Bridging the Divide  

Rav David Lau is in the final month of his ten-year term as Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel. He leaves his post with so many existential issues facing the country still unresolved: the war to uproot Hamas from Gaza, the continuing protests in Tel Aviv, the lack of a draft law for chareidi yeshivah students. But through it all, his charge has been clear: The role of the chief rabbi is to reach each and every Jew

The haunting scene took place just before our interview in the Chief Rabbi’s office. A young war widow, whose soldier husband died without leaving children, had arrived for the chalitzah ceremony.

Over the past six months, the once-rare rite has tragically become commonplace. Until October 7, chalitzah would normally be performed before the dayanim in the Great Rabbinical Court of Appeals. But Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Rav David Lau noticed that the widows felt awkward in that setting. So he began offering to host the ceremony in his office, lighting a memorial candle and explaining that chalitzah is a kind of farewell, an extension of the Jewish practice of sitting shivah.

When the widow who arrived before our interview was asked to lean against the wall, she leaned against a pillar on which the picture of Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach ztz”l has hung for the past decade.

“Rav Shlomo Zalman, whose boundless love of the Torah, Am Yisrael, and the soldiers putting their lives on the line were all closely linked, would have happily deferred and considered it a great zechus,” said Rav Lau, removing the picture from the pillar.