JERUSALEM (VINnews) — In the wake of the Israeli government’s attempts to promote a new conversion arrangement which will allow every city rabbi to perform conversions, Chief Rabbi Lau sent a sharp letter to Prime Minister Bennett. Rabbi Lau said that if the head of the Rabbinate’s Conversion Directorate, Moshe Waller, would be fired as he was told by Religious Affairs minister Matan Kahana and if the new arrangement was promoted in the Knesset, he would suspend the entire conversion procedure in Israel.
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Rabbi Lau referred in the the letter to Waller’s dismissal by Kahana because he opposes the new arrangement and is subordinate to the Chief Rabbi who himself opposes the new initiative. Rabbi Lau wrote that “this is exactly the role of the head of the Conversion Directorate – to implement the halachic directives of the head of the Rabbinical Court. Conversion is a halachic process and Rabbi Waller’s role is to ensure that the halachic directives of all the Chief Rabbis are maintained.”
Rabbi Lau added that firing Waller would “severely harm the Conversion Directorate” and added that Waller was currently promoting the conversion of Benei Menashe and Ethiopians as well as children in religious schools who undergo conversion within the educational system.
Rabbi Lau also attacked the proposed arrangement, stating it would cause a “significant split within the people of Israel which will be irrevocable.” He added that the arrangement will cause a “fissure within the Jewish people which will force us to deal with the difficult question of “who is Jewish, who can we marry, a terrible situation of two states,two peoples and a divided nation.”
Rabbi Lau concluded the letter with a threat, stating that with the dismissal of Waller, the authority reverts back to the Chief Rabbi, and “I will be forced to resign all of my responsibility to the Conversion Directorate and to immediately cease authorizing conversion certificates.”
Kol hakavod Rabbi Lau.
I’m not sure how this changes anything . The non-religious will do the conversions anyway , and bring in a different governing official
This is starting to sound like the early days of Conservative Judaism. They were (and still are) trying to be Orthodox and Reform at the same time: traditional and simultaneously progressive. Over time, committed Conservatives in the rightmost 10% shifted to Orthodoxy; the leftmost 90% to Reform. The remainder are the ones who want their shul and rabbi to feel Jewish, but not be personally committed to halacha. Intermarriage is the norm.
A pity if that’s where the medinah is going. But moshiach is in the plan, the plan is executing, and the “secular state with a Torah deparment” model won’t last much longer,.
Government should not have anything to do with religion, period. We are able to avoid marrying Reform Converts in America without the big government nanny state doing our religion for us.
Israel is no longer a Jewish state. period.
chazal say that there will be a time when we will not accept geirim anymore, and whoever is considered to be a geir from that point on, will be called geirim garurim.
they will not be jews, but will wear tefillin, and will belittle torah and judaism.
please, give me many thumbs down, as you deny the words of chazal.
If Rabbi Lau stop all conversions he should then get the boot – as not doing his job. How about that?