Jew-on-Jew Racism or Cultural Autonomy?
Anshey Shlomenu! There has been a mild buzz lately about just how attractive the settlements are to low-income Israelis. Looking for land on the cheap, haredim are especially attracted to life in the West Bank. Yet, one particular settlement, Emmanuel has such a low public image that no one really wants to move there. A while back, the press heard that a local Haredi school had started to segregate Ashkenazi and Sephardi/Mizrahi students, arguing that each community cared deeply about preserving their unique Hebrew accents and minhagim, and that educating Sephardi students to pray and learn in loshn-koydesh (Ashkenazi Hebrew) contradicted centuries of cultural autonomy and constituted nothing more than a zealous defense of traditional Ashkenazi custom . Call it a radical critique of Zionist culture or blunt Racism, I’m torn.
Nathan Jeffay writes in The Jewish Chronicle
Happily, the days are long gone when Israel’s ruling secular-Ashkenazi elite imposed its ways on everybody else, stripping Sephardi and Oriental immigrants of their traditions. Today, almost every public figure makes a point of visiting the Moroccan community during Mimouna, its spring festival. And, in November for the first time, there was an official state reception to mark the Sigd festival of Ethiopian Jews, a newly declared national holiday.
Many in the education ministry, the law and the media regard the Charedim who are pushing for segregation in schools as, at best, dinosaurs or, at worst, racists. But these strictly Orthodox rabbis and others quite reasonably argue that, if their distinctive Hebrew pronunciations are compromised, a valuable part of their heritage is in danger of being lost. Just because many of us in Israel are happy with our hybrid pronunciation called Modern Hebrew, that does not give us the right to impose it on others.
For a critique of Natan Jeffay’s article, please check out Shmarya Rosenberg at http://ht.ly/1R73Y
He writes: “Jeffay is wrong…Jeffay’s whole spin about pronunciation is foolish.”
next thing you know, israeli salad will become a bowl of diced tomatoes sitting next to a bowl of diced cucumbers.
Shmarya Rosenberg’s rebuttal is not only confused, it’s wrong. He writes disgustingly, and inaccurately, of the Yiddish language:
“And Jeffay’s whole spin about pronunciation is foolish. The Ashkenazic pronunciation hasidim wish to preserve is really Eastern European pronunciation with heavy Slavic influences. It is not the traditional Ashkenazic pronunciation, just as Polish hasidic Yiddish is not classical Yiddish; instead, it is a greatly reduced creole of various Slavic languages and bits of classical Yiddish. It – and the pronunciation that comes with it – has no provenance. It is barely more than 500 years old, far newer than the Sefardic pronunciation hasidim revile.”
The Ashkenazi Hebrew pronunciation of modern Hasidim, indeed any Haredi Ashkenazi, are the closest examples we have to the spoken and sacred languages of pre-war Ashkenaz. In my view, Shmarya is off the mark entirely, suggesting also that “Sefardic Pronunciation” is “older” ?
What? Ridiculous.
Rosenberg gets to the heart of the matter for me here:
The state pays for 80% or more of the education in these ‘private’ haredi schools. Because of that, the state and its citizens have the right to mandate certain things, for example, like basic secular education be taught.
If the state is paying for education it should be equal. If Haredi communities want to teach their children something that cannot be taught to other children, don’t expect the government to pay for it.
(I know they would be unable to do this, financially)
Let’s not try to split hairs about this. Pure and simple, this is racist segregationism. Many yeshivot in Israel have mixed populations, and yet students are allowed to keep their own minhagim. Justifying by feigning concern for the discriminated group is not only a weak argument, it smacks of paternalism. In this case, it’s the Yiddisher Mensch’s Burden: We have to protect those poor brown folk lest they become assimilated and lose their identity, so let’s separate them and deny them the higher level or education granted to ourselves.
The smoking gun that it is not about “cultural heritage” is that the new rules, drafted to keep the Sephardi girls out by default, are all about stocking length, and avoidance of bicycles.
Let’s take this to an extreme.
Can an Arab Muslim student join the yeshiva? Can 20 Arab Muslim students join the yeshivah? Let’s say a particular yeshivah happened to also provide the best secular curriculum in the country. Could Arab students join it, and then demand exemptions from gemara learning, or that no religion should be taught in a state funded school?
“Let’s not try to split hairs about this. Pure and simple, this is racist segregationism. Many yeshivot in Israel have mixed populations, and yet students are allowed to keep their own minhagim. Justifying by feigning concern for the discriminated group is not only a weak argument, it smacks of paternalism. In this case, it’s the Yiddisher Mensch’s Burden: We have to protect those poor brown folk lest they become assimilated and lose their identity, so let’s separate them and deny them the higher level or education granted to ourselves.”
Not sure what “paternalism” means here, since it seems that the Haredi Ashkenazi Rabbis are really interested in protecting their OWN customs, not the customs of the sephardim. So, it might be a kind of internal paternalism, but again, the argument can be made that it would be racist and paternalistic to force Sephardi bochrim to daven ashkenaz.
Whenever the marginalization of a group is justified by feigning concern for its well-being, that is paternalism.
Anon, I’m not sure who is comparable to the Muslim in the analogy you’re drawing.
I’m not drawing an analogy. Just wondering, can an Arab Muslim join a Yeshiva, and under what conditions.
In Israel? No, they cannot. Neither can women. This has never been challenged in the courts, and if anyone ever will, I don’t see how they can be kept out.
Government money means you do what the government says.
Really? Is that how the Arab education sector run? What the government says, goes?
Boymlpisher don’t be so upset by Shmaryahu’s vitriol, this kind of fight over pronunciation has been going on for a long time.
gib a kik:
Eruvin 53b:
בני גליל דלא דייקי
לישנא מאי היא (דתניא) דההוא בר גלילא
[דהוה קאזיל] ואמר להו אמר למאן אמר למאן אמרו ליה גלילאה שוטה המר
למירכב או חמר למישתי עמר למילבש או אימד לאיתכםאה
‘The Galileans who were not exact in their language’. For instance: A certain Galilean once
went about enquiring, ‘who has amar?’ ‘Foolish Galilean’, they said to him, ‘do you mean an “ass”
for riding, “wine” to drink, “wool” for clothing or a “lamb” for killing?’
shmap, way to make this a more ancient thing than it actually is, falsely. This is about modern Israel, not eruvin.
Lashon HaKodesh is, “The Holy Language” or literally, “The Holy Tongue.” Lashon HaKodesh can therefore never be twisted into incorrect pronunciation.
The vowels and pronunciation have been so severely distorted by the Chassidim and communities of Eastern Europe, or those of ashkenazi origin – that some words have unfortunately become unrecognisable. The problem persists until today, and it must be corrected – speedily.
The vowels can never be mixed up – because Hashem doesn’t like the sound of it.
There IS a correct way to pronounce every letter of the Aleph Bet. We are not allowed to change Hashem’s Torah.
Drastically changing the pronunciation of any letter is changing Hashem’s Torah – and this is something very grave.
Every letter is extremely holy. Each letter has a particular sound – like a particular note. When that sound or “note” is played incorrectly e.g. I play a piano with a hammer instead of my fingers – then great damage is caused. Damage is caused Above, and correspondingly, below.
The vowels and pronunciation have been so severely distorted by the Chassidim and communities of Eastern Europe… Damage is caused Above, and correspondingly, below.
I find it interesting that Chassidim don’t go around telling others how to pronounce words properly, and warning of “great damage” if they do not do as instructed. The Lubavitcher Rebbe always advised Chabadniks from Sephardic, Litvisher and other backgrounds to maintain the minhagim of their communities, including Hebrew pronunciation.
Anonymouse:
The Torah was not given in Munich or Hamburg. The Jewish People came out of EGYPT, which is in the Middle East. This means that Lashon HaKodesh is pronounced with the Sefardi pronunciation.
Lashon HaKodesh is a Holy Language, and it cannot be twisted to how you like it to sound – from Eastern Europe. What you are saying, is that you ‘like to play the piano with a hammer, not your fingers’, and that because Rabbi Schneerson a”h didn’t tell you that it is better to use your fingers, you will carry on using the hammer.