I'm visiting relatives this week, but wanted to remind you that Torah study will be conducted as per usual at 9:00 AM tomorrow (Saturday) with a brief minyan followed by our encounter with Parashat Shemot. Rabbi Dan Sklar will be present for leadership and assistance.
In this week's portion, a king arises over Egypt "who knew not Joseph." Under his watchful eye, the Israelites multiply so as to arouse the fear of the Pharaoh who tries to subjugate the people: first by calling for the death of the male children, then by imposing upon them corvée (forced labor) "in mortar and bricks."
Too many times throughout Jewish history, our people has endured its share of Pharaohs, of kings who had no appreciation for the positive contributions of our people to history, religion, culture, science; who would rather suppress than encourage the indomitable Jewish spirit.
Now is not one such time.
And yet dangers lurk.
I believe that we Jews living in America today are faced with unprecedented opportunity and public encouragement; at the same time we are a minority population awash in a multicultural sea of which Christianity is the dominant wave. On this Shabbat Shemot that intersects with Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, please use the Comments section of our blog to offer your reflections on what it means to be Jewish in America today. Are we in any way like the Israelites in Egypt in this week's portion? Or are we free of the enslavements of the past once and for all?
I wish you Shabbat Shalom from my chilly outpost away from home.
Yours,
Rabbi Jonathan Blake
Rabbi Blake,
ReplyDeleteYou suggest there may be an impediment with christianity's dominance, when you say, "at the same time we are a minority population awash in a multicultural sea of which Christianity is the dominant wave".
I, for one, think we Jews do ourselves a greater disservice than do to us our christian fellows. Here's a vivid example:
Maybe you heard:
Female Reform Jewish rabbis wrote a letter criticizing a call from Orthodox rabbis' wives (rebbetzins) for Jewish women not to socialize with or date Arab men because of the possibility of this leading to marriage, which they see as a natural result of male-female friendships. The femal Reform rabbis only disagreed with the rebbetzins in part – while they believe Jewish women and Arab men should socialize, they remain opposed to their marrying one another.
Here you see the danger I alluded about in my last post, where I made it clear that reform Judaism cannot boast of any "tradition" because its approach leads to self-extinction. Now I ask you, is this not absurd, to say it's ok to "socoalize" with Arabs (like a slow dance, for example) but not to marry them. Pray tell - why oh why must the reform outlook always grab the most liberal tangent and parade with it? Could they not have just hushed up and just let things ride? Did they have to put in their two cents to oppose the orthodox viewpoint, and bring upon unwary youngsters, who often are but one or two steps out of schooling with no real hard knocks life experience to help guide them, potential catastrophes? Have you not heard of the Jewish women whom Arab men bait and once they sucker them and wed them, and take them into their villages, these poor Jewish girls live a life of misery?
Or do you believe a Jew's intermarriage with an Arab is not at all disgraceful. Or maybe they ought to socialize on either side of a mechitza (that which separates man from woman during prayer and social affairs in orthodox circles)? Of course I say the latter in jest, but you do get my point. Some things simply do not lend themselves to partial commitment. Removing the mechitza barrier is bad enough, in my view, for prayer and social events. But removing it from Jewish sanctity and purity, is taking the already bad to a whole lot worse!
G-d bless you.