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Hevron for Shabbos

I went to Hevron for Shabbos. It was awesome. I visited Baruch Goldstein‘s grave. It took three random IDF jeeps to escort us up and down the ten minute walk from Givat Avot (by Kiryat Arba) to Maarat Hamachpela. Then again, a group of Jews were stoned by a mob of about 30 Arabs- which stopped when the soldiers (G-d bless them and keep them safe from Arabs and leftists alike) came.

We went on a heavily guarded tour of the Arab shuk during the day…it was heartbreaking to see all of the holes carved into the stone doorposts where mezuzot used to be, where Arabs took over after the 1929 massacre of the Hevron Jews, before there was any green line… I saw where the Jews had made nets over the alleys of the shuk because Arabs would constantly dump trash over their streets… I saw Jewish stars engraved over doorways, where huge yeshivot used to be, where victims of Arabs who spoke fluent Yiddish were stabbed to death.

Yes, we know, Hevron was never a Jewish city.. we know…(sarcasm).

80 thoughts on “Hevron for Shabbos

  1. DOn’t fret once they have Hebron again the garbage will flow freely in the streets, the giant rats that seem to beat up that cats (Often found in Arab towns) will be visible once again. THey will probably figure out a way to use Maarat Hamachpela as a sewage plant or somthing too. DOn’t worry in a few more years everyone will by into the idea of Hebron never ever having a Jewish presence

  2. Uh Holy Terror….
    Your Dear Dr. Goldstein did the very opposite thing that he was trained to do. Actually, his act puts him in good company with Manson, etc. I don’t see how anyone could waste one second of their life visiting this man’s grave. A black stain on Jewish history I tell ya.

  3. While I respect the desire to have a more diverse group of opinions on this site Mobius, I am not sure that your sister visiting a terrorist’s (Baruch Goldstein’s) grave is really blog worthy. Also, what is with these “Discuss” posts that really just attract the extremists on both sides of the isle to yell @ one another. I liked when the postings at least report something…
    Also , Baruch Goldstein was a horribe person. How could someone complain about Palestinian terrorists being immoral scum and not believe the same about Goldstein. And just like it is a failure on the part of the Palestinian leadership to not have stopped suicide bombings and amost nevr having effectively responded to them, it is a failure on our side for having allowed one of our own to do what Goldstein did. I think Tom Friedman had it right when he called Goldstein “Hezbollah in a skullcap.”

  4. “I am not sure that your sister visiting a terrorist’s (Baruch Goldstein’s) grave is really blog worthy.”
    I disagree. It balances out the Brown/Asaf posts. And while I don’t agree with either, it lends itself to some healthy debates.
    “Also, what is with these “Discuss” posts…I liked when the postings at least report something… ”
    I agree. I feel like I’m in nursery and the teacher is trying to distract me from playing with my poo.

  5. Hey Brown,
    Go look at the link I posted on your Cheney post…and subsequent comments. I’m sure we’ll be back to where we stared. Have a swell day.

  6. robbie, so the actions of a single nut case (call him a terrorist, thats what he was), acting on his own, is now the equivalent of the palestinians acting through their national bodies (the plo, hamas, etc.) to murder jews? got it, i should now despise the israeli government in the same way i despise hamas. robbie, ht may be to the right, but no more than you are to the left; and if the readers are willing to put up with the crap from the browns and asafs of the world, guess it wont destroy your virgin little ears to hear their rightist counterpoint.

  7. Did you guys even read that link? Were u there? Do you even know what happened? Read the link and debate it instead of getting all smarmy.

  8. baruch Goldstein is a tzaddik who offset a huge massacre of Jews.
    They found guns wrapped in khaffiyehs in the Ma’arah after his death.
    The army told him to prepare medical supplies, forewarning him of the massacre.
    He acted in a way he thought would save Jews.
    If you don’t agree, do not sit here and attack me and what I said. Prove me wrong with facts.
    I ask again, were any of you there? Do any of you have eyewitness accounts? Instead of running off at your sanctimonious mouths, prove my previous statements wrong.

  9. The author of this post may feel that she is just thinking of the welfare of the Jewish people, but she has given up her morals and her humanity if she can genuflect at this guy’s gravesite. For shame.

  10. blah blah blah
    hey, how come none of you mentioned the fact that the Arabs destroyed Jews and took over their homes in Hevron….
    conveniently ignoring it, I see.
    busts up yer schema

  11. My God HT. A rabbi in Vancouver (a man I admire and adore very much btw) once went into an entire conspiracy theory that Goldstein never committed the atrocity…that Amir didn’t murder Rabin. Everything is a conspiracy. Sorta sounds like ISM, huh?
    The man went into a mosque and emptied (I forget how many clips of ammunition) an M 16 into the innocent bodies of folks praying.
    Now even if there’s some weight to your linked version of events, do we just pick up guns and march into every mosque, shopping mall, etc., and gun down what we thing MIGHT be a threat. HT…ever hear of the police? Army? Law?
    I can’t believe I’m even discussing this shit.

  12. I mean, you want thousands of Jews to be torn from their homes to give the land to people who’ve doe much worse than Goldstein, but he’s the bad one, and the PLO and Hamas and all those guys are OK.
    BTW, be warned, if you guys keep attacking me and not coming up with realistic proofs against my statements, you will be banned from the site, word is bond from my brother.

  13. “I ask again, were any of you there? Do any of you have eyewitness accounts? Instead of running off at your sanctimonious mouths, prove my previous statements wrong.”
    By your logic, we can’t talk about violence committed by Arabs against Jews, if we weren’t eyewitnesses, either. (For that matter, were YOU there?)
    You sound a teensy bit sanctimonious yourself.
    There are many heroes of the Zionist movement, and many latter-day defenders of the Jewish people whom you could be celebrating. Instead, you’re choosing to focus on this guy. He killed in such a scattershot way, how can you play judge and be sure EVERY SINGLE person he killed had murderous intent? You can’t.
    I think you’re deliberately setting yourself up for confrontation, but I cannot understand why. You’re defending the indefensible.

  14. “baruch Goldstein is a tzaddik who offset a huge massacre of Jews.
    They found guns wrapped in khaffiyehs in the Ma’arah after his death.
    The army told him to prepare medical supplies, forewarning him of the massacre.”
    What’s your source for any of this? You have the burden of proof here. Unless you can make your case, the best we can say about Goldstein is that he may have been out of his head. I tend to take the right of self-defense very far, but once a person’s actions are not covered under self-defense, they become crimes.
    Here is the comparison of the year:
    “And just like it is a failure on the part of the Palestinian leadership to not have stopped suicide bombings and amost nevr having effectively responded to them, it is a failure on our side for having allowed one of our own to do what Goldstein did.”
    Do I have to take this apart, or can we just marvel at the absurdity?

  15. Dan,
    Is your sister for real? I mean this:
    “BTW, be warned, if you guys keep attacking me and not coming up with realistic proofs against my statements, you will be banned from the site, word is bond from my brother.”
    sounds like….like….
    Hey I respect her energy dude, but she’s flying off the handle my friend.

  16. wait, it’s good you’re discussing this shit. Because it is a symptom of the central issue of what’s going on in Israeli politics today.

  17. And once again, J pipes in with reason and a healthy kick to the head. Hey J, when are you going to get a blog up and running?

  18. ht (or is it mobius in disguise), bottom line, while you are doing g-d’s work for the most part, what goldstein did was a terrorist act that was non jewish and inhuman. i know the provaction to act in that fashion must be great, given the action of the palestinians, but what makes the palestinians despicable is their murderous actions, we shouldnt put ourselves in the position where we copy them.

  19. I’m just repeating what my brother said…
    Not saying it was done severely yet or anything, but the gist is there…
    btw: I know where you’re getting at with the comparison and if you’re daring to insult her here, dude, I wish you every evil in the world from the bottom of my heart.

  20. yes, I was there, and I have a cousin who is now a paraplegic for life, because he is there, and my sister’s friend’s kids are all missing limbs, because they were there.

  21. but I mean, you’re all too busy feeling the pain of those poor Arabs statistically proven most of whom who would gouge your eyes out if they had the chance.
    the hell with the Jews who suffer, that’s ok, right?

  22. The Manfred Lehmann article on Goldstein is really stupid IMO.
    No doubt a well-established Jewish legal rule was also on his mind: “Habs l’horgecha, hashkenl, l’horgo” (“If you are threatened by murder, you can pre-empt it by killing the would-be murderer in self-defense.”).
    How did he know that the specific people he killed in that mosque were would-be murderers?
    The stupidest paragraph in the Goldstein article has got to be this one:
    At least one witness, Mordechai Sayed, heard from inside the Machpelah that a gun, wrapped in an Arab kafiye, was found in the Machpelah, proving that the Arabs — far from peaceful worshipers — were armed for their planned pogrom.
    Aha! Some guy said one gun was found, therefore it’s proof of an imminent pogrom.
    This story makes me think of Dr. Baruch Kimmerling’s latest “Israel’s Culture of Martyrdom” from The Nation
    Have you read it, Holy Terror?

  23. Oy vey….we’ve got B Goldstein and now Brown adds Kimmerling, that puke, to the mix. Ok, I’ll raise the bid and throw in an Amir and a Finkelstein. Next?

  24. Webmacher, i did once have issue with what you brought up. I thought, but how did he know all of those people were guilty?
    It bothered me.
    Then someone told me of the “collective punishment” concept.
    I’ll get more sources on it.
    but just know, that if he’d killed 1000 arabs, if it even saved the life of one Jew, I really don’t give a flying flidgit.
    I don’t know if that’s right or not, but after all I’ve seen and heard, that’s how I feel.
    Why should that change?

  25. “I don’t know if that’s right or not”
    How about Jewish or not? I mean, why does the Torah and Rabbeim make it so difficult to try someone for murder? To invoke the death penalty? Not 1000, but one?

  26. ah the collective punishment concept
    When Stalin’s secret police arrested a man as an “imperialist spy”, his family was dispersed, his wife sent to the Gulag and the children to the party’s orphanage. The Nazis created the term “Sippenhaft“, meaning that the whole family is responsible for the acts of any of its members.

  27. Holy Terror is a bad caricature of what a stupid knee-jerk “progressive” thinks a stupid knee-jerk “right-winger” should think like.
    This “joke” is becoming transparent.

  28. that’s JEWS not goyim.
    How come G-d says to remember Amalek and commands us to wipe them out?
    man, what about the seven nations G-d commanded us to kill?
    what about the pasuk in Shulchan Aruch, Shin Chaf Tet, that says if foreigners come to a border town in Israel on Shabbos, whether or not there is a king, whether or not the Beis Hamikdash is built, even if they only come to steal hay, you are COMMANDED to go with your weapons and kill themand are allowed to bring your weapons back. Why? Because if they are going to steal hay they will see you are weak and eventually try to conquer.
    GO CHECK. HILCHOS SHABBOS. SHIN CHAF TET. SHULCHAN ARUCH.
    That;s a Christian perspective, not Jewish. EL NIKAMOT HASHEM – G-D IS A VENGEFUL G_D, read tEHILLIM.
    and another thing. collective punishment as mandated by Jewish law is different than NAzi law, just cause it makes your western internationalist heart go aflutter because of the connotations doesn’t mean it’s not valid.
    man, you guys have no business celebrating Purim, especially since its about killing Amalek cause they wanted to kill us.

  29. Dickforce…I wish you were right. But Dan made it clear that HT is his sister. Now unless this is a PR move by Mobius to increase traffic on Jewischool, to increase his chances of winning a Jewish Blog Award…HEY ONE SECOND HERE

  30. I have to tell you, I admire the Torah knowledge and passion that HT brings to Jewschool. I may not agree with her, but I find her a lot more enjoyable that some of the Left leaning conspiracy driven posters on this site.

  31. and you guys still never said anything about the 1929 riots where Arab friends of Jews for centuries, Arabs who spoke fluent Yiddish, even the gatekeeper of Yeshivat Chevron, killed 67 Jews and maimed many more.
    Way before 1967.
    if I don’t start getting some answers I’m gonna make a subject about it and really upset your complacent comfort levels.

  32. yes, the olive pickers aid in finidng security breaches in the fence. What, you think they’re like, oh, those poor jews, i should tell em about the hole in the fence there so they can fix it so arab terrorists (usually my brother, cousin, nephew, son etc). can;’t get in?
    Who the hell are you kidding?
    Tell it to the Sabo family.
    Did you even hear of them?

  33. I have no doubt they even purposely cut them with those strong clippers they use to clip the olive branches.

  34. HT, your perspective, if implemented would bring a pan-Arab war. The Knesset disagrees with your views on Goldstein, as does almost every mainstream Jewish organization.
    Most of us here want to act in the interest of Jews, and I would imagine that most of us defend Jews when in front of other audiences. We don’t defend Arabs, but when someone promotes something as vile as genocide, or at least ethnic cleansing, against Arabs, we will defend Arabs. They are human beings and are G-d’s creation. They should be treated as such.

  35. So are Amalek and G-d commanded us to kill them.
    So are the Nazis – if someone had his boot on your grandmother’s back would you cry that you still need to treat his as a human being?
    The problem is you people are not feeling the pain of your fellow Jew, you’re busy trying to prove to the world that you’re not ‘racist’ like they all say you are, when meanwhile, they’re racist against you no matter what.
    And why is it ok to promote racial cleansing against Jews then?

  36. Quick clarification: Im not saying that because of Goldstein our leadership is as corrupt or evil or horrible as the pal leadership or that we are equally immoral as the large part of pal society accepting and commiting terrorism. BUT, i would say that we bear responsibility for our own, as do the Palestinians, and the Goldstein case is one of those times we must take blame for an outgrowth of our society. if goldstein had not been klled, i do not doubt we would have tried and jailed him-something that palestinians have failed to do with their terrorists, that is a huge difference between us. but we still must know that goldstein was a failure that came out of our society. recognize.
    Also, HT, i agree with u on your next post that the seccular left in israel is unfairlyprejudice against the ortho community, we all better find some common ground…

  37. G-d may be vengeful but he is also all knowing, man is not it is very important to remember that.
    As for calling on your relatives for protection:
    Frankly HT, I think the people on this site are giving you a total pass. Almost everyone disagrees with your very strong and one sided opinions and yet no one is attacking you personally.
    I’ve been torpedoed for far less, as have most of us.

  38. I have to tell you, I admire the Torah knowledge and passion that HT brings to Jewschool. I may not agree with her, but I find her a lot more enjoyable that some of the Left leaning conspiracy driven posters on this site.”
    HT *is* one of the “Left leaning conspiracy driven posters on this site.” I have it on good authority.

  39. Man, what, I should go away because it’s not comfortable for you to read preaching to the choir all day?
    Fwahahahahahahaha am I making you nervous?

  40. Man, what, I should go away because it’s not comfortable for you to read preaching to the choir all day?
    Fwahahahahahahaha am I making you nervous?

  41. ht = mobius, but you know what? i prefer his fantasy view of the world as his ficitional 18 year old sister, than to his real postings, he/she is more fun, more provactive, more interesting. mobius, keep it up, its the best thing youve done!

  42. “BUT, i would say that we bear responsibility for our own, as do the Palestinians, and the Goldstein case is one of those times we must take blame for an outgrowth of our society. if goldstein had not been klled, i do not doubt we would have tried and jailed him-something that palestinians have failed to do with their terrorists, that is a huge difference between us. but we still must know that goldstein was a failure that came out of our society. recognize.”
    I agree that we bear responsibility for our own, but just as we don’t judge individuals based on unrealistic standards never or rarely achieved by anyone, so too should we judge groups or nations. By that standard, and taking into account the provocations and pressure Israel is constantly subject to, I would say that Israel is a spectacular moral success. I can’t imagine any group in the world, standing in Israel’s shoes, not producing far MORE Goldsteins. And to say this is in no way to minimize or condone his evil actions.
    Also, the moral obligation to prevent incidents like that of Goldstein has to be based in foreseeability. I don’t know what steps could have been taken to prevent the Goldstein murders. By all accounts I’m aware of, up until the actual incident, Goldstein seemed an unlikely candidate for what he ended up doing. Let’s remember that these were the actions of an individual, not a conspiracy or organization, and that there likely was not a great deal of premeditation. Palestinian terrorism, on the other hand, involves none of these factors, and so is completely forseeable.

  43. Excuse me. I am his quite non-fictional 27 year old sister. I live in Israel where I am learning to be a jeweler.
    And if there are any metalhead Kahanist semi-charedi types out there looking for a cute shidduch drop me a line.
    🙂

  44. and if G-d says commit genocide on every remnant of Amalek including their sheep it is different than Hitler saying kill the Jews.
    G-d’s command is much more important than man’s.
    And His reasons are different.

  45. Holy Terror:
    You wrote this earlier:
    “baruch Goldstein is a tzaddik who offset a huge massacre of Jews.
    They found guns wrapped in khaffiyehs in the Ma’arah after his death.
    The army told him to prepare medical supplies, forewarning him of the massacre.”
    I’m still waiting for you to supply any reason for me or anyone else to believe these statements. I hope you didn’t just write them in order to score cheap propaganda points, like some of the leftists around here. I don’t think I’m asking too much in asking you to back up what you say. And if you’re unable or unwilling to do so, ask yourself if in the long term you’re helping or harming your cause.
    Shtreimel-
    Thanks again for the kind words. I couldn’t even consider starting a blog unless some sugar daddy relieved me of the need to work for a living. Even then, it’s probably better to have fewer blogs with more people involved than more blogs floating around isolatedly in cyberspace.

  46. the difference between the religious and the left can be boiled down to what are the dominant genetic jewish characteristics inherent. religious jews inherited all of the jewish genes that make them interpret the torah literally, reject democracy in the stead of a religious monarchy, and isolate themselves on the grounds that their holy seed is too pure to mix with the other nations of the world. the left, on the other hand, inherited the familiar characteristics often attributed to genuine jews of the past: free thinkers in the truest of abrahamic tradition, value the inherent freedoms of all men, and see themselves as part of a larger world full of G-ds creation. either you got it or you just don’t.

  47. Thank you, Oren. After a thread filled with half-truths and valid points distorted to the point of unrecognizability, you’ve come up with a pure, non-mixed post. You’ve managed to get everything wrong.
    What’s more bizarre: your complete misunderstanding of Orthodox Judaism (including your Aryan explanation for the prohibition against intermarriage) or your complete misunderstanding of the Left (freethinkers? valuers of freedom? G-d’s creation? Where you been hangin’out?)?
    Please tell me your post was a parody.

  48. J-
    obviously your dictionary is lacking a definition for satire.
    and you might want to check that dictionary more often before using words like “unrecognizability”.
    pwn3c

  49. i have not read all of the above posts, so i apologize if this is repetitive, but after visiting hevron this summer, i was under the impression that the nets were because settlers were moving into the apartments above the arab shuk and throwing down trash onto the streets and arabs below. and by trash i mean everything from yogurt containters to full out cement blocks.
    also, what baruch goldstein did was a massacre. wouldnt you be outraged if a palestinian told you all about visiting his hero’s grave/memorial after that said hero aquired his status by murdering jews? b/c that is exactly what one does when one visits the memorial to baruch goldstein to honor him. how can you express outrage at posters in ramallah honoring suicide bombers/martyrs and at the same time honor a jewish murderer?
    im not saying that hevron does not have a complex history or ancient jewish roots, but murder is murder and bloodshed is bloodshed and if you are going to comdemn the palestinians for indiscriminately murdering jews going about their daily lives, then you have to condemn jews that also indiscriminately murder palestinians going about their daily lives.

  50. Last time I was in Hevron I went to the Machpelah and saw that someone had put a “Kahane Tzadak” sticker right in Avraham Avinu’s freaking tomb.
    That was about as fed up as I’ve ever been.

  51. :J-
    obviously your dictionary is lacking a definition for satire.
    and you might want to check that dictionary more often before using words like “unrecognizability”.”
    I had no idea we were so formal here. Should I point out that sentences are supposed to start with a capital letter; that you don’t end a sentence with “inherent”; and that the words “Jews” and “Abrahamic” should be capitalized ?
    So – unfunny satire or foolish analysis?

  52. I don’t need to prove anything, I believe it. You’re the ones who don’t, you prove me wrong.
    I TOLD U FIRST SO NYAAAH

  53. “I don’t need to prove anything, I believe it. You’re the ones who don’t, you prove me wrong.
    I TOLD U FIRST SO NYAAAH”
    Why couldn’t some Hamas murderer say the same thing? By your standard, anyone can say anything.

  54. “I had no idea we were so formal here.”
    punctuation is a matter of formality, whereas using made-up words like “unrecognizability” is a matter of inaptitude and skillessness.
    if my satire was unfunny, was it because you fail to see the moral eliteness of the orthodox invoked instead by the left?
    if my analysis was foolish, was it because you couldn’t handle the deconstruction of orthodox judaism into elements meant to be ridiculed?

  55. Well Oren,
    It seems that a person only needs to back up their argument if they’d like to convince others of their beliefs.
    Perhaps “NYAAAH” is enough to sway some people but I’m not ready to be bullied into changing my mind with no good reasons presented.
    In conclusion:
    People who post just to see their own opinions up on the web see no need to back up their arguments.

  56. Shifra:
    Oren didn’t write the NYAAAH comment.
    Oren:
    “whereas using made-up words like “unrecognizability” is a matter of inaptitude and skillessness.”
    Tell that to Shakespeare. This is an informal venue, so as long as what I sat can be understood, I’m not gonna research the dictionary.
    The problem with reading your post as a satire is that you have elements meant as satire mixed with items you actally believe. Taken straight, your analysis was foolish in that the “holy seed” comment is inaccurate, your assumption about religious monarchy is overbroad as applied to the Orthodox in general, your notion that the Left are freethinkers is at best inaccurate, the Abrahamic tradition is not a freethinking one, and the Left’s record in valuing the freedoms of anyone has been dismal (the Left loves equality – so they claim – but freedom has never been their strong point). You might be confusing “Left” with nonreligious, or secular, or Enlightenment thought. That would make for a more interesting debate.
    “was it because you couldn’t handle the deconstruction of orthodox judaism into elements meant to be ridiculed?”
    I’ve handled much more skillful and devastating arguments against Orthodox Judaism than yours. I make it a point to study the best arguments of all sides that I can get my hands on.
    If you’d like to restate any of your points in a clearer fashion, I’ll be happy to tell you what I think of them.

  57. J-
    I’m sorry that I insulted your ability to wield the english language. But if you interpreted what I wrote as a reflection of my beliefs (since your satire-detector is either broken or missing) then you have a problem much worse than a corrupt lexicon. I won’t respond to your accusations about my so-called “beliefs” since you misinterpreted the entire context that I wrote. but I will share with you the story of Abraham, if you could just bear with me please, because you made a statement that I think deserves maybe a second, more intelligent analysis by its writer.
    “…the Abrahamic tradition is not a freethinking one”
    Abraham was a radical who realized that idol worshipping is wrong at a time when it was the most commonly accepted belief in the world, effectively thinking outside the box of his entire world. If deconstructing popular notions is not freethinking then just what is? don’t be afraid to use a dictionary this time…
    omfg pwn3d part III!

  58. Holy Terror:
    How many of the settlers would you say are as crazy as you are? I mean, I have a lot of sympathy for the settlers. In an ideal world, I’d say they should stay where they are. But I have always predicated that to some extent on the idea that most of them are regular people who moved to the suburbs to get away from the city and get a good mortgage. I’ve always explained to people that they are not crazy people who worship murderers like Baruch Goldstein. You seem intent on proving the stereotype of the extremist settler. If the rabbeim are really pushing Goldstein as some kind of hero, boy are we in trouble.

  59. Oren:
    “But if you interpreted what I wrote as a reflection of my beliefs (since your satire-detector is either broken or missing) then you have a problem much worse than a corrupt lexicon.”
    The problem I had with your initial post is that I couldn’t read it as satire consistent with any one point of view. If you meant to mock the Orthodox, how would it be satire to mention several items praising the Left and disparaging the Orthodox? I also couldn’t read your post as a defense of the Orthodox by any means. If you mix satire and straight comments in the same paragraph, your’e going to be misunderstood.
    “I won’t respond to your accusations about my so-called “beliefs” since you misinterpreted the entire context that I wrote. ”
    That’s why I asked you to restate your position. You brought up several interesting ideas that might be worth a discussion.
    “but I will share with you the story of Abraham, if you could just bear with me please, because you made a statement that I think deserves maybe a second, more intelligent analysis by its writer.
    “…the Abrahamic tradition is not a freethinking one”
    Abraham was a radical who realized that idol worshipping is wrong at a time when it was the most commonly accepted belief in the world, effectively thinking outside the box of his entire world. If deconstructing popular notions is not freethinking then just what is?”
    First, we need to define “freethinking”. The word could mean “objectively searching for truth”. That would describe Abraham and is certainly a fine thing. However, the word is most commonly used today (like a self-advertisement) to describe secular humanists/ agnostics/ atheists, or those who prefer a stance of rebellion against the mainstream for its own sake, rather than as a reaction to the flaws of the mainstream. I assume this is what you meant by “freethinking”. (Your reliance on the dictionary is misplaced. Dictionaries give all possible meanings of a word. When you write or speak in public, though, you need to be sensitive to which of the meanings the public will assume you intend. For example, I could call anyone who I believe is misinterpreting a person or text a “pervert”. The dictionary will back me up, but the “pervert” in question will be furious, and rightly so.)
    I don’t think that iconoclasm (literally, if we follow the Midrash) is the point of the story of Abraham (whether we’re discussing only what’s in Genesis or all Jewish sources re Abraham). The main achievement of Abraham is the recognition of one God, that God demands moral behavior of us, and that concern for other people is a basic component of morality (and of course Abraham’s untiring promotion of these ideas). The fact that Abraham had to promote these ideals in the face of the hostility of most of the people he encountered certainly speaks to his heroism and greatness, but it is not in itself his message. There is no reason to believe that he was an advocate of permanent revolution. I think he would have been thrilled to live in a world that accepted his message. In other words, his alienation from his society was due to specific criticisms he had of that society, not a permanent stance of alienation.

  60. J-
    although I disagree with your analysis, I certainly respect your opinion and appreciate your response. In order for you to understand what I meant by freethinking, I thought I would include a couple dictionary definitions:
    one who has rejected authority and dogma, especially in religious thinking, in favor of rational inquiry and speculation. (The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
    unwilling to accept authority or dogma (WordNet)
    if you can find a dictionary that defines “freethinking” as “preferring a stance of rebellion against the mainstream for its own sake” then please reference it to me. however, if you cannot find one, then perhaps you should consider that your concept of “freethinking” is perverted. In reference to secular humanists/agnostics/athiests, don’t you think that abraham would have been considered back then the same way that these groups are considered nowadays? As well, I could go so far to argue that the talmudic tradition is an extension of the Abrahamic tradition, where the talmud is forever unfinished and its goal of study being the endless revolution of laws and customs.

  61. Oren-
    “although I disagree with your analysis, I certainly respect your opinion and appreciate your response. ”
    Likewise.
    “In order for you to understand what I meant by freethinking, I thought I would include a couple dictionary definitions:
    one who has rejected authority and dogma, especially in religious thinking, in favor of rational inquiry and speculation. (The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
    unwilling to accept authority or dogma (WordNet)
    if you can find a dictionary that defines “freethinking” as “preferring a stance of rebellion against the mainstream for its own sake” then please reference it to me. ”
    As I explained earlier, while your definitions of “freethinker” are certainly correct (in fact, I wish the word was used exclusively in that way), the way the word is primarily understood, at least in the USA in 2005, is as I described above. You are of course welcome to use it in its correct meaning – I only ask that you specify that this is what you mean. I didn’t assume that you meant it this way originally, because in your original post you described Leftists as “freethinkers”. This is not – to put it mildly – my experience with Leftists. If anything, they eerily resemble the most dogmatic religious people.
    “however, if you cannot find one, then perhaps you should consider that your concept of “freethinking” is perverted. ”
    Ouch! See how jarring even the correct usage of a word can be if you don’t pay attention to the impact the word will have on its readers? Does my concept of “freethinking” get its own Megan’s Law?
    “In reference to secular humanists/agnostics/athiests, don’t you think that abraham would have been considered back then the same way that these groups are considered nowadays? ”
    In the sense of being in the opposition, maybe (minus the fiery furnace tossing). But you can’t ignore the content. And I think it’s clear that Abraham’s content is very different from that offered by secularists today.
    “As well, I could go so far to argue that the talmudic tradition is an extension of the Abrahamic tradition, where the talmud is forever unfinished and its goal of study being the endless revolution of laws and customs.”
    I think that that is a complete misunderstanding of the Talmudic tradition. If it is true that the Talmud is forever unfinished, it is true in the sense that the content it presents has endless layers and depths. It is not true, in fact the opposite of true, that its content is nonexistent or indeterminate. There is no “endless revolution of laws and customs”. In fact, the Talmud, in theory and historically, actually reduced the range of laws and customs practiced by the various Jewish communities. It served as a creator and repository of standards, and “set in stone” many aspects of Judaism. (By way of example, think of the Talmud as a large building bounded on each side by properties owned by other people. The building can be renovated or expanded upward or downward (deeper basements), but it cannot expand onto the other properties. So the building has infinite expansion capability within its boundaries, but must stay strictly within those boundaries.)

  62. J-
    simply put i don’t give a flying f how a word is “primarily understood” as you put it. all I care about is how it is defined in the corpus of widely established dictionaries. if I were to go out and ask people to vote on what they thought a word meant before I used it, the overhead involved would be a serious detriment to the formulation of my argument. Indeed, if we were to be sensitive to all perspectives regardless how unpopular they are, we would not be able to use a word in any way as no one would be able to agree completely on a single definition. for example, when I use the word “anti-semitism”, I am talking about the hatred for jews. Many arabs try to use this word to mean the hatred against all semites, which makes sense etymologically, however is not defined in any dictionary to include any semites other than the jews. should I refrain from using the word “antisemitism” in the context defined in a dictionary just because I may offend a group of people who believe in a definition that is “primarily understood” but not established in the english lexicon? of course, if the word antisemitism was established in a widely regarded reference dictionary, then I would have to consider its definition carefully before using it. but enough about semantics…
    what I would like to say about the talmud is this: in other religions, any deviations from the common dogma results in new sects. For example, Christianty split into almost innumberable sects, all with differing dogma, such as catholicism, protestantism, etc etc. likewise with Islam there are sunni, shiah, wahabi, alawi, etc. etc. Judaism has its fringes too but the talmud differs from a dogmatic canon in the sense that it is forever revisable. ok, you and I disagree about something in the talmud, our differing views are both recorded, and discussion continues. This is an extension from the Abrahamic tradition because like abraham, we engage in a culture of freethinking where we are not forced to believe anything. I challenge you to name one belief that all jews can be said to believe. This includes all jews that defined themselves as jews, not who you or anyone else defines. that we do not have a single belief is the essence of the abrahamic tradition. and therefore I will express to you that it is my opinion that both “the left” as well as “the orthodox” are hypocrits in this respect. the orthodox want to impose their jewish laws upon all jews and likewise the left want to impose their secular laws upon all jews. By the way, when I talk about “the left” I am talking about “shinui”, and the orthodox is the National Religious Party.
    I sincerely hope that this provides you insight into my own opinons.

  63. “in other religions, any deviations from the common dogma results in new sects”
    Not always. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Depends on the level of deviation and many other factors.
    “but the talmud differs from a dogmatic canon in the sense that it is forever revisable.”
    Where did you get this idea? The Talmud was designed to standardize Judaism, and crated standards that were NOT revisable, as I explained above.
    “ok, you and I disagree about something in the talmud, our differing views are both recorded, and discussion continues.”
    Not “you and I”. Only th eviews of the leading authorities in Judaism over 500 years are recorded. And for all the hoopla about the many arguments in the Talmud, the differences in nearly all of these arguments are fairly narrow. (Certainly much narrower than the type of difference which would cause a religious split.)
    “we engage in a culture of freethinking where we are not forced to believe anything.”
    Which culture is this? If we’re talking about Judaism, anyone subscribing to this religion /worldview most certainly is required to believe certain things. If we’re talking about Jews overall, yes, in a category wherein membership is purely biological, no particular belief is required. So? You also don’t have to believe anything to be a cow.
    :I challenge you to name one belief that all jews can be said to believe. This includes all jews that defined themselves as jews, not who you or anyone else defines.”
    That’s a hell of a challenge. If we include all self-defined Jews, you are indeed correct that there are no unifying beliefs. Youv’e pretty much created a tautology. But how inclusive are you? Can a practicing Christian born of non-Jewish parents call himself a Jew? What about a neo-Nazi?
    “that we do not have a single belief is the essence of the abrahamic tradition.”
    Remember the “show about nothing”? You seem to think Judaism is a religion about nothing. Thousands of pages on the Jewish bookshelf say you’re wrong.
    “and therefore I will express to you that it is my opinion that both “the left” as well as “the orthodox” are hypocrits in this respect. the orthodox want to impose their jewish laws upon all jews and likewise the left want to impose their secular laws upon all jews. ”
    This is too complicated for me to fully get into now, but unless your’e an anarchist, no government can function without some philosophy being “imposed” on the public. Separating which impositions are necessary and which are not is a huge debate.
    I recommend that you read as many classic Jewish sources as possible, and lay off the Rushkoff for awhile. You’ll find that not only does Judaism have actual content, the amount of content can be overwhelming.

  64. J-
    Remember the “show about nothing”? You seem to think Judaism is a religion about nothing. Thousands of pages on the Jewish bookshelf say you’re wrong.
    If you want to group Judaism into the rest of the worlds religions, be my guest. but to me there is much more to the world than just picking a group of beliefs and then joining the religious group that best represents those beliefs. to me life is about constantly renewal of perspective and beliefs. I question everything and am not afraid of change. I reject authority and treasure equality between all human beings. If you want to call me an anarchist then please indulge yourself, but I am a Jew and I believe that if you examine Judaism closer you will see that this is the culture of our hebrew ancestors. without the jews the nations of the world would continue to be warring pagan tribes and brass would be the extent of human technological development. the jews have been the most fundamental catalyst for change in the past 6000 years and if you do not agree with me then you should read “The Gifts of the Jews : How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels” by Thomas Cahill. Judaism is all about change and not simply about everyone having the same belief and adhering to it steadfastly. Judaism is a culture of liberal minded people who work to change the world for the better by constantly questioning everything. People seem to have forgotten this and instead warp it into both an ethnic definition coupled with a religious one. in my opinion this comes from the long and persistent influence of christianity and islam over jewish thought for the past 1600-2000 years. the talmud is the backbone of judaism because it represents our culture of liberalism and change, but does not represent the dogma of a religion. you may call yourself a jew but to me you are the same as any other christian or muslim who defines themselves by their beliefs. elevate yourself from your persistent worldview and you will see that. and finally I wanted to comment on the way you said the talmud is constructed. you said that:
    The building can be renovated or expanded upward or downward (deeper basements), but it cannot expand onto the other properties. So the building has infinite expansion capability within its boundaries, but must stay strictly within those boundaries.)
    as you know, the talmud is written with the core text in the center and commentaries and notes on either side surround it, expanding forever outwards. if the purpose of the talmud is to create standards that are not revisable like you say, then it should be written in an opposite manner where the core text would be on the outside and would limit and constrict the commentaries and notes on the inside. That is the thing about Judaism, just like the rest of the world, there is always room for improvement.

  65. I agree with Oren here in that Judaism is not a creedal religion. “Yigdal” attempts to be a Jewish creed, but it has never really been adopted as one and it has been shown that even among solely Orthodox sources there is disagreement on all of its points, taken as propositional statements of creedal belief.

  66. OK, I’m back. Briefly:
    “to me life is about constantly renewal of perspective and beliefs.”
    That’s nice, but nobody needs 20 huge volumes of the Talmud to espouse that methodology. An essay would have sufficed.
    “I question everything and am not afraid of change.”
    Do you question your own statement above? (A little paradox for you.) More seriously, you may come to realize that it’s possible to take a more traditional stance and still question everything. Not afraid of change? I suspect you haven’t experienced much real change yet. You might be willing to undergo it, but you’d learn to fear it.
    “I reject authority …”
    Very hip. What does this mean? That you don’t accept authority without verifying its worthiness to be an authority, or that you don’t recognize any form of authority at all?
    “the jews have been the most fundamental catalyst for change in the past 6000 years and if you do not agree with me then you should read “The Gifts of the Jews : How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels” by Thomas Cahill. ”
    I have read it. I just want to warn you that I liked the book, but it’s entry level. Had I been the one to bring it up, some of the snarkier lefties would have jumped right down my throat. The author is a generalist with a good level of knowledge but no real expertise on the subject. Not everyone agrees with all his claims.
    “Judaism is a culture of liberal minded people who work to change the world for the better by constantly questioning everything. ”
    Wishful 19th and 20th century thinking, not fact.
    “People seem to have forgotten this and instead warp it into both an ethnic definition coupled with a religious one. in my opinion this comes from the long and persistent influence of christianity and islam over jewish thought for the past 1600-2000 years.”
    The people that forgot and warped include the rabbis that wrote the Talmud (0-500 C.E.) The ethnic and religious aspects you don’t like are all in there. I doubt that Christianity was much of an influence – the Mishnah was compiled around 200 C.E., long before Christianity became a majority or official religion, and the Bavli was compiled and composed by rabbiws who were outside the Christian domains. Islam didn’t even exist during this era.
    “the talmud is the backbone of judaism because it represents our culture of liberalism and change, but does not represent the dogma of a religion. ”
    How much of the Talmud have you actually read? (Not counting specially edited exerpts.) Culture of liberalism? Pretty ambitious to be finding this 1500 years ago.
    There is certainly a spirit of inquiry in the Gemara, but the inquiry (whether you like this or not) remains within some strict boundaries.
    “you may call yourself a jew but to me you are the same as any other christian or muslim who defines themselves by their beliefs. ”
    Well there you go. I’m not only wrong, I’m…….not a Jew!! The best defense…
    “elevate yourself from your persistent worldview and you will see that.”
    I’d like to, but I’m so deep in the gutter. Oh, help me….
    Someday you may actually try to understand Judaism. When that happens, you’ll remember this and cringe.
    “as you know, the talmud is written with the core text in the center and commentaries and notes on either side surround it, expanding forever outwards. if the purpose of the talmud is to create standards that are not revisable like you say, then it should be written in an opposite manner where the core text would be on the outside and would limit and constrict the commentaries and notes on the inside. ”
    You must be joking. Your’e trying to prove a core principle of the Talmud… from a printer’s decision. Amazing. And anyway, how would you print the Talmud any other way? The core text on the outside?? You mean like a box, with the commentaries on the inside? Wouldn’t that look a bit insane?
    By the way, as a real Jew, would you mind telling me, without asking anyone or consulting anything, which are the two primary commentaries that surround the Gemara on the pages of the Talmud Bavli?

  67. How dare fellow Jews write such lies about the great Baruch Goldstein! Goldstein was a Tzaddik and any one who says otherwise is a traitor to our people. Such traitors should be taken to the Kotel in Yerushalayim and be given lashes!
    Mr Streimel needs to eat his streimel! Mashiach should come soon and get rid of all the Arabs. We all know the Arabs are the Bnei-Amalek! I haven’t been to Goldstein’s grave, but next time I’m in Chevron I’ll pay him a visit.

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