Rabbi Ido Pachter: Making a new tradition of Jewish law for modern Israel

Halacha (Jewish law) is one of the core pillars of Judaism, built upon thousands of years of rabbinic tradition, study, and rulings. It has been constantly evolving over time, with rabbis trying to keep up with the many challenging issues of the modern day.

Rabbi Ido Pachter is one such rabbi. He is attempting to reframe how we approach Jewish law to create something new: Halachat Yisraeli (Israeli Jewish law).

A former pulpit rabbi in Netanya, Pachter seeks to make Halacha relevant to practical issues in modern Israeli life. Questions about Shabbat, marriage, banking, and, of course, dealing with life during wartime are all pertinent to modern Israel and its diverse population from various religious backgrounds. 

In this context, Pachter set up a beit midrash (study hall) here in Jerusalem called LeMa’ase – meaning the practical application of Jewish law – where he and his colleagues tackle these important religious queries. Already, they have released their first book of responsa, Zikaron Yisraeli, which relates to the Oct. 7 massacre and life during wartime, and have begun working on their next volume. 

In Jerusalem sat down with Pachter to hear about his work and why it is so necessary for Israeli society.

Tell us about what you do and what’s new in your work world.

I was a communal rabbi at a Young Israel congregation in Netanya before leaving three years ago. Last year, I opened my beit midrash in Jerusalem at the former location of the President’s Hotel [now a municipal community center]. 

It’s a new beit midrash. We technically work under a midrasha based in Ramat Hagolan that opened a branch in Jerusalem, but we operate independently. 

We’re a small beit midrash of colleagues who come from all over Israel. We have people from Tel Aviv, the North, the South, and Jerusalem, and we all work and learn together. 

There are many other batei midrash with similar goals, such as Ruth Calderon’s Alma in Tel Aviv. But those are usually secular, while ours has people who are religious, secular, haredi, as well as men and women. 

We’re all Israelis, and our beit midrash is meant to represent Israeli society. 

What we do is quite different, though. Alma teaches Talmud and Aggadah [rabbinic literature], and some others focus on ritual and prayer. But nobody deals with Halacha – except for us.

What makes the work you and your colleagues do different?

We deal with Halacha. Normally, many people – especially secular Jews – just choose to ignore Halacha. They don’t want to deal with it because for them, it’s something threatening. They would rather live freely, and they see Halacha as something that forces them to do things they don’t want to do. 

We have a different approach. We believe Halacha is a core part of the Jewish tradition. It’s our Torah, and we can’t just abandon it or say it doesn’t exist. 

But that means we need to deal with it and how it applies to our day-to-day life in Israel. 

For instance, what should Shabbat look like in Israel? What do we do with kashrut? How should we be getting married? What is the code or morality we should practice during war? These are all halachic questions. 

We say that we can’t escape from Halacha. The haredi world took the opposite approach and froze Halacha. They say there should be no change in Halacha despite the changing circumstances [resulting from] having a [Jewish] state. What we do is bring Halacha to modern Israeli society, and we all need to work on it together. We learn the sources of Halacha, the ideas behind the Halacha, and how we can bring it up to date.

What are some examples of Jewish laws you’re seeking to examine? 

One example is marriage. We want to look at the principle of equality between spouses and ask how we can establish a code of marriage today in Israel that is based on that understanding. 

With Shabbat, we ask ourselves how we fulfill the obligations of Shabbat in our modern-day reality. What is Shabbat in the world of media, Facebook, and smartphones? 

Sometimes we have to deal with contradicting issues. The Torah’s commandment of Shabbat is that everyone is required to observe the day of rest and not work – and that includes non-Jews. Anyone who works for you or lives in your home shouldn’t be working on Shabbat. But we see today that Jews do have non-Jews working on Shabbat, be they Arabs or foreign workers.

The Torah says this isn’t acceptable: If you live in a Jewish society, you must give a day of rest to the non-Jews among you. The haredi world – and the Orthodox world in general – does not fulfill this idea of Shabbat, and that’s one thing when they live in small communities. But when it comes to the entire country, we need to think about how we should give this day of rest to minorities. 

Have you written any responsa [rulings] about Shabbat yet?

Well, when we founded the beit midrash, we originally wanted to focus on Shabbat. But this was just a few days before Oct. 7. We then decided to focus on the halachic issues that came up surrounding that. In the end, we published Zikaron Yisrael.

[For a look at this text, see “‘No guns in synagogues’: Jerusalem rabbi releases book of responsa for post-Oct. 7 Israel” on JPost.com.)

One issue that I’ve often seen come up with Halacha and modern Israel is banking and interest. Can you tell me your thoughts on that?

This is a modern issue. The Torah says you can’t charge interest to Jews, but all of modern banking is built around interest. 

What we do today is the Orthodox solution of heter iska, which lets us charge interest, but this doesn’t fulfill the commandment of the Torah. The Torah gives very clear rules about not charging interest to your brother. 

We need to think about how we can fulfill this idea, and I don’t have a solution yet, since we need interest in the banks. 

Ruth Calderon, when she was in the Knesset, tried to pass a law related to shmita [the sabbatical year in the agricultural cycle] that would help deal with banking, but it didn’t pass – she said it was because of the Chief Rabbinate. And I think this is something so important, and we need Halachat Yisraeli to try to bring back actual shmita, since today it’s just seen as a problem and not a solution. 

What’s the next topic you hope to deal with at Beit Midrash LeMa’ase?

We want to deal with issues of marriage, and we’re going to publish another book about it and related topics. 

What made you want to open a beit midrash in Jerusalem specifically?

The truth is that I wanted to open it everywhere that people wanted to learn about Halachat Yisraeli. I had thought that we might even open other branches in Tel Aviv and Beersheba, but ultimately I was only able to get a place in Jerusalem.

But I also think there may have been a deeper subconscious reason – that Halachat Yisraeli could only come from Jerusalem.

Jerusalem is the heart of the Torah, the heart of the people and the Land of Israel. And just like the heart is what brings the blood throughout the body, Jerusalem brings the Torah – the blood of Judaism – to the Jewish world. So maybe it’s symbolic that it starts from here. ■