Q&A: Rabbi/Politician Costume
Rabbi/Politician Costume
Question
A question with enormous and very practical implications.
Rabbi 1 tends to express his opinion even on matters that are not halakhic by definition but political.
The justification is:
These are matters of values and faith, for the sake of the Jewish people, the Land of Israel, and the Torah of Israel. (And not politics…)
The habit is to relate to these statements and letters on a higher level than just whatever some political operator writes or claims, because ostensibly there is something value-based here, etc.
And there is also a feeling that one should treat it respectfully because of the honor of the Torah, etc., even when I think / am sure that he is mistaken.
Now it became clear to me that there was a vote in the Knesset on a law that is supposed to prevent thousands of Palestinians every year… from settling and becoming citizens in the Land of Israel (an automatic law that has legal problems, and therefore is reenacted automatically every year as a temporary order for another year).
The law protects a Jewish majority (it prevents thousands of Palestinians from settling and becoming citizens here, while on the other hand we bring Jewish immigrants to the Land of Israel every year)
and also has a security rationale (there is a Shin Bet report that mixed families are more involved in terror attacks and murders of Jews than other Israeli Arabs, apparently because of an identity conflict / guilt feelings…) which quite literally reduces the murder of Jews.
It used to be approved automatically every year (after much tendentious hair-splitting, the High Court validated this law through convoluted means, and I won’t elaborate here; see Wikipedia).
A group in the Knesset decided to oppose the law and it fell through (they intended to embarrass the coalition, and I don’t understand why this is not an eternal disgrace and humiliation for them in the eyes of their own voters and their rabbis?)
Bottom line: that same rabbi, despite supposedly always speaking loftily about the Jewish people, the Land of Israel, and the Torah of Israel, refrained from attacking those who committed this vile act—not before, not during, and not after.
Quite simply, everything is fine despite the terrible damage to the people, to its security, to assimilation, to the Jewish character of Zion. Not one bad word.
This raises the suspicion that he is simply a political side, nothing more.
Not values and ideology, not the Torah of Israel, not the Land of Israel, not the Jewish people—just an ordinary mediocre political fixer.
So now my question is:
Am I right?
Does this teach us about his intentions?
Does this show that his actions in those political letters and demands really were just those of another political player disguised as values, etc.?
From now on, is it proper to treat his political statements within the framework of a politician and not of a rabbi?
Not the honor of the Torah and all that—just a politician?
I understand that this is a bit delicate, but for me and for many others this has practical implications every day…
I’d be glad for an answer.
Answer
How one relates to a person’s statements should not depend on his actions or on his reliability and integrity. Each thing should be examined on its own merits, and whatever persuades you, you should accept, and whatever does not, you should not. In this respect there is no difference between a rabbi and a politician.
In this specific case, it is not certain that his consideration is illegitimate. Perhaps in his eyes it is more important to bring down the government than to take care of this law. That too seems like nonsense to me, but perhaps he thinks otherwise.
Except that the government does not fall over a law like this.
This is not passing a budget or a no-confidence vote of 61 saying who is in favor.
It has no significance for toppling a government.
It does have significance for our lives here.