Facebook - http://honestreporting.com/breaking-news-facebook-shuts-down-third-intifada-group
The Legend of Sam Fuld - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q7U22IgxoI&feature=related
Yom HaSHOAH Facebook Project - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg5aG339t_8&feature=fvst
WHY We Remember the Holocaust = http://www.ushmm.org/remembrance/dor/video/?content=whyweremember
http://www.aish.com/jw/s/Purim__Responding_to_the_Itamar_Massacre.html
Glenn Beck - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjK8M4uxcjM
Glenn Beck - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjK8M4uxcjM
Tefillin (phylacteries)
The Barbie doll, launched in 1959 by Jewish businesswoman Ruth Handler, started out as a fashion model toy intended for young girls and has long since moved into the realm of cultural icon. Over the years, Barbie has been everything from fashion model to astronaut, from Olympic medalist to Hollywood movie star. In the 80s, she joined the multicultural movement and was depicted as African-American, Latina, and Asian. Her creators and followers have always strived to help Barbie adapt to the times and offer a variety of options for our imaginations. In her 1994 autobiography, Handler explained Barbie's true purpose: "My whole philosophy of Barbie was that through the doll, the little girl could be anything she wanted to be. Barbie always represented the fact that a woman has choices."
Barbie has also been the object of parody and criticism. Her unrealistic measurements have prompted many to worry that little girls might strive to look like Barbie and fail, causing low self esteem and poor body image. She thus represents an icon of beauty for millions, and for many others the embodiment of our culture's unrealistic expectations for women.
In 2006, Jen Taylor Friedman—one of the first soferot (female ritual scribes) in a male-dominated profession—gave Barbie a new look: she created a version of the famous doll sporting modest clothing, a tallit (prayer shawl) and her own miniature pair of tefillin(phylacteries). tefillin Barbie—whose picture swept through the blogosphere—provokes reactions that range from disgust to shock to amusement to great admiration. Not unlike her secular counterpart, tefillin Barbie has continued to inspire much debate over whether she is to be taken seriously or to be considered a "bimbo" who might not be a good role model for girls considering whether to wear tallit and tefillin in their own Jewish lives.
However you see her, the sight of this blonde, blue eyed, cultural icon sporting the quintessentially Jewish and for some, very masculine, black tefillin can be jarring. Traditionally, women have not been considered obligated to wear tallit and tefillin, because doing so are time-bound commandments (that is, they must be done within a specific time frame), from which women are exempt according to Jewish law. This exemption from time-bound commandments has generally been interpreted as a prohibition. However, Jewish tradition also includes reports of some women who did wear tefillin, most notably the daughters of Rashi, the 11th century commentator.
Barbie has also been the object of parody and criticism. Her unrealistic measurements have prompted many to worry that little girls might strive to look like Barbie and fail, causing low self esteem and poor body image. She thus represents an icon of beauty for millions, and for many others the embodiment of our culture's unrealistic expectations for women.
In 2006, Jen Taylor Friedman—one of the first soferot (female ritual scribes) in a male-dominated profession—gave Barbie a new look: she created a version of the famous doll sporting modest clothing, a tallit (prayer shawl) and her own miniature pair of tefillin(phylacteries). tefillin Barbie—whose picture swept through the blogosphere—provokes reactions that range from disgust to shock to amusement to great admiration. Not unlike her secular counterpart, tefillin Barbie has continued to inspire much debate over whether she is to be taken seriously or to be considered a "bimbo" who might not be a good role model for girls considering whether to wear tallit and tefillin in their own Jewish lives.
However you see her, the sight of this blonde, blue eyed, cultural icon sporting the quintessentially Jewish and for some, very masculine, black tefillin can be jarring. Traditionally, women have not been considered obligated to wear tallit and tefillin, because doing so are time-bound commandments (that is, they must be done within a specific time frame), from which women are exempt according to Jewish law. This exemption from time-bound commandments has generally been interpreted as a prohibition. However, Jewish tradition also includes reports of some women who did wear tefillin, most notably the daughters of Rashi, the 11th century commentator.
Maimonides/RAMBAM
Maimonides's full name was Moses ben Maimon; in Hebrew he is known by the acronym of Rabbi Moses ben Maimon, Rambam. He was born in Spain shortly before the fanatical MuslimAlmohades came to power there. To avoid persecution by the Muslim sect — which was wont to offer Jews and Christians the choice of conversion to Islam or death — Maimonides fled with his family, first to Morocco, later to Israel, and finally to Egypt. He apparently hoped to continue his studies for several years more, but when his brother David, a jewelry merchant, perished in the Indian Ocean with much of the family's fortune, he had to begin earning money. He probably started practicing medicine at this time.
Maimonides's major contribution to Jewish life remains the Mishneh Torah, his code of Jewish law. His intention was to compose a book that would guide Jews on how to behave in all situations just by reading the Torah and his code, without having to expend large amounts of time searching through the Talmud. Needless to say, this provocative rationale did not endear Maimonides to many traditional Jews, who feared that people would rely on his code and no longer study the Talmud. Despite sometimes intense opposition, the Mishneh Torah became a standard guide to Jewish practice: It later served as the model for the Shulkhan Arukh, the sixteenthcentury code of Jewish law that is still regarded as authoritative by Orthodox Jews.
Philosophically, Maimonides was a religious rationalist. His damning attacks on people who held ideas he regarded as primitive — those, for example, who understood literally such biblical expressions as “the finger of God” so infuriated his opponents that they proscribed parts of his code and all of The Guide to the Perplexed. Other, more liberal, spirits forbade study of theGuide to anyone not of mature years. An old joke has it that these rabbis feared that a Jew would start reading a section in the Guide in which Maimonides summarizes a rationalist attack on religion, and fall asleep before reading Maimonides's counterattack-thereby spending the night as a heretic.
How Maimonides's opponents reacted to his works was no joke, however. Three leading rabbis in France denounced his books to the Dominicans, who headed the French Inquisition. The Inquisitors were only too happy to intervene and burn the books. Eight years later, when the Dominicans started burning the Talmud, one of the rabbis involved, Jonah Gerondi, concluded thatGod was punishing him and French Jewry for their unjust condemnation of Maimonides. He resolved to travel to Maimonides's grave in Tiberias, in Israel, to request forgiveness.
Throughout most of the Jewish world, Maimonides remained a hero, of course. When he died, Egyptian Jews observed three full days of mourning, and applied to his death the biblical verse "The ark of the Lord has been taken" (I Samuel 4:11).http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Maimonides.html
Maimonides's major contribution to Jewish life remains the Mishneh Torah, his code of Jewish law. His intention was to compose a book that would guide Jews on how to behave in all situations just by reading the Torah and his code, without having to expend large amounts of time searching through the Talmud. Needless to say, this provocative rationale did not endear Maimonides to many traditional Jews, who feared that people would rely on his code and no longer study the Talmud. Despite sometimes intense opposition, the Mishneh Torah became a standard guide to Jewish practice: It later served as the model for the Shulkhan Arukh, the sixteenthcentury code of Jewish law that is still regarded as authoritative by Orthodox Jews.
Philosophically, Maimonides was a religious rationalist. His damning attacks on people who held ideas he regarded as primitive — those, for example, who understood literally such biblical expressions as “the finger of God” so infuriated his opponents that they proscribed parts of his code and all of The Guide to the Perplexed. Other, more liberal, spirits forbade study of theGuide to anyone not of mature years. An old joke has it that these rabbis feared that a Jew would start reading a section in the Guide in which Maimonides summarizes a rationalist attack on religion, and fall asleep before reading Maimonides's counterattack-thereby spending the night as a heretic.
How Maimonides's opponents reacted to his works was no joke, however. Three leading rabbis in France denounced his books to the Dominicans, who headed the French Inquisition. The Inquisitors were only too happy to intervene and burn the books. Eight years later, when the Dominicans started burning the Talmud, one of the rabbis involved, Jonah Gerondi, concluded thatGod was punishing him and French Jewry for their unjust condemnation of Maimonides. He resolved to travel to Maimonides's grave in Tiberias, in Israel, to request forgiveness.
Throughout most of the Jewish world, Maimonides remained a hero, of course. When he died, Egyptian Jews observed three full days of mourning, and applied to his death the biblical verse "The ark of the Lord has been taken" (I Samuel 4:11).http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Maimonides.html
WHAT DOES THE TANACH SAY ABOUT MONEY?
Legal Principles and Rulings
These views of God and human psychology, then, set the stage for business. The Jewish tradition does not presume, let alone demand, socialism or communism; quite the contrary, it assumes capitalism, albeit with a thick safety net for the poor and sick. That is the reason that Jewish law sets out so many rules about how business should be conducted honestly. These laws include both general principles and specific demands. So, for example, the Torah and the Talmud announce value statements like these:
• “You shall not steal; you shall not deal deceitfully or falsely with one another” (Leviticus 19:13).
• “Love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:18).
• “You shall not falsify measures of length, weight or capacity. You shall have an honest balance, honest weights, an honest ephah [dry measure] and honest hin [liquid measure]” (Leviticus 19:35).
• “Your ‘yes’ should be honest, and your ‘no’ should be honest” (Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 49a).
• “Justice, justice shall you pursue….” (Deuteronomy 16:20).
• “You shall not oppress a stranger, for you know the feelings of the stranger, having yourselves been strangers in the land of Egypt” (Exodus 23:9).
• “The seal of the Holy One is truth” (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 55a, Yoma 69b, Sanhedrin 64a).
• The Holy One created everything in the world except for falsehood and exaggeration, which were not God’s doing; people created those on their own (Pesikta Rabbati 24).
The prophets of the Bible complain bitterly about people who violate such principles, and both the prophets and the Books of Psalms and Proverbs depict the righteous person as one who is honest in business (e.g., Psalms 15; 112).
We need such principles to guide our lives, but we also need to know how they should be applied to concrete circumstances. The Torah, the Talmud, the codes and the multiple rabbinic rulings in concrete cases (teshuvot, responsa) to our own time give us precisely that kind of guidance. For example, the Conservative movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards has approved responsa on such modern issues in business ethics as intellectual property, whistleblowing, unions, privacy on the Internet and donations of ill-gotten gain (all available at rabbinicalassembly.org under the link “Contemporary Halakhah”).http://www.jewishjournal.com/financial_outlook/article/business_ethics_for_a_post-madoff_world_20090729/
These views of God and human psychology, then, set the stage for business. The Jewish tradition does not presume, let alone demand, socialism or communism; quite the contrary, it assumes capitalism, albeit with a thick safety net for the poor and sick. That is the reason that Jewish law sets out so many rules about how business should be conducted honestly. These laws include both general principles and specific demands. So, for example, the Torah and the Talmud announce value statements like these:
• “You shall not steal; you shall not deal deceitfully or falsely with one another” (Leviticus 19:13).
• “Love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:18).
• “You shall not falsify measures of length, weight or capacity. You shall have an honest balance, honest weights, an honest ephah [dry measure] and honest hin [liquid measure]” (Leviticus 19:35).
• “Your ‘yes’ should be honest, and your ‘no’ should be honest” (Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 49a).
• “Justice, justice shall you pursue….” (Deuteronomy 16:20).
• “You shall not oppress a stranger, for you know the feelings of the stranger, having yourselves been strangers in the land of Egypt” (Exodus 23:9).
• “The seal of the Holy One is truth” (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 55a, Yoma 69b, Sanhedrin 64a).
• The Holy One created everything in the world except for falsehood and exaggeration, which were not God’s doing; people created those on their own (Pesikta Rabbati 24).
The prophets of the Bible complain bitterly about people who violate such principles, and both the prophets and the Books of Psalms and Proverbs depict the righteous person as one who is honest in business (e.g., Psalms 15; 112).
We need such principles to guide our lives, but we also need to know how they should be applied to concrete circumstances. The Torah, the Talmud, the codes and the multiple rabbinic rulings in concrete cases (teshuvot, responsa) to our own time give us precisely that kind of guidance. For example, the Conservative movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards has approved responsa on such modern issues in business ethics as intellectual property, whistleblowing, unions, privacy on the Internet and donations of ill-gotten gain (all available at rabbinicalassembly.org under the link “Contemporary Halakhah”).http://www.jewishjournal.com/financial_outlook/article/business_ethics_for_a_post-madoff_world_20090729/
Some Basic Principles of Jewish Business Ethics
by Rabbi David Golinkin
In the United States, 2002 was the “year of the corporate scandal.” From Enron to Andersen, from Worldcom to Adelphia, CEOs have robbed their companies of millions while leaving their workers penniless and unemployed. These unfortunate events provide us with an opportunity to outline some of the basic principles of Jewish business ethics.
It is no secret that the world of business presents both business people and laypeople with many ethical dilemmas and challenges. As our Sages said: “Character is tested through business” (Avot D’rabi Natan, ed. Schechter, version B, Chap. 31, p. 68) while the Mekhilta teaches (Vayassa, ed. Lauterbach, vol. 2, p. 96): “ ‘If you will heed the Lord diligently, doing what is right in His eyes’ (Exodus 15:26) - this refers to business dealings. This teaches us that whoever trades in good faith… it is accounted to him as though he had observed the entire Torah.”
Our Sages, however, never limited themselves to aggadic statements in pious language about ideal utopias. They insisted on spelling out concrete laws and legal principles by which to govern our everyday lives. The following six principles of Jewish business ethics will help teach us what pitfalls to avoid and what standards to strive for throughout the year.
1. Accurate weights and measures
We are admonished in the book of Vayikra (19:35-36): “You shall not falsify measures of length, weight, or capacity. You shall have an honest balance, an honest weight, an honest ephah, and an honest hin.” The Mishnah (Bava Batra 5:10) spells out how often wholesalers and retailers must clean their weights and measures.
Throughout the Talmudic period, the rabbis appointed agronomoi – a Greek word for market commissioners – whose job it was to inspect measures and weights and to fix prices for basic commodities (Bava Batra 89a). The agronomoi eventually disappeared, but the ideal was still there as late as the nineteenth century, when Rabbi Israel Salanter wrote: “As the rabbi must inspect periodically the slaughtering knives of the shochtim in town to see that they have no defect, so must he go from store to store to inspect the weights and measures of the storekeepers” (Dov Katz, Tenuat Hamussar, Vol. 1, Jerusalem, 1996, p. 281).
These laws are just as applicable today. Wholesalers and retailers must check their scales and cash registers on a regular basis, not just because civil law demands it, but also because Jewish law requires it.
2. Ona’at mamon (monetary deception)
This concept is based on a verse in the book of Vayikra (25:14): “When you sell anything to your neighbor or buy anything from your neighbor, you shall not deceive one another.”
The rabbis of the Talmud used this verse as a basis for a series of specific laws on the subject of monetary deception (Bava Metzia 49b and 50b; Rambam, Mekhira, Chapter 12). They ruled that if the price charged was more than one sixth above the accepted price, the sale is null and void and the seller must return thebuyer’s money, while if it was less than a sixth, the transaction is valid and no money need be returned. Needless to say, these laws are relevant today. It is permissible for a Jew to make a fair profit; it is not permissible to price gouge and rob the customer blind.
3. Ona’at devarim (verbal deception)
This teaching is based on another verse in the same chapter of Vayikra (25:17): “Do not deceive one another, but fear your God, for I the Lord am your God.” Since the verse cited above had explicitly mentioned monetary deception, the rabbis concluded that this verse refers to verbal deception. Thus we learn in the Mishnah (Bava Metzia 4:10): “Just as there is deception in buying and selling, there is deception in words. A person should not say to a merchant: ‘How much does this cost?’ if he has no intention of buying it.”
Let us say that Reuven goes into a warehouse outlet in order to buy a computer, but he wants a demonstration before he spends $1000. The warehouse outlet is not equipped for demonstrations. The salesman says to Reuven: “Go to the IBM showroom down the block and ask for a demonstration, then come back here and buy the computer at our low, low price.” Reuven complies and gets a free demonstration plus a discount.
When Reuven asks for the demonstration at the IBM store, he has absolutely no intention of purchasing the computer there. He merely wants a free demonstration. The IBM salesman is being deceived. He either loses a real customer while waiting on Reuven, or feels badly when Reuven walks out on him after a half-hour demonstration. This is ona’at devarim, verbal deception.
4. Gneivat da’at (literally, “stealing a person’s mind”)
We would call it false packaging or false labeling. The Talmud gives a number of specific examples: One should not sift the beans at the top of the bushel because he is “deceiving the eye” by making the customer think that the entire bushel has been sifted. It is forbidden to paint animals or utensils in order to improve their appearance or cover up their defects (Bava Metzia 60a-b).
We are all familiar with this kind of ruse. A wholesaler takes an inferior brand of shirt and puts on Pierre Cardin labels. You buy a box of perfect-looking tomatoes or strawberries, only to discover upon opening the box at home that they were packaged with the bad spots facing down. And we all know how used cars are touched up and polished for the sole purpose of overcharging the customer. Such behavior is clearly forbidden by Jewish law.
5. "Putting a stumbling block before the blind”
We would call it “giving someone a bum steer.” This law is based on Vayikra Chapter 19 (v. 14): “You shall not curse the deaf nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God, I am the Lord.” Our Sages interpreted this verse in a very broad fashion (Sifra ad. Loc.):
“You shall not put a stumbling block before the blind” – before someone who is blind in that particular matter… don’t say to your neighbor ‘sell your field and buy a donkey,’ when your whole purpose is to deceive him and buy his field.
This law can be readily applied to modern situations: A real estate agent should not dupe a young couple into buying a home with structural faults simply in order to make a fast buck. A stockbroker should not sell his client a bad investment just to collect the commission. A salesman should not convince his customer to buy an expensive item he really has no use for. About such behavior we are warned: “and you shall fear your God, I am the Lord.”
6. Tax evasion
Eighteen hundred years ago, the Amora Shmuel established the legal principle that in civil matters “dina d’malkhuta dina - the law of the land is the law” (Bava Kama 113a and parallels). In its discussion of this principle, the Talmud specifically includes taxation as a secular law that must be followed. This, for example, is the way Maimonides summarizes this law (Gezeilah 5:11): “but a tax fixed by the king of 33% or 25% or any fixed sum… a person who avoids paying such a tax is a transgressor because he is stealing the king’s portion, regardless of whether the king is Jewish or not.”
Jewish law requires us to pay our taxes in a scrupulous fashion because in civil matters “the law of the land is the law.”
We should take to heart the words of Rav Nachman of Kossover, as we read: “He taught that we should always have the Lord in our thoughts. He was asked: ‘Can we think of the Lord when we are engaged in buying and selling?’ ‘Surely we can,’ answered the Rabbi. ‘If we are able to think of business when we are praying, we should be able to think of praying when we are doing business’” (Louis Newman, The Hasidic Anthology, p. 343).
Rabbi Prof. David Golinkin is the President and Rector of The Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. He is the author of "Responsa in a Moment" and "The Status of Women in Jewish Law", which can be ordered at www.schechter.edu where a longer version of this article can also be found.
by Rabbi David Golinkin
In the United States, 2002 was the “year of the corporate scandal.” From Enron to Andersen, from Worldcom to Adelphia, CEOs have robbed their companies of millions while leaving their workers penniless and unemployed. These unfortunate events provide us with an opportunity to outline some of the basic principles of Jewish business ethics.
It is no secret that the world of business presents both business people and laypeople with many ethical dilemmas and challenges. As our Sages said: “Character is tested through business” (Avot D’rabi Natan, ed. Schechter, version B, Chap. 31, p. 68) while the Mekhilta teaches (Vayassa, ed. Lauterbach, vol. 2, p. 96): “ ‘If you will heed the Lord diligently, doing what is right in His eyes’ (Exodus 15:26) - this refers to business dealings. This teaches us that whoever trades in good faith… it is accounted to him as though he had observed the entire Torah.”
Our Sages, however, never limited themselves to aggadic statements in pious language about ideal utopias. They insisted on spelling out concrete laws and legal principles by which to govern our everyday lives. The following six principles of Jewish business ethics will help teach us what pitfalls to avoid and what standards to strive for throughout the year.
1. Accurate weights and measures
We are admonished in the book of Vayikra (19:35-36): “You shall not falsify measures of length, weight, or capacity. You shall have an honest balance, an honest weight, an honest ephah, and an honest hin.” The Mishnah (Bava Batra 5:10) spells out how often wholesalers and retailers must clean their weights and measures.
Throughout the Talmudic period, the rabbis appointed agronomoi – a Greek word for market commissioners – whose job it was to inspect measures and weights and to fix prices for basic commodities (Bava Batra 89a). The agronomoi eventually disappeared, but the ideal was still there as late as the nineteenth century, when Rabbi Israel Salanter wrote: “As the rabbi must inspect periodically the slaughtering knives of the shochtim in town to see that they have no defect, so must he go from store to store to inspect the weights and measures of the storekeepers” (Dov Katz, Tenuat Hamussar, Vol. 1, Jerusalem, 1996, p. 281).
These laws are just as applicable today. Wholesalers and retailers must check their scales and cash registers on a regular basis, not just because civil law demands it, but also because Jewish law requires it.
2. Ona’at mamon (monetary deception)
This concept is based on a verse in the book of Vayikra (25:14): “When you sell anything to your neighbor or buy anything from your neighbor, you shall not deceive one another.”
The rabbis of the Talmud used this verse as a basis for a series of specific laws on the subject of monetary deception (Bava Metzia 49b and 50b; Rambam, Mekhira, Chapter 12). They ruled that if the price charged was more than one sixth above the accepted price, the sale is null and void and the seller must return thebuyer’s money, while if it was less than a sixth, the transaction is valid and no money need be returned. Needless to say, these laws are relevant today. It is permissible for a Jew to make a fair profit; it is not permissible to price gouge and rob the customer blind.
3. Ona’at devarim (verbal deception)
This teaching is based on another verse in the same chapter of Vayikra (25:17): “Do not deceive one another, but fear your God, for I the Lord am your God.” Since the verse cited above had explicitly mentioned monetary deception, the rabbis concluded that this verse refers to verbal deception. Thus we learn in the Mishnah (Bava Metzia 4:10): “Just as there is deception in buying and selling, there is deception in words. A person should not say to a merchant: ‘How much does this cost?’ if he has no intention of buying it.”
Let us say that Reuven goes into a warehouse outlet in order to buy a computer, but he wants a demonstration before he spends $1000. The warehouse outlet is not equipped for demonstrations. The salesman says to Reuven: “Go to the IBM showroom down the block and ask for a demonstration, then come back here and buy the computer at our low, low price.” Reuven complies and gets a free demonstration plus a discount.
When Reuven asks for the demonstration at the IBM store, he has absolutely no intention of purchasing the computer there. He merely wants a free demonstration. The IBM salesman is being deceived. He either loses a real customer while waiting on Reuven, or feels badly when Reuven walks out on him after a half-hour demonstration. This is ona’at devarim, verbal deception.
4. Gneivat da’at (literally, “stealing a person’s mind”)
We would call it false packaging or false labeling. The Talmud gives a number of specific examples: One should not sift the beans at the top of the bushel because he is “deceiving the eye” by making the customer think that the entire bushel has been sifted. It is forbidden to paint animals or utensils in order to improve their appearance or cover up their defects (Bava Metzia 60a-b).
We are all familiar with this kind of ruse. A wholesaler takes an inferior brand of shirt and puts on Pierre Cardin labels. You buy a box of perfect-looking tomatoes or strawberries, only to discover upon opening the box at home that they were packaged with the bad spots facing down. And we all know how used cars are touched up and polished for the sole purpose of overcharging the customer. Such behavior is clearly forbidden by Jewish law.
5. "Putting a stumbling block before the blind”
We would call it “giving someone a bum steer.” This law is based on Vayikra Chapter 19 (v. 14): “You shall not curse the deaf nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God, I am the Lord.” Our Sages interpreted this verse in a very broad fashion (Sifra ad. Loc.):
“You shall not put a stumbling block before the blind” – before someone who is blind in that particular matter… don’t say to your neighbor ‘sell your field and buy a donkey,’ when your whole purpose is to deceive him and buy his field.
This law can be readily applied to modern situations: A real estate agent should not dupe a young couple into buying a home with structural faults simply in order to make a fast buck. A stockbroker should not sell his client a bad investment just to collect the commission. A salesman should not convince his customer to buy an expensive item he really has no use for. About such behavior we are warned: “and you shall fear your God, I am the Lord.”
6. Tax evasion
Eighteen hundred years ago, the Amora Shmuel established the legal principle that in civil matters “dina d’malkhuta dina - the law of the land is the law” (Bava Kama 113a and parallels). In its discussion of this principle, the Talmud specifically includes taxation as a secular law that must be followed. This, for example, is the way Maimonides summarizes this law (Gezeilah 5:11): “but a tax fixed by the king of 33% or 25% or any fixed sum… a person who avoids paying such a tax is a transgressor because he is stealing the king’s portion, regardless of whether the king is Jewish or not.”
Jewish law requires us to pay our taxes in a scrupulous fashion because in civil matters “the law of the land is the law.”
We should take to heart the words of Rav Nachman of Kossover, as we read: “He taught that we should always have the Lord in our thoughts. He was asked: ‘Can we think of the Lord when we are engaged in buying and selling?’ ‘Surely we can,’ answered the Rabbi. ‘If we are able to think of business when we are praying, we should be able to think of praying when we are doing business’” (Louis Newman, The Hasidic Anthology, p. 343).
Rabbi Prof. David Golinkin is the President and Rector of The Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. He is the author of "Responsa in a Moment" and "The Status of Women in Jewish Law", which can be ordered at www.schechter.edu where a longer version of this article can also be found.
Avatar and the Jews
The three villains of Avatar are:
Materialism places ultimate value on the accumulation of wealth and worldly possessions. A materialistic society honors the rich simply because they are rich and despises the poor simply because they are poor. “Making it” means making money, since that is the ultimate value.
But materialism also refers to the philosophy that physical matter is the only reality and that everything can be explained in terms of natural phenomena. This philosophy derides those who believe in the existence of spiritual forces as “superstitious” at best, “crack-pots” at worst.
A society that values military power devotes much of its resources to the development of armaments and chooses as its leaders ex-generals (E.g. Eisenhower, DeGaule, Rabin). It equates power on the national level with military strength, on the personal level with muscles. Such a society glorifies the “super-hero” who has a weight-lifter’s physique and can beat up his opponent. It might snicker at the Jewish definition of a “hero": “A hero is one who overcomes himself” (Ethics of the Fathers 4:1).
- Parker Selfridge, the corporate executive in charge of RDA (Resource Development Administration) on Pandora. His job is simply to make money for the stockholders by mining the valuable mineral unobtanium, whatever the cost to the “natives” and their way of life. Clearly, he represents materialism.
- Col. Miles Quaritch, the brutal head of RDA’s on-planet security. He represents military might and physical power.
- Dr. Grace Augustine, a nasty person but brilliant scientist. She viciously denigrates Jake for his lack of higher education and academic credentials. She represents scientific and academic knowledge.
Materialism places ultimate value on the accumulation of wealth and worldly possessions. A materialistic society honors the rich simply because they are rich and despises the poor simply because they are poor. “Making it” means making money, since that is the ultimate value.
But materialism also refers to the philosophy that physical matter is the only reality and that everything can be explained in terms of natural phenomena. This philosophy derides those who believe in the existence of spiritual forces as “superstitious” at best, “crack-pots” at worst.
A society that values military power devotes much of its resources to the development of armaments and chooses as its leaders ex-generals (E.g. Eisenhower, DeGaule, Rabin). It equates power on the national level with military strength, on the personal level with muscles. Such a society glorifies the “super-hero” who has a weight-lifter’s physique and can beat up his opponent. It might snicker at the Jewish definition of a “hero": “A hero is one who overcomes himself” (Ethics of the Fathers 4:1).
HOLOCAUST DENIAL
What motivates people to deny something that they know so much about and what motivated Hitler and the Third Reich to promote Anti-Semitism to its extreme?
Anit-Semitism - it's a new form of it now but what lies behind it is very old - "the international Jewish conspiracy" that was propogated by the Elders of Zion in Czarist Russia in 1902. The thought is that Jews are using the Holocaust to gather support for the state of Israel. Ironically, the fact that Jewish families are trying to get back some of their possessions prior to WWII is looked upon as another way to prove that their is a Jewish takeover about to happen. The ultimate answer to the second question is as follows: "Nazism was a doctrine of world salvation to redeem humanity from the Jewish-Christian-Marxist doctrine," according to the lecture by Professor David Bankier, the head of Yad Vashem's International Institute for Holocaust Research. "Hitler believed through total war of Germans against the Jews in a fight of which the only alternatives are victory or extinction for either side."
1. Largest Death Camp = Auschwitz II began killing operations in 1942 and was closed down in 1944 when the Russians were getting to close. It is estimated during that time that 1.2 -1.4 million people were executed and 90% were Jews. This camp had 60,000 prisoners at any given time, but when you walk around this massive complex seeking out the evidence of the killing of these people, you don't find it. There are not mounds of ashes and bones or clothing or shoes, etc. You don't see the crematoriums because the Germans blew them up to cover it up. They are just gone. The same is true is you visit Treblinka. From July 22, 1943 to August 2, 1944, 900,000 Jews died there. Before this camp was closed down as a result of a Jewish revolt on August 2, 1943, Hitler had ordered all the dead bodies that were buried in very deep trenches made by steam shovels dug up, burned and dispersed in the area. Jewish prisoners did this work. So when you visit Treblinka, you see nothing..
2.At Babi Yar (Kiev), a different kind of murdering was taking place - not the gasing but the shooting operations. Altogether, 33,000 Jews were murdered there. One can only expect that if you go to that site, you would be able to see the evidence, but it was all dug up and burned. A special unit called 1005 had it all desecrated. It was a very secretive operation. These "cleanups" were built into the Final Solution plan - not just to kill every single Jew but to erase their memory.
3. It is the convergence of evidence that allows us to know what happened to Jews in the Holocaust. That evidence includes German documents - the overt type such as the Eizengruppen reports which have the exact numbers of Jews killed. The German's overtly documented 1.4 million Jews were killed in their shooting operations. The Germans were excellent bureaucrats and always made more than one copy of a document. There is a particular document that categorizes the killings between June and December 1941. It specifically states that the Germans had killed 137,346 people of which 95% were Jewish. Another document dated August 23, 1941, reveals a small killing operation in Lithuania. It even categorizes the number of Jews killed on that day -1312 men, 4602 women and 1609 children. That totals 7523 Jewish people. This document that is telling us how unique this killing was and what makes it unprecedented in all of history. The Germans killed all sorts of people = Russian POW's, mentally retarded Germans, Gypsies, but this document clearly documents the target of one ethnic people - the Jews. There are another kind of documents that exist to prove the existence of the Holocaust - diaries, Polish documents. Soviet documents. the Nuremberg Crime documents, and most recently the Enigma Decodes which surfaced from American intelligence. The Germans did not know that by 1940, the British and Poles had broken their signal transmission codes. Nazis did their best not to leave any evidence their documentations. Mydankic, 1,274.166.000 Jews were killed in 1942.
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/holocaust/insights/video/holocaust_denial.asp
http://www.nsa.gov/about/_files/cryptologic_heritage/publications/wwii/eavesdropping.pdf
Anit-Semitism - it's a new form of it now but what lies behind it is very old - "the international Jewish conspiracy" that was propogated by the Elders of Zion in Czarist Russia in 1902. The thought is that Jews are using the Holocaust to gather support for the state of Israel. Ironically, the fact that Jewish families are trying to get back some of their possessions prior to WWII is looked upon as another way to prove that their is a Jewish takeover about to happen. The ultimate answer to the second question is as follows: "Nazism was a doctrine of world salvation to redeem humanity from the Jewish-Christian-Marxist doctrine," according to the lecture by Professor David Bankier, the head of Yad Vashem's International Institute for Holocaust Research. "Hitler believed through total war of Germans against the Jews in a fight of which the only alternatives are victory or extinction for either side."
1. Largest Death Camp = Auschwitz II began killing operations in 1942 and was closed down in 1944 when the Russians were getting to close. It is estimated during that time that 1.2 -1.4 million people were executed and 90% were Jews. This camp had 60,000 prisoners at any given time, but when you walk around this massive complex seeking out the evidence of the killing of these people, you don't find it. There are not mounds of ashes and bones or clothing or shoes, etc. You don't see the crematoriums because the Germans blew them up to cover it up. They are just gone. The same is true is you visit Treblinka. From July 22, 1943 to August 2, 1944, 900,000 Jews died there. Before this camp was closed down as a result of a Jewish revolt on August 2, 1943, Hitler had ordered all the dead bodies that were buried in very deep trenches made by steam shovels dug up, burned and dispersed in the area. Jewish prisoners did this work. So when you visit Treblinka, you see nothing..
2.At Babi Yar (Kiev), a different kind of murdering was taking place - not the gasing but the shooting operations. Altogether, 33,000 Jews were murdered there. One can only expect that if you go to that site, you would be able to see the evidence, but it was all dug up and burned. A special unit called 1005 had it all desecrated. It was a very secretive operation. These "cleanups" were built into the Final Solution plan - not just to kill every single Jew but to erase their memory.
3. It is the convergence of evidence that allows us to know what happened to Jews in the Holocaust. That evidence includes German documents - the overt type such as the Eizengruppen reports which have the exact numbers of Jews killed. The German's overtly documented 1.4 million Jews were killed in their shooting operations. The Germans were excellent bureaucrats and always made more than one copy of a document. There is a particular document that categorizes the killings between June and December 1941. It specifically states that the Germans had killed 137,346 people of which 95% were Jewish. Another document dated August 23, 1941, reveals a small killing operation in Lithuania. It even categorizes the number of Jews killed on that day -1312 men, 4602 women and 1609 children. That totals 7523 Jewish people. This document that is telling us how unique this killing was and what makes it unprecedented in all of history. The Germans killed all sorts of people = Russian POW's, mentally retarded Germans, Gypsies, but this document clearly documents the target of one ethnic people - the Jews. There are another kind of documents that exist to prove the existence of the Holocaust - diaries, Polish documents. Soviet documents. the Nuremberg Crime documents, and most recently the Enigma Decodes which surfaced from American intelligence. The Germans did not know that by 1940, the British and Poles had broken their signal transmission codes. Nazis did their best not to leave any evidence their documentations. Mydankic, 1,274.166.000 Jews were killed in 1942.
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/holocaust/insights/video/holocaust_denial.asp
http://www.nsa.gov/about/_files/cryptologic_heritage/publications/wwii/eavesdropping.pdf
Nazi Col. Claus von Stauffenberg
Posted on Sun Jul 18 2004 07:36:24 GMT-0400 (Eastern Daylight Time) by Grzegorz 246
BERLIN, (AFP) - Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg made a dramatic turnaround from being an enthusiastic supporter of Adolf Hitler and his regime to carrying the bomb packed in a briefcase that was intended to kill him.
The 60th anniversary of Stauffenberg's failed assassination attempt of July 20, 1944, will be commemorated in Germany on Tuesday.
Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and President Horst Koehler will attend a ceremony at the Bendlerblock, the former Nazi war ministry in Berlin, where Stauffenberg and three fellow conspirators were executed by firing squad hours after the bomb went off.
Four years earlier, the young count was full of praise for Hitler after his armies chalked up military successes in Poland and France.
"Such changes in such a short space of time!" he wrote.
It was a description that fitted his own swing of opinion.
By 1942, he was complaining that "not a single officer in the Fuehrer's headquarters has killed that pig with their pistol."
It was the crushing defeat of the German army on the Russian front that same year that prompted Stauffenberg's radical shift of opinion.
By insisting on leading his troops into a battle they did not have a chance of winning, Hitler lost all credibility in the eyes of the brilliant young officer.
Stauffenberg was born on November 15, 1907 into an aristocratic family in southwest Germany.
When Hitler came to power in 1933, the young count had already joined the army. He admired the principle of a strong leader, a Fuehrer, for the shattered country, although he was quietly suspicious of the modest origins of many of the Nazi leaders.
Blue-eyed, with high cheekbones, Stauffenberg was an outstanding student at the military academy in Berlin and he rose rapidly through the ranks before taking part in the offensive on Poland.
He wrote to his wife, Nina, another aristocrat whom he had married in 1933, that Poland contained "many Jews, many people of mixed blood... who are only happy when they are dominated."
In May 1940, Stauffenberg was named to the army's chief of staff where he discovered that Hitler was planning to attack Russia.
He became increasingly vocal in his criticism of Hitler's tactics and in 1942 requested to be sent to the North African front where he was seriously injured, losing an eye, his left hand and two fingers on his right hand in fighting in Tunisia.
Back in Berlin in 1943, he was approached by General Friedrich Olbricht, head of the army's supply units and a central figure in the resistance against Nazism. Stauffenberg accepted immediately to take part in a coup against Hitler.
Stauffenberg was not originally intended to be the man who carried out the attack, but the circle of officers with access to Hitler was highly restricted and few had his courage.
On July 1, 1944, he was appointed Chief of Staff to the Army Reserve in Berlin, putting him in regular contact with Hitler.
He knew he must act. "There is only one solution: kill him," he said.
Having carried the bomb into Hitler's war headquarters in East Prussia, Stauffenberg flew immediately back to Berlin to organise the coup.
Instead, Hitler was only slightly injured in the blast and Stauffenberg was betrayed.
He was executed at the age of 36, crying "Long live holy Germany" as the shots rang out, according to several witnesses.
BERLIN, (AFP) - Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg made a dramatic turnaround from being an enthusiastic supporter of Adolf Hitler and his regime to carrying the bomb packed in a briefcase that was intended to kill him.
The 60th anniversary of Stauffenberg's failed assassination attempt of July 20, 1944, will be commemorated in Germany on Tuesday.
Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and President Horst Koehler will attend a ceremony at the Bendlerblock, the former Nazi war ministry in Berlin, where Stauffenberg and three fellow conspirators were executed by firing squad hours after the bomb went off.
Four years earlier, the young count was full of praise for Hitler after his armies chalked up military successes in Poland and France.
"Such changes in such a short space of time!" he wrote.
It was a description that fitted his own swing of opinion.
By 1942, he was complaining that "not a single officer in the Fuehrer's headquarters has killed that pig with their pistol."
It was the crushing defeat of the German army on the Russian front that same year that prompted Stauffenberg's radical shift of opinion.
By insisting on leading his troops into a battle they did not have a chance of winning, Hitler lost all credibility in the eyes of the brilliant young officer.
Stauffenberg was born on November 15, 1907 into an aristocratic family in southwest Germany.
When Hitler came to power in 1933, the young count had already joined the army. He admired the principle of a strong leader, a Fuehrer, for the shattered country, although he was quietly suspicious of the modest origins of many of the Nazi leaders.
Blue-eyed, with high cheekbones, Stauffenberg was an outstanding student at the military academy in Berlin and he rose rapidly through the ranks before taking part in the offensive on Poland.
He wrote to his wife, Nina, another aristocrat whom he had married in 1933, that Poland contained "many Jews, many people of mixed blood... who are only happy when they are dominated."
In May 1940, Stauffenberg was named to the army's chief of staff where he discovered that Hitler was planning to attack Russia.
He became increasingly vocal in his criticism of Hitler's tactics and in 1942 requested to be sent to the North African front where he was seriously injured, losing an eye, his left hand and two fingers on his right hand in fighting in Tunisia.
Back in Berlin in 1943, he was approached by General Friedrich Olbricht, head of the army's supply units and a central figure in the resistance against Nazism. Stauffenberg accepted immediately to take part in a coup against Hitler.
Stauffenberg was not originally intended to be the man who carried out the attack, but the circle of officers with access to Hitler was highly restricted and few had his courage.
On July 1, 1944, he was appointed Chief of Staff to the Army Reserve in Berlin, putting him in regular contact with Hitler.
He knew he must act. "There is only one solution: kill him," he said.
Having carried the bomb into Hitler's war headquarters in East Prussia, Stauffenberg flew immediately back to Berlin to organise the coup.
Instead, Hitler was only slightly injured in the blast and Stauffenberg was betrayed.
He was executed at the age of 36, crying "Long live holy Germany" as the shots rang out, according to several witnesses.
St. Louis - Voyage of the Damned
The S.S. St. Louis, part of the Hamburg-America Line (Hapag), was tied up at Shed 76 awaiting its next voyage which was to take Jewish refugees from Germany to Cuba. Once the refugees arrived in Cuba they would await their quota number to be able to enter the United States. The black and white ship with eight decks held room for four hundred first-class passengers (800 Reichsmarks each) and five hundred tourist-class passengers (600 Reichsmarks each). The passengers were also required to pay an additional 230 Reichsmarks for the "customary contingency fee" which was supposed to cover the cost if there was an unplanned return voyage.1 As most Jews had been forced out of their jobs and had been charged high rents under the Nazi regime, most Jews did not have this kind of money. Some of these passengers had money sent to them from relatives outside of Germany and Europe while other families had to pool resources to send even one member to freedom. On Saturday, May 13, 1939, the passengers boarded. Women and men. Young and old. Each person who boarded had their own story of persecution.The following day, Wednesday, June 7, Captain Schroeder informed the passenger committee that they were returning to Europe. Though the situation was desperate there was still hope that negotiations for their landing in Europe somewhere other than Germany could be possible.
While massive negotiations were beginning, Aaron Pozner rallied some youths aboard to participate in a mutiny. Though they succeeded in capturing the bridge, they did not capture the other strategic locations of the ship. The mutiny was overcome. A crew members suicide by hanging also marked dread on the return voyage.
Through miraculous negotiations, the Joint committee was able to find several countries that would take portions of the refugees. 181 could go to Holland, 224 to France, 228 to Great Britain, and 214 to Belgium.
The passengers disembarked from the S.S. St. Louis from June 16 to June 20. Other ships were transformed to carry the passengers to their locations.
Having crossed the Atlantic Ocean twice, the passengers' original hopes of freedom in Cuba and the U.S. turned into a forlorn effort to escape sure death upon their return to Germany. Feeling alone and rejected by the world, the passengers returned to Europe in June 1939. With World War IIjust months away, many of these passengers were sent East with the occupation of the countries to which they had been sent.
While massive negotiations were beginning, Aaron Pozner rallied some youths aboard to participate in a mutiny. Though they succeeded in capturing the bridge, they did not capture the other strategic locations of the ship. The mutiny was overcome. A crew members suicide by hanging also marked dread on the return voyage.
Through miraculous negotiations, the Joint committee was able to find several countries that would take portions of the refugees. 181 could go to Holland, 224 to France, 228 to Great Britain, and 214 to Belgium.
The passengers disembarked from the S.S. St. Louis from June 16 to June 20. Other ships were transformed to carry the passengers to their locations.
Having crossed the Atlantic Ocean twice, the passengers' original hopes of freedom in Cuba and the U.S. turned into a forlorn effort to escape sure death upon their return to Germany. Feeling alone and rejected by the world, the passengers returned to Europe in June 1939. With World War IIjust months away, many of these passengers were sent East with the occupation of the countries to which they had been sent.
Eli Weisel
Elie Wiesel was born in 1928 in Sighet, Transylvania, which is now part of Romania. He was fifteen years old when he and his family were deported by the Nazis to Auschwitz. His mother and younger sister perished, his two older sisters survived. Elie and his father were later transported to Buchenwald, where his father died shortly before the camp was liberated in April 1945.
After the war, Elie Wiesel studied in Paris and later became a journalist. During an interview with the distinguished French writer, Francois Mauriac, he was persuaded to write about his experiences in the death camps. The result was his internationally acclaimed memoir, Night (La Nuit), which has since been translated into more than thirty languages.
"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death."
After the war, Elie Wiesel studied in Paris and later became a journalist. During an interview with the distinguished French writer, Francois Mauriac, he was persuaded to write about his experiences in the death camps. The result was his internationally acclaimed memoir, Night (La Nuit), which has since been translated into more than thirty languages.
"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death."
Eli Wiesel in Buchenwald
Slave laborers in Buchenwald are liberated by the American Army in April, 1945. They survived in spite of miserable conditions: overcrowding, lack of food, hard labor, and psychological torture. Eli Weisel appears as the last full face on the second bunk from the bottom.
Courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives.
Courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives.
Simeon Wisenthal
In his eulogy, Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center said, "As you go to your eternal repose, I am sure there is a great stirring in heaven as the soul of the millions murdered during the Nazi Holocaust get ready to welcome Simon Wiesenthal, the man who stood up for their honor and never let the world forget them."
The Bulgarian Defiance
In 1943, the Germans began pressing their Bulgarian allies to deport their Jews to concentration camps in Poland. Over 20,000 Jews were deported to Auschwitz from Macedonia and Thrace, areas that had recently been annexed to Bulgaria. The Jews of Old Bulgaria were to be next. The King of Bulgaria ordered all plans for deportations of Bulgaria's Jews stopped. He was, however, unable to prevent the expulsion to the countryside of Sofia's 20,000 Jews. From there, they were to be transported by ship to "the East." The people of Bulgaria protested this action. Nissim's many relatives from Sofia were given shelter in his home. The Bulgarian people began large-scale protests against the treatment of the Jews. Instead of arousing antisemitism, the expelled Jews won the sympathy of the peasants. By January 1944, massive allied bombing of Bulgaria began, and plans to deport the Jews were completely shelved. The Jews of Old Bulgaria were saved due to the courageous defiance of the King of Bulgaria and his people.
Raoul Wallenberg saved Jews on the eve of Christmas
The Nazi soldiers in Budapest had been given orders to round up and execute as many Jewish teens as they could before the Christmas holiday began. Stripped naked, pushed up against a wall, facing a machine gun. It was Christmas Eve, 1944.
Suddenly there was a commotion at the other end of the courtyard. A Gestapo officer arrived and commanded the shocked soldiers to stop the slaughter.
«As Christians you can’t kill these teens on Christmas Eve,” he scolded. «How can you go to Church after this? Better do it after Christmas», he reasoned.
After much debate the executioners reluctantly conceded and the teenage children were released into the officer’s custody. Within moments they had been driven to safety in a stolen army truck.
The truth is; the officer in question was no Nazi, but the courageous Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg who saved thousands of Jewish lives in Hungary during this bleak and desperate time.
Years later in Israel, Joseph, told me of the vow he made that day to celebrate Christmas as long as he lived.
He was saved because of Christmas Day.
This season we joyfully celebrate Jesus’ birth. But we do so recognizing that it impossible to love Him and hate His people.
Source: ICEJ.org. Letter from Rev. Malcolm
Actor and commentator Ben Stein recently wrote an essay saying that Jews should feel no shame about having so much power in Hollywood, because it's a sign of how much they love America. He said the same about Christmas.
"I have always felt that no one loved Christmas like the Jews," Stein wrote in an e-mail. "No family tensions, no disappointments about the wrong gift, just that great Christmas spirit. For a Jew to be in America at Christmas, with all the love in the air, after two millennia of being hunted and killed at Christian holidays, is pure bliss, and I believe we feel it keenly."
"I have always felt that no one loved Christmas like the Jews," Stein wrote in an e-mail. "No family tensions, no disappointments about the wrong gift, just that great Christmas spirit. For a Jew to be in America at Christmas, with all the love in the air, after two millennia of being hunted and killed at Christian holidays, is pure bliss, and I believe we feel it keenly."
Anatoly (Natan) and Avital Sharansky phoning
President Reagan from Ben-Gurion Airport
to thank him for his part in Anatoly's release (2/11/86 - GPO Photo)
President Reagan from Ben-Gurion Airport
to thank him for his part in Anatoly's release (2/11/86 - GPO Photo)
Natan (Anatoly) Sharansky
Natan (Anatoly) Sharansky was born in the Ukraine, and graduated with a degree in mathematics from the Physical Technical Institute in Moscow. His early association with the human rights movement was an English interpreter for Andrei Sakharov, before emerging in his own right as a foremost dissident and spokesman for the Soviet Jewry movement.
In 1973, Sharansky applied for an exit visa to Israel, but was refused on “security” grounds. He remained prominently involved in Jewish refusenik activities until his arrest in 1977. Convicted in 1978 of treason and spying on behalf of the United States, Sharansky was sentenced to thirteen years imprisonment. He spent 16 months in Moscow's Lefortovo prison, frequently in solitary confinement and in a special “torture cell,” before being transferred to a notorious prison camp in the Siberian gulag.
During the years of his imprisonment, Sharansky became a symbol for human rights in general and Soviet Jewry in particular. A campaign for his release was waged tirelessly by his wife, Avital, who emigrated to Israel immediately following their wedding with the hope that her husband would follow shortly. Intense diplomatic efforts and public outcries for his release were unsuccessful until 1986, when Sharansky was released as part of an East-West prisoner exchange. Freed on the border of a still-divided Germany, he was met by the Israeli ambassador who presented him immediately with his new Israeli passport under the Hebrew name of Natan Sharansky. He arrived in Israel on February 11, 1986, and was greeted by leading government officials, including then Prime Minister Shimon Peres, and was given a hero's welcome.
In 1988, he was elected President of the newly created Zionist Forum, the umbrella organization of former Soviet activists. He also served as an associate editor of the Jerusalem Report.
THE SWASTIKA
The Swastika is a well-know good-luck symbol from India. Unfortunately, it is too well known in the west, as the Nazis chose it as their main symbol. In Sanskrit, swastika means "conducive to well-being". In the Buddhist tradition, the swastika symbolizes the feet or footprints of the Buddha and is often used to mark the beginning of texts. Modern Tibetan Buddhism uses it as a clothing decoration. With the spread of Buddhism, it has passed into the iconography of China and Japan where it has been used to denote plurality, abundance, prosperity and long life.
(In India, Hindus use the swastika to mark the opening pages of account books, thresholds, doors, and offerings, the right-hand swastika is a solar symbol and the left-hand version represents Kali and magic. Among the Jains it is the emblem of their seventh Tirthankara. Other uses of the symbol: in ancient Mesopotamia it was a favourite symbol on coinage, In Scandinavia it was the symbol for the god Thor's hammer. In early Christian art it was called the gammadion cross because it was made of four gammas. It is also found in Mayan and Navajo art.)
Oskar Schnidler
To 1200 Jews a womanizing, heavy-drinking, German-Catholic industrialist and Nazi Party member named Oskar Schindler was all that stood between them and death at the hands of the Nazis. He was a man all too human, full of flaws like the rest of us. The unlikeliest of all role models. An ordinary man who answered the call of conscience. He remained true to 'his' Jews, the workers he always referred to as 'my children'. He rose to the highest level of humanity and gave them a second chance at life. He spent millions to protect them, everything he possessed, and eventually risked his life in desperate rescue attempts. Even on the days when the air was black with the ashes from bodies on fire, there was hope in Crakow because Oskar Schindler was there.
In those years, millions of Jews were exposed to ruthless slaughter in the Nazi death camps, but Schindler's Jews miraculously survived. Today there are more than 8,500 descendants of his Jews living in the US, Europe and Israel.
Oskar Schindler died in Hildesheim in Germany October 9, 1974. He wanted to be buried in Jerusalem. As he said: My children are here ..
He died penniless, but he earned the everlasting gratitude of his Jews. He was mourned on four continents and generations will remember him for what he did.
A story to bear witness to goodness, love and compassion, an inspiring evidence of human decency.
But Oskar Schindler not only saved the lives of 1200 Jews - he saved our faith in humanity ...
- Louis Bülow
In those years, millions of Jews were exposed to ruthless slaughter in the Nazi death camps, but Schindler's Jews miraculously survived. Today there are more than 8,500 descendants of his Jews living in the US, Europe and Israel.
Oskar Schindler died in Hildesheim in Germany October 9, 1974. He wanted to be buried in Jerusalem. As he said: My children are here ..
He died penniless, but he earned the everlasting gratitude of his Jews. He was mourned on four continents and generations will remember him for what he did.
A story to bear witness to goodness, love and compassion, an inspiring evidence of human decency.
But Oskar Schindler not only saved the lives of 1200 Jews - he saved our faith in humanity ...
- Louis Bülow
The Mosque at Ground Zero
by Abraham H. Foxman (Excerpt)
All in all, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has established ourselves as leaders in promoting pluralism and fighting against bigotry, particularly against Muslims in the difficult post-9/11 period.
Critics should consider that context and credibility before reacting to ADL's position. Clearly we would not take a position to limit religious freedom. Clearly we would never take a position that would stereotype Muslims.
However, we also must take into consideration the feelings of the families who lost loved ones at Ground Zero.
The lessons of an earlier and different controversy echo in this one. In 1993, Pope John Paul II asked 14 Carmelite Nuns to move their convent from just outside the Auschwitz death camp. The establishment of the convent near Auschwitz had stirred dismay among Jewish groups and survivors who felt that the location was an affront and a terrible disservice to the memory of millions of Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis in the Holocaust.
Just as we thought then that well-meaning efforts by Carmelite nuns to build a Catholic structure were insensitive and counterproductive to reconciliation, so too we believe it will be with building a mosque so close to Ground Zero.
The better way for Muslims seeking reconciliation and moderation would have been for them to reach out to the families of the victims, who we are sure could have recommended any number of actions to achieve those goals other than the present plan.
To make this a test of whether one supports religious freedom or is stereotyping Muslims is to engage in demagoguery. Good people can differ as to what should happen, without falsely being accused of abandoning their principles.
Abraham H. Foxman, a Holocaust survivor, is National Director of the Anti-Defamation League.
All in all, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has established ourselves as leaders in promoting pluralism and fighting against bigotry, particularly against Muslims in the difficult post-9/11 period.
Critics should consider that context and credibility before reacting to ADL's position. Clearly we would not take a position to limit religious freedom. Clearly we would never take a position that would stereotype Muslims.
However, we also must take into consideration the feelings of the families who lost loved ones at Ground Zero.
The lessons of an earlier and different controversy echo in this one. In 1993, Pope John Paul II asked 14 Carmelite Nuns to move their convent from just outside the Auschwitz death camp. The establishment of the convent near Auschwitz had stirred dismay among Jewish groups and survivors who felt that the location was an affront and a terrible disservice to the memory of millions of Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis in the Holocaust.
Just as we thought then that well-meaning efforts by Carmelite nuns to build a Catholic structure were insensitive and counterproductive to reconciliation, so too we believe it will be with building a mosque so close to Ground Zero.
The better way for Muslims seeking reconciliation and moderation would have been for them to reach out to the families of the victims, who we are sure could have recommended any number of actions to achieve those goals other than the present plan.
To make this a test of whether one supports religious freedom or is stereotyping Muslims is to engage in demagoguery. Good people can differ as to what should happen, without falsely being accused of abandoning their principles.
Abraham H. Foxman, a Holocaust survivor, is National Director of the Anti-Defamation League.
Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg
"We have come here to Governors Island to stand where the earliest settlers first set foot in New Amsterdam, and where the seeds of religious tolerance were first planted. We've come here to see the inspiring symbol of liberty that, more than 250 years later, would greet millions of immigrants in the harbor, and we come here to state as strongly as ever – this is the freest City in the world. That's what makes New York special and different and strong.
"Our doors are open to everyone – everyone with a dream and a willingness to work hard and play by the rules. New York City was built by immigrants, and it is sustained by immigrants – by people from more than a hundred different countries speaking more than two hundred different languages and professing every faith. And whether your parents were born here, or you came yesterday, you are a New Yorker.
"We may not always agree with every one of our neighbors. That's life and it's part of living in such a diverse and dense city. But we also recognize that part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11.
"On that day, 3,000 people were killed because some murderous fanatics didn't want us to enjoy the freedom to profess our own faiths, to speak our own minds, to follow our own dreams and to live our own lives.
"Of all our precious freedoms, the most important may be the freedom to worship as we wish. And it is a freedom that, even here in a City that is rooted in Dutch tolerance, was hard-won over many years. In the mid-1650s, the small Jewish community living in Lower Manhattan petitioned Dutch Governor Peter Stuyvesant for the right to build a synagogue – and they were turned down.
"In 1657, when Stuyvesant also prohibited Quakers from holding meetings, a group of non-Quakers in Queens signed the Flushing Remonstrance, a petition in defense of the right of Quakers and others to freely practice their religion. It was perhaps the first formal, political petition for religious freedom in the American colonies – and the organizer was thrown in jail and then banished from New Amsterdam.
"In the 1700s, even as religious freedom took hold in America, Catholics in New York were effectively prohibited from practicing their religion – and priests could be arrested. Largely as a result, the first Catholic parish in New York City was not established until the 1780's – St. Peter's on Barclay Street, which still stands just one block north of the World Trade Center site and one block south of the proposed mosque and community center.
"This morning, the City's Landmark Preservation Commission unanimously voted not to extend landmark status to the building on Park Place where the mosque and community center are planned. The decision was based solely on the fact that there was little architectural significance to the building. But with or without landmark designation, there is nothing in the law that would prevent the owners from opening a mosque within the existing building. The simple fact is this building is private property, and the owners have a right to use the building as a house of worship.
"The government has no right whatsoever to deny that right – and if it were tried, the courts would almost certainly strike it down as a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Whatever you may think of the proposed mosque and community center, lost in the heat of the debate has been a basic question – should government attempt to deny private citizens the right to build a house of worship on private property based on their particular religion? That may happen in other countries, but we should never allow it to happen here. This nation was founded on the principle that the government must never choose between religions, or favor one over another.
"The World Trade Center Site will forever hold a special place in our City, in our hearts. But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves – and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans – if we said 'no' to a mosque in Lower Manhattan.
"Let us not forget that Muslims were among those murdered on 9/11 and that our Muslim neighbors grieved with us as New Yorkers and as Americans. We would betray our values – and play into our enemies' hands – if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else. In fact, to cave to popular sentiment would be to hand a victory to the terrorists – and we should not stand for that.
"For that reason, I believe that this is an important test of the separation of church and state as we may see in our lifetime – as important a test – and it is critically important that we get it right.
"On September 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than 400 of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked 'What God do you pray to?' 'What beliefs do you hold?'
"The attack was an act of war – and our first responders defended not only our City but also our country and our Constitution. We do not honor their lives by denying the very Constitutional rights they died protecting. We honor their lives by defending those rights – and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.
"Of course, it is fair to ask the organizers of the mosque to show some special sensitivity to the situation – and in fact, their plan envisions reaching beyond their walls and building an interfaith community. By doing so, it is my hope that the mosque will help to bring our City even closer together and help repudiate the false and repugnant idea that the attacks of 9/11 were in any way consistent with Islam. Muslims are as much a part of our City and our country as the people of any faith and they are as welcome to worship in Lower Manhattan as any other group. In fact, they have been worshipping at the site for the better part of a year, as is their right.
"The local community board in Lower Manhattan voted overwhelming to support the proposal and if it moves forward, I expect the community center and mosque will add to the life and vitality of the neighborhood and the entire City.
"Political controversies come and go, but our values and our traditions endure – and there is no neighborhood in this City that is off limits to God's love and mercy, as the religious leaders here with us today can attest."
"Our doors are open to everyone – everyone with a dream and a willingness to work hard and play by the rules. New York City was built by immigrants, and it is sustained by immigrants – by people from more than a hundred different countries speaking more than two hundred different languages and professing every faith. And whether your parents were born here, or you came yesterday, you are a New Yorker.
"We may not always agree with every one of our neighbors. That's life and it's part of living in such a diverse and dense city. But we also recognize that part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11.
"On that day, 3,000 people were killed because some murderous fanatics didn't want us to enjoy the freedom to profess our own faiths, to speak our own minds, to follow our own dreams and to live our own lives.
"Of all our precious freedoms, the most important may be the freedom to worship as we wish. And it is a freedom that, even here in a City that is rooted in Dutch tolerance, was hard-won over many years. In the mid-1650s, the small Jewish community living in Lower Manhattan petitioned Dutch Governor Peter Stuyvesant for the right to build a synagogue – and they were turned down.
"In 1657, when Stuyvesant also prohibited Quakers from holding meetings, a group of non-Quakers in Queens signed the Flushing Remonstrance, a petition in defense of the right of Quakers and others to freely practice their religion. It was perhaps the first formal, political petition for religious freedom in the American colonies – and the organizer was thrown in jail and then banished from New Amsterdam.
"In the 1700s, even as religious freedom took hold in America, Catholics in New York were effectively prohibited from practicing their religion – and priests could be arrested. Largely as a result, the first Catholic parish in New York City was not established until the 1780's – St. Peter's on Barclay Street, which still stands just one block north of the World Trade Center site and one block south of the proposed mosque and community center.
"This morning, the City's Landmark Preservation Commission unanimously voted not to extend landmark status to the building on Park Place where the mosque and community center are planned. The decision was based solely on the fact that there was little architectural significance to the building. But with or without landmark designation, there is nothing in the law that would prevent the owners from opening a mosque within the existing building. The simple fact is this building is private property, and the owners have a right to use the building as a house of worship.
"The government has no right whatsoever to deny that right – and if it were tried, the courts would almost certainly strike it down as a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Whatever you may think of the proposed mosque and community center, lost in the heat of the debate has been a basic question – should government attempt to deny private citizens the right to build a house of worship on private property based on their particular religion? That may happen in other countries, but we should never allow it to happen here. This nation was founded on the principle that the government must never choose between religions, or favor one over another.
"The World Trade Center Site will forever hold a special place in our City, in our hearts. But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves – and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans – if we said 'no' to a mosque in Lower Manhattan.
"Let us not forget that Muslims were among those murdered on 9/11 and that our Muslim neighbors grieved with us as New Yorkers and as Americans. We would betray our values – and play into our enemies' hands – if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else. In fact, to cave to popular sentiment would be to hand a victory to the terrorists – and we should not stand for that.
"For that reason, I believe that this is an important test of the separation of church and state as we may see in our lifetime – as important a test – and it is critically important that we get it right.
"On September 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than 400 of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked 'What God do you pray to?' 'What beliefs do you hold?'
"The attack was an act of war – and our first responders defended not only our City but also our country and our Constitution. We do not honor their lives by denying the very Constitutional rights they died protecting. We honor their lives by defending those rights – and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.
"Of course, it is fair to ask the organizers of the mosque to show some special sensitivity to the situation – and in fact, their plan envisions reaching beyond their walls and building an interfaith community. By doing so, it is my hope that the mosque will help to bring our City even closer together and help repudiate the false and repugnant idea that the attacks of 9/11 were in any way consistent with Islam. Muslims are as much a part of our City and our country as the people of any faith and they are as welcome to worship in Lower Manhattan as any other group. In fact, they have been worshipping at the site for the better part of a year, as is their right.
"The local community board in Lower Manhattan voted overwhelming to support the proposal and if it moves forward, I expect the community center and mosque will add to the life and vitality of the neighborhood and the entire City.
"Political controversies come and go, but our values and our traditions endure – and there is no neighborhood in this City that is off limits to God's love and mercy, as the religious leaders here with us today can attest."
Published August 16, 2010 by:John Mario
Should a Mosque be built at Ground Zero?
Both sides of the issue are examined in this article.
If our intelligence community was able to isolate all terrorist sleeper cells and export the members of those cells or charge them with conspiracy to commit a terrorist act, then perhaps the people would be able to rise above their biases and stand by the first amendment of the United Stated Constitution. If the Mosque was not being built near ground zero in New York, then it would be much easier to stand by the first amendment of the US Constitution. If you only consider the first amendment to the US Constitution, then you would agree with Obama.
There are mitigating factors. It's near the site of a terrorist attack on the US. That terrorist attack was performed by Muslims. We are still at war with the terrorists (Al Qaida) who participated in planning the 9/11 attack. The majority of the Muslims have not waged war against Al Qaida. The building where the Mosque is being built was damaged by the landing gear of one of the planes involved in the attack.
Of course, the politicians stand by popular opinion. But is the real issue the Mosque? Or is the real issue safety and security? Is the real issue a bias against all Islamic people? Or is the real issue the Mosque becoming a refuge for terrorist sleeper cells?
All these questions are very disturbing. I credit PBS News Hour for defining the debate in practical terms.
I can't refute the fact that the Mosque can be built on private property. But I question why that particular site was chosen for the Mosque. I question why those who are building the Mosque there won't chose another site and avoid the controversy. Is it a protest against the growing bias against all Islamic people? I mean, lets face it. What is the first word that comes to your mind when you see an Muslim? Obviously, the fear of terrorism is coloring our thoughts.
Should a Mosque be built at Ground Zero?
Both sides of the issue are examined in this article.
If our intelligence community was able to isolate all terrorist sleeper cells and export the members of those cells or charge them with conspiracy to commit a terrorist act, then perhaps the people would be able to rise above their biases and stand by the first amendment of the United Stated Constitution. If the Mosque was not being built near ground zero in New York, then it would be much easier to stand by the first amendment of the US Constitution. If you only consider the first amendment to the US Constitution, then you would agree with Obama.
There are mitigating factors. It's near the site of a terrorist attack on the US. That terrorist attack was performed by Muslims. We are still at war with the terrorists (Al Qaida) who participated in planning the 9/11 attack. The majority of the Muslims have not waged war against Al Qaida. The building where the Mosque is being built was damaged by the landing gear of one of the planes involved in the attack.
Of course, the politicians stand by popular opinion. But is the real issue the Mosque? Or is the real issue safety and security? Is the real issue a bias against all Islamic people? Or is the real issue the Mosque becoming a refuge for terrorist sleeper cells?
All these questions are very disturbing. I credit PBS News Hour for defining the debate in practical terms.
I can't refute the fact that the Mosque can be built on private property. But I question why that particular site was chosen for the Mosque. I question why those who are building the Mosque there won't chose another site and avoid the controversy. Is it a protest against the growing bias against all Islamic people? I mean, lets face it. What is the first word that comes to your mind when you see an Muslim? Obviously, the fear of terrorism is coloring our thoughts.
The Rebbe’s Investment
My Thoughts on the Rebbe's Modality of Leadership
By Tzvi Freeman
Leadership, to many, means leading the masses. To the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of righteous memory, leadership meant empowering individuals, each one, one by one. Unconventional ideas require unconventional strategies. In his later years, the Rebbe did some-thing uniquely tied to his modality of leadership: He would stand in the hallway outside his office every Sunday morning, sometimes for as long as four or five hours, handing thousands of people, one by one, a dollar and a blessing. Students and business people, politicians and police officers, rabbis and rabble rousers, the famous and powerful along with the down and out—there were no limits on who could stand in line and each received the same dollar.
In the past, there were wise men for whom many stood in line for advice. The Rebbe stood for those standing in his line and gave each one a job to do. First, here's a dollar. Why a dollar? The dollar was not yours. It was the Rebbe's dollar that he wished to give to charity. Which charity? The charity that you would choose. You would give that dollar or its equivalent worth, on the Rebbe's behalf, to whatever charity you liked. The Rebbe was investing in you, in your ability to make the right choice and do something good. You and the Rebbe were now bound together in a single act of goodness: The Rebbe's dollar, your choice.
Many then reported to the Rebbe about all the good things they had already done. Very good, the Rebbe would reply, but don’t be satisfied. Double your efforts. And once you’ve doubled them, double again.
And then there was the blessing given to all without exception: Blessing and success. Success in what? In the job you have to do, in your mission in life, in doubling the power of that mission. What mission? The mission in which you have been empowered. Now go, choose, and do something. Always the bottom line: Do.Empowerment. Leadership. Rebbe. I’m grasping for words to describe it when you can see it all for yourself right here.
http://www.chabad.org/therebbe/article_cdo/aid/402599/jewish/The-Rebbes-Investment.htm
Does Spider-Man's struggle to find himself resemble the dilemma of the modern Jew in America?
Not really. It may more closely resemble the small-town, impoverished rural Jews of Czarist Russia.
I ask for your indulgence in my examination of Spider-Man 2, stretching some of the gossamer webbing very thin, back to a small fictional town called Anatevka in what may be the most popular piece of Jewish pop culture in history. Just read on, nod a little and nobody gets hurt.
ARACHNATEVKA
In a recent interview, Alfred Molina, currently starring as Tevya in the umpteenth Broadway revival of Fiddler on The Roof, challenged me, well not me personally, but in mentioning his part as mad scientist Doctor Octopus in the new Spider-Man movie and his role as Tevya the milkman on Broadway, he remarked that he has a career strategy of picking each acting role as different as possible from the previous one.
So I got to thinking: How different are the two, The Spider-Man super-sequel that was almost entitled "Spider-Man No More" and the new production of Fiddler on the Roof on Broadway?
Spider-Man's dilemma of how he can remain a hero to the unbalancing detriment of his career, bank account, education, social life and commitment to family, (not to mention him swinging from the tops of skyscrapers) evokes Tevya's opening monologue:
"In our little village of Anatevka you might say every one of us is a fiddler on a roof. Trying to scratch out a pleasant simple tune without breaking his neck. . . You may ask, why do we stay up here if it is so dangerous?"
And that's basically the same question asked by college student Peter Parker, who, thanks to a bite from a genetically modified spider, became Spider-Man.
In the first movie, his loved ones suffer because of his commitment to a life that carries serious obligations. As this new film opens we see his failure to eke out even a modest living, as his secret identity prevents him from keeping a job, a class schedule or any other commitment.
Like Fiddler, Spider-Man 2 begins with the impoverished hero making the rounds with his dairy products (Parker is a delivery boy for Joes' Pizza) and just as Tevya's horse loses a shoe right before the Sabbath, Peter's pathetic little scooter gets broken at the most inopportune time imaginable.
Like Tevya, Parker suffers from an almost comical inability to make a living. With a landlord hounding him, his aunt May threatened with foreclosure and eviction (not unlike the inhabitants of Anatevka) a professor threatening to fail him, and an abusive couple of downsize-happy bosses, Peter asks himself why he should be fighting crime… fiddling around on rooftops.
Like Spider-Man leaping off of skyscrapers, at times it may seem like near-suicidal madness, but for generations, millions of Jewish families lived every day in danger of their lives.This is the Jewish heart of the matter: the issue of balancing one's identity, the haphazard dance of living life on the edge, in constant danger of falling one way or the other. Just how much Jewish commitment am I capable of? How flexible can I be Jewishly without myself or my children stumbling onto a slippery slope into the abyss of assimilation?
Like Spider-Man leaping off of skyscrapers, at times it may seem like near-suicidal madness, but for generations, millions of Jewish families lived every day in danger of their lives.
There were those who assimilated or converted, left the small-town shtetls for Moscow or elsewhere, shaved their beards, ditched their head-coverings, changed their names and neither looked back, nor were seen by the Jewish community again. (Similar, perhaps, to a story where Spider-Man tosses his suit in a trash can in order to leave his super-past behind.)
Historically, there were those who could have left their Jewish community but chose to stay, literally putting their loved ones in danger every day, just by remaining part of the Jewish community… because they believed that living a Jewish life was important enough to take those risks.
Sounds crazy, no?
In a certain way the historical obligations of the Jewish people are somewhat like the obligations of super-heroes. We have a never-ending set of tasks including -- prominently -- helping those in need. We are called upon at times to make tremendous sacrifices and to lead lives that can include much that is unfamiliar to others. At times, to protect ourselves and our loved ones, we have had to go underground, adopt other identities. And in every generation there is someone like Spider-Man or someone like Tevya, who holds up a mirror to the sacrifice and its consequences, personal, financial or otherwise.
After the first 15 minutes of Peter Parker's life on screen, I can't say the audience would have been surprised if he looked skyward and began to sing Tevya's signature song "If I Were a Rich Man."
On top of ruining his life, it seems as if Peter's spider-powers might be vacillating at inauspicious times. The webbing material which he shoots out of his hands and which he may have begun to take for granted, fails him. He looks longingly at his hands, suddenly empty of webshooting stuff, but Peter could just as believably be looking at his palms bemoaning his fiscal empty handedness.
But maybe there's a relation between the two. Just as Peter Parker, when leaping from a building, must have faith that he will have in hand (literally) the light thin life-saving substance that makes all the difference between life and death, the Jewish people once counted on another white gossamer material without which we would have been lost.
In the wilderness for 40 years, the Jewish people counted on a miraculous white, thin-yet-powerful substance, the life-sustaining manna. The biblical story is considered an important lesson in faith, as manna could only be gathered in quantities sufficient for that one day, except for Friday, when there was an extra portion for the Sabbath. In perhaps a similar way, Peter Parker must make a leap of faith, confident that the webbing will carry him from building to building and not fail him over midtown. Sort of like the sad little portions of milk and cheese Tevya distributes, hoping that the meager payment he receives for them will be enough to get him and his family to their next Sabbath.
With his selfhood challenged, Peter, faced with a reality that he cannot speak of openly, invents a dream. With memories playing a vital part in this film, Spider-Man's life is haunted by two 'ghosts' from the first film: his memories of his Uncle Ben, whose sage advice and tragic death made Spider-Man a hero, and his friend Harry's memory of his own father, secretly the villainous Green Goblin, played to chilling perfection in the first Spider-Man movie and in flashbacks here by Willem Dafoe.
Similarly, in Fiddler on the roof, Tevya invents a dream with two ghosts, Fruma Sarah and Grandma Tzeitel, one threatening to thwart human happiness with murderous vengeance, and one pointing the way to bliss, bearing a promise that a blessing will be forthcoming to those who do what's right.
On Broadway, Molina, a really remarkable actor with a winning smile and a gift for accents, delivers a beautiful performance. His Tevya lives up to the character's reputation, famous for waffling, alternating, even equivocating. "On the other hand," he reasons numerous times during the play, continually trying to see all acceptable alternatives.
The dramatic high point of the show occurs when, after always being able to solve a problem by looking at "the other hand," one daughter crosses the line, relinquishing Judaism and the Jewish community entirely. He says bleakly, "On the other hand… there is no other hand!!"
Well now, there is another hand -- four of them. Molina plays the multi-limbed Dr. Octopus, an affable genius scientist who is trying to serve mankind by creating laboratory fusion which, if harnessed properly, could provide enough energy to turn the world into a paradise.
But there are four snakes in His Eden. Doctor Octopus has created four mechanical arms -- tentacles really -- whose artificial intelligence is no more under control than the fusion mini-sun he is obsessed with creating. He thinks he can retain control, but the arms turn him into their evil puppet.
The 'Revolutionary' technology out of control evokes another character from Anatevka. To Perchik, as to many other Jews under the Tsars, Communism seemed the solution to all their problems. That is until, like Doc Ock's fusion mini-sun, it began to suck in everything around it, finally bringing down the very roof on which everyone's been trying so desperately to fiddle.
SHTETL ON A TRAIN
Doc Ock is really only his nomme de villainy. He starts out as kind-hearted Dr. Octavius. (pronounced Ock-Tevyas). Like those perpetrating the community-threatening pogrom in Fiddler on the Roof, Doctor Octopus is only following orders. Still, Spider-Man's personal relationship with New York is underlined by a subway car full of people who stand together in times of crisis, just like the good people of Anatevka.
Like Peter Parker, and like Tevya before him, we all have something innate making us incapable of permanently, irrevocably denying who we are, although sadly, we sometimes wish and pray otherwise.
Which brings us back to "If I were a Rich Man." When Peter Parker is suffering from his appointed role in life, seeing his gift as a curse and wishing he wouldn't have to bear his heavy burden, your heart goes out to him. You can almost see him looking heavenward singing:
"Lord who made the Lion and the Lamb
You decreed I should be what I am
Would it spoil some vast eternal plan
If I weren't Spider-Man"
Copyright 2004 Alan Oirich
Not really. It may more closely resemble the small-town, impoverished rural Jews of Czarist Russia.
I ask for your indulgence in my examination of Spider-Man 2, stretching some of the gossamer webbing very thin, back to a small fictional town called Anatevka in what may be the most popular piece of Jewish pop culture in history. Just read on, nod a little and nobody gets hurt.
ARACHNATEVKA
In a recent interview, Alfred Molina, currently starring as Tevya in the umpteenth Broadway revival of Fiddler on The Roof, challenged me, well not me personally, but in mentioning his part as mad scientist Doctor Octopus in the new Spider-Man movie and his role as Tevya the milkman on Broadway, he remarked that he has a career strategy of picking each acting role as different as possible from the previous one.
So I got to thinking: How different are the two, The Spider-Man super-sequel that was almost entitled "Spider-Man No More" and the new production of Fiddler on the Roof on Broadway?
Spider-Man's dilemma of how he can remain a hero to the unbalancing detriment of his career, bank account, education, social life and commitment to family, (not to mention him swinging from the tops of skyscrapers) evokes Tevya's opening monologue:
"In our little village of Anatevka you might say every one of us is a fiddler on a roof. Trying to scratch out a pleasant simple tune without breaking his neck. . . You may ask, why do we stay up here if it is so dangerous?"
And that's basically the same question asked by college student Peter Parker, who, thanks to a bite from a genetically modified spider, became Spider-Man.
In the first movie, his loved ones suffer because of his commitment to a life that carries serious obligations. As this new film opens we see his failure to eke out even a modest living, as his secret identity prevents him from keeping a job, a class schedule or any other commitment.
Like Fiddler, Spider-Man 2 begins with the impoverished hero making the rounds with his dairy products (Parker is a delivery boy for Joes' Pizza) and just as Tevya's horse loses a shoe right before the Sabbath, Peter's pathetic little scooter gets broken at the most inopportune time imaginable.
Like Tevya, Parker suffers from an almost comical inability to make a living. With a landlord hounding him, his aunt May threatened with foreclosure and eviction (not unlike the inhabitants of Anatevka) a professor threatening to fail him, and an abusive couple of downsize-happy bosses, Peter asks himself why he should be fighting crime… fiddling around on rooftops.
Like Spider-Man leaping off of skyscrapers, at times it may seem like near-suicidal madness, but for generations, millions of Jewish families lived every day in danger of their lives.This is the Jewish heart of the matter: the issue of balancing one's identity, the haphazard dance of living life on the edge, in constant danger of falling one way or the other. Just how much Jewish commitment am I capable of? How flexible can I be Jewishly without myself or my children stumbling onto a slippery slope into the abyss of assimilation?
Like Spider-Man leaping off of skyscrapers, at times it may seem like near-suicidal madness, but for generations, millions of Jewish families lived every day in danger of their lives.
There were those who assimilated or converted, left the small-town shtetls for Moscow or elsewhere, shaved their beards, ditched their head-coverings, changed their names and neither looked back, nor were seen by the Jewish community again. (Similar, perhaps, to a story where Spider-Man tosses his suit in a trash can in order to leave his super-past behind.)
Historically, there were those who could have left their Jewish community but chose to stay, literally putting their loved ones in danger every day, just by remaining part of the Jewish community… because they believed that living a Jewish life was important enough to take those risks.
Sounds crazy, no?
In a certain way the historical obligations of the Jewish people are somewhat like the obligations of super-heroes. We have a never-ending set of tasks including -- prominently -- helping those in need. We are called upon at times to make tremendous sacrifices and to lead lives that can include much that is unfamiliar to others. At times, to protect ourselves and our loved ones, we have had to go underground, adopt other identities. And in every generation there is someone like Spider-Man or someone like Tevya, who holds up a mirror to the sacrifice and its consequences, personal, financial or otherwise.
After the first 15 minutes of Peter Parker's life on screen, I can't say the audience would have been surprised if he looked skyward and began to sing Tevya's signature song "If I Were a Rich Man."
On top of ruining his life, it seems as if Peter's spider-powers might be vacillating at inauspicious times. The webbing material which he shoots out of his hands and which he may have begun to take for granted, fails him. He looks longingly at his hands, suddenly empty of webshooting stuff, but Peter could just as believably be looking at his palms bemoaning his fiscal empty handedness.
But maybe there's a relation between the two. Just as Peter Parker, when leaping from a building, must have faith that he will have in hand (literally) the light thin life-saving substance that makes all the difference between life and death, the Jewish people once counted on another white gossamer material without which we would have been lost.
In the wilderness for 40 years, the Jewish people counted on a miraculous white, thin-yet-powerful substance, the life-sustaining manna. The biblical story is considered an important lesson in faith, as manna could only be gathered in quantities sufficient for that one day, except for Friday, when there was an extra portion for the Sabbath. In perhaps a similar way, Peter Parker must make a leap of faith, confident that the webbing will carry him from building to building and not fail him over midtown. Sort of like the sad little portions of milk and cheese Tevya distributes, hoping that the meager payment he receives for them will be enough to get him and his family to their next Sabbath.
With his selfhood challenged, Peter, faced with a reality that he cannot speak of openly, invents a dream. With memories playing a vital part in this film, Spider-Man's life is haunted by two 'ghosts' from the first film: his memories of his Uncle Ben, whose sage advice and tragic death made Spider-Man a hero, and his friend Harry's memory of his own father, secretly the villainous Green Goblin, played to chilling perfection in the first Spider-Man movie and in flashbacks here by Willem Dafoe.
Similarly, in Fiddler on the roof, Tevya invents a dream with two ghosts, Fruma Sarah and Grandma Tzeitel, one threatening to thwart human happiness with murderous vengeance, and one pointing the way to bliss, bearing a promise that a blessing will be forthcoming to those who do what's right.
On Broadway, Molina, a really remarkable actor with a winning smile and a gift for accents, delivers a beautiful performance. His Tevya lives up to the character's reputation, famous for waffling, alternating, even equivocating. "On the other hand," he reasons numerous times during the play, continually trying to see all acceptable alternatives.
The dramatic high point of the show occurs when, after always being able to solve a problem by looking at "the other hand," one daughter crosses the line, relinquishing Judaism and the Jewish community entirely. He says bleakly, "On the other hand… there is no other hand!!"
Well now, there is another hand -- four of them. Molina plays the multi-limbed Dr. Octopus, an affable genius scientist who is trying to serve mankind by creating laboratory fusion which, if harnessed properly, could provide enough energy to turn the world into a paradise.
But there are four snakes in His Eden. Doctor Octopus has created four mechanical arms -- tentacles really -- whose artificial intelligence is no more under control than the fusion mini-sun he is obsessed with creating. He thinks he can retain control, but the arms turn him into their evil puppet.
The 'Revolutionary' technology out of control evokes another character from Anatevka. To Perchik, as to many other Jews under the Tsars, Communism seemed the solution to all their problems. That is until, like Doc Ock's fusion mini-sun, it began to suck in everything around it, finally bringing down the very roof on which everyone's been trying so desperately to fiddle.
SHTETL ON A TRAIN
Doc Ock is really only his nomme de villainy. He starts out as kind-hearted Dr. Octavius. (pronounced Ock-Tevyas). Like those perpetrating the community-threatening pogrom in Fiddler on the Roof, Doctor Octopus is only following orders. Still, Spider-Man's personal relationship with New York is underlined by a subway car full of people who stand together in times of crisis, just like the good people of Anatevka.
Like Peter Parker, and like Tevya before him, we all have something innate making us incapable of permanently, irrevocably denying who we are, although sadly, we sometimes wish and pray otherwise.
Which brings us back to "If I were a Rich Man." When Peter Parker is suffering from his appointed role in life, seeing his gift as a curse and wishing he wouldn't have to bear his heavy burden, your heart goes out to him. You can almost see him looking heavenward singing:
"Lord who made the Lion and the Lamb
You decreed I should be what I am
Would it spoil some vast eternal plan
If I weren't Spider-Man"
Copyright 2004 Alan Oirich
