The Agudath Israel of America accused Israel’s Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren of “bowing to the demands of Israel’s secular establishment that the Torah and Jewish law be altered to conform to the so-called needs of present times.” The charge was contained in a resolution denouncing Rabbi Goren’s ruling in the Langer case which was adopted unanimously by 1000 delegates attending the Orthodox group’s 50th national convention here this weekend.
The resolution accused Goren of acting in an “underhanded, secret and lightening-like manner… in defiance of all the leading halachic and Torah authorities” and thereby posing a “serious danger to the continued existence of the Jewish people.” The resolution was referring to the decision by a court of nine rabbinical judges assembled by Rabbi Goren two weeks ago that Hanoch and Miriam Langer were not “mamzerim” (illegitimates) and therefore permitted to marry their fiances. The decision was approved by a majority of Israelis, but has been condemned by right-wing and ultra-Orthodox elements in Israel and abroad.
Among the latter was Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, leader of the Lubavitcher Hasidic movement who criticized the Israeli government yesterday for using what he called “coercion and influence” in Rabbi Goren’s ruling on the Langer case. Rabbi Schneerson charged that the decision “undermined the whole structure of rabbinical law.”
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