In 1971, when he was 18 and studying at Yeshivat HaNegev, Yosef collected halakhic (Jewish law) rulings from the five volumes of then-in-print Yabia Omer [he], his father's responsa, and published them in a work called Yalkut Yosef. The book was published with his father's support and supervision. It is often considered one of his father's works, since not only is it a summary of his father's rulings, but the latter also went over it section by section and added his own comments. Yosef won the Rabbi Toledano Prize for Torah Literature [he] from the Tel Aviv Religious Council for his book Issur VeHeter, as well as the Rabbi Kook Prize for Torah Literature [he].
In 1973, upon his father's election as Chief Rabbi of Israel, they together established Yeshivat Hazon Ovadia [he] and its kollel (advanced studies department). In 1980, he and the rest of the first graduating class were ordained as rabbis and dayanim (rabbinic judges) by Shalom Messas and the chief rabbis of Israel. With the beginning of the second class, he was appointed head of the school.
In 1975, Yosef was appointed rabbi of Nes Harim and Mata, moshavim (villages) in the vicinity of Jerusalem. As part of his responsibilities, he taught classes on halakha several times a week and took care of other religious matters. He gave lectures and taught classes in the secular public schools and strengthened religious education there.
In 1992 Yosef expanded Hazon Ovadia to include a boys high school. This was necessary because of discord between the Sephardi Haredi and AshkenaziLitvakyeshiva communities.
On July 24, 2013, Yosef was elected as Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel and the Rishon LeZion, a position he would hold for a decade. The ceremony took place on August 14, 2013, at the official residence of the President of Israel.[5]
Through the death of Yosef's father, the Shas political party lost its spiritual leader. Having been elected Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Yosef appeared to be in a good position to inherit his father's mantle as Shas spiritual leader. However, his public position precluded such political activity by law. Until the election, he never held any formal public office.[6]
On August 21, 2013, Yosef released a psak halakha (ruling) stating it is an obligation and mitzvah (good deed) for parents to have their children vaccinated for polio virus.[7] In 2021, he endorsed the Alliance of Rabbis in Islamic States and serves as its halakhic guide.[8]
Yitzhak Yosef In Lag Ba'omer celebration 2024
Controversies
2016
In March 2016 Yosef called for religious Jews to keep their children away from secular or traditional members of their family because they could be a negative influence.[9][10][4]
Later that month, when Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot told military staff that rules of engagement must respect the law, and soldiers should not kill an attacker who has already been subdued, Yosef said soldiers must kill anyone who comes to attack them regardless of legal or military repercussions.[11] Later he said: "If they no longer have a knife, they must be put in prison for life until the [Jewish] Messiah comes and says who are Amalekites, and then we can kill them."[12][13]
He also said that according to Jewish law, gentiles "should not live in the Land of Israel" – unless they practice the Seven Laws of Noah, a set of universal moral laws. Should they refuse to do so, they should be sent to Saudi Arabia. He added that non-Jews are allowed in Israel to serve the Jewish population.[11][13][14][15] Leaders of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) condemned Yosef's statements and called for their retraction. Jonathan Greenblatt and Carole Nuriel of ADL Israel called the remarks ignorant and intolerant.[16] He was eventually pressured into retracting his comments.[15]
Controversy surrounds the authority of the Chief Rabbis in Israel, particularly on matters such as conversions, marriages, and rabbinic ordination. In 2016, it was discovered that the Chief Rabbis maintained a confidential list of approved and rejected beth dins (religious courts), causing further controversy as some Orthodox rabbis, including Avi Weiss and Yehoshua Fass, were included on the blacklist. This secretive process without external review or appeal led to confusion, and the situation was exacerbated when Orthodox rabbi Haskel Lookstein, and some of his students, were barred from officiating at marriages in Israel.[21][22][23][24][25][26][27]
Lookstein officiated Ivanka Trump's conversion, causing tensions between Israel and the US. David Lau opposed Yosef's policy on recognizing US converts, but the rules were eventually changed.[28][29][30][31][32]
In December, he said that it was "not the way of the Torah" for women to join the Israel Defense Forces or even sign up for Sherut Leumi (civilian national service): "All the great sages through the generations, including all Israel's chief rabbis, believe that it is forbidden for girls to go into the army... not just to the army – but to national service too."[33][34][35]
2017
In May 2017, Yosef compared secular women to animals because they dressed immodestly.[36][34][37][40]
2018
On March 18, 2018, Yosef allegedly likened people of black African descent to monkeys.[41][18][43] He was speaking on the topic of the Meshaneh HaBriyot bracha, translatable as "Blessed are you, Lord our God...who makes creatures different", in the Talmud[44] concerning the sight of an unusual creature, typically an animal, but also humans with congenital abnormalities. In the Talmud for MasekhetBerakhot (58b), there is debate over when to give this blessing for humans, and examples mentioned include "an (unusually) black, red, or white person, a giant, a dwarf, or one with spots".[45] In referring to black people, Yosef used the ancient term kushi, the term present in the Talmud. The term is considered derogatory in modern Hebrew,[46][47][48][49] but in the Talmud it is equivalent to simply saying "African" (see Kingdom of Kush). He said: "Seeing a black person, you say the blessing. What black person? One who had a white mother and father, and came out black. Not on every black person do you make a blessing. When you walk in the streets of America, every five minutes, you see a black person. Will you say on him the blessing? Rather, it only needs to be on a black person whose mother and father are white. If, you know, two people birth a monkey or something like that, then you say the Different Creatures blessing."[50][51] The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) tweeted that his comments were "utterly unacceptable".[39][18][53]
In January 2020, he was criticized for calling immigrants from the former Soviet Union "Communist, religion-hating" gentiles. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called Yosef's remarks "outrageous" and said the immigrants from the former Soviet Union are a "huge blessing to the State of Israel and the Jewish people." Yosef's remarks also were slammed by others in the Knesset, including Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein, who immigrated from Ukraine in 1987, and by Yisrael Beiteinu party leader Avigdor Liberman, who immigrated from Moldova.[55] Yosef stood by his comments, saying they were distorted by politicians who had been inciting against Jews and Judaism and that he was only referring to a minority of immigrants.[20][56][57][58]
2021
In January 2021, Yosef was criticized for flouting the coronavirus health restrictions.[59]
In June 2021, he said science and mathematics are "nonsense", and students should only study Torah instead, adding proudly that he never finished school or received a high school diploma.[4][60] Critics accused Yosef of promoting dependence on government handouts and charitable donations instead of advancing self-reliance. The large majority of ultra-Orthodox boys do not study the core curriculum of mathematics, English, science and computer studies at elementary school level, and the overwhelming majority do not study this curriculum at high school level. Socioeconomic experts have warned that this failure to provide a basic education to boys in the Haredi sector combined with its high rate of population growth means the economy will be imperiled with an inadequate workforce for the 21st century.[60][4]
In July 2021, the rabbi caused outcry when he stated that it is "better to live abroad than among secular Israelis".[61]
Personal life
Yosef is married to Ruth, daughter of the kabbalist Rachamim Attia. They have five children. His eldest son, named after his father Ovadia, is married to the daughter of Shlomo Amar, his predecessor as Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel. His daughter Margalit is married to the son of Yehuda Deri, the Chief Rabbi of Be'er Sheva. His youngest daughter is married to the son of Meir Sage. Yosef lives in the Sanhedria Murhevet neighborhood of Jerusalem.
^Rabbi Ratzon Arussi said (Hebrew) "יש לציין, שהאריך בענין הזה, בטוב טעם ודעת, הרב יצחק יוסף בנו של הרב עובדיה יוסף, שכידוע, שכל פסקיו הם כפסקי אביו" (recorded lecture [starting at 00:50] at http://net-sah.org/en/node/19263, posted February 12, 2010).
"שיעור בגזענות: הרב הראשי השווה בין "כושי" לקוף". ynet (in Hebrew). March 20, 2018. הרב הסביר את הסוגיה ההלכתית: "אתה הולך ברחוב באמריקה, כל חמש דקות תראה כושי, תברך עליו 'משנה הבריות'? אלא צריך שיהיה כושי שאבא שלו ואימא שלו לבנים", והוסיף: "אם אתה יודע, יצא להם בן קוף, יצא להם בן ככה – אז תברך עליו 'משנה הבריות'. אז מה תגיד, צריך שיהיה שני כושים? לא, אלא זו דוגמה שהגמרא נתנה, אז (כך) גם כאן באילנות".
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