Things go from Bad to Worse to so low as to defy imagination.... Posted by Rabbi Harry Maryles on his blog Emes ve-Emunah [Hat tip: Rabbi Dr. Aviad Stollman]
Shavuous Message from a Convert
Guest Post
I was forwarded the following letter from a friend. It was written by a righteous convert. It speaks for itself and requires no further commentary from me. It has been edited for brevity and somewhat for style. But I believe it captures he essence of this woman’s message. And though it is still a bit longer than my usual posts it’s message is too impritant to ignore. -
Twenty-one years ago last week I was converted through a halachic Beis Din by 3 Orthodox rabbis. Their credentials and authority to do so would not be questioned. In fact, they are considered to have some of the strictest requirements for conversion.My desire to be a Jew was preceded and nurtured by years of study. My desire to be a Jew was not based on love for any man or for money, prestige or power. It was – and is – purely out of love for G-d and the truth and wisdom of Torah. Never, ever have I felt that it was hard to be a Jew. Quite the contrary, I cannot fathom how I would live the full, productive enriched life that I lead had I not accepted upon myself to live a life of Torah and mitzvoth which I strive to do every single day.
In the last 21 years, I have been blessed with many and varied good teachers. I have sought them out, begging and bugging them for their time and knowledge to teach me halacha, Tanach, and the many other rich sources of Jewish wisdom. I have invested heavily to do so: A large library consisting of thousands of seforim that are opened and studied; a vast tape and CD library of shiurim by various rabbis and rebbetzins; and several trips to Israel for the sole purpose of immersing myself in learning.
Speaking of children, my 13 year old daughter is and has always been enrolled in Orthodox Jewish schools. So has my 10 year old son who is currently in what would be considered a “Chareidi” track of more intense Torah learning. Both children are good students, B”H. Both children present us with report cards that speak of their middos tovos and strong derech eretz.
During our 15 years of marriage, my husband and I have supported, to the best of our ability, various Torah institutions both in N. America and in Israel, with our time as well as with our money.
In a few weeks, my family and I are moving to the West Bank where we intend to raise our children, enroll them in Chardal-oriented schools, and live out our lives as Torah observant committed Jews.
And now, for absolutely no reason, no crime committed, a group of rabbis who have never met me or my children wish to throw a dark cloud of suspicion and doubt over the legitimacy of our Jewish souls.
Why? How?
The Beis Din who converted me 21 years ago is considered Chareidi. Its Vaad HaKashruth is recognized by all major Kashruth bodies. Its conversions have never been questioned and their converts have married into mainstream Orthodox Jewish society. This Vaad initially appeared on “The List” – the list issued by Israel’s Rabbinate of Who is Recognized to Do Conversions, or some paraphrased equivalent title.
However, for various ugly reasons which have to do with one person’s desire for revenge, the Vaad who converted me 21 years ago was now removed from The List.
A discussion and meeting with Rabbi Shlomo Amar by my rabbi resulted in assurances that “they were looking into it and, in any event, all conversions prior would be retroactively recognized”.
So, according to Rabbi Amar, I’m still a Jew and so are my kids. That is – until the next rabbi comes along and decides something else. At what point do my children and I no longer have to even think that somebody would unilaterally and arbitrarily remove the cloak of Torah and Jewish identity out of our definition? How many years – 30, 50, 100 – never?
Does this mean that if I ever speak a drop of lashon hara, or some of my hair peeks out from under my tichel, or my elbows become uncovered, or I wear my sandalim without socks, – that I must reckon with someone’s claims that this is sufficient evidence to disclaim my Jewish soul? These are not dramatic questions.
Much is written in our literature about the convert. Yevamos 47b tells us that a convert is as injurious as “sapachas” -a scab - to the Jewish people. The reason is two-fold but for diametrically opposed reasons. On one hand, “shekal Yisrael aravim zeh b’zeh” - all of Israel is responsible one for the other (Shavuous 39a). So, my sin will hurt you (but my mitzvah will help you, too).
On the other hand, Tosafos cites several sources that teach something else: Because a convert can be more exacting and meticulous in their mitzvah observance, the bar is raised in judgment for the born Jews which could result in less favorable judgment due to the increased relative standard of expectation.So one may argue, why not nip these potential problems in the bud and refuse to accept any converts – no matter how sincere and righteous?
Well, this was tried at least once but with disastrous consequences which accompany the Jewish people to this day, even “in every generation”(Shemot 17:16).
The prospective convert was Timna. This woman understandably admired the lot of Yaakov’s house – wealth, their ability to prevail over their enemies, the shem tov of this illustrious family. And she desperately wanted to marry into Yaakov’s family. Yaakov had a good reason for rejecting Timna, princess daughter of the Chief of Edom, for Timna mistakenly attributed all of these blessings to the roll of the dice. She wanted to be part of it.
But Timna did not acknowledge or understand the Divine Hand and benevolence in all of Yaakov’s blessings. This was a serious spiritual flaw that Yaakov could not tolerate in the spiritual gene pool – and he rejected her. The relentless Timna found another way – she married Yaakov’s nephew, Eliphaz – son of Esav, Yaakov’s brother. The marriage was consummated. The child born to Timna and Eliphaz was Amalek. .Yaakov had good reason to reject Timna – after all, believing that our blessings are just life’s random gamble is outright kefira! But Chazal do not commend Yaakov – they chastise him!Yaakov should have at least tried. It is possible that his efforts would have been in vain. This woman may have never changed. Or Amalek would have arisen anyway. But Yaakov would not have been blamed for it. If only he had not rejected her!
Let’s direct our attention for a moment to Shemot 23:9 – “Do not oppress a ger; you know the feelings of a stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Mitzrayim.”Then, look at the very next pasukim, 23:10 - 11: “Six years shall you sow your land and gather in its produce. And in the seventh, you shall leave it untended and unharvested, and the destitute of your people shall eat, and the wildlife of the field shall eat what is left; so shall you do to your vineyard and your olive grove.”
The conversion machloket is occurring in a shmittah year – the very mitzvah discussed next to the mitzvah of not oppressing the ger! Is it too bold to respectfully suggest that the great rabbinical leaders of today give us some guidance as to whether there is a connection here?Shemot 22:20 warns against oppressing the convert. The next pasuk, 22:21 gives the same warning regarding widows and orphans. And right next to that, 22:22, gives a very, very scary admonition without mincing any words: “If you dare to cause him pain – for if he will cry out to Me, I shall surely hear his outcry. My wrath will blaze and I will kill you by the sword, and your wives will be widows and your children orphans.” There are some opinions that this Divine wrath also extends to those who oppress gerim.
If Gerim today are needlessly oppressed causing them untold agmas nefesh, just what kind of Divine wrath can Klal Yisrael expect? The Ibn Ezra comments that the Divine wrath will not be directed just toward the individuals who commit these wrongs but against the entire community!
Recently, a very kind-hearted, learned, and well-intentioned friend casually remarked, “What’s the big deal? The worst that can happen is that you will have to convert again and your children will also have to convert.” It most certainly is a big deal. As it stands now, my son is a Levi - my daughter can marry a Cohein. A new conversion would deny my son his spiritual status as a Levi and my daughter would be prohibited from marrying a Cohein. Why should they be deprived and stripped of these characteristics?
As we enter into Shavuos this week, when we read Megillas Rus, let us remember that this extraordinary woman was the great-grandmother of Dovid Ha Melech. There was a major machloket concerning Dovid HaMelech’s Jewish ancestry and legitimacy as a kosher Jew called into question by those who did not properly understand the halacha concerning a Moabite vs. a Moabitess – Ruth’s ancestry. Had they not been challenged, the Davidic dynasty would have been lost. The sparks of Moshiach would have been extinguished.This horrible machloket had the power to derail forever the mission of the Jewish people. Today’s machloket on Jewish legitimacy is no less grave.
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Of Fantasiasts and Grains of Sand: A Post Yom Yerushalayim Reflection
The mantra of the Israeli Left has always been that Religious Zionists are, essentially, idolators who worship the sticks and stones of the Land Of Israel. Moreover, they prize them more than human life, itself. So the canard goes. The most recent expression of that sentiment came from that paragon of morality, PM Ehud Olmert.
In support of that position, mutatis mutandis, religious and secular leftists often cite the words of מורי ורבי Rav Soloveitchik זצ"ל, concerning the supreme value of life over land. I've been thinking a lot about that speech recently, and I think that it's message has been distorted.
It is true, that the Rav was emphatic that if real peace were achievable, that territorial compromises were legitimate. However, that does not mean that it is illegitimate to love a place, especially if that place is endowed with sanctity. On the contrary, he spent many hours emphasizing the kerygma of Eretz Yisrael, of the rarified sanctity that it exudes and its inexpressible hold upon the Jewish soul, which is irresistably drawn to it. As anthropologists have maintained for decades, people must live in a 'Place.' Anyone who lives everywhere, lives nowhere.
Our place, is 'the place that the Lord, your God will choose,' blessed by the in-dwelling of the source of 'Place,' המקום ב"ה. That is why Hazal observed (Ketubot 112b):
R. Abba used to kiss the cliffs of Akko. R. Hanina used to repair its roads. R. Ammi and R. Assi used to rise [from their seats to move] from the sun to the shade and from the shade to the sun. R. Hiyya b. Gamda rolled himself in its dust, for it is said in Scripture, For Thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and love her dust.
In support of that position, mutatis mutandis, religious and secular leftists often cite the words of מורי ורבי Rav Soloveitchik זצ"ל, concerning the supreme value of life over land. I've been thinking a lot about that speech recently, and I think that it's message has been distorted.
It is true, that the Rav was emphatic that if real peace were achievable, that territorial compromises were legitimate. However, that does not mean that it is illegitimate to love a place, especially if that place is endowed with sanctity. On the contrary, he spent many hours emphasizing the kerygma of Eretz Yisrael, of the rarified sanctity that it exudes and its inexpressible hold upon the Jewish soul, which is irresistably drawn to it. As anthropologists have maintained for decades, people must live in a 'Place.' Anyone who lives everywhere, lives nowhere.
Our place, is 'the place that the Lord, your God will choose,' blessed by the in-dwelling of the source of 'Place,' המקום ב"ה. That is why Hazal observed (Ketubot 112b):
R. Abba used to kiss the cliffs of Akko. R. Hanina used to repair its roads. R. Ammi and R. Assi used to rise [from their seats to move] from the sun to the shade and from the shade to the sun. R. Hiyya b. Gamda rolled himself in its dust, for it is said in Scripture, For Thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and love her dust.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Wanted: Courage, Heroism and Humility
[The ongoing crisis of the rabbinate has been overshadowed this week by the political crisis surrounding the ongoing exposure of the venality of Ehud Olmert. While the Talansky circus was underway, though, there were two siognificant developments. First, Rav Druckman's termination was suspended, sine die. Second, an appeal on behalf of the woman originally hurt by R. Sherman is finding it difficult to garner support among many of the same elements in the Religious Zionist community who are among R. Druckman's most vocal supporters. Both developments reminded me of a vort that the Rov zatzal presented on a Saturday Night in Boston, and which was the key point of my valedictory at the YU Hag ha-Semikha in March, 1982. It is more relevant today than it was even then.]
The Mishnah in tractate Ta'anit (10a) states that if the 17 day of Marheshvan arrives, and no rain has yet fallen, 'singular individuals' (יחידים) begin to fast. The Talmud (10a-b) then asks who these 'singular individuals' are. Here the Talmud distinguishes between scholars (תלמיד) and these יחידים. [תלמיד means student, but based upon the parallel passages in Shabbat 114a and Qiddushin 49b, it 's clear that here תלמיד is shorthand for 'scholar' (תלמיד חכם).] A scholar is defined as 'who when asked a matter of halachah in any place can answer it, even in the Tractate Kallah.' In other words, one is referring here to a an individual who possesses sovereign mastery of the entire Torah. (Though see, per contra, Tosafot Shabbat ad loc. s.v. ואפילו).
Knowledge, however, does not make one, automatically, a יחיד. The latter is one who 'is worthy of being appointed a leader of the community.' Knowledge, it would appear, is not sufficient for leadership. One needs more. The Rav declared that, first and foremost, one must have fortitude and courage. The theoretician may be a fine teacher. However, if he lacks courage; if he is not sensitive to the needs of the community, then he is not a יחיד. He may not, he must not, be appointed as a leader of the community.
Far too many acknowledged rabbinic scholars lack this crucial characteristic. They are either timid and/or obtusely insensitive. Some of those presently in power in the Israeli rabbinate, lack the latter quality. Far too many of those who would replace them, are woefully deficient in the former trait.
Since I count myself among the latter group seeking a solution. I urge my colleagues to look into their souls to find the courage, the גבורה, to step up to the plate and do the task that God has given them.
Woe to them if they don't. Woe to us if they don't.
The Mishnah in tractate Ta'anit (10a) states that if the 17 day of Marheshvan arrives, and no rain has yet fallen, 'singular individuals' (יחידים) begin to fast. The Talmud (10a-b) then asks who these 'singular individuals' are. Here the Talmud distinguishes between scholars (תלמיד) and these יחידים. [תלמיד means student, but based upon the parallel passages in Shabbat 114a and Qiddushin 49b, it 's clear that here תלמיד is shorthand for 'scholar' (תלמיד חכם).] A scholar is defined as 'who when asked a matter of halachah in any place can answer it, even in the Tractate Kallah.' In other words, one is referring here to a an individual who possesses sovereign mastery of the entire Torah. (Though see, per contra, Tosafot Shabbat ad loc. s.v. ואפילו).
Knowledge, however, does not make one, automatically, a יחיד. The latter is one who 'is worthy of being appointed a leader of the community.' Knowledge, it would appear, is not sufficient for leadership. One needs more. The Rav declared that, first and foremost, one must have fortitude and courage. The theoretician may be a fine teacher. However, if he lacks courage; if he is not sensitive to the needs of the community, then he is not a יחיד. He may not, he must not, be appointed as a leader of the community.
Far too many acknowledged rabbinic scholars lack this crucial characteristic. They are either timid and/or obtusely insensitive. Some of those presently in power in the Israeli rabbinate, lack the latter quality. Far too many of those who would replace them, are woefully deficient in the former trait.
Since I count myself among the latter group seeking a solution. I urge my colleagues to look into their souls to find the courage, the גבורה, to step up to the plate and do the task that God has given them.
Woe to them if they don't. Woe to us if they don't.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Kol ha-Posel or, Rabbi Sherman Revelatus
Ben Chorin posted this revealing information about Rabbi Avraham Sherman, the self-appointed critic of the Conversion Authority:
One of the main arguments put forward by R. Avraham Sherman against R. Druckman's conversions is that R. Druckman signed on conversions at which he was not present. This was a technical matter since it is not disputed that three dayanim were present at each of those conversions.
As they say: kol haposel bemumo posel. I am holding in my hand a document written by the Commissioner of Complaints against Judges, Tova Strassberg-Cohen, and signed by her on March 31, 2008. The document is a response to a complaint against a panel of dayanim sitting on a case involving a divorce dispute.
The whole panel seems to have been out of control: they heard testimony in the presence of only one side, neglected to keep protocols, and so on. But the main complaints involve the aforementioned R. Sherman (RAS).
First of all, RAS failed to disclose that one of the lawyers appearing before him was at the same time representing his daughter in front of another court. When this was discovered, he was asked by Rav Amar to cease hearing the case. RAS simply ignored Rav Amar's request.
Second, RAS signed the ruling despite not attending a session of the court at which testimony was heard.
You can't make this stuff up.
One of the main arguments put forward by R. Avraham Sherman against R. Druckman's conversions is that R. Druckman signed on conversions at which he was not present. This was a technical matter since it is not disputed that three dayanim were present at each of those conversions.
As they say: kol haposel bemumo posel. I am holding in my hand a document written by the Commissioner of Complaints against Judges, Tova Strassberg-Cohen, and signed by her on March 31, 2008. The document is a response to a complaint against a panel of dayanim sitting on a case involving a divorce dispute.
The whole panel seems to have been out of control: they heard testimony in the presence of only one side, neglected to keep protocols, and so on. But the main complaints involve the aforementioned R. Sherman (RAS).
First of all, RAS failed to disclose that one of the lawyers appearing before him was at the same time representing his daughter in front of another court. When this was discovered, he was asked by Rav Amar to cease hearing the case. RAS simply ignored Rav Amar's request.
Second, RAS signed the ruling despite not attending a session of the court at which testimony was heard.
You can't make this stuff up.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
FLASH! Olmert Fires Rav Druckman [UPDATED]
Rav Haim Druckman שליט"א I have to say that I'm stunned (and not much stuns me anymore). PM Olmert's office decided to exploit the absence of Rav Amar to summarily fire Rav Druckman, on the pretense that he was 75 years old. This, to put it mildly, is a very lame excuse. Exceptions to the various age limitations are made all the time. One classic example, the founding conductor of the IDF orchestra was kept on the job for over thirty years after he was supposed to retire. We are a country that specializes in making exceptions.
Without sounding extreme, I can't help but think that Olmert sacrificed Rav Druckman in order to secure the support of Agudat Yisrael and Degel ha-Torah and Shas to support his survival in office. (If Olmert has already given away the Golan in order to avoid problems, what a conversion authority?) His statements against Rav Druckman, and his swipe at the National Religious community that they will soon become Reform, are not only disgusting per se, they are disingenuous. None other than Rav Ovadiah Yosef has ruled, הלכהלמעשה, that if a non-Jew converts and agrees to some sort of traditional lifestyle, the conversion is valid. I have it on the best authority that he has expressed support for Rav Druckman's efforts. So what is this? Political grandstanding on the backs of the converts.
Without sounding extreme, I can't help but think that Olmert sacrificed Rav Druckman in order to secure the support of Agudat Yisrael and Degel ha-Torah and Shas to support his survival in office. (If Olmert has already given away the Golan in order to avoid problems, what a conversion authority?) His statements against Rav Druckman, and his swipe at the National Religious community that they will soon become Reform, are not only disgusting per se, they are disingenuous. None other than Rav Ovadiah Yosef has ruled, הלכהלמעשה, that if a non-Jew converts and agrees to some sort of traditional lifestyle, the conversion is valid. I have it on the best authority that he has expressed support for Rav Druckman's efforts. So what is this? Political grandstanding on the backs of the converts.
Whatever the reason, the question is what now? Personally, I see no other option but the establishment of an independent rabbinical court system, manned by the hundreds of qualified Dayyanim whom the Haredi Politicos and their Secular allies keep out of the Rabbinate. Let the Badatzim stew in their own juices. If they don't want to accept us, so we need not support them (monetarily, politically or any other way). Our own yeshivot and institutions are crying for support. Our efforts need to go there and towards teaching Torah in the broader community.
As for Yishai's demagogic remark about the Religious Zionist/Modern Orthodox community becoming Reform, let me say this. Accusing anyone who isn't Haredi of being Reform is an old, cheap form of anti-Modern Polemic. Unfortunately, our community has often taken such screed too seriously, and we've been hurt as a result. For example, because the Conservatives addressed the problem of recalcitrant husbands first, we did nothing- lest we look Reform. Does that make sense?
In the end it's a matter of our own self-discipline and confidence. If we continually work on strengthening our יראת שמים, our diffidence in Psaq, our readiness to be heroic and our readiness to stop where the Torah won't let us go, even if there is a human price to pay- we have nothing to fear from political hacks and Haredi polemicists.
If, however, we subordinate the Torah to modern trends, to religious subjectivism and relativism, and do violence to its texts and inner logic- as advocated by some self-styled 'Orthodox' humanists- then we will go down the path of religious, spiritual and national perdition that Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist and Renewal 'Judaism's have blazed.
The latest information on the story is:
http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3546328,00.html
http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART1/737/180.html
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1211434077386&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
The Return of the Lemmings
It shouldn't, but it never ceases to amaze me. In a move of incredible, potentially deadly, cynicism Olmert is planning to hand over the Golan (together with 93% of Judea and Samaria) to the Arabs. Never mind that Syria doesn't really want a deal. Never mind that the Palestinians can't bring themselves to compromise on anything. Never mind that both the Alawite junta in Syria and the so-called 'moderate' Fatah Government of the PA will likely both fall to Jihadists. Never mind that Olmert is just trying to save his skin.
Despite all that, the papers are hailing the peace with Syria that hasn't even begun to be defined or worked on. By contrast, the increasingly solid and sordid tale of corruption that is closing in on Olmert is reduced to a secondary or tertiary place.
It's a drug this Peace fantasy, and the whole system of elites is addicted.
Drug addiction kills.
I guess they forgot.
Despite all that, the papers are hailing the peace with Syria that hasn't even begun to be defined or worked on. By contrast, the increasingly solid and sordid tale of corruption that is closing in on Olmert is reduced to a secondary or tertiary place.
It's a drug this Peace fantasy, and the whole system of elites is addicted.
Drug addiction kills.
I guess they forgot.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
It's Not Purim: It's Sefira and it's Happening Now
There must be something in water (what's left of the water). In addition to the craziness in the Battei Din, there is the above pashkvil, which is simply the latest salvo in the power play of the Edah ha-Haredit to take over Ramat Bet Shemesh. So now there will be no satellite carried shiurim either. I wonder how that will go over with Rav Ovadia Yosef.
Even better is a psak halakha that was conveyed to me by a Rosh yeshiva friend of mine:
אחד מגדולי הפוסקים בבני ברק אסר להתקשר לאישתו נידה בטלפון רוטט
As the Rav זצ"ל used to say: It's assur to be stupid.
Monday, May 19, 2008
Conversion Redux: The Ground is Burning (2)
I now have a copy of the decision I mentioned yesterday, wherein a Jerusalem Bes Din in 2000, invalidated a ruling of the Army Rabbinate after the Yom Kippur War and rendered a young girl a safeq-mamzer, based upon the assumption that the Army Rabbinate is neither reliable nor God-fearing.
There are no words for such cruelty in the name of Torah. The same person is now one of the leading supporters of those seeking to destroy the conversion authority.
Anyone interested in obtaining the text can write to me at: woolfj@gmail.com.
There are no words for such cruelty in the name of Torah. The same person is now one of the leading supporters of those seeking to destroy the conversion authority.
Anyone interested in obtaining the text can write to me at: woolfj@gmail.com.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Conversion Redux: The Ground is Burning
President Bush’s Middle East visit and the on-going bribery investigation of PM Olmert, have overshadowed the controversy surrounding the Haredi attempt to delegitimize the Israeli Rabbinate’s Conversion authority, and willy nilly to retroactively revoke the over 25,000 conversions carried out in the past decade. It has, however, not gone away. On the contrary, the Jerusalem Post reports that the fallout has thrown the entire rabbinate into disarray. [This, of course, is exactly what the extremist Lithuanian faction wants.]
No one knows whether the Sephardic Chief Rabbi, R. Shlomo Amar, will succeed in neutralizing the Sherman ruling. In the interim, the lives of close to one hundred thousand people are in turmoil. The converts don’t know if they are Jewish. Their spouses don’t know if they are married. Their children don’t know if they are Jewish. The latter’s children (and their prospective spouses) don’t know if they are Jewish and/or getting married. So much for Haredi awareness of the fact that, on forty eight separate occasions, the Torah commands that one love the convert and forbids one to hurt him or her. (Uri Urbach has an important take on the larger context of the issue, here.)
In the interim, Tzohar has published a statement supporting Rav Druckman and excoriating the Sherman Psak in the strongest terms. Signed by 80 Religious Zionist Rabbis (including this writer), it is a strong response and a big Kiddush HaShem. In a parallel report, YNet highlighted R. Aharon Lichtenstein's impassioned words at last week's conference. As reported (accurately, I was there) by YNet:
On the other side of the issue, the Post report included an interesting fact:
However, Sherman received backing from the haredi rabbinic establishment. For instance, Rabbi Avraham Dov Levine, who heads an independent rabbinical court based in Jerusalem that specializes in determining Jewish genealogical trees (yihus) in the haredi community for couples before marriage, claimed in an interview this week on Radio Kol Hai that the vast majority of converts converted by Druckman's authority did not adhere to Halacha after the conversion. Therefore, this was proof the conversions were not valid.
I was not aware of R. Levine's existence until last week. It was then that a colleague called my attention to a decision issued by R. Levine, when he served as chief marriage registrar of the Jerusalem rabbinate (פסקי בתי הדין הרבניים, תיק תקכ"א שעל ידי בית דין מס' 126, תש"ס).
A girl came to the Rabbinate to register to marry. Her mother had been married to a young man who was killed in the Yom Kippur War, when his tank took a direct hit. No physical remains were found, though shreds of clothing were identified as belonging to him. Based upon this and the military reports, the Army Rabbinate declared him to have died and issued a certificate that the young widow was free to remarry. After some time she did so, and the young lady in question was the child of the second marriage. Twenty-Seven years later, she came before Rabbi Levine to receive the required documentation that would allow her to marry.
R. Levine reexamined the Army Rabbinate's decision and disqualified it. He argued that the latter had not elicited sufficient evidence of the soldier's death. Hence, the wife was a safeq Eshet Ish and her daughter a safeq mamzeret. He informed the stunned girl that she was unable to marry. The only out that he offered was that if she were to represent the case to a 'God fearing Bet Din'
(בית דין ירא שמים), she might find relief and be able to marry.
Now, anyone who knows anything about Halakha knows that one NEVER reopens the case of an Aguna, who was freed by a recognized Bet Din, certainly not a quarter of a century later.
One never creates the circumstance to create mamzerim.
Why did he do this? He did this because he is part of what, to my shame as a proud Litvak, religious commentators are terming the 'Litaliban.' He cares not for anything but the supererogatory demands of his tiny coterie. Otherwise, how does this charlatan dare to term the military Rabbinate's Bet Din as not being 'God fearing'? Was he ever in a tank? Did he ever suffer the heat of battle? Does he know the circumstances of what type of remains one might expect to find in a burning tank? [By contrast, as described by R. Benny Lau, Rav Ovadia Yosef sat with military experts to determine the realities of battle, locked himself in a room with the outstanding cases of missing soldiers, and found solid halakhic reasons to release over 1,000 agunot! Evidently, the spiritual heir of R. Isaac Elhanan Spector, the Rov of Kovna who was famous for helping agunot, was born in Baghdad. The Lithuanians have, it would appear, dropped the ball.]
So, the inclusion of R. Levine in this story indicates that conversion is but the tip of the iceberg. This cabal is out to totally destroy the non-Hareidi rabbinate, and it does not care how many lives it destroys in the process.
תורה תורה חיגרי שק
No one knows whether the Sephardic Chief Rabbi, R. Shlomo Amar, will succeed in neutralizing the Sherman ruling. In the interim, the lives of close to one hundred thousand people are in turmoil. The converts don’t know if they are Jewish. Their spouses don’t know if they are married. Their children don’t know if they are Jewish. The latter’s children (and their prospective spouses) don’t know if they are Jewish and/or getting married. So much for Haredi awareness of the fact that, on forty eight separate occasions, the Torah commands that one love the convert and forbids one to hurt him or her. (Uri Urbach has an important take on the larger context of the issue, here.)
In the interim, Tzohar has published a statement supporting Rav Druckman and excoriating the Sherman Psak in the strongest terms. Signed by 80 Religious Zionist Rabbis (including this writer), it is a strong response and a big Kiddush HaShem. In a parallel report, YNet highlighted R. Aharon Lichtenstein's impassioned words at last week's conference. As reported (accurately, I was there) by YNet:
"כמה שנאה, כמה טינה, כמה עוינות יש בפסק הדין האיום והנורא הזה", אמר הרב ליכטנשטיין, "במערך הגיור ישנם דיינים יראי שמים ותלמידי חכמים אשר השקיעו את מרצם וחייהם למען התורה. אי אפשר לדחוק אותם ולזרוק אותם לרחוב". לדבריו, "בנקודה הזאת צריכים להיות תקיפים. אסור להשלים עם הסגנון הזה ועם הגישה... היכן שמענו או ראינו כי כל הסומך על מיעוט הפוסקים, בניגוד לדעה הרווחת, אפיקורס במזיד יקרא? אוי לאוזניים שכך שומעות ואוי לבית דין מגמתי שכזה אשר כך התבטא". "כמה שנאה, כמה טינה, כמה עוינות יש בפסק הדין האיום והנורא הזה", אמר הרב ליכטנשטיין, "במערך הגיור ישנם דיינים יראי שמים ותלמידי חכמים אשר השקיעו את מרצם וחייהם למען התורה. אי אפשר לדחוק אותם ולזרוק אותם לרחוב". לדבריו, "בנקודה הזאת צריכים להיות תקיפים. אסור להשלים עם הסגנון הזה ועם הגישה... היכן שמענו או ראינו כי כל הסומך על מיעוט הפוסקים, בניגוד לדעה הרווחת, אפיקורס במזיד יקרא? אוי לאוזניים שכך שומעות ואוי לבית דין מגמתי שכזה אשר כך התבטא".
On the other side of the issue, the Post report included an interesting fact:
However, Sherman received backing from the haredi rabbinic establishment. For instance, Rabbi Avraham Dov Levine, who heads an independent rabbinical court based in Jerusalem that specializes in determining Jewish genealogical trees (yihus) in the haredi community for couples before marriage, claimed in an interview this week on Radio Kol Hai that the vast majority of converts converted by Druckman's authority did not adhere to Halacha after the conversion. Therefore, this was proof the conversions were not valid.
I was not aware of R. Levine's existence until last week. It was then that a colleague called my attention to a decision issued by R. Levine, when he served as chief marriage registrar of the Jerusalem rabbinate (פסקי בתי הדין הרבניים, תיק תקכ"א שעל ידי בית דין מס' 126, תש"ס).
A girl came to the Rabbinate to register to marry. Her mother had been married to a young man who was killed in the Yom Kippur War, when his tank took a direct hit. No physical remains were found, though shreds of clothing were identified as belonging to him. Based upon this and the military reports, the Army Rabbinate declared him to have died and issued a certificate that the young widow was free to remarry. After some time she did so, and the young lady in question was the child of the second marriage. Twenty-Seven years later, she came before Rabbi Levine to receive the required documentation that would allow her to marry.
R. Levine reexamined the Army Rabbinate's decision and disqualified it. He argued that the latter had not elicited sufficient evidence of the soldier's death. Hence, the wife was a safeq Eshet Ish and her daughter a safeq mamzeret. He informed the stunned girl that she was unable to marry. The only out that he offered was that if she were to represent the case to a 'God fearing Bet Din'
(בית דין ירא שמים), she might find relief and be able to marry.
Now, anyone who knows anything about Halakha knows that one NEVER reopens the case of an Aguna, who was freed by a recognized Bet Din, certainly not a quarter of a century later.
One never creates the circumstance to create mamzerim.
Why did he do this? He did this because he is part of what, to my shame as a proud Litvak, religious commentators are terming the 'Litaliban.' He cares not for anything but the supererogatory demands of his tiny coterie. Otherwise, how does this charlatan dare to term the military Rabbinate's Bet Din as not being 'God fearing'? Was he ever in a tank? Did he ever suffer the heat of battle? Does he know the circumstances of what type of remains one might expect to find in a burning tank? [By contrast, as described by R. Benny Lau, Rav Ovadia Yosef sat with military experts to determine the realities of battle, locked himself in a room with the outstanding cases of missing soldiers, and found solid halakhic reasons to release over 1,000 agunot! Evidently, the spiritual heir of R. Isaac Elhanan Spector, the Rov of Kovna who was famous for helping agunot, was born in Baghdad. The Lithuanians have, it would appear, dropped the ball.]
So, the inclusion of R. Levine in this story indicates that conversion is but the tip of the iceberg. This cabal is out to totally destroy the non-Hareidi rabbinate, and it does not care how many lives it destroys in the process.
תורה תורה חיגרי שק
Monday, May 12, 2008
Another Graduate....
Readers of this blog are, by now, well aware of the fact that I am of the firm opinion that the Arab-Israel conflict was, is and will remain essentially religio-cultural. It has much less to do with post-colonialism, economics or secular nationalism. I have been of this conviction since I read Bernard Lewis' 'The Return of Islam' (Commentary, January 1976) and that conviction has grown and intensified as time has gone by. That is why whenever I'm invited to speak in Israel or abroad, I try to convince my hosts that some variation on this theme ought to be included in the program. I am not doing so in order to sow despair. I do so out of the belief that challenges can best be met by looking them straight on.
The willingness of the various academic, intellectual and political groupings, here and abroad, to hear this point of view has been very wan. The cognoscenti love to dismiss this idea as just so much drivel, despite the fact that very accomplished scholars maintain exactly this position (inter alia, Bernard Lewis, Yehoshua Porat, Richard Pipes, Richard Landes, and Martin Kramer).
Now, further confirmation has come from an unexpected source. None other than the first of the so-called 'New Historians,' Professor Benny Morris, has come to exactly this conclusion in his new book on the war of independence. As excerpted in this past Friday's Jerusalem Post (with interview):
To be sure, while mentioning "God," Ben-Gurion... had failed fully to appreciate the depth of the Arabs' abhorrence of the Zionist-Jewish presence in Palestine, an abhorrence anchored in centuries of Islamic Judeophobia with deep religious and historical roots. The Jewish rejection of the Prophet Muhammad is embedded in the Qur'an and is etched in the psyche of those brought up on its suras. As the Muslim Brotherhood put it in 1948: "Jews are the historic enemies of Muslims and carry the greatest hatred for the nation of Muhammad."
Such thinking characterized the Arab world, where the overwhelming majority of the population were, and remain, believers. In 1943, when President Franklin Roosevelt sent out feelers about a negotiated settlement of the Palestine problem, King Ibn Sa'ud of Saudi Arabia responded that he was "prepared to receive anyone of any religion except (repeat except) a Jew." A few weeks earlier, Ibn Sa'ud had explained, in a letter to Roosevelt: "Palestine... has been an Arab country since the dawn of history and... was never inhabited by the Jews for more than a period of time, during which their history in the land was full of murder and cruelty... [There is] religious hostility... between the Muslims and the Jews from the beginning of Islam... which arose from the treacherous conduct of the Jews towards Islam and the Muslims and their prophet." Jews were seen as unclean; indeed, even those who had contact with them were seen as beyond the pale. In late 1947 the Al-Azhar University 'ulema, major authorities in the Islamic world, issued a fatwa that anyone dealing with "the Jews," commercially or economically (such as by "buying their produce"), "is a sinner and criminal... who will be regarded as an apostate to Islam, he will be separated from his spouse. It is prohibited to be in contact with him."
This anti-Semitic mindset was not restricted to Wahhabi chieftains or fundamentalist imams. Samir Rifahi, Jordan's prime minister, in 1947 told visiting newsmen, "The Jews are a people to be feared... Give them another 25 years and they will be all over the Middle East, in our country and Syria and Lebanon, in Iraq and Egypt... They were responsible for starting the two world wars... Yes, I have read and studied, and I know they were behind Hitler at the beginning of his movement."
The 1948 War, to be sure, was a milestone in a contest between two national movements over a piece of territory. But it was also - if only because that is how many if not most Arabs saw it (and see it today) - part of a more general, global struggle between the Islamic East and the West, in which the Land of Israel/Palestine figured, and still figures, as a major battlefront. The Yishuv saw itself, and was universally seen by the Muslim Arab world, as an embodiment and outpost of the European "West." The assault of 1947-1948 was an expression of the Islamic Arabs' rejection of the West and its values as well as a reaction to what it saw as a European colonialist encroachment against sacred Islamic soil. There was no understanding (or tolerance) of Zionism as a national liberation movement of another people. And, aptly, the course of the war reflected the civilizational disparity, in which a Western society, deploying superior organizational and technological skills, overcame a coalition of infinitely larger Islamic Arab societies.
Historians have tended to ignore or dismiss, as so much hot air, the jihadi rhetoric and flourishes that accompanied the two-stage assault on the Yishuv and the constant references in the prevailing Arab discourse to that earlier bout of Islamic battle for the Holy Land, against the Crusaders. This is a mistake. The 1948 War, from the Arabs' perspective, was a war of religion as much as, if not more than, a nationalist war over territory. Put another way, the territory was sacred: its violation by infidels was sufficient grounds for launching a holy war and its conquest or reconquest, a divinely ordained necessity. In the months before the invasion of 15 May 1948, King 'Abdullah, the most moderate of the coalition leaders, repeatedly spoke of "saving" the holy places. As the day of invasion approached, his focus on Jerusalem, according to Alec Kirkbride, grew increasingly obsessive. "In our souls," wrote the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al-Banna, "Palestine occupies a spiritual holy place which is above abstract nationalist feelings. In it we have the blessed breeze of Jerusalem and the blessings of the Prophets and their disciples."
The evidence is abundant and clear that many, if not most, in the Arab world viewed the war essentially as a holy war. To fight for Palestine was the "inescapable obligation on every Muslim," declared the Muslim Brotherhood in 1938. Indeed, the battle was of such an order of holiness that in 1948 one Islamic jurist ruled that believers should forgo the hajj and spend the money thus saved on the jihad in Palestine. In April 1948, the mufti of Egypt, Sheikh Muhammad Mahawif, issued a fatwa positing jihad in Palestine as the duty of all Muslims. The Jews, he said, intended "to take over... all the lands of Islam." Martyrdom for Palestine conjured up, for Muslim Brothers, "the memories of the Battle of Badr... as well as the early Islamic jihad for spreading Islam and Salah al-Din's [Saladin's] liberation of Palestine" from the Crusaders. Jihad for Palestine was seen in prophetic-apocalyptic terms, as embodied in the following hadith periodically quoted at the time: "The day of resurrection does not come until Muslims fight against Jews, until the Jews hide behind trees and stones and until the trees and stones shout out: 'O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.'"
The jihadi impulse underscored both popular and governmental responses in the Arab world to the UN partition resolution and was central to the mobilization of the "street" and the governments for the successive onslaughts of November-December 1947 and May-June 1948. The mosques, mullahs, and 'ulema all played a pivotal role in the process. Even Christian Arabs appear to have adopted the jihadi discourse. Matiel Mughannam, the Lebanese-born Christian who headed the AHC-affiliated Arab Women's Organization in Palestine, told an interviewer early in the civil war: "The UN decision has united all Arabs, as they have never been united before, not even against the Crusaders... [A Jewish state] has no chance to survive now that the 'holy war' has been declared. All the Jews will eventually be massacred." The Islamic fervor stoked by the hostilities seems to have encompassed all or almost all Arabs: "No Muslim can contemplate the holy places falling into Jewish hands," reported Kirkbride from Amman. "Even the Prime Minister [Tawfiq Abul Huda]... who is by far the steadiest and most sensible Arab here, gets excited on the subject."
Nor did this impulse evaporate with the Arab defeat. On the contrary. On 12 December 1948 the 'ulema of Al-Azhar reissued their call for jihad, specifically addressing "the Arab Kings, Presidents of Arab Republics,... and leaders of public opinion." It was, ruled the council, "necessary to liberate Palestine from the Zionist bands... and to return the inhabitants driven from their homes." The Arab armies had "fought victoriously" (sic) "in the conviction that they were fulfilling a sacred religious duty." The 'ulema condemned King 'Abdullah for sowing discord in Arab ranks: "Damnation would be the lot of those who, after warning, did not follow the way of the believers," concluded the 'ulema.
Another graduate of the university...of duh. Welcome aboard.
The willingness of the various academic, intellectual and political groupings, here and abroad, to hear this point of view has been very wan. The cognoscenti love to dismiss this idea as just so much drivel, despite the fact that very accomplished scholars maintain exactly this position (inter alia, Bernard Lewis, Yehoshua Porat, Richard Pipes, Richard Landes, and Martin Kramer).
Now, further confirmation has come from an unexpected source. None other than the first of the so-called 'New Historians,' Professor Benny Morris, has come to exactly this conclusion in his new book on the war of independence. As excerpted in this past Friday's Jerusalem Post (with interview):
To be sure, while mentioning "God," Ben-Gurion... had failed fully to appreciate the depth of the Arabs' abhorrence of the Zionist-Jewish presence in Palestine, an abhorrence anchored in centuries of Islamic Judeophobia with deep religious and historical roots. The Jewish rejection of the Prophet Muhammad is embedded in the Qur'an and is etched in the psyche of those brought up on its suras. As the Muslim Brotherhood put it in 1948: "Jews are the historic enemies of Muslims and carry the greatest hatred for the nation of Muhammad."
Such thinking characterized the Arab world, where the overwhelming majority of the population were, and remain, believers. In 1943, when President Franklin Roosevelt sent out feelers about a negotiated settlement of the Palestine problem, King Ibn Sa'ud of Saudi Arabia responded that he was "prepared to receive anyone of any religion except (repeat except) a Jew." A few weeks earlier, Ibn Sa'ud had explained, in a letter to Roosevelt: "Palestine... has been an Arab country since the dawn of history and... was never inhabited by the Jews for more than a period of time, during which their history in the land was full of murder and cruelty... [There is] religious hostility... between the Muslims and the Jews from the beginning of Islam... which arose from the treacherous conduct of the Jews towards Islam and the Muslims and their prophet." Jews were seen as unclean; indeed, even those who had contact with them were seen as beyond the pale. In late 1947 the Al-Azhar University 'ulema, major authorities in the Islamic world, issued a fatwa that anyone dealing with "the Jews," commercially or economically (such as by "buying their produce"), "is a sinner and criminal... who will be regarded as an apostate to Islam, he will be separated from his spouse. It is prohibited to be in contact with him."
This anti-Semitic mindset was not restricted to Wahhabi chieftains or fundamentalist imams. Samir Rifahi, Jordan's prime minister, in 1947 told visiting newsmen, "The Jews are a people to be feared... Give them another 25 years and they will be all over the Middle East, in our country and Syria and Lebanon, in Iraq and Egypt... They were responsible for starting the two world wars... Yes, I have read and studied, and I know they were behind Hitler at the beginning of his movement."
The 1948 War, to be sure, was a milestone in a contest between two national movements over a piece of territory. But it was also - if only because that is how many if not most Arabs saw it (and see it today) - part of a more general, global struggle between the Islamic East and the West, in which the Land of Israel/Palestine figured, and still figures, as a major battlefront. The Yishuv saw itself, and was universally seen by the Muslim Arab world, as an embodiment and outpost of the European "West." The assault of 1947-1948 was an expression of the Islamic Arabs' rejection of the West and its values as well as a reaction to what it saw as a European colonialist encroachment against sacred Islamic soil. There was no understanding (or tolerance) of Zionism as a national liberation movement of another people. And, aptly, the course of the war reflected the civilizational disparity, in which a Western society, deploying superior organizational and technological skills, overcame a coalition of infinitely larger Islamic Arab societies.
Historians have tended to ignore or dismiss, as so much hot air, the jihadi rhetoric and flourishes that accompanied the two-stage assault on the Yishuv and the constant references in the prevailing Arab discourse to that earlier bout of Islamic battle for the Holy Land, against the Crusaders. This is a mistake. The 1948 War, from the Arabs' perspective, was a war of religion as much as, if not more than, a nationalist war over territory. Put another way, the territory was sacred: its violation by infidels was sufficient grounds for launching a holy war and its conquest or reconquest, a divinely ordained necessity. In the months before the invasion of 15 May 1948, King 'Abdullah, the most moderate of the coalition leaders, repeatedly spoke of "saving" the holy places. As the day of invasion approached, his focus on Jerusalem, according to Alec Kirkbride, grew increasingly obsessive. "In our souls," wrote the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al-Banna, "Palestine occupies a spiritual holy place which is above abstract nationalist feelings. In it we have the blessed breeze of Jerusalem and the blessings of the Prophets and their disciples."
The evidence is abundant and clear that many, if not most, in the Arab world viewed the war essentially as a holy war. To fight for Palestine was the "inescapable obligation on every Muslim," declared the Muslim Brotherhood in 1938. Indeed, the battle was of such an order of holiness that in 1948 one Islamic jurist ruled that believers should forgo the hajj and spend the money thus saved on the jihad in Palestine. In April 1948, the mufti of Egypt, Sheikh Muhammad Mahawif, issued a fatwa positing jihad in Palestine as the duty of all Muslims. The Jews, he said, intended "to take over... all the lands of Islam." Martyrdom for Palestine conjured up, for Muslim Brothers, "the memories of the Battle of Badr... as well as the early Islamic jihad for spreading Islam and Salah al-Din's [Saladin's] liberation of Palestine" from the Crusaders. Jihad for Palestine was seen in prophetic-apocalyptic terms, as embodied in the following hadith periodically quoted at the time: "The day of resurrection does not come until Muslims fight against Jews, until the Jews hide behind trees and stones and until the trees and stones shout out: 'O Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.'"
The jihadi impulse underscored both popular and governmental responses in the Arab world to the UN partition resolution and was central to the mobilization of the "street" and the governments for the successive onslaughts of November-December 1947 and May-June 1948. The mosques, mullahs, and 'ulema all played a pivotal role in the process. Even Christian Arabs appear to have adopted the jihadi discourse. Matiel Mughannam, the Lebanese-born Christian who headed the AHC-affiliated Arab Women's Organization in Palestine, told an interviewer early in the civil war: "The UN decision has united all Arabs, as they have never been united before, not even against the Crusaders... [A Jewish state] has no chance to survive now that the 'holy war' has been declared. All the Jews will eventually be massacred." The Islamic fervor stoked by the hostilities seems to have encompassed all or almost all Arabs: "No Muslim can contemplate the holy places falling into Jewish hands," reported Kirkbride from Amman. "Even the Prime Minister [Tawfiq Abul Huda]... who is by far the steadiest and most sensible Arab here, gets excited on the subject."
Nor did this impulse evaporate with the Arab defeat. On the contrary. On 12 December 1948 the 'ulema of Al-Azhar reissued their call for jihad, specifically addressing "the Arab Kings, Presidents of Arab Republics,... and leaders of public opinion." It was, ruled the council, "necessary to liberate Palestine from the Zionist bands... and to return the inhabitants driven from their homes." The Arab armies had "fought victoriously" (sic) "in the conviction that they were fulfilling a sacred religious duty." The 'ulema condemned King 'Abdullah for sowing discord in Arab ranks: "Damnation would be the lot of those who, after warning, did not follow the way of the believers," concluded the 'ulema.
Another graduate of the university...of duh. Welcome aboard.
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