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Andrew Dice Clay on Josh Orlian

If there’s ever someone you wouldn’t expect me to praise, it would have to be Andrew Dice Clay. He was banned for life by MTV and from many radio and television programs for his use of foul language and “politically incorrect humor” — one of the cast members of Saturday Night Live refused to appear during the episode in which he made a guest appearance. In terms of “defining deviancy down” when it comes to language and references in the media, he exceeded even Howard Stern.

But he provides an interesting footnote to the appearance of Josh Orlian on America’s Got Talent, as previously discussed by both Rabbi Adlerstein and myself. In contrast to Howard Stern, who I have since been told has a non-Jewish mother, Andrew Clay Silverstein grew up in a Jewish family in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn.

On Shabbos I mentioned Josh Orlian’s AGT appearance, and my reaction to it, while speaking at a Kiddush. I was seated across from a corporate entertainer and comedy magician named Avi Frier, who is also the former publisher of the Florida Jewish News. Honestly, I didn’t know the “corporate” part or what sort of language Avi chooses at his appearances, so I didn’t know what he, as a comedian, would think about my remarks. But after I sat back down, he told me that he had been in contact via email with Orlian’s father, and had related the following story — which I include here with Avi’s endorsement.

At the height of Andrew Dice Clay’s career, Avi was the last of four acts opening for him at an appearance. There was a heckler in the audience who was giving each of the comedians an extremely hard time. Avi resolved to stay with his script, but eventually he was distracted by the incessant heckling. So he said something which, he reports, successfully stopped the heckler, but employed language “inconsistent” with the yarmulke on his head. I’m sure we all sympathize, and again, Avi endorsed saying this story in his name.

Immediately following his act was the main event. And Andrew Dice Clay stood up at the open mic and asked if “the magician” was still present. Avi raised his hand. And Andrew Dice Clay Silverstein, in front of the crowd, said he had a good act and a good response to the heckler. But if Avi was going to talk like that, he added, “take off the […] yarmulke!” [Demonstrating again that foul language can get a laugh where otherwise a remark would barely get a smile.]

All of the other comedians gave Avi a pat on the back for the call-out and praise from one of the world’s top comedians. But Avi was sitting there thinking about how right Clay was. Even the leading foul-mouthed comedian of the day knew that the yarmulke represents a different, higher standard, incongruous with choices of language and topic made by others.

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Defining Deviancy Down

Ordinarily, TV portrayal of Orthodox Jews isn’t worthy of comment (even for those who own one). A degree of negativity, something to make us uncomfortable, is practically to be expected. That writers of fictional TV programs don’t understand our community and misportray it is a given. That the media prefers to focus upon the most negative stories is not only true regarding the Orthodox — and writers and reporters for stories of that kind can usually be counted upon to add a heavy dose of cynicism when the alleged miscreant is perceived as religious.

Even so-called “reality” TV, where the people portraying the Orthodox are Orthodox, is little different. Yes, the kipah-clad kid singing non-Jewish lyrics has a great voice, but he’s singing non-Jewish lyrics. Such is the nature of national TV, where the audience doesn’t want to hear him sing a Shwekey track (or, more apropos, one from Shalshelet).

The most recent such case, though, is different.

First, some background, though you may know all of the following better than I do. There’s a show called “America’s Got Talent” — it’s a national variety show, and apparently gets huge audiences. It’s in a different league than “The Gong Show.” It must be, because countless stories and individuals told me that I just have to watch a clip from its most recent episode… and say something about it.

A talent show of this size attracts fame-seekers like moths to a flame, whether or not they have any talent of record. Producers filter through the hundreds or thousands of applicants, deciding who will get to appear before the judges. The judges determine who will appear on the live shows, at which point people call in to vote for their favorite acts.

So what makes this show, this year, different from the others? It is different because of a sixth-grader who, with Dad’s advice and encouragement, introduced himself as a stand-up comic — and then proceeded to deliver a series of off-color jokes. Oh… and he was wearing a kipah.

Let’s be blunt — he didn’t get on stage on the merit of his comedic genius. Whatever talents he might have, stand-up comedy isn’t it. He opened with “what an honor to be auditioning in front of the best judges in the world” with precisely the same intonation used for “it’s such an honor to read you the script that Daddy gave me on the occasion of my Bar Mitzvah.” It made me cringe. And then he made me cringe for different reasons.

Why did he get onto the show? As mentioned, the staff only send on those whose appearance will make for good viewing — they have to be particularly good, bad, amusing, or shocking. I remember my childhood friend Eric Witt telling jokes in our school’s talent show — if I recall correctly, we were all of one grade older. And just being honest, Eric’s delivery was much smoother. I remember because I was impressed, I didn’t know he would be that good on stage. And needless to say, Eric did not tell, in front of his teachers, the sort of jokes that seventh-grade boys in the secular world share with their friends.

In my opinion, Eric, as good as he was, would not have made it onto the show. Both because he wouldn’t tell that type of joke, and because he didn’t wear a yarmulke.

It’s nothing new that the use of nivul peh, vulgar speech, can make people laugh, masking otherwise mediocre talent. And in general, comedy is a two-edged sword — the Gemara both advises starting a shiur with a milsa d’bedichusa, a joke, and describes one joke as capable of nullifying the benefits of a thousands words of mussar, rebuke. One of my closest teachers and advisers once mentioned how important it is to have a “Torahdig” sense of humor. It is important that we be able to smile and laugh — and equally important not to use humor to profane the holy.

In this case, as shocking as his filth was, I wonder if he could have proceeded past the producers and out onto the stage — much less get through to the next round — without the kipah. A twelve-year-old boy telling jokes of that variety isn’t particularly newsworthy, and his delivery was, as I said, stiff like cardboard.

What is the yarmulke supposed to symbolize? Why does the Torah tell us to look different in the first place? Our mission is to proclaim — in both word and deed — G-d’s Presence in the world. We should strive to represent the highest and holiest of values.

We live at a time when society is going in the opposite direction. What was scandalous a generation ago is commonplace today — in dress, in conduct, and in dialogue. And what did this boy tell the judges, two of whom are Jewish (and one of whom made his career by lowering the standards for broadcast radio)? “You’re right, society is going your way. Even we so-called religious guys, we’re just as gutter-mouthed as you are.” And, to no one’s surprise, they ate it up.

In describing the failures of the criminal justice system twenty years ago, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan coined the term “defining deviancy down,” allowing ever worse behavior to pass as acceptable. And as Mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani knew that when things are spiraling out of control, you need to compensate. He ordered the police to address even petty crimes, and reversed the trend Moynihan observed.

Chazal told us the same, that you need to push in the opposite direction just to preserve proper standards. Seeing for what passes as acceptable (or even expected) dress for girls and women today, we understand why many Rabbonim push for more care and higher levels of tznius than were tolerated fifty years ago. It’s not only because the community has grown and gained so much internal strength and respect, but because no American woman fifty years ago would dare walk outside in what ten-year-old girls consider “normal” today. It’s not a time to be lax. And confronted with rampant nivul peh, our response must be similar.

Clearly we have reached the time described by the Mishnah when chutzpah yasgi, when to be brazen or bold-faced overruns the world. But the embarrassment to Kavod Shamayim still turns the stomach. No, that level of speech is not acceptable — on the contrary, we should be more careful in Lashon Hora, Ona’as Devarim, Nivul Peh (gossip, hurtful words, and vulgarity) and all other Halachos of speech, as we are surrounded by a generation that has made vulgarity commonplace.

May our doing so be a merit for three other young men — Yaakov Naftali ben Rachel Devorah, Gilad Michael ben Bat Galim, and Eyal ben Iris Teshurah.

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The Importance of Unity

At this writing, we are anxiously awaiting the rescue or release of the three boys kidnapped by terrorists, Yaakov Naftali ben Rachel Devorah, Gilad Michael ben Bat Galim, and Eyal ben Iris Teshurah.

All over the world, Jews have set aside their differences to pray for these three boys. At the Knesset, perhaps the focal point for disagreements between Jews, all the Jewish representatives said Psalms together.

tefilah-gatheringWhy does it take an event of this magnitude to unify us?

This week’s Torah reading focuses upon Korach, who led a rebellion against Moshe. What could be a more ridiculous idea? Everyone knew that Moshe was appointed by G-d and had led them out of Egypt. As mentioned last week, the Medrash even tells us that everyone had the opportunity to hear the Commandments directly from HaShem, but each time He spoke, their souls left their bodies. They were unable to hear Him directly, though Moshe could — which is the best indication of Moshe’s purity of thought and intent. It was the Jews themselves who turned to Moshe and asked him to transmit G-d’s message; for Korach to now turn around and claim that Moshe was changing the rules for his own benefit was both absurd and deadly.

For Korach and all his followers, it was all about their personal honor and benefit. They didn’t get the positions they thought they “deserved,” and so they acted out of jealousy. They were wrong, and as we see, to act upon their feelings certainly wasn’t worthwhile.

Whether or not a person is in the right, taking it personally is never worthwhile. The problem is that it’s difficult, in the heat of the moment, to remember the brotherhood between us that is more important than any argument we might be having. A story I heard this week from Rabbi Dovid Eisenberg illustrates this point nicely:

After someone passes away, there is a Jewish custom to accompany the body until burial. This means that even overnight, people stay with the deceased, as arranged by the Chevrah Kadisha, the burial society.

In one community, there were two people who had been in an argument, and never reconciled. For two decades they lived in the same community, sent their children to the same schools, saw each other in synagogue, at weddings, etc., and never spoke.

Then someone in the community passed away, and the person with the Chevrah Kadisha who arranged the shemirah, the watching of the body, was unaware of the argument between these two men. So he scheduled both of them to share the same shift, to watch the body at the same time.

So the two of them found themselves in a room, with just each other and someone who had passed on. They were confronted with the realization that all of us are, like the deceased person they were watching, headed to the World of Truth after our time in this one.

That one scheduling error caused a twenty year argument to disappear.

As a merit for Yaakov Naftali ben Rachel Devorah, Gilad Michael ben Bat Galim, and Eyal ben Iris Teshurah, may we all find an opportunity to reconcile our differences, and commit to remembering this without another tragic reminder.

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Guess Who Came to Dinner?

Did a Frothing Press Help Serve the Truth?

According to those in the know, Mayor Bill de Blasio was to have delivered his greetings and departed with his press entourage before the Novominsker Rebbe, Rav Yaakov Perlow, rose to address the assembled at Agudath Israel’s 92nd annual dinner. Instead, the mayor was running late, Rav Perlow’s speech was moved up, and both hizzoner and his press ended up with front row seats. And in a departure from his norm at the annual dinner, the Novominsker chose to address an urgent Inyana D’Yuma instead of delivering more general remarks.

To judge from the coverage that resulted, one could be forgiven for thinking that Rav Perlow had ascended the podium and called for open warfare.

The press reached into its bag of stereotypes and pulled out a familiar caricature of “angry” charedim, though the antipodal video is available for all to see. The Forward said that Rav Perlow’s “fiery” speech “stunned” the dinner, and quoted an anonymous “Jewish leader” as claiming the comments of the Rosh Agudath Israel were “divisive,” along with other adjectives which would besmirch the Rebbe’s kavod to even repeat. [What sort of “leader” is willing to offer only an anonymous critique of Rav Perlow’s statement was, of course, not outlined by The Forward.] The NY Daily News reported that the Rebbe “blasted” non-Orthodox Judaism. The video posted online was captioned: “Agudath Israel’s Rabbi Perlow Rails against Danger of Reform, Open Orthodoxy Movements.”

Many distorted the comments still further, as if Rav Perlow had spoken not about digressions from normative Judaism, but about the Jews who have been led astray. Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, executive director of the New York Board of Rabbis, called Rav Perlow’s remarks “disparaging comments about our people.” Michael Powell of the NY Times claimed that the Rebbe “offered a shower of condemnation for Reform and Conservative Jews” (and, still worse, suggested that Mayor de Blasio should have opined on a Jewish religious matter). Emily Hauser, blogging in – once again – The Forward, said that he “slandered virtually every Jew on the planet.” And there are more in this vein.

In actuality, the listeners were so visibly “stunned” that they kept eating, drinking and listening as if nothing extraordinary had been said – because it hadn’t. The press corps was most exercised by his offhand dismissal of the non-Orthodox movements, but Rav Perlow himself was much more concerned with Open Orthodoxy, which is now ordaining rabbis and sending them to take posts in Orthodox congregations. This makes the foreign ideas and untenable innovations coming from its school and leading alumni much more dangerous to the integrity of Torah Judaism.

With regards to the heterodox movements, the Rebbe commented that they “have no future, they almost have no present, and… will be relegated by the Ribono Shel Olam [Master of the World] to the dustbin of Jewish history.” They were yesterday’s challenge. The leaders of these groups have no bone to pick with Rav Perlow, but with the Pew Report and other surveys showing that “Jews of No Religion” and intermarried families are engendered by abandoning the path of Halacha.

The distortion of the Rebbe’s observation about ideological movements into an attack upon their members is no accident. Most who describe themselves as “Reform” or “Conservative” are at most peripherally affiliated with those movements – they attend synagogue biannually, and give no special credence to the words of their clergy. Unless deceived into taking the Novominsker’s statement as a personal insult, they could instead ponder its accuracy.

When the dust settles, that could yet happen – and the press will have made it possible. These articles made both Rav Perlow’s clear condemnation of “Open Orthodoxy” and his dismissal of heterodoxy a far more public matter than they would have been otherwise. Both Modern Orthodox and non-Orthodox have heard that somewhere in New York can be found a Jewish leader who stands for truth and standards.

The [grey] lady doth protest too much, methinks. It would not be the first time that the media’s overwrought reaction to the statements of a Gadol turned out to serve a positive end.

This article first appeared in Ami Magazine.

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An Evil Report

In this week’s reading we learn about the spies sent to look at the Land of Cana’an. As is clear from the consequences, their evil report, and the Children of Israel’s reaction, became their greatest sin in all their time in the Sinai desert — and it was initiated by “leaders of the Children of Israel” [Num. 13:3]. Even among the Generation of the Desert, those who heard the Voice of G-d at Mt. Sinai, those who set this in motion were on an exalted spiritual level. How could this have happened?

the-juiciest-gossipAfter they went through the land of Cana’an, these great men came home very discouraged. They knew that the Children of Israel had sinned previously, especially with the Golden Calf. They saw that the inhabitants were giants, and it would take open miracles for Israel to be victorious. So they concluded, erroneously, that Israel was no longer worthy of that level of protection — that G-d’s promise was not unconditional, that they would lose.

So what did they do when they returned? Did they go to Moshe? Moshe, of course, had a direct line to G-d, and they all knew it. Like all the rest of the Children of Israel, even these leaders, the spies, couldn’t withstand hearing G-d’s Voice directly — at Mt. Sinai, says the Medrash, their souls left their bodies both times G-d spoke to them, so they asked Moshe to listen and transmit to them. Moshe was thus uniquely able to tell them if Israel was or was not worthy, or if it mattered. His guidance stood above that of all the elders, all the judges, and certainly all the nation.

But what did they do? They didn’t turn to Moshe. They made their own judgement and spread their story via the rumor mill. And that was their failing. And all the Children of Israel listened to them, and not to Moshe — and that was their failing.

Had the spies turned to Moshe and let him reassure them, or had the Children of Israel known the difference between being a leading figure and having true leadership (and listened to the latter), they would have entered the land forty years sooner — all those adults would have entered the land rather than dying in the desert.

Have we learned from their experience?

Today, following the spies seems to be commonplace. Magazines and websites exist solely to gossip about leading entertainers and anyone else they choose. There are no shortage of outlets, especially blogs, whose primary purpose is to speak evil of Jews or Israel, and Jews read them. Today, anyone can set him or herself up and claim to be a “leader” — and get plenty of followers.

We, the Children of Israel, cannot afford to repeat the error of the spies.

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Why Kids’ Clothing Harms Women

Why? Well, I can’t claim it makes sense. My impression is that if you’re The Forward, everything oppresses (Orthodox) women.

As acknowledged by Footsteps, an organization helping people leave the “ultra-” Orthodox community, women are much less likely to leave Torah observance than men (in a TV interview, the head of Footsteps said only one-third of its clients are women). But as demonstrated by Deborah Feldman, Leah Vincent and Frimet Goldberger, they are much more likely to provide fictionalized depictions of their past lives and communities after they do.

Even so, this article is an amazing journey into the realm of illogic. Its basis is a single anonymous phone call to a store in Lakewood selling “trendy” clothing, berating them for advertising depicting a seven or eight-year-old boy dressed according to current fashion — which, in all honesty, outfits him as a Ringling Bros. employee. Be that as it may, the caller was outraged, not amused, and she threatens a boycott if the store won’t stop wasting their money trying to market clown costumes to the Orthodox Jews of Lakewood.

Which, to Frimet Goldberger, “continues a cycle in which women perpetuate their own victimhood.” I wish I were making this up.

To her, the fact that women seem even more concerned with tznius than men, despite her own acknowledgment that “ultra-Orthodox women are not the gullible and oppressed creatures we sometimes purport them to be” (an amazing admission, that, especially with her confession to having done this herself), just means that women are being more oppressed. It is women, not men or children, who are “outraged,” “unwilling,” yet “forced to conform.”

It’s good enough for Ripley — but given that it denigrates the Orthodox, its appearance in the Forward is little surprise.

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Learning Torah Is Equal to them All

On Shavuos, many of us will stay awake throughout the night, learning until we daven k’vasikin (pray at dawn). But as we finish our final cup of coffee and pat ourselves on the back, we should acknowledge for a moment that for many this is a weekly practice. And we should ponder, further, how unique this makes our nation.

During my first year in college, a lighthearted op-ed in the town newspaper complained that it was difficult to hire a student babysitter due to frequent breaks and vacations: mid-semester break, Thanksgiving weekend, winter vacation, reading period, post-exam break, and the list goes on. I responded with a letter to the editor, co-signed by my roommates, arguing the importance of independent research and our other efforts outside the classroom.

All of that was true, of course. But as I continued my college career, I slowly learned things covered neither in class nor the student handbook. Rules such as “9 am classes are for freshmen,” “the weekend begins on Thursday evening,” and “you need to be on the field by 4:30” were as important as any published by the school. Our schedules were augmented by sports, theater, music, the school newspaper, debating clubs, and even campus businesses. And, of course, that op-ed had a point: the weeks of classes and exams added up to barely six months of the year.

To say that going from college to yeshiva involved a culture shock is the quintessential understatement. The baseline expectation suddenly became nine to ten hours of learning every day plus 90 minutes of davening – for nine months or more each year. “Extracurricular activities” included eating, sleeping, and doing laundry.

But more than that – even in the best of colleges, the respected students are the top athletes, the editor of the newspaper, the top debater. Genius and innovation are respected, but due to talent more than dedication. In yeshiva, the greatest respect is reserved not for the natural genius, but for the student who commits himself above and beyond the norm.

It is the study of Torah that has produced a nation that excels in intellectual pursuits. Jews constitute just 0.2% of the world’s population, but over one-quarter of the winners of the Nobel and similar prizes in research fields are Jewish. From where did the Jewish people gain its phenomenal dedication to intellectual exploration and inquiry? Without recognizing the role of traditional Jewish learning, it is difficult to find an answer free of racial overtones.

But despite much-deserved admiration for scholarship in medicine and physics, Torah remains unique. Upon completing a Masechta (Tractate of Talmud) or Seder Mishnayos (Order of Mishnah), part of the “Hadran” compares Torah scholars to others. It says, “we toil and receive reward, they toil and do not receive reward.” Is that really true? Is there no compensation for other forms of “toil?”

The answer speaks to the unique nature of Torah: other fields reward not the effort, but the results. Even an hourly employee will be dismissed if the work product is considered deficient. Only in the field of Torah scholarship is the effort an end unto itself.

Nearly 30 years ago, an article in a prominent newspaper lionized yeshiva learning. It compared a yeshiva to an elite music conservatory, and asked readers to imagine the pride that they would feel if the world’s best violinists gathered in their city to practice their art 10 to 12 hours each day.

The newspaper was the Philadelphia Inquirer, and the article, written by a non-Jewish writer, concerned the Talmudical Yeshiva of Philadelphia. It is a sad truth that such articles are not written by Jewish writers, whether in American Jewish community papers or in Israel. In Jewish circles, these same scholars are described as lazy, or taking too many vacations – and the material they study deemed unnecessary.

Without question, no kollel should harbor a yungerman unwilling to do the work; to do so is both dishonest and gives our detractors the ability to make absurd generalizations. But neither can we fall prey to their slanderous, sweeping judgements. The average yungerman is not merely the best of our nation in our own eyes. By any impartial standard, the intensity of his scholarship deserves admiration, respect, and our support.

This article first appeared in Ami Magazine.

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Shared Glory

Upon the inauguration of the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, the leaders of each of the Tribes of Israel, the Nesi’im, brought gifts to be offered as sacrifices. We read the details of the gifts offered by each of the twelve, and immediately realize that the Ba’al Koreh, the Torah reader, had an easier job preparing that we might have thought — because besides the names of the tribes and their leaders, essentially the same six verses are repeated twelve times. Each one of them brought precisely the same gift.

torah-mountainRabbi Shmuel Greineman writes that this is no coincidence. On the second day, Nesanel ben Tzuar of the tribe of Yissachar had to make a decision. What would he do differently than Nachshon ben Aminadav of Yehudah? Each of the remaining ten, of course, would then have to decide how to vary from the earlier ones, inevitably leading to jealousy as each one felt compelled to upstage those who gave previously. So he chose instead to let Nachshon’s gift serve as the template which they all followed. G-d found this so gratifying that He had all twelve gifts recorded in the Torah individually, although they could as easily have been stated collectively.

This week’s reading, Naso, is universally read either immediately before or after the holiday of Shavuos, when the Torah was given, when the entire Nation gathered around the mountain “like one person with one heart.” The gifts of the Nesi’im teach us the importance and greatness of unity. The Torah, with its “seventy facets,” is not a prescription for anarchy. On the contrary — the depth of Torah provides abundant lessons all leading us in the same direction, to bring G-dliness into the world and share it with the next generation.

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Leading the Blind

The results of recent Jewish community surveys are alternately delightful and dismal, exciting and excruciating. The growth of Torah-observant households is a stunning phenomenon, while Jewish sociologist Steven Cohen observed, “the sky is falling for the rest of the population.”

Given this dichotomy and the urgency of the problem, we might imagine that everyone would want to know what it is that we, the Orthodox, are doing right. But apparently we would be wrong. Despite multiple surveys detailing the divergent trajectories of young traditional versus liberal Jews today, we have seen no studies dedicated to understanding our successful formula. Instead, Federations and well-meaning philanthropic foundations continue to invest great sums of money on projects whose claim to promote Jewish continuity is nothing more than conjecture — with predictable results.

As we all know, the Torah community is thriving. In less than a decade, the number of Orthodox Jews grew by over 100,000 in the New York area alone, according to the UJA/Federation survey — over 20%. In Baltimore, a similar survey showed an increase of 50%. Last year’s Pew Survey reported more modest growth nationally, but noted that while 11% of adults 18-29 are Orthodox, the same is true of 27% of Jewish minor children. 60% of Jewish children in the New York City area live in Orthodox homes.

But a birth rate of over five children for the average charedi family is only one important factor. According to the Pew Survey, only 22% of retirement-aged Jews raised Orthodox remain Orthodox today. By contrast, the retention rate for those now 30-49 is 57% — while fully 83% of young adults (under 30) remain in our community. Again, one would expect that understanding the dramatic improvement in Orthodox retention would be a high priority.

Instead, many Jewish pundits find themselves living in the past. Writing in The Forward, Josh Nathan-Kazis opines that “The picture is of a denominational rockfall sliding from more traditional streams through the Reform movement and out of the denominational structure altogether.” While this image may have been accurate for thousands of families, “Orthodox by default,” who immigrated from Europe prior to the War, today it is as dated as a rotary phone.

Pini Herman, a researcher at the Jewish Federation of Los Angeles, went still further, arguing that “it is in the self-interest of the Conservative and Reform movements to encourage the flowering of the Orthodox American Jewish community, for they are the ultimate beneficiaries of the adult choices of Orthodox-raised children.” They have missed the boat on our success, neatly explaining why they cannot chart their own.

For it is not true that the educational efforts of the Orthodox community, which Herman acknowledges as “heroic,” “legendary,” and “to the point of actual impoverishment,” have resulted in the production of yet more heterodox Jews. On the contrary, commitment to Torah education over multiple generations has made the retention of our youth the norm rather than the exception. Today’s Torah community is literally that — a community of Torah, in which parents, rebbeim and teachers all work together to transmit the mesorah.

Why is this so poorly understood by outside observers? Liberal Jews have been trained to believe that their traditional brethren — especially those labeled the “ultra-Orthodox” — comprise a society so alien that their experience is irrelevant. Besides news stories highlighting bizarre tales of (often exaggerated, if not invented) wrongdoing, there is a more basic depiction of traditional Jews as no more modern than the Amish, but more hostile. Further, our brethren regard the Talmud and other traditional texts as practically our exclusive province.

Yet learning is and remains the answer. There is no magic or gimmick, and no alternative that will ever be effective. Their lack of awareness remains their own loss — and it remains our obligation to do all we can to show them the way forward. To study Judaism, to connect yourself to generations past, and to make this the centerpiece of a child’s education, comprise the only effective route to ensuring a Jewish future.

This article first appeared in Ami Magazine.

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Punishing American Learning in Israel

Besides the legal changes affecting the funding for the Yeshivos, the Religion Ministry under Bennet has a few tricks up its sleeve that we don’t even know about. I just spoke with a Rosh Yeshiva in Israel whom I know personally to confirm details of this, and who insisted that his name not be used, so he had no reason to exaggerate.

Like college after the end of exams, students from abroad will often exit during the last few days of a yeshiva zman, especially at the end of the winter before Pesach. It is quite routine that if a zman ends on Monday, for example, students will be permitted to fly back home on Saturday night or Sunday.

The inspectors from the Religion Ministry are essentially hired accountants, who come to visit a yeshiva and see how many students they have. But they do not have control over their schedules. An inspector who had visited a yeshiva several times previously, and knew that it was functioning and flourishing, was deliberately instructed to come visit the yeshiva on Sunday, immediately prior to the “official” end of zman but once all the students had been let go. And by taking a tally at that time, he was forced to report that the Yeshiva had a tiny fraction of the students that it claimed, had lied to the government, and not only should not receive money but should be forced to pay money back to the ministry that it had taken illegally.

All of which, of course, the inspector knew to be false, and he was honestly quite apologetic about it to the Rosh Yeshiva.

The Rosh Yeshiva sounded content and happy as he always is, but the Yeshiva was facing very significant debts before this happened. This is how you ruin an institution which brings hundreds of young men to spend lots of money in Israel — with lies and fraud. It’s how you murder a person via government fiat. Believe what you will, but this is the truth. This is what now runs the government of Israel.

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