Rabbis’ Rejection of Proposal Seen As a ‘declaration of War’

Reform and Conservative movement ???eaders are denouncing the Israeli Chief Rabbinate’s rejection of a key component of a compromise proposal aimed at resolving the controversial issue of conversions in Israel.

The Chief Rabbinate “declared war on the Reform and Conservative movements,” the heads of those movements in Israel said in a joint statement Monday.

Rabbi Uri Regev and Rabbi Ehud Bandel, the Reform and Conservative representatives of the committee that had worked seven months to hammer out a proposal, said that in taking this step, “the Chief Rabbinate endangers splitting the Jewish people.”

The strong words came after Israel’s Chief Rabbinate Council rejected the creation of a conversion-training institute in which non-Orthodox rabbis would participate. The institute, which would be overseen by the Jewish Agency for Israel, was a key component of the compromise proposal reached by the Ne’eman Committee last month.

The proposal also included a provision that all conversions in Israel would continue to be performed only by Orthodox officials.

The Rabbinic Council, which met for several hours Monday, restricted its discussion to the Ne’eman Committee’s recommendation that conversions be conducted in Israel in accordance with halachah, Jewish religious law.

It was not immediately clear what impact the decision would have on efforts to reach a compromise on the conversion issue. The Ne’eman Committee, chaired by Israel’s finance minister, Ya’acov Ne’eman, had been meeting since last year in an effort to achieve a compromise acceptable to all of Judaism’s religious streams.

The religious parties in the Knesset are now likely to press for resumption of legislative action on a bill that would set into law the Orthodox establishment’s sole authority over conversions in Israel. The bill already passed the first of three legislative hurdles last year.

At the same time, however, a majority of Knesset members recently said they would oppose such legislation.

And court cases brought by the Reform and Conservative movements, which are seeking recognition of their authority in Israel, are now likely to move ahead after being put on hold while a compromise was sought.

Israel’s chief Ashkenazi rabbi, Yisrael Meir Lau, said after Monday’s meeting that the council had not been asked to address other proposals in the Ne’eman Committee’s report, including the call for the conversion institute.

Asked whether a rabbinical court would confirm a conversion candidate who had been trained by the non-Orthodox movements, Lau told Israel Radio, “Each person will be judged as an individual, according to personality, thoughts and knowledge.”

“We will not ask where did you learn,” he added. “If this milestone is handled according to the halachah, we will embrace it, and say, `Welcome brother.'”

Just the same, it appeared that the Chief Rabbinate Council would not accept the creation of the joint conversion institute.

In a statement released after its meeting, the council lashed out at those “who are trying to shake the foundations of the Jewish religion, causing rifts among the people and causing them to stray from the generations-old heritage.”

The statement did not actually name the Reform and Conservative movements, but it seemed clear they were the intended targets.

Such efforts “have already had a disastrous effect and caused confusion among Diaspora Jewry,” the statement added. “The sages of Israel have barred any cooperation with them and their methods, and no one should consider establishing joint institutions with them.”

In New York, meanwhile, Dr. Mandell Ganchrow, president of the Orthodox Union, welcomed the Chief Rabbinate’s decision, calling it “courageous.”

The Chief Rabbinate’s decision was not unexpected.

Anticipating such a rejection, Reform and Conservative movement officials had moved forward to approve a technical solution that would address the conversion issue.

Now, an American leader of the Reform movement predicted that the technical solution — first proposed seven months ago, at the start of the Ne’eman Committee’s negotiations — would be worked out in a manner acceptable to both the Chief Rabbinate and the liberal movements in Israel.

If one is implemented, the State of Israel would recognize as legitimate the conversions to Judaism performed by non-Orthodox rabbis for the first time.

“We don’t expect the ultra-Orthodox to accept us,” said Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, executive director of the Association of Reform Zionists of America.

“But they’re not entitled to have a monopoly over religious life,” said Hirsch.

But Ganchrow said he did not anticipate that a technical solution would be worked out.

It would be “a tragedy” if one were, he said, because then there would be multiple standards for conversion, rather than the one “which preserves Jewish unity.”