More On Fighting Assimilation
Tuesday December 23, 2008
Categories: Jewish Holidays, Judaism
Because Zvi's comments on today's original post about Hanukkah as a story of the fight against assimilation, are so important, so clearly stated and so wrong, I want to respond. The quick response is that far from "careless", my reading...
Filed Under: assimilation, defining assimilation, fighting assimilation, fighting on the sabbath, hanukkah, hasidim
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About Windows & Doors
Author, radio and TV talk show host, and President of CLAL-The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, Brad Hirschfield is the author of You Don’t Have To Be Wrong For Me To Be Right: Finding Faith Without Fanaticism. Listed as one of the nation’s 50 most influential rabbis in Newsweek, and a regular commentator on Court TV, he is the creator of the popular series, Building Bridges, airing on Bridges TV, and the co-host of the weekly radio show, Hirschfield and Kula. More About Brad
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The segment of the Jewish People who say the fight the strongest agst assimilation are the far right, such as the Chabad, and the West Bak settlers.
In its Dec 19, 2008 issue, the Forward has a story, "Hebron Rioters Inspired by Radical Settler Leaders." Inside we learn Chabad's spokesman Rabbi Shalom Dov Wolpe, says he does not condone violence, and he continues, "I understand them, and you can blame only our government (Israeli) brought them to his point." Thus, Chabad sees rioters and see two Palestinians shot just because they are Palestinian and Chabad does not blame the rioters or the shooters. This rationalization is the same one that OBL gives for 9/11. America forced him to do it.
For years, we Jews have closed our eyes to the fascist bigots growing among us, yet we urge the Muslims to reign in the fascists in their midst. From Goldstein to Amir to the recent pogroms, we Jews have a growing faction of self-righteous bigots and murders and the Jewish mullahs cannot find voice to blame them for following the yetzer harah.
When I was young, I thought the ultra-Orthodox were doing the rest of us Jews a favor -- they were retaining Jewish Tradition while we were off playing in the secular world. I was wrong. These right wing extremists with their religious bigotry and violence are perhaps the most serious threat to the Jewish people.
I don't know - comments like Zvi's make me feel alienated from Judaism.
I married a non-Jewish woman when I had no commitment to Judaism, and embraced my birth religion only later. We are raising our adopted son Jewish, but his conversion would never be recognized by the Orthodox because my wife isn't Jewish.
Sorry - I have no use for that. I'll take Judaism on the terms I've been dealt and what I have dealt myself - and Reform, Reconstructionist and Conservative Jews, who still make up 85% of the population.
I hear you Scott R. And in no way should you feel you are not fully accpeted here. Your honesty and genuine embrace of Jewishness in adulthood are both admirable. In fact, they are signals of deep relgiosity, however it may be expressed.
Your approach of thinking of your Jewishness as a combonation of the terms you have been dealt and those you have dealt yourself, is masterful. And relfects how Judaism, and all traditions, have always grown -- It just makes some folks nervous to admit that both halves of your equation are always in play.
Thank you for reminding us that they always are.
Thank you Rabbi.
Having a child brings a person back to their roots faster than any other event.
What has hurt me on other fora at Bnet is where I have been told by a few people that because my wife is not Jewish (and mind you, she no longer believes in Xianity and loves going to services, though she doesn't feel called to convert), I have been told it's wrong to raise my son as a Jew. My wife has supported my raising him as a Jew 123%. We adopted him at 8, and last year, he got up on the bima and, learning disabilities and all, chanted his Torah as well as any born-Jew I've ever met. You should have seen us kvell.:)
Mon non-Jewish wife and I made a Jew.
Scott R.,
I wish you, your wife and that amazing son of yours a very happy Hanukkah! The pride you and his mom experienced is geunine and appropriate. The love you share is clear. And while there is room for serious Jews to disagree about the legal status of particular Jews, it would be better if we could do so in the spirit of being one people who share a common destiny even when we do not all agree how how best to achieve it.
Clearly, you live that openess every day. Your post provided a great opportunity to re-state the hope that we all treat each other with kind of respect. Disagreements do not destroy a community, but disrespect and disregard can. Neither you, nor anybody else striving to create a meaningful Jewish life should ever experience either.
I see a similarity between Ruvain and Scott R. when I was young (1950's), fears of increasing assimilation meant that we should do what we Jews have done for 4,000 years -- make certain that we were relevant to the world. Like Rip van Wrinkle, I must have fallen asleep only to awaken to a Jewish world where fighting assimilation has turned into seeing how many Jews we can exclude from the Jewish people.
I hear that the Israeli Orthodox refuse to recognize hundreds of thousands of Russian Jews who are Jewish under the Law of return, and thus, they have to leave Israel to be married.
Chabad closes its doors to Gay Jews and declares them tref.
I know one woman who forbid her daughter to date a perfectly fine Jewish boy because he had blond hair and blue eyes and therefore he must be a Nazi.
While the Talibanization of some aspects are troubling, Scott R and his son are the future of the Jewish people. (Also if his son technically converts (which is unnecessary in Reform which accept patrilineage), his mother's status is completely irrelevant.)
Blessings and More Blessings! These comments have made my heart soar with joy and love. Thank you. G-d is here... in your (our) hearts!
Thanks again Rabbi - and a Happy Chanukah to you and your family as well.
Scott,
My son had a legit conversion - beit din and mikveh. There was, however, no brit meileh, but that is because he has a severe form of hemophillia, and is "excused" even in most Conservative circles.
Scott R.
I misunderstood your prior post. I thought someone was telling you that your son still wasn't Jewish just because his Mom wasn't.
Personally, I have a problem with requiring a minor to undergo conversion as long as one of his parents is Jewish that should be good enough, but I would have done what you did and follow the law as it now stands.
I am hoping that we Jews reach a consensus of sorts that while the Haredim are Jews, their rules as to who is and who is not a Jew is not determinative for other Jews. If the ultra-Orthodox etc want to live by stricter rules for themselves that's fine, but their word should no longer be taken as Law.
Scott,
Well said! We are all in your debt for three reasons:
1) the willingness to re-visit old conclusions is the start of all new wisdom, and your first point proves that.
2)You willingness to talk about this very personal issue from a personal perspective, and not hide behind what others say is crucial.
3)Your understanding that we can have multiple religious definitions of Jewishness while remaining one people is vital. In case you did not know it, that view is rooted in the tradition. In the time of the Hebrew Bible, there were many ways to be a part of "Israel" even if they were not all the same.
Like then, we are a powerful and sucessful people and the idea that there should be multiple membership categories is more than reasonable. And your premise that one can be a part of the Jewish people w/o meeting the religious demands of all members of the community is as old as the the Torah itself.
Dear Rabbi Brad:
Thank you for your kind words.
It would be nice if we had a new system for Responsa wherein Israel and Diaspora could all contribute. I fear we have abandoned responsibility for Torah to narrow minded intellectual bullies. Power tends to corrupt and I see the right wing to be corrupting of Jewish life. I find the carrying aloft the picture of Rabbi Schneerson during the Chabad telethons to be inappropriate as well as their pretension that they alone know who is good Jew. While I do not advocate their removal, I do wish we would develop some mechanism whereby world Jewry from the most secular to the most insular could contribute opinions. Right now the quasi-monopoly of the Theocrats is not acceptable.
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