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Correct– but the Shatz can only daven one nusach at a time, and there are many people who are particular to daven a certain nusach only.
It depends who you are. Many people love law school and find it intellectually stimulating.
Neither one is for me, but if I had to pick one it would definitely be law school. I joke that I should have an honorary law degree anyway, since I helped my husband through law school and the bar exam and learned a lot of law along the way.
I strongly suspect you are in the minority there.
Time for Truth: No, I do not believe that homosexuality “causes downward spiral and degradation of every society”.
Yes, a religious Jew who is gay should remain celibate and find a way to integrate into the community outside the framework of family life. However, this is far easier said than done, and honestly is irrelevant to the question of whether or not homosexuality is genetically hardwired.
I have no interest in reading the work of a pair of “researchers” who believe that the best way to fight rape is by telling women to cover up.
Health: You’re still not making any sense. The statements you quoted are not proof that the AMA and APA support conversion therapy.
They state that they oppose therapies that are designed to treat homosexuality as a disease or disorder. Then you mention that the associations do not recognize homosexuality as a disease or disorder. Well and good, but proponents of conversion therapy certainly do! So we’re back to where we started.
I believe writersoul is on point here. MO is not just Orthodoxy in lazy form. It’s not just “Shabbos and kosher and that’s it”. It can’t be reduced to what people do or don’t typically wear, or which mitzvos they do or don’t keep. It’s a hashkafa. An ideology. It means that on the one hand, you engage fully with the secular world, that you aren’t afraid of interacting with the secular world and with non-Jews, that you believe that non-Jews and secular Jews can make positive contributions to society, that you respect them for those contributions and acknowledge them as real people with real rights, not lesser forms of humanity. That you believe that your children can grow up to be strong, independent adults, and that you can send them off into the secular world without being fearful of what it will do to them. And it means on the other hand that you acknowledge the existence of an all-powerful Creator, of a Torah and mesorah passed down through generations, representing absolute truth, that Jews are bound by halacha, that men and women have (on the whole) different roles in life, that sometimes you will encounter parts of Torah that make you feel highly uncomfortable, that you will struggle to accept, and that that struggle is itself something holy, insofar as it pushes you to get to the heart of the text and to really internalize it in a deeper way. And that as much as rabbis and talmidei chochomim are to be revered, they are not in any way to be put on a pedestal (similarly, women should not be put on a pedestal) and deemed all but infallible, that it is far from assur and even encouraged to “argue with” a Rishon, without insisting that the Rishon was exponentially greater than you in learning and therefore how dare you challenge him.
I am not sure that giving tochacha to strangers is ever a good idea. I know I certainly would not be motivated to change if I were the recipient of tochacha from a stranger, no matter how “gentle”.
Separate minyanim would not be racist at all.
The only reason for separate minyanim is that you can’t have more than one nusach simultaneously in the same minyan. So it wouldn’t be “the minyan for Sephardim” and “the minyan for Ashkenazim,” it would be “the Nusach Ashkenaz minyan” and “the Nusach Edot HaMizrach minyan” (throw in “the Nusach Sphard minyan” too, if you like).
Anybody would be free to daven at whichever minyan they want, no questions asked. Not racism, just plain utilitarianism.
Yes. They should also learn parsha, Chumash, and Nach on a regular basis.
I personally enjoy learning Mishna and Gemara as well.
It is forbidden to give tochacha if it is unlikely to be well-received.
I am not sure in what universe one might think that approaching a random woman and telling her “You look terrible” is likely to be well-received.
Sparkly: who said anything about Reform Jews being “better” than frum Jews? I certainly didn’t.
nishtayngesheft: I’m not sure what your distinction between “chessed” and “true chessed” is, but either way, in my experience, Reform synagogues do a lot of social service projects, like feeding the poor, for instance. That certainly qualifies as chessed.
apushatayid: I feel genuine warmth towards Reform Jews. Certainly not chanifa. It depends what you mean by approval. I certainly don’t “approve” when they tell me that they are going on a road trip next Saturday, but I don’t say anything against it because that would not be productive. But I do “approve” of them as people.
Sparkly: What do you mean, what do I call MO? MO is MO, I don’t understand your question.
Subtitle please: Yes, and?
Joseph: Xtianity during the life of Yoshke cannot be compared to Xtianity today. Followers of Yoshke during his lifetime probably were practicing a form of Judaism. Followers of Yoshke today, not at all.
That…doesn’t say what you think it says. It tells you what conversion therapy was designed to do. Conversion therapy as a treatment for homosexuality is, by definition, based on the assumption that homosexuality is a disease or disorder. Otherwise there would be nothing to “treat”.
It is a fact that that is how conversion therapy was designed. But acknowledging the fact of what it’s for and how it came to be is not a statement on its efficacy. Those are two very separate things.
Joseph, you’re evading the question. Please explain what exactly those “requisite halachic stipulations” would be.
nishtdayngesheft: Most of the chessed that they do (not all, but most) is true chessed. They call it tikkun olam, which my husband finds hilarious because apparently that’s not at all what tikkun olam actually means in the Gemara. I agree with you about Avi Weiss: yes, he is “a problem,” and yes, he does chessed just about as well as Reform rabbis do (I don’t know about more, but about the same). I have to disagree about his talmidim, though; I know many of them, and they aren’t “actively seeking to harm frum Yidden”. To the contrary, they bring warmth and sincerity and Torah to MO communities. I have a great deal more respect for them than I do for him, in fact. Yes, most frum rabbis have some sort of chessed operations in place, but they aren’t public about it. Reform communities really integrate chessed into their ongoing activities and get the entire congregation involved. It’s a model we can certainly learn from.
Sparkly: It depends what you mean by “anti the Reform movement”. I wish that it didn’t exist and I wish that all Jews in the world would return to frumkeit. BUT, since I don’t live in a world where that’s true (yet), since Moshiach hasn’t come and the majority of Jews are NOT frum, I have to live with that reality. And I just don’t see how pushing away the not frum population is helpful or productive in any way. I see no reason to criticize their beliefs. I already know that I don’t agree with them. I already know that I believe their interpretations of Torah to be wrongheaded. I already know that I believe that the way they practice Judaism leads to assimilation, and to people who are not halachically Jewish growing up in Jewish communities. Those are all problems that I have with the movement and its leadership. But let me be clear: I have zero problems with the PEOPLE who identify as Reform. They are lovely people, sincere people, people who are part of Klal Yisroel just like you and I are, people who will be judged by Hashem eventually and need no judgment from you or I in the meantime. And, yes, I also believe that I can learn something from these people, because I can learn something from everyone. I treat them warmly, with respect and dignity. I invite them into my home, I listen to their Torah, I don’t attend their services or eat in their houses, but neither do I make fun of them behind their back. I count many of them as friends, and I refrain from discussing my beliefs with them unless they ask me, in which case I am happy to have the conversation. But I will not actively push Orthodoxy on them, just as I would never want them to push their beliefs on me.
I believe that every frum person should make an effort to treat non frum people with compassion, for two reasons. First of all, because that is what will bring the Geulah, and second of all, because derech eretz is derech eretz no matter who you are.
Sparkly: I know that there are MO people who practice as you describe. My objection was to your assertion that MOST do that: “most mo dont wear a kippah. they dont cover their hair or theyll barely cover their hair.” Do those people exist? Sure. But it’s not “most” MO. I now see that you have added more definitions of what you believe “most” or even “all” MO believe, which is not true in my experience and I have lived in several different MO communities across the country. I’m not sure where you are getting this information from…
Joseph: Acknowledging that Reform people are practicing a form of Judaism does not mean that you have to grant them legitimacy as a movement.
Subtitle please: The difference is that Yoshke is a different god from a different religion. Reform people are practicing OUR religion, just with a lot of gaping holes missing. So-called Messianic Jews are practicing Xtianity dressed up as Judaism.
Syag Lchochma, I am not “getting upset and carried away”, actually, I’m not sure why you think I am…Gravity was an example to illustrate the point I was making about scientific consensus and how at a certain point you have to accept that consensus and consider it a done deal– UNLESS and UNTIL the medical establishment itself decides to reconsider. A handful of “studies” published by people who are not recognized medical experts and whose work is outside the pale, should be disregarded.
I’m almost afraid to hear the response, but I’m curious whether or not anybody here believes that man-made climate change is real. That would be another definitive conclusion reached by the scientific community. Are there a minority of people who deny climate change? Yes. Do some of those people have scientific degrees? Sure. But when 99% of scientists, including the best and brightest in the industry, the leading voices of modern scientific theory, when they all come to the same conclusion, what good is it to cry “But Dr. So and So did a study!” It just doesn’t make any sense.
Health, what are you talking about? The AMA says that conversion therapy does NOT work.
dovrosenbaum: Correct. Their actual sexual orientation will never change, but they can choose celibacy.
Typically when talking about eruvin, one should say “I don’t hold by such and such eruv” or “We [meaning your family] don’t hold by such and such eruv”. I would never say “such and such eruv is treif” if God-fearing Jews hold by it and it’s checked by a frum rav.
Time for Truth: Huh? I’m not looking to go to law school…and if I was, I would not consider CUNY.
Sparkly: Yes, I am a “religious person”. Why do you ask?
Joseph: When you say “treated as such,” what do you mean exactly?
dovrosenbaum, that is false. Leining and davening are not the primary job duties of a rabbi, so it doesn’t make the job “incredibly easier” that they’ve modified the liturgy. Incidentally, 20% is a gross exaggeration and they also add English stuff, so it’s not actually as short of a service as you seem to think it is. (Actually, their services typically go an hour longer than the standard Young Israel service…)
They do not “do everything wrong”. They do some things very right. In fact, they do some things better than we do them, and we would do well to acknowledge that and to try to learn from them rather than constantly criticizing.
For instance, they do chessed extremely well.
Yes, science changes over time, but that’s neither here nor there because that line of thinking can lead you to question EVERYTHING. Who says gravity is real– maybe the experts will change their minds in ten years! Maybe sugar is really good for you, that might change in ten years also! etc etc.
The current consensus among leading medical experts is that sexual orientation is hardwired at birth, while addiction is not (unless the mother was addicted to something during pregnancy). Period, end of story, and anecdotal evidence is irrelevant.
So you are right, because of what you’ve seen anecdotally, and ALL of the leading medical experts are wrong?
Ben Levi, you have your majorities and minorities mixed up. You’re quoting a minority nutjob against the consensus of the leading medical experts.
That doesn’t make it “not relevant”.
Medical experts have said that. Do you disbelieve them?
“whatever it is about, it is cheering on, normalizing, and in many instances promoting something the torah says not to do. for no other reason it is worthy of condemnation.”
This much, I agree with.
Syag Lchochma, addictions are heartbreaking and can do incredible damage, and yes, at a certain point the addict actually loses his free choice. BUT, most people aren’t born addicted to anything. They are born with hardwired sexual orientations.
Mincha isn’t relevant to women? Hum, I must have missed that section of Shulchan Aruch…
Have you ever actually met a Reform rabbi?
The difference is that belief in Yoshke is 100% incompatible with Judaism. Even a Jewish atheist can be said to be practicing Judaism in some way, but an idol worshipper, absolutely not.
Reform and Conservative Jews who don’t keep the entire Torah aren’t just keeping what they do keep because “they like doing it for whatever reason”. It’s not just for fun. Many of them believe that they are mandated by halacha, some do it because it helps them feel a connection to HKBH, and others do it to connect with the heritage. All of those are valid reasons and are very much connected to Judaism. Even if you believe that there is only one right way to practice, that doesn’t mean you have to deny your brethren a place at the table. You might strongly disagree with their lifestyle, but that doesn’t warrant denying that they’re a part of the tribe. Reform rabbis wake up every morning and put on tefillin, daven, learn, officiate at funerals, teach Torah, and promote chessed. If that isn’t “practicing Judaism,” I don’t know what is.
People AREN’T born with “predilections to murder or shoplifting” the way they are born with sexual orientations. That is simply false, and again, not backed up by science.
And pride parades have absolutely nothing to do with “raising self-esteem”.
Sure I can. Judaism isn’t all or nothing. They may not be practicing Judaism in the best way, or the most consistent way, or the most halachically ideal way (or whatever other epithet you like), but Judaism is still Judaism and even if they reject parts of it, that doesn’t negate the fact that they’re still practicing in some way. What are they, Mormons?
The only people who call themselves practicing Jews who really, truly aren’t, are Hebrew Christians (so-called “Messianic Jews”).
Health and Ben Levi:
Conventional science and medicine has rejected conversion therapy. No credible, reputable association or institution will make the claim that sexual orientation can be changed or that conversion therapy works. You can throw out “articles” all day from a handful of nutcases who are beyond the pale of modern scientific theory, but it doesn’t change the reality that those people have zero credibility.
The only thing that marriage therapy has in common with conversion therapy is the word “therapy”. So I don’t know what that point was supposed to be.
Joseph: And if it is heresy? Therefore what?
apushatayid: Yes, there are some people who choose not to do mitzvos and others who simply don’t know how to do them well, or don’t know that they should be doing them in the first place, etc. But again: what is the nafka minah? We should be supporting and encouraging people who want to take things on, not rejecting and demeaning them because they aren’t all the way there yet.
Subtitle please: A) Not all Conservative and Reform folks deny the existence of God or the divinity of the Torah, and B) Even for those that do, it is still better for them to keep some mitzvos than none. Even if they are doing them for the wrong reasons, like if they don’t believe that they are specifically commanded by God to do them, that doesn’t negate the fact that they are doing them. Where does hatred come in? Seriously, look around you. Try searching “reform” in the Coffee Room search box and see what you get. There is zero compassion, there is zero understanding, just hateful criticism and gleeful superiority.
Abba_S: I’m surprised that you have never heard of anyone leaving Orthodoxy for Reform or Conservative Judaism. They are all over the place. Organizations like Footsteps are full of people who still feel an attachment to Torah and to Judaism, they just need a new environment to practice. You seem to have a lot of misconceptions…not all OTD are rebellious and angry. And OTD is NOT a contagious disease, that their siblings will go OTD also if the OTD child is not removed from the house. And OTD is not “a goy”. I personally would be delighted to welcome an OTD child into my house, but I would be very saddened that he really had nowhere else to go.
The Goq: 100%
zahavasdad: If not constrained by university policies, what would you ideally do in the situations you mention? McDonalds and the Zen Buddhism table. I’d really like to know.
Sparkly: I don’t think you understand what MO is. I live in an MO community and 90-95% of the married women cover their hair, 100% of the men wear a yarmulke while not at work and 98% at work.
I occasionally get a ride home from work with a frum male colleague (he and I work in totally different parts of the building). Usually his kids are in the backseat. I don’t see it as a problem and neither does he, or either of our spouses.
Gavra at work, I love your rav’s suggestion!
Scarves can be beautiful and elegant, while sheitels of any length can be perfectly tzanua (and not “gross” in any way).
I find the judgmental comments from (mostly male) posters to be way out of line.
Which later posts? What sources? I don’t “clearly see” anything at all. If you believe the conclusions of the American Medical Association to be nothing more than “popular opinion” and “PC”, then I really don’t know what else there is to say.
Health, please refer to my above comment: “The fact that reparative therapy/conversion therapy does NOT work is not ‘PC garbage’. It is proven scientific fact.”
The fact is that nearly every professional medical association out there (American Medical Association, American Psychological Association, etc) has disavowed conversion therapy. You have to be a serious conspiracy theorist (looking at you, mentsch1) in order to believe otherwise (and, Time for Truth, “ask any old mashgiach” is not a reputable source, sorry.)
First of all, that doesn’t negate the fact that he is still OTD. As apushatayid pointed out, if he’s off, he’s off. Could be any circumstance why or how.
Second of all– guess what, a Jew who does some mitzvos but not others is still a Jew and still practicing Judaism. Perhaps not perfectly, but he’s still doing it. It boggles my mind how people can have so much hatred in their hearts toward our non-frum brethren that they would go so far as to think that the Torah is all or nothing. It’s not. Once again, Chabad is way ahead of the rest of the frum world on this.
I once heard a beautiful story about a lesbian couple that one of the women had been raised as a Jew and the other as a Catholic. The Catholic Church (obviously) rejected them, they tried out Buddhism, and eventually made their way to Judaism. Their local Chabad rebbetzin welcomed them warmly, with no judgment, and provided them with Shabbos candles every week. Unfortunately, the Jewish woman was diagnosed with cancer and died at a very young age, and her partner wrote a wonderful letter to the rebbetzin thanking her for all of her warmth and support over the years (what a tremendous Kiddush Hashem!)
This rebbetzin was interviewed for a Jewish radio station and the interviewer asked her why she got involved with these women, knowing that they were romantic partners.
The rebbetzin responded, “I’ve never heard of a halacha that says that if someone doesn’t keep one mitzvah, that means that she’s exempt from all the others.”
Bottom line: mitzvah observance and Torah study is precious to Hashem, regardless of the quantity or context. If a person decides not to be Orthodox, that’s not a signal for us to give up on them completely, shun them from the community, and all but spit in their faces. On the contrary, we must meet them at their level, treat them with utmost compassion and respect (but not condescension) and, to the best of our ability, enable them to perform whatever mitzvos they DO want to do.
If Torah observance was all or nothing, literally zero people would be “practicing Judaism” according to you, Joseph. Because literally nobody in the world does it perfectly.
One more point: the comparison between homosexuality and theft, adultery, or other issurim that people have pointed out is seriously flawed.
We didn’t need the Torah to tell us that it’s wrong to steal or to cheat on your spouse. We DID need the Torah to tell us that we shouldn’t marry same-sex partners. If I weren’t frum, I would 100% support gay marriage, because why not? Whom is it hurting, right?
So, while it’s still assur to marry a same-sex partner or to engage in homosexual activity, we should have a lot more compassion and understanding for those who do so, AND for their straight “allies”.
Subtitle please: Why is it not OTD?
Health:
The fact that reparative therapy/conversion therapy does NOT work is not “PC garbage”.
It is proven scientific fact.
Conversion therapy, moreover, can be harmful and dangerous, resulting in higher rates of anxiety, depression, and suicide among patients who enroll in the so-called therapy.
It has been widely discredited. You are absolutely off your rocker if you think this is in any way political.
It’s a highly personal choice. Some women wear sheitels for professional reasons, others because they don’t like how they look in scarves and hats, others because their mothers always wore sheitels and it never occurred to them to wear anything else…etc etc.
Real human hair sheitels are of course going to be expensive (and synthetic ones do NOT look good or wear well). You can get one for under a thousand dollars, especially if you buy secondhand. But if you want a more expensive one and you have the money, I don’t see anything wrong with it.
Abba_S: You’ve never heard of someone who left Orthodoxy for Conservative or Reform Judaism? Someone who is no longer “on the derech” of frumkeit, but still believes in God and practices Judaism?
Just because the URJ conference, for instance, is called a “conference” and not a “parade” doesn’t negate the fact that it is also, like the parade, in essence a public repudiation of Torah observance.
DaasYochid, it’s very relevant. You and others here seem to be primarily objecting to the public nature of the parade (to quote Joseph, “they insist on making their sinful ways a matter of the public record”).
There isn’t a “pride parade”, per se, for anything else. However, there are many, many examples of non-Orthodox Jews promoting halachic transgressions as “a matter of the public record”.
For instance, what if you picked up a Jewish newspaper and saw an advertisement for a conference of the Union for Reform Judaism? Would you be up in arms over that? Or how about a Jewish newspaper that prints advertisements for non-kosher establishments? Suppose the local JCC hosted a talk and book signing by Deborah Feldman, open to the public?
Writersoul, thanks for being the voice of reason here.
DaasYochid, what wasn’t clear?
Health, DaasYochid, Joseph, et al:
I assume you regularly protest against Jews who are publicly not frum, and believe that we should speak out against accepting them as people and treating them with dignity.
After all, they promote a lifestyle of aveira and toeiva. They are not deserving of basic respect and should be sent to seek psychological help.
I guess someone needs to break the news to 770…
A location would be helpful…I have been happy with Maven Motors in Baltimore.
Thanks!
“It is a must read. Wow! He hit the nail on the head, as they say.”
I don’t think so…I could barely get through it. Just a sampling of inaccurate and/or offensive things he said:
-“Concern over community hypocrisy” is something that only applies to “liberals”.
-“With the rarest of exceptions”, all colleges are “liberal”.
-Guys who go OTD in college do so because of girls from Barnard who apparently seduce them and “take them away” and “take over their minds”.
-Going OTD=”voting for Hillary”.
-It should “give us heart” that just as these goyishe seductresses can brainwash our precious boys, so too can aidel seductresses bring them back to us! Source: a Torah pasuk that forbids intermarriage.
-Liberalism=hedonism.
-People can’t and therefore don’t think for themselves. They just follow what everyone else tells them. Therefore gender equality isn’t an issue and it’s the liberals’ fault because liberals control college campuses, the media, and most probably the entire world.
-College professors voted for McGovern because they were stupid and blindly listened to each other rather than the rest of America, which was much smarter.
-Survey analysts are out to get the Orthodox and “advance their personal ideological agendas”. It’s a massive conspiracy started by the Jewish Federations. There isn’t a single statistical analyst out there who isn’t crooked.
-Only 11 percent of people from the survey (remember, we can’t trust the survey anyway) said that they left Orthodoxy because of gender roles. This proves that only a tiny minority of people leave Orthodoxy for ideological reasons, because gender role is the only issue that liberals care about. Therefore, at least 89 percent of people left Orthodoxy because they were brainwashed by their college professors. But remember, it’s probably more than 89 percent because the survey is wrong.
-I wrote this article that you should all read because it’s so important for us to wise up to the brainwashing college professors and Jewish Federation professionals who are out to get Orthodoxy. I’m going to tell you all about the yarmulke-wearing day school graduates who are no longer wearing yarmulkes by the time they graduate college. All the conspiracy theories took up too much space, though, so I can’t also tell you about what happens to women, who don’t wear yarmulkes. But you should just know that their experience is “somewhat similar”.
-“Orthodoxy would lose everything” if we allowed a crooked rabbi to actually be brought to justice.
-People who came from non-observant families, but the shul they didn’t go to was Orthodox, identified as Orthodox pre-1970. After 1970, when REAL Orthodox Jews “emerged from a century of hiding” in America, these people realized their silly error and began accurately classifying themselves as not actually Orthodox. Anyone with half a brain knows this.
And writersoul is absolutely correct that it’s ridiculous to argue that surveys should be distrusted in favor of 40+ year old anecdotal evidence.
This article made me sick.