As a number of readers have pointed out, the ever reliable Pavlovian pit bull of the Haredi world, Jonathan Rosenblum, has published an attack on Modern Orthodoxy using Noah Feldman as his point of departure. I have already written my response, here.
No, as a few asked, I am not a prophet. As I sit here in St Petersburg, where Dr. Pavlov did his pioneering work, I can say with full confidence that it was expected. Feldman rang the bell and Rosenblum barked.
Quod erat demonstrandum.
7 comments:
Rosenblum's anti MO points are largely undermined by Feldman's piece itself: the castigation Feldman got by his Rabbis was exactly the kind one would expect from Haredi Rabbis. The whole point of Feldman's piece is that MO is orthodox and unforgiving, despite perhaps its own claims to the contrary.
Rosenblum being the paid Haredi shill, indeed can be counted on for schadenfreude when enemies (and perceived enemies) fail, or for limp apologetics when his patrons publicly appear foolish, backwards, and parasitic. If Jonanthan Rosenblum had never been made into a baal t'shuva they would've found some other Jonathan Rosenblum.
You might not agree, but ultimately many although not all of the charges within Feldman's piece do pose a formidable challenge to all of Orthodoxy. The challenges of particularism vs. universalism, Orthodoxy's countenancing of extra-Torah morality, are old ones, and largely go unmet, so that all of Orthodoxy suffers - Rosenblum's people included. I recently saw the movie "Mendy". Expect lots more Mendys in the coming years (rch"l), except that the new defectors won't be limited to the lust seekers. [It's also worthwhile watching the interview with the ex-Husid writer on the DVD].
I knew Rosenblum once, and have a hard time believing that he actually believes that his brand of Orthodoxy could handle the challenges of modernity any better. This is all about money.
If not prophecy at least ruach hakodesh.
In fact his criticism's of Feldman were fairly accurate but he couldn't hold himself back.He went way over the boundary,implying that MO will turn out just like Mendelson's kids.He ended up acting just like Feldman.
Apparently, the original in the Yated was worse: He stated that many Maimonides graduates are no longer religious.
Delicious! Laughing uproariously
Nachum,
Many Maimo graduates ARE no longer religious. That's a fact. In general, I think it would behoove MO (and I consider myself MO) to accept criticsm a little more gracefully. Isn't that one of the MO criticisms of Chareidim? And I might add, that Jonathan Rosenbloom did not use the language used by our ba'al ha'achsanya.
i thought Pavlov's dogs "came and salivated" when he rang the bell... but the last i learned of it was years ago.
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