Daas Torah - Part II

Much as I try, I can’t seem to reconcile the Orthodox Judaism I grew up with and the one practiced today. Whether in Israel or here in United States, Orthodoxy has trended rightward in outward observance and backwards in tolerance. Let’s look at Israel first. There is no longer what you used to be known as the “Religious Zionist Camp.” The Mizrahi Party (MAFDAL) which participated in every Israeli cabinet until the mid eighties died a slow death and is now part of a “National Religious Camp,” whose only purpose seems to be to hang onto Judea and Samaria at all costs. I don’t lament the growth of the settlement movement per se, just the death of a tolerant, centrist religious party.

Buses and sometimes streets in Jerusalem and other cities segregate the sexes for reasons of modesty. This is to say that previous generations all practiced their Judaism wrong because they tolerated mixed buses and streets. Advertisers are being censored by religious vigilantes who deface immodest posters. Kosher food is no longer kosher enough in the Israel Defense Forces for many religious soldiers. Last week an Israeli newspaper reported about a rabbi in the national religious camp who runs a pre military academy who extolled the dedication and courage of Baruch Goldstein and Yigal Amir. For those that don’t remember; one is a mass murderer the other an assassin. The IDF Education Corps forbade attending the Yitzchak Rabin memorial service in uniform, so as not to hurt the sensibilities of a new corps of rabbis and religious soldiers who do not want the army to be “politicized.” As if a memorial service for an assassinated prime minister is political. Yet another rabbi has ruled that soldiers are required to refuse evacuating any settlements, even outposts that the government finds to be illegal.

Here in the USA, women cannot volunteer for Hatzoloh the volunteer ambulance service, even though the reason they want to volunteer is to preserve the modesty of women being treated. To report someone for child abuse say our revered sages, permission must be granted by a rabbi. The iconic National Council of Young Israel, who recently celebrated its 100^th year, has quashed the attempts of nearly a third of its members to change the way they do business. In fact, like the Palestinian Authority, the NCYI has conveniently skipped its constitutional obligation to hold elections prompting the resignations of some officers.

These attitudes and directives are not the result of a groundswell of popular support. These are simply marching orders given by some rabbinic leaders who seek to consolidate power by the language of dictat. This emboldens followers to go to extremes to force others to see things the same way and causes fear in those who don’t. This past summer Rabbi Yehuda Levin tied the tragic death of Leiby Kletzky to the passing of the gay marriage bill in New York http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQCBM01_voY he also blamed a recent earthquake on homosexuality too. His reasoning is based on a corrupt understanding of Torah, but somewhere there are people listening to him. People listen to the Yehuda Levin’s of the world because they have been fed a boatload of junk that says daas Torah reins supreme. The problem is that daas Torah according to these bullies, has only one direction. If a rabbi goes the opposite way finding tolerance or being lenient in halachic rulings, it’s not daas Torah it’s idolatry. The more of a yoke these leaders put on their followers the more control they have over them. Nowhere in any of the cases above do I see protecting G-d, what I see is isolating followers and alienating everyone else. Is this Judaism? Is Judaism not the betterment of mankind? Is it not to strive to love and embrace our brothers and sisters? Is it not to become better human beings? Since when did yiddishkeit become about what is forbidden instead about what is good?

We need a reawakening to steer our religion and peoplehood in the same direction. Rather than two ships passing in the night observant and non religious should be like two fish swimming upstream. Perhaps the destination is different, but the journey is shared.