Beautifully written as usual. I recently reread Rabbi J Sack’s A Letter in the Scroll and highly recommend it to anyone. Does anyone know if it is translated into Hebrew? I would support a mass distribution of this book to the Jewish population looking for some clarity on what it means to “identify” Jewish independent of their level of observance.
Very well written, but with an issue. You haven't proposed what it is we seculars are supposed to take from both Jewish "religion" (I sort of agree that it's a civilizational culture broadly and shouldn't be compared to an imperial-confessional faith) and, most especially, from the blend of European and Islamic forms that religion officially takes in Israel. I have a fairly reasonable Jewish education myself, am adamantly pro-Zionist, would argue for a particularly Jewish Israel -- but I don't think "God said so as given to Moshe at Sinai then to ... Rav Ovadiyah Yosef then to Yitzhak Yosef" is a source of cultural authority or of culture, period. It is a claim of moral imperative by divine command. If I don't believe in any link in the chain, from Moshe at Sinai down to Rav Yosef - for instance if I am Ashkenazi! - then what am I or the State (which is neither Ashkenazi nor Sefaradi but *Jewish*) supposed to draw from it?
This is brilliant. I feel like the early socialist/Bundist antipathy towards "religion", which is still present on the Left, never really made sense in the context of Judaism, which encompasses so many aspects of life.
This requires families, schools and youth movements to teach Jewish history and philosophy and secure the knowledge that their great grandparents had in their hearts and minds !!!
Regarding the miracle of oil. A Zoom teacher pointed out that the gemara doesn't say that the one cruse of oil lasted 8 days. It says that they 'lit from it' for 8 days -- i.e., they burned a little of it one day, a little the next,...
Beautifully written as usual. I recently reread Rabbi J Sack’s A Letter in the Scroll and highly recommend it to anyone. Does anyone know if it is translated into Hebrew? I would support a mass distribution of this book to the Jewish population looking for some clarity on what it means to “identify” Jewish independent of their level of observance.
Very well written, but with an issue. You haven't proposed what it is we seculars are supposed to take from both Jewish "religion" (I sort of agree that it's a civilizational culture broadly and shouldn't be compared to an imperial-confessional faith) and, most especially, from the blend of European and Islamic forms that religion officially takes in Israel. I have a fairly reasonable Jewish education myself, am adamantly pro-Zionist, would argue for a particularly Jewish Israel -- but I don't think "God said so as given to Moshe at Sinai then to ... Rav Ovadiyah Yosef then to Yitzhak Yosef" is a source of cultural authority or of culture, period. It is a claim of moral imperative by divine command. If I don't believe in any link in the chain, from Moshe at Sinai down to Rav Yosef - for instance if I am Ashkenazi! - then what am I or the State (which is neither Ashkenazi nor Sefaradi but *Jewish*) supposed to draw from it?
This is brilliant. I feel like the early socialist/Bundist antipathy towards "religion", which is still present on the Left, never really made sense in the context of Judaism, which encompasses so many aspects of life.
This requires families, schools and youth movements to teach Jewish history and philosophy and secure the knowledge that their great grandparents had in their hearts and minds !!!
Fighting a war over an idea. The is profound. I never knew this. DG is coming to Houston in the Spring and I am very happy.
Regarding the miracle of oil. A Zoom teacher pointed out that the gemara doesn't say that the one cruse of oil lasted 8 days. It says that they 'lit from it' for 8 days -- i.e., they burned a little of it one day, a little the next,...