RCA Members to Open "Orthodox": It's your fault!

Did you see the letter from a bunch of RCA members to the leaders of Open Orthodoxy? It’s great! They basically say that while YCT and their followers claim everyone is ganging up on them, it’s really their fault for crossing the line of what is acceptable.

Oh, and rebdoniel, enjoy – when I used Google to find the original source of the article, I found a site which most people here aren’t big fans of, who thanked you for tipping him off about this letter. I’m guessing you don’t exactly approve of it.

Here’s the full text of the letter:

We, the undersigned rabbis, representing three generations of American Orthodox leadership, are deeply concerned at the many ways in which Open Orthodox rabbis and leaders have divided the Orthodox community by unilaterally violating normative Orthodox laws, customs and traditions.

All of us are members in good standing or identify with the Rabbinical Council of America, an organization associated with the Orthodox mainstream. We are devoted to bringing people closer to tradition through authentic Torah teaching and practice, not to reading people out of it.

But if Open Orthodoxy’s leaders feel some distance developing between themselves and mainstream Orthodoxy, they should not be blaming others. They might consider how they themselves have plunged ahead, again and again, across the border that divides Orthodoxy from neo-Conservatism. Why are they surprised to find themselves on the wrong side of a dividing line?

Rabbi Elie Abadie, M.D.

Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein

Rabbi Yisroel Bendelstein

Rabbi Heshy Blumstein

Rabbi Kenneth Brodkin

Rabbi Chaim Crupar

Rabbi Ephraim Epstein

Rabbi Ilan D. Feldman

Rabbi Dov Fischer

Rabbi Arie Folger

Rabbi Cary Friedman

Rabbi Dr. Barry Freundel

Rabbi Shaul Gold

Rabbi Jay H. Goldberg

Rabbi Chaim Goldberger

Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer

Rabbi Howard Katzenstein

Rabbi Hillel Klavan

Rabbi Eric Kotkin

Rabbi Louis Langer

Rabbi Phil Lefkowitz

Rabbi Yaakov Luban

Rabbi Jacob B. Mendelson

Rabbi Yerachmiel Morrison

Rabbi Yehuda L. Oppenheimer

Rabbi Steven Pruzansky

Rabbi Mitchell Rocklin

Rabbi Gidon Rothstein

Rabbi Larry Rothwachs

Rabbi Eliyahu Safran

Rabbi Fabian Schonfeld

Rabbi Yoel Schonfeld

Rabbi Dov Schreier

Rabbi Max Schreier

Rabbi David Shabtai, M.D.

Rabbi Shmuel Singer

Rabbi Zecharia Sionit

Rabbi Leonard Steinberg

Rabbi Gil Student

Rabbi Neal Turk

Rabbi Yaakov Wasser

Rabbi Elisha Weiss