Posted on 01/04/2013 1:37:22 PM PST by NYer
JERUSALEM, January 3, 2013, (LifeSiteNews.com) - Israel’s two chief rabbis have again issued a letter to all synagogue and community rabbis urging them to condemn abortion and to support the work of Efrat, the country’s pro-life organization.
In stronger language than they have used in their previous messages, Chief Rabbi of Israel Yona Metzger and Chief Sephardic Rabbi of Israel Shlomo Amar called the killing of the child in the womb “murder.”
“As in past,” the letter reads, “we call on all rabbis in Israel” to “raise in their words and sermons in synagogues…the severe prohibition of abortion.”
The chief rabbis called for an increased effort in making the wider public aware of the extreme seriousness involved in killing fetuses, which is like actual murder.
The chief rabbis time their letters condemning abortion to coincide with the reading of a portion of the Torah (Parashat) known as Shemot, which describes the genocidal attack on Hebrew newborn boys by the Egyptian pharaoh, and the efforts of the Hebrew midwives to save them.
Last year the rabbis wrote they were working to encourage births among the Jewish people and to prevent unnecessary abortions.
In previous years, the chief rabbis focused their letter on a passage of the Talmud, which states, “The redemption does not take place until all the souls are brought out of their storing place.” This, they say, means that widespread abortion in Israel is delaying the coming of the messiah.
Abortion in Israel is “a real epidemic, as tens of thousands of Jewish souls are being lost each year,” they wrote. “In addition to the enormity of the transgression, it is also delaying redemption.”
Abortions in Israel are authorized by hospital committees, but their approval criteria is quite broad: Abortions are allowed in cases of rape, incest, adultery, if the woman is under 17 years of age or over 40, if the woman’s health is at risk, or if the baby is suspected to have a physical or mental handicap. Such broad parameters have essentially established abortion on demand.
Such a view is possible, because most Jewish teachers do not teach that the inviolable right to life begins at conception but varies according to development and circumstance.
Dr. Eli Schussheim, director of Efrat, has pointed out that the demographic implications of abortion in Israel make it one of the nation’s greatest dangers.
“Israel has lost more than one and a half million Jewish children to abortion since 1948. In a country of about 5.5 million Jews, this number has great demographic significance. Imagine how much stronger Israel would have been today with one million more Jews,” a statement from Efrat says.
Rabbis Metzger and Amar praised the efforts of Efrat to help women contemplating abortion by providing emotional and material support.
We see great importance in the work of the Efrat association to save the lives of Jewish children,” the rabbis wrote. “Over its 30 years of activity, tens of thousands of fetuses were saved, and in the past year alone, the lives of 4,000 children were saved.
They also urged that, every rabbi who holds a conference on abortion or birth, or acts on this issue in any forum, should invite Efrat chairman Dr. Eli Schussheim to participate in the event, or consult with him as the countrys leading expert in this field, since it has been proved that [Efrat] actually saves lives.”
Ping!
FYI ping!
Ah, the lefties have another reason to help the muzzlems wipe Israel off the face of the earth. This may be the last straw. Now they have to be seething.
Agreed—Those liberal self-hating Jews are going to have an absolute fit about this.
Integrity, priceless...
Now if Israel were to stick to this and the rest of the world didn’t, in time the world would become more rightious as the leftus eliminated their family lines.
The price of foolishness can be steep.
They are right, ever abortion is first degree premeditated murder. If ever babies in the womb are considered human from the moment of conception, then anyone could use deadly force to protect them.
They are indeed orthodox rabbis, commanding varying degrees of respect in different subsets of orthodoxy, as they are actually political appointees. There is nothing novel or surprising or previously unknown about their stand on abortion.
Integrity? Given that as recently as a year ago, these gentlemen were only against "unnecessary" abortions, this looks more like practical demographics. With 1.5 million Jewish babies dead at the hands of their own mothers (in Israel alone), "never again" rings rather hollow.
I wonder what song the tone is ringing in the “Land of the Free” with 60,000,000 dead?
If youd like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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If youd like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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If youd like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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Evey Jew on this forum that I know believes that abortion is murder. I might go even farther than some because I hold to the old belief that murder is the ONE thing there can never be redemption from. Never. You abort your child and you forfeit your own eternal soul. Period.
God bless them.
Well, I agree that abortion is murder but with regards to your other point, there actually is a scripture that talks about what is forgiven and what is not. Praise God that even murder can be forgiven but there is something that cannot Matthew 12:31 Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.
I am a strict Old Testament Believer. The New Testament does not hold the same meaning for me as it does Christian Believers. Only I am responsible for my sins and no man or blood sacrifice can lift or absolve that sin from me.
My deeply held religious belief is that premeditated or coldblooded murder can never be forgiven in all of eternity. Your soul is already forfeit. That’s it. A murderer’s death is eternal death. That is the justification for the death penalty.
Suicide is premeditated murder as well. So if you murder yourself, there is no forgiveness. That is a paradox in Christianity to me.
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