Efrat, Israel - This week's Torah reading features one of the most - if not the most- seminal experiences of the Jewish people: the Revelation at Sinai, the foundation of our Torah . As the introduction to this momentous event, the Almighty declares: "You have seen what I have done to Egypt...And now, if you will surely hearken to My voice and observe my Covenant.. then you will be for Me a Kingdom of priest-teachers and a holy nation" (Exodus 19:4-6).

In effect, the drama of the exodus and it s aftermath has transformed Israel from a family to nation-religion, from Bet Yisrael to Am Yisrael. But how do we define the Am (literally, with, together, collective)? Are we a nation, are we a religion, or are we an amalgamation of both?

In truth, one of the most agonizing problems facing the Jewish people of Israel as well as the diaspora, an issue which can potentially tear us asunder and make a mockery of the Jewish Federation slogan "we are one, " is "who is a Jew." From a technical, legal perspective, this question expresses itself in the requirements for conversion, the ramifications of which impinge on who qualifies for automatic Israeli citizenship under the "Right of Return" (Israeli law provides automatic citizenship for any "Jew" who desires to live there, an obvious and proud reaction to the tragic situation in the 1930's and '40's when Jews were sent to the gas chambers because virtually no existing country would relax their rules of immigration and allow the would-be refugees a haven from Nazi persecution.) In a far broader way, however, the "who is a Jew" controversy speaks volumes about "what is Judaism;" after all, the necessary criteria for entering our fellowship will pretty much define the cardinal principles of that fellowship.

The Sages of the Talmud as interpreted by Rav Yosef Karo's sixteenth century Code of Jewish Law set down three criteria for male conversion, the latter two applying to female conversion as well: circumcision, immersion in a mikveh (ritualariam), and the acceptance of the commandments (Shulhan Arukh, Yoreh Deah, 268, 3). The casting off of the fore-skin connotes the removal of Gentiledom, the separation of the Jew from the licentious practices (especially in the sexual realm) which characterized the pagan world (Interestingly enough, the Rabbinic Sages understood that women were as "naturally circumcised"). Ritual immersion symbolizes re-birth - after all, the fetus is encompassed in fluid and birth is presaged by the "breaking" of the mother's water - into a new family-nation. (A similar ritual was adopted by Christianity in the form of baptism). And the acceptance of the commandments signaled the entry into a religion, a faith community bound together by common adherence to a system of ritual, moral and ethical laws. With this understanding it becomes clear that we are a nation as well as a religion, a nation with a separate language, culture and homeland and a religion with a unique code of law defining our prayer rituals, feasts and fasts, life-cycle celebrations, and ethical behavior.

Fascinatingly enough, the Bible records just such a process of development a "national conversion," as it were, in the Torah portions which we are now reading. In the exodus from Egypt, the Israelites were separating themselves from the Egyptians, the Egyptian enslavement, the Egyptian concept of slavery as a societal norm, and the Egyptian immoral lifestyle. And the Bible suggests that the Jews expressed this removal from Egyptiandom with circumcision, since the Pascal lamb sacrifice could only be eaten by one who was circumcised (Exodus 12:48). The Midrash explains precisely when the circumcision took place. The Bible provides for the Israelite preparation for the exodus, commanding each household to take a lamb on the tenth of Nissan, to guard the lamb until the fourteenth of Nissan, and then to sacrifice the lamb to G-d (their disavowal of Egyptian idolatry, since the lamb was one of the Egyptian gods) and place its blood on their doorposts. On the night of the fifteenth they were to eat the lamb - their first seder - and then exit from Egypt.

Asks the Midrash, why take the lamb on the tenth and wait until the fourteenth to sacrifice it? The midrash answers that the male Israelites were to have themselves circumcised, and by merit of the two-fold blood of the sacrifice and the circumcision would they be found worthy by G-d to be freed from Egypt. (Exodus 12:6, Mechilta and Rashi ad loc). Indeed, in Temple times, the convert would be expected not only to have himself circumcised, but to bring a sacrificial offering as well (Maimonides, Laws of Forbidden Relationships, 13,1).

The ritual immersion of the Israelites took place right before the Revelation at Sinai, either when G-d commanded Moses to see that the people "be sanctified and their clothing be washed" (Exodus 19:10, see Maimonides, laws of Forbidden Relationships, 13, 2-3), or when the Israelites jumped into the Reed Sea before it split ("and the children of Israel entered into the midst of the waters on the dry land...Exodus 14:22). And of course the acceptance of the commandments came following the Decalogue and the subsequent legal code, but as a prerequisite to the confirmation of the eternal covenant between G-d and Israel: "...And the entire nation responded with one voice and declared.. 'all that the Lord has spoken, we shall do and we shall internalize' " (Exodus 24:3,7). Indeed, prior to the formula of acceptance, the Bible not only recorded the ten commandments as well as the major civil and ritual laws, but also outlined the eventual borders of the land of Israel which the Jews would occupy (Exodus 23:20-25). In effect, therefore, the Israelites were accepting both Jewish nationality and Jewish religion. We were to be bound together (am,im) by common genes, land and destiny as well as by a unifying system of laws, values, and lifestyle.

Now does this mean that a Jew can only convert if he/she lives in our Jewish homeland and is observant of all of the commandments? Perhaps the Book of Ruth suggests that this be the case, having Ruth say to Naomi, "Where you shall go (to your homeland Israel), there shall I go; your nation shall by my nation, your G-d (religion) shall be my G-d" (Ruth 1:16). However, since the Babylonian expulsion of the Jews from Israel (586 B.C.E.),a majority of Jews have lived in the diaspora - even during the Second Commonwealth. Hence the Rabbis have accepted converts, even though they have lived in the diaspora. And many religio-legal decisors have also ruled that although acceptance of commandments is a necessary prerequisite for conversion, there is no requirement to teach all of the 613 commandments with their respective rabbinic injunctions and enactments; indeed, the Talmud merely requires "several of the more stringent laws and several of the more lenient laws", specifically mentioning the laws of the Sabbath, Kashrut and tithing (charity to the poor)- B.T. Yebamot 45b-47a. There is nevertheless a general consensus amongst the rabbinic authorities that circumcision for males, ritual immersion and a general acceptance of commandments for males and females are clear and absolute requirements for conversion. After all, becoming Jewish is not merely an acquisition of a new garment; it is a commitment which connotes sacrifice, a willingness to share a national destiny of yearning for Zion and of perfecting the world (tikkun olam) and to participate in a tradition of faith and habitual norms which have united Jews from Ethiopia, Yemen, Jerusalem, New York and Melbourne for 4,000 years. And it was these very requirements which the Israelites fulfilled at the very dawn of their history.

Shabbat Shalom.