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Thursday, October 23, 2014
"The Shabbos Project" - Problems which cannot be ignored!
Guest post by RaP
What will be "the morning after the day before" ?
That is the $64,000 question so to speak if one thinks about it!
To what does this really refer?
No question about it that something truly extraordinary has happened with the way the Shabbos Project has caught on worldwide. Best wishes to everyone concerned for its greatest success. Mazel Tov to South Africa's Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein on his great milestone, who has now become a truly global outreach Kiruv rabbi following in the footsteps of Rav Noach Weinberg and the last Lubavitcher Rebbe and in fact building on their great successes and examples.
But coming back to the big question, the Shabbos Project begs the REALLY big questions that come in its wake! With its great successes come the great questions, challenges and problems that cannot be ignored or pushed aside under the rug of the current catchy euphoria.
How does the whole notion behind the Shabbos Project (to make people more observant of Torah Judaism via Shemiras Shabbos, a noble goal) mesh with TODAY's reality that in many places around the world, the MAJORITY of people who regard themselves as "Jews" are either married to gentiles given the skyrocketing intermarriage rate, or are the children of non-Jewish mothers (father Jewish and mother gentile and never converted), or are converts of Reform, Conservative, civil marriages and various non-Orthodox denominations of Judaism who "think" they are "Jews" but according to Orthodox Jewish Law (the Halachah) they are still 100% gentiles.
This is the reality that faces us:
"Interfaith marriage in Judaism [Wikipedia]: A 2013 survey conducted in the United States by the Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project found that intermarriage rate to be 58% among all Jews and 71% among non-Orthodox Jews." [Reference:] Poll Shows Major Shift in Identity of U.S. Jews The New York Times, October 1, 2013: "The first major survey of American Jews in more than 10 years finds a significant rise in those who are not religious, marry outside the faith and are not raising their children Jewish — resulting in rapid assimilation that is sweeping through every branch of Judaism except the Orthodox. The intermarriage rate, a bellwether statistic, has reached a high of 58 percent for all Jews, and 71 percent for non-Orthodox Jews — a huge change from before 1970 when only 17 percent of Jews married outside the faith. Two-thirds of Jews do not belong to a synagogue, one-fourth do not believe in God and one-third had a Christmas tree in their home last year...The survey uses a wide definition of who is a Jew, a much-debated topic. The researchers included the 22 percent of Jews who describe themselves as having 'no religion,' but who identify as Jewish because they have a Jewish parent or were raised Jewish, and feel Jewish by culture or ethnicity. However, the percentage of 'Jews of no religion' has grown with each successive generation, peaking with the millennials (those born after 1980), of whom 32 percent say they have no religion...Reform Judaism remains the largest American Jewish movement, at 35 percent. Conservative Jews are 18 percent, Orthodox 10 percent, and groups such as Reconstructionist and Jewish Renewal make up 6 percent combined. Thirty percent of Jews do not identify with any denomination. In a surprising finding, 34 percent said you could still be Jewish if you believe that Jesus was the Messiah...Jews from the former Soviet Union and their offspring make up about 10 percent of the American Jewish population...Steven M. Cohen, a sociologist of American Jewry at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, in New York, and a paid consultant on the poll, said the report foretold 'a sharply declining non-Orthodox population in the second half of the 21st century, and a rising fraction of Jews who are Orthodox.' The survey also portends 'growing polarization' between religious and nonreligious Jews, said Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, senior director of research and analysis at the Jewish Federations of North America..."
The above sources are brief descriptions of the situation of Jewry in North America and certainly worldwide since if anything it is worse in the UK, Europe, South America, and even Australia and New Zealand, all places with significant Jewish populations.
South African Jewry, home and epicenter of the Shabbos Project, is unique because in spite of its slipping from Halachic observance of Judaism, such as keeping Shabbos properly, yet nevertheless South African Jews have remained loyal to the concept of attending Orthodox shulls where men and women sit separately, employing only duly ordained Orthodox rabbis, subscribing to the standards laid down by the South African Orthodox Bais Din in all matters, and just considering themselves "Orthodox" -- but once they land up in places like the USA and Canada and even Israel they find out very quickly that they are not regarded as truly Orthodox since they do not observe Shabbos according to Halachah and do not send their children to Orthodox yeshivas etc.
The point being that while the Shabbos Project and other similar initiatives to enhance a more Orthodox mode of Judaism works within South Africa for South African Jews given their unique heritage and milieu, it does not automatically translate the same way in far-off America, Israel and elsewhere where the local Jews are VERY assimilated, intermarried, have irrevocably abandoned their faith altogether by even becoming Christians.
So the question is, once the Shabbos Project "hits" this "reality" in the way that an "irresistible force (i.e. Shabbos Project) hits an immovable object (assimilation & intermarriage") aka "the morning after the night before" -- the big question is, what will happen and are the people in charge aware of what they are up against outside of South Africa? And note, even with international rabbis involved, those rabbis do NOT deal with such questions because outside of South Africa they service strictly Orthodox or Charedi populations most of the time.
Logically speaking there may come a "project" that will have to face how to deal with masses of intermarried Jews and how to inform people who are not Halachically Jewish that things like he Shabbos Project are not meant for them and that they should please step back. This may sound "messianic" but there have been efforts from very Orthodox outreach sources in this direction, such as by the failed EJF project, that have come seriously asunder and crashed on the rocks due to this very question because the rabbis do not have one approach to CONVERSION and even more troubling PROSELYTIZATION to gentiles, a hugely DIVISIVE issue, unlike something as universally marketable as proper Shabbat observance for Jews who wish to do so!
Have the South African Chief Rabbi and his planners and rabbinic partners all over the world thought this through to its end game and final conclusion or are they just riding on the wave of "ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise"?
What happens a few "projects" down the line or even what happens now during an actual Shabbos Project someplace when the gentiles married to Jews or those who consider themselves to be "Jews" etc discover or are informed, as they invariably will be, that they are NOT truly Jewish in the sense of Jewish Law-Halachah? Do they leave the Shabbos table? What about the wine? Who answers the Halachic Shaylos at the end of the day and has a suitable body of Poskim been chosen already and in place to deal with the tidal wave of inevitable questions?!
These are serious questions for all those involved to seriously come to terms with and be prepared to face as the time comes closer. In South Africa there is the acceptance of the local one and only Orthodox Bais Din, something that does not exist in most places, except in Israel and perhaps in the UK.
To be forewarned is to be forearmed! or as the boy scouts succinctly put it "be prepared"! And as always, life is stranger than fiction! Once again Mazel Tov to everyone who has made the Shabbos Project such a popular success and here's wishing for the success of the Shabbos Project and many more that will bring Klal Yisroel to a Teshuva Gemura, Amen!
That is the $64,000 question so to speak if one thinks about it!
To what does this really refer?
No question about it that something truly extraordinary has happened with the way the Shabbos Project has caught on worldwide. Best wishes to everyone concerned for its greatest success. Mazel Tov to South Africa's Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein on his great milestone, who has now become a truly global outreach Kiruv rabbi following in the footsteps of Rav Noach Weinberg and the last Lubavitcher Rebbe and in fact building on their great successes and examples.
But coming back to the big question, the Shabbos Project begs the REALLY big questions that come in its wake! With its great successes come the great questions, challenges and problems that cannot be ignored or pushed aside under the rug of the current catchy euphoria.
How does the whole notion behind the Shabbos Project (to make people more observant of Torah Judaism via Shemiras Shabbos, a noble goal) mesh with TODAY's reality that in many places around the world, the MAJORITY of people who regard themselves as "Jews" are either married to gentiles given the skyrocketing intermarriage rate, or are the children of non-Jewish mothers (father Jewish and mother gentile and never converted), or are converts of Reform, Conservative, civil marriages and various non-Orthodox denominations of Judaism who "think" they are "Jews" but according to Orthodox Jewish Law (the Halachah) they are still 100% gentiles.
This is the reality that faces us:
"Interfaith marriage in Judaism [Wikipedia]: A 2013 survey conducted in the United States by the Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project found that intermarriage rate to be 58% among all Jews and 71% among non-Orthodox Jews." [Reference:] Poll Shows Major Shift in Identity of U.S. Jews The New York Times, October 1, 2013: "The first major survey of American Jews in more than 10 years finds a significant rise in those who are not religious, marry outside the faith and are not raising their children Jewish — resulting in rapid assimilation that is sweeping through every branch of Judaism except the Orthodox. The intermarriage rate, a bellwether statistic, has reached a high of 58 percent for all Jews, and 71 percent for non-Orthodox Jews — a huge change from before 1970 when only 17 percent of Jews married outside the faith. Two-thirds of Jews do not belong to a synagogue, one-fourth do not believe in God and one-third had a Christmas tree in their home last year...The survey uses a wide definition of who is a Jew, a much-debated topic. The researchers included the 22 percent of Jews who describe themselves as having 'no religion,' but who identify as Jewish because they have a Jewish parent or were raised Jewish, and feel Jewish by culture or ethnicity. However, the percentage of 'Jews of no religion' has grown with each successive generation, peaking with the millennials (those born after 1980), of whom 32 percent say they have no religion...Reform Judaism remains the largest American Jewish movement, at 35 percent. Conservative Jews are 18 percent, Orthodox 10 percent, and groups such as Reconstructionist and Jewish Renewal make up 6 percent combined. Thirty percent of Jews do not identify with any denomination. In a surprising finding, 34 percent said you could still be Jewish if you believe that Jesus was the Messiah...Jews from the former Soviet Union and their offspring make up about 10 percent of the American Jewish population...Steven M. Cohen, a sociologist of American Jewry at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, in New York, and a paid consultant on the poll, said the report foretold 'a sharply declining non-Orthodox population in the second half of the 21st century, and a rising fraction of Jews who are Orthodox.' The survey also portends 'growing polarization' between religious and nonreligious Jews, said Laurence Kotler-Berkowitz, senior director of research and analysis at the Jewish Federations of North America..."
The above sources are brief descriptions of the situation of Jewry in North America and certainly worldwide since if anything it is worse in the UK, Europe, South America, and even Australia and New Zealand, all places with significant Jewish populations.
South African Jewry, home and epicenter of the Shabbos Project, is unique because in spite of its slipping from Halachic observance of Judaism, such as keeping Shabbos properly, yet nevertheless South African Jews have remained loyal to the concept of attending Orthodox shulls where men and women sit separately, employing only duly ordained Orthodox rabbis, subscribing to the standards laid down by the South African Orthodox Bais Din in all matters, and just considering themselves "Orthodox" -- but once they land up in places like the USA and Canada and even Israel they find out very quickly that they are not regarded as truly Orthodox since they do not observe Shabbos according to Halachah and do not send their children to Orthodox yeshivas etc.
The point being that while the Shabbos Project and other similar initiatives to enhance a more Orthodox mode of Judaism works within South Africa for South African Jews given their unique heritage and milieu, it does not automatically translate the same way in far-off America, Israel and elsewhere where the local Jews are VERY assimilated, intermarried, have irrevocably abandoned their faith altogether by even becoming Christians.
So the question is, once the Shabbos Project "hits" this "reality" in the way that an "irresistible force (i.e. Shabbos Project) hits an immovable object (assimilation & intermarriage") aka "the morning after the night before" -- the big question is, what will happen and are the people in charge aware of what they are up against outside of South Africa? And note, even with international rabbis involved, those rabbis do NOT deal with such questions because outside of South Africa they service strictly Orthodox or Charedi populations most of the time.
Logically speaking there may come a "project" that will have to face how to deal with masses of intermarried Jews and how to inform people who are not Halachically Jewish that things like he Shabbos Project are not meant for them and that they should please step back. This may sound "messianic" but there have been efforts from very Orthodox outreach sources in this direction, such as by the failed EJF project, that have come seriously asunder and crashed on the rocks due to this very question because the rabbis do not have one approach to CONVERSION and even more troubling PROSELYTIZATION to gentiles, a hugely DIVISIVE issue, unlike something as universally marketable as proper Shabbat observance for Jews who wish to do so!
Have the South African Chief Rabbi and his planners and rabbinic partners all over the world thought this through to its end game and final conclusion or are they just riding on the wave of "ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise"?
What happens a few "projects" down the line or even what happens now during an actual Shabbos Project someplace when the gentiles married to Jews or those who consider themselves to be "Jews" etc discover or are informed, as they invariably will be, that they are NOT truly Jewish in the sense of Jewish Law-Halachah? Do they leave the Shabbos table? What about the wine? Who answers the Halachic Shaylos at the end of the day and has a suitable body of Poskim been chosen already and in place to deal with the tidal wave of inevitable questions?!
These are serious questions for all those involved to seriously come to terms with and be prepared to face as the time comes closer. In South Africa there is the acceptance of the local one and only Orthodox Bais Din, something that does not exist in most places, except in Israel and perhaps in the UK.
To be forewarned is to be forearmed! or as the boy scouts succinctly put it "be prepared"! And as always, life is stranger than fiction! Once again Mazel Tov to everyone who has made the Shabbos Project such a popular success and here's wishing for the success of the Shabbos Project and many more that will bring Klal Yisroel to a Teshuva Gemura, Amen!
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
What if Age Is Nothing but a Mind-Set? The conscious use of placebos
NY Times One
day in the fall of 1981, eight men in their 70s stepped out of a van in
front of a converted monastery in New Hampshire. They shuffled forward,
a few of them arthritically stooped, a couple with canes. Then they
passed through the door and entered a time warp. Perry Como crooned on a
vintage radio. Ed Sullivan welcomed guests on a black-and-white TV.
Everything inside — including the books on the shelves and the magazines
lying around — were designed to conjure 1959. This was to be the men’s
home for five days as they participated in a radical experiment, cooked
up by a young psychologist named Ellen Langer.
The
subjects were in good health, but aging had left its mark. “This was
before 75 was the new 55,” says Langer, who is 67 and the
longest-serving professor of psychology at Harvard. Before arriving, the
men were assessed on such measures as dexterity, grip strength,
flexibility, hearing and vision, memory and cognition — probably the
closest things the gerontologists of the time could come to the testable
biomarkers of age. Langer predicted the numbers would be quite
different after five days, when the subjects emerged from what was to be
a fairly intense psychological intervention.
Langer
had already undertaken a couple of studies involving elderly patients.
In one, she found that nursing-home residents who had exhibited early
stages of memory loss were able to do better on memory tests when they
were given incentives to remember — showing that in many cases,
indifference was being mistaken for brain deterioration. In another, now
considered a classic of social psychology, Langer gave houseplants to
two groups of nursing-home residents. She told one group that they were
responsible for keeping the plant alive and that they could also make
choices about their schedules during the day. She told the other group
that the staff would care for the plants, and they were not given any
choice in their schedules. Eighteen months later, twice as many subjects
in the plant-caring, decision-making group were still alive than in the
control group.
To
Langer, this was evidence that the biomedical model of the day — that
the mind and the body are on separate tracks — was wrongheaded. The
belief was that “the only way to get sick is through the introduction of
a pathogen, and the only way to get well is to get rid of it,” she
said, when we met at her office in Cambridge in December. She came to
think that what people needed to heal themselves was a psychological
“prime” — something that triggered the body to take curative measures
all by itself. Gathering the older men together in New Hampshire, for
what she would later refer to as a counterclockwise study, would be a
way to test this premise.
[...]
Placebo effects have already been proven to work on the immune system.
But this study could show for the first time that they work in a
different way — that is, through an act of will. “As far as we know
today, the placebo responses in the immune system are attributable to
unconscious classical conditioning,” says the Italian neuroscientist
Fabrizio Benedetti, a leading expert in placebo effects. In Benedetti’s
experiments, a suggestion planted in the minds of test subjects produced
physiological changes directly, the way a dinner bell might goose the
salivary glands of a dog. (In one study, healthy volunteers given a
placebo — a suggestion that any pain they experienced was actually
beneficial to their bodies — were found to produce higher levels of
natural painkillers.) “There’s no evidence that expectations play a role
as well,” Benedetti says. Langer plans to further analyze the subjects’
saliva to see whether they actually have the rhinovirus and not just
elevated IgA. [...]
Terror Attack in Jerusalem - Hamas says it is natural for them to kill babies
Arutz 7 A baby girl was killed and eight people were injured Wednesday, after a terrorist hit them with his car outside the Givat Hatachmoshet (Ammunition Hill) Light Rail stop.
"A private car hit passengers from the light rail near the police national headquarters. The car's driver attempted to escape and was shot, apparently by a police officer from the Jerusalem district," police spokeswoman Luba Samri said in a statement.
Footage of the attack has now begun to circulate. The grainy security video appears to show a white car careening across the median and straight at pedestrians, mowing down one of them.
One of the wounded, a three month-old girl, died after being rushed to Hadassah Har HaZofim (Mount Scopus). She has now (8:00 pm) been named as Chaya Ziso, hy"d.
Shimon Helperin, the infant's grandfather, toldArutz Shevathat the Ziso family - which had been waiting for a child for years - had been returning from prayers at the Western Wall (Kotel) when they were struck by the terrorist. [...]
"This is a natural response to the crimes of the occupation and invasion of our land by the Jews, particularly on the Al-Aqsa Mosque (Temple Mount - ed.)," Hamas spokesman Hossam Badran stated on official Hamas television.[...]
Allan Katz - Shemittah and meeting your kids' nutritional needs
Guest post by Allan katz
I recently said to a friend – that the people who cannot afford the expensive ' hechsherim' , the super glatt meat, the suits and Borsalino hats, women's wigs and Pei'ot , the imported or Nochri fruit and vegetables during Smittah, bug free ( but plenty of insecticide ) vegetables are buying these products , while those who can afford them don't. And it is not just a question of different communities spending money on different things or having different priorities, but it seems that the poorer communities are cutting back on healthy nutrition and this is impacting on kids' health development with problems of underweight kids and malnutrition. Stringent bug-free standards for vegetables mean that kids may also be missing out on many important green and leafy vegetables.
There is a video clip of the Harav Ovadia Yosef Z'TL on the -Credibility of the Heter Me'chirah hechsher . The interesting point for me was his statement that if you have extra money to spend, buy produce from the Otzar Beit Din. I have heard his son, the chief rabbi of Holon remark how families and especially the bigger families could not afford to pay the exorbitant prices of the Smittah le'mehadrin produce and meet the nutritional needs of their families.
I was wondering whether parents , educators and rabbis reflect on the saying – when you are machmir in one area you are mei'kel in another area ?
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
IDF Finally Admits: Hamas Planned Terror-Tunnel Massacre
Arutz 7 The IDF has confirmed rumors, circulating since last summer's war
with Gaza terrorists, that Hamas was planning a massive attack on
Israeli communities by hundreds of terrorists who would infiltrate into
Israel via the vast network of "terror-tunnels" dug from Gaza into
Israeli territory.
In an exclusive Vanity Fair report, IDF spokesperson Lt.
Colonel Peter Lerner finally revealed that in destroying the tunnel
Israel may have prevented a coordinated massacre of its civilians on an
unprecedented scale.
"Hamas had a plan," he said. "A simultaneous, coordinated, surprise
attack within Israel. They planned to send 200 terrorists armed to the
teeth toward civilian populations. This was going to be a coordinated
attack.
"The concept of operations involved 14 offensive tunnels into Israel.
With at least 10 men in each tunnel, they would infiltrate and inflict
mass casualties."
An unnamed senior military intelligence figure elaborated further on how the attack was meant to pan-out: "First,
get in and massacre people in a village. Pull off something they could
show on television. Second, the ability to kidnap soldiers and civilians
using the tunnels would give them a great bargaining chip." [...]
Joey (Deutsch) Diangello - courageous advocate against child abuse and rape survivor - buried in Monsey
Over the joyous Yom Tov of Succos, a 34-year-old man named Joey DiAngello tragically died. His Levaya (funeral) was in Monsey this past Sunday. He was a passionate advocate for abuse prevention and victim's rights, having been molested in a Brooklyn Mikva when he was an innocent seven-year-old child named Yoeli Deutch.
After Joey/Yoeli's burial, a dozen friends of his gathered to share their memories of his all-too-short life. One of the people who spoke was a middle-aged, chassidic man. He softly stated that his son had been abused many years ago and said, "I am terrified that I might be here one day burying my own son."
He said that his family is following the advice they received from Rabbonim and professionals who are knowledgeable in these matters [to give their son "space" and the love/support he needs] even though, "it is very, very difficult for us to do that."
My message to parents, siblings, and loved ones of abuse victims is that you please, please listen to the wise words of that father and support the survivors in every way possible. And to all members of our community, always keep in mind that you never really know what pain and suffering people are contending with.
We are burying far too many of our kids who couldn't deal with the pain and confusion of the childhood abuse that shattered their innocent lives - and for many of them, the support they get from you could be the difference between their life and death.[...]
*MONSEY, N.Y. (PIX11) –* The marker on the freshly-dug grave in the Monsey Cemetery had the name “Joel Deutsch” in Hebrew, the name 34-year old Joe Diangello was given at birth in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
Diangello had walked away from the Satmar Hasidic community — and his name — at age 17, ten years after suffering what he said was a brutal sexual assault in a mikvah bath on Marcy Avenue.
“I think when that person raped me, he murdered my Jewish soul,” Diangello told PIX11 Investigates in early 2009, when he finally started going public with his story.
Diangello was buried Sunday by members of the Hasidic community, not long after he was discovered dead in his Manhattan apartment by a social worker.
His close friends who became his true support system in recent years, after Diangello’s family rejected his new lifestyle, said he would not have wanted a Monsey funeral.
Diangello certainly stood out in a crowd, with his dyed, jet-black hair, black fingernails, and heavy metal t-shirts.
The cause of death was listed as a drug overdose, but many friends insisted to PIX11 it must have been accidental, since Diangello had been taking a more positive outlook on life.
He was running marathons, working as a medical biller from his apartment, and enjoying Yankee games.
Still, his life was one filled with pain. [...]
Diangello had walked away from the Satmar Hasidic community — and his name — at age 17, ten years after suffering what he said was a brutal sexual assault in a mikvah bath on Marcy Avenue.
“I think when that person raped me, he murdered my Jewish soul,” Diangello told PIX11 Investigates in early 2009, when he finally started going public with his story.
Diangello was buried Sunday by members of the Hasidic community, not long after he was discovered dead in his Manhattan apartment by a social worker.
His close friends who became his true support system in recent years, after Diangello’s family rejected his new lifestyle, said he would not have wanted a Monsey funeral.
Diangello certainly stood out in a crowd, with his dyed, jet-black hair, black fingernails, and heavy metal t-shirts.
The cause of death was listed as a drug overdose, but many friends insisted to PIX11 it must have been accidental, since Diangello had been taking a more positive outlook on life.
He was running marathons, working as a medical biller from his apartment, and enjoying Yankee games.
Still, his life was one filled with pain. [...]
Monday, October 20, 2014
Should sexual abuse be accepted as an inherent part of football - Sayreville Scandal
NY Times SAYREVILLE,
N.J. — The freshmen were easy prey in the locker room. They slinked
away when the older varsity boys barreled in, blasting their music,
shooting each other with Nerf guns and stripping down with the kind of
confidence that freshmen could only fake. Intimidated by the older boys,
most played invisible. But on the day of the second game of the season,
Sept. 19, the freshmen became targets in a pastime very different from
football.
“Hootie
hoo,” the older players yelled before their home game that night,
flicking the lights on and off and on again. Then they tripped a
freshman in a T-shirt and football pants, letting loud music muffle any
noise the boy made as he fell. Two pinned the younger boy’s arms, while
others punched and kicked him — not viciously, but hard enough to
matter, two witnesses said. He curled into the fetal position and was
groped by his attackers.
What
happened during that episode and in three other locker room attacks in
subsequent days at Sayreville War Memorial High School prompted the
arrest of seven varsity players on hazing and sexual abuse allegations,
the cancellation of the football season and another round of
introspection about the sport and its recent spate of scandals. [...]
The
freshmen may now be minimizing any abuse because of the scorn that has
been directed their way. Prosecutors here face a challenge: building a
case not on physical evidence, but on the testimony of teenagers who
live in a world of often cruel peers, a place where threats of
drop-kicking and jumping someone are as common as texting “LOL.” [...]
Some
players said they thought that the attacks were just part of being on
the team, a way for the varsity players to show that the chosen freshmen
belonged to the Bombers family. They said the popular freshmen were
targeted, not the weak ones. Yet others were scared of the older boys.
“They
think they’re joking around, but I don’t think it was a joke,” a
witness to the first attack said. “I said, ‘This is nasty.’ ” [...]
The "scientific" claim that Jack the Ripper was definitely Jewish - is false
It was recently reported that a scientist had proven through DNA that Jack the Ripper was Jewish. It is now being reported that the claim is false because it is based on an elementary but devasting error which renders the evaluations totally worthless.
The scientist who carried out the DNA analysis that identified Victorian-era serial killer "Jack the Ripper" as a Jewish barber named Aaron Kosminski has apparently made a fundamental error that fatally undermines his case, according to several top experts.
Scientist Jari Louhelainen is said to have put a decimal point in the
wrong place when using a mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) database to
calculate the chances of a genetic match between DNA left on a shawl
that allegedly belonged to one of Ripper's victims, Catherine Eddowes,
and was supposedly discovered near her body, and DNA taken from
descendants of Eddowes and Kosminski.
The apparent error, first noticed by amateur criminologists in
Australia blogging on the casebook.org website, “has been highlighted by
four experts with intimate knowledge of DNA analysis – including
Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, the inventor of genetic fingerprinting,”
according to The Independent.
Professor Walther Parson of the Institute of Legal Medicine in
Innsbruck has reportedly “echoed” Professor Jeffreys' concerns, as have
Mannis van Oven, professor of forensic molecular biology at Rotterdam's
Erasmus University, and Hansi Weissensteiner, also at Innsbruck and one
of the scientists behind the computer algorithm used by Dr Louhelainen
to search the mtDNA database.
Louhelainen used the database at the Institute of Legal
Medicine to match a DNA fragment from the shawl with Karen Miller, the
three-times great-granddaughter of Eddowes. Another DNA fragment was
matched to a descendant of Kosminski's sister who asked not to be
identified.
The error seems to have been made in the calculations linking Eddowes and Miller. If
the critics are right, Louhelainen's calculations were wrong and
virtually anyone could have left the DNA that he insisted came from
Eddowes. This means that Eddowes cannot be connected to the
shawl, and that therefore, no DNA connection can be made between
Kosminski and Eddowes.
Sunday, October 19, 2014
Rav Schochet - prominent Chabad rabbi - bans Telushkin Book For Heresy Content
Chabad Info October 17, 2014
In a scathing letter written by the Av Beis Din of Toronto, Rabbi Gershon Elisha Schochet, he categorizes the Telushkin book as heresy, and demands that the Rabbi who permitted it recant his permission
In a letter written a few weeks ago, Rabbi Gershon Elisha Schochet, Av Beis Din of Toronto, asks Rabbi YY Shusterman, Rov in Beverly Hills California, if he permitted the reading and disseminating of the Telushkin book.
After a response was not forthcoming, he chose to publish the letter:
I have heard a rumor, that you have supposedly approved the book of Telushkin, and additionally, you have ruled, in your capacity as a Rov More Hora’ah for Chabad, that Shluchim should encourage the distribution of the book.
I am sure you are aware of the Rebbe’s opinion prohibiting the use of books which were written by unscrupulous individuals, even when there is no inherent problem with the content of the book. And the Rebbe held the same regarding books which only referenced such publications.
Also, you are surely aware of the Rebbe’s extensive correspondence regarding the Conservative movement, it’s “Rabbis” and leaders – that the Halacha is they are considered heretics.
You are surely aware of the famous ruling by Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, that a Conservative “Rabbi” is not trusted for testimony in Jewish court just by the mere fact that he is affiliated with said movement, and he doesn’t need any prior warning before being disqualified…
Regarding the author, Telushkin – there is no need to do any research, for it is clearly known to anyone who searches the internet that he serves as a “Rabbi” in a Conservative temple, where a woman serves as a “Chazanit” and his assistant “Rabbi” is from the Reform movement,
Although this would have been enough for someone who is a G-d fearing Jew, and even more so for a Chossid of the Rebbe, and even more so for one who presents himself as a Rov who rules according to the directives of the Rebbe – to completely prohibit the above book.
More so, in this case (without even discussing the issue of the author), when many people who are considered G-d fearing Jews, and known around the world as smart people who are busy with spiritual issues (I am not talking about those “leaders” who are well-versed in politics, PR and monetary issues) – have said that the book has some terrible ideas which constitute a Chilul Hashem, so much so that anyone who has any inkling of a connection to the Rebbe, and more so if he has an iota of Hiskashrus, would immediately denounce this book.
I therefore turn to you and ask you, in the name of Anash and their descendants which are here and those that will come, that you please tell me that this rumor is a lie, and there is no inkling of truth in this matter.
If G-d forbid there is some truth to this rumor, I demand you tell me what the reasoning behind your ruling is, and if you made your decision independently or after consulting with other Lubavitcher Rabbonim and Mashpiim, and tell me their names and reasons.
With a blessing for a Ksiva V’chasima Tova,
Rabbi Gershon Elisha Schochet
New book reveals that Eichman was truly evil - not banal
update Oct 14, 2014 of the controversy from Jewish Review of Books
"Richard Wolin’s review of Bettina Stangneth’s newly translated book about Adolf Eichmann caused a stir, mainly about Hannah Arendt and the banality (or not) of evil. Yale Professor Seyla Benhabib responded in a New York Times piece, others blogged, and Wolin responded in an essay on our website. Now Professor Benhabib has rejoined the debate and Professor Wolin has replied a final time. Here's a guide to the exchange from the original review to its last installment."
NY Times [See also Jewish Review of Books] Ever since his capture in the early 1960s, Otto Adolf Eichmann, who was in charge of Jewish affairs during the Third Reich, has been the subject of unsettled and passionate controversy — centered, above all, on Hannah Arendt’s portrait of him at his 1961 trial. Her “Eichmann in Jerusalem” in many ways mirrored Eichmann’s own self-presentation. She insisted that, contrary to expectations, the man in the dock was not some kind of demonic Nazi sadist but a thoughtless, relatively anonymous, nonideological bureaucrat dutifully executing orders for the emigration, deportation and murder of European Jewry. Arendt’s insights — that genocide and bureaucratic banality are not necessarily opposed, that fanatical anti-Semitism (or for that matter, any ideological predisposition) is not a sufficient precondition for mass murder — remain pertinent.
"Richard Wolin’s review of Bettina Stangneth’s newly translated book about Adolf Eichmann caused a stir, mainly about Hannah Arendt and the banality (or not) of evil. Yale Professor Seyla Benhabib responded in a New York Times piece, others blogged, and Wolin responded in an essay on our website. Now Professor Benhabib has rejoined the debate and Professor Wolin has replied a final time. Here's a guide to the exchange from the original review to its last installment."
- The Banality of Evil: The Demise of a Legend by Richard Wolin
Bettina Stangneth’s newly translated book Eichmann Before Jerusalem finally and completely undermines Hannah Arendt’s famous “banality of evil” thesis. - Who's on Trial, Eichmann or Arendt? by Seyla Benhabib
On September 21, 2014, on The New York Time’s website, Seyla Benhabib argued that a “rejection of the ‘banality of evil’ argument . . . does not hold up” and took issue with Wolin’s review. - Thoughtlessness Revisited: A Response to Seyla Benhabib by Richard Wolin. Richard Wolin responds to Benhabib’s “ringing reaffirmation of Hannah Arendt’s notion of the banality of evil.”
- Richard Wolin on Arendt’s “Banality of Evil” Thesis by Seyla Benhabib
Seyla Benhabib rejoins the debate, contesting Wolin’s critique of Arendt’s banality thesis on historical and philosophical grounds. - Arendt, Banality, and Benhabib: A Final Rejoinder by Richard Wolin
In the final installment of the exchange, Wolin defends and amplifies his critique.
NY Times [See also Jewish Review of Books] Ever since his capture in the early 1960s, Otto Adolf Eichmann, who was in charge of Jewish affairs during the Third Reich, has been the subject of unsettled and passionate controversy — centered, above all, on Hannah Arendt’s portrait of him at his 1961 trial. Her “Eichmann in Jerusalem” in many ways mirrored Eichmann’s own self-presentation. She insisted that, contrary to expectations, the man in the dock was not some kind of demonic Nazi sadist but a thoughtless, relatively anonymous, nonideological bureaucrat dutifully executing orders for the emigration, deportation and murder of European Jewry. Arendt’s insights — that genocide and bureaucratic banality are not necessarily opposed, that fanatical anti-Semitism (or for that matter, any ideological predisposition) is not a sufficient precondition for mass murder — remain pertinent.
Yet
as Bettina Stangneth demonstrates in “Eichmann Before Jerusalem,” her
critical — albeit respectful — dialogue with Arendt, these insights most
certainly do not apply to Eichmann himself. Throughout his post-1945
exile he remained a passionate, ideologically convinced National
Socialist. He proudly signed photos with the title “Adolf Eichmann —
SS-Obersturmbannführer (retired)” and, quite unlike a plodding
functionary, boasted of his “creative” work. At one point he described
the mass deportation of more than 400,000 Hungarian Jews as his
innovative masterpiece: “It was actually an achievement that was never
matched before or since.”
The
enduring image of Eichmann as faceless and order-obeying, Stangneth
argues, is the result of his uncanny ability to tailor his narrative to
the desires and fantasies of his listeners. Arendt was not the only one
to be taken in, and Stangneth, an independent philosopher living in
Hamburg, is able to present a more rounded picture on the basis of
previously unmined archival sources, particularly Eichmann’s own
compulsive notes and jottings made in exile, in conjunction with the
elusive series of taped conversations known as the Sassen interviews.
These were exchanges organized in Argentina by the Dutch Nazi journalist
Wilhelm Sassen and attended by a small group of old Nazis and their
sympathizers. [...]
It
is in these interviews and Eichmann’s own notes that he gave
uninhibited vent to his version of the Holocaust and his involvement.
Since he had a penchant for tailoring his endless chatting and
voluminous writings to what he believed his audience desired, it may not
be immediately evident why his statements in Buenos Aires should be
considered more authentic than the “little man” portrait he painted in
Jerusalem. The answer lies in the stance he took against what
his Nazi and radical-right audience wanted to hear. For they were intent
on either denying the Holocaust altogether, or outlandishly regarding
it as either a Zionist plot to obtain a Jewish state or a conspiracy of
the Gestapo (not the SS) working against Hitler and without his
knowledge. Eichmann dashed these expectations. Not only did he affirm
that the horrific events had indeed taken place; he attested to his
decisive role in them. Hardly anonymous, he insisted on his reputation
as the great mover behind Jewish policy, which became part of the fear,
the mystique of power, surrounding him. As Stangneth observes: “He
dispatched, decreed, allowed, took steps, issued orders and gave
audiences.”
Like
many Nazi mass murderers, he possessed a puritanical petit-bourgeois
sense of family and social propriety, indignantly denying that he
indulged in extramarital relations or that he profited personally from
his duties, and yet he lived quite comfortably with the mass killing of
Jews. This was so, Stangneth argues, because Eichmann was far from a
thoughtless functionary simply performing his duty. He proceeded quite
intentionally from a set of tenaciously held Nazi beliefs (hardly
consonant with Arendt’s puzzling contention that he “never realized what
he was doing”). His was a consciously wrought racial “ethics,” one that
pitted as an ultimate value the survival of one’s own blood against
that of one’s enemies. He defined “sacred law” as what “benefits my
people.” Morality was thus not universal or, as Eichmann put it,
“international.” How could it be, given that the Jewish enemy was an
international one, propounding precisely those universal values? [...]
Saturday, October 18, 2014
My father, locked in his body but soaring free
In 2011 Ronnie Cahana suffered a severe stroke that left him with locked-in syndrome: completely paralyzed except for his eyes. While this might shatter a normal person’s mental state, Cahana found peace in “dimming down the external chatter,” and “fell in love with life and body anew.” In a somber, emotional talk, his daughter Kitra shares how she documented her father's spiritual experience, as he helped guide others even in a state of seeming helplessness.
========================
Three years ago, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana
suffered a rare brain stem stroke that left him fully conscious, yet
his entire body paralyzed. It’s a condition known as “locked-in
syndrome.”
Last month, TED Fellow Kitra Cahana spoke of her father’s experience at TEDMED (watch her talk, “My father, locked in his body but soaring free”),
revealing how her family cocooned Rabbi Cahana in love, and how a
system of blinking, in response to the alphabet, patiently allowed him
to dictate poems, sermons and letters to his loved ones and to his
congregation.
Kitra began documenting her father’s recovery in photographs and video, creating layered images that — in contrast to her photojournalistic work — are
more abstract and emotional. “I wanted to try to find a way to take
photographs that reflected the mystical things that were happening in
the hospital room,” she says. “How do I explain, in a photograph, the
power that another human being has to either add or detract from the
healing of another person? I started a process of trying to tell a story
in images.”
As Rabbi Cahana began to regain his ability to speak, Kitra started
recording his voice. She is now in the process of developing this body
of work for an exhibition to help raise support for his ongoing care and rehabilitation.
Below, see Kitra’s stunning images — accompanied by her father’s
poems — and hear more about the thoughts behind them. But first, a
Q&A with Rabbi Cahana himself, in which he describes his own
experience.[...]
The Beggars of Lakewood - New York Times
The yeshiva students may not give much, but nearly all of them give —
and there are so many of them. Between 1990 and 2010, Lakewood’s
population doubled to about 92,000 residents, largely because of the
growth of its ultra-Orthodox Jewish community. Conveniently located
equidistant from New York City and Philadelphia, Lakewood is home to
Beth Medrash Govoha, the nation’s largest yeshiva. The school, founded
in 1943 by the refugee Rabbi Aharon Kotler, has seen its student body
swell to about 6,500, making it just smaller than Harvard College. The
growing Orthodox movement encourages young men to forgo or postpone
higher education for religious study, and the yeshiva has benefited from
that. Other schools have followed suit, setting up shop in Lakewood.
Most students are married, and families with five or 10 children are
common.[...]
Lakewood
is becoming a medium-size city, but in many ways, it’s a pre-World War
II European village, right down to the Yiddish and, to an extent, the
clothes. The spiritual ecology of the town revolves around the Torah,
which obliges that all Jews, even those who are in need themselves, give
to charity. And so Lakewood — full of broke students, most likely at
the peak of their adherence to Jewish law — has given full expression to
the generous tendency of small, diasporic communities, which can be
amplified when they find a little piece of the world to call their own.
It’s
not that Lakewood residents enjoy having their doorbells rung two,
three or four times a day to hear a hard-luck story. But while other
towns may criminalize beggars or tell them to move along, Lakewood has
an obligation to fulfill — Jews are literally family, according to the
Torah. So the town came up with a modern solution to an ancient problem:
paperwork. Beggars are registered and licensed in Lakewood, as a means
of preserving trust in this community that aspires to be a village but
is outgrowing that label.[...]
Aaron Kotler, who hosted me one night this summer in Lakewood, is the
president of Beth Medrash Govoha and the grandson of its founder. He
dresses in banker’s pinstripes, is an avid cyclist and, seemingly alone
among the middle-aged men of Lakewood, speaks without a trace of Yiddish
singsong. He has been instrumental in bringing real estate investors to
town to feed the growing need for housing. I asked Kotler what he
thought of the culture of begging. “I think that people of quality want
to live in a place that has a flavor of doing chesed,” or
kindness, he said. He questioned whether the door-to-door begging was
“the most effective way to raise money,” but ultimately he looked on it
favorably. [...]
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