Fisticuffs In Shul Over Whether TV Show Defiled Rashi Or Rabbeinu Tam Tefillin

Paramedics treated nineteen people for injuries at the scene, all of them minor.

At right, Head-Tefillin, with arm-Tefillin.
Credit: Black Stripe, via Wikimedia Commons

Bnei Brak, May 17 – A fight broke out in a synagogue today following a controversial segment on a television program last night featuring the misuse of Jewish ritual objects, with each party to the fracas insisting the version of the objects depicted in the episode followed the procedures of one medieval Rabbinic authority and not the other faction’s choice.

The Beis Adas Korach congregation in this city east of Tel Aviv saw violence this morning following services as post-prayer conversation among attendees turned to the previous evening’s satirical show Eretz Nehederet, during which an actor pretending to be Minister of Education Naftali Bennett donned two sets of Tefillin, or phylacteries, in imitation of a photo of himself Mr. Bennett shared several weeks ago, with the segment mocking the use of religious activity as a political tool. Political and religious figures on the right decried the segment as disgraceful, and debate over the incident continued into this morning. Eyewitnesses offered conflicting versions of how the donnybrook began, with partisans of Rashi and of his great-grandson Rabbeinu Tam each insisting it was their respective authority who was maligned on the air. Within fifteen minutes police had arrived to break up the melee. Paramedics treated nineteen people for injuries at the scene, all of them minor.

A police spokesman told reporters that in their initial assessment, it appears men came to blows amid a heated exchange over the order of the four Biblical passages inside the Tefillin, as well as over the placement of stitching. “According to preliminary indications, at approximately seven-fifteen this morning an altercation took place inside this house of worship,” stated district commander Yaakov ben-Meir. “As we understand it, one group of men expressed revulsion that the television program had defiled Tefillin, and noticed that the placement of an external knot on the front of the head-Tefillin indicated it housed the passages in the order favored by Rabbeinu Tam and not the more common Rashi version. Others present began shouting their disagreement, and within moments, dozens of people were fighting over it.”

Police arrested six, but no charges are likely, given the contradictory witness statements from partisans of the different versions. Observers note that a similar scene occurred at the synagogue during the holiday of Sukkot three years ago, when a fight started over whether the Hoshanot service should be performed immediately after Hallel or immediately after Musaf.

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