosen said he nevertheless invited the pastor to participate in the forum—even if his only reason for being there would be to attempt to convert the others.

Meeting clerics of other faiths was an eye opening experience for that minister, recalled Rosen.  The process was equally a “theophany—a religious revelation” for Rosen himself, who had grown up in a modern Orthodox home.

What “suddenly hit” Rosen was that all the clergy members at the Inter-Faith Forum were members of monotheistic faiths who believed in an “omnipresent, omniscient” deity, yet at the same time were under the false impression “that we can encapsulate the totality of that deity within one religion—within our own exclusive one.  What a ridiculous idea!  Obviously, God is more than any one faith tradition can encapsulate. …The encounter with people of other faith traditions is like another prism of this remarkable crystal of this … diamond which is unfathomable beyond any human totality of grasp.”

Rosen added, with a smile, “I got such a kick out of these encounters, I wanted more of it.”

He went from South Africa to Ireland, where from 1979 to 1985 he was designated as the “chief rabbi.”  “You know being in Ireland, as Rabbi (Lord Immanuel) Jakobovits said before me, ’95 percent of the country is Catholic, 5 percent is Protestant, and I am chief rabbi of the rest.’  You can’t do your job very well unless you are involved in interfaith relations.”

The experience served Rosen well after he moved to Israel and was selected by Israel’s Chief Rabbinate to dialogue with the Vatican, despite his maverick political views. “I am very openly critical of the Israeli religious establishment,” he said.  “I also believe that separation of religion from politics and the disestablishment of the rabbinic structure within Israeli society is not only right for democracy, not only good for Israeli citizens, not only good for Israeli-Diaspora relations, but it is good for Orthodoxy.

“Only when Orthodoxy really functions in an open market situation can it purify itself and adjust appropriately for the age in which it lives,” he said.

“Not all my colleagues like to hear this sort of thing,” he added, his eyes twinkling.

Rosen had served as the director of the Anti-Defamation League’s Israel office before being hired away in 2001 by the American Jewish Committee—“an organization by which I am much better suited by temperament, nuance and responsibilities,” he said.

Asked about his work with Muslims, he commented that Indonesia’s former president, Abdurrahman Wahid, jointly holds the presidency with him of the World Conference of Religion and Peace.

Rosen suggested that if the Muslim leader, who “has been to Israel a number of times” had been able to remain in power a little longer, there would have been diplomatic relations between Indonesia and Israel.

“He is not only a Judeophile, he is very positive toward Israel,” said Rosen.

In the United States, WD Muhammad—son of Black Muslim founder Elijah Muhammad—similarly has “visited Israel twice, once as a guest of the government of Israel,” Rosen said.  “He is very positive with regards to Jews and is very interested in dialogue.” 

The rabbi said it’s a shame that few Jews have heard of WD Muhammad, yet many have heard of Louis Farrakhan, leader of the smaller, breakaway Nation of Islam.  “Why don’t people know about him?” Rosen asked rhetorically.  It is because WD Muhammad “isn’t tall and handsome and doesn’t play the violin and doesn’t spew filth.  He is moderate and conciliatory, and he is not charismatic.  

“I have spoken at four of his mosques—Houston and Dallas among them—and I was received with incredible warmth.  In questions and answers afterwards, they didn’t pull any punches. They asked serious questions, and I gave serious answers.” 

In Israel, he said, there is a religious council with 70 different organizations working for Muslim-Christian-Jewish understanding, “and there are over 300 organizations working in Arab-Jewish relations in areas of philanthropy…We have three different organizations where Jews and Muslims learn (religious) texts together…”

He said the American Jewish Committee helped facilitate a meeting at which representatives of different faith groups in Israel condemned violence and called for living in peace. While the current political situation eclipses that declaration, he predicted that in the future it would loom more important.

 “In the final analysis this is the most important issue,” he said.  “If Islam does not adjust to modernity, we (the western world) are going to sink.  We need to reach out to moderate Muslims.”