NYP no. 5764.5

CCAR RESPONSA

5764.5

Minimal Dues for Congregational Membership

She’elah

A family in my congregation has refused, claiming financial hardship, to pay even a token amount toward synagogue dues. Although we offer dues relief to households that cannot afford our standard assessments, in most cases we do ask that they pay a small amount toward their membership. We do not doubt that this family has experienced difficult financial circumstances. Still, they do not seem to be in worse straits than other households that do pay some amount, however small, in synagogue dues. What should be our approach toward this family? (Rabbi Ellen Lewis, Washington, NJ)

Teshuvah

This case, as described to us, involves a family that despite its difficult economic condition can pay a small amount toward synagogue dues but chooses not to do so. Our task is to evaluate this sort of choice from the perspective of Jewish tradition. We therefore frame the question in this way: is an individual or a household entitled to refuse to pay obligations assessed by the Jewish community? And if the answer to that question is “no,” are there circumstances under which we might make an exception to the general rule?

The Individual’s Obligations to the Community.[1] Jewish tradition teaches that every Jew is obligated to contribute his or her fair share toward the welfare of the community.[2] For example, tzedakah, support for the poor, is a mitzvah, a religious duty, and not a matter of choice.[3] This duty is incumbent upon every individual; “even the poor person who is supported by tzedakah is obligated to contribute tzedakah from what he himself is given.”[4] The poor are exempt from the normal requirement to contribute tzedakah if that gift will drive them below the poverty line.[5] If, however, the community (traditionally, the beit din) should determine through a fair appraisal[6] that an individual ought to contribute a particular amount, that person may not refuse to pay less than the assessment. Should he or she fail to meet that obligation, community authorities are empowered to collect it through coercive legal means if necessary.[7] The community is also empowered to coerce its members to build and to support its synagogue.[8] Some authorities, indeed, consider support for the synagogue to take precedence over tzedakah for the poor.[9]

The lesson is clear: support for the synagogue is understood as a tax, a legally-enforceable contribution from which only the most destitute citizens are exempt. While our Diaspora Jewish communities no longer wield the power to levy taxes or to coerce individual Jews to contribute to vital communal needs and institutions, the language of “coercion” indicates just how seriously we take these moral obligations. This is especially true with regard to the synagogue, the primary institution through which we nowadays organize ourselves as a community. It is the synagogue, more than any other agency, that brings us together for prayer, Torah study, Jewish fellowship, social and political action – in short, the synagogue enables us to live successful Jewish lives in the fullest sense of that expression. It is therefore a mitzvah for each one of us to contribute to its support.

In the she’elah before us, the family in question does not appear to be destitute. To repeat, the family can contribute a small amount to the synagogue but chooses not to do so. As we have seen, this is not a valid and acceptable Jewish choice. Were the situation otherwise – if, for example, the family simply could not contribute toward the synagogue without risking its solvency — we would hold them exempt from the requirement to contribute, just as the halakhah exempts the very poor from the obligation of tzedakah. Every synagogue with which we are familiar offers dues relief to families under financial duress and will either suspend or waive the dues requirement entirely in cases of dire need. In this case, however, the synagogue authorities have determined that this family can in fact afford “to pay a small amount toward their membership.” Assuming that this is a fair evaluation of the circumstances,[10] the family has no valid basis in Jewish law to protest the synagogue’s decision. We might add that in joining the synagogue, the family stipulated its acceptance of the congregation’s rules and procedures, including the financial obligations of membership. The family, in other words, has agreed in advance that it cannot remain a “member” of the synagogue without making an appropriate contribution toward dues.

The Community’s Obligation to Provide Jewish Education. There is, however, another perspective from which our tradition might view this question. Suppose that this family has children of religious-school age: should the congregation admit the children to its school even if the parents refuse to pay their minimum dues assessment? Jewish education, as we know, is of critical importance to our future as a people; shall we deny it to these children, who are certainly not at fault in this matter? Might we say that the goal of transmitting Torah knowledge and Jewish identity to the next generation takes priority over the strict enforcement of our financial rules and regulations? To be sure, our tradition holds the father (we today would say “parent”) primarily responsible for teaching Torah to his child[11] or for hiring a teacher to do so.[12] Yet the community has long realized an essential problem with this system: “if one does not have a father, one will not learn Torah.” For this reason, Yehoshua ben Gamla, a high priest who lived in the first century C. E., enacted a decree (takanah) that “teachers of children be placed in every town.”[13] That takanah, in turn, was adopted by all Jewish communities,[14] which have acknowledged that the funding of Jewish education is a public responsibility as well as a private, familial one.[15] Perhaps this congregation and all others should accept this responsibility, making sure that a Jewish education is available to all Jewish children, even if their parents do not fulfill their own duty under the terms of this mitzvah.

We would not, however, want to impose this as a requirement upon the congregation. The takanah of Yehoshua ben Gamla “never was intended to release parents from the obligation that the Torah imposes upon them, but rather to make it easier for them to fulfill it.”[16] Were the congregation to bear the entire cost of education for the children of parents who refuse to pay their fair share, it would send the message that parents are somehow permitted to shirk their duty toward their children and toward the community. It would, additionally, place an unfair burden upon those members of the congregation who do pay toward the upkeep of the synagogue and the school. It is indeed unfortunate that some children are denied a Jewish education as a result of their parents’ inadvertent or willful neglect of their responsibility to help provide it. It is vital that our communities develop outreach and funding initiatives that would allow Jewish education to reach the children of unaffiliated families. But it is simply wrong to expect the synagogue, an organization that depends for its survival upon the fair-share contributions of its members, to compensate for the refusal of members who can – but won’t – accept their financial responsibility toward the institution.

Conclusion. One of the most fundamental principles of Jewish communal life is that no Jew should be denied the opportunity to affiliate with the community and no Jewish child should be denied a Jewish education out of inability to pay dues and fees. The synagogue, as the central unit of Jewish association in our communities, bears the moral obligation to make membership affordable to all Jews. Yet because the synagogue is a membership organization, it can exist and function only so long as its members meet their duly-assessed financial obligations toward it. A congregation has no duty to provide membership and education services to households that refuse to pay, in the words of our she’elah, “even a token amount toward synagogue dues.” Such a refusal is evidence, not of poverty, but of a set of priorities that devalues the importance of synagogue membership and Jewish education. The refusal, in other words, stems from an economic choice on the part of the family.[17] They cannot expect the congregation to validate that choice by granting them a free membership, a benefit denied to those who are willing to contribute their fair share to the life and sustenance of the synagogue.

NOTES

 

  • Shulchan Arukh Choshen Mishpat 163:1, and Isserles ad loc.: a community is empowered to require its citizens (literally, “the citizens may coerce [kofin] each other”) to contribute to “all the needs of the city.” The chapter as a whole is a treatise on Jewish public law, the rules concerning our obligations toward the communities in which we live. See M. Bava Batra 1:5, B. Bava Batra 7b-8b, and Tosefta Bava Metzia 11:18-23.
  • “It is a positive mitzvah to give tzedakah in accordance with one’s means”; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 247:1, an affirmative formulation of the Talmudic dictum (B. Ketubot 68a and Bava Batra 10a) that “when one ignores the duty to give tzedakah, it is as though he has committed idolatry.”
  • B. Gitin 7b; Yad, Matanot Aniyim 7:5; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 248:1.
  • Siftey Kohen, Yoreh De`ah 248, n. 1. See also Isserles, Yoreh De`ah 251:3: “one is not obligated to give tzedakah until he has the wherewithal to support himself (ad she-yehei lo parnasato).” By “normal requirement,” we refer to the customary amounts stated in the sources (one-fifth or one-tenth of his annual income; see Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 249:1); on the other hand, even the poorest of the poor is expected to make some sort of tzedakah contribution, albeit less than that amount (Bayit Chadash, Tur Yoreh De`ah 248; Arukh Hashulchan, Yoreh De`ah 248, par. 3).
  • “Fair appraisal” means that a community may not demand from an individual a higher amount than he should properly give; B. Bava Batra 8b; Yad, Matanot Aniyim 7:11; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 248:7.
  • B. Ketubot 49b and Bava Batra 8b; Yad, Matanot Aniyim 7:10; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 248:1. The power to coerce an individual to give tzedakah is the subject of some controversy in the halakhah. There is a Talmudic rule (B. Chulin 110b) that “the beit din does not enforce the observance of a positive commandment when the Torah specifies a reward for the keeping of that commandment.” Since we are told that God will bless us for helping the poor (Deuteronomy 15:10), we ought not to be able to coerce over matter of tzedakah. Tosafot (Bava Batra 8b, s.v. akhpeh) notes this contradiction and offers various resolutions of it. Perhaps the best resolution of all comes from R. David ibn Zimra (16th-17th cent. Egypt), in his commentary to Yad, Matanot Aniyim 7:10. Tzedakah, he writes, differs from other positive commandments in that the welfare of the poor depends upon it. It is considered, moreover, a debt owed by the individual, and just as a creditor may take legal action to collect from the debtor, so may the court force an individual to pay his tzedakah obligation.
  • Tosefta Bava Metzi`a 11:23; Yad, Tefilah 11:1; Shulchan Arukh Choshen Mishpat 163:1.
  • Provided that the poor are not in a life-threatening situation. See Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 249:16, relying upon a decision of R. Yosef Kolon (15th-cent. Italy), Resp. Maharik, no. 128.See also R. Avraham Danzig, Chokhmat Adam 145:7. The wording “some authorities” (yesh mi she’omer) in the Shulchan Arukh passage indicates that not every authority agrees with the setting of priorities, and see Bi’ur HaGra to Yoreh De`ah 249, no. 20. As the remainder of the passage indicates, however, the issue is linked to the role of the synagogue in helping to fulfill the mitzvah of Torah study, which occupies the summit of priorities in Rabbinic Judaism (talmud torah keneged kulam; M. Pe’ah 1:1).
  • See above at note 6.
  • This responsibility is derived from Deuteronomy 11:19 (“and you shall teach [these words] to your children”). See B. Kidushin 29a-b; Yad, Talmud Torah 1:1; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 245:1.
  • Yad, Talmud Torah 1:3; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 245:4. Hagahot Maimoniot to Yad, Talmud Torah 1, no. 1, cites R. Meir of Rothenburg (13th century) to the effect that this requirement is simply a logical outgrowth of the mitzvah to teach Torah; if one cannot perform that task personally, one must hire an agent to do so. The requirement, moreover, can be enforced by the beit din.
  • B. Bava Batra 21a.
  • Yad, Talmud Torah 2:1; Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De`ah 245:7.
  • See Isserles, Shulchan Arukh Choshen Mishpat 163:3, end: if the parents of the children cannot pay the fee for Torah teachers, the community must raise the money by taxing its members according to their ability to pay. The Gaon of Vilna (Bi’ur HaGra ad loc.) notes that this is simply one of the “needs of the city” that the citizens are required to fulfill (see note 1).
  • R. Chaim David Halevy (20th-cent. Israel), Resp. Aseh Lekha Rav 5:23, at p. 172. See also Arukh Hashulchan, Yoreh De`ah 245, par. 9: the community taxes itself to provide education “for the poor and for the orphans.” The father, meanwhile, is coerced if necessary to pay for the education of his son; he is not released from this duty by the fact that the public is also involved in the education of children.
  • There are, of course, other possible explanations. A refusal to pay dues may be the result of a dispute over this or that synagogue policy, anger over perceived mistreatment, and the like. Our responsum presumes that the refusal to pay dues does not stem from such a factor but reflects an economic decision on the part of the family.

 

If needed, please consult Abbreviations used in CCAR Responsa.

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