12/02/22 - SHIUR 397

Abuse and Abuse Coverups in Our Communities

Guest host: RabbiAri Wasserman, Author "Making it Work", "Making it ALL Work" (for women) and 10 other Seforim, Maggid Shiur, Yerushalayim

Speakers: RabbiShraga Feivel Zimmerman, RabbiGershon Bess, Rabbi Dr.Dovid Fox, Mrs.Debbie Fox, RabbiYona Reiss

Categories: Molestation, Rabbonim

Downloads: 22,138

Jump to comments Jump to riddle

Should a Rabbi meet in his office with a woman?
What’s enough proof to start warning other women? Do recordings suffice?
When do we go to the police?
When do we keep abuse quiet and when do we publicize the dangers?
What’s going on in the head of an abuser? Is he not worried about getting caught?
Why would followers of a Rabbi coverup his abuses?

Shiur Details

(15:10)

Rabbi Shraga Feivel Zimmerman, Av Beis Din of the Federation of Synagogues in London

(23:12)

Rabbi Gershon Bess, Rav Congregation Kehilas Yaakov, Los Angeles

(47:29)

Rabbi Dr. Dovid Fox, Rav, Psychologist and Director, Crisis Intervention, Chai Lifeline

(1:30:57)

Mrs. Debbie Fox, Torah Umesorah Rep. for Abuse

(1:42:12)

Rabbi Yona Reiss, Av Beis Din of the CRC

Shiur Reference Material

מראי מקומות

8 Comments

Moshe Cohen

I’d appreciate a session with R Dovid on the matter aimed at plain folk. The talk last week was aimed at kehilos with money and infrastructure and not many machlokesim. Not many cities have those wonderful qualities. The way it commonly is these days is cities like Lakewood, Jerusalem ,NYC with many different kehilos and no central authority, and individuals that have been abused, or that their kids have been abused are at a loss over what to do.

Going to the police is very iffy – they might (big safek even there) arrest the fellow and release him in four days. There really isn’t much motivation for them to do anything. And they are inundated with these cases. And putting your kid through police interrogation isn’t happening for most people. It’s a huge price to pay for the victims.

Individual initiatives are limited and people are soon wearied of chasing abusers out of shul – they come back again and again. The Rabbonim have largely thrown in the towel – the ones I have spoken to. THere just aren’t many options at hand.

There is a Rabbi Naftali Lorentz who has an organization to deal with these problems, but effective tools for regular folks are necessary to stop the problem. I look forward to hearing more on the topic.

One side issue – the psychologists on the session last week repeatedly told the listeners that rabbanim are not to be trusted on these issues, they are untrained and have negios, and only psychologists are qualified to deal and express judgement on these topics. I recall hearing from Rabbi Yosef Engel (Ramot) that Rabbi Moshe Feinstein once expressed that he felt that psychologists are terrible, rotzchim. And he said that he referred specifically to the frum ones. They are trusted by frum people, yet their values do not derive from Torah and therefore they are so harmful. And they present psychology as a mature discipline, as scientific fact, when actually there is still a great deal being discovered.

Its a bit of a shame that anything any ‘expert’ said was accepted and went unchallenged, but I know that R Dovid cannot be on every week,

kol tuv,