Published: 30 April 2021
Last updated: 4 March 2024
Man accused of seeking to convert people and says he was born Jewish
A MAN IN JERUSALEM who has worked for years as a rabbi and raised his family in an ultra-Orthodox community has been accused of faking his religion to mask his true identity as a Christian missionary from New Jersey.
Beyneynu, an organisation that monitors missionary activity in Israel, said the man wore traditional ultra-Orthodox clothes and even performed marriage ceremonies for Jewish couples to hide the “bitter truth” that he secretly sought to convert Jews.
“The family has been under surveillance for at least seven years,” Shannon Nussan, a researcher for Beyneynu, told local media.
She said in 2014 the man was confronted by her organisation but “disappeared” before re-emerging with his wife and children in another neighbourhood. Once there, she said, “he assimilated into the ultra-Orthodox community and began a new life, but [one] apparently full of lies”.
The man’s wife, Nussan said, promoted Judaism on social media but “incorporated content from Christianity”. She died last year and was buried in Jerusalem with a Jewish funeral ceremony, Nussan said.
Many in Israel see the conversion of Jews as a threat to the relatively small global population as well as their majority demographic status within the country. While the country’s laws do not ban proselytising, it is forbidden to preach to a person under 18 without the consent of a parent or to offer material gifts in exchange for conversion.
FULL STORY Jerusalem rabbi accused of being undercover Christian missionary (Guardian)
Photo: Ultra-orthodox Jewish men pray during Passover at the Western Wall (Sebastian Scheiner/AP)
