VANESSA FELTZ, I imagine, has a wide repertoire of Jewish jokes,
of which the one she served up for Quentin Letts on What's the
Point of . . . the Chief Rabbi? (Radio 4, Wednesday of last
week) was a relatively anodyne sampler. A Jewish man is stranded,
alone, on a desert island. When his rescuers finally come, they
notice that he has built two synagogues. "Why two," they ask, "when
there's only one of you?"
"So that I can go to one", he replies, "and reject the
other."
The point of the Chief Rabbi, Ms Feltz suggested, is to give the
British Jewish community somebody to disagree with. And, judging by
the evidence of this programme, it works pretty effectively. There
are all sorts and conditions of Jewry that dislike the Chief Rabbi,
and, on present reckoning, the retiring incumbent, Lord Sacks, is
entitled to claim that he represents only about 50 per cent of
synagogue-going Jews in the UK.
How the institution of Chief Rabbi came into being and, in the
late Victorian and Edwardian periods, rose to one of real influence
is a story of personal ambition and political expediency. And it is
largely expediency that underpins its continued existence. When a
Home Secretary wishes to declare that he has met "leaders of the
faith communities", he or she need have only one Jewish
representative on speed dial.
In contrast, Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner, of the Reformed
Synagogue, argues that people are less dumb than the media and
politicians make out: they do not need figureheads to explain to
them the nuances of Jewish identity.
Listeners might think that this is either an evasive or a wholly
naïve approach to the challenge of representing faith issues on the
national stage. And yet, by all accounts, Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis -
who will succeed Lord Sacks next month - may well agree with the
sentiment. It is expected that he will take a more introverted
approach to the position, turning down the official residence of
the Chief Rabbi and moving closer to the London Jewish community.
Whether he can maintain this exercise in institutional branding
remains to be seen.
Following up on the success of last year's radio series The
Bishop and the Prisoner (Media, 27 January 2012), Bishop James
Jones has launched a series talking to people who - were popular
opinion to have its way - would also be behind bars. The Bishop
and the Bankers (Radio 4, Monday of last week) comes at a time
when the Archbishop of Canterbury is leading the charge on ethical
capitalism.
We have had a great deal of this sort of programme recently,
although this one added some texture to the usual mixture of
recriminations and justifications, courtesy of the former head of
investment at RBS, Johnny Cameron.
Mr Cameron, in his words, "took one for the team", absorbing
much of the vituperation that might have gone in the direction of
other colleagues. Only an adamantine heart could fail to be touched
by Mr Cameron's sense of shame on behalf of Scottish bankers: "I'm
glad my father was not around to see it."
