â–ª A Tale of Beggars and Minyans
â–ª Beit Shemesh residents decry ‘haredi only’ neighborhood
â–ª Public diplomacy against shechita laws
▪ Share and share alike: Boulder’s Jewish community at work
â–ª National-religious rabbis slam gender segregation
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â–ª Retired Judge to Media: Use Common Sense
â–ª Israeli doctors withdraw from fertility conference over exclusion of women
â–ª Yisgadeil Veyiskadeish Shemei Rabboh
â–ª SALT Friday
â–ª Report: Hareidi Soldiers Told to Clean Women’s Restroom
â–ª Prominent NJ rabbi gets 5-year prison term for hiding $1M in massive corruption case
â–ª Local Support Grows for ‘Chained’ Woman
â–ª Raising More Tolerant Children
â–ª Beit Shemesh: Dialogue Is The Only Solution
▪ Nefesh Head Backs Away From ‘Torah Declaration’ On Gays
â–ª Hamodia Publisher Calls On The Charedi Community To Rise Up Against Religious ‘Fanatics’
▪ On Feminism and Fanaticism: A Female Charedi Attorney’s Perspective
â–ª New York – The Shechita Wars
â–ª SALT Thursday
â–ª Scholars offer new explanation for rare Temple artifact in Jerusalem
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â–ª For the Glove of the Game
â–ª New Words Coined To Exclude Women
â–ª Haredi Orthodox children attacked in Jerusalem
â–ª IDF to supervise rabbi-soldier meetings
â–ª Beitar Illit store offers men-only counter
â–ª Haredi soldier warns: We’ll leave IDF over women’s singing
â–ª Everyone is fighting a different battle
â–ª SALT Wednesday
â–ª R. Yehuda Levin supports husband who refuses to give get (video)
â–ª Sorcerer for the Goose and Gander
â–ª Scrolls raise questions about Afghan Jewish history
▪ R Robinson: The Curse of Violent Extremism – from the 10th of Tevet to Bet Shemesh
â–ª Where do Israeli haredim stand on haredi violence?
â–ª Haredim reject Beit Shemesh division plan
â–ª The Living Torah Museum Comes To Lakewood
â–ª Are These Not Jewish Children?
â–ª The Events in Beit Shemesh: A Hareidi Resident Speaks
â–ª The Human Spirit: What do religious women want?
â–ª Working Men
â–ª SALT Tuesday
â–ª Last week’s news & links
Rules: link
IH:
Just a note that the Hertz translation is, in fact, the old JPS one. (It was originally, in the five-volume edition, the King James Revised, presumably altered to Jewish standards, but changed very shortly after in the one-volume we all know.) The same translation was/is used in the Soncino Bible set and other editions. Of course, the notes are original.
Steve:
I told R’ Rakeffet Prof. Kaplan’s story about the Rav and R’ Hartman, and he didn’t seem to feel there was any contradiction.
Re: the beggars piece. All the beautiful language in the world can’t disguise that he’s trying to pretty up a pretty ugly picture. Twenty-dollar bills for people who can fly across the world and tell fantastic stories about self-imposed poverty?
Re: Lipshutz: My eyes started to glaze over early on. As with all Charedi apologists, a simple condemnation would have done. As it is, it’s entirely possible that he’s trying to make charedim look like the victims of the violence here.
“I tend to agree-the Vatican and Popes do not operate that way-they do not shoot from the hip. Vaticans caution so carefully”
BTW-it is my impression that the Catholic church in general acts that way-a story from a Jesuit who I once heard say that one of his jobs is to interpret pronouncements from Rome and how he goes about interpreting them-they;ll put in a lot of “ecclesiastical bolerplacte” and most of a stawtement will do that he just xs out that language and might be left with one sentence or so that one can determine what it means.
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/medieval-siddur-battles-gender-inequality-via-jewish-prayer-1.405948
Not thrilled with the obviously ideological title, but still interesting.
Prof. Kaplan — thank you for your note. Perhaps I overreacted to your reversion from R. (in the Kimelman article we were discussing) to Prof. It is a pet peeve of mine that many (e.g. Gil) are not willing to use the Rabbi title on people who became associated with non-Orthodox institutions. My unreserved apologies for casting this aspersion on you incorrectly.
Regarding R. Heschel: actually, he is not — as you assume — a particular hero of mine. As I have stated before, at this stage in my life, I find the philosophies of both Rabbis Heschel and Soloveitchik to be too weighted down by the (then fresh) post-Shoah angst to be relevant for our times.
That said, a look at Amazon’s top 100 Bestsellers in Jewish Theology is interesting: http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/books/12597/ref=pd_zg_hrsr_b_1_4_last
Finally, Edward Kaplan may be a great admirer of R. Heschel — but, the section I read on Vatican II in Google Books culminating on the page I quoted is neither impressive biography nor convincing in my view. I could understand the Vatican staying silent after the fact; but E. Kaplan asserts their “deliberate cooperation” which, sorry, does sound like a conspiracy theory. E. Kaplan is not helped by the generous amount of backchair psychoanalyzing of R. Heschel either (see p. 274 bottom through p. 275 top).
To sum up, if I may, our agreements are:
1. The results of Nostra Aetate have been positive for the Jews.
2. With 20/20 hindsight, R. Soloveitchik’s jeremiads against were wrong (particularly the cites 1963 text)
3. R. Heschel & R. Tanenbaum had a significant impact, at least in the early stages of Cardinal Bea’s Council
I am not sure whether we agree/disagree that R. Heschel was probably the originator of the removal of the deicide charge, as well as addressing the issue of proselytization (ref: Kimelman).
Where we disagree is whether the eventual victory of Cardinal Bea in 1964 – after failure in 1963 – was due to the Jews, or would have happened anyway irrespective.
—-
Nachum – Indeed regarding Hertz and OJPS which is why I omitted OJPS from the list. But, you are right to make it explicit.
IH: I accept and very much appreciate your apology. I certainly have no objection in principle about referring to individuals associated with non-Orthodox instituions by the title of rabbi. I think your summary of where we agree and where we disagree is accurate. I emphasize that I did not assert anything categorical about R. Prof Heschel’s role in Vatcan II, though I tend to think that the ultimate vicoty of Cardinal Bea in 64 was not due to the Jews in general and to Prof. Heschel in particular.
You, indeed, in your thoughtful response have differentiated yourself from Steve Brizel.
JERRY:
“Not thrilled with the obviously ideological title, but still interesting.”
2 important facts not stated in the article but put this siddur into some context wrt to its polemical point:
1) it is a manuscript. hence one must be extremely cautious about making sweeping generalizations. one does not learn anything about an entire society’s attitude toward women from one manuscript document.
2) most importantly, also not indicated in the article is that the colophon to this siddur indicates that it was commissioned by a choson for his kallah. this was specifically a woman’s siddur. (and all the bircos hashachar were altered to reflect this fact.) it has nothing to do with consevative-style egalitarianism as suggested in the article.
all this is not to say that this isn’t an important and fascinating historical document. and yes there are other interesting early documents that deal with women (e.g., certifying one as competent in shechita and nikkur)
but still, it is completely erroneous to cast this siddur as an early Conservative-style egalitarian text and moreover to draw wider implications based on it. the only question is whether the error in presentation is haaretz’s or julie schoenfeld’s. and whether it is based on ignorance or not.
JERRY:
do you have a link to the hebrew version of that haaretz article. i wonder if it got skewered in the translation?
“I told R’ Rakeffet Prof. Kaplan’s story about the Rav and R’ Hartman, and he didn’t seem to feel there was any contradiction”
Not necessarily a contradiction but entirely different feelings appear.
“lawrence kaplan on January 8, 2012 at 10:09 am
IH: I accept and very much appreciate your apology. I certainly have no objection in principle about referring to individuals associated with non-Orthodox instituions by the title of rabbi”
Certainly the Rav also referred to non Orthodox Rabbis as Rabbi-I believe there are at least a couple of examples in Helfgotts book-I certainly recall his referring to Rabbi Shubow as Rabbi.
” Israel charged five Jewish settlers on Sunday with orchestrating a riot in an army base in the West Bank in a bid to foil plans to dismantle illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory.
The December 13 rampage sparked outrage in Israel where the conscript military is a revered institution and a symbol of unity. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged a swift crackdown against the perpetrators”
there are at least 3 groups in Israel that essentially don’t accept the general narrative of Israel-the aravim, the chareidim and the mitnachlim-together they are probably close to 40% or so of the population-what does it say for a country when such a high percentage does not accept the basic narrative of the country.
Interesting post – informative too- by brill on the state of biblical scholarship with an interview with prof. Carr:
Very valid point to the frummies- “The reason for this interview is because if the religious community wants to respond to Biblical criticism, then it should know what it is talking about. It has to stop create homiletics about repetitions and thinking that it answers anything at all. ”
http://kavvanah.wordpress.com/2012/01/08/interview-with-david-m-carr-current-state-of-bible-scholarship/
Are you going to do a post on the new Milin Havivin? David Fried, who has a Hebrew article is a real talmid chacham and will be a force in Open Orthodoxy if he chooses to go in that direction
Shim: No, I didn’t see anything particularly interesting there other than the annoying misspelling in Prof. Sperber’s title. Never heard of David Fried but I appreciate his writing a traditional Torah journal article.
“How about the claim that Obama has thrown Israel under the bus vis-Ã -vis the Palestinians? That’s not going to make all that much of a difference. It turns out the two groups of voters most concerned about Israel (American Jews and evangelical Christians) likely already have a pretty clear sense whom they’ll be voting for in November.”
from
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/01/06/fighting_words?page=0,1
sad why Israel is not a real priority for any political party.
from the article on heter meah rabbanim,
“But simply signing because someone else
signed is not what Rabbeinu Gershom
intended and is not proper conduct
(unless, of course, the beis din that issued
the heter meah Rabbanim is known to be
one with an impeccable reputation)”
what is that “unless..” based on? my understanding is that all 100 rabbanim who sign have to come to an independent conclusion and cant rely on the beis din, whether its reliable or not. if they can rely on that beis din, what would be the point of 100 signatures, just take the beis din’s word!
a strange aside in an otherwise worthy article.
btw, re the final point in the article:
“Harav Yosef
Shalom Elyashiv, shlita, ruled that if
someone remarries based on an improper
heter meah Rabbanim, in addition to the
cherem against the polygamous husband,
there is also a cherem against the
signatories of the heter meah Rabbanim. In
light of these serious consequences, one
should sign a heter meah Rabbanim only if,
after careful contemplation and due
diligence, one arrives at the conclusion
that the heter is appropriate.”
anyone know what the basis of rav elyashiv’s position is?
“Very valid point to the frummies- “The reason for this interview is because if the religious community wants to respond to Biblical criticism, then it should know what it is talking about. It has to stop create homiletics about repetitions and thinking that it answers anything at all. â€
http://kavvanah.wordpress.com/2012/01/08/interview-with-david-m-carr-current-state-of-bible-scholarship/”
Apologetics is always a risky enterprise.
Official Bet Shemesh Women Flashmob: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZd0kLWP01c&sns
I hate how Israelis (and it seems like the American Olot of Beit Shemesh have assimilated enough to follow suit) think they understand American culture and imitate it, and wind up just looking stupid. That was not a flashmob. There was nothing spontaneous about it, there was no public venue that was mobbed (unless you think some empty square in the town with all of 10 people not participating is a public venue), it simply bears no resemblance whatsoever to the original flashmobs. What it was was some 200 or so American women looking for an excuse to do some cheesy 80′s line-dance in public. The only reason this is getting any attention at all is because the media has decided to distract Israeli society with this latest cause for “truth and justice and the Jewish way”. It’s pathetic.
Another interesting piece about Israeli charedim from Yair Ettinger: http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/a-quiet-drama-is-taking-place-among-ultra-orthodox-holocaust-survivors-1.406226
“Harav Yosef
Shalom Elyashiv, shlita, ruled that if
someone remarries based on an improper
heter meah Rabbanim, in addition to the
cherem against the polygamous husband,”
A cherem against someone who acted in good faith?
“there is also a cherem against the
signatories of the heter meah Rabbanim.”
I’d like to see a cherem against lets say hypothetical Chareidi Rabbis who sign a heter meah Rabbonim on behalf of a scion of a well known descendant of world class gadol. Waiting…..
” it simply bears no resemblance whatsoever to the original flashmobs.”
Apparently, you don’t know how flash mobs really work…
Oprah did a nice segment on them, and they are coordinated, and are not spontaneous.
“http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4173013,00.html”
COULD LAPIDS ENTERING POLITICS CAUSE A CHANGE IN POLITICAL POWER OF HAREIDIM?
mycroft that story you linked to is hilarious. You would think with way Lapid has covered political news that it would be clear that he is entering politics to make more money from corrupt deals :)
It appears by crusade here did not go unheard.
http://www.jewinthecity.com/2012/01/whats-in-a-name-a-call-to-re-brand-the-extremists-in-israel-from-ultra-orthodox-to-sikrikim/?mid=570
Thank you to all the people who are participating in this endeavor.
You mean, avi, thanks to all the people still avoiding making difficult decisions by pretending they’re not part of the problem.
Ms. Josephs, on the other hand, is perhaps suffering from what I’ve observed in many modern, liberal, western Jews (all Orthodox!): An inability to believe that, yes, people can be that bad. This affects how the West deals with the Muslim world as well: “The Muslim Brotherhood is moderate! There are only a few crazies!”
Nachum,
Do you know anybody who participates in the thuggery?
Avi – As far as I am aware, it was not the Sikrikim who named themselves, rather it was Yisroel Aharon Kletzkin, who used to be responsible for the pashkevillen in Meah Shearim (and the annoying automated megaphones which announced the details of levayos, until he got into a fight with assorted hooligans. He named them ‘Sikrikim’ and it stuck. Mr. Kletzkin effectively lost the war, and has now moved to New York, where he opened a sushi restaurant.
Avi, I know plenty of people of chareidim personally who enjoyed watching thuggery. Plenty of yeshiva students who might not otherwise get involved, still enjoy sitting and watching the scene. (Also, if they know of people involved, they won’t turn them in).
Mycroft — on your question regarding Yair Lapid’s decision, see: http://menachemmendel.net/blog/2012/01/03/the-lapiddeeri-factor/ then follow the link to the poll.
Avi,
When I was in Mir over 30 years ago there were plenty of “moderate” bochurim who participated in the thuggery. When I asked one regular American guy how he could call Jews “Nazis” he told me “You don’t know what an adrenaline rush it is.”
[...] Israeli society unraveling? â–ª Nachlaot Pedophile Crisis: At Least 100 Victims â–ª SALT Mondayâ–ª Last week’s news & linksRules: link Share and [...]
So Tzvi, where was your outrage 30 years ago?
maybe he thought “this is a phase, it will pass” and it hasn’t.
Gilad Shalits father entering politics-interesting
Why is lasts weeks News still the default on my browser?
The original idea for flashmobs came from a Larry Niven story from 1973, where people would receive messages on their phones and all suddenly converge on a given point to block traffic, through “transfer booths”, instantaneous transporters between street corners.
As implemented today, they tend to be advertising for some idea – a group of dancers converge on a plaza and perform some line dance, where the song conveys an idea.
Larry Niven story
trying link again
.
“Heter Meah Rabbonim merely reflects the fact that the Torah gave the husband the power to initiateâ€
siNCE MIHATORAH A MAN CAN HAVEM ORE THAN ONE WIFE WHY ISN’T SIMPLY A MATTER OF HEM SHEHECHMIRU HEM SHEHITIRU