Religious services minister nixes punishing chief rabbi who'd defy court
Yosef said that he would refuse any agreement to grant state accreditation in Jewish law expertise for women.
By JEREMY SHARONSEPHARDI CHIEF Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)Religious Services Minister Ya’akov Avitan of the Shas Party has roundly rejected the recommendation of the head of the Civil Service, retired judge Uri Shoham, to end Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef’s tenure as a rabbinical judge on the Supreme Rabbinical Court due to his rhetorical attacks on the High Court of Justice and the non-Orthodox Jewish denominations.Shoham’s recommendation published on Sunday determined that several comments made by Yosef were incommensurate with his position as a rabbinical judge who sits on the highest rabbinical court in the land, and in violation of Civil Service regulations.The head of the Civil Service was writing in response to a complaint filed by the Israel Religious Action Center of the Reform Movement in July following comments made by Yosef regarding state accreditation in Jewish law expertise for women.Yosef said that he would refuse any agreement to grant such accreditation and that he would put on strike the entire Chief Rabbinate qualifications examination system if the High Court of Justice ruled that provision of such accreditation must be given.“Nothing will help the Reform, they made a fake Torah, everything with them is fake, so I sent a letter to [Attorney-General Avichai] Mandelblit [saying] I will not in any way make an exam for women and if they force me I will shut down the entire Chief Rabbinate qualifications examination system,” threatened Yosef.Despite Yosef’s statements, the initiative for state accreditation in Jewish law expertise for women mostly stems from moderate religious-Zionist women, and three NGOs backing them.Shoham said that declaring his readiness to openly defy the High Court of Justice was unacceptable for a rabbinical court judge.Avitan, who serves as chairman of the Committee for the Appointment of Rabbinical Judges, rejected Shoham’s recommendation however in a sharply worded letter on Monday.“A decision to discipline a rabbinical court judge, and especially a chief rabbi of Israel, because of comments of a halachic [Jewish law] nature resulting from the very nature and character of his position, cannot stand up to any public test,” wrote the minister to Shoham.Avitan said as chief rabbi Yosef is entitled to give his opinion and response to questions on Jewish law.“It is unthinkable that the chief rabbi will be stopped from fulfilling his duty to express his opinion on Jewish law on matters which he must determine, or will be prevented from acting to prevent the distancing of Jews from the values of Torah and the commandments,” said Avitan.Shoham had rejected this line of argument in his recommendations, saying that Yosef’s position as chief rabbi did not exempt him from the obligations of rabbinical judges.“Even when a rabbinical judge has another position this does not exempt him from the obligations incumbent on any rabbinical judge or judge in Israel,” wrote Shoham, saying that the ethical principles of civil service employees applied to Yosef as a rabbinical judge regardless of the fact that he is also the chief rabbi.
