Vexing of Converts

I recently read Rabbi Yom Tov Schwarz's masterpiece, Eyes to See (Urim Publications: product page). Truly, this is a work of lofty grandeur; 502 pages long, it is already on page 17 that we read,

The distinctions that are found in the Talmud are between a Jew and an akum (heathen), whose societal standards, ethics and morality were so low as to be almost non-existent, and in no way has any bearing on the non-Jews our our time, as has already been noted by the Gedolei Ho'Ahcaronim (great halachic authorities of the recent past).

Imagine how much wealth is to be found in the almost 500 pages that follow this passage!

The recent giyur issue added additional poignancy to the following passage, found on pp. 271f. Discussing the greatness of kiddush hashem, especially when before a non-Jewish audience, Rabbi Schwarz says (square brackets are Rabbi Schwarz's; curly braces are mine),

...the Talmudic lesson in Yevamos (79a) concerning the public hanging of seven descendants of King Saul to avenge his "killing of the Givonites," as related in II Samuel, Chapter 21. Verse 10 states: "Ritzpah daughter of Aiah took a sackcloth and spread it for herself over a rock, from the beginning of the harvest until water fell down on [the corpses] from heaven; she did not allow the birds of the heaven to descend upon them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night." Commenting on this, the Gemara asks:

Is it not written (Deut. 21:23), "His body shall not remain for the night upon the tree"? {Footnote 14: When a person is administered the death penalty by hanging, the Torah commands that the body not remain exposed; it must be removed and buried before nightfall. However, the bodies of King Saul's descendants were left out for many months, because King David commanded that the bodies not be removed until the rains began to fall.} Rabbi Yochanan taught in the name of R. Shimon ben Y'hotzodok: It is preferable to uproot one letter (i.e. one commandment) of the Torah, so that G-d's name will be publicly sanctified. For the passerby would say, "What is the nature of these corpses?" "These are the sons of kings!" "But what did they do?" "They acted against self-declared converts." {Footnote 15: The Givonites sought to convert to Judaism after Joshua's victories in Israel. Because they did not do so out of religious conviction, they were not accepted as authentic converts. They just voluntarily began to live as Jews.} [The passerby] then said, "No other nation is as worthy of becoming attached to as this one. For if the sons of royalty are held liable in this manner [and there is no favoritism], then this is certainly true all the more so for ordinary people. And if self-declared converts [are avenged] in this manner, then how much more so is this true for the Jews themselves!" Immediately, 150,000 converts joined the ranks of Israel.

We may quibble with footnote 15. Now, surely the Givonites indeed were less than exemplary converts, given that they converted via subterfuge, deceiving Joshua and hiding their true identity. Nevertheless, as Rabbi Schwarz himself notes elsewhere in the same book, the Givonites, for their cruel demand that the sons of King Saul be executed (for King Saul's killing the priests of Nob and depriving the Givonites of their livelihood), rather than accepting King David's monetary compensation, were punished by King David's declaration that henceforth, no one may marry a Givonite, for their cruelty was unbecoming of a Jew. (As Rabbi Schwarz notes several times in the book, the Talmud questions the Abrahamic ancestry of a cruel or unkind Jew who lacks compassion, but never is the ancestry of a Jew who violates Shabbat or kashrut questioned. This has ramifications both for where Orthodox Jews ought to invest their efforts and energies, and also for how Orthodox Jews perceive and treat non-observant Jews.) Apparently, previously, one could marry a Givonite, meaning they were fully-fledged Jews, even though their conversion lacked acceptance of mitzvah observance, and was moreover entered into via shady means. This would be in keeping with what has been written by Rabbi Marc Angel (see articles all over http://www.jewishideas.org, Rabbi Yehuda Herzl Henkin (in Hakira vol. 7), Professor Zvi Zohar (at Jewish Ideas, ibid.), and others, following the Talmud and Rambam, that though conversion for non-religious reasons is surely less than ideal, such a conversion is still valid, as long as the convert satisfies kabbalat mitzvot (variously explained as acceptance of the beit din's authority to punish transgression, or acceptance of Jewish peoplehood, or some similar acceptance that falls far short of a declaration to actually be an observant law-abiding Jew; more or less, as long as the would-be-convert accepts his or her becoming a Jew qua Jew, the conversion is valid, even if one should not have performed the conversion in the first place).

On the other hand, I'm not learned in the history and halachot surrounding the Givonites; I'm only assuming they were valid converts, based on the articles I've read about contemporary converts. I'll admit that I'm not learned in why the Samaritans are considered invalid converts; how could their conversions be annulled? The Soncino Talmud, regarding the status of the Givonites, says,

[H] lit., 'dragged in'; proselytes who have not been admitted into the congregation, [or, 'self-made proselytes', a class of converts who Judaize in mass under the impulsion of fear. V. Moore, G. F. Judaism I, 337].

I've been meaning to acquire for myself a copy of Moore, which I have seen cited and quoted often by the authorities whom I follow (chiefly the British ones), but in the meantime, I've only yet gotten Schechter's Some Aspects of Rabbinic Theology and Urbach's The Sages, so I regrettably cannot check Moore here for what he says. So I'm assuming the Givonites were valid converts, but I may be incorrect; I am not learned in this specific subject.

But be that as it may; whether the Givonites were true converts (albeit for less than ideal motives, and achieved by shady means), or only impostor and inauthentic converts (as per Rabbi Schwarz), either way, see how swift and uncompromising the punishment was of those who oppressed them! In fact, King Saul only indirectly hurt the Givonites, killing only those who employed them (viz. the priests of Nob); King Saul never actually laid a finger on the Givonites themselves. Moreover, it is not entirely clear what role King Saul's sons played in this entire series of events, and yet they were the ones executed. And as we have seen, the Givonites were not the best of converts, if they were converts at all. On top of all this, the Givonites were considered to be cruel and heartless people, for King David declared no one was permitted anymore to marry the Givonites, on account of their cruel and vindictive demand that King Saul's sons be executed, rather than accepting the generous monetary compensation offered by King David. But despite all this, witness the great punishment of those who were associated with vexing and troubling them: a Torah commandment (viz. not to let an executed criminal's body stay out overnight) was violated in order to vindicate them!

Now, those in Israel who recently invalidated conversions, they claim that the conversions they invalidated were never valid in the first place. Now, this claim is patently false according to the halachah, but let us suppose their claim is actually valid. Nevertheless, according to Rabbi Schwarz's opinion that legitimate and authentic converts must be practically observant (this opinion is shared by those who recently invalidated conversions, following the 19th century innovation of Rabbi Yitzhak Shmelkes, that conversion without observance is an invalid conversion), and that therefore the Givonites were not really Jewish at all, whatsoever, nevertheless, even so, the events in this Gemara occurred to those who caused pain and frustration and loss to them. So even if the rabbis who invalidated converts were halachically correct (viz., in their claim that a convert who is not observant is not really a convert at all), nevertheless, they'd fall under the aegis of this Gemara's implicit censure! Needless to say, given that the converts whose conversions were (supposedly) invalidated are actually true bona-fide converts according to the halachah, all the more are the rabbis who vexed them are subject to the Gemara's implicit censure.

Instructive indeed is this Gemara passage.