Mordechai Eliyahu

Mordechai Eliyahu was born in Jerusalem in 1929 and grew up in the city’s Old City.[1][3] His family had limited financial means, and his father, Hakham Salman Eliyahu, was both his teacher and a Jerusalem kabbalist.[1] Salman died when Mordechai was 11, leaving his son to continue his religious education under other teachers.[1]

After his father’s death, Eliyahu studied at Yeshivat Porat Yosef under Rabbi Ezra Attiah.[1] He also spent several years studying with Rabbi Abraham Yeshaya Karelitz, known as the Hazon Ish.[1] His religious relationships extended to Rabbi Israel Abuhatzeira, the Baba Sali, and Sephardi chief rabbi Yitzhak Nissim.[3] These connections placed him in contact with rabbinic figures associated with both Sephardi religious life and the Ashkenazi scholarly world.[1][3]

Eliyahu subsequently graduated from the Institute of Rabbis and Religious Judges headed by Nissim, preparing for a career as a dayyan, or religious court judge.[1] His education thus included study at Porat Yosef, instruction from the Hazon Ish, and specialized preparation for judicial service.[1] These stages preceded his appointments to courts in Beersheba and Jerusalem and his eventual election to the chief rabbinate.[1]

In April 1950, Eliyahu helped found Brit HaKanaim, the “Covenant of the Zealots,” an underground organization opposed to secularization and committed to establishing a state governed by Jewish religious law.[3] The group comprised several dozen young people and carried out arson attacks against missionary institutions and cars traveling on Shabbat. Eliyahu’s reported role included recruiting members, raising funds, locating places to store weapons, and approving some activities.[3] The episode formed a contentious part of his early public life.

Eliyahu qualified as a rabbinical judge in 1962 and became Israel’s youngest religious court judge at the time.[3] He served on the rabbinical court in Beersheba for four years before transferring to Jerusalem, and he subsequently advanced to the High Rabbinical Court.[1] His judicial career therefore preceded his national religious leadership and supplied an institutional setting for his work as a halakhic decisor.[1]

In 1983, Eliyahu was elected Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel, succeeding Ovadia Yosef.[3] He served a ten-year term, ending in 1993, alongside Ashkenazi chief rabbi Avraham Shapira.[1] The two offices represent the Sephardi and Ashkenazi traditions respectively and carry legal authority over Jewish religious arrangements in Israel, as well as spiritual and halakhic responsibilities.[4] At his appointment ceremony, Eliyahu called for unity: “May the spirit of God dwell upon all the people of Israel, the barriers be removed, and there be unity.”[3]

During their terms and afterward, Eliyahu and Shapira became spiritual leaders of Israel’s religious Zionist camp.[1] Eliyahu addressed political and social questions of concern to religious Zionism for more than two decades, extending his public role beyond the formal duration of his chief rabbinate.[1] Although he initially kept away from political subjects as chief rabbi, he soon began expressing his positions publicly.[3] His constituency included supporters of the settlement movement, national religious political parties, and other right-wing organizations.[2]

His religious outlook also helped bring parts of the religious Zionist community closer to ultra-Orthodox thought and practice, contributing to the development of the Hardal movement.[2] At the same time, his Zionism did not prevent him from gaining respect among ultra-Orthodox rabbis, and his followers included both Ashkenazi and Sephardi religious Zionists.[2] This combination of constituencies was a notable feature of his public standing: his authority reached beyond a single ethnic tradition or the institutions of the chief rabbinate.[2]

Eliyahu’s written work addressed practical Jewish observance as well as questions arising from contemporary life.[1] His books included Darkhei Taharah, a treatment of family purity and the laws of nidah.[1] The work appeared in five languages.[1] He also produced an annotated and updated edition of the Kitzur Shulchan Arukh, a Sephardi-rite prayer book, and pamphlets on Jewish law.[1] Together, these publications offered guidance through several formats: a specialized legal work, an edition of an established legal manual, liturgical material, and shorter treatments of religious practice.[1]

His teaching reached audiences through a regular Monday lesson broadcast on radio, the Internet, and satellite.[1] The satellite broadcast could be heard in 250 localities throughout Israel.[1] People also approached him directly for answers to questions of Jewish law and for advice about personal matters.[1] He was recognized both as a posek, a decisor of Jewish law, and as a kabbalist, roles that accompanied his institutional service and public teaching.[1]

A passage from his Responsa of the Chief Rabbi, 1988–9 explains the recitation of Hallel on Yom Ha’atzma’ut through several features of restored Jewish national life.[5] He cited the transition from foreign rule to self-government, the opening of the Land of Israel to Jews, and the large number of Torah institutions.[5] The explanation concludes that “these are signs of genuine redemption.”[5] His reasoning connected statehood not only with political independence but also with Jewish access to the land and the growth of Torah learning.[5]

Eliyahu’s rulings on in vitro fertilization addressed parenthood, the status of an embryo before implantation, and Sabbath observance.[6] He held that the birth mother was the halakhic mother.[6] In a ruling cited as Techumin 11:273, he maintained that Shabbat should not be violated to save a fertilized egg that had not yet been implanted.[6] The explanation distinguished an unimplanted egg, which still required transfer to a womb in order to develop, from an ovum already within the mother’s womb.[6] He also permitted circumcision on Shabbat for a baby conceived through IVF.[6] These rulings treated different stages and consequences of assisted reproduction separately rather than assigning one undifferentiated status to the entire process.[6]

On the relationship between Jewish law and Israel’s civil courts, Eliyahu held that observant judges could make a positive contribution to the court system under contemporary circumstances.[7] He also permitted recourse to civil courts to collect an undisputed debt when no judgment was involved, in a ruling cited as Techumin 3:244.[7] That permission concerned a defined situation rather than a general authorization to use civil courts for every dispute.[7] His position therefore included both an assessment of the contribution religious judges could make and a limited practical allowance for debt collection.[7]

His reasoning also entered religious discussions of territorial policy through an analogy concerning medical disagreement.[8] Professor Eliav Schochetman cited Eliyahu’s ruling that, when doctors disagreed about the course a patient should take, the status quo should be maintained.[8] Schochetman applied this reasoning to disagreement among military experts over the prudence of exchanging land for peace.[8] The application was Schochetman’s use of Eliyahu’s medical ruling within a wider rabbinic debate over territorial concessions.[8]

Eliyahu’s involvement with Jewish mystical learning included meetings with the Lubavitcher Rebbe.[9] A study in Hakirah recounts that, during a 1984 meeting with Eliyahu and Shapira, the Rebbe urged the chief rabbis to issue a public call encouraging Jews to study the mystical parts of Torah.[9] The study further recounts that the Rebbe returned to the request at a meeting in 1989 and expressed disappointment that it had not been carried out.[9]

Territorial questions became a sustained part of Eliyahu’s public activity.[1][3] He opposed returning territory that he regarded as part of the Land of Israel, considered parts of southern Lebanon and Syria Jewish territory, and supported the First Lebanon War, which he called a “war of religious duty.”[3] At a Jerusalem-focused conference in Safed on January 27, 2001, he said that an agreement relinquishing parts of the Land of Israel would be “void and null from the outset,” comparing it to “a broken shard.”[10] About 1,000 Galilee residents attended the conference, along with retired military officers Effi Eitam and Meir Dagan and Safed mayor Yosef Oz.[10]

During the debate preceding the 2005 Gaza disengagement, he vocally opposed removing Jews from their homes and uprooting Jewish communities in Gaza.[1] His instructions to security personnel distinguished between different forms of nonparticipation.[11] He advised reservists to request release from service and to tell their commanders that they could not carry out evacuation orders; he described accepting imprisonment rather than participating as meritorious.[11] For conscripts, he advised entering a family’s home, sitting on the floor, and refraining from action.[11] He also said not to dismantle the army or use force against soldiers or settlers, and permitted road-blocking only when an alternative route remained available.[11]

In a later 2005 interview concerning the evacuations from Gaza and the northern West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria — Eliyahu said that he regretted advising settlers not to resist.[12] He said that he would urge soldiers and police to refuse orders in a future withdrawal, opposed settlers leaving voluntarily, and expected Israel to return to Gush Katif.[12] He also argued that a united religious political front could have prevented the evacuation.[12]

Following the 2008 attack on the Mercaz Harav seminary, Eliyahu urged the government to establish a yeshiva and a township for each life lost.[13] At a rally for religious-Zionist youths marking the attack’s 30-day anniversary, he identified establishing yeshivas and settlements, approving outposts, and encouraging the national birth rate as the government’s most important mission.[14] About 8,000 youths attended that rally.[14]

His later years were marked by serious illness. After suffering a heart attack, Eliyahu underwent emergency bypass surgery. Two weeks later, he collapsed during a follow-up examination, was resuscitated, and suffered a mild stroke.[15][16] His condition later stabilized, and in January 2009 he returned to his Jerusalem office, visited Torah institutions that he chaired, spoke with students, and gave a lesson.[15] His associates expressed hope that he would resume his weekly broadcasts to Jews in Israel and abroad.[15] He later suffered a relapse and died at Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center on June 7, 2010, aged 81, after a prolonged hospitalization.[3][16]

More than 100,000 mourners attended Eliyahu’s funeral in Jerusalem.[2] Chief rabbis Shlomo Amar and Yona Metzger spoke at the funeral, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed sorrow at the loss of a major rabbinic leader.[2] Netanyahu called Eliyahu “a foremost spiritual leader of religious Zionism.”[17] Metzger described him as a pillar of the Chief Rabbinate and said that his modest home had been open to every person seeking a sympathetic ear and understanding.[17]

His standing within religious Zionism had nevertheless changed over time.[3] During the development of the Oslo process in the 1990s and following the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, Eliyahu and Shapira gradually lost influence, while the National Religious Party distanced itself from their positions.[3] At his death, however, Eliyahu remained a leading religious-Zionist rabbi whose authority also extended into some Haredi, Sephardi, and Ashkenazi circles.[3] His influence thus continued beyond the period when he and Shapira exercised their strongest collective leadership over the religious-Zionist political camp.[3]

His published works and broadcast lessons formed another part of his religious legacy.[1] Darkhei Taharah reached readers in five languages, while his annotated legal manual, prayer book, and pamphlets addressed other aspects of Jewish observance.[1] The Monday lessons brought his teaching to listeners through radio, the Internet, and satellite, with the satellite network reaching 250 Israeli localities.[1] His reputation as a halakhic authority was accompanied by a role as a source of personal counsel.[1][17]

Eliyahu was the father of Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu and the grandfather of Rabbi Amichai Eliyahu.[18] His family also appeared in a children’s comic based on his life, Aviham shel Yaldei Yisrael, translated as The Father of the Children of Israel.[19] A 2011 report described the book as presenting ten stories and including his wife and his sons Shmuel and Shlomo Ben-Eliyahu.[19] Its account began with the young Mordechai, aged 11, selling lupines in a market.[19]

The comic’s stories portrayed his religious judgment through encounters outside Israel as well as episodes from his youth.[19] One narrative placed him with a family in Argentina, where a guest tried to embarrass the host over donations to Reform Jews.[19] In the story, Eliyahu responded with an anecdote about a French Reform synagogue where his group needed two additional people for a prayer quorum.[19] When a Reform rabbi asked why a maintenance worker could participate but he could not, Eliyahu reportedly replied that the worker was present only for money, prompting the rabbi’s answer, “So am I.”[19]

Another story concerned a man in Italy whose wife faced a possible childbirth complication.[19] The narrative recounts that Eliyahu advised against an operation recommended by doctors, that the doctors objected to his intervention from Israel, and that the birth ended well.[19] Both episodes belong to the biographical stories retold in the comic and illustrate the kinds of personal encounters through which his life was presented to young readers.[19]

Eliyahu’s involvement in Brit HaKanaim included more than membership: he helped recruit participants, raise funds, locate places to store weapons, and approve some activities.[3] The underground set fire to missionary institutions and cars traveling on Shabbat.[3] Later political positions included calling for pardons for members of the Jewish Underground.[3]

His positions on property transactions and religious pluralism also attracted criticism.[3][20] He prohibited Jews from selling or renting homes to Muslims and Christians.[3] In a 1987 presentation, Yehoshafat Harkabi criticized his prohibition on selling even one flat to gentiles, questioning the absence of reciprocity if Jews expected non-Jews abroad to sell property to them.[20] A January 1987 report connected Eliyahu’s statement that “there is no freedom of worship for Jews in Israel” with his condoning the interruption of a Reform Simchat Torah service in Jerusalem’s Baka neighborhood.[21] The Orthodox rabbi who led the interruption later apologized to the Reform rabbi, and the two publicly embraced.[21]

Eliyahu also called for a synagogue on the Temple Mount taller than the mosques there.[3] Beginning in September 1996, Palestinians explained construction of the Marwani prayer hall in Solomon’s Stables as an effort to forestall an initiative by Eliyahu to establish a synagogue at that location; this was their stated explanation, not an independently established account of the construction’s purpose.[22]

In a 2007 radio interview, he said that Holocaust victims were innocent but connected the Holocaust to Reform Judaism’s origins in Germany, referring to divine wrath that did not distinguish between righteous and wicked.[23] Reform movement members, including Holocaust survivors, filed a police complaint and condemned his remarks.[23] One complainant characterized them as tantamount to Holocaust denial, and the report left any decision about indictment to the attorney general.[23] At a 2008 memorial for victims of the Mercaz Harav attack, Eliyahu also declared that “the life of one yeshiva boy is worth more than the lives of 1,000 Arabs.”[13]

His views on women’s religious education generated a further public disagreement.[24] In a 2007 article, he argued that women should not study Gemara in the same manner as men, identifying education as their principal role and recommending study of relevant laws and faith.[24] He allowed selected Talmud passages on subjects relevant to women.[24] Rachel Keren, chair of the religious women’s forum Kolech, responded by defending women’s access to every area of Torah study.[25]

Accounts of his position on organ donation require distinctions between recognizing brain death, supporting organ donation, and signing a particular donor card. A 2018 account states that Eliyahu and Shapira ruled in 1987 that Jewish law recognized brain death, helping make organ donation possible under specified conditions.[26] A 2010 obituary reported that Eliyahu advised against signing a donor card, while a contemporaneous eulogy quoted Kadima as saying that his concern for others led him to support organ donation.[27][17] The available reports do not fully explain the apparent difference between these positions. Likewise, the personal stories circulated in the children’s comic were not separately corroborated in the report describing them and should be understood as biographical narratives rather than independently verified episodes.[19]