Kosher Sex. That is the name of a book written by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. I haven’t read it so I have no opinion one way or the other. But I’m told that Chabad basically cut him off after it’s publication.
For the record, I have no problem with writing a book about sexual matters and Halacha. If that is what he did, then I am curious as to why he was ostracized by them. But that aside, the fact is he was. He has not, however, repudiated them. And he still venerates the late Lubavitcher Rebbe as he writes in this... yet another in the seemingly never ending topic on Dr. Noah Feldman. It makes me kind of wonder how Dr. Fledman feels about all the attention he’s getting in the media from Orthodox Jews. If he thought he was ignored by his alma mater by their airbrushing him and his wife out of a class reunion picture before, that has certainly been made up for now. He has been anything but ignored. Although much of the press has been negative.
That is not the case with Rabbi Boteach. I highly doubt that the kosher sex Rabbi Boteach writes about includes intermarriage. Yet he may be the only Orthodox rabbi who stands staunchly by his friend.
The argument he makes isn’t really that off base. As I originally wrote, I sympathize with his views. One might ask how that’s possible? After all, the criticism Dr. Feldman has received is well deserved. He is a public figure well respected by his peers and by the culture. And he was a pretty knowledgeable Jew, having been raised in a religious home and having attended an Orthodox school through high school. Does not one who intermarried under these circumstances deserve to be publicly condemned? I think so. How can I then sympathize with Rabbi Boteach’s approach? Let me see if I can better explain the conflict I feel on this issue.
It is one thing to understand some one who has little of no Jewish education. A man falls in love and follows his heart. As another Jew, Woody Allen once said about it when he divorced his wife to marry their adopted daughter, “The heart wants what it wants”. It is wrong and they may know it but they do not feel it or understand it.
When a knowledgeable Jew like Dr. Feldman does it, there is no real excuse. He knows better. Falling in love with a non Jew is a non starter for someone like this. It is a highly unlikely scenario. That Dr. Feldman let it happen is indicative at least to me, that he had already left observance. When a religious Jew does this, he deserves nothing but condemnation in the public arena.
Rabbi Boteach claims, however, that his approach to Dr. Feldman is that of the Lubavitcher Rebbe. That no matter what Averia a man does because of Taavah… desire. He is not to be ostracized.
I kind of share that view too... right along with the view that he deserves public condemnation. I do not think he ought to be completely ostracized. On a personal level one should take him at face value in the same way Rabbi Boteach says. If he is still inclined to some observance, then on a one to one basis, one ought to act in ways that encourage it while at the same time letting him know of our disapproval for what he did. And to make him aware why he is criticized publicly.
As Rabbi Boteach puts it, there are 613 Mitzvos. If one violates one of them, that does not mean we just throw him to the wolves. There is always a possibility and hope that his wife will convert at some point in the future
But I would disagree with the example that Rabbi Boteach uses to show how we accept people all the time who are not fully observant. He says that there are many people who need to remove their Yarmulkees at work and yet we acccept them without hesitation. Is he kidding?
Rav Moshe Feinstein was very clear about this. It is permitted. And in fact he Paskins that covering one's head is not really a Halacha at all but a Midas Chasidus, a sign of piety as I wrote not long ago. (It is a very strong Minhag today and has risen to great significance to Orthodox Jews so I am not advocating taking off one’s Yarmulkee in public, But it is not a Halacha.)
But even if it were a Halacha, it is certainly not to be treated in the same way intermarriage is. Rabbi Boteach’s comparison is silly. Can one compare eating chicken together with milk to murder? Both are Halacha. Comparing intermarriage to wearing a Yarmulkee is just as silly. But that should not make one lose sight of the point he made which I think is a reasonable one.
There is one thing that bothers me greatly about Dr. Feldman that was not addressed by Rabbi Boteach.. Dr. Feldman slipped in some misleading and embarrassing facts about Judaism. It was presented is an unforgivable way, in my view. The subject is the comparative way in which Jews and non Jews are viewed in Halacha with respect to matters of life and death on Shabbos. His presentation was very misleading and irrelevant. Halacha, Jewish law is very clear. Both Jews and non Jews are treated alike. Does it really matter how our sages arrived at this Halacha? It is practice we should be concerned with, not how a Halacha was developed. Yet Dr. Feldman chose to focus on a disparity without even attempting to explain it. That is unforgivable.
When Dr. Feldman was asked about it, he responded by saying that in this age of instant information we couldn’t keep the theology out of the discussion. Better to bring it out in the open and deal with it. He’s right about that. The only problem is that he just brought it out into the open. He did not deal with it in any way except to embarrass us. But Rabbi Yitzchak Addlerstein did so brilliantly and I highly recommend reading his article at cross-currents.
