JERUSALEM — “Communist, religion-hating goyim!”
That’s how Israel’ Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef described Israelis who’ve immigrated from the former Soviet Union. His statement may have been also intended against Avigdor Lieberman, the leader of the Yisrael Beiteinu party, many of the members of which are immigrants and descendants of immigrants from the countries that once formed the Soviet empire. Their Jewish status has often been denied by the Orthodox establishment.
Leiberman has of late refused to sit in a government with representatives of Orthodox political parties in response to their discrimination against many of his party members. He has thus become one of the reasons that seem to make it impossible for Israel to form a government forcing us all to a third general election in a year.
As Lieberman has been a member of coalition governments that included the Orthodox in the past, it may be legitimate to question his current motives. But Rabbi Yosef’s tirade against a substantial part of Israel’s Jewish population – and a loyal, resourceful and creative part at that – seems to justify Lieberman’s action irrespective of his motives.
Not surprisingly, the two major political rivals – Prime Minister Netanyahu of Likud and General Benny Gantz of Blue and White – reacted strongly against Yosef’s statement. Netanyahu called it outrageous. Gantz called upon Yosef to apologize.
The statement by Rabbi Gilad Kariv, the director-general of the Israel Reform Movement, included this: “Time after time Rabbi Yosef shows himself to be a hateful and prejudiced person. Instead of handling the corruption in the rabbinate, Rabbi Yosef is busy dividing the people and trying to turn the rabbinate into frontline position of the Haredi [ultra-Orthodox] parties.”
Rabbi Kariv is echoing the views of many Israelis, including Jewish Orthodox citizens, who believe that the Chief Rabbinate and many of its incumbents over the years are doing harm to all streams of Judaism, including those they’re purporting to represent. They’ve become an anachronism and an embarrassment. Thus, for example, a growing number of Israelis, including those who are recognized as Jews by the Chief Rabbinate, choose to marry outside its auspices. And several Orthodox rabbis officiate at such ceremonies.
Similarly, there’s now in Israel an organization that supervises kashrut outside the Chief Rabbinate because – as Rabbi Kariv’s statement implies – of the alleged corruption in the official set-up. The Chief Rabbinate has come to reflect religion at its most despicable.
Israel moves many Jews to become more observant and to deepen their faith in God. They do so while ignoring the official religious establishment of which Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef is supposed to be an exponent and a role model. Mercifully, this country is blessed with many other teachers who’re unencumbered by Yosef’s obsolete and reactionary office.
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Rabbi Marmur is spiritual leader emeritus of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, Canada. He may be contacted via dow.marmur@sdjewishworld.com