Rabbi David Lau, the recently elected chief Ashkenazi rabbi of Israel, has been accused of cheating on an ordination exam in 1993.

Israel’s Channel 2 reported Aug. 4 that Lau brought questions and answers from previous exams into one of his ordination tests. Reference material is not permitted in ordination exams.

The papers did not have Lau’s name on them. He was disqualified from the exam and took the test again in 1994, the same year he received his ordination.

Channel 2 received a signed affidavit documenting the incident from Rabbi Uzi Levi, the test’s proctor and a senior official in the Chief Rabbinate’s ordination department.

Last week, Lau came under fire for using a racist slur in describing Israeli and foreign basketball players. He was elected to serve as Israel’s Ashkenazi chief rabbi for the next 10 years. — jta