When a Yeshiva Forgets What It Is

by Ram ben Ze’ev

When a Yeshiva Forgets What It Is

There are moments when silence becomes complicity. This is one of them.

The recent appointment of a non-Jew, openly homosexual public figure as a Professor of Practice at Yeshiva University is not merely ill-judged. It is symptomatic of a deeper crisis: a Jewish institution no longer certain of what it is, whom it serves, or to whom it owes allegiance.

A yeshiva is not a university with kosher branding. A yeshiva is a בית מדרש (Beit Midrash — house of Torah), a place defined not by academic novelty or external approval, but by fidelity to Torah, mesorah, and moral clarity. When the name Yeshiva is retained while its substance is hollowed out, we are left with a shell — impressive to the outside world, but spiritually unmoored.

This is not about personal animus. It is not even, primarily, about the individual appointed. The issue is suitability. Torah does not measure worth by eloquence, popularity, or one’s usefulness as a public ally. Torah measures alignment. חיים של תורה (Chayim shel Torah — a life shaped by Torah) is not a negotiable credential in a yeshiva; it is the foundation.

We have seen this pattern before. In my recent article, “An Orthodox Gay Shul” Is a Contradiction — And Israel Must Not Normalise It, I addressed the dangerous attempt to rebrand behaviour that the Torah explicitly forbids as merely “another expression of Jewish identity.” The language changes, the slogans soften, but the substance remains unchanged. What the Torah calls an איסור (Issur — prohibition) does not become permitted because the world applauds it.

The appointment at Yeshiva University is the same phenomenon in academic dress.

Much has been made of this individual’s vocal support for Israel following the atrocities of 7 October 2023. That support was welcome in the moment, as any clear denunciation of Jew-hatred and terror should be. But we must be honest: public advocacy costs little and often yields much. In an age where alignment with Jewish suffering can elevate one’s profile, increase invitations, and confer moral authority, expressions of solidarity are not always expressions of loyalty.

It should be said clearly that not all public advocacy is either desired or required. While I bear no personal animosity toward Douglas Murray, and have read his work and heard him speak with appreciation for his eloquence, I neither need nor seek him as a defender of Israel or of the Jewish people. In April 2025, I wrote critically of his public humiliation of a Jewish commentator, an act that crossed a clear Torah boundary by embarrassing a fellow Jew in public. That incident was not peripheral; it revealed a fundamental misalignment with Jewish ethical restraint and communal responsibility. That such a figure is now elevated to a Professor of Practice at an institution calling itself a yeshiva only sharpens the question: when rhetorical brilliance is valued above Torah conduct, what, precisely, is being taught?

Torah is not impressed by applause.

The deeper tragedy here is not external influence, but internal weakness. We are witnessing a Jewish community increasingly desperate for recognition from the Nations — for validation, praise, and inclusion — even at the cost of its own identity. This is the psychology of assimilation: when a people no longer trusts its own values, it begins to borrow worth from outsiders.

The Torah warned us of this long ago. “ובחקתיהם לא תלכו” (Uvechukoteihem lo telechu — do not walk in their statutes) is not a call to isolation, but a demand for distinction. Our task is not to mirror the world, but to sanctify it through difference. When that difference becomes embarrassing, we do not become safer; we become invisible.

A yeshiva that seeks legitimacy through external voices rather than internal conviction has already conceded the argument. It signals to its students that Torah alone is insufficient, that it requires endorsement from those who neither live by it nor accept its authority.

This is not strength. It is surrender.

The Jewish people do not need mascots, spokespeople, or symbolic appointments to reassure us that we are “on the right side of history.” We need courage. We need leaders who remember that תורה לא מתנצלת (Torah lo mitnatzélet — Torah does not apologise). We need institutions willing to say, without embarrassment or hostility, that not every voice belongs at the centre of Jewish life.

Support from the Nations is welcome when it is genuine. But allegiance belongs elsewhere. Our identity does not come from smiles, applause, or carefully chosen words. It comes from Sinai, from covenant, from obligation — from a Torah that has never required permission to exist.

A yeshiva that forgets this ceases to be a yeshiva in anything but name.

And names, as we know, matter.

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Bill White (Ram ben Ze'ev) is CEO of WireNews Limited, Mayside Partners Limited, MEADHANAN Agency, Kestrel Assets Limited, SpudsToGo Limited and Executive Director of Hebrew Synagogue

Editor’s Note:

This article was written in response to a recent announcement by a Jewish institution identifying itself as a yeshiva regarding the appointment of a non-Jewish public figure to a senior academic role. The purpose of the article is not to critique any individual personally, but to address the broader and growing tension within Jewish communal life between fidelity to Torah values and the pursuit of external validation.