Suffern, NY – Rabbi Leib Tropper’s response to recent allegations has been delayed until now in deference to his legal counsel.
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Events of recent weeks have caused Rabbi Tropper great anguish, in particular given his recognition that the high standard of ethics in the Jewish community is one of its most treasured principles.
He wishes to express his regret for the turmoil caused by his departure from the Eternal Jewish Family organization and for what has appeared to be conduct not within our significant laws of modesty. Rabbi Tropper now looks forward to a return to both his studies and time with his loving family, as well as to personal introspection. He thanks those outside his closest circle of friends for respecting his privacy.
Waht does it mean? Is it an admition? A very pareve comment, is he on the way to vindication, just holding out?
whoa johnny!!!!!! can someone please explain
what a disgrace!! I hope they look for the “Satmar” and all others involved and remove them from their positions as well.
So, is this then an admission to his wrong doings?
This is not a denial. Allegations of behaviour this outrageous requires a better response. I’m saddened by the conclusion this leads me to.
Well well well now let him resign from his yeshiva
Rav Tropper, shlita, has shownn a great deal of regret over his indiscretions and will do tshuvah. Now its time to move on and leave him and his family to heal. Nothing is to be gained by focusing more attention on this ehrleche yid and talmid chacham who strayed from the derech on this one matter.
This is news for what it does not say rather than for what it does!
First, note that this wasn’t a denial.
In addition, this statement writes of Judaism’s “high standard of ethics” and “our significant laws of modesty.” To me these seem like excuses (just like when it wrote “appeared to be” improper); that the harsh strictures of the law were simply to great for a normal person to keep. However, in this instance, the accusations are sordid and, if true, it did not require high standards or significant laws to avoid but, rather, normal and accepted standards of Western culture. Ask yourself if a normal ethical person in the same position of authority would act this way.
Moreover, the accusations are particularly galling given EJF’s position in regard to how it treated the conversion standards of other Orthodox groups like the RCA. How can one publically attack the legitimacy of the conversions by other frum people and then not be able deny doing things such as this behind closed doors!
Finally, “His Legal Counsel” is not an entity. The law firm or lawyer making the statement is. We should know who was retained by R’ Tropper to write this and defend him.
Loving family life” they need some real counseling….
“allegations”??? There is proof, they have him on tape being quite “immodest ” with another woman (not his wife, not even Jewish yet
Hashem yeracheim!! Afar l’pumeh!
**Since when does legal counsel advise the delay of a statement of innocence & denial?!
**Rabbi Tropper has been caused “great anuish”?!! Not Klall Yisroel and our Torah?!!
**His recognition of “Hihgest standard of ethics” – as if the problem is his ‘not rising to be the ba’al madreigah hamevukash’ – Instead of the lowly ba’al taivah hamenuval v’ham’naef?!!
**He’s apologizing for the turmoil caused by “his departure” instead of the horrendous chilul Hashem caused by his ma’aseh nevalah?!! . . .
**for what “appeared” to be conduct “not within . . . modesty”?!! What it’s ‘possible’ he went out in his bathrobe to get the morning newspaper – as opposed to his engaging in shtufay zimah?!?!
**He looks forward to going back to his studies (guess he wasn’t studying while ‘engaging’ in EJF activities?!) . .oh and also “personal introspection” – is that cheshbon hanefesh & Teshuva? As an END thought – instead of ‘Rabbi Tropper looks forward to spending the next few years in bitter self imposed galus l’teshuva for his maaseh mitzrayim, pouring out his heart for the unforgivable chilul Hashem he caused?!
What about the conversions that he approved? Don’t they have to be investigated to see if they were subjected to undue pressure to sin.
This “statement” sounds and feels like nothing more than another paid Public Relations Release. Its brazen chutzpah and disregard for the reality of events only compounds and magnifies the humongous chilul Hashem!
B’ikvisa d’moshicha yihiyeh beis vaad l’znus – v’hoemes neheders!
V’chol bais yisroel yivku es hachilul Hashem hanorah!
There’s a very interesting saying. Nisht kein antfort iz oich an antfort. Not denying and asking for privacy is a very fudgy way of saying I did it, leave me alone. Of course we believe in teshuva and I’ll even grant him that he is truly sorry for what he did. But go he must and go he did. The onus is on the “gedolim” who try to cover up one of their own by saying how great he is and the tragedy of his departure. The tragedy is that a so-called godol would do something like this, take advantage of his position to sin egregiously. I’m old enough to understand that al taamin b’atzmecho and that anybody can sin. But what about our youth who look at this “roshyeshiva” and get turned off? If Joe Doe does this, no chilul Hashem, no turn offs. Yep, this is a Jewish tragedy.And the tragedy must be great for his poor “loving” family with whom he wants to spend more time.
“Rabbi Leib Tropper’s response to recent allegations has been delayed until now in deference to his legal counsel.”
Legal counsel? I am not a lawyer nor a son of a lawyer, can someone explain why he needs legal counsel?
All of these freaks should be locked up. Say you did it, be a man and live up to the responsibilites of the people you hurt.
It says: “… what has appeared to be conduct not within our significant laws of modesty. ….”
” … Appeared …” (it ONLY appears to be wrong, but maybe isn’t L’choil Hadeiois)???
I cannot even imagine any Rabbi (Shul, Yeshiva etc.) that I know referring to any female (outside of his own family, of course) as “… Darling …” .
Even if this is the only thing he did wrong, it’s bad enough.
Maybe we expect too much from our K’lei Koidesh today.
Niskatnu Hadoirois.
Anyone who reads between the lines will see clearly that this is essentially a formally worded confession. The question is where he goes from here in terms of the yeshiva he heads, hopefully he will give that up. Very tragic, but I don’t believe that he was always insincere, obviously something snapped along the way that caused this behavior. We cannot judge.
He as a person is so full of him self and thinkgs he is higher thenn god a hugh misnagid who put ppl the whole time,,, let this show the world what a bitter misnagid is…
M.
I dont think I have ever been so embarassed of anything Jewish until this point. The absolute Chillul Hashem that this man (NO – I will NOT refer to him as a Rabbi) committed is worse than anything Bernie Madoff could have hoped to do. If this man were to learn just a little about what Chillul Hashem means, what it does to Shechinah, he would do much more to repent and not worry about cute little PR stunts like this statement.
Add to this the Spinka “Rebbe” being sentenced to jail for laundering money and a Yeshivah teacher being arrested at home this morning for molesting students, and you have a triple crown of Chillul Hashem this week.
“He thanks those outside his closest circle of friends for respecting his privacy.”
After devoting years to preying on the weakest members of our community to exploit them for money and sex, he has the nerve to ask the rest of us to respect his privacy on this matter?
It is ALL of our business to know when the vulnerable in our community are being attacked. Because it was really an attack on our entire community – he was only able to catch a few, but I’m sure he would have taken advantage of any woman in our community had he been able to. If one member of our community is being used and hurt, we should all feel the pain – because we are one people.
So, Rabbi Tropper – NO, I will not respect your privacy on this matter!
This statement is a disgrace. I have no words.
Doesn’t he and his legal counsel realize that he owes a honest apology to the frum community not a statement making nothing of his disgraceful actions, as if Torah and the frum community are responsible.
He makes it sound like we all lost out by him leaving the EJF. Doest he understand that a person like him doesn’t belong in any Torah leadership position? We are happy he is out!
This story is only getting worse!!!
What do we say to our youth and young couples seeing all this???
Note how this monster is not apologizing to the victims and the community for the horror and the chillul hashem he caused. Tropper “now looks forward to a return to both his studies and time with his loving family.” Amazing how he would not even have his wife stand next to him. Also why dud he abandon his “studies” when he was the head of EJF? What a disgrace of a man he is!
My dear friends; who from amongst can honestLy say that he never sinned in the earea of kedusha who
What a low life. I wish he would take off that hat and beard and at least put on a pair of jeans and baseball cap.
He says he is going back to his studies and time with his loving family.
How about looking for some serious guidance for Teshovah on what you did?
You need to do Teshvah not just what you did to yourself and your family but for deceiving the frum community!
Some honesty at least now!
Are his convertions null and void?
It seems he is not an orthodox rabbi, so we must presume his convertions are neither according to Torah, nor acceptable.
It appears that even HE does not accept all the mitzvos!
i think his statment is good and professional. it was the right thing. listen we people arent made out of stone, we have desires lust ect. we arent perfect. he got caught and is repending…the only thing i ask for is if we arent as holy as we make ourselves, for g-ds sake lets be kind to people. i am not refering to leib tropper am referring to his org. why do we have to place added to chumras to converts and then have the insensitivity to revoke a gueres once they people work so hard to convert. the same emnchshlichkeit you want people to extend to the leib tropper extend to these converts…..in general any rav or lay leader whom harps on extra chumras or ionsensativity to others in my book is a nobody and not a mensch. a person who learns torah and goes by torah has and must be a bal middos tovas period.
You can’t expect privacy if you made yourself a public person and then violated our trust!
You have not just disgraced yourself but you disgraced the whole frum community in the most horrible way!
what you all are saying i said months ago for this is not the only matter he is involved in he also try ed to steal 100 of thousands of $ from a very rich man whom i know personally and accused him of thinking he was mashiach and this was years of trust and “companionship” he also damaged my friends reputation because than he was considered a “holy rabbi” what i think is that any “rabbi”
who is involved in any sort of public money dispute and does not back down for ethical reasoning than you already know ……………
Seems to be that there are “certain” people involved in this incident that are being very well shielded by others, with keeping things on the low-down. The entire story has not yet broken, as there are very big players involved in this story.
I’m weighing in. Knowing that I will open myself as target. But so be it. Emes M’eretz Tizmach, there is a concept of Ameetus that has to be addressed in the Rabbi Tropper alleged affair. A caveat – I know the Tropper family very, very well. Have referred Talmidim to his Yeshiva. And am cringing at the pain all of the bloggers have caused, not just to the family, but also to the Talmidim worldwide.
Okay, so you want to know, how can I defend wrong actions. The first thing I want to explain is that we live in a time of mixed-up morality. Here in the State of New York we booted out a governor who had paid someone to have a relationship. In his stead, we placed a man who had, Chinam, for free, cheated on his wife with another married person. And that, we have decided, was more moral – for Mr. Paterson to have had “troubles in his marriage” allowed him to do something we call Giluy Arayos, whereas the previous guy, gasp, paid. So morality is really spun based on secular societies’ warped Sodom-like views.
Now to the matter at hand. We have a rabbi who did an indiscretion. He was caught on tape having a very untzniyusdike conversation. As Dovid would have said “Chatasi LaHashem”. If he did this sin, his sin is against G-d, not against you and me. Therefore, we should not be here in the midst of the fray. In fact, most of what is being said is added on salacious lies. There is nothing shocking about what happened. We know that no person is immune to sin. That is why we have something called Gedarim, boundaries. So, yes, Rabbi Tropper broke some boundaries. He did not molest a child. He did not rape anyone. There was no “victim”.
Now, we know he did something untzinyusdik. But did he do something worse than the phone conversations? Ah, you all want to know, don’t you? Well, there is a 50-50 chance. Let us play both sides of the scenario. Let us say he did. Does that make his life fodder for discussion, based on Torah law? Nope. It would be Lashon Hara, if we expose his sin, as he is not a willful sinner who has been warned not to continue and keeps doing it. Now, let us play the other possibility – -what if Rabbi Tropper did not do anything other than have that perverted phone conversation. Then what is going on is retzicha and motzei shem rah. Either side of the coin, if he did or didn’t do the sin, we are not licensed to dissect him, call him names and trash him and his family.
We are the children of Shem, blessed with the mitzvah of Tallis because our ancestor when he saw his father’s indiscretion, made sure to cover it. I am not a fan, as anyone who knows me can attest to, who believes in the cover-up of anyone who is a “rodeph”. Molesters, rapists, drug pushers should and have to be exposed. That is our obligation as an Am Kadosh. But, hand-in-hand with that, has to be the refinement to know when to cover up.
Reply to #33 :You’re the one one who sounds bitter and pathetic. How many “Misnagdim” did something like this? (Your use of the term “misnaged” shows your chabad orientation, they are the only ones who still use this term instead of “Litvish”) Get over it, it’s not Vilna of 200 odd years ago!
I have met Rabbi Tropper many times, I have Davened Next to Him on Rosh Hashana , I have heard him give Shmuzim, I know people who he has made frum, That being said, When I heard this, I thought “absolutely Impossible” . …….Then I heard the tapes, which if you have ever met him are Irrefutable. Being somewhat of a Baal Teshuva myself , I am truly sickened by the depravity of this man(I refuse to call him a Rav ) He used Halacha , and His rabbanus for perverted purposes , . To the people who stick up for him, you really speak to the fact that so many people in the “Yeshivish world” (whatever that means) have Blinders on and don have the capacity to see how disgusting this situation is. Sadly , Its Very typical, the same closed minded , Racist, Sexist ,exclusionary , people who claim to represent Judaism , refuse to accept that this man,(refused to admit the Molestation and the kids at risk issue too) ) took advantage of what could be countless people , or at the very least 3 or for people. Additionally he made a Huge Chilull Hashem . Please wake up and dont stick up for this excuse for a human Being . Not that any of you will listen………………
Tropper has a long history of azus! in 1985 he was invited to speak in Mesivta of Long Beach, in the speech he criticized the masters of the Mussar movement the Rosh Yeshiva declared at that time that he would never be invited back.
I remember the shock and the ensuing tumult he caused in the Yeshiva.
I know this will not be popular on this forum but I will say it anyways. I think that despite all that has transpired we need to allow time to heal and bottom line is he is a groise talmid chochom, the fact is that he got his smicha from HaRav Shach z”l and therefore I believe that despite all that has happened all the Torah that he learned in the beis midrash and that he was marbitz borabim which you cannot take away from him certainly will not go to waste ch”v but “HaMaor Shebah Machziro L’mutav”. I’d like anyone to challenge me on this as this is what our great chazal tell us about the power of Torah notwithstanding any aveira one might commit.
in response to goldy rosenberg post # 51 “There was no “victim”.
is that line a joke??????? so most rabbis that do conversions, ask for phone sex for his buddies??? and sex for himself?????? ask to squeeze the women???? talk about certain positions his wife likes and doesnt like???? thats normal to you???? goldy, no disrespect but u need a heavy dose of reality…………..there certainly were victims here…and tropper aint one of them my friend
for those who don’t put their names and say they know me, yes this is me. and I answer to G-d, not to relatives, though, Baruch Hashem I have been blessed with a wonderful family in which my father taught us that we must always measure anything against Torah. All I said was that there is something wrong about the publication of this and the trashing of this family. A victim is someone who cannot walk away. This woman could have converted via Chabad — she worked for them. She did not need EJF to convert. And the point of the post is that everyone posting obviously did not ask Da’as Torah before doing so. Because according to Torah guidelines, if Rabbi Tropper did sin, it is not for you and me to decide and discuss. Again, I quote Dovid HaMelech that said “Chatasee LaHashem” — he had no need to discuss the matter with the rest of Klal Yisroel
Al Tudin chaveirchu AT shtagia limkoymoi
jude — this is not about defending him. This is about challenging you all to ask yourself, “what does G-d expect of us with these circumstances”. And, based on Torah sources, I would say that trashing the man and his family is not the way to go.
to #51 – He has damaged the respect and trust of every single Rabbi in the world. Period
This is the best the legal counsel can come up with? He will still have followers defending his every move.
Tropper statement is self serving and without a shred of remorse the only remorse Tropper exhibits that his misdeeds were exposed and he lost prestige that is not the remorse we are looking for.
The gemara states: if you saw a talmud chochom commiting a sin during the night, don’t accuse him during the day since he must’ve repented since he commited the sin. This should be enough.
to #51
First of all I’d like to commend you on using your real name, that takes guts. I dont’ know tropper and did not have an opinion about him before this started. I listened to the tapes and here’s the impression that I have; If I were to judge soley on his demeanor and tone of voice, he’s a classic ‘artscroll’ jew, polite, considerate,understanding. He asks her opinion, is sensitive to her feelings.
At the same time, the man has no soul. none.
I don’t mean neshomo, i mean soul. character, integrity. and tha’st what you don’t get, based on your defense.
That’s why he doesn’t and wont apologize. It’s not an infraction he committed, it’s the undoing of what people are being ‘mekareved’ for;go to Yeshiva for 20 years.
If you take this situation combined with spinka, douek, etc. They were taught, I’m sure, in their youth not to speak loshon horo ( an expression that should be banned from all schools) mekabel..besver ponim yofos ( which tropper did very well); but ..are you ready?! That if you give your word you have to keep it; integrity and character as a fundememtal of what it means to be a jew, not there. We all make mistakes, granted. His mistake is that he’s living a lie.
The way 2008 was a distater for economics , 2009 will go down as a year of the immodest. So many “frum” people being accused of crimes of harrasement, drugs, cheating on their spouses and many other things that can’t be written about here.
Nebach nebach nebach on all of us.
This is what happenes when we live in a chumrah society.
Many years ago when things were a bit more normal and we did not have all these phony restrictions of not being able to go to concerts, and the wigs we wore, nobody cared about, and the so called bugs in water years, there weren’t half of these problems.
Now we have kids at risk and even the Aguda wants to change the name of “at risk”. Just another way of covering up an issue. We have people cheating on spouses all over the place, people stealing in business and so many other ills.
In no way is anyone condeming anyone on this story. This is just an accusation and we don’t know the truth but like the famous saying goes-they don’t say those things about us and you!
We need real leaders that have the guts to get up at the podium and say things that have to be said. When this happens then Moshiach will come.
Like it has been said with all the cases of massive chillul hashem how can we expect for Moshiach to want to come and get us out of golus!
You don’t use a lawyer to say vidui. HKB’H is the final judge of sincerity, but fakery many of us can recognize from a mile away. On top of his other sins he has added on mocking the rules of tshuvah. I have written elewhere that he will now start a new organization called Eternal Jewish Tshuvah (EJT).
Now I would give him some credit if he issued this sort of a statement:
I regret my misconduct that broke many of our most significant laws including those pertaining to lewd conduct, extorting favors, oppressing converts, misusing people in the process of converting, in this and many other instances. I admit I regularly behaved hypocritically and misused my control of funds to sway others to support me. Accordingly I am stepping down from all positions which involve my having control of funds and influence over those seeking to enter Judaism or strengthen their attachment to Judaism.
In the coming days I will initiate a process of repentance by fully confessing all my misdeeds to all affected individuals and groups, including the Jewish public. I will make every effort to repair the damage though I realize that some of the damage I caused will never be repairable.
welll we must understand he had a weak momnet and he fell true this mean felles now worse then a squril i thin its enogh lets leave him and his family alone to deal with this done put more shame on him and his family we all have skeltons hidding and lots of theese so called cant understand writters you dont want anybody to check you and know what you are doing 24 7 thats does not say it was right or moral no way but he had his punishmnet for him i belive wishes that he can die and get over with this lets stop