Author Archives: Rabbi

Battered Nation Syndrome

Posted on August 1, 2013 | 11 comments

As a young attorney a few decades ago, I was trying a case of child neglect in the Family Court. The mother testified (trying to excuse her neglect) that she had been beaten regularly by her husband – weekly or monthly – for six or seven years. “Did you ever call the police?” I asked. “No.” “Well,” I said trying to impeach her credibility, “why would stay for years with a man who was beating you?”
The wrath of the court fell on me. I was called to the bench, where the judge asked me: “Counselor, haven’t you ever heard of the ‘battered wife syndrome’?”
Indeed, I hadn’t, but quickly gained an education. There are women, I was told, who routinely live with abusive husbands. They stay because they can’t afford to leave, because they always think the situation will improve and the last beating is the last beating (until the next one, and that becomes the “last” one), because there can be long periods of domestic tranquility punctuated by explosions, or because they have low self-esteem and on some level “feel” that they deserve the beatings by provoking their malevolent husbands or by not being sufficiently good wives.
Obviously, it is irrational, and almost inexplicable to an outsider with a healthy psyche and a normal, healthy way of looking at the world.
Welcome to Israel, afflicted with the “battered-country syndrome.” There is really no rational explanation why a nation would enter into negotiations with an enemy sworn to its destruction, when any outcome of those negotiations will redound to its detriment, and almost immediately. Furthermore, the very notion that Israel should have to bribe its evil interlocutors to come to the negotiation table by releasing another 104 murderers of Jews is beyond bizarre, beyond explanation, and only attributable to a virulent strain of a mental illness that is unprecedented and, as yet, untreatable. It is painfully obvious that no other country on earth ever has or ever will agree to liberate the murderers of its own citizens simply to purchase the right to have an enemy negotiate them into further concessions and weakness.
It is mindboggling. How would the US respond if Iran insisted, as the price of negotiations on its almost-finished nuclear program, that the US release Dzokar, the Boston Marathon bomber? The depraved absurdity speaks for itself. And Israel is releasing 100 Dzokars.
Note as well that the Obama administration, in pressuring Israel to free terrorists, refused to release Jonathan Pollard imprisoned now for almost 29 years. They would not consider it, despite the fact that Pollard has no blood on his hands, unlike the Arab murderers being released some of whom were involved in absolutely brutal slayings of innocent civilians. Only Israel, suffering from the battered-country syndrome. (And what does it say about the Arab society that demands freedom for these killers and celebrates them as heroes? But that is a different syndrome altogether.)
Israel’s response can only be the result of a mental illness because neither the negotiations nor the release make any sense – in timing or in execution. The Middle East is aflame – a tinderbox of violence and hatred. Three times as many Syrians have been killed by each other in the last two years than “Palestinians” have been killed by Israelis in 65 years, and few of those Palestinians were innocent of any wrongdoing. Egypt is in the midst of a civil war. Northern Africa is Islamasizing. Jordan fears for its future, as the unrest to its north and the radicalization of Islam that surrounds it threatens the stability of its monarchy. Gasoline prices in the United States have doubled – yes, doubled – since Obama took office.
And John Kerry can find nothing better to do than browbeat Israel into negotiations with its enemy, and at the price of freeing murderers as well? Kerry has made six trips to the region in his attempts to jumpstart these talks, which do not lead to a good place for Israel. There are only two possibilities ahead: either Israel makes more territorial concessions that further weaken it, strengthen the Arabs, and demoralize its Jewish population, or Israel makes no concessions and is blamed for the lack of peace in the Middle East and beyond. How is it possible that its government can be so obtuse and behave in such a shameless way?
Surely, PM Netanyahu knows the disadvantages of pandering to terrorists; he even wrote a book on it. And, of course, he has long insisted, quite passionately and eloquently, as is his wont, that “there will be no pre-conditions for negotiations!” That robust declaration, apparently, holds true – until it doesn’t. Does he believe that peace will come as a result of these talks? Does he believe that the US will give Israel a green light to attack Iran, or even attack Iran themselves? Does he believe that Israel cannot any longer bear the absence of negotiations? Does he believe that the same three people who failed in their last round of negotiations five years ago will now suddenly succeed, and the Arabs will morph into the Swiss? Does he believe that the European Union will renounce their hateful boycott of Israel? (Why not make that an Israeli pre-condition for negotiations??)
None of the above is credible in the least, and the ongoing weakness is only attributable to the battered-country syndrome. Just like the battered-wife blames herself for the violence, thinks she can improve the situation by making unilateral changes, lacks self-esteem, and therefore endures the violence, injury, emotional and verbal abuse and degradation that is her fate – so too Israel.
Only a country that lacks self-esteem willingly surrenders its land to its enemies; that diminished self-worth is only possible among those who deny the divine promise of the land of Israel to the Jewish people. Only a battered-country blames itself for Arab unhappiness and discontent, and thinks it can solve all its neighbors’ problems. Only a battered-country will tolerate rockets on its citizens’ heads, endure terror for years without responding, and then regret and apologize for its forceful response when it does happen. (Just like the battered wife will often regret defending herself against her abusive husband.)
Just like battered women have been known to seek out cosmetic surgery in order to please their husbands (new face, new look, new start), so too, only a battered country will make surgically excise parts of its homeland in order to please, or even just temporarily mollify, its abusers. And just like the battered wife always feels that relief is just around the corner, so too the battered country feels that peace is attainable, juuuuuuuuuuuust around the corner. It’s entirely visible, like any mirage.
The battered wife accepts repetitive cycles of abuse and tranquility, but always lives in fear of the abuse and thinks she can somehow avert it by changing something, anything. But the same story repeats itself again and again – like here, the same faces emerge once again: Livni, Molcho, Erakat, Indyk. Expect Dennis Ross to make a cameo, and Shimon Peres to take a bow at some point. And where is Hanan Ashrawi?
The battering husband never makes concessions, because he thinks he does nothing wrong. Fault lies only with the misbehaving, unsatisfying, failed wife. So, only Israel, the battered country, must make concessions. The only Arab concession –having to sit in a room for a short time with the accursed Jews – is bought at the price of freeing murderers of Jewish men, women and children. The battered country makes concessions in order to forestall terror and violence, because it thinks that it is responsible for the distress of the “husband,” and because it does not really believe it is entitled to a peaceful, tranquil existence, a normal life, as other countries have. It does not really believe it deserves such a life, and so it does everything it can to undermine it, and at every opportunity.
And then the terror resumes, and the heartbreak of expulsions and the denial of rights to its citizens recur. Just like the battered wife often takes out her frustrations on her children (as in the case above), so too the battered country abuses its citizens, expels them from their homes, expects to stomach terror, massacres, bombings and shootings, and exults in its victimization. After all, it deserves it.
The battered country, like the battered wife, thinks it cannot live without the “husband.” But the healthy know that the dependency is unhealthy and reversible. Thus, every country pressured by the Obama administration thumbs its nose at it; only the battered country is incapable of standing up for its interests and saying a polite “no.”
The greater irony here – and what underscores the illness –is the superfluity of it all. Israel is today living in relative peace and prosperity, much more than any other nation in the region and more than in most of the world. The “Palestinians” are a spent force, characterized by Bret Stephens in the Wall Street Journal just three weeks ago as a “boring” people, whose affairs do not really interest the world or have any impact on global affairs. Watching the Israeli news the last few days, it was surprising that these negotiations barely rated mention in the first half-hour. The only outcry – from the pockets of normalcy that remain – was over the impending release of the Arab murderers. The cause of the Palestinians is not even in the top five interests of the Arab world today; it is probably not in the top fifty of important world concerns.
So why do it?
The Oslo process also began when the Arabs were in political decline. Their civil war had petered out, with Israeli casualties in the years before Oslo numbering annually in the twenties. (After Oslo, there was an awful spike in terror and casualties.) Now again, terror is at an all-time low, notwithstanding the recent increase in shootings, stabbings, and, in the last few days again, rockets. Why should Israel indulge Kerry, revive the dormant Arab cause, punish its own citizens, and weaken itself in the process? Why not just do as the battered wife should do – leave her abusive husband until he gets help, or just leave him altogether – as in “peace is not possible in this generation with these Arab leaders; let us focus instead on co-existence”?
It is inexplicable, as inexplicable as the battered country syndrome.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Israel

The Death of Shame

Posted on July 26, 2013 | 14 comments

Watching the implosion of Anthony Weiner for the second time stimulates a few thoughts. His attempted run for Mayor of NYC, bound to be aborted in the near future either by himself or by intelligent voters, is painful to watch. His confessions seem strangely detached, read in a bland tone without obvious expression as if he is on emotional auto-pilot. His wife is similarly pained, although she cannot be shocked except by the extent of the dysfunction of the man she married and assumed was normal.
There was a time when non-Jewish women desired to marry Jewish men, assuming that they would be less likely to stray, deviate, drink to excess, beat or exhibit other signs of aberrant, anti-social behavior. Jewish men without any semblance of loyalty to the Jewish people or understanding of their heritage willingly complied and they too sought out non-Jewish women for marriage. The one bright note in the tragic sagas of Weiner and the similarly intermarried, again running-for-office reprobate Elliot Spitzer is that perhaps non-Jews will re-consider marrying Jews, thereby driving down the intermarriage rate. Jewish men do not seem as desirable as they once were; in fact, these two are embarrassments irrespective of their ethnic origin.
What would possess these two individuals to return to the public eye, run for office, and subject their families and themselves to increased scrutiny knowing that they both have…issues? Certainly both feel a compulsion for public service, presuming that they can do what others cannot do. They must enjoy the publicity, the acclaim and even the occasional criticism – all of which make them feel important. But they have to be particularly obtuse not to realize that they are laughing stocks, notwithstanding that both stood (stand) reasonable chances of getting elected to their respective posts. Part of their success is media-driven: both make great fodder for the media beast because their stories are so salacious. Part of their success is attributable to their faith in Americans as a forgiving, even forgetful, people. And part of it traces to something else that is now endemic to American life: the death of shame.
Shame was murdered when morality was reduced to a lifestyle preference that is completely subjective. There was a time when a married, two parent (male and female) family with children was not only the norm of American life but socially desirable. Today, people boast about families existing in all forms, with different configurations and lifestyles on which any moral judgment redounds to the detriment of the putative judge. The other day I walked past two young women talking in a public place, and overheard one saying “she lives with her boyfriend in a house on the other side of…” and kept walking.
I never heard the end of the sentence, but what struck me was that, not long ago and in my own lifetime, no one would talk that way in a public place, and couples living together before marriage would be discussed in hushed, embarrassed tones if it would be discussed at all. It is still that way, thank God, in the world in which I live, but modern culture, its value system and celebration of all that is different and deviant, can be oppressive at times, and perhaps always. Decadence is so normative it is no longer perceived as decadence.
Misfits like Weiner and Spitzer benefit from that non-judgmentalism, always able to trot out spokesmen, celebrities or acolytes to declare that one’s private life is private, should not intrude on one’s public service, and should always remain a private matter between husbands, wives and their paramours. They can count on people saying “let one who is without sin cast the first stone,” and gleefully point to other similarly-situated sinners who have resumed public roles. One would think that, at least for the sake of their wives and children, they would be better advised to slink off to some obscure job with a low profile and focus on what is truly important in life – family, children, values, reputation, and even – if they chose wisely – divine service. Have some shame, at long last!
There is an ongoing debate on whether or not the wives of these degenerates deserve sympathy. On the one hand, they are both strong, intelligent and successful women who are making their choices with the eyes open even if their heads are not held high. On the other hand, they are doing what they can, under extremely trying circumstances, to keep their families together, and that is most admirable. On the third hand, they both benefit from the prestige that attaches to the prominent politician, and may be willing – as the Kennedy wives were – to tolerate a certain amount of indiscretion in order to retain that prominence. Weiner’s wife, long-time aide to Hillary Clinton, certainly has her boss as a role model. I tend to be more sympathetic than not, especially because they will always go through life with the stigma of “wife of so-and-so who…” and that is not a particularly desirable notation on a resume. And surely they know – as Weiner’s wife seem to know now – that a happy ending will be an unlikely and unexpected coda to their marriages.
What has changed? Society used to pay lip service to the morality of the Bible, so that even people who did wrong at least knew that what they were doing was wrong, as in immoral. Now, the only offense is the personal wrong done to the spouse, which is why her support is crucial to the miscreant’s rehabilitation. But as a society we have lost much – innocence, decency, standards and responsibility. Every lowlife can retreat behind the wall of “personal morality,” and then, as has become customary, wrap himself in the warm blanket of “therapy” which transforms the scoundrel into the victim or patient. If only it were sincere.
We were a better society when the private was kept private, when character was a person’s most cherished asset, when a good name was worth more than money, when a person could watch the news with his children without cringing, when dignity and self-pride actually meant something, when moral standards were objective and widely embraced if not always heeded. Those were the days before the television confessionals of misfits became a daily staple, when politicians and public figures would actually balk at answering questions they deemed “too personal,” and decency, loyalty and responsibility were nobler values than personal expression, freedom of choice, and individual happiness. Those were the days; today, even hypocrisy would be a blessing because it presupposes some objective standard of good behavior.
The Talmud (Masechet Sanhedrin 55a) states that after a conviction for the crime of bestiality (still frowned in our ultra-sophisticated, tolerant society – the last remaining barrier!) both the perpetrator and the animal are executed. But why should the animal be executed, the Talmud asks, it is an innocent beast? The answer is that we do not want that animal to “walk in the marketplace and have people say, ‘so-and-so was executed because of what he did to that animal.’”
There is such a concept of moral pollution, even more harmful than the toxic fumes emitted by Chinese factories. It is deleterious to our spiritual aspirations to have constant reminders thrust into our faces of debauchery and depravity. It is even worse when they are Jews who are intermarried, such sorry representatives of the Jewish people in the general world.
The World Street Journal several weeks ago featured the post-scandal life of John Profumo, who threw himself after his personal downfall into charity and good works for the rest of his life. One longs for that sort of dignity.
Is repentance is possible? Of course – after contrition, being again tested and not failing, and after acknowledging the bad behavior and not just regretting getting caught in the bad behavior. That takes years, not months. That takes humility, not the exhibitionism that is almost a prerequisite to political life.
It would also take the reawakening of shame, whose return would be most welcome to our troubled world.

14 Comments

Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Machshava/Jewish Thought

Fatal Distraction

Posted on July 19, 2013 | 9 comments

The deck was stacked against Trayvon Martin from the very beginning.
As is often the case when trials are litigated in the media, the obvious is overlooked. The prosecution always bears the burden of proving a defendant’s guilt “beyond a reasonable doubt.” That is not just a platitude but a legal standard. It is not sufficient to prove a preponderance of guilt; that is the standard in civil matters – a “preponderance” of evidence pointing to liability, usually meaning more than 50% of the evidence. In criminal matters, a reasonable doubt is not a percentage but a sensibility – a doubt for which one can give a reason. That is why Zimmerman was not found “innocent” by the jury but “not guilty.” That is the legal standard. He need not have proved his innocence. The prosecution has to prove his guilt.
Is there any thinking person who can honestly state that what occurred that night in Sanford, Florida is so clear that there is no reasonable doubt as to George Zimmerman’s guilt? Of course not. Only the race hucksters, political opportunists and other charlatans looking to profit off this tragedy would ever aver such a conclusion and even then, not seriously.
And it is a tragedy. For sure, the sympathies of the masses were manipulated by the frequent publication of the picture of a 12-year old Trayvon – and not the muscular, tattooed, 6’2” tall 17-year old he was at his death. Nor was there any reference to several scrapes with the law that he had in the year before his death, some manifesting an aggressive tendency that did not accrue to his advantage on the night of his death.
But the tragedy was, sadly, not unlike other tragedies that occur in life for which the law has no remedy. Every time a jury finds a defendant not guilty there is a disappointed complainant who thinks the system is corrupt and too malleable. The judicial system prefers to err on the side of exonerating the guilty than convicting the innocent. From that perspective, the verdict was fairly obvious, even though I thought that the jury would be hung (i.e., incapable of deciding) at least for a lot longer than they were, if only because of the public pressure to convict that the jurors invariably felt. But they followed the law, which is not always synchronized with the emotions and certainly not with the mob sentiment of the race-baiters.
Tragedies occur on the roads and in the hospitals and at home. Often there is no criminal guilt and even no civil liability. Not every mishap or misfortune lends itself to judicial redress or punishment. It is a part of life that can lead to despair, but it can also lead to daily gratitude for what we construe as small things until their absence causes them to loom very large – children, health, marriage, work, shelter, etc. Such is life.
The elephant in the room that cannot be discussed in polite company is the obvious answer to the prevailing question: why did Zimmerman suspect that Martin was up to no good? The answer is that of course Zimmerman was “racially profiling,” a cliché that has attracted a dastardly reputation notwithstanding that all thinking people do the same on a consistent basis. Even Jesse Jackson, adding these days to his resumé of dishonor, said years ago that if heard the footsteps of teenagers behind him on an urban street at night, he would be relieved to turn around and see that they were white teens. Simply put, young black men commit a wildly disproportionate number of crimes in America, and especially in America’s cities. Their rate of incarceration far exceeds their percentage of the population. There are many more black men in America’s prisons than their percentage in the population (probably 6-7%) should warrant. It is not because they are specifically targeted but because they are the ones disproportionately committing the crimes.
The saddest aspect of that is that most of their victims – overwhelmingly – are other blacks, in terms of homicides and other street crimes. Blacks growing in the inner city struggle to remain alive, to stay in schools and to keep their homes intact. The number of young innocent blacks killed in Chicago alone is staggering and a national disgrace.
Such is not the result of poverty of wealth but poverty of values. With more than 2/3 of black children being born out of wedlock, most are raised without strong, stable paternal role models. In certain circles, that abandonment of personal responsibility is still blamed on the legacy of slavery despite its abolition 150 years ago. Despite the best efforts of many black mothers, education is often frowned upon, and the easy money that many inner city youth see in the flaunted wealth of the criminal warlords of their neighborhoods – until they are caught, and if they are caught – remains a tantalizing allure.
They are not helped by the grievance industry nurtured by the hucksters. And it is a lucrative industry that plays on liberal white guilt and is therefore self-sustaining. Nothing can ever happen that will end it. Even the election of a black American president and the presence of a black Attorney General have little impact on the hustlers. According to them, America is irredeemably racist, always was and always will be, and whitey should just keep on paying, and especially paying them. To be called a racist today in American is so hackneyed as to draw yawns, not rebukes.
The double standard is blatant but familiar. Blacks discriminated against in apartheid South Africa had far better lives and were treated far better than today’s black citizens of Zimbabwe. But just like black-on-black crime in America is essentially ignored, so too black governmental dysfunction and brutality in Africa is also ignored. Wherever whites are not the perpetrators of wrongdoing against blacks, the suffering of blacks is of no interest to the hustlers or their acolytes in the media.
That fatal distraction is the real cause of Trayvon Martin’s death. In the best of circumstances, excluding even the issue of self-defense (if, indeed, George Zimmerman was attacked and his head was being pounded into the pavement, what was he supposed to do at that point but defend himself?), Zimmerman was careless in the use of his firearm like countless others negligently drive their cars or wield their axes while chopping wood. Death by accident is always distressing and leaves a bitter taste, a sense of loss than can never be filled. Accidents do happen, and they are terrible.
The real issue is what can be done to reverse the perception that many young black men pose a threat to civil society, and routinely induce fear in passersby. Certainly, that is unfair to the young black men who are decent and hard-working, who long for a life of normalcy away from the maelstrom that is stirred up by the black activists, many of whom reside in tony white neighborhoods themselves. But that is the challenge for the black community – and for its leadership that has already failed them for decades and shows no signs of reversing course. The attempt to impute racial animus to Zimmerman – even to deny and discount that he is Hispanic – has been as unseemly as it has always been typical.
The real victory for the black community does not lie in further persecution of George Zimmerman but in coming to grips with its real problems, of which the Zimmerman episode is only the latest manifestation.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events

An Abundance of Riches

Posted on July 10, 2013 | 11 comments

Let’s concede at the outset that the process by which Israel chooses its Chief Rabbis is disgraceful, humiliating, over-politicized and demeaning to all the participants. The election date has come and gone without any election; the terms of the previous Chief Rabbis have expired and been extended; and the electoral process itself changes from week to week and is still unclear.
We can also concede that the involvement (even interest) of American Jews is fairly limited. Our lives will not be changed in any meaningful way whether the Chief Rabbi is this one or that one. We have little stake in the outcome, notwithstanding that there is always cooperation between rabbis in both countries and there are consequences to all from any of our actions.
What is being lost – indeed, trampled – in the process is the realization that all of the candidates are wonderful people, fine talmidei chachamim, and outstanding Rabbonim. Every single one of them would serve as Chief Rabbi with honor and distinction, and there are a dozen other Rabbis off the top of my head that would be equally outstanding if they sought and gained the position. The politicking, the campaigning and the media advisers have made this election unseemly, but it should not divert us from the basic reality: we are blessed to have such capable rabbis in their current positions and in the Chief Rabbinate if they are so blessed (if, indeed, that is the right word).
Most of the public’s attention has been focused on Rav David Stav, Rav of the town of Shoham and head of the rabbinical organization Tzohar. Rav Stav is a creative, energetic, dynamic leader who is rooted in the Mesorah but who is unafraid to speak his mind, to break through the inertia of the terminally passive, and to make the Rabbinate more responsive to the people. He is said to be the choice of secular Israelis, among others, because he will look to revise the status quo and renew the role of the rabbinate in Israel. The attacks on him have been scandalous and unfair, but have succeeded – as lashon hara usually does – in making him in the eyes of some into a polarizing figure. That itself is unfair.
The primary alternative candidate now is Rav David Lau, Chief Rabbi of Modiin, with whom I have developed a very warm relationship over the last few years. Son of a former Chief Rabbi, Rav Yisrael Meir Lau, whose life story should be read by and inspire all Jews, Rav David should nonetheless not be perceived as a legacy candidate, driven to higher rabbinic office by the effects of nepotism. He is an exceptional human being – warm, friendly, engaging, personable and dedicated to Torah and Klal Yisrael. By the standards of the Israeli rabbinate, he is unique. I have personally witnessed Rav Lau walk miles on Shabbat morning to participate in the smachot taking place in a variety of kehillot, only because as the city’s rabbi he deems it appropriate. (Few, if any other chiefs, do the same – Rav Shlomo Riskin in Efrat being the exception, but an exception that proves the rule.) That approach, more typical of the American rabbinate, is sorely lacking in Israel. Rav Lau brings that to Modiin, which is why so many will be disappointed if he is elected, because they do not wish to lose him – the greatest testimony to a Rav’s effectiveness.
Both Rav Stav and Rav Lau are excellent orators and teachers of Torah. But this is unique: every Thursday night at 11:00 PM, Rav Lau gives a shiur at a different home in one neighborhood of Modiin, only because people asked for it and he is happy to do it. (I have attended several times myself and even filled in once when Rav Lau was away.) Between 15-20 men come every week, late at night (the class ends around midnight), and Rav Lau enters, banters, takes a topic in halacha or from the sedra and teaches Torah. There is no money, no fanfare, no entourage, no need for the national media to take note of it; just a Rav teaching Torah to eager students, laymen all. He is treasured by religious and secular alike, and his scholarship is apparent from his sefer on halacha (a compendium of different topics) called “Maskil L’David.”
Another illustrious Rav whose name was entered but withdrawn because of an age barrier is Rav Yaakov Ariel, Chief Rabbi of Ramat Gan. He is not only a superior talmid chacham, but a human being of exquisite sensitivity and humility. One example: a number of years ago, the expellees from Gush Katif set up a protest tent outside the Knesset in which they lived for a few weeks while their demands for justice were being considered. I went to visit them to show support. When I arrived, all I saw was Rav Ariel sitting in the tent surrounded by the refugees, giving a shiur, offering words of chizuk, consoling, supporting and identifying with Jews in need. Again – there was no entourage, no media, nothing to record that this was the rabbinate at its best: ministering to Jews, and tending to their spiritual and material needs not to win plaudits or acclaim but simply because it was the right thing to do.
Some candidacies have been placed on the back burner – but they are also wonderful rabbis and people. Rav Eliezer Igra, Rav of Kfar Maimon and Dayyan, is filled with Torah knowledge, depth, integrity, and love of Israel. He fought in the Yom Kippur War under Yoni Netanyahu’s command, and is widely respected, if perhaps the least known of the candidates. While sitting next to him and chatting at an event not long ago, I noticed that he (like me) wears a kippa serugah under a black hat. I didn’t ask him why (I’m not sure why I do!) but it is symbolic of someone who wants to overcome divisions in Jewish life, and doesn’t wish to see the Torah world divided into teams with uniforms.
And Rav Yaakov Shapira, Rosh Yeshiva of Mercaz HaRav and also son of a former, and most revered Chief Rabbi, Rav Avraham Shapira zt”l, is also a strong religious-nationalist and an effective spokesmen for Torah and the land of Israel. His candidacy also seems to have been muted for now, through no fault of his own.
In the Sefaradi world, admittedly less familiar to me, vying for the position of Chief Rabbi are two of the sons of Rav Ovadia Yosef, and also Rav Shmuel Eliyahu, son of former Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu zt”l. He is the longtime rabbi of Tzfat – a powerful, outspoken defender of Israel, Jewish settlement and Torah – a leader who is unafraid to ruffle feathers and is guided by the truth of Torah in all his endeavors. Another candidate is Rav Ratzon Arussi, a dayyan and Rav of Kiryat Ono, whose Torah works are widely studied but whose outsider status might benefit the Rabbinate in general.
My point is not to choose sides, declare a favorite or to influence any voter; this particular system is broken. It is rather to underscore that all these individuals are splendid Rabbis and human beings, lovers of Israel, who do great honor to the Rabbinate in particular and to the Jewish people generally. The campaigning – including the pathetic leaks, rumors, innuendos and endorsements that are staples of secular elections – should not obscure that fact. Israel is blessed with many fine rabbis. They are the “judges who will be in those days” (Devarim 17:9) whose authority applies to their era. Nostalgia for the past is always pleasurable but often inaccurate. Great rabbis of the past – universally applauded today – were often vilified in their time, and usually by the same type of people responsible for today’s vilifications. (Who knows? Maybe they are all related as well.) That so many people view the Chief Rabbinate as the vehicle for power, patronage, money, jobs and prestige is one reason why the process is so vexing and troublesome. But don’t blame the rabbis for that.
Whoever wins, we should wish him well. Whoever doesn’t win, we should wish him well too, for all Jews should be appreciative that they all will continue to serve God, His Torah and His people.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Israel