A quick glance at my dates and my sitemeter tells me that it's been too long since I posted. So much to write and so little time....
In the interim, as I collect my thoughts, I want to send everyone to a very insightful posting at QED, about a long lost (and sore needed) rabbinic voice: Rav Shlomo Goren זצ"ל. Too many people think of him in political terms, unaware that he was a great Talmid Hakham, who possessed a quality unknown in the contemporary rabbinate: Fearless Courage.
Absolutely Required Reading.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
On the Cusp of 5768
In just a couple of hours we will intone the perennial wish:
תכל שנה וקללותיה, תחל שנה וברכותיה.
Oh God, let the year and its curses end. Let the New Year and its blessings commence.
I feel a bit mixed about the sentiment, because there is a lot that happened this year for which I have to thank God. Everyone is healthy, and home for the Hagim. I got tenure, was picked for a lot of really great projects and my book is steaming along. My wife was graduated from Beit Berl and is working as an Art Therapist. Number one son finished his BA and is finishing his MA proposal. Number two son finished Hesder and the army. Daughter Number 1 is starting universitt. Daughter number two is doing wonderfully in High School. Daughter number three went into fourth grade and gets up early so as not to be late for school. Barukh HaShem!
Nationally, though, next year lookks more ominous than this past one. Olmert is running a liquidation sale, and both God's house and (le-havdil) my house may be on the block as he does everything to stay out of jail, and the all-knowing Left cheers the sounds of self-destruction. The Bet haVaad is a Bet Zenut (M. Sotah, end). The Syrians may have nuclear missiles and there are Neo-Nazis in the Shfelah. And what is our biggest problem?Shemittah.
And yet, Rosh Hashanah brings comfort. It is, as we know, the day of God's coronation. He is the King. He is the Judge. He decides. Ultimately, the sense of helplessness we feel about the world around us, brings us back to that fact. Modern man, as the Rav zt'l said, confuses 'What' with 'Why'. We know how things work. We don't know why, and Science can't tell us. Only God can, because only He knows.
So, at the end of the day, as we crown our King tonite and for the next two days, המלך הקדוש, it's a reaffirmation of our utter dependence upon Him, and Him alone.
תכל שנה וקללותיה, תחל שנה וברכותיה.
Oh God, let the year and its curses end. Let the New Year and its blessings commence.
I feel a bit mixed about the sentiment, because there is a lot that happened this year for which I have to thank God. Everyone is healthy, and home for the Hagim. I got tenure, was picked for a lot of really great projects and my book is steaming along. My wife was graduated from Beit Berl and is working as an Art Therapist. Number one son finished his BA and is finishing his MA proposal. Number two son finished Hesder and the army. Daughter Number 1 is starting universitt. Daughter number two is doing wonderfully in High School. Daughter number three went into fourth grade and gets up early so as not to be late for school. Barukh HaShem!
Nationally, though, next year lookks more ominous than this past one. Olmert is running a liquidation sale, and both God's house and (le-havdil) my house may be on the block as he does everything to stay out of jail, and the all-knowing Left cheers the sounds of self-destruction. The Bet haVaad is a Bet Zenut (M. Sotah, end). The Syrians may have nuclear missiles and there are Neo-Nazis in the Shfelah. And what is our biggest problem?Shemittah.
And yet, Rosh Hashanah brings comfort. It is, as we know, the day of God's coronation. He is the King. He is the Judge. He decides. Ultimately, the sense of helplessness we feel about the world around us, brings us back to that fact. Modern man, as the Rav zt'l said, confuses 'What' with 'Why'. We know how things work. We don't know why, and Science can't tell us. Only God can, because only He knows.
So, at the end of the day, as we crown our King tonite and for the next two days, המלך הקדוש, it's a reaffirmation of our utter dependence upon Him, and Him alone.
אנו לי-ה ועינינו לי-ה.
והיה ד' למלך על כל הארץ ביום ההוא יהיה ד' אחד ושמו אחד.
כתיבה וחתימה טובה לכל בית ישראל.
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Told You so...
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.
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.
Tuesday, August 07, 2007
This is a Real Estate Lawyer
I'm presently sitting in Moscow, where Jews were not allowed to live until the late 19th century, and watching two, related dramas unfold before my eyes at home.
Our soldiers are throwing Jews out of their homes, in buildings purchased by Jews over two centuries ago (and documented as such), in order to appease Abu Mazen. They are doing so with the type of brutality that makes me ashamed I ever wore the blue uniform. If Olmert had been their lawyer, i.e. if they were not some religious shnooks but rich clients who could line his pockets, he'd be out there stopping it.
At the same time, Olmert is offering a chunk of pre-1967 Israel, the size OF THE ENTIRE WEST BANK if only Abu Mazen (who has no power anyway) will make peace (Pretty Please). Any why do we tolerate this? Because the harlots in the Knesset would rather retain their seats than their country.
Chronologically, we're in the period of post-Tisha B'Av consoltation. In reality, we're stuck in Isaiah I:
How is the faithful city become a harlot! She that was full of justice, righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers. Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water. Thy princes are rebellious, and companions of thieves; every one loveth bribes, and followeth after rewards; they judge not the fatherless, neither doth the cause of the widow come unto them.
Our soldiers are throwing Jews out of their homes, in buildings purchased by Jews over two centuries ago (and documented as such), in order to appease Abu Mazen. They are doing so with the type of brutality that makes me ashamed I ever wore the blue uniform. If Olmert had been their lawyer, i.e. if they were not some religious shnooks but rich clients who could line his pockets, he'd be out there stopping it.
At the same time, Olmert is offering a chunk of pre-1967 Israel, the size OF THE ENTIRE WEST BANK if only Abu Mazen (who has no power anyway) will make peace (Pretty Please). Any why do we tolerate this? Because the harlots in the Knesset would rather retain their seats than their country.
Chronologically, we're in the period of post-Tisha B'Av consoltation. In reality, we're stuck in Isaiah I:
How is the faithful city become a harlot! She that was full of justice, righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers. Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water. Thy princes are rebellious, and companions of thieves; every one loveth bribes, and followeth after rewards; they judge not the fatherless, neither doth the cause of the widow come unto them.
Monday, August 06, 2007
Memory and Territory+ survival
This just arrived on YNET. It should be must reading.
A state of exile
A methodical exile is taking place; the exile of location and exile of the mind
Yishai Fleisher
We all know what exile is. Exile is when you get kicked off your land. But that's not the worst exile. A nation may be forcibly exiled from its land, but if the nation longs to return, sets days to mourn the eviction, remembers every inch of the land, remembers its history there, reveres the holy places and burial sites of their forefathers, and teaches every successive generation to remember - in such a scenario, the exile is never complete because the relationship between the people and their land is never fully severed.
Memory, education, and yearning – these are all methods of warding off the full effects of exile, and they can sustain a nation until the time comes when the exile can be reversed and a return can commence.
But what then is a full exile? A full exile is when the connection between the land and the people is forgotten. If there is no memory of prior ownership, no longing to return, no stories told to children, then the exile brought about by an enemy nation which wished to impose a disconnect between the people and its land comes into full effect. If the very fact that the nation has been exiled is forgotten, then that is true exile.
The idea that the loss of collective national memory brings true exile has a surprising corollary: a nation can be in a state of exile even while living on its original soil! Like a person suffering from amnesia while sitting in his own house – a nation may be so utterly without memory that it has no idea that it is at home.
Rachel's Tomb
Such is the case in Israel today. The memory that has been carried in our collective conscience for two thousand years has steadily worn away and no longer serves to keep the exile at bay. Take, for example, the case of the Tomb of Rachel.
In terms of emotional connection, Rachel's Tomb is unequaled for the Jewish people. From the biblical narrative of Rachel's life, to Jeremiah's account of her crying for her children going to exile and God's promise of their return, to the generations who visited her grave, to the beautiful mausoleum constructed by Moshe Montefiore in 1841, the memory of Rachel's Tomb in the olive orchards of Bethlehem has kept us connected to this place through out the long exile. In 1919, Louis Brandies stood next to Rachel's Tomb at sunset and said "I know now why all the world wanted this land and why all peoples loved it."
Go to Rachel's Tomb today – if you can. A monstrosity of walls, pillboxes, gates, and chains has been erected to ostensibly keep the would-be intruder away. The place is downright ugly, and if you did manage to get in to the compound, soldiers do not allow you to walk around freely, because, they claim, danger is everywhere, even inside the labyrinth of high walls.
Take your children there. As you pass into the prison-like fortress try to teach your children about the Matriarch Rachel, our mother Rachel. You will not succeed because you will not be able to communicate a sense of the value of the place. It is too ugly, too military, too filled with fear, it is simply unattractive both physically and emotionally.
Only those who remember Rachel's Tomb the way it used to be can still have an emotional connection to the place. If the current state of affairs continues, the next generation will not remember Rachel's Tomb and the exile from this place will be stronger then it has been in two thousand years. Just as we are exiled from the physical Rachel's Tomb, Rachel's Tomb is being exiled from our minds.
This phenomenon of exile is not only at Rachel's Tomb – it's everywhere. The Tomb of Joseph in Nablus is gone, destroyed by Arabs, abandoned by Israel. Hebron, home and burial place of the patriarchs is constantly in the crosshairs of destruction. The Temple Mount, the place of two Jewish temples, is being systematically neutered of its history (let alone its future value). Judea and Samaria, the biblical heartland, is now being cut off by a snaking wall, which scars the land and cuts us off from our history and heritage. The exiling forces seem to attack the very places where our collective memory was strongest.
Cerebral exile
As we have noted, physical exile is one thing, but cerebral exile, the cutting off of memory is the final guillotine of exile. Here, the groundwork for forced forgetting has been in the works for decades. On the one hand, the Jewish people's historical connection to the land has been systematically un-taught. In schools, many Jewish children learn to hate the Bible, learn a revisionist anti-Zionist history, and are simply never taught the stories and the emotional connection to places like Rachel's Tomb. On the other hand, a new milieu and accompanying lingo fill the void left in the young mind: Occupation, Palestine, Peace, and Post-Zionism. Our history and with it, our emotional connection to our land, is being erased.
This is not the first time when an attempt to sever the Jewish memory of the land of Israel has been made. Of course, there were the two great exiles when the Babylonians and the Romans sacked Jerusalem and dispossessed the nation.
Yet there is another case that is a clearer reflection of what is happening today: Yerovam Ben Navat was a wicked Jewish king of the Northern tribes during the period of the divided kingdom (10th century BCE). He wanted his vassals to forget about the Davidic dynasty that still reigned in Jerusalem and therefore built two idolatrous temples as an alternative to the one that stood in Jerusalem and bade his people to worship in these shrines.
But the people persisted in going up to the real Temple, so Yerovam then constructed manned roadblocks that barred aliyah to Jerusalem. He hoped that by forcibly stopping people from going to Jerusalem he would make people forget all about it. It took two centuries for this "security barrier" to be removed, but by then it was too late, the people had indeed forgotten.
Today, those who still teach and preach a connection with these places are branded extremists, so their message makes little sense to our people. Say the word "Hebron" to a young disconnected Israeli and he will only conjure up an occupied Arab city with a few cantankerous crazy Jews who cause all the problems. The majesty of Hebron's history from Abraham to King David to the first Hasidic settlement of 18th century, to the murderous Arab riots of 1929, to the valiant return in 1967, is completely lost on him. It is no wonder then that for him it makes sense to "give it back" since nothing seems to tie us to these places in the first place.
Today's post–Zionist leaders have made Israel into a State of Exile, exiling our people from their homes, exiling our land by cutting it off and giving it away, and exiling the minds and hearts of the Jewish people by teaching them to forget. After waiting for two thousand years to return, Jews are being taught that Hebron isn't Jewish, that Bethlehem isn't Jewish, that Nablus isn't Jewish, that the Temple Mount isn't Jewish. A methodical exile is taking place, the exile of place and the exile of mind.
Yishai Fleisher is the founder of Kumah, a grassroots pro-aliyah organization, and a broadcaster at Israel National Radio
A state of exile
A methodical exile is taking place; the exile of location and exile of the mind
Yishai Fleisher
We all know what exile is. Exile is when you get kicked off your land. But that's not the worst exile. A nation may be forcibly exiled from its land, but if the nation longs to return, sets days to mourn the eviction, remembers every inch of the land, remembers its history there, reveres the holy places and burial sites of their forefathers, and teaches every successive generation to remember - in such a scenario, the exile is never complete because the relationship between the people and their land is never fully severed.
Memory, education, and yearning – these are all methods of warding off the full effects of exile, and they can sustain a nation until the time comes when the exile can be reversed and a return can commence.
But what then is a full exile? A full exile is when the connection between the land and the people is forgotten. If there is no memory of prior ownership, no longing to return, no stories told to children, then the exile brought about by an enemy nation which wished to impose a disconnect between the people and its land comes into full effect. If the very fact that the nation has been exiled is forgotten, then that is true exile.
The idea that the loss of collective national memory brings true exile has a surprising corollary: a nation can be in a state of exile even while living on its original soil! Like a person suffering from amnesia while sitting in his own house – a nation may be so utterly without memory that it has no idea that it is at home.
Rachel's Tomb
Such is the case in Israel today. The memory that has been carried in our collective conscience for two thousand years has steadily worn away and no longer serves to keep the exile at bay. Take, for example, the case of the Tomb of Rachel.
In terms of emotional connection, Rachel's Tomb is unequaled for the Jewish people. From the biblical narrative of Rachel's life, to Jeremiah's account of her crying for her children going to exile and God's promise of their return, to the generations who visited her grave, to the beautiful mausoleum constructed by Moshe Montefiore in 1841, the memory of Rachel's Tomb in the olive orchards of Bethlehem has kept us connected to this place through out the long exile. In 1919, Louis Brandies stood next to Rachel's Tomb at sunset and said "I know now why all the world wanted this land and why all peoples loved it."
Go to Rachel's Tomb today – if you can. A monstrosity of walls, pillboxes, gates, and chains has been erected to ostensibly keep the would-be intruder away. The place is downright ugly, and if you did manage to get in to the compound, soldiers do not allow you to walk around freely, because, they claim, danger is everywhere, even inside the labyrinth of high walls.
Take your children there. As you pass into the prison-like fortress try to teach your children about the Matriarch Rachel, our mother Rachel. You will not succeed because you will not be able to communicate a sense of the value of the place. It is too ugly, too military, too filled with fear, it is simply unattractive both physically and emotionally.
Only those who remember Rachel's Tomb the way it used to be can still have an emotional connection to the place. If the current state of affairs continues, the next generation will not remember Rachel's Tomb and the exile from this place will be stronger then it has been in two thousand years. Just as we are exiled from the physical Rachel's Tomb, Rachel's Tomb is being exiled from our minds.
This phenomenon of exile is not only at Rachel's Tomb – it's everywhere. The Tomb of Joseph in Nablus is gone, destroyed by Arabs, abandoned by Israel. Hebron, home and burial place of the patriarchs is constantly in the crosshairs of destruction. The Temple Mount, the place of two Jewish temples, is being systematically neutered of its history (let alone its future value). Judea and Samaria, the biblical heartland, is now being cut off by a snaking wall, which scars the land and cuts us off from our history and heritage. The exiling forces seem to attack the very places where our collective memory was strongest.
Cerebral exile
As we have noted, physical exile is one thing, but cerebral exile, the cutting off of memory is the final guillotine of exile. Here, the groundwork for forced forgetting has been in the works for decades. On the one hand, the Jewish people's historical connection to the land has been systematically un-taught. In schools, many Jewish children learn to hate the Bible, learn a revisionist anti-Zionist history, and are simply never taught the stories and the emotional connection to places like Rachel's Tomb. On the other hand, a new milieu and accompanying lingo fill the void left in the young mind: Occupation, Palestine, Peace, and Post-Zionism. Our history and with it, our emotional connection to our land, is being erased.
This is not the first time when an attempt to sever the Jewish memory of the land of Israel has been made. Of course, there were the two great exiles when the Babylonians and the Romans sacked Jerusalem and dispossessed the nation.
Yet there is another case that is a clearer reflection of what is happening today: Yerovam Ben Navat was a wicked Jewish king of the Northern tribes during the period of the divided kingdom (10th century BCE). He wanted his vassals to forget about the Davidic dynasty that still reigned in Jerusalem and therefore built two idolatrous temples as an alternative to the one that stood in Jerusalem and bade his people to worship in these shrines.
But the people persisted in going up to the real Temple, so Yerovam then constructed manned roadblocks that barred aliyah to Jerusalem. He hoped that by forcibly stopping people from going to Jerusalem he would make people forget all about it. It took two centuries for this "security barrier" to be removed, but by then it was too late, the people had indeed forgotten.
Today, those who still teach and preach a connection with these places are branded extremists, so their message makes little sense to our people. Say the word "Hebron" to a young disconnected Israeli and he will only conjure up an occupied Arab city with a few cantankerous crazy Jews who cause all the problems. The majesty of Hebron's history from Abraham to King David to the first Hasidic settlement of 18th century, to the murderous Arab riots of 1929, to the valiant return in 1967, is completely lost on him. It is no wonder then that for him it makes sense to "give it back" since nothing seems to tie us to these places in the first place.
Today's post–Zionist leaders have made Israel into a State of Exile, exiling our people from their homes, exiling our land by cutting it off and giving it away, and exiling the minds and hearts of the Jewish people by teaching them to forget. After waiting for two thousand years to return, Jews are being taught that Hebron isn't Jewish, that Bethlehem isn't Jewish, that Nablus isn't Jewish, that the Temple Mount isn't Jewish. A methodical exile is taking place, the exile of place and the exile of mind.
Yishai Fleisher is the founder of Kumah, a grassroots pro-aliyah organization, and a broadcaster at Israel National Radio
Friday, August 03, 2007
It Will Break: A Response to Comments
My remarks about the Herem placed on the Jewish Music Concert elicited several types of comments that deserve a posting of their own.
1) I absolutely meant no disrespect to Gedole Torah. However, greatness in lehrnen was not the issue. My point is that I see the disasterous results of this policy of socio-cultural constriction and constant prohibiting the allowed. It destroys people, adumbrates the break up of families and actually contributes to people leaving Torah. So, it might be that the signatories on the herem were misled. However, as in חושן משפט so in יורה דיעה, you bear full responsibility for your signature. [I might add that if you read books like Karlinsky's, Rishon le-Shushelet Brisk, you learn that there was no lock-step Daas Torah position on most things.]
2) I agree that Ger is not dour, except in matters בינו לבינה. It was of those we were speaking.
3) Not every Litvak is dour (at least not 24/7).
1) I absolutely meant no disrespect to Gedole Torah. However, greatness in lehrnen was not the issue. My point is that I see the disasterous results of this policy of socio-cultural constriction and constant prohibiting the allowed. It destroys people, adumbrates the break up of families and actually contributes to people leaving Torah. So, it might be that the signatories on the herem were misled. However, as in חושן משפט so in יורה דיעה, you bear full responsibility for your signature. [I might add that if you read books like Karlinsky's, Rishon le-Shushelet Brisk, you learn that there was no lock-step Daas Torah position on most things.]
2) I agree that Ger is not dour, except in matters בינו לבינה. It was of those we were speaking.
3) Not every Litvak is dour (at least not 24/7).
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Bend It Too Far, It Will Break
While Noah Feldman is trying desperately to push the envelope leftward, the Haredi leadership is pushing in the other direction. At least, that what it looks like from this item:
Rabbinical "Ban" on Hassidic Music Concerts
by Hillel Fendel
(IsraelNN.com) Hassidic music stars Avraham Fried and Yaakov Shwekey are to perform in Jerusalem before over 10,000 Thursday night - but Rabbi Elyashiv, the Gerrer Rebbe and others say it's forbidden to participate or attend events of that nature.
Flashy posters all over Jerusalem and elsewhere advertise a high-powered Hassidic music concert scheduled for Thursday evening at Teddy Stadium. It features two of the genre's greatest stars, Fried and Shwekey, as well as guest appearances by Aharon Razel and the up-and-coming Elad Shaar. Called "L'Chaim in Jerusalem," the event commemorates the 40th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem, and will feature an extra-large orchestra.
A damper was placed on the event, however, in the form of a grave rabbinic ban appearing in the hareidi-religious press. The ban is signed by leading rabbis including Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, the Gerrer and Bezler Rabbis, Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, Rabbi Shmuel HaLevy Vozner, Rabbi Chaim Pinchas Sheinberg, and more.
The ads state: "We trembled at hearing about the terrible breach in our camp of 'music evenings' and 'concerts' in which musicians sing before men and women sitting together, Heaven forefend, and even not together. All Torah leaders have in the past clearly forbidden these events, even when men and women are separate." The rabbis say the ban applies to men, women and children and of course the performers. Newspapers are not permitted to advertise these events, according to the ad, and musicians who sing "in front of men and women together" must not be invited to sing at other events.
Now, I've seen these ads and all of them say there will be so much segragation of the sexes that there might as well be two concerts. So what gives here? I'm not really sure. However, if the extremely dour Rav Eliashiv, and the legendarily dour Gerrer Rebbe keep it up they will make the lives of Haredim so bitter that they will have created a crisis that will be heard around the world. You can't take away people's parnassah, forbid them to educate themselves, forbid them to go hiking and take away their very few forms of entertainment without a reaction.
Oh, as long as we're at it the same article reported:
"It is known that Rabbi Moshe Feinstein [the pre-eminent Torah authority in the U.S. in the 20th century - ed.] permitted events of this nature if the proceeds were for charity," a source close to one of the rabbis said, "as is the case in Thursday's concert, so I'm not sure how to understand this."
Reb Moshe Feinstein? Who's he? Oh yes, I remember. He's the rabbi who, a prominent Haredi Rav objected to, because he had the temerity to disagree with the Mishnah Berura and the Hazon Ish.
Rabbinical "Ban" on Hassidic Music Concerts
by Hillel Fendel
(IsraelNN.com) Hassidic music stars Avraham Fried and Yaakov Shwekey are to perform in Jerusalem before over 10,000 Thursday night - but Rabbi Elyashiv, the Gerrer Rebbe and others say it's forbidden to participate or attend events of that nature.
Flashy posters all over Jerusalem and elsewhere advertise a high-powered Hassidic music concert scheduled for Thursday evening at Teddy Stadium. It features two of the genre's greatest stars, Fried and Shwekey, as well as guest appearances by Aharon Razel and the up-and-coming Elad Shaar. Called "L'Chaim in Jerusalem," the event commemorates the 40th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem, and will feature an extra-large orchestra.
A damper was placed on the event, however, in the form of a grave rabbinic ban appearing in the hareidi-religious press. The ban is signed by leading rabbis including Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, the Gerrer and Bezler Rabbis, Rabbi Aharon Leib Shteinman, Rabbi Shmuel HaLevy Vozner, Rabbi Chaim Pinchas Sheinberg, and more.
The ads state: "We trembled at hearing about the terrible breach in our camp of 'music evenings' and 'concerts' in which musicians sing before men and women sitting together, Heaven forefend, and even not together. All Torah leaders have in the past clearly forbidden these events, even when men and women are separate." The rabbis say the ban applies to men, women and children and of course the performers. Newspapers are not permitted to advertise these events, according to the ad, and musicians who sing "in front of men and women together" must not be invited to sing at other events.
Now, I've seen these ads and all of them say there will be so much segragation of the sexes that there might as well be two concerts. So what gives here? I'm not really sure. However, if the extremely dour Rav Eliashiv, and the legendarily dour Gerrer Rebbe keep it up they will make the lives of Haredim so bitter that they will have created a crisis that will be heard around the world. You can't take away people's parnassah, forbid them to educate themselves, forbid them to go hiking and take away their very few forms of entertainment without a reaction.
Oh, as long as we're at it the same article reported:
"It is known that Rabbi Moshe Feinstein [the pre-eminent Torah authority in the U.S. in the 20th century - ed.] permitted events of this nature if the proceeds were for charity," a source close to one of the rabbis said, "as is the case in Thursday's concert, so I'm not sure how to understand this."
Reb Moshe Feinstein? Who's he? Oh yes, I remember. He's the rabbi who, a prominent Haredi Rav objected to, because he had the temerity to disagree with the Mishnah Berura and the Hazon Ish.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Shedim (Dis)incorporated
Avishai Ben Hayyim shares the following vignette, which has a lot of unmeasured valance.
(And they wonder why in the Yeshivot Ger, Alexander, Sochatchov and Izbitz are considered honorary Litvaks.)
ובכל זאת, רבנים חשובים מדגישים שהאמונה בשדים אינה מעיקרי הדת היהודית, ושאפשר להיות יהודי טוב גם בלי להאמין בהם ולהתעסק בהם.
מספרים שפעם שאלו את הרבי מקוצק: איך יכול להיות שהרמב"ם אומר שאין שדים והרי בגמרא כתוב במפורש שיש? "בתקופת הגמרא היו שדים", השיב הרב, "משעה שפסק הרמב"ם שאין, אז גם
בשמים פסקו כמוהו, ומאז אין שדים".
(And they wonder why in the Yeshivot Ger, Alexander, Sochatchov and Izbitz are considered honorary Litvaks.)
Subscription Woes
I need some expert advice from my fellow bloggers.
Bloglet appears to have died and I need to replace a subscription service. Any ideas? I have seen references to RSS and ATOM but have no idea how to use them. (I"d rather transcribe MS Budapest Kaufman 150A than try to figure out the web pages I've seen on these).
All assistance appreciated: woolfj@gmail.com
Bloglet appears to have died and I need to replace a subscription service. Any ideas? I have seen references to RSS and ATOM but have no idea how to use them. (I"d rather transcribe MS Budapest Kaufman 150A than try to figure out the web pages I've seen on these).
All assistance appreciated: woolfj@gmail.com
Shalom Carmy on Noah Feldman (and a Postscript)
Professor Shalom Carmy has, in typically perceptive and lucid fashion, produced a pointed and penetrating response to the challenge raised by Noah Feldman's article. Of especial note is his discussion of the question of a Jewish physician violating the Sabbath in order to treat a Non-Jew. As Carmy notes, this claim has long been a weapon in the arsenal of anti-semites. Indeed, it was used as a vicious anti-religious weapon in the fifties by secularists here in Israel.
Inter alia, Carmy writes:
An honest understanding of the Halakha about saving a Gentile on Shabbat is grounded in the fact that not all mitsvot can be violated to save life. Idolatry, sexual offenses and murder may not be allowed even to save life, however this flies in the face of our utilitarian mentality. Shabbat has much in common with the so-called “big three.” [Note R. Shimon’s view in Yerushalmi that a bystander may intervene to prevent Shabbat violation even at the cost of the transgressor’s life.] For Jews Shabbat may be violated to save life, but only on the basis of a special limmud (inference)—“desecrate one Shabbat so that he may observe many Shabbatot.” Where this principle does not apply, Shabbat is inviolable.
Where people understand that religion may on occasion make life and death demands, the law that Shabbat is so important that it is overridden only for those who are members of the community that observes it is difficult but not scandalous. In our culture this understanding is lacking; thus the failure to treat Jews and Gentiles identically will be interpreted as indifference to the fate of the non-Jew, and will be perceived as tantamount to connivance in his death. It will provoke hatred, and understandably so. In this case, the theoretical gulf separating secularists from halakhists is not universalism vs. particularism but the recognition that Shabbat is, in principle, worth the sacrifice. It is common to stress that Judaism, compared, let us say, with Hinduism, affirms the value of human life and eschews such sacrifices. That the value of human life is overridden only in exceptional circumstances is a significant element in generalizing about Jewish ethics. But an almost absolute principle is not the same as an absolute one.
In any event Feldman presumably knows very well that his high school teacher’s remark is not representative of grown-up halakhic thought, and he knows even better that it is not a guide to the practice of Orthodox Jewish doctors. Nonetheless, in his desire to satisfy himself against those who failed to properly esteem his choices and flatter his vanity, he has resorted to one of the most potent weapons of 19th-20th century anti-Semitism. He has made it easier for individuals or groups in medical schools to sideline or bar Orthodox Jews, in the name of high-sounding universalistic moral ideals, from positions in the medical profession. Whether he intends these consequences or not, and whether or not he envisions, in his wise shrewdness and genteel outrage, further punitive consequences to his classmates and their children, he has employed his power and prestige to those ends. He, and we, must live with the consequences of his decision.
Not only Feldman’s actions have consequences. There are rabbis and teachers, who sometimes feel that they must show their cleverness at any cost. At times it seems that the less they have to contribute, the more they wish to stand out. Like precocious children impressing the adults, they vie for the attention of their students with forced displays of cleverness and provocation. The point is to come up with something that nobody else would think of saying and to say something shocking and memorable. Surely the teacher whom Feldman quotes succeeded eminently in this game of pedagogical one-upmanship. He, and we, will have to live with the consequences of his judgment.
Postscript:
I recall reading that Professor Gerald Blidstein once asked the Rov if he was satisfied with the fact that Sabbath deseceration for a non-Jew was due to איבה, or the hostility toward Jews that would be thereby engendered. The Rov, reportedly, responded that while he was happy with the legal results, he found the actual argument morally unsatisfactory.
I've thought a lot about this issue lately, and I've come to two conclusions. First, any fine moral impulse must still find its expression within the terminology of the Law. Sometimes, indeed oftentimes, that terminology is somewhat jarring to the non-professional ear. Thus, making all sorts of allowances for non-observant Jews because they are 'תינוקות שנשבו' sounds paternalistic, arrogant and dismissive of the rich cultural context within which someone might have been raised. That, however, is the legal tool we have. That, however, does not mean it should be bandied about supercilliously and hurtfully. (Indeed, I've often thought we should create some sort of new category.)
The same is true, or so it seems to me, about the allowance of Sabbath violation for a non-Jew on Shabbat. As Carmy points out so well, saving a Life is not always an absolute value. Even saving a Jew on Shabbat requires special license. Recall that, according to the First Book of Maccabees (2, 32-40) there were those who fled Antiochus' decrees and were slaughtered because they thought that self-defense did not justify desecrating Shabbat. Modern society is based on absolute human autonomy, together with a very strong dose of narcissism. Thus, the idea that Human Life takes second place to anything is at best impossible, at worst, an anathema.
Jewish Law realized that the question of treating a non-Jew on Shabbat had to be addressed and allowed. Halakhah came up איבה. Yes, in marketing terms it's terrible. That, however, is not the point. The genuine, Jewish moral impulse did find a cogent, principled legal category within which to function. Halakhah doesn't operate in philosophical categories, it operates in legal categories. One might add, though, that it's not much of a stretch to go from absence of hostility to co-fraternity. Or, alternatively, who says that Hobbes was wrong? Perhaps, Hazal and Rishonim had a more Hobbesian view of man than we (ostensibly) possess? Certainly, based upon the empirical evidence, Hobbes has the competition beaten, hands down.
Inter alia, Carmy writes:
An honest understanding of the Halakha about saving a Gentile on Shabbat is grounded in the fact that not all mitsvot can be violated to save life. Idolatry, sexual offenses and murder may not be allowed even to save life, however this flies in the face of our utilitarian mentality. Shabbat has much in common with the so-called “big three.” [Note R. Shimon’s view in Yerushalmi that a bystander may intervene to prevent Shabbat violation even at the cost of the transgressor’s life.] For Jews Shabbat may be violated to save life, but only on the basis of a special limmud (inference)—“desecrate one Shabbat so that he may observe many Shabbatot.” Where this principle does not apply, Shabbat is inviolable.
Where people understand that religion may on occasion make life and death demands, the law that Shabbat is so important that it is overridden only for those who are members of the community that observes it is difficult but not scandalous. In our culture this understanding is lacking; thus the failure to treat Jews and Gentiles identically will be interpreted as indifference to the fate of the non-Jew, and will be perceived as tantamount to connivance in his death. It will provoke hatred, and understandably so. In this case, the theoretical gulf separating secularists from halakhists is not universalism vs. particularism but the recognition that Shabbat is, in principle, worth the sacrifice. It is common to stress that Judaism, compared, let us say, with Hinduism, affirms the value of human life and eschews such sacrifices. That the value of human life is overridden only in exceptional circumstances is a significant element in generalizing about Jewish ethics. But an almost absolute principle is not the same as an absolute one.
In any event Feldman presumably knows very well that his high school teacher’s remark is not representative of grown-up halakhic thought, and he knows even better that it is not a guide to the practice of Orthodox Jewish doctors. Nonetheless, in his desire to satisfy himself against those who failed to properly esteem his choices and flatter his vanity, he has resorted to one of the most potent weapons of 19th-20th century anti-Semitism. He has made it easier for individuals or groups in medical schools to sideline or bar Orthodox Jews, in the name of high-sounding universalistic moral ideals, from positions in the medical profession. Whether he intends these consequences or not, and whether or not he envisions, in his wise shrewdness and genteel outrage, further punitive consequences to his classmates and their children, he has employed his power and prestige to those ends. He, and we, must live with the consequences of his decision.
Not only Feldman’s actions have consequences. There are rabbis and teachers, who sometimes feel that they must show their cleverness at any cost. At times it seems that the less they have to contribute, the more they wish to stand out. Like precocious children impressing the adults, they vie for the attention of their students with forced displays of cleverness and provocation. The point is to come up with something that nobody else would think of saying and to say something shocking and memorable. Surely the teacher whom Feldman quotes succeeded eminently in this game of pedagogical one-upmanship. He, and we, will have to live with the consequences of his judgment.
Postscript:
I recall reading that Professor Gerald Blidstein once asked the Rov if he was satisfied with the fact that Sabbath deseceration for a non-Jew was due to איבה, or the hostility toward Jews that would be thereby engendered. The Rov, reportedly, responded that while he was happy with the legal results, he found the actual argument morally unsatisfactory.
I've thought a lot about this issue lately, and I've come to two conclusions. First, any fine moral impulse must still find its expression within the terminology of the Law. Sometimes, indeed oftentimes, that terminology is somewhat jarring to the non-professional ear. Thus, making all sorts of allowances for non-observant Jews because they are 'תינוקות שנשבו' sounds paternalistic, arrogant and dismissive of the rich cultural context within which someone might have been raised. That, however, is the legal tool we have. That, however, does not mean it should be bandied about supercilliously and hurtfully. (Indeed, I've often thought we should create some sort of new category.)
The same is true, or so it seems to me, about the allowance of Sabbath violation for a non-Jew on Shabbat. As Carmy points out so well, saving a Life is not always an absolute value. Even saving a Jew on Shabbat requires special license. Recall that, according to the First Book of Maccabees (2, 32-40) there were those who fled Antiochus' decrees and were slaughtered because they thought that self-defense did not justify desecrating Shabbat. Modern society is based on absolute human autonomy, together with a very strong dose of narcissism. Thus, the idea that Human Life takes second place to anything is at best impossible, at worst, an anathema.
Jewish Law realized that the question of treating a non-Jew on Shabbat had to be addressed and allowed. Halakhah came up איבה. Yes, in marketing terms it's terrible. That, however, is not the point. The genuine, Jewish moral impulse did find a cogent, principled legal category within which to function. Halakhah doesn't operate in philosophical categories, it operates in legal categories. One might add, though, that it's not much of a stretch to go from absence of hostility to co-fraternity. Or, alternatively, who says that Hobbes was wrong? Perhaps, Hazal and Rishonim had a more Hobbesian view of man than we (ostensibly) possess? Certainly, based upon the empirical evidence, Hobbes has the competition beaten, hands down.
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