Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah[2] (Hebrew:מועצת גדולי התורה, "Council of great Torah [Sages]") is the supremerabbinical policy-making council of theAgudat Yisrael andDegel HaTorah movements in Israel; and ofAgudath Israel of America in the United States. Members are usually prestigiousRoshei Yeshiva (heads ofyeshivas) orHasidic rebbes, who are also usually regarded by manyHaredi Jews to be theGedolim ("great/est") sages ofTorah Judaism. Beforethe Holocaust, it was the supreme authority for theWorld Agudath Israel in Europe.
The component words of the name are transliterated in a variety of ways. This is frequently done as Moetzet,[3][4] and less frequently as Gedolai[5][6][7] and ha-Torah[5][7] or ha Torah.[6] The phrase is regularly shortened to Moetzes or The Moetzah.
Prior toWorld War II, only one such body existed, theWorld Agudath Israel.[8] The Council of Torah Sages was established following the establishment ofAgudath Israel inKatowice in 1912.[9] It was decided at the time that two councils would be set up for the movement: a council of homeowners, and a council of rabbis,[10] composed of leading rabbis from around the world.[11]
The Moetzes ofAgudath Israel of America serve as religious decisors, leadership, and political and policy liaisons with state and federal government agencies on behalf of many American Haredi Jews.[2][12][13] The council, consisting primarily ofrosh yeshivas and Hasidic rebbes, directs Agudath's policies and leadership. Formerly known as the Moetzet Chachmei HaTorah, the body was founded in 1948.[14] It sets all major policies, and guides the organization according to its precepts ofDa'as Torah.
The Moetzes ofAgudat Yisrael likewise constituted theIsraeliAshkenazic Haredi community's religious policy leadership, and exercises strong control over political matters for strongly observantIsraelis, such as joining government coalitions.[15][16]
Prior toDegel HaTorah's late 1980s break fromAgudat Israel (because of the dominance of thePolish Hasidic groups), there was only one Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah in Israel.[17] With the breakaway of the Lithuanian/"yeshivish" faction (led by RabbiRabbi Elazar Shach), two separate, at times complementary, councils were created.
The HarediSephardi Jews of Israel had also at one time followed the leadership of the Moetzet of Agudat Yisrael when it was still a body that generally spoke for most of Israel's Haredim. Eventually, however, the Haredi Sephardim broke with their Ashkenazi counterparts (again because of the dominance of the Polish Hasidic groups), and established theMoetzet Chachmei HaTorah ("Council of [wise] Torah Sages"), which in turn became the source for the formulation and expression of the policies and agenda of theShas political party in the IsraeliKnesset.[18] RabbiOvadiah Yosef became the main leadership figure of this council.
InKatowice (Kattowitz),German Empire in 1912 appointed to the council were RabbiAvraham Mordechai Alter (1866–1948) Rebbe ofGer (Chairman), RabbiSholom Dovber Schneerson Rebbe ofChabad, RabbiChaim Soloveitchik, RabbiYitzchak Isaac Halevy, RabbiMeir Simcha of Dvinsk, RabbiChaim Ozer Grodzinski, RabbiItzela of Ponevezh, RabbiShlomo Zalman Breuer, Rabbi Ze'ev Feilchenfeld ofPosen, RabbiDavid Zvi Hoffmann, Rabbi Kopel Reich ofBudapest.[19]
At the great congress inVienna in 1923, the Council included: theChofetz Chaim, the Gerrer Rebbe, Rabbi Yisroel Friedman theChortkov Rebbe, RabbiChaim Ozer Grodzinski, RabbiMeir Arik, RabbiYitzchak Zelig Morgenstern the Admor of Sokolov, RabbiMordechai Yosef Elazar Leiner the Admor ofRadzin, RabbiMeir Dan Plotzky, RabbiMoshe Mordechai Epstein, RabbiMeir Shapira of Lublin, RabbiAvraham Mendel Steinberg ofBrod, Rabbi Kalman Weber ofPiestany, and Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Breuer.[20]
In 1937, the members of the Council were: RabbiAvraham Mordechai Alter, RabbiYitzchak Menachem Mendel Danziger ofAleksander, RabbiDovid Bornsztain ofSochatchov, RabbiAvraham Yaakov Friedman ofSadigura, RabbiMordechai Shalom Yosef Friedman ofPrzemysl, RabbiElchonon Wasserman, RabbiAharon Levin, RabbiAharon Kotler, Rabbi Ben Zion Yoezer (Rabbi ofTurda and President of the Federation of the Association of Ultra-Orthodox Communities inRomania), Rabbi Dov BerAv Beit Din of Ozarkov, Rabbi Moshe Blum Av Beit Din ofZamosc, RabbiZalman Sorotzkin, RabbiYehuda Leib Tsirelson, RabbiYosef Tzvi Dushinsky, RabbiMenachem Ziemba, Rabbi Mordechai Rotenberg, Rabbi ofAntwerp, RabbiAkiva Sofer, and RabbiShmuel Dovid Ungar. The council's president was RabbiChaim Ozer Grodzinski.
Source:[21]
The final resolution declared that Agudas Yisrael would serve to resolve all difficulties facing Jews and Judaism on the basis of Torah, without any political considerations. TheMoetzes Gedolei HaTorah, the rabbinic council, would be the supreme governing body and final authority in all decisions.
The chiefposekim of the ultra-Orthodox are organized in the Moetzet Gedolei haTorah (Council of Torah Greats).
Following the tradition begun by his father, R.Israel Alter was active in developing and leading the Moetzet Gedolei Hatorah (Council of Torah Sages) of Agudat Yisrael, which was the guiding force and deciding board behind the decision of the Haredi Agudat Yisrael political party in Israel.
R. Eliyahu Meir Bloch – one of the members of theMoetzes Gedolai ha-Torah with whom Rav Breuer maintained a close relationship – also decried the failure to offer instruction in Tanach... .
Agudath demanded insularity and an authoritarian organization. The Agudath founded theMoetzes Gedolai Ha Torah (the Council of Torah sages), a group of renowned rabbis, the interpret the problematic areas of modern life according to Torah law.
Kotler emerged as one of the most significant Orthodox rabbinic leaders of the time, not only in America, where he was Chairman of Agudath Israel'sMoetzet Gedolai ha-Torah (Council of Torah Sages), but in Israel as well.
He was one of the founders of Agudas Israel in Czechoslovakia, and after the Holocaust, of Agudas Israel of Central Europe, and was one of the leaders of the Moetzes Chachmei Hatorah in the area.
Yeshiva and day school principals from across the nation posed the above question to Rabbi Yitzchok [Isaac] Hutner, head of the Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin-Aryeh and a member of theMoetzes Gedolei HaTorah (Council of Torah Sages) ofAgudat Israel or [sic] America.
Through the years, Agudath Israel has been guided by its Torah leadership, mainly through the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah (Council of Torah Sages), comprised of many of the country's leading rabbinic authorities. Aside from the focus put on their decisions and policy statements, regarding most every major issue confronting American Orthodoxy...
Established in 1912 in Kattowitz (Katowice), Poland,Augda was to be a Torah movement directed byMoetzet Gedolei Hatorah (Council of Torah Sages), a group of rabbinical scholars who represent the various factions of theAguda movement and are chosen for their scholarly merit and prestige in the realm of Orthodox Jewry.Moetzet Gedolei Hatorah continues to be the supreme decision-making body for Aguda adherents, and its decisions are sovereign in all questions affecting the membership, including religious and political matters such as joining or remaining in the government coalition.
Following the tradition begun by his father, R. Israel Alter was active in developing and leading the Moetzet Gedolei Hatorah (Council of Torah Sages) of Agudat Yisrael, which was the guiding force and deciding board behind the decision of the Haredi Agudat Yisrael political party in Israel.
Unlike the dynastic succession of Hassidic courts, which usually allowed for one central rabbinical authority per sect at any given time, theMitnagdic world often had severalGedolim (Great Torah Scholars) to turn to in one generation. From the 1970s until the late 1990s,R. Shakh functioned as the major authority in terms of various issues, and his political machinations were instrumental in creating a new form of Mitnagdic separatism. Having broken away from the heavilyHassidic Moetzet Gedolei Hatorah in the latter 1980s, Shakh founded a new Haredi political party, (Degel Hatorah), started a new Haredi newspaper,Yated Ne'eman, and created theShe'erit Yisraelkashrut authority.
In Shas there is a single hierarchy, with Rabbi Ovadia Yosef the unchallenged leader of the party. He sits at the head of the party's Council of Torah Sages (Moetzet Chachmei Hatorah), which is subordinate to his authority.
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