Bombay, India.
Are the Bene Israelites of the Jewish faith?
This question has been the subject of heated discussion in India. Recently, the Rangoon High Court decided in the affirmative in a case brought by the Bene Israelites to prove that they are eligible for election to the board of trustees of a local synagogue in Rangoon.
The case concerned the meaning of the words “the Jewish faith and community” as used in the clauses three and eight of the plan for management of the Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue. Clause three provides that no person shall be eligible to be elected as a trustee unless he is a male person of the Jewish faith and community who has attained the age of 25 and has ordinarily resided in Rangoon, for a period of at least five years. Clause eight restricts the voters’ list to persons of the Jewish faith and community, who have attained the age of 18 and have ordinarily resided within the limits specified in clause three for a period of at least one calendar year.
AFFIRM MEMBERSHIP
The plaintiffs claimed that the Bene-Israelites are members of the Jewish faith and community within the meaning of these clauses. The defendants denied the validity of this claim, declaring that the Bene-Israelites are not of the Jewish faith or community within the meaning of the plan, because they do not observe the Mosaic law with regard to divorce, yibboom and halissa.
The plaintiffs, on the other hand, maintained that the Bene-Israelites are orthodox in all respects.
YIBBOOM AND HALISSA
The Jewish law with regard to divorce involves the delivery of a bill of divorcement before witnesses. The allegation in this respect was that the Bene-Israelites dispense with the bill of divorcement and permit a divorce to take place without any formalities at all.
To understand what is implied by the terms yibboom and halissa, reference must be made to the twenty-fifth chapter of Deutoronomy, verses five to ten.
MOSAIC LAW DISREGARDED
The marriage of a man to the widow of his deceased brother who has died childless is known as yibboom. The procedure which follows the refusal of the surviving brother to marry his sister-in-law is known as halissa, and when it is carried out it has the effect of setting the widow free to marry again according to her own choice. It was admitted by the defendants that the modern Jew refuses to marry his brother’s widow and openly disobeys the Mosaic law in this respect.
A Jew whose brother has died and left a childless widow now prefers to submit to the procedure implied by the word halissa. The consequence is that the odium which formerly attached to the refusal of the survivnig brother to marry his sister-in-law no longer exists, and the halissa ceremony has been so modified that it is now carried out in a manner which entails no unpleasant consequences to the unwilling brother-in-law.
TRIBE’S HISTORY TRACED
The Bene-Israelites are confined to India, and to a large extent to the western side of India, their greatest strength being in Bombay. When they first came to India is uncertain. Their own tradition places their settlement in India some fourteen hundred years ago, but those who have investigated the history of the tribe and are entitled to speak with authority, place the date much later.
What, however, is quite certain is that the Bene-Israelites settled in India many years ago, and in the beginning freely intermarried with the inhabitants of India and adopted many Hindu customs.
CAME IN 6TH CENTURY
Though there is no certainty as to the date when they came to India, it seems probable that it was in the sixth century. Their own tradition, for they have no records of any kind, states that they came to India about fourteen hundred years ago from the north, and that they were wrecked off Navgaon, a little to the north of Thal, at the southern entrance to the Bombay harbor, and only fourteen—seven men and seven women—were saved.
Several centuries ago, a Jewish priest, David Rahabi, coming to Bombay from Arabia, heard of the Jews in the country close by, and going among them, won them back from many Hindu observances and taught them the chief tenets and practices of the Hebrew faith. He also introduced the knowledge of the Hebrew language.
13 PRINCIPLES ACCEPTED
It was conceded by the defendants that the Bene-Israelites now accept the thirteen fundamental principles of the Jewish faith, that they insist on circumcision, and that they observe the Jewish law, except in the three respects already mentioned. As has been pointed out, modern Jews disregard the Mosaic law so far as yibboom is concerned and consequently it cannot be said that failure on the part of the Bene-Israelites to observe this law would make them unorthodox.
The issue was, therefore, reduced to this: Do the Bene-Israelites refuse to follow the Jewish law with regard to divorce and halissa and, if so, what is the affect?
BARRED AS CANDIDATES
An election of trustees took place in the year 1926. In respect of this election the then trustees included vote at the election the names of the Bene-Israelites possessing the qualifications with regard to age in the list of those Jews entitled to and residence. The Bene-Israelites
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
