Videos -Eternal Jewish Family - Preservation Of The Jewish Culture
Video about EJF's dedication to promote the concept of universally accepted conversions in intermarriage as a way of preserving the Jewish family.
Video about EJF's dedication to promote the concept of universally accepted conversions in intermarriage as a way of preserving the Jewish family.
Whether an idea is typically Jewish can best be judged by the halacha – not the Aggadah – to understand any work as the authority meant to convey and you must have lived in the same social environment and cultural forces as the author. Mankind is changeable in its cognitive adventures, and to say that I understand Aristotle means in the tradition of Aristotle, which, of course, has been subject to change. In halacha there is a masoret, a tradition as to method, but if I give an interpretation to Maimonides, it does not necessarily mean that Maimonides meant just that. If measured by halachic standards it is correct. That suffices. But as to Aggadah, there is no tradition, nor in philosophy do we have a tradition. In halacha there is a certain kabballah without any missing links, while in Aggada and certainly philosophy there are many such missing links.It appears to me that the Rav’s remarks concerning evolution are an attempt to achieve what I would call ‘halachic commensurability’ and not, merely, ‘scientific commensurability’. While Judaism views man as the “bearer of a divine image” and therefore endowed with the capacity for transcendence, this transcendence, in the Rav’s words, “was always seen against the background of naturalness. The canvas was man’s immanence; transcendence was just projected on it as a display of colors” (Emergence of Ethical Man p. 9). The Rav is clearly speaking from the standpoint of the halachah. In contradistinction, “Christianity succeeded in isolating them and reducing the element of naturalness to a state of corruption” (ibid.). This has to be seen as a consequence of Christianity’s rejection of the halacha.
At least $600 million in Jewish charitable funds have been wiped out by the collapse of Bernard Madoff's Wall Street investment firm, a partial review by The Jerusalem Post revealed Monday.
Yet much is still hidden about what may amount to the most spectacular financial disaster to hit Jewish life since the Great Depression, with unconfirmed losses totaling up to $1.5 billion.
Furthermore, the Post's figures do not include billions of dollars lost to individual and family investors, many of whom were the primary donors to Jewish schools, synagogues and communal charities.[...]
For the worldwide Jewish community, the fact that the man at the heart of what may be Wall Street's worst-ever fraud was an active member of the community could be the worst news yet in a bad recession period.
Not only could Madoff's alleged dishonesty increase anti-Semitic feeling in a time of worldwide economic downturn, said many Jewish leaders, but his close involvement with the Jewish community has exposed vast amounts of Jewish communal assets to his scheme.[...]
"This is a tidal wave, a tsunami," said a veteran advisor to Jewish nonprofits, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "You can live with a downturn in the economy, because there will be an upturn. But now we're talking about foundations that have been wiped out completely, money that's not recoverable."[...]
No subject so divides the Jews of Israel and America as that which once bound them most closely: Israel itself. To appreciate the gap, try telling an American Jew that George W. Bush was the president who best understood Israel's predicament and watch his jaw drop.
American Jewry is lining up behind a return to the hyperactive American peacemaking of the Clinton years. The Jewish Alliance for Peace and Justice, according to an article in New York's Jewish Week, recently obtained the signatures of 800 rabbis on a petition to President-elect Barack Obama urging him to make the Israeli-Palestinian peace process an early priority, beginning with the appointment of a high-level envoy to the region. And the new left-wing group, J Street, contacted the Obama transition team to argue that American Jews want a more active peace process and that large Democratic majorities in Congress provide the incoming administration with the power to push an aggressive peacemaking agenda.
J Street is likely right. For many American Jews, Israel has become a drag. If they were to wake up tomorrow and find that Israel had bloodlessly disappeared and its Jews had found safe haven elsewhere, they would be relieved. That includes the 50 percent of American Jews under 35 who told sociologists Steven Cohen and Ari Kelman that they would not view the destruction of Israel as a personal tragedy.
Others, such the Jewish Alliance for Peace and Justice and Americans for Peace Now, are intensely concerned with events in Israel. But it is their cherished image of the Jew as the bearer of universal justice, not concern with the lives of Jews of Israel, that primarily drives their Middle East agenda. So long as Israel does not have peace with its neighbors and is the subject of widespread obloquy, that image is tarnished.
Even among the 3% of Reform Jews and 6% of Conservative Jews for whom Israel is the crucial issue driving their voting choices (according to a May study conducted by the American Jewish Committee), there are many who would not protest intense American pressure on Israel, as long as known "pro-Israel" figures like incoming secretary of state Hillary Clinton, and prominent American Jews such as Dan Kurtzer, Martin Indyk and Rahm Emmanuel, are the ones turning the screws.
And who can blame them, when Israel's prime minister himself says Israel's future depends on the speedy achievement of a peace agreement with the Palestinians? For all Ehud Olmert's venality, nothing so reveals his soul-deep corruption as having deliberately handed any future American president the club to pressure Israel without doffing the mantle of "a true friend."
THOSE AMERICAN Jews who still fret about the safety of their brethren in Israel should at least ask themselves: Why do the majority of Israel's Jews view matters so differently? Why are they poised to elect as their next prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the bete-noire of the Clinton administration in the heady days of Oslo? Is it that Israelis are an anomaly in Jewish history - fanatic warriors craving permanent warfare? Or is it rather that they learned something over the
past 15 years?[...]
The zoning lawyer in Miami trusted him because his father had dealt profitably with him for decades. The officers of a little charity in Massachusetts respected him and relied on his advice.
Wealthy men like J. Ezra Merkin, the chairman of GMAC; Fred Wilpon, the principal owner of the New York Mets; and Norman Braman, who owned the Philadelphia Eagles, simply appreciated the steady returns he produced, regardless of market conditions.
But these clients of Bernard L. Madoff had this in common: They chose him to oversee much of their personal wealth.
And now, they fear, they have lost it.
While Mr. Madoff is facing federal criminal charges, accused by federal prosecutors of operating a vast $50 billion Ponzi scheme, many of his clients are facing an abrupt reversal of fortune that is the stuff of nightmares.
“There are people who were very, very well off a few days ago who are now virtually destitute,” said Brad Friedman, a lawyer with the Milberg firm in Manhattan. “They have nothing left but their apartments or homes — which they are going to have to sell to get money to live on.”
From New York to Palm Beach, business associates of Mr. Madoff spent Friday assessing the damage, the extent of which will not be known for some time. Many invested with Mr. Madoff through other funds and may not know that their money is at risk.[...]
Mr. Madoff has resigned from his positions at Yeshiva University, where he was treasurer for the university’s board and deeply involved in the business school.
“Our lawyers and accountants are investigating all aspects of his relationship to Yeshiva University,” said Hedy Shulman, a spokeswoman for the university.
The most recent tax filings for the university show that its endowment fund, a separate charity, was heavily invested in hedge funds and other nontraditional alternatives at the end of its fiscal year in 2006.
DT: "I don't think you have the context quite right. Nobody is saying that these or other involved rabbis are doing thing which they think violate their principles for the sake of money".
DT: No one is going to a rosh yeshiva and saying - if you do will violate halacha I will give you big bucks. The issue is much more subtle. I would suggest you search through this blog for the Achiezer 26 and Achiezer 28 - twenty years separated these two statements".
“The Torah is not interested in disclosing any scientific data to man. Revelation was only the revealing of the will of God… Therefore if the Bible employed the Ptolemaic description of the cosmos, it was only to present to the people of its time and not to present the true scientific view…” (Lecture II).