TORONTO — Rabbi Benjamin (Benny) Lau, a leading voice of modern Orthodoxy in Israel, believes in “evolution, not revolution.”

When it comes to human rights, women’s rights, treatment of animals and
other issues not necessarily considered in the religious realm, Rabbi
Lau – the 47-year-old director of the Center for Judaism and Society as
well as the Institute for Social Justice, which he founded at Beit
Morasha of Jerusalem – is at the forefront precisely because of his
religious convictions, he said in a phone interview from Israel.

“It’s a big mistake in the Jewish world when rabbis feel their business is [only] the relationship between man and God,” he said. “It’s completely wrong. It’s a Jewish statement that to be a religious Jew means to care about your community and your state. We read the newspapers to see the real needs, and ask ourselves what the Torah has to say about them.””

“The Orthodox world can bring to the world new ideas, and they don’t need to break the rules [of Jewish law] to find the solutions,” Rabbi Lau said.

The rabbi – whose uncle, Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, was

Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel from 1993 to 2003 – will be in Toronto on the weekend of Nov. 8 for Torah in Motion’s seventh annual Renewing Our Spirit conference.

He will speak at three sessions, including the opening night panel titled “Is Jewish Unity a Myth? The Fragmentation of Orthodoxy in Israel and Beyond.” He will also be speaking in Montreal on the evening of Nov. 9.

Although the term modern Orthodoxy is used more often in a Diaspora context, Rabbi Lau typifies its philosophy.

“Modernity in the western world means I want to be part of human rights. I want to be in a position of democratic ideas, tolerance and pluralism. I am part of that, and at the same time I am Orthodox. It means I [accept] the law of the Jewish people… I don’t want to cut this line.”

Rabbi Lau said he is not the only Orthodox rabbi in Israel who believes that “we have to be part of modernity.”

An article in Ha’aretz last year noted that Rabbi Lau was willing to form an alternative beit din for conversion to Judaism, which would be more user-friendly than the existing ones that are controlled by haredi rabbis.

“Officially, steps have not been taken yet, but we are working very hard,” he told The CJN.

Regarding the current system, he said that “the ultra-Orthodox world put themselves in a very aggressive way against people who convert who are not 100 per cent religious. We saw that the religious high courts… closed the gates to thousands of people, most who come from Russia.”

Those olim, who identify as Jewish and made aliyah under the law of return, are not Jewish according to Jewish law because their mothers are not Jewish, he explained.

Rabbi Lau has said publicly that his uncle, as chief rabbi, “excelled in inaction in the conversion field.” Explaining that quote, which also appeared in the Ha’aretz article, the rabbi said that his uncle, with whom he said he has a close relationship, made a decision to focus on other areas and that his “partner” at the time, the Sephardi chief rabbi, Rabbi Eliyahu Bakshi-Doron, served as a strong positive force in dealing with conversion issues.

A proponent of ethical kashrut before the issues at Agriprocessors – the kosher meat processor in Postville, Iowa, that faces charges for alleged child labour and immigration violations – became commonly known, Rabbi Lau said that a teudat kashrut (certificate of kashrut) for restaurants in Israel refers to food only.

“It’s not enough,” he said. “If we want to go in and have a coffee, I want to check if the manager in the restaurant gives his waiters complete rights. I want to check that people with disabilities have the ability to go inside that restaurant. How can I as a religious Jew sit in a restaurant that my friends cannot go in?”

He said about 200 restaurants in Israel have a certificate of ethical kashrut from an NGO called Maaglei Tzedek (Circles of Justice) in partnership with Beit Morasha.

Similarly, Rabbi Lau said, he is working with Maaglei Tzedek to look at ways in which synagogues and yeshivot can be more inclusive.

He believes that change “will take many years… but we can see a bit here, a bit there.

“We need to be part of the process.”