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November 2, 2001/Cheshvan 16, 5762, Vol. 54, No. 8
51 percent of Jews identify with Judaism
JULIE WIENER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
NEW YORK - An increasing number of Americans raised as Jews are marrying non-Jews and identifying with other religions, according to a new study.
In addition, even Jews who identify Judaism as their religion - not simply their ethnic background - are much less likely to believe in God or describe themselves as religious than are other Americans.
The new study, which followed the methodology and many of the questions of the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey, aims to provide a "second opinion" for that survey's official update, National Jewish Population Survey 2000, which is being conducted under the auspices of the federation system's United Jewish Communities.
Among the findings:
- There are approximately 5.5 million American adults who are either Jewish by religion or of Jewish parentage and/or upbringing, the same number found in 1990. However, 2.8 million, or 51 percent, say their religion is Jewish, compared with 58 percent in the 1990 survey.
- Among adults of Jewish parentage and/or upbringing, nearly 1.4 million say they are members of a non-Jewish religion or profess a different religion. That number has more than doubled since 1990.
- Thirty-three percent of Jews - defined as people either raised Jewish or who say Judaism is their religion are married to non-Jews, compared with 28 percent in 1990. The 1990 study is famous for finding that 52 percent of Jews who married in the previous five years had married a non-Jew; the new study has not yet determined statistics for newlyweds, but researchers say logic dictates that the intermarriage rate has increased for this group.
- Forty-two percent of Jews who say Judaism is their religion, not simply their ethnicity or heritage, describe their outlook as secular, while 14 percent say they do not believe in God.
The new study was conducted by Egon Mayer, director of the Center for Jewish Studies at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Ariela Keysar, also of the Center for Jewish Studies, and Barry Kosmin, who oversaw the 1990 study and currently is director of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research in London. All three were involved in the 1990 study.
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