I keep meaning to mention this. On Sunday at the Miami Book Fair, Norman Podhoretz talked about his book, Why Are Jews Liberals? (a somewhat disingenuous title; he should have called it, Jews Shouldn’t Be Liberals). And he said that Jews had fallen for Obama the way that they had fallen for the Shabbatai Tzvi in the 1600s, until the Shabbatai shattered all their illusions and converted to Islam. Obama is the liberal Jews’ Shabbatai Tzvi, Podhoretz said in so many words. Meaning? That Obama is a secret Muslim? Or that he is aimed at destroying Israel? Nopod didn’t spell that out.
Many Jews on my side of the Israel question liken Israel to the Shabbatai Tzvi– in that support for the Jewish state has drawn on traditional, messianic feeling in Jewish life. Marc Ellis has made this point. I’m forgetting who else right now, but it’s a common analogy. We have been told to worship the Merkava tank, and we do. The neoconservative Iraq war and the Gaza slaughter are serving to unconvert some.
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Jews aren’t the only ones falling out of love with Obama these days. Pod is kicking a dead messiah.
He, or you, ommitted that Zvi converted under the threat of he and his family being beheaded.
A “true” Jew is supposed to willingly martyr.
Obama’s formula is excellent (support for Jewish AND democratic Israel). If he can construct the means to stick with that, he will succeed.
The radicalness of critics of neo-conservative theses doesn’t help him keep his eye on the prize. They add pressure to pick either/or rather than effectively mediate.
His nature and all of his intellectual training however is to find win-win solutions, not either-or ones (left or right).
And you omitted the part where he had pretended to embrace Islam initially in order to score political capital and trick his way into an audience with the local governor to try to “convert” him. This your model of what it means to be a “true” Jew, Witty? And anyway, who omitted anything? Mr. Weiss linked directly to his Wikipedia entry.
I didn’t know about this guy before now, but my first impressions are that he was a cult leader and a bit of a con man. I don’t know about you guys but I do not see that as a fine example of what Judaism is really about.
“bit of a con man. “
And that defy-gravity-and-reality-through-faith thing still had a few bugs in it. He should have gone for the out-of-town tryout, and gotten a couple of good show doctors to work on the gag.
Like the guys who did the mid-stage vanish in “One Touch of Venus”
“A “true” Jew is supposed to willingly martyr.”
Sure, makes perfect sense, Richard, and I would trumpet that as the all0time Jewish line: Over a few words and a bit of wine or water, we should die, but for land, a Jewish State, we should kill!!
Oh, BTW, since it’s a matter of life or death, can you provide an authoritative source for that martyr-rather-than-concert schtick?
No Richard, not the authority you expect me to martyr myself over, for that anything will do, including “everybody knows”, but the authority you will martyr yourself over, with confidence your place in heaven (wait, do Jews believe in Heaven?) is assured.
You are patently phony.
Geez, Richard, and I thought you were gonna shoot me right down with “Rabbi Ben Eliezer M’chim Pim Shmya, edicts of the Jewish Central Committee, 190-5 through 15, On the Necessity of Martyrdom vs. Conversion”
I’m sure the citation is unfamiliar to you, you paskudnik! Squatting on prayer rugs in Tebetan monasteries and chanting “Ohm” instead of davaning and studying Torah!
There are three commandments over which a Jew is supposed to die rather than commit: 1. Foreign worship, 2. murder and 3. adultery.
Whereas Christianity involves a lessening of monotheism involved in the doctrine of a trinity, the acceptance of Christianity is considered to be an abrogation in the commandment to avoid all foreign worship and therefore to die is preferred to conversion. The acceptance of Islam is a different story because Islam is monotheistic and thus certain communities accepted Islam when confronted with the choice between the sword and conversion.
(As the leader of a Messianic movement, Shabtai Tzvi’s “obligations” regarding accepting Islam or converting might have differed from those of ordinary Jews.)
The general law regarding the choice between conversion and abrogating one of these three sins can be found in Maimonides’ the laws of the Basics of the Torah (Hilkhot Yesodei Hatorah) in the Fifth chapter.
Obviously the fighting of wars in which innocents are killed raises questions about this supposed preference for death rather than abrogating these laws.
Orthodox Jews believe in heaven, but I’m not sure if heaven is assured to one who chooses death over abrogating these laws; (does it outweigh a previously sinful life).
And Richard, wouldn’t you rather not talk about Sabbati Levi? Do we really want to go there?
Shabbatai Tsvi was an embarrassment within Jewish history, for his conversion primarily. MANY felt betrayed by it. Many others stated “I told you so”. I don’t know his teachings well enough to comment on any element of it.
The parallel is that Podhoretz is stating that the admiration of Obama is a drunkenness, the absence of sobriety.
Let him think what he wants.
Practically still, peace is possible only with acceptance of the other, and affirmation of that mutual acceptance in treaty, commitment to continue mutual acceptance.
“Why are Jews liberal” generally except when it comes to Israel . That is the question I have been asking friends for 35 years.
Although things are changing
““Why are Jews liberal” generally except when it comes to Israel . That is the question I have been asking friends for 35 years”
I bet you’re a blast at parties. Don’t forget to duck, there will be canards flying everywhere.
Shabbatai shattered all their illusions and converted to Islam
Bullshit. Podhoretz either needs to read history, or stop with the dininfo campaign to fool American Jews and all their supporters. That is not what Shabbatai was about. He was for deception. He recommended being Moslem on the outside and Jewish at home. They are known as Doenmeh Jews or crypto-Jews. Kemal Ataturk of Turkey was one; reason why he would not allow the Muslim religion as a state religion in Turkey.
Read Hillel Halkin’s piece here about Ataturk. Halkin’s first article about Ataturk was written in January 1994 for The Forward from Zichron Yaacov, when Halkin was their Israeli correspondent, but The Forward scorched it from its archives, and got Lexis-Nexis to remove it as well. You can only find the original on Highbeam Research for a fee. You might be able to get a copy of a copy if you search Google with the original title “When Kemal Ataturk recited Shema Yisrael.”
Halkin’s July 25, 2007 piece in The New York Sun is here:
http://www.nysun.com/opinion/ataturks-turkey-overturned/58997/
I am not an expert on Shabtai Zvi, but I think most experts agree that originally his conversion to Islam was not meant as a strategem but was merely the preference for life over death. Later he developed the “philosophy” that the conversion was part of his work to descend into the depths of impurity and thus to purify those depths as part of his Messianic “task”. Thus what Shabtai was really about can be divided in two: what he was really about before the conversion and what he was really about after the conversion.
Podhoretz and his band of merry extremist right-wing Jews (a la the Republican Jewish Coalition in concert with Danny Ayalon) are the genesis of the Obama as Muslim meme and all those hideous emails during the primary.
They’re a bunch of treasonous phucks.
I found an accurate copy of Hillel Halkin’s article written in January 1994 here:
http://report-abuse.lahana.org/blog/SHEMA%20YISRAEL.htm
It is the same as the one you can buy from Highbeam Research, unlike other copies I’ve seen.
The three guys who did the Armenian Genocide were Doenmeh Jews from Salonica as well: the Bey Boys. Ambassador Henry Morgenthau wrote about them to President Wilson in 1916, and detailed their study of medieval torture, and how they were “exterminating a people.” Copy available in the The London Times archives.
Phil Weiss- There certainly is a distance between worshipping the Merkava tank and advocating the dissolution of Israel. Many defenders of Israel’s right to exist do not worship the Merkava tank.
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