hmmmm

I wonder if there is a tactic in play here.

The Perry Committee has been meeting to formulate a plan for "equality of service", that would deal with all the issues of increasing the number of haredim drafted into the army, and making those exempt due to learning Torah the exception rather than the rule. It was looking like the decisions to be presented to the Knesset would be fairly harsh, and the Haredi parties and askanim were gearing up for a battle.

Sure enough, at least based on what I read in the Mishpacha newspaper over Shabbos, at the last minute the Perry committee has decided to sfoten up their decisions a bit. The "decrees" won't be as harsh as originally planned. There was a list of changes, such as the institutions being sanctioned for not meeting the right numbers of draftees produced rather than personal sanctions, the target numbers were lowered a bit, etc.

I think I am seeing a pattern here.

The past few weeks had all the talks of general budget cuts and especially budget cuts applied to the haredi community, to the haredi educational systems. The picture painted was that the budget cuts would be very harsh on the haredi community. If it was being painted as harsh by the Finance Minister and his people, from the side of the haredim it was being painted as much worse. Yet, at the last minute things were changed, some budget cuts were canceled, some delayed, some altered. And it passed with little serious opposition. it seems that the Haredim, while smarting from the cuts, figured they had at least lessened the damage and it could now be lived with.

And now the same is being done with the issue of the draft. Talk was of very harsh changes, "decrees" as they are being called in the haredi media, and at the last minute things are being changed, decrees are softened, the decisions are made more palatable.

It might be in my mind alone, but I suspect that this is a tactic being used. By talking everything up and making it look really bad, when they come in and soften things at the last minute, both sides get satisfaction out of the conclusion and it passes easier.

As you can see here, Rav David Bar-Hayim, head of the Bet Ha'Vaad Beis Din in Jerusalem (he spells things differently - I am spelling it more phonetically practical for your ease of reading) has come out with his long awaited psak.

Rav Bar-Hayim holds that the decree against eating kitniyot is a ban that should be repealed.

Discussing the custom he says, "According to Rav Bar-Hayim, the custom grew up in some Jewish communities during the Exile, but no one is quite sure how it began or why. Some say it started in Medieval Europe as a response to sometimes finding wheat grains in sacks of rice. This is a problem, as rice cannot become Chametz (leavened) whereas wheat certainly can--and the consumption of Chametz is strictly forbidden during Pesah by the Torah. Others have suggested that it was to avoid confusion with the five grains that can become Chametz.

"This was a localized custom in parts of Germany, which later moved eastwards to Poland and Russia with the waves of Jewish emigration", states Rav Bar-Hayim. "The explanations offered for the custom are unconvincing. You don't find wheat in rice today. It was never accepted by Jews worldwide. Whatever the origin of the custom, Ashkenazi Jewish commentators have struggled to find good reasons for the ban. Some authorities, such as Rabbenu Yeruham, called it a ‘foolish custom'".

Over time, more and more items were arbitrarily added to the list: beans and peas, and more recently soya beans and even peanuts. Few Ashkenazi Jews today would eat peanuts or use peanut oil on Pesah, but as recently as 40 years ago peanuts were permitted by all Rabbinical authorities. Often there were economic interests at work behind the scenes, pushing for ever more stringent definitions of Kitniyoth, in order to create a market for a particular product. Products that were previously kosher were banned. Very expensive oils such as walnut oil replaced other oils that were previously acceptable and the focus of the holiday shifted from avoiding Chametz to avoiding Kitniyoth.

"We learn from the Mishnah and the Talmud that customs are connected to a particular place. When one moves permanently to another locality, one is to adopt the local custom," explains Rav Bar-Hayim. "The custom of abstaining from eating Kitniyoth during Pesah has never been the prevailing practice among all Jews in Erets Yisrael, and is therefore not binding upon Jews living in Israel. A person may choose to continue adhering to his custom, but no one has the right to enforce his custom on others."

According to the ruling, the variety of customs forbidding different foods creates divisiveness that the Torah prohibits. "The Torah specifically instructs us not to act in a divisive fashion; the Jews in a particular place should follow the same customs" says Rav Bar-Hayim. "This is the opinion of Rambam and other authorities who state that we should not have more than one beth din (religious court) or groups practicing different customs in the same city. This leads to a lack of societal cohesion. Today we see that this is all too true. We hope that this ruling will serve as the beginning of a process that will unite the Jewish People.""

I like the idea behind it. Over the years we have become more and more machmir as to what is considered kitniyot. As he writes, many items are no longer used today despite never having been included in the ban.

Some of Rav Bar-Hayim's talmidim will eat kitniyot this year, I am sure. I am not a talmid of his and will therefore continue refraining from eating kitniyot, until my rabbonim decide otherwise.

But who knows - maybe this psak of Rav Bar-Hayim's will open the file on kitniyot and spur halachik debate among the rabbonim on the issue. Maybe this is the beginning of a general change.

Rabbi Yitzchak Adlerstein has posted a good article on Cross Currents questioning whether the recent "Bais Yaakov edicts" coming from the gedolim in Israel are appropriate for the Jewish community in America or not.