Elections and Eclectics
* This is Israel's sixth election in fourteen years. One starts to think about the high priests in the Second temple - צא וחשב, כל אחד מהם לא הוציא שנתו. Is the political system flawed, or is reality just
flawed?
* In a recent article, my teacher Chaim Milikowski, with a wave of his hand, condemns most of the work that has been preformed on rabbinic texts (including his own) as nonsense, or at least useless. Studying with him is an exciting experience, most of all because we get to actually put our hands on "the real stuff" and work with him the way he thinks one should work, almost from scratch. His points about stemattics are interesting - that no one text embodies the *original work*, and that the work does not neccesarily embody the *original derasha*. The differences he points out seem so simple, but are not. They have foiled so many people, including many who are living with us today. (Ch. Milikowsky, "Reflections on the Practice of Textual Criticism in the Study of Midrash Aggada, The Legitimacy, the Indispensability and the Feasibility of Recovering and Presenting the (most) Original Text", in C. Bakhos (ed) _Current Trends in the Study of Midrash_ JSJ Suppliments 106, Leiden 2006)
* Joel Roth is spending an inordinate amount of time trying to explain what exactly the law comittee of the Rabbinical Assembly (Conservative) has to say about the public status of gay and lesbian Jews. But he is walking into a dead end: in a movement which exhibited such a high level of tolerance to members ignoring heterosexual sex laws, how can the movement - aside from its homophobic sections - afford anything less to the gay members? Yet again, I think, we find, that If halakha is not followed without bias as a prettybinding guide, western conservative tendencies get the better of you - and this includes the Orthodox more than anyone, but the Conservative movement, which has a right wing with Orthodox overtones, and a left with with reform leanings, is in a fix over this one, becuase Halakha is hard for them to embrace.
* This is Israel's sixth election in fourteen years. One starts to think about the high priests in the Second temple - צא וחשב, כל אחד מהם לא הוציא שנתו. Is the political system flawed, or is reality just
flawed?
* In a recent article, my teacher Chaim Milikowski, with a wave of his hand, condemns most of the work that has been preformed on rabbinic texts (including his own) as nonsense, or at least useless. Studying with him is an exciting experience, most of all because we get to actually put our hands on "the real stuff" and work with him the way he thinks one should work, almost from scratch. His points about stemattics are interesting - that no one text embodies the *original work*, and that the work does not neccesarily embody the *original derasha*. The differences he points out seem so simple, but are not. They have foiled so many people, including many who are living with us today. (Ch. Milikowsky, "Reflections on the Practice of Textual Criticism in the Study of Midrash Aggada, The Legitimacy, the Indispensability and the Feasibility of Recovering and Presenting the (most) Original Text", in C. Bakhos (ed) _Current Trends in the Study of Midrash_ JSJ Suppliments 106, Leiden 2006)
* Joel Roth is spending an inordinate amount of time trying to explain what exactly the law comittee of the Rabbinical Assembly (Conservative) has to say about the public status of gay and lesbian Jews. But he is walking into a dead end: in a movement which exhibited such a high level of tolerance to members ignoring heterosexual sex laws, how can the movement - aside from its homophobic sections - afford anything less to the gay members? Yet again, I think, we find, that If halakha is not followed without bias as a prettybinding guide, western conservative tendencies get the better of you - and this includes the Orthodox more than anyone, but the Conservative movement, which has a right wing with Orthodox overtones, and a left with with reform leanings, is in a fix over this one, becuase Halakha is hard for them to embrace.
posted by DafKesher at 12:53 AM
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