The High Court of Justice last month made a small but consequential decision that has the potential to affect how chief rabbis and members of the Chief Rabbinate Council are chosen in the State of Israel.
It issued a conditional order requiring the respondents to explain why legislation passed in December 2024 should not be interpreted to require the chief rabbis to appoint both men and women as their representatives in the electoral assembly - or, alternatively, why the provision restricting eligibility for those appointments should not be struck down.
The petition was filed on December 19, 2024, ahead of elections to the Chief Rabbinate Council. Submitted by six women with advanced religious education, Bar-Ilan University’s Rackman Center and Na’amat, it argues that the amendment passed earlier that month effectively prevented women from being appointed to the electoral assembly’s rabbinic contingent.
The case concerns the body that chooses the chief rabbis and the council’s elected members, rather than membership in the council itself.
Why doesn't the Chief Rabbinate ordain women?
Under the Chief Rabbinate Law, the electoral assembly comprises 150 members: 80 rabbinic representatives and 70 public representatives. Most seats are linked to specified offices, including rabbinic posts, local government leadership and religious councils. Ten of the rabbinic representatives are appointed by the chief rabbis, in consultation with the religious services minister and with government approval.
Those 10 appointments are at the center of the dispute.
In an earlier Rackman Center case, the court ruled on January 14, 2024, that the chief rabbis must consider appointing women with suitable Torah and Jewish-law education to those seats. Justices Dafna Barak-Erez and Isaac Amit formed the majority, against Justice David Mintz’s dissent.
The ruling did not require the appointment of particular women or their ordination as rabbis. It rather held that, for this electoral role, the statutory term “rabbis” was not confined to people formally ordained by the Chief Rabbinate.
On May 19, 2024, however, the Chief Rabbinate Council adopted a decision saying that women could not be appointed as rabbis and that even considering such appointments was forbidden under its interpretation of Jewish law. The decision, cited in the petition and reproduced in the state’s response, argued that considering a woman would itself recognize the possibility of her holding a rabbinic role.
The Knesset subsequently passed Amendment No. 8 to the Chief Rabbinate Law on December 4, 2024. It defined a “rabbi” eligible for one of the ten appointments as someone ordained by the Chief Rabbinate after passing its required written examinations, or holding a certificate of eligibility for specified rabbinic posts.
Because the Chief Rabbinate does not ordain women, the petitioners argue, the new definition closed the route the court had recognized.
A separate ruling has since changed women’s access to the rabbinate’s examinations. On July 14, 2025, a unanimous panel, in a judgment written by Supreme Court Deputy President Noam Sohlberg, ruled that the Chief Rabbinate could not bar women from taking its exams.
The court explained that the examinations serve purposes beyond qualifying candidates for rabbinic office: recognition of religious learning can also carry employment and salary benefits. Denying women access was therefore unlawful discrimination. That ruling did not, however, settle their eligibility for the electoral appointments challenged in this case.
At a High Court hearing last month (September 14), the petitioners’ lawyers emphasized that distinction: passing examinations would not by itself satisfy a law requiring ordination. They argued that women’s expertise in Jewish law was being excluded from the assembly’s rabbinic representation because of their sex.
The state’s response argued that the amendment must be considered as a whole. Alongside the disputed qualification requirement, it introduced a minimum of 31 women among the assembly’s public representatives.
The state maintained that reserving the ten appointments for rabbis recognized by the Chief Rabbinate served a legitimate purpose, and that the broader increase in women’s representation supported the amendment’s constitutionality. The Knesset joined that position. The petitioners argued that additional public-representative seats did not remedy the exclusion of women as religious scholars.
The government also argued that the petitioners’ request to halt the council elections pending a judgment would effectively suspend the statutory election arrangements. Justice Gila Canfy-Steinitz rejected that interim request on December 31, 2024, citing the caution required before suspending legislation ahead of a ruling on its merits.
The September conditional order leaves the substantive challenge open. The respondents must submit their formal answers by December 15, 2026.