Da'as Torah May Not Be the Answer: But What is the Question?

On Friday March 13, 2020, as the coronavirus was beginning to ravage Israel’s Haredi community, R. Hayyim Kanievsky, the 92-year old acknowledged leader of the so-called Lithuanian Haredim, issued an open letter “Regarding the concern of transmission of the Corona Virus Pandemic.” “Everyone,” he wrote, “must be mechazek [strengthen themselves] to refrain from Lashon Harah [gossip] and rechilus [slander] as it states in [Talmud] Arachin 15b…They must further strengthen themselves in the midah [attribute] of humility and to be maavir al midosav [let matters pass, that is, not take umbrage] as the pirush  haRosh [commentary of the Rosh] on the side of the page says explicitly in the end of [Talmud]Horios......

And the merit of one who strengthens himself in these prescriptionswillprotect him and his family members so that not one of them will become ill.” [1] He said nothing about social distancing, or any other orders that might have emanated from the medical community.

The following night, Motzei Shabbat March 14, Rav Kanievsky’s grandson asked his grandfather (in Hebrew) whether Cheders (elementary schools) and Yeshivot should remain open. The grandson said that the “Medineh,” that is, the Israeli government, was warning that schools should remain closed until there was a way to deal with what he called the mageifeh   (plague). R. Kanievsky, mumbled something that was not entirely audible. The grandson then said, “so the cheders should remain open?” and R. Kanievsky nodded his assent. The grandson then followed up with “and the yeshivot should remain open too?” Again the Rav agreed. The grandson never mentioned medical advice, and the rabbi never asked.

Despite personal pleas the next day from top police officials, who did refer to medical opinion,  R. Kanievsky, together with R. Gershon Edelstein, the Rosh Yeshiva (Dean) of the famed Ponevezh yeshiva in Bnai Beraq and chairman of Aguda’s Mo’etzses Gedolei Hatorah (Council of Torah Greats) issued an open letter that called for Haredi schools at all levels to remain open though it did acknowledge the need for certain precautions. The letter began with a clarion call that no Haredi was likely to ignore:

“In a time when we are in grave need of great heavenly mercy to maintain the health of our nation, certainly it is proper to strengthen ourselves in the study of Torah, to be careful in committing slander (Lashon HaRah and Rechilus), and to strengthen ourselves in humility and to judge everyone favorably….Our sages have already stated (Yuma 28b), “Since the days of our forefathers, the Yeshivos have never ceased [to be active] from them.  They further stated (Shabbos 119b):  The world only exists on account of the sounds of children in the house of their Rebbe [yeshivos].  They are the greatest insurance possible that the destroyer not enter into the homes of Israel [my emphasis].”

The letter then made some allowances for the reality of the epidemic, calling for schools and yeshivot to split up students; ensure “that there is adequate space between person [social distancing – recommended at 2 meters” and that “classrooms and Batei Midrashim [study halls] be properly ventilated; and to appoint supervisors [Mashgichim] to maintain the proper level of cleanliness as a health necessity.” It also called upon educators to ensure that no one who was meant to be under quarantine, or had a family member under quarantine, was to enter the Beit Midrash.

The two rabbinical leaders then observed that “This is all from the perspective of an understood precondition to the action [of attending school or Yeshiva]. The Roshei Yeshiva [Deans] and the administrators of the Talmud Torahs (and Yeshivos) must be on guard to ensure compliance.” The letter did not specify whether “compliance” meant compliance with health regulations, or compliance with the directive to keep the yeshivot open. The letter then concluded with the admonition that “we must have faith in the Holy One Blessed Be He who watches over all His creations, and no man is stricken by a calamity if it was not decreed from Above.  And may the merit of Torah and all that strengthen us stand for us as protection and salvation.”[2]

The letter prompted a major outcry over the danger into which the aged rabbi and his Ponevezh colleague had placed youngsters and their families and led to his reversal two weeks later. By then, however, considerable damage may have been done. Though it was unknown, indeed unknowable to what extent his ruling resulted in more coronavirus carriers and more Covid-19 deaths in Bnai Beraq, Jerusalem’s Haredi neighborhoods, and other Haredi enclaves such as Beitar Ilit, there was little doubt that the letter had added to the roster of both carriers and death.

It was also reported that Kupat Ha’ir, a charity based in Bnai Beraq that raises funds by offering to have young Haredi scholars pray at the kotel for all sorts of personal requests made by the donors, was advertising, in R. Kanievsky’s name, that donors who paid the shekel equivalent of $836 would “enjoy immunity from the coronavirus for themselves and their families.”[3] This appeal for funds simply reinforced the intent of R. Kanievsky’s original edict of 13 March.

On April 20, shortly after the conclusion of Pesach, it was reported that R. Kanievsky had ordered the schools and yeshivot once again to open their doors but that R. Edelstein had put a hold on its publication. The latter denied that was the case, however, and instead, the two rabbis issued a second letter that revealed their impatience, warning that  if there will not be a response [to reopen the Yeshivot] and the foot dragging continues without real progress, the great Torah sages [of Agudah] will consider drastic action.”[4]

Meanwhile the virus continued to rage in Israel generally, and among the Haredim in particular. Though Haredim accounted for perhaps 12 percent of the Israeli population, it was estimated that they accounted for as much as 50 percent of all hospital beds in the country. No wonder that R. Kanievsky’s edicts in response to the country’s health crisis prompted outrage among Israel’s non-Haredi elements.

At long last, in recognition of the depth of the crisis confronting the Haredi community no less than the entire Israeli population, the two rabbinic leaders, acting with the government’s consent, appointed a special task force consisting of  two younger rabbinic leaders, R. Shraga Shteinman, son of R. Kanievsky’s predecessor as leader of the “Lithuanian” Haredim, R. Aryeh Lev Shteinman (and R. Kanievsky’s son-in-law), and R. Baruch Dov Diskin, scion of another leading Haredi rabbinic family, together with Dr. Meshulam Hirt, “the Gedolim’s physician,” to examine ways to reopen schools in compliance with government directives. The task force issued its initial guidance on May 3, recommending that higher elementary grades and above could reopen under strict conditions mandated by the government. R. Kanievsky endorsed the task force recommendations.

For Haredim, Rav Kanievsky’s views were not merely the opinions of a wise leader. They were Da’as Torah[5] and thus had the imprimatur of the Divine.[6] At a minimum, it was asserted in some quarters that if the rabbi had erred—and no one would dare say that he had—it was because he was so enmeshed in his studies that he did not fully realize the extent of the threat that the virus posed to Israeli society.

The problem, however, was not with R. Kanievsky’s initial responses. It was with the way the matter had been put to him.

Haredim and “The Medinah”

After 72 years of existence as a state, a consequential portion of the Haredi community has yet to come to terms with what they term “the Medinah.” Nothing has changed since 1912, when Yaakov Rosenheim convened the first Agudas Yisrael conference in Kattowitz (Katowice), then part of Germany, in no small part as a reaction to a decision by the Tenth Zionist Congress not to fund religious schools. Rosenheim envisaged Agudah as an umbrella organization for all religious Jews. While he never fully realized his dream, the organization did emerge as a major locus for opposition to Zionism. Not coincidentally, Da’as Torah also became enshrined in the Agudas Yisrael platform. Indeed, Agudah created a Council of Torah Giants (Mo’etses Gedolei HaTorah), whose pronouncements on all matters, whether Halachic or secular, were treated as authoritative and binding upon all religious Jews. And the Council was overwhelmingly anti-Zionist.

During the First World War, when Germany occupied parts of Russian Poland, leading German rabbis, notably Rabbi Dr. Emmanuel Carlebach, coordinated their activities with the Gerer Rebbe, Rabbi Avraham Mordechai Alter, one of the most prominent Hasidic leaders. Like the German rabbis, and indeed, Hasidic admorim (Grand Rabbis) of all stripes, R. Alter was hostile not only to secular Zionism, but also to religious Zionism, which was organized under the umbrella of the Mizrahi movement.

The Agudah leadership allied itself with the representatives of the so-called “Old Yishuv,” the long-standing Haredi community of Palestine, most of whose members resided in the older districts of Jerusalem and Tsefat. These Jews were violently opposed to the influx of Zionist settlers into what after 1918 became a British mandate. Not surprisingly, the Agudah leadership aligned itself with the leaders of the Old Yishuv who in 1937 testified before the British Peel Commission in opposition to the creation of a Jewish State.

Needless to say, Agudah invoked Da’as Torah in its opposition to Zionism and the notion of a Jewish State. In so doing, it was claiming heavenly support for what was essentially a political position. This was  consistent with the view, articulated by R. Yisroel Meir Kagan, best known as  Hofetz Hayyim, and subsequent rabbinic leaders such as  the late Rosh Yeshiva of the Mirer yeshiva, R. Nosson Zvi Finkel that Da’as Torah was as binding with respect to non-Halakhic matters as to Halakhic ones. As R. Finkel put it, “when a great man offers either advice or a ruling, Emunas Hakhamim [belief in the Sages][7] mandates that one can neither hesitate nor doubt. This is Da’as Torah and this is how it should be.”[8]

Agudah had no choice but to come to terms with the Jewish state once its leaders declared its independence in 1948. There was a sense among Haredim, as among some secular Jews, however, that the State would not survive more than a decade or at most fifteen years,[9] but for the moment, Agudah felt it had no choice but to transform itself into an Israeli political party. Nevertheless, in so doing it did not relinquish its refusal to come to terms with the secular state. It refused to join government coalitions, or to allow its representatives to hold ministerial posts, though through a sleight-of-hand ruling, the Council of Torah Greats permitted Agudah’s representatives in the Knesset to serve as Deputy Ministers. These men often acted as de facto ministers, and in some “emergency” cases, held full ministerial portfolios.

Agudah’s participation in Israeli political affairs did not extend to other aspects of Israeli society, however, particularly army service. The Haredi leadership viewed the army’s secular, assimilationist orientation as the leading threat both to its values and to its control of the community. Thanks to an agreement between Agudah’s acknowledged leader, R. Abraham Isaiah Karelitz, popularly known by the title of his works as Hazon Ish, and Prime Minister David Ben Gurion , yeshiva students were exempted from service in the Israeli Defense Forces. The agreement enabled Haredi leaders to maintain at least some semblance of a wall between their adherents and the rest of Israeli society, and to underscore their fundamental and principled opposition to what they termed “the Medinah.” It is in the context of this opposition that R. Kanievsky’s edict must be seen.

The Mantle of Haredi Leadership

Not all Haredim are anti-Zionist. In 1984 the great Sephardi leader R. Ovadia Yosef led his followers out of the main Ashkenazi Haredi political parties, and created the Shas Party with its own Council of Torah Sages (Motetset Hakhmei HaTorah). Shas displayed a more sympathetic attitude toward the state, including having its Knesset members serve as full ministers in the government.

Even among Ashkenazi Haredim, however, there is no common stance vis a vis “the Medineh.”  Although they share a common antipathy to Zionism, Haredi leadership is not vested solely in Agudah’s Council of Torah Greats. In particular, the Eidah Haredis, successors to the Old Yishuv, is far more vociferously, and far too often violently, opposed to the Jewish State. Moreover, whereas the majority of Haredi yeshivot do not hesitate to receive financial support from the State’s coffers, some –such as the Brisker yeshiva, following the leadership of its late dean, R. Yosef Zev Soloveichik—refuse to take any state funds. Nevertheless, whatever their differences, the vast majority of Ashkenazim look to a single leader for guidance, Da’as Torah, on major political and social issues.  Until his passing, Hazon Ish was that leader.

Hazon Ish rose to his position of prominence on the passing in 1940 of his brother-in-law, R. Hayyim Ozer Grodzinski, who had in turn succeeded Hofetz Hayyim as the acknowledged leader of the Lithuanian Haredi world. Familial ties among the Lithuanian Haredi leadership continue to this day: R. Kanievsky was not only a student of the Hazon Ish, but also his nephew.  And, as has been noted, R. Shraga Shteinmann, whom R. Kanievsky appointed to the coronavirus task force, is the latter’s son-in-law.

 At 92, R. Kanievsky represents the tendency of the Lithuanian Haredim to recognize as supreme leaders of the movement nonogenarians or even centenarians. Thus, R. Kanievski’s predecessor, R. Aryeh Yehuda Leib Shteinman was niftar (passed away) in 2017 at the age of 103, while his own predecessor, R. Sholom Yisef Elyashiv died at the age of 102. R. Elyashiv’s predecessor, R. Elazar Menachem Man Shach, likewise was 102 when he was niftar.

Is the problem the answer, the question, or the system?

The Torah teaches that Moses was as much in control of all his faculties on the day he died at the age of 120, as when he was a much younger man. That is not necessarily the case with other older persons, even if they are great scholars. It is arguable that by the time they reach their nineties, even leading Halakhic experts may have lost half a mental step. They might comprehend what is being asked of them, indeed, their replies may reflect their decades of Torah knowledge. Nevertheless, they may not have the mental acuity to probe all facets of whatever issue is brought before them, as they may have been able to do as recently as a decade earlier.

It is well known that Haredi leaders surround themselves—or are surrounded by—men who are collectively known as askanim. In the words of R. David Stav, leader of the moderate Orthodox Tzohar movement, askanim are “a small group of Haredi askanim who, because of their own personal interests, make Judaism and Haredi society hateful to Israelis." [10] R. Dov Lipman, an American-born moderate Haredi who served for a period as a Knesset member, outlined the power of these men:

“The issue of the gedolim Torah greats] is very largely the askanim who surround them…Askanim are the community activists and assistants who normally surround the leading rabbis and act as a buffer between them and the communities they lead. They [Torah greats] are totally controlled by people around them and that’s the biggest problem….[11]”

These askanim clearly take advantage of elderly rabbis, putting questions to them in much the same way as pollsters with a particular political bias will put questions to their respondents. Not surprisingly, manipulative questioners will elicit pronouncements that are in line with what they want to hear. And since those pronouncements have the force of unchallengeable law for the Haredi community, they are in effect empowering their questioners to ride roughshod over that community.

This appears to have been the case when R. Kanievsky’s grandson, with one of the askanim standing over his shoulder, asked his grandfather whether yeshivot and elementary cheders should remain open. He did not explain clearly that not just the “Medineh,” but doctors had argued for such closures. Had he done so, R. Kanievsky would immediately have recognized that the issue was one of pikuach nefesh, saving lives. Without a doubt, had R. Kanievsky been asked whether schools should be closed to save lives, his answer would have been in the affirmative. After all, Halakha is unambiguous with respect to this issue; indeed, Halakha posits that even the remote possibility of life being endangered justifies violating the Torah.[12] Indeed, once R. Kanievsky fully fathomed the severity of the crisis, he did call upon a trusted doctor, along with respected Haredi rabbis, to devise an approach that satisfied both the requirement to maintain safety and the objective of studying Torah. It was the word “Medineh” that had acted as a red flag to the aged rabbi and prompted his initial response.

The Challenge for the Haredi world

("Modern"- This term never existed until the Agudath Israel created it in the 1960s - PM)) Orthodox Jews do not recognize Da’as Torah outside the bounds of Halakha. They look to specialists, for example in the military or medical realms, for guidance on purely secular issues. They justify their attitude both because rabbinic greats ranging from R. Joseph B. Soloveichik to R. Ovadia  Yosef took this view, and because Da’as Torah has been on the wrong side of Jewish history in multiple occasions, failing the Jewish people at critical times in the recent past. These include opposing immigration to America or Israel when it was still possible before the invasion of Poland; opposition to the creation of the State of Israel; and opposition to public demonstrations to free Soviet Jewry. For the Modern Orthodox, therefore, Haredi rulings concerning responses to the coronavirus epidemic had little impact.

Moreover, not all Haredi leaders are as closed to the outside world, and therefore as vulnerable to askanim. The recently departed Novominsker Rebbe, R.  Yaakov Perlow, who died due to the coronavirus, graduated with honors from Brooklyn College![13] A group of Hasidic admorim and rabbonim residing in Boro Park, Brooklyn and led by R. Perlow, issued a proclamation on the eve of Pesach outlining the importance of maintaining government restrictions even at the cost of hallowed Passover traditions.(4 weeks too late - PM)

On the other hand, as noted at the outset of this essay, contrary pronouncements by Haredi rabbinic leaders have had a devastating effect on the community. Indeed, the outsized impact of the coronavirus on the Haredi population affected all Israelis, since Haredim occupied a disproportionate percentage of hospital beds. The community, whether in Israel, the United States or elsewhere therefore needs to re-evaluate how to structure its leadership. In particular, if it will continue to treat the words of aged leaders as inviolable law it must take steps to rid itself of the scourge of askanim. The lesson of Israel’s hospital bed crisis is that doing so not only will enhance the welfare of Haredim, but will also redound to the benefit of the Jewish community as a whole.

https://www.jewishideas.org/article/daas-torah-may-not-be-answer-what-question

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[1] Translation of the Hebrew, reprinted in David Zer, “MESSAGE FROM THE GADOL HADOR: Rav Chaim Kanievsky’s Instructions on How to Protect Yourself and Loved Ones,” The Yeshiva World (March 13, 2020), https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/featured/1839688/message-from-the-gadol-hador-rav-chaim-kanievskys-instructions-on-how-to-protect-yourself-and-loved-ones.html.

[2] https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/featured/1839688/message-from-the-gadol-hador-rav-chaim-kanievskys-instructions-on-how-to-protect-yourself-and-loved-ones.html

[3] Jacob Magid, “Charity tied to top rabbi raises cash with promise of immunity from coronavirus” (Times of Israel, April 18, 2020). https://www.timesofisrael.com/charity-tied-to-top-rabbi-raises-cash-with-promise-of-immunity-from-coronavirus/

[4] TOI staff and Jacob Magid, “Top Haredi rabbi Kanievsky orders yeshivas opened; his colleague blocks him – TV” (Times of Israel, April 22, 2020). https://www.timesofisrael.com/top-haredi-rabbis-threaten-drastic-steps-if-no-way-found-to-open-yeshivas/

[5] When citing Haredi statements or concepts, this essay employs Haredi Ashkenazi pronunciation.

[6] For a discussion, see Lawrence Kaplan, “Daas Torah,” in Moshe Z. Sokol, ed. Rabbinic Authority and Personal Autonomy (Lanham, MD and Boulder, CO: Rowman&Littlefield, 2006), 1-60,  and Dov S. Zakheim, “Emunat Hahamim, Da’at Torah and National Security,” Conversations 30 (Winter 2018/5778), 78-93.

[7] When citing the writings and names of leaders of the Yeshiva World I employ their “Ashkenazis” pronunciation, since that is how both the authors and their intended audience will pronounce what is written.

[8] R. Nosson Zvi Finkel, “Sihos Mussar,” in Yeshurun 27 (Elul 5772/September 2012), 373.

[9] See R. Hayyim Shlomo Leibovitz, “Hashpo’as HaTorah” Yeshurun 38 (Kislev 5777/December 2016), 328. Interestingly, R. Yosef Zev Soloveichik postulated at the time that “if they [i.e. the Israeli government] will permit yeshiva students to study and not serve in the military, then the state will survive in the merit of the exemption they are granting to yeshiva students.” Ibid.

[10] https://www.haaretz.com/.premium-word-of-the-day-askanim-1.5224598

[11] https://www.jpost.com/jewish-world/jewish-features/the-new-haredim

[12] R. Yosef Karo Shulhan Aruch: Orah Hayyim 329:2; R. Meir Kagan, Mishna Berurah, ad. loc., s.v. kemehtza; R. Moshe Feinstein, Igros Moshe: Orah Hayyim I: 132.

[13] Sam Roberts, “The We’ve Lost: Rabbi Yaakov Perlow, Head of Hasidic Dynasty in Brooklyn, Dies at 89,” The New York Times (April 16, 2020), https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/10/obituaries/rabbi-yaakov-perlow-dead.html

The Hareidi-promoted understanding of emunat hakhamim is not only rejected by significant rabbinic authorities, but is deeply offensive to those who insist on the right to think for themselves and make their own decisions. To ascribe quasi-prophetic powers to a small clique of Talmudic scholars is intellectually unsound. It undermines a thinking faith and condemns the public to sheepishly follow the opinions of an unelected group of “gedolim.”

  I'm not one to mince words. Officially I retired from my "highly paid" blogging job. But I can't help myself from commenting on the present crisis. Why? For the same reason I blogged for almost 15 years!

TO TEACH YOU THAT YOUR WORLDVIEW IS MESSED UP, and give you an opportunity to get it right! And NOW It's not only killing people emotionally, but it is bringing death to your doorstep!

The bitter reality of Covid-19 has forced you to rethink just about everything you believed before the deadly virus started killing your friends, neighbors, family members and someone you know. Yes, some of the people were elderly and maybe their time was up anyway. But the facts are if they died of Covid-19, they died of an unwarranted, tortured, suffocating death, prematurely.

So how do we process the present crisis? What should we learn from this pandemic? What mistakes were made that could have prevented this calamity, or at the very least reduced the amount of illness and death?

The day before Purim, on March 9, Agudath Israel posted a Q & A that advised individuals to continue going to shul for minyan, attending synagogue Megilla readings, and carrying on with their Purim celebrations, unless they were actually ill. And on that same day, a large group of Rabbis and leaders gathered to discuss what they deemed a pressing issue for their community: the matter of preventing government enforcement of education standards in their yeshivas. Coronavirus, which had already begun to quietly spread throughout New York, was not their prime concern.

In 1990, I met with the Chief Rabbi of a major city in Israel, a man who was known for his great erudition and who authored a number of volumes of halakhic responsa. He told me that a military leader of Israel had asked him to encourage yeshiva students to serve in the army. He had responded to the general:  instead of getting yeshiva students to serve in the army, all the soldiers should put down their weapons and start studying Torah.  He quoted a Midrash that God will protect the Jewish people if they all study Torah. I asked the rabbi if he would risk the security of Israel based on that Midrash. He told me without hesitation: “yes, of course! We don’t need an army, we need everyone to study Torah. We have the words of hazal, and our Sages spoke truth.”
 

     When I expressed my astonishment that he actually thought Israel did not need military defense, he expressed his astonishment that I doubted the truthfulness of the words of the Midrash. The two of us were operating on different sets of assumptions.

     The Chief Rabbi was living in a pre-modern spiritual/intellectual bubble. He relied faithfully on the words of our ancient Sages; they knew the real truth. Their words were uttered in pure holiness. The teachings of our Sages are absolutely reliable, far more trustworthy than anything that could be said or taught by military, political, or governmental experts—especially those who were not religiously observant.

     The Chief Rabbi thought it was a lack of faith on my part to give more credibility to the experts than to statements made by our Sages. For my part, I was horrified that an intelligent and pious Chief Rabbi would genuinely think that Israel did not need military defenses if everyone simply studied Torah and kept the mitzvoth. We sat in the same room, we believed in and observed the same Torah…but we were in different spiritual/intellectual worlds.

     The Chief Rabbi was an advocate of emunat hakhamim, requiring us to have absolute faith in our Sages and their teachings. All genuine truth existed within the ken of our Sages. All “outside” information was not credible…unless the Sages themselves gave it credibility.

     This kind of thinking has gained traction within Orthodox Judaism in recent decades. It has led to an Orthodoxy that fosters authoritarianism and obscurantism. It has relegated immense power to gedolim who are supposed to have a monopoly on truth. It has fostered negative attitudes toward secular sources of knowledge, since the Sages have the keys to all real knowledge themselves. It discredits those fine Orthodox Jews who do not share their worldview, and ostracizes Orthodox rabbis who do not fall into line with their faith in the almost infallible wisdom of the gedolim.

     A venerable exponent of the emunat hakhamim view was Rabbi Avraham Karelitz,(1878-1953) popularly known as the Hazon Ish. He taught that “everything written in the Talmud, whether in the Mishnah or in the Gemara, whether in halakha or in aggadah, were things revealed to us through prophetic powers…and whoever deviates from this tenet is as one who denies the words of our Rabbis, and his ritual slaughtering is invalid and he is disqualified from giving testimony. (Kovetz Iggerot 1:59. This is cited by David Weiss Halivni, in The Midrashic Imagination: Jewish Exegesis, Thought and History, ed. Michael Fishbane (Albany: State University of NY Press, 1993, p. 40, n. 13)

     Not only are we instructed to believe in the prophetic powers of ancient Talmudic sages (even though they never claimed these powers for themselves), we are asked to suppress our own minds to the opinions of the sages. Even if we think their statements are unreasonable, we should assume they are right and we are wrong. Thus taught Rabbi Eliyahu Dessler, an influential Hareidi leader of the 20^th century:   “Our rabbis have told us to listen to the words of the Sages, even if they tell us that right is left and not to say, heaven forbid, that they certainly erred because little I can see their error with my own eyes. Rather, my seeing is null and void compared with the clarity of intellect and the divine aid they receive….This is the Torah view [daas Torah] concerning faith in the Sages. The absence of self-negation toward our rabbis is the root of all sin and the beginning of all destruction, while all merits are as naught compared with the root of all—faith in the Sages.” (Mikhtav me-Eliyahu 1:75-77, cited by Lawrence Kaplan “Daas Torah; A Modern Conception of Rabbinic Authority,” Rabbinic Authority and Personal Autonomy, ed. M. Sokol Northvale, NJ, Jason Aronson, 1992, pp. 16-17).

     Proponents of emunat hakhamim ascribe divine powers to the sages of all generations, including our own. They not only know Torah better than anyone else; their Torah knowledge gives them the right and authority to guide the Jewish people in all areas of life. In the words of Rabbi Bernard Weinberger:  “Gedolei Yisrael possess a special endowment or capacity to penetrate objective reality, recognize the facts as they really are and apply the pertinent halakhic principles. This endowment is a form of ru’ah haKodesh [Divine inspiration], as it were, bordering, if only, remotely, on the periphery of prophecy. ….Gedolei Yisrael inherently ought to be the final and sole arbiters of all aspects of Jewish communal policy and questions of hashkafa.” Cited by Lawrence Kaplan, p. 17).

     Rabbi Nachum Rabinovich has pointed out that emunat hakhamim actually has a very different meaning and intent (“Emunat Hakhamim, Mah Hi?”, in Darka shel Torah, Maaliyot Press, Jerusalem, 1998, pp. 206-214). We are expected to respect the wisdom of our sages, but not to assume their infallibility or their quasi-prophetic status. Rather than blindly following their words, we are expected to examine their comments carefully; to try to understand their intent; to accept or reject them only after careful consideration. “True emunat hakhamim requires deep analysis to seek the reasons for the words of the sages; this entails an obligation on the part of the student or questioner to a very careful and critical examination, to determine if there is place to dissent. Certainly their words have reason, but one is still obligated to clarify whether to follow [their words] in actual practice” (p. 213).   

     It is up to each individual to make informed decisions; it is wise to consult the advice and teachings of sages. But one is not allowed to suspend personal judgment. “There is a difference between one who seeks advice and then ultimately acts based on personal responsibility, and one who relies on a “great tree” without independent thought. There are those who ascribe this childish behavior under the name emunat hakhamim, whereas this is a perversion of this important virtue. Instead of acquiring true Torah, people who cling to this mistaken notion of emunat hakhamim thereby distance themselves from the light of Torah, and in the end don’t know their right from their left” (p. 214).

     For Rabbi Rabinovich, emunat hakhamim does not foster an attitude of blind obedience. On the contrary, it demands careful attention to the words of our sages…followed by a personal evaluation of whether those statements ought or ought not to be accepted. His views are very much in line with a long rabbinic tradition that calls for respect for the words of our sages, but not a belief in the infallibility or divine inspiration of their words.

     The Talmud and Midrashim are replete with statements by great sages on various topics…medical cures, demons, seemingly far-fetched interpretations of biblical verses. It is not a religious virtue to ascribe “truth” to all their statements, although it is important to try to understand the context of their words....

 Rabbi Abraham, son of Maimonides, in an important essay concerning aggada, maintained that one may not accept an opinion without first examining it carefully. (See his Ma-amar Odot Derashot Hazal, printed in the introductory section of the EinYaacov.) To accept the truth of a statement simply on the authority of the person who stated it is both against reason and against the method of Torah itself. The Torah forbids us to accept someone's statement based on his status, whether rich or poor, whether prominent or otherwise. Each case must be evaluated by our own reason.

 Rabbi Abraham stated that this method also applies to the statements of our sages. It is intellectually unsound to accept blindly the teachings of our rabbis in matters of medicine, natural science, astronomy. He noted: "We, and every intelligent and wise person, are obligated to evaluate each idea and each statement, to find the way in which to understand it; to prove the truth and establish that which is worthy of being established, and to annul that which is worthy of being annulled; and to refrain from deciding a law which was not established by one of the two opposing opinions, no matter who the author of the opinion was. 

We see that our sages themselves said: if it is a halakha (universally accepted legal tradition) we will accept it; but if it is a ruling (based on individual opinion), there is room for discussion."

READ MUCH MORE:

  https://www.jewishideas.org/article/emunat-hakhamim-surrender-or-challenge?fbclid=IwAR2tDh_WdVyxYgpf4jee3zrFZvNoyUqeTH3NriIp6TVjO9lvToYhanhyG54
  

RE :

Kotler Brothers Get $6 Million Dollars From State of New Jersey - Kollel Families Get Bupkis!

Malkiel & Aron Kotler - Owners Of The Lakewood Yeshiva

https://bshch.blogspot.com/2020/04/blog-post_5676.html…

מאת לייקוואודער בתגובה לכתבה שלך לגבי המכתב של ראשי הישיבות בלייקווד וכו' חשוב לי ליידע אותך, כי הישיבה 
בלייקווד/ אהרון קוטלר, קיב

לייקוואוד קיבלה מיליונים ומשרתת אינטרס של הסטייט האברכים לא נהנים מן הכסף

מאת לייקוואודער בתגובה לכתבה שלך לגבי המכתב של ראשי הישיבות בלייקווד וכו' חשוב לי ליידע אותך, כי הישיבה בלייקווד/ אהרון 

bupkis (US, slang) Absolutely nothing;


"Each institution is required to distribute half of their award—the portion being released first—directly to students by providing emergency financial aid grants to help cover costs associated with the disruption of campus operations due to COVID-19, including course materials, food, health care, technology, housing, and other eligible costs."

https://www.menendez.senate.gov/news-and-events/press/menendez-booker-announce-323m-in-covid-19-emergency-funding-to-support-nj-colleges-students

A Teachable Moment For The Orthodox Jewish Community - Eat Herring With Your Rabbis - Go To Doctors For Medical Advice!

 MARCH 12, 2020 -----  KEEP YESHIVAS OPEN ---- "It is our opinion, at least as of now, and at least in cities or municipalities where public and private schools are not required to close, that yeshivos and day schools should remain open. The koach haTorah generated by tinokos shel bais rabban is inestimable, and is urgently needed in times like these.

The general consensus among health officials at this time appears to be that schools may remain open, as evidenced by the fact that most local health authorities have not at this point ordered the wholesale closing of schools, neither public schools nor private schools. We do not think that yeshivos and day schools need to hold themselves to a different standard than that determined appropriate for neighboring public or private schools."

The (Jewish) Doctor Who Helped Defeat Smallpox Explains What's Coming

Epidemiologist Larry Brilliant, who warned of pandemic in 2006, says we can beat the novel coronavirus—but first, we need lots more testing.

Larry Brilliant says he doesn’t have a crystal ball. But 14 years ago, Brilliant, the epidemiologist who helped eradicate smallpox, spoke to a TED audience and described what the next pandemic would look like. At the time, it sounded almost too horrible to take seriously. “A billion people would get sick," he said. “As many as 165 million people would die. There would be a global recession and depression, and the cost to our economy of $1 to $3 trillion would be far worse for everyone than merely 100 million people dying, because so many more people would lose their jobs and their health care benefits, that the consequences are almost unthinkable.”

Now the unthinkable is here, and Brilliant, the Chairman of the board of Ending Pandemics, is sharing expertise with those on the front lines. We are a long way from 100 million deaths due to the novel coronavirus, but it has turned our world upside down. Brilliant is trying not to say “I told you so” too often. But he did tell us so, not only in talks and writings, but as the senior technical advisor for the pandemic horror film Contagion, now a top streaming selection for the homebound. Besides working with the World Health Organization in the effort to end smallpox, Brilliant, who is now 75, has fought flu, polio, and blindness; once led Google’s nonprofit wing, Google.org; co-founded the conferencing system the Well; and has traveled with the Grateful Dead.

We talked by phone on Tuesday. At the time, President Donald Trump’s response to the crisis had started to change from “no worries at all” to finally taking more significant steps to stem the pandemic. Brilliant lives in one of the six Bay Area counties where residents were ordered to shelter in place. When we began the conversation, he’d just gotten off the phone with someone he described as high government official, who asked Brilliant “How the fuck did we get here?” I wanted to hear how we’ll get out of here. The conversation has been edited and condensed.

MORE: https://www.wired.com/story/coronavirus-interview-larry-brilliant-smallpox-epidemiologist/?utm_source=pocket-newtab

This suggests that anyone in a position of power or authority, instead of downplaying the dangers of the coronavirus, should ask people to stay away from public places, cancel big gatherings, and restrict most forms of nonessential travel.

 POSTED ONE YEAR AGO - MARCH 12, 2020

Cancel Everything!

Social distancing is the only way to stop the coronavirus. We must start immediately!

In an email to my children dated Monday February 24 - 5:24 PM

 My suggestion is that everyone should have at home a 2-4 week supply of non-perishable food. Matzo, water, all canned foods...keep it in the garage or basement. There are over 200 cases in EY, and known 36 cases in the US. There's a run on food in the Asian countries and starting in Europe. Costco/Amazon...Stuff that you would eat anyway. It will come here.

Love 

***********

DO NOT PAY ATTENTION TO THIS GROUP OF RABBIS ON THIS ISSUE - THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY IS THE ONLY SOURCE OF INFORMATION FOR HEALTH  RELATED MATTERS - THEY ARE TELLING EVERYONE TO KEEP YOUR CHILDREN AT HOME!

 Daily Jewish Community Novel CoronaVirus Updates as They Happen: 

 

CLICK: https://www.jta.org/2020/03/05/global/the-latest-jewish-coronavirus-updates-el-al-downsizes-services-move-online-and-more?utm_source=JTA_Maropost&utm_campaign=JTA_DB&utm_medium=email&mpweb=1161-17628-21723

 

 

We don’t yet know the full ramifications of the novel coronavirus. But three crucial facts have become clear in the first months of this extraordinary global event. And what they add up to is not an invocation to stay calm, as so many politicians around the globe are incessantly suggesting; it is, on the contrary, the case for changing our behavior in radical ways—right now.

Read: You’re likely to get the coronavirus

The first fact is that, at least in the initial stages, documented cases of COVID-19 seem to increase in exponential fashion. On the 23rd of January, China’s Hubei province, which contains the city of Wuhan, had 444 confirmed COVID-19 cases. A week later, by the 30th of January, it had 4,903 cases. Another week later, by the 6th of February, it had 22,112.

The same story is now playing out in other countries around the world. Italy had 62 identified cases of COVID-19 on the 22nd of February. It had 888 cases by the 29th of February, and 4,636 by the 6th of March.

Because the United States has been extremely sluggish in testing patients for the coronavirus, the official tally of 604 likely represents a fraction of the real caseload. But even if we take this number at face value, it suggests that we should prepare to have up to 10 times as many cases a week from today, and up to 100 times as many cases two weeks from today.

The second fact is that this disease is deadlier than the flu, to which the honestly ill-informed and the wantonly irresponsible insist on comparing it. Early guesstimates, made before data were widely available, suggested that the fatality rate for the coronavirus might wind up being about 1 percent. If that guess proves true, the coronavirus is 10 times as deadly as the flu.

But there is reason to fear that the fatality rate could be much higher. According to the World Health Organization, the current case fatality rate—a common measure of what portion of confirmed patients die from a particular disease—stands at 3.4 percent. This figure could be an overstatement, because mild cases of the disease are less likely to be diagnosed. Or it could be an understatement, because many patients have already been diagnosed with the virus but have not yet recovered (and may still die).

Juliette Kayyem: The U.S. isn’t prepared for what’s about to happen

When the coronavirus first spread to South Korea, many observers pointed to the comparatively low death rates in the country to justify undue optimism. In countries with highly developed medical systems, they claimed, a smaller portion of patients would die. But while more than half of all diagnosed patients in China have now been cured, most South Korean patients are still in the throes of the disease. Of the 7,478 confirmed cases, only 118 have recovered; the low death rate may yet rise.

Meanwhile, the news from Italy, another country with a highly developed medical system, has so far been shockingly bad. In the affluent region of Lombardy, for example, there have been 7,375 confirmed cases of the virus as of Sunday. Of these patients, 622 had recovered, 366 had died, and the majority were still sick. Even under the highly implausible assumption that all of the still-sick make a full recovery, this would suggest a case fatality rate of 5 percent—significantly higher, not lower, than in China.

The third fact is that so far only one measure has been effective against the coronavirus: extreme social distancing.

Before China canceled all public gatherings, asked most citizens to self-quarantine, and sealed off the most heavily affected region, the virus was spreading in exponential fashion. Once the government imposed social distancing, the number of new cases leveled off; now, at least according to official statistics, every day brings more news of existing patients who are healed than of patients who are newly infected.

Read: Here’s who should be avoiding crowds right now

A few other countries have taken energetic steps to increase social distancing before the epidemic reached devastating proportions. In Singapore, for example, the government quickly canceled public events and installed medical stations to measure the body temperature of passersby while private companies handed out free hand sanitizer. As a result, the number of cases has grown much more slowly than in nearby countries.

These three facts imply a simple conclusion. The coronavirus could spread with frightening rapidity, overburdening our health-care system and claiming lives, until we adopt serious forms of social distancing.

This suggests that anyone in a position of power or authority, instead of downplaying the dangers of the coronavirus, should ask people to stay away from public places, cancel big gatherings, and restrict most forms of nonessential travel.

Given that most forms of social distancing will be useless if sick people cannot get treated—or afford to stay away from work when they are sick—the federal government should also take some additional steps to improve public health. It should take on the costs of medical treatment for the coronavirus, grant paid sick leave to stricken workers, promise not to deport undocumented immigrants who seek medical help, and invest in a rapid expansion of ICU facilities.

The past days suggest that this administration is unlikely to do these things well or quickly (although the administration signaled on Monday that it will seek relief for hourly workers, among other measures). Hence, the responsibility for social distancing now falls on decision makers at every level of society.

Do you head a sports team? Play your games in front of an empty stadium.
Are you organizing a conference? Postpone it until the fall.
Do you run a business? Tell your employees to work from home.

Are you the principal of a school or the president of a university? Move classes online before your students get sick and infect their frail relatives.

 
All of these decisions have real costs. Shutting down public schools in New York City, for example, would deprive tens of thousands of kids of urgently needed school meals. But the job of institutions and authorities is to mitigate those costs as much as humanly possible, not to use them as an excuse to put the public at risk of a deadly communicable disease.

Finally, the most important responsibility falls on each of us. It’s hard to change our own behavior while the administration and the leaders of other important institutions send the social cue that we should go on as normal. But we must change our behavior anyway. If you feel even a little sick, for the love of your neighbor and everyone’s grandpa, do not go to work.

When the influenza epidemic of 1918 infected a quarter of the U.S. population, killing hundreds of thousands nationally and millions across the globe, seemingly small choices made the difference between life and death.

As the disease was spreading, Wilmer Krusen, Philadelphia’s health commissioner, allowed a huge parade to take place on September 28; some 200,000 people marched. In the following days and weeks, the bodies piled up in the city’s morgues. By the end of the season, 12,000 residents had died.

In St. Louis, a public-health commissioner named Max Starkloff decided to shut the city down.

Ignoring the objections of influential businessmen, he closed the city’s schools, bars, cinemas, and sporting events. Thanks to his bold and unpopular actions, the per capita fatality rate in St. Louis was half that of Philadelphia. (In total, roughly 1,700 people died from influenza in St Louis.)

In the coming days, thousands of people across the country will face the choice between becoming a Wilmer Krusen or a Max Starkloff.

In the moment, it will seem easier to follow Krusen’s example. For a few days, while none of your peers are taking the same steps, moving classes online or canceling campaign events will seem profoundly odd. People are going to get angry. You will be ridiculed as an extremist or an alarmist. But it is still the right thing to do.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/coronavirus-cancel-everything/607675/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=atlantic-daily-newsletter&utm_content=20200311&silverid-ref=NTk0NjUwMDEzMDAyS0

I Will Be On A Live Podcast With Luke Ford --- This Coming Sunday January 5, 2020 at 9 PM EST. You Are Invited To Participate In The Discussion!

 THE INTERVIEW:

https://youtu.be/_C1GDZICbzE

A Time For Reflection & Introspection...

To My Friends and Readers:

As we are approaching the yimei hadin, I have decided that I will suspend writing on this Blog;  thanking HKBH for giving me the wisdom and opportunity to drum the horrible issue of abuse into the moral consciousness of the Jewish people, the failure of Jewish leadership to do anything about it, and worse, lied continuously about its existence and went out of its way to coverup these crimes, and seeing the Jewish community taking small steps to address this scourge. In that zechus I pray that my family, children and grandchildren and their children will merit a favorable gezeira from HKBH for the coming year and forever.

I will be taking time off to assess my role going forward how best to serve the Jewish community, and take a much needed break from being notified on a daily basis of the horrors that are going on in the Jewish community in front of our eyes.

I intend to travel more, spend more quality time with my family, my outstanding children and grandchildren, and disconnect for the most part from the Internet.

It has been 14 1/2 years since I went online --- March 5, 2005 --- and I must tell you that I am still affected by every heinous crime today, with the same horror, as I was when I began writing.

My hiatus, and my decision on how to best make a difference will probably be decided in about 60 - 90 days. I need some quality private time to gather my thoughts on my self-imposed communal obligations.

I will check my emails about once a week --- a_unorthodoxjew@yahoo.com

Wishing all members of the Jewish community and humankind my heartfelt good wishes, and pray that others will step in aggressively to make amends of a leadership that has run afoul of the laws of God and man.

With all of my heart and soul I urge you to keep up the good fight, for the right reasons!

Shana Tova u'Metuka

Paul Mendlowitz

The UOJ Perspective

A Time to Cry - A Time to Learn What is Genuine and What Are Lies!

The # 1 Most Widely Read Post of all 2011 

The events of the past several years, very obviously demonstrate the way you and your leaders understand our cultural history. But for the few of us that truly understand our history, as I do, untangling some of its complex strands has practical and intellectual consequences.

In my own case, the hardest - and the most challenging - is my never-ending research of Judaism's core values. I had to unlearn what I thought I knew, and was forced to shed presuppositions I had grown up with and taken for granted internally and intellectually.

This type of introspection, difficult to the extreme, has given me the depth of understanding of the Jewish doctrines to which is part of my very being, embedded in my DNA, and has assisted me in determining, at least for myself, what is divine and what is human.

For those who will never experience my struggle, there is no contradiction at all to the divine and human perception, the challenge is integrating the two. They are not diametrically opposed to one another as your ignorant rabbis would have you believe. They rule out that learned and spiritually inclined Jews, have always sought to discern spiritual truth via their intuition, reflection, senses, and creative imagination.

The rabbis that will deny you your God-given intellect, to experience on your own what humankind was destined to evolve into, a mirror-image of the beauty of what could and should be the Divine will of chochmat ha'briah; the understanding of the evolution of the intellect to adapt to today's realities of truth and practicality. What they would want you to forget, that only with the shedding of the "Church" as the arbiter of truth and morality in the U.S. Constitution, a mere couple of hundred of years ago, was then civilization, at least the United States, able to remove its intellectual shackles burdened and encumbered by nonsense, cruelty, ignorance and hell.

We've developed more in the last few hundred years, than we have in the last untold thousands. That does not come without a price, however. But that is not the thrust of this post.

Rabbis who will deny such experiences, can teach us anything they choose to about God,and have always identified themselves as our "guardians" of the ancient traditions, or Mesorah. They will preach with fire in their eyes and bimah-banging that it is only they that can determine your faithfulness - by your ability to abide by their interpretation of what was handed down from ancient witnesses -- never adding or subtracting anything unless you consult with them first. And these "guardians", who refer to themselves as the "eini ha'edah" or the eyes of the community, that this view of their role expresses appropriate humility; and it vests them and them alone of the Divine Truth, with God's own authority.

These so-called leaders, of course could not ban the imagination entirely, but they effectively channeled your religious imagination to support their opinions, no matter how cruel and ignorant they may be. Everything you are, they teach, is because you are merely an extension of them, not individuals who have the ability to know right from wrong. And if you stray; like Heaven forbid, do not consult with them if an ongoing series of heinous crimes and cover ups are transpiring under your noses, by the very rabbis that will have you consult with them only, than it is you that is the heretic, the maskil, the sheigetz, the oisvorf and the menuvel.

But in fact, these "heretics" having left the intellectual Jewish ghettos of New York, have impoverished the very system that they outgrew. These "heretics" often walk alone - despite the fact that the spiritual inquiry that they undertook, forcing them to leave their ghettos of origin behind, have become primary sources of inspiration to tens of thousands, and eventually their ideas to the vast majority of Jews, because ultimately I pray "right makes might"!

What such people seek, however, is NOT a different set of rules and obligations to their faith, but rather insights or intimations of the Divine, that would validate themselves in experience. Some who have engaged on this path pursue it in voluntary solitude; others participate in various forms of worship, prayer and action, or a combination of the above.

Engaging in such a practice requires the highest form of faith, or belief, but it also involves so much more; the trust that enables us to commit ourselves to what we hope and love. We have the knowledge and experience to declare boldly; "THIS IS NOT SO, I DO NOT ACCEPT THAT!"

The sociologist Peter Berger points out that everyone who participates in tradition today chooses among elements of that tradition. We survived thousands of years BECAUSE we were able to relive, reinvent, and transform what we received.

This act of choice - which the term heresy originally meant - leads us back to the problem that Orthodoxy meant to resolve; how can we tell truth from lies? What is genuine and thus connects us with one another and with reality, and what is shallow, self-serving, or evil? Anyone who has seen foolishness, sentimentality, delusion, and murderous rage disguised as God's truth, knows that there is no easy answer to this dichotomy. Orthodox Judaism distrusts your capacity to make such discrimination and insists on making them for us. Given the often notorious human capacity for self-deception, we can thank your so-called rabbis for this. And the many of you that wish to be spared hard work, gladly accept what these rabbis tell you.

But the fact that we do not have a simple answer, does not mean we should evade the question. We have also seen the hazards - even terrible harm - that sometimes result from unquestioning of religious authority. Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman's tyrannical, unforgivable conduct during the Holocaust comes immediately to mind. Thousands went to their death upon instruction from him. How many hundreds of thousands of "modeh ani l'fanechahs" will forever remain unsaid every morning from the mouths of children?, perhaps only God knows, but I suspect that He does not know either.

Many of us, however, sooner or later, at critical points in our lives, will have to make our own path where none exists. And that, done correctly, is a good thing. As for me, I am resolute, passionate in my beliefs, non-yielding to any ideological foe that crosses my path. I live in my head and in my contemplative soul. Any setback I view as temporary and a challenge to outhink my opponent. I never concede to evil, never...and I never will. My children and your children are counting on me, whether they know it or not.

And so are you....

As the posuk in יְשַׁעְיָהוּ Isaiah - 10:13 says, "The light of Israel will be fire and its Holy One - flame, it will burn and consume its thorns..."

“I know that this is an extremely difficult message to read and process on many levels,” wrote the principal, Rabbi Binyamin Krauss. “It is shocking to know that someone who we have trusted with our children has been accused of harming them....

Administrator at NY Jewish day school arrested for ‘production of child pornography’

A view inside the SAR Academy in Riverdale, N.Y. 

NEW YORK (JTA) — An administrator at a prestigious Modern Orthodox Jewish middle school in New York City was arrested for production of child pornography.

Over the weekend, Rabbi Jonathan Skolnick, Associate Principal, for Judaic Studies grades 6-8 at SAR (formerly of Yeshiva of Flatbush) was arrested for production of child pornography, possession and receipt of child pornography, inducement of a minor to engage in sexual activity, and extortionate communication with that minor.

According to the complaint, he posed as a number of girls and chatted with the 14 year old male victim. Over the course of his various conversations with the victim, he solicited nude photos of him. He then instructed the victim to send more, and when the victim eventually stopped communicating with these accounts, he sent messages threatening to release the photos.

According to the FBI Skolnick admitted to soliciting nude pictures from 20-25 minor minor victims.

In an email to the school community on Monday, the principal of Salanter Akiba Riverdale Academy in the Bronx, known as SAR, informed parents that Rabbi Jonathan Skolnick, the middle school associate principal of Judaic studies, was arrested late Friday night. The email said that the school had reason to believe that SAR students may have been victims of Skolnick.

“I know that this is an extremely difficult message to read and process on many levels,” wrote the principal, Rabbi Binyamin Krauss. “It is shocking to know that someone who we have trusted with our children has been accused of harming them. Despite the practices in place to protect our children, we are not immune to breaches such as the one that seems to have taken place at SAR.”

 Skolnick, was at the school for 14 months. The school is cooperating fully with the FBI. Beyond the claim of “production of pornography” and a mention of “inappropriate photos,” the email did not contain more detail.

Last year, the school commissioned a report about its previous employment of a teacher who abused at least a dozen students at the school, according to the report. Stanley Rosenfeld, now 84, who has admitted to abusing hundreds of boys throughout his lifetime, worked as an assistant principal at SAR in the 1970s and also taught English there a decade later. The school commissioned the investigation in January, soon after learning of allegations against Rosenfeld.

“We strive to create a learning environment in which students feel comfortable coming forward with concerns or reports of misbehavior of any kind,” Krauss wrote to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last year following the release of the report. “Nothing is more important than the safety of our students. If we were to learn of a report of abuse, we would work quickly to begin an investigation and ensure, throughout the process, that students are safe.”

Krauss wrote in his email Monday that the school’s administration will be discussing the arrest with students in the middle school on Tuesday, as well as students now in ninth grade who were under Skolnick’s authority last year. The school also encouraged parents to discuss the situation with their kids, and administrators are making themselves available to speak with parents on Tuesday and in the coming days as well.

The school instituted a sexual harassment policy in 2014. The policy requires reporting credible allegations of sexual misconduct to law enforcement, as well as guidelines for reporting allegations within the school and investigating them.

https://www.jta.org/2019/09/16/united-states/administrator-at-ny-jewish-day-school-arrested-for-production-of-child-pornography?fbclid=IwAR0B_lGJjIV-1okA04AsICdAdkCq34cr9FyBGvhjQn6OjGEm_PqNAczviRE

"Rabbis Have No Expertise In This Area of Sexual Abuse - It Is Wise To Go Direct To The Appropriate (Secular) Authorities!" A Must Listen For Every Educator, Parent, and Teenager....(Listen in its entirety even if it is not in one sitting)

Now, just weeks after the lookback clause went into effect, Jewish institutions across the denominational spectrum are facing legal retribution for allegedly mishandling allegations of child sexual abuse, with claims reaching as far back as the 1950s.

Through ‘Lookback Window,’ Jewish Orgs Face Retribution for Child Sex Abuse

 

As child abuse cases against yeshivas mount following a one-year lookback provision, questions turn to legal strategy. Are their fears of bankruptcy warranted?

When a one-year lookback provision created by New York’s new Child Victims Act opened last month — temporarily lifting the statute of limitations on civil child sex abuse cases and allowing survivors of any age to pursue justice through the courts — youth-serving institutions across the state braced for legal fire. 

Now, just weeks after the lookback clause went into effect, Jewish institutions across the denominational spectrum are facing legal retribution for allegedly mishandling allegations of child sexual abuse, with claims reaching as far back as the 1950s. In the handful of cases filed thus far, prominent defendants include the National Ramah Commission, the Conservative movement’s camping arm; the Conservative movement’s flagship rabbinical school, Jewish Theological Seminary; Modern Orthodoxy’s flagship institution, Yeshiva University; prominent Modern Orthodox day school Salanter Akiba Riverdale High School (SAR); prominent Modern Orthodox day school Westchester Day School; Yeshiva Torah Temimah, a Brooklyn-based ultra-Orthodox school with a branch in Lakewood N.J.; Oholei Torah, a prominent Chabad yeshiva in Brooklyn; and Temple Beth Zion, a legacy Reform congregation in Buffalo. 

Claims leveled against these institutions include negligence in stopping or preventing sexual abuse; breach of fiduciary duties; and the intentional infliction of emotional distress against survivors of childhood sex abuse. Though details among the cases vary, leadership across institutions are alleged to have known about predatory behaviors and failed to act; helped alleged abusers gain entry to other youth-serving institutions; and engaged in intimidation tactics to prevent victims from coming forward.

Claims leveled against these institutions include negligence in stopping or preventing sexual abuse; breach of fiduciary duties; and the intentional infliction of emotional distress against survivors.

Yeshiva Torah Temimah, an all-boys charedi school based in Brooklyn, faces a new lawsuit for covering up the alleged sexual abuse perpetrated by Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, who taught at the school from the 1960s throughout the ’80s. Four ex-students previously sued the school, charging Kolko molested them from ages 11 to 13; at the time, the state court tossed the cases after determining claims fell outside the statute of limitations then in place.

(L-R) Barry Singer, Jay Goldberg, David Bressler three of the plaintiffs in the suit against Yeshiva University at a recent press conference announcing their suit against YU

(Previously, the school agreed to pay an unprecedented $2.1 million to two former students who accused Kolko of sexually assaulting them. Details of the secret settlements emerged in 2016 when the school failed to make payments. The case marked the first time a New York yeshiva paid off alleged victims of sex abuse, experts said. Kolko, now 72, received a controversial plea deal from then-Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes in May 2012 after pleading guilty to two misdemeanor counts of child endangerment; he did not have to serve jail time or register as a sex-offender.)

Now, the case is being revived under the Child Victims Act. Alleged victim Baruch Sandhaus filed a complaint in Brooklyn Supreme Court last month, alleging that Kolko and another rabbi on staff “would inappropriately touch” his private parts on various occasions between 1978 and 1980, when he was a student at Torah Temimah. 

Hank Sheinkopf, a spokesperson for the yeshiva, said the alleged events occurred “40 years ago” and so have no connection to the current administration.

“Why would a new administration know anything about what took place decades ago?” he told The Jewish Week in a phone conversation. “It’s not going on today.” The school, he said, is “financially capable of dealing with a lawsuit” and will “continue to function and turn out Torah-trained young people.” 

Sheinkopf referred to the new roster of lawsuits — including the revived case against Torah Temimah — as “a trial lawyer game to make a lot of money.”

As cases begin to play out — a process that could take years — precedents set in other states that have adopted similar lookback provisions might provide a blueprint for what institutions, and survivors, might expect, lawyers say. 

“So far, every religious institution I’ve sued has told its constituents that lawsuits would lead to bankruptcies,” said Patrick Noaker, the attorney representing plaintiffs in a new lawsuit filed last week in Kings County Supreme Court against the Chabad boys yeshiva, Oholei Torah.

Yeshiva Torah Temima in Brooklyn, NY.

Noaker said the passage of the Child Victims Act won’t make it any easier for alleged victims to win cases. “Sometimes the time that has passed can make it hard to find witnesses and evidence that the school knew or should have known that children were in danger. We also have to prove damages,” he said. “The only thing the Child Victims Act does is open the court room doors. We still have to prove our case like any other,” he said.

“The only thing the Child Victims Act does is open the court room doors. We still have to prove our case like any other.

In February, shortly after the Child Victims Act bill passed, Agudath Israel of America — a large charedi umbrella group that long advocated against the bill alongside the Catholic Church and Boy Scouts of America — issued a statement warning its constituents that the look-back provision “could literally destroy schools, houses of worship that sponsor youth programs, summer camps and other institutions that are the very lifeblood of our community.”

Rabbi Avi Shafran, director of public affairs for Agudath Israel, told The Jewish Week this week that “the fears certainly continue,” though he was not aware of how many suits had been filed against yeshivas.

For Noaker, a Minneapolis-based lawyer who represented plaintiffs in a host of lawsuits against Catholic dioceses in Minnesota after the state passed a three-year lookback window in 2018, the line is familiar.

The argument is straight-up manipulation.

“The Catholics said lawsuits would shut down hospitals and homeless shelters — it never happened,” said Noaker. “The argument is straight-up manipulation.”

Though several of the cases he litigated did contribute to dioceses in Minnesota filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in order to settle hundreds of claims of sexual abuse at the hands of priests, not one diocese ceased to function because of the financial decision.

Child victims and advocates during the debate in Albany in the run-up to a vote on the Child Victims Act earlier this year.

A major benefit he has seen for states, like Minnesota and California, that implemented similar look-back provisions is a “more robust sex offender registry”; suits previously barred by strict statues of limitations “identify predators that could still have access to children.” 

For Noaker, the case against Oholei Torah, which brings new allegations of child sex abuse against Rabbi Joseph (Yossi) Reizes — a religious instructor hired by Oholei Torah in the ’80s and dogged by allegations of sexual abuse — is his first venture representing plaintiffs from the Orthodox Jewish community. Noaker, who has represented victims of child sexual abuse for 20 years, said he has more lawsuits involving the Chabad-Lubavitch community “on the way.”

Oholei Torah did not respond to request for comment.

Chaya M. Gourarie, an attorney representing plaintiffs in the newly filed lawsuit against the National Ramah Commission, said the “ideal outcome” of these lawsuits is to “change policies, not bankrupt institutions.”

The deal outcome of these lawsuits is to ‘change policies, not bankrupt institutions.’

“We hope these lawsuits will usher in a new era where institutions put in safeguards to protect against child sexual abuse,” she said. “Sometimes, it takes a radical change in the law to force the culture change we need to see.”

The complaint, filed on Aug. 29 in the New York State Supreme Court, alleges that then-counselor-in-training Harvey Erlich was allowed “unrestricted and unsupervised access to campers, whom he repeatedly molested throughout the summer of 1971.” (Erlich was arrested on sex abuse charges in 2012 in Canada, which does not have a statute of limitations on sexual abuse cases. In 2015, Erlich pled guilty to sexually abusing four minors, aged 9 to 13.)

Marci Hamilton, founder and CEO of Child USA, a nonprofit that works to prevent child abuse, stressed that “across the country, there has been no cause-and-effect relationship between statute of limitation reform and bankruptcy.”

Across the country, there has been no cause-and-effect relationship between statute of limitation reform and bankruptcy.

With new legislation passed in over 20 states and 44 states considering new legislation around statute of limitations reform, “We’ve finally reached a tipping point,” Hamilton said.

“It took a quantum of information to be out in the public square to reach this moment,” she said, mentioning the grand jury investigation of Catholic Church sex abuse in Pennsylvania, released last year; the unfolding of hundreds of allegations against Larry Nassar, the former  USA Gymnastics doctor, in 2017; and, finally, the developing allegations of child sex trafficking against financier Jeffrey Epstein, who committed suicide last month.

“The issue has become impossible to ignore,” said Hamilton. “None of this is terribly surprising for those of us who have been in the trenches for two decades, but it’s certainly gratifying.” 

More on the Child Victims Act here.


https://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/jewish-institutions-that-mishandled-abuse-cases-decades-ago-now-fear-bankruptcy/?fbclid=IwAR21N6R4HzGfeQsWUovLVo_ZFp4kznsadUm_aevn6diMpfa6-b9_oNh_vdQ