Haaretz, Arutz Sheva and the Jerusalem Post all report on yesterday's decision by Israel's High Court of Justice that effectively forced the country's Chief Rabbinate to adopt a more liberal interpretation of rules governing agriculture in the country during this Sabbatical year. In the past, Orthodox rabbis in Israel have permitted the sale of produce grown on land technically "sold" to a non-Jew during the year in which Jewish-owned land in Israel is supposed to lie fallow according to religious law. This year, however, the Chief Rabbinate deferred to local rabbis, some of whom refused to certify as kosher produce grown under this legal loophole (known as "heter mechira"). (See prior posting.)
The 3-judge panel of the High Court ordered the Chief Rabbinate to exercise its authority to authorize kashrut certificates for produce grown under heter mechira. In the lawsuit filed by the Plants Production and Marketing Board, the Israel Farmers Federation, and a group of farmers and marketers, the High Court criticized the informal telephone poll that the Chief Rabbinate used to change its prior policy. The court also said that the Rabbinate's had no authority to take this more stringent stance unnecessarily, that its new approch seriously harmed farmers' livelihood, leads to discrimination and results in inequality due to the high prices of produce. The Court, according to Justice Rubenstein, was not expressing a Halakhic (Jewish legal) opinion, but was instead ruling on the administrative validity of the decision by the Chief Rabbinate.
For those interested in following Israeli issues closely, Joel Katz has a new blog and weekly E-Newsletter, Religion and State In Israel. A link to it is also in the Religion Clause sidebar.
