Showdown in Crown Heights - religion vs. government

While everyone is focused on the heated debate over the future of the U.S. presidency, there’s an even more heated debate brewing - over the future of Crown Heights’ status as a Jewish community!

You see - a Jewish community has certain Halachic responsibilities.

Residents, collectively, are obligated to (see sources below) -

1. build a synagogue;

2. purchase holy books for communal study - Torah, Nivi’im, K’suvim, and Gemaras;

3. build a wall, gates, and lock for the city;

4. tend to all needs of the city (like hiring a chazan);

5. commission teachers for school children;

The last item listed here is rather dire, as Shulchan Aruch* mandates:

M’lamdei tinokos must be designated and effectuated in every single city. Any city in which there is no teacher for children - the residents of the city should be excommunicated until they appoint and engage a teacher. If they did not commision teachers, the city is to be destroyed, for the world exists solely on the merit of the air of the mouths of school children.**

In Crown Heights, however, some Jewish schools may consider themselves private enterprises. This has been expressed recently by both the board of directors of the largest school in the community, as well as by a representative of the Beis Din!

The message was conveyed several weeks ago, in the wake of schools barring children from school unless their parents consent to weekly covid testing. Both local doctors as well as the CDC opined that the testing is unnecessary and unwarranted. Hundreds of parents voiced their vehement opposition to the said coerced testing, and the largest of the schools retorted that their school is a private enterprise, and can and will do all that it sees fit for its financial interests. As mentioned, a community rabbi concurred with this right, stating emphatically that the school is not answerable to the community.

Could it be that the rabbi and the school board of directors were misunderstood? If not, then the “community” needs to ask itself a serious, introspective question:

Are we in fact a Jewish community?

Are we keeping our Halachic responsibilities as one?

It’s time for the community to band together for the sake of our children and grandchildren, to see to it that every Jewish child in this neighborhood receives a religious education, without any governmental intervention or political maneuvering.

It’s time to voice your opinion - before it’s too late.

There are two pressing issues:

1. Very soon, schools are poised to implement New York regents’ new minimal requirements for secular studies, and employing instructors approved by the state. Over a century ago, Lubavitch fought governmental agencies in Czarist Russia from mandating secular studies in Jewish schools - and now is no different. Can our schools, who need to comply with all government mandates, stand up against this decree?

Is our childrens’ religious education at risk?

2. In merely a few short weeks or less, schools are poised to oust children whose parents refuse to subject them to a new and untested covid vaccine, although polls show that around half of all Americans are reluctant or in opposition. Doctors have also expressed their fears and qualms. (Even worse, school administrations may be forced to administer the vaccine to children in schools, as implicated by federal and state laws***). Can our yeshivas, forced to comply with all government dictates, stand up against this new interference?

Hamaaseh hu ha’ikar. It seems that there is no other choice but to recommend the following actions for concerned community members:

1. To elect additional rav or rabbonim, who will represent the community in its quest for unadulterated Torah education for its youth. An election is imperative, for the Beis Din recently lost a member, R”L, and furthermore, in reference to chinuch, the present rav has declared himself a nogeiya bidavar, lacking impartiality, because, as he explained, he himself has children in school, and can therefore not rule in the above matter of utmost essence and importance to our community.

2. To elect new vaad hakahal, new political activists, who will represent the community in its desperate need for unhindered and unadulterated Torah education of its youth.

3. To appoint a vaad hachinuch, to represent the community in its moral obligation for the unimpeded Torah education of its youth. The only hope for achieving such education, it seems, is to wean schools off government funding. The formation of such a vaad could assist in raising and appropriating funds, to help cover new deficits.  

Or, alternatively,

4. To insist on the formation of new mosdos chinuch, which will serve the community to provide an unadulterated and unobstructed Torah education for all children, notwithstanding political or financial expediency.

But before all else,

5. To communicate your concerns to the schools, and demand transparency in the above matters. Do this now, before you find out that your child’s course descriptions have suddenly changed mid-year or that he has suddenly been vaccinated by third party operatives, without your or your family doctor’s consent.

Sources:

Shulchan Aruch Yoreh De’ah siman 245 sif 7. Orach Chaim siman 150 sif 1 (and Magen Avraham s”k 1). Choshen Mishpat siman 163 sif 1.

שו"ע יו"ד סי' רמ"ה ס' ז': "מושיבין מלמדי תינוקות בכל עיר ועיר. וכל עיר שאין בה מלמד תינוקות, מחרימין אנשי העיר עד שיושיבו מלמד תינוקות. ואם לא השיבו, מחריבין העיר, שאין העולם מתקיים אלא בהבל פיהם של תינוקות של בית רבן".

שו"ע או"ח סי' ק"נ ס"א: "כופין בני העיר זה את זה לבנות בית הכנסת, ולקנות להם תורה נביאים וכתובים" (מגן אברהם ס"ק א' - "...עכשיו מחויבים גם לקנות גמרות ללמד בהם לקטנים וגדולים…")

שו"ע חו"מ סי' קס"ג ס' א': "כופין בני העיר זה את זה (אפי' מיעוט כופין את המרובין) לעשות חומה דלתים ובריח לעיר ולבנות להם בית הכנסת ולקנות ספר תורה נביאים וכתובים כדי שיקרא בהם כל מי שירצה מן הצבור.

הגה: וה"ה לכל צרכי העיר וע' בא"ח סי' נ"ה דין שכירות חזן לבני העיר…"

* Yoreh De’ah Ibid.

** “School children” in this paragraph refers to male students. Community responsibility for female students in a Halachic sense is not the scope of this article.

*** Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment and NY State Senate Bill S7919