by Eli · Friday, August 8th, 2008
Bohdan Khmelnytsky with Tuhaj Bej at Lviv painted by Jan Matejko, 1885
As Shabbos descends and Tisha b’Av arrives thereafter, Jews in golus and eretz yisroel will commemorate the destruction of the beys hamikdesh with a 24 hour fast and the recitation of Eicha, the Book of Lamentations and kinnos, liturgical poems that lament tragedies that occurred throughout our history.
One of these tragedies, the Gezeyres Takh Vetat, the Evil Decrees of 1648-1649, is a fascinating example of how Yiddish-speaking Jews understood themselves, the non-Jews who lived around them, antisemitism and how they intertwined. (The term is derived from the Hebrew dates of the tragedy, 5408 and 5409). Here’s an abridged rundown of what went down:
In 1648, the Ukrainian lands were part of the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth. While most of this land was owned by wealthy Catholic nobility, the people who worked it were mainly Eastern Orthodox Ukrainian peasants. The Polish nobility heavily taxed the peasants working their land. About 1/3 of Eastern European Jews lived on Ukrainian land during this time. In the regional cities, there was a ethnic mix of Jews, Poles and other groups, and in southern Ukraine, Christian Cossacks and Muslim Tatars mingled in the Ottoman borderlands. With the economy booming, the Cossacks protected the interests of the nobility by fighting Tatars, who often plundered peasant communities and lived off the spoils.
Some Jews made a living off collecting taxes from peasants on behalf of Polish nobility. Consequently, they were often perceived by the Ukrainian peasants and their Cossack protectors as part of the landowner’s oppressive system.
Before 1648, Ukrainian peasants and Cossacks had rebelled against the nobility many times, destroying Jewish and non-Jewish communities as they made their way from Ukraine to Poland, but now a large scale uprising had begun and forces lead by Bohdan Khmel’nyts’kyi moved towards Lithuania and central Poland, murdering many Jews and razing their towns as they fought Polish forces. In many Jewish communities, organized defense forces were created.
According to scholarship on the event, there is no evidence that there was a plan to specifically murder Jews, nor is there any exact accounting of the number of casualties. What is clear is that Jews who commemorate the event understood it in spiritual ways relevant to Tisha b’Av. More »
by BZ · Thursday, August 7th, 2008
A few years ago I was getting Hebrew handouts copied at Foxy Copy (92nd & Broadway), and without my asking for anything special, they did something complicated to the machine to get the staple to come out on the top right corner, rather than the top left.
I was impressed at the time, but today’s experience beats that by far.
Today I was at Global Copy (Broadway between 97th and 98th) to drop off the handouts for my Institute workshops, and they said “Do any of these need genizah if we make a mistake?”
“No, but thanks for asking!”
by Kung Fu Jew · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
* Sarah Benor and Steven Cohen are doing a survey on language and identity in which they’re cross-referencing your Jewish parentage/upbringing with how you talk Jewy. Click the link to download your lingo. (Speaking of which, I’m collecting ideas for an independent take on Jewish communal buzzwords and slang – continuity, affiliated, OJC — so send ‘em my way.)
* Cohen’s last study about singles raised some hackles — but then again, all the comments on Haaretz are crazies. (Not like our well-behaved commentors on Jewschool…)
* Most Americans (and 14 of 18 countries) oppose taking one side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including Israel’s.
* 83% of Palestinians support the ceasefire, according to the June 18th poll Palestinian Center for Public Opinion.
* An Ir-Amim poll found that 78% of Israeli Jews already see Jerusalem as divided — and 65% of the Israeli public accepts an agreement that puts the Palestinian neighborhoods of Jerusalem under Palestinian control.
* Olmert’s sweeping speech about moving Israel-Diaspora relations away from an institutional focus on aliya to supporting Jewish education, culture and heritage outside Israel is supported largely by the Israeli public — especially younger Israelis, by 46% before public debate. Only 20% supported taking Diaspora opinion into account in making national decisions.
by Aryeh Cohen · Thursday, July 3rd, 2008
The right wing of American Orthodox Judaism, those who align themselves with various factions of chareidi and Yeshivah Judaism, are committed to what might only be called “triumphalist Zionism” (my locution, as far as I can tell). Triumphalist Zionists skip the whole cultural and political transformation piece of Zionism and go straight to “now we have an army and its our turn to kick gentile butt.” Most of these groups are extreme hawks on Israeli (and, often, therefore, American) foreign policy. Lubavitch, for example, were exceedingly anti-Zionist through the second world war (as Avi Rivitzky demonstrates in his important book Messianism, Zionism, and Jewish Religious Radicalism). They are also very active in opposing any territorial compromises or peace negotiations.
This process of triumphalist Zionism in the States was followed by the same trend in Israel. Whereas there was some talk that Rav Ovadyah Yosef, former Sephardic Chief Rabbi, (who does not see the settlement movement with the same messianic urgency as does Gush Emunim) would direct his political party Shas to support peace overtures, this did not in fact happen. The same holds true for Rav Shach, the dean of Roshei Yeshivah (Yeshivah heads) in Israel, and his Degel HaTorah party. Shas’ supporters were far more right wing than their leader and Rav Yosef ultimately let the party follow the more hawkish line. Rav Shach (an early mentor of Rav Ovadyah) too, expressed himself in opposition to the settlements, however his hatred of secular Jews and especially kibbutzim won out, with his Degel HaTorah party not supporting the peace overtures of the Labor Party.
It was only a matter of time before the patina of ambiguity toward co-existence cracked and the ramifications of triumphalist Zionism became obvious to all. On the one hand, this ideology afforded the chareidi parties internal justification to join the government as ministers (and ensure funding for their families and institutions), and to be in the heart of policy-making for all citizens of Israel (a seeming compromise with the Zionist project); the flip side of this was that this position of power gave the chareidi parties much political capital. Moreover, the chareidi parties could use foreign/security policy (settlements, wars) as leverage to score more funding for families and institutions (with the tacit and explicit backing of the American Jewish right).
This devil’s bargain has just now blown up again in the face of those Israelis who still see Israel as a Zionist project. This week in the Knesset a bill which exempted certain Yeshivot from the core curriculum that is mandatory for all elementary schools in Israel, passed the first reading. The Israeli High Court ruled three years ago that schools which do not teach the core curriculum can be denied government funding. The core curriculum mandates the teaching of basic civics and democratic values, Hebrew language and literature, English and Arabic, (though this latter is being contested mainly by the chareidim), along with sciences and mathematics, etc. This bill would grant exemptions to certain chareidi institutions (the so-called yeshivot ketanot), which would allow them to be funded by the government without having to teach the core curriculum.
The chareidi community in this latest move, has used its political leverage to undermine any sense of homogeniety or even unity of identity in Israel. This might not be a bad thing: liberal democracies are based on the notion that ethnic and/or religious minorities need not conform to the ideologies of the majority. However, and here is the chiddush, the chareidi parties are using their power from within the supposedly Zionist political institutions (not only Knesset seats, but government ministries) in order to undermine Zionism’s claim to forging a new kind Jewish identity. As Prof. Ruth Gavison wrote yesterday in Ha’aretz:
“It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of this law to the image of the State and the manner in which it educates its young citizens. The law perpetuates a situation in which particular groups receive significant public financing even though the curriuclae of their institutions do not impart to their students the skills necessary to become part of the life of the State and fulfill their part in the activities needed for the survival of the State. The law gives a hechsher [kosher certification] to the ideologies which are the basis of the “their Torah is their craft” arrangement.” (my translation)
This move follows fast on the heels of the Israeli Rabbinate’s declaration that only chareidi conversions are okay, and that converts practicing modern Orthodox Judaism can have their conversions reversed (as Gershom Gorenberg has been assiduously documenting). In the States, Shaul Magid has argued, modern Orthodox high school graduates go to Yeshivah in Israel for a year and then come back alienated from the modern-Orthodox values of their parents.
It would seem then that the vaunted Zionist “return to history” is actually history repeating itself, playing out once again the fight over modernity of eighteenth and nineteenth century Eastern Europe and Germany. The new variable is, of course, political power. The chareidim now have the ability to enforce their own brand of Wahabism. It would also seem that only on Birthright (or the mainstream American Jewish community more generally) is Israel seen as paradigm which provides an answer to question of Jewish identity.
by shamirpower · Friday, June 13th, 2008
I just received this from the JTS Bible department listerv from my former Bible M.A. adviser:
Are you tired of doing the NY Times crossword puzzles or sudoku puzzles (at the evil level) during the summer? Here is a puzzle you might want to consider working on while on the beach or in Vermont. It comes from someone who has just visited Russia. She wants to know what the accompanying text is (part of her letter to me is underneath). If anyone has some success in solving the text, let me know. There is no prize, but the “winner” will be acknowledged with great acclaim at the next Bible Dept Lunch.
Good luck!
- DM
[email from person who found the book]
Recently while visiting on of the countries of the former USSR I was approached by someone with a question: the family was in possession of what they believe is an ancient Jewish religious book/scripture and they were interested in finding out exactly what this book meant. Several experts from Russia attest that the language is neither Arameic, nor Hebrew, and that the red frame around the words is uncharacteristical of ancient Jewish religious writings. And this is as far as anyone got… The cover of this book is wooden and the pages appear to be made out of pergament.
*Since 3 people on the listerv already figured it out, I wanted to see if any Jewschooler wants to try an solve it. The winner will have the option of writing a guest post related to archeology and modern relevance. (Here are some leads for you). The contest will end by Shabbat of next week. Go for it!
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Saturday, May 10th, 2008
Week Three, Day seven
Malchut of Tiferet
Week Three, Day six
Yesod of Tiferet
This past weekend, Be’chol Lashon (In Every Tongue), a project of the Institute for Jewish and Community Research sponsored a conference in San Francisco of Jews and Jewish identified ethnic groups from around the world. Many of these groups are not formally Jewish, the descendants of anusim and xuetas. Some are Jews officially, although not always accepted with open arms by the so-called “mainstream,” such as the Ethiopian Jews, or the Abayudaya. And then there are the Jewish communites whose faces and color don’t fall within the stereotypes of what a Jew looks like - as if there was any such thing: the Jews of India, Jews who are of color who converted, or whose parents did.
“The Jewish community keeps talking about the crisis of intermarriage and the crisis of declining numbers, but meanwhile you’ve got people with Jewish heritage, spiritual seekers, Jewish communities of historical significance, and the Jewish community is doing nothing to help them,†says Gary Tobin, the institute’s president and a longtime advocate of greater openness to those outside the Ashkenazi mainstream.
According to institute research, at least 20 percent of American Jews are racially and ethnically diverse. But old stereotypes about what “real Jews†look like persist, Tobin says.
“Instead of worrying about people being ‘lost’ to intermarriage,” he wonders, “why aren’t we extending our ideological borders to include all these people who are so interested in joining us?â€
Personally, I think it would be completely fabulous if the descendants of the anusim made a formal return, and the Ibo and Lemba formally converted. Welcome! Join the party!
And of course, for those that are us, we should move mountains to bring them close and help them.
On a humorous note:
Safed’s Chief Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu wrote in an article … “it turns out that Olmert is more corrupt than we thought.”
“So what shall we do? Elect another prime minister without faith? Another one without credibility? Another one without values?…when will we wake up and realize that we need a prime minister with a kippa?”
“We need a prime minister who acts based on genuine faith and values.
Um. Hey, I’m a rabbi myself, and I even occasionally wear a kippah (rather than a hat), but I’m just not quite sure this would solve the problem. Especially since I’m pretty sure that Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu wasn’t promoting say, Rabbi Andy Sacks, or R. David Golinkin, as a solution to the problem.
I dunno. I could be wrong. PM Sacks, has a kind of a nice ring to it….
Yeah, okay. A PM with a kippah. That would definitely solve all our problems. No more corruption. (Anyone want to do a quick google on rabbi, Israel, corruption charges?)
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Sunday, May 4th, 2008
Day 15,
Week Three: Tiferet
Day One: Chesed (Chesed of Tiferet)
(Two weeks and one day of the Omer)
JTA notes the upcoming ordination of the marvelous and lovely person Gershom Sizomu.
Why is this interesting to JTA? Gershom Sizomu will become the first officially ordained rabbi of Uganda’s Abayudaya Jews. He will be ordained in a few days at American Jewish University (formerly University of Judaism) from the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies (as will our very own equally fabulous Danya Ruttenberg!).
Sizomu, inherits the spiritual leadership of his community, through his father and grandfather.
Some 1,000 Abayudaya Jews live in five Ugandan villages. …Most Abayudaya Jews converted in 2004, and hundreds of the children now attend the Hadassah School, where they learn Hebrew and Jewish studies along with a general curriculum.
At the end of May, Sizomu will return with his wife and three children to Uganda to reassume leadership of the Abayudaya.”
By the way, he also has a lovely accent. And a nice singing voice which is featured (as is his wife’s) on the Grammy award winning nominated Abayudaya: Music from the Jewish People of Uganda from the Smithsonian’s Folkways records.
And many blessings upon Danya as well.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Monday, April 28th, 2008
Week two, day two:
Gevurah of Gevurah
Ed Koch, the irascible former mayor of New York City, has purchased a burial plot in Trinity Church, the only uptown cemetery still accepting burials. According to the Times (of course!) Says Koch, “The idea of leaving Manhattan permanently irritates me.â€
The Times reports:
Mr. Koch also said he had ordered a tombstone to “adorn my grave upon my death, which I hope won’t be for another 8 to 10 years.â€
Carved on the tombstone is the most important prayer in Judaism, “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One,†in English, Hebrew and a transliteration, and the last words of the journalist Daniel Pearl before he was murdered by Islamic terrorists: “My father is Jewish; my mother is Jewish; I am Jewish.â€
…I called a number of rabbis to see if this was doable,†he said. “I was going to do it anyway, but it would be nice if it were doable traditionally.â€
He said he had been advised to request that the gate nearest his plot be inscribed as “the gate for the Jews,†and the cemetery agreed.
He was also instructed to have rails installed around his plot, so he ordered them.
Being buried in Manhattan, Mr. Koch said, would also make it easier for former constituents to visit.
“I’m extending an open invitation,†he said.
Although the plot is non-denominational, I am very struck by this irony, of someone declaring his Jewishness by… buying a burial plot in a churchyard, and then declaring it “the Gate of the Jews.”
He is spending a lot of money on a place where his remains will be, but I wonder, what could that money have done for the Jewish community.
Speaking more generally, I have often been struck when doing funerals, by how odd it is that people who aren’t particularly interested in being active in the Jewish community while alive want to be buried by a rabbi, after it can’t make much of difference any more. There’s some odd niggle that I can’t quite put my finger on about people who want to be Jews in their deepest moments, but who don’t do Jewish. On this day of gevurah in gevurah, it seems to me that we need to be asking how to make our American Jewish sisters and brothers think about being Jewish as something which is more than a -meaningful, perhaps, but only a - hobby, something to be done for one’s own satisfaction, at one’s own convenience, but not to interfere with the business of life.
Perhaps some of you out there in blogoland can get at that niggle better than I.
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol · Sunday, April 27th, 2008
Day 6 Yesod of Chesed
JTA reports on a “new” “trend” (goodness, how many scare quotes do I need for this post?). Once again, the Jewish press gets on the bandwagon a little late., since Moishe house has been doing this for a while now. But what is new and interesting bout these new kvutzot is that they are affiliated with the Zionist youth movements, Habonim-Dror and Hashomer Hatzair (there appear to be three of these altogether currently, one with Habonim Dror and two with Hashomer Hatzair, two in NY and one in Toronto).
Setting up these collectives in North America represents an overhaul of the Zionist youth movement ideal. Whereas in the past these movements functioned more or less like farm teams, preparing young American Jews to settle in Israel, aliyah is no longer the goal.
“Judaism has always been a global reality,†says Jane Manwelyan, 25, of Kvutzat Orev. “Zionism is the collective potential of the Jewish people. Israel is just one of the physical representations of that, certainly not the only one.â€
Rather than a physical destination, Israel “is central to our idea of Jewish peoplehood,†says Gil Browdy, 25, of the Habonim kvutza.
He notes that the Israeli kibbutz movement still isn’t sure what to make of the North American upstarts.
“It’s a tension,†Beran acknowledges.
But these young urban pioneers wanted to stay at home, to help revitalize Jewish life in the Diaspora, become involved in community-based activism and build good lives for themselves based on the values with which they grew up, even after they age out of their youth movements.
Since I’ve been scolded lately for drinking the hateorade, I’ll just say that I like it. I think that it’s a fine idea, I’m glad that Moishe house isn’t the only ones doing it, and I hope the idea spreads, not only to sinlge 20somethings, but I can’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be a good idea for a way to revitalize Jewish communities of all ages, mixed ages, and with or without kids. Oh wait, someone’s done that too (I know the article doesn’t say so, but although being Jewish is by no means required, there are quite a few Jews living there).
Week one, Day 7
Malchut of Chesed
Rabbi Jill Jacobs, over on Jspot, opines that the seder table seems to have gotten rather cluttered. She notes the dozens of emails calling her attention to the various political agendas that yell “me, me” at pesach and offer an assortment of candles, glasses, fruit, and so on to add to those items part of our regular ritual/
More »
by zt · Friday, April 25th, 2008
It is fairly well known that, in Israel, many recognize and observe seven days of pesach and a single seder whereas, outside of Israel, many recognize 8 days of pesach and two seders as proper observance.
Where did the extra day come from?
A piece over at my jewish learning does a good job explaining:
The Jewish calendar is lunar. Over 2,000 years ago, a council of rabbis from the Sanhedrin, the ancient legislative and judicial body, held special sessions in Jerusalem at the end of each lunar month to receive witnesses to the first sliver of the new moon. Because a lunar cycle is approximately 29 days long, it was no mystery when the new moon should appear, but the Sanhedrin still declared months and holidays only on the basis of these witnesses. …
Once the sighting was legitimated, the rabbis declared the next day Rosh Hodesh, the beginning of the new month. Originally, beacon fires would be set on mountaintops to spread the word to distant Jewish communities already living in far away places such as Egypt and Babylon. Watchers on faraway hills set their beacon fires as soon as they saw them, continuing the relay “until one could behold the whole of the Diaspora before him like a mass of fire” (Mishnah Rosh Hashanah 2:4)… Celebrating festivals for an extra day would ensure that, regardless of whatever confusion reigned about the exact start of the new month, at least one day of their celebration would be on the correct day.
Okay, that makes sense but we started to switch to a rule-based fixed-arithmetic lunisolar calendar system after the destruction of the second temple. That made the days designed to prevent error obsolete since everyone everywhere in the world used the same system and derived the days similarly. It no longer mattered how close one was to the Sanhedrin so why keep the extra days?
There are two major answers.
Our own BZ’s:
At the end of Beitzah 4b that issue is addressed. “Now that we know the fixed new month, what’s the reason for doing two days?” The answer there is hizaharu b’minhag avoteichem (be careful about your ancestors’ minhag), because in the future there might be a decree preventing us from keeping the calendar…And we can even agree on the value of minhag avoteinu (see Beitzah 4b), and you can follow the minhag of your ancestors who kept 2 days, while I’ll follow the minhag of my ancestors who have been Reform for at least five generations.
The other common answer is given by a Rabbi from Aish here:
So why was a second day Yom Tov added? In order to make a distinction, to add to the Jewish awareness that one is living in the Diaspora and does not claim permanent residence in the Holy Land.
BZ’s answer to Minhag Avoteinu is compelling as is the issue that there has ceased to be a consistent mihag in the diaspora. The Reform, Renewal, Reconstructionist, and Conservative movements have all offered decisions permitting the use of a 7-day pesach. Here is some CCAR (Reform) analysis. The Cons and Recon movements both provide flexibility for local congregations but the result is that a majority of American Jews, and nearly all Israeli Jews fall under a 7-day authority. Many have been in such a situation for generations.
Now to respond to the idea that we should have an extra seder to remember we aren’t in Israel…
Was anyone really confused? In case you were here are ten ways to conclude you are in the US rather than in Israel that have nothing to do with extra days of passover.
10:The falafel is overpriced and underspiced.
9: Municipal services are transparent and efficient.
8: Sunday is for football not school.
7: Teacher strikes are generally limited to a few days, max.
6: People talk slowly and get uncomfortable with interruptions (supreme court excepted).
5: Holocaust jokes are rare and usually generate discomfort.
4: People have difficulty making political and religious assumptions based on the type of kippah a person is wearing. Many can’t remember the word and use “beanie” or “skull cap” instead.
3: Though people talk about God non-stop in government there aren’t religious parties associated with single religious approached.
2: Nation’s founders where individual rather than collective farmers.
1: Look around. No occupations and settlements for miles in any direction? You probably aren’t in Israel.*
*If you are, time for new bifocals.
by Josh Frankel · Tuesday, April 15th, 2008
So, here’s a different source for a news story on this blog. HaTzofeh, the national religious newspaper in Israel, reports on extensive abuse of the few remaining Jews in Yemen. The newspaper reports that recently many Jews have been attacked, including the Rabbi of the community whose home was recently destroyed. The article also mentions ongoing human rights abuse, including forced conversions, and a law that makes marrying a Jew punishable by death. Strangest though, the article reports that the only organization working to help these Jews is Satmar. The flat-hatted chassidim want them to emigrate, not to Israel of course, but to the UK and America.
Yikes. That’s scary stuff, happening to our own brothers and sisters, and I had no idea. I don’t know what to do to stop this, but the first step must be making sure that people know. It’s a shame that I heard about it first from a religious rag which I usually only read for laughs.
Update: I found a Christian Science Monitor article about the abuse.
by zt · Tuesday, March 18th, 2008
In some deep way, parts of American Judaism are still paralyzed by fear and still suffering from holocaust induced post-traumatic-stress. Going to day school I felt it, and being the grandson of survivors I know the narratives in a deeply personal way. We often hear that things seemed just fine in Germany before the Nuremberg Laws. Of course, everything wasn’t fine and all it took was an economic disaster to bring long-held hate to the surface in the form of blame. In some ways, our country today, looks a bit similar. Beset by enormous economic trouble we don’t yet know how our fellow countrymen will respond. A we-are-never-safe Jew might worry that– between all the Jewish Wall Street tycoons and Greenspan presiding over the run-up that resulted in collapse–rosy days might not be ahead. I don’t buy that analysis but at the same time I know how deep the narrative runs and re-runs. That is why it was so heartening to read Obama’s speech on race given earlier today (I hope to watch later, at home). An amazing excerpt from the speech on the flip:
Here is an excerpt:
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.†This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don’t have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn’t look like you might take your job; it’s that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation – the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
Though the vision doesn’t talk about Jews specifically it fights against the idea that minorities should be constantly on edge that one day, when the shit hits the fan, and the problems are great, that the “real Americans” will behave like the “real Germans”. It says that we are all, together, the “real America.” My grandfather recently passed away but this is the sentiment, the dream, he was chasing when he fled Dachau, a place where he could be a real citizen. It is beautiful to hear a major candidate offer such an inclusive message (and mean it). This articulation of what America truly is and what politics should be about is, to borrow a phrase, very good for the Jews.
by biz · Tuesday, February 26th, 2008
There were many times when we worried that one move too far into the mainstream, one step beyond the very traditional bounds of the Orthodox world, could bring a ban on a certain very tall Hasid. We took a lot of questions to the Bet Din at 770 and respected the answers they gave, but always, always, I had this concern. Seems in another part of “the Jewish music jungle” (Thanks frumhouse, i love that term), just such a ban has been decreed. Does anyone care? Will anyone follow it? I just find this too intriguing not to share…
Have you heard of The Big Event? If so, for the love of Hashem, write a comment and chime in. I love how the Ultra-Orthodox world can randomly swing into Madison Square Garden and it flies totally under the radar of the rest of the Jewish world. Apparently, it is/was a concert planned for March 9th featuring frum music favorites headlined by Lipa Shmeltzer. Lipa really is a King. A wedding singer and simcha entertainer, he gained prominence with his lighthearted rewrites of secular tunes as newly Kosherfied hits in both Yiddish and English. He performed at a friend’s wedding and while his “Yo Ya” was good, he really got me with version of Melanie C’s “I turn to you.” Apparently you can make it Jewish simply by adding “Hashem” before the phrase. ANYWAYS…
I’ll let the frum bloggers explain from here:
Frumhouse:Basically, the current king of the Jewish music jungle, Lipa Schmeltzer, has been deemed too wild by certain factions of the orthodox community. Furthermore, these factions believe that current Jewish music has become goyified (my word, not theirs). Songs that stem from non-Jewish melodies, even if the words and taam have been changed to elevate their kiddusha, are deemed inappropriate for kosher Jewish entertainment.
This concert and future Jewish music concerts have been banned by a group of about 35 rabbanim. They also prohibit people from hiring any performer who participates in the Big Event Concert.
Lipa speaks out: I have recently started learning Bichavrusa with a leading Rosh Yeshiva, and I promised him that I will never sing any songs which were composed by non-Jews. Being true to my word, I have sang at more then a dozen Chasuna’s since I made that decision - and I have not sang “Yiddenâ€, “Abi-Mileibtâ€, or “Numa†(Rabbi Nachman M’uman) or any other song that is questionable as to its origin.
The really ironic thing to me about this is many Hasidic niggunim, and most Jewish music in general, doesn’t come from exclusively Jewish sources. We are a people with a tradition of song as a vital form of expression in our lives. But with the exception of Torah cantillation as a system of musical notation and musical modes of prayer, as a Diaspora people our appropriation of the culture of our various host communities is inevitable. What makes Klezmer more Jewish than pop songs about Hanukkah? What makes pining for Hashem to the tune of a French Revolutionary War March more Kosher than pining to Hashem to the tune of an ex-Spice Girl?
by Eli · Wednesday, January 30th, 2008
Whenever the media publishes an article about the desecration of Jewish cemeteries, its usually the work of disaffected skinhead youths. With nothing better to do, these angry kids take out their frustration with the current state of affairs on the memorial space of Jews. Whether in New Jersey, Germany or Brooklyn, the vandalism of graveyards is a tried-and-true way to be unimaginatively antisemitic, and get a little sensationalist attention from the papers. I usually think little of it.
The situation of a destroyed Jewish cemetery in the Ã…Snipiskes neighborhood of Vilnius, Lithuania is remarkably different. Without any remaining tombstones, the cemetery is a vivid reminder to the city’s Jews that their contributions to Vilnius mean little to Lithuanians born after the war. Consequently, the stretch of open land with Jewish bones beneath is the sight of planned King Mindaugas apartments, a new housing development for upwardly mobile Lithuanians intent on redrawing their city to look, above all things, modern and free. Situated close to the commercial, modern center for the capital - its slick construction will obscure forever the memory of our Jerusalem of Lithuania, and set the relationship between a post-Soviet Lithuania and its proud Jewish diaspora even further apart.
Unlike Poland or Germany, Jewish tourism in Lithuania is less lucrative and less attractive to its citizens, as it would force certain elites in the society to acknowledge that their country is at its heart a patchwork of cultures - Lithuanian, Jewish, Tatar, Roma, Russian, German and Polish among others. To places like the Czech Republic or Germany, the European cosmopolitan idea is strong, and despite a rise in right-wing violence, they have poured enormous funds into welcoming Jewish tourists back to a world they lost. For Lithuanians, sacrificing a money-making housing development to erect a plaque to a destroyed cemetery invites the question for Jewschool readers: Why should a Jewish cemetery be preserved in a city that welcomes relatively few Jewish tourists, which has already marked other Jewish sites with memorial plaques and which above all things, needs a housing boom in its capital to boost an economic resurgence that could eventually benefit the Jewish community living there?
by shamirpower · Tuesday, December 18th, 2007
In the past five years, young Jews have seen a burst of philanthropies step up to the task of training Jewish leaders of the ‘next generation.’ The programs they have developed range in quality and length of engagement; however, what they all seem to have in common is an interest in both hearing about the experiences of the fellows as well as giving them some sort of opportunity to actualize an innovative project. In some cases they also include mentoring by a seasoned Jewish professional. Perhaps one day in the future Steven M. Cohen’s disciples will looks back and say: “How did the explosions of these fellowships shape young Jewish engagement in Jewish life? Did they in face develop the type of leaders they hoped to?”
Feel free to add anything I missed in the comments section, including similar fellowships you can think of from previous generations. Note: There are many more of these fellowships that are Israel specific - I have purposely left them out since I feel like those have their own set of goals and have been around much longer. The point of this post is that there are now many such fellowships in the US.
You may have already heard of ROI120 (a five day conference in Israel), PLP (which has both conferences and an academic fellowship), CLI/Leading Up, (Insight, a one year program working full time, Charlie, basically money and support to do a birthright follow-up program), Legacy Heritage Fellowship (a year long international professional mentorship program where the fellow works toward Middle East Peace) or , and the lesser known Muehlstein Institute (an 18-month certificate in non-profit management and Jewish communal leadership).
Well, it’s time to throw a few more into the mix. These new ones don’t have an ambiguous acronym or a particularly difficult to pronounce family name, though they both are only named for the sponsoring family. More »
by Bradford · Thursday, December 13th, 2007
I published a rather scathing essay about Abraham Foxman and the Anti-Defamation League in the latest issue of American Jewish Life, and surprisingly I haven’t received anything but positive feedback about it.
A bit of background: Over the waning months of this past summer, the ADL found itself embroiled in a small crisis. It’s refusal to label the Armenian genocide as genocide was causing towns in the Boston area to yank their relationships with the organization, specifically it’s anti-bigotry campaign. When the head of the ADL’s Boston chapter spoke up in defiance of the national organization’s position, he was fired. A firestorm erupted, and he was re-hired, but only after the ADL and it’s director, Abe Foxman, had been severely tarnished by the episode.
My article was a slightly broader piece about Foxman’s motor mouth, but in the end it revolved around this core argument:
“This is an organization created to fight bigotry generally and anti-Semitism in particular, to make our world better by exposing hatred and holding racism, genocidal or otherwise, to account. Where exactly do they get off apologizing to genocide deniers? In two sentences, Foxman had broken the camel’s back, letting a deluge of missteps and hyperbolic statements turn into the absolute shredding of his organization’s moral authority.”
All of this is wonderful fodder for debate, except it would seem nobody’s picking up Foxman or the ADL’s side in this debate. So much for the debate, but I have continued to think quite seriously about the subject of the ADL’s mission:
“The immediate object of the League is to stop, by appeals to reason and conscience and, if necessary, by appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people. Its ultimate purpose is to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens alike and to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens.”
– ADL Charter, October 1913
You have to understand this about me: Even as I’ve lambasted Foxman and grown ever more dismayed with the national leadership of many Jewish organizations, I’ve also remained hopeful about these groups. I interned for the ADL in Atlanta when I was in college. I’ve worked with AIPAC in the past, and I’d like to think I can work with groups like these in the future.
The problem, from my vantage point, is that they’ve lost site of their respective missions. More »
by rokhl · Sunday, December 9th, 2007
Anyone else read that article in the Times recently by Natalie Angier? You know, the one where a neurophysicist teaches everyone at a symposium the steps to the Jewish hora and, OMG! Angier realizes how much fun it is to dance when, say… you know the steps. I know, I know, you don’t have to a brain surgeon (or neurophysicist) to know that participation in one’s own culture is actually enjoyable when you know the steps. Nonetheless, I’m applying for a grant to prove just that. But don’t hold your breath for my findings to be published in the Journal of Totally Fucking Obvious Things Jews Pretend Not To Know.
Anyway, that reminds me- there’s an amazing Yiddish dance party tonight, starting at 6:30, where, in conjunction with the big Yiddish dance symposium happening this afternoon, there will be something like 5 (million) Yiddish dance teachers leading and teaching Yiddish dances, along with a hot klezmer band.
It’s going to be held at the Ukrainian East Village Restaurant in the East Village 140 Second Ave. (between 8th and 9th Streets) Admission: $10.
(After the jump, find out why I’m changing my name to Old Dirty Jewess)Â
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by YehuditBrachah · Tuesday, December 4th, 2007
Seen at a New York City grocery store:
