The Sephardi Perspective: It is time to decide

There is a battle raging in Israel that has long been simmering just below the surface of the mainstream Israeli perception. However, recent events have meant that the dispute has reached such a magnitude that it has become well known to even those outside of its parameters.

Recent accusations against Rabbi Haim Druckman, head of the Conversion Authority that have since led to his being dismissed from his position, have opened this simmering dispute into something akin to an all-out rabbinical war.

For those who are not aware of these latest events: basically a ruling by a panel of High Rabbinical Court judges upholding an earlier decision by the Ashdod rabbinical court retroactively annulled a woman's 15-year-old conversion to Judaism by Rabbi Druckman. The issue was that it was felt that Rabbi Druckman had converted someone that he supposedly knew would not lead a completely observant lifestyle.

The ramifications of this hard-hearted decision are immense. Not only has the Jewish legal status of the woman involved (and her four children) been annulled, the genuineness of thousands of other conversions under Druckman's authority has been willfully cast into doubt. The ruling could also raise doubts about conversions conducted abroad by non-haredi Orthodox rabbis.

This attack on Rabbi Druckman's credentials was led by Rabbi Avraham Sherman, a haredi judge who sits on Israel's High Rabbinical Court, the most senior rabbinical body in the state. This is the same rabbi who recently ruled that a deaf person cannot convert because they can't fulfill mizvot.

The dispute can improperly be described as a dispute between haredi and Dati, between the so-called 'ultra' Orthodox and the 'modern' Orthodox. However, these are artificial descriptions in the current conflict and the reasons behind it.

The real conflict is between those observant and religious members of society who take into account the whole, and those who see no virtue in relating to society outside of their own highly parochial community. It is between those who see themselves as part of society with all its faults, trying to raise the standard as they see it, and those who have no social responsibility and are glued to the letters on the page of halacha without glancing up to see the living vibrant but imperfect world around them.

These are the same people who will call for people to take to the streets and riot because a couple decided to marry without the father of the bride's permission. However, where are the demonstrations against the recent cases of child abuse in certain sectors of the religious community?

This latest episode has created a backlash like no other. One of the foremost Sephardi rabbis in America, Marc Angel, reprimanded the decision in the strongest possible terms:

The outcome is morally repugnant, and is an outrage to Rabbi Drukman and his colleagues who are attempting, within the confines of Halacha, to resolve a fundamental challenge to the social and religious well-being of the Jewish State - the religious integration into the Jewish People of hundreds of thousands of Russian non-Jews living in Israel as full citizens, loyal to the State and to the People of Israel."

Rabbi Angel has pinpointed the issue at stake. The fact remains that there is a problem and there are brave rabbis who feel that we have to confront the issue head on rather than ignore it and shrink back to the confines of the Bet HaMidrash (religious study hall).

The same people, who do not serve in the army, do not undertake national service, rarely work and don't pay taxes should not be in charge of issues dealing with the state and its future.

However, there are the beginnings of a major backlash against those who seek to have control over much of our lives without understanding or contributing to wider society.

Asher Maoz, a teacher of law at Tel Aviv University, said "Rabbi Druckman may have one fault: He has the "deficiency" of loving the Jewish people and a sense of responsibility for the Jewish people. I thought that the Torah commanded us to have such characteristics. It turns out that I was wrong, at least according to the three respected rabbinic court judges."

Maoz continues to suggest that he and people like him have had enough of the current situation, "And now they have thrust the divorce papers in our faces."

Respected Rabbi Benjamin Lau took an even more belligerent tone in an open-editorial titled 'Free Israel!'

"Religious Zionism has so far been restrained in its criticism of the ultra-Orthodox, out of a feeling of respect for the Torah sages and a desire to maintain a united religious camp. No longer! In honor of the state's 60th birthday, we must free Israel, strengthen the Zionist camp - including among the religious - and establish religious services and religious courts that are fundamentally identified with the values of the country in which they operate.

"There are many rabbis in Israel who served in the army, sent their children to the army, and are full partners in all the challenges of Israeli society. The country deserves to have religious court judges who are committed to its future and its fate, and to free itself of judges estranged from the public."

Apparently some of the major rabbinical figures in the religious Zionist community have been meeting to decide how to react to this massive slap in the face.

This is where the Sephardim should make a decision.

Chief Sephardi Rabbi Amar was noticeable by his equivocation on this issue and tried to show that he was in favor of either side in the dispute. As Chief Rabbi, Amar could have unequivocally arrived at a halachic opinion to overrule the High Rabbinical Court.

This is a very un-Sephardi position to take. A previous Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Benzion Uziel ruled on a similar issue of conversion in the early years of the state:

A would-be convert is informed of the basic principles of Judaism, namely, the unity of God and prohibition of idolatry, and that is what we dwell upon; whereas regarding the undertaking to observe the mitzvot, we only mention a few of the mitzvot and emphasize that 'Before your conversion you were not culpable for violating such things as eating non-kosher foods, etc...The Beit Din does not need to know whether he will observe them. Otherwise you would close the door on all conversion, since we can never know what he will do. From this it is clear that conversion is not dependent on any future observance.

"From the words of our sages it is clear that as long as the convert is sincere in his wish to convert, even though he may very well not be strictly observant once converted, it is still a mitzva to convert him."

"Our sages went so far as to state that God exiled His people for the purpose of bringing more people into the fold. In our age, to place obstacles in the way of converts is a dereliction of our responsibility."

This is a true Sephardi worldview. Sephardim, as I have mentioned in another article, do not tend to split themselves into groups and do not avoid interaction with those who think differently from them.

Even the Sephardi haredi will be close to many members of their family who are not haredi and this should provide them with an understanding of the outside world. The Sephardi Jew is bound by the words of the Rambam who demands that Jews follow the 'Goldan Path' and the 'Middle way' between either ends of extremism.

We should not sit idly by and let the future of Israel to be dictated by those who care little for our nation as a whole.

It is vital that Sephardim decide which side of this debate to take. The time has passed to equivocate and call for an artificial unity in a cowardly manner; it is for the sake of the unity of Israel as a whole that we have to bring religion and its effect on our lives back to the place where it has historically been.

Our Sephardi ancestors would never have tolerated such a usurping of Torah for such parochial matters. Sephardi rabbis historically held professional positions outside of the rabbinate so they could best understand the needs of their community. We should demand a rabbinate that can guide the spiritual and moral compass of all of Israel while understanding the every day realities of life in our state. On the 60^th anniversary of the reestablishment of our ancestral home, we deserve nothing less.