Shlomo Goren

Rabbi Shlomo Goren
Shlomo Goren as a young Israeli officer and rabbi heading the Military Rabbinate of the IDF
Personal details
Born	3 February 1917 Zambrów, Poland
Died	29 October 1994 (age 77)
Nationality	Israeli
Spouse	Tzfia Cohen
Occupation	Chief Rabbi of the Military Rabbinate of the IDF, third Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel

Shlomo Goren (Hebrew: שלמה גורן) (February 3, 1917 – October 29, 1994), was an Orthodox Religious Zionist rabbi in Israel, a Talmudic scholar and foremost authority on Jewish law. He founded and served as the first head of the Military Rabbinate of the Israel Defense Forces and subsequently as the third Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel from 1973 to 1983, after which he established a yeshiva in Jerusalem, which he headed until his death.

He served in the Israel Defense Forces during three wars, wrote several award-winning books on Jewish law, and was appointed Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv in 1968.

Goren's original family name was Gorenchik. He was born in Zambrów, Poland and immigrated with his family to the British Mandate of Palestine in 1925.

Goren was raised in Kfar Hasidim, a village of religious Jews near Haifa that his father co-founded. He began studying at the Hebron yeshiva in Jerusalem at age 12, where he was identified as a prodigy. His first book was published when he was 17 years old.

Goren's career was characterized by a commitment to the Religious Zionist values of his youth. He volunteered for the Haganah in 1936, and served as a chaplain for the Jerusalem area during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, during which he tested for and qualified as an IDF paratrooper. Goren was a Chaplain of the Carmeli Brigade during the war. Immediately after the Israeli War of Independence, he engaged, often at great personal risk, in the collecting of the bodies and giving proper burial to soldiers whose remains had been left in the field. He strongly opposed the idea of separate religious and secular units and worked for the integration of all soldiers in united army units. He was the most prominent halakhist involved in rulings for religious soldiers regarding their army service. Goren was eventually promoted to the rank of Brigadier-General.