Oh. Did Jesse Helms die?

Apparently the old racist met Satan on the fourth of July. Guess he couldn't stand to live in an America that might elect a black president. Ah well.

And of course his apologists are already hard at work. Choosing to airbrush and forget Helm's many sins, the partisan rag known as National Review said: "Helms’s real offense was a stubborn and victory-making political incorrectness" Indeed. Being a homophobic, jesus-loving opponent of progress and equality must not be "real" offenses.

Besides he made liberals mad with his oh-so-manly, and principled political incorrectness and that's all that matters.

Fox News is vile

Amazing. Via Media Matters I see that Fox News has attempted to discredit a NY Times reporter by making him look like a goblin. After Jacques Steinberg wrote what can only be described as a middle-of-the road article about the Fox Network's ratings, he was called a "poodle" and his motives were discredited by the fiends on Fox & Friends. Accompanying the segment was a photo of Steinberg in which his "teeth have been yellowed, his nose and chin widened, and his ears made to protrude further."



High journalistic standards, no? And the really amazing thing is this: A Jew (or at least someone with a recognizably Jewish surname) has been given the full Streicher treatment - splayed ears, gargantuan nose, diseased teeth - and the Mighty Bloggers of Zion are silent. Try this thought experiment, oh ye Bloggish Defenders of Israel and/or Charedism: Imagine CNN had played this dirty trick. Imagine they had tried to embarrass and slander a Jew by twisting his face into a Der Strumer caricature. Feeling furious? So where's your righteous outrage now?

The Yeshiva World paskens on P.O Baile Glauber

The word from on high, as recorded by the Torah True scribes at The Yeshiva World :

"A female police officer, by definition, cannot be Orthodox Jewish. She may claim to be Orthodox, like I can claim to be the Pope, but Orthodox it doesn’t make her" -- Comment by Joseph — July 6, 2008 @ 1:32 pm

"she is not frumm" -- Comment by myrivers88 — July 6, 2008 @ 2:00 pm

"this is mamish a prusta zach and i am not mekabel. I hold it is usser to get arrested by her and anyone who does is chayiv curais this is not a joking matter at all" -- Comment by ultimateshtarkness — July 7, 2008 @ 5:06 am [DB: We hold this one is a joke]

Everyone following the thread here? If you wish to be absent from work on shabbos, for the sake of keeping the seventh day holy, you still might not be frum enough to win any respect from this crowd.

Peek-a-Jew

Ramapo gives new Orthodox Jewish cop the Sabbath days off pending review

Last week, Ramapo's police department was in the news after a police officer ordered a Hasidic woman to remove her wig for a mug shot. The Hasidim said the order was insensitive. The police said it was procedure. The Town Supervisor, who can follow the money as well as anyone, apologized to the Hasidim and ordered sensitivity training.

Now, the same police department is back in the same news - this time for hiring a Hasidic police officer. She is Baile Glauber, amazingly a graduate of the Hasidic school system. Because she wants shabbos off, the scandal dance described above is being performed again, this time with the police union playing the role of the aggrieved hasidim. The union says giving weekends off to a new recruit like Glauber is unfair to senior officers. The department insists its procedure, and the supervisor, naturally, is apologizing.. The only one in this affair with any guts is Glauber: Can you imagine what it takes for a Hasidic woman to become a cop? Not easy. Not easy at all.

True Self-Sacrifice?

Collected on the Internet: (by she who we do not name)

The following is a translation of a letter received by our offices

To the Central Taharas Hamishpacha Office:

The following story I heard from a good friend and I felt the responsibility to pass it on to you.

In the town of Emmanuel in Eretz Yisroel (Israel), there lived an elderly couple, olim (immigrants) from Russia, who were childless. They lived there for several years, quietly and alone, without any real contact with other members of the community. Last year, the old man passed away. Except for the small community, there weren't many who knew him and therefore at the funeral there was only a minyan (ten men) present, with the help of the Chevra Kaddisha (burial society).

At the time of burial, the wife of the departed asked that someone eulogize her husband. Everyone remained quiet because none of them really knew him. The wife said: "No one is speaking, so I will speak!" Everyone was very quiet as she said the following words: "Hirshel, when you go up in heaven and you are asked why you did not bring children onto this earth, explain to them that in Russia there was no mikvah. By the time we came to Eretz Yisroel, we were already too old!"

Everyone present cried. Even the Chevra Kaddisha, who are already immune to death, also cried.

This story I heard from Matisyahu Kubalkin, a resident of Emmanuel. I am sure that this mesiras nefesh (self-sacrifice) of so-called "simple" Jews must be publicized in order to strengthen others in this area.

I'll be dam l'kaf zechut and assume the people present cried for the same reason I did.

Jewgle

Today, Google has a custom logo honoring the extraordinary Marc Chagall.

The difference between Neturei Karta and Satmar

A Guest Post by Rafi G.
(cross-posted from LII)


The lines between Neturei Karta and Satmar are often blurred and unclear. Both are anti-zionist, and in general Neturei Karta is an offspring of Satmar. People commonly mistake the two and when Neturei Karta does something outrageous in public, often Satmar gets some flak.

Mishpacha (Hebrew) newspaper reported this past week on a protest in England that Satmar Hassidim were scheduled to take part in.

The protest was to be against some sort of event in London celebrating the 60th anniversary fo Israel. The Satmar Rebbe had called upon his Hassidim to protest the event, as "we must remind everybody that Judaism is not necessarily Zionism, and that there are many who think that the establishment of the State was a rebellion against the kingdom of God that continues to this day".

He set rules however. Rules that included a stipulation that the Hassidim could only protest as long as they "would not be anywhere in the vicinity of Palestinian protestors, who protest for their own reasons, and definitely not near Neturei Karta protestors who make a tremendous chilul Hashem with their identification with the murderous Arabs and their disgracing the kannoim who are God fearing and Jew loving."

They got the various licenses to hod their protest. After all the announcements and arrangements, the police called them up and told them, on the day of the protest, that they had decided that all protestors would have to stand in one area and it did not matter that they were protesting for different reasons.

The Admor of Satmar immediately put out announcements cancelling the protest, despite their having spread the word around all the Haredi areas on Shabbos.

So there you have the difference between Neturei Karta and Satmar. Satmar protests Zionism and what it sees as a rebellion against Hashem. That protest, however, does not allow one to join up with any other people just to achieve a certain goal. No chilul Hashem can be created in the process. While Neturei Karta people go and kiss people like Arafat and Ahmadinejad and praise them in their efforts to eradicate the Jewish people.

In Parshas Chukas, God behaves almost like a blogger. Rather than authoring his own material, our Lord and Creator twice references the published work of other people. The first occurrence is a cite from the the "Book of the Wars of the Lord" a book that was lost, and excluded from the canon. I'm not aware of a reliable theory that explains why it was lost, though Robert Alter speculates that the book was not preserved because was too mythological. Later authorities, he says, were uncomfortable with a book that represented God as a warrior, in direct combat with Israel's enemies, rather than working through the agency of Israel. I'm not entirely sure why Alter feels comfortable with such a speculation given that just a tiny snippet from the book is extant, but there it is. In the King James translation, the citation seems seriously weird and it reads as follows:

"...Waheb in Suphah and the ravines, the Arnon and the slopes of the ravines that lead to the site of Ar and lie along the border of Moab."

What this means is anyone's guess, forcing us to ask: If God had something to say, why didn't He put it in His own ordinary, easy to understand words instead of borrowing something impenetrable from another man's book?

The second occurrence is even more mysterious. After describing an Israelite victory over Sihon king of the Amorites, the Torah tells us the land Israel took from Sihon first belonged to Moab. The claim is supported not with a historical notice, or a narrative assertion, but with a snippet of poetry. Yes, poetry. The lines are attributed, vaguely, to "moshlim" who may have been something like the Celtic bards who composed and recited verses celebrating the legendary exploits of chieftains and heroes. Today, we would call them folk singers. In the KJV, their song is translated this way:

Come to Heshbon, let it be built, Let the city of Sihon be repaired.
“For fire went out from Heshbon, A flame from the city of Sihon;
It consumed Ar of Moab, The lords of the heights of the Arnon.
Woe to you, Moab! You have perished, O people of Chemosh!
He has given his sons as fugitives, And his daughters into captivity,
To Sihon king of the Amorites. “But we have shot at them; Heshbon has perished as far as Dibon.
Then we laid waste as far as Nophah, Which reaches to Medeba.”

For those of us saddled with a Torah-true perspective this is about as queer as a three dollar bill. Secular poetry? In the Holy Torah? It's a little like using a Bob Dylan tune to clinch an argument about halacha. (This doesn't work) (Unless getting tossed out of class is your goal) Again, we're forced to ask why God preferred this poem to His own writing.

Honoring the fabulous fourth

I feel like I should say something patriotic to celebrate the holiday, but I am not feeling it. America? Blah. Land of liberty, of thee I sing? Not today.

I'm not going to get on the couch, right in front of you, but if I were to attempt some self-analysis I'd say three factors were contributing to my indifference:

(1) I'm an indifferent sort of fellow Israel, as you know, doesn't excite me. Judaism, lately, has been leaving me cold as well. Passion, fervor, fire, zeal, ardor: It all, lately, seems so childish. So, though I recognize the blessing that is America, and appreciate the fact that I can sit at my desk and write about how our president is a pinhead with no repercussions, this is a cold and rational realization which inspires no patriotic excitement.

(2) Patriotism has been perverted In George Bush's America, you're a patriot if you support him and his policies, and a traitor and a terrorist if you do not. Patriotism per the dictionary means "love and devotion for your country" but sometime shortly after 9/11 this meaning was lost. Love and devotion to the president is more important. Once upon a time, a patriot was someone who sacrificed for the common good, someone like John Kerry or Al Gore, both of whom volunteered to fight in Vietnam. Now, no sacrifice is needed. All it takes to be a patriot is tough talk and blind devotion. Salute the flag and you're a patriot. Salute the constitution which provides us all the right to give the flag the finger, if we so choose, and you're a liberal, which some consider the very opposite of patriotic. Teddy Roosevelt once said, "to announce that there must be no criticism of the president or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong is not only unpatriotic and servile, it is morally treasonable to the American people." That, of course, is pre 9/11 thinking. Among the many casualties Al Queda inflicted upon us is this: "servile" and "patriotic" have become synonyms.

(3) The pinheads are still in charge I confess: Its hard to get excited about America when the worst president we've ever had smirks in the Oval Office. Still, hope is on the way: Even Old Man McCain would be a significant improvement over the chimp and his criminal cronies. Perhaps next year, or even as soon as next November, I'll feel more like celebrating America.

Declaration of Dependence

...Or Why I miss George III
a guest post by Chaim G. The (refrocked) Bray of Fundie

Tomorrow is Independence Day. Guess this is one of those quirky years when it coincides with July the 4th. It is a day when we grill the flesh of bovines in our backyards and our own epidermis’ on beaches. Somewhere, deep in the hidden strata of our collective societal subconscious, we also exult in breaking the shackles of tyrannical monarchy to enjoy the diverse blessings of liberty and democracy.

The eternal question though is; is it good for the Jews?

Hobbes wrote that “the sovereign ruler is by definition above the law” and Jean Bethke Elshtain’s added, “laws take the form of his untrammeled will." Without a doubt this puts all of his/her subject as at a vulnerable disadvantage. Yet the absence of sovereign monarchs from the world stage puts us at a distinct disadvantage in terms of our relationships with HaShem. Lacking kings claiming “the Divine Right (to rule)” we are short of living breathing metaphors for the right of the Divine King. Every brakha containing the phrase Melekh HaOlam= King of the Universe, every Avinu Malkenu, rings hollow without any sense of the majesty, sovereignty and POWER of Princes.

All brakhos are phenomenological. While saying “Blessed are you HaShem, King of the Cosmos, who created the fruit of the vine” is always a true statement it’s a brakha l’vatala= a brakha in vain unless one is about to imbibe wine/ grape juice. Still, by and large, brakhos are opportunistic. We seldom find a halakha of striving to come in contact with a phenomenon that forces a brakha. The brakha pronounced over kings is a notable exception. The Gemara in Brakhos states that one should exert themselves to see kings, even gentile kings. Also IIRC this is the only brakha in which hearing the phenomenon is sufficient and seeing is not required. IMO the brakha over Kings is exceptional because it is so essential for us to forge an authentic relationship with HaShem.

It is striking that King James I claimed for himself the right “to exalt low things, and abase high things, and make of their subjects like men at the Chesse." It resonates with our liturgy in describing HaShem as a “mashpil geyim and maggbihah shefalim”. It is also extremely apt because it implies that although, in theory, the absolute Monarch could make up the rules as he goes along, there is, in fact, a game with certain immutable rules that cannot be flouted. Try as he might a sovereign monarch playing chess cannot move his Rooks as he would his Bishops. This speaks to HaShem's “willingness” to abide by the “limitations” of “midah k’neged midah”= quid pro quo, in dealing with His chess pieces. Re HaShem although “He make-uh da game, He play-uh by da rules”

And while Adam Kirsch wrote in a recent NY Sun Review of Ms. Bethke Elshtain's book Sovereignty: God, State, and Self that “natural law, history shows, has an unsettling malleability: It tends to become an honorific for prejudice and custom” the current era of the sovereign self, the logical conclusion of the French revolution and July 4th 1776, has culminated in “a self conceived in terms of total autonomy and absolute will — … a monster of egotism.”, in Ms. Elshtain's view and the expressions of this egotism include radical feminism, sexual license, abortion rights, eugenics, stem cell research, and cloning.

So here’s my dilemma: While a Merciful Providence micromanaging history replaced monarchies with parliamentary democracies and directed a large chunk of His nearly shattered people to these shores in the years following the Holocaust, shores where we breathe free and enjoy religious liberty unprecedented in our long and bitter Galus= Diaspora, did He do so at the expense of His own “prestige” and, concomitantly, at he expense of our own ability to relate to Him in a real and authentic way? To wax metaphoric, did He “raise us on the wings of eagles” and take the hunters arrows for us yet again? And in so doing are the eaglets and chicks now orphans with warped views of their own Parent?

The article that inspired this post is here. You may hate my post but click on the link and read this provocative review. It alone is worth the price of admission!

What a blessing that no one ever puts false biographical information on the internet.

Shidduchimlist.com

You'll be quite glad to know this website "was produced with the haskama of Gedolei Yisrael," --though, al korcha, we must presume that the Gedolei Yisroel who last year told us the Internet was immoral, treif and banned were not invited to the meeting.

Additionally: "Our database includes names of boys, who are presently learning in Eretz Yisroel, Lakewood, Chaim Berlin, and Torah Vodaath. How many times do parents and shadchanim hear the name of what sounds like a great boy, but have no idea how to find information about him?"

To which I can only say boruch hashem. I'm tired of having to go to shul to get dirt on my neighbor's kid. Being able to access the gossip from the comfort and privacy of my own home is so much more convenient. Thanks Shidduchimlist.com!

Update: Here's what I want to know: Do these so called "good" boys come from homes where the shabbos table is covered with plastic? Or are the expensive linens left uncovered and at risk to wine and cholent spills, according to the authentic Torah True practice of our ancestors? Actually, never mind. There is no way in hell the gedolai yisroel would, nebach, allow boys with plastic-using parents to be included in such a heimisha data base.

HT: Emigma

Hold on to your head gear

You'll be dancing in your seats to learn that this newfangled kosher sifter thing has been "ENDORSED BY TOP RABBIS TO BE INSECT AND MEALWORM FREE!"

Hoo-ray and phew. Because if it was endorsed by those ordinary riff-raff Rabbis and not the much holier top rabbis I'd never go near the thing. And good thing about it being both insect and meal worm free, am I right? Sure, that's a little bit like being suitable for "dogs and poodles," but you can't be too sure when it comes to kashrus, I guess.

Here's more from the marketing monkeys who created the kosher sifter website:

"Since Rabbonim are reporting significant infestation in grains, the necessity for effective flour sifting has risen to its peak. Today's market offers various different sifters; however, each of them poses a question of kashrus and convenience. Most flour sifters have wide mesh spacing allowing tiny insects, present in flour, to sieve through the sifter.

Furthermore, open to atmosphere sifting gives room for insects or bugs to jump from the sifter to the already sifted flour"

All of which leads me to conclude that until sometime around August 8, 1995 no one kept kosher.

Tip of the fluffy white chef hat to Enigma (not that we're implying that she belongs in the kitchen) (though she can cook as much as she likes) (so long as it is her choice, and her choice alone)

Terrorist attack in Jerusalem

A guest post by TikunOlam

Jameel just got back from tending to the wounded and dead in today's terrorist attack in Jerusalem where a bulldozer driven by a terrorist went on a rampage. Jameel reports that there are now 5 dead - according to updated information from Jameel, 3 dead and 50 injured. Terrorist groups are already claiming credit for the attack. To read more please see Jameel's blog, The Muqata.

Yasher Koach Jameel.

Why men and women should sit together on the bus

A guest post by TikunOlam

I notice that on this blog, there is always a lot of debate about how much or how little women should be separated from men. Just today, Rafi G wrote about the latest in the never-ending Israeli bus soap opera.

I thought it was high time an argument was made as to why women and men *should* sit together on the bus. And in effort to prove that I am not just "eye candy," I figured I would give it a shot.

So I would like to present an argument that not only should men and women sit together on buses, but they should sit together on trains, planes and automobiles too. Of course I also think they should sit together in classrooms, work together in the workplace, share meals together, blog together and even just hang out together. Here are some of my reasons:

1. Adam and Eve did not sit under separate trees. It is only because they hung out at the same tree that any of us were even born and can now sit on buses.

2. Men are from Mars and women are from Venus. It is therefore helpful to have a friend or two of the opposite sex (one that you might have met, let’s say, on a bus) with whom you can talk through the challenges of understanding members of the opposite sex.

3. Shidduch dates can be really awkward. It is easier to talk to a member of the opposite sex when you've had, well, some experience talking to them (I mean ones other than your siblings).

4. Platonic friendships between members of the opposite sex can be totally awesome. I can’t imagine my life without my male friends and I credit the ones I had in early adulthood with warning me against getting involved with “bad guys” and letting me know who the good guys were.

5. Friendships between members of the opposite sex sometimes develop into relationships that end up at the chupah. Mine did and I am sure that some of the girls on Rafi G's bus will soon be kallah meidels too.

6. When men spend time with women, they have opportunities to develop their more feminine sides and women who spend time with men can develop their more masculine sides. Results of research on androgyny indicate that having highly developed feminine and masculine traits results in improved well-being. Truth be told, some of the research in this area is mixed and it seems that women benefit more from developing “masculine” traits then men who develop "feminine" traits, but the research is not all in yet.

7. Grown men and women who have been kept separate from each other their whole lives end up in adulthood relating to members of the opposite sex with, at best, an adolescent mentality. I mean, who other than pre-adolescents could possibly get distracted from their Torah learning at the sight of an elbow? Or a picture of a pretty woman, tilting her head, wearing fake hair? That is so 12 years old.

8. There are too many negative stereotypes of women perpetuated by men and men of women. This fosters a lack of respect between the sexes which does nothing good for marriages, communities, workplaces or for the world at large. Just like any other bigotry, sexism is best combated by time shared communicating, sharing, debating and listening to members of the opposite sex. A good conversation or ten, while sitting on the bus side by side, could change the world for the better!

9. Sitting next to each other on a bus has never been proven to lead to mixed dancing, swimming or anything else. We can trust that with proper Torah preparation, people should be able to control their ids. Those who can't control themselves because they are sitting next to a member of the opposite sex, let's face it, have serious problems that separate seating on buses will do little to nothing to solve.

10. Going back to Adam and Eve, we all know what happens when you constantly tell someone, “don’t look at that,” “don’t touch that,” “you can’t have that.” There is a term we psychologists use to describe the way people compulsively want what they can’t have. It is called “coveting the forbidden fruit.”

More on the Media's McCain Love Affair

Four years ago we were told that because John Kerry talked excessively about his war medals it was OK for the Swift Boat weirdos to go on TV and lie about how he got them. After all, Kerry had "made the medals a campaign issue" so all bets were off.

This time around, the shoe is on a different foot. The candidate talking too much about his military career is the Republican, and as you might expect, the 2004 rules don't seem to apply. This week Wesley Clark, the retired multiple star general, said "Well, I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president." This is a legitimate opinion, that has the additional benefit of being true. Whatever qualifications for president McCain may have, being shot down in combat isn't one of them. But instead of giving McCain the Kerry treatment, and either ignoring or defending Clark's remark, all three networks have ridden to McCain's rescue, and done him the favor of not merely refuting Clark's remarks, but mischaracterizing them.

making buses de facto mehadrin

A Guest Post by Rafi G.
(cross posted from LII)


Ynet (Hebrew) is reporting in the name of the Yated Ne'eman (which I have not yet seen) that the "Rabbinic Committee for Transportation" has found a new way to advance its desire to increase the mehadrin bus lines.

That is, they are instructing Bais Yaakov girls that need to travel on non-mehadrin lines, that they should still be careful to only sit in the back of the bus. By doing this, they say, they will turn non-kosher bus lines into kosher ones.

the idea is by creating facts on the ground, by making it de facto mehadrin, Egged will find it easier to speed up the process and declare those lines mehadrin.

In the letter to the Bais Yaakovs, the committee writes, "Those girls that are careful in tznius will find this a great merit, and will urge their friends as well to sit in the back of the bus. By guarding the rules of holiness and tznius, we will merit the Divine Presence with health, satisfaction, sustenance and fortune."

Furthermore, with the Jerusalem Light Rail project finishing soon, the Haredi community has set it eyes on the next project - working to make the light rail mehadrin.

They say that many bus lines to and from frum neighborhoods will be cancelled because of the light rail. Many of the cancelled bus lines will be mehadrin lines. Another problem is that because of the light rail, many bus lines will be altered, causing many bus lines to be diverted to new routes going through Geula and Mea Shearim neighborhoods. That means all these non-mehadrin lines will go through Geula, and bring many secular people through the neighborhood. This will be a "spiritual destruction of the neighborhood", they say.

On the other hand, instead of looking at it as destruction of their ways, they could look at it as an opportunity to make a Kiddush Hashem on people they would otherwise never have come in contact with.

I found a copy of the pashkevil:

Project SMS Sderot

A Guest Post by Rafi G.

I just received this news release by email. It seems like a good program...

NCYI LAUNCHES PROJECT SMS

Initiative Urges Solidarity With People Of Sderot

The National Council of Young Israel announced today that it has launched an innovative initiative intended to give people the unique opportunity to develop an understanding of just how little time the people of Sderot have to react each time a rocket is fired at their city. Project SMS (Solidarity Messages for Sderot) utilizes text messaging technology to enable people throughout the world to stand in solidarity with the citizens of Sderot by getting a sense of the urgency that they have experienced on a regular basis for the past seven years and taking appropriate action in times of crisis.

"The people of Sderot have been forced to live in a time warp of fifteen seconds for the last seven years," said NCYI Executive Vice President Rabbi Pesach Lerner, "When a rocket is fired at Sderot and the alarm is sounded, they have fifteen seconds to run for cover; find their children; gather the sleeping family from the top floor to the basement; and wonder if today is the last day of their life. I commend NCYI Chief Operating Officer Chaim Leibtag for creating a program that encourages us to stop for a moment and consider how the people of Sderot must feel during those fifteen seconds of sheer terror."

Project SMS, which is a joint initiative of the National Council of Young Israel and the Coordinating Council on Jerusalem, enables people to sign up to receive a real-time text message when a rocket is fired at Sderot, or anywhere in Israel. When the Tzeva Adom (red alert) goes off, subscribers will receive a text message that reads: "A KASSAM HAS BEEN LAUNCHED AT SDEROT...YOU HAVE FIFTEEN SECONDS TO:"

(and you choose)

1.Recite Psalms Chapter 130

2.Give Charity

3. Call the UN, the White House, your Senators and Congressmen

4.Pause for a moment and pray for the people of Sderot

To subscribe to Project SMS and sign up to receive the emergency alert text messages, go to WWW.SMSSDEROT.ORG

"Project SMS gives us a sense of just how little time the people of Sderot have to react when an incoming rocket is hurtling towards their homes," said NCYI President Shlomo Z. Mostofsky, "While the citizens of Sderot use those fifteen seconds to try and avoid the deadly rockets and the ensuing damage, we need to use those fifteen seconds to undertake a meaningful action, such as saying a prayer or giving charity on their behalf."