Dealing With ‘Toeivah’

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shafran1By Rabbi Avi ShafranThe timing couldn’t have been more uncanny. Or more sad.

It was the week of parshas Noach when a flood of invective poured forth following a statement by the New Jersey Jewish Standard, a regional newspaper based in Teaneck, that it had erred by including among marriage announcements the intention of two young men to live together as a couple. According to the Midrash, the Mabul was especially destructive because of antediluvian society’s endorsement of “writing marriage contracts for men.”

The newspaper’s decision “not to run such announcements in the future” came in the wake of quiet protest by some local Orthodox rabbis. The firestorm of anger that later ensued has caused the paper to consider adding a flop to its flip.

Among comments posted online about the paper’s decision to discontinue announcements like the one that brought the Orthodox protest were: “disgusting and abhorrent,” “craven and ridiculous,” “despicable” and a “shande.” Several media, including The New York Times and the New York Jewish Week, saw fit in their reports on the brouhaha to remind readers of the suicide, several days earlier, of a college student living what the Torah considers an abhorrent lifestyle, as if to subtly convey the notion that support for maintaining the traditional meaning of marriage somehow begets such things.

The Conservative movement’s Rabbinical Assembly weighed in with its own creative take on the controversy, couching it as a “free press” issue and the newspaper’s decision as “censorship.” Leaving aside the assertion of a relationship between the First Amendment and simcha announcements, one finds it hard to imagine the assembled rabbis similarly condemning a Jewish newspaper’s policy to, say, not include announcements of “Hebrew-Christian” events. There is a rather large difference, it shouldn’t need to be said, between censorship and standards.

In any event, newspapers, particularly nondenominational Jewish ones, are ultimately beholden not to the marketplace of ideas but to the marketplace. The New Jersey Jewish Standard may be an exception, and its decision to cease publication of celebrations of gross violations of the Torah’s moral code might in fact have been born of sincere concern for its Orthodox readers’ feelings. But it may also have been a cold business decision intended to not jeopardize subscriptions and advertisements from the Orthodox community. If so, well, industry strategies often change with changed circumstances and the uproar at the paper may yet yield a new business plan.

But the real story here isn’t about a community organ or the relative clouts of Orthodox and non-Orthodox consumers. It isn’t, either, the story of two young men who want to live as a married couple. It is about the immeasurably vast chasm between so large a part of the non-Orthodox Jewish community and its religious heritage.

Few moral precepts are as deeply rooted in the Torah as the one forbidding Jews – and non-Jews as well, since it is part of the Seven Noahide Commandments governing all humankind – from engaging in the behavior that supporters of the young men insist must be celebrated in the pages of an ostensibly Jewish newspaper. The sources in the Torah itself are well known. The Midrash associates such behavior not only with the Mabul but with the Canaanites, whose behavior defiled Eretz Yisrael and caused their expulsion from it. A statement in the Gemara asserts that one of human society’s redeeming qualities has been its refusal to countenance the extension of matrimony to pairs of men.

The Torah’s rejection of what it labels “to’eva” cannot be denied. It is as essential a part of Judaism as the rest of the moral and ethical imperatives in the Torah. That Jews today have been led to feel they can erase it from that canon is not only outrageous but tragic.

“It is sad to think a small group can influence a newspaper like this,” said one of the young men whose announcement begat the controversy, adding – in an unfortunate choice of words, considering the week’s Torah-reading – “But I’ve been flooded with support.”

He has, indeed. And that’s precisely the tragedy.

He and his friend and their supporters are frighteningly removed not only from the Jewish religious heritage’s teaching about human relationships but from the lesson of the parsha after Noach.

In Lech Lecha, we are introduced to Avrohom. Who was known as the “Ivri” – the “other sider.” Because, our mesorah explains, he was not afraid of taking a stand for Hashem and truth even when the rest of the world remained on the opposite side of the divide.

 [Rabbi Shafran is director of public affairs for Agudath Israel of America.]

{Matzav.com}


13 COMMENTS

  1. So Rabbi Shafran, wao are you electing for governer? Cuomo is going to make these same announcments not from some newspaper but from city hall…

  2. MDshweks: Whoever promises the most money will be endorsed. It doesn’t matter what their views are on anything else.

  3. Rabbi Shafran – well said. When will you be speaking out against toeiva support by Andrew Cuomo – and the threat he made to sign into law toeiva marriage?

  4. Thank you rabbi! We need more leaders like you and R’ Yehuda Levin to speak up and defend the Torah, no matter how popular it is in the court of public opinion

  5. “It is about the immeasurably vast chasm between so large a part of the non-Orthodox Jewish community and its religious heritage.”

    Rabbi Shafran! What name are you talking about?

    How often do you hear of such announcements in the non-orthodox jewish community, and why are you and everyone else giving these two men any attention?

    Stop thinking you are in the 1960-1970 era, shrieking againts conservatives and reform.

  6. Rabbi Shafran:

    Your article is of course correct. How can we remain silent when people seeking our political support making support of Toevah a centerpiece of their election campaigns?

  7. Mr. Shweks,
    As Jews we have an obligation to correct wrongs in our own community. A Jewish newspaper is not City hall or the Governors mansion. To NOT understand this major diference is where you MD Shweks and Yehuda Levin are simply wrong wrong and wrong- over and over no matter how many times you criticize Agudath Israel for valiantly trying to secure funding for our Mosdos,Yeshivos and kollelim. Elected candidiates are not being supported for a Rabbinical position but a political one. New York is a liberal state and our community will never agree with all of the issues of a secular candidate.Its nearly impossible. Carl Paladino before Levin trashed him was as flawed a candidate as there was, but Levin looked away from his many personal flaws and kashered him as long as he fit Levin’s one obssesive issue-TOAIVA.
    To think or imply that the “Levin way” is working is ignorant and blind.
    So DR. MD, knock Avi Shafran, ask and post the cynical and sarcastic questions but I assure you he has heard it all before. As they say the truth is the truth.

  8. Bottom line: once Coumo made a public announcement about enacting legistlation of equality for toeivah, a vote for Coumo is a statement that you support such legistlation.

  9. There are more important things in life than money. As Frum Jews we follow the Torah. We value morality over gelt & we are not allowed to be michaneff low life politicians!

  10. This is a huge issue. This was the sin of the dor hamabul last week and it was the practice in sodom for this weeks inyono diyomo

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