As for most of the rest of you (no, not you, onedoug), I am disgusted at some of the things you have posted here. It's funny. FReepers always beat their chests about being "pro-Jewish" and how "conservatives are the Jews' best friends," but every time an article is posted about the so-called "ultra-Orthodox" (which, btw, is an insult, like "illiterate inbred trailer park redneck") I notice it's just bash, bash, bash.
First of all--you people (like the liberals) "support the Jews" only on your own terms, not on the terms of the Torah. You need to get it through your heads that Orthodox Jews are not "old testament proto-chrstians" or the "cub scouts" to the chrstians' "boy scouts." Chrstians do not get to define Judaism. You are outside Judaism looking in. You have as much right defining Judaism as an atheist or a "jain" (just for example) has defining chrstianity.
Try to understand this: the State of Israel founded in 1948 is not the prophesied Jewish State in the TaNa"KH. It is a secular state with a president, a prime minister, a parliament, and political parties--all of which are alien to the Torah. It is a liberal, western, hellenistic state. It is full of liberals and socialists and "gays" and abortionists. It is not a Jewish government. The Torah and the Torah alone defines a Jewish government, and it is nothing like any of our modern systems (or like any other ancient system). Modern Zionism was from the outset a typical secular European nationalist ideology just like Irish Republicanism or the nationalist movements among the Czechs, Bulgarians, Greeks, Armenians, Poles, etc. Even the non-socialist conservative Zionists were secular. And the socialist Zionists (like Ben Gurion, though he certainly wasn't as far left as most world socialist leaders) thought that Orthodox Judaism would disappear from the earth in a few years.
Understand this as well: studying Torah is the highest Jewish duty. Only a liberal or a modernist or an atheist would be so blind as to refuse to see that the safety of the Jews depends on HaShem alone, and it is always safest to follow HaShem's instructions and study Torah than to defy them. Who knows how many calamities have been averted by these "parasites" (as one of you so charmingly put it) studying Torah continually? Looks like a lot of FReepers are rationalists who don't believe in the supernatural.
All Orthodox Jews, whether Zionist, anti-Zionist, or ambivalent, love the Land of Israel. The Land of Israel has a sanctity that no other land has, and even the most anti-Zionist Chasid in the world (except maybe Neturei Karta' who are nuts) loves both the Land and the Jews who live there. A secular western government has nothing to do with it. No secular government, whether non-Jewish or "Jewish," has the right to forbid Jews to visit or live there. And as for Joshua, he was named by G-d Himself as Moses' successor. No Israeli politician or government member has the Halakhic authority that he did.
Please get it through your heads that these Jews, while certainly withdrawn and "provincial," primarily refuse the draft because it conflicts with their beliefs about Torah, not just because they would "meet other people."
Then we have those nasty posts about dual loyalty, "Jewish supremacism," and the "kabbalah" (meaning Jews should turn from their eeee-vil religion and "git SAVED!!!" when you chrstians can't even all agree on what that means!). Not to mention nasty posts about them being "obamabots" or "anti-gun" or for "big government." I'm sorry to be so blunt, but you people literally don't have the slightest idea what Judaism is about. You're no different than a mormon whose only use for historical chrstianity is as proto-mormonism.
As if conservatives and especially sincere religious chrstians aren't slandered and libeled every single day by the liberal media. But some of you here take advantage of every article about "ultra-Orthodox" Jews to do the exact same thing while hyocritically claiming to be "lovers of the Jewish People" and "the Jews' best friends." Is it any wonder so few of them trust you when you give the lie to your claims every time an article like this gets posted?
One final word: these particular Orthodox Jews are withdrawn and provincial because they actually live in a Theocracy--and a Theocracy that is totalistic, regulating every activity in life and of the day. Every single Orthodox Jew lives a life that combines what in chrstianity is divided up between laypeople and monks. They live regular productive lives and recite set prayers at their times like chrstians can only find time for in monasteries. None of you could handle it. And furthermore, compared to these people, most FReepers are G-dless Communists. You're so addicted to the eighteenth century rationalist "enlightenment" that you wouldn't even let G-d tell you what to do!
Some of the comments on this thread are objectively disgusting and show their authors as ugly and evil (or at least ignorant) people.
I know I shouldn't be surprised any more, but sometimes I forget that most of you don't mean what you say about how "pro-Jewish" you are.
Well, you have some good points, and I wish more people lived a sanctified life. I am a Catholic, so the “get saved” thang is meaningless to me, but I have a Jewish soul and would be more comfortable there, but it is impossible for me. I suppose it is true that we have no idea how much good has been done by the students of Torah.
Still, I believe Hashem knows we have to somehow cope with the physical world He created.
Well said, ZC!
Have a nice day.
CC
You are more full of poop than a Christmas goose.
You don’t get to define Jews, and you know about as much of Christianity as you claim we know of Jews.
If the Satmars in Israel want to reap the benefits of the Israeli government, then they need to play by the state's rules. If not, they should emigrate to the United States where they can be as against the current Israeli state as the NY Times. They can plan to return to Israel when the Messiah delivers to them a genuine Jewish state.
I would like to hear your opinion on these matters.
my views have zero, zilch, nada to with any Jew’s Jewish theology or or philosophy
it’s really very basic
the “ultra-orthodox” in Israel accept the security afforded them FROM that horrible, “helenistic”, awful secular state of Israel, which as you point out the ultra-orthodox do not accept as a biblically correct “Jewish” government, and yet, I repeat, THEIR secuirty in that land RIGHT NOW exists ONLY because IT IS BEING PROVIDED BY the state of Israel
and yet they will not HELP in providing for their own security
then why should that state provide them with anything?????
yada, yada, yada
frankly scarlet, we really don’t give a dam why some think they have a right to sit on their asses and still be protected
Try to understand this: some of us take Israel's side because we see them as fellow members of Western Civilization besieged by barbarians, rather than purely because of their Jewishness. I would support Israel against the Muslims even if every single Israeli converted to Buddhism today.
“This summer the issue of everyone bearing an “equal burden” for national defence has boiled over in Israeli politics. Yet the conscription argument may be a diversion from the real economic and political crisis. The haredi community is overwhelmingly poor, underemployed, and dependent on the rest of Israel. It is also growing rapidly, creating an ever-larger weight for wider society to carry. Unless ultra-Orthodox education changes and haredim are integrated into the workplace, the Israeli economy could collapse. “We could lose the country,” as a leading Israeli economist, Dan Ben-David, warns.”
Thanks for the information and dialogue. Very interesting.
“Understand this as well: studying Torah is the highest Jewish duty.”
Perhaps. I understand the highest mitzvah of a Jew is the preservation of Jewish life. If you house catches on fire when studying the Torah, would you not be required to leave the house?
Regardless, studying Torah is not the ONLY duty.
There is a time for every mitzvah in a balanced life.
True in some ways (comment #68) about Israel, secular states and Prophets. When we’re there in time, all will know it. I would still be afraid to oppose Jewish people being in Israel, though, regardless of the mix of people involved. Some of each of the various groups obviously have their purpose, and many still don’t know it.
But then that brings us around to who is most physically involved in preserving and teaching Torah the most, too (Chassidim). In a big way, they’re not so withdrawn. Some of them are teaching those of us who’ve asked honestly and repeatedly, when all others refuse (except Reform, but I’m not talking about Reform).