Video: Lakewood Mobilizes Against Toeivah Marriage Bill

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rabinowitz-sorscher-small[Video below.] The following are edited excerpts of a report by Geoff Mulvihll for The Associated Press which was written after the AP met with a number of Lakewood rabbonim:

The leaders in the local large Orthodox Jewish community in Lakewood, NJ, go to great lengths to keep out the outside world, discouraging nonbusiness use of the Internet and encouraging strict filters to keep the ungodly out when members must use the Web.

But last month, several rabbis and other elders did something astounding for them: They took a public stand on a political issue, declaring their opposition to [toeivah] marriage in the state.

“This really hurts us,” said Rabbi Osher Lieberman, a key figure in the community in the suburbs about 30 miles east of Trenton. “To say (it’s) immoral is not enough.”

He said community members are being encouraged to do whatever they can to make sure lawmakers don’t vote to recognize toeivah marriage.

In a state that leans a bit left, the conservative (sic) rabbis are one of a handful of groups taking a passionate – and maybe surprising – role in a debate that’s likely to be decided by January. The newly political rabbis have joined a coalition including Roman Catholic bishops, evangelicals and some black and Latino leaders.

The other side of the debate, anchored by a well-organized, well-connected toeivah rights group, is getting a boost from liberals.

When Republican Chris Christie unseated Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine in the gubernatorial election last month, it gave toeivah-rights activists more urgency to try to achieve their long-held goal of getting a toeivah marriage bill through the Legislature before Christie takes office Jan. 19.

The reason is simple: Corzine supports the bill. Christie says he would veto it.

If it’s not passed by the end of the legislative session, that means the window will close for now on New Jersey joining Massachusetts, Iowa, Vermont, New Hampshire and Connecticut as the only states to recognize toeivah marriage.

L-R: Rav Aharon Sorscher and Rav Moshe Rabinowitz.
L-R: Rav Aharon Sorscher and Rav Moshe Rabinowitz.

Democratic lawmakers have been wrangling over whether the matter will get a debate in the Legislature. Most party leaders say they won’t bring it up unless it looks as though it will pass.

Toeivah-rights supporters and social conservatives alike have been lobbying lawmakers, though it’s a debate that doesn’t seem to be enrapturing the state as a whole. Two polls last month found the public is divided over the issue. One found narrow support, the other narrow opposition.

But the Rutgers-Eagleton Poll, which found support, also showed that most residents think the issue is not a big deal.

It is a big deal to Betty Wyka, a museum employee from Parsippany who has long supported toeivah marriage. In February, she started volunteering for Garden State Equality, the state’s main toeivah-rights group. Steven Goldstein is the chairman of the group.

Wyka said she joined partly to counter a claim that toeivah-marriage opponents often make: that allowing toeivah couples to wed will make society value traditional marriages less.

“I got sick of hearing that [toeivah] marriage is going to impact my marriage. That’s a bunch of hooey,” she said. “It’s a civil rights issue.”

Lakewood’s Orthodox community is mostly isolated from the rest of society. The men wear long beards, white shirts, black suits and black hats, and women are not nearly as visible as men. The community was founded in 1942 by a rabbinic leader who fled Poland and the Holocaust. It’s now home to some 10,000 Orthodox families and the rabbinical school, which has more than 5,000 students.

Before last month’s election, rabbis allowed distribution of a voting guide from the socially conservative New Jersey Family Policy Council. While religious institutions would not be required to marry toeivah couples, some say their religious freedom could be squeezed by permitting something they say runs against their beliefs.

Orthodox Jews, like many Christians, look to the Old Testament Book of Leviticus, which many interpret as saying that toeivah is immoral.

A group of Lakewood community leaders granted an interview with an Associated Press reporter – a rarity and part of the effort to become involved in the push against toeivah marriage. The leaders said they’re taking their position public because in the Internet age more information about the broader world is flowing into their community.

The large Orthodox community is not the first to speak out against the prospect of toeivah marriage. Last year, the New York-based Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America made a public statement in favor of California’s Proposition 8, a state constitutional amendment that outlawed toeivah marriage there months after a court allowed it.

And leaders in Lakewood say they received political guidance from some in the Orthodox Jewish community in Monsey, N.Y. In New York, the state Assembly already has passed a law to allow toeivah marriage, and the Senate is considering whether to follow.

Orthodox Jews traditionally have been regular voters who oppose candidates who are pro-choice and support toeivah rights, said Yaakov S. Ariel, a professor of religion at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“The visible part is what’s new,” Ariel said. “The opinions and the support of candidates is not new.”

What’s especially troubling to some in Lakewood is not just that New Jersey might recognize toeivah marriages, but that Orthodox Jews would be more likely now than in the past to know about it.

“These type of laws bring an exposure to our community,” Rabbi Aaron Sarscher said.

And that’s why there’s a new voice in the debate.

“I really don’t believe in getting involved in government,” said another community leader, David Sofer. “But when an issue is so dangerous, you have to stop it.”

Click below for a brief video clip of an askan trying to get bnei hayeshiva in Beth Medrash Govoah last night to sign a petition against the proposed toeivah bill:

[media id=358 width=400 height=300]

 {AP/WBAY.com/Matzav.com Newscenter}


9 COMMENTS

  1. Siz zehr vikhtik far dee khusheveh
    Lakewood kehillah tzoo nehmen noteets foon
    dee sakanas nefoshis in rookhneeyes vos
    vet koomen fun dee mishkov zuhkher reshaim.

    Es iz takeh emes az dee mishkov zuhkher
    aktivisten villen makhen az dee gantse
    amerikaner gezellshaft zull upgeben kovod
    far dee vos leben al pee sdom oon amora
    gesetzen.

    Faran yeedin, rakhmuneh litzlan,
    vos zay seh-nen mishtatif in dee sdom un
    amora polee-tik, nebekh.

    Es iz zair tseel arine-feerin
    ahn iberkerenish in dee melookhah.

    Froome yeedin toren nisht shvihgen;
    faran normaleh un traditsionelle goyim
    vos makhen ah meh-khaw ah-kegen dee-duh-zee-
    geh reeshus.

    Geolay Yisroel foon alle krihzen
    azoy vee HaRav Moshe Feinstein z’tsal,
    HaRav Kamenitskee z’tsal un ah sakh chasideshe rebbeim un anshay maaseh hoben gezogt
    az men mooz protestieren ad keh-day kakh az
    men darf tsoo-zamen-arbehtn mit konservative
    goyim un kristlikhe galakhim vos makhen
    ah meh-khaw.

    Beh-kitzur, es redt zikh foon
    kevod shomayim. Rabbi Chaim Silver

  2. It is clearly understood that these relationships are an affront to the Torah.It is the Torah’s view that the actual act is a “toeivah.” But,where does the Torah call the recognition of their “marriage” a “toeivah?” So, what is the uproar in recognizing these relationships? What additional benefits will be achieved through the change in status? Is it simply caused by their desire to have EQUAL rights of filing joint tax return or to benefit from exemptions of estate tax? These rights are currently reserved only for spouses.
    Please, do not misunderstand me. I am not pro this lifestyle. I believe it should be against public policy. However, since it is legal in the United States to engage in such relationships, those that are involved will continue to do so. Therefore, I would not be opposed to recognizing the few additional rights that they are requesting.

  3. To Comment #3 of Mr. Levi Rand:

    Of course, Boruch HaShem, we who know the Torah know how strongly the Torah condemns the Toeva act; we further know how the Torah declares of all the severely perverted relationships that if the illicit parties try to make a “Kiddushin”/try to make a “marriage” of their illicit relationship, “Ain HaKiddushin Tofsin” — the “marriage” does not take effect and is totally meaningless.

    At the same time though, it is obvious that the wicked people are going through these motions of “marriage” in order to solidify and intensify their illicit acts. So when two Toeva people, in addition to their Toeva acts, make a Toeva “marriage,” they are obviously making a much stronger and much more intensive entity of Toeva.

    We can thus begin to understand the Medrosh that states (I heard it on a tape of a Shiur from Rav Yissachar Frand, Sh’lita) that HaShem made the final decree of the Mabul/the decree of world destruction of the flood when people started making Kesubos/”marriage” contracts for two Toeva men!

  4. One of the 7 Noachide laws is illicit relations. It is common sense that male toevah is included. But nevertheless the Rabbinic literature clearly lists male toevah as one of the 6 illicit acts included in this Noachide law.

    In fact it is stated that it is included in Noahide Laws in Mesechtes Chullin 92a.

    In addition to Mesechtes Chullin 92a saying toeva is against the 7 mitzvos bnei noach, it says the same in Asarah Ma’amaros, Ma’amar Chikur Din 3:21. It is also said by Rabbeinu Shmuel bar Hofni HaKohen, one of the last Geonim in Sura.

  5. #3-Mr. Rand:

    The “civil unions” give them everything in marriage but the name. It gives them all the financial rights and privileges. IOW, with civil unions they have all rights of marriage. This is not enough for the sodomites. They want the name of marriage too.

    The Gemorah (in Chulin) says outright that the goyim agreed to not issue marriage contracts for toeva — and they are obligated to maintain that restriction.

  6. Re: #3

    “Where does the Torah call their marriage
    a ‘toeivah’?”

    Answer: 1)Parshas Acharei Mohs, Shehvee-ee
    (Leviticus 18:22)

    Thou shalt not cohabit with a man as
    one lies down with a woman; it is
    a hateful sin. (The Hebrew noun found
    in Scripture is TOH-AAY-VAH, often
    translated as abomination in literary
    English.)

    2) Genesis, Chapter 19 concerning
    the destruction of Sodom and
    Gemorrah

    3) See Genesis 2:24
    “Therefore, a man shall leave
    his father and his mother and
    cling to his wife and become one
    flesh.”

    Thus, the marital bond, which
    can be only beteen a man and
    woman, fulfills a Divine mandate
    as it constitutes a reenactment
    of the original msrriage at
    the beginning of creation.
    (Tur)
    Dr. Arnold Berger

  7. Pardon Typo: The marital bond can be only between a man and woman in fulfillment of Divine mandate. That is the DVAR HASHEM

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