More than being a spiritual-political leader, Rabbi Ovadia was a halakhic and ideological arbiter and guide, and this is the moral standard by which he is measured by the Jewish public in Israel and around the world. He carried on his back with responsibility and dedication, 'as a shepherd carries a suckling calf,' all the needs and hardships of the public in Israel and around the world, on both the physical and spiritual levels.
Rubinstein's decision is as porous as Swiss cheese.
He performed his role willingly, by choice, and with joy. The party served him only as a technical tool, through which he aspired and hoped to bring that will and wish to expression. That crowd of people who rushed to his funeral at short notice knew how to honor him for his Torah greatness on the one hand, and to acknowledge his deeds on his behalf on the other.
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But in the Israeli media, everything is measured through different lenses, airtight lenses and the feelings of the field. In her opinion, everything is measured by the index of enlightenment and liberalism, or to be more precise and call the child by its first name - in terms of flocking and bowing to peoples and their cultures.
She also knew how to give him grades for praise or disparagement according to his standing (according to their perspective) on that same scale of enlightenment and progress. The rabbi himself had one and only one standard: What does the Torah command us to do in such a case? What does God expect of me as a Torah arbiter and leader? And according to that alone he acted and decided, even on issues in which the media supposedly praised him.
So too is the halakhic concept, "Kuha Dehitra Adif" - which has become a worn-out coinage among people who do not have a minimal understanding of the literature of jurisprudence. "Kuha Dehitra Adif" is a concept that already appears in the Talmud and Mishnah, and is not at all an innovation of the Rabbi zt"l. However, for this purpose, extensive comprehensive knowledge and a complex ability to decide and rule on matters of law are indeed required, which few and far between have been blessed with.
Sincere and pure love
He loved every Jew not in a fake way from the outside, but with a sincere and pure love. Even when he scolded and rebuked, it was out of care and concern. It pained him that a million children and youth grow up without knowing and recognizing the basic concepts of their Judaism and their meaning such as; Shema Yisrael, and that is what he fought for.
However, the hypocritical Israeli media, which hailed and praised him for his 'enlightened' rulings in their eyes, condemned him for the others. The same media that searched day and night for any shred of information that might bother or serve as a weapon of attack against Netanyahu (even at the cost of political or economic damage), stormed with a flood of ignorant and ignorant rhetoric, whenever it found a suitable opportunity to lash out and incite against the 'dark and primitive rabbi', who chose to study the ancient books most of the time, with immense dedication for decades.
He was kind to them because, in accordance with what is said in that Torah - the Torah of Israel, he acted and did to unite the people of Israel and benefit them.
Who threw the Mizrahi on the side of the road?
For Rabbi Ovadia, the need to go to work and earn a living is a necessity, a derived existential reality, and not an obligation or a required sacred reality, and the same is true for military service. The study of the Holy Torah is of enormous ethical importance, tenfold greater than these necessities.
He advanced his flock far more than was ostensibly made possible by those vested interests who from the beginning threw the Mizrahi and religious public by the wayside, and systematically and consistently deprived them of the most basic elementary rights. He did not need your praise or approval, nor did he fear or shy away from any kind of media attack.
And the people? The people felt and sensed the truth. It will always emerge and rise from the cracks, even if it takes time for it to emerge and rise above consistent and persistent incitement campaigns. A million people in the streets of Jerusalem constituted, among other things, a public statement, which the media refused to internalize, of the standards and values by which a Jewish personality is judged even in our own day.
