Jewish Excommunication: How and Why.

23 Menachem Av 5786

Establishing courts of justice is a Divine command that obligates the entirety of humanity, but Jews are supposed to set the example.  Without some system of justice, the world breaks down into pure chaos and it is the innocents who suffer the most.

Rule is supposed to be established from top to bottom, but justice is carried out from the bottom up, starting within the local communities, with appeals rising upwards as needed.

It begins with each one of us.  If a predator is known to live among us, the first thing our instincts tell us to do is put up a barrier between us, our loved ones and them.  Distance them.  We don't invite them in or just ignore the threat they pose to us.  Beyond that it becomes the responsibility of the community.

Despite the fact that the anti-Torah regime that rules in Eretz Yisrael has legalized what the Torah forbids, there is still the possibility of acting at the individual, as well as the local communities, level in order to "remove the evil from your midst."

This phrase appears first in this week's parashat Re'eh (Devarim 13. 1-.6, 13 - 16)...

The entire word that I command you, that shall you observe to do; you shall not add to it and you shall not subtract from it.

If there should stand up in your midst a prophet or a dreamer of a dream, and he will produce to you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes about, of which he spoke to you, saying, "Let us follow gods of others that you did not know and we shall worship them!" - do not hearken to the words of that prophet or to that dreamer of a dream, for Hashem, your God, is testing you to know whether you love Hashem, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul.  

Hashem, your God, shall you follow and Him shall you fear; His commandments shall you observe and to His voice shall you hearken; Him shall you serve and to Him shall you cleave.  And that prophet and that dreamer of a dream shall be put to death, for he had spoken perversion against Hashem, your God, Who takes you out of the land of Egypt, and Who redeems you from the house of slavery, to make you stray from the path on which Hashem, your God, has commanded you to go; and you shall destroy the evil from your midst.

...If, in one of your cities that Hashem, your God, gives you in which to dwell, you hear, saying, "Lawless men have emerged from your midst, and they have caused the dwellers of their city to go astray, saying, 'Let us go and worship the gods of others, that you have not knkown'" - you shall seek out and investigate, and inquire well, and behold!  It is true, the word is correct, this abomination was committed in your midst. You shall....

As far as I can tell, this phrase appears only in Sefer Devarim and this is the first instance.

• Devarim 13:5:   Regarding false prophets trying to turn people away from God.
• Devarim 17:7:   Regarding individuals who worship other gods.
• Devarim 17:12: Regarding anyone who refuses to listen to the judge or priest.
• Devarim 19:19: Regarding a malicious witness who plots against another.
• Devarim 21:21: Regarding a stubborn and rebellious son.
• Devarim 22:21, 24: Regarding sexual immorality and violations of marriage laws.
• Devarim 24:7:   Regarding kidnapping a fellow Israelite to sell them

Remember, we are not responsible for things we have no power or opportunity to do, but we are most assuredly held responsible for what we are capable of doing but fail to do.

No death penalty can be applied without the Sanhedrin and in the absence of the Beit Hamikdash.  But, cutting an individual out of the life of the community, ignoring him and acting as if he no longer existed could serve the same purpose.  And this is precisely the tool that Jews used in the Diaspora to deal with people who posed a spiritual threat to their communities.  Like, it was the least that they could do.  

(Jewish Encyclopedia)  EXCOMMUNICATION (Hebrew: Niddui, Herem)

The highest ecclesiastical censure, the exclusion of a person from the religious community, which among the Jews meant a practical prohibition of all intercourse with society.

...Although developed from the Biblical ban, excommunication, as employed by the Rabbis during Talmudic times and during the Middle Ages, is really a rabbinic institution, its object being to preserve the solidarity of the nation and strengthen the authority of the Synagogue by enforcing obedience to its mandates.

...The Talmud speaks of twenty-four offenses punishable by excommunication.... 

First on that list is Humiliating Torah Scholars and the Punishment of Excommunication.

The Rambam (Chapter 6 of Hilchot Talmud Torah) states: “It is a grave sin to degrade Torah scholars or to hate them. Jerusalem was only destroyed once people humiliated Torah scholars, as the verse states (Divrei Ha’Yamim 36), ‘And they mocked the messengers of G-d and despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of Hashem rose up against his people till there was no remedy.’” This means that the people would mock those who studied the word of Hashem, i.e. Torah scholars, and this caused Hashem great anger until He eventually allowed for Jerusalem to be destroyed.

The Mishnah (Sanhedrin 90a) states: “The following individuals do not have a share in the World to Come: One who says that the Resurrection of the Dead is not derived from the Torah, that the Torah is not from Heaven, and an apostate.” The Gemara (ibid. 99b) states that both Rav and Rabbi Chanina explained that “an apostate” refers to one who degrades Torah scholars. Thus, one who humiliates Torah scholars has no share in the World to Come.

If one humiliates a Torah scholar and then two witness come before a Bet Din and testify that this was the case, Bet Din publicly excommunicates the individual and he charged with a heavy fine. According to the letter of the law, if a Torah scholar is degraded by an individual, the Torah scholar himself may place an excommunication on the guilty party and the excommunication takes effect at which point the entire nation who may not be Torah scholars like the one who placed the excommunication to treat the excommunicated party with the appropriate laws, such as not counting him as part of a Minyan and not sitting within a four Amot radius, until the Torah scholar forgives the individual and releases the excommunication.

Utilizing the Niddui or Herem is a real and valid (Torah-based) and effective way to "remove the evil from your midst."  It can't be that for 22 years, "Evangelical" Chr*stians with the declared goals of 1) "making the two one" (i.e. Jews and gentiles) and 2) spreading their evil cultic religion from a "base of operations" established inside a Jewish "religious" community with the hechsher of its rabbi, will continue any longer without some kind of denial from the righteous Jews among them,  

The obligation and the responsibility begins from the target and spreads outward.  It requires action from the residents of Har Brachah and failing that, then their closest neighboring communities.  And whomever is the senior rabbi to the one over Har Brachah or the Av Beit Din for that area should be petitioned to act.

The goal is that the Jews will understand the gravity of what they have allowed to be perpetrated and the severity of the punishment awaiting them if they don't repent and they will remove the evil (HaYovel/Israel Guys) from their midst.

Refusal to act is not an option.  The sword is already at the neck.