FailedMessiah.com

Putin Critic Assassinated

A leading critic of Russia's ruling despot, Vladamir Putin, has been assassinated:

RUSSIA’S most famous investigative reporter, Anna Politkovskaya, was gunned down in the lift of her Moscow apartment block yesterday in an apparent contract killing.
A fearless opponent of Russia’s wars in Chechnya who once described President Vladimir Putin as a “KGB snoop” and compared him to Stalin, she was shot as she returned home from a shopping trip at 4.30pm. A pistol and four bullets were found near her body.

She was the most prominent of dozens of Russian journalists murdered in the past 10 years and her death has dealt a serious blow to the country’s reputation.

Mikhail Gorbachev, the former president, said: “It’s a strike against all the democratic independent press, a terrible crime against the entire country, against all of us.”

Last night police were hunting a young man who was caught on a video camera in the hall of the apartment block wearing a black baseball cap. Officers said the killer, whose face is not visible on the footage, followed Politkovskaya inside as she unloaded the shopping from her car, and killed her with two shots to the chest and head.

Politkovskaya, 48 and divorced with a son and a daughter, was one of the few Russian journalists who dared to write critically about widespread human rights abuses in Chechnya. She won international acclaim for her reports but was hated by many in Russia’s security forces.

Readers will note Chabad's "chief rabbi of Russia" has been providing Putin with cover for several years now. I wonder if he feels any remorse?

Rabbi Steinsaltz On Putin, Lazar and Boro Park Hungarians

Tzemach Atlas is in Jerusalem for Yom Tov, and files this fun report from Chabad's Tzemach Tzedek shul in the Jewish Quarter:

On the first day of Sukkos I was found myself sitting next to Peter Kalms. … We both made our way to Rabbi Steinsaltz’s table; he was speaking about the new addition to the Shule with agitation. “This is an epitome of kitsch; they should take this wall and give it to an Arab church. Look at this!!! Look at the lights!


Tzemach Atlas: But the lights look appropriate.
Rabbi Steinsaltz, counting the lights on the chandelier: “You see eleven; there is a Jerusalem tradition to have ten lights like the sefirot. They should have asked the Lelever Rebbe. He builds lights according to the traditional arrangements”.…


Tzemach Atlas: So the wall is a little Hungarian Boro Park in Jerusalem.
Rabbi Steinsaltz: Hungarian taste is the worst chachkes they did not want in Vienna ended up in Hungary as high art. I speak about this with authority because when I was a teen I studied sculpture.
Tzemach Atlas: R. Weiss is the donor; you can talk to his grandkids other there, the Levitins. Why did they build the wall?
Rabbi Steinsaltz: The temptation was too great. You see in Jerusalem this is the weakness.


The conversation skips to Russia and Putin.
Rabbi Steinsaltz: I think Putin is an alien. The way he walks and then all the emotions are staged. He has no anger. When he is angry it is all calculated.
Peter Kalms: Lazar says that Putin is OK.
Rabbi Steinsaltz: He probably learned this from the Italian mafia, in the mafia you leak the one who is above you.
Rabbi Steinsaltz: Putin once said in a conference that a journalist who cared too much about Chechenya that the journalist could convert to Islam, and that Putin can recommend excellent Mohels from Moscow. You see Mohels in Moscow actually use this quote as an endorsement advertising their services. But it is all calculated and staged like everything Putin says.…

It reminds me of my Tishreis at the Tzemach Tzedek. Peter Kalms is wonderful guy, and Steinsaltz – what can you say?

Make sure to check out the post for some great pictures, as well.

A Ba'al Teshuva Story: Carlos Santana Returns To Jerusalem

The JPost is reporting that Carlos Santana has agreed to play a concert in Jerusalem this Spring. The news reminded me of a story from 1987, which may be the last time Carlos was in Israel. It was April 29 and smack in the middle of sefirat haomer. Of course, being a good yeshiva mon, I did not listen to music during sefira. Anyway, I'm walking through the square of the Jewish Quarter and I see a flatmate sitting on a bench playing his guitar. I shook my head disapprovingly and walked by him. A few minutes later, I come out of Tony's makolet, and I see a stranger sitting with my friend, playing his guitar – and boy can this guy play. I take a closer look and, sure enough, it's Carlos Santana.

I had one of those BT moments, when one has to choose between being really frum or living life normally. I made a bad choice, and went to the bais medrash for my afternoon shiurim. (If this ever happens to you, get professional help immediately.)

I study with all the false fervor I can muster. A few hours later, I run into my flatmate back in the square. He's alone, and comes up to me. "Shmarya," he says, "I had a strange day." "What happened?" I asked, even though I knew. He then tells me the story. Except there's a great twist. The flat mate doesn't know it's Santana. It's just some guy in the square named Carlos who asks to try his guitar, and then plays it really well, teaching my friend licks. After an hour or so of this, my friend says to him, "Have you seen the Wailing Wall yet?" "Is it close by?" Santana replies. My friend says "Sure, just a couple of blocks, I'll take you." And so he does.

Santana gets to the Wall and prays his heart out. When he's done, he thanks my friend for the help and for jamming with him. He then pulls a couple of tickets out of his pocket, gives them to my friend and says, "Why don't you come and see my band play tonight? Come backstage after." At this point my friend says, not looking at the tickets in his hand, "Carlos, what's the name of your band?" Santana tells him. My friend begins to have trouble breathing.

They part. The upshot as I remember it was this guy wouldn't go to the concert, because, you guessed it, sefira, and a concert was really live music, unlike simple jamming in the square. I hope for his sake I remember this part incorrectly.

Gang Beats 16 Yr Old In Crown Heights, NYPD: Attack Not Bias Crime

The NY Daily News reports:

"A 16-year-old Hasidic boy walking home from a Brooklyn synagogue on Yom Kippur was jumped by a group of teens who called him a "f-----g Jew," witnesses and his family charged.
Mendel Chesney was heading home about 10 p.m. Sunday when he was attacked by as many eight young men on Carroll St. in Crown Heights, witnesses and police said.

"At first, I thought they might be playing around, so we walked over to where the crowd was. That's when I see the talaisim [prayer shawls] and know it's a Jewish person and hear someone say, 'You f-----g Jew,'" said Michael Gitchel, who lives nearby.

Police confirmed Mendel was beaten, but NYPD officials said investigators have determined the attack was a robbery - not a bias crime.

Upset that the NYPD has not classified the attack as a hate crime, about 700 people rallied Wednesday outside the Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters on Eastern Parkway.

They say it was a mugging, but they didn't stick their hands in his pocket. This is the epitome of a hate crime, and he's not being charged as a hate crime," said Hanoch Hecht, 22, one of the rally organizers.

Mendel told his father, David Chesney, he heard footsteps, turned and was hit in the face with a fist or a rock. He said he fainted, and didn't hear any anti-Semitic taunts. When he regained consciousness, he heard someone ask for money.…

The Saint of Migdal Ohr

The Jerusalem Post reports:

Sometimes good things come from bad. This summer's war, with a boost from Rabbi Yitzhak Grossman of Migdal Ha'emek, helped bring some secular and ortohdox Israelis together.

Last Thursday, a Torah scroll was dedicated in honor of the 8th Paratrooper Battalion at Grossman's Migdal Ohr Yeshiva.

The unit's 600 soldiers, most of them secular, had stayed in the yeshiva's dormitories before leaving to fight in Lebanon in July and made it their home base during the three subsequent weeks when they went in and out of the battle zone.

Grossman, an Israel Prize laureate often referred to as the "disco rabbi" for his work reaching out to youths at clubs, blessed each fighter when they first set out, praying for their safe return. All 600 came back unharmed.…

Grossman saw to the soldiers' needs, providing necessities like food and clothing and making sure recreational facilities like the swimming pool were at their disposal. He also helped the unit acquire additional equipment such as knee pads.

"It was amazing," said Sharon Ohana, a member of the paratrooper unit. "He said, 'Anything you need, just tell us.'"…

Ohana spoke about staying on the campus. "That was also amazing. We're not used to [religious life] normally," he said in a phone interview.

Although the yeshiva students were not there, the staff were, and the soldiers were invited to join them for prayers and in laying tefillin (phylacteries) if they wished. "You feel something inside you and it makes you feel different about their [the religious] world," said Ohana. He said he and his comrades felt at home at Migdal Ohr and stressed that no one pressured them to participate in religious activities. [Consider this a note to Aish, Ohr Somayach, Heritage House, Chabad, etc.]

"To meet those people, for me and for other soldiers, was something very special and new since we don't live that kind of life," Ohana said. "That anyone in Israel would do that, say 'come into my place and do what with it what you want...,' personally, I will never forget it."

It occurs to me that Rabbi Grossman is the closet thing to a bona fide saint Judaism has.

Rubashkin and the Conservative Rabbis

Sukkot is upon us, and it seems the Conservative rabbis sent so long ago to investigate worker abuse at Rubashkin's Postville, Iowa slaughterhouse have still not released a report of their investigation, let alone announced a verdict on Rubashkin's guilt or innocence. Why?

A cynic might note the biggest volume season for kosher meat sales after Passover is Rosh HaShana and the Fall holidays, and that, in effect, the last of those holidays begins in less than 24 hours time. If these rabbis were to release a report and find Rubashkin culpable, it could hurt kosher meat sales at a critical time. It might also prompt Rubashkin to again restrict the flow of non-glatt meat where this is possible. It might appear to this cynic that the C-rabbis have intentionally dragged their feet to get Rubashkin and the industry through the holidays intact.

Now, the C-rabbis will deny this and instead claim the pressures of work slowed the process.

It is not for us to doubt our C-rabbis, or any of our rabbis, for that matter. And cynicism simply must be done away with.

That being said, there is only one conclusion to reach – it's too bad we weren't born Buddhists.

The OU, OK, KSA, etc. on the Monsey Chicken Scandal

The JTA reports:

A recent case of retail fraud could lead to wholesale changes in the kosher meat industry.
The changes were discussed at two recent meetings of high-level rabbis and kashrut supervisors, one at the Orthodox Union headquarters in Manhattan and another in the heavily Orthodox neighborhood of Borough Park in Brooklyn. The meetings came after a kosher grocery in Monsey, NY, was found selling non-kosher chickens under a kosher label in early September.…

The implications of the supervision breakdown that allowed the Shevach Meats mishap have rocked the kosher world, said Rabbi Chaim Fogelman, head of kashrut supervision for OK Kosher, which supervises some 240,000 kosher products in 68 countries.

"This is probably the biggest kashrut disaster since Mount Sinai," Fogelman said.

The problem is that supposedly credible merchants took advantage of a system built on trust.

"In Monsey, it was a respectable person in the community," Fogelman said. "And in general, even though it wasn't our supervision, it could have happened under our watch. It's an extremely painful story in kashrut."…

[Head of OU kashrut Rabbi Menachem] Genack attended the Yiddish-language meeting in Brooklyn - held the week after Shevach Meats was outed - which included representatives from numerous Chasidic kashrut supervising organizations. Another meeting, at O.U. headquarters, included the owners of several kosher slaughterhouses, including Empire Chickens, Aaron's Rubashkin and International Glatt, as well as the rabbis that supervise their plants, Genack said.…

"We have to create some kind of global accounting system so that we can verify the source of the product," said Genack, who has consulted with several large corporations about how they avoid retail fraud. But, he noted, "This isn't going to take a week to fix."…

Then, we have this (which may be what the Jewish Press was referring to in a cryptic editorial, and the Jewish Star had as a banner headline):

Barry Rosenbaum of Empire Chickens said his company long has been concerned about product counterfeiting.

"We're well aware that buyers buy just a little" Empire chicken, "then buy cheaper" kosher "products from our competitors, just to put our sticker in their window," Rosenbaum said. He said Empire receives reports nearly every week of such fraud, especially as many retailers unpack the whole chickens Empire sells them so they can cut them into smaller pieces that are sold separately.…

Through These Pale Cold Days

Through these pale cold days
What dark faces burn
Out of three thousand years,
And their wild eyes yearn,

While underneath their brows
Like waifs their spirits grope
For the pools of Hebron again--
For Lebanon's summer slope.

They leave these blond still days
In dust behind their tread
They see with living eyes
How long they have been dead.

–– Isaac Rosenberg [no relation], c. 1914

Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Ethiopian Jews

Recently, I found Rabbi Moshe Feinstein's 1984 teshuva-letter on Ethiopian Jews stuck between two file folders. (You can click the thumbnail image for a larger, more readable image or download a PDF.) This letter was written in response to a question I asked through Rabbi Moshe Tendler, Rav Moshe's son-in-law. He referred the question to his son, Mordechai, who then served as Rav Moshe's secretary-assistant. What follows is a (rough) translation:

With the Help of HaShem

26 Sivan 5744

To the honored, my beloved grandson ha rav ha-gaon moreinu ha-rav Rabbi Mordechai Tendler, shlit"a, with blessings of peace and blessing and all good:

With my best regards,

Here as per your request, I reaffirm what you wrote in my name several years ago regarding the "Falashas," that it is known what is written in the responsa of the Radba"z, section seven, §9, that it is understood he considers them to be Jews; however for practical application of the law it is difficult to rely on this, for it is not clear if the Radba"z knew well the reality regarding them, nor is it clear whether up until our time their status has [remained the same and] not changed. But in regard to practical application of the law they are not mamzerim or the like, for the Radba"z mentions there that many many doubts apply to them. Review my responsa where I detail at length the qualifications of the rabbinical prohibitions regarding the legal status of 'an illegitimate child of unknown fatherhood' and 'a child found in the street whose parents are (both) unknown'.

Regarding their Judaism, we must consider it a safek [doubt], and one must require of them true conversion before we permit them to marry within the Jewish community. Yet even before their conversion it is an active precept to save them from being drawn into a non-Jewish creed and from danger as the law is for any Jew, for "safek nefashot l'hakel" ["a doubt involving saving lives is judged leniently"] even where here the doubt is in their very status as Jews.

One should also know that even if in practical application of the law they are not Jews, nevertheless since they think they are Jews and sacrifice their lives for their Judaism, we are obligated to save them.***

As you mentioned, they should not be brought to the Land of Israel* unless they have underdone a conversion**, in order to not increase the concern for assimilation [i.e., intermarriage with Jews who do not have a doubt regarding their Jewish status and also a weakening of the faith of Ethiopian Jews themselves]. But if they have legally converted, and as I have heard they are doing, we shall consider them like all Jews, and one must assist them and support them for all needs of livelihood, both physically and spiritually. And I suffered great anguish because I have heard there are those in Israel who are not drawing them close in spiritual matters and are causing, G-d forbid, that they might be lost from Judaism. And it seems to me these people are behaving so only because the color of the Falashas' skin is black. It is obvious that one must draw them close, not only because they are no worse than the rest of the Jews – and because there is no distinction in practical application of the law because they are black – but also because one can say perhaps they are gerim [converts], and are therefore included in the mitzva "and you shall love the convert."

And I will conclude with the hope that the situation will improve, and in the merit in observing all the mitzvot, we should all soon merit to the ingathering of the exiles by our righteous messiah.

Your grandfather who loves you in heart and soul,

Moshe Feinstein

[All emphasis added.]

* Suggestions were made to bring Ethiopian Jews to Cyprus or Italy (or even the US or Canada) first to fulfill this request, but it proved impossible to do so. I told R. Mordechai Tendler this would not work. His answer based on conversations with his grandfather was to try anyway, which we did, and to note "safek nefashot l'hakel" in the teshuva. In other words, you have to save them no matter what. Rav Moshe wanted to give Baruch Tegegne and I brachot (blessings) to do so and asked us to come to the mountains, where he was vacationing, so he could bless us in person. Illness on our parts prevented this.

** Rav Moshe would later specify a giur l'humra, a form of pro forma conversion that allows conversion without first pushing away the potential converts and without first teaching them Jewish law. He would also later note that the Israeli Chief Rabbis' decision on these matters should be respected.

*** Rav Moshe had long before signed a public letter with non-Orthodox rabbis calling for the immediate aid for Ethiopian Jews and for rescue. It is linked here. Rabbi J. B. Soleveitchik signed the same letter. This is the campaign the late Lubavitcher Rebbe refused to join.

BREAKING KOSHER SCANDAL?

The Jewish Press editorial board reports:

As per our recent reports and editorials, kosher consumers are up in arms over the recent Monsey kashrus scandal. Now we learn of startling new allegations – allegations that come to our attention too close to press time for full investigation but which we feel duty-bound to share with our readers.

Names have not yet been provided to us, only alleged practices. But we have been told that some kosher food merchants have been advised by their kashrus supervisors that they may switch kosher labels on kosher food in order to accommodate customers desiring a particular shechita – as long as the product has some reliable hashgacha.

Individuals who rely on a particular hashgacha are advised not to base their decision exclusively on the label affixed to the meat or poultry. It behooves kosher consumers to be more proactive – to forgo a passive and deferential posture – when it comes to what they eat and feed their families.

If this turns out to be true, expect riots on the streets of Brooklyn.

[Hat tip: Michelle.]

The Soul Of An Artist

The story behind this Maurycy Gottlieb painting of a shul on Yom Kippur is fascinating. (Here's a link to a much larger pic of the painting.)

The painting is held at the Tel Aviv Museum. Its website notes:

The painting before us was done in Vienna, and is one of three masterpieces on religious themes painted by Gottlieb which reflect the personal conflict of the artist as to his identity as a Jew, a Polish citizen or a man of the Enlightenment. However, in this painting, Gottlieb does not hesitate to depict himself as a Jew among his fellow-Jews, in the synagogue, on the Jews' holiest day of the year. It is possible that towards the end of his short life Gottlieb resolved his conflict of identity. [In his work, he] He chose to depict himself in the context of Jewish tradition and culture, but also, as an independent person, enlightened, unafraid to stand up on his own.

The painting is based on the artist's memories of the synagogue in his childhood home of Drohowicz. Of the twenty figures in the painting, 15 are of those closest to the artist: his parents, his fiancee Laura and her family, and his own self-portrait which appears three times at different ages: In the center of the picture, he appears to be 22, as he was at the time the picture was painted; on his neck lies a medallion with a Star of David and his initials in Hebrew. On the left, the same medallion may be seen hanging on the neck of Gottlieb as a young child, dressed in holiday finery with an open prayer book before him. On the right side, Gottlieb may be seen as a youth looking aside from his prayer book.

His fiancee, Laura, appears twice. On the left, she stands up [in the women's gallery], holding a closed prayer book and on the right, she bends over, whispering to her mother.

The painting excels in masterful techniques, beginning with the layers of color, some semi-transparent and others opaque, and ending with an rich impasto of three-dimensional brush strokes and engravings in the paint with the help of the sharp point of the brush handle. The drapes and rugs are depicted in exquisite detail.

One year following the completion of the picture, Laura Rosenfeld married Leo Henschel. Two weeks later Gottlieb died suddenly following a short illness. There are those who say he committed suicide due to unrequited love for Laura. On the Torah mantle may be seen an inscription dedicated to the memory of the dear, departed Moshe (Maurycy) Gottlieb of blessed memory. Gottlieb explained that an urge came upon him to write his own epitaph. His father, who saw the work, strongly protested and Gottlieb rubbed it out, but later replaced it. The painting may indeed be an epitaph to the life and world view of Maurycy Gottlieb.

Somehow the soul of the artist touched a truth even he did not comprehend. Perhaps the most poignant Jewish painting ever.

[For those of you familiar with Chabad trivia, the woman at the upper right looks suspiciously like Mindy Feller, shtikhye.]

Who Is Rabbi Ovadia Yosef?

The JPost's Anshel Pfeffer gives us a brief biography:

…His recent bout of illness notwithstanding, the followers of the rabbi - who will today be celebrating his 86th birthday in a hospital ward, after also spending Yom Kippur there in his third hospitalization in as many weeks - cannot even begin imagining what life without him will look like. It's not only the sanctity of life that makes them insist that Yosef will live to 120, nor is it the awe in which he is held, but the total absence not only of a credible successor, but of an entire substrata of spiritual leadership in the haredi world.

The almost total vacuum that will be caused by Yosef's absence will not be because of the depth and breadth of his Torah learning or the audacity of his halachic rulings, unrivalled perhaps in generations, but the particular brand of leadership he has exhibited for five decades.…

…Unique among other senior rabbis, he wasn't the scion of a long-established rabbinic dynasty, pampered and nurtured in a Torah environment from infancy. Instead, his father Ya'acov, a poor grocer with a weakness for arak and singing, did everything in his power to end his son's nascent yeshiva career and set him to work dragging flour sacks.

Even after his father was thwarted, Yosef still had to overcome almost insurmountable obstacles of poverty and position before he managed to establish himself as a professional rabbi and dayan. None of his siblings managed to travel his route; most of them are still secular.

When addressing the spiritual needs of a fragmented Mizrahi community, buffeted by the challenges of poverty and eroding parental authority, Yosef knew exactly where they were coming from. That rapport, together with his prowess in Torah, was the secret of his success. Those strengths enabled him to forge diverse groups into a social force, long before it first took political form when Shas ran in the 1984 elections. It is also what commanded wide respect - not only from Israeli haredim - both within and outside the Mizrahi community.…

The Fight Over The Kotel HaKatan

Ha'aretz provides a recap and background.

Marvin Schick, Haredim and Libel

Do haredim get a raw deal in the media? Some, Marvin Schick and Agudath Israel's Rabbi Avi Shafran most prominent among them, believe they do.

Schick writes a regular advocacy piece published in the New York Jewish Week. This 'column" is in reality an advertisement and is paid for by a donor. The Jewish Week refuses to disclose the donor's name or affiliation. For a period of months, Schick's ad ran without the requisite disclosure that it was in fact an ad and not editorial copy. (The Jewish Week claims this is an error, and that it will – or already has been – corrected.)

Schick used one of these unlabeled ads to libel (and I do not use that word lightly) Hella Winston, the author of The Unchosen, a book documenting the plight of haredim who seek to leave the fold.

Schick hates Winston, and he does little to hide that animosity. In a column dedicated to 'proving' that there is little sexual abuse in the haredi world, written under the headline, "Group Libel Is Also Abuse," Schick accuses Winston of "claim[ing] that her book deals with sexual abuse among Chasidim," and links her to anti-haredi abuse.

I challenged Schick to provide even one citation where Winston claimed her book is about or focused on haredi sexual abuse. He was unable to do so.

Schick also claimed that Winston relied on "unreliable sexual abuse statistics." It turns out those statistics come from a then-unpublished study (not conducted by Winston) that failed to factor in the presence of ba'alei teshuva in the community. Schick's contention, in effect, is that ba'alei teshuva suffer more abuse and themselves abuse more often than born haredim. Even if this were true, it would barely change the statistical outcome. Nonetheless, Winston told me she added a clarification regarding this in the paperback edition of the book, due out this November. This is all the more remarkable because, in Schick's own words, Winston's book contains "no more than a brief reference" to abuse.

Schick then gets dirty. He writes, "I will add that her dissertation advisor told me that the original manuscript was far more hate-filled than what appears in print." William B. Helmreich, Winston's dissertation advisor, told me this is absolutely false. Helmreich only saw the manuscript – which is not Winston's dissertation – a few days before it was finalized by the publisher. He made no changes. Winston's publisher, which, unlike Helmreich, saw earlier versions of the book manuscript, has no idea what Schick is talking about. There were no edits made to remove hateful or bigoted material.

But what is most shocking is the context of the ad, written by Schick to respond to New York Magazine's story on the thirty-year alleged sex abuse and child molestation carried out by Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, and the ongoing coverup surrounding it. Look again at the tile Schick himself chose for this ad: "Group Libel Is Also Abuse."

Schick has no words of comfort for the alleged victims. He heaps venom on Robert Kolker, journalist who wrote the New York Magazine piece, and on Hella Winston, whose excellent book does nothing more than what it claims to do – document a small subset of haredim who choose to leave.

Schick's own family has itself been at the root of several scandals of note, including the riots caused by his brother's childish reaction to being stopped for a traffic violation in Boro Park. That brother's son was arrested, charged and pleaded guilty to conductiong a ponzi scheme that bilked dozens of haredim out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Schick has not, to my knowledge, written about either episode.

Marvin Schick has done much good in his life, but that good does not excuse his venom, his bias, or his libel. Consider this post to be a stub. Much more on the Schick family to come …

How I First Learned The Truth

Rabbi Natan Slifkin writes in an essay in memory of his mentor, Rabbi Aryeh Carmel, ztz"l:

Rav Carmell also taught me the corollary of “Accept the truth from wherever it comes,” which is “Reject falsehood from wherever it comes.” About twelve years ago, he rejected a halachic explanation that I had written in a manuscript on the grounds that it simply didn’t make sense. I protested that I was simply presenting the view of one of the Acharonim. Rav Carmell replied that one must be very wary of accepting something merely on the grounds that it was stated by a great authority if it does not make sense. As it happens, I went back and checked the sefer again, and it turned out that I had misunderstood what it stated. But the lesson remained with me; and I recently noticed that Rav Chaim of Volozhin, in his commentary to Pirkei Avos, comments that even if one’s own rebbe states something that does not seem to make sense, it is forbidden to accept it.

Soon after becoming Orthodox, I was in shul in St. Paul for Shabbos. After davening, the shul had a prolonged kiddush. In those days, about half of the members who attended were old timers, Litvaks and MOs, children of hasidim who came to America immediately after the war, second and even third generation locals. The other half was made up of Chabad BTs with and the five or so Chabad rabbis who lived in Minnesota.

The custom was that the first half hour of the kiddush was pareve. The Rebbe would of course be mentioned, but the context was such that it was non-threatening to the non-Chabadniks, who rarely stayed more than 30 minutes at any kiddush. After that, the kiddush turned into an hasidishe farbrengen.

I was standing at one of these farbrengens waiting for my Shabbos host. As was customary, the Chabadniks were reading a summary of the Rebbe's talk at last week's Crown Heights farbrengen. "You see," said a rabbi, the "Rebbe is endorsing prayer in public schools. He's calling for it explicitly!" The Chabadniks were happy with this bit of news. I wasn't, in large part because I believed it to be false. I spoke up.

"The Rebbe can't be calling for prayer in the public schools," I said. "If he is, that means Jewish children will be subjected to Christian prayer mentioning Jesus, Muslim prayer – even idol worship and cults like Hare Krishna and Satanism. You all went to private religious schools…You don't realize what this means. There must be a mistake. The Rebbe may be calling for a moment of silence, but I doubt he wants public prayer." I then briefly explained the difference between the two.

"OOOOOOOOOOhhhh, I'm sure the Rebbe should have asked you first!" said one Chabad rabbi, followed by snickering and peels of laughter from him and others.

"No," I replied, "what you say the Rebbe said makes no sense. If he said it that would be a problem, but I doubt he did. I don't think you understand whatever it is the Rebbe actually said."

The hasidim went back to farbrenging, shooting me occasional dirty looks. The rest of Shabbos passed uneventfully.

The next week I'm again in shul and, sure enough, my Shabbos host stays for the farbrengen. I'm about to leave when a Chabad rabbi starts to summarize the Rebbe's talk from the previous week. The Rebbe, it seems, had issued a correction – of sorts. To paraphrase, the Rebbe said, what I said last week was misunderstood. He then went on to say that he was calling for a moment of silence, not public prayer, and he explained the difference between the two, closely paralleling what I had said the previous week.

Not one hasid, not one Chabad rabbi, apologized for their obnoxious behavior the week before. No one acknowledged that I had been correct. It was then I knew that, at the very least, the local hasidim were broken.

ABC's Nightline To Focus On Orthodox Sex Abuse

It seems this will air Thursday night, but check Tuesday anyway. It's already been postponed at least twice, so don't be surprised if ABC postpones it again or shifts its broadcast time at last minute. Nightline appears to be under a lot of pressure to kill this story. That pressure seems to come from many sources – the Brooklyn DA's office trying to cover up its own corruption, Agudath Israel and other haredi groups trying to hide abuse in their community, and other "well-meaning" souls out to prevent a "hillul hashem." As preparation for this story, I suggest you watch the Satmar Kiryat Joel video linked here. That will help you understand how creeps like Kolko and Mondrowitz get away.

Yom Kippur and Repentance

It's just a few hours before Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. Most Jews, even many not otherwise religious, will spend the day in fasting and in prayer.

Yom Kippur is perhaps the most observed Jewish holiday after the Passover Seder night. I think the reason for this is largely because the idea of teshuva – and of forgiveness – is universal. All of us have done things we are sorry for. We all want to make amends and seek forgiveness. But this is hard to do. Yom Kippur gives this process structure and, perhaps more importantly, makes it communal. Asking another for forgiveness, especially at a time when he is himself seeking forgiveness from someone else or from God, makes the process much easier. It is difficult to refuse another's apology when you must yourself ask forgiveness of someone.

So Jews will flock to shuls, synagogues, and temples to seek forgiveness, or to hope that their one-day presence is enough to excuse their year long absence, and that God will forgive their neglect.

Others will sit, perhaps in the seat next to yours, and will quietly demand an apology from God and from man. For what? For entire families burned to smoke and ashes or buried in mass graves. For starvation and torture and neglect. For the rabbi, God's messenger, who raped and abused them, and for the rabbis who stood by and let it happen. For the Kolkos and the Lanners and for their enablers, the Margulies and the Willigs, and, sadly, the gedolim.

Chances are, in your shul, someone will be alone within the crowd, lost in the pain of abuse present or past.

But we will ignore them. We will beat our chests, cry and seek forgiveness for tying the wrong shoe first or accidentally eating a piece of non-yoshon bakery. We will beseech God with all our might to forgive us these sins. For the day we ate a Hebrew National hot dog, for the day we ate the wrong cheese, for the day we didn't learn enough or daven hard enough. And, as the day ends and the fast lifts, we feel renewed and forgiven.

This Yom Kippur take a few minutes out of your scripted self-centered piety and think about those people who really needed your help, but you ignored them. Maybe you wanted to avoid a "hillul hashem." Perhaps you denied their cries by citing lashon hara law, or you chose to side with the rabbis because of their power and social standing ("they must be right – they're rabbis and community leaders, after all"). Or maybe through the din of your daily life you did not hear their cries.

When the fast ends will you feel renewed and forgiven? I don't think so.

It is our job, our mission as Jews, to make God known in the world. We do that whether we realize it or not, often whether we want to or not, for better or for worse.

The world is what we make of it. If you want to see God's presence, make room for it. How do you do that? Help people. Feed the hungry, protect the defenseless. Reject corruption, stealing and fraud. Deal honestly with everyone, and protect the weakest among us.

If you do that, people will look at your communities and they will see God and they will say God is good.

If you do not, they will look at your communities and they will see a God of evil, a corrupt God, a falsifiable God, a God of welfare fraud and political fixes, of nepotism and abuse. You may not understand this but, all frum propaganda aside, this is what many people now see when they look at Orthodoxy.

It doesn't have to be that way. You each have a choice. It may be difficult and it may be painful, but it's yours. Please act on it.