Are there any laws concerning the celebration of a conversion? If we consider conversion as a life-cycle event (at least for the person involved), shouldn't it be celebrated publicly? Do they have to be sort of a "secret", as if the converted person is ashamed of his/her past? Are they like that because of halakhah or because of minhag? Please note that I'm not speaking about the ritual, but about the way to celebrate the event.

Vocabulary used in this Answer:

• Mishneh Torah – The great code of Jewish law (and perhaps the greatest code of Jewish law in history) penned by Maimonides in the twelfth century.
• Shulchan Aruch – The great code of Jewish law penned by Joseph Caro in the Seventeenth Century. Because it is the most recent code, it is the most widely accepted today.
• gerut – Conversion
• ger – A convert; plural: gerim; feminine singular: gioret
• Halakhah – Jewish law
• minhag – Custom, not binding as law, but often the line between halakhah and minhag gets blurred.
• limud – Learning
• beit din – Jewish court, can be of 1, 3 or even more.

Answer:

    Relative to other areas of Jewish law we have very little Jewish legal material on Gerut. Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah and the Shulchan Aruch deal with the subject in summary fashion. The reason for this dearth of material is that for most of Jewish history, the gerut of a non-Jew to Judaism has been illegal in Christian and Muslim lands. Therefore, people just did not convert very often, and legal scholars had little reason to write about it.

    The traditional literature does require a beit din of 3, and for this reason, according to Walter Jacob, gerut is a public statement. The traditional law also states that an individual converted as a child has the opportunity at the age of maturity to renounce Judaism as if he/she were never a Jew. Halakhah also allows gerim to marry a wider range of individuals, such as individuals with questionable lineage. Therefore the public must know who is a convert to permit these decisions at the time of Bar/Bat Mitzvah or the wedding. These are halakhic reasons why conversion is public.

    We also have the minhag that converts usually receive the Hebrew name as ben Avraham (son of Abraham), or bat Rut (daughter of Ruth—the first female convert—I often suggest bat Sarah as well). Since this Hebrew name is used in all public ceremonies, the public always knows who is a convert.

    From the halakah and the minhag it is clear that conversion is public. Nevertheless, it is also a personal decision. Converts often receive discrimination from certain Jews and can be uncomfortable openly declaring their non-Jewish origin. This derives from individuals who see Judaism as an ethnic community, something passed by blood. No matter how distasteful this behavior may be, it still exists, and for this reason the privacy of a convert should be treated with sensitivity.

    In our community, gerim undergo a year of limud, and often they have spent many years prior studying on their own. The process is rigorous, and the gerut marks the completion of a difficult task. In addition, conversion is an event in the life of not just the individual ger or gioret but also in the life of family and friends who have supported this individual and participated in the process as well.

    In the modern world, all of us could chose to assimilate and to leave Judaism behind. Many Jews follow this choice. For this reason gerut is an event in the life of a community, welcoming new members, and celebrating the decision of every single individual, whether born Jewish or not, to embrace Judaism. For these reasons, a public celebration can be quite appropriate.

    In order to fully integrate the conversion into the life of the community, I recommend that the public ceremony be built into an existing, ongoing synagogue activity or service. Therefore, in my opinion, a blessing of converts in front of the Ark and in front of the entire congregation on a Shabbat evening (followed by an extra big oneg Shabbat) afterwards, would be most appropriate.

    Finally, the tradition teaches that a convert is like a Jew on the first day he/she is born. For this reason, we should create our public conversion ceremony to resemble a baby naming ceremony, in which we publicly welcome a new life into the congregation.

- Rabbi Michael Holzman

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