 | Vote No to Slander - by Rabbi S. Weiss | |||||||||||||
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Monday, March 27, 2006
OrTorah: Vote No to Slander - by Rabbi S. Weiss
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Jew_Concious: An Open Letter to the Israel Prison Service - brought by Naomi Ragen
| An Open Letter to the Israel Prison Service - brought by Naomi Ragen |
| Friends, Guess who running for election in the Palestinian Authority? A letter from Arnold Roth, whose beautiful daughter Malki was murdered in the Sbarro Pizza bombing. Marwan Barghouti, who has been sentenced in Israeli courts to 5 life terms, and who hide the murderers of Malki Roth, is a candidate. Below, a letter from Malki's father on the outrageous way Israel is allowing Barghouti to run. Naomi An open letter from Arnold Roth, Jerusalem. Chief Superintendent Ian Domnitz International Relations Branch Israel Prison Service Jerusalem Dear Mr Domnitz, I would be grateful for your help in getting to the root of a troubling matter. Marwan Barghouti, the leader of Arafat's Fatah movement in the West Bank and closely identified with what the BBC <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/middle_east/2001/israel _and_the_palestinians/profiles/1473585.stm> calls "one of its militant offshoots", the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, was arrested by the Israeli authorities in April 2002 and charged with the killing of 26 people and belonging to a terrorist organisation. On May 20, 2004, the Tel Aviv District Court convicted Barghouti of three terror attacks in which five Israelis were murdered. He was convicted of attempted murder, convicted of membership in a terror organization and convicted of conspiracy to commit a crime. On June 6, 2004, Barghouti was sentenced to five consecutive life terms and 40 years. He is therefore a convicted terrorist and a convicted murderer. It is worth adding that at the trial of Barghouti's nephew and aide Ahmed Barghouti, r <http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=11 614> evelations <http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=11 614> were made that Uncle Marwan hid the terror gang members who carried out the Sbarro restaurant massacre in Jerusalem in August 2001. Fifteen innocent civilians died there that day. Fair disclosure: one of those murdered was my 15 year-old daughter Malki <http://www.kerenmalki.org/> . (I make no pretence to being dispassionate about this particular thug.) In light of these matters, why, in your capacity as Israel Prison Service spokesperson, did you - an accomplished and fluent speaker of the English language - refer again and again in a BBC World Service radio interview yesterday (January 24, 2006) to Marwan Barghouti as "security prisoner"? My recollection is you used that expression half a dozen times or more in a single interview, speaking deliberately and fluently. No slip of the tongue seems to have been involved. It's clear enough that, for their part, Barghouti and gang want his multiple convictions for murder and terrorism to be expunged from the record, the faster the better. Claiming him as a security prisoner or a political prisoner plainly serves Barghouti's interests. The question for Israelis is whether this is (a) justified and (b) in the interests of Israelis. These are highly charged times. In the run-up to today's elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council, left-wing extremists like Joseph Beilin have called for Barghouti to be released from his Israeli jail-cell. Beilin has said <http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3174972,00.html> the murderer should be go free because he "heads one of the Palestinian camps that do want peace and so this is the moment to end his sentence". In the give-and-take of Israel's robust democracy, Beilin's position may be deeply offensive to many Israelis and thin on both logic and jurisprudence. But Beilin speaks as a political activist, which means he is perfectly at liberty to be as offensive as he chooses. But it's an entirely different matter for the official spokesperson of the Israeli Prison Service to express himself in what seems to be a partisan manner. Which brings me to my questions. Does the Prison Service agree with you that Marwan Barghouti is a 'security prisoner'? If yes, does this entitle him to privileges to which a mere murderer would have no right? If no, will you immediately issue a public statement clarifying that the final determination of Israel's criminal justice system, convicting Barghouti of the most serious crimes, will not be undermined any further by those responsible for running its jails? If the global war on terror means anything, it is essential for us to be clear about this. Barghouti is no security prisoner. He is no more than a loathsome felon. I await your response. Sincerely, Arnold Roth www.kerenmalki.org <http://www.kerenmalki.org/> Father of Malka Chana Roth Z"L ------------- The Malki <http://www.kerenmalki.org/> Foundation PO Box 23637 Jerusalem 91236 Israel To stay in touch with the work of the Malki Foundation, please join the Friends of Keren <http://groups.google.com/group/Friends-of-Keren-Malki> Malki Email List --------------------------------------------------------------------------- For more articles,please visit my Web page at: http://www.NaomiRagen.com |
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Jew_Concious: ON THE "PALESTINIAN ELECTIONS" INVADING EAST JERUSALEM: LETTER SENT TO REPRESENTATIVE, SENATORS AND WHITE HOUSE
| ON THE "PALESTINIAN ELECTIONS" INVADING EAST JERUSALEM: LETTER SENT TO REPRESENTATIVE, SENATORS AND WHITE HOUSE |
ON THE "PALESTINIAN ELECTIONS" INVADING EAST JERUSALEM: LETTER SENT TO REPRESENTATIVE, SENATORS AND WHITE HOUSE posted by pvpreacherman@webtv.net to the group STANDING_WITH_ISRAEL at YahooGroups Please write as well. This does not bode well for Yisrael or for Jerusalem! Dear (sir): As your constituent, I feel compelled to write about the latest news from Israel. It appears that Israel is going to allow the Arab residents of East Jerusalem to vote in the proposed January 25 elections. This is going to happen, it seems, in spite of Israeli misgivings, because of pressure being applied by Ms. Rice and her State Department. This could easily be seen as a step toward the division of Jerusalem, the eternal and indivisible capitol of Israel. Sir, our State Department has a long record of pro-Arab and anti-semitic bias, and this concerns me. Israel is our only real ally in the entire Middle East, and the only legitimate democracy there. If for no other reasons, it stands to more than reason that we accede more to her concerns, and less to the Arabs. For all of their so-called "desire for democracy", the only real aim of the so-called "Palestinians" (a true misnomer, by the way) is the destruction of the Jewish state and people. As both your constituent and a "man of the Book", I call upon you to do the right thing, to truly support our ally, Israel, and to do all possible to "rein in" our rogue State Department and Secretary of State. I, and others, will be watching your actions to that end, sir. Thank you very much, and may G-d guide and bless you. Sincerely, Robert L. Hand Those who kneel before G-d can stand before anyone! Please daven for the safety of Bnei Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael and for G-d's Shalom for Yerushalayim ! Am Yisrael Chai! |
Thursday, January 05, 2006
OrTorah: Harry Potter is Jewish!
| Harry Potter is Jewish! |
Harry Potter is Jewish! (A Useful Metaphor) by Rabbi Jack Abramowitz www.ou.org/ncsy/projects/5764/oct31-64/harry_potter_is_jewish.htm No, sorry to say, the character of Harry Potter is not Jewish. I think the books are quite clear on that, what with Christmas being a major plot point what seems like every six weeks. But I think the theme of the Harry Potter series is quite Jewish. Some religious people of different faiths, including Judaism and Christianity, have opposed the Harry Potter series. (I wouldn't be surprised to find that Moslems, Hindus and others have objected, as well.) After all, it does appear to glorify a lifestyle quite at odds with the one they espouse. But I think they're missing the point. Harry Potter doesn't advocate witchcraft as a lifestyle choice any more than the Terminator movies advocate the killer android from the future lifestyle. Harry Potter is about a boy who just happens to be a wizard. Personally, I think the Harry Potter story may be a perfect metaphor for what many Jewish teens encounter in their quest for religious growth. You see, Hogwarts isn't a school of wizardry. It's a yeshiva. It's Yarchei Kallah. It's a Shabbaton. It's wherever you want to go to grow in Torah observance and get closer to G-d. We'll talk more about Hogwarts specifically soon enough. All about Harry Harry is Jewish. His parents died so that he might survive and carry on their legacy. Voldemort isn't an evil wizard, but he does represent the forces of evil. He is Egyptian slavery. He is the Syrian-Greeks. He is Haman. He is the Roman persecution. He is the Spanish Inquisition. He is pogroms and Crusades and the Holocaust and the Intifada. He thought he had destroyed the Potter family, but you know what? They survived in Harry, much the same way the Jewish people lives on in you. Harry didn't know the gifts he had. He knew that talking to snakes at the zoo was a little strange, but he didn't understand the power he had inside. Maybe you've sometimes felt different from your peers. Maybe you've felt that spark inside you, but not known what it was. That's your Jewish soul, baby! It's looking to get out and express itself! So, like you, Harry got his wake-up call. His came by owl post. Yours probably didn't. But if you're reading this, somehow or some way G-d sent you an invitation. It didn't say "Hogwarts" on it, but it said "Torah." G-d invited you to come claim your heritage. Dealing with the Dursleys Harry had the Dursleys, his aunt and uncle, who tried to stand in his way. They were scared of witchcraft. They said it was because it wasn't "normal," but that wasn't the real reason. It was because Mrs. Dursley was jealous of her sister, Harry's mother, who was a witch. Lily Potter had something special that Petunia Dursley lacked and she hated her for it. Historically, a lot of people have hated the Jews for exactly the same reason: G-d gave us something special that they don't have. You probably have Dursleys in your life, too. In America in the 21st Century, your Dursleys probably aren't overt anti-Semitism (thank G-d), but there are plenty of others. People who belittle your interest in Torah can be Dursleys. But Dursleys can also come from within. The yetzer hara can be a big Dursley. ("Yetzer hara" is usually translated "the evil inclination. If you were a cartoon, the yetzer hara would be a little guy in a red suit who sits on your shoulder and tells you to keep a wallet instead of turning it in.) Laziness, fear of change, peer pressure - Dursleys all. Harry overcame his Dursleys. You can beat yours, too. (But you have to be careful! Harry goes home every summer and has to outwit the Dursleys again and again. Your Dursleys will never stop trying to deter you from growing in your "magic," so you must be ever-vigilant!) Harry and his Friends at Hogwarts Harry finally made it to Hogwarts. While he was there, he met other witches and wizards from all different types of backgrounds. Ron Weasley's family is all-wizard. He doesn't know any other lifestyle. He takes for granted so much of what is new and magical to Harry. Hermione Granger's family is all-muggle (non-wizard), but unlike the Dursleys, Hermione's family appreciates what being a witch has done for their daughter and they encourage her growth. Harry is a little jealous of this positive relationship. After all, Hermione can bring her muggle relatives to Diagon Alley (sort of like inviting them to your Shabbos table), something Harry can never do with his family. At Hogwarts, Harry studies magic. His course of studies includes such varied courses as the History of Magic, Potions and Care of Magical Creatures. This is like our study of Torah. (This gets a huge lehavdil, which is what we say when we compare two things that really aren't alike.) The Torah is not just a book of laws. It's the history of our people. It's self-improvement. It's how to treat other people. Harry's course of study is diverse and so is ours. Casting Spells Harry and his friends cast spells, but the charms they cast don't always turn out as intended. Hermione didn't mean to turn herself into a cat with the polyjuice potion. Ron didn't want slugs pouring out of his mouth. Gilderoy Lockhart didn't intend to remove all the bones in Harry's broken arm. To a degree this can be compared to davening. (No, really.) I'll explain. We "cast our spells" (a big lehavdil, again) and ask Hashem to do certain things for us. Sometimes He does as we ask. But, like a spell gone awry, sometimes G-d says no. Not because He's capricious, but because He knows what's best for us. (It's like when you refuse to stuff a three-year-old with candy until they get sick. They think you're "mean," but you know that you're doing them a big favor.) It's not a perfect parallel. Spells will probably succeed or fail based on the wizard's proficiency, which is not the case with our prayers. But, as with the spells, when our prayers don't get the results we asked for, that doesn't mean they dissipate in the atmosphere. They still have an effect. No, they won't make slugs come out of your mouth. The effect of prayer is invariably positive, even when G-d says no. Voldemort Returns But all is not perfect in Harry's world. Voldemort returns and he's out for blood. Yet, even with his meager abilities, Harry manages to defeat him. A little magic can go a long way, but after each year at Hogwarts, Harry becomes much more proficient! Similarly, whatever Torah we have is what we need to defeat the forces of evil. Even a little is powerful stuff, but every step brings us much more "power." Harry would not have been safer back on Privet Drive, never knowing he was a wizard. Voldemort still would have come after him, because he considered Harry's very existence a threat. Without Hogwart's, however, Harry never would have had the tools to survive. It's the same with you and Torah. Those who would oppose you because you are a Jew don't care whether you are learned or ignorant, observant or assimilated. They consider you a threat simply because you're a Jew. Without Torah, you lack the basic tools to defend yourself and banish the darkness. Refusing to take up your arms, i.e. the Torah, is what they want you to do. I could go on, but I won't. You can draw your own parallels. A metaphor is just a metaphor. (Or, as I like to put it, "A metaphor is like a simile.") Harry Potter is just a book. It may be well-written and critically-acclaimed, but at the end of the day it's the product of human hands and imagination. Like all humans, J.K. Rowling is just dust and ashes. She may have her five Harry Potter books, but we have the five Books that G-d gave to Moses on Mount Sinai. (And we saw special effects far greater than anything ever shown on the silver screen!) Those are the books that count. As much as we can learn from Harry, Ron and Hermione, there is so much more we can learn from the examples of Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov (our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob). May we merit to spend as much effort analyzing the Torah, the true source of our real Jewish "magic." |
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Jew_Concious: Spiritual MalNutrition
| Spiritual MalNutrition |
| Spiritual MalNutrition posted by "Ruth" to "JewishViews" What if you were forced to sustain yourself on a low-calorie, minimal-intake diet for the rest of your life? Or worse, what if you were told that you could never eat again? No more chocolate! No more homemade soup! How would you feel? If you did not eat to sustain your physical body, you would eventually grow weak and weary. As you used up the reserved resources of nutrients and vitamins, your vital organs would stop functioning. Your body would begin to shrivel up and waste away. A person can only diet or fast for so long before the body demands to be fed. The same is true of the Spirit. Some people are suffering from Spiritual Malnutrition. Some people have deprived themselves of spiritual nutrition for so long, they no longer have the strength to handle the weight of their lives. Their vision is shot! Their sense of Self has been diminished to the point that it is a chore for them to do the simplest task in their lives. Spiritually malnourished people are fretful and frightened, worried and worrisome. They are drained and draining. They have their eye on someone else's plate, someone else's life, and they will stretch their shriveled and shaking hand out for whatever crumbs can be spared. There is only one cure for spiritual malnutrition. It is a steady diet of spiritual food. Prayer builds the spiritual structure. Faith puts meat on the spiritual bones. Gratitude builds spiritual bones. If you are feeling worn out, run down or weary, check your spiritual diet. You may need to increase your intake of spiritual nutrients. Until today, you may have been suffering from spiritual nutrition. Just for today, increase your intake of spiritual food. Engage in a few spiritual experiences. Test your spiritual muscles. Make the necessary adjustments to your spiritual diet. |
Jew_Concious: Boycott "Munich"
| Boycott "Munich" |
Boycott "Munich" posted to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/OhaveiEretzYisrael/by "Sasha F." Friends I am bothered by what I have read about Spielberg's take on "Munich" which, by all accounts, morally equates Israeli self-defense with the criminal terrorism of the PLO. That is inexcusable. I have read enough to make the decision not to pay to see the movie. I hope you have come to the same decision. If you would also be willing to write to Spielberg's Dreamworks to protest, please address letters to Dreamworks CEO Roger Enrico renrico@dreamworks.com, director David Geffen dgeffen@dreamworks.com, and Field Marketing Director Mike Vollman mvollman@dreamworks.com, the official Dreamworks contact person. I believe letters to them will be made known to Spielberg. Or you can use the following contact info: DreamWorks Studio 100 Universal City Plaza Bldg. 477 Universal City, CA 91608 Phone: (818) 733-7000 C/O Mr. Mike Vollman (Field Marketing Director) Phone: (818) 733-6892 Fax #: (818) 733-6995 Note that the address sspielberg@dreamworks.com will not work but you may want to include it anyway to show the others your intent is to contact Spielberg. Below is the letter I sent to Mr. Spielberg. Please feel free to copy it and append your own name, or better still, write your own. Thank you and best wishes. David. Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 21:09:35 -0800 (PST) From: teach <teachntrain@yahoo.com> Subject: The "Munich" Boycott To: sspielberg@dreamworks.com, renrico@dreamworks.com, dgeffen@dreamworks.com, mvollman@dreamworks.com To Mr.Spielberg and Dreamworks: I have admired your work as a director until now. However, what I have read about "Munich" has disappointed me. It is my understanding that instead of focusing on the brutality, evil, and criminality of the Palestinian massacre of Israeli athletes, "Munich" instead focuses on Israeli retaliation and equates it morally with the violence it punished. Terrorism is a crime against humanity. The retaliation was justified self-defense. As one who has spent a good deal of the last ten years chronicling the evil perpetrated against the Jewish people by the Nazis, I would have thought that you would have the moral clarity to make the distinction between crime and punishment. By parallel, are we to understand that you consider the fight against Nazi Germany to be the moral equivalent of what the Nazis did to the Jewish people? I am open to watching your "Munich" Mr. Spielberg. But I will not reward you by buying a ticket. Sincerely, |
Jew_Concious: Islam's Most Reliable Ally
| Islam's Most Reliable Ally |
Islam's Most Reliable Ally By Hal Lindsey© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com posted to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EUROPEANS_WHO_SUPPORT_ISRAEL/ In a speech in Chechnya this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin reminded the Islamic world; "Russia has always been the most faithful, reliable and consistent defender of the interests of the Islamic world," Putin said. "Russia has always been the best and most reliable partner and ally." "Always" might be a stretch. Russia's series of wars with the Muslim Ottoman Empire - spanning 241 years from the 17th to 19th centuries - inspired countless inspirational songs and poems. Historians credit the Russo-Turkish wars as a main cause of the decline of the Ottoman Empire. It was the fall of the Ottoman Empire that created the modern Middle East - including Israel - so Islam's "most reliable ally" is also indirectly responsible for Islam's current state of affairs. Be that as it may, Putin's statement about being "Islam's most reliable defender" is true if one goes back no further than the Cold War. As America's attention was focused on Western Europe, particularly during the late '40s and early '50s, the Soviet Union was quietly creating Soviet satellite states across the Middle East. In each of its five wars against the Arab world, Israel faced the best Soviet weaponry Islam could buy. When Putin spoke of Russia as Islam's most "faithful, reliable and consistent defender of the interests of the Islamic world," it implied Russian support for the primary Islamic goal - annihilating Israel. Even after the Cold War ended the spy vs. spy game of alliance- building, Russia, as Putin noted, remained "consistent" in its defense of the interests of the Islamic world - with Islam's chief interest remaining the annihilation of Israel. Russia's alliance with Islam was an accidental consequence of the Cold War - as noted, prior to the Soviet Union, Russia was the Ottoman Empire's Islamic caliphate's bitterest enemy. The Russians were drawn into the Middle East out of necessity by the demands of the Cold War, but they remained after the Cold War out of a need to maintain existing alliances. In a sense, Russia had no other choice but to sleep in the bed the Soviets made for her. Russia committed all of her chips to Islam's side with the decision to make Iran a nuclear power. Israel's intelligence services told Israeli lawmakers that by late March, Iran would have reached the "point of no return" in its quest for nuclear weapons. The IAEA's Mohammed el Baradei gave the United Nations a similarly dismal assessment. Taken together with Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's recent public comments advocating "wiping Israel off the map," the London Sunday Times recent assessment that Israel is readying a military strike against Iranian nuclear sites is probably more accurate than the Israelis would like it to be. Iran's entire nuclear program has been engineered and overseen by Russia. It is worth billions of dollars to Russia's cash-strapped economy. Iran's nuclear facilities are crawling with Russian technicians, scientists, advisers, security and military personnel - and, in many cases, their families. A strike against these facilities would undoubtedly kill many of them, including some of the cream of Russia's nuclear scientists. In such a case, the Russians would not just shrug their shoulders, bury their dead, and head back to Moscow to explain to their investors that Israel blew up all their investments. The Hebrew prophet Ezekiel, writing from captivity in Babylon over 2,500 years ago, foretold the rise of a great military alliance "in the latter times" that would mount an invasion force against Israel. The alliance will be led by Gog [modern Russia] together with Persia [modern Iran] which includes most Muslim nations of the Middle East and North Africa. In light of that, it is fascinating to watch as Russia is being inexorably drawn into the Middle Eastern conflict, almost against its better judgment. As "Islam's greatest defender," Russia is being driven by strategic and economic interests that virtually give it no other choice. This perfectly fulfills the role Ezekiel predicted for Russia. Ezekiel predicted concerning a people from the extreme north of Israel known as Gog: I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and lead you out ... In the latter years you will come into the land of those brought back from the sword and gathered from many people on the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate; they were brought out of the nations, and now all of them dwell safely. - Ezekiel 38:4a, 8b There is only one nation to the extreme north of Israel, Russia. (See Ezekiel 3:6, 15; 39:2) And Meshech and Tubal (39:1), predicted as the ancient pro-genitors of this northern people, are the source of the ancient Scythians, who are the source of the modern ethnic Russians. Ezekiel penned his prophecy in the 6th century B.C., 1,000 years before Muhammad, 2,000 years before Columbus, and 2,500 years before Israel's restoration. His prophecy and the forecasts of modern-day secular futurists examining current geopolitical trends differ with Ezekiel's vision only in one point: Israel survives and wins the war. For the first time in history, the conditions necessary for the Ezekiel Scenario to move forward are all in place at the same time. What does this tell us? First, it means that the Bible proves its Divine inspiration by the test God gave to the first writing Prophet, Moses, in Deuteronomy 18:21-22. God threw His gauntlet into the arena and said that the proof of His Word would be 100 percent accuracy in prophecies given to His prophets. Those who kneel before G-d can stand before anyone! Please daven for the safety of Bnei Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael and for G-d's Shalom for Yerushalayim ! Am Yisrael Chai! Support the Healing Teddies Project--- <http://www.healingteddies.org> To donate and/or shop online for beautiful Judaica, click on <http://www.goood.co.il> Help Israel and show the world you care! SWI Israel Store: http://www.cafepress.com/isenburg . These items can be used anytime and anywhere to let your community know that wherever you stand, you stand with Israel! Please support the victims of the expulsion and those whose communities are still in danger. Eretz Yisrael le'am Yisrael! Wherever we stand we stand with Israel! Forever! |
Monday, December 19, 2005
Jew_Concious: Holocaust USA
| Holocaust USA |
http://lazerbrody.typepad.com/lazer_beams/2005/12/holocaust_usa.htmlDecember 19, 2005Holocaust USAMy ongoing war against Jewish assimilation around the globe is no secret. Yet, I did not realize the mega-catastrophic magnitude of the ongoing "benevolent" Holocaust in the USA, until I received the following email several days ago from Arthur Englard, may Hashem bless him always: Dear Rav Brody: I recently discovered your web site and I find many of the things you say to be fascinating. In one of your past postings you talk about how the American Jewish population in the United States has gone from 6.1 million in 1970 to 5.2 million in 2000 which is a tragic loss of about 300,000 souls a decade. The reality is, that the ongoing holocaust in the United States is much worse than that. The National Jewish Population Survey of 1990 claimed that there were 5.5 million Jews in the the USA while in 2000 the NJPS found 5.2 million Jews or a loss of 300,000 souls. However, during the decade of the 90's, 200,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union came to the USA and that would mean that we actually lost 500,000 souls during that decade - 50,000 a year - 1000 a week . In addition, when they counted Jews in 1970, they counted only Halachic Jews but the NJPS survey of 2000 also count people who only have a Jewish father as full Jews. The reality is that when you count Halachic Jews in the USA the number approaches 4 million. Which means that in 30 years we lost 2 million precious souls. Sincerely, Arthur Englard When I checked up on Arthur's figures, I found them accurate. Out of the 5.2 million people who called themselves Jews in the NJPS census of 2000, only 4.3 million are Jewish according to Halacha, or Jewish law, as opposed to 6.1 million in 1971. As Arthur noted, when we add the 200,000 Russian Jews who came to America, that means that 2 million Jewish souls have vanished from the face of the earth in the last 3 decades of the American Holocaust. Future generations will demand to know why most of the Jewish world did and said nothing to prevent this. Rebbe Nachman of Breslev cried and screamed against secular education. He warned us that it would bring calamity on our people. Non-Jewish ideas lead to non-Jewish wives, and non-Jewish wives bear non-Jewish children. Hitler killed bodies, but assimilation and intermarriage kill Jewish souls; the latter is a much greater tragedy. The soul of a martyr can return in a different body, but the souls lost to assimilation die an eternal death; nothing could be more tragic. Let's put things in their proper proportion: In three decades, we've lost 2 million Jews. Israel - with all the wars and the terror combined, considering both civilian and military deaths - has lost a total of 21,908 Jewish martyrs since 1948. In other words, 3 decades of the American Jewish holocaust has claimed 100 times more victims than five-and-a-half decades of Israel's ongoing struggle with the Arabs. Historically, Jewish cultural assimilation has always invoked physical annihilation. When we don't stop the assimilation holocaust by returning to Hashem with all our hearts, then a tyrant rises to do the job for us, G-d forbid. Each of us must be an ambassador of Outreach to do what he or she can to stop the catastrophe of assimilation. We must strengthen the home, for the slightest deviation in a minor Jewish custom today can lead to intermarriage tomorrow. As in navigation, a minor error of a mere two degrees becomes an error of 2 miles in the course of a mere 60 miles of flight. For a pilot, that could mean dumping his bombs on the wrong target. For that reason, the Torah warns us not to deviate the slightest - neither to the right or to the left - from what our sages tell us to do. You can't send your child to public school or university and then complain about his or her desire to marry the nice guy or girl in the adjacent seat. You can't fill your child's head with non-Jewish ideals while pumping his or her tender mind with TV, DVD's, and Internet, and then expect them to be a Chatzkel Levinstein or a Sara Schnirrer. The best way to stop assimilation, to save Jewish souls, and to raise upright, strong, and G-d-fearing Jews is to give your children a Torah education and to remove all Amalekite influence from your home. In America alone, we are losing some 100 Jewish souls every day! The Yetzer in the United States of Amalek is outperforming the torture chambers of the Spanish Inquisition without firing a shot. Now, would you like to know why I believe that the redemption of our people is so imminent? At the rate we're going, pretty soon there won't be anyone left to redeem, G-d forbid. Hashem, òã îúé, until when? Hashem, you must send Moshiach - now! |
Jew_Concious: AntiSemitic and Insane Jews
| AntiSemitic and Insane Jews |
| (http://up-yours.us/) AntiSemitic and Insane Jews >From the Pen of Hank Roth "I despise above all two kinds of people: Jews and journalists. Unfortunately, I am both." - Ferdinand Lassalle Someone wrote to me and said, "Isn't it pushing the envelope to call other Jews antiSemites?" And I asked him why can't a Jew also be self-destructive and insane just like anybody else? Yes, "insane" - because it is insane to question the existence of the State of Israel if you are a Jew --- although it is perfectly acceptable to be critical of Israeli policy -- and therein lies a problem because those I debate often times do not distinguish between Israeli policy and Israel's existence. They are just as critical of Israel being there and that is AntiSemitic just as much if a Jew says it, as it is if a non-Jew says it. Paul Reitter in Jewish Social Studies; 9/22/2003, writes: "Has anyone been accused of Jewish self-hatred more often and more emphatically than Karl Kraus? Otto Weininger, Kraus's fellow fin-de-siecle Viennese, appears to be the only real competition. In fact, studies of German-Jewish culture frequently make Kraus and Weininger stand by themselves, under headings like "Self-Rejection and Self-Hatred" and "Prophets of Doom." Kraus receives such treatment because he laced his satirical newspaper, The Torch (Die Fackel), which he founded in 1899 and wrote and edited by himself from 1911 until his death in 1936, with countless antisemitic imprecations. He condemned the "world-destroying power" of "Jewish capitalism." He bragged that the "aversion" most antisemites felt against "Jewish things" was "child's play" next to his. He castigated the "Jew boys" at the "Jewish press." And he demanded that Jews give up Judaism completely and seek "redemption through total assimilation," to cite a final example." * Paul Reitter teaches in the German Department at Ohio State University. He is completing a book manuscript entitled The Soul of Form: Journalism, Karl Kraus and the Dialectics of German-Jewish Identity, which will be published by the University of Wisconsin Press. * Karl Kraus published The Torch. The Torch appeared three times per month, at least in its early years. Over 37 years, Kraus published 922 "numbers," whose topics range from sex trials to preposition usage. The Torch had a circulation of about 34,000 copies. Many of Kraus's readers were cultural luminaries--for example, Arnold Schonberg, Sigmund Freud, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Thomas Mann, Alban Berg, and Bertolt Brecht. For a survey of The Torch's cultural impact, see Martina Bilke, Zeitgenossen Der Fackel (Munich, 1981). Hereafter, all references to The Torch will be abbreviated TT, and citations will be given parenthetically. There is that constant refrain from Israel's critics that Israelis are colonizers and they are on "stolen land." It is ironic that they can distinguish between Israel being on so-called stolen land and their parents or the parents of their parents coming to America and being on stolen, confiscated property because everyone at one time or another was on someone elses land and it was common in the history of this country - for land to be acquired by force of conquest. Every piece of sand on the American continent was acquired by force or it was purchased from a foreign power that acquired it by force. Title as Valid as It Gets An abstract of title in Florida shows a line of ownership all the way back to the Queen of Spain when it was given to someone as a grant for services performed for the crown. And how did the Queen of Spain acquire the land? By force of course. The deed to that land is just as valid as any other deed of conveyance. Whether you like it or not, it is as valid as it gets. And so is Israel's title to the land of Israel. And Jews are among the worse self-criticizers and most guilt ridden people I know. I don't believe we have anything to feel sorry or guilty about. The land of Israel belonged to Jews once and belongs to Jews again. Some have tried to take it away and some have been successful but a return to the land and possession of the land is in itself a valid title to the land. But that is just one of the many points of contention. Those arguments against the right of Jews to have a claim to Israel are built on myths. The right extends to the government of Israel to do everything within its power to insure the security of the people who live in Israel. One insane, self-destructive Jew is Israel Shamir. I don't find anything written by Israel Shamir that isn't seething with self-hatred and it isn't credible. Israel Shamir is a self-loathing insane Jew. So when I came across something he wrote attacking Jared Israel as a "mole" on the left, or at best confused I was not at all surprised. Jared and I have had our differences too but I consider them minor and they are merely degrees of difference about the same issues which we find ourselves on as progressive, Israel supporting Jews. Peace and Support for Israel Are Not Mutually Exclusive Jared is a left-wing activist from the 60s and so am I - and both of us are still very critical of the right wing governments of Britain and the U.S. and Israel - and both of us advocate for peace and also support Israel's right to exist. Like many others on the Israeli left we are both Zionists. Israel Shamir, who is an anti-Zionist, writes hate filled articles about Israel calling for it's destruction. It is insane for a Jew to question the existence of Israel. Israel is the last refuge and the only real refuge from AntiSemitism. Not America, not England, not anywhere, but Israel is the last hope and security for Jews. It is a haven from AntiSemitism where Muslims and Christians are the majority and security against pogroms and another Holocaust. Israel Shamir is insane just like Lenni Brenner is also insane and just as Norman Finklestein is insane. Ran HaCohen is also insane because all of them are self-destructive and that is insane. Uri Avneri writes valid criticism, which I do not always agree with, but Uri is a Zionist. He would be the first to tell you so and has mentioned it in his writing. So is Benny Morris. So are most Israeli leftists. There have been other self-hating Jews who betrayed themselves and their community. The Marx family were Jewish. Karl Marx was a Jew. His mother was a Jew. But Karl Marx rejected Judaism because his father converted the entire family because Christian identity was a necessary prerequisite for anyone to have a professional life. And Karl Marx was also an AntiSemite. Often a former Jew is the most extreme kind of AntiSemite. It is also becoming acceptable again to compare Israelis with Nazis on the InterNUT. While some do not also say these things in public where it may not yet be acceptable that is changing too and there has been an increase in AntiSemitism - even in Europe where AntiSemitism was once institutionalized public policy. AntiSemitism is appealing and it makes the most complex of things seem simple. Anthony Julius writes: "Certainly, Jews perplex beyond mere animosity; an ancient people in the vanguard of progress, they are perceived to be the wealthiest of plutocrats and the most menacing of radicals, dogmatically attached to their faith and the most subversive skeptics. It is anti-Semitism's versatility, and what gives it such resilience, that it can embrace such contradictory imaginings. It appeals to Left and Right; it offers solutions to every social ill; it knows the secret of human misery. When the world becomes too variously complex to grasp, simplifications are felt to be necessary. Anti-Semitism is the great simplifier. As the French ideologue Charles Maurras--much admired by Eliot--put it: "Everything seems impossible, or frightfully difficult, without the providential arrival of anti-Semitism, through which all things fall into place and are simplified" (qtd. in Bredin 28)." * Anthony Julius is a partner in the London law firm Mishcon de Reya and a part-time teacher at University College London. - 9/22/1998) "Such is anti-Semitism's power that it has beguiled not just demagogues and those other, ordinarily vicious enemies of the Jews, but also creative artists of the highest quality. The educated public, however, is liable to forget this, and so, every few years, it needs to be reminded of what many of its favorite authors were capable. We tend to sentimentalize our great writers and often think more of them than they deserve. Expecting our poets and novelists to be moral, we are blind to the amorality of their imaginations." (ibid) Anthony Julius began writing "Reflections on T.S. Eliot, Anti-Semitism, and Literary Form" as a kind of exercise to prove Bernard Lewis wrong in "Semites and Anti-Semites where Lewis calls T.S. Eliot a "typical anti-Semite" but his conclusion after doing research on Eliot was that Bernard Lewis was wrong, but not about Eliot's antiSemitism. He was wrong not to consider T.S. Eliot an "extraordinary anti-Semite". Another words the only error Bernard Lewis made was to consider Eliot simply typical. Anthony Julius also wrote: "Eliot wrote some remarkable anti-Semitic poetry and some banal anti-Semitic prose. The evidence that he regretted this poetry and prose is weak, and the evidence of amends, weaker still." "Anti-Semitism was a muse for Eliot. It was on occasion his inspiration......It yielded remarkable, disturbing results: chiefly, the poetry collected in the volume entitled Ara Vos Prec (1920), the principal work of what I describe in my book as his anti-Semitic period. While this is hardly something to celebrate, it demands a certain guarded, qualified regard." "Anti-Semitic discourse comprises a stockroom of cliches about Jews, discovered and adopted anew by each generation of anti-Semites. Unlike most anti-Semites, however, Eliot didn't merely take over these fatigued commonplaces, he exploited them to fresh and disturbing effect. Critics who miss this underestimate him." "What kind of anti-Semite, then, was T. S. Eliot? Some anti-Semites break Jewish bones; others wound Jewish sensibilities. Eliot falls into the second category. He was civil to Jews he knew, offensive to those who knew him through his work. He wounded his Jewish readers, if not the Jews of his acquaintance. He had the imagination of an anti-Semite in the highest degree. He was alive to anti-Semitism's resources while being indifferent to Jewish pain." And many today who do not consider themselves AntiSemitic use Antisemitic stereotyping and cliches to effect, including some who are Jewish; and non-Jews feed on those words and use them to sting and attack Israel and Jews. Arabs have had time to study and immitate the AntiSemitic ways of the West and they have picked up on all the stereotyping and the myths and now have adopted them as their own - repeating them at every opportunity and with relish - as they point to Christians who also say these things and attack Jews - and they quote self-destructive Jews to back up their disdain and encourage it, which leads to more violence against the Jewish State and ironically everything that happens to them, a complaint often also heard in the West, is considered the fault of Jews. Bernard Lewis is a great historian and orientalist. He knows the Arabs better than many Arabs know themselves. He points out how the Arab attitude toward Israel is not simply a quarrel against the Israeli state or Zionism; it is about the Jews and their religion. He says they have a "seething hatred" which is "commonly expressed in Arabic books, newspapers, magazines and even school textbooks in many parts of the Arab world." Quoting an Arab Spokesman: "The Jews and Zionism are like an evil tree. Its root is in New York, its branches all over the world, its leaves the Jews--all of them, old and young, male and female, without exception, are its thorny leaves and poisoned thorns, and the poison is swift and deadly." (Abd al-Rahman) This is grist for ignorance but many antiSemites have not been ignorant people. T.S. Eliot, Shakespeare, Wagner, Nietzsche, et al, were not ignorant. Those who engineered out the "Final Solution" were not ignorant. Hitler was not the ignoramus some have labeled him. "In any event, anti-Semitism is not, and never has been, an unavoidable, universal pathology. No one says you have to be an anti-Semite. And indeed, hostility to Jews has often been countered by vigorous, sometimes heroic interventions by others on their behalf. One cannot assert of any period in history that it was unqualifiedly anti-Semitic. When Jews have been attacked, there have been others willing to defend them; when they have been defamed, others have challenged their slanderers. Anti-Semitism has rarely enjoyed an entirely free run: Jews have fought back, numerous non-Jews by their side. And they have often won." (Julius) But nevertheless AntiSemitism did win when it became the ideology of the Third Reich. The result of which, we have seen, was the Holocaust. "Kershaw and Hamann dispose of many myths regarding the young Hitler- -the claim that he was partly of Jewish origin, and the claim that in Vienna he endured extreme poverty. The latter myth was created by Hitler himself in Mein Kampf, a book written in 1924 and replete with other fictions regarding his origins and his youth. Kershaw and Hamann also dispose of Hitler's later claim that he had become an anti-Semite in Vienna. There is no evidence, from friend or foe, that in those days Hitler disliked the Jews. In his endless political monologues he rarely referred to the Jews; and when he did, it was in a favorable vein. Young Hitler had several close Jewish acquaintances, one might even say friends. As Hamann shows, Hitler spent most of his time in the men's shelter with educated Jews, and he dismissed the then-popular blood libel charge against the Jew Leopold Hilsner, calling it "absolute nonsense, a groundless slander." Those who commissioned his watercolors, and thereby provided him with a livelihood, were Jews; he also owed his escape from a brief stint in the depths of lice-ridden misery and homelessness to Jewish benefactors." (Deak) "Hitler especially admired Dr. Eduard Bloch, a Jewish physician from Linz, who had treated his mother for breast cancer. Treatment at that time consisted of the use of iodine, which must have added to her sufferings. Some historians argue that Hitler's hatred of Jews and his desire to gas them or to poison them stem from this incident. Yet both Kershaw and Hamann make clear that Hitler, who adored his mother (he hated his father, a lower civil servant who was a ruthless martinet), was grateful to the Jewish doctor, despite his mother's agonizing death in 1907. He readily paid the doctor's fees, and wrote letters to Bloch expressing his gratitude; and in 1938, following the Anschluss in Austria, he made sure that the doctor and his family were able to emigrate under the most favorable conditions. In return, the doctor commented positively on the young Hitler in memoirs written in the United States." (ibid) "When did Hitler become an anti-Semite? Apparently not during the war, when this Austrian draft dodger served bravely in the Bavarian army. No fellow-soldier remembered his having made anti-Semitic statements, and he received the Iron Cross First Class, his most cherished possession for the rest of his life, at the recommendation of a Jewish lieutenant. Many historians believe Hitler when he writes in Mein Kampf that it was the collapse of Germany in the fall of 1918 that taught him to truly hate the Jews. Temporarily blinded by gas, Hitler experienced, as he claimed later, the most profound disappointment of his life at the news of the German collapse; and he, like other desperate Germans, concluded that the Jews had stabbed Germany in the back. But even this assertion is hard to prove." (ibid) * Ian Kershaw in "Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris" and Brigitte Hamann in "Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship" (Norton) shatter some myths about Hitler, both of which were reviewed by Istvan Deak in an article called, "The Making of a Monster" (4/12/99) in The New Republic. Hitler, also was not a typical anti-Semite. He certainly was extraordinary. The more we know about this man, the more enigmatic he becomes and the more we know about people who appear insane the more enigmatic that condition appears also. Perhaps we should not try to define it or explain it? Perhaps we should just treat it?? But, it should not be a surprise when it happens. It should not be surprising to us when we hear Arabs repeating old canards and libels because how do you erase thousands of years of myths and libels against Jews and it should not come as a great surprise that Jews can be concentration camp guards to obtain favors or become self-hating Jews when they can find some relief by joining the enemy. We are not the problem, they are. We can only treat the symptoms of their disease. Hank Roth, LL.B Recommended * Bernard Lewis, "Semites and Anti-Semites", Norton, 1999 Quotes are Fair Use for educational purposes per Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, of the Copyright Law. PERMALINK: This page on the WEB: http://pnews.org/ArT/AiS/SeL.shtml More at http://pnews.org/archives/ |
Monday, December 05, 2005
OrTorah: Jerusalem Talmud Quotes About Shabbat
| Jerusalem Talmud Quotes About Shabbat |
Jerusalem Talmud Quotes About Shabbat compiled by derechemet@yahoo.com=========================================== {1} Jerusalem Talmud, tractate Berachot Chapter 1, Law 5: Shabbat is equal to all of the other commandments of the Torah COMBINED. {2} Jerusalem Talmud, Tractate Shabbat, Page 15: Shabbat was given to us in order to study Torah. {2A} Rabbeinu Bachya on Shemot 20:8: On SHABBAT, King David would spend the entire day studying Torah. {2B} Sefer Ben Ish Chai, Hilchot Shanah Sheniah, Parshat Shemot: One hour of Torah-study on Shabbat is equal to a thousand hours of Torah study during the week. {3} Jerusalem Talmud, Tractate Taanit, Page 3B: If all Jews would observe one Shabbat properly, the messiah would come immediately. {3A} This quote is repeated in: Midrash Tehillim for Psalm 95. |
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
Kolot_JewVoice: Our World: The Jewish refugees
| Our World: The Jewish refugees |
The Jerusalem Post Internet Edition Our World: The Jewish refugees _____ Caroline Glick, THE JERUSALEM POST Nov. 22, 2005 _____ The Quartet's envoy and former World Bank president James Wolfensohn is reputed to be quite a deal maker. One of the deals he made as the Quartet's envoy to the region was the purchase by wealthy American Jews of greenhouses owned by the Jews who were expelled from Gaza this past summer and their transfer as a gift to the Palestinians. Unfortunately, while the greenhouses were indeed abandoned by the Jews as the IDF threw them off their land, and they were transferred to the Palestinians, the Jews have yet to receive all their money. According to the farmers, the World Bank has deducted the value of the property looted from the greenhouses after they left Gaza from their payments. This story is one of many that were never reported in the aftermath of the expulsions. Those expulsions, and the withdrawal of IDF forces that followed have enabled Gaza to be transformed into a new base of operations for global jihad. But aside from the foreseen strategic consequences of the withdrawal of IDF forces from Gaza, the expulsions have caused a humanitarian disaster for Israeli society. Hundreds of families have been living in hotel rooms in Jerusalem for the past three months. The largest group of refugees - some 350 families with another 150 on their way - lives in the temporary city of Nitzan. When one enters Nitzan, at first glance it looks like a success story. The roads are largely paved. Each family lives in a red-roofed mobile home with grassy lawns all around. But dig just slightly beneath the surface and you see you are in a refugee camp. The fiberglass walls of the homes can be torn apart by a stray soccer ball. Children play in dirt plots next to moving bulldozers. Sewage runs openly between the homes. And those homes - 60 square meters for families of five and under, and 90 square meters for families with more than three children - are cramped and tiny. Most of the families in Nitzan had lived in homes that averaged 200 square meters in Gaza. When they arrived at Nitzan many of the refugees realized that their furniture was unsuitable and so they were forced to buy new furnishings. Although each family's belongings were packed in containers, you will see no containers in Nitzan. The Defense Ministry, which runs the camp, only allows people to have their containers for 10 days. Anyone who does not remove their container after 10 days is fined. And anyway, the summer heat combined with less than professional packing by Defense Ministry contractors left the contents of some 20 percent of the containers ruined. THE COMMUNITIES in Gaza were self-sustaining. Most of the residents worked where they lived. Eighty percent of the residents of Nitzan, who farmed, taught in schools, owned shops and worked in the local councils, are unemployed today. The massive unemployment, together with the trauma of having been forced out of their communities, has taken its toll on the residents. Divorce rates are skyrocketing. Parents, who spend much of their days watching television and climbing the walls, have lost control of their children. The child refugees of Gaza are perhaps the worst hit by the expulsions. Violence among the youths is high and rising. Drug abuse, which was negligible in their communities in Gaza, is on the rise. Two empty mobile homes were locked after they were found to contain drug paraphernalia. So the party moved elsewhere. Nitzan is prime territory for drug dealers looking for easy prey. Children and youths have an almost psychotic fear of policemen and soldiers. "When they see soldiers or policemen these kids start shaking uncontrollably and become hysterical," explains Eliya Tzur, the head of the One Heart volunteer organization that has been helping the residents get reestablished. "The Education Corps of the IDF wanted to send officers to come to the schools to talk with them. I warned them not to," Tzur, a 24-year-old college student from Jerusalem explains. "They said they weren't afraid of hostility. I explained that it wasn't hostility that I was worried about, but violence. These kids look at soldiers and see tyrants. I don't know what or how long it will take to change this." THE IRRATIONALITY of the youths' reaction to the army and police is matched by the financial irrationality of many of their parents. They received NIS 50,000 from their overall reparations immediately after they were thrown out of their homes. Rather than save it, many bought cars they didn't need. The government deducts monthly rent for the mobile homes from the rest of the restitution package, which averages NIS 600,000 per family. The residents, without jobs, are eating away the possibility of ever having the money to build new homes for themselves. The government has met all these problems with indifference. The Labor Ministry has yet to set up an employment office in Nitzan. There is only one social worker assigned to the Potemkin town. Much of the property of the regional council in Gaza was disbursed to other communities. Four thousand books from Gush Katif's library are stacked up in one of the mobile homes, locked away. There is still no mikve. There is no grocery store. Buses come through twice a day and a taxi ride to the grocery store costs over NIS 100. Absurdly, when the residents moved in there was an IDF watchtower set up in the middle of the development for no reason. There are guard towers at its four corners, but they are unmanned. Theft is rampant. One Heart organized workshops on everything from job searches to resume writing to teaching parents how to assert their authority over their children. Its volunteers scour the surrounding cities of Ashkelon and Ashdod to try to encourage businesses to employ the residents. The volunteers, who sleep on bare mattresses in an afterschool homework center they organized for elementary school children, also organized a community center and clubhouses for teenagers. When they tried to bring in a mobile home for a pizzeria, the Defense Ministry refused to allow it. Only Ministry contractors can bring in mobile homes - even though each mobile home, for no apparent reason, costs the taxpayers NIS 400,000 and the mobile home One Heart planned to bring in cost only NIS 120,000. As the residents sink into impoverishment, someone is apparently getting rich at Nitzan. It would be interesting to know how the contracts were awarded. INCOMPETENCE alone doesn't explain the Sharon-Peres government's treatment of the refugee population that it senselessly created. Today the refugees still want, most of all, to build new communities that will allow them to stay together with the people they have lived with all their lives. But while Sharon and Peres and Ehud Olmert grandly discuss plans to develop the Negev and Galilee, these people, who want to develop both, are shunted aside and left to disintegrate. In its systematic demonization and criminalization of the Israelis of Gaza that preceded their expulsions, the government seemed to be begging for these people - who heroically withstood some 6,000 mortar and rocket attacks, thousands of shootings and hundreds infiltration attempts on their communities over the past five years - to do something that would prove their deprecators right. When these patriots left peacefully, deciding not to disengage from their country, Sharon and his spinmeisters were left with their tongues hanging out. The brutal indifference with which the refugees are treated today seems tinged with more than a slight hint of vindictiveness. "Perhaps the most terrible thing about Nitzan," Tzur says, "is that we at One Heart have so much work to do here. We're just a bunch of students. Why are we necessary?" But there's the rub. For the past 12 years the governments of Israel have been playing poker with our lives and well-being by granting land, guns and legitimacy to terrorists. The only thing that has kept this country going is the fact that the Israeli people have refused to collapse. Once again, the vacuum created by government negligence, incompetence and vindictiveness is being filled by private citizens. One day, perhaps we will have a government that is worthy of us. In the meantime, we have no choice but to work around those who are elected and paid to serve us. This article can also be read at http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1132475597543 <http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1132475597543&pa gename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull> &pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull [ Back <http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1132475597543&pa gename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull> to the Article ] _____ Copyright 1995-2005 The Jerusalem Post - http://www.jpost.com/ |
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
OrTorah: "My big fat Amaraic Wedding"
| "My big fat Amaraic Wedding" |
"My big fat Amaraic Wedding" by Jay BushinskyInternational Jerusalem Post April 29 - May 5, 2005 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HaTsafon There is no better proof of modern Aramaic's vitality than the spectacular weddings held by the Jewish "Nash Didan" community, which hails from the remote foothills of the Caucasus Mountains. "Nash Didan" means "Our People" and its distinctive music and dance have been immortalized by Nissan Aviv, a brilliant composer and orchestrator who arrived in Israel 55 years ago during the peak of the "Nash Didan" immigration, and has devoted his life to preserving and continuing this culture ever since. Soon after the late Naomi Shemer's Yerushalayim Shel Zahav ("Jerusalem of Gold") became a hit on the eve of the Six Day War, Aviv obtained her permission to render it in Aramaic. Translated as Yerushalayim Ai Dheba, it is a beloved staple at "Nash Didan" weddings. Aviv was born in Urmia, an ancient city in Iranian Azerbaijan. "We spoke Aramaic at home, Turkish on the street and learned Persian at school," he said. "I knew a fair amount of Hebrew when we came to Israel because it was taught in our Jewish schools. And partly thanks to my Aramaic, I was able to speak like a sabra in no time." Aviv's lyrics are written in modern Aramaic and his songs not only draw audiences from the various Aramaic-speaking communities in Israel - located in Holon, Givatayim and Jerusalem -- but also are played on the Aramaic (or Syriac) radio and TV stations in Australia, Canada and Sweden. "Jerusalem of Gold is as popular abroad is it is here," he said. Aviv's music is based on three instruments: a drum known as a dair'a, a five-stringed instrument plucked like a balalaika or mandolin known as a kar kavkazi and a Central Asian version of the cello known as a kamanncha. Aviv has won the unstinting acclaim of one of Israel's leading experts in cognate Semitic languages, Hezy Mutzafi, who speaks half a dozen of the Aramaic and Syriac dialects fluently. Noting that the "Nash Didan" community consists of "only a few thousand" Israelis (its members constitute a relatively small percentage of an influx of nearly 200,000 immigrants from Iran, Turkey and the Caucasus), Mutzafi points out that it is also one of the least known Jewish ethnic groups. "Its focus is on culture, folklore and spoken Aramaic," explained Mutzafi, referring to the latter as lishan noshan or "our language." Mutzafi singled out Aviv as one of the outstanding activits in the "Nash Didan" community, a man who has contributed mightily to its spiritual and cultural life. Privately, Aviv is rather pessimistic about what the future holds for the language and lifestyle he loves and has tried to preserve. "Our Aramaic is being forgotten," he said. "The younger generation can understand it, but cannot speak and in time, this too will be lost." One project that gives Aviv hope is the Tel Aviv University's development of an Aramaic dictionary. "The trouble is that the project is enormous and the funding available for it is miniscule," he said. |
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