Lying and Omission: Permissible to Make Jews Religious

  Yosef Mizrachi, the ultra-orthodox kiruv rabbi known throughout the orthodox world for his use of inflammatory rhetoric in his shiurim, or lectures, states in the above video that deception is permissible in order save someone's soul for the purpose of kiruv, or Jewish outreach. While he doesn't want people to think that it's okay to lie, he does claim that if in the desire to point to truth, it causes Jews to stop observing, then maybe it's better to lie (so they'll maintain observance)--which he then says is never okay and is forbidden in the Torah. Mizrachi then mentions that when the Chazon Ish  (a famous Haredi leader who died in 1953) was asked if a person was allowed to lie in order to make a non-religious Jew religious, the Chazon Ish said that it should be done to save his soul. Mizrachi finishes by explaining that it's always better to omit information so that people won't be discouraged from becoming orthodox. (Transcript available at the end of the article.)

  Justifying the use of deception for the purpose of Jewish outreach doesn't win Mizrachi any awards in my book, but sadly, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to offensive utterances within the body of his lectures.

  Mizrachi, who also preaches that: people who don't observe Shabbat according to orthodox practice shouldn't say kaddish for dead relatives,1 that "Down Syndrome, autistic(sic), and any other problem is a punishment as a result of [gossiping during] a previous life",2 and that God specifically afflicts women with breast, brain, and uterine cancers and men with prostate cancer and brain cancer as punishment for not observing the laws of Shabbat and modesty,3 is most recently the subject of a petition requesting that his lectures be removed from the Torah Anytime website, after an irresponsible speech in which he claimed that only one million Jews were killed in the Holocaust and that "the other 5 million people included in the numbers of Jews killed by the Nazis were intermarried and not Jewish."4 While Mizrachi has since issued an apology for this particular incident, his hurtful words have already circulated around the internet, drawing even more negative attention to the incendiary speeches he is known for giving. This is also not the first time he's said disparaging things about Holocaust victims. In a video entitled Manners--The Right Way to Behave, Mizrachi rants about the immodesty of secular Jewish women during the Holocaust just moments before their deaths. He explains that minutes before the women were going to be taken to the gas chambers, the religious women huddled together for modesty, while secular women "they stand like this, completely in front of the photographer [Mizrachi pantomimes frontal view on video] crying that they're going to die. So they're thinking that I don't want to die, who cares? Put my picture all over the world."5

 Mr. Mizrachi's irresponsible speech is reminiscent of the story illustrating how spreading lashon hara, or gossip, is akin to cutting open a feather bed and scattering the feathers to the wind. This story is often taught to potential ba'al teshuvahs and newly religious Jews as an example of the far-reaching effects of gossip and how one can never take back all of his/her words. In our modern world, one can easily substitute racism, sexism, ageism, heterosexism, classism--and too many others to mention--with "gossip" and realize that irresponsible speech, especially now with easy access to information, has the power to do damage not just to those who are targeted by hurtful language, but to those who spread such ugliness from the start.


Transcript of Above Video

:08 First of all: why would you say something? Let's start like this: what did we gain by this? What did we gain by this? Does your desire to, if it were, point to the truth immediately justify that you bring down tens of thousands of Jews that started to keep Shabbat and behave like those who keep mitzvot so you brought them down in the name of truth? Was that so urgent? I didn't, God forbid, say that it is allowed to lie. It's forbidden to lie, God said so explicitly.

:35 "By the way, they asked the Chazon Ish if it's allowed to lie to make a Jew newly religious. Rabbi Shwadron, one of the greatest speakers, asked this to the Chazon Ish. What's the answer?
:47 "He told him: "For sure, kal vachomer ("all the more so" argument.) If an irreligious person was about to die now, would you be allowed to desecrate Shabbat for him? To save him is allowed, this is the halacha [Jewish law]. He says: If now, to break the Shabbat, it's the sign with the creator of the world, it's the greatest mitzvah with the most extreme punishment, you may desecrate it in order to perhaps save someone's life. Perhaps he will die regardless, despite having desecrated the Shabbat--there are no guarantees. Even if there's a percentage of a percentage chance that it may save his life we desecrate the Shabbat for him. Even if you save his life for [another] ten minutes, he would perhaps die anyway because he's got, let's say twenty bullets in his stomach, and now you desecrate the Shabbat and you give him, let's say, oxygen, and now he will live another ten minutes, what did you gain by this? He will die anyway--they pumped twenty bullets in him! You are allowed to desecrate Shabbat for him even for one more minute that he may still live. That's how important a minute of life is. (1:42) So, the Chazon Ish told him: All the more so, to lie to an irreligious person in order to save his soul which is much more important than his body--if to desecrate Shabbat so that he may live--What does 'to live' mean? He will continue to sin!

1:58 "It's allowed to save his soul though a lie. Everyone knows that a lie is less [severe] than the desecration of Shabbat. There is no capital punishment of stoning or "cutting off" but on desecrating the Shabbat there is a heavy punishment and it [still] is allowed, all the more so [are you allowed to lie] he answered him simply. Nevertheless this is not our way. We don't need to lie and to distort and not even to exaggerate, we don't sit and lie, there's enough words of the truth and the Torah--we don't need to lie and to distort and not even to exaggerate--but if there is something subject to dispute . . .

2:26 "Let's say it's something subject to dispute . . . some say yes and some say no, why would you need to say anything? What did you gain by this? Tell me one thing that you gained by this. That now another 10,000 or 1,000 or 100 or 20 that already started to [strengthen their observance] and they are on fire and they're starting to listen to Torah lessons, suddenly they write that all was rubbish, all was bluff (sic), and they will leave the path--what did you gain by this?6

1. Mizrachi, Yosef. You Should Not Say Kaddish for Dead Relative if Not Shomer Shabbat. Yosef Mizrachi. Shademanvendetta. YouTube. Dec. 31, 2014.
2. Mizrachi, Yosef. Rabbi Yosef Mizrachi on Down Syndrome and Autistics. Dan Cohen. YouTube. Jan. 1, 2014.
3. Mizrachi, Yosef. Mizrahi explains why women and men get cancer. TubeChop.
4. Sharon, Jeremy. Orthodox rabbi: Only One Million Jews Killed in Holocaust. Jerusalem Post. Dec. 30, 2015.
5. Mizrachi, Yosef. Manners--The Right Way to Behave. YouTube. Jan. 8, 2014. Holocaust discussion begins at 1:41:26.
6. Mizrachi, Yosef. It is Permissible to Lie to Make People Religious. Undercover Kofer. YouTube. Jan. 6, 2016.

Deceased Non-Orthodox Jews Undeserving of Honors?

Click to enlarge.

     This is not a post about Israeli politics. This is a post about decency. The picture included with this post is from a letter from Y. Friedman to the editor of Hamodia, the nearly hundred-year old "daily newspaper for Torah Jewry." This is not a paper that the ultra-orthodox don't take seriously--if you visit neighborhoods like Monsey, New York, you'll see many houses marked with the Hamodia box for home delivery.
     The "About Me" section of Hamodia's website justifies the position in this letter quite clearly. They state that the purpose of their newspaper is "to assist in the critical battle against the strong winds of assimilation that threatened the very foundations of our nation. In this struggle for survival, these Gedolim and others recognized the power of a Torah-true newspaper as the appropriate response to the lure of the spiritual war being waged against the Torah camp by popular youth movements."1 This makes perfect sense for the Haredi audience targeted with its ultra-orthodox-centric "Torah perspective."2 With that understanding in place, it's understandable that this newspaper would not want to bestow any postmortem honors on someone who did not live an orthodox life.
     Let's back up for a second.
     The Hebrew term "zichrono levracha," abbreviated "z"l," means "of blessed memory" and is often used to denote a non-rabbinical figure of good character. Hamodia's use of the term after Ariel Sharon's name prompted reader Y. Friedman to write to the newspaper stating that he/she

was astonished and astounded to see that [Hamodia] honored Sharon with a very undeserving title "z"l" (Zichrono Levracha.) Even though the writer attempts to describe him as a very proud Jew, it seems to be quite irrelevant when the proud one is actually not practicing what he's proud of. Hamodia, being an orthodox paper with Torah values should of [sic] not honored an unorthodox person with this title. 3

     Hamodia's editor agreed with the writer of the letter that it was an "oversight" that a person who was not orthodox was given this honor. I thought about the baalei teshuva (newly religious) readers of Hamodia who might have non-orthodox family and might find Hamodia's stance to be offensive. I thought about the people involved in kiruv who read and support this newspaper. I thought of the potential BT's (baalei teshuva) who might find this article while spending a Shabbos at the house of an orthodox family and be put off by such a statement. Who gave Hamodia's editorial staff the right to decide who is of blessed memory and who is not? Why not err on the side of tactfulness? Why create a further embarrassment (chilul Hashem with your coffee, anyone?) by publicly passing judgement on whether or not someone should be given honors and by retracting honors given? Instead of backing the writer of the original article, the editorial staff apologized and took the stance that non-orthodox Jews do not deserve honors after death. Hamodia could have easily taken the high road and not even printed this letter. Instead, they opted to widen the rift between orthodox and non-orthodox Jews. I am not in favor of deceptive kiruv, but I'm puzzled as to why such a widely read publication would not take the opportunity to bring people closer to Judaism or just leave them alone, but instead play the "us and them" card.  It seems like there may be a bulb out in this light unto nations.


1. Hamodia. About Us. accessed January 25, 2014.
2. ibid.
3. Y. Friedman. Letters to the Editor. Hamodia. January 23, 2014. (note: at the time of publication of this blog, this letter did not appear on the online version of Hamodia. The picture submitted is from the print version only.)

Welcome to Kiruv City. Speed Limit: Faster! Faster!

In Defense of the Bitter Ex-BT Blogs
A Guest Post by DK

This essay was originally posted on The Kvetcher blog in January 2007. At the time, the new power and challenge of the Internet generally and blogs specifically were being reckoned with by the haredi world in an intense way.  This article was posted in response to "The Dilemma of the Talented ex-BTs,” by Ron Coleman on the baal teshuvah [newly ultra-Orthodox] support site, Beyond BT. His piece dealt with the problems of ex-baal teshuvah bloggers specifically to the kiruv [“outreach”] movement and beyond.  “In Defense of the Bitter Ex-BT Blogs “ was my defense of this specific subset of ex-baal teshuvah writers. The Kvetcher blog is currently locked.

The focus of this essay was restricted to defending the newly ultra-Orthodox bloggers who took it upon themselves to warn others about what they witnessed,  and critique the institutions and attitudes they experienced. This repost was inspired by Brielle Levy and others who seem unwilling to recognize entry problems cause by Big Kiruv.  But it is dedicated to all who have spoken out despite their shame and fear, willing to suffer ridicule and condemnation in order to warn others of the cost and realities of joining an ultra-Orthodox enclave.

--

Ron Coleman is a black hat fellow, as he has revealed in comments on this blog as well as elsewhere.  Naturally, he is not very happy with what the "bitter ex-BT bloggers" are writing about the haredi BT world.

Coleman writes:

Because ultimately my rather mundane point, of course, is that it is a special bitterness -- I cannot say wickedness; we all are tinokos shenishbu (compared to "captured children") -- that makes a talented former BT, man or woman, do this. They do not just walk away from what they think is a car wreck of a spiritual journey but flag everyone else tooling happily along the road and swear that the bridge is out, there are monsters waiting on the next exit and that it was actually much better where they were coming from and you can't U-turn fast enough to get back there.

 And he asks, "What motivates them?"

Coleman offers that, "My armchair psychology tells me that they would rather believe the journey is an eight-lane disaster than consider whether they themselves forgot to check the oil under their own hoods before setting out."

Well, Ron is assuming that none of us take any ownership for our actions. In fact, many of us do, and frequently do not forgive ourselves for doing so.

The newly religious are "encouraged to
drive quite fast and reckless."

In the haredi BT world, you are frequently discouraged from checking under the hood. All too often, you are sent to the races, and encouraged to drive quite fast and reckless. And sometimes--go figure--you end up in a few fender benders, and get dizzy, and feel like you are going nowhere except in circles. Then when you announce you don't like this race anymore, people start changing. No one in the racetrack wants to help you, especially the referees on the side wearing the black and white outfits of authority. Instead they yell at you you for riding off the racetrack. If you're lucky,--very lucky--someone might secretly whisper in your ear that it's okay if you stop racing like you have been. But almost everyone at the racetrack just tries to get you to race some more. And then things get ugly. Because you want to reclaim your car, and some people don't approve of changing tires, new brakes, or adding gas. Definitely not adding gas.

So you go outside, and you stay kinda quiet. And you don't tell people about your racing days. Only a couple of people know. But then you see that they are opening more racetracks, and adding bleachers to the old ones, always recruiting new racers. And you see that the referees were the same ones who were there when you used to race, and are making the tracks even more dangerous in accordance with management's new rules for still better racing.

And you feel a sense of solidarity for the new racers, especially the young ones.  You want to tell them what you know about racing. And make sure they do check the oil, and make sure they don't drive too fast, that they get enough gas, and quite frankly, not to trust that the referees are on their side. Because they are not. They are simply there first and foremost to make people race as fast as they can make them, in accordance with management's wishes.

So you announce you have some questions; you have some concerns. But you are told that you have to go to customer service if you have a complaint. But they don't want to listen; they just want you to shut up. They even tell you that they will only listen to your complaint if you ask very, very nicely and politely, and don't say anything bad about the racetrack. And you see the customer service manager through the window, and it turns out, the manager is the same referee you have a problem with, or at least, is related to him.

But one day, outside the racetrack, they invent a bullhorn. And you pick it up, and stand outside the racetrack. And you start protesting the treatment of the racers, and the insanity of the racetrack.  And some people hear you, and they start listening. And you find other protesters of the racetrack, other former racetrack racers. Sometimes you stand together, sometimes you stand alone. But because you are saying bad things about the referees and even criticizing the racetrack itself, you are all declared haters of racing.  Even though some of you privately still race on your own terms, though not at a racetrack, and yeah, some of you indeed don't race all that much anymore.

But it isn't racing itself you are really against. It's the referees and the specific demands they make, as well as concern of what is expected and demanded of the racers, who seem less of a priority than the race itself, and whose individual needs and limits are casually and assiduously brushed aside, even delegitimized.

But my goal--and I believe frequently the goal of other former racers like me--is not really to stop the racers from racing, though admittedly, that isn't my concern. My concern is the racer. Because the owner of the racetrack does not speak directly, and I don't believe that the managers report to him as directly as they claim. For if they did, the racers would be surely be treated differently, and the race a different experience altogether.

If the referees and managers cannot dispute our charges but neither can they change the house rules of the race, but can only call the protesters "racer haters," then their racetracks are simply not to be considered appropriate for most new racers, particularly the youngest racers.

There are other racetracks, slower ones with wider lanes and service roads.  These must be utilized instead, or built from scratch. I don't claim to have the perfect balance. I don't claim to have all the answers. But I do have the questions.
And if the recruits don't know how to ask them, and their parents don't understand the real questions either, and the FFBs certainly have no interest in raising them on their behalf, and even the best and seasoned BTs are only willing to hint at the crucial questions lest they draw a yellow flag (it isn't hard to do), then who will ask them if we don't? Who, Ron?

You?

DK is a blogger at Kvetcher.net.

Ed. Note: This post was reposted with all of the original links intact.

Is Chabad Ultra-Orthodox?

photo credit: http://umsenglishdepartment.blogspot.com/

     I spend a lot of time on this blog referring to "ultra-orthodox" outreach. Usually, unless otherwise noted, I am referring to outreach groups including Chabad. I bring this up because while perusing Chabad.org, the colorful, article-laden, information-rich website put out for those curious about all things Chabad and Jewish related, I happened upon an article in which that same question was asked. Here is Chabad.org's answer:

Is Chabad "Ultra-Orthodox?"

Chabad is referred to as an "Orthodox" Jewish movement because it adheres to Jewish practice and observance within the guidelines of Talmudic law and its codifiers. The prefix “ultra” is commonly used by media broadcasters, but it has no practical meaning. It is used to marginalize a group or to portray them as extremists battling with extremists of other religions.
Mother Theresa was never called “ultra-Catholic.” Albert Schweitzer was never “ultra-Calvinist.” Doctors Without Borders are not ultra-militant New-Agers. When a Chabad couple travel to a community, they are not interested in converts, in battles, or in brainwashing youth. They are only interested in sharing their Shabbat tables and the heritage that belongs to every Jew. A Chabad House is a “Jewish Center” and a Chabad rabbi is a rabbi, period.
If you hear Chabad described in the media as “ultra-Orthodox,” pick up the phone or fire off an email and complain. Tell them Chabad is a Jewish movement, without any labels, and they should describe it as such.1

     As that is a statement put out by Chabad, I'm hesitant to argue, after all, they probably know better than anyone else how to define themselves. However, I really think that their statement is simply one of semantics. According to the website MyJewishLearning.com, "the word "haredi" is a catchall term, either an adjective or a noun, which covers a broad array of theologically, politically, and socially conservative Orthodox Jews, sometimes referred to as "ultra-Orthodox." What unites haredim is their absolute reverence for Torah, including both the Written and Oral Law, as the central and determining factor in all aspects of life.... Certain groups of haredim, notably, but not exclusively, members of Chabad Lubavitch, do make contact with non-haredi Jews for the purpose of kiruv--encouraging others to adopt more stringent religious observance."2
     Ami Steinberger, a Jewish Press blogger, explains that "“Ultra-Orthodox” is the English term that describes a large group of Jews, whose religious practice tends to be very strict and whose dress remains very conservative, reminiscent of Eastern Europe before modernity. Many English speakers are familiar with another term that describes this group – Haredim..... [The term Haredi is further explained as meaning] "those who tremble before the word of God."3
     I completely understand why Chabad, who tends to define themselves as a movement and a philosophy, eschews the use of the term "ultra-orthodox." They don't want to appear threatening. Under the heading "Questions People Ask" in the handbook for outreach workers,  it's written that they find labels to be problematic because they divide people. To Chabadniks, one is simply a Jew. However welcoming and pluralistic this sounds, the late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Schneerson, is cited as having stated that "the doctrines and ideologies of the Reform and Conservative movements, can only be classed in the category of heretical movements which have plagued our people at one time or another, only to disappear eventually, having no basis in our everlasting Torah, the Torah of truth, the living Torah, Toras Emes, Toras Chaim."4 
     Rather than divide people by labels, it is better to get rid of the labels that the Chabad movement finds problematic. To them, all non-orthodox Jews appear to be equal as (non-orthodox) Jews. However, to Lubavitchers, Chabad is Chabad, and even though they may fall under the Hebrew term haredi, they never want to be called by the English translation "ultra-orthodox."

1. What is Chabad? Frequently Asked Questions. Chabad.org. http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/776104/jewish/FAQ.htm

2. Weiss, Raysh. Haredim (Charedim.) MyJewishLearning.com http://www.myjewishlearning.com/history/Jewish_World_Today/Denominations/Orthodox/haredim.shtml
3. Steinberger, Ami. Ktzat Ivrit. The Jewish Press. com Blogs. January 30, 2013. http://www.jewishpress.com/blogs/ktzat-ivrit/in-hebrew-the-meaning-of-haredi/2013/01/30/
4. On Reform and Conservative Judaism. TrueJews.org. http://truejews.org/Igud_Historic_Declaration.htm