Philip Berg’s new wife was young, beautiful and worldly, everything that he, a middle-aged orthodox rabbi, wasn’t. Karen Berg could be pushy too. She brought a television into their home over his objections. She tossed out his traditional black fur hat, and pressured him to teach ancient Jewish mysticism -- known as kabbalah -- to the public.
“Men and women together?” Philip said.
“Yeah, sure, men and women,” she replied.
Philip understood how radical her proposition was. For centuries, elite rabbinical scholars -- all of them men -- had guarded like rare gems the spiritual secrets believed to be encoded in the Torah. Karen was an outsider to this culture. Entrepreneurial and unimpressed by religious authority, she saw no reason why such valuable teachings shouldn’t be offered on the open market.
“Let’s give it to the people,” she insisted.
Philip was torn between tradition and his soul mate. He chose Karen.
Is the LA Times being snide about Philip's son Michael? They call him the talmid chochom of the family before describing him as being "very close" to the prusta shiksa hanikra Madonna.
ReplyDeleteYou have to commend the Carlebach movement who as eccentric as they are will not allow goyim to hang around because it is gorem intermarriage. R' Shlomo Zalman Auerbach in Minchas Shlomo criticizes an unnamed hashgocho (which is Star K) for utilizing a bogus loophole in bishul akum as it is gorem intermarriage through kochos. There is definitely intermarriage arising from taaruvos at Kabbalah Center. Consider them the Star K's silent partner.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering why this topic is more appropriate for this blog than any other crime that happens to be done by a Jew. The Grubergers ("Berg" is an affectation, not even a legal name change) simply run a cult that has more to do with the New Age than Kabbalah. It's kind of self-evident to anyone with even a passing familiarity with mesorah. They don't even claim to be teaching a Judaism, the way the non-O movements do. So I ask again, what makes any of this relevant?
ReplyDeleteIt's important to keep this in mind. People might forget that Bergism is no more Jewish than the religion Paul spun off from us a couple millennia ago.
It's just avoda zora with a veneer of something "Jewish". A modern day reform movement which in its day was an extension of the Sabbateans, so it's come full circle.
ReplyDeleteThe fascinating thing is that there is a "longing" among those who are drawn to it for something more SPIRITUAL and meaningful and the Berg's figured it out long ago, exploited, milked and capitalized on it, yet in the end did not deliver what the people who came to them really wanted, which was more SPIRITUALITY and a path to TRUTH and GOD.
So now the Kabbalah Center like many of its counterparts such as Scientology and TM will go down the tubes as its customers forsake them, as they see the feet made of clay and that the emperors have no clothes, much like the Eastern Europeans forsook communism and the Arabs are forsaking their putative "leaders" and this in turn should be a warning to all political and religious leaders (including all Jewish ones) that the words of Abraham Lincoln remain as true as ever:
"You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all the time!"
I was trying to see if it's possible that there is any officially kosher food at Vegas casinos so that Berg would at least have a choice of eating kosher or treif if he requested kosher.
ReplyDeleteKosher on the Go under the hashgocho of Rabbi Yaakov Wasser claims to be an official outside caterer at many area casinos.
Micha - don't understand your concerns - Berg is an obvious topic because he is a dangerous distortion of Yiddishkeit
ReplyDeleteIn the popular press he is Kabbala
But who is creating the illusion that Bergism has anything to do with Judaism? The Grubergers barely are -- they preach more to rich and famous non-Jews than within the Jewish community. Yes, they use Jewish buzzwords, but on a communal level they already cut their ties. Unlike Conservative or Reform -- they may stand outside Yahadus (qedushas ha'eidah) but still stand proudly part of the Jewish People (qedushas ha'am). (To a large extent that's still true for R even after Patrilineal Descent.)
ReplyDeleteWe pay too much attention to what is basically a new non-Jewish spinoff from Judaism. We, therefore, are what is keeping that illusion going that those communal ties still exist.
Many Xians think that their religion is the completion of Judaism. Cardinal Lustiger didn't see a conflict between his religion and asking that Qaddish be said at his funeral (and it was). Do we pay more attention to goings on in Xianity because people think it's the real Judaism?
The Kabbalah Centre had its Paul moment. It's not Jewish. They left us, it's way past time we leave them.
And then people won't confuse what they teach with real Kabbalah anymore, because it will be common knowledge that Jews don't consider their stuff to be Judaism.
Does anyone really buy into Berg's assertions "that his wife made him do it'? What a load of croc!
ReplyDeleteI was just looking at pics of the heavens courtesy of NASA and randomly clicked on someone's comments and came across this:
> Beth Chris BrewCrew Nathan was just this morning asking me what's the latest going with/how Jared Auble is. Thank you for the update, and we'll certainly be praying! Shabbat Shalom and Gemar Hatimah Tovah! xoxo
October 7 at 12:12pm
Serena Lazear
Rick and I saw on YNet news last night that the troops in Israel are on alert and they are calling up reserves. Jared was out today as the fellows went to the Mediterranean beach today for a little and he noticed that they seemed on a higher level of readiness, too. He and another fellow in his house had a similar dream that Israel was being attacked. Jared felt like it was Yom Kippur which starts there in less than an hour. So, I'm sending out a prayer alert that y'all would be keeping Israel in your prayers today and tonight especially. Thank you for joining in praying for the shalom of Jerusalem (and all of Israel).<
Interestingly, these folks neither look Jewish or have Jewish names. Some more digging turned up this:
>>Thank you for responding so quickly. I appreciate your willingness to share info with so many of us who are looking for those little blanks that happen along the way. I haven't been doing genealogy that long but became interested when I began finding a Jewish connection to our family. We are registered as a family in the Diaspora Museum in Tel Avi and found a practicing Jewish Lazear family in the Pittsburgh, Pa area. I recently found that the spelling of our Lazear name is a hebrew Elazar and was spelled that way to protect family members from certain harm doing darker periods of history. Have found some interesting tidbits along the way which has made me all the more wanting to explore this colorful family of ours. I look forward to continued dialogue with you and I am sure you've found similar stories.<
Based on my knowledge of things the above is almost all just wishful thinking! – Dovy [Glad my ‘Jewdar’ is still in working order!]. This lady is much more on-target I bet:
>Received your last message and was a little surprised and puzzled. Your information takes you back further than mine so I have none of the information you presented. The information I have also has the indicates the Lazear name changed many times with spellings--deLazear or deLaseure--Lazier--deLaZear--and Lazear.In my searches I have also seen the name Le Suer with no idea whether it applies to us or not. My information comes from Appendix-C of a family genology of Lazears (appearently the original--which I do not have--contains 3 separate branches of Lazears that have come to this country. It was compiled by Weston Lazear from the information I have.) My branch does have Jeremiah Pierpoint marrying Mary Rose.
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