by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Monday, May 13th, 2013
NO, really:
Onion gets hacked by Syrian propagandists, responds with funny article. The Onion got hacked, sending out a bunch of nonsense tweets such as:
To which they responded with their usual aplomb. HT BoingBoing
Is Yiddish dying? Uh, no.
Is Jack Rosen hijacking the AJCongress? Does anyone care?
Dvora Myers on Unorthodox Gymnastics comments on the chutzpah it takes to thanks God for not being a woman ironically. What do you think?
Doctor Who is a Jew? Come on Tablet, can’t you do any better than that?
And here’s a kickstarter to translate for what sounds like a completely fascinating book. I can’t wait to read it.
If you can read Yiddish literature only in English translation, Joseph Opatoshu’s 1921 novel, In Poylishe Velder (In The Forests of Poland),is one of the most important works of world literature with which you’re probably unfamiliar. A vast panorama of Jewish life in Poland during the 1850s, Opatoshu’s novel concentrates on backwoods Jews who live among gentile peasants rather than in Jewish communities in cities or shtetlekh. Touching as it does on hasidism, heresy, pre-Christian Polish folk customs, wife-swapping, messianism, and Polish nationalism, this book will change the way you think about Jewish life in Poland. Those parts not set in the forests or on the road take place in the court of the Rebbe of Kotzk, the last of the classical hasidic leaders. The Rebbe and his court are portrayed so convincingly that even members of the book’s original audience often forgot that they were reading a novel and not an intimate history of hasidism in Kotzk. It’s the price that Opatoshu had to pay for writing some of the best prose ever published in Yiddish.
Of course, I consider myself the last of the Kotsker Hasidim, so perhaps it’s just me.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Wednesday, May 8th, 2013
A couple of days ago, I was interested to see an article on Times of Israel asking the question, “Why is it easy to keep kosher but so hard to diet?”
I have to admit to having wondered myself. He offers the example of a woman who made her diet work for her by using kashrut, “I once heard of someone who wanted to lose weight but was having trouble laying off late night sweets. So what she would do is eat a little piece of meat at night and then she wouldn’t find it difficult to refrain from eating dairy desserts,” and then posits three reasons why he believes it’s easier to keep kosher than diet: Kashrut has a defined list of what you can eat and what you can’t; Keeping kosher is for life, dieting is seen as temporary; and Keeping kosher is highly habitual.
Each of these has its points – as someone who didn’t grow up keeping kosher, but has now for many years, I’d have to say that each of these points makes some difference. Yet, while keeping kosher has a list of things you can and can’t eat, so, in many respects, does dieting (don’t eat sweets, don’t eat fried and fatty foods); most people know that dieting is for life, and, I suspect that if one actually was serious about the dieting, it would also become habitual.
I actually think that the reason kashrut is easier for rather different reasons: it’s a communal effort. True, in many shuls, there are people who keep different levels of kashrut, but generally when people are eating together, there’s some minimal level of recognition for the person’s kashrut – at the very least, picking a restaurant where the person can eat, or making accommodations for them in one’s home. The rabbis were no fools. Americans love to think that everything is about the individual, and, even better, the individual will – but in reality, what we do with other people is an exceptionally powerful force.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, December 25th, 2012
For the last couple of weeks, as the fallout from Newtown continues, as the NRA displays its absolute contempt for anyone who finds anything other than guns of value, Jews have also been participating in the conversation about gun control in the US.
While Jews tend toward the liberal positions about guns, Judaism does not, in reality, always correspond with American 21st century liberal politics. Does Judaism have a position on gun control? Rabbi Aaron Alexander of AJU’s Ziegler school, writes a commentary in HuffPo that, although it focuses on one aspect and one commentator that gets at the crux of the Jewish view.
There is simply no rational way of escaping the fact – not opinion- that gun ownership raises risks of death and injury for everyone in the house where the gun is owned. Nor is there any credible evidence that gun ownership deters crime or stops crimes in progress. Jewishly, significantly increasing safety risks to oneself without showing a significant benefit to offset it would require a ban on gun ownership.
Secondarily, hunting for sport, as Rabbi Landau says (the commentator that Alexander is writing about) is considered negatively by Jewish sources. Taking pleasure in something that causes pain is contrary to Jewish values. Even when we eat meat, we are required by Jewish law to slaughter it in a way that causes no pain to the animal (that is why an animal whose slaughter is performed with a knife that has even a single nick in it is considered treif). Arguments aside about whether or not such a death is truly painless (and there are certainly those who advocated vegetarianism – such as the gadol hador – the great one of his generation, Rabbi Soloveitchik), the value is clear: Jews are not supposed to engage in such behavior, except if there is no other option – in other words, one may stave off starvation by hunting, but it’s not something Jews should do if there are other sources of food.
Finally, it is worth knowing that the ban on Jewish hunting is not merely a halachic matter (matter of Jewish law) custom too has long viewed the hunter as a negative character. Those who make their living by killing are considered the very height of what my mother would have called “a goyishe kop” (please excuse, non-Jewish friends). If one looks through old haggadot, the wicked son, the rasha is often portrayed as a soldier or a hunter.
Sport hunting is not a value. Hunting for food – outside of a starvation case- is not a value. Safety for one’s family is a value, and the evidence is that having guns in the home not only does not protect one from intruders, but increases risks of accidental shootings, suicide deaths, and deliberate shootings, particularly in cases of domestic violence. Societally, then, there is one last case to be made. Many people argue that the case for owning guns is that the second amendment is determined to let us protect ourselves from a tyrannous government. God knows the Jews know from tyrannous governments.
To consider this rationally: does the possibility that a bunch of neighbors with assault weapons might gather together to fend off the United States government when it comes for us to send us to the camps balance out the overwhelming numbers of American gun deaths, and the evidence that very tight gun control, or even banning guns would reduce (not eliminate, of course, but reduce) gun deaths. That leaves us two questions actually. First, would those assault weapons stave off tanks, rockets and the very latest in military technology? Not likely. Second. If by some miracle there was a chance that it did, would it be worth it? I suppose that is a calculus that in general society could be argued, but Jewishly, I would say that the decisive view is no. The risks are too clear, and the protection far, far too little – if there is indeed any at all.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Friday, August 17th, 2012
In a curious piece in yesterday’s Israel Hayom, Isi Leibler decries a leadership crisis in the diaspora. That of course, is not much in the way of news. Oh, wait, but maybe it is. Leibler claims that “the key professionals dominating the scene are close to retirement, yet failing to groom successors.”
What’s odd, though is exactly what he thinks leadership is. I can’t speak as well to the European scene…Since I know the American scene best, let’s focus on that. Leibler singles out AIPAC as the exception to the rule and then mentions the “the three major public political organizations — the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League and the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations (the Presidents Conference),” as apparently representative of the entire Jewish community leadership in the USA.
He points to the fact that each of these organizations is headed by a charismatic figure (talented professional) reaching retirement age and also are the key fundraisers.
While he’s certainly correct in this analysis of these organizations, I wonder why he considers this the “leadership” of the Jewish community? More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Wednesday, August 1st, 2012
Applications are now online for Selah San Francisco Bay Area Cohort 11!
The Selah Leadership Program is a collaboration between the Nathan Cummings Foundation and Bend the Arc, in partnership with the Rockwood Leadership Institute. Selah trains a cross-section of leaders in Jewish and secular organizations to be effective, sustainable and collaborative agents for change. Selah is the first leadership training designed specifically for Jewish leaders working across the social change field. Since its founding in 2004, we have trained more than 250 leaders from over 180 organizations.
The Selah Leadership Program provides unparalleled training for social change leaders, new tools to enhance organizational vision and facilitate change, and the opportunity to learn among some of the nation’s most innovative and inspiring Jewish social change leaders. This cohort is broadly designed for Jewish leaders working in the Bay area who are dedicated to social change and justice and have at least 7 years of experience in their field
. We encourage applicants from secular and Jewish organizations that work on social change from multiple approaches including, but not limited, to: community organizing, direct action, social entrepreneurship, advocacy, education, and arts and culture. The application process is highly competitive.
Learn more about Selah, get an application, or recommend someone you know.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Wednesday, May 23rd, 2012
In this month’s Commentary magazine, Jack Wertheimer once again takes on all the terrors of (assume a creaky old gramps voice here) those young people today. Except that it isn’t actually those young people today who are best characterized by his complaints.
Here are his complaints in order (This is just the outline, for the full effect, you’ll need to go see the actual essay):
I. I am the Lord your God, Who took you out of Egypt to ‘repair the world.’
II. You shall not be judgmental.
III. You shall be pluralistic.
IV. You shall personalize your Judaism.
V. Meaning, meaning shall you pursue.
VI. You shall create caring communities.
VII. You shall encourage the airing of all views.
VIII. You shall not be tribal.
IX. You shall celebrate your Jewishness.
X. You shall hold the Jewish conversation in public.
Just to get them out of the way, I’m just going to skim over my major wuts in is piece:
I’m kind of mystified by number 5. Is he saying that Jewish survival, should it have, for example, no Torah at the center, and no community, is worthwhile for its own sake? Why? Number ten, OTOH is classic Wertheimerian krechtzing. He just doesn’t actually get that there is no non-public square anymore. I know the guy is basically a grump (and sexist, though that doesn’t come out so much here) who spends his editorial time complaining about “the kids these days,” but does he really want to advertise the fact that he has no idea what year it is and is unaware of the use of new technologies and how people – not just Jews- actually live?
Still, even a stopped analog clock is right twice a day: More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Thursday, April 5th, 2012
By request:
No offense everyone, but nothing else is going on my seder plate.
Orange, okay – that actually has a venerable history (I was told by a Moroccan rabbi,that Moroccans have put oranges on their seder plates for generations), but no apples, no tomatoes, no marzipan, olives, paper airplanes, tobacco, safety pins, boots to the head, old shoes, picnic tables, automobile engines, stuffed rabbits, keys, construction equipment, window glass, or used kleenex. Nothing. Else.
I’m happy to have people bring questions to the table, but the seder plate is the seder plate, and this addition of objects has gotten out of hand.
1. Charoset,
2. Chazeret
3. Beitza
4. Maror
5. Zaroa (Actually Selek, because our house is dairy)
6. Karpas
7. Orange
makes a perfect kabbalistic tree of the seven lower sefirot (which is actually why we have 6 plus the matzah, which is seven for the seven lower sefirot – bet you didn’t know that, did you?) adding anything else makes the sefirotic tree impossible, so nope, nothing else. I can talk about freedom without adding any other objects to my table
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Saturday, March 17th, 2012
I hope the kid (I guess he’s barely a kid, at 17, although the story reads as though he’s younger) doesn’t keep hiding his Jewishness. Go, young, Jewish, black, Irish-dancer, use the force! Or whatever.
meet Drew Lovejoy, a 17-year-old from rural Ohio. His background could not be more American. His father is black and Baptist from Georgia and his mother is white and Jewish from Iowa. But his fame is international after winning the all-Ireland dancing championship in Dublin for a third straight year.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Thursday, March 15th, 2012
Gawker has discovered a variation on Godwin’s law: “As a Tea Party discussion grows longer, the probability of anti-semitism approaches one.”
Apparently Sandra Fluke’s dating a Jewish guy (Bill Mutterperl) is somehow relevant… to something?
“anyone familiar with Boston and New York political history knows about the wealthy Mutterperl family’s long tradition of supporting the typical Jewish variant of socialism.
I wonder if Adam has ever been to a kibbutz.”
As Gawker notes, “These are literally the same Tea Partiers who accused Occupy Wall Street of antisemitism.” -it’s in fact, the same guy: Brooks Bayne
As someone involved with Occupy Judaism and several other variants of Occupy in my native city, how much damn time did I have to spend talking to newspapers about how stupid the accusations of antisemitism were? And yet, people keep defending tea-partiers as misunderstood?
Feh.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, March 13th, 2012
Dee Snider of Twisted Sister fame, is apparently doing an album of showtunes. Well, we all gotta grow up sometime, right? Who knew?
From Broadway.com:
Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider will team up with Tony winners Patti LuPone and Bebe Neuwirth, in addition to Broadway veterans Cyndi Lauper, Clay Aiken and more on his new album Dee Does Broadway. The heavy metal singer’s forthcoming album will feature a selection of classic Broadway hits. Dee Does Broadway is set for release on May 8 on the record label Razor & Tie. Snider himself appeared in Broadway’s Rock of Ages, which features music from his band, in the fall of 2010.
HT dlevy
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, January 31st, 2012
I could probably just about build a raft and sail around the world with all the books advocating for Jewish Social Justice that have come out in the last couple of years. Several of them are very good. I particularly like Rabbi Jill Jacobs’ first book, which is both thorough and excellent.
But I want to recommend a book that’s a little bit different.
Rabbi Shmuly Yankelowitz, the founder of the Orthodox social justice movement Uri L’Tzedek, has just come out with a book very simply titled Jewish Ethics and Social Justice (Derusha Publishing). Unlike most of the the other books in this burgeoning genre, Rabbi Y’s book is a collection of essays previously published in newspapers journals and blogs. This is both a strength and a weakness, which I will touch on later. More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Monday, January 30th, 2012
Feministe has a round-up on the recent squabbling about whether or not religious organizations that don’t approve of birth control should have to have health plans cover it.
Aside from the misogyny and offensive attitudes on display in general, let us analyze the statement made by a few people that requiring such organizations to require it would be like serving bacon at a Jewish barbeque. Well, let’s see: suppose someone attending the barbeque had a life-threatening illness that required them to eat pork. And supposing that person had to attend the barbeque and to eat while there. Well, now, I suppose they’d just fire up a separate grill upwind, since under those circumstances, Jewish law requires them to eat it. And if they weren’t Jewish? All the more so.
Now, shut up.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Friday, January 13th, 2012
A little tempest in a teapot has apparently hit the ranks of the Conservative movement about the cover of the latest issue of Kolot (The Conservative Movement’s now-integrated magazine, including more or less all the different arms of the movement that used to have separate magazines).
The Jewish week showcased an internal spat between Kolot and some selected women rabbis who objected to the most recent cover which features a picture of two female arms holding hands whilst wearing tefillin.
More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, December 13th, 2011
The Jewish Organizing Fellowship is recruiting emerging social justice leaders for our year-long, paid community organizing training program in Boston. The Fellowship is a professional development opportunity for Jewish young adults (ages 21-30) who are currently working as organizers or who are looking for jobs in the field. If not already employed, Fellows are placed in full-time paid jobs that address a wide range of issues including: the environment, civil rights, health care, and interfaith cooperation. We seek Fellows who are eager to learn the theory and practice of community organizing and explore the connections between Judaism and social justice.
Early Selection Deadline: January 30, 2012
Regular Selection Deadline: May 7, 2012
Please join us for an informational conference call on Wednesday January 11th from 5:00pm-6:00pm EST, featuring the Fellowship Director and current and former Fellows, who will share information about the Fellowship and answer any questions. Register now to receive the dial-in information.
For more information, contact Jessie Weiser at jweiser@jewishorganizing.org or visit www.jewishorganizing.org. Twitter: @jewishorganizer Facebook: facebook.com/jewishorganizing
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
Turns out rabbis aren’t quite obsolete after all. Rabbis for Human Rights -North America sent out a press release this morning that they are among this year’s Slingshot Guide to the most innovative Jewish organizations.
Not so buried in the press release: Rabbis lead eleven of the sixty organizations named by this year’s Slingshot Guide. Four of these organizations are new additions to the list this year. An additional two organizations were led by rabbis at the time of the application.
Many rabbis went to rabbinical school not necessarily because they were interested in leading congregations, but because they wanted to be leaders for change in the Jewish community, as well as in American and the world. It may well be that Jewish institutional life is not as synagogue focused as it was, but that shouldn’t make young Jews who want to drive moral leadership despair – there’s plenty of work to be done, and we see that the next generation of Jewish rabbinical leaders has turned in much the same direction as young Jewish leaders of all stripes – towards grassroots, entrepreneurial organizing. Maybe we’re all “Occupying Judaism” now.
More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Saturday, October 1st, 2011
I have mixed feelings about posting something that uses the word “incentivize,” and even more skeptical of one that talks about “millenials,” but overall, it doesn’t seem like a bad thing, sort of like a political version of Jewish Values Online so what the heck:
On Monday (October 3rd), PolicyMic.com will be hosting a debate on the topic of “Do young American Jews care about Israel-Palestine?” We want you to participate in the discussion!
We’ll post the debate question on Monday morning (6:00am). All you have to do is sign up for an account and comment with your thoughts throughout the day. The most
Mic’d (voted on) contributor will win a special prize.
PolicyMic is a unique platform to host the highest-quality discussion online. Targeted to engage millennials in current events, the site uses game-like technology to incentivize users to participate in discussions more actively and comment more thoughtfully than on other sites. Think of it as Twitter meets the Economist.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Tuesday, July 12th, 2011
Over on Salon, Tracy Clark-Flory declares that sexlessness (or at least articles about it) are officially a trend. Which strikes me as funny, because the article just below that one in the queue is all about the rise of non-monogamy (which together with Dan Savage’s proclamations that people should consider non-monogamy and today’s JTA headline that an Israeli group of Orthodox rabbis (c’mon, you knew this was coming!) is trying to bring back polygamy (a trend that even the Torah implicitly warns against while not forbidding) definitely qualifies as a trend.
So what to get to first? I’m impressed by the ridiculousness of Erica Jong’s complaint. I’m not sure why Clark-Flory concludes that her complaint is that technology has taken over for the actual messiness and intimacy of sex – from what I can tell, her real complaint is that this younger generation prefers monogamy and childrearing to the raunch that she claims her generation championed. Look at the utter condescension:
More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Wednesday, July 6th, 2011
Two quick articles that I read last month: The first is an article that groans about how Jewish eaters are getting so picky that it’s getting to be impossible to invite Shabbat guests. The second is an article which advises all those people who create meaningful programming for Jews to quit it, will ya? because they’re actually enabling whiny, entitled Jews (the study that he quotes is about Baby Boomers, but I think he’s generally aiming this for everyone) to continue to view Judaism as a consumer product.
Both of these articles have a familiar tone: “What a bunch of whiners Jews today are!” And to some extent, there’s something to be said for that. In the shabbat meals article, towards the end, Rabbi Rebecca Joseph comments, “This is a problem of an affluent society and an affluent group within that society.” Again, true. Indeed, homeless Jews, poor Jews and Jews struggling to make ends meet aren’t going to be picky about what is served to them at a shabbat meal – or any other (I was reminded of recently rereading the book Rachel Calof’s Story about a Jewish woman who emigrated from Russia to be a pioneer bride, and while they certainly cared about kashrut, which is demonstrated throughout the book in various ways, when her husband comes home with a tin labeled herring and it turns out to be pickled pigs feet.. well, she doesn’t say that they ate, but she certainly hints at it. When there’s no other food, you eat what there is).
Nevertheless, there’s a certain oddity about these two articles. For example, let’s take the shabbat meals article: The title is, “With increasingly particular eaters, Shabbat meals get tough.” And yet, that isn’t actually the sense I get at all from the actual content of the article – let alone from my personal experiences. More »
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