WHO DARES ENTER MY DOMAIN!!! I AM YOFFIE, THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE!!!
Posted on 12/28/2005 5:11:59 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
In November, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, caused a stir when he used the occasion of the Reform movement’s biennial assembly to sermonize against the “Religious Right.” Preferring caricature over considered debate, Yoffie darkly depicted his religious adversaries’ position thus: “unless you attend my church, accept my God and study my sacred text, you cannot be a moral person.” Earlier this month, he joined hands with the Anti-Defamation League’s Abe Foxman to demonize Christian conservatives, whom Foxman claims are out “to Christianize America.”
That was then. This week, however, Rabbi Yoffie offered a distinctly political variation of the exclusionary tactics he claimed to deplore. On Tuesday, the URJ decided to make public a letter written by Yoffie and URJ chairman, Robert Heller to President Bush denouncing, in so many words, the Iraq war. Purporting to address the “great moral issues” of our day, the URJ’s letter rehearsed the standard catalogue of antiwar tropes, assailing American military efforts for “discrediting of America in the international community and its contribution to the growth of terrorism.” And that was the most fair-minded portion of the letter.
In a more partisan vein, the letter charged the Bush administration with lying about the war. “Respectfully but firmly, Mr. President, we want our leaders to tell us the truth, the whole of it, and we therefore call on your Administration to adopt a policy of transparency,” the letter said. The letter also dismissed Iraq’s connections to terrorism as mistaken; accused the U.S. military of committing “torture”; and, echoing the antiwar resolution passed at the URJ’s November assembly, demanded immediate troop withdrawals following this week’s parliamentary elections. In conclusion, and with conspicuous disregard for Yoffie’s earlier admonition against using religion as a political wedge, the URJ justified its antiwar views as “based on Jewish teachings.” Warming to that theme, the URJ, which claims a membership of 1.5 million, professed to speak on behalf of all Jews, insisting that “American Jewry in general, broadly support the spirit and quite likely the letter of our statement.”
Nor is the first time that the URJ has attempted to make Judaism synonymous with left-wing politics. In late November, the URJ came out against Samuel Alito’s nomination to the Supreme Court on the tendentious grounds that he would threaten the “protection of the most fundamental rights.” The same spirit of political activism couched in appeals to Jewish values is evinced by even the youngest of the URJ’s leaders. Jordyn Jacobs, a vice president of the Reform Movement’s youth program, contended that Jews were compelled to speak out against the Alito nomination because “[o]ur tradition teaches us that we must not be silent.”
On economic matters, too, the URJ has styled itself as the arbiter of Jewish morality. Thus, at the November assembly, URJ leaders passed a resolution for alleviating global poverty that would not have looked out of place on the pages of the Nation. Among the tired nostrums advocated by the resolution was the immediate cancellation of all debts owed by developing countries and the institution of “fair trade” laws that would subvert the free market in order to satisfy the URJ’s demands for “economic justice.” Each item on the URJ’s itinerary was in turn buttressed by its supposed accordance with “Jewish values.”
The Reform movement’s adherence to left-wing political orthodoxy often makes for strange bedfellows. One day before the URJ’s anti-war letter was dispatched to the president, Rabbi David Saperstein, the director of the Reform Movement’s Religious Action Center and a close ally of Rabbi Yoffie, affixed his name to a petition signed by ten religious leaders, urging Governor Schwarzenegger to stay the execution of convicted killer Stanley “Tookie” Williams. Among the signatories was none other than Nation of Islam leader and outspoken anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan.
In part because much of the organized Jewish community is disinclined to enlist religion is the cause of political activism, the Reform movement’s grandstanding as the voice of the American Jewish community has long gone unchallenged. But the URJ’s statement on Iraq has sparked widespread dissent, not least from other Reform leaders. In an interview with the New York Sun, Rabbi Clifford Librach, the head of a Reform synagogue in Connecticut, took pointed issue with the URJ’s antiwar pontificating. “There may be a majority of American Reform Jews who are currently opposed to this war under any circumstances,” Librach said, “but the role of leadership is not to rubberstamp misguided popular opinion. The new peace process in Israel has advanced in part because Iraq has been neutralized and removed from the equation.”
The Republican Jewish Coalition has also gotten into the act. On Tuesday, it launched a print ad campaign to counter the URJ’s antiwar line. As the RJC’s Executive Director Matt Brooks put it, “A wide-range of political opinions exists within the American Jewish community and the RJC’s ad campaign emphasizes that the URJ is wrong to assume that all Jews share their anti-war views.” In contrast to the URJ’s approach, the RJC’s ad does not affect to speak for the Jewish community. Instead, it registers support for a “democratic Iraq,” and cites its centrality to the broader “fight against terrorism.”
The sudden backlash is a welcome antidote to the URJ’s relentless political posturing in the name of G-d.
Back in November, Rabbi Yoffie declared that “we need beware of the zealots who want to make their religion the religion of everyone else.” By taking on the URJ’s latest effort to equate left-wing politics with Jewish values, the critics, at last, are heeding their own wise counsel.
Foxman & Yoffie are *not* Jews. they are *fake* jews.
*Phoney* Jews. Perverted baby genociding culture of
Death, worshipers of the golden Calf, creatures of
evil. They are *not* Jews. They are not even human.
Yoffie and his followers are cult freaks, that have
*nothing* to do with real jews or true judaism.
They just use Judaisim as a sheild, for when they are
called to account for their perversions and treachery.
Sqealing "anti-semitism" and "jew hater!" whenever anyone
says or does anything they don't like, or starts winning
an argument against them, as they are now, when their
plans to turn america into a godless faithless, spirit killing socialist hellhole, like the ones their parents or grandparents came from.
Yoffie & Foxman are, at their cores, Fourth Reich
Socialist Democrat Nazi wanna-Be's.
How can one reconcile being both a jew...*and* a nazi
at the same time?
> ... so rabidly bazaar
Is that where one goes to buy rabies innoculations? Try "bizarre".
foxman and co. are miles past weird.
About 1 1/2 percent of the people of the USA (Jews--mostly non-Orthodox) comprise only about 1/50 of the American left. Catholic Democrats are about 13 times their number--Protestant Democrats by about 35 or 40 to their one. There aren't enough Democrat Jews to represent many US Democrat votes.
But they sure get a lot of emphasis in the news. This stuff to broadcast the opinions of Foxman and co. has really gone on and on.
...another funny thing about all of this. Romans have been publishing the comments of Yoffie and Foxman more than Jews have.
The beauty of FreeRepublic.com is that the last time this article was discussed, a member of Yoffie's old congregation out the fact that Yoffie was bounced out of a congregation.
Whacko, crypto-commies like Yoffie are increasingly seen as wrong by more and more of America's Jews. It is a long overdue change.
"A bunch of atheists of Jewish descent constantly trashing others who believe in the God of the Jews."
Not all Jews are trashing Christians, but Yoffie and Foxman are definitely and constantly trashing Christians.
WHO DARES ENTER MY DOMAIN!!! I AM YOFFIE, THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE!!!
Well, I'd like to consider his opinion, but he comes from a religious standpoint and since it's not an Atheist religious standpoint, we can't enact it into law.
So sorry - guess the war will continue, but keep voting Democrat anyway...
I really don't understand this.
"Each item on the URJ’s itinerary was in turn buttressed by its supposed accordance with “Jewish values.”"
Ha ha ha. Modern day Hellenists, the lot of them. Jewish values are derived from the Torah. To these guys, Jewish values are "buy a dozen bagels, get cream cheese free."
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