ISRAEL
Jerusalem Post
By JEREMY SHARON
06/23/2013
As the political battles over control of established religion in Israel become ever sharper and more vicious, it may become ever harder to prevent the ongoing decline in legitimacy of the chief rabbinate.
As if the Chief Rabbinate was not under enough scrutiny with the unseemly shenanigans surrounding the upcoming election of new chief rabbis, the dramatic events surrounding the investigation of Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger for financial improprieties have served to cast an even darker shadow over the once-respected institution.
The current investigation into Metzger, which is not his first as chief rabbi and not even his second as an ordained rabbi, is just one of several recent indicators of the grave crisis of legitimacy facing Israel’s rabbinate.
Indeed, Metzger’s appointment in 2003 was seen by many as a haredi ploy to weaken the institution of the Chief Rabbinate, given his lack of credentials, especially compared to the other prominent candidates at the time: the much respected national-religious leader Rabbi Yaakov Ariel, chief rabbi of Ramat Gan; and the equally wellconsidered rabbi and rabbinical judge Shlomo Daichovsky, who is currently the director of the state rabbinical courts system.
But the leading haredi rabbi of the time, the late Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, decided to back Metzger, despite his slight credentials, which secured Metzger the election due to the strength of the haredi parties in the electoral committee for the Chief Rabbinate.
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