[Avodah] Stam yeinam of Giyur Candidates

[Michael Makovi]

(1)

Rn' Chana Luntz sent a lengthy critique of what I had said, and I
thank her. One particularly important point seems to have been that we
are not concerned only with idolatry, but also with intermarriage.

One musing of mine is that often, we need not be concerned with
intermarriage. That is, practically speaking, if the person is
committed to doing giyur, we have no concern with marrying either him
or his daughter; he will be kosher very soon, and his daughter, when
she comes of age twenty or thirty years from now, will be a frum Jew
as well! Similarly, regarding a certain supposed heretic, someone
quipped that his daughter was a perfectly frum Jew with whom we have
no concern of intermarriage. Of course, I know halakhah generally does
not take what I've just said into account; a non-Jew is a non-Jew, and
he is prohibited for us to marry, and we don't consider the fact that
in another X months he'll have finished his giyur; lo plug. Be all
this as it may, I thank Rn' Luntz for reminding me of this factor of
intermarriage. I of course meant (not the M'doraita concern of true
yayin nesech but rather I meant) the Rabbinic hasash of yayin nesech,
and the Rabbinic stam yeinam for fear of intermarriage; I thank her
for this clarification.

She brings the kashrut issues of being allowed to bring in one's own
food; I cannot argue here. I will note, however, the yeshiva itself
stocks only pasteurized grape juice, so the issue is "only" those who
bring in their own food from outside.

(2)

She notes that amira l'akum is permitted where there is real true
suffering (the aged and infirm, etc.); should the personal feelings of
a giyur candidate take precedence over the needy? Should not he be
willing (if not proud!) to help these individuals by violating
Shabbat? Is this not also a bein adam l'havero?
---
This point is true, but I will emphasize again how profound the
emotional pain can be of a giyur candidate. I remember when I finally
got to the stage when I myself stopped taking a car on Shabbat to
shul. I remember that I'd actually get psychosomatic pains in my chest
from opening the car door. For a few weeks, I'd try to time matters so
that my mother would open the car door first (turning on the light)
and close the door last (turning off the light), with myself opening
and closing my own door in between, so that I did not actually
(de)activate any lights. She, of course, did the driving as well. But
not only did I quickly realize this was simply morally wretched to
exploit my mother so, but also, I knew that I wasn't fooling anyone,
and that I simply couldn't continue taking a car on Shabbat; the pains
in my chest, if nothing else, would be decisive.
---
What is my point in the previous story? I hadn't yet done my giyur,
and my mother also had only done her Conservative giyur. So
technically, neither of us was Jewish. But did this assuage my
feelings of guilt? Did it assuage the pain in my chest (which was a
real very tangible pain)? Not in the slightest bit. The knowledge that
I was technically not a Jew was a whisper in the back of my mind; my
own Jewish upbringing more that threatened to drown out that fact. As
for giyur candidates who were not raised Jewish, they have
nevertheless entirely and drastically changed the courses of their
lives, moving from their countries of origin to Israel, moving to a
place fraught with terrorism and an unfamiliar language, working with
an Israeli Rabbinut that hardly tolerates their existence, much less
acknowledges their convictions, and we expect these individuals to
graciously accept a reminder that they are still goyim gamurim??!! To
ask them to perform melacha is simply a slap in the face; it is to
remind them that despite all their endeavors so far, they are still
nothing, that they haven't accomplished anything.
---
This point needs emphasis. We had a fellow, for example, who was in
the process of training for a job that he'd yet several hundred
thousand dollars yearly for, and he abandoned this training in the
middle, in order to make aliyah and begin giyur. When he got to
Israel, the Rabbinut dragged his giyur on for months, saying that they
were afraid he had made aliyah for material gain! He finally got his
giyur completed, and then, after he married his fiance, Rabbi Sherman
annuled his conversion! (Interestingly, the Rabbinut still recognizes
his marriage to a Jewish woman, even though they simultaneously say he
is a gentile. His marriage is still considered kosher by the Rabbinut,
even though his giyur has been annuled.) We had another fellow that
the Rabbinut insisted he was mentally ill and did not deserve giyur,
and even when he produced testimony from a psychologist and testimony
from all his rabbis that he was sane, the Rabbinut continued to insist
that he was not competent, based on their own psychological expertise.
The candidates here are given so much suspicion, and are treated with
so little compassion and understanding, that I think the least they
deserve is to be treated NOT as Shabbos goyim.

I'd like to add something else: several individuals in my yeshiva and
its associated sister midrasha have claimed that the yeshiva is paid
by the Israeli government monthly for its giyur candidates, and that
the rabbi (whose job is to send candidates to the Rabbinut, where the
actual beit din investigation occurs) has an interest to retain these
candidates as long as he can. Once they convert, they often leave, and
so the rabbi has a vested interest in keeping them unconverted as long
as possible. Several converts have said that if they pay the rabbi
himself, he'll expedite the conversion, since he no longer has an
interest in retaining them as long as he can. (The Israeli Rabbinut is
still in charge of the actual giyur, and in investigating the
candidate's sincerity, etc. The rabbi's task is simply to prepare the
candidates, and send them to the beit din for investigation.)

Given these stories, I'm hardly inclined to be open to any suggestion
that the pain of these candidates is not legitimate, that it ought to
be accepted in stride.

I'll accept the halakhot regarding hashash of intermarriage and stam
yeinam, even though they perhaps should not logically apply in all
cases (lo plug). But regarding the notion that they should accept
their suffering in good stride and good grace, I will not budge one
nanometer.

Perhaps some people's suffering is greater in magnitude than other's,
and the candidate's own shame - legitimate as it is - is outweighed.
An old woman who will freeze unless the heat is turned out would be a
case in point; her suffering outweighs the candidate's, to be sure.
But my personal litmus test would be: if the need is great enough that
a Jew himself would be permitted to violate Shabbat (or at least, a
D'rabanan), then the candidate also should be willing to violate
Shabbat. But if no Jew would deign to involve himself in the present
matter, then neither should the candidate himself be expected to
involve himself. I say this based on my personal experience with the
magnitude of the candidate's own shame and discomfort.

Michael Makovi