More and more American Jews are dissenting when it comes to Israel support, and some are getting excommunicated for doing so (and one even lost an eye for it, without any support from her government). And an important group in that slender constellation of dissent, Jews Say No, is circulating a prayer for the first night of Chanukah, which begins on Wednesday night, December 1:
Dear Friends and Family,
As we usher in the holiday of Chanukah,
we ask each of us to light a candle during the first night and recite:
"WE ARE LIGHTING
THIS CANDLE
ON THE FIRST NIGHT
OF CHANUKAH
TO RE-DEDICATE OURSELVES
TO THE STRUGGLE
FOR PEACE, JUSTICE,
AND DIGNITY
FOR THE PALESTINIAN
PEOPLE."
(Note too that JSN has a petition to support the Goldstone Report on the Gaza onslaught, which we will memorialize next month...)
Terrific! Signing. Thanks. The earth is moving under our feet. Better late than never.
Signed Kathleen Galtsky. Why is the petition set up just for Jews?
Perhaps we (Christians) should let you, our Jewish colleagues, do the work on this occasion, while we look for a time of our own. Perhaps Epiphany, since we want things to appear as they are and the light to dawn on some people.
“some are getting excommunicated for doing so…”
Oh really? Who has been “excommunicated”, and what Jewish religious body is qualified to do that? That there is an official “excommunication” procedure would be news to me.
Unless, of course, you think that social or political rejection is the same thing as “excommunication”?
At any rate, I’m worried.
Derbig, I think the barring of J Street from that Reform temple in Brookline goes under the categroy of excommunication. I use the term broadly, yes. Though it goes more directly to the recent Jewish discussion of BDS in NY that has twice been hosted by a frekkin church. Synagogues cant have the discussion yet.
Don’t ever expect BDS to be promoted in a shul (maybe 5 in the country).
“Don’t ever expect BDS to be promoted in a shul (maybe 5 in the country).”
I know what you mean, Witty! After all, who could have imagined Reform Judaism?
thats funny and wise, mooser
Don’t ever expect BDS to be promoted in a shul (maybe 5 in the country).
That’s what they said about women rabbis.
Nope, Shmuel’s is even better! That’s what I should have said.
Witty, you might be very surprised at what American (and other) Jews might do when they feel threatened by Israel.
What the hell are they gonna do? “Excommunicate” us?
Refuse us the “right (privilege) of return”?
Dissent against wrongs perpetrated by Israeli policy and individuals’ behaviors is a healthy thing to do. It helps Israel and the world.
BDS though is different. It shuns, isolates, expresses hatred in its action.
When a shul would join that mass movement to shun its own family, it would be an example of self-hatred.
Individuals can do it, especially those that have renounced their connection to Jewish community to some extent, but it is extremely unlikely for a shul. That would be Orwellian to my understanding.
Very true.
Also, no more than 15 years ago, you could not have found 5 synagogues that advocated the 2 state solution. Today, it’s dogma. It’s just as hard today to find 5 synagogues that preach the 1 state solution.
The moral is: you’ve got to be quick on your feet if you are going to stay on top of ideological trends.
As far as I know, there is no process of “excommunication” in modern Judaism. To use the word “excommunication” is to imply, or infer (your choice) that there was a religious and administrative process which justifies, at least on religious grounds, the social minipulation practised by Zionists. Or that there was a process at all.
Why not call it what it is, instead of making excuses for them?
Well, at least I hope there’s no excommunication process. And if there is, I’ll hide in the basement and tell my wife to say I’m not at home.
While Judaism may not have a process of excommunication, there are rabbis who do practice it.
Within my extended family it has involves a funeral combined with shunning.
i know someone who was un-rabbi ed because of his political activism. he’s young too. also once he left his frum community he was shunned although his mom talks to him sometimes tho she isn’t supposed to.
“Within my extended family it has involves a funeral combined with shunning.”
Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn knew what to do about that. I hope I can follow their example and attend mine, too!
Shunning is by no means the same thing as “excommunication”.
Maybe a Catholic would be kind enough to explain it to us.
Shunning? Hey, if they don’t like me at Temple Beth-I’ll-Take-Ya all I gotta do is move over to Not Sure Synagogue.
There is, as far as I know, no excommunication process in Judaism, no body which can make the determination, and no agency by which this “excommunication” can be conveyed to Jewish communities world-wide.
There’s nothing to be afraid of. No one can stop you from being a Jew.
And besides, my wife will just tell them that the guy who wrote those things at Mondoweiss wasn’t me.
Let ‘em try and excommunicate me! I’ll show them! I just won’t go to schul! How can they excommunicate me, or even shun me, if I’m not there? Sort of takes the heart out of the whole thing.
Gosh, damn those Gentiles! Remember when they used to force Jews to live together in ghettos? Now, in those days, shunning really meant something! Gentiles have really torn the heart out of the Jewish religion, haven’t they? Only anti-Semites would keep Jews from psychologically, socially and economically torturing each-other.
“Your comment is awaiting moderation.”
Well, someone else is going to have to do it. I’m too old to change.
“WE ARE LIGHTING
THIS CANDLE
ON THE FIRST NIGHT
OF CHANUKAH
TO RE-DEDICATE OURSELVES
TO THE STRUGGLE
FOR PEACE, JUSTICE,
AND DIGNITY- for the Jewish people, and for the freeing of Judaism from it’s imprisonment by Zionism. The idea that Judaism needs a state to support it is an insult, and a sure route to enslavement.
so mooser you are saying that Spinoza was not excommunicated because the amsterdam rabbis lacked that power..
and thereofre that the Hebrew U was correct when Klausner in 33 or so said, We forgive you Spinoza, and undid the excommunication.
Ok, so:
if there is no such thing, formally, then why the frik cant i use the word in its secondary meaning, “exclusion from fellowship in a group or community.” thats what the word means, and i dont know a word of scripture and believe its happening
Ovadia Yosef excommunicated Member of Knesset Amsalem for rebelling against His Rabbinical Highness. Yosef used traditional language. Arguably, the Grand Rabbin does not live in modern times.
I think there are clear modern forms of excommunication. Stripped of rabbinic jargon the term means, barring the excommunicee from synagogue life and, if you run into them on the street, pretend that they are dead.
Judge Richard Goldstone, anyone?
Helen Thomas, anyone?
Phil, what they did to Spinoza is really not relevant today. The reason I object to the word “excommunication” is because it has a meaning in other religions, and it’s use implies the same organisation and procedure. And I think it is very important, as I have said many times, that people do not assume that the Jewish religion is operated, administratively and financially, like their centralised religion. In fact, I think it would help a lot if people did understand exactly how Judaism does operate in a decentralised condition, and the Judaism has become a commodity, available to the highest bidder.
Understanding this is the difference between understanding that Zionism is a thing done by Jews, but it is not necessarily done by “the Jews” nor is it, or could it ever be “Jewish”.
Also, it might help people who are Jewish to understand what a thin reed they are depending on when they expect some kind of benefit from Zionism because they are Jewish. I’m sure Madoff’s Jewish clients might have paid (in a smaller way) for leaning on that same thin reed.
In fact, a person who is excommunicated from a religion by an administrative process might be subjected to a more open, objective and truthful procedure than the social minipulation, viscious whisper campaign, smearing, and attempts to harm in other ways associated with “shunning”
Calling it “excommunication is giving it more credit than it deserves. Look at the informal process which has led to incidents like the Goldstone Bar Mitvah imbroglio, and the other incidents described here. Hell, an excommunication procedure would be step up! Presumably a person could go to a hearing and declare they were still believers in Judaism, and practiced it’s tenets and rituals, but had certain disagreements with Zionism and then emerge without blemish. The incidents you are taking about are nothing like that.
huh. mulling. smart.
This is why nobody really knows for what offense Spinoza was excommunicated. Catholics leave an unambiguous record – you know, Canon Law.
I’d like to get to the original topic here: that prayer.
“Peace , justice and dignity for the Palestinian people” – that’s it? Only for the Palestinians? Not for our people, too?
How about a prayer for Gilad Shalit?
that’s it? Only for the Palestinians? Not for our people, too?
Maybe because the members of Jews Say No are fed up with “balanced” statements and prayers that mean nothing. Maybe because the Palestinians need it a lot more than we do. Maybe because we are the cause of the Palestinians’ lack of peace and justice (dignity they still have in spades, and that can’t be taken away). Maybe because Jews praying for peace for Jews is taken for granted, but Jews praying for Palestinians isn’t. Maybe (in traditional Jewish fashion) because they wanted you to ask why.
How about a prayer for Gilad Shalit?
How about a prayer for the thousands of Palestinian prisoners, including children, “administrative detainees” and loads of people who did far less (if anything) than sit on the borders of frequently-attacked Gaza in a uniform and a tank – who also haven’t seen their families in years. Why is Gilad Shalit so much more important than they are? Do you even know any of their names (not to mention their parents’ names, what they look like, their life’s story)? I don’t. Shalit’s rights must be respected, but he does not deserve any more of our attention and concern than they do.
“Not for our people, too?”
I’m sorry dear, who are “your people”? You don’t seem to make that clear.
“Only for the Palestinians? Not for our people, too?”
Excuse me, but exactly what peace, justice and dignity are you being denied, boychik? And for God’s sake, who is doing these horrible things to you?
Remember, jon, the Holacaust doesn’t count. Gotta look to the future, not the past. Can’t have peace and justice, everybody knows that!
Why do Zionists always want to play the games Jews have always lost? From whence comes this yawning credulity, this complete lack of intelligence, this herd-think, as soon as somebody says Jewish? And from where does this blind faith in “leaders of the Jewish community” come from? Ever looked at their track record? You want a gilt-edged annuity, only available to preferred Jewish customers?
Say a prayer for each one of the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. There are at least 10 thousand.
But all you can think of is Gilad Shalit. Maybe Israel should send ten thousand of its own troops to join Shalit in jail, for the company. Then the prayers will even out.
They are your people? Have you still got the receipt?
Jews should say “YES”, to mutual health, not to the either/or.
Palestinians should say “YES” to mutual health.
There is no single state without that YES, and there is no peaceful two-state without that YES.
Humane, with no implication in any way of repeat of the persecution of the Jewish people.
Yes Witty, Israelis should do a lot of things but they refuse to.
Saying they should do something and not giving them a compelling reason to do so is a waste of time.
“Humane, with no implication in any way of repeat of the persecution of the Jewish people.”
It’s always the concerns of the Jewish people (whoever they are). Never the Palestinian.
You know Witty, to be a humanist, you need to care for all human beings. not just your tribe.