By Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel
CHULA VISTA, California — Many people would say that there is a lot to like about Rabbi Manis Friedman. He is a leading exponent of Chabad theology and his book, Doesn’t Anyone Blush Anymore?: Reclaiming Intimacy, Modesty, and Sexuality discusses a very important concept that is seldom heard or discussed in modern society: the importance of modesty in our daily lives. As a father of at least 14 children, he obviously is very much in love with his wife.
However, I am troubled by some of his recent comments concerning the problem of pedophilia that seem very inconsistent with the ethos that he promotes in his talks and book. In a YOUTUBE video released recently—subsequently removed by Rabbi Friedman—he brings up the subject of sexual child abuse.[1] In one surprising confession, he admits that most of the children who attend Chabad programs, have been sexually abused at one time or another. Friedman says that, “sexual abuse is only as damaging as victims allow it to be because the damage is all collateral.” He goes on in his video to equate pedophilia with having diarrhea. “The abuse isn’t such a big aveirah (sin) and that the failure to say an after blessing over a piece of cake is a much worse.”
To date, the Chabad Headquarters in Brooklyn has been eerily silent about the problem of pedophilia within their institutions. In Chabad of Melbourne, the police have accused the Yeshiva College of deliberately “lying to the police by trying to cover-up sex abuse claims.” Chabad is not alone; indeed, shock-waves can be felt almost every day as charges of sexual abuse and molestation are made daily in Jewish newspapers and blog sites all across the globe. The harassment of witnesses seems to be a common reaction to the victims’ families in the secular courts.
Rabbi Friedman trivializes a very serious problem that needs to be publicly discussed within the rank-and-file members of their organizations. Somehow, I do not think that he would feel the same if someone close to him were a victim of molestation. His attitude reflects the conspiracy of silence that exists within much of the Orthodox-Haredi-Chabad communities, Parents demand a change, but leadership does not want to solve the problem by publicly admitting it exists in their institutions. Survivors and victims of child sexual abuse and their families suffer because none of the people they respect wishes to take the steps to confront the problem. This only adds more traumas to these people’s lives. Rabbi Friedman may want to, at the very least, offer a public retraction for his insensitive and flippant remarks. When young people commit suicide on their wedding night because they cannot live with the shame they have experienced at the hands of Haredi rabbinical pedophiles, we have a very serious problem that must be addressed.
The Orthodox community seems to suffer from the same kind of problem that has destroyed the moral credibility of the Catholic Church. By now, most of us have probably heard about the articles in the newspapers about the courts ordering Cardinal Roger Mahony to release the personnel files detailing how he helped hide the abusers from the police. Among his decisions to hide the guilty priests, Mahony kept Fr. Father Carl Sutphin, a known pedophile, to serve on his staff.
When I was a yeshiva student in the Chabad Yeshiva in Israel, my best friend was accused of fondling young Russian children. I could not believe he would do such a thing. They asked him to swear on a Torah scroll to deny the charges. He refused. They kept the matter hush-hush, and he went on to be a leading Chabad emissary in Israel, where he serves today. Back then we did not understand the nature and problem of sexual abuse; and I believe the yeshiva merely followed a protocol that other yeshivas have long endorsed perhaps for centuries. Such problems exist in the yeshiva world and my cousin David in Baltimore eventually got fed up with the Haredi attitude of protecting high-profile rabbis who were long suspected of being pedophiles. He gave up wearing his black hat and dropped the Haredi regalia. He’s now a Conservative Jew and his children attend public school.
Last year (May 12, 2012) the New York Times accused Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes of collaborating with Haredi rabbis in shielding some sex offenders from prosecution and public exposure. According to Haredim, going to the secular courts violated reflecting long-held beliefs that any conflict must be dealt with from within the community.
During this period, New York television stations on Tuesday broadcasted a series of scenes from a well-attended, ultra-Orthodox fund-raiser for Nechemya Weberman who was accused of sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl, while the girl’s relatives maintained a vigil and protest outside the building where the fund-raiser was being held. On January 22, 2013, the court gave Weberman a 103 year sentence . He was guilty of 59 counts of endangering the welfare of a child and sexual abuse. Prior to the time of the trial and during, the Haredi community ostracized and harassed the girl and her family. Attempts to bribe the girl and her new husband were made, but they refused to cave in.
Rabbi Manis Friedman, Chabad, and the Satmar Hasidim seem to be living in a very different world from the most of us. Unfortunately, they are living in a house of cards that is collapsing.
These men have much to blush about in their religious communities. For those of us who are observing these travesties, we dare not remain silent or complicit. It’s time we all stood up to the Kosher-nostra that has infested our communities.
Notes:
[1] You can hear the actual video at: http://failedmessiah.typepad.com/failed_messiahcom/2013/01/audio-what-rabbi-manis-friedman-really-said-about-child-sex-abuse-456.html
also http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f3a_1359513453
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Rabbi Samuel is spiritual leader of Temple Beth Shalom in Chula Vista, California. He may be contacted via michael.samuel@sdjewishworld.com