Ben Zion Abba Shaul - Communal Activities

Communal Activities

Abba Shaul cared about his students as a father for his sons. He tried to make sure that all his students married; his rebbetzin would suggest shidduchim from the many girls who helped her in her house. Seeing that married students were unable to manage on a kollel stipend, he established a special Friday kollel and traveled to the United States to raise money for it.

Abba Shaul helped to launch a religious revival among Sephardi Jews in Israel as the founder of Maayan Hachinuch HaTorani, a network of Sephardi schools which is the equivalent of Chinuch Atzmai. He promised to fund the first year of operation for any Talmud Torah that was opened in a city that did not already have one. He also worked to strengthen Sephardi communities in other countries. He traveled to England, France, Italy, Iran, Mexico, Panama, Colombia and the United States to establish rabbinical courts and to arrange for shochtim (ritual slaughterers), mohelim (ritual circumcisers), and rabbis.

Abba Shaul joined other Torah leaders in Israel to fight against edicts that threatened the Torah way of life. These included the battle to preserve the sanctity of Shabbat, the fight to close mixed-sex swimming pools, and the battle against autopsies for religious individuals.

In 1972, he assumed a prominent stand in opposition to the government's proposal of mandatory army service for girls. Together with Rabbi Yehuda Tzadka, he drafted a halakhic ruling which stated that mandatory army service for girls was in the category of yehareg ve'al yaavor ("be killed and do not transgress"). The text of his ruling was signed by 400 Torah leaders throughout Israel.