Editor – Joel Katz
Religion and State in Israel is not affiliated with any organization
or movement.
CONVERSION
Op-ed: The truth about the conversion bill
By Rabbi Seth Farber
In the past week, the chief rabbis of Israel and major rabbinic leaders of the Religious Zionism stream have been outspoken contesting the new conversion bill. Publishing their comments on Israeli websites, giving speeches and Torah lectures, and speaking to their students, rabbis such as Chaim Druckman, Shlomo Aviner and Yaacov Ariel have all concluded that the present law is a threat to Judaism and the future of the Jewish people.
… The above-mentioned rabbis speak of three problems with the law:
1. It is legislating halacha and the Knesset has no right to do that.
2. It will recognize non-Orthodox conversions.
3. It ignores the chief rabbi of Israel, who should be the halachic standard- bearer.
Each of these is patently false.
“When you’re centralizing authority, to whom are the people you’ve given this power responsible to?” Rabbi Avi Weiss, founder of the liberal Orthodox rabbinical school Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, told JTA.
“A convert’s evaluation can continue till the end of their lives.”
“There’s no doubt their standards have changed,”
Weiss said. “It’s one thing if somebody asks you to make an evaluation. But
you’re evaluating conversions that took place 30 years ago, and your evaluation
is based on your post-GPS standards. Had the RCA been asked about the
conversion 20 or 30 years ago, the RCA would have signed off on it.”
By Shmuel Rosner
The more people opt out of the rabbinate-managed system of conversion, marriage, burial, the closer we get to a tipping point — when enough Israelis will no longer abide by rabbinate rules, it will finally be recognized by Israelis to be what it already is, a nuisance rather than a huge problem.
Then, the question of whether it should be dismantled will become one of less urgency and less importance. Mainly, a question related to the waste of funds on an outdated institution.
By Harry
Maryles
The rabbinate should not be looking at how much they dislike a profession or how inappropriate it is for a woman to be in it. What they should focus on is enforcing their own rules about the sincerity of commitment to Halacha by the potential convert.
I therefore see absolutely no justification for the what the rabbinate has done. It is hurtful to the convert and it is hurtful to the Klal in that it will discourage good people from even considering conversion.
By Rabbi Stewart Weiss
[W]e should have been well-prepared for all this.
For years, we fought hard to force Russia to lift the Iron Curtain, sincerely believing that our efforts would succeed and that these compatriots of ours would ultimately “come home.”
We should have organized, right from the get-go, committees of tolerant, enthusiastic Orthodox rabbis – of the Tzohar or Beit Hillel type – who would have taken the “new recruits” under their wing and guided them slowly but surely into the fold. Utilizing a more lenient halachic approach, rather than taking the strictest line possible, we could have bestowed a proper conversion upon thousands of these people.
see also: http://forward.com/
RABBINATE/RABBINICAL
COUNCILS
KOTEL/WESTERN
WALL/WOMEN OF THE WALL
RELIGIOUS
SERVICES MINISTRY/JEWISH IDENTITY ADMINISTRATION
EDUCATION
Religious organizations cannot be allowed to
meddle in the public school system, while religious schools remain
ideologically insular.
IDF HAREDI
DRAFT
HAREDI
SOCIETY
By Isi Leibler
The power of the radical rabbis will only be reversed if we exercise people power. We must insist that a moderate Zionist rabbinical leadership take control of fundamental issues affecting all Jewish citizens. If the haredi-controlled Chief Rabbinate remains an obstacle, the Modern Orthodox and national religious camp should set up its own independent rabbinate.
By Rabbi Berel Wein
I think that we can all agree that the two main events in the Jewish world of the past century were the Holocaust and the establishment of the State of Israel. These two cataclysmic events changed the present Jewish society radically if not even permanently. Yet much of Orthodoxy inexplicably ignores these two events as though they never happened.
SHABBAT
JEWISH AND
DEMOCRATIC STATE
By Tomer
Persico
AGUNOT/MARRIAGE
ALIYAH/ISRAEL-DIASPORA
RELATIONS
see also: http://www.jta.org/
CHRISTIAN
COMMUNITY
ETHIOPIAN
JEWS
HOLOCAUST
KASHRUT/RITUAL
SLAUGHTER
BEIT
SHEMESH MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS
RELIGION
AND SOCIETY
see also: http://www.chabad.org/
SHAS
SHMITA
TEMPLE
MOUNT
VIDEO: MK Moshe Feiglin ascends Temple Mount: Why The
Temple Mount Has Become A Powder-Keg (English
Subtitles)
- Poll: 85% 'non-religious' Israeli boys read Torah on Bar Mitzvah
- Poll: 60% Israeli youth make sure or try to eat in restaurants which have kosher certificate
- Poll: 67% of Israeli youth say their family recites Kiddush on Shabbat
- Poll: 13% Haredi youth plan on joining IDF
- Survey: 87% of Israeli youth say they eat Shabbat dinners with their families
- Poll: 25% of Haredi youth identify as 'Zionist'
Editor – Joel Katz
Religion and State in Israel is not affiliated with any organization
or movement.
All
rights reserved.
