Authoritativeness versus Accessibility

(Or, Orthodox vs. Open-Source?)

I've been reading an interesting book about major Orthodox publisher Artscroll, whose publications have become ubiquitous throughout the Jewish world. While Artscroll books (which are mostly in English) are quite widespread among the Modern Orthodox community, the author, Jeremy Stolow, has some very interesting statistics indicating their growing "market share" into non-Orthodox populations as well. He even goes so far as to link new Reform and Conservative publications directly to Artscroll's increasing popularity among their congregants:

ArtScroll books are praised as instructive, meaningful, authentic, and even empowering. Its enthusiasts thus claim that an "ArtScroll revolution" has facilitated an unprecedented degree of access to Jewish knowledge and confidence in ritual performance among English-speaking Jews, forming a readership that extends from the erudite to the culturally illiterate and that transcends the traditional markers of institutional affiliation or local custom. At a further remove, ArtScroll has precipitated a reaction among its competitors that one is tempted to describe as an "ArtScrollification" of the Jewish liturgical field as a whole: most notably, with the recent publication of Eitz Chaim (the new Conservative chumash, designed explicitly to "respond" to ArtScroll 's success), and Mishkan Tefillah (the new Reform siddur, which incorporates many design elements, editorial structure, and instructional material found in ArtScroll). 

At first I thought this was just hyperbole, until he cited quotes from those movements' own rabbis admitting that part of the motivation to put out those publications was to counter Artscroll's popularity.

Movement rabbis acknowledge that a main impetus for commissioning the new commentary, titled “Or Hadash” and set to be released April 15, was the growing phenomenon of Conservative worshipers using the popular Orthodox prayer book put out by ArtScroll/Mesorah Publications. The trend certainly irked many Conservative leaders, who concluded that the increasing popularity of ArtScroll was not a function of its ideological bent, but the desire of many Conservative congregants to have a prayer book that offered them more than a flowery translation of the Hebrew text.

...“I’ve been using ArtScroll for about 12 years,” said Steven Rothman, a third-generation Conservative Jew and a member of the ritual committee at Temple Beth Zion-Beth Israel in Philadelphia. “I wanted something with commentary. But the problem with some of their commentary is that it is coming from a strictly Orthodox point of view. I would like to see commentary from a Conservative point of view.” 

Rothman told the Forward that he is excited about the upcoming release of “Or Hadash.” Along with “Etz Hayim,” he said, the prayer book represented a newfound, and long-needed, willingness on the part of Conservative movement leaders to tend to the intellectual and liturgical needs of their followers. “They are finally answering some of the questions about what it means to be a Conservative Jew,” Rothman said. “I’m very pleased that the Conservative movement is opening itself up intellectually to the lay person. That’s not always the way it was before.” 

...“It’s clear that many congregants have been complaining to us for a long time that they have felt a real lack of ability to grab hold of a lot of the prayers,” said Rabbi Jerome Epstein, executive vice president of United Synagogue, the movement’s congregational arm. “Some have felt that the ArtScroll really provided them with information that they needed. But its approach doesn’t represent what we are or what we stand for.”

This, I think, is a key point that many Artscroll triumphalists often overlook. There is no question that some Jews are attracted to Orthodox texts because they see them as an authoritative voice over Conservative or Reform ones. But my impression is that a large number may also simply be reaching out to sources like Artscroll because they are offering information they want and have had a hard time finding elsewhere-- and not necessarily because they're craving an ideological purity that can only be found in Orthodoxy. In the case of Etz Hayim, the willingness to engage with a lay congregant-- to wade into the issues of commentary and interpretation and to lay out exactly what the Conservative approach or approaches are to the text, not only helps inform people about possible interpretations, but also specifically about what the Conservative movement has to say about it.

Still, at the end of the day I think many liberal Jews, particularly those who, like me, were not born into a specific movement and whose denominational affiliations and identities are more fluid, are less interested in establishing or even explicating specific ideological boundaries than in just getting some good nuts and bolts information, which we can then use to draw our own conclusions.  Personally, my lack of Hebrew skills-- but interest in having access to traditional texts- has meant that I've had to invest a fair amount of effort to find resources that reach my needs. Sometimes Artscroll has filled that niche (I used their Schottenstein Talmud quite often in various Jewish studies classes as a source for midrash), and for that it should be commended and given credit. However my gut is that a lot of liberal Jews who use or have used Artscroll or similar texts (including my Conservative shul's Reconstructionist rabbi) are most interested in what Artscroll can do rather than what it specifically says: Artscroll remains a good, solid resource to help bridge the gap between a desire for information about traditional Jewish theology and practice while still needing explicit instruction. However what that tells me is that the real market is not in polemics or apologetics, but good old information: in a nutshell, it's the open-source mindset.

What is open-source? Generally it refers to the philosophy or approach of having open access to technology, often with the ability to copy, modify or transfer it. The "modification" element is challenging when applied to Judaism (there was a book a few years ago that actually used the term  "open source Judaism," which I find a little problematic by its implications). That said, I think what we're seeing here is definitely connected to the effects that open source has had on popular culture. These days many people, particularly young people, approach information as something that should be open and accessible to anyone that wants to see it-- and this in turn leads to a lowering of hierarchy. Even in non-Orthodox Judaism, the communal values are very much clustered around who has the most information and knowledge. This then leads to a huge gap between those who know a lot and those who don't-- and the ones without a lot of education or knowledge therefore get to a point where either they start to lose interest or opt out, or they find ways of gaining access to the information. That's where open source Jewish texts-- not necessarily "open source Judaism" comes in.

As more movements and independent writers start opening the tradition up and making it accessible to less Jewishly literate Jews, I think ultimately we'll find a larger segment of liberal Jews who, if given the opportunity, are interested in taking Judaism more seriously and grappling with it in a more authentic way-- because they won't be operating from an all or nothing, "Orthodox or secular" binary. Having the ability to access Jewish tradition on your terms, whether it be through the siddur, text study, or other forms, is incredibly empowering as well as challenging. Now that you've read the parsha, what do you think about it? Now that you know what your prayers mean, what do you intend to do with that knowledge? What does a liberal Judaism informed by regular or semi-regular Talmud study look like? When liberal Jews are confronted with the knowledge of what their tradition says, they by necessity are required to start becoming more engaged and more authentic-- not more Orthodox, but more informed. "I don't know" is no longer an excuse.

With the advent of accessible-- but hopefully still authentic-- Jewish texts, we in liberal communities now get to start having some of these conversations. And funnily enough, in a real way a lot of this is thanks to Artscroll- for inspiring or attracting its readers, for irking its competitors, and for inspiring more of us to wrestle with our tradition-- but on our terms and its, not theirs.

Come on down to Crazy Town

I don't visit WND much anymore, mostly for my blood pressure. The few times a month I traipse back, hoping against hope they may have become more sane (ok, not really), I get a stark reminder that they're not just conservative, they're downright nuts.

For example: WND's editor, Joe Farah, likes to tout how much he's a real Christian and believes in Biblical prophecy. He also has a major Judeophile crush on us Hebrews. He also is a complete business huckster who never passes up a chance to plug whatever new thing he's selling.

Cue this monstrosity:

Sept. 17, 2001, marked the beginning of the economic calamity associated with 9/11 with the lowering of interest rates by the Fed resulting in the collapse of the stock market. Seven years later, on Sept. 29, 2008, the next big stock market crash followed – bigger than the previous one – resulting in an economic crisis that continues to this day. 

What does all that have to do with today, Sept. 15? 

It’s Sept. 15 on the Gregorian calendar, but it is Elul 29 on the Hebrew calendar. And both of those previous economic calamities occurred on Elul 29.

Ok, who's been talking to Farah about the Hebrew calendar? Clearly someone told him about that silly (and debunked) tradition that everything bad happens on Tisha B'Av, and now he's rolling with this mishegoss.

But fear not! Joe doesn't actually think that something terrible is going to happen just because it's Elul 29.

The good news is that today is not a Shmitah year on the Hebrew calendar. 

Huh?

On Elul 29 on Shmitah years, the financial accounts are wiped away, debts are canceled and the land is to be given a Sabbath rest, according to Deuteronomy 15:1-2 and Leviticus 25:3-6, with Elul 29 being the last day of the civil calendar year.

Hold it right there, Joe! I know where you're going with this, and... NOOOO.

The next Shmitah year will end Sept. 13, 2015. And, because of the unprecedented popularity of the No. 1 bestselling Christian book in America this year, “The Harbinger,” and the No. 1 bestselling faith movie in America in 2012, “The Isaiah 9:10 Judgment,” some people are already marking their calendars.

Are these by any chance the same people who bought TVs and computers before Y2K expecting all the credit card records to be wiped out?

Jonathan Cahn, a messianic rabbi and author of “The Harbinger,” and the narrator of “The Isaiah 9:10 Judgment,” is the person who first noticed that America’s two great financial shakings occurred on successive Hebrew Shmitah years following the 9/11 Islamist terror attacks on the U.S., the key to the series of limited judgments the author sees as a result of America’s turning away from God just as ancient Israel did before the dispersion.

Of course he does. 

“A clear pattern has been established,” says Joseph Farah, producer of “The Isaiah 9:10 Judgment.” 

Of course you are!

“I don’t believe it’s a coincidence what happened in America on Elul 29 in 2001 and 2008. It would be foolish to ignore the possibility that a greater judgment might be in the works – especially if America continues to move away from God and His Word.”

Almost as foolish as reading an ancient legal procedure meant to promote economic justice and early land management as a financial curse sent by God for not voting Republican?

If that doesn't convince you that God's about to kick some ass, fear not! The messianic rabbis also have the stars on their side. They think.

It’s also worth noting that Elul 29, 2015, represents the eve of the Feast of Trumpets or Rosh Hashana at sundown. An unusual astronomical phenomenon, a blood red moon – or tetrad – is expected to occur that evening, according to NASA. The Feast of Trumpets begins a period known by Jews as “the days of awe” that lasts through Yom Kippur a week later. 

Hebrew roots pastor Mark Biltz of El Shaddai Ministries in Washington state noted several years ago that a cluster of tetrads will occur in 2014 and 2015 – all of them on Hebrew high holidays. There won’t be any more for the rest of the 21st century. 

Joel 2:31 says: “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD come.” Other biblical references can be found in Acts 2:20 and Revelation 6:12.

Ok, first of all, the ancient prophets weren't super savvy about the natural sciences. Hell, the rabbis of the Talmud who came along thousands of years later still thought that salamanders were made from fire and that lice came from sweat. Just because Joel talks about the sun going black and the moon going red doesn't mean he's predicting tetrads. And besides, why focus on the moon? Why not scream doomsday every time there's an eclipse? At least then the law of averages might be more in your favor. I'm sure there's bound to be some terrible things that have happened on eclipses over the years.

Whether or not anything significant occurs of a prophetic nature Sept. 13, 2015, Farah said he is immensely pleased with the documentary treatment of the message found in the best-selling book “The Harbinger” by Jonathan Cahn, which has remained on the New York Times bestsellers list for all of 2012. 

“If you haven’t seen this movie yet, I urge you to get it, screen it with your family, show it to your friends and arrange church viewings,” said Farah. “This is the most important project I have been involved in through my 35-year media career. This is a message, I believe, God directed me to be involved with for a time such as this.”

Nice covering your butt there. "The apocalypse and/or total financial ruin is going to happen in three years, so buy all my crap talking about it. Then again, it could totally not happen, but you should probably buy my crap anyway just to be safe." Well played. Oh, and something about shmitah. And tetrads.

Nobody's Perfect- but some folks try harder

A recent comment on Dovbear from SJ perked my interest. SJ was trying to fight the perception that the GOP is anti-women or anti-gay. Rather than point to the increased visibility of minorities and women in GOP leadership roles, though, SJ decided instead to go on the attack by posting a couple of links to op-eds bashing Democrats for not being as inclusive as they claim to be. Compare this to an op-ed from some Montana paper taking liberal pundits to task for demeaning the presence of black, Latino and female speakers at the Republican convention:

The parade of accomplished minority and women speakers at the Republican National Convention truly stood out, particularly because of the  alleged Republican “war on women” theme and relentless accusations of Republican racism. 

But sure enough, there was no shortage of critics showing dismissive regard toward GOP speakers...

...Proof is in what people do, and it was Republicans who put these people in office and at the convention podium. People should believe what they see, yet they continue to hear things like this from Democratic National Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz: “I think we believe that women can see through that nice shiny packaging that the Republicans have been putting out there, through to what’s inside, which is really a disaster for women’s future, extreme policies.” 

OK. Republican policies are fair game. But diminishing the women who were featured at the convention as “shiny packaging”? With language like that, just who is waging the “war on women”? 

... The prize for insulting, obnoxious temerity goes to Los Angeles Times columnist David Horsey, who essentially accused Republicans of resorting to tokenism — and worse — at the convention. 

“It would be easy to dismiss this as tokenism and window dressing — which, of course, it is — but there is something bigger behind it,” he writes. “Republicans truly believe that a rising tide lifts all boats, and that the best thing a poor Latino or an unemployed African American can do to better his or her condition is to vote for a party that intends to let rich people keep more of their money. Showing off all those non-Caucasian officeholders is a way of saying to skeptical minority voters, “These guys have chosen the Republican path and just look where it has gotten them!”

Tokenism, it seems, suggests unworthy people who were plucked off the street and put at the podium as props. But that simply wasn’t the case. Many of the minority and women speakers named above are accomplished leaders, and in some cases, rock stars in the Republican Party. They deserve to be featured, rather than dismissed as being somehow illegitimate or unworthy.

Here's my take: The difference between the parties on sexism and homophobia is that the Democrats rhetoric/ideology aspires towards an ideal (gender and orientation equality) that their actions fall short of. The GOP's actions, by contrast, seem to be more or less aligned with their general philosophies on those issues: some Republicans accept gays on pragmatic/libertarian grounds (though many don't), and women, while valued, seem to be seen by many in the party as supporters, not leaders.

This is borne out by statistics: In this Congress, female Democrats outnumber Republicans 2 to 1. In the last Congress, it was closer to 3 to 1. Of course, numbers aren't everything, but they seem to show that in the GOP, women are either not encouraged to seek political leadership roles, or not seen as having the same abilities/qualifications as men (Remember that Pat Boone article that said any time women were elected to office it was because there were no competent men around to do the job?)

This doesn't mean Republicans necessarily "hate" women, minorities or gays or that Democrats are incapable of being sexist, homophobic or prejudiced. However, the disparity does suggest that there are some real limiting factors keeping women from being as successful in party leadership-- and I'm going to go out on a limb here and say this is true by, let's say a hundred-fold, for gays.

That doesn't mean that the speakers at the convention are deficient or unqualified-- but you'd have to be living under a rock to claim that tokenism-- or window dressing, or pandering, take your pick-- isn't at work here. It's at work with the Democrats, too, of course-- I'd say it's become a ubiquitous element of American politics these days. At conventions, on political ads, at debates, you always hear about these random people whose stories and faces are meant to exemplify an entire class of constituents to convince women, minorities, hunters, military supporters, teachers, small business owners, whoever, that this candidate, this party, really understand and care about you, YES, YOU! It's unabashed showmanship, and the fact that minorities were being paraded around to be seen and counted at the convention exemplifies the exact issue the GOP is trying to fight: the perception that it's the party of old white men. The existence of minorities within the party is a good thing, but until they become unremarkable, until their race or gender clearly isn't a major factor in picking them to speak at conventions, the GOP still has a lot of work to do. That's not the speakers' fault-- it's the party's.

Standing Up or Standing Out?

I've written about experimenting with wearing religious headgear previously, as well as some of the issues its raised with my family. I (mostly) understand where they're coming from, but I think they still don't really have a sense of what I'm thinking. They don't understand why I want to "single myself out," "make myself a target," or be so visibly identified as Jewish if I'm "not religious."

While reading through some op-eds over the past week written by Sikhs in response to the shootings in Wisconsin and their thoughts about wearing visible markers of their identity I saw many of my own thoughts reflected in their words. As Rajdeep Singh put it, "devout Sikhs express their religious commitment by wearing a turban, which signifies nobility and a willingness to promote justice and freedom for all peoples," adding that the turban is a "declaration of Sikh identity." In short, the act of wearing identifiable clothing establishes a commitment to identify with-- and live up to the ideals of-- one's religious/cultural group.

In another article I was reading, this one about kashrut, identity reared its head again:

Keeping kosher is “a way of asserting that you are a conscious Jew,” explains Rabbi James Ponet, chaplain at Yale University and a family friend, “when you join friends out for dinner but decline the lobster, shrimp, oysters and all the meat entrees [or] when you ask the waiter if the tomato soup” is made from vegetarian stock. 

Echoing Achad Haam’s pithy observation about Shabbat observance, one might hold that more than the Jews have kept kosher, kosher eating has kept the Jews. A Jewish atheist’s children might grow up with a learned distaste for pork and thereby call themselves Jewish.

For me, the twist here is not that one would specifically want to cultivate a dislike for pork in children (much less the pseudo-scientific silliness claiming that one absorbs the "nature" of animals one eats-- who wants to be like a cow or a chicken?) as much as impart a deep respect for traditions and culture of one's ancestors. It's not that non-kosher food is bad, it's that this is part of our heritage and one way of connecting to it and others in our communities.

For me, that shift in perspective is key: it's not about being observant or religious, per se, at least not in my father's way of thinking. It's about being conscious, serious, and engaged. It's about finding more ways to connect yourself (on your terms), not less. To me, the visibility and accountability-- to oneself as well as others-- are part of that process, whether I meet certain people's litmus tests or not. If there was a particular visual identifier that read, "Jewish but not Orthodox," I'd be all over that. But so far it doesn't seem like that's really a choice. By taking on the visual aspect, the tradition's "vote" becomes a little stronger, a little less easy to just shrug off. That's not to say that I think that wearing a kippah would make me Orthodox, but I think you have to grapple with the tradition a little more once you're no longer invisible-- to a degree, you lose your deniability, let's say. That's part of what intrigues me about wearing a kippah and being identifiable to myself as well as others, and I think that's also part about what drives my parents crazy-- the idea that I would want to be thinking of myself, and having others think of me, in those terms, nearly all of the time.

Today's society seems to be somewhat schizophrenic when it comes to identity and differences. On the one hand difference and diversity are understood to be valuable and worthy of respect, but at the same time there are great pressures to conform and homogenize with one's peers. Visibly identifying oneself with one's culture can be kind of scary, as in some ways it's a limiting act-- I am not "just" like everyone else, because I am identifying with this group, as opposed to all of you, who don't. It's not bad, but it can definitely be an act of setting oneself apart-- of standing out, of isolation. I think that's part of my parents' fear, that I will be somehow limiting myself or restricting myself by identifying myself as Jewish in so public a way-- and also, potentially, setting myself up to be viewed either negatively or exclusively as "Jewish."

But I have to say, I don't think that's all that likely. The people I live and work with are supposed to be exemplars of tolerance, and if the mere act of visibly identifying with my heritage and identity winds up stirring up latent antisemitism, I'd rather have that be out in the open than not. It seems incredibly backwards to use the specter of possible abuse or discrimination as a rationale to avoid identifying with your culture, and again, I don't know whether to place the majority of this hostility on my father's personal baggage or his generational experience of not going against the grain (even as he claims to be oh-so-counter-cultural).

I don't see why the onus should be on Jews or Sikhs or anyone else to hide who they are, "or else." Amazingly, when I speak about this with my father, the burden always gets placed on me as if I'm inviting trouble by merely putting a kippah on-- "Why would you want to do that to yourself?" he always asks, as if my goal is to be mistreated, as if a kippah is a legitimate stand-in for a kick-me sign. He's also said, "You don't need to rub people's face in it!" To me, the subtext to all this is, "Do you need to be so damn JEWISH?", as I'm proposing dressing up like a Hasid. (To be fair, I did do that for Halloween one year as a kid-- the costume was recycled from my Amish costume the year before. I know, I like beards.)

I'm not sure he'll ever understand that for me, this growth process is somewhat akin to coming out-- it's part of wanting to be comfortable in my own skin and finding my own way of expressing myself and who I am. And I think there's something very wrong when your basic message to people, be they kids or adults, is, "Why can't you be yourself like everyone else?"

Frustration does not equal Conversion

I like to consider myself pretty open-minded. By which I mean that though I have some deeply held opinions when it comes to things like religion or politics, I try to be open to other points of view, if only to understand where folks are coming from (this could be related to why I spend so much time reading Orthodox blogs or why most presents I buy for my wife are memoirs of people growing up in eclectic religious groups).

So it's been interesting during this electoral cycle to hear the Republican party and its mouthpieces going on about how many of their elusive voter demographics they're supposedly going to bag this time.

I won't lie, as a liberal late 20-something I have plenty of reasons to not be very happy with Obama-- there are social, military and foreign policy areas where he's made promises he hasn't kept, the economy still isn't very good, and perhaps most galling to the youth vote, has proven himself to be just as corruptible by the game of politics as anyone else.

So yes, young people, especially those still politically engaged, are definitely annoyed, which is where folks like JustNew Productions come in. The company, run by two quasi-recent college graduates, has gotten a lot of attention for a Gotye parody video focusing on the various ways Obama has disappointed them.

I watched the video and couldn't fault them for their opinions, in fact I share a lot of them. However what's curious about cases like the "Obama that I used to Know" video is how fundamentally Republicans seem to be misreading it.

In this clip, a Fox News lady tries to present the filmmakers not only as deeply dissatisfied but also a symptom of how youth voters are so fed up with Obama they're potentially ready to go run to join the Republicans. However if you look at the lyrics of their song (or watch the interview, where they seem bemused by the tone of the questions and framing by the news anchor), their big problem seems to be not only that Obama isn't doing enough to help them economically, but also that he hasn't lived up to the image he presented to young, mostly liberal voters. These kids are annoyed with Obama's hypocrisy about not closing Guantanamo and discomfited by the fact that he is simultaneously a Nobel Peace Prize winner and has been using predator drones for assassinations. They want to relax drug laws and enforcement, and seem to not be fans of Sarah Palin. They're mad about a lack of results in the economy, but also that Obama hasn't lived up to the foreign and domestic policy he promised them. That's a far cry from wanting to go over to the Republican party-- they don't want to elect Romney, they want Obama of 2012 to start acting like the Obama of 2008! The Republicans can't-- or won't-- comprehend that these kids, and many more like them, aren't disaffected moderates whose votes are "in play," they're pissed off liberals who want Democrats to start living up to the values they keep campaigning on.

Furthermore, by misreading people like the filmmakers, the Republicans are demonstrating that they don't seem to understand what makes people become Democrats. No matter how much the Republican party tries to rebrand itself, no matter how many open-minded college students claim that they don't care about social issues anymore and they want a big tent, when the rubber hits the road, the present-day GOP still has a social platform, and on many issues, it is in stark contrast to many young people's positions. Reporters have described Romney's pick of Ryan as "reframing" the election along ideological lines; the reality is that for people paying attention, it has always been about ideological lines-- specifically, red lines. No matter how much people may dislike behavior by members or leaders of their party, absent better choices, they will probably stick with them rather than vote for a person-- or a party-- who they disagree with even more. That's just human nature.

While young people may have economic opinions (and certainly are affected by economic policy, as they're discovering), my impression is that economic issues alone don't drive many people's votes-- young or old. It's the constellation of other issues, foreign, domestic, and social, that people have more emotional and visceral  investment in. Unless the GOP becomes a radically different party within my lifetime, I am fairly confident that I will never vote for a Republican candidate-- because even if I agreed with them on certain issues, the social values of their party are so fundamentally opposed to my own that it would be a betrayal of my other principles to do so.

In my opinion, this same phenomenon can be applied to the Jewish vote. Republicans (especially Republican Jews) don't like to hear it, but long as a majority of American Jews still believe in liberal politics, especially on social issues, there's no way the Republicans will get the Jewish vote. That may change over time as shifting demographics alter the political landscape, but until most Jews are right-wing Orthodox, it's not going to happen.


Whether you attribute it to naiveté, personality, life experience, or something else, if people believe in liberal values, the fact that liberals aren't living up to their names isn't going to make them vote Republican. It may disappoint them enough that they stop voting entirely (which I suppose is a net win for the other side), but more likely they will hold their nose and cast their vote for what, in their mind, is the lesser of two evils-- like everyone else has been doing for a long time.

Pundits can argue and campaigns can spin all they want; if Republicans think frustrated liberals (not moderates) are going to come out and vote for Romney, they're the ones who are naive.

Kippah Updates

When my family found out I was contemplating wearing my kippah full-time, they were not on board. Their primary concern was that I would "stand out" too much at my new job-- Abbot Yid kept saying, "especially since you didn't wear one at the interview!"-- as if me showing up with one would somehow be seen as some sort of bait and switch. I've finally decided to not wear one at school, at least to start,  to have one less thing to be self-conscious of (making them pipe down about it is a nice side benefit, though).

Still, that doesn't mean I can't start wearing one more in my free time. I haven't made any mental rules yet, but I've started wearing them intermittently at my parents' house and out in public, like to the movies. Mama Yid doesn't seem to really care, Abbot Yid can't seem to not comment on it. The latest one came as I was driving him and Deacon home:

"What I don't get is that you're not even religious!"

"Why do you say that? What religious litmus test do I fail?"

"Well you've admitted to me previously that you're not sure you believe in God."

"And?"

"So why would you want to wear a yarmulke and identify yourself as a religious Jew?"

"Well I don't see it as claiming religiosity as much as identity."

"Well I just don't get it."

"I know."

At this point I've progressed beyond being irritated by it, mostly because I know it's not specifically about me as much as it is a bunch of internal factors: first, there's Abbot's baggage with/ignorance of Judaism. There's also a generational issue( in Abbot's day, wearing a yarmulke was a specific religious identifier, and my post-modern take on it doesn't really compute for him), as well as his professional background, coming from the corporate world of the 80s and 90s where it was potentially controversial for him to even have a beard (apparently he always interviewed clean-shaven and would only "sneak" his beard in after his first few months).

I know he's coming from a good place, and as long as I remember that-- and refuse to be bothered by the side comments-- we should be fine. 

Some sad parallels

The Bet Shemesh culture clash that's been occurring off-and-on for the past year has been pretty upsetting to watch and read about. While my usual reaction to such stories is to jump on the Haredi-bashing wagon, at this point, hearing about all the negative interactions between the communities, I'm filled less with disgust and more with pity. It's so tremendously sad that these two groups of Orthodox Jews seem to not have enough common ground to coexist, and it adds to the pessimism many people have about the ultimate direction of Israeli culture as well as Jewish diversity and tolerance.

The Bet Shemesh mess is in particularly sad contrast to the book I just finished, The Jew in the Lotus, which while now rather dated (the events in it took place over a few weeks in 1990, which I never considered "a long time ago" until I did some math), radiates with warmth and love as it describes the various dialogues that occurred (both between Jews and Buddhists as well as between Jews and Jews) during a trip by a Jewish delegation to the Dalai Lama to explain the "secret of surviving Diaspora." The author, Rodger Kamenetz, goes into the visit rather jaded and comes out of it filled with, if not specifically hope for Jewish revival, then at least a great deal of respect and passion for the multiplicities of practice and philosophy within Judaism, represented by the individual participants in the Jewish delegation, who ran the gamut from Yitz and Blu Greenberg to Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. It's tragic to go from reading about different Jews gently disagreeing but still clearly respecting each other to hearing about the latest installment of craziness from Bet Shemesh. Though the school protests seem to have stopped, the war on women (or should I say females, as it includes little girls) seems to be ongoing.

Reading about Bet Shemesh, and especially watching the videos focusing on the Haredi crowds who would congregate near the Orot school, made me think of a similar flashpoint ten years ago in the Ardoyne area of Belfast, where Protestant crowds blockaded a Catholic girls' school and harassed the students trying to get in or come out. This led to a twice-daily running of the gauntlet by the girls and their parents, often with police acting as buffers, just to get them in to school. If you watch some of the videos, the hatred and hostility-- directed towards children-- is pretty disturbing.

That for me is what Bet Shemesh really comes down to. It's one thing to have ideological disputes. It's even ok to have very heated arguments. But when you decide that you have no common ground, no common language, no starting-place for discussion and need to take to the street-- and particularly when, as at Holy Cross, you are targeting, and effectively abusing, young children, there is a serious problem, a problem with leadership, as well as culture.

This isn't to say that there may not be two sides to the Bet Shemesh issue, as there were in Ardoyne. But there need to be some basic lines drawn when it comes to what is legitimate discourse and what isn't. Harassing children most definitely isn't, and I hope, hope, hope, that in ten years' time when Na'ama Margolis is interviewed by Israeli TV, she and her classmates don't show the same signs of PTSD as the Holy Cross girls do.

Overcoming Embarassment

Am I the only one who has a hard time admitting when they don't know something?

Growing up I was always considered the family scholar because I could be readily counted on to provide some sort of quip or connection to nearly any topic. The flip side of this, though, was that like many autodidacts, my depth of my knowledge was limited to my select areas of personal interest. History? Religion? Judaism? Genealogy? Check. At one point I even used a Scottish craft magazine to memorize tartans and triumphantly called them out when we would drive past them in the car (my time likely would have been better spent studying subjects I was actually tested on in school, but that's why hobbies are hobbies).

The downside of this, however, was that as I got older, I got progressively more uncomfortable admitting when something was beyond my grasp, or simply not very familiar. With my family I would usually admit it, sometimes pseudo-proudly ("What do you mean you don't know how many ounces are in a cup?"), but with people I didn't know very well, I would usually just pretend. Even now, my usual fall-back when someone makes some sort of art or literary reference I don't know is not to say, "Never heard of it," but rather, "I think I've heard of that somewhere..."

This wouldn't be such a big deal except that there are significant life skills that I wish I had acquired much earlier and am now struggling to catch up on. For instance, driving a car. Growing up in a city with good public transportation (and not much sprawl), driving seemed entirely unnecessary, and since it also seemed a little dangerous, was something I decided to avoid until I absolutely had to learn it. Hence me going many years without even getting my license, much less regularly practicing with a car. With my new job I will be commuting around 40 miles a day on the highway, so the past month has been devoted to practicing the route with whoever will put up with me, usually Mama Yid. Usually it goes fine but when things foul up, my first reaction, after fear and anger, is shame. It's humiliating that this is so hard and that it's taken me so long to get to it. It's not made any easier by the fact that Abbot Yid has very little understanding about why this is so challenging for me. Frequently his response to me saying something like, "I still haven't figured out parallel parking," or, "I'm not comfortable driving at night yet," is, "Well you're going to need to figure it out!" Yes, I got that, thanks for the help.

I think I see a similar connection to trying to learn Hebrew. Again, it's a skill that under different circumstances I would have learned much earlier, but due to various factors (including parental inertia/indifference), never happened. So now it's up to me and Mrs. Yid to make it happen. When we're on our own we're usually ok-- one of the things we've started doing regularly on Shabbat is using our Alef-Bet flashcards and are slowly working our way towards deciphering words-- but when we're at shul, it's hard to not care about what other folks might be thinking. When I go to minyan and have to flip around because I'm using a transliterated prayer book, or go up for an aliyah and botch it because it's only my fifth time saying one... it's hard. I feel like I should be able to do this, and I'm frustrated that I didn't start earlier so I could have ten years of driving practice by now, or twenty years of Hebrew practice. I'll also admit that it's been a while since I had to learn brand-new skills or struggle do to things that I wasn't already competent in. Usually my response to not being able to do something well is to stop doing it. Here, though, that's not an option-- or should I say, it's no longer an acceptable option. (Which I suppose is a bit of personality development that's been a long time coming.)

I know that in the end being frustrated or embarrassed won't get me where I want to be. Rather than focus on what didn't happen in the past, I need to use the negative feelings as increased motivation to stick with these new skills and develop them to where I want them to be.

One reason we're not Orthodox: Feminism

It's hard being in the middle of the road. Especially when people don't understand why you're there. My parents look at me and my wife and the fact that we "do religion" at all and assume that we're one step away from joining a Hasidic cult (to be fair, my grandfather did set precedence here). Meanwhile, Ortho folks online have pointed out that if I want to start keeping some mitzvot, I should be following normative halachic standards for doing so.

So at some point in the future, I will write a mega-post on all the ways and reasons why Mrs. Yid and I can't be Orthodox. For today, we'll just focus on one big one: Feminism.

Mrs. Yid and I are feminists, which I define as, "Women and men should be able to have the same privileges and autonomy." (I asked Mrs. Yid for her one-sentence definition and she just gave me a glare.) As such, Judaism's traditional gender roles are somewhat problematic-- not because gender roles in of themselves are always bad, per se, but rather because in maintaining those roles and boundaries within the context of a modern society, a lot of negative tools are often used-- such as guilt, coercion, or threats-- to keep people in line.

I also realize that there are areas where reasonable people can disagree on this issue. For instance, while I have no interest in praying in a men's section and my wife having to pray in a women's section, I acknowledge that some people-- men and women-- get something out of it, and depending on the parameters of this arrangement, assuming that the women are actually being treated respectfully in a manner that they're comfortable with-- could potentially be ok with. But while it's one thing to say that, per your halachic understanding, women can't be counted for a minyan (partnership minyans, while not without their own problems, have been a creative solution to this particular issue), it's crossing another line entirely when you say that if a woman is simply present without a mechitza, the entire minyan becomes invalidated. I'm sorry, that's when my tentative respect for halacha meets the road and I have to go with my fleeting secular values.

Part of my biggest problem is that seems that a lot of what goes on in Orthodox gender dynamics (both in and out of shul) has much less to do with halacha and much more to do with exerting control over people, and that really rubs me the wrong way.

Case in point: the 2012 Siyum celebrating the completion of the 7-year-Talmud study cycle. Check out the way the organizer and reporter work in the women's angle.

About 20 percent of the people in attendance will be women, said Rabbi Shlomo Gertzulin, executive vice president for administration at Agudah, and the Siyum's chief coordinator. They will sit in upper tier seats and be hidden by a 12-foot-high mechitzah, a partition to separate men and women, fashioned from four tiers of curtain at a cost of $250,000. At 2.5 linear miles, it is the largest mechitzah ever created, says the organization. Women will watch the proceedings from behind the partition, on huge video screens. 

 Michelle Huttler Silver, a modern-Orthodox professional photographer, will be one of those women. She has studied Talmud in the past, though not as part of the Daf Yomi. "The fact that we can fill up not just this stadium, but so many places in the world, to celebrate the completion of Talmud is amazing," she said in an interview. "So many people uniting for the same cause is really the beauty of the event."

I's nice that some of these women don't have an issue with having to sit behind a tarp and watch the event that they're attending on TV, but how is it that no one has a problem with Agudah treating 18,000 frum women as if they were lepers? The tickets were sold for over $50 each, and the women knew they were going to be in their own section. Can't you assume they'll be dressed appropriately? Why the need to surround them in a tent? I know the genders are supposed to be separate during prayer and you shouldn't hear a woman sing, but when did this turn into, "Thou shalt never see a woman, ever!" Also, how big of an issue would it be for people to see a woman from across a stadium? Are Talmud scholars ordering X-ray glasses now? Wouldn't you think they'd be busy looking at the stage full of illustrious rabbis? And what kind of reporter, after hearing something like that, just parrots the fact that, "Wow, this mechitza is the biggest ever, and cost a ton of money!" Think of how much good that money could do if you put it towards charity, or even sponsoring more Torah study. And instead you pulled an Ashcroft. Go you, Agudah.

But it's not just the Haredi community that's on board the modesty train. Haaretz ran a column by a Modern Orthodox woman who also thinks that modesty is the best thing since sliced kugel. For your reading pleasure, I tied up Mrs. Yid and forced her to read it with me:

The other day, during a meeting at a coffee shop, I showed the producer I was meeting with a newspaper article about my latest Haredi film. The movie, intended for viewing by women only, had recently premiered at the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival. Suddenly a man at the next table barged into the conversation, launching into a scathing diatribe: "These Haredim don't serve in the army and they live off government money! And this insanity about not hearing women sing is primitive. They're crazy!"

Me: Why is her film for women only? Would it be immodest for men to see it? I'm confused.


Mrs. Yid: I like how this screenwriter is so talented she had to pad her article with this random guy interrupting her. Tell me more of this pointless lead-in! What were you eating at the coffee shop? Was it a scone?

For those of us steeped in modernity, it is often impossible to see beyond the seductive bubble of popular culture. I wanted to tell this man that the headlines from Israel that had so enraged him, sensationalizing events perpetrated by extremists, were eliciting vicious and unwarranted attacks against all religious Jews, resulting in the proverbial baby thrown out with the dirty bathwater.

Me: Yes, the wackjobs in those stories were extremists, but it's an extreme example of the inherent problem in a culture that comes to value modesty over dignity. And you can bash modernity's "seduction" all you want, but that's not the same as actually making an argument for why modesty is important, much less good.

Mrs. Yid: Also, I think it's legitimate to be irritated with people not pulling their weight, especially when you're surrounded by other people that want to squish you.

Some 20 years ago, while a rising theater and film director, I experienced a profound sense of cognitive dissonance in my world. On the one hand, I yearned for spiritual meaning, inner wholeness and a lasting relationship, yet I was bombarded with advertising images depicting female beauty as utterly flawless and female pop stars performing sexually explicit acts peddled as women's liberation. The feminist in me wondered: What's wrong with this picture?

Mrs. Yid: Apparently the feminist in you is nuts. Yes, giving people freedom causes some people to go to extremes. What were you saying about throwing out babies with bathwater?

Me: If she's so well-versed in the entertainment industry, shouldn't she be aware of how much BS is involved in those female images and be better able to ignore them?

Mrs. Yid: I've noticed that when housewives wash their dishes on TV, everything is spotless and gets cleaned up really fast. Clearly I'm doing it wrong! Cue crippling self-doubt about my womanly worth!

Most of my female friends weren't married and many, under the duress of sexual permissiveness, had suffered pointless affairs and abortions, scarring them ineradicably. Upon further reflection, it became clear that the insidious force behind prevailing trends was a multibillion-dollar industry whose sole intention was to send us out to shop in the hope of remedying our gross inadequacies.

Mrs. Yid: Everyone is out to sell something, including rabbis. If you don't like it, don't do it. Use your brain. I mean, it's just as much within your rights to pick OJ as hippie-dom, but they also don't seem to have a lot of body issues without all the accompanying guilt complexes about tznius.

Me: Yeah, she's still just talking about how bad "society" is without explaining why people should specifically go the religious route, much less Orthodox Judaism. It sounds like all you really need is to turn your TV off.

While seeking to transcend this toxic cultural climate, I had an opportunity to step into the mysterious and remote world of Haredi Jews.

Me: I like how she describes them like a lost tribe. Or like she's on safari. And here I thought only heretical liberal Jews like me were shallow enough to do that.

I appreciated that tzniut (Jewish laws of modesty ) shifted focus from the body to the person, from objectifying and sexualizing women to valuing inner beauty. Though I didn't own a long skirt, I saw these ancient concepts as a refreshingly counterculture expression of female dignity and, ironically, I decided it was time to go shopping.

Mrs. Yid: So, it turns the focus onto the person, by which we mean that if you show half-an-inch too much leg you get tomatoes thrown at you? Sorry, that's extremist. Ok, what if I wear a too-flashy gray sweater? Surely I won't get any yentas carping on about how I'm tramping up the community and not keeping the mitzvah, right? Oh wait.

Me: Tell me more about how unsexualized women are. From behind the giant curtain I made so I don't have to look at you, you super-respected bunch of Eshetot Chayil!

True, many Haredi traditions were more difficult to understand. I remember a Shabbat kiddush where the women sat in the kitchen while the men occupied the dining room. I bristled at first, but then realized how much I loved the warmth and holiness I experienced. I unexpectedly began to see virtues in gender separation. In my Hollywood world, where Jen's husband, Brad, goes off to make a sexy movie with Angelina and never comes home again, it doesn't take a genius to see that glamorizing society's lack of gender boundaries doesn't promote healthy marriages or family values.

Me: And teaching your daughters they belong in the kitchen promotes great values, right? 

Mrs. Yid: Gender separation makes sense for High-school bathrooms. Having a random dinner conversation, not so much. What holy things are the men talking about that might be ruined by having ladies around? Also, the fact that you feel warm and fuzzy hanging with your girlfriends is not a good argument for why you shouldn't be allowed to be in the same room when "guy-talk" is happening. Plenty of ladies have spa days or girls' night out, what they don't do is decide they can't be in the dining room when men are present "just in case" they have an affair. Take some damn responsibility, lady!

True intimacy, as Torah tells us, can only be built on a foundation of inviolable trust. A Haredi woman would be horrified if her actions or appearance were to attract another woman's husband. I could embrace such sensitivity.

Me: Why is it a woman's fault if the man is attracted to her? Her job should not be to spend her life running away from potential horn-dogs. Even if we accept the premise that men are incurable sex fiends, isn't it the goal of Torah to refine the human spirit? How about putting more strictures on the MEN so they can elevate themselves above their animal instincts?

Mrs. Yid: You know, it's not very feminist of this lady to support controlling other ladies' lives and behavior to avoid tempting men. If you really want to avoid husbands being attracted, just blindfold them. Stop playing into the idea that anything a woman does is an invitation for sex. You taking dinner out of the oven does not equal, "Hey Avram! Check out my tuchus!"

Can Haredi culture go overboard in its quest for modesty? When women are denied a voice or when intimidation is used to hinder critical thinking, there is a problem.

Mrs. Yid: Like when you don't let women participate in conferences about women's issues? Like that?

And assaulting women, either physically or verbally, in the guise of enforcing tzniut is unconscionable. As Adina Bar Shalom, daughter of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, recently asserted, "The exclusion of women from the public domain violates Torah. Halakha treats women with the utmost respect."

Me: I sense a "No True Scotsman" here.

Mrs. Yid: What about agunot? Halacha seems pretty biased against women there.

Me: I would be able to take this "That's not real Halacha" argument more seriously if the Modern Orthodox community was aggressively standing up for the rights of its women and advocating to give them the widest possible latitude as permissible by halachic standards. Instead we get dog-piling on Orthodox liberals like Avi Weiss, a lot of sliding to the Haredi right and a small and not very vocal centrist group that acknowleges this stuff is crazy but doesn't seem to have any idea how to combat it.

On a recent trip of mine to Crown Heights, Brooklyn, Rebbetzin Dusia Rivkin recounted to me a visit to her son, a Chabad emissary in New Orleans. At their Shabbat table sat several colorful, non-Orthodox students from Tulane University. Mrs. Rivkin, appalled by their unseemly conversations, voiced concern about the negative impact on her young grandchildren. Rabbi Rivkin responded, "The Lubavitcher Rebbe promised that if I took care of his children, he would take care of mine." Mrs. Rivkin, regretful of her judgmental attitude, understood that it was incumbent upon Haredim to impart the beauty of Torah, especially to those who have never experienced it.

Me: First, how actually "colorful" or "unseemly" was this conversation? Were these kids swearing or talking about drinking, drugs or sex in front of little kids? Or were they, chas v'shalom, talking about a lady professor wearing pants? Wait, was it unseemly because they mentioned Jews going to university? Because that's kind of not their fault. Second, assuming they were actually being rude in front of the shaliach's kids, this stuff can be avoided if you establish respectful boundaries ahead of time-- or do some thinking and determine that maybe you don't want your nine year old to have Shabbat dinner with frat boys, Jewish or otherwise. Also, how is the ghost-rebbe going to protect these children? Sounds kind of creepy?

Mrs. Yid: How are lady Haredim going to impart the beauty of Torah to others when they're deliberately shut out from educational opportunities? And how are dudes going to be able to impart the beauty of Torah to women if they're dressed inappropriately? Unless they're religious Muslims, of course, but that might be a hard sell.

Orthodox Judaism is a treasure trove, but it's the middle road, what King Solomon called "the path of pleasantness," that doesn't impose strictures on others or reject those with differing views. This is what will inspire the world toward a more civilized and harmonious future.

Me: Not to be mean, ma'am, but you're no King Solomon. If you want to try to convert people (religiously or just rhetorically), you have to actually talk about why your way is good, not just why theirs is awful.

Mrs. Yid: Doesn't impose strictures on others? What Orthodox Judaism are you looking at? Your cheerful rainbow umbrella is not an umbrella. It's a series of shoeboxes where you define everybody in it by what kind of skirt they wear.

On this one, it's Liberals: 1, Orthodox: 0. If you think I'm wrong or off-base, feel free to tell me in the comments.

Someone might want to take some notes

Culture clashes are hard, and symbolism and iconography can be particularly tricky, especially when emotionally-charged political issues are involved.

When I was in High School I had occasion to go to Washington D.C. The purpose of the program was to get students from different political backgrounds to meet each other and have some conversations, and looking back on it, I think that was a valuable goal. That said, it didn't always work out. Me and my nine classmates were the only liberals in the hotel out of 400 students. Many of them had never met a liberal, much less a Jew. I remember at one point someone seriously asked me to explain what a bagel was. As part of that school trip I got to have some, shall we say, interesting discussions with Red-State kids, and it became apparent to me that while liberal blue-staters can sometimes be snide or obnoxious about their beliefs, at least many of them are aware that other points of view exist. They may think they're wrong, they may have simplistic or stereotyped views about their political opponents, but at least they're on their radar. With these kids, it was like we were from another planet.

Case in point: one day after visiting the Vietnam, Lincoln and Korean War memorials, we went back to our hotel and were split into groups and told to design our own memorial-- we were to plan out the cause, the architecture, and the funding.

When it was time for the first group to present, I couldn't believe my eyes. The first thing I saw was a giant cross, flanked by roses with a bunch of small objects ringing its bottom tier. When I looked closer, I realized they were supposed to be basinets. One girl, who earlier had commented that her parents were her greatest heroes for raising her in "a Christian manner," declared that their monument was to all aborted babies, and that their plan was to put a miniature version of the monument in front of every abortion clinic in America. During their presentation, they also passed out pro-life literature they had gotten from a "very articulate" protestor standing in front of the Supreme Court (he had been wearing a Stop sign that he had modified with a magic marker to read "STOP killing babies"). When I glanced at the pamphlets, I noticed they had a picture of a fetus next to a black and white photo of Auschwitz bodies. When the time came to ask questions, I asked them why they would want to alienate non-Christian pro-lifers by using a single religious symbol. "Won't that make them feel not wanted?"

These girls had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. They honestly could not believe that someone would interpret a cross as a symbol of Christianity. "For us, it's not about Jesus, the cross is a universal symbol of Heaven." I replied that without the Christian influence, the cross was just a form of execution and asked them weather they would consider the electric chair a universal symbol of heaven. The teachers didn't appreciate that very much.

I bring this experience up because it seems relevant to the recent brou-ha-ha in Kansas. Apparently a mere eleven years after my bizarre conversation with three girls from Arkansas, some pro-lifers in Wichita have gotten it into their heads to follow up on the fetus shrine (those are their words, by the way) to all aborted babies. Only this time, they've got an even better idea than making it into a giant cross. This time, it's going to be the freaking Western Wall. Or, as the pro-lifers call it, the Wailing Wall (Get it? Because abortion is sad. Brilliant.)

But wait, you might ask. Why would someone do that, and also isn't that stupid? Yes, I know. But try telling that to Pastor Mark Holick, who thinks it's so damn inspiring Jesus may very well come back just to give him a high-five.

[The Western Wall] is a place that memorializes what happened during the Holocaust... Since Roe v. Wade, 60 million baby boys and girls have been murdered, and that is a holocaust unprecedented in the history of mankind.

Okay, A- the Western Wall is not a Holocaust memorial. B- it's not a memorial at all. It's part of an ancient holy site and has been used as a symbol for lots of things, but as far as I know, "Holocaust memorial" has never been one of them. Honestly, how do you get your iconography this wrong? Do we need to have Tom Hanks put on his Robert Langdon suit and slap you a few times?

Also, even when we're actually talking about Holocaust stuff, we still don't like you nutjobs ripping off Holocaust stuff. It's creepy, it's dishonest, it's disrespectful, and it makes you look like dicks, particularly when you insist that you're doing it because you "love" us so much. Why don't you try loving us less and respecting us more, Pastor Mark? Part of respecting someone means listening when they say no. No means no, and we're all saying it, NOOOOOOO.

Oh, sorry, you had something else to add?

We understand that some Jews consider it controversial,” he said of the wall. “It is our hope that it will be of help to the Jewish people, like it is in Israel.”

Uh huh. Here's a tip, Mark. If you want a memorial to be "helpful" to someone, it helps to actually talk to them before you co-opt their stuff for your own grandstanding project. As an example:

A wall modeled on the Western Wall in Jerusalem will stand at the site of the Jewish cemetery in Bilgoraj, in south-eastern Poland. 

The wall, which is being funded by the Isaac Bashevis Singer Association of Bilgoraj, will display the names of Jews who lived in the town.

See, this Jewish cemetery, which has actual significance to Jews, is memorializing some Jews with a symbol of a place that's holy for, that's right, Jews. The town isn't just sticking a ying-yang on there because they think it looks cool and pretending that it "might be helpful" to some Taoists.

For extra awful, check out this wacko's website. Not only is this "National Life Center" going to have the Wailing Wall surrounded by crosses (each one represents a whopping 10 million abortions, now that's value!), apparently there's also another planned statue which has a cross, a "weeping Rachel" (really?) and Jesus holding an aborted child.

Dude, either go to art school or hire someone that actually has some idea what they're doing. You couldn't come up with weirder Judeo-Christian mash-ups if you were trying.

A Sage, not a Saint

Rabbi Elyashiv, the last "great sage" of Haredi Judaism, died today at age 102. While he has been admired by many in the Orthodox world for his integrity and respected for his knowledge and leadership, I don't feel it's quite appropriate to celebrate his life "with a full cup."

As a leader, he was "principled" to a fault, vigorously refusing compromise or accommodation with other communities he disagreed with. In cases where he could have ruled leniently, he quite often decided that the true path to righteousness lay with hardship and difficulty-- for his followers and for many others. As Failed Messiah notes, his tenure as leader of the Haredi world also saw not a few moments of hypocrisy, as well, most notably declaring that it was forbidden for Haredi Jews to donate organs but perfectly kosher for them to accept them. Leah Vincent at Unpious discusses how Elyashiv's positions may have empowered and enabled child abusers in Haredi communities. Anyone who has kept abreast of academic/intellectual freedom in the Haredi world knows how far-reaching Elyashiv's power was when it came to silencing writers like Natan Slifkin or Nathan Kamenestsky. And, of course, under his tenure, the position of Haredi women, particularly in Israel, has deteriorated even further under an epidemic of misogyny masquerading as a concern for modesty.

Reports suggested that he had sacrificed much to become a great sage in his community. He seemed to be estranged from his family and lack personal connections with friends or colleagues. Worst of all, under the pretense of caring and assisting their great rabbi, a group of hangers-on used his name and position to advance their own pet interests and biases, in activities that can only be described as elder abuse as the rabbi's mental and physical state steadily deteriorated.

I would like to admire R. Elyashiv. But the truth is that I feel sorry for him, and his family, and even his followers, who have spent so much time denying any problems with his health (or their community's) that they now seem at a total loss to do anything now that the inevitable has happened.

A sof shalem to Rabbi Elyashiv. And hopes for a chayim shelayim to the ones whose lives he touched-- for good and bad.

Battle of the Tznius Ladies!

Mrs. Yid has been covering her hair since our marriage over a year ago. She has also pretty much stopped wearing pants and usually dresses pretty conservatively. My parents, of course, blame me for all of this and have occasionally accused me of brainwashing my wife-- despite the fact that I never told her, nor for that matter, even asked her, to do any of this. (For the curious, Mrs. Yid says that she likes scarves but under zero circumstances would she ever be interested in a sheitel, half-fall, or a pillbox hat. Frankly, she doesn't even like the idea of lady-not-kippot. On snoods: "They look like a big sock or a saggy butt-diaper on your head.")

Anyway, based on this, I feel qualified to call Mrs. Yid the tznius lady of my local community. Which, as it turns out, is quite convenient, because Garnel recently alerted me to the existence of another tznius lady, Mrs. Ella Lerman, of Chabad in Crown Heights, who has just put out an article high-fiving herself on, well, being the tznius lady. I thought it might be fun to let the two tznius ladies in my life go head-to-head and write down the carnage that follows. Here goes:

I was born in Crown Heights and I have lived here all my life. My husband and I were directed by the Rebbe to stay in Crown Heights after we were married. I have been teaching in Bais Rivkah for over 25 years and now I have a new title. I am the tznius lady. It has taken me a while to say that out loud. Let me try that again with a little more pride. I am the tznius lady. It is hard sometimes, especially when I see people crossing the street when they see me.

Me: Could this be an indication that perhaps you're doing something wrong? No?

I am nervous to be speaking to you tonight. Not only because I am talking to such a large crowd, kein ayin hara, of the Rebbe’s Shluchos, but I am also worried whether I will do justice to this topic. Will I be able to get you to feel the passion that I feel? When I go to speak to principals at our schools, my husband asks me why I am so nervous. I tell him how much is riding on getting people to see how vital tznius is. Are we up to the challenge?

Me: I'd love to know exactly what is riding on the tznius, but unfortunately she never answers.

This may surprise you, but I asked for the job of tznius lady. I told Bais Rivkah that someone needed to stand in front of their doors and tell mothers that they couldn’t enter if they were not dressed according to Jewish law, and I offered to do the job. My family was not excited about this.

Mrs Yid: What a nosey yenta!

Me: I like how she decided there was a problem, she informed the school how big an issue it was (apparently it even violated the ever-straightforward"Jewish law,") and also luckily volunteered to help them out. Now that's just convenient! Also, it sure is lucky that though she's supposedly a teacher at the school, she has enough free-time to be head tznius guard at the front entrance. Maybe they gave her a TA this year?

Many women would get angry at me. They’d yell at me and give me dirty looks (one woman even spat at me). When I was done, I’d sit in my car, shaking and sometimes crying. One woman yelled at me, “How dare you tell me what to wear?”

Me: And yet you remain totally convinced that God has ordained you to be the arbiter of what all Chabad ladies should wear. Interesting.

I answered her calmly, “I dare because I have been employed by Bais Rivkah, so this is my job. Also,” I said, looking her straight in the eye, “if your parent was being disgraced in the streets, would you sit at home and do nothing, or would you be out in the streets to bring back honor to your mother or father? Well, it is my Rebbe, my Rebbe’s community, my Eibershter and my Torah that is being disgraced. I can’t just sit at home!”

First of all, you're employed by the school to teach, not to be tznius lady. This job didn't even exist until you badgered them into creating it, so don't act like your hands are tied. If you retired tomorrow, I am fairly certain they would not be scouring frumy-Craigslist (Chaimslist?) to find a replacement. Second, I'm not sure how "going out in the streets" brings back honor to one's parents. Then again, my parents don't tend to be disgraced in the streets, so... wait, what are we talking about?

Mrs. Yid: I'm pretty sure there's a Torah value related to not embarrassing other people, no? Besides, I'm almost positive this lady was not dressing in a tank top or shorts to go to her daughter's school. Ooh! This lady's tights aren't bulletproof! Scandalous!

I received many calls regarding my new job. Most people were very supportive and even excited that we were taking a stand. Some mothers said, “Can’t you instead motivate the mothers to dress in a tzniusdik manner with speeches and workshops?”

Mrs. Yid: I will concede I am sure there are already enough stupid workshops going around. However, funnily enough, I can believe that women who are no longer in school might let their Torah-fences drop a millimeter or so. Heaven forbid grown women decide what they want to wear out in public and not be hounded by angry camp-mommies! Also, I love that in a conversation about modesty they add "dik" to every word.

Me: I'm very curious about the ratio of calls that congratulated her on "taking a stand" versus people that either told her to stop doing this and play nice, or just cursed her out for humiliating moms just trying to drop their girls off at the damn school.

I explained to them that though all that is very important, the time had come for what I call “Mehn tor nisht, mehn ken nisht, mehn muz nisht.” We should not, we cannot, we must not. It is unacceptable to dress in a non-tzniusdik manner. It is against halachah and it will not be tolerated. When you are boarding a plane, the security personnel don’t say to you, “Let me first tell you about how wonderful it is to be safe from terrorism. Then, if you feel inspired to, you can leave behind your knives and guns.”

Me: Oh good, someone's finally found a non-Hitler version of Godwin's Law. Now the frummies can play, too. Shall we call it Ella's Law or Lerman's Law?

No, these are the rules if you want to board the plane. Of course, learning about the beauty of tznius is important and we want to approach everyone with love. But the time has come to say, “These are the rules; these are the halachos.”

Mrs. Yid: As interpreted by who, what when?

Me: By her, right now. Duh. All hail mighty tznius lady!

Mrs. Yid: No one may disagree with her, ever! Because apparently she can't tell the difference between children under her domain and dress-code from adult women, who may do what they like.

Me: Only until they get within 15 feet of the school door. Then they're on Tznius Lady's turf!

It takes guts and a lot of courage to say something, but when it hurts enough you scream. My job here is to empower you to “say something.” We cannot be silent. Say something to your daughter, your neighbor, your student, yourself. Say it with love and let them see how much you are bothered by what we are doing to Lubavitch.

Mrs. Yid: She's causing people to scream, huh? Sounds very loving to me. Maybe she should carry a cattle prod and just tap people on the offending body part. That way she won't have to strain her voice.

Me: I'm just thinking of how much guts it takes to humiliate random parents under the quasi-authority of the school. Truly, you are the bravest lady in the land. Also, yes, I would love for all these women to use their guts and courage to tell you, (with love) how much they are bothered by what you are doing to Lubavitch. If only.

I spoke to a woman who teaches in one of our schools. I asked her not to wear dark- colored nail polish. She was not happy that I had called her. She said to me, “If you would just stick to the black-and-white areas we wouldn’t have such problems with tznius. It is because you pick on things that are in the grey areas, that’s why we are losing the girls.” I was almost crying. 

I said to her, “Are you telling me that from a teacher in one of the Rebbe’s mosdos I can only ask for the basic halachos of tznius? Are you telling me that the girls in school don’t deserve role models? Do they have to see their mechanchos with very long sheitlach and dark nail polish?” I ask the same of the Shluchos that I ask of the Bais Rivkah teachers, the parents of our students, and Crown Heights residents. You are our teachers, our role models. You are who we aspire to be.

Mrs. Yid: I do not think nail polish is the thing on which any society lives or dies. Also, I love how we maintain identical standards for young girls that we do for adult women. This just doesn't seem right. Their main problem is that their rules are so stupid and restrictive that their girls don't want to follow them. And the mothers and teachers clearly don't, because there are gray areas... which honestly, aren't even that gray! I don't think the tznius lady is going to win this argument.

Me: As a teacher, I have to say I am almost positive that every teacher in this school would love to toss this woman out a window. Like they don't have enough to worry about, what with trying to teach actual material to their students along with all the random brainwashing about how they're nothing more than baby machines and "not obligated" to do anything other than light candles. Now they also have to worry about not corrupting them with their slutty nails. Also, how totally unsurprising that as soon as someone contradicts tznius lady, she bursts into tears. God, I'm happy to not have her as a colleague.

Last year, on the final day of school, a Friday, I was proctoring the 12th graders who were taking their last test. I saw one of my students with the buttons of her shirt open quite low. I knew I had to say something. She is a good student, the daughter of Shluchim, a really nice girl. I started to give myself excuses. “I don’t want to embarrass her. I will speak to her when she comes up to the desk to hand in her test paper.” 

Well, when she put her test in the envelope I didn’t say a word. After all, there were other girls at the desk and I didn’t want to make her feel uncomfortable. 

That Friday night, I dreamt that I saw this student walking in the street with pants on. On Shabbos day, after a Pirkei Avos shiur, I told my friends what had happened and what I learned from it all. I didn’t speak to the girl, not only because I didn’t want to embarrass her, but because I didn’t want to appear not cool. I knew that the girl liked me and I didn’t want her to think of me as an annoying, nagging teacher. 

When we don’t speak up it is because we want to appear hip and cool, G-d forbid.

Mrs. Yid: Nobody thinks she is hip or cool. Ever.

Me: I wanted to do something but I didn't because I'm a weenie and had a vague feeling I shouldn't be a jerk to someone in public! And then, later, I had a dream! And then after that, rather than doing the thing I thought I should do in the first place that actually required me to follow my judgmental convictions, I blabbed about my student behind her back to my friends! Aren't I the best role model ever?

I have asked women who struggle with keeping the halachos of tznius to come to my house dressed in a tzniusdik manner. I have refused to patronize stores in Crown Heights where the saleswomen are dressed in a not-tzniusdik manner... I have decided that it is cool to stick up for your principles!

Mrs. Yid: Fine, you're entitled to shop wherever you want to, though I'm not sure what you're going to wear if the stores in Crown Heights aren't tzniusdik enough for you... I suppose you can shop at some Islamic stores, though you may not enjoy that.

Me: I'm in favor of anything that limits this woman's contact with other people. Boycott everyone, I say! Quick, boycott the school! That will teach all those kids an important lesson!

I often wonder, how did the environmentalists make it so cool to go green? Recycling isn’t glamorous and using cloth diapers can’t be fun. Then I realized, they got celebrities on board and made it popular. The Shluchos are our celebrities. You are creative, devoted and so talented. If you decide to dedicate yourselves to bringing back the pride and dignity to our women and girls, and to restoring the glorious, shining name of Chabad, it will happen.

First, I'm not sure that's how the environmental movement got people to go green. Second, I like that the best role model you can think of for your tznius crusade isn't some authentic Torah-true sage or movement (mussar, maybe?) but those goyishe, earth-worshipping hippy pagan types with their godless Hollywood celebrities. Why do you even know about celebrities? Did someone show you a TV? Are you a BT, Mrs. Ella Lerman, if that is your real name? How do we know you weren't born Eileen, or G-d forbid, Erica?

This is a call to action. It is time to take a stand. When people tell me the terrible things they are seeing in our communities, I tell them, “Don’t tell me the horror stories. Tell me what you are doing about it!” We need to be bold and brave. It requires strength and mesirus nefesh. This is not the battle hymn of the tiger mom, this is the battle cry of the Yiddishe Mamme.

Mrs. Yid: The Battle Whine, maybe.

Me: Again with the Pop Culture! Who let you read the Wall Street Journal? Doesn't sound very tznius to me. Does your rebbe know about this?

I am asking the over 1500 women in this room to stand up. If each one of us makes a decision to dress according to the law and to commit to living a tzniusdik lifestyle, the world will look very different tomorrow.

Mrs. Yid: Right, because if we decide to dress according to the law, we can agree to a few general principles on what needs to be covered. Instead, we have to go according to the guidelines established by random rebbes and Tznius Queens. If everyone made up their own tznius people probably would be happier, though they'd also dress less tznius-- if we take this lady's ideas to their logical conclusion everyone should be walking around wearing a bedsheet, like Charlie Brown in that Halloween episode.

Pictured: The two Tznius Ladies. And the Rock of our Salvation, why not.

Me: Am I the only one unconvinced that 1500 women committing to not wearing dark nail polish is not going to make the world all that different?

So, this is our challenge. When you finish reading this article, what will you do about the terrible chilul Hashem which we are seeing in our neighborhoods? Are you going to say, “Enough, from now on I will make sure that my skirt is covering my knees when I sit, walk and climb the stairs”? Will you be careful with necklines that fall too low and clothes that are too tight? Do we really want to cheapen our beautiful, Torah way of life for a few inches?

Mrs. Yid: You know what would keep knees covered regardless of what you're doing? Pants.

It is time for us to ask our boys’ and girls’ schools to set high and true standards for their students, teachers and parents. Many people do not have a Rav or a mashpia to guide them, but everyone sends their kids to school and they respect the school’s rules. We must demand from anyone who has authority: principals, camp directors, heads of organizations, etc., not to quietly accept and tolerate behavior that goes against halachah.

Mrs. Yid: People don't respect the school's rules! They tolerate the school's rules! Also, if she got her way on skirts, she'd move on to criticizing girls' nail polish for being the wrong shade of tan.

Many people will be reading this article. Will you be the one who will sigh and say, “This is terrible,” and then do nothing? Or will you decide that you can make a difference and take action right away? Our children need us to protect and guard our Yiddishe, chassidishe lifestyle, for them and their children. May we be matzliach and may we have, in abundance, true nachas from our children and grandchildren.

Me: Is "none of the above" an option? Why not?

Mrs. Yid: This is terrible. But I think I like our solution of making fun of her better.

Me: I'm just amazed that this women comes from a shaliach family and yet seems totally unaware of the fact that many shluchim have learned that the best way to motivate people to take on halacha is to not badger or guilt trip them into doing it. I wonder if this is part of the "Crown Heights bubble" I've heard people speak of, how Crown Heights as ground zero of Chabad operates on its own different wavelength and, to a degree, philosophy than the rest of the movement. Anyway, it's rather sad on a number of levels. Also, let's hope none of her granddaughters decide to put on nail polish, or god forbid, go off the derech. They'll probably be nagged to death.