Sir Martin Gilbert has written “In Ishmael’s House” a popular history of the Jewish experience over almost fifteen centuries of life under Moslem rule. The book, is an eye opener for it will destroy with hard evidence some of the current most cherished myths of Western society and history-ignorant Jews about the root problems in the Middle East and especially about the Arab-Israeli conflict. Jews lived a forced subjugated life in Moslem society since the seventh century onwards. The application of dhimmi laws and customs degraded Jews wherever they lived in Moslem lands and no matter to what economic or governmental heights individual Jews may have attained. Jewish life was dictated by the whim of the Moslem ruler of the country. Some were kinder and more tolerant than others but the general picture was one of bleakness, poverty, sporadic violence and constant degradation.
In spite of this, the Jews in
the Arab lands developed their own rich culture of literature, music and
philosophic thought. There arose great Torah scholars in every one of the
countries under Moslem rule and in a constancy of every generation and age.
Jews were poor and degraded and persecuted, but like the Ashkenazic Jewish
world, Jewish life was full and rich and vibrant. Living and preserving their
Jewish way of life and practice under such adverse conditions is a testimony to
those Jewish communities of the Levant. Gilbert documents in this book that
pogroms were not confined to Ashkenazic Christian Europe. They occurred
regularly and fiercely in the Moslem countries as well though it must be noted
that it was with less frequency and somewhat less total ferocity than those
perpetrated by the Church and Christianity.
Nevertheless Gilbert’s book
is filled with gruesome descriptions of the atrocities committed against Jews
by the Moslems who were their neighbors and sometimes erstwhile “friends.”
Jewish children were regularly kidnapped and forcibly converted to Islam. This
was especially true in the case of Jewish orphans. The same calumnies that were
voiced against the Jews in Christian Europe – blood libels, poisoning the
wells, invoking demons and evil spirits, disloyalty to the state, shady
dealing, etc. – were also common currency at all times in the Moslem world.
The situation for Jews in
Moslem societies always was precarious even under the most benevolent rulers.
The reason for that was that even though the leader, Sultan, President, sheik,
whoever, was relatively tolerant and benevolent, the society as a whole never
was. Thus Moslem society resented and oftentimes rebelled against rulers who
were deemed to be too kind to their Jewish subjects. It is much the same in
today’s Moslem world where, for instance, the revelation of the concessions
made in negotiations with Israel by Abbas and the Palestinian Authority
leadership has sparked angry protests, denials and retractions because of the
prevailing mood and deep seated hatred of Jews in the Palestinian society as a
whole.
Gilbert’s book is full of
such instances stretching over the long centuries of Moslem domination over
Jews. The situation for Jews in the Moslem world seesawed violently in the
twentieth century. The rise of secularism and Western education and values
brought about a relaxation of enforced dhimmi status for Jews. Many Jews again
rose to high governmental and social prominence in Moslem countries during the
first part of the twentieth century.
Jews were prominently successful
in the arts, politics, financial fields and industrial development of the
Moslem countries where they resided. However the effects of World War I and the
continuing immigration of Jews to then Palestine coupled with openly expressed
Zionist aspirations for a Jewish state to be located in the heartland of the
Moslem Middle East gave rise to a surging sense of Arab nationalism and a
demand to be freed from colonial rule. The emerging Jewish society in Palestine
was seen as a threat to this tide of Arab national aspirations. Thus the Moslem
society reacted with violence against the Jews in Palestine as well as against
the Jews living in their midst in countries outside of Palestine. All
protestations by the political and religious Jewish leadership in North Africa
and the rest of the Middle East that the Jews living in those
Moslem countries were not
Zionists and were loyal to the interests of the countries where they resided. A
Jew is a Jew is a Jew, no matter what. The rise of Naziism in Germany created
the still continuing unholy alliance of innate Moslem religious bigotry with
German genocidal anti-Jewish propaganda and persecution and this has marked the
scene of JewishMoslem relations over the past eighty years. The Arabs
overwhelmingly supported Nazi Germany in World War II and openly stated that
they wanted the Final Solution to the Jewish Problem to be implemented in their
countries as well, especially in Palestine. When Israel successfully repelled
the armies of the Arab states that attempted to destroy it at its birth in
1947-1949 the anger, humiliation and frustration of the Arab masses was
violently vented against the Jews of Algeria, Morocco, Libya, Egypt, Iraq,
Syria and Lebanon. In a chilling description of the atrocities perpetrated
against the Jews of those countries Gilbert details the
full horror of those developments.
As he wryly notes there were
726,000 Arab refugees from Palestine after the War of Independence while there
were 850,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands. The difference in the world’s
treatment of these different groups of refugees is startling and disheartening.
The Moslem Brotherhood, the Iranian Shiite mullahs, Al-Qaeda, the Saudi Arabian
Wahabi monarchy and the other fundamentalist Moslem societies the world over
are all committed to the subjugation if not the outright destruction of the Jewish
people – not merely the State of Israel. The world did not believe what Hitler
wrote in his book Mein Kampf and paid for it in a destructive war that consumed
over twenty million lives including six million Jewish lives. Much of the West
and its leadership has never read Gilbert’s book and therefore continues to
live in its fantasy world about “true” Islam’s moderation and tolerance for
others.
J Street, the Israeli Left
and much of its academia also continue to live in their fantasy world of
so-called ill-defined human rights and fruitless peace negotiations, unilateral
concessions and the illusory Middle East rose garden. The roots of the problems
facing Islamic countries are historically very deep, strong and very troubling.
Before the West can hope to influence the Moslem masses and the Arab street it
has to reorder its own views and accepted truths, most of which are based on
historic misreadings and fallacies. Reading Sir Martin Gilbert’s book, In
“Ishamel’s Tent,” can help start this necessary process of rethinking and
reevaluating the very dangerous world that we find ourselves living
in.
The dafhayomi learning
cycle of studying one page of the Babylonian Talmud every day was inaugurated
at the instigation of Rabbi Meir Shapiro in 1923 (Rosh Hashana, 5684.) This
program of daily Talmud study has tens of thousands, if not hundreds of
thousands of participants, and has grown in popularity and strength over the
past decades. It is a tribute to the greatness and genius of Rabbi Meir
Shapiro. His idea of daily universal Jewish study of the Talmud has stood the
test of time. But, it should not be that surprising to us, since Rabbi Meir
Shapiro was an unusually gifted and prescient personality.
Rabbi Meir Shapiro was born in
Shotz, Poland, on 7 Adar, 5647 (1887). He was descended from noted Chasidic
luminaries (Rabbi Pinchas of Koritz was his great-great-grandfather) and his
grandfather was the rabbi of Monastritz, Poland. Because of his unusual gifts
of memory and understanding, the child Meir was already known for his genius.
He was also a student of tremendous diligence. He had great intellectual
curiosity, teaching himself astronomy and mathematics and soon developed into a
great Torah scholar of note at a very young age. He studied with his
grandfather in Monastritz for a number of years, When his grandfather died in
1903, he returned home to Shotz where his parents lived. There, in addition to
his Talmudic studies he studied kabalah with the rabbi of the town, Rabbi
Shalom Moscowitz (later a noted Chasidic rebbe in London, England). In spite of
his young age, he achieved expertise in this area of Jewish knowledge as well.
His charismatic personality also began to develop and he came to the notice of
many of the great rabbis of Poland, such as Rabbi Yitzchak Shmelkes of Lemberg
(Lvov) and Rabbi Shalom Schwadron of Berzhan. He was ordained as a rabbi at the
age of eighteen by these two luminaries and he was extolled as well by the
great Chasidic leader, Rabbi Yisrael of Vishnitz, and by Rabbi Aryeh Leib
Horwitz of Stanislav and Rabbi Meir Arik. Thus, at a very young age his
reputation for Torah greatness was already firmly established.
When he was nineteen, he married
and moved to Tarnopol, one of the main Jewish centers in Galicia. His wife’s
family was among the leaders of the Jewish community and Rabbi Meir soon became
an educational force in the community. Rabbi Meir at that time also became a
chassid of Rabbi Yisrael of Tchortokov. He remained a Tchortkover chassid all
of his life. In Tarnopol, Rabbi Meir wrote a Torah commentary in a pilpulistic
style, called Imrei Daas. Even though the book was a work of innovation and
genius, it never gained distribution due to the fact that almost all of the
printed copies, together with Rabbi Meir’s great private library, were
destroyed in the First World War by Russian shellfire. The only remaining two
copies were buried with Rabbi Meir Shapiro in his grave.
When Rabbi Meir was twenty-three
years old he was appointed as the rabbi of Galina, a town near Lemberg. In
Galina, with the encouragement and approval of the Tchortkover Rebbe, Rabbi
Meir founded a school called “Bnei Torah” which included vocational training in
its curriculum. He also created a yeshiva from which many Torah scholars were
produced. His phenomenal fund-raising abilities began there in Galina where he
established proper quarters for his educational projects and paid proper
salaries to those who taught therein. There he also became interested in wider
political activity and began to be active in the programs of Agudat Yisrael in
Poland. .
During World War I, Galina, part
of the Austro-Hungarian empire, was damaged severely by the invading Russian
forces. The Jewish community fled to Tarnopol and Lemberg and Rabbi Meir
Shapiro did likewise. He never returned to Galina. After the war, Rabbi Meir
became the rabbi of Sunik (Sanuk) and there he rebuilt his yeshiva “Bnei Torah”
and helped restore the religious services of that community, which was also
severely damaged by the wars that engulfed Poland from 1914 to 1921. In 1922,
the rabbis and Chasidic leaders of Poland and Galicia gathered in Warsaw to
discuss how to deal with the chaos in Jewish life caused by the ravages of the
wars, and of the Bolshevik revolution and its aftermath.
Rabbi Meir Shapiro delivered an
electrifying and challenging speech demanding that the rabbis now became
activists in their communities and no longer merely passive scholars. His words
had a dramatic effect on the gathering and propelled him into a leading role in
Jewish public life in Poland. He was recommended by the rebbe of Gur to become
the head of Agudat Yisrael in Poland and in 1923 he assumed that role. He was
elected as a member of the Polish parliament and distinguished himself there
with his political and diplomatic abilities. There were many open anti-Semitic
members of parliament and he confronted them head on. When one of them remarked
that there was a sign in a public park in Silesia that prohibited Jews and dogs
from entering, Rabbi Shapiro retorted: “Well, I guess now that neither of us
will enter that park.”
At the international convention
of Agudat Yisrael in Vienna in August 1923, Rabbi Meir Shapiro proposed the
idea of the dafhayomi – the study of one page of the Talmud
daily and in unison by Jews throughout the world. His proposal was
enthusiastically accepted at that convention. It is no exaggeration to say that
this idea and learning program of the dafhayomi is his lasting
legacy to the Jewish people. Rabbi Meir Shapiro had no children. His great
yeshiva, Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin, was desecrated and destroyed in the
Holocaust and never regained prominence again after the war. However, the dafhayomi project continues to grow in popularity and acceptance. It is
through the learning of the dafhayomi by tens of thousands of
Jews daily that Rabbi Meir Shapiro gains immortality and eternity amongst the
great leaders of Judaism.
Though the dafhayomi
is still officially a project of Agudat Yisrael, it has crossed all political
borders in the Jewish world and can truly be seen as a national project of
Torah learning for all Jews no matter what their political affiliation may be.
The ccycle of studying dafhayomi is by itself a testament to the
greatness and creativity of its progenitor, Rabbi Meir Shapiro. The righteous,
even after their death, are still deemed to be alive.
In 1924, Rabbi Shapiro became the
rabbi of Pietrikov, a position of great prestige. He published one book of
rabbinic responsa “OhrHameir ” but most of his brilliant
writings never saw the light of publication. He threw himself into the
establishment of a great yeshiva, which he envisioned would produce the
religious leadership of Poland. He wanted to raise the prestige of the Torah
student and the community rabbi in the eyes of the masses of Polish Jewry. This
prestige had been sorely diminished by the ravages of the Haskala (the
“enlightened ones”), Socialism and Communism, as well by secular Zionism. He
envisioned creating a magnificent institution, both physically imposing and
spiritually inspiring, that would help stem the tide of assimilation and loss
of Torah observance that was then affecting Polish Jewry. He traveled to
America to raise funds for this great project.
His influence and impression on
American Jewry was profound and inspiring and his visits were financially
successful. A wealthy Jew in Lublin gave him a magnificent plot of land in that
famous ancient city upon which to build the yeshiva building. He called his
yeshiva “Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin” and after protracted delays and financial
difficulties, the great and imposing building, containing among other
treasures, a full-scale model of the Second Temple and a library of over thirty
thousand volumes, was dedicated and opened in May, 1930. Over one hundred
thousand Jews took part in the celebration of its opening. The students in the
yeshiva were of the highest caliber, many of them were of genius quality and
the yeshiva produced many great leaders in Israel until its tragic end at the
hands of the Germans and Poles in World War II.
Rabbi Meir left Pietrikov and
became the rabbi of Lublin, the home of his great yeshiva. However, the strain
of maintaining the yeshiva financially took its toll on Rabbi Meir. He
therefore consented to leave his beloved Lublin to become the rabbi in Lodz on
the condition that the community in Lodz would assume much of the financial
burden of supporting the yeshiva in Lublin. However, he never made it to Lodz.
He had planned to spend Pesach of 1934 in the Land of Israel. Yet, in September
1933 he had a premonition of impending sickness and arranged for a life
insurance policy on himself for $30,000 with the yeshiva as its beneficiary.
In October 1933 he fell ill with
a viral type of pneumonia and on 7 Cheshvan, 5694 he died at the age of only
forty-six. He was buried in Lublin but his remains were reburied twenty-five
years later in Jerusalem on 26 Elul, 5718 at Har Hamenuchot. His passing would,
in our perfect hindsight, mark the dreadful harbinger of the demise of Polish
Jewry itself a few short years after. The Jewish world has not since seen his
equal in the combination of Torah scholarship and greatness, Chasidic warmth,
political astuteness, fund-raising talents and creative programming and
initiative. The Jewish world was orphaned by his demise. His dafhayomi
project lives on as a comfort to us.
Bobby Fischer was perhaps the greatest chess champion of all
time. He certainly was the greatest native born American chess champion. He was
a genius at chess but a completely despicable and neurotic individual as a
human being. His long time follower and himself a chess expert Frank Brady has
written a fascinating biography about Bobby Fischer. The biography, titled
“Endgame,” presents Bobby Fischer as he was with all of his neuroses, bigotry,
hatefulness and unbelievable talent as a chess master. He was born to a Jewish
mother and an uncertain father. The mother, a wild liberal Leftist advocate,
raised him and she was a truly doting Jewish mother.
Brady is of the opinion that Bobby Fischer, raised in
polyglot Brooklyn had a traditional bar mitzvah commemoration. However
Fischer’s attention to Judaism was very tenuous at best. His passion and
religion was chess from childhood on. His school work and attendance was
desultory at best because of his continuing concentration on chess. He played
chess in the public parks with the older players who gathered there daily. He
was a regular at The Manhattan Chess Club and there met many of the grandmasters
of chess of the twentieth century. Most of them were Jewish. He was especially
combative and competitive with Samuel Reshevsky, a world grand master who was
an observant Orthodox Jew who I knew personally when I lived in Monsey, New
York. Fischer’s genius was recognized by all and even as a teenager he was a
feared opponent and a fierce competitor. He was sponsored for chess tournaments
by the Manhattan Chess Club and soon came to international attention in the
rarefied world of professional chess players. The chess world then in the
middle of the twentieth century was dominated by Russian grand masters such as
Boris Spassky and Gary Kasparov.
These Russian champions were Jewish but Fischer saw them as
Russian and he hated Russians. He also hated Jews as I will discuss shortly. He
claimed that the Russians ganged up on him, fixed games between themselves to
deprive him of opportunities to win the world championship and were basically
despicable people. Fischer suffered from serious paranoia and believed that he
was entitled to deferential treatment that no other chess champion ever
received or demanded. The ironic thing is that most of the time he had his way.
His defeat of Spassky that gained him the world championship and made him a
wealthy man sparked unprecedented interest in chess in the United States and
throughout the world. But his temperament was so mercurial that no one knew how
to deal with him.
He went into isolated seclusion for many years after winning
his world championship. He joined a cultist church organization and gave
it millions of dollars only to become disillusioned and a bitter foe of it. His
personal life was as disordered as his personality though he finally apparently
did marry a companion of his. He eventually agreed to defend his title against
Kasparov. The venue that was chosen was in Yugoslavia, at that time breaking up
in a terrible atrocity filled civil war and under American sanctions not to
visit there. Fischer ignored the warnings, defeated Kasparov in Yugoslavia and
became an outlaw to the American government. He eventually moved to Iceland
where he gained political asylum and died and was buried there – no longer a
hero to Americans and even to the professional chess world. His foul and
erratic personal behavior and terrible rantings and ravings about Jews,
Russians, and the United States had finally caught up with him.
Even genius in one field of human endeavor – in this case
chess – does not provide immunity for evil behavior and despicable attitudes.
Bobby Fischer was a vicious anti-Semite. Brady is hard pressed to find any
reason or turning point in Fischer’s life that made him so. Every scurrilous
libel about Jews and Judaism was believed by Fischer and spread by him. As such
he falls into the category of the many Jewish self-haters that history has
spawned. In fact he became the poster boy of the neo-Nazi groups throughout the
world. But as is usually the case in such circumstances he was himself the
greatest victim of his own unreasoning hatred of Jews. His rabid anti-Semitism
more than anything else robbed him of the approbation and respect that his
chess genius should have earned for him.
Brady’s biography is fascinating and a great read. One need
know nothing about chess to reap its benefits and insights. It records another
example of genius gone wrong and talent befouled by hatred, bigotry, avarice
and hubris. In that regard it serves as another type of medieval morality play
for all of us.
This is an
“only in America” type of story. On January 11, 2009 the New York Giants
professional football team played the Philadelphia Eagles in a divisional
championship playoff game at Giants Stadium in New Jersey. Since all New
Yorkers are convinced that they own New Jersey as well there is no problem that
the New York Giants play their home games in Rutherford, New Jersey. The New
York Times in order to mark the occasion of the playing of this momentous game
published a feature column entitled: “A Prayer Ritual Shared in Religion and
Football” in its January 10, 2009 issue of the newspaper. The thrust of the article
refers to a Jewish family in Brooklyn that operates a niche clothing store. The
owners of the company have a religion – the New York Giants. Its fortunes
occupy the center point of their lives and when the Giants have a bad season
the factory owners are depressed for the whole year. So, in the fall of 2007 when the Giants were
losing badly and regularly, Jay Greenfield, one of the owners of the clothing
company, “was a desperate man. His team had gone 1-3 in the preseason. The
Giants lost their two regular season games and confidence sagged in their
quarterback, Eli Manning.” There was a customer of the company who was a
Lubavitcher chassid who visited the store regularly to buy material for his own
clothing store located in another section of Brooklyn. But he would prove to be
an apparent savior to the Greenfields and indirectly to the Giants.
The article
continues: “It was around this time that the rabbi, (every chassid is a rabbi
to the New York Times, BW) who acknowledges not watching television, let alone
Giants games, visited. With Yom Kippur approaching, [he] was trying to
encourage Mr. Greenfield to do the Tefillin prayer – which includes strapping a
pair of black leather boxes containing biblical verses around the head and on
the arm, hand and fingers and reciting a prayer declaring loyalty to God and a
request for blessing. The rabbi told Mr. Greenfield that the ritual would help
make it a good new year.” Greenfield then told the rabbi, “You’re talking about
a good new year, but if we lose against the Redskins this Sunday, my year is
over.” The article continues: “It was then that Mr. Greenfield, who follows
strict game day rituals including wearing the same jeans, undershirt and
jersey, got an idea. None of his rituals seemed to be working and here was this
persistent rabbi telling him that simply saying the Tefillin prayer might be
just the thing needed to help Mr. Greenfield get what he wanted for his team.
‘I was at a weak moment, so I considered it,’ Mr. Greenfield said. I told the
rabbi, ‘I’m not greedy – I just want to make the playoffs.’ He said, ‘What’s
the playoffs?’ I said, ‘You need to know that now.’” The rabbi finally said: “I
told him, ‘We know prayer goes a long way, and I can see this Giants thing means
a lot, so let’s go for the prayer.” Mr. Greenfield did and saw immediate
results. The Giants beat the Redskins the following Sunday.
“The Giants kept winning in 2007 and Mr. Greenfield kept praying. Soon, his brother
Todd, was also praying. So were many of their friends and relatives who
attended the home games – and many games on the road. The Tefillin prayers
became rituals at the tailgating gatherings before games at the Meadowlands and
when some of the fans traveled to games on the road, the rabbi would contact
Chabad rabbis in those cities to help Mr. Greenfield’s group with pregame
prayers. The giants went on to qualify for the playoffs and began their playoff
run. Mr. Greenfield said he saw divine intervention during the playoffs in a dropped
pass by a receiver for the Dallas Cowboys, which changed the tide of the game
and allowed the Giants to go on to victory. ‘When that happened, about 50
people jumped up and said ‘Thank you, rabbi. We really thought that God was on
our side.’ The Giants went on to win the Super Bowl, but even that did not get
Mr. Greenfield to start attending synagogue or reading the Torah regularly –
although he did agree to pray with the rabbi in the off season. The pregame
Tefillin prayers have gained momentum…putting on Tefillin in the Meadowlands
parking lot drew stares and comments, but as the Giants continued to win, other
fans – even some non-Jewish rooters–began doing it too. ‘He thought he was
converting me,’ Mr. Greenfield said of the rabbi, ‘but I got a sector of his
community interested in the Giants.’ [The rabbi said] ‘[T]his means a lot to
Jay and each one should pray according to what he needs. I may hear the score,
but I still really couldn’t tell you if the Jets were playing the Mets. I don’t
know the difference. But if it makes him happy, only good things will come out
of it.’”
Well, my
friends, the Tefillin notwithstanding, the Giants lost their January 11 playoff
game in a badly played effort by
them. The great theological
question of testing God by apparently performing His will is raised in this
otherwise tongue in cheek article. I am reminded of an incident that happened
in my youth. A neighbor of ours was running for alderman in the Democratic
primary election which was to be held during the intermediate days of Pesach.
In order to attract the mainly Orthodox Jewish vote in the area he demonstrably
showed and advertised his purchase of matzot for the holiday. To his chagrin,
he lost the election by a wide margin. He then publicly threw out the remaining
matzot from his second-floor window shouting for all to hear: “The devil take these
stupid crackers!” Tying the fate of Tefillin to that of the New York Giants or
vice versa is to me the wrong way to deal serious matters of belief, tradition
and human behavior. The Giants will probably have losing seasons in the future.
Will Mr. Greenfield continue with his Tefillin ritual? Making Tefillin a good luck talisman is unjustifiable
in Jewish thought and belief. God does not accept bribes from us. It is
important that Mr. Greenfield, and all other male Jews, place Tefillin on their
heads and arms every weekday. But are all means legitimate in the pursuit of
having Jews observe this most important ritual? This is a question that is
being sorely debated regarding other forms of outreach in the Orthodox Jewish
world today. I enjoyed reading the article about the Giants, but it left me
vaguely disturbed as well.
There are
many religious players that play in the National Football League on all its
teams. There are regular prayer meetings
for the players. One of the teams, in spite
of its prayers, is destined to lose the game. Abraham Lincoln in one of
his famous addresses during the American Civil War made note of the fact that
both sides prayed to the same God for the destruction of the other. He felt
that to be sad and ironic but nevertheless somehow valid. It is somewhat demeaning
and sacrilegious to think of the Lord as merely a Giants fan. Prayers
unanswered are part of human life. The Lord has His own plans and agendas. Our
thoughts are not necessarily his thoughts. Judaism avoids superstitions and
good luck charms. The performance of commandments is not to be viewed as a good
luck charm. Relegating Tefillin to such a status distorts their true purpose
and meaning.
The wonderfully joyous holiday of Chanuka occurs this month. In light of the horrific events of the past few months, the message and lights of Chanuka could not come at a more appropriate and necessary time. For Chanuka, in its essence, represents the ability to withstand oppression and evil, coercion and bigotry, and to believe in the improbable miracles that have always marked Jewish history and advanced the cause of all human civilization. The story of Chanuka is made up of two radically different components. One is the war, the battles of the Hasmoneans, the blood spilled and the casualties sustained, the human sacrifice and tragedy that always accompanies the struggle for Jewish survival and a better world for all humankind. The other is the miraculous, supernatural event of the small pitcher of oil that supplied oil for eight days while physically holding oil only for one night. Chanuka is thus the culmination of man and God in the joint effort to improve our world and society. There is no message that could be more fitting for us this Chanuka season than this one. (more…)
In the early thirteenth century Ashkenazic Jews living in Germany, Austria, Bohemia and other Germanic lands began to speak a dialect of low German that soon turned itself into a jargon of German and Hebrew with some old French and Slavic words also thrown into the mix. In earlier centuries during the lifetime of Rashi (Rabbi Isaac Yitzchaki, 1040-1105, Troyes, France) the Ashkenazic Jews of France spoke the vernacular tongue of the area – old French. The small Jewish community in England then spoke Chaucerian English interspersed with old French as well. Since the time of the Norman conquest of England much old French had already seeped into the English of the time. However, after the expulsion of the Jews from both England and France in the thirteenth century the Ashkenazim trekked eastward into Germany, Central Europe, Lithuania and Poland and eventually Russia. There they fully developed their own unique language, which soon became known as Yiddish – literally, Jewish. Based on German, Yiddish absorbed within its vocabulary many Hebrew words, biblical, midrashic and Talmudic phrases, Slavic and Polish words and a semi-sing-song intonation reminiscent of Jewish prayer and study melody. As a living language it constantly developed and expanded over the centuries.
Even though there were strong differences in dialect and pronunciation between Ashkenazic Jews living in these different countries, Yiddish became the universal language of Ashkenazic Jewry wherever these Jews were living or travelling. It achieved its own status as being “mamaloshen” – the beloved mother tongue of Ashkenazic Jewry. Yiddish also developed colloquialisms, sayings and wry comments on life and people – all almost untranslatable into any other language – that became its identifying hallmark. It is a language of nuance more than vocabulary. As a folk language possessing few rules of grammar and syntax Yiddish has an earthiness, sometimes even a touch of vulgarity to it, a true reflection of everyday Jewish life. There is also a certain melancholy in its phrases but paradoxically it contains much wry humor and bemused comments about human foibles and life generally. And its sayings and metaphors many times also remained as the only safe way to mock and ridicule the oppressors and enemies of the Jews and the difficulties of Jews living under foreign and hostile rule. (more…)
In the American Revolutionary War, General Christopher Gadsden designed the famous flag depicting a rattlesnake and the words, “Don’t Tread On Me!” The symbol of the rattlesnake dated back as far as 1751 when Benjamin Franklin sardonically wrote that since the British were sending convicts to the colonies, the colonists should send rattlesnakes, which were native to America, over to England. Both the flag and the phrase have been appropriated in many contexts – from the Tea Party movement to rock ‘n roll songs – so now I will appropriate it for a message of Torah.
This week’s Parshah is Eikev, which, in the context of the opening verse, means “since” or “because.” It usually denotes a cause and effect relationship, such as, “Because you will observe God’s commandments, then blessings and physical rewards will descend upon you.” The great medieval commentator Rashi, however, uses an additional meaning of the word: “foot” or “heel.” He explains that there are commandments and values in Jewish life that the Jews sometimes take lightly. They grind them into the dust of everyday life by stepping upon them with their foot and/or heel. They tread on them. But these neglected commandments and values are actually the true key for spiritual success and a good life. So the choice of the word eikev is not merely literal. With the choice of that particular word, the Torah is teaching us the valuable lesson that there really are no small or inconsequential acts in life. (more…)
Decaying eastern white pine tree stump along the Pine Brook drainage in Lincoln, New Hampshire USA. This area was logged during the East Branch & Lincoln era, which was an logging railroad in operation from 1893 – 1948
“Poems are made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree,” wrote Joyce Kilmer, famed British poet who was killed in action in World War I. More than perhaps any other form of nature, the connection of trees to the Creator appears throughout Torah, Talmud, and later Jewish thought. Eternal life and knowledge are represented in the Garden of Eden in the form of trees. The wanton destruction of trees by man is expressly forbidden by Jewish law. In fact, the human race itself is described in the Torah as being a tree: “For humans are as the tree of the field.” (Deut. 20:19)
All later Jewish thought and practice has been influenced by this use of trees as the metaphor for human life in the Bible and Talmud. Trees, therefore, bear study and contemplation. They can aid us in our never-ending search for ourselves and our destiny. So here are a few thoughts for us wooden-headed humans.
A number of years ago, my wife and I were able to spend a few days in Yosemite National Park. Among the awesome wonders of nature that can be viewed there is a famous grove of sequoia trees. They are the oldest living things on our planet, some of them already being thousands of years old. They are massive in height and girth. If anyone needs a lesson in humility, standing in the midst of that sequoia tree grove in Yosemite will do nicely.
As the park ranger explained their growth and nature, and as the immensity of the trees gradually overwhelmed the visitors, a tremendous hush and palpable silence filled the air of the sequoia grove. I thought to myself, “I am standing next to a living creation of God that was here when the Temple in Jerusalem stood on its foundation, when Rome was the colossus of the world, and when there was no London, Paris, or New York. What wonderful secrets it could tell me, if only it could speak!” (more…)
Rabbi Berel Wein was once invited to a meeting with the editor of the Detroit Free Press. After introductions had been made, the editor told him the following story.
His mother, Mary, had immigrated to America from Ireland as an uneducated, 18-year-old peasant girl. She was hired as a domestic maid by an observant family. The head of the house was the president of the neighboring Orthodox shul.
Mary knew nothing about Judaism and had probably never met a Jew before arriving in America. The family went on vacation Mary’s first December in America, leaving Mary alone in the house. They were scheduled to return on the night of December 24, and Mary realized that there would be no Christmas tree to greet them when they did. This bothered her greatly, and using the money the family had left her, she went out and purchased not only a Christmas tree but all kinds of festive decorations to hang on the front of the house. (more…)
The fast day of the tenth of Tevet, which is tomorrow, marks the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem, which eventually led to the destruction of the Holy Temple and the exile of the Jewish people from their homeland. However, Jewish tradition records that today, the ninth day of Tevet, is also a sad day on the Jewish calendar, so much so that is worthy of being declared a fast day by itself.
This ninth day of Tevet is mentioned in the Jewish Code of Law. But the language there is cryptic. All it states is that the ninth day of Tevet is a sad day for “troubles that occurred on that day that are no longer known to us.” How are we to commemorate a day that has no meaning for us?
The prayers for the tenth day of Tevet make reference to the ninth of Tevet as the day of death of the great Jewish leader, Ezra the Scribe. The prayers, as well the above section in the Code of Jewish Law, also mention the eighth day of Tevet as a day that is a candidate for being a fast day. Thus, we have three consecutive sad days following one upon the other. All of these sad days have been united into the one fast day of the tenth of Tevet.
We are still left with the troublesome and somewhat mysterious question as to why the Code of Jewish Law did not clearly identify the ninth day of Tevet as being the day of the death of Ezra the Scribe. Ezra ranks second to Moshe in the hierarchy of the transmitters of Torah to the Jewish people. The rabbis of the Talmud taught us that “if the Torah had not been given through Moshe, then it would have been given through Ezra.” Why would the rabbis purposely hide Ezra’s day of death and give that sad day an anonymous character? (more…)
The wonderfully joyous holiday of Chanuka occurs this month. In light of the horrific events of the past few months, the message and lights of Chanuka could not come at a more appropriate and necessary time. For Chanuka, in its essence, represents the ability to withstand oppression and evil, coercion and bigotry, and to believe in the improbable miracles that have always marked Jewish history and advanced the cause of all human civilization. The story of Chanuka is made up of two radically different components. One is the war, the battles of the Hasmoneans, the blood spilled and the casualties sustained, the human sacrifice and tragedy that always accompanies the struggle for Jewish survival and a better world for all humankind. The other is the miraculous, supernatural event of the small pitcher of oil that supplied oil for eight days while physically holding oil only for one night. Chanuka is thus the culmination of man and God in the joint effort to improve our world and society. There is no message that could be more fitting for us this Chanuka season than this one. 
In the American Revolutionary War, General Christopher Gadsden designed the famous flag depicting a rattlesnake and the words, “Don’t Tread On Me!” The symbol of the rattlesnake dated back as far as 1751 when Benjamin Franklin sardonically wrote that since the British were sending convicts to the colonies, the colonists should send rattlesnakes, which were native to America, over to England. Both the flag and the phrase have been appropriated in many contexts – from the Tea Party movement to rock ‘n roll songs – so now I will appropriate it for a message of Torah.
