Photo: Danny Shem Tov, Spokeswoman for the Knesset
Along with hundreds of other rabbis, I received a letter from Rabbi Yigal Kamintsky calling for the unification of what he calls: “parties”GodJudaism GodZionist. “An initiative that, if I understood correctly, is also supported by former or current politicians.
In general, I am in favor of incumbent rabbis not engaging in politics or being partisan. After all, they must serve a diverse community. But this letter, written by a rabbi who is a friend from my youth, aroused in me, without political connection, the need to respond in a matter of values and principles:
I cannot accept an argument that only a few fragments of parties supported by a small section of the public exclusively represent Judaism and Zionism. In the same way, I do not accept the appropriation of democracy and civil rights for a single camp or party.
The following are letters to Rabbi Kamintsky:
Monday, Mount Adar, 27 Tevet 5771
Rabbi Yigal Kamintsky to IT, Friends of Youth, Shlomech Yeshga,
“GodJudaism GodZionist “?!
In one proclamation, Lain reduced both Judaism and Zionism.
In your opinion, the Shemeni parties, supported by a few percent of the country’s citizens, are the exclusive representatives of “GodJudaism GodZionist. “In so doing, you undermined the very right of our existence as the state of the Jewish nation. A state that, as is well known, was established by movements and parties that you do not define as” Zionist Jews. “
You warn against making the state a “state of all its citizens” and in practice, you yourself have made it such thatYou abolished the Judaism and Zionism of the majority of the people living in Zion.
Along with the economic and political achievements you pointed out, it is worth noting the development of the world of Torah and love of Torah and mitzvos among the general public in the country. Not a “growing erosion of Jewish identity” as you say, but a deepening of Jewish identity among large sections of the public who consciously disengaged from it, in the first decades of the state.
With gratitude we should not ignore the many challenges before us, assimilation, family and Shabbat and observance of Tum in general. The establishment of the state, by a largely “secular” Jewish nationalist movement, slowed the pace significantly.
The State of Israel is, on the other hand, a tool that holds a blessing. The way to deal with the challenges and correct what needs to be corrected does not go through the exclusion of the general public from “GodJudaism GodZionist “but rather the opposite: avoiding party definitions and inclusion of the general public.
The path you have chosen, is politically identical, to the path of those who appropriate democracy to one party or camp. They are doing great damage to democracy and human rights. They cause the general public who do not identify with them not to be committed to democracy and the politicization they do to human rights is kosher for violating them. You want to put on the other side a party that appropriates “Zionist Judaism.” There will be two so-called parties in these contrasts, God forbid strengthening each other and distancing the public from Judaism and democracy.
In friendship and Bikra Dauriyta,
Naftali Rotenberg
Rabbi of Har Adar