Numerous cases of child abuse, rape, homosexual abuse have
occurred in Rabbinic institutions – yeshivas, or by supposedly Orthodox people,
observant of both the Written and Oral law sets. This has not been unlike what has happened in
the Catholic Church for many years.
The response to these terrible crimes has often been
suppression, denial, and threats against the accusers or publicisers, and calls
of “informer”. Some changes have occurred in recent years. In the Religious
Orthodox Zionist world, which was also hit by such scandals, a forum of leading
rabbis was set up to tackle this problem, and they boldly took down some people
who were even heads of yeshivot. In the
Ultra-orthodox (Hareidi) world the leaders
have at last advised any victims to go directly to the police.
A current scandal is so contorted that it has to be
explained in several steps:
1) A
Chareidi author, who wrote many books for children, as well as being a rabbi,
also became a self-appointed child therapist.
He was accused of multiple rapes and abuse of children put in his care
for “therapy”, as well as conducting adulterous affairs with married women. All
this from a Bnei Brak “rabbi”.
2) 2
courageous Rabbinic courts, one of Rabbi Eliyahu, the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of
Safed, and another in Bnei Brak itself ,
under the auspices of leading Ashkenazi
rabbinic Dayanim , attempted to deal with this problem.
3) The
alleged paedophile, by the name or Chaim Walder, refused to cooperate with
either Beit Din, and in the meantime
removed himself from public life.
4) The
Safed Bet Din received testimonies form 22 different people, who all accused
Walder of various types of sex abuse, rape and adultery.
5) It
was rumoured that the Police had received reports of these accusations, and had
contacted Walder.
6) A
recording of a phone conversation between a married woman and Walder was leaked
to Haaretz newspaper, who originally broke the story. In this conversation,
Walder appears to be telling his married lover who to lie her way through
everything, the way he does. She was going through divorce proceedings as a
result of her adultery, which was carrying on for 6 years.
7) Some
5 weeks after the story broke, Walder had acquired a gun, and shot himself
dead, leaving a suicide note, placing the blame of Rabbi Eliyahu of safed, and
rabbi Silman of Bnei Brak, and claiming a fair trial is not possible in this
world , and hence he is summoning these Dayanim to the great bet din in the
sky! Suicide is strictly forbidden in
Orthodox Judaism, and is considered to be equivalent to murder.
8) In
the Orthodox Rabbinic world, several
groups have emerged, with varying opinions on this whole shameful
episode:
The Modern and Zionist orthodox have largely backed Rabbi Eliyahu, as have
essentially the entire Sephardi world, whether modern or Chareidi. I should add that secular Israelis who have
followed the story also support Rabbi Eliyahu.
The Chareidi Ashkenazi world has
split into several parts. The “modern” end of the hareidi spectrum, together
with Chabad Lubavitch have tended to
back rabbi Eliyahu. The leading
Ashkenazi rabbi Gershon Edelstein has made 2 contradictory statements. The
first one accused people who publicised
the matter of having shamed Walder, and ultimately are guilty of
“murdering” him. A few days later, this statement was retracted, and attributed
to other people. He then made a more measured statement, saying people should
go direct to the police if they have suffered abuse, and also notes that
suicide is strictly forbidden.
However, an extremist sector in
the Chareidi world, has only accepted the first statement, i.e. blaming the
press, and the court of Rabbi Eliyahu (whilst also ignoring the Bnei Brak
court) of being guilty of “murdering” the mass rapist, Chaim Walder. Also,
some “religious Zionist” rabbis, who are somewhat closer to the Chareidi
world view, but not entirely, have also joined in the anti-Eliyahu chorus.
The problems that this scandal
raise are quite troubling. The Rabbanites, and the Chareidim in particular, are
obsessed with the separation of the sexes, “modesty” eg in dress, closing off the outside world, eg movies, TV,
smartphones etc.
Yet, when their own people behave
in the most depraved manner, they deny, cover, or even justify and consider
them to be righteous. Adultery,
suicide, rape, which are severe crimes, are brushed off as being insignificant
compared to those who speak “loshon hara”
- gossip.
The fixation on laws of “loshon
hara” and embarrassing another person, are stifling them from doing what the
Torah commands, eg to do justice, to plead the cause of the widow and orphan,
to drive out evil from the Land etc. At
the same time, many Hareidi rabbis have no problem in embarrassing and speaking
against those who don’t agree with their interpretations or politics.
Despite claims to the contrary, these episodes show that even highly organised religion of Rabbanite
Orthodoxy is subject to the same psychological drives as any other group of
people. What occurs in the Catholic church , also sadly occurs in the orthodox
yeshiva – and the psychological reasons are most likely the same. Restriction heaped upon restriction has not
managed to control this type of behaviour, and it is in fact not even a matter
of great concern to some in that world.
Also , the other myth, that Talmud study is a cure all, and that mental
illness is not so prevalent in the Orthodox world, appear to be completely
false.
Do the overly strict laws and regulation of the rabbanites
cause mental harm? Or is the kind of mental illness that leads to such
depravity something that is more genetic, and not learned form the
environment? Or would a relaxation of
many restrictions actually make things worse?
These are important questions, but would require a systematic research
programme, which I am unable to do at this moment.
