By, Marcus Dysch
3 min read
As the Chief Rabbi stepped up to deliver a sermon in shul during the High Holy Days, I prepared to hear an exhortation on repentance.
Yet here was Ephraim Mirvis giving a run-through of the political year, highlighting - although offering no specific personal political views on - the major stories and issues.
It was a lively tour de force, taking in Brexit, the refugee crisis, the US presidential election and more. In the pews around me, few congregants stirred, resting quietly during the break between the davening.
But the Chief Rabbi's words made me ponder the much-debated issue of religious leaders intervening in politics.
In the United States, the argument has raged over whether rabbis should endorse a candidate in next month's election.
No one wants a full Question Time-style row over the fishballs
The Adas Israel Congregation in Washington DC is seen as one of the most political in that country. Barack Obama spoke there in the only shul address of his presidency. Its rabbi, Gil Steinlauf, is unequivocal about the need for rabbis to take a political stance. "I am lifting up a Jewish discussion of the times that we live in," he told the Washington Post.
In Detroit, Michigan, Rabbi Steven Rubenstein sees it more simply, believing congregants know their rabbinic leaders well enough to know who they would vote for anyway.
That is a position which would largely be unfamiliar in the rabbi-congregant relationship in this country, I think, where political persuasion is often on the list of never-discussed-in-polite-company taboo topics alongside salaries and sex.
We might like to natter in shul about politics, but no one wants a full-scale Question Time-style row over the fishballs. Better to stick to how your football team is faring.
Many of the big political topics of the day have a wider social impact though, and it is in this way, that many rabbis feel compelled to discuss them with congregants.
The EU referendum campaign, for example, grabbed the public's attention in a way council polls and even general elections have failed to.
I know of rabbis who took so forthright a stance on the issue that they preached from the pulpit about the need to vote Leave, before following up in the kiddush with their views on the value of sterling and Brussels bureaucrats. Shul-goers, inevitably, complained about the politicising of their Shabbat mornings.
Rabbi Mirvis has made a number of significant interventions this year. He has not been shy about commenting on individual politicians, and his approach has led some to ask whether he should - as a religious leader in a role normally seen as being above politics - be speaking out.
In May, his comments featured on the front page of a national newspaper, as he attacked Jeremy Corbyn and others embroiled in Labour's antisemitism crisis.
He returned to the subject two months later when giving evidence to a panel of MPs investigating rising Jew-hatred. Rabbi Mirvis described his concerns about the party's leadership.
But when, in August, Shami Chakrabarti was awarded a peerage, he blew a gasket, using language noticeably stronger than he usually employs, and saying the credibility of her report "lies in tatters". Labour's intentions to tackle antisemitism were "woefully unrealised", he added.
It is hard to imagine Rabbi Mirvis's predecessor, Lord Sacks, voicing his thoughts in such a way during his time in the role, although he, too, has criticised Mr Corbyn this year.
There is a long history of chief rabbis maintaining close contact with leading politicians, although more commonly they engaged in behind-the-scenes relationship-building rather than front-page rebukes.
Lord Sacks was close to Gordon Brown and others, and would regularly host dinners for politicians at his home in Hamilton Terrace. Rabbi Mirvis now does the same in Hendon - remember Theresa May dined there the night before becoming Prime Minister.
Lord Jakobovits had an exceptionally close bond with Margaret Thatcher. He personally lobbied her to secure the future of shechita in this country, and his From Doom to Hope report on faith and community identity was seen as fervently Thatcherite.
So is the current Chief Rabbi in the wrong? No.
There are, I think, two credible explanations for Rabbi Mirvis's approach during these past few months.
The first is that he believes the politicisation of antisemitism carries so significant a threat to the future of the Jewish community in Britain that he has no choice other than to weigh in. The Jew-hate crisis goes to the top of politics, so why not respond from the top of the rabbinate?
The other is more Jakobovitsian, if you will. Rabbi Mirvis evidently sees the causes he has intervened in - including the refugee crisis - as so morally compelling that he is duty bound to interject.
At a time when those who are elected to lead the country seem hopelessly incapable of doing so, we should be thankful for those who carry moral authority stepping up to fill the void.
And, in doing exactly that, the Chief Rabbi has no reason to be apologetic.