SEPARATING THE ADULT FROM ADULTERY

honors. The second advocates excluding or removing the person from leadership positions in the congregation. Both these penalties have previously been recommended within Reform congregations for serious transgressions. In a 1962 responsum, for example, Rabbi Solomon Freehof , discussed, inter alia, the eighteenth-century case of a man that had“embezzled the money of the Chazan and[run] away with the Chazan ’s wife.” Although the man had publicly confessed his guilt, he had made no attempt at restitution. Freehof concluded that such a“notoriously evil man” should not, within the modern Reform setting,“be allowed to shame the congregation by being called up to the Torah .”® An instance of the“leadership” penalty appears in a 1995 responsum that ruled that a Board Trustee that had been found, beyond doubt, to have cheated another member of the congregation and“owes him a significant sum of money,” should leave office, unless he is prepared“to do teshuvah, to admit his wrong and to make restitution to his accuser.”

Could such penalties be used for cases of proven adultery? Rabbi Freehof ’s responsum does not clarify whether his ban on aliyot relates more to the theft of the money or to the“theft” of the wife or both. But, turning to Rabbi Jacob’s second teshuvah related to the issue of adultery, it is plain that Rabbi Jacob views these kinds of penalties as absolutely appropriate. In 1989, a question arose about a woman in her forties who was participating in an adult Bar/Bat Mitzvah program. With the course of study nearing its end and the ceremony fast approaching, it emerged that the woman was involved in an adulterous relationship.“Is it possible,” the sho’el asked,“to have her participate in the Bat Mitzvah ceremony under these circumstances?”* Rabbi Jacob replied as follows:

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