Premier Golda Meir has agreed to meet the brother and sister who have been barred from marrying because they are considered “mamzerim” (bastards). The planned meeting will also be attended by their lawyer Ram Caspi. Caspi and his clients will ask Mrs. Meir why she feels that their problem will receive a positive solution once new elections for chief rabbis have been held. Mrs. Meir expressed this view in reply to a letter to Caspi asking her to intervene in the affair. Caspi said that although he fully understood the Premier’s implication–that if Tel Aviv Rabbi Shlomo Goren is elected Chief Rabbi he will act to solve the problem–he was doubtful if he could rely on this. Caspi pointed out that people change when they take office and this could well happen to Rabbi Goren. The rabbi has circulated a booklet setting out his view that the brother and sister are not in fact mamzerim according to halacha. Caspi will ask the Premier to bring the full weight of her influence to bear on whoever is elected Chief Rabbi to move to solve the problem. If she agrees to do so he will suspend the contacts he has had with certain Reform rabbis who are willing to take up the case.
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.
