A CALL for the dismissal of the Israeli chief rabbi, and his prosecution for incitement to murder, underlines the growing tension in Israel between mainstream Orthodox Judaism and more liberal branches of the faith.
Leaders of the small Reform Jewish community made the call because of remarks by the rabbi in a sermon last sabbath in a Jerusalem synagogue.
The chief rabbi, Dr Eliahu Bakshi-Doron, was commenting on the Biblical story of Pinhas, son of Aharon the priest", who is praised by God in the Book of Numbers (Numbers 25:10-13) for slaying "Zimri, the son of Salu".
The general interpretation of this tale is that Zimri had been encouraging an overly tolerant view of relations with Gentiles, an approach that would have led to large-scale assimilation and the eventual disappearance of the Jews - hence the Lord's satisfaction at Pinhas's "zealous" action.
In a remark that, not surprisingly, has caused considerable offence to Reform Jews, Dr Bakshi-Doron described Zimri as "the first Reform Jew" and expressed his satisfaction at the murder, noting that "sometimes there are circumstances that necessitate radical action".
The chief rabbi added in his sermon that Jewish religious law outlawed murder - and has since made clear that he did not intend his comments to be interpreted as having any current relevance.
But Rabbi Uri Regev, a lawyer and a leader of Reform Jewry in Israel, has accused Rabbi Bakshi-Doron of having "paved the way for the first murder of a Reform rabbi".
Yigal Amir, the Orthodox Israeli who assassinated the prime minister, Mr Yitzhak Rabin, last November, justified that killing by invoking his interpretation of Jewish religious law, which he said obligated him to shoot dead Mr Rabin for abandoning his people through his peace policies with the Palestinians. In such a climate, said Rabbi Regev, the chief rabbi's comments last Saturday stood as a dangerous incitement to violence.
Although massively supported among American Jews, Reform Judaism has relatively few adherents and no formal standing in Israel. With the election of a right-wing religious government in May, there is little prospect of the Reform breaking an Orthodox monopoly - a situation deeply frustrating to Reform leaders.
Equally, despite that monopoly said Rabbi David Rosen - the former Chief Rabbi of Ireland who now works in Israel promoting interfaith dialogue - Dr Bakshi-Doron's remarks reflect the widespread "Orthodox hostility to Reform Judaism, hostility that misunderstands modern Jewish life, and that actually weakens Orthodoxy."
Dr Rosen, who served as Chief Rabbi of Ireland's overwhelmingly Orthodox community from 1979 to 1985, noted that Dr Bakshi-Doron had been speaking at a closed, Orthodox forum, and that, had he realised the comments would receive wider publicity, he would "hopefully have been more careful".