Rabbi Aryeh Stern, Former Jerusalem Chief Rabbi, Dies at 81

Former Jerusalem Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Aryeh Stern died Thursday at the age of 81 after an illness, drawing tributes from Israeli leaders, rabbis and Religious Zionist institutions.

Rabbi Stern was remembered as a senior Religious Zionist scholar, educator and public rabbi who sought to combine strict commitment to halacha with service to the broader public in Jerusalem. He served as Jerusalem’s Ashkenazi chief rabbi after being elected in 2014, alongside Sephardi Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar.

Religious Services Minister Yariv Levin said the Jewish religious leadership had lost “one of its pillars.”

“Rabbi Stern was a figure of unity, a spiritual leader who was able to unite all parts of the people out of true love and uncompromising commitment to Jewish law and tradition,” Levin said. “His loss will be felt in every home in Israel, and especially in the alleys of Jerusalem, which he loved so much.”

Rabbi Stern made accessibility to religious services a central part of his public mission in Jerusalem. After his election, he said he intended to serve every sector of the capital’s population.

“I intend to serve as rabbi of all Jerusalemites: Secular, religious, and ultra-Orthodox,” Rabbi Stern said at the time, according to Congregation Har Horev, where he served as community rabbi. “To head the Jerusalem Rabbinate is a great privilege, but it also carries with it a heavy responsibility.”

Jerusalem Mayor Moshe Lion said the capital had been blessed by Rabbi Stern’s leadership.

“Rabbi Aryeh Stern led Jerusalem with his actions, humility, and rulings, leaving a deep mark on the spiritual life of the capital,” Lion said.

Former Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat, who served during Rabbi Stern’s tenure as chief rabbi, said he was privileged to help lead Rabbi Stern’s election to the post. Barkat described him as “a man of Jerusalem, a man of connections and Torah” who united the public in the city.

Rabbi Stern was a student of Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook and worked for decades to preserve and transmit the Religious Zionist teachings associated with Mercaz Harav. In 1970, at Rabbi Kook’s request, he helped establish the Halacha Brura and Birur Halacha Institute, which connects Talmudic study with final halachic rulings. Rabbi Stern headed the institute for decades and served as editor of its summaries of the rulings of early and later authorities on Talmudic sugyot.

He also taught at Mercaz Harav and several other yeshivot, and was involved in educational institutions connected to Religious Zionist Torah learning. Tzohar described him as “a great Torah scholar, upright, a man of truth and pleasant ways.”

Rabbi Stern was born in Tel Aviv in 1944 and studied at Yeshivat HaYishuv HeChadash, Chevron Yeshiva and Mercaz Harav. He served in the IDF and later in the Paratroopers reserves during the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War.

He is survived by his wife, Rebbetzin Miriam Yocheved Stern, and seven children.

His funeral was held Thursday afternoon, leaving from Yeshivat Mercaz Harav in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Moshe neighborhood to Har HaMenuchot.