Ovadia Yossef

Rav Ovadia Yossef (רבעובדיהיוסף), born in 1920 with Baghdad in Iraq, is a former Chief rabbi of Israel, décisionnaire rabbinical of great fame for the Séfarades and spiritual leader of the Israeli political party séfarade and religious Shass .

Ovadia Yossef emigrates in Israel at the 4 years age, and studies in Yechiva Porat Yossef in the hurdy-gurdy town of Jerusalem. The Chief rabbi Sépharade, Rav Meir Ouziel will give him his title of Rabbin at the 20 years age.

Between the years 1947 and 1950, it chairs the Large rabbinical Court of the Cairo in Egypt. In 1968, Rav Ovadia Yossef is named Chief rabbi of Tel Aviv. Elected for 10 years, it obtains the title of Rishon Letsion, Sépharade Chief rabbi of Israel in 1973.

It is with is posted that it will have in 1973 to decide (positively), in favor of Judaïté of the Falashas (Jewish of Ethiopia).

In the years 1980, he sponsors the scission of the Sépharades party Agoudat Israel (with the Rav Shach), scission which will give rise to the powerful religious party Israeli Sépharade, the Shass. Ovadia Yossef in is always, (at the beginning of 2006) the spiritual main leader.

Among its partisans, Rav Ovadia Yossef is famous for its phenomenal memory and its knowledge of all the sources of the Halakha through the centuries. For much of religious Sépharades, in Israel and in the world, the rav Yossef thus has extraordinary faculties, which give an important weight to its rabbinical decisions. In those, Rav quotes sometimes hundreds of works of Halakha to support its position.

Rav Ovadia Yossef wrote many works and in particular two Responsa: Yéh' ave Daat , and Yabiya Omer .

His/her son, Rav Yitshak Yossef is the author of the series of books Yalkout Yossef , which deal with all the fields of the halakha according to the directives and the rabbinical decisions of his/her father.

Controversial statements

These last years, the Yossef rabbi was characterized by violent flame attacks quoted in the media, pronounced in majority during his sermons. The justification of the spokesperson of Shas is with each time its remarks were deformed because quoted except context or translated too literally in the media foreigners.

Some of the declarations flamers of the rabbi:

In 2000, it claimed that the victims of the holocaust were hearts réincarnées pécheresses which owed expier by this biais.
July 2001: “In the old city of Arab Jerusalem they swarm. That they go in hell - and the Messiah will lead quickly to it”
November 2003: “All the problems come from Ashkénazes… You them Jewish ashkénazes, you were in Occident, hell. Why did you come here? What you said or made is of no importance”.
In 2005 after the Katrina hurricane: “There was a tsunami and there were terrible disasters, because one does not study enough the Torah… The blacks live Orleans over there. Do the blacks study the Torah? said send to them a tsunami and boundary-lines them… Bush was behind expulsions of Gush Katif, he encouraged Sharon to empty Gush Katif… we had 15.000 expelled Israel here, and there was the United States 150.000. It was the divine remuneration… God gives to each one what it deserves”.

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