Israel - Orthodox Zionis Rabbis Use SMS Messages to Answer Halakhic Questions

Israel - Orthodox Zionis Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, writes and receives an average of no less than 3,000 cellphone text (SMS) messages a month. Almost all are questions of halachha, to which Aviner responds in short, permitted or forbidden, without giving the reason.

The questions vary: Is it permissible to prepare tehina on Shabbat?
Only if it is watery, Aviner responds.

‪Can I have physical contact with my three-year-old niece?
Up to age nine is the answer.

Can one steal from an Arab, who probably stole one's merchandise?
No, stealing from a thief is prohibited.

Ultra-Orthodox rabbis prohibit the use of SMS even for secular purposes. But Orthodox Zionism adopted it some years ago as a means of direct communication, and Aviner was one of the pioneers. "My phone number is not unlisted," he said. "That's the rabbi's job, to be available. During the war, I received 600 SMS messages a day. A soldier wrote me from inside a Lebanese house in the middle of the battle, asking whether he could use the electricity to recharge his cellphone. I said yes. The next day he wrote me that he had in any case decided to leave NIS 10 in the house."