Sunday, September 16, 2007
The Importance of Being Moishe
If you want to read a good book about the shidduch crisis, try Oscar Wilde's 1895 play The Importance of Being Earnest. Pay particular attention to the scene when Lady Bracknell interrogates a young man who wants her daughter's hand in marriage. Bracknell asks him all the important questions: whether he smokes (she is pleased that he does), how old he is, how much money he earns, what type of house he lives in, and who his parents are. She is horrified to discover that he never knew his parents, and that he was found as a baby in a handbag at a railway station.
On more than one occasion I have found myself conversing over the phone with a frum Lady Bracknell whose daughter was set up with a friend of mine. These mothers always have specific criteria they want to know about. It might be my imagination, but they seem woefully indifferent when I try to explain how great a guy my friend is. I am still not clear as to why the mothers are getting involved at all.
I also am on the dating scene, and a few months ago I went to a yeshivish bookstore for help. I wanted ideas, but I was prepared to take anything I read with a grain of salt. I passed up the first book I saw, which seemed to spend many chapters on the subject of background checks to prevent domestic abuse and other ugly situations. That was not the sort of advice I was after. I finally found a book titled Successful Dating, and when I turned to the inside cover, I discovered that it was actually titled Don't Judge a Book By Its Cover. Cute.
I was disappointed. I knew something was awry when it defended a Rav's instruction to a young man to stuff his shoes with paper because he had the misfortune of being shorter than his date. This book also advised against marrying people from foreign countries.
More recently, I got a book called Dating Secrets, and it is more along the lines of what I was looking for, especially its chapter "The Second Date and Beyond." Abraham Twerski provides the foreword, a commentary on the "shidduch crisis." While he makes some good points, I stopped short when he said the following: "Regardless of how much the frum community has tried to insulate itself, the prevailing cultural ideas have penetrated the defenses." This is the sort of statement I constantly see whenever the "shidduch crisis" is raised: it's all Western society's fault, and the solution should be to distance ourselves further from horrible Western influences.
The flaw in this argument is staring them in the face. Western society cannot be the culprit, for Western society isn't having a shidduch crisis. Western society is having a divorce crisis, and it's fair to question the predominant Western attitude toward marriage. But there is no widespread problem of non-Jews finding partners in the first place. The reason that we have this problem, and they don't, is rooted almost entirely in the restrictive social customs that plague our community.
Take the claim that one shouldn't marry someone from another country. I'm not denying that cultural differences may potentially be a source of conflict in a relationship. But to make a blanket statement against marrying foreigners is only to increase the chances that people may end up rejecting their besherte. And while the author was quick to insist that he wasn't discouraging people of different national backgrounds from dating, impressionable readers are likely to use this dubious advice to pass up worthwhile matches.
The shidduch world is full of similar bits of questionable advice, which create an atmosphere of pigeonholing and judgmentalism. A shadchanit for SawYouAtSinai recently told me that some women were rejecting my profile because I'm willing to consider dating a woman who wears pants. I'm not offended: any woman who judges my frumkeit based on such matters is probably not meant for me anyway. But this says something about the values of the shidduch system. It's not about finding suitable spouses, it's about conformity and parochialism.
These values are deeply ingrained in the very structure of our community. I don't claim to have easy answers on how to confront them. But the first step is surely not to place the blame elsewhere.
On more than one occasion I have found myself conversing over the phone with a frum Lady Bracknell whose daughter was set up with a friend of mine. These mothers always have specific criteria they want to know about. It might be my imagination, but they seem woefully indifferent when I try to explain how great a guy my friend is. I am still not clear as to why the mothers are getting involved at all.
I also am on the dating scene, and a few months ago I went to a yeshivish bookstore for help. I wanted ideas, but I was prepared to take anything I read with a grain of salt. I passed up the first book I saw, which seemed to spend many chapters on the subject of background checks to prevent domestic abuse and other ugly situations. That was not the sort of advice I was after. I finally found a book titled Successful Dating, and when I turned to the inside cover, I discovered that it was actually titled Don't Judge a Book By Its Cover. Cute.
I was disappointed. I knew something was awry when it defended a Rav's instruction to a young man to stuff his shoes with paper because he had the misfortune of being shorter than his date. This book also advised against marrying people from foreign countries.
More recently, I got a book called Dating Secrets, and it is more along the lines of what I was looking for, especially its chapter "The Second Date and Beyond." Abraham Twerski provides the foreword, a commentary on the "shidduch crisis." While he makes some good points, I stopped short when he said the following: "Regardless of how much the frum community has tried to insulate itself, the prevailing cultural ideas have penetrated the defenses." This is the sort of statement I constantly see whenever the "shidduch crisis" is raised: it's all Western society's fault, and the solution should be to distance ourselves further from horrible Western influences.
The flaw in this argument is staring them in the face. Western society cannot be the culprit, for Western society isn't having a shidduch crisis. Western society is having a divorce crisis, and it's fair to question the predominant Western attitude toward marriage. But there is no widespread problem of non-Jews finding partners in the first place. The reason that we have this problem, and they don't, is rooted almost entirely in the restrictive social customs that plague our community.
Take the claim that one shouldn't marry someone from another country. I'm not denying that cultural differences may potentially be a source of conflict in a relationship. But to make a blanket statement against marrying foreigners is only to increase the chances that people may end up rejecting their besherte. And while the author was quick to insist that he wasn't discouraging people of different national backgrounds from dating, impressionable readers are likely to use this dubious advice to pass up worthwhile matches.
The shidduch world is full of similar bits of questionable advice, which create an atmosphere of pigeonholing and judgmentalism. A shadchanit for SawYouAtSinai recently told me that some women were rejecting my profile because I'm willing to consider dating a woman who wears pants. I'm not offended: any woman who judges my frumkeit based on such matters is probably not meant for me anyway. But this says something about the values of the shidduch system. It's not about finding suitable spouses, it's about conformity and parochialism.
These values are deeply ingrained in the very structure of our community. I don't claim to have easy answers on how to confront them. But the first step is surely not to place the blame elsewhere.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
A homily on teshuva
[Translation is mostly Soncino, but some of its mine.]
It was said of R. Eleazar b. Dordia that he liked the ladies. Once, after hearing about the unsurpassed excellence of a certain harlot in one of the towns by the sea he took a purse of money and crossed seven rivers to reac her.
As he came unto her, she expelled a gasp of air [yes, this means what you think it means] and said: "As this blown air will not return to its place, so will Eleazar b. Dordia never be received in repentance."
He thereupon went, sat between two hills and mountains and exclaimed: "O, ye hills and mountains, plead for mercy for me!"
They replied: "How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed!" [Note: In this homily "hills and mountains" represent those external forces we can't control.]
He then exclaimed: "Sun and moon, plead ye for mercy for me!"
But they also replied: "How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, Then the moon shall be confounded and the sun ashamed." [Here, the "sun and moon represent" the natural cycles or intenral forces we can't control.]
He exclaimed: "Ye stars and galaxies plead ye for mercy for me! Said they: How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, And all the hosts of heaven shall moulder away. " [Stars and galaxies represent the luck and the accidents and the coincidences that are beyond our control.]
Said he: "The matter then depends upon me alone!"
--
Everyone get that last bit? ON YOU ALONE.
You. Not your Rabbi. You. Not your wife. You. Not you upbringing, your background, your training. Not your moods, your maladies, your shortcomings. Not your genes, not the dice, not the luck of the draw.
You. You. You.
So, just do your very best. Just buckle down, and use the the brain God gave you, and you'll be fine. Follow this prescription and God can have no complaint against you. I mean, what else could He want? What else could He expect? The world is built on truth, and truth is discovered only through argument and observation.
(Incidently: In this way, Ed and XGH are identical. Both are doing their best, and pursuing the truth with all the honesty they posses. Therefore, about them I say: eilu v'eilu.)
It was said of R. Eleazar b. Dordia that he liked the ladies. Once, after hearing about the unsurpassed excellence of a certain harlot in one of the towns by the sea he took a purse of money and crossed seven rivers to reac her.
As he came unto her, she expelled a gasp of air [yes, this means what you think it means] and said: "As this blown air will not return to its place, so will Eleazar b. Dordia never be received in repentance."
He thereupon went, sat between two hills and mountains and exclaimed: "O, ye hills and mountains, plead for mercy for me!"
They replied: "How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed!" [Note: In this homily "hills and mountains" represent those external forces we can't control.]
He then exclaimed: "Sun and moon, plead ye for mercy for me!"
But they also replied: "How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, Then the moon shall be confounded and the sun ashamed." [Here, the "sun and moon represent" the natural cycles or intenral forces we can't control.]
He exclaimed: "Ye stars and galaxies plead ye for mercy for me! Said they: How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, And all the hosts of heaven shall moulder away. " [Stars and galaxies represent the luck and the accidents and the coincidences that are beyond our control.]
Said he: "The matter then depends upon me alone!"
--
Everyone get that last bit? ON YOU ALONE.
You. Not your Rabbi. You. Not your wife. You. Not you upbringing, your background, your training. Not your moods, your maladies, your shortcomings. Not your genes, not the dice, not the luck of the draw.
You. You. You.
So, just do your very best. Just buckle down, and use the the brain God gave you, and you'll be fine. Follow this prescription and God can have no complaint against you. I mean, what else could He want? What else could He expect? The world is built on truth, and truth is discovered only through argument and observation.
(Incidently: In this way, Ed and XGH are identical. Both are doing their best, and pursuing the truth with all the honesty they posses. Therefore, about them I say: eilu v'eilu.)
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
A shtickel Toyrah from CA
[DB: This is funny, but false, and I do not endorse it. Happy Rosh Hashana]
As you can imagine, I was more than a little startled
by CA
"CA," began the Divine Entity, "You've been a bad boy... "
"Yeah, I know," I replied. "First I made a margarita to drink before dinner. Then some kiddush wine, and after that, a half a bottle of merlot. And the two shots of slivowitz after dinner as a digestif. It's not a good idea to mix drinks, and now I have a hell of a headache, not to mention a queasy tummy...."
It seemed that the face of the KBH grew red with anger as He said, "No not that, you alcoholic nudnick! I mean your posts in the comments section at DovBear! I mean the way you always go out of your way to look for pork and shellfish entrees at the lunch buffet! I mean the way you're always arriving at shul just in time for the kiddush! I mean the way you act as though the Orthodox (or even Conservative) Jewish Mesorah was just a foolish fantasy! Well, I've got news for you, mister: That Orthodox mesorah is all true, and not only am I, G-d, Orthodox, I'm RIGHT-WING FUNDAMENTALIST ORTHODOX! But I'm still a merciful G-d, so I'm giving you one more chance to do teshuva. "
With that, He lifted me out of bed with His supernatural powers, and took me straight to Gehenna for the deluxe tour. The Pain! The freezing cold! The burning heat! The agonizing boredom of having to re-experience every moment I ever spent in Hebrew School! As I was writhing in the uttermost degradation while lying on my back on a bed of spikes, the Divine Presence towered over me, glowing red with righteous indignation."Well, CA? Do you see what you will face if you don't repent and become a frum black hatter? "
I weakly nodded my assent, my mind numb with terror and regret at the wrong turn my life had taken...and yet...
"You know what I require of you? That you immediately resign from that evil House of Conservative k'firah where you now pray..."
"Actually," I replied, "I don't really pray there, because I usually arrive too late, but in time for kiddush..."
"Shut up," said the Almighty. "And you must re-kasher your kitchen to meet the exacting humradik standards of the most right-wing rabbi in your city, not that he'd ever agree to eat by you, anyway. And you must take your children out of that "community" day school and place your son in the yeshiva that I will show you and your daughter in Beis Yaakov. There's no need for either of them to waste their time with "college preparatory" courses, as they shall never attend college. Your son shall go to Israel, attend a yeshiva, and learn full time for the rest of your life. After all, you have a generous pension plan and can afford to support him. As for your daughter, all she needs to learn is enough to get a shidduch with a nice yeshiva boy who will also learn full time for the rest of your life. You do have that pension, after all, which should be enough to cover the tuition payments for your 50 grandchildren. And your wife must throw away all that Modern-Orthodox style pritzidik stuff she now wears and only buy official z'niyusdik beged Isha approved by the rabbis. Plus, she'll need to wear a wig, AND a snood, AND a hat. As for you, you will spare every free minute you have either you will be learning Torah with a proper rabbi or you will write comments in DovBear in support of the fundamentalists. And you will make friends with the Bray of Fundie and agree with him always!!Thus sayeth the L-rd!!"
As the Ineffable One was listing His non-negotiable demands, the rational part of my mind was finally starting to recover its function. True, Hashem had shown me all of my flaws and warts, and I had reason to regret many of the choices I made with my life. But always agreeing with the Bray of Fundie? No! That was too much for anyone to ask. All of a sudden it became crystal clear. I knew what I had to do, and I was no longer afraid of the consequences
"No." I croaked."
No?" repeated the KBH. "You dare misuse the Free Will I gave you?"
"Yeah. I dare. And it's not "misuse." Go Cheney yourself you sorry excuse for a Deity. Who do you think you are -- God or something.."
The Abishter cleared his throat-equivalent with evident displeasure.
"..oh, yeah, yeah, OK, so you're God. Well then who the Hell made you God? What right do have to claim Divine rulership over me?"
I could tell that He was getting a little peeved.
"My Kingship prevails because I created the Universe, and I am Omnipotent...""
Oh..." I said, "That's it? The source of all 'Morality?' The great and Holy YHVH is just another Tinpot Dictator operating on the principle of 'might makes right?' What should I call you, 'El Presidente?' 'Il Duce?' 'Mein Fuhrer?' or 'Mr. Giuliani?'"
"No fair!" sputtered the L-rd. "I invoke Godwin's Law! I win!""
'Godwin's Law?'" I repeated. "Using the name of Rudolf Guiliani doesn't invoke Godwin's Law.."
"You know what I mean!"
Now G-d was showing his blazing wrath, indignation, fury, and a band of messengers of evil, but He also sounded frustrated. "Well I gave you your chance, but now you will burn in Gehnna forever!..."
"Go ahead," I said, amazingly calmly considering what I knew would be in store for me. "You think that you prevail when You cast me into the pit, but you're wrong. When You win, You really lose. Look, You have revealed Yourself to me in all Your glory and clearly demonstrated Your power over me. And You could do was punish me and make me feel bad until the cows come home, but in the end, You were unable to convince me to use my free will to do Your will. You might be all-powerful, but You're still a Loser."
"In fact, I'll bet that every year during the High Holiday's you see all the Jews praying and outwardly repenting their sins, but You know it's all a crock. That the vast majority of Jews don't even believe in You as a Right-Wing Fundamentalist God and blow off Your commandments accordingly. Most of the few who do only do Your Will out of fear of punishment. You call that 'Free Will?'. I'll bet that the number of people who actually follow Your rules by choice and with joy and acceptance is so small you can count them with the fingers of one hand! Nobody wants the snake oil you're selling, and I'll bet it must really bother you! So go ahead! Send me to Hell! Fat lot of good it will do YOU..."
And with that a huge frustrated cry broke out that shattered my mind. It seemed as if all the air in the Void were being sucked out and I was choking, choking....And my wife was shaking me as I suddenly snorted awake. The glowing numbers on the clock by the bed said that it was 3 in the morning
."Jesus!" she said, "CA, don't scare me like that, you stopped breathing again, it was for, like, 20 seconds! Oy, when will that damn Central Medical Supply come and deliver that CPAP machine you ordered? I can't take your snoring and your stopping breathing and all. And when you're not doing that, you're talking in your sleep! And who is this "Bray of Fundie," anyway? I hope he's not one of those nudnik commentators on DovBear who get you all upset. Really, you spend too much time reading those blogs, it puts you in a bad mood. Why bother, because God is really a laid back Feminist egalitarian who's dedicated to religious pluralism. Why read fundies whose beliefs just make you feel bad?"
Well, Mrs. Apikoris is a wonderful partner, and I know she means the best for me, but I also know that I must continue to uphold my principles of "I'm an apikoris, not a goy!" and continue to engage with the fundies. And now that I've encountered the worst, I can do it without fear that I'm wrong, because even when He wins, He really loses.
As you can imagine, I was more than a little startled
by CA
"CA," began the Divine Entity, "You've been a bad boy... "
"Yeah, I know," I replied. "First I made a margarita to drink before dinner. Then some kiddush wine, and after that, a half a bottle of merlot. And the two shots of slivowitz after dinner as a digestif. It's not a good idea to mix drinks, and now I have a hell of a headache, not to mention a queasy tummy...."
It seemed that the face of the KBH grew red with anger as He said, "No not that, you alcoholic nudnick! I mean your posts in the comments section at DovBear! I mean the way you always go out of your way to look for pork and shellfish entrees at the lunch buffet! I mean the way you're always arriving at shul just in time for the kiddush! I mean the way you act as though the Orthodox (or even Conservative) Jewish Mesorah was just a foolish fantasy! Well, I've got news for you, mister: That Orthodox mesorah is all true, and not only am I, G-d, Orthodox, I'm RIGHT-WING FUNDAMENTALIST ORTHODOX! But I'm still a merciful G-d, so I'm giving you one more chance to do teshuva. "
With that, He lifted me out of bed with His supernatural powers, and took me straight to Gehenna for the deluxe tour. The Pain! The freezing cold! The burning heat! The agonizing boredom of having to re-experience every moment I ever spent in Hebrew School! As I was writhing in the uttermost degradation while lying on my back on a bed of spikes, the Divine Presence towered over me, glowing red with righteous indignation."Well, CA? Do you see what you will face if you don't repent and become a frum black hatter? "
I weakly nodded my assent, my mind numb with terror and regret at the wrong turn my life had taken...and yet...
"You know what I require of you? That you immediately resign from that evil House of Conservative k'firah where you now pray..."
"Actually," I replied, "I don't really pray there, because I usually arrive too late, but in time for kiddush..."
"Shut up," said the Almighty. "And you must re-kasher your kitchen to meet the exacting humradik standards of the most right-wing rabbi in your city, not that he'd ever agree to eat by you, anyway. And you must take your children out of that "community" day school and place your son in the yeshiva that I will show you and your daughter in Beis Yaakov. There's no need for either of them to waste their time with "college preparatory" courses, as they shall never attend college. Your son shall go to Israel, attend a yeshiva, and learn full time for the rest of your life. After all, you have a generous pension plan and can afford to support him. As for your daughter, all she needs to learn is enough to get a shidduch with a nice yeshiva boy who will also learn full time for the rest of your life. You do have that pension, after all, which should be enough to cover the tuition payments for your 50 grandchildren. And your wife must throw away all that Modern-Orthodox style pritzidik stuff she now wears and only buy official z'niyusdik beged Isha approved by the rabbis. Plus, she'll need to wear a wig, AND a snood, AND a hat. As for you, you will spare every free minute you have either you will be learning Torah with a proper rabbi or you will write comments in DovBear in support of the fundamentalists. And you will make friends with the Bray of Fundie and agree with him always!!Thus sayeth the L-rd!!"
As the Ineffable One was listing His non-negotiable demands, the rational part of my mind was finally starting to recover its function. True, Hashem had shown me all of my flaws and warts, and I had reason to regret many of the choices I made with my life. But always agreeing with the Bray of Fundie? No! That was too much for anyone to ask. All of a sudden it became crystal clear. I knew what I had to do, and I was no longer afraid of the consequences
"No." I croaked."
No?" repeated the KBH. "You dare misuse the Free Will I gave you?"
"Yeah. I dare. And it's not "misuse." Go Cheney yourself you sorry excuse for a Deity. Who do you think you are -- God or something.."
The Abishter cleared his throat-equivalent with evident displeasure.
"..oh, yeah, yeah, OK, so you're God. Well then who the Hell made you God? What right do have to claim Divine rulership over me?"
I could tell that He was getting a little peeved.
"My Kingship prevails because I created the Universe, and I am Omnipotent...""
Oh..." I said, "That's it? The source of all 'Morality?' The great and Holy YHVH is just another Tinpot Dictator operating on the principle of 'might makes right?' What should I call you, 'El Presidente?' 'Il Duce?' 'Mein Fuhrer?' or 'Mr. Giuliani?'"
"No fair!" sputtered the L-rd. "I invoke Godwin's Law! I win!""
'Godwin's Law?'" I repeated. "Using the name of Rudolf Guiliani doesn't invoke Godwin's Law.."
"You know what I mean!"
Now G-d was showing his blazing wrath, indignation, fury, and a band of messengers of evil, but He also sounded frustrated. "Well I gave you your chance, but now you will burn in Gehnna forever!..."
"Go ahead," I said, amazingly calmly considering what I knew would be in store for me. "You think that you prevail when You cast me into the pit, but you're wrong. When You win, You really lose. Look, You have revealed Yourself to me in all Your glory and clearly demonstrated Your power over me. And You could do was punish me and make me feel bad until the cows come home, but in the end, You were unable to convince me to use my free will to do Your will. You might be all-powerful, but You're still a Loser."
"In fact, I'll bet that every year during the High Holiday's you see all the Jews praying and outwardly repenting their sins, but You know it's all a crock. That the vast majority of Jews don't even believe in You as a Right-Wing Fundamentalist God and blow off Your commandments accordingly. Most of the few who do only do Your Will out of fear of punishment. You call that 'Free Will?'. I'll bet that the number of people who actually follow Your rules by choice and with joy and acceptance is so small you can count them with the fingers of one hand! Nobody wants the snake oil you're selling, and I'll bet it must really bother you! So go ahead! Send me to Hell! Fat lot of good it will do YOU..."
And with that a huge frustrated cry broke out that shattered my mind. It seemed as if all the air in the Void were being sucked out and I was choking, choking....And my wife was shaking me as I suddenly snorted awake. The glowing numbers on the clock by the bed said that it was 3 in the morning
."Jesus!" she said, "CA, don't scare me like that, you stopped breathing again, it was for, like, 20 seconds! Oy, when will that damn Central Medical Supply come and deliver that CPAP machine you ordered? I can't take your snoring and your stopping breathing and all. And when you're not doing that, you're talking in your sleep! And who is this "Bray of Fundie," anyway? I hope he's not one of those nudnik commentators on DovBear who get you all upset. Really, you spend too much time reading those blogs, it puts you in a bad mood. Why bother, because God is really a laid back Feminist egalitarian who's dedicated to religious pluralism. Why read fundies whose beliefs just make you feel bad?"
Well, Mrs. Apikoris is a wonderful partner, and I know she means the best for me, but I also know that I must continue to uphold my principles of "I'm an apikoris, not a goy!" and continue to engage with the fundies. And now that I've encountered the worst, I can do it without fear that I'm wrong, because even when He wins, He really loses.
The Fallacy of Gil
The frustrating mistake in Gil Student's post about shul singing, as aptly noted by a reader named Simon, is this: "authentic" and "older" are not synonyms. In Gil's imagination the custom embraced by the Brooklyn men with the longer coats and beards - in this case responsive shul singing - is better and more authoritative.
But this is absurd.
There is no reason to presume the responsive custom Gil prefers was ever universal, nor do we have any evidence that the custom was established deliberately with any higher purpose in mind. Singing responsively is just what some people did, at some point in time. Elsewhere, it was otherwise. In fact, we can't even prove that the responsive style was the first custom: Perhaps the Eastern European Jews Gil venerates broke with a previous tradition. Perhaps the very first time Jews gathered to sing Kel Adon they did it congregationally. Who can know? The answer is lost in the mists of time. This much, however, is certain: The idea that everything Jewish was forever immutable and inalterable until c. 1939 is the sort of sloppy thinking that causes grown men to use phrases like "Torah-True" or to presume that Moshe wore a shtreimal.
Honorable mention: Lipman tears into Gil.
But this is absurd.
There is no reason to presume the responsive custom Gil prefers was ever universal, nor do we have any evidence that the custom was established deliberately with any higher purpose in mind. Singing responsively is just what some people did, at some point in time. Elsewhere, it was otherwise. In fact, we can't even prove that the responsive style was the first custom: Perhaps the Eastern European Jews Gil venerates broke with a previous tradition. Perhaps the very first time Jews gathered to sing Kel Adon they did it congregationally. Who can know? The answer is lost in the mists of time. This much, however, is certain: The idea that everything Jewish was forever immutable and inalterable until c. 1939 is the sort of sloppy thinking that causes grown men to use phrases like "Torah-True" or to presume that Moshe wore a shtreimal.
Honorable mention: Lipman tears into Gil.
Monday, September 10, 2007
DovBear Dialouges
Housekeeping note:
The first DovBear Dialouge between LittleFoxling and the Bray will continue after Yom Tov.
The first DovBear Dialouge between LittleFoxling and the Bray will continue after Yom Tov.
A coincidental mistake
A curious mistake appears in both the Septuagint and the Deuteronomy scroll found at Qumran, a mistake which sheds some thematic light on the first verse in last week's parsha. The Masoretic text reads:
וַיֵּלֶךְ, מֹשֶׁה; וַיְדַבֵּר אֶת-הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה, אֶל-כָּל-יִשְׂרָאֵל.
And Moshe went and spoke these words to all of Israel.
All of the major commenters attempt to explain where Moshe went, and their suggestions vary widely. The Septuagint and the Deuteronomy scroll, however, have a different reading, one that obviates the difficulty: "And Moshe finished speaking these words to all of Israel."
What happened seems clear: The Greek scribe, and the Qumran scribe coincidentally both made the exact same identical error, and reversed the order of the last two letters of the verb vayelehk (he went) producing vayekhal (he finished) instead.
I call the mistake curious, because aside from the remarkable coincidence of two scribes working in two different places making the same error, and aside from solving the problem of where Moshe went, the scribal error makes much thematic sense. The final chapters of Deuteronomy form an epilouge to the book, and the mistake makes this verse into what Robert Alter calls "a proper introduction to the epilogue." Moshe has finished his valedictory sermon. Beginning here, with this verse, the final chapters of the book are concerned with wrapping up the loose ends: The transfer of authority to Yehoshua, Moshe's song, and the blessing of the 12 tribes.
וַיֵּלֶךְ, מֹשֶׁה; וַיְדַבֵּר אֶת-הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה, אֶל-כָּל-יִשְׂרָאֵל.
And Moshe went and spoke these words to all of Israel.
All of the major commenters attempt to explain where Moshe went, and their suggestions vary widely. The Septuagint and the Deuteronomy scroll, however, have a different reading, one that obviates the difficulty: "And Moshe finished speaking these words to all of Israel."
What happened seems clear: The Greek scribe, and the Qumran scribe coincidentally both made the exact same identical error, and reversed the order of the last two letters of the verb vayelehk (he went) producing vayekhal (he finished) instead.
I call the mistake curious, because aside from the remarkable coincidence of two scribes working in two different places making the same error, and aside from solving the problem of where Moshe went, the scribal error makes much thematic sense. The final chapters of Deuteronomy form an epilouge to the book, and the mistake makes this verse into what Robert Alter calls "a proper introduction to the epilogue." Moshe has finished his valedictory sermon. Beginning here, with this verse, the final chapters of the book are concerned with wrapping up the loose ends: The transfer of authority to Yehoshua, Moshe's song, and the blessing of the 12 tribes.
The neo-Laffer Curve
Explanation: "The neo-Laffer curve is a satirical construct created by Martin Gardner to establish the fallacy of the Laffer Curve... The truth of the matter is that the optimal tax rate for government revenue is guided by intensely immediate circumstances and numerous, nigh-uncountable variables, and all the wicked webs that make up history Laffer's fallacy, whether conscious or unconscious, occurred when he assumed that simply because two ends of his graph could be easily examined and quantified, that the rest of the graph would follow the same rules and thus arrive at a "point". In fact, not only did the graph not follow those rules, it could not by definition of the system it represented. "
In other words, Laffer and the Supply-siders politicians are full of it. (Though anyone who noticed that there were 31 million new jobs created and a record surplus following the Clinton tax hike knew that already)
In other words, Laffer and the Supply-siders politicians are full of it. (Though anyone who noticed that there were 31 million new jobs created and a record surplus following the Clinton tax hike knew that already)
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Friday, September 07, 2007
The frum hockey player
Can you believe this? Benjamin Rubin is a shomer shabbos 18-year old making a name for himself on the Gatineau Olympiques, a junior hockey team. Currently he sits on shabbos and holidays and is considered to have a fair chance of making the NHL.
[Related]
[Related]
Our Churchgoing Friends
Along with the wonderful debunking of the Supply Side myth excerpted below, the current TNR contains a review of a new book about the Holocaust, one that contains new sources, and previously unpublished documentary material. The review is facinating, and suggests the book is, too. Here are just a few sentences from it, dedicated to those Orthodox Jews still unable to accept the well-proven complicity of the Catholic Church in the disaster:
I remind you again that John Paul II, the pope OJ's love the most, worked tirelessly to promote the beatification of his predecessor Pius XII, the man who presided over this disgrace.On July 15, 1941, in the first month of the Einsatzgruppen murders of tens of thousands of Jews behind the lines on the Eastern Front, Polish Catholic officials sent the following message to the Polish government-in-exile in London:
As far as the Jewish Question is concerned, it must be seen as a singular dispensation of Divine Providence that the Germans have already made a good start, quite irrespective of all the wrongs they have done and continue to do to our country. They have shown that the liberation of Polish society from the Jewish plague is possible.... Clearly, one can see the hand of God in the contribution to the solution of this urgent question being made by the occupiers.By December 1941, deportations of Jews from Germany to the East had sharpened controversies in both the Catholic and Protestant churches.On December 17, 1941, German Christian church leaders of Saxony, Nassau-Hesse, Mecklenburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Anhalt, Thuringia, and Lubeck announced that the "severest measures" should be taken against the Jews, who should be expelled form German territories. The overwhelming majority of Catholic church leaders who had previously denounced the Nazi murders of the mentally ill and physically handicapped said nothing about the deportations of Jews from Germany. Friedländer concludes that between 1939 and 1945 the vast majority of church officials remained silent. They made clear and ugly distinctions between a tiny minority of Jews who converted to Christianity and the vast majority who did not. They accepted that there was a fundamental inequality between Christians and Jews, and failed to use the moral authority of the church to attempt to stop the genocide in progress. Anti-Semitic antipathies rooted in traditional Christian theology combined with fear of communism led the preponderance of leadership in the Christian churches of Europe to remain silent and on occasion to fan the flames of anti-Semitism. We read of the occasional priest or minister who gave a dissenting sermon (and was sometimes arrested or murdered as a result); but these were exceptions that proved the rule.
Supply Side Stupidity
The current TNR has a long article on the fools and nutters who founded the cult of Supply Side Economics, a crank doctrine embraced by Republican politicians, but rejected by mainstream economists. Because I expect the article is too long and complicated for most supply-siders to bother with, I excerpt the best bit below:
That fateful night, Wanniski and Laffer were laboring with little success to explain the new theory to Cheney. Laffer pulled out a cocktail napkin and drew a parabola-shaped curve on it. The premise of the curve was simple. If the government sets a tax rate of zero, it will receive no revenue. And, if the government sets a tax rate of 100 percent, the government will also receive zero tax revenue, since nobody will have any reason to earn any income. Between these two points--zero taxes and zero revenue, 100 percent taxes and zero revenue--Laffer's curve drew an arc. The arc suggested that at higher levels of taxation, reducing the tax rate would produce more revenue for the government. At that moment, there were a few points that Cheney might have made in response. First, he could have noted that the Laffer Curve was not, strictly speaking, correct. Yes, a zero tax rate would obviously produce zero revenue, but the assumption that a 100-percent tax rate would also produce zero revenue was, just as obviously, false. Surely Cheney was familiar with communist states such as the Soviet Union, with its 100 percent tax rate. The Soviet revenue scheme may not have represented the cutting edge in economic efficiency, but it nonetheless managed to collect enough revenue to maintain an enormous military, enslave Eastern Europe, fund ambitious projects such as Sputnik, and so on.
Second, Cheney could have pointed out that, even if the Laffer Curve was correct in theory, there was no evidence that the U.S. income tax was on the downward slope of the curve--that is, that rates were then high enough that tax cuts would produce higher revenue.
But Cheney did not say either of these things. Perhaps, in retrospect, this was due to something deep in Cheney's character that makes him unusually susceptible to theories or purported data that confirm his own ideological predilections. (You can almost picture Donald Rumsfeld, years later, scrawling a diagram for Cheney on a cocktail napkin showing that only a small number of troops would be needed to occupy Iraq.) In any event, Cheney apparently found the Laffer Curve a revelation, for it presented in a simple, easily digestible form the messianic power of tax cuts.
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Luciano Pavarotti has passed away.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luciano_Pavarotti
I didn't realize he had been sick.
ברוך דיין האמת (=God, not Pavarotti)
I didn't realize he had been sick.
ברוך דיין האמת (=God, not Pavarotti)
Unconditional love... or I've received a promise so did you
The word of the Lord, God to the prophet Isaiah
Sing, barren woman, who has never had a baby.
Fill the air with song, you who've never been in labor!
You'll have far more children than all those childbearing women." God says so!
"Clear lots of ground for your tents! Make your tents large. Spread out! Think big! Use plenty of rope, drive the tent pegs deep. You're going to need lots of elbow room for your family.(You're going to take over whole nations; you're going to resettle abandoned cities.)
Don't be afraid—you're not going to be embarrassed.
Don't hold back—you're not going to come up short.
You'll forget all about the humiliations of your youth, and the indignities of being a widow will fade from memory. For your Maker is your bridegroom, his name, God-of Hosts!
Your Redeemer is The Holy of Israel, known as God of the whole earth.
You were like an abandoned wife, devastated with grief, and God welcomed you back, the wife of your youth can't ever be rejected," says your God.
Your Redeemer God says:
"I left you, but only for a fleeting moment. Now, with enormous compassion, I'm bringing you back.
In an outburst of anger I turned my back on you— but only for a moment.I t's with lasting love that I'm tenderly caring for you.
This is just like the days of Noah for me: I promised then that the waters of Noah would never again flood the earth. I'm promising now no more anger, no more rebuke.
For even if the mountains walk away and the hills fall to pieces, My love won't walk away from you, my covenant commitment of peace won't fall apart."
The God who has compassion on you says so.
Its loads better in the original Hebrew but I think this translation (adapted from the Message) does it justice.
Sing, barren woman, who has never had a baby.
Fill the air with song, you who've never been in labor!
You'll have far more children than all those childbearing women." God says so!
"Clear lots of ground for your tents! Make your tents large. Spread out! Think big! Use plenty of rope, drive the tent pegs deep. You're going to need lots of elbow room for your family.(You're going to take over whole nations; you're going to resettle abandoned cities.)
Don't be afraid—you're not going to be embarrassed.
Don't hold back—you're not going to come up short.
You'll forget all about the humiliations of your youth, and the indignities of being a widow will fade from memory. For your Maker is your bridegroom, his name, God-of Hosts!
Your Redeemer is The Holy of Israel, known as God of the whole earth.
You were like an abandoned wife, devastated with grief, and God welcomed you back, the wife of your youth can't ever be rejected," says your God.
Your Redeemer God says:
"I left you, but only for a fleeting moment. Now, with enormous compassion, I'm bringing you back.
In an outburst of anger I turned my back on you— but only for a moment.I t's with lasting love that I'm tenderly caring for you.
This is just like the days of Noah for me: I promised then that the waters of Noah would never again flood the earth. I'm promising now no more anger, no more rebuke.
For even if the mountains walk away and the hills fall to pieces, My love won't walk away from you, my covenant commitment of peace won't fall apart."
The God who has compassion on you says so.
Its loads better in the original Hebrew but I think this translation (adapted from the Message) does it justice.
The original charge to Abraham: Be like the gentiles
The preponderance of the archaeological evidence suggests that circumcision was practiced among several Semitic people, and at least in the Egyptian priestly class. By our lights, circumcision sets us apart and marks us as different. Given the discoveries of archaeologists, is it possible God wanted the very opposite from his first servant?
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