Posts from — February 2008

Rabbi Weinbach, founder and Rosh Yeshiva (Dean) of Ohr Somayach, comments on modesty for women this week.

You might think Rabbi Weinbach tackles the issue of the bleaching of women in the haredi community for wearing Shulchan Aruch acceptable but not fundamentalist appropriate clothing in his community…in a neighborhood right next to Maalot Dafna. But he does not say anything about that. As far as I can tell, he has been consistently silent on the subject, at least in writing.

You might think he has what to say about the women who have been beaten to the back of the bus…but again…only silence.

What Rabbi Weinbach does say on the subject of modestly this week is the following,

This slogan of the garment industry will certainly come to mind this Shabbat as we hear in the Torah reading the stress that was placed on the details of the sacred garments worn by the kohanim. Those garments not only identified the wearers as do uniforms in secular life but also exerted a mystical influence on those chosen to perform the Sanctuary service for the nation.

If clothes of dignity are important for men, this is even more important in regard to women. One of the disappointing features of secular society in Israel and elsewhere is the lack of appreciation by Jewish women of the need to dress in modest fashion. The Torah teaches us that the Divine Presence that protects us from our enemies departs from us when immodesty prevails.

It is to be hoped that the message of this week’s Torah portion that clothes make the man will inspire women to appreciate that clothes not only make the woman but transform her into a princess whose royal modesty will help protect Israel forever.

The idea that secular Jews will 1) be going to shul, and 2) extrapolate from a verse about the clothes of the male priests as pertaining to women’s modesty is a most dubious wish on Rabbi Weinbach’s part. In fact, one could be forgiven for believing that Rabbi Weinbach is being disingenuous. It would seem that Rabbi Weinbach’s message is not really to secular Jewry at all, but rather, a message to the already converted that the problems that exist in regards to modesty are not the beatings; are not the bleachings. These are the unfortunate, but justified, antics of vigilantes attempting to enforce the will of the Gedoylim.

And their will be done!

Rather, for Rabbi Weinbach, the root problem is the same problem that all middle eastern fundamentalists blame for all their countries problems. Whether in Egypt, whether in Israel, whether in Saudi Arabia. The problem is the secular government, and the nation’s lack of faith.

So cover up, bitches. You are the problem. Not the vigilantes. And certainly not the Gedoylim whom inspire them.

Yeshiva University appears to be reconsidering accrediting Ohr Somayach.

Yeshiva College’s newspaper The Commentator reports,

In late summer of 2008, a new Yeshiva University Kollel will begin servicing the city of Chicago, Illinois. Following in the footsteps of successful YU Kollelim located in Dallas, Texas, and Boca Raton, Florida, the Chicago Kollel plans to help enrich what is already a strong Jewish community while also raising the level of awareness around the greater Chicago area. Additionally, the Kollel will present an opportunity for its members to further develop their teaching, learning, and leadership skills.

The Commentator describes this phenomenon as “Inspiring Torah u-Madda, One Community at a Time�

How is a Kollel system Torah u-Madda, exactly? “Madda� was always understood to mean secular knowledge, not enclave existence.

Rabbi Brand continued by noting that his two main goals were to both “enrich” and “engage” the Chicago community.

Is this Kollel or Hillel?

Still…if this is meant to energize the Modern Orthodox community, and stop the “slide to the right,� the harediazation of Orthodox Jewry, this could be a great idea. It could present Modern Orthodoxy in a passionate form, which just may be what is needed in order to present MO as a truly genuine alternative to haredism for those looking for an intense traditional Jewish experience. Additionally, it should help create Modern Orthodox teachers, of which there is a derth.

It think we should keep an open mind, and see exactly what these YU Kollels preach and what they produce, even though a “kollel� seems an anathema to what we understand MO to be.

Rabbi Goldson writes about his experience at Ohr Somayach. I should note, I met Rabbi Goldson at a Dark Light branch, and I have nothing against him personally from that experience. I think he was a nice person…I didn’t get to know him very well.

But he is a Dark Light paladin.

Rabbi Goldson writes,

I was just settling into my new room when Norman arrived. He didn’t want to be there, and he had no interest in Torah. In fact, he seemed to have little interest in anything at all … except girls [...]

I remember the day he packed up to leave. I asked him what impression six weeks in yeshiva had made on him. I don’t think I’ll ever forget his answer.

“The rabbis are right,” he said. “They’ve answered all my questions. Their proofs are all sound. I can’t refute anything they’ve said.”

“So what are you going to do?” I asked.

“Nothing. I like chasing girls.”

Rabbi Goldson writes,

“I still can’t understand his answer.”

Goldson is lying. He understands the answer just fine. In fact, it is actually the only resistance his kind willingly acknowledges is legit: the enemy of “taivah” – desire. They (Ohr Somayach neo-B’nai Torah types) pretend Gottlieb’s most dubious “proofs” are real…they pretend that evolution is “bunk,” and they pretend that it is perfectly logical to believe that allegorical stories in the Torah are literal.

So how do you explain why so many won’t commit to this obviously divine and rock solid theology and clearly mandated fahfrumpte lifestyle?

You blame all who choose a secular lifestyle (at least, at the time the routine was established) as driven by “the yetzer hara” – the evil inclination.

For Rabbi Goldson, “Norman” isn’t an anomaly at all. He is emblematic of all Jews who do not understand the Torah and Judaism the way he does. Only a selfish desire for something else– especially physical desire for something else– could possibly explain why a person wouldn’t care/choose to live a haredi lifestyle.

Because look – even Norman admits it’s right — everything sure makes sense over there in harediville. But alas…desire takes us away from the truth…

Goldson writes,

How do you teach someone else to care?

Maybe there is no answer. Maybe the only answer is that those of us who do care have to push ourselves to care even more.

Actually, maybe that isn’t the only answer. Maybe some know that there is no proof, even if at a younger age, they can’t refute that which is presented as that. But maybe Norman knew on some level that this wasn’t really the one and final answer, even if he admitted he just couldn’t explain how he knew, or why he felt like that.

And maybe Rabbi Goldson is doing something wrong all too often. Perhaps many resisting his teaching can’t—at their stage of life or education—dispute it exactly, but maybe they don’t really buy into it. Maybe they intuitively sense it just isn’t really true. Maybe they sense that it isn’t going to take them where they are supposed to be going.

And that’s something that takes BTs a long time to figure this out, as we don’t have the years of inoculation to this haredi nonsense that Norman did. It is taking years of collective work to unravel the lies and fantasies and the sleights of hand of the haredi kiruv movement. But that inner voice….wasn’t it always screaming that this wasn’t right, this wasn’t what we should be doing? But we listened to the Gottlieb’s and the Goldsons…and ultimately, the Rabbi Weinbachs, the Rabbi Schachs, the Rebbes…who explained and insisted it was just the boner talking. Just the yetzer hara.

A desire to pursue a vocation…higher secular education…gain life experience…all just yetzer hara. All just a boner.

This is what they preach. Read Rabbi Goldson’s essay. He is not even one of the radicals. He teaches in Aish St. Louis, not Aish Jersualem.

But if it isn’t his Judaism, it’s all just one big boner.

Beyond BT published a letter from a reader asking,

I have a question that I was wondering if you could post. I am not looking for a debate, only some answers. I, and probably a lot of other BTs, grew up in a staunchly democratic home. I do not think I even knew any republicans. What is up with frum Jews voting republican”

The kicker was at the end of the letter.

“Honestly, I do it because people I respect tell me to. What is the real reason?”

There’s…well…there’s nothing I can say to top that…so let’s just keep going.

Anyway, much discussion ensues, including a few of the expected frummie explanations of why the right-wing Republicans are closer to a Torah point of view, which I find just as convincing as when I read about how the Left-wing Democrats are closer to Judaism because of “Tikkun Olam” and of course, social justice.

Anyway, it was worth reading. One, because we get to laugh at the baal teshuvahs who don’t even know why they are voting according to “daas Torah,” and two, because Steve Brizel brings down a brilliant approach from Rabbi J.B. Soloveitchik (RYBS).

Brizel writes,

Like it or not, I think that it is too easy to say that the Torah demands that one vote for either party. RYBS once commented that the capitalism ( and i.e. conservatism) set forth in Bava Kamma, Bava Metziah and Bava Basrah is more than offset by the seemingly socialist ( and liberal) ideals set forth in the halachos Shemitah and Yovel.

As some of you may be aware, Yeshiva University pulled the plug on their relationship with Neve Yerushalayim, a radical and major recruiter of secular/liberal Jewish women into hard-line B’nai Torah haredism.

YU should be commended for finally breaking this relationship…but the verdict is still out on what will be with Ohr Somayach proper, even though Neve is a sister school of OS. It is critical that YU distance itself from these predatory fundamentalists groups which promote socio-economic devastation to young people, and which incessantly deride Modern Orthodoxy in hopes of preempting it as an option to their naïve, young students from liberal and secular Jewish backgrounds.

There is still time…and there is reason to hope that YU will distance themselves from Ohr Somayach proper, whose founder and current Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Mendel Weinbach, believes that the world in its entirety – outside the safety of the yeshiva enclave – is an “environment of sin,� and a place that the “bochrim� (young men) should be discouraged from engagement with at all cost.

The effects are to languish indefinitely.

This is whom Yeshiva College currently works with.

Please spread word that Yeshiva University is making its decision. If they retain a relationship with Dark Light, we in the secular and liberal Jewish community must respond appropriately. We will not be able to stay silent while Modern Orthodox institutions continue to work with hardline haredi predators of our youth,

If, however, YU kicks Ohr Somayach out of their Israel program, we should accept that Yeshiva University is perhaps more consistently sensitive and attuned to the needs of secular and liberal Jews than it once was, and reference this change as a precedent to other Modern Orthodox institutions that continue to work with Ohr Somayach.

Izzy is not happy that Jewish women’s accomplishments are devalued if they don’t also have babies. Izzy notes,

Maybe we Jewish feminists should be less worried about the fact that online dating is an impersonal experience, and more worried about how even in this enlightened age — a time when egalitarianism is utterly the norm in some strains of Judaism, e.g. the female-rabbi–dominated Reform movement — we’re still haranguing women to work those wombs.

Leaving aside that from a Jewish communal perspective, I don’t think we devalue these women enough, let’s consider Izzy’s issue. Now, Reform Judaism isn’t really egalitarian in the first place, but it is feminist.

So why don’t liberal Jews stop “haranguing� these women?

Because every civilization – even a feminist one – wants to survive. It wants to continue to exist. And it wants its descendants to be a part of that same civilization.

So…if a man or woman (even a feminist) has children, she will want to make sure there is a critical mass of appropriate mates and members to support necessary infrastructure — like hipster Jewish websites that feature essays that pretend we don’t care about babies even as they steer people to dating sites where they can meet others with whom to make Jewish babies with. Because the way things are going here, that isn’t going to be so easy, unless they are willing to go Ortho, which isn’t always the same civilization in many ways, and it certainly isn’t feminist.

So these things called children are required. And we have a shortage. And the most qualified to help are the ladies.

And if you have no hopes or demands of continuation of our civilization, then why the hell did you bother becoming a rabbi in the first place? Even a Reform one?

So maybe, Izzy, you should be less worried that “we’re still haranguing women to work those wombs,� and more worried about how to successfully harangue women to work those wombs.

I don’t really know for sure that these people are FFBs, I am just assuming that they are.

Miriam at Live From Israel writes,

“Kiruv introduces a more simpler life away from the complex, sophisticated how many years degree needed “outside” world life. Just listen to ‘the rabbi’ and your whole life is set. Forget college, forget education. The Torah is the only thing you need. What? Help to understand the Torah? Just ask a rav!â€?

Jacob Da Jew added in the comments section that,

“I personally do not run after people to make them frum.�

I have to admit, it is nice to see frum people acknowledging real reservations about kiruv, and acknowledging that people get hurt, and are frequently guided down destructive paths. And most notably, their concern comes not from the more common FFB reservations about kiruv, from a place of FFB frummie contempt and xenophobia for those from “diverse backgrounds,� but actual empathy for the recruited themselves.

This is refreshing.

Unfortunately, it is almost shockingly.

A woman claiming to be Allyson Marcus, who was featured in the New Voices article, commented both here and on New Voices that,

“Look guys, I was raised in a religious upbringing, with a chassidic backround. I love Judaism, I’ve worked a lot in outreach, I didn’t speak out because I think outreach is bad, on the contrary, I like doing it myself, but this person hurt me so badly I had a hard time recovering. If you’re going to work in outreach be very aware of your behavior towards others. If we preach good midos towards others and Rabbi Akiva said you must love your fellow Jew, then we have to accept people for who they are and treat everyone the way you yourself like to be treated. Simple.”

JAM (Jewish Awareness Movement) has made the headlines of Cult News.

Wow, that’s so cool!

Some of you may remember my concerns about JAM (Jewish Awareness Movement), a kiruv group based in Southern California, which I described as “disturbing.”

Well, good news! New Voices did a full investigation of said youth group (and credits The Kvetcher for raising these concerns), and guess what? They totally do suck ass!

Amanda Milstein writes in New Voices that,

“When Allyson Marcus arrived at the Jewish Awareness Movement’s Shabbat afternoon luncheon near the University of Southern California, she wasn’t expecting to return home in tears. That, however, is how things turned out for Marcus, then a senior at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa. After talking throughout the meal with a group of male friends, Marcus was confronted as she left the table by Bracha Zaret, the wife of Moshe Zaret, a Jewish Awareness Movement rabbi. The rebbetzin, apparently incensed by Marcus’ immodesty, asked her if she was on any medication. Marcus was puzzled, not realizing that the question was meant as an insult. Zaret then kicked her out of the house, telling her that she would never amount to anything and would be unmarried at forty.”

But the thing is…THEY MAKE PEOPLE FRUM!

“There is some evidence that these tactics have made JAM particularly successful in its outreach efforts. A 2003 article in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal cited findings by Rabbi David Refson, dean of Neve Yerushalayim College in Jerusalem [DARK LIGHT!], that JAM at UCLA turned a higher percentage of students religious than any other program in the country.”

So read the full story. And then read the full love letter from the Jewish Journal about JAM from 2003. They even advertise for the program at the end of the story. Unbelievable.

Update: Dennis made a fair point — the Jewish Journal does “routinely publish contact information for local groups, events, etc.” Never the less, the Jewish Journal FAILED to report on the real problems with JAM. Instead a publication based in NY did so. The only criticism — and it was a bogus one — was that this Orthodox group did not sufficiently present Reform and Conservative approaches to Judaism. No one really expects them to.