The Chief Rabbinate — the Dream and Its Shattering, or: the Institution and Its Harm

With God's help

Makor Rishon – 2013

Michael Abraham

Many pressing questions that reverberate through our world need to be discussed in a broader context. For example, when I considered questions such as whether the disengagement was a correct step, or whether the withdrawal from Lebanon was a correct step, I reached the conclusion that they cannot be answered in isolation. The answer depends on the plan regarding various scenarios after the disengagement/withdrawal. Only after we see the overall picture can we form an opinion about the specific step. That is why public discussion of such questions is usually almost worthless.

It is likely that the question of the Chief Rabbinate too should be discussed from a broader perspective. The main question in the background is that of religion and state. Anyone who supports preserving the current connection between religion and state in Israel—that is, personal-status law according to Jewish law, conversion according to Jewish law, the Law of Return, the Sabbath, kosher supervision, the Bible Quiz, the blessing for IDF soldiers, the prayer for the welfare of the state, and the like—must answer who will be responsible for all these in the absence of a Chief Rabbinate. On the other hand, within the broader context there is room to ask whether it is right at all to continue this problematic connection between religion and state. If the answer to that is negative, then the answer regarding the Chief Rabbinate seems self-evident.

Fortunately, the Chief Rabbinate spares me the need to examine the context in order to answer the question before us. True, I support the separation of religion and state, and therefore it is clear to me that the Chief Rabbinate is an unnecessary institution by its very nature. But since it is also a harmful and corrupt institution, whose main business is systematic desecration of God's name, therefore even without discussing the context—and even if I wanted the connection between religion and state to continue—I would oppose the continued existence of this institution, at least in its current form.

And yet, if only for the sake of methodological propriety, I will divide my remarks in two: first, I will discuss the structural problems that exist in this institution by virtue of its very essence. Second, I will describe some of the problems in the way it actually conducts itself. At the end I will also briefly address the cardinal question of the proper place for our dirty laundry.

The Structural Problems

At the top of the Chief Rabbinate's website appear the words of Director-General Oded Wiener, and he opens with the following:

Rabbi Abraham Isaac HaCohen Kook, of blessed memory, the thinker and founder of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, aptly defined the Rabbinate's duties and responsibilities when he came to establish it. "The rabbinate must stand atop the summit of the nation's revival and labor with the public in every corner of life involved in national building and creativity; the rabbinate is the important force that has always shaped public opinion in Israel, the exalted force that sustained the nation's soul and awakened it to a full and proper life. The rabbinate will exert influence through constant effort to draw hearts together and to instill a spirit of peace among all factions and parties, and to strengthen the Torah and its honor in the Holy Land and throughout the whole world".

So that we may appreciate the range of its activities that realize this lofty ideal, Oded Wiener then immediately details the variety of its departments and divisions (more accurately: its division—singular), and here is the continuation of the quotation:

The Kosher Division:

"and you shall be holy people to Me" In order to pave our way toward realizing our spiritual and moral destiny, to be a "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation", we must be careful and make sure that everything that enters our mouths accords with what is commanded in our holy Torah. There is a close connection between the moral stature of a person in Israel and his food…

Below is a detailed list of the various departments in the Kosher Division of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel.[1]

The National Unit for Enforcement of the Law Against Fraud in Kosher Certification: Import Department: Overseas Slaughter Department: Department for the Commandments Dependent on the Land: Public Institutions: Industry and Manufacturing: Department of Hotels, Halls, and Event Gardens: Department of Retail Chains and Restaurants: Meat and Poultry: Slaughterhouses: Abattoirs: Butcher Shops: Examinations Department: Circumcisions Department: Computerization Department: Human Resources Department: Material Resources Department:

After exhausting this riveting and challenging description of the Kosher Division of the spiritual leadership at the summit of our spiritual revival, I lowered my gaze to the rest of the page and looked for the other divisions, which would surely be even more promising and refreshing, such as: the division for examining and updating prayer and Jewish law for our times, the division for setting up-to-date moral norms, the division for Torah scholarship, the division for law and Jewish law, the division for medical ethics, the division for shaping and guiding the Jewish home and personal-status law, the division for shaping and guiding the public in relation to the alien and the gentile, the division for the status of women, the division for teaching and transmitting the principles of faith, Jewish law, and morality to the public and its rabbis, the division for systems of government and the laws of statehood, the division for the laws of war and security, the division for international relations, the division for guiding the health and welfare systems, the division for examining methods of study and the Torah methodology of Jewish-law ruling, the division for economics and Jewish law, and so on.

You will not believe what I found there: nothing. The page simply ended. The Kosher Division is the only division (!) in the Chief Rabbinate. Ah, pardon me! On another page of the site I also found the department for holy places (someone has to manage the Middle Eastern version of Jewish idolatry). Marriage and divorce and ritual baths I did not find, but perhaps they too are hidden there somewhere.

Thus, in the list of divisions of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel—the distilled essence of the soul of the Israeli nation at the height of its sparkling vigor—there is only a Kosher Division, branching into endless particulars, departments and subdepartments, down to the level of the kiosk. Beyond that, there is handling the appointment of rabbis and religious court judges, who are apparently also intended to deal with kosher supervision and nothing else, and various administrative divisions. I think every additional word is superfluous.

How did we arrive at this farce? How was such a polar gap created between the declarations and the implementation? The answer is simple. The Chief Rabbinate was conceived and born in a mistaken, naive assessment of reality, and its continuation has been sinful. It was established at a time when it was accepted that communities were led by religious leadership. To this day Israeli law still contains the anachronistic concept of the 'head of the religious community,' who is nothing more than the official representing the true heads of the religious community (who, from their homes in Bnei Brak and Jerusalem, give the 'head of the community' precise instructions). Add to this a pinch of hopes based on the naive assessments of activists and rabbis in the pre-state period and in the first years of the state's existence, as though the renewed state would be conducted on the foundations of Jewish law and the spirit of Judaism, and therefore required spiritual leadership to manage that complex process.

All those visionaries—or fantasists—did not take into account that they were operating within a society that had long since ceased to be interested in their sublime spiritual leadership (incidentally, with respect to the figures who then stood at the head of the Chief Rabbinate, this is not irony). They acted as though the ideological bubble in which they lived was reality itself. But life quickly slapped them/us in the face. At a certain stage, the broader society was no longer willing to accept the authority of the 'leadership of the religious community,' because the community was no longer religious. But none of this affected the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. It continued to lead with a high hand the full range of diverse spiritual domains that the public allowed it to lead: from the kosher status of soda at a kiosk to the import of meat slaughtered in Argentina. In accordance with Rabbi Kook's aforementioned vision: 'to labor with the public in every corner of life involved in national building and creativity.' So much for the naivete in the Rabbinate's birth. As for its continuation in sin, see below.

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the cooperation of the institutions of government. Yeshayahu Leibowitz, then the representative of Hapoel HaMizrachi in the Histadrut (apparently the Histadrut too has undergone some change since then), describes a conversation he had with Ben-Gurion. Ben-Gurion told him that he knew Leibowitz wanted to separate religion from state, but he, Ben-Gurion, would not allow that to happen. He wanted to keep religion and the religious by the throat, and his way of doing so was by establishing 'leadership' institutions on behalf of the state. That gave him full control and supervision over these problematic and subversive elements. This was his way of neutralizing their ability to lead and to express positions that were troublesome from his point of view. Thus the state rabbinate was created, in its Middle Eastern version. In essence this was hush money: money in exchange for silence. You will receive money, respectable robes, representation at various ceremonies, provided only that you keep quiet and do not cause problems. Azer Weizman once said in the name of his uncle, Chaim Weizmann, the first president, that the only place the president can stick his nose is into his handkerchief. The state rabbinate cannot even do that.

It is therefore no wonder that any connection between spiritual leadership and these institutions is the product of fevered imagination. This is a government bureaucracy, incapable of saying or doing anything outside the very narrow confines of the handkerchief left to it by the legislator. It is invited to express its opinion (under the supervision of the High Court of Justice) in the field of kosher supervision, in conversion, ritual baths, and the appointment of rabbis, and nothing more. Any statement on another subject, or any statement too original, crossing the permitted and trivial boundaries, will immediately be met with a bucket of cold water—either from the secular leadership (the press, the government, or the court) or from the real leadership of the religious community (which, as noted, sits in Bnei Brak and Jerusalem).

To prevent misunderstandings, the demand that the Rabbinate not express such positions is entirely justified. Rabbis are appointed officials, and as such they cannot act outside the framework of the law and their mandate. They receive a salary from the secular government, and they demand and receive authority over the public as a whole, and therefore they are subject to the administrative rules set by law. They are part of the public service. A serving rabbi cannot say that apartments should not be sold or rented to gentiles, because that is against the law (and in my opinion also against Jewish law). If he wants to express such a position, let him kindly detach himself from the state's teat and comforts. Anyone who wants authority over the entire public, secular and religious alike, must understand that this public determines the boundaries of his authority. Demands that rabbis be appointed only by the religious public or its representatives, or that they express Jewish-law positions even when these contradict the law, are out of the question in such a structure. It cannot be that a particular group in the population appoints for itself a governmental authority that has power over the entire public. At the same time, it cannot be that an institution appointed, funded, and maintained by the state acts as though it were an independent rabbinate in a Jewish community in Kasrilevke.

That is precisely why you will not find in the Rabbinate all the missing divisions listed above. A rabbi cannot express a position in any field, and certainly not a non-consensual position. This follows from the very nature and structure of the Chief Rabbinate, and is not an accidental result of poor conduct. When was the last time you heard any statement by a chief rabbi on an important matter? When did he say something of value? Something unexpected? Something that might influence and guide in some way? I do not remember such a statement. All these relevant fields are simply not within the Rabbinate's mandate. But this is no wonder, since it wants and draws its power from the secular legislator. He will never lend a hand to the creation of a real spiritual religious authority, and from his point of view quite rightly so.

In the Sabbatical year before last, I bought at a grocery store a container of salad that solemnly announced that there was no concern, heaven forbid, of reliance on the sale permit (heter mekhira). I saw that its bottom was raised (that is, its actual volume was not what it appeared to be from the outside). The high price of the salad because of the avoidance of the sale permit (under an 'otzar beit din' framework, of course, the salad is sold at cost price) was reflected in the reduced volume, and this while hiding the matter from the buyers. I turned to the Rabbinate that supervises the factory producing the salad and told the man in the kosher department there that Sabbatical observance today is only of rabbinic status, and if the land has been sold then it is not at all clear that there is any Jewish-law problem with the salad. But fraud, even today, is according to all opinions a Torah prohibition. I will leave it to the discerning reader to guess what he did about it. The Rabbinate sees itself—and with a certain measure of justice—as responsible for the Sabbatical year, but not for fraud and morality. Incidentally, I suspect that if the factory had celebrated Christmas, its kosher certification would have been removed.

I now recall another case, one that concerns the Military Rabbinate specifically, but it is certainly representative. When I taught at the hesder yeshiva in Yeruham during Operation Defensive Shield, young men from the yeshiva, officers and soldiers, approached us and argued that there were no rabbinic Jewish-law and moral guidelines regarding the difficult questions that arose there (harm to innocents and the like). The Military Rabbinate, of course, kept silent as usual (I think that has changed somewhat since then). And yet, very shortly after the operation, the head of the Jewish-law branch of the Military Rabbinate came to the yeshiva and delivered a lecture whose title was something like 'New Conclusions from Operation Defensive Shield.' I rejoiced like one who has found great treasure; at last the institution was filling our lack. To my astonishment, he immediately opened with a stormy casuistic discussion of the important question of what a reserve soldier should do when he receives a call-up order on the Sabbath and wants to pack his toothpaste. Must he take it in his mouth and drop it into the kitbag, or is there permission to carry it in his hands? Incidentally, the subject was discussed in the lecture from its primary sources, in the manner of Torah studied with the analytical depth appropriate to such grave questions, that is to say: contradictions in the Mishnah Berurah and solutions drawn from responsa of Rabbi Goren. and the rest—go and learn (and the rest, go learn).

And despite everything, precisely in these times there is importance to the existence of a central rabbinate. The reason is the great diversity and dispersion of Jewish communities, which does not allow supervision over the fairly wild standards prevalent in some of them. In an open and pluralistic world, no one can determine who is fit to be a rabbi, how much he knows, and by what standards he operates (whether he is Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, Orthodox, or some other variety). The complexity of the questions that arise, and correspondingly the different forms of treatment proposed for them, requires concentration and the provision of information to the public, and perhaps even guidance for the various communities around the world. Someone needs to tell Jews that a certain person does not really know Jewish law, or that his rulings do not really fit its sources. Any baba or other charlatan can appear in some community and present himself as the leading sage and luminary of the generation, and there is no shortage of such people today.

The need does indeed exist, but the problem is that today we have no people who can do this. The Chief Rabbinate certainly cannot do it. Even those currently regarded as the leading Torah sages are not broadly accepted, and in my opinion most of them are not equal to the task either, and therefore I am very glad that today there is no Sanhedrin with authority. Those who would be sitting in it are a collection of figures to whom I would very much not want to grant coercive authority over me.

Despite the need for such a central institution, there is currently no possibility of establishing it. The way to establish a courageous and original rabbinate, one that might be genuine spiritual leadership for the religious public, and perhaps for the public at large as well, is to detach the Rabbinate from the teat of the central government and put it to the test of the public. Neither from the government's honey nor from its sting. Neither from its budgets and formal powers and the force it provides, nor from the restrictions it imposes. If an institution arises that naturally receives authority from the public, and is not a state rabbinate, then we will have a Chief Rabbinate. And if such an institution does not arise, then we will not have a Chief Rabbinate. That depends on the leadership and character of leading Torah scholars of a kind (very rare) that could inspire some trust in the public, and it also depends on us. So long as this does not exist, there is no way to create it artificially, by means of the authority and power granted by the secular government.

In practice, this means the separation of religion and state. This should be done for the sake of religion too, and not only for the sake of the state. People should take their fate into their own hands and appoint rabbis themselves, not through degenerate institutions that choose rabbis for us whom no one asks anything. Perhaps in this way an independent and courageous spiritual leadership will arise, one that will express positions, guide, and lead the public in a proper and clean way. If as a result some central institution also emerges, so much the better.

The issue of separating religion from state is, of course, bound up with additional questions, and we will not enter them here.

Conduct in Practice

In practice, what has arisen before our astonished eyes is an extremely problematic monster, one that causes enormous damage to all the lofty goals for whose sake this institution was established. The spiritual leadership of the nation's revival has become a corrupt institution, nothing more than a device that provides a livelihood for insiders (usually ones who do not believe and do not speak in terms like 'the nation's revival' and the like), is run through nepotism and bullying, and lacks the most basic criteria of proper administration. The fundamental reason for this scandal is probably the built-in emptiness of this dubious institution, described in the previous section. But to that one must add the people involved, and the social-cultural atmosphere in which it operates, as a sort of island of a persecuted and defensive religious-Haredi shtetl within the modern secular state, while at the same time dependent upon it by its very navel. This is also why, despite its emptiness of content and powers, desperate quarrels and struggles are waged within it over the staffing of positions. When there is no substantive role, what remains is power and money. This is the framework in which even the inhabitants of the closed shtetl can find catharsis for their political and power-seeking tendencies. The clever lord left the shtetl's inhabitants a place to strut, as though saying to us: fight there as much as you want, at our expense, so long as you do not disturb us in real life outside.

The Rabbinate today is run by third-world standards, as befits a shtetl with self-respect. Dates of examinations, publication and proper administration of certification for the rabbinate and for religious judges—who has even heard of such a thing? Maintenance of information and transparency—perish the thought. Proper appointments (not somebody's son/brother)—not in our institution. The rabbinical courts sometimes operate like a synagogue. Many rulings that come out of there are problematic, and of course there is no consideration for, or recognition of, critical positions (for those are merely anti-Semitic elements, or liberals, heaven forbid). As for appointing worthy people to head the system—of that we long ago ceased to expect anything from the political horse-trading behind these appointments. It seems that in another term or two we will have to check whether those at the top can even read and write. An original candidate who is prepared to express independent positions has no chance of being elected. Just go to the alleyways of Bnei Brak and Jerusalem, well known for their traditional support of the Chief Rabbinate and for their deep immersion in modern values and society; that is where the worthy candidate is determined, the one fit to stand at the head of the peak of the sparkling might of our renewed redemption.

And thus the Chief Rabbinate introduces 'a spirit of peace among all factions and parties, and strengthens the Torah and its honor in the Holy Land and throughout the whole world,' in the words of its founder quoted above. All the factions squabble among themselves over the appointment of rabbis, until in the end the most worthy candidate is chosen (that is, the most obedient one), and power, money, and honor reach their destination. Love truth and peace.

To increase peace in the world still further, it is fitting that every city have an Ashkenazi and a Sephardi chief rabbi. Why? Does the Ashkenazi rabbi not know the rulings of the Mechaber, or does the Sephardi one not know the Rema? Truth be told, in today's wretched situation, perhaps that too is correct. But I think the real reason is that being a city rabbi—not to mention Chief Rabbi of Israel—is the best sinecure in the country (and also a bit of power and status). It pays best, and demands nothing (quite the contrary, the demand is that nothing be done). And if 'anti-Semitic' ministers such as Yossi Beilin or Shimon Shetreet dare, heaven forbid, to come out against these phenomena and impose a little order on the chaos, the cry of the aggrieved Cossack is immediately heard: Do not touch My anointed ones! Once again the religious and Judaism are being persecuted (in other words: you villains, do not shut down our sinecure).

Managers of kosher supervision in various rabbinates do not eat from the kosher supervision that they themselves oversee. Sometimes not even from the stricter certifications. This phenomenon is not objectionable in itself. It may be that the rabbi demands of himself higher standards, but toward the public he is committed to minimal standards (after all, public kosher supervision is intended for the general public). But as a result, those minimal standards too are often damaged. With my own ears I heard (and second-hand there were several more such cases) from a rabbi involved in kosher supervision that he does not really bother, because in any event anyone who is careful about Jewish law knows not to eat from 'Rabbinate' certification. He is merely earning a living, and there is no real need to provide any service in return for the salary.

When an organization such as Tzohar tries to create a system of officiating weddings that will be more pleasant and accessible to the broader public, better suited to the time and circumstances of this generation (as noted, that was the Rabbinate's original role), it is persecuted by the Chief Rabbinate, which uses the monopoly granted to it by law and constrains it. As the agent of the most conservative and fossilized elements in halakhic Judaism, it uses political (that is, secular!) power to impose on all of us a fossilized and repellent Judaism, one that lives by medieval standards and refuses to change. Ironically, it is precisely secular political power that gives it the possibility of doing so. The secular legislator is the one who brought us the war against the sale permit, the treatment of agunot (women chained to dead marriages), women denied a religious divorce, and women generally, and the neutered rabbinate we have. But as I described, Ben-Gurion foresaw everything. That, after all, was his goal. This is how clever people neuter the potential spiritual power and fruitful ferment that a spiritual rabbinic institution might have.

The Protest and the Criticism: Dirty Laundry Belongs Indoors

But we, faithful to the delusions of our spiritual and political leaders of the past, continue to cling to the importance and honor of this institution ("the honor of the rabbinate," as we have already said?), and do not permit ourselves to harm it. The jokes told in the ritual bath, in the yeshivot, or in the synagogue, about the Rabbinate, about the kosher certification it gives, and especially about those who stand at its head—God forbid that these be mentioned in the public media, lest there be desecration of God's name (I can already see in my mind's eye the furious responses I will receive to this article). Only the 'wicked leftist journalists and politicians,' persecutors of religion and Judaism, may their names be blotted out, do such things.

Instead of joining this criticism, and helping finally to eliminate the affliction called 'the Chief Rabbinate of Israel,' we all take care not to air the dirty laundry in public. The problem is that our dirty laundry has been fluttering in the wind in the middle of the street for many years already, and what we are hiding at home are the detergents and the bleach. A wise man once said (I think it was Justice Brandeis) that sunlight is the best disinfectant for every affliction and stain. But we have not yet internalized that. Despite the lofty height of our exalted national revival, we still conduct ourselves as though we were a persecuted community in the fading exile. We are afraid of what the lord will say.

Others are not afraid of the lord. And yet they think the criticism should not be taken outside, for another reason: the alternative will be worse. How will marriage and divorce be conducted here if we shut down the religious courts and the Rabbinate? they ask. And how are they conducted today, I ask, when almost half the public does not marry through the Rabbinate? And what will become of kosher supervision? And what about ritual baths (and holy places—how did we forget them)? But it seems to me that in recent years it is becoming clearer and clearer that even when there is a Chief Rabbinate, things are not conducted as they should be. On the contrary, private institutions are now arising for each such task and doing it better (kosher supervision, marriage, ritual baths, burial, and so on). Oversight of private institutions should not be done by means of a corrupt central institution (which raises the problem of 'who will oversee the overseer?'), but through tools of investigative media, reporting, public discussion, and transparency. Anyone who is not transparent and does not conduct himself properly will be shut down. That is the essence of the economic-spiritual capitalism that I propose.

Autonomous management of independent communities is an ancient Jewish art. We have about two thousand years of experience in this field, far more than our years of military or political experience. Such a long record is certainly worth trusting. The vision of spiritual socialism, which advocates regulated management of Judaism through the central government, apparently does not really work, and not for nothing. Milton Friedman, the well-known capitalist, once said that what saves the State of Israel is two thousand years of exile (during which we learned how to circumvent the attempts of central government to manage us). It is worth making use of those blessed skills with respect to the centralistic religious management imposed upon us as well. There is no need to fear what will happen when the Chief Rabbinate falls apart. What will happen is what happened and happens in every place and every time in Jewish communities in the diaspora, over thousands of years and in thousands of places. They managed perfectly well even without a Chief Rabbinate. True, with the closing of the Chief Rabbinate we will have to worry about alternative sources of livelihood for a few good Jews, but that is a thoroughly tolerable price relative to the great benefit such a step would bring. Love truth and peace.

[1] The more detailed descriptions of the various departments have been omitted.