Dumb Jewish leaders

Every time you think religious leaders can’t get any more dumb, they get dumber!

So Katrina was punishment for the Gaza withdrawal was it? “Hurricanes hardly happen”, but why didn’t one turn up off the Gaza coast instead? Sometimes I really wonder what the Almighty’s thinking about the way some rabbis make our religion into a laughingstock. And it doesn’t help that other religions have equally challenged leaders.

A few months ago the clerics of the world were all busy claiming that the tsunami was God’s punishment for whichever was their favourite enemy at the time. Now you will have heard that Katrina was punishment for Afghanistan, Iraq and Christian Crusaders. It was punishment for gay marriage, pornography, atheism, slavery, killing Aztecs, Incas and Red Indians, not to mention Monica Lewinsky and Hugh Heffner.

It is one thing to believe that God intervenes in human affairs. It is one thing to claim that we need to learn lessons from every catastrophe. But it is quite another thing to say, “You know, guys, I am privy to Heavenly information, and it was personally revealed to me via the Holy Spirit that God Himself nudged Katrina off its original course with the precise intention of teaching New Orleans a real lesson for all that decadent jazz down there.”

Sadly, our religion is made a mockery of by other jokers. Here’s a report from The Forward, a Jewish newspaper in the USA:

“The Orthodox Union, representing 1000 congregations in North America, sent an urgent letter to the Israeli Supreme Court urging it to forbid Prime Minister Sharon’s government from destroying the synagogues from 21 recently evacuated Jewish settlements in Gaza. In its letter, the OU. . .argued that bulldozing the sanctuaries would violate Jewish Law and put synagogues in the Diaspora in jeopardy. The President of the OU said the organization (which is the world’s largest certifier of kosher foods) was supporting the preparation of a report alleging that Sharon’s government repeatedly violated the civil rights of disengagement supporters.”

Now, I understand why the Knesset or frustrated Cabinet members should want to make useless gestures in pursuit of political capital. But what sort of stupid gesture was the OU’s? Was it the frustrated, futile, angry act of American Modern Orthodoxy that so blindly allied itself with the Gaza settlers and now feels the need to assert itself? Are there no greater issues in life in Israel today to be addressed? Did the OU really think it better to have the synagogues desecrated in the crudest way by howling mobs of Palestinian youth, instead of an efficient, if sad, demolition by Israeli contractors (perhaps with pieces to sell to those who care for buildings more than people)? And if the argument was that the Israeli Government should re-construct them elsewhere, who would pay? And wouldn’t the money be better spent combating poverty? Priorities, my dear!

And here’s another jewel from a different North American journal of Jewish juvenilia, the Jewish Press:

“As the Lijensker Rebbe was deeply pained by the appalling condition of the eternal resting place of Jaroslav, he joined Rabbi Mayer Gabbai, an expert in cemetery rehabilitation, and planned to rebuild the Ohel (Sepulchre) and restore its glory. The cemetery is under the watchful eye of the local authority. A formal application would have been denied without consideration.

In the darkness of the night, Rabbi Gabbai and the Lijensker Rebbe excavated around the gravesite. After he discovered the foundations, an architect was employed to draw up plans for the rebuilding. In order to avoid detection and eventual interference, all building efforts had to be carried out in the darkness of the night. Supplies had to be brought in under several subterfuges so that an onlooker would not understand what was underway.

A team of experienced roofers had to be covertly recruited, smuggled into the cemetery in the middle of the night and complete the work before sunrise. All night activities had to be scheduled on evenings that had no other local events. Of course, after completion of the Ohel, its detection was only a matter of time. Literally only a few days after the cement dried, the complaint was filed with a notice of impending destruction. The Lijensker Rebbe quickly mobilized all his contacts and brought as much international and diplomatic pressure as possible to avert the second destruction of this saintly Ohel, and at the very last moment the municipal order to demolish the Ohel was rescinded.”

Have you noticed that there are sections of the Ultra-Orthodox world that seem more concerned with the dead than the living? Part of it is, of course, traditional reverence for the remains of spiritual giants. Part of it is misplaced nostalgia for the imagined perfection of the ghettos of the past. But why can’t half the energy that’s put into the dead be applied to alleviating many of the pressures and limitations that too many living Jews suffer from simply through religious inertia that refuses to get off its butt and use tools provided within our constitution to help some people who could benefit from lenient or innovative ruling?

But there’s another issue here. It’s the paradigm of, “To hell with the Law of the Land, let’s see what we can away with. Let’s fiddle and hopefully we’ll find a way of hanging on to our ill-gotten gains.” It may be harmless enough over petty bureaucrats and graves in Belarus or the Ukraine, but it’s less so over fiddling social security, illegal real estate practices and devious business dealings that ought not to be encouraged or praised when ill-gotten gains get allocated to yeshivas and kollels while rebbes turn a blind eye.

There is something sick in the minds of too many outwardly religious people wherever you look. It always amazes me that so much good and wonderful work is done, nevertheless, and that there are so many really good, spiritual souls that have succeeded in rising above the murk that surrounds them.

Encouraging seeing a Rabbi speak up and condemn the ultra-orthodox loonies who have blamed Katrina on Bush's support of the removal of settlers from the occupied territories. The guy has guts to take on the anyone-who-criticizes-fanatical-Haredism-is-a-Jew-hater -crowd, although I'm certain some will pronounce him a self-hating or self-loathing Jew, or perhaps a heretic as he is a rabbi.

My first reaction based on our previous conversation is that you’re an ignorant Jew obsessive, and simply googled this article.

But I’m sure that’s not true, like me you’re probably familiar with Rabbi Rosen’s writings.

A good choice. You’ve explained you’re not anti-Jew, just orthodox Jews, and Rabbi Rosen is in agreement. Since you’re not anti-Jew, I’m sure you agree with the good Rabbi across the board when it comes to religiosity. It’s a problem for some people, mostly code pinkers and Duers, but you fit in.

As to your source not much there that excites me, but if you hold Orthodox Jews and Mel Gibson in contempt, and refer to Pope John Paul as primitive, ruthlessly conservative, lashon hora in my mind, I can see how you’d post it.

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No passion for Mel
by: Rabbi Jeremy Rosen

Scene from The Passion

I have just emerged from a preview ( thanks to the BBC Radio 3) of Mel Gibson’s controversial film ‘The Passion of the Christ.’ Before dealing with the theological and political issues I want to say that it was a really bad film.

It was banal and gratuitously violent, almost non-stop flagellation, beating and sadism. It showed that the Mel Gibson of Mad Max, of the crude disembowelling of Wallace, or the gratuitous violence of The Patriot is a sick man who must see the world through such crudely cruel eyes that I think he badly needs top see someone who can help him professionally. I have often wondered at a religious faith based on constant images of pain and suffering.

The violence in this film is so pornographic that I am not so much worried about anti Semitic repercussions as I worry about the effect this will have on minds already disturbed by violent films and video games. The preoccupation with devils with worms, snakes and maggots creeping in and out of them is positively psychopathic and it says more about Gibson’s religious problems than it does about Christianity.

The film totally fails disastrously on every count in comparison to that really great and sensitive film of Pasolini, ‘The Gospel According to St Mathew’ that came out in 1965. If anyone is interested in Christianity , that is a film worth seeing.

Now to the theology. The writers, perhaps, cannot be blamed too much for basing themselves on the synoptic Gospels which contradict themselves on so many issues. But the fact is that whoever wrote them was clearly ignorant of Jewish theology and the social and political conditions that prevailed in Judea two thousand years ago. There is nothing objectionable in Jewish law in saying that one is ‘The Son of God.’ Heresy in Judaism is when you deny there is a God or maybe claim, unprobably, that you are yourself. There is nothing in the Gospels suggest this latter view. It is not until Constantine and the Monophysites three hundred years later that Christianity adopted the dubious idea that Jesus was god. Similarly to say you are ‘the King of the Jews’ or ‘the Messiah’ might be grounds for scepticism but you are not breaking any Jewish laws. Neither is it an offence to cure the sick or perform miracles.

The gospels do not seem to know the difference between the priests, known as the Sadducees and their opponents the rabbis, the pharisees. They seem unaware of the fact that many Pharisees were unhappy about temple corruption, money changers, and priests who cosied up to the Romans. The ‘truths’ that Jesus is reported as preaching in the Gospels can all be found in Jewish sources.

Had Jesus been simply a rabble rousing political upstart this might have offended the Romans and indeed they crucified thousands of political rebels. But had he been real histotrical figure as opposed to a myth, he would not have offended Jewish religious authorities with what is attributed to him. Even his alleged willingness to disobey halacha on aspects of Shabbat observance would have put him with the majority of contemporaneous Jews not a minority.

The film selects that version of the gospels that depicts the poor weak Romans as being reluctantly bullied by the nasty priests into putting him to death simply to pacify the restless mob. Anyone vaguely familiar with the rule of the Roman procurators in Judea will know full well that the Romans at the time were so much in control there was no way they would have allowed themselves to be bullied by a Jewish rabble into making political decisions of life or death they did not have good reasons for themselves. And as for confusing Herod the Great ( who died in 04 CE ) with a minor Herod of Gallilee, Lord only knows why, other than to find another opportunity for depicting corrupt Jews.

The Gospels are the first example of a popular international PR campaign directed at the ignorant Roman masses and I have to say whoever masterminded it was a genius any student of PR today could learn a great deal from.

As for repercussions, I think Jewish objection to the film was exaggerated and counter productive. All religions have myths (true or not, is irrelevant) and when these myths are directed towards uplifting people and enhancing their understanding of life they can only do good. But when they vilify or denigrate other human beings they are dangerous.

It is true in Judaism we say unkind things about the Egyptian authorities but the Tora itself commands us not to hate the Egyptians. It is true the bible says and commands some nasty things to be done to the Seven Canaanite tribes. But by 2,500 years ago the Oral Law declared that Sennacharib had destroyed the tribes and the law was no longer applicable.

Christianity has been disastrously at fault for not qualifying the Gospel teaching of contempt for the Jews. Indeed until Pope John 23rd some forty years ago it was Catholic doctrine that the Jews of today were cursed because they rejected Jesus and supposedly declared that his blood should be upon them and their children. But Protestantism has over the years reinterpreted its basic texts and not been so bound to literalism and in recent years Catholicism too has taken further strides in rectifying the ‘Teaching of Contempt.’

The trouble with Gibson and his disturbed father is that they belong to a Catholic sect that thinks the present Pope has gone too far in being nice to the Jews. Gibson pere thinks the Holocaust never happened. So one is bound to wonder about Gibson’s motives and sadly why the conservatives of the Vatican have triumphed once again over the progressives and refused to qualify the film themselves.

In the past after Easter sermons about the crucifixion, maddened crowds poured out of Churches to attack the local Jews in revenge for killing Jesus. But if I were you I wouldn’t worry about this happening after this film. Much more likely is that parents will make for the nearest candy store to soothe their children upset by such crude, bloody, violence. Gibson has lost an opportunity to contribute to understanding and tolerance but what's new?

Shabbat Shalom

Jeremy

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Purity and the Pope
by: Rabbi Jeremy Rosen

SJackson…..read the beginning at the link, this is what pertains to the discussion.

Perhaps it is this that leads some religious leaders to go too far the other way.

We have in our tradition the notion of a Chassid Shoteh, a Pious Fool. I mean no disrespect when I say that too many saintly people of all religions fall into this category. (The rigid attitude of the Beth Din in London to conversion is another good example of a valid idea being taken to degrees of absurdity.)

As a child I read with admiration about the multi-talented, great Nobel Prize winner, Albert Schweitzer, who abandoned a life of fame and wealth in Europe to dedicate himself to the poor in Africa. He set up a hospital for lepers at Lambarene in Equatorial Africa . He was an idealistic Christian missionary, as well as a highly educated, enlightened man and a world-class organist. He died in 1965.

His more recent equivalent was Mother Theresa in India, who was all but worshipped, for her similar devotion to the poor and sick. So was Pope John Paul 2nd ; likewise, a wonderful person trying his best to help mankind. Yet in my opinion they, unlike Schweitzer, were mentally constricted by inappropriate dogma, rather like the witch doctors and shamans they hoped to displace.

Both Mother Theresa and the Pope believed that contraception is the same as murder! This prevented them, and many like them around the world, from helping to mitigate the circumstances of the poor they were dedicated to serving. The late Pope was quick to condemn the war in Iraq, but was responsible for not helping to prevent many millions more deaths through AIDS. The refusal of the Catholic Church in Africa to encourage contraception in the context of the massive plague of AIDS is a crime against humanity, decimating families, communities and tribes because of a religious dogma that, frankly, I find both incomprehensible and dangerous. There are many laws in Judaism that might be considered incomprehensible and illogical, but when it comes to saving life virtually all are set aside.

I did admire a great deal about Pope John Paul, including his continuing the great work initiated by John 23rd of rethinking the primitive attitudes of much of the Church toward the Jews. He was undoubtedly a caring man and a major politician. But he perpetuated quite ruthlessly the conservative myopia to which dogmatic religion all too often falls prey.

This is why I so value Maimonides’ principle that religion requires us to have a Golden Mean, a balance between extremes. Middle-of-the-road has its advantages!!

If you'd like to be on or off this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

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Probably not worth a ping, I don’t think I’ve pinged the God caused Katrina threads, but I’ll do it anyway.

Imo this thread, as well as the posters previous comments are designed to do nothing other than promote animosity. A couple of his previous comments, links found at post 10 and Post 12

AIPAC blasts U.S.-Saudi oil pact for not ending boycott of Israel
Posted by US admirer to DeeOhGee
On News/Activism 09/09/2005 10:15:15 PM CDT · 5 of 11
Not to long before the Israel first pings begin.

Yes, that’s the standard paleo/islamist/neo-nazi/conspiracy theorist thing addressed to the ping listers, Sjackson, Alouette, knighthawk, Convert from ECUSA, Salem and apologies to anyone I forgot. Old news, I know, but designed to get these people to stop posting on FR.

A classic personal attack on a Freeper

Posted by US admirer to ChicagoHebrew
On News/Activism 09/07/2005 10:42:10 PM CDT · 24 of 64
Or else what? You gonna put an ultra-orthodox curse on me? You guys are something else! Pig gelatin- insanely brilliant! For crying out loud, get a freakin life!

Pig gelatin- insanely brilliant! An acceptable characterization of the Jews who post on FR.

Anyone care to tell me anti-Semitism exists only on the left?

Speaking of the left, Jihad Cindy raises her voice

Analysis: Netanyahu: U.S. opposes? So what?
Posted by US admirer to Blogger
On News/Activism 08/31/2005 8:11:47 PM CDT · 20 of 80
If American boys were not going to be called on to bail Israel out of a mess that they get themselves into, AND we, the American taxpayers, were not their banker you might, might just have a point.

And, of course, his characterization of Sjackson

You and your ilk however are frozen in time, or at least “5000 years” worth..You are a vile example of what religion can produce. The same disease, albeit somewhat less virulent, that created the nuts that drove planes into the WTC... you would be right alongside your nutty black-robed and hatted zealots in arms, ready to stone the cars of non-adherents...unfortunately an all too excellent example of what is wrong with religion...Just leave the people who [recognize the?] Islamism of Haredism for what it is - fanaticism, alone and in peace even if it means letting a car drive by you on the Sabbath. Surely you can resist that urge to heave a rock at its windshield unlike the ultra-orthodox nut cases who have, with such righteousness, done so in Israel.

Just another day at a conservative forum, attracting minority votes.

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