Q&A: Conversion through the Rabbinate
Conversion through the Rabbinate
Question
Hello Rabbi Michael,
I wanted to ask you a question regarding conversion.
I have a friend in the army whose father is Jewish and whose mother is not Jewish. He recently joined the Nativ course (a course intended to prepare non-Jewish soldiers for conversion), and from there continued to the advanced stages of the course and completed them successfully. He has scheduled an appointment with a rabbinical court of the Rabbinate for conversion this coming April.
I heard in recorded lectures from Rabbi So-and-so that there is concern regarding the Rabbinate’s rabbinical courts for conversion, since they produce converts who do not intend to keep Torah and commandments. Because of that, he says they have the presumption of being a rabbinical court unfit for conversion, so that even if a non-Jew comes before them intending to convert for the sake of Heaven, and they convert him, the conversion is invalid (all this without either the court or the non-Jew being aware that the conversion is invalid).
My question is whether this is indeed the halakhic situation. And if so, would it be preferable to send the friend who wants to convert to a rabbinical court of the Haredi community?
Also, I assume there have been many invalid conversions in recent years, with nobody aware that they are invalid. Are the descendants of people whose conversion was invalid also regarded as non-Jews? Or can one argue regarding them that they are presumed Jewish on the basis of nullification by majority, just as the descendants of an assimilated Jewish woman are presumed non-Jewish on the basis of nullification by majority?
And another question: should a person be concerned about the possibility of an invalid conversion in one of his maternal ancestors? After all, it is not unreasonable that among one’s maternal ancestors going back 100 generations, there was a convert whose conversion may have been invalid.
Best regards,
Answer
I should begin by saying that I share the view that the conversions carried out in the state conversion system are problematic. I wrote a fairly controversial article about this in Akdamot. On the other hand, despite all that, the claim that all of them should be disqualified en masse and across the board, and likewise the claim that the judges are wicked, is utter nonsense.
The judges in the conversion system all have the presumption of being fit, and even if I disagree with them, that is their opinion and I disagree with it. If one wants to invalidate a conversion, one must prove that the specific convert in question did not intend to accept the commandments at the time of conversion (which is almost impossible, of course). When a valid rabbinical court sits and performs a conversion, there is no way to invalidate the conversion across the board and without a specific examination. Anyone who says otherwise is himself thoroughly wicked, in my opinion (according to the Sages and the halakhic decisors): he is casting unjustified aspersions on thousands of fully kosher Jews. Therefore any conversion performed by such a person, in my opinion, is not a conversion.
Practically speaking, there is no impediment whatsoever to converting through the conversion system, and as long as the young man seriously intends to accept the commandments, he will be a fully valid Jew in every respect. By the way, even personally he loses nothing, since in any case he would not get a Haredi match (if he would even want one), so the danger of losing marriage prospects because he converted through the state conversion system is meaningless. As for how Haredi rabbinical courts operate, I won’t elaborate here.
There is no need to worry about the conversions of anyone who is presumed Jewish, and “a family that has become absorbed remains absorbed.”
By the way, the mere chance that there was such a mother is not enough. For you to be a non-Jew because of her, the lineage from her to you would have to be through mothers only, daughter after daughter. The probability of that is negligible (and then it must also be multiplied by the probability of an invalid conversion). Put your mind at ease. If it’s hard to be a Jew, it’s no less hard to be a non-Jew. 🙂
All the best,
Michi
Discussion on Answer
As for what he said, that unfit judges invalidate the conversion, that is straightforward. There’s no need to quote anyone, and no need to be a leading rabbi of the generation for that. It is a simple halakhah that every child knows. If there is no rabbinical court, there is no conversion (“I converted myself on my own” — he is not a convert).
As for his statements about rabbinical courts that are not serious, the whole question is of course whom he means. If he means just three random people who are unfit to judge, then maybe it’s true. But if he means the rabbinical courts of the Rabbinate or of the conversion system (and it seems clear that he does), then he is indeed a world-class babbler, exactly as I wrote to you.
His proofs too are complete ignorance. A ritual slaughterer with whom we found a blemished knife three times, or a worm three times, indeed loses his presumption of reliability, because that proves that his inspection is worthless. But rabbinical courts that converted people and we found three times that a convert later does not observe commandments do not lose their presumption of reliability. And the reason is very simple (and you really don’t need to be some great genius to understand it): the fact that the convert does not observe commandments afterward does not mean that he did not sincerely intend to do so at the time of the conversion, and that alone is what matters. Therefore it is not comparable to a knife, where if we found it unfit that is a sign that its inspection was not good from the outset, since the state of the knife does not change over time. But a convert is a person, and as Moshe Dayan said, only donkeys do not change their minds.
The fact that people finish the entire Talmud and know it all does not mean they have reasonable judgment, or that they speak responsibly and seriously. Many times these are people who do not have straightforward halakhic judgment, certainly when the matters involve politics and power struggles, as with conversion.
By the way, I have heard hair-raising stories about Rabbi Karelitz’s rabbinical court and about the Badatz concerning conversions that are worth nothing. I am not sure one can believe them, and I have not checked. But I only mention this to show you that there are stories about everyone. It depends whom you ask.
By the way, the same is true regarding kosher certifications.
Attached is a recording (https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwJAdMjYRm7IOFJhRERUZXRLYjF6bVVNZjRXTmJGV0VNblNv – five minutes long) from a lesson by Rabbi So-and-so in which he talks about conversion. He bases what he says on the opinions of major rabbis.
I wanted to know whether, in your opinion, there is substance to what is said in the recording, or whether this is a stringency that is not required by the basic law.