KERRY's Jewish Grandparents "DISCOVERED", and did you know that Kerry's brother converted to Conservative Judaism?
Interesting article.

Sent: Wednesday, February 18, 2004 8:47 AM

Subject: Kerry & Judaism

It seems fashionable for Americans in public life to suddenly "discover" their Jewish ancestry. But why do we or anyone care so much?

A JEWISH CZECH IN JOHN KERRY'S COURT by Jennifer Anne Perez

(Jennifer Anne Perez, a former reporter for the Los Angeles Times,
is now an international freelance journalist based in Prague)

The saga of a U.S. senator and presidential contender in search of his roots--and his reaction to the "revelation."

Seven years ago, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was confronted with a genealogical discovery: her Czech émigré parents were Jewish.

They'd hidden their Jewish roots during and after the Second World War. More than a dozen of her Jewish relatives, including three grandparents, an aunt, an uncle and a first cousin, had all perished in the Nazi concentration camps.

Albright has been reluctant to comment on the discovery, telling the Washington Post, "I have to look into this myself...it's a very personal matter."

A similar revelation occurred on February 2, 2003, when the Boston Globe reported that Massachusetts senator and Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, thought by many to be a "Boston Brahmin" of Irish-Catholic ancestry, was the grandson of Czech immigrants who also had concealed their Jewish heritage.

The story begins in the hamlet of Horni Benesov on the tenth of May 1873--the day Benedikt and Mathilde Kohn had a son they named Fritz. Like his father, Fritz became a simple brewer. Yet it was difficult for him to succeed in an area dominated by German-speaking Catholics. Many Jews hid their religious identity, posing as Gentiles. "It was easier to do business as a Christian," says Prague-based genealogist Julius Miller, who specializes in tracing Jewish lineage. "Many Jews just stopped practicing Judaism during this period and had no belief at all."

On March 17, 1902, shortly before his 30th birthday, Fritz took his wife Ida and infant son Erich to a government office in Vienna and changed their family name. Fritz Kohn would henceforth be known as Frederick Kerry.

The Kerry family settled for three years in Austria before embarking on the steamship Konigen Luise in Genoa, Italy on May 4, 1905, bound for America. The two-masted, twin-screw "Barbarosa"-class ship was configured to carry nearly 2,000 passengers in
steerage, about 150 in first class, and 140 in second. According to the ship's manifest, the Kerrys traveled in first class with only twenty-nine other passengers--French, American, and Swiss families with decidedly Anglican names like Hale, Walker, and Bridgeman.

Ellis Island records note that upon boarding the ship, Kerry identified his family as Germans from Austria, their former place of residence as Vienna. By the time the ship arrived in New York City on May 18, 1905, Frederick Kerry had left his Jewish heritage
behind.

A New Life

The Kerrys settled in Chicago, where Frederick quickly set out to stake his claim in theAmerican dream. On June 21, 1907, he filed his initial citizenship papers with Illinois' Cook County Circuit Court. By 1908, he was listed in a business directory with an office on Dearborn Street in Chicago's famous Loop. In 1910, the year his daughter Mildred was born, he had made it into the Chicago Blue Book, a catalogue of notable city residents. By February 6, 1911, he had filed his naturalization petition, which was witnessed by the highly respected State Street merchant Henry Lytton and by Frank
Case, a business manager at Sears Roebuck. Kerry had assisted in the reorganization of Sears, and by the following year he was promoting himself as a "business counselor" under the title "Frederick A.Kerry & Staff."

But for reasons that remain unclear, Kerry soon left Chicago and settled in Brookline, Massachusetts. There, in 1915, Ida gave birth to their third child, Richard, the future father of Senator John Kerry. Frederick would continue the merchant life, now working in the shoe business and achieving enough success to hire a live-in German domestic worker, who appears on the 1920 census records of the Kerry household. The census information also offers a glimpse into the lengths to which Frederick Kerry had gone to obscure his Jewish lineage. Both he and his wife listed their native tongues as German--although the first language of Czech Jews of that era who were born near the Polish border would almost certainly have been Yiddish. By this point, however, both Frederick and Ida had been practicing Catholics for nearly twenty years, and by all accounts were regarded as devout in their faith.

Frederick Kerry's American dream ended mysteriously on November 21, 1921 at the age of 48. According to front-page news reports, the now virtually bankrupt husband and father of three walked into the lobby washroom of Boston's posh Copley Plaza Hotel, put a loaded revolver to his head, and pulled the trigger. He left behind $25 in cash, $200 in stocks, and a Cadillac.

The suicide cast a shroud of silence over the family history for more than fifty years. It would come to light again with the first stirrings of a U.S. senator's bid for a possible presidential run in 2004.

A Rising Star

The Kerrys' youngest child, Richard, would also achieve success, but unlike his father, would sustain it. He served as an Army pilot during World War II; married Rosemary Forbes, a descendant of two wealthy Massachusetts families, the Forbes and the Winthrops; and became a U.S. diplomat, holding posts in Oslo, Berlin, and Paris.

Richard and Rosemary's first son, John Forbes Kerry, was born on December 11, 1943. Though he attended exclusive boarding schools in Europe as well as an elite private school in New Hampshire, John later would tell interviewers that somehow he always felt disconnected from his peers, like an outsider.

He attended Yale at about the same time as President George W. Bush--both belonged to the elite secret Skull & Bones society--but while Bush lived the fraternity life, Kerry, an admirer of John F. Kennedy, found his niche in politics and became president of the Yale Political Union, a nonpartisan group providing a forum for a wide range of political debate. Upon graduation in 1966, he joined the Navy to fight in Vietnam. Returning to the U.S. in 1969 with a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and three Purple Hearts, Kerry soon became a vocal critic of the war. Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in April 1971, he asked a question that would make him famous: "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"

Five years later, Kerry graduated from Boston College law school and kicked his political career into high gear. He quickly rose through the ranks of state government, becoming lieutenant governor of Massachusetts in 1982 under then Governor Michael Dukakis, and eventually winning a U.S. Senate seat in 1984.

In the late 1980s Kerry learned from a relative that his grandmother Ida had been born Jewish--a surprising revelation, as he had remembered her as a zealous Catholic. But he knew virtually nothing about his paternal grandfather, Frederick.

John Kerry's constituency assumed that, with his father's name and his mother's lineage, the senator was a full-blooded Irish Catholic. Even his hometown newspaper, the Boston Globe, regularly made the mistake, despite Kerry's repeated attempts to set the record straight.

During a 1993 interview with TV host John McLaughlin, Kerry addressed the incorrect presumption that his father was Irish by stating that his grandfather was Austrian and that his grandmother had been born Jewish. He added: "We're still trying to find all the details." And try he did.

Once, while on a visit to Europe, he stopped off in Vienna and called every Kerry in the phone book. And in 2002, his office contacted the regional Czech archives, which, he would later discover, actually possessed information on Fritz Kohn's birth, but the senator never received a reply--two years earlier the bureau had stopped
conducting searches for foreigners.

It was not until the late 1990s, when John's father Richard was suffering from cancer, that he finally disclosed to John that his grandfather had shot himself to death. "[That] turned on a light bulb for John Kerry on why his father was so understandably reticent to talk about it," Kerry spokesman David Wade told the Boston Globe. "[It] help[ed] him understand his father much more and what his father went through."

Richard Kerry died in 2000. He never revealed that his father had been a Jew. Born in the United States and only 5 years old when Frederick died, it is likely that Richard did not know of his grandfather's hidden past.

The Mystery Revealed

In late 2002, as rumors began to circulate that Kerry would seek the Democratic nomination for president, editors at the Boston Globe began soliciting reporters for in-depth articles on Kerry's life. Journalist Michael Kranish, a veteran Washington correspondent who had spent four years piecing together his own Jewish family history, volunteered for the assignment.

Knowing that Jews had sometimes altered their names and identities--his own family's name had been changed at Ellis Island--and that unless he hired an overseas collaborator to check European records, it would be months before he'd be able to complete an accurate search, Kranish turned to prominent genealogist Felix Gundacker of the Institute for Historical Family Research in Vienna. Gundacker
had developed a specialty in tracing the genealogies of Jews in Austria and in parts of what is now the Czech Republic. Within two weeks, Gundacker discovered the original document in Vienna that recorded Fritz Kohn's name change to Frederick Kerry.

Ironically, had Kohn's name been changed at Ellis Island, it might have been impossible to uncover the original name. But because Kohn made the change while still in Austria, probably to conceal his background before coming to America, his origins could now be traced.

Gundacker's next step was to find Kohn's birth records. That search took him to the state archives in the Czech city of Opava, halfway between Krakow, Poland and Prague. There he met archivist Jiri Stibor, a traditionalist who refused to use a computer, preferring to search by through the millions of musty files collected in the
cavernous rooms of a former palace.

Stibor told Gundacker that on June 20, 2002 he had received an unusual inquiry--a letter in English from a certain "Samuel C" which carried the seal of a high-ranking Washington, D.C. official. The mysterious letter noted that John Kerry was a candidate for president (though the senator had yet to publicly announce his intention to run) and inquired about a man named "Fritz Cohn." Stibor knew he couldn't be of assistance; the archives had stopped processing foreign requests several years earlier. In any case, the war and local antisemitism had left little evidence of a former Jewish presence in the region. "The Germans didn't want any trace of the Jews left," Stibor says, "even after so many of them were taken away. So many of the records were simply destroyed."

Keeping in mind the earlier request, and now proceeding on the assumption that Frederick Kerry had been born Jewish, Gundacker and Stibor began scouring the archives. "The Catholics of the time weren't interested in keeping good records [of the Jews]," Stibor says. "If there were Jews in the town, they would be the last entries, at the end of the book." Adds Gundacker: "If there was no [official] Jewish community, parish priests and other Catholics had to add birth records to the central record books. They mostly added those records to the end of the books, not as part of the regular records."

Finally, after hours of pulling volume after volume off the archive shelves, they came upon a handwritten entry in the last pages of a yellowed book. "In the year 1873, on May 10th, was born Fritz Kohn, a legal son of Benedikt Kohn, master brewer in Bennisch (the old German name for Horni Benesov), House 224, and his wife, Mathilde, daughter of Jakob Frankel, royal dealer in Oberlogau in Prussia."

This one sentence had put the last piece of the puzzle into place, solving an 80-year-old mystery. Gundacker phoned Globe reporter Kranish and told him he was "1,000 percent sure" that Senator John Kerry's grandfather had been born a Jew.

A short time later, Kranish personally presented the evidence to Kerry in the senator's Washington office. He let Kerry review the documents: ship manifests, Ellis Island records, newspaper clippings, and additional materials obtained through genealogists,
Kranish himself, and the Globe's library staff.

"This is amazing...fascinating to me," Kerry told the reporter. "This is incredible stuff. I think it is more than interesting; it is a revelation....It has a big emotional impact, because it obviously raises questions: I want to know what happened, why did they do this, what were they thinking, what was the thought process, and why, once they got over here, they never talked about it."

At one point, Kranish said, Kerry became emotional, particularly when reviewing the front-page news accounts of his grandfather's suicide. "God, that's awful, Oh, God, that's awful. This is kind of heavy," the senator told him. "That explains a lot. It connects the dots. My dad was sort of painfully remote and shut off, and angry about the loss of his sister [she had died of cancer] and lack of a father."

He also shook his head in wonder at the number of times he had visited the Copley Plaza, never knowing its significance in his family's history. "How many times have I walked into that hotel...." he said, his voice trailing off.

No Trace of a Past

Horni Benesov's current mayor, Josef Klech, says that he has considered extending an invitation to Senator Kerry to visit his grandfather's birthplace. But, admits Klech, the unavoidable truth is that there really isn't much to see. Not a single trace remains
of Kerry's ancestors; not a single person in town remembers the Kohn family.

Over time, the entire town--except for the Catholic chapel, parish, and church--has been completely rebuilt. An unremarkable box-shaped apartment building now sits on the lot where Kohn's house once stood. Gone is the small Jewish cemetery where Kohn's parents Benedikt and Mathilde were likely buried. In place of the Kohn
brewery there is a public sauna advertising discount rates to local residents.

Reflecting on His Roots

In Kerry's office, half a world away, the senator chose to say little publicly about the discovery.

He did discuss the matter with Reform Judaism magazine, however. "This was an incredible illumination," Kerry says. "It really connected the things I'd talked about for years but now understand more personally. I never really knew why my grandfather
left Austria or why he underwent such personal transformation, but we do know many of the things that were happening under the old Hapsburg Empire. We know what life was like for too many of them, and the ultimate turn for even greater tragedy it would take not much later."

As for why Fritz Kohn chose the path he did, Prague-based genealogist Julius Miller believes he was a man who, like many other European Jews, looked to start over and build a better life for himself and his family.

"Thousands of European Jews abandoned their past," Miller says. "The story of Frederick Kerry, alias Fritz Kohn, mirrors the histories of many Jewish families who came to America in the early 1900s."

Postscript

In a twist of irony, John Kerry's younger brother Cameron converted to Judaism in 1983, shortly before marrying Kathy Weinman, a Jewish woman raised in a Conservative household in Michigan. As a member of a Boston Brahmin family, Cameron thought he was entering uncharted territory. Only later did he realize that he was returning to his genealogical roots.

When Cameron, now a Boston litigation attorney, was courting Kathy,they decided that "we were going to raise any children we had as Jewish,"

Cameron recalls. After that, he says, it wasn't difficult for him to become a Jew himself. "Converting seemed to me a small step--I wanted to be a full participant in their upbringing. [My decision] was helped along by the warm reception and welcome I received from the clergy at Temple Israel [in Boston]."

Converting, he says, was far less traumatic than he had anticipated.

There were no objections from the rest of the Kerry clan, and his new Jewish family at Temple Israel welcomed him with open arms. Today Kathy is a member of the synagogue board. Their two daughters have become b'nai mitzvah at the temple, and were delighted when they found out about their great-grandfather.

"It's been wonderful for the whole family," Cameron Kerry
says. "It's ironic--I guess things come full circle."
- posted by Izak @ 2:34 PM (0) comments

 
Berkeley, California Reform Jews welcome: Same-Sex Wedding Erev Shabbat Celebration
Isn't it amazing how Jews just can't keep trying hard enough to keep up with the Joneses, even if the Joneses happen to be "same sex marriages", see what this congregation is up to as it announces:

"Same-Sex Wedding Erev Shabbat Celebration

Congregation Beth El http://urj.org/congs/ca/ca030/ warmly celebrates the weddings of the many members of the Bay Area Jewish community who have married in San Francisco over the past week and a half. We are pleased to rejoice over the civil licenses that now accompany the ketubot that many of the couples have signed through the years. We look forward to the day when all Jewish couples will be able to marry according to both Jewish ritual and civil law.

On Erev Shabbat, Friday, February 27th, (2004) during our Joy of Shabbat Service, Congregation Beth El (Berkeley, California) will religiously welcome any couples married by civil law during this period. We are honored to celebrate this wonderful moment in history as a Jewish community. The clergy will speak in support of equal marriage rights, and there will be a special Oneg following services."
- posted by Izak @ 8:24 PM (0) comments

 
"It is the darkest accusation the Jewish People has ever faced. And it is coming to a theater near you."
Background / Jesus of Palestine & the 'Passion' of Israel

By Bradley Burston, bburston@haaretz.co.il Thu., February 26, 2004 Adar 4, 5764
Haaretz Correspondent

It is the darkest accusation the Jewish People has ever faced. And it is coming to a theater near you.

Left for dead in the post-Vatican II era of secularism and political correctness, the deicide debate has roared back to life with the scheduled release Wednesday of Mel Gibson's new feature film "The Passion of the Christ."

Twenty centuries in the making, it boils down to a single charge: it was the Jews who had Christ killed.

As an issue that cannot be resolved, it is doomed to be resurrected, century after century, exhumed, reimagined, transubstantiated into new forms: inquisition, wholesale expulsion, burnings at the stake, mass murder.

Or movies.

Jewish sensitivity over the film in the United States has been cast in bold relief, both by Christian raves for the emotional force and the bonecrushing physicality of its portrayal of the Passion, and by the vocal fears of Anti-Defamation League National Director Abraham Foxman that the film, while not anti-Semitic in itself, could exacerbate what is already the most dramatic rise in Jew-hatred worldwide since the close of the Nazi Holocaust.

American media buzz over the "Passion" has reached oversaturation levels, with close attention paid to such sidebars as Gibson's octogenarian father's view of the Holocaust. "It's all - maybe not all fiction - but most of it is," Hutton Gibson, 85, told New York talk show host Steve Feuerstein last week.

In a New York Times Magazine article last year, Hutton Gibson was quoted as saying that the Holocaust was manufactured as part of an arrangement between Hitler and "financiers" to move Jews out of Germany and into Palestine.

Hitler "had this deal where he was supposed to make it rough on them so they would all get out and migrate to Israel because they needed people there to fight the Arabs," Hutton Gibson told the Times.

In the land of Jesus, the controversy has been treated somewhat at a remove, as a curiosity that has not yet made its way to its gore-drenched traditional source.

For the moment, more immediate expressions of brutality, horror, inhumanity and suffering in Jerusalem and its environs have held sway over the attention of Israelis and Palestinians.

Here and there, however, the buzz is taking root. Clips of the "Passion" have been broadcast on news programs, along with an excerpt of an interview with the film's creator, an expression of acknowleged master storyteller Mel Gibson's unerring gift for raising new suspicions even as he allays old ones.

Israel's Channel 10 television station screened a recent ABC interview in which ABC's Diane Sawyer asks Gibson - who has strongly condemned anti-Semitism as a "sin" - to comment on those who fear that "in a world in which horrible things have been done to the Jewish populations, simply looking at these events will once again incite people toward if not violent animosity, [then] prejudice, vindictiveness."

Gibson, nodding in agreement to the first part of the sentence, then replied, in a parallel that grated on Israeli ears: "I don't think you can say that. I watched Schindler's List, and what the Germans do in that is horrible, you know. But I don't hate Germans, or want to hurt them or anything. I mean, if you go by that rationale, any story where one group of persons does something to another group of persons - you shouldn't put any of it on film."

In recent years it has become axiomatic, if in many cases less than accurate, that Israel's policies have inflamed anti-Semitism in Europe, the United States and throughout the Muslim world.

But when Gibson's Jesus of Palestine finally makes his way home, could the world's oldest form of anti-Semitism, the charge of Christ-killing, take the opposite route, helping to fan the flames of Palestinian anger against Israelis?

When it finally reaches the Holy Land, could "The Passion of Christ" add new fuel to an already intensely volatile conflict?

'Jesus was a Palestinian'

Certainly many Palestinians, even among the strongly Muslim majority, identify with Jesus. The concept of the holy rebel waging a hopeless, ultimately victorious fight to the death against authorities of overwhelming power, has been long used by Arab cartoonists and editorial writers to represent the Palestinian struggle.

Gibson's "Passion" may ultimately be used by some Palestinians in marshalling anger against Israel, says Haaretz commentator Danny Rubinstein.

In some respects, Palestinian identification with Jesus renders irrelevant the Gospels-driven debate over whether the Jewish establishment or the Romans bore ultimate responsibility for the death of Jesus.

In the Palestinian national metaphor, with an American empire believed to be under the influence of Jewry, Jewish Israel can easily play a simultaneous dual role: that of the armor-clad iron-fisted Roman occupier, and that of the hard-line Tz'doki [Sadducee] Jewish leadership of Roman-ruled first century Judea, a territory which imperial authorities would only after Jesus's death begin to call Palestine.

The point has been driven home repeatedly by Yasser Arafat, who on Christmas Eve 1995, soon after Israeli troops withdrew from Bethlehem, attended his first mass at the traditional site of the manger of Jesus's birth.

"Jesus was a Palestinian," Arafat declared to assembled thousands of Palestinians and Christian pilgrims around the world. He also once wrote the sentence in a message to the Pope.

Christian Palestinian clergymen, taking radical Latin American churches as a rough model, created a Palestinian Liberation Theology based in part on the figure of Jesus.

"Jesus was a refugee and lived under occupation," the movement's founder Dr. Naim Ateek, a canon at St. George's Anglican Cathedral in Jerusalem, told Reuters in 1999, as the Holy Land prepared to celebrate the millenium of Jesus's birth.

"If he's interpreted in this way he becomes a model for faith. So I can learn from him and how he coped with a life under occupation like me," said the U.S.-educated Ateek, who said that when he was 11 in 1948, Jewish soldiers forced his family to flee their home near Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee.

The figure of Jesus, known in Arabic as Issa, also resonates for Muslims as a prophet and saint in Islamic tradition.

Arafat, a devout Muslim, has always been careful to include Christians as integral to the ranks of the Palestinian movement, notes Haaretz commentator Danny Rubinstein.

"Politically, the Palestinians as a national movement, and Arabism as a whole, exists without reference to religious affiliation, it relates rather to language, culture, lifestyle, music, food, dress, but not religion."

When Arafat speaks publicly of going to Jerusalem and flying the Palestinian flag, he often states that he will fly it "from the churches and from the mosques," placing the churches first, Rubinstein says.

Arafat, himself married to a Christian-born convert to Islam, has also been careful to include Christians in his cabinets.

Exodus of Christians

At the same time, many Palestinian Christians, like Christian Arabs in Syria and Lebanon, have left the area, continuing an exodus that has been taking place for more than a century.

"This is in part due to increased access to the West in recent years," Rubinstein continues, citing Latin America and the United States as primary destinations. "In Chile, for example, there are some 30,000 people descended from families from [the Bethelem-area West Bank village of] Beit Jala, with cousins bringing cousins, and so forth. At this point, there are only 6,000 Christians in Beit Jala itself."

Violence in the territories has also been a primary spur of migration, with some Christians moving out of the West Bank into Israeli Arab centers like Ramle.

There has also been increased, if quietly expressed, concern among Christians over the increasingly Islamic nature of Palestinian activism, as symbolized by the use of the expression "Al-Aqsa intifada," focusing on the Muslim holy site.

An expression that has made the rounds in the Palestinian street is "After Shabbat comes Sunday," meaning, Rubinstein says "'After we finish with the people of the Sabbath [the Jews], those who revere the seventh day, we'll begin with the people of Sunday.' I have heard this from Christians, who said this saying was hurled at them in anger during a row."

Christian concerns over intra-Palestinian strife have deepened since September 11, 2001. In the aftermath of American military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, some Muslims have come to view the Bush White House as reincarnating the Christian-led Crusades.

"As long as the war here is one of nationalism, there's no problem, there are Arabs on one side and there are Jews on the other. But if the war begins to acquire a religious dimension, then the Christians find themselves on the other side," says Rubinstein.

Rubinstein quotes an aide to the Pope as having said that if the process of emigration continues, "In one generation, there will be no Christians in Christ's land."

Giving racism a bad name

In the end, the Middle East may serve to exemplify one of the signal lessons of "The Passion of the Christ": that the potential for deep-seated, extra-rational hatred is universal, that no side is exempt from the failing of human cruelty.

In any event, the Israeli-Arab conflict hardly requires wide-screen cinematic fuel to keep its conflagrations white hot.

This was arrestingly illustrated Tuesday by Deputy Defense Minister Ze'ev Boim, when he addressed the issue of why much of local, regional and world terrorism is directed by extremist Muslims.

"What is it about Islam as a whole and the Palestinians in particular?" Boim asked rhetorically, speaking at a memorial for the victims of a Palestinian terror attack that took place 26 years ago.

"Is it some form of cultural deprivation? Is it some genetic defect? There is something that defies explanation in this continued murderousness."

Fellow Likud legislator Yehiel Hazan rushed to defend Boim against charges that the deputy minister had practiced anti-Semitism against the Arab branch of the Semitic peoples.

"He's right," Hazan said, "It's been a known fact for many years that the Arabs slaughter and murder Jews, without any connection to land. It's imprinted in their blood. It's something genetic. I haven't done research, but there's no possibility of explaining it differently.

"You can't believe an Arab, even one who's 40 years in his grave," Hazan said.

Leftist Meretz legislator Avshalom Vilan then condemned both Boim and Hazan for racism of the type practiced by old-fashioned anti-Semites.

"What is this? 'Genetic defect'... 'You can't believe a single Arab.' These are the gravest of generalizations, disgusting, having nothing in common with the truth," said Vilan.

"There is something called terrorism. It must be fought. We need to understand its sources, and to seek to dry them up. But to go into genetics, is like trying to cite the inexplicable for why and how the Jewish people have lasted this long, then to apply all sorts of labels on us such as those in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, then to make accusations of blood libels, and then finish with the terrible massacre of the Holocaust."

Israeli Arab legislator Jamal Zahalka (Balad), then traded muck for muck, responding that "whoever says that Palestinian behavior is caused by a genetic defect, has a brain defect himself and the values of a racist fascist."

Zahalka, accusing Boim of having violated an Israeli law prohibiting racism said Boim was "returning to the same kind of primitive, sickening and dangerous racism from which the Jews have suffered for many generations."

The Arab lawmaker declared, "Boim is giving racism a bad name."
- posted by Izak @ 1:32 PM (0) comments

 
Israeli Orthodox Parliament leader Shas chairman MK Eli Yishai calls for Gibson's Jesus film to be banned in Israel
By Amiram Barkat, Haaretz Correspondent, and Agencies Thu., February 26, 2004 Adar 4, 5764
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=398397&contrassID=1

Shas chairman MK Eli Yishai on Wednesday called for Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" movie to be banned from Israeli cinemas, calling it a blood libel.

In the U.S., the Anti-Defamation League issued a statement saying that the film "repeats all of the stereotypes and myths surrounding the death of Jesus that have accompanied anti-Semitism for the last 2,000 years. Regretfully, Gibson refused all of our attempts for a dialogue aimed at preventing this harm to Jews."

ADL National Director Abraham Foxman said he was troubled by Gibson's claim of historical accuracy. "He made his choice," Foxman told a news conference after viewing the film. "And it's to blame the Jews."

"The Passion," which depicts in gruesome detail the final hours of the life of Jesus, premiered in the U.S. and other countries Wednesday, but not in Israel.

Jewish and other religious groups in Manhattan planned protests for Wednesday. Amcha, The Coalition for Jewish Concerns, planned to wear concentration camp uniforms at a New York theater to link the film's portrayal of Jews to the sort of hate that led to the Nazi Holocaust.

"The whole thing is a blood libel," said Yishai, from the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, using a term that refers to a medieval slur that Jews used the blood of Christians to make unleavened bread for the Passover festival.

However, it appeared unlikely that the film would be banned. Few films have been barred in recent years, and the ones to be forbidden are usually pornographic. The Israeli film board, which makes these decisions, could not be reached for comment.

Yishai said the belief that the Jews had killed Jesus had led to "millions" of Jews being killed and persecuted in the last two millennia.

"This libel used to spread by word of mouth. Now the media are spreading it," Yishai told AP. "We should not accept this."

Yishai said he had also appealed to the Foreign Ministry to try to encourage other governments to bar the film.

Jewish leaders have said that the movie gives a harsh portrayal of Jews and blames them for death of Jesus. They have warned it could lead to a rise in anti-Semitism. Gibson, who also funded and co-scripted the film, denies that charge.

New York Cardinal Edward Egan, meanwhile, wrote to parishes to stress Jews were not responsible for the crucifixion of Jesus.

"He gave His Life for us," Egan wrote in a column to appear in next month's issue of Catholic New York. "No one took it from Him. This is, and has always been, Catholic doctrine."
- posted by Izak @ 1:22 PM (0) comments

 
The House That Stands Forever
WRITTEN by Me SIMSHALOM !

Hi, just a note to remind you that the Hebrew month of Adar has now begun, and Judaism teaches that: “When Adar enters (we should) increase joy” as Purim (day 7th March) and Passover (eve 5th April) approach, both festivals of great joy and happiness.
See “The Joy of Adar” at http://www.vbm-torah.org/purim/pur-eb.htm

(Related to the weekly Torah portion Terumah (“Offering”) read in synagogue 28th Feb `04. Exodus, Chapter 25, verse 1 – Chapter 27, verse 19. Hebrew-English text at
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0225.htm#1 Dedicated to my parents.)

The House That Stands Forever

Somebody gives you a few million dollars, now what do you do with it? Do you stuff into your mattress? Do you share it with the world? Do you stop functioning and go on vacations? The savvy advisors will tell is that you have to “make it work for you”, to “make it last” and “make it grow” through smart “investing” so that it “grows” and that you can “live off it” for the rest of your life and even “hand it over” as a thriving inheritance to your descendants!

That is precisely what happened after God gave the Ten Commandments, the entire Torah in essence, to the Children of Israel. It was the GREATEST TREASURE ever revealed and the Jews became the eternal custodians of it. So how was it to be preserved then?

There are many ways to answer this question. The Torah itself contains many passages that warn that the key to “happy” Jewish history hinges on the best observance of the Torah’s TEACHINGS and its COMMANDMENTS – “MITZVOT”.

The establishment, construction, and endurance of the first religious portable religious spiritual SANCTUARY, which metamorphosed into the permanent TEMPLES which in turn shaped the rise and endurance of the system of multiple SYNAGOGUES (roughly meaning “bring together” in Latin or Greek) known as a House of Prayer - “Beit Tefilah”, or a House of Gathering – “Beit Midrash”, or a House of Learning – Beit Midrash, ALL OF WHICH WERE DIRECTLY BASED ON THE TORAH’S BLUEPRINT as outlined and detailed in this week’s Torah portion. It was THROUGH THESE STRUCTURES THAT THE MANNER AND STYLE OF JEWISH WORSHIP OF GOD WAS PRESERVED AND TRANSMITTED THROUGH ALL THE AGES. They provided the framework for the “transmission” of the spiritual “wealth” of the Torah, much like great fortunes are preserved and transmitted by wealthy families. Just in this case the “families” included all Jewish families committed to Torah life, and the “banking houses” are NOT savvy financial institutions, but HOLY INSTITUTIONS OF JEWISH WORSHIP – “AVODAH” (DIVINE SERVICE).

I would like to quote the famous teaching from the Mishnah Oral Law Teaching of Ethics of the Fathers – “Pirkei Avot” at the outset: “MOSES RECEIVED THE TORAH FROM (AT MOUNT) SINAI AND TRANSMITTED IT…TO THE MEN OF THE GREAT ASSEMBLY…RABBI SHIMON THE RIGHTEOUS WAS AMONG THE SURVIVORS OF THE GREAT ASSEMBLY. HE USED TO SAY: THE WORLD DEPENDS (STANDS) ON THREE THINGS – ON TORAH STUDY, ON THE SERVICE (WORSHIP) [OF GOD], AND ON KIND DEEDS (ACTS OF LOVING-KINDNESS)” (Ethics of the Fathers, Chapter 1, Mishnah 2).
Torah “includes the Written Law and the Oral Law in its entirety and expounded by successive generations of Sages.” [1]

Rabbi Shimon, (who lived about 2,000 years ago), of this Mishnah, is not giving a “personal” opinion. He is stating a UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLE OF JUDAISM: That the very FOUNDATIONS of the world are built FIRST on the TORAH! That is the foundation that is embodied by the GIVING OF THE TORAH – “MATTAN TORAH” and is symbolized by the physical Ten Commandments on the two tablets of “sapphire” stone. Where do they go? Into the “HOLY ARK” which is placed into the Holy of Holies within the Sanctuary. Surrounded by all the other holy objects, such as the TABLE, ALTAR, and “MENORAH” which have a variety of functions or “SERVICES”, known as the “AVODAH”. And this is what Rabbi Shimon states that the world rests on this SERVICE – “AVODAH” too: “The SERVICE of God, i.e. the SACRIFICIAL SERVICE in the Temple and, IN THE ABSENCE OF THE TEMPLE, STUDY OF THE LAWS REGARDING THE SERVICE. IN ITS BROADER SENSE, SERVICE REFERS TO PRAYER AND THE PERFORMANCE OF THE COMMANDMENTS.” [2]

So we have two foundations of the world in place right here in the Sanctuary, where does the third component of KIND DEEDS – “GEMILUT CHASADIM” come into the picture? The answer, as we shall explain later, is that the entire process of building, maintaining and supporting both the TORAH and the AVODAH of not just the sanctuary, but of the entire world is built upon the KINDNESS and GENEROSITY that people give of their wealth, efforts, know-how and SELFLESSNESS towards maintaining the entire EDIFICE of Torah - religious, communal and social, material and physical needs. The world rests on the Torah, the Service – “Avodah”, and Kind Deeds.

Why the need for a special “HOUSE OF or FOR GOD” or “RELIGIOUS EDIFICES or BODIES” in the first place? What motivates the need for such things?

In many instances, the more precious something is, the greater its need for an outer casing. The most expensive jewels and valuables are stored in massive secure vaults. Historical books and items of great importance are preserved in professional libraries. Great paintings and works of art are guarded in museums and private collections. The vegetables and fruits we eat grow in peels and shells awaiting the right (ripe) minute for our mouths. Chocolates and gifts are no fun if they are not wrapped in fancy paper and boxes. Fine wines and liquors come in exotic bottles and canisters designed to beguile the eye and lure the palate as they flatter the contents. In the animal kingdom many have skins and furs that not only give them natural, and beautiful, insulation, but are also prized for the same protection and elegance they can convey upon men and women as clothes and fashions.

On a human level, an infant is protected from the outside world first by its mother’s body and is then swaddled by layers of warm clothes and covers. Children are protected from harm with fences and alarms and by being watched and cared for at home and school. Most civilized people cannot survive even moderate changes in climate without any clothing or physical shelter. Human beings have an innate need to be housed and protected. For work purposes, all sorts of structures are erected to enable business and commerce to take place within them, from the computer cubicle to the convention center. Societies and states with populations and resources to protect from outside threats and dangers, must shield their people and assets militarily from fortifications and posts to missile “shields and umbrellas”.

It goes even deeper than that, as Judaism believes that the body HOUSES and HOSTS an indefinable ethereal abstract entity called the “SOUL” (“NESHAMAH” in Hebrew), that is in fact its original SPARK OF LIGHT rooted to the SOURCE OF LIFE which provides an ongoing connection to LIVING and ultimately is linked to the Divine: “NER HASHEM NISHMAT ADAM” – “(THE) LIGHT OF GOD (IS THE) SOUL OF MAN, which searches the chambers of ones innards,” says the book of Proverbs (Chapter 20, verse 27) and as Rabbeinu Yonah (Rabbi Yonah ben Avraham of Gerona. Spain, c.1200 – 1263) explains: “BY MEANS OF THE SOUL, GOD SEARCHES MAN’S INNERMOST THOUGHTS AND SCRUTINIZES HIM”. [3] Thus the SOUL is compared to LIGHT which is inside the special “LIGHTHOUSE” within each and every one of us, casting a glow on the darkness and instinctively, intuitively, almost imperceptibly guiding us to safe harbor as our frail bodies, like battered ships (the “houses” of the sea) sail across the stormy oceans of life praying not to be sunk before our time has come to leave the world in peace.

If we take a close look at the Torah’s description of the first man’s creation, it says that: “God formed man out of dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils a ‘BREATH (SOUL) OF LIFE’ – ‘NISHMAT CHAIM’” (Genesis, Chapter 2, verse 7). “Breath” and “Soul” in Hebrew have the same root origin. The Hebrew words for “breath of” are “nishmat”. The “BREATH” is the “N E S H I M A H”. The Hebrew word for the SOUL is the “N E S H A M A H”, because the SOUL – “NESHAMAH” is the source of LIFE –“CHAIM” which is manifested by the obvious fact that a person has BREATH – “NESHIMAH”. So we see clearly that the SOUL comes from God since He is the one who “breaths” it into Adam having made him from the “dust of the ground”. Therefore, the material, physical, corporeal earth and dust-like vessel that is the human body, is the REPOSITORY for the Divine Soul. The body “houses” the soul, as much as our homes “house” us. Furthermore, the world, meaning the totality of our planet and universe, is a grand-scale home for all of humanity that is “housed” upon the face of the globe.

Judaism also teaches that just as the soul is “housed” or “clothed” by the body, and the body in turn is literally dressed by clothes, it is a metaphor for the Torah which has a spiritual “soul” as in its esoteric mystical teachings and the Oral Law – “TORAH SHE-BEAL PEH”, which are housed in the body of the Written Torah – “TORAH SHE-BICHTAV”, which in turn is “clothed” by the COMMANDMENTS – “MITZVOT” and the Codes of Law relating to life in the everyday “real” world, all of which are studied and practiced by the House of Israel – “BEIT YISRAEL”.

Can we point to any root source for these concepts in the Torah and Judaism?

What is the real “truth of the truth” as to why the more sophisticated people are, the greater the value and stress they place of the centrality of “housing” in their lives?

After all, for thousands of years billions of people lived in carved out caves, scraggly tents, primitive mud or thatched huts, and even under the natural shades of the trees and vines without needing a special place to “call their own”, so why the need for something more?

What is the hidden essence of any structures that makes them special to people, whereby a house is not necessarily a “home”, and my home can be my “castle”, and a castle can become a “ruin” but could also become a wondrous “castle in the sky”, and my dull little town turns into a shining “city on a hill”?

What is the essence of the PRIVATE Jewish home, the place where each family contributes to the foundation, stability, growth, variety, and strength of the Jewish People – Nation (Children) of Israel – Hebrews?

Taking a quantum leap, what defines a “House of Worship” as it is called on common parlance?

What are the roots and explanations of those uniquely Jewish PUBLIC holy places: The Tabernacle - “MISHKAN” of the Exodus and early Israel; The First, and Second, Holy Temple – “BEIT HAMIKDASH” that stood in Jerusalem; and the rise of the SYNAGOGUE – “BEIT HAKNESET” for prayers and worship and the Yeshiva and Study Hall – “BEIT HAMIDRASH” for learning, studying and teaching Torah?

This week’ Torah portion of TERUMAH, refers to the “OFFERINGS” or “GIFTS”, “CONTRIBUTIONS”, “DONATIONS” that God requests from the Children Israel (Exodus, Chapter 25 vs. 1 – 9):

This is to provide the materials to enable the construction of the FIRST PERMANENT , albeit portable, RELIGIOUS SANCTUARY to get underway. The core purpose of these contributions is so that: “THEY SHALL MAKE ME A SANCTUARY (‘MIKDASH’ – ‘A HOLY PLACE’), AND I WILL DWELL (‘SHOCHANTI’) AMONG THEM. YOU MUST MAKE THE TABERNACLE (‘HAMISHKAN’) AND ALL ITS FURNISHINGS FOLLOWING THE PLANS THAT I AM SHOWING YOU.” (Exodus, Chapter 25, vs. 8 – 9) [4]

(Note that the rabbis point out that the verse is seemingly “misdirected”, meaning that it should state: “make me a sanctuary and I will dwell IN IT (i.e. the sanctuary)” and NOT “AMONG THEM”. Why is that so? After all doesn’t God want a “dwelling” here on earth to live in? And the answer is uniquely Jewish in that God has not “interest” in “dwelling” in a “place of worship” if the people in it have not let God into THEIR PERSONAL SELVES FIRST! This is the classical mistake of superficiality in religious life that so many people make, placing God into a neat “two by four” (ok, maybe a bit bigger than that) “enclosure”, and “arranging” to “meet” with Him at pre-appointed times as if He were the “ultimate executive” to be found in “the office” 9 to 5 so to speak, like “the doctor is in” now during services. This is blatantly childish as the verse here teaches that sanctity is created when God is constantly in our PERSONAL lives and NOT WITHIN THE HOLLOW PHYSICAL STRUCTURES. After all, at one time God saw fit to allow the complete destruction of the ancient Temples because of this kind of misunderstanding and abuse, and that is why we mourn on the Ninth of Av – “Tisha BeAv’.)

What goes into a SANCTUARY / TABERNACLE / TEMPLE / (and eventually a SYNAGOGUE)?

These that follow are to be among the crucial and necessary “FURNISHINGS” for God’s HOLY PLACE. All the elements to be enumerated as necessary for the SANCTUARY would continue FOREVERMORE, either literally or symbolically, as the Jews traveled through time. All the features would be place into the permanent Temples and even enhanced. When these would be destroyed, first by Babylonia and then by Rome, the Jewish People would RECREATE and REESTABLISH them within each and every formal SYNAGOGUE and YESHIVA structure, as soon as they found the freedom, and place to settle down. Resources, time and money were never held back to establish the needed core of any COMMUNITY – “KEHILLAH” during over 2,500 years of exile:

An “ARK OF THE COVENANT” (Exodus Chapter 25, vs. 10 – 22):
(Diagram: http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/mishkan/23.htm )

Also known as the “ARK OF THE TESTIMONY”, a square box made of special wood with an outer and inner layer of gold boxes, with two golden “KERUVIM” – dramatic and mysterious “male-child~female-child, cherub-like, bird-winged, figures” facing each other, on top of the Ark, into which will be placed, “REST”, the TEN COMMANDMENTS inscribed on the two tablets of stone. This will be placed in the inner sanctum to be called the “Holy of Holies” – “KODESH HAKODASHIM”.

Perhaps it may be said that this is analogous to the most private part of any home, the BEDROOM that is the place where the husband and wife dwell together in HOLINESS, as the Jewish marriage is called “KIDDUSHIN”. The mission of the Jewish home is to produce God-fearing good children and Judaism teaches that this comes about when the mother and father join to produce the body and God joins them to provide the soul. Hence the expression in classical Judaism that there are “Three partners to [creation] of man; the Holy One, the father and mother” (Talmud, Tractate Niddah). From the mother and father comes the body and from God comes the SOUL”.

In any SYNAGOGUE, this remains the HOLIEST spot. It is the ARK where the Torah scrolls are permanently stored. To this day, when the doors of the ark are opened, the congregation rises and the level of holiness present is considered to be higher than usual.

The special TABLE (Exodus Chapter 25, vs. 23 – 30):
(Diagram: http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/mishkan/18.htm )

Also known as the “TABLE OF THE SHOW (or “SHEW”) BREAD”, made of wood and overlaid with gold, upon which were placed TWELVE LOAVES of specially baked bread, which is the origin for the concept of a “DOZEN”. This is representative of man’s need for basic nourishment and for elevation and dedication of the eating act to one of holiness.

It is symbolic of the “kitchen” and dining room of the Jewish home that places great emphasis on holiday and Shabbat meals with bread being on the “highest level’ of any mundane food requiring the most serious Blessings and Grace after meals.

Perhaps one may surmise that these are the tables or “pews” in synagogues, at which congregants sit and pray, or follow along with the Torah readings, placing their prayer books upon the tables, “taking in” the words of the services and having faith and trust that God will answer their prayers for daily bread and success in dealings with our fellow man.

The GOLDEN LAMP, SEVEN-CUPPED CANDELABRUM - “MENORAH” (Exodus, Chapter 25, vs. 31 – 40):
(Diagram: http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/mishkan/16.htm )

In order to provide and symbolize LIGHT on all levels. No house or home can exist without basic lighting and the TABERNACLE and TEMPLE were no different. Probably aside from the Star (Shield) of David , the “MAGEN DAVID”, no item better symbolizes the whole essence of Judaism and Godliness than the “MENORAH” from which shone forth light. It is symbolic from the first “LIGHT” of Creation, to the “LIGHT” of the Torah, and the “HIDDEN LIGHT” – “OR HAGANUZ” of the End of Days. The great mystical text of Judaism is called the “ZOHAR” which means “SHINING’ as its teachings “SHED LIGHT” upon hidden mysteries in the Torah.

Most amazingly, modern science has “discovered” that “LIGHT” is the “BUILDING BLOCK” of all “existence” as everything in the universe is nothing but energy in the form of light.

The Jewish people has a role as a “LIGHT UNTO THE NATIONS” and the Jewish home is the custodian of all the “LITTLE LIGHTS” of its precious children as they grow up to become great shining bastions of the right kind of “en-LIGHT-enment” (hopefully!) Every synagogue has an “ETERNAL LIGHT” – “NER TAMID” near the front above the Ark where the Torahs are kept. There is a custom in some places to light a candle, and obviously to TURN ON THE LIGHTS, before services begin, as to pray in darkness is a sign of mourning, and one should be happy when facing God in prayer. The greatest symbol of light is the Torah, and its fusion with the Jews as a symbol of LIGHT in all its positive connotations.

The ALTAR – “MIZBEIACH” (Exodus, Chapter 27, vs. 1 – 8):
(Diagram: http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/mishkan/14.htm )

Upon which would be offered SACRIFICIAL slaughtered KOSHER ANIMALS. It was also referred to as the “ALTAR OF EARTH”, the “OUTSIDE ALTAR”, or the “BRASS ALTAR”. From the dawn of time God desired the institution of animal sacrifices both as an “ATONEMENT” – “KAPARAH” (as for example on the DAY OF ATONEMENT, know as “YOM KIPPUR”) for man (rather the animal than the person) and as a “GIFT” from man and as a “SPECIAL AROMA” to God.

By symbolic extension to the Jewish home we are talking about the oven and grill upon which are cooked and roasted all the delicious kosher meats, and much else of course, which we should consider as being a form of our own “SERVING” of God as we eat meat NOT as frustrated “cannibals” but as people who can serve God through the fine foods we cook and consume with the proper Blessings and intentions to serve God.

This makes the despicable practice of human “sacrifices” totally unnecessary and evil, as people should transfer their sins upon the beasts of the field that will please God sufficiently.

On a far more tragic note, we must remember that during the Holocaust (1939 – 1945) over SIX MILLION JEWS perished, and many of them had to face death in the face of FIRING Squads and if they were gassed to death THEIR BODIES WERE BURNED TO ASHES IN THE CREMATORIA of “en-LIGHT-ened” Europe, by Nazis who were MORE merciful to animals and cared nothing for their fellow humans whom they sent up in SMOKE!

In a synagogue, the “Altar” is the “BIMAH”, meaning an “ELEVATED PLACE”, as an ancient altar was referred to as a “BAMAH”. Whenever the Torah is taken out of the Ark it is brought to the “BIMAH” which is like an ALTAR UPON WHICH ARE PLACED HOLY OFFERINGS. Since we cannot and do not offer any form of “living” sacrifices, we often times read, especially on each and every Holy Day – “YOM TOV”, those PORTIONS and SECTIONS from the Torah that describe the ancient offerings. This is in lieu of the “real thing” and because there is no Temple standing in Jerusalem, the Torah readings on the “BIMAH” are considered as if they had been offered on the original ALTAR.

The body of the SANCTUARY, (Exodus, Chapter 26, vs. 1 – 36; Chapter 27, vs. 9 – 19):
(Diagram: http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/mishkan/1.htm )

It is called a HOLY PLACE - “MIKDASH”. This is not yet the full and permanent Temple that will be built in Jerusalem hundreds of years later. It is to be its core and will be a “PORTABLE STRUCTURE” to be called THE TABERNACLE – “MISHKAN”. The SANCTUARY is to be made with beams, crossbars, held together with special fasteners, covered with special woven sheets and skins that will create a roof, walls, enclosures and partitions. There are many details. The “MISHKAN” which literally means “DWELLING PLACE” because God designates it as His “HOME AWAY FROM HOME” for His Divine Presence known as the “SHECHINAH” , which is connected to the same Hebrew root as “MISHKAN”.

The “S H E CH I N A H” known as God’s “’Feminine’ PRESENCE” can also mean “THAT WHICH DWELLS”. For example, in Hebrew, a street or a neighborhood is called a “SH` CH U N A H”, a neighbor is a “SHACHEN”, (“SHECHENIM” in plural), and a “SHICUN” is a small house or cottage.

This “Tabernacle” is NOT to be confused with the portable “hut” known as a “SUKKAH” which has its own festival called “SUKKOT”, or “TABERNACLES” in English, commemorating the miracle that God preserved and protected the Children of Israel in “huts”/Sukkot/Tabernacles after the Exodus in the 40 years of the wonderings in the wilderness. In English though, the word “tabernacle ”, is derived from “tabern” which means “hut” and “cule” means “small” in Latin, probably related to the word “tavern” maybe even to “barn”. Interestingly, a “tavern” is the ancient concept of a “hotel” where one can find rest and food on a journey far from home, and a “barn” is a place where grain, foodstuffs, and animals are kept for the benefit of people, especially in the ages before deep freeze and mass containers.

The concept of the “SUKKAH” as a portable structure is endowed with its special religious aura and somehow hinting at the future permanent Third Temple which is described as “SUKKAT DAVID” – THE SANCTUARY OF DAVID. It also hints at a future wondrous mystical structure, THE SKIN OF THE LEVIATHAN (FISH) – “ORO SHEL LIVYATAN”, that will HOUSE the righteous at a final Grand Banquet.

Let us look at that third component of the world’s foundation, KINDNESS, as mentioned by Rabbi Shimon in Ethics of the Fathers, Chapter 1, Mishnah 2.

The Torah records that God required that HOW all of this was to become possible is the foundation for WHAT was to happen. Meaning, that now the Children of Israel were called upon to make a PERSONAL SACRIFICE, assuming their natural KINDNESS – “CHESED”, and give up something that they may have held to be of “PERSONAL VALUE” as a CONTRIBUTION to the “COMMUNAL NECESSITY” for a “PLACE OF WORSHIP”.

Amazingly, wherever Jews have gone to live, one of the first things they do is build a “SHULL” (Yiddish for Synagogue). Money is always found to do it, and when the community eventually leaves, the “SHULL” will be the last communal structure to close down. Jews have always excelled at philanthropy. Per capita they are probably the most generous and giving nation in human history. In the United States Jews have contributed untold BILLIONS of dollars each YEAR to all sorts of HUMANITARIAN causes over the past fifty years out of all proportion to their relatively tiny numbers in the general population. Secular assimilated Jews have HAPPILY given away their hard earned billions to universities, hospitals, foundations, medical research, employment training, education, scholarships, community centers, democratization of societies, and countless positive needs. Where has this wonderful “philanthropic gene” come from? You don’t have to look far to know that it comes from, firstly the kind Jewish hearts of the Jewish people during the ages, and secondly from the religion and commandments of Judaism as outlined in the Torah and voluntarily practiced with great joy by Jews for millennia.

A few days ago I happened to witness a telling incident. I was at a synagogue after the conclusion of morning services that is attended by some very astute professional people. There were perhaps about twenty of them lingering to say “Mazel Tov” (congratulations) to a congregant whose wife had just given birth to a girl, so they were distracted and even anxious before trotting off to work; businessmen, accountants, brokers, teachers and some others. Suddenly out of nowhere a hassled young many appears, not a member of the community and never seen before, who approaches the center of the synagogue in a rushed and urgent manner. In a fairly loud, unprofessional, yet coherent manner he states, talking to no-one and everyone at the same time, that he is on a self-appointed mission to collect funds for a family that recently came from Israel and is living on the other side of town. The father is very ill and needs to have several serious surgeries but that the family does not have medical coverage, (sadly this is common for so many people in America too). In the course of his pitch the young man does mention the name of some rabbis who know the family and endorse the appeal and the name of some non-profit organization that will provide the needed receipts for donations if need be. I do not think anybody really noted the names of the “endorsing” rabbis. I for one had never heard of them. No one even bothered to ask the guy his name nor the name of the sick person. But what did come across was that this was a sincere religious young man deeply concerned about a suffering fellow Jew crying out for help. From what I could tell, by the time the young fellow left, he had collected a few hundred dollars, some in cash, mostly in personal checks, all unexpected and “out of the blue”. He left as “mysteriously” as he arrived. The synagogue had already done its own daily minor voluntary collection earlier, and not everyone gives to blank strangers, and I am sure some in the crowd had doubts whether to give for THIS “appeal”. But what came across loud and clear was the warm welcome, openness and generosity of the majority of those present.

The above is not some “isolated freak occurrence”. It is typical of the natural generosity that is inherent in every Jewish heart, and hopefully in all humanity. Classical Judaism teaches that in fact the ENTIRE WORLD IS BUILT ON GOD’S OWN IMMENSE KINDNESS – “OLAM CHESED YIBANEH” (Psalms, Chapter 89, verse 3). It is this very QUALITY of KINDNESS, so close to God’s true essence, when people overcome their tendencies towards parochial selfishness, that actually signals and “triggers” God to “ENTER INTO” our world when he asks us to make a SANCTUARY for Him: “Take My offering from everyone WHOSE HEART IMPELS HIM TO GIVE” (Exodus, Chapter 25, verse 2). (Probably this is the first and most major instance of a “CAPITAL CAMPAIGN”, as it’s known in today’s fundraising parlance, for a “religious institution” stated in the Torah by God Himself, no wonder fundraisers many times have that air of …. well, you fill in the blanks yourself, as hopefully your experiences have been positive.): “God spoke to Moses, saying: speak to the Israelites and have them bring to me an offering. Take my offering from everyone whose HEART IMPELS HIM TO GIVE…gold, silver, copper, blue wool,…lines, skins, acacia wood, oil for the lamp, …incense, …precious stones…” [5] And as classical Judaism teaches “(THOSE GOOD) THINGS THAT GO OUT FROM (YOUR) HEART, ENTER (INTO ANOTHER’S) HEART” – “DEVARIM HAYOTZIM MIN HALEV NICHNASIM EL HALEV”, so it’s so to speak from God’s Heart to your heart and then back again to God’s Heart that makes the OFFERING – “TERUMAH, also called the “NEDAVAH” – “GIVING” significant and valuable from God’s perception.

So we come full circle as we see that foundations of both the world and the Tabernacle were based on KINDNESS and GENEROSITY. The gentile nations of the world were also welcomed to give appropraite offerings. This is all derived from the original forefathers, Abraham who embodied KINDNESS, Isaac who embodied SELF-SACRIFICING SERVICE, and Jacob who was the embodiment of TRUTH the “seal” of God. “On Three things the World Stands: On Torah; and On Service (‘Avodah’); and On Kindness (‘Gemilut Chasadim’)”!

Have a great Shabbat, and please let me know what you think!

[1] Pirkei Avos – Ethics of the Fathers, Artscroll English prayer book, p. 544 – 545.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Book of Proverbs, Tanach – 24 Books of the Bible, Artscroll English translation, p. 1597.
[4] The Living Torah, English translation by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, p. 382 – 383.
[5] Ibid.
- posted by Izak @ 2:31 AM (0) comments

 
Judaism and Law: The Greatest Constitution
WRITTEN BY ME, SIMSHALOM simshalom@att.net

Hi, wishing you a wonderful Shabbat. Please remember that this Shabbat is called Shabbat Shekalim one of the 4 special ones and this one is the first always coming before Purim. See more about it at: http://www.ou.org/chagim/fourshabbatot/shekalim.htm

(Related to the weekly Torah portion of Mishpatim (Judgments), read in synagogue 21st February `04. Exodus, Chapter 21, verse 1 – Chapter 24, verse 18.
Hebrew – English Text: http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0221.htm#1
English Text with Commentary of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan at:
http://bible.ort.org/books/pentd2.asp?ACTION=displaypage&BOOK=2&CHAPTER=21
Dedicated to my parents).

Judaism and Law: The Greatest Constitution

Most people are not conscious of the fact that they live in a society that is governed by laws that essentially protect them and their human, religious, political, and civil rights. In the United States children are educated about the written Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and a Bill of Rights. They are taught how the system of government is based on “checks and balances” between the three branches of the legislative, judicial, and executive branches. But once out of the classroom, nobody gives a second thought to the legal system that makes all the freedom possible.

The United States’ Declaration of Independence from its mother country of Great Britain was written in 1776, two and a quarter centuries ago, and is considered to be a revolutionary document “ahead of its time” in modern history. It preceded the famous French Revolution of 1789 that in time brought Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity to its citizens. The Russian Revolution that overthrew the Czarist system took place in 1917 was supposed to bring more freedom to the people. It was only after the Second World War (1939 – 1945), after the crushing defeats of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, that the rest of the world was able to obtain freedom from the remaining colonial powers, such as Israel and India from Britain in 1948. All of these movements of national liberation and freedom were inspired by the “American Experience” and unfolded in relatively recent times.

The question arises: What was the hidden volatile powerful explosive and dynamic SPARK, the special root source, for the very concept of declarations of freedom, constitutions, bills of rights and balancing governmental powers between an executive leader and counterbalancing powers as in a judiciary and a legislature?

Classical Judaism would say, hey, that’s an easy question, because the greatest of humanity’s laws is rooted in the Torah, because after all, humanity itself is rooted in the Torah, and in fact all of existence and reality, all the knowable and unknowable dimensions are rooted in the Torah. Why is that? Because in classical Judaism, the Torah is so-to-speak in abstract terms GOD’S MIND as it were. Obviously God is unknowable and inscrutable. However, classical Torah sources teach that GOD, THE TORAH and ISRAEL are ONE – “YISRAEL, VE’ORAYTA, VEKUDSHAH BRICH HU CHAD HU”. It is through the Torah that God “reveals” His Mind, Intentions, Goals, Expectations, Demands, and Predictions for us as well as for all humankind! God is the ultimate CONTINUUM in ABSOLUTE TERMS. Then the Torah is a CONTINUUM of teachings, laws, and judgments and the source of all TRUE KNOWLEDGE no matter what kind, be it mathematics, biology, history, philosophy or religion, what have you, nothing in the fields of human knowledge and experience, ideas or phenomena, can “knock down” the Torah’s teachings and narratives.

On the contrary, with the passage of time, it is the Torah’s worldview that has permeated the world, be it through its main HIDDEN conduit of Judaism, or through its “surrogates” such as Christianity and Islam as the famous RAMBAM (with an “M”), Rabbi Moses Maimonides (Spain, North Africa, 1135 – 1204), teaches. (This does NOT mean to say that classical Judaism “endorses” these other alien faiths that it considers to be flawed and false. Just that the founders of the faiths expropriated from the Jewish Bible and so unwittingly also transmitted some core teachings to the pagans of the world who would have otherwise remained completely ignorant to “Biblical” concepts such as Monotheism, the Decalogue and much else.)

Humanity too IS a solid CONTINUUM from Adam and Eve until the time God will see fit to conclude the current cycle of civilization as we know it and Creation will have reached its original purpose. And starting with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Jewish People are a WONDROUS CONTINUUM all of their own encapsulating and symbolizing the heart of all the other CONTINUUMS. Hence the expression: THE INDESTRUCTIBLE JEWS. Finally, as time will draw to a close with the dawn of the SEVENTH Jewish millennium, the one connected to all the concepts of the SABBATH, a new era will awaken. We cannot know what it will be like, but Judaism does teach about the times of the JEWISH Messiah, a place called “Gan Eden” (Garden of Eden in Hebrew), the END OF DAYS – “ACHARIT HAYAMIM”, and a FUTURE WORLD the “OLAM HABAH”, AND THEY ALL STRESS THAT IT WILL BE AN ERA OF PEACE AND HOLINESS AND THE TORAH WILL BE AS CENTRAL AS EVER ALL THE TIME. Thus, there are no “pit stops” and/or detours to exotic islands of escapes in time, such as the fictions of movies and books create in the minds of the masses, from God, as Jonah tried, or flights of fancy from the TRUTH of the UNIFIED CONTINUUM of world history that is moving in one direction only whether we want it to or not. Just as Pharaoh could not fight the will of God when he saw that nature was nothing but a straw puppet, similarly, the modern Naturalists cannot escape to their ivory towers and gilded TV cages as they note that there their beguiling intellects and hidden passions were ensnared by false gods with clay feet.

Thus we are not just looking at some ancient “religious code” of laws when we look at the “dry facts of the law” in this week’s Torah portion. The comprehensive CIVIL LAWS with over FIFTY (out of the “613”) applicable Commandments – “MITZVOT” are all part of a greater human and spiritual CONTINUUM of the “TORAT CHAIM” – TORAH OF LIFE of an “ELOKIM CHAIM” – A LIVING GOD, as observed by the “AM YISREAL CHAI” – THE LIVING NATION OF ISRAEL:

Freedom for the slaves; Punishing a murderer; Penalties for injuries and damages; Dealing with the thief and robber; Damaged property; Judging between a plaintiff and a defendant; Laws of guardianship; Cases of borrowers and lenders; Eliminating seduction; Lending money to the poor; Prohibition of “loan sharking”; Not charging interest; Not to curse the judges or rulers; Paying tithes from crops on time; Ignoring false rumors; Do not follow a wicked majority; Judges need to be learned and clear; Following a majority in good Torah laws; Impartiality in court; Relieving the burden of another; Rejecting circumstantial evidence in capital cases; No bribery; Observing a Sabbatical year. And then follow a few more laws concerning the Sabbath, not swearing by an idol’s name, sacrificial offerings, first fruits, not eating meat and milk together, dealing with enemies in Israel, removing evil gentile influences from Israel. These are the great laws in this week’s Torah portion, going well beyond what we can deal with comprehensively.


These are all revolutionary milestones in the establishment of a world order based on the revealed Torah Law that emanated from Mount Sinai. Judaism believes that it was because these laws were Divine in origin, that they were rooted in the MOST POWERFUL FORCES OF ALL, that are in fact an expression of God’s Will in this world that the laws of the Torah have continued to be trailblazing pathways that have carved out the roads and highways for all subsequent MORAL, JUST, and HUMANE legal systems that respect the fact that there is a God in the Universe and that he is in fact the final Judge! As Abraham pleaded with God to show mercy to even the wicked people of Sodom: “…SHALL THE WHOLE WORLD’S JUDGE NOT ACT JUSTLY?” (Genesis, Chapter 18, verse 25). http://bible.ort.org/books/pentd2.asp?ACTION=displaypage&BOOK=1&CHAPTER=18

Indeed, Judaism celebrates its HOLIEST DAYS OF THE YEAR the Ten Day Period from the JEWISH NEW YEAR – “ROSH HASHANAH” to the DAY OF ATONEMENT – “YOM KIPPUR” as a process of God sitting in Judgment over each individual and nation. It is the time when people and events are JUDGED by God as to WHO WILL LIVE AND WHO WILL DIE in the coming year. So Judaism views the entire cosmos as being enveloped within God’s Judicial system with the Torah being its Constitution and the Ten Commandments being its core heart and soul. It applied then, it applies now, and it will always apply, no matter what the Social Sciences may teach about the nebulous functions of “Social Systems” and the “rise and fall” of personalities, psychologies, tastes, trends, fashions, institutions, societies, civilizations and universes.

(Remember any of these?: The “theory” that “meteor showers” killed out the bumbling dinosaurs billions of years ago as they foraged for food in swamps that sucked them under forever? The destructiveness of the “Social Darwinism” “philosophy” that has been linked to the rise of Fascism? The actual fact that the “moon rocks” were no different to your own garden variety of stones? Walt Disney’s animated “Jiminy Cricket” regaling you with the song “You ARE A ‘Human ANIMAL’” in biology class? Putting time capsules in the ground with everyday items in them so that a million years from now (then) people, very “evolved” by then no doubt, will know what we ate and did for fun? Famous musicians took on names of “beetles” and “stones”? And why the relentless drive wasting trillions of dollars in the unsuccessful push to find even one measly under-nourished itsy-bitsy amoeba in space someplace that is obviously MIA in space and “out to lunch” down here on earth in everyone’s kitchen sink??? Such is the magnificent scientific and sociological trivia search we live with as we have evolved to the stage of TV “reality shows” where people eat garbage under the hot sun, and couples go on national television for an “intimate” date. Our society shows no signs of letting up on its own determination to make itself outlandish and out of the ball park, scientifically, sociologically and psychologically speaking.)

In this weeks portion the Torah makes a huge quantum leap when it introduces a flood of “MISHPATIM” which means JUDGMENTS / STATUTES / LAWS / RULINGS /. A “SHOFET” is a JUDGE, a “MISHPAT” is a RULING /ADJUDICATION / LAW / JUDGMENT. A “BEIT MISHPAT” is a COURT. And of the four Codified Sections of the Jewish Code of Law – “HALACHAH”, the “SHULCHAN ARUCH’, one Sections is called the “CHOSHEN MISHPAT” – Which deals mainly with matters of Civil Law: Laws and guidelines relating to appointment of Judges; Laws of Testimony and Witnesses; Business Law of Lending and Borrowing; Monetary Claims and Adjudication of Financial Disputes; Guarantors and Underwriting; Property Disputes; Partnerships; Representatives; Sales and Purchases; Wrongful Purchase; Gifts; Lost and Found; Theft and Robbery; Monetary Damages; Personal Injury and Claims of Compensation. These laws are discussed and analyzed in great depth in Talmudic Tractates – “MASECHTOT” such as Baba Kamma, Baba Metzia, Babba Kama, Sanhedrin and others way beyond the scope of this essay. What they all have in common is that everything in Jewish Law is derived from the verses and statements in the Torah such as we learn in this week’s Torah portion. And these are not “college courses”, they have been the staples of classical Torah and ‘yeshiva’ (Torah and Talmudical school) education for thousands of years. The Talmud itself begins as mature system over two thousand years ago.


Secular Legal scholars share the confusion of secular scientists and of the Social Science and Humanities scholars, when they just cannot get past the historical smoke screen of modernity’s cultural propaganda that blinds them to an understanding of the origins of Law as it is understood in the Western world. They follow dead ends and dark alleys rather than take a look at what is in front of their noses. Some start with the Middle Ages, and others look at English Common Law and Roman Law or fiddle with some obscure illegible cracked codex scribbled on clay deemed to be the starting points of the great legal heritage. The Nazis invoked Nordic and ancient Persian myths to buttress their racist “laws” made for their new cruel race of “supermen” - “ubermentschen”. Murderous Jihads, justified by some Moslems as based on a law that seems to have its origins in hallucinations in the over-heated Arabian deserts still fires up fanatics to kill innocent men, women and children without any recourse to minimal humane legal due process. The Czars of Russia were just a “law unto themselves” from Ivan the Terrible To Nicholas the Last. In France, the Kings were absolute monarchs who believed like Louis XIV that “I am the State”.

In the Oral Law teachings of the Ethics of the Fathers – “Pirkei Avot” the Talmud’s own source of JURISPRUDENCE, the very first teaching deals with the REVELATION OF THE LAW AND ITS TRANSMISSION: “ Moses received the Torah from [Mount] Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua; Joshua to the elders; the Elders to the Prophets; and the Prophets transmitted it to the Men of the Great assembly. They [the Men of the Great Assembly] said three things: BE DELIBERATE IN JUDGMENT; DEVELOP MANY DISCIPLES; AND MAKE A FENCE FOR THE TORAH.” (Ethics of the Fathers, Chapter 1, Mishna 1) [1] We see from this the centrality of the concept that the LAW of the Torah, in its ENTIRETY was handed down by Moses through the generations and in fact they were encouraged to protect it with making additional “laws”, i.e. “FENCES”, to protect the original body of laws. The first bit of GREAT legal advice that is stated unequivocally here is to “BE DELIBERATE IN JUDGMENT”, this means: “Do not give hasty decisions, but analyze each question in depth. Rendering a fair judgment is one of the highest forms of Torah study (Rashi, Rambam, Rabbeinu Yonah –[Three classical Torah commentators]).” [2] The first chapter concludes with the following famous statement: “RABBAN SHIMON BEN GAMLIEL SAYS: THE WORLD ENDURES ON THREE THINGS – JUSTICE, TRUTH, AND PEACE, AS IT IS SAID: ‘TRUTH AND THE VERDICT OF PEACE ARE TO ADJUDICATE IN YOUR GATES’ (Zechariah, Chapter 8, verse 16)” (Ethics of the Fathers, Chapter 1, Mishna 1) [3]. Justice is “DIN” in Hebrew and it is related to the Name for God that Jews use for God: “ADONAI” meaning “My Lord”, the One Who applies “DIN” to me, hence also being consistent with the English language origins of the word “law” in the name “Lord”.

So here is another question that deserves some of your intellectual curiosity: HOW DO YOU SQUARE OFF AND RECONCILE THE BASIC PREMISES OF A GREAT LEGAL SYSTEM AND CONSTITUTION WITH ACCEPTANCE AND BELIEF IN THE MEANINGS AND RAMIFICATIONS OF THE POPULAR THEORY OF EVOLUTION?

Essentially what I am asking is how do you reconcile two contradictory philosophies of life and living? A study of the Law in America will lead you to its roots in Biblical Moral Spiritual Divine Law, with its belief in One God and the foundations of Humanity’s Godliness and Holiness. Life assumed along the lines of the popularly held views of Evolutionary Theory, and the fact that so many scientists are “devoted” to Atheism and Agnosticism, influences society’s and people’s self-image as connected to vegetables and animals, and derived from Neanderthals and now related and perhaps even resembling Orangutans.

I am NOT saying that the laws of the United States of America were derived “directly” from the Ten Commandments of from this or that aspect or detail of Biblical laws. The Ten Commandments are Moral Laws that apply to human society as originally “legislated” by God according to classical Judaism. I am talking about the notion of “law” to begin with. What are its origins in its present common forms? One may say that the ancient societies of the Pharaohs or the Babylonians had “codes”, but those ancient archaic blood-thirsty kingdoms slave and feudal systems were geared for the benefit of an oligarchy, a few powerful people who ruled as god-kings and ruthless absolute monarchs brooking no dissent and usually deposed violently. We are certainly not referring to the “laws of the jungle” or of “might makes right” either. The ancient Persians, Greeks and Romans, and even the English kings, developed a modicum of democracy and representation for their inner circles, whereas the American Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are SWEEPING DOCUMENTS that herald a new modern era of “equality before the law”, democratic republican government, and a host of promises still coming into full force for hundreds of millions of people. This has put America into a breathtaking leadership position in democratization and freedom. Fascinatingly, the Oxford dictionary says that the origin of the word “law” is from the Old English “lag” meaning “laid down” or “fixed”, it also says it is a variant of “lo” or “lor`” for “Lord”. It may be said that this was a sign of the rest of the world taking over THIRTY THREE HUNDRED YEARS to catch up with what the Torah had intended all along and which Jews had actually benefited from internally, before the events of modern times preached the most ancient demand by God of Pharaoh: Let My People Go So That They May Serve Me! Celebrated by Jews as Passover – The Festival of FREEDOM from bondage!


We do NOT agree with the following lengthy quote, but let’s give the “other side” their chance to speak, since we are talking of “justice” and “judgments” after all. You may choose whichever opinions you feel best represents your views, obviously, but remember, honestly ask yourself is it what Judaism represents or expects?

So here goes: We will turn our attention to the famous controversial naturalist and anthropologist Charles Darwin (Britain, 1809 – 1882), a very complex scholar with deep set eyes and a long majestic white beard, who at one time studied for the Christian ministry, but instead was recruited for an around the world voyage of nature research by the British Royal Navy {THEY are the REAL “culprits” `|: - } . The few years he spent at sea, looking at all sorts of life forms, gave him the time to rethink life and formulate and organize “theories” that would reshape the way modern men of science viewed life. He had plenty of time to read as well, and was also influenced by the thinking of one Thomas Malthus (Britain, 1766 – 1834) of the “Malthusian” philosophy alarmed by population explosions and advocating “birth control” for the working classes.

I came across the following by Peter Landry at http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Biographies/Science/Darwin.htm#fn8
which seems pretty representative. Again, I do NOT agree with this information, but I cite it in order to “round out the picture”:

“DARWIN, directly on account of his early adventures (with his evidence and his conclusions: zoological, botanical, geological and paleontological), COULD NO LONGER SUBSCRIBE TO THE TEACHINGS OF GENESIS, viz., that every species had been created whole and have come through the ages unchanged. Of course, Darwin's theory, at first blush, is at odds with the whole notion that there exists a Supreme Being, which brought into existence all things. As to the Primary Cause and more generally the existence of a God: ‘I [Darwin] cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I FOR ONE MUST BE CONTENT TO REMAIN AN AGNOSTIC.’ All the evidence supports (and none exists that disproves) the proposition that life on earth has evolved; life started out slow and small, and our current state of existence is as a result of some process working upon natural materials throughout a period that consists of millions and millions of years…In 1859, Darwin's shattering work, The Origin of the Species, came out (‘a sell out in one day’); it is now recognized as a leading work in natural philosophy and in the history of mankind. Simply stated, Darwin's theory is that things, and, in particular, life, evolves by a process which Darwin called ‘natural selection.’…(H. Alfvén, professor of Plasma Physics at the University of Stockholm Atom, Man, and the Universe) states: ‘We are beginning to see that the awesome wonder of the EVOLUTION FROM AMOEBA TO MAN - for it is without a doubt an awesome wonder - was not the result of a mighty word from a creator, but of a combination of small, apparently insignificant processes. The structural change occurring in a molecule within a chromosome, the result of a struggle over food between two animals, the reproduction and feeding of young - such are the simple elements that together, in the course of MILLIONS OF YEARS, created the great wonder. This is nothing separate from ordinary life. The wonder is in our everyday world, if only we have the ability to see it.’ … We will let Julian Huxley (Britain, 1887 - 1975) (Humanist, ATHEIST and science popularizer, a Professor of Zoology, brother of Aldous Huxley and grandson of Thomas H. Huxley) sum up Darwin's place in the history of science: ‘DARWIN’S WORK…PUT THE WORLD OF LIFE INTO THE DOMAIN OF NATURAL LAW…Man is not a finished product incapable of further progress. He has a long history behind him, and it is a history not of a fall, but of an ascent. And he has THE POSSIBILITY OF FURTHER PROGRESSIVE EVOLUTION BEFORE HIM. Further, in the light of evolution we learn to be more patient. The few thousand years of recorded history are nothing compared to the million years during which man has been on earth, and the thousand million years of life's progress. And WE CAN AFFORD TO BE PATIENT WHEN THE ASTRONOMERS ASSURE US OF AT LEAST ANOTHER THOUSAND MILLION YEARS AHEAD OF US IN WHICH TO CARRY EVOLUTION ONWARDS TO NEW HEIGHTS’…Julian Huxley was the grandson of Thomas H. Huxley (1825 - 1895) an English biologist, teacher, and a defender of Darwin. Darwin was not a conversationalist and he only very rarely appeared in public to defend his theories himself; he was fully represented by Thomas H. Huxley, ‘Darwin's Bulldog.’ It is interesting to note what Thomas H. Huxley said about his topic when confronted with the opposition in the form of Bishop Wilberforce of Oxford. Both Huxley and Bishop Wilberforce were on the same stage when during a conference which had as its theme, Darwinism. The Bishop, in a sarcastic manner called out: ‘I would like to ask Professor Huxley whether it was on his grandfather's or his grandmother's side that the ape ancestry comes in.’ (Darwin) after whispering to his dinner companion, ‘The lord hath delivered him into my hands,’ took the podium:
‘A MAN HAS NO REASON TO BE ASHAMED OF HAVING AN APE FOR HIS GRANDFATHER. If there were an ancestor whom I should feel shame in recalling, it would be a man of restless and versatile intellect, who, not content with success in his own sphere of activity, plunges into scientific questions with which he has no real acquaintance, only to obscure them by an aimless rhetoric, and distract the attention of his hearers from the point at issue by eloquent digressions and skilled appeals to religious prejudice’.” [4]

End of the long above citation. Here is MY partial reaction to some of it, and the conclusion to this essay:

From the foregoing we see that Darwin remains one of the world’s most important and accepted “philosophers” as many millions of people “believe” in his school of thought and “theories” even though the majority have no clue how he “invented” them. Darwin’s views and attitudes and his own life’s history are very typical of the “modern scientific” man: Rejecting Biblical Teachings of the Creation of the Universe by God during the Six Days of Creation; Accepting the notion that life evolved over “millions” of years from amoebas; Defining the origins of life by new “scientific” slogans of “Natural Selection” and “Evolution”; A false notion that somehow to “believe” that people are “evolving” is a “progressive” idea because to believe that God created the complete Adam and Eve means that they cannot “progress” (the word “progress” may be relative, of course); Equating humanity with the “animal kingdom” especially the apes; Celebrating that “finally” an alternative “explanation” could be provided for life’s development on Earth; Traditional views of God could not be accepted so it is acceptable to be an Agnostic and an Atheist; The world exists primarily within the parameters of Natural Law; An amazing display of arrogance – “CHUTZPAH” by the newly-minted “Evolutionists”, who defend their views with ideological ferociousness, as they refuse to accept even simple LOGICAL questions, critiques or criticism as if their ideas were the “holy” words of a new civil “secular scientific religion” that must not be questioned but just accepted as “facts”, and they will of course decide for the rest of the world which facts are “politically correct” and which are not; Since the Bible is now relegated to secondary place (at best, or to the incinerator most likely) behind the new “bibles” of biology and zoology tomes, there is no longer a role for that type of morality associated with the same beliefs that gave you Creation and God in the first place in Biblical books; An amazing hold on the popular imagination as the academic world with the media and entertainment industry reinforce Evolutionary philosophy, continue to enshrine and worship Darwin as a modern day “saint, prophet and law-giver”.


It is therefore remarkable to remember that Judaism already had a “Declaration of Independence” from Natural Law in ancient Egypt when nature specifically was shattered by Ten Plagues recorded in the Torah and recited at Passover in the Haggadah, and a “Bill of Rights” as embodied in the Ten Commandments (“The Decalogue”), and a comprehensive “Constitution” of the Torah (“The Bible”) with a complete, sophisticated and trustworthy system of government that protected the rights and status of both its adherents and those who lived within their society beginning with the REVELATION and the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai in the Hebrew year 2448 (1312 B.C.E.) more than 3,300 years ago!

Our Torah portion is way AHEAD of mere human-centered Natural Law theories. It’s called “MISHPATIM” which means laws, judgments, and ordinances taken from the first verse of the portion: “And these are the laws that you must set before them [the Israelites]” (Exodus 21, verse 1), in a real world, of real time with real flesh and blod human beings demanding JUSTICE – “TZEDEK”.
http://bible.ort.org/books/pentd2.asp?ACTION=displaypage&BOOK=2&CHAPTER=21

The classical Torah scholars zero in on the very first words of this verse which in the Hebrew are actually combined into one: “AND THESE” – “VE-EILEH”. The famous rabbinical commentator RASHI, Rabbi Shlomoh ben Yitzchaki (France, 1040 – 1105) teaches: “Wherever ‘these are’ - ‘eileh’ is used it cuts off the preceding section from that which it introduces; where, however, ‘VE-eileh’ - ‘AND these’ is used it adds something to the former subject (i.e. forms a continuation of it). So also here: ‘AND these are the judgments (i.e. these, ALSO)’: what is the case with the former commandments (THE TEN COMMANDMENTS)? THEY WERE GIVEN AT SINAI ! SO THESE, TOO, WERE GIVEN AT SINAI ! If this be so, why is this section dealing with the ‘civil laws’ placed immediately after the commanding the making of the ALTAR? To tell you that you should seat (i.e. provide quarters for) the SANHEDRIN in the vicinity of the TEMPLE (or near the ‘mizbeach’ - ‘altar’) in one of the chambers in the Temple court (i.e. the ‘lishkat hagazit’ - ‘chamber of stone’).” RASHI cites his sources for this as the Oral Law’s Mechilta, Midrash Rabbah, and Tanchuma, all classical texts of reliable scholarship. [5]

Dr Russell Jay Hendel (creator of the extensive site devoted to studying Rashi at http://www.rashiyomi.com/ ) notes on the above Rashi comments that: “Again Rashi by way of pun notes that the Parliament (Sanhedrin) sat IN the temple and ‘therefore the altar is mentioned near the Judicial code (judgments)’ But Rashi is not connecting JUST two chapters but rather Rashi is connecting a whole sequence of chapters dealing with laws that enable us to live a just and good life…Some highlights are as follows: While Exodus, Chapter 23 deals with the laws for HOLIDAYS and the 7th YEAR (Sabbatical) nevertheless the emphasis in Exodus, Chapter 23 is on letting the STRANGER and POOR have a respite (e.g. Exodus, Chapter 23, verse 9; Exodus, Chapter 23, verse 12). FURTHERMORE THE ALTAR WAS AN INTRINSIC PART OF THE JUDICIAL CODE – FOR ALL LAW IS BASED ON THE BACKUP OF COURT PROCEDURES WHICH IN TURN IS BASED ON THE OATH. IF A PERSON TOOK AN OATH FALSELY HE HAD TO BRING A SACRIFICE (Leviticus, Chapter 5).
http://bible.ort.org/books/pentd2.asp?ACTION=displaypage&BOOK=3&CHAPTER=5
SIMILARLY IF A PERSON ROBBED A CONVERT WHO HAD NO CHILDREN THEN HE NEEDED A SACRIFICE TO ATONE (Leviticus, Chapter 6).
http://bible.ort.org/books/pentd2.asp?ACTION=displaypage&BOOK=3&CHAPTER=6
THUS THE ALTAR WAS AN INTRINSIC PART OF THE JUDICIAL CODE. [6]

Thus Rashi’s words prove the concept of the TOTALITY and UNITY of all aspects of Jewish Law: The necessity of faith in God and rejection of other false gods as set out in the first of the Ten Commandments are connected to its moral and humanistic teachings governing human relationships and behavior, which is connected to the spiritual days and observances like the Sabbath and Holidays. They are all connected to a system of worship and rituals with sacrificial offerings that would become part of the Jewish Temple worship. Of course this all takes place within the Torah’s original framework of Creation and the flow of world history, and ultimately even prophecies of doom that would befall the Children of Israel should they falter and renege on their covenant with God. These prophecies also include optimistic predictions about Jewish survival, return and redemption as there is always the note of future affirmation, validation and triumph of the Jews and the Torah that binds them to God.

Here is what is written in the Artscroll commentary, explaining the connections:
“The juxtaposition of this ‘Sidra’ [Portion in Hebrew] ( dealing primarily with CIVIL and TORT LAW) with the Ten Commandments and the laws of the Altar provide a STARTLING INSIGHT INTO JUDAISM. To God, there is no realm of ‘religion’ in the colloquial sense of the word. Most people think of religion as a matter of ritual and spirituality. Western man differentiates between Church and State. The Torah knows NO SUCH DISTINCTION. To the contrary, all areas of life are intertwined and holiness derives from ‘halachically’ (Jewish Torah Law) CORRECT BUSINESS DEALINGS no less than from piety in matters of ritual. The sages teach that one who wishes to be a ‘chassid’, or a devoutly pious person, should be scrupulous in matters of civil and tort law [‘mili denizikin’, Talmud Bava Kamma, 30a] for in Judaism the concept of ‘temple’ is in the courtroom as well as in the synagogue. This is the significance of the (Torah’s) juxtaposition of chapters. From this proximity, the Sages derive that the seat of the Sanhedrin, the seventy-one member court that is the supreme authority on ‘halachic’ (legal) matters, should be on the Temple Mount, near the Temple itself, for both the Temple and the Sanhedrin are expressions of holiness and worship of God. A judge who rules correctly is considered a partner in Creation, and one who rules corruptly is a destroyer of God’s world. It is quite natural, therefore, that immediately after carrying us through the recognition of God’s power, through the miracles of the Splitting of the Sea, and the Revelation at Sinai, the Torah commences with laws that SEEM almost mundane. THEY ARE AS MUCH EXPRESSIONS OF GOD’S GREATNESS AS THE FIRST COMMANDMENT, WHICH PROCLAIMS GOD’S EXISTENCE AND SOVEREIGNTY…[Rabbi Moses ben Nachman (Spain, North Africa, Israel, 1194 – 1270), known as the] RAMBAN (with and ‘N’) comments that the CIVIL LAW IS AN EXTENSION OF THE TENTH COMMANDMENT, WHICH FORBIDS COVETOUSNESS. In order to know what he may NOT covet, ONE MUST KNOW THE RIGHTS AND PROPERTY OF OTHERS. Elaborating on this concept, [Rabbi Obadiah ben Jacob (Italy, 1470 – 1550) known as the] SFORNO comments that the above commandment states that one may not covet anything that belongs to his FELLOW; so the Torah now goes on to begin defining what it is that belongs to others.” [7]

Whay do you think?
Best wishes and have a wonderful Shabbat!

[1] Ethics of the Fathers in the Artscroll Prayer book, English translation, p. 544.
[2] Pirkei Avos, The Wisdom of the Fathers, English translation and commentary, Rabbi A. Davis, p. 7.
[3] Ethics of the Fathers, Ibid, p. 548.
[4] http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Biographies/Science/Darwin.htm#fn8 , by Peter Landry.
[5] Pentateuch with Rashi’s commentary, Exodus, English translation, M. Rosenbaum and M. Silberman, p. 107.
[6] http://www.rashiyomi.com/nu20-01z.htm , Dr Russell Jay Hendel.
[7] The Torah - The Chumash, The Artscroll Stone Edition, English translation and commentary, p. 416.
- posted by Izak @ 7:40 PM (0) comments