I saw your name, thought that I would get a diatribe and began reading. But no: here is someone who is a Jew in his essence, who really cares to involve himself in the reason that we are here on earth, to turn the world into a good and kind place. BUT, your way involves mixing Jews and non-Jews, a spiritual mismatch that will hurt young couples wanting to marry as two systems arise, and many will not marry a person whose papers are questionable from a Halachic point of view. Keep your tolerance and learning up, go to Eli Yishai and Co. and work with them not against them. And always remember to keep your cool, be the first to put your foot forward first even if they drop out. Persevere! As for Downs kids (pure angels with no evil in them!) or those with mental illnesses, again work hard on their behalf to find solutions within Halacha. We need people of your intelligence and inquiring mind.

For the humanity and mercy that you show. This is what it is all about. God bless you!!

It is clear that Lapid uses Ynet to push his political agendas. I used to enjoy reading Lapid's informational and intelligent articles, but they have merely now become a source for his political views and rants. Lapid should not forget that Israel was founded based on Jewish ideals, and in order to continue this, the Rabbinate needs money. Lapid should begin writing more intelligent articles, as he used to.

An article with half-truths, slurs, slanders like this should not be published. But if it is, someone from the opposing side should be given the opportunity to publish their article side-by-side.

fool who really could not care less what will happen to the Jewish people once civil marriage is an option. They will disappear, just like they are disappearing through assimilation in the rest of the world. Why doesn't he and his kind simply go live among the gentiles of the world to speed up the process and leave the religious, who care about the continuity of the Jewish nation, ALONE?!? BTW - Yair, no matter what your warped mind thinks (obviously only in $s), the religious Jews have a keen interest in keeping the Jewish nation alive. And, surprise, surprise, they will be the only ones who will do so...

According to your distortd logic then anyone in the helping professions or teachers should not be compensated .It appears your hatred is 'in the genes.'

Your comments about the Rabbinate denying those who have mental disabilities or Down,s syndrome to marry is patently false.

It is supposed to be about keeping track of Jewish people marrying other Jews and sort out the non Jews amongst us.

Thank you for saying it . The Rabbinate here is over the top, their stranglehold on marriage is only about money always has been. You cannot call yourself a true democracy when the basic religous laws are not balanced with state law.

Once an MK, dear Yair won`t be able to dance in two weddings at the same time.

I haven't read articles by Yair Lapid in a while. I was worried that Lapid was ashamed because of his conviction for writing an inaccurate and blatantly false article about religious soldier Chananel Dayan. I hope Lapid's apology to Dayan gets published soon.

Did our "Learned" author point out that according to Talmud, the witnesses need to be Torah observant, and if not the entire ceremenony is invalid? To say this is about money shows the way Lapid's brain functions - this is not about money; this is about Jewish continuity; a mamzer, according to the Torah, is still a mamzer even if no-one knows about it. What we are going to have here is that in a few years, any Jew who holds his heritage dear is going to be reluctant to marry with a long list of people because it is going to be impossible to know if they are permissable to him/her.

Dear Mr. Lapid, You have a lot of facts absolutely wrong. You plainly hate everything that is religious. For your information, if you don't want to pay, there are MANY organizations that will marry you for free!!!

I don't know if Mr. Lapid does not know or not except the oral Torah (as laid out in te Talmud). According to oral Torah/Talmud there are clear regulations for wedding including that the witnesses should be Torah observant and decent honorable people. Furthermore The marriages of Jaacov and Moses have not much to do with Torah laws (given after their marriages) and in the time of David the Torah was also not that much detailed and followed (and why would that mean something if somebody before did not the right thing as David did some other not acceptable thing?)

Who needs missionaries? Pathetic!

honestly i think we have bigger things to worry about then who marries who and how. Marriage is a ceremony and regardless of your religion all clerics demand money for their ceremonies. i have chirstian friends who the priest is also given money after the ceremony although a specific amount is not asked for but most are given 500 NIS so don't worry so much all religious leaders are theives it's a known fact!

you also need a chupah and a ketubah as well as qualified witnesses and obviously a jewish woman and man...weddings should conform to halacha and who wouldn't want a rabbi ?

Your article is ridiculous. Most of the rabbis do not take anything for their services and even those who do, so what? Is their time free? They don't make a million dollar a year like you, Mr. Lapid, spreading your anti religious venom.

The purpose of the Rabbinate is to keep Jews Jewish!

Yes, I'm kipa sruga from a settlement, and while I don't think Lapid is right on all counts, he's totally correct that the current system stinks, and it's the religious establishment that makes it stink. Instead of making marriage a joyous religious event for the secular couples, the religious bureaucracy is just that, a mindless, heartless bureaucracy that simply does its job unconnected to mitzvot. For most seculars, the process is a nightmare from the time they walk in the door and are made to pay the 600 shekels, while at the same time some unemployed yeshiva guy sits down at the pakid beside them and gets an automatic discount. The rest of the process is downright demeaning and offensive: they're Judaism is questioned, they are made to miss work, forced to bring in witnesses who also miss work, and made to take family purity classes and miss more work or university. At the end of the day, they're left with the impression that religious Judaism is about making people pay money and suffer indignities in order to get things done. Lapid is saying nothing new. The system stinks, and the religious talkbackers should be figuring out how to fix the system and make it better and more attractive to everybody - that way they will be encouraged to embrace Judaism, instead of rejecting it because of all the hatred and venom they read about here.

as far as i remember the religious don't get a discount, and get a hard time about their religious credibility too. they also miss hours of their days in the rabanute. the only difference is that their jewishness means something to them so the keep all the necessary paperwork (parent ketuba) and have generally credible witnesses to vouch for them. to the talkbacker who said that in the days of king david they weren't as jewish, go learn some real jewish history, you might get your facts straight. and to yair, who said that david wasn't married by a rabbi? your idea of a rabbi is very differant from what a rabbi actually is, a torah scholar.

Yeah! But at least we know that the "rabbi" marrying the couple is Jewish! Does that mean that anyone should be able to perform the ceremony? Makes one wonder what a free for all world we are in.

If Lapid, or anyone else, is spreading " venom" by "preaching" against religion then those "preaching" for religion are equaly "spreading venom". Indeed if I took both potions to a lab for analysis the scales would weigh in favor of "religious venom" as opposed to "anti religious venom". Religious "venom" has proved to be poisonous to the mind of man to such an extent that it causes, irrationality and leads to senseless thoughts and actions which are contradictory to the basic tenet of life and existence,"love thy nieighbor as you love yourself". Religion, in all its manifestations is the biggest load of nonsense ever created by Man, and nothing, throughout history, has been more detrimental to life, existence,Humanity and our Planet, our very being, than this blatant stupidity called religion.

I couldn't believe my eyes. You wrote: "...and in the time of David the Torah was also not that much detailed" Yet according to the Orthodox tradition the Oral Torah was given on Mt. Sinai WITH the Written Torah and this was way before king David was born. Actually you just shot yourself into the leg. You state that the Tora somehow "evolved" or "had a continuation" after being given according to the book of Sh'mot. In other words you agree that the generations after Moshe Rabeinu have the right to add, add and add plus re-interprete and twist the Torah & tradition for their own means? Come on, look at the Talmudic discussions - no rabbi agrees with another. At the times of David & Shlomo there was no unified Talmudic conduct but many opinions and schools. the current Orthodoxy is following just one or couple of selected ideas. Applause to Yair Lapid for revealing once again the true G-d of the Orthodox Rabbinate - money.

Spirituality uplifts man's heart and soul. Religion is the very root of evil in the world.

...wailing about how Shlomo Artzi and other "cultural elite" (with the noble exception of himself : yes, he considers himself the "cultural elite" too) won't come to give pep-talks to the IDF troops, leaving that important job to....heaven forfend!....Rabbis! (the only ones who care enough to show up). Well, you asked in your last article, Yair, what the difference was between yourselves (deep self-important voice, please:), the "Cultural Elite", and the Rabbinate? Quite more than this talkback would contain! Imagine the gall....the FRIDAY night TV host and son of infamously blasphemous Tomy Lapid, the proud pork eater, is presuming to quote at us about....Maimonides?!?!?! It is very noble of you, Mr. Lapid, to marry couples for gratis (not that YOU need the money), but I worked for a Bet Din that certified marriages and also maintained Kosher certification, so I am aware of the costs and the value of running such organizations (and believe me, those organizations are NOT about the money, although they cannot run on air). As far as the offices of the Rabbinate and "the giant and flourishing kosher-certificate industry at banquet halls" (thank G-d so many people care to keep it Kosher, unlike the pork-consuming Lapids): It costs money! If someone does ask, "what exactly they're doing with all this money" as you query, the answer is that people spend hours and hours and more hours to ascertain and maintain the Kosher status of locations and products, to maintain accurate records of marriages so that when Israel or anyone else asks, "Is this person a Jew?" whether for claiming their "right of return" or just to maintain record of their Jewishness for anyone concerned (you and those you've married before these last 2 yrs are obviously not) there will be an answer. Thank G-d there are so many concerned that their marriages and their food are Kosher that there is a demand for this and, however noble an idea, it's not going to get done by itself or for free (most Israelis don't have the disposable income that you do, Mr. Lapid). [You do happen to have a point, Mr. Lapid. As a recent article here on Ynet pointed out about a couple of kids who halachically got married while joking around and consequently needed a divorce (oy), all one technically needs to get married, by halacha, is a declaration of intent, a gift from male to female of something of some value, and 2 witnesses. HowEVER, receiving the 7 blessings under the chuppah among other traditions and maintaining proper records for purposes of ascertaining Jewishness for future generations, is both a valuable nod to our Jewish traditions as a nation and a necessary practicality in this day and age when "who is a Jew" is becoming an increasingly difficult thing to ascertain]

If someone doesn't get divorced by halacha, and remarries, his children are mamzerim, which can not marry regular jews. Introducing secular divorce and marriage would create a situation that we have 2 groups of jews living in israel that can't marry each other. It would split the country in two, and there is no solution for mamzerut, since it is de orayta.

last week when Yair wrote about his speach at an army base he claimed that those terrible rabbis who were indoctrinating the youth didn't take money for their time and were only too happy to give of themselves. this week we see that those dastardly rabbis are back up to their old tricks again. what will it be next week, Yair?