Posted on 04/20/2006 4:10:00 PM PDT by avile
Shared values makes for good friends. I think that's why Freeps works so well.
There's a lot of Jews who are torn between being proud of their intellectual lineage (from Spinozza to Einstein)and wanting to be viewed as thoroughly modern thinkers, which means rejecting religion.
The ancient Israelites were intellectuals, but their intellectuality was manifest in the study of Torah, the highest possible human endeavor. Similarly, even during the current Exile there have been times and places where Jews excelled in secular learning even while remaining true to Torah. However, the "enlightenment" changed all that. Jewishness is now interpreted as free-thinking dissent against chr*stian religiosity, and ancient Jewish rejection of paganism has been transmuted into rejection of G-d.
Spinoza and the other famous Jewish intellectuals of recent history were heretics (why Einstein is treated as some sort of Gedol HaDor amazes me). True Jewish intellectuality still exists and always will exist among the true Torah Sages and their students. Unfortunately, this world is very insular and largely invisible to the outside world.
Of course. The Exodus is a myth out of that "chr*stian" Bible, and "everyone knows" that the essence of Jewishness is to deny "chr*stian" myths. And people wonder why G-d allows Holocaust-denial to exist.
How was your Pesach, Alouette? I hope it was happy, holy, and kosher.
Basically yes. But there is more to it than that. In part its because they took it too far. Many Jews don't speak Hebrew or read Hebrew but the services are in Hebrew, so that makes it difficult. Also the liturgy is a bit arcane, repetitive. It's customary to do it a certain way but I'm not so sure people find relevency in repeating the same phrases.
Liberal judaism has become practically Kumbaya sessions, it makes a mockery. Orthodox judaism is too foreign for this young generation of Jews. Some kind of neo-orthodox revival needs to come about. I'm not a rabbi so I couldn't say exactly how, but impo I'd cut out a lot of the repetition stuff and do more Talmudic give and take. Open the floor to debate on topics. It would take a learned, patient man to do it.
The fact is that much of the practice was put to format 700-1200 years ago... but Judaism itself is much older. There is no telling for sure how Moses prayed. Later passages from David, Solomon and others were added to the daily prayer. Maybe it needs to mix it up a little.
I saw on CNN (sorry, I was in a hotel room they didn't have fox news) that there is an Orthodox Rabbi in lower Manhattan who is doing services a little differently.. getting some heat from the orthodox community but is attracting a lot of formerly secular Jews. But no matter the heat, bringing Jews closer to Torah is a mitzva, so Kudos to him even if he had to strip out King David's poetry from the prayer books and make the service more community oriented.
Again, in re-reading the post and also my post to you in 21 I don't see why you have your hackles up. I don't see any contempt.
No one is looking down their nose at Reform Jews, their low birthrate mirrors that of many liberal (and conservative) Christians, agnostics and atheists.
What grabbed my interest personally in reading the article was Rabbi Wolpe's comment about attendance in Los Angeles; as most of my Jewish friends and business associates live in West LA and they are quite liberal and many even pretty much agnostic when it comes to religion. Being Jewish is more of a special club to them... someone here said it's more of an ethnicity than a religion to some.
Your statement to me is quite well written and I can agree with most all of your post, but I don't understand why you are upset. The article was highlighting Jewish attendance at services so naturally the discussion is centered on Jews. The same discussion can be turned toward liberal Christians and Catholics. As a Catholic I would not find it offensive. or contemptible. Liberal Catholics and white Catholics in general do not have children in requisite numbers to reproduce themselves, Catholics from Phillipines, Asia and Latin American countries, however do fill the pews at my church with 5 to 6 kids on Sunday.
Personally I like to factor in the fact we live with today, in that it takes both parents working to support a household, at least here in So Calif. I think that has severely limited the birthrate, as it is harder to raise 5 or more kids when both parents have to work. I don't know how the immigrant families do it, but I noticed that many live together with several generations in one house. Perhaps the fact they have Grandma and Grandpa under the same roof to help with the kids gives them the ability to sustain a larger family.
So you see, we are all reflecting on the issues brought up in this article. No one is looking down at anyone.
No, I was quite liberal at the time. Just most of the Muslims I knew were real a**holes. Angry, selfish, klannish, boorish, rude, egotistical, pushy... the sorts of traits that in most religions spirituality tends to counter.
But then Islam isn't really a religion... It's simply totalitarianism, like Nazism and fascism, from a time before the notion of the absence of any god caught hold.
It was the don't worry they'll all be gone in 100 years bit that I took exception to..in post 5.
There are 900 reform synagogues in US today up from 0 in 1885. So someone was projecting the absurd, and implying Reform movement is a problem that is solving itself.
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Still there are keys to Jewish attendance issue that were addressed in this thread.. that you only find synagogues in cities so Jews in rural areas have to make due at home and that many ceremonies are performed at home.. sabbath observations and passover and almost every holiday can celebrated at home.. with family.. so folks go for things like study and weddings and bar mitzvahs ceremonies.
As I said before, low birthrates come from prosperity. This is a long recorded demographic trend. And Gramma and Grandpa certainly are the keys to having and maintaining large families that and farms and such. People trade material wealth and comforts for children when they can because kids are a pain no way around it. They are a blessing but anyone who has raised one knows how it ages you..
Frankly, life cannot be a race to see who can have the most kids because in the end.. we get outcomes that fall out of uncontrolled population explosion. What has tipped the scales has been feminism and abortion intervening to take women out of child production altogether.. (One could argue that there is nothing feminine at all about feminism anymore)
I wish I could have had more children. I only had one child. I would have given anything to be able to have a larger family. Having a child changes your life. Yes you are a lot more broke, but the blessings of being a family far outweigh any material wealth.
There is no thing in this world more precious than your children, more meaningful, or more worthy of any sacrifice. We stopped at two. Funny, we speculated the name of another, and the two talk of this one as if he is a missing child, the brother they never had.
I got some news for you. If you didn't do a halachic orthodox conversion--THEN YOU AIN'T JEWISH.
you wife can pretend to be Jewish--BUT SHE AIN'T. AND NEITHER ARE YOUR CHILDREN
being a Jew is not what is convenient for you to be accepted. It's about being a JEW and living like one.
Reform rabbi's would convert a dog to judiasm if someone asked them.
They have no standards of anything, and are 100% wrong in their entire approach to Judiasm, and life in general.
no offense to you or your wife personally--Just pointing out facts.
you are way wrong my friend.
being a Jew requires adherence to mitzvos. Jewish men are required to pray 3 times a day WITH A CONGREGATION. Virtually ALL aspects of Jewish life revolve around the community, from our schooling, to ritual baths, to charity organizations to gemachs etc....
It is only NON-ORTHODOX Jews that choose to live in places without Jewish life, because their Judiasm doesn't mean anything to them
you wife can pretend to be Jewish--BUT SHE AIN'T. AND NEITHER ARE YOUR CHILDREN
I got news for you, but my wife did go through a halachic orthodox conversion. A conservative rabbi taught the conversion class, but the conversion itself was at an Orthodox synagogue with an orthodox Beit Din approving her conversion.
As for the rest, my parents chose where I grew up, so I can't help that. But believe me, after being of the few Jews on town -- the kid who was often thought of as THE JEW -- my Judaism means a lot to me. How I choose to express it, based on how I was raised, what I've experienced, what I've thought, and what I've prayed is a matter between me and God, for Him to condemn or approve. I answer to God. Not you.
if you answered to G-d, then you would be observing his mitzvos--because that is what he COMMANDS JEWS to do. I assure you, he doesn't approve of you driving on the sabbath, or eating at Pizza-Hut etc.... regardless of how you were raised.
your answer to me was basically a "I answer to no one and I'll do what I want"
reform Jews unfortunately do not follow anything and will unfortunately be lost and are being lost at an enormous rate.
please read this and let me know if it makes sense:
http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/WillYourGrandchildrenBeJews.htm
ping
No. I answer to God. In fact, even those who answer to themselves ultimately answer to God.
please read this and let me know if it makes sense: http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/WillYourGrandchildrenBeJews.htm
There are several problems. First off, it seems to imply that once in a denomination the children will, if they remain Jews, be in the same denomination. I was raised conservative, but now attend a reform synagogue. I've known others that went the other way -- from Reform to Orthodox. In fact, one of the brothers of my Reform Rabbi is now Orthodox. The follow-up discussion acknowledges that somewhat, but the numbers don't seem to.
Further, there is something of a rotation in-and-out of Judaism. When my wife converted, one of the rabbis observed that something like 90% of those he converted have Jewish ancestry in their past the they're aware of. In my wife's case, it's 500 years in her past -- a Jewish family that fled the Spanish Diaspora, and ended up in Scotland. If a person with their Jewish ancestry 500 years in the past can feel the call to be a Jew, then certainly there are many whose Jewish ancestry is only a few generations in the past, who will hear the call, as well.
I'm not even sure assimilation is entirely a bad thing for Judaism. Antisemitism usually rises, when there is a separation between Jews and the rest of the community. For people to be not Jewish, but aware and proud of Jewish ancestry is a defense against the worst of antisemitism.
You are so dead wrong it is not even funny.
It is when Jews try and assimilate that that Hashem punishes us the worst. Trying to be like the gentiles and breaking down our separation is the most dangerous thing for us. There is a chazal that says "Eisav sonay es Yaakov" That Eisav (the gentile) will always hate Yaakov (the Jew).
Gentiles come to despise us when we break from our heritage and G-d will always remind us of that when we try.
In every instance in history (especially pre WWII Germany and pre 1492 Spain), many Jews were affluent and assimilated--They viewed themselves as Germans first, Jews second-- G-d punished us for it.
remember the old saying "If Jews don't make Kiddish, then Gentiles make Havdalah"
Study your Talmud, and you'll see I'm correct. A Jew means being, and living like a Jew not like "the nations of the world"
Except that the time the Jews were the most assimilated in Spain was "The Golden Age" of the 10th to 12th centuries or so. It's fall wasn't due to assimilation, but the military conquering of Spain by more militant Muslims, followed by militant Christians.
The Nazis are an exception, but for the most part, the history of Jews in Western Europe for the last 200 years has been one of assimilation and tolerance. Especially in this day and age, when not only can Jews become gentiles, but gentiles feel free to become Jews. (Indeed, I should note that the first person to encourage my wife to convert was a Christian in a conservative church.)
A rootless tree topples and falls. But a tree that doesn't reach out is stunted and sick. And I spend much of my life, going out on various limbs.
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