Notes from the Marom Bet Midrash: An Aversion to Conversion

[lethargic_man]

Notes from the Marom Bet Midrash

An Aversion to Conversion

Rabbi Reuven Hammer

You hear a lot of nonsense about conversion, about what can and cannot be done. Many of the conversion courts do not abide by halacha but impose lots of stringent measures on top of it.

Yevamot 47a-b

יבמות מז א/ב

Our rabbis taught1: If at the present time a man2 desires to become a proselyte, he is to be addressed as follows: 'What reason do you have for desiring to become a proselyte, do you not know that Israel at the present time3 are persecuted and oppressed, despised, harassed and overcome by afflictions? If he replies, 'I know and am yet unworthy,' he is accepted forthwith4, and is given instruction in some of the minor and some of the major commandments5. He is informed of the sin [of the neglect of the commandment of] Gleanings 6, the Forgotten Sheaf, the Corner and the Poor Man's Tithe. He is also told of the punishment for the trangression of the commandments. Furthermore, he is addressed thus: 'Be it known to you that before you came to this condition, if you had eaten 7 suet, you would not have been punishable with כרת [spiritual excision], if you had profaned the Sabbath you would not have been punishable with stoning8.' And as he is informed of the punishment for the transgression of the commandments, so is he informed of the reward granted for their fulfilment. He is told, 'Be it known to you that the world to come was made only for the righteous, and that Israel at the present time are unable to bear either too much prosperity, or to much suffering.' He is not, however, to be persuaded or dissuaded too much. If he accepted, he is circumcised forthwith. Should any shreds which render the circumcision invalid remain, he is to be circumcised a second time. As soon as he is healed, arrangements are made for his immediate ablution, when two learned men must stand by his side and acquaint him with some of the minor commandments and some of the major ones. When he comes up after his ablution he is deemed to be an Israelite in all respects.9 In the case of a woman proselyte, women make her sit in the water up to her neck, while two learned men stand outside and give her instruction in some of the minor commandments and some of the major ones. The same law applies to a proselyte and to an emancipated slave, and only where a menstruant may perform her ablution may a proselyte and an emancipated slave perform this ablution; and whatever is deemed an interception in ritual bathing is also deemed to be an interception in the ablutions of a proselyte, an emancipated slave and a menstruant. The Master said, 'If a man desires to become a proselyte... he is to be addressed as follows: "What reason have you for desiring to become a proselyte..." and he is made acquainted with some of the minor, and with some of the major commandments.' What is the reason? In order that if he desire to withdraw let him do so; for R. Ḥelbo said: Proselytes are as hard for Israel [to endure] as a sore, because it is written in Scripture, And the proselytes shall join himself with them, and they shall cleave [same root in Hebrew as "sore"] to the house of Jacob. 'He is informed of the sin [of the neglect of the commandment of] Gleanings, the Forgotten Sheaf, the Corner and the Poor Man's Tithe.' What is the reason? R. Ḥiyya b. Abba replied in the name of R. Yoḥanan: Because a Noahide would rather be killed than spend so much as a perutah which is not returnable. 'He is not, however, to be persuaded or dissuaded too much.' R. Eleazar said: What is the Scriptural proof?10 It is written And when she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, she left off speaking to her. "We are forbidden," she told her, "[to move on the Sabbath beyond the] Sabbath boundaries." "Whither thou goest," [the other replied], "I will go." "We are forbidden private meeting between man and woman."—"Where thou lodgest, I will lodge." "We have been commanded six hundred and thirteen commandments!"—"Thy people shall be my people." "We are forbidden idolatry."—"And thy God my God." "Four modes of death were entrusted to the Beth Din!"—"Where thou diest, will I die." "Two graveyards were placed at the disposal of the Beth Din!"—"And there will I be buried." Presently she saw that she was steadfastly minded etc. "If he accepted, he is circumcised forthwith." What is the reason? The performance of a commandment must not in any way be delayed11. [...] "When he comes up after his ablution he is deemed to be an Israelite in all respects." What is the practical meaning of this? In that if he retracted and then betrothed the daughter of an Israelite, he is regarded as a non-conforming Israelite, and his betrothal is valid.12

תנו רבנן גר שבא להתגייר בזמן הזה אומרים לו מה ראית שבאת להתגייר אי אתה יודע שישראל בזמן הזה דוויים דחופים סחופים ומטורפין ויסורין באין עליהם אם אומר יודע אני ואיני כדאי מקבלין אותו מיד׃ ומודיעין אותו מקצת מצות קלות ומקצת מצות חמורות ומודיעין אותו עון לקט שכחה ופאה ומעשר עני׃ ומודיעין אותו ענשן של מצות אומרים לו הוי יודע שעד שלא באת למדה זו אכלת חלב אי אתה ענוש כרת חללת שבת אי אתה ענוש סקילה ועכשיו אכלת חלב ענוש כרת חללת שבת ענוש סקילה׃ וכשם שמודיעין אותו ענשן של מצות כך מודיעין אותו מתן שכרן אומרים לו הוי יודע שהעולם הבא אינו עשוי אלא לצדיקים וישראל בזמן הזה אינם יכולים לקבל לא רוב טובה ולא רוב פורענות׃ ואין מרבין עליו ואין מדקדקין עליו׃ קיבל מלין אותו מיד׃ נשתיירו בו ציצין המעכבין את המילה חוזרים ומלין אותו שניה׃ נתרפא מטבילין אותו מיד ושני ת״ח עומדים על גביו ומודיעין אותו מקצת מצות קלות ומקצת מצות חמורות טבל ועלה הרי הוא כישראל לכל דבריו׃ אשה נשים מושיבות אותה במים עד צוארה ושני ת״ח עומדים לה מבחוץ ומודיעין אותה מקצת מצות קלות ומקצת מצות חמורות׃ אחד גר ואחד עבד משוחרר׃ ובמקום שנדה טובלת שם גר ועבד משוחרר טובלין וכל דבר שחוצץ בטבילה חוצץ בגר ובעבד משוחרר ובנדה׃ אמר מר גר שבא להתגייר אומרים לו מה ראית שבאת להתגייר ומודיעים אותו מקצת מצות קלות ומקצת מצות חמורות׃ מאי טעמא דאי פריש נפרוש דאמר רבי חלבו קשים גרים לישראל כספחת דכתיב ונלוה הגר עליהם ונספחו על בית יעקב ומודיעים אותו עון לקט שכחה ופאה ומעשר עני מאי טעמא אמר רבי חייא בר אבא אמר רבי יוחנן בן נח נהרג על פחות <ומודיעים אותו עון שכחה ופאה>משוה פרוטה ולא ניתן להשבון׃ ואין מרבים עליו ואין מדקדקים עליו אמר רבי אלעזר מאי קראה דכתיב ותרא כי מתאמצת היא ללכת אתה ותחדל לדבר אליה אמרה לה אסיר לן תחום שבת באשר תלכי אלך׃ אסיר לן יחוד באשר תליני אלין׃ מפקדינן שש מאות וי״ג מצות עמך עמי׃ אסיר לן עבודת כוכבים ואלהיך אלהי׃ ארבע מיתות נמסרו לבית דין באשר תמותי אמות׃ ב׳ קברים נמסרו לבית דין ושם אקבר׃ מיד ותרא כי מתאמצת היא וגו׳ קיבל מלין אותו מיד מאי טעמא שהויי מצוה לא משהינן [Can't easily find Aramaic of this last section, which is somewhere further down.]

1. This always introduces a teaching of the Tannaim: an ancient teaching which is a basic teaching.
2. Or woman.
3. This was after the time of the Bar Kochba revolt, when Jews were indeed heavily oppressed.
4. Though this is not yet the end of the process, nothing more is going to be put in his way.
5. מקצת מצות קלות ומקצת מצות חמורות. It does not say he needs to know everything; he learns some of the easy ones and some of the difficult.
6. These are all agricultural מצות.
7. Of course, nobody was stoned at this time, but they're making a point. Whatever punishments there are—which come from Heaven, they are not punishments human beings make—you now have to accept them.
8. For a male there are two requirements: circumcision and going into the mikva.
9. It does not say that this would take any long period of time.
10. They learn the proofs from the Book of Ruth—a proselyte herself. From Ruth's speech— "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the LORD do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me."—they learn what is required. Following this comes the rabbinic interpretation (in the main text): they interpret each of Ruth's speeches as a response to something Naomi is supposed to have said.
11. I.e. circumcision.
12. The conversion cannot be undone. He is regarded entirely as a non-practising Jew.

This gives you pretty much the details of what conversion is like in Jewish law. These rules and regulations were codified by all the great teachers of Jewish law—the Rambam, for instance, wrote:

If there was a person who came to be converted, and they didn't really give him all the instruction he should have had about the מצות and the punishments, if he was circumcised and went into the mikva before three hediot [non-rabbis], he is nevertheless converted.

Even if we are informed that he wanted to be converted for an improper reason [such as wanting to marry a Jewish woman], since he has been circumcised and been in the mikva, he is no longer a non-Jew.

---

In the light of this, you wonder, in view of some of the things you see going on with conversion, why the stringencies, the insistence that a person be 100% observant, and rabbinical courts in Israel retracting conversions after five or ten years because the convert is not observant. How can they do that? They are disregarding all the basic laws of Judaism!

One of the chief rabbis in Israel was for many years converting people, and said that the conversion was good so long as they lived in Israel, but was בטל [void] if they left Israel! This is ridiculous: at what point as the aeroplane flies away from Israel are they to be regarded as permitted to eat a ham sandwich? And what if they left Israel and then came back? Are they to be regarded as okay nipping abroad for a quick pork chops?

The problem today in Israel is as follows: The rabbinical courts make conversion extremely difficult. All of their requirements go way beyond the halacha. They insist that you know everything, and practise everything. A few months ago, there was a case of a woman who went through a conversion institute, and came before a rabbinical court, which asked her if she could recite the prayer אשרי by heart. She couldn't, so they turned her down!

You have courts which don't even recognise each other—Israeli rabbinical courts refusing to recognise conversions performed by the London Beth Din! So then you get the London Beth Din retaliating by refusing to recognise conversions by Israeli batei din!

Conversion in Israel is very complex, because since the Chief Rabbinate is part and parcel of the government, there is the question as to whether conversion by anyone else is to be recognised by the government. The registration of an individual in Israel is done by one's religion. It also used to be listed in people's ID cards.

At one point they only put you down as a Jew, if you were a convert, if the conversion was done by or recognised by the Chief Rabbinate. This can also have consequences as to whether converts can get Israeli citizenship. There are two ways of getting Israeli citizenship, the easy way and the hard way. The easy way is if you are a Jew (or married to a Jew or have a Jewish parent or Jewish grandparent), under the Law of Return. (This leniency, rather than limiting it just to Jews, is because the Nazis persecuted, under the Nuremberg Laws, people with one Jewish grandparent. Such people had no place to go then—see the case of the St Louis. It was not long after this period that the Law of Return was passed in Israel.)

If you are not a Jew, however, the process of gaining Israeli citizenship can take many years.

The Law of Return also states the definition of a Jew: someone who was born of a Jewish mother, or has converted to Judaism. It does not state in the law who converts or which rabbinate has carried the conversion out. For many years the State of Israel took the view that it had to be done by an Orthodox rabbinical court. Eventually this was taken to the Supreme Court, which decided this was not what the law said, and therefore a conversion by any rabbinical court would have to be recognised.

This overturning of the law came about because in 1997 there was a case of non-Jewish adopted children. In Israel it's very difficult to adopt a child; in almost all cases people have to go overseas to do so; they adopt children from Romania, Russia, the Philippines, etc. Since these children are not Jews, the adoptive parents would take the child to the Chief Rabbinate and ask for the child to be converted—and be refused because the parents were not 100% observant in the Orthodox manner, so the child would not be living a full Jewish life.

(People converted as children are given the opportunity when they reach the age of religious majority (twelve for girls, thirteen for boys) for renouncing their conversion, since their conversion was not carried out with their assent. This is theoretically possible, but never in practice happens.)

This was very problematic, as most people in Israel are not Orthodox and fully conversion! Also, at that time you could not complete an adoption unless the child was of the same religion as the parents. A group of these parents came to the Masorti rabbinical court in Israel and asked them to convert their children. They knew that Masorti conversion adhered to all requirements in Jewish law. Their conversion should be recognised by everyone in Israel. The Masorti Beth Din agreed to carry the conversions out, and converted the group, of about fifteen (using the mikva in Kibbutz Ḥanaton [which, a propos of very little, was where I had my first experience of Masorti Judaism, back in 1992]).

This became a major cause celèbre in Israel; it was big news in the media the next day, that the Masorti movement was converting these adoptive children the Orthodox movement refused to convert. The parents then took the certificates of conversion to the Ministry of the Interior to have the children registered. The Ministry of the Interior refused, and did not give a reason. After a long time, they gave the reason that they did not recognise conversions not carried out by the Chief Rabbinate.

At that point the Masorti movement took them to court, because there is no law in Israel saying that conversions carried out by other institutions than the Chief Rabbinate are not valid. The courts took this up (though a verdict would not be reached for several years).

Now, the Orthodox political parties in Israel often play political kingmaker out of relation to their size, as they are generally necessary in making up a viable coalition government, and by threatening to pull out of the coalition they can bring the government down. When everybody thought they were pretty certain the court would find in the Masorti movement's favour, the Orthodox political parties moved to prevent this from happening by putting a bill through the Knesset stipulating that the State of Israel would only recognise conversions carried out by the Chief Rabbinate. They went to the then PM, Binyamin Netanyahu, and threatened to pull out of his coalition if he did not have this law passed. At the same time, pressures came upon Netanyahu from Jews outside Israel pointing out that most of the Jews in their countries are not Orthodox (in the States, only 10% of the Jews are Orthodox; Britain, France and South Africa are some of the few countries left with an Orthodox majority to their Jewish community). Most of the conversions in these other countries are therefore performed by non-Orthodox batei din, and people who made aliya [emigrated to Israel] came from these movements. Is he really going to pass a law that said that these people would not be recognised as Jewish?

So Netanyahu was stuck risking to lose the support, important both financially and politically, of the Jews in the Diaspora. But if he did not act, his government would fall. So what did he do? He appointed a committee, the Ne'eman Commission, to come up with a compromise that would satisfy everyone. It consisted of representatives of Orthodoxy, the Masorti movement and the Reform movement.

The committee met for the best part of a year. Finally it came up with an idea they were all agreed upon, that they were willing to try on a trial basis, for a year or two, and see how it worked: They would establish a joint conversion institute where all the denominations would be involved in the teaching. There would be an agreed-upon curriculum of what you have to teach a convert. Following the period of study, the converts would be turned over to an Orthodox rabbinical court, which would consist of more open and liberal rabbis than your typical Orthodox rabbinical court. Thus the Orthodox would be satisfied that the conversion was valid, because it was carried out by an Orthodox בית דין, and the non-Orthodox would be satisfied that the rabbinical court was liberal and open enough to accept all of the converts.

This was the compromise agreed upon; the movements agreed that for the trial period they would not carry out their own conversions. But this was dependent upon the agreement of the Chief Rabbinate that they would go through with this, and appoint the liberal ביתי דין. Once the proposal was agreed upon, though, the Chief Rabbinate pulled out from it, and issued an extreme statement saying they would not cooperate with any other movement; that the Masorti movement was responsible for the destruction of Judaism in the world, and for intermarriage; that they were worse than the Nazis as they had destroyed Judaism spiritually.

However, the representatives of certain Orthodox groups, and the Reform and the Masorti movements, decided to start their institute anyway, and it has been going ever since. As it does not have any backing from the Chief Rabbinate, though, it has not worked out too well. It's been so problematic, R. Hammer wonders whether it is not time to give up the ghost on this.

One place in which this is working, however, is in the Army: There's a lot of non-Jewish soldiers in the army, mostly people from the former Soviet Union. There are in Israel today 250-300,000 olim from the former Soviet Union, who are not halachically Jews: they have Jewish fathers, or are married to Jews. This is a big number—close to a third of all the olim from the former Soviet Union.

This is one of the major reasons that the Ne'eman Commission came to its compromise: these are people who have to be accommodated one way or another. The government would very much like to have these people made Jewish. But the Chief Rabbinate is not interested, because they are not going to become observant Orthodox Jews. (The Masorti movement recognises that it's not going to be able to convert them all. It would like to concentrate on new recruits into the Army (see below) and couples wishing to get married. If the older couples are never converted, nothing terrible will happen to them.)

Now, the Army has its own chaplaincy court which is not subject to the Chief Rabbinate, the head of which is much more liberal than the Chief Rabbinate; and they have worked out a whole system so that any non-halachically Jewish army recruit is given the option of attending for six months a very intensive course on Judaism, at the conclusion of which they can present themselves to the Army chaplaincy for conversion, and will be accepted.

Coming back to the failure of the Ne'eman Commission's proposal, the Masorti Movement went back to court. (The Orthodox parties did not, however, pull out of the government, for whatever reason.) The case went all the way up to the Supreme Court—and the Supreme Court found in the Masorti Movement's favour: their converts had to be registered and recognised as Jews. The one thing they did to placate the Chief Rabbinate was to remove the religion clause from the identity card, because the Chief Rabbinate did not want people running around with identity cards saying they were Jewish, when they did not recognise them as such.

The Masorti movement has now won all these battles so far through the courts. There is one more battle, however, that is yet to be won, and that is of attaining citizenship if you have converted in Israel. There is no problem if you have converted outside Israel; you will be recognised and granted citizenship. However, there are people who are living in Israel who are non-Jewish, who are non-citizens, who want to become Jewish. When the Masorti movement has converted such people, and they go to the Interior Ministry to become registered and become citizens, they get turned down. Again, they are told the law requires them to recognise people who have been converted outside Israel; it does not require them to recognise people who have been convreted in Israel.

The Masorti movement says where does it say that about the law? This situation is ludicrous! So they took them to court. It's been before the court now for two years. Hopefully the court will find in our favour.

The other problem, of course, of recognition by the Orthodox, is not something which can be addressed by the courts, inside or outside Israel.

In Israel, all marriages are under the auspices of the Chief Rabbinate; there's no civil marriage. Anyone who can't be married as such has to go abroad, though their marriage will still be recognised by the Israeli authorities afterwards. This system was inherited from the Ottoman law, where each religion's marriage is handled by that religion's authorities. The British continued that under the League of Nations Mandate; and it is still continued today. But international law requires every country to recognise the legitimacy of marriages carried out in other countries; otherwise there would be chaos! So Israel has to recognise civil marriages carried out elsewhere—generally Cyprus (as its the closest available place to Israel). The rabbinate will not recognise such marriages, but the civil authorities will.

This happens increasingly. The Masorti movement performs hundreds of weddings every year, both by its members but also by people who ideologically object to the way the Chief Rabbinate carries out marriages—they require you to go to extreme lengths to prove you're Jewish, they force you to attend marriage courses, and so forth. But if the Masorti movement performs a wedding in Jerusalem, the Interior Ministry will not recognise it; so the couple then has to go over to Cyprus to get a civil marriage as well.

Jewish learning notes index

Comments

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

Can I just comment 'they are crazy, these Israelis?'

What an utterly ludicrous situation.

[zsero.livejournal.com]

Note that the bit you quote from the Rambam makes it clear that these conversions ought not to have been done in the first place; he's dealing with the aftermath of poorly-thought-out conversions done by incompetent and irresponsible people. A convert has to accept the obligation to keep all of the mitzvot, without exception; if they declare in advance that they have no intention of doing so, then it's dishonest and irresponsible to accept them.

Also note in that same chapter that at times when there are advantages to being Jewish the rules for accepting converts become stricter, and in King Solomon's time no converts were accepted at all by the official courts, because applicants' motives were always suspect. After the Bar-Kochva revolt was put down there wasn't much material incentive to convert, so any candidate who, on being informed of the disadvantages, persisted in his desire to convert, could be presumed to be sincere and committed, and the court could be reasonably confident that when he learned more he would accept whatever he learned. The most important principle is to avoid having converts who will backslide; we have enough non-observant Jews already, and don't need any more.