“The change that needs to happen is in the religious world, not among LGBTQ people,” said Rabbi Elkana Cherlow, one of dozens of Orthodox rabbis who recently signed a halachic document opposing conversion therapy. “There needs to be change in our educational institutions, in synagogues, and in the outlook of rabbis.”
The public letter warning against treatments that claim to change sexual orientation is another step toward the shift that Cherlow and others say they are striving to bring about. A total of 75 rabbis and rabbanit signed the following text:
“We, the undersigned rabbis and rabbanit, who are committed to halacha in all its aspects, believe that according to the principles of halacha and its spirit, it is forbidden for any person — including a rabbi or rabbanit, or any educator or therapist — to recommend that someone undergo treatment intended to change their sexual orientation, commonly known as ‘conversion therapy.’ This is because conversion therapies are harmful, ineffective, and because same-sex attraction is not a psychological disorder.”
Rabbi Aviya Rozen, head of the Netur Integration Midrasha, is also among the signatories. “I am a member of the Beit Hillel Rabbinic Organization and I believe that respect for every person, as the Holy One created them, is a foundational principle of Jewish thought,” he said. “A worldview that disqualifies a person in the name of God is a flawed worldview — as long as we are not talking about someone who committed a crime or harmed another person. These are people whom God created this way.”
Opponents of conversion therapy often face a familiar question: If you reject conversion therapy, what are you offering a religious gay man or lesbian woman instead? Should they live a life of celibacy and never act on their love?
“I think the question of what kind of relationship a person chooses to live in is their own decision, and we as rabbis must respect that,” Rozen said. “Just as I have not appointed myself the police officer of the Master of the Universe on other issues, I am not a police officer on this issue either. I am not going to change the halacha I believe in or twist it to suit myself. Halacha is halacha.
“Sometimes there are painful clashes and difficult dilemmas, and they must be confronted. But confronting dilemmas can never be done by disqualifying another person. That is not a solution to any dilemma. The starting point of conversion therapy is the disqualification of the other — the idea that God created someone defective and that they need to be fixed. But this is not a defect or a flaw. It is a creation that was created differently, with different inclinations. And I don’t recall ever being appointed to grade the Creator on one creation or another.”
Through the Rozen family, it is possible to observe the change that has taken place over the years in religious society’s attitude toward LGBTQ people. Rabbi Aviya Rozen is the son of Rabbi Israel Rozen, founder of the Zomet Institute, which deals with the intersection of halacha and technology. Rabbi Israel Rozen passed away about eight years ago, and the two did not see eye to eye on LGBTQ issues.
“He distinguished between how to treat LGBTQ individuals and whether to legitimize activism for LGBTQ rights and raising the pride flag,” his son explained. “His view was that people should be welcomed as long as they didn’t turn it into an ideology or agenda.
“I think the demand to hide is illegitimate. My late father believed that gender and sexual preferences belonged in the private sphere and were not a public matter. I think this is a public matter — primarily because of the severe discrimination — and therefore there is a clear need to cry out on behalf of the oppressed.”
The issue is especially personal for Rabbi Rozen, as one of his children is a religious gay man. “He lives with his partner. There are no categories of better or worse children in our home. All of them are my children,” he said.
He is asked whether his son and his partner come to Shabbat meals.
“Yes,” he replied. “There is no issue here at all. Every person is worthy in their own right, and their private questions should remain private. The public struggle is against disqualification and rejection. It is not currently about promoting one progressive agenda or another. That is not where I am.”
Does close personal familiarity help break down barriers?
“I assume it plays some role,” Rozen said, “but as someone who has worked in education for 30 years, I have met many people.”
Critics from within the religious community often ask how God could create someone with an inclination they cannot overcome.
“There are many big questions,” Rozen said. “But the solution cannot be violence or erasure. A priest who falls in love with a divorcée — how did God allow that? How did God allow the Holocaust? There are many big questions. Trying to solve them by erasing reality — that is violence. Certainly when we are talking about something dangerous and harmful like conversion therapy.
“The solution begins with changing our attitude from one of negation to one of respect. The role of rabbis is to offer responses within the framework of halacha. But those responses must look reality in the eye, not erase it.”
“I didn’t think this way 20 years ago”
Journalist Eran Suissa recently described the conversion therapy he underwent as a young man in an interview. “It’s brainwashing, for months, every week,” he said. “It starts with the facilitator asking: ‘Do you want to be among the good ones or the bad ones?’ Of course I wanted to be among the good ones. The hardest part is that I really wanted the change. I believed in it. Until it became depression. I called my sister screaming that if they didn’t stop and if my family wasn’t with me, I would kill myself.”
Suissa’s experience, which ended with him stopping the treatments and coming out, is just one example of what people sent to conversion therapy endure. The harm and trauma associated with these practices form the background to the halachic document published last week. The rabbis stress that they are not dismissing the Torah prohibition on male same-sex intercourse, but rather calling for acceptance and inclusion of people who are attracted to their own sex.
Rabbi Prof. Daniel Sperber, an Israel Prize laureate in Jewish studies, said he delved into the issue at the encouragement of his daughter Shulamit, a sex therapist. “I researched the issue and consulted doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers,” he said. “I wrote an independent halachic opinion stating that this is forbidden and causes terrible harm. People have even taken their own lives because of it, and it does not work.
“I felt a religious, halachic and human obligation to explain that this is forbidden.”
Rabbanit Devorah Evron, also among the signatories, emphasized that women are also sent to conversion therapy. “It harms them deeply,” she said. “It sends the message that something is wrong with them, and that message must never be sent. We are all created in God’s image. We are all born with desires and aspirations, and we choose what values and commitments guide our lives.”
The document draws on positions taken by professional mental health organizations, noting that studies have found conversion therapies ineffective and harmful, and that homosexuality has not been considered a psychiatric disorder since it was removed from the DSM in 1973.
Rabbi Yitzhak Ajzner, one of the initiators and the author of the final text, said the document states that any treatment aimed at changing sexual orientation is degrading and causes deep psychological harm. He said directing someone to such therapy constitutes both verbal abuse and financial deception under Jewish law.
The rabbis cite the commandment “Do not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor,” arguing that it obligates intervention when a person is in danger — and therefore prohibits referring someone to practices that may cause serious harm.
“We must accept people who are attracted to their own sex with love,” the document states. “This is not encouragement of sin, but fulfillment of the commandment ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Ajzner, who has worked for years with religious LGBTQ individuals, said he consulted extensively with them while drafting the document. “They don’t want rabbis to rule on their every halachic question,” he said. “They want compassion, understanding, acceptance and love. They want to be accepted as equals.”
Today, he warned, conversion therapy often hides behind euphemisms such as “sexual orientation clarification” or “personal empowerment.”
“If the purpose of the treatment is to change sexual orientation — that is conversion therapy,” he said. “Helping someone cope with social pressure or the difficulty of coming out is legitimate therapy. Trying to change who they are is not.”
Rabbi Cherlow, who has accompanied religious LGBTQ individuals for over a decade, said many still remain in the closet. “So much has changed,” he said. “And yet there are still young people who need support. That work is far from over.”