Who’s Your Messiah?
That’s the question raised in a Jerusalem Post article about an immigrant from the former Soviet Union who came to Israel under its Law of Return and was interested in converting to Judaism. While the rabbis were impressed with his religious observance, the problem came when they started asking him questions prompted by his affiliation with the Chabad Hasidic sect, which tends toward the belief that its late rebbe is the messiah.
The Post reports:
Prof. Binyamin Ish-Shalom, head of the Joint Institute for Jewish Studies, where the young man prepared for his conversion, said that the rabbinic court, impressed with the high level of adherence exhibited by the young man, was on the verge of converting him.
“Suddenly, one of the rabbinic judges asked him if he believed that the rebbe [Schneerson] was the messiah,” recounted Ish-Shalom.
“He answered, ‘Yes, that’s what I’ve been taught,’ or something like that. And that was it; at least one of the judges refused to convert him.”
Ish-Shalom rejected the notion that believing the deceased Schneerson was the messiah constituted a form of forbidden worship.
However, a source in the State Conversion Authority said that at least two leading religious Zionist rabbis ruled that messianic Chabad was beyond the pale of normative Jewish belief.
“They [messianic Chabad Hassidim] attribute to him supernatural powers years after he passed away. That is not Judaism. It’s something else.”
Read the full article.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
