This makes all rabbis look bad - see the talkbacks on the article.Please cut it out rabbosi.
Rabbi Aviner: Girls should dodge army service
Prominent rabbi says recruitment of women may bring about spiritual deterioration. 'Who do we want in the army, women or the Almighty?' he asksby Kobi Nahshoni
"Girls should dodge army service, as their enlistment is tantamount to a mitzvah that entails an offense," Rabbi Shlomo Aviner stated in an article written for the synagogue pamphlet, Be'ahava U'Be'emuna.
In an article titled "Recruitment of girls is absolutely forbidden!", the rabbi of Beit El and head of the Ateret Kohanim yeshiva presented several halachic rulings regarding the issue that were given in recent decades, and stated that despite the "Mitzvah War" the people of Israel were engaged in, the modesty of women must not be compromised.
According to the rabbi, a girl who avoids joining the army only strengthens it, because she allows for God to be present in the IDF base. "This is our choice: Who do we want in the army, women or the Almighty?" he wrote, adding that the recruitment of women may lead to spiritual deterioration among soldiers.
Rabbi Aviner added that in certain cases, girls are even permitted to evade service by making false declarations to the IDF about their religious beliefs.
Aviner advised female teens to prefer Sherut Leumi (national service) over service in the IDF, reminding them that there were no women in the armies of Moses, Joshua, Saul, David, the Hasmoneans or Simon Bar Kochba.
This isn't news. Rabbis have been saying this for decades!
ReplyDeleteWhat would Rav Soloveitchik have said?
ReplyDeletei'm sure that in a printed publication he would not have advocated lying to dodge the draft.
ReplyDeleteYou know you're evading the larger question about women in the military.
ReplyDeleteIt isn't draft dodging if you have the legal option of Sherut Leumi or an outright exemption.
ReplyDeleteSo are you just going to sit in Teaneck and criticize or are you going to do something positive and helpful?
ReplyDeleteThere are many units of the army and Israeli police that are short-staffed and need people, men or women, charedi or non-caredi.
For non-Israeli citizens, see
http://www.mahal2000.com/ to volunteer for the IDF.
For those with a teudat zehut, see
http://www.israelvolunteerborderguard.com/
Both men and women can volunteer up to age 55 for the above unit.
(For those who do not yet have a teudat zehut, see http://www.nbn.org.il/)
The best way to convince others is to lead by example, which Rav Aviner, whatever one thinks of his positions, has certainly done.
When you advocate that non-religious girls lie and say that they are religious in order to evade army service, that corrupts the very system that you value. Once enough women lie, the credibility of those that tell the truth goes down the drain. Then you have pressure to end the "phony" exemption.
ReplyDeleteI'm all for women serving or getting legitimate exemptions. What is the concern here is whether a rabbi who advocates lying and corrupting a valid system that is in place is doing G-d's work. Or is he undermining hard earned valid processes?