i know of a couple who adopted an orphaned girl from a south american country- can't remember which country- but they converted her when she was a few months old and they didnt "re-convert her at 13" - she did have a bat mitzah though... would this have been wrong then, given that a second conversion did not take place?

It is not neccesary to re-convert her.

Why don't they need to re-convert her?

If a child converts, then when he or she becomes Bar or Bat Mitzvah the conversion automatically continues and it is as if the child had been Jewish from the time of the actual conversion.

earlier, someone wrote that 2 conversions are needed...

quote:

Originally posted by laurence shore:
You can not exactly adopt a child under Jewish law. The biological parents remain the biological parents. Essentially you become the legal guardian of the child. One usually converts the child on adoption and the child converts again at age 12 or 13. However, if the young man maintains a relgious lifestyle for many years and he knows he was adopted, then the some authorities feel that a second conversion is not an absolute necessity if for some reason it wasn't done at age 13.

I wasn't aware that a second conversion was necessary in any case where a child was converted. Can you point me to an authority that says otherwise?

I am not sure I would consider the first time a conversion or not. however to make this more simple rather then complex the family made the choice for the child of HaShem to be raise orthodox. however when the child get's older it becomes a choice for them, now how that works I have no idea. however it is not what one might think being some long process as say an adult who want to convert.

In fact i wouldn't be surpise if the bar Mitzvah was their conversion since a bar mitzvah is the child saying they accpet upon themselves the mitzvot. (but this is all theory)

There is no second conversion process. When the child becomes Bar Mitzvah he has the opportunity to repudiate his earlier conversion. If he does not and continues doing the mitzvos he is Jewish.

going back to the original matter, since the husband is the one that doesnt think his wife's eggs are viable because of her age, what is she went ahead and got pregnant by him anyway? Ruthie is a convert and there is only one case of mongoloidism in her family, a cousin(non-jewish) who at the age of 49/50 had a child but she didnt know she was pregnant until the 6th month(she didnt show really) and she smoked and drank. Ruthie does neither. What are the odds of her having a mongoloid child and most importantly, what are the marital implications, keeping quiet about trying to get pregnant by a husband that does not want her to be at her age. Does he have the right to not want her to be pregnant if she want to do it?

Are you talking about Down's Syndrome? If yes, it is an extra chromosome and therefore the fact that her cousin smoked and drank during pregnancy would not have been the reason why this child had Down's.

I'm not sure what the statistical chance of her having a Down's baby is, but they do increase after the age of 35. Although of course there are younger women that have Downs babies.

About her trying to get pregnant 'behind her husband's back', I don't know what the halachic implications of this are. But it won't be good for the marriage, and it is not the ideal situation to bring a child into. I would suggest that they speak to a competent Halachic authority who could advise them what to do in their situation, and hopefully come up with something they are both comfortable with.

Good luck

What is the link between maternal age and Down syndrome?
Since Down syndrome is a chromosomal disorder caused by an error in cell division, the likelihood of such an error occuring increases with maternal age. This means that an older mother is more likely to give birth to a child with Down sydrome than her younger counterpart. However, overall, fewer older mothers have babies than younger ones.

According to the National Association for Down syndrome, "80% of babies born with Down syndrome are born to women younger than 35. The average maternal age is 28 years old." The likelihood of a woman under 30 years of age giving birth to a child with Down syndrome is less than 1:1000, but increases the older the woman gets (see chart below), with an incidence of about 1:60 at 42 years of age.

An annual occurence of Down syndrome of about 9% is seen in women 35 years of age or older, but about 25% of babies with Down syndrome are born to women in this age group. 20-25% of babies conceived with Down syndrome survive past birth.

Down syndrome - the risks?

Age Risk

20 1:1,340
25 1:1,500
30 1:900
35 1:400
36 1:300
37 1:230
38 1:180
39 1:135
40 1:105
42 1:60
44 1:35
46 1:20
48 1:16
49 1:12

quote:

Originally posted by Rabbi Y. Kacev:
There is no second conversion process. When the child becomes Bar Mitzvah he has the opportunity to repudiate his earlier conversion. If he does not and continues doing the mitzvos he is Jewish.

As outlined in Ketuvot 11, the conversion process of a minor is not complete. If at age of 12 or 13, the child decides she or he does not want to be jewish, the conversion is annulled. However, if the child does start doing mitzvot, then the conversion is final. (Since there is no such thing as a Bar Mitzveh or Bat Mitzvah ceremony in Jewish law, one has to do an actual mitzveh like putting on tephillin.) The problem I was refering to if the adapting parents do not observe mitzvot, it is problimatical (and a problem which comes up everyday in Israel) since the logic of conversion is that the child wishes to follow the desire of his guardians.

Aryeh Shore

As I understand it, the child, when he or she has become Bar or Bat Mitzvah, has only a small amount of time (possibly only an hour) within which to cancel the conversion.

So if the child doesn't cancel the conversion, but is not Shomrei Mitzvos, what is the situation? And what if he kept some Mitvos (say, Kashrus) but not others?

Do we look at what the parents were doing in term of obervance of Mitvos at the time of the original conversion?

Do you know of any comtemporary authorities that deal with this problem?

Dear Steve,

This a problem in the State of Israel where the conversion must be done by the Rabbinate. As mentioned there is a special court under R. Druckman which tries to handle the problem of adoption by secular parents. In general, halachically they can't and it is not allowed. Unfortunately, the problem is generally solved by false declarations but some secular people just have thing thing about lying.

As you can imagine, having tax paying citizens who can't register their adoption leads to a great deal of discord. Similar to the thousands of tax payers who can not get married because the couple is from different relgions.
2. At age of bar mitzveh, the gar has shaah echad to annul the conversion. The exact meaning of this is not fully agreed on by the Rishonim. However, it is generally agreed when the young man does a mitzveh, they all become binding. The examples given are active mitzvot such as putting on tephillin.

ראה רמב"ם הלכות איסורי ביאה פרק יג, הלכה ז, ובית יוסף יורה דעה סימן רסח לגבי חרש, שוטה וקטן שבאו להתגייר בעצמם
http://www.snunit.k12.il/seder/convert/citizen9.html (non-orthodox opinion, but you should know what people are saying, in Hebrew)

Aryeh Shore

as to this matter i wanted to keep it simple because all the question you raise dr shore are but a few of them. thus my comment are maintain within the confines of a orthodox family. but lets say a consertive or reform husband and wife adopt a child and desire to raise the child jewish. then everything which i said earlier no longer applies, I believe (could be wrong) that the child/adult must go before an orthodox beit Din and convert, no different then if the child mother was a convert through the reform movement.

In re:
what if the adopted parents are reform or conservative, does this present the same difficulties as parents who reject any jewish mitzvot.

The weight of conversion is that one is converted, i.e. you are a convert unless there is an extremely powerful reason to assert otherwise. Assuming the conversion is done by a conservative bet din, the parents are doing some mitzvot. So either the Bet Din is valid or not. If it valid, then the conversion is valid, if it is not, then the father is converting the child himself which halachally is a stronger.
One can not lump reform with conservative. The conservative rabbis are mitveh observing jews and technically any three jews can convert someone.

A few cases from the last decade:

A women converts going to an approved ulpan. It was not realistic for her to observe any mitzvot on her husbands kibbutz when they adopted the children. They later went abroad and adopted a fully religious life style. Someone wanted to convert the children again for chumrah. (Bnei Banim, II)

A man passed the Bet Din for conversion and made a favorable impression on the Bet Din. It turned out later that he was a homosexual and in his statements indicated that he never accepted Rabbinical judiasm. Is the conversion valid? (Tanchmim 17)

A woman was converted on Thursday and married two days later. The affair wasn't kosher. Was the conversion valid? (Tanchumim 17)

Aryeh Shore

quote:

Originally posted by laurence shore:
One can not lump reform with conservative. The conservative rabbis are mitveh observing jews and technically any three jews can convert someone.
Aryeh Shore

1. Why cant you lump the reform with conservative? The Rambam Hilchos Teshuva 3:8 lumps them together. They are both kofrim who deny the Torah.
2. I never meet a conserative rabbi who kept Shabbos so what do you mean that they are "mitvoth observing Jews"?
3. What is the source that any three jews can convert someone even if they are Jews who deny the Torah?

and I never met a conservative rabbi who wasn't shomrei shabbat or who denied the divinity of the torah. Since I haven't met any conservative rabbis under the age of 40, you be entirely right that they are not shomrei shabbat. I don't think you can disqualify someone because of a belief or non-belief. If he says I am eating pork because I deny the divinity of the torah, then he is disqualified.
As for three kosher jews forming a beit din converting someone (Mordechai), it is in the same category as getting married before two witnesses and a giving a ring. Don't do it because it will put in a halachic never-neverland that you don't want to be there.

Aryeh Shore

quote:

Originally posted by laurence shore:
and I never met a conservative rabbi who wasn't shomrei shabbat or who denied the divinity of the torah. Since I haven't met any conservative rabbis under the age of 40, you be entirely right that they are not shomrei shabbat. I don't think you can disqualify someone because of a belief or non-belief. If he says I am eating pork because I deny the divinity of the torah, then he is disqualified.
As for three kosher jews forming a beit din converting someone (Mordechai), it is in the same category as getting married before two witnesses and a giving a ring. Don't do it because it will put in a halachic never-neverland that you don't want to be there.

Aryeh Shore

I do not know how many Conservative Rabbis you know that are shomer mitzvos, but they are in the vast minority. So for you to make a statement that Conservatives follow halacha is ridiculous and as absurd as stating the color of the sky is black.
Therefore any beis din that has a conservative Rabbi in it would be unquestionably possul.Even if the Rabbi himself kept the mitzvos he would be possul because he would be transgressing the serious sin of misleading others in not keeping the mitzvos

quote:

Originally posted by Rabbi Y. Kacev:
is ridiculous and as absurd as stating the color of the sky is black.

There are times that the sky is black or dark grey. Maybe like the color green or purple would do it?