Rabbi Ya’akov Ariel, president of the Tzohar national-religious rabbinical
association, expressed opposition on Friday to the so-called “Tzohar Bill” that
his own organization lobbied for and which passed its preliminary reading in the
Knesset two weeks ago.
“I’m not comfortable with Knesset involvement in
the dealings of the Chief Rabbinate,” the rabbi told
Makor Rishon in an
interview published on Friday. “The rabbinate has a job and it needs to be able
to do its work, and it can’t be that we tell it how to operate.”
RELATED:Closure of Tzohar wedding project prompts outrage ‘Tzohar Bill’ passes preliminary vote The
Tzohar Bill – so named because it is primarily designed to assist the
independent Tzohar rabbinical group in registering and marrying people – would
allow couples to register in any municipal jurisdiction they want. As the law
stands, a couple must register in the city of residence of one of the
spouses-to-be, which also limits their choice of which rabbi can marry
them.
Ariel said he wasn’t consulted or asked by others in the
organization who decided to push for legislation on the matter in recent
months.
He did say, however, that he disagreed with the stance of the
rabbinate toward his organization.
“I have a very deep argument with the
rabbinate on this issue. But the change needs to come from within the rabbinate
itself and not through a bill. Only when there is no other alternative
whatsoever should we consider legislation.”
In response, a Tzohar
official agreed that legislation should be a last resort, but said that it had
only been advanced following “a year and a half” of efforts to get political
officials who were able to prevent the closure of Tzohar’s wedding initiative to
intervene.
“Unfortunately, these efforts were unsuccessful, and therefore
it was agreed with Minister [of Religious Services Ya’acov] Margi [to advance]
legislation to regulate our operations. It’s important to remember that the law
[restricting] marriage registration to the regions was the main pretext for the
minister in hindering our initiative.”
Over the past few years, Tzohar
has registered marriages primarily from Shoham and the Gush Etzion region, even
if couples were not residing there, because rabbis belonging to the organization
head the rabbinates there. In November, Tzohar temporarily suspended its wedding
service because of a bureaucratic crackdown imposed by the ministry and the
rabbinate.
Following a national uproar, an agreement was reached between
the two sides to return to the status quo, but Tzohar decided to lobby for the
introduction of legislation to protect its initiative.