Category Archives: Talmud

Warning: The following contains graphic imagery and language.

Last week, I conducted an informal survey: I asked five Ashkenazi friends and five Iranian-Jewish friends in Los Angeles if they had heard of Kristallnacht, the antisemitic pogrom that occurred in Germany in 1938. All of them said yes.

I then asked if they had heard of the Farhud, a deadly pogrom against Iraqi Jews during June 1-2, 1941, in which hundreds were murdered and raped. Out of ten friends in Los Angeles, nine of them had not heard of the Farhud.

And then, a strange thing happened: I asked ten friends in Israel if they had ever heard of the Farhud, given that hundreds of thousands of Israelis have grandparents or great-grandparents of Iraqi Jewish descent. Nine of them also responded that they didnt know what it was.

Im not an Iraqi Jew (Im a neighboring cousin from Iran), but as of the 81st anniversary of the Farhud last week, Im on a mission to expose as many Jews and non-Jews to the atrocities that were committed against this once-vibrant community as a result of a heinous combination of Muslim antisemitism and Nazi propaganda.

The Farhud (pogrom in Arabic) occurred in Baghdad during the Jewish holiday of Shavuot. Muslim Iraqi mobs screamed Cutal al yehud (Slaughter the Jews!) and butchered nearly 200 Jews (some estimate that number is closer to 1,000). Hundreds were raped; over 1,000 were injured and over 900 homes were destroyed. The Farhud was the closest Iraqi Jews came to experiencing their own mini version of a genocide. One thing is certain: Jews who survived the Farhud were traumatized for the rest of their lives.

Shortly before the Farhud, assailants had compiled a list of Jewish homes and businesses. Jewish leaders begged local authorities for mercy, but to no avail. Jews were beheaded; Jewish babies were slaughtered (some Jewish family threw their babies over rooftops, hoping they would be caught in blankets below to save them); murderers waived severed limbs and other body parts, including in one case, the breast of a young Jewish woman (who had been raped). Perpetrators raped Jewish girls at a local school. Six girls were actually abducted to a village nine miles away.

Learning about the Farhud is not for those with weak stomachs. But here are some key facts about this dark moment in the history of Middle Eastern Jewry that everyone should know:

Nazism Found An Enthusiastic Partner In Arab Nationalism

The Middle East and North Africa were an enormous hub of Nazi activity, and that included actual SS boots on the ground (particularly as far as Nazi masterminds who collaborated with Egyptian leaders were concerned). Many of us have seen the infamous 1941 photo of Palestinian leader Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, in conversation with Adolf Hitler.

Hundreds of Libyan Jews starved to death in Italian-controlled Libya during the Holocaust; most Jews in Cyrenaica were sent to the Jado concentration camp (250 kilometers south of Tripoli). Hundreds were sent to camps in Europe. The Nazis had a long-term strategy for the Middle East, and that included propagandizing Berlin as a friend of downtrodden Muslims everywhere. If they could successfully align with fanatics in the region, Nazi leaders surmised, they might convince jihadists to actually fight Germanys enemies (beyond Jews).

Before the Farhud, the Nazis began to broadcast Radio Berlin in Arabic throughout the Arab and Muslim world. Hitlers Mein Kampf was not only translated into Arabic, but printed in a local Baghdad newspaper, thanks to Fritz Grobba, Germanys charge daffaires in Baghdad. In 1933, he bought Al-Alem Al Arabi (a Christian Iraqi paper) and published Arabic translations of Mein Kampf in installments.

Whereas the Nazis had Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend), Iraq created the Futtuwa, a pre-military youth movement that was active in the 1930s and 1940s. These youth attended the Nazi rally in Nuremberg in 1938; when they returned home, they popularized a chant in Arabic: Long live Hitler, the killer of insects and Jews.

For further information on Nazi activity in the Middle East, I recommend reading Nazis, Islamists, and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Barry Rubin and Wolfgang G. Schwanitz (Yale University Press, 2014).

Where Theres Anti-Zionism, Jews Will Always Be Killed

Im particularly fascinated by one aspect of the Farhud thats worth sharing: In 1941, seven years before the establishment of the modern State of Israel (which antisemites continue to use as justification for isolating, defaming and attacking Jews today), Muslim Iraqis who led the pogroms accused Iraqi Jews of being Zionist sympathizers in the conflict between Jews and Arabs in then-Mandatory Palestine. They also accused Iraqi Jews of working with the British in colonizing Iraq. Does any of this sound familiar? Im reminded of post-revolutionary Iran (1979-today), whose regime identifies Zionism as a capital offense. Maybe thats why every few months, theres a story about a Jewish leader in Iran denouncing Israel publicly or proudly attending an anti-Israel rally.

Heres the worst part about Iraqs history of violent antisemitism today: Whereas other Arab countries, including the former behemoth of Arab nationalism, Egypt, have made peace with Israel, two weeks ago, Iraqs Parliament passed a law criminalizing relations with the Zionist entity. Anyone who violates this new law, including businessmen, faces life imprisonment or even the death sentence. The government said it was only reflecting the will of the people. Hundreds gathered in Tahrir Square (yes, it shares its name with the famous Tahrir Square from Egypts 2011 revolution) in central Baghdad to celebrate the passing of the law.

Hows that for progress 81 years after the country shamefully allowed for the mass slaughter of its ancient Jewish population in Baghdad? Even the regime in Iran had the decency to criminalize Zionism over 40 years ago, rather than today.

For The Last Time, Jews Are Not White.

I can nearly guarantee that certain American celebrities who believe that the Holocaust was a white-on-white crime dont know that Nazism spread its hideous tentacles throughout the Middle East.

I can nearly guarantee that certain American celebrities who believe that the Holocaust was a white-on-white crime dont know that Nazism spread its hideous tentacles throughout the Middle East. Ive also never believed that Jews are white (if thats the case, why are we the target of white supremacists?), but I challenge anyone who weaponizes race against Jews by calling us white and privileged to see photos of brown-skinned Iraqi Jews running out of their destroyed homes in 1941 and screaming in horror, and to tell me that these Jews are white (or privileged).

And then, theres the deeply offensive and untruthful argument that Israel ethnically-cleanses Palestinians. Do you know which once-thriving Jewish population was actually driven out completely from the Arab Middle East? Iraqi Jews. And if you want to get technical, Libyan Jews. And Syrian Jews. And Yemenite Jews.

Three to five Jews remain in Iraq, from a former population of over 135,000 before the Farhud (including 90,000 who lived in Baghdad). Forty or so Jews remain in Syria; while six Jews are still in Yemen. These are estimates and some of the numbers might actually be smaller.

Not a single Jew remains in Libya. Im not a mathematician, but something about that wreaks of ethnic cleansing.

Anyone who knows even minimally about Jewish history knows that modern-day Iraq was one of the most important epicenters of Jewish learning. The Babylonian Talmud was completed there, and Jews have had a continuous presence in the region since they were brought there as captives after the Babylonians conquered the Kingdom of Judea in the sixth-century BCE. That means that for nearly 3,000 years, Jews lived in present-day Iraq. Again, only three to five Jews remain there today.

The Farhud not only marked the beginning of a mass exodus of Iraqi Jews from the country, but tragically, it also marked the end of an ancient Jewish community.

The Farhud not only marked the beginning of a mass exodus of Iraqi Jews from the country, but tragically, it also marked the end of an ancient Jewish community.

I shouldnt have been surprised that my Israeli friends had not heard of the Farhud. A recent poll found that half of Israelis that were polled knew about Kristallnacht; only seven percent had ever heard of the Farhud. That, in itself, is another tragedy.

For more information on the Farhud, read Edwin Blacks The Farhud Roots of the Arab-Nazi Alliance in the Holocaust (Dialog Press, 2010).

Tabby Refael is a Los Angeles-based writer, speaker, and civic action activist. Follow her on Twitter @TabbyRefael

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Have You Ever Heard of the Farhud? - Jewish Journal

What does it mean to join the people of Israel? This question takes on pressing urgency now as the State of Israel takes in tens of thousands of refugees from Ukraine, some with Jewish mothers, some with only Jewish fathers, some who converted or want to convert, others non-Jews seeking safety until the fighting ends. The complexity of Israels national immigration law, including the relevant-as-ever Law of Return, overlaps uneasily with traditional Halacha, resulting in confusion and bureaucratic hurdles for hundreds of thousands of people. Our current countdown toward the Shavuot reading of the Book of Ruth coinciding with the Daf Yomi study of the locus classicus of conversion laws in the Talmud offers a perfect opportunity to untangle the historical strands of the laws of conversion and gain a better perspective of both the current predicament and possible solutions.

How did one join the nation of Israel during biblical times? As a sovereign kingdom in a land defined by borders, conversion in early Israel meant immigrating and naturalizing as a citizen. The first requirement would be to live in the land of Israel, just as modern countries require residence for citizenship. A foreigner who has come only for a visit or a temporary stay received the title of nokhri (foreigner) and was treated like any member of a foreign nation (Deuteronomy 14:21, 15:3, and 17:15). However, immigrants who have come to live permanently in Israel gained the status of toshav or ger, literally a dweller or resident. These individuals had a right to receive gifts to the poor (Leviticus 19:10, 23:22, 25:35-36), could not be forced to work on Shabbat (Exodus 20:10, 23:12), and were provided special protection against usury, abuse, and injustice (Exodus 22:20, 23:9, Leviticus 19:33-34, Deuteronomy 24:17) on account of their vulnerability as poor newcomers lacking alliances and family networks. They were invited to celebrate national holidays (Leviticus 16:29, Deuteronomy 16:14) and, if they agreed to circumcise, could even partake of the Passover sacrifice (Exodus 12:48), a defining ritual that indicated affiliation with the Israelite people.

The requirement of circumcision for men in order to marry into Israelite families can be derived from the offer by Jacobs sons to the Shechemites. But other than that, the Bible legislates no formal procedure. GerimJews by choice, or proselyteswould simply become indistinguishable after they lost their accents and married into local communities. The finest model for this process was Ruth, who was still considered a Moabite while living outside of Israel, even though married to a Judahide there. Her move to Judea, however, made her marriageable even to a respected landowner like Boaz, which eventually made her the foremother of King David. Ruths inspiring declaration to her mother-in-law encapsulates the transformative significance of her journey: Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried (Ruth 1:16-17).

Jumping forward several centuries and two Temple destructions later, the Talmudic sages find themselves scattered throughout the Roman and Persian empires struggling to maintain a sense of nationhood without a homeland. Even without a capital city or a centralized leadership, the rabbis envision a nation bound by laws rather than land, upheld by academies and courts rather than cavalry. A revised set of criteria for joining this nation could no longer require residency, as the Talmud explicitly derives: I know only that a convert is accepted in the Land of Israel; from where do I derive that also outside of the Land of Israel? The verse states with you, which indicates that in any place that he is with you, you should accept him.

Instead, the sages brilliantly draw from their history to formulate a set of rituals and legal processes to becoming Jewish. Talmud Bavli Yevamot 46a offers a three-way controversy about the minimum ritual requirment:

Rabbi Eliezer looks for a ritual precedent in the Torah and finds not only that circumcision is the symbol of the covenant commanded to Abraham but also that the forefathers in Egypt underwent a mass circumcision at the time of the Passover sacrifice (see Joshua 5:5) to mark their bodies as Israelite, just as they did with their doorposts. Rabbi Joshua argues that since the foremothers did not have circumcision to define them, they must have had a different conversion ritual. The continuation of the Talmud finds a lead in the instructions of Moses that the people sanctify themselves and wash their garments three days before the Lawgiving (Exodus 19:10). If they washed their garments, then they surely also immersed their bodies. The sages agree with both precedents of the forefathers and foremothers such that every new convert in future generations will need to experience for themselves all elements of the mass ceremony when the Children of Israel first became a nation. The Talmud continues to provide a script for the interview before the court:

The Talmud continues to elaborate on these details, changing the two Torah scholars into three judges such that they are not simply witnessing the ritual but issuing a legal decision to accept the new convert. The opening question establishes that joining a people also means joining in their persecution, feeling the weight of their history and their minority status among great empires. The goal of the educational section that follows is not to drill in a full curriculum of Jewish law that would take years to accomplish. Rather, just as at the Sinai Lawgiving the people accept 10 foundational laws and hear the rest later, so, too, the convert learns a representative sampling (with special emphasis on charity) and an expectation to continue studying afterward. Instead of geographical boundaries, it is now primarily the bounds of the commandments, with all of their legal consequences and rewards, that comes to define Jewish identity. The Gemara poetically reenacts this shift through a rereading of the conversation between Naomi and her daughter-in-law:

Each phrase in Ruths nationalistic pledge of allegiance is now read as a cipher for particular commandments and for the consequences of violating them. Adjudicated by a loose network of rabbinic courts around the world, the Talmudic system of defining who is a Jew succeeded for 2,000 years of exile.

The rise of the State of Israel, however, now rekindles fundamental questions about what it means to join the nation. The Jewish people finds itself at a crossroads that the ancient rabbis could only have hoped for but could barely have imagined. Israel as a democracy legislates civil immigration laws based on economic, political, and humanitarian considerations, as does every other sovereign nation. Add to that the Law of Return guaranteeing that anyone with even partial Jewish lineage persecuted under the Nuremberg Laws can find safety in the Jewish homeland. These national laws overlap the Talmudic definitions that continue to define Jewish conversion in the Diaspora as well as the status of returnees to Israel who must answer to Halacha for full marriage and burial rights as Jews.

Can Halacha find precedent for taking into account residence in the sovereign State of Israel as a key element for conversion as it was in biblical times? Many halachic decisors, both Ashkenazic and Sephardic, agree that specifically for conversion in Israel, we should follow the lenient views based on Maimonides, Rabbi Meir Hai Uziel, and others to accept converts even without complete halachic observance at the outset. In Israel, these immigrant converts will become integrated with Israeli society, will fight in the Israel Defense Forces, will contribute to the rebuilding of the country, and will be far from foreign influence or threat of future intermarriage.

Ironically, those coming to convert in Israel today are held up to the strictest standards while those in the Diaspora can choose from the widest range of conversion programs from the most to the least demanding. Common sense, however, would recommend for stricter standards outside of Israel, where keeping up Jewish identity, practice, and intramarriage is more challenging. On the other hand, ensuring that all Israeli citizens who identify as Jewish can halachically marry other Jews is of utmost importance for the integrity of the Jewish State. Precedent for reintroducing elements of the biblical model by fast-tracking converts in the Land of Israel is already found in Tractate Gerim 4:5:

As the Jewish people counts up toward the reacceptance of the Sinai Lawgiving on Shavuot and the reading of the Book of Ruth, we can take this opportunity to revisit and strengthen our own Israelite identities, whether based on lineage, law, or longing. Whether that means learning Hebrew, observing Shabbat and celebrating holidays, creating a Jewish music playlist, considering aliyah, joining Daf Yomi, or getting involved in a synagogue or a Jewish humanitarian organization, there are plenty of paths toward greater Jewish commitment and a deepened feeling that your people shall be my people.

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The Rules of Conversion - Tablet Magazine

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From a Jewish perspective, the 2021 World Serieswas particularly special.

Four Jewish players appeared (Max Fried and Joc Pederson of the Braves, and Alex Bregman and Garrett Stubbs of the Astros), and all of them played in Game 6 (although not simultaneously). No prior Series featured more than two Jews. Except for 1972, in which Mike Epstein, Ken Holtzman, and Joe Horlen of the Oakland As appeared in at least one game.

In the bottom of the first inning of Game 2 in Houston, Bregman came to the plate against Fried, the first World Series clash between Jewish pitcher and Jewish hitter. Except for Game 4 of the 1974 World Series, when Dodgers catcher Steve Yeager faced Holtzman three times, going 1-for-3 with a double and a strikeout.

So did the 2021 Series represent historic Jewish firsts or mere Jewish seconds? Were these unprecedented Jewish events or replays of Jewish events from prior Series? And how and why do we not know for sure?

Horlen and Yeager are Jews by choice, although that is not the issue. Those who ponder baseballs Jewish history welcome converts. Some continue to include Rod Carew (thank you, Adam Sandler), although he never converted.

But Horlen and Yeager converted in retirement, after their respective playing careers were over. That presents a unique dilemma how the historical record and conversations about Jews in baseball account for players who had not converted and were not identified or recognized as Jewish players when their athletic records, achievements and milestones were being compiled.

Shavuot which commemorates the Revelation at Sinai while celebrating Jews-by-choice in reading the Book of Ruth offers the appropriate moment to consider this question.

The baseball perspective is mixed. Howard Megdals Baseball Talmud,the authoritative ranking of every Jewish player at every position, includes Yeager but not Horlen. Jewish Baseball News and the Jewish Baseball Museum do not include either. The Big Book of Jewish Baseball by father-son team Peter and Joachim Horvitz includes encyclopedia entries on both players. Both appear in Ron Lewis Jews in Baseball, a lithograph depicting more than 30 Jewish contributors to the national pastime (players, managers, executives and officials), and in the short film detailing the portraits history.

The Jewish perspective offers multiple answers. Two Jews, three opinions, and three outs.

The simple answer is that because neither Yeager nor Horlen had converted during his playing career, neither is Jewish for purposes of statistics, achievements and the historical record. The Talmudic principle holds that a convert emerges from the mikveh with the status of a child just born, a new person, without family or history. As a halachically new person, a convert theoretically could marry his sister (but for a rabbinic decree to the contrary). According to Reish Lakish, children born to a man before he converts do not satisfy the mitzvah to be fruitful and multiply. Nothing that came before the man emerged from the mikveh remains part of his new Jewish self; although Reish Lakish did not say so, that should include records and achievements.

But Rabbi Yohanon disagreed with Reish Lakish, insisting that the mans pre-conversion first-born fulfilled the mitzvah; Rambam accepted Yohanons position. This suggests that something of ones pre-conversion life gains some Jewish character along with the convert.

More fundamentally, the simple answer rests on a restricted conception of Jews and of Jews by choice. A convert emerges from the conversion process like a born Jew in every sense. Judaism rejects distinctions between Jews-by-birth and Jews-by-choice; it is forbidden to harass or denigrate the latter, to treat them as different than the Jew-by-birth, or to inquire how or when a person became Jewish.

The simple answer also requires us to ignore how peoples lives define them. A wealth of living, experience and achievement creates a whole person and leads the Jew-by-choice to the beit din; that history contributes to their choosing Judaism, forms a Jewish person, and cannot and should not be forgotten or ignored. The Talmud thus speaks of a convert who converts, rather than a non-Jew who converts, recognizing an internal spark in ones pre-Jewish life that provides a connection to the Jewish people and leads one on the path to Judaism.

We might extend this to the idea that a Jew-by-choice affirms rather than creates their Jewish identity. Their soul has been Jewish (and stood at Sinai with other Jewish souls); through conversion they return home an appropriate place for a baseball player. For our purposes, the body who hit those home runs and won those games possessed an unknown and unrevealed Jewish soul. And that souls baseball achievements count among the achievements of all baseball souls, although no one knew of its Jewish nature at the time of those achievements.

A compromise approach to the baseball question distinguishes in-the-moment milestones by those who did not recognize their Jewishness from backward-looking considerations of the historical record of raw statistics by those who now publicly identify as Jews.

Thus, neither Horlen nor Yeager should count in identifying how many Jewish players appeared in past World Series or whether Bregman-Fried was the first or second all-Jew pitcher-hitter showdown. Even if pre-conversion Yeager and Horlen were Jewish in some sense or possessed of some Jewish spark, no one including themselves recognized their Jewishness in those moments.

Anyone reviewing the As roster for the 1972 World Series in 1972 would have identified two Jewish players, not three. For anyone watching Game 4 of the 1974 Series in 1974, Holtzman pitching to Steve Yeager was not Jewishly distinct from Holtzman pitching to Steve Garvey, Yeagers non-Jewish teammate. Nothing in 1972 pulled Horlen to join his Jewish teammates in wearing black fabric on their uniforms in memory of the 11 Israeli athletes murdered at the Munich Olympics. Neither Horlen nor Yeager was expected to refuse to play on Yom Kippur, a holy day that was not part of their lives.

Looking backward, however, Yeager and Horlen alter the Jewish record book and the historical conversation about top Jewish players.

Megdal ranks Yeager as the fourth-best Jewish catcher. Yeager was among the top defensive catchers of the time, among league leaders in defensive statistics. While never an offensive threat, he hit double-digit home runs in six seasons and hit 102 for his career, 12th among Jewish players. He also is seventh in games played and 10th in RBIs. Yeagers offensive numbers jumped in the postseason. In four World Series, he hit almost .300 with an OPS above 900 and four home runs (second among Jewish players behind Bregman, Pederson and Hank Greenberg) and shared the 1981 Series MVP (the third Jewish player to earn that award). Megdal suggests that Yeager could lay claim to best Jewish catcher on a combination of World Series performance, defense and some advance metrics.

Horlen finished his career one game below .500. Yet he places fourth among Jewish pitchers in career wins (116), E.R.A. (3.11), strikeouts (1,065, tied with Steve Stone), and innings pitched (2,002). His 1967 season was, by advanced metrics, the second-best season by a Jewish pitcher not named Koufax; his 1.88 E.R.A. in 1964 is the best by a Jewish pitcher not named Koufax. His second-place finish in the 1967 American League Cy Young voting is the best Cy Young finish other than Koufaxs three wins and Stones 1980 win.

Big Book tells that Horlen ran into Epstein years later and told him about converting; Epstein responded, Welcome to the tribe. He should have welcomed Horlen back to the tribe. And thanked him (and Yeager) for contributing an additional 116 wins, a near Cy Young Award, a World Series MVP, and an essential piece of catchers equipment to the story of Jews in baseball.

Rabbi Jonathan Fisch of Temple Judea (Coral Gables, Florida), Rabbi Zalmy Margolin and Mendy Halberstam aided in researching this story.

Howard M. Wasserman is a professor of law and associate dean for research & faculty development at FIU College of Law.

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These Jews were among baseball's all-time greats but do they count as Jewish baseball players? - Forward

Rebbi Meir said: Whoever occupies himself with the Torah for its own sake merits many things; not only that, but [the creation of] the whole world is worthwhile just for himAnd it magnifies him and exalts him over everything. (Avot 6:1)Whoever regularly occupies himself with the study of Torah is surely exalted. (6:2)Great is Torah for it grants life to those that practice it, in this world, and in the world to come. (6:7)

Tractate Avot originally consisted of five chapters. To accommodate the study of Pirkei Avot on the sixth Shabbat between Pesach and Shavuot, a sixth chapter was added to the Tractate. As that Shabbat (generally) falls out right before Shavuot, the sixth chapter helps us prepare for the chag by focusing on Torah learning. This perek is called Kinyan Torah because it refers to two aspects of Torah acquisition: how we acquire Torah, and the great value(s) we acquire along with it.

Grants Life

Torah learning benefits the learner in both this world and beyond. The seventh Mishnah formulates the point this way: Torah is great, for it grants life in this world and the next.

The Next World

Considering Torah learnings status as a central mitzvah, we easily understand how it earns one life in the next world. The tenth Mishnah tells of Rebbi Yosi Ben Kismas rejection of a substantial monetary offer aimed at convincing him to move to a city lacking a strong Torah presence. Rebbi Yosi explained his refusal with the fact that it is only (the reward for) Torah learning and good deeds (and not gold and silver) that we take with us to the next world. Many things seem valuable in this world. When choosing how to live our lives, we should focus on what has eternal value.

This World

The Mishnahs assertion that Torah learning grants life in this world as well is a greater chiddush. Rebbi Akiva reinforced this point in his response to those who questioned his teaching of Torah despite the Roman prohibition against doing so. Rebbi Akiva compared a Jews need for Torah learning to a fishs dependency on water (Talmud Bavli, Berachot 61b). Torah is not just an enhancer of life; it is a condition for it. Though many people physically survive without learning Torah, their lives lack true meaning.

Beyond meaningful life itself, the first Mishnah lists many additional benefits earned through Torah learning. Before listing these benefits, Rebbe Meir emphasizes that a person learning Torah also makes the existence of the entire world worthwhile.

Avot began with Shimon HaTzaddiks assertion that the world exists for the purpose of Torah learning (as well as avodah and gemilut chasadim). Rebbe Meir takes this notion a significant step further by portraying even a single persons Torah learning as making the whole world worthwhile!

The Greatest and Highest Life

The first Mishnah in our perek concludes its list of benefits by declaring that Torah learning makes one greater and higher than all creations (note that this Mishnah presents the elevation in relation to the rest of creation, while the second Mishnah describes the elevation as related to the person learning). Torah learning is great not just because it grants life (Mishnah seven), but also because it makes those who learn it greater.

The Gemara in Megilla (16b) further develops the greater aspect of Torah learning by asserting that it is greater than kibud av veim, building the Beit HaMikdash, and even saving a life. Though saving a life takes priority over Torah learning, the act of learning is of greater value because it helps people become greater.

As we saw, Mishnah Aleph describes Torah as raising the student above other creations. Mishnah Bet adds a second aspect by explaining that Torah learning elevates people (not just relative to other creatures, but also) to a higher (in fact the highest) version of themselves.

This second dimension is the backdrop to the way Rav Yosef reflected on his Torah learning. The Gemara (Talmud Bavli, Pesachim 68b; Rashi) tells us that when asked about his custom to celebrate Shavuot by eating a special meat sandwich, Rav Yosef explained that without Torah learning, he would have amounted to no more than the average Joe (Yosef).

Rashis formulation of Rav Yosefs words (if not for the days I learned Torah and elevated myself) links it to our Mishnahs focus on Torah as elevating. Though the mitzvot and good deeds we perform earn us reward, only Torah learning develops us in a way that elevates and distinguishes us.

To summarize, Avots sixth perek emphasizes the great significance of Torah learning, which grants life in both this world and the next and also helps one achieve greatness and reach the highest level of his potential.

May these mishnayot prepare us for Shavuot by helping us appreciate and properly celebrate Matan Torah and by inspiring us to maximize future Torah learning opportunities.

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Onward And Upward Through Learning Torah - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

PARIS (JTA) In 2019, at a Jewish conference in Troyes, France, Myriam Ackermann-Sommer did something quietly historic: She read from the Torah in an Orthodox prayer group.

Ackermann-Sommer was in charge of facilitating the minyan or the 10-person Jewish prayer quorum, traditionally male-only at the cross-denominational conference, titled Do Women Have To Disobey To Be Leaders? and organized by Filles de Rachi, or Daughters of Rashi, a reference to the medieval French sage born Shlomo Yitzhaki. Troyes was his birthplace.

Theres a lot of questioning our motives in the Orthodox world, and elsewhere, like saying, Why do you do that? Is it just feminism? she told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. No, I think its Judaism and its been there all along.

In the United States especially, the roles of women in Judaism have expanded in all denominations, including strictly gender-conscious Orthodoxy. In France, however, where Orthodoxy has long been the dominant Jewish denomination, there are only five female rabbis in a country with over half a million Jews.

The 2019 Daughters of Rashi conference was a call to action: Just after the conference that year, Pauline Bebe, the countrys first-ever female rabbi, opened up the countrys first Reform rabbinical school. Six of its eight current students are women.

A second edition of the conference imagined as a biannual event, but delayed due to COVID-19 took place last month in Rouen, the city in Normandy known for its medieval, Romanesque yeshiva (Europes oldest and discovered in the 1970s). Panelists took on an array of topics, from the COVID pandemic to the war in Ukraine to the role of France in Jewish history, and vice versa. Between 70 and 80 people attended, down from 200 in 2019 because of COVID precautions.

Conference-goers discussed topics that engage all French Jews, especially their sense of security in a country struggling with diversity and integration. I often think when youre Jewish in France, they always ask where you came from, said Manon Brissaud-Frenk, a student at Bebes Rabbinical School of Paris and a Daughters of Rashi co-president. And I always find it quite difficult because if I look at it personally, its been more than a century. Im French. Full stop.

But the conference also continued the theme of greater inclusion for women in the Jewish organizational and theological worlds. One well-known attendee was Reform Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur, who has gained international acclaim for her books and media presence.

The question of the advance of women in the political world is the opposite of the pawn in the game of chess: the right of women can go backwards, warned Horvilleur in her talk with Danielle Cohen-Levinas, a French philosopher and musicologist with a specialty in Jewish philosophy.

Also in attendance were figures from the Israelite Central Consistory of France, or Consistoire, created by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1808. Many women hold leadership and teaching positions within the largely Orthodox body, which continues to play an important role in the direction of French Judaism, but it does not recognize women rabbis. Rosine Cohen, who has been teaching for years at the Consistorial Victoire synagogue in Paris, shared a workshop with Javier Leibiusky, who researches the immigration of Ladino, or Judeo-Spanish, from the East to Buenos Aires.

When I was young, we studied women in the Talmud, but it was never an issue, Cohen said during their talk.

Even if we dont have the same way of interpreting the text, even if we try to do it in a different way, with maybe different roles, there is no reason that in a society like France, women should find themselves at some point choosing between playing minor or major roles, no matter what space they are in, Brissaud-Frenk said.

The mix of topics, the array of religious denominations represented and the focus on women made for a historic combination in the eyes of Laura Hobson Faure, chair of the modern Jewish history department at the University of Paris Panthon-Sorbonne. She said that while these groups might come together at a rally for Israel, for example, gathering for an overtly religious event is rare.

Whats interesting is that usually Orthodoxy struggles with the notion of pluralism in Judaism, said Hobson Faure. The fact that women are creating this pluralistic space in France where the different tendencies of Judaism are represented is quite new.

Brissaud-Frenk was part of the board directors of the Maison Rachi, a cultural center that aims to preserve Rashis legacy. She was inspired by one of the lines in Rashis siddur, or prayer book, concerning the education of women: If she wants to, nothing can stop her.

The concept led to a discussion with Bebes husband, Rabbi Tom Cohen of the French-American liberal Kehilat Gesher synagogue in Paris. Brissaud-Frenk and Cohen decided to bring together female rabbis and Jewish scholars to exchange, study and learn and the conference was born.

Ive gone to way too many conferences where all the talking heads were male rabbis who talked about women and Judaism, said Cohen, who is a Daughters of Rashi honorary co-president. I thought that would be great because were now at this stage in the development that theres enough women who have come through the studies, universities, that we have scholars of high quality in all of the different [Jewish] movements.

The conference has inspired women outside of the more liberal movements too. Ackermann-Sommer, who also spoke at this years conference, is studying in New York City with two other French women at Yeshivat Maharat, which confers semicha ordination to Orthodox Jewish women.

Myriam Ackermann-Sommer speaks at the conference in the Synagogue of Rouen, May 23, 2022. (Filles de Rachi)

She is also pursuing a Ph.D. with a focus on Jewish-American literature, and her podcast Daf Yummy a play on Daf Yomi, the practice of studying a single page of the Babylonian Talmud per day compares Jewish teachings to classic literature and popular culture, from Platos Symposium to Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.

With her husband mile Ackermann, she also runs a Modern Orthodox group called Ayeka, which promotes the democratization of Jewish study. One Ayeka program focuses on studying Jewish texts that are usually reserved for men. Its name, Kol-Elles, is more wordplay in this instance on the word kollel, the term for an institute of full-time, intensive Jewish study, using elle, the French female pronoun. So far, about 100 Jewish women, ages 25 to 60, have taken part in the program.

Ackermann-Sommers end goal: to become Frances first female leader of a Modern Orthodox synagogue.

I just think that male, bearded rabbis are simply not enough anymore, she said. It used to be the case that these were the types of figures that we wanted to look up to, for decades, for millennia, probably. But now we need women to represent women and to speak to women and to men as well.

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France has 500,000 Jews but only 5 women rabbis. A growing movement is pushing to change that. - JTA News - Jewish Telegraphic Agency

To the editor Sincere thanks to the YH-R for courageously editorializing about the dangers of theocracies and then publishing a letter about abortion, noting not all people of faith believe the soul begins at conception.

Jewish rabbis disagree with Evangelicals and others who make the poetic praise of Psalm 139 (You knit me together in my mothers womb) into a proof-text for legislating when life begins.

Many Jewish scholars understand both the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud to teach the fetus is part of the mother until birth. The babys soul or spirit arrives only when the first breath is taken.

It should be deeply troubling to people of all faiths indeed, all Americans when one religious view seeks to become the law of the land, taking away from other people of faith the right to follow the teachings of their sacred texts.

Freedom of religion means nothing when one religion can impose its beliefs on society. When mere mortals attempt to enforce their theocratic beliefs on others, the result never proves to be righteous.

The result is, instead, sorrow and division. If history is any indication, theocracies tend to deteriorate into violence.

AARON COHEN

Yakima

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Letter: History shows us where theocracies lead | Opinion | yakimaherald.com - Yakima Herald-Republic

On Saturday, May 14, an 18-year-old gunman entered a supermarket in Buffalo and opened fire. In a matter of minutes, ten innocent people were dead and three more injured. Eleven of the victims were African American, deliberately targeted because of the colour of their skin. This, in itself, is horrific, but even a cursory look at this heinous hate crime reveals a deeply troubling motive that renders this impossibly immoral act even more evil and one that should concern us all.

Before perpetrating the attack and live streaming it on social media, the murderer published his manifesto, providing insight into the ideologies that animated his killing spree. He subscribed to the Great Replacement, a racist and antisemitic conspiracy theory that claims that elites and Jews are engaged in a nefarious plot to replace white Americans with people of colour. It was the same egregious theory that, in 2018, motivated a gunman to walk into the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and murder 11 people and leave another six wounded.

While what happened in Buffalo was, clearly, a racist crime targeting African Americans, the actions of the murderer were connected to a conspiracy theory that is antisemitic to its core. The horror in Buffalo serves as devastating proof that hatred of Jews has consequences well beyond the Jewish community.

As part of my duties as a rabbi, I counsel people considering converting to Judaism. I recently sat with a young man who came to see me. After listening to him recount the fascinating journey that brought him to my office, I was compelled by Jewish law to caution him. Paraphrasing the 5th century text of the Talmud, I asked, are you aware that not everyone loves us?

The longer directive in the Talmud instructs that the potential convert must be asked, are you not aware that at this time the Jewish people are despised and oppressed? Tellingly, whenever this quote was repeated in later texts and codified into Jewish Law, the phrase at this time continued to be included.

This is a sobering reminder of the persistent nature of the worlds oldest hatred.

In addition to Pittsburgh and Buffalo, on August 3, 2019, a racist murdered 21 at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, where he targeted Latinos. His manifesto cited the same conspiracy theory. He also referenced the mosque shootings earlier that year in Christchurch, New Zealand. That killer targeted Muslims and killed 51 at two mosques. Again, his manifesto cited the evil, pernicious and debunked Great Replacement Theory.

Many were perplexed by the chant Jews will not replace us heard in Charlottesville. What was regular fare at neo-Nazi and white supremacist gatherings was, suddenly, thrust into the public consciousness. Unfortunately, it has only burgeoned since that notorious Unite the Right rally in August 2017.

In a sickening confluence of hate, the Buffalo murderer wrote Virginia Sorenson on his weapon. She was one of the victims of a car ramming attack during a 2021 Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin. White supremacists have characterized the six victims of that attack as exemplars of Black on White crime, and those victims have since become martyrs for the White supremacist cause. By inscribing her name on the gun, the Buffalo killer probably imagined himself as her avenger. The disturbing irony? The Black perpetrator of the Wisconsin assault also posted hate-filled antisemitic conspiracy theories.

More examples: On December 10, 2019, inspired by the sermons of Louis Farrakhan, two Black Nationalists opened fire on a kosher supermarket in Jersey City, New Jersey, killing five. On May 22, 2021, diners at a kosher restaurant were violently assaulted by leftist extremists in Los Angeles. On January 15 of this year a man entered a synagogue in Colleyvillle, Texas, demanding the release of an al-Qaeda operative imprisoned nearby.

We do not need to enumerate all recent examples to spot the pattern of hate and murder. The hate was fomented online, spread by veteran haters to their fellow believers and to young adults they seek to recruit to do the killing for them. These young, mostly white males are susceptible to the conspiracies peddled not just in the dark corners of the virtual world but, increasingly, in relatively mainstream media.

The events are linked both by the murderers wholehearted embracing of the spurious but dangerous conspiracies and by their proud references to the heinous killers they are emulating. Like others before him, the Buffalo terrorists manifesto comprised whole paragraphs from the New Zealand murderers manifesto. And, like the New Zealander, the Buffalo terrorist went in prepared to share his hate in real time with the world online.

Its that hate, grounded in antisemitism, that repeatedly manifests as violence in the real world and destroys any lives in its path.

Rabbi Reuben Poupko is the rabbi of the Beth Israel Beth Aaron Congregation in Montreal.

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Anti-Black Racism and The Great Replacement | OP / ED | thesuburban.com - The Suburban Newspaper

After years of social distancing and independent creation, the Urban Ecology Center will feature artwork created by Milwaukee artists throughout the pandemic.

Four local Jewish artists are hosting an exhibit at the Riverside Park location, open now through July 31, 2022, titled Four The First Time, with the underlying themes of nature and abstract expressionism. This exhibit marks the first time these artists are collaborating to create an immersive experience for visitors.

Bev Richey, one of those artists, is a New Haven native with a strong background in psychology and art. When she settled in Milwaukee as an adult, she acclimated to the Milwaukee art scene by getting involved in the Jewish Artists Lab, of the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center. The program put Jewish artists together regionally to create an exhibition after a 10-month learning experience.

Richey creates abstract expressionist paintings based on what it means to live as a liberated human being.

In Judaism, the task, like in most spiritual situations, is ultimately to liberate the soul, Richey said. If you take apart the Passover story, its about developing relationships with a liberated self.

At the exhibition, Richey will feature a series based on the COVID-19 pandemic. In the true form of an abstract expressionist, she does not have a premeditated design or title and will step up to the canvas and let the painting come out.

At the beginning of the pandemic, we had no idea what was going on and things were falling apart, Richey said. If you look at the piece, I am squeezing paint out of a tube, almost like I am patching the world back together, similar to the repair side of Judaism.

Miriam Sushman specializes in stained glass mosaics and was the initial organizer of the group. Her artwork is inspired by nature, and she did a series on houseplants and Wisconsin birds for the exhibition.

Theres a lot in the Talmud concerning Jewish law about how to handle land with respect to the land, but also the effects nature has on people, Sushman said. Thats how I incorporate Jewish values into my art.

Although she had always been active as an artist, she discovered her passion for mosaics when she moved to Wisconsin in the early 2000s. Since then, she has been teaching others at the Sharon Lynne Wilson Center for the Arts, the senior living community Saint Johns On The Lake and the Grand Avenue Club.

The Grand Avenue Club is a resource center for people who experience mental illness, Sushman said. I taught members how to create a mosaic through a community mural featuring fish from Lake Michigan.

At the exhibit, Sushman is excited to share her artwork not just on the walls, but also interactive on the ground with her stepping stones.

Its at the Urban Ecology Center, which tries to bring nature education to children and adults in Milwaukee, so the stepping stones are a perfect match, even though usually in an exhibit art goes on the walls, Sushman said.

The other artists include Adria Rose, whose artwork is also inspired by nature and uses mixed media and watercolor to create fine art. Jonathan Ellis is a visual artist who develops a contemporary style rooted in truth, love, humor and theory.

The pandemic was really isolating, and as artists, we spend a lot of time working alone anyway, Sushman said. Human nature and human connection, those are the most important aspects of our work, Richey added.

* * *

How to go

What: Four The First Time, with art by Jonathan Ellis, Beverly Richey, Miriam Sushman and Adria Willenson.

Where: Urban Ecology Center, Riverside Park location, 1500 E. Park Place,Milwaukee

Contact: 414-964-8505, UrbanEcologyCenter.org

Related

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Pandemic art and more local Jewish artists featured at Urban Ecology Center exhibition - The Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle

While we strongly support and applaud the current community-wide efforts to encourage thousands of our co-religionists to sign petitions calling for a reversal of the proposed NYS Department of Education regulations prescribing yeshiva curriculums, we also cannot fail to note with sadness that we have yet to take a page from the very successful advocacy book of some of our fellow minorities. Black Americans have scored big time by coming out en masse in public places urging this or that result.

To be sure some of their demonstrations have unfortunately been marked by violence. One does not have to agree with the merits of their positions to acknowledge that they have made it perfectly clear that they understand the symbiotic dynamic between the street and politics and are not at all shy about exploiting it.

What makes this very frustrating is that what New York State is about to do to us directly impacts our fundamental duty to perpetuate our faith in the time-honored way we teach it to our children that Torah study is central. The proposed regulations would require our yeshivas to provide instruction that is substantially equivalent to what is offered in the public schools. Yet this would not only necessitate a curtailment in the time available for religious studies but would also authorize the imposition of the anti-Torah woke agenda that is causing such havoc in the public schools across America.

Moreover, there is a decided lack of appreciation of the educational value of the study of Jewish texts such as the Talmud and the commentaries in terms of reading comprehension and analytical skills and so much more.

When government tampers with our ability to transmit our faith, they challenge our essence as a people. Maybe we should consider making our views more loudly and clearly in person and at the ballot box.

Read more here:

Take The NYS Dept. Of Ed Fight To The Streets - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com

They do not merit fame only infamy.

Grief, despair, anguish all of these words express, in the limited way words can convey heartbreaking pain, our response to the horror of this past weeks murderous rampage in the elementary school in Uvalde, Texas that took the lives of 19 children and two teachers.

In the aftermath of the Columbine massacre, a few months after teen shooters brutally murdered 12 of her classmates as well as her father who tried to intervene and save intended victims, Coni Sanders was standing in line at a supermarket with her young daughter when they came face-to-face with a shocking magazine cover. It prominently pictured the two gunmen responsible for one of the deadliest school shootings in American history. Coni realized that very few people know anything about her father who had saved countless lives, whereas virtually everyone knew the names and the tiniest of details about the murderers.

What do the killers want above all? Money is not the greatest motivator. Above all it is fame and notoriety that are the primary goals of those who commit the most horrific crimes assured of the media spotlight for weeks, if not months and years.

Adam Lankford, a criminologist at the University of Alabama, who spent years studying the effects of media coverage on future shooters, concluded that in all probability the most powerful deterrent to copycat crimes is to ensure that the murderers never achieve the personal fame that served as primary psychological motive. A lot of these shooters want to be treated like celebrities. They want to be famous. So the key is not to give them that treatment.

A mere four days after the 2017 Las Vegas concert shooting, an event which remains the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history, Lankford publicly urged journalists to refrain from using shooters name, photos, or writing in exhaustive detail about his supposed motivations - ideas which could inspire others to justify similar actions.

James Alan Fox, the Lipman Family Professor of Criminology, Law, and Public Policy and former dean at Northeastern University, singles out over-the-top coverage that includes irrelevant details about the killers, such as their writings and their backgrounds, items not only irrelevant but which unfortunately and unnecessarily humanizes them. It grants them the gift of being perceived human when our efforts ought to concentrate on their inhumanity.

Many law enforcement agencies have adopted the lead of the Aurora Illinois police chief who spoke just once the name of the gunman who killed five coworkers and wounded five officers: I said his name one time for the media, and I will never let it cross my lips again, Chief Ziman wrote in a Facebook post.

It is an approach that I believe has a precedent in the Bible.

The Torah recognized the most appropriate punishment for ultimate evil: God will blot out his name from under heaven (Deuteronomy 29:20).

King Solomon put it this way in his book of Proverbs: The memory of the righteous is a blessing, but the name of the wicked will rot (Proverbs 10:7).

Thankfully, the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Team, in collaboration with the FBI, developed the dont name them campaign to minimize and/or to totally avoid naming and describing individuals involved in mass shootings.

A name, according to the Talmud, is our most prized possession. The Hebrew word for name, shem, is represented by the two letters central to the word neshamah, soul. Those who, by their actions, destroy the sanctity of their souls no longer deserve the preservation of their names.

They do not merit fame only infamy.

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He Who Must Not Be Named: Responding to Mass Murders - aish.com - Aish