So non-Jews are right and justified to hate Jews for following what God required of us???? Gee, maybe I ought to give out my neck for them too while we're at it.
Wow, just went through the article. Some incredible stuff in here!
Take this gem: The Kabbalistic vision of the Messiah as the redeemer of all mankind is the Jewish counterpart to [the Christian Jesus], yet the question must still be solved as to who influenced whom.
He goes on to praise the historian Urbach, whom he calls a "Chakham", and R' Shaul Lieberman as well, whose academic work (on Tosefta & Yerushalmi) he acknowledges is helping to improve the world.
A lot of his observations all too on target (emphasis mine): In general, we are afflicted with a despicable charlatanism which is not found among any other peoples. When I see this I become depressed and ask myself: “For whom am I working?” . . . Furthermore, in the new Hebrew state they give out high positions only to friends and people who know how to flatter properly. . . . The Jewish world has always acted and will continue to act in this fashion.
I see that in the end the (Jewish) nation will split into different factions. The English nation is unified despite its large number of heretics. The English heretics are well-mannered men of culture, and do not assault the feelings of the religious. The religious themselves [...] fight with one another. [...] Scientific investigations must be restricted to limited circles. What is worst is that we do not have religious sages who can respond properly. I do not remember an era as lacking in outstanding intellectual and spiritual figures as our era. We proclaim anyone who can offer a pilpul as a gaon, and the new literature declares that every one who has a good writing style is a poet or the leading writer of the nation.
I am very distressed at the great fanaticism which has increased in strength in the Orthodox camp. [...T]hey proclaim every “rebbe,” whom everyone knows is not outstanding in Torah knowledge, as gaon and rosh koi benei hagolah ["RoshKeBeHa"G"]. For the members of Agudah, every unimportant rabbi who joins them is considered a great gaon.
And he goes on to praise a certain NY Reform Rabbi as "a wonderful man, honest in heart and mouth" and "full of grace, etiquette, simplicity and love of Israel and Judaism" -- as opposed to those who "just use Judaism for their despicable desires. We are guiltier than any other people! I have never seen among the wise men of the nations such unethical ones [as among our own]. . . .". Telling it like it is! He continues, I have already quipped before the men who surround me that this Liberal rabbi causes a “hillul Hashem” because in him we see that one can be an upstanding and noble man, full of the spirit of love for Israel, its Torah, and its language, even if one does not belong to the community of zealous Hasidim and is not punctilious about laws and customs. Yet with those fervent zealots we see the opposite.
And there's much more. This 1997 cache released by Prof. Marc Shapiro just a treasure of Gadol reflections on our modernity not readily to be heard in our times now.
So non-Jews are right and justified to hate Jews for following what God required of us???? Gee, maybe I ought to give out my neck for them too while we're at it.
ReplyDeleteWow, just went through the article. Some incredible stuff in here!
ReplyDeleteTake this gem:
The Kabbalistic vision of the Messiah as the redeemer of all mankind is the Jewish counterpart to [the Christian Jesus], yet the question must still be solved as to who influenced whom.
He goes on to praise the historian Urbach, whom he calls a "Chakham", and R' Shaul Lieberman as well, whose academic work (on Tosefta & Yerushalmi) he acknowledges is helping to improve the world.
A lot of his observations all too on target (emphasis mine):
In general, we are afflicted with a despicable charlatanism which is not found among any other peoples. When I see this I become depressed and ask myself: “For whom am I working?” . . . Furthermore, in the new Hebrew state they give out high positions only to friends and people who know how to flatter properly. . . . The Jewish world has always acted and will continue to act in this fashion.
I see that in the end the (Jewish) nation will split into different factions. The English nation is unified despite its large number of heretics. The English heretics are well-mannered men of culture, and do not assault the feelings of the religious. The religious themselves [...] fight with one another. [...] Scientific investigations must be restricted to limited circles. What is worst is that we do not have religious sages who can respond properly. I do not remember an era as lacking in outstanding intellectual and spiritual figures as our era. We proclaim anyone who can offer a pilpul as a gaon, and the new literature declares that every one who has a good writing style is a poet or the leading writer of the nation.
I am very distressed at the great fanaticism which has increased in strength in the Orthodox camp. [...T]hey proclaim every “rebbe,” whom everyone knows is not outstanding in Torah knowledge, as gaon and rosh koi benei hagolah ["RoshKeBeHa"G"]. For the members of Agudah, every unimportant rabbi who joins them is considered a great gaon.
And he goes on to praise a certain NY Reform Rabbi as "a wonderful man, honest in heart and mouth" and "full of grace, etiquette, simplicity and love of Israel and Judaism" -- as opposed to those who "just use Judaism for their despicable desires. We are guiltier than any other people! I have never seen among the wise men of the nations such unethical ones [as among our own]. . . .". Telling it like it is! He continues,
I have already quipped before the men who surround me that this Liberal rabbi causes a “hillul Hashem” because in him we see that one can be an upstanding and noble man, full of the spirit of love for Israel, its Torah, and its language, even if one does not belong to the community of zealous Hasidim and is not punctilious about laws and customs. Yet with those fervent zealots we see the opposite.
And there's much more. This 1997 cache released by Prof. Marc Shapiro just a treasure of Gadol reflections on our modernity not readily to be heard in our times now.