kenw@lcuxc.UUCP (K Wolman) (01/28/85)
***From Asher Meth*** [Ken Wolman writes] > In 1791, when France made its first moves toward emancipating > its Jews, wasn't it the Sephardim who wanted to deny emancipation > to their Ashkenazic brethren? Didn't it take almost TWO years ------ [Asher Meth answers] >> Didn't/doesn't emancipation lead to greater possibility of assimilation ? >> In which group do we find greater assimilation - Ashkenazim or Sephardim ? >> >> I do not know all the historical background implied by Ken Wolman, but must >> not these factors be taken into account, especially when arguing a point >> with Martillo ? >> >> asher meth >> allegra!cmcl2!csd2!meth >> ARPA meth@nyu-csd2.arpa ---------------------------------------- Since I am about to "make trouble," Meth first of all deserves an answer to clear up any misapprehensions about the posting. I was talking not about assimilationism but about POWER and the misuse of same. My point--perhaps improperly stated--was that the history of oppression of Jew by Jew is nothing new, but that the names of the players may change. Today, the Ashkenazim are in a power position; many, unfortunately, use that power and influence to turn their Sephardic brethren into an underclass. I was attempt- ing to place on the table an illustration that suggests that at one time in our history, the proverbial shoe was on the other foot and was used by the wearer to kick the "other" group with equal ferocity and ill-will. Meth, however, has downplayed what HAPPENED and has focused instead on the assimilationism problem. Again. I did not want to discuss "Assimilation and Its Discontents." But it is a real issue, and may as well be addressed. Again. Sigh. Just when I thought it was safe to put away my smoke detector and asbestos suit. . . . First of all, I am not given to posting based on a need to best Yakim Martillo in an argument. I have no doubt that Martillo can bury me under a pile of facts, factoids, Gemora references, etc. The man's learning is prodigious. But it is not Revealed from Heaven. It may be challenged; and on the terms of the challenger, not Martillo himself. (It's called "not fighting the other man's fight.") Second, the word "assimilation" presents problems. How do we define it? A nonobservant, totally secularized Jew living in "The Suburbs" is assimilated. A Reform or Conservative rabbi may be said to be assimilated. An Orthodox Jew living in the United States, employed by New York University, Bell Laboratories, or the Massachusetts Institute of Techology--and therefore not earning his living by interacting primarily with other observant Jews in a primarily Jewish environment--may also be said to be assimilated. We may even say Rav Samson Rafael Hirsch was assimilated. It is a matter of degree and definition. That is the crux of the assimilation issue, as I understand it. Definition. Can any Jew who has accepted "The Freedom Of The City" define him/herself as cut off from the majority culture? Yes, it can be done: and has been done with significant success by Hasidic and "ultra-Orthodox" sects in Brooklyn, New Square, Monsey, and other communities. These communities are largely self-supporting and self-sufficient. Few of us, however, have the ability or willingness to live in that way. Like it or not, we have grown up in a late 20th Century postmodern environment which MUST affect us: we can accept the culture, we can reject it--but we cannot ignore it. The moment we seek accommodation with modernism and technology-- e.g., the moment we install "Shabbos timers" for our lights, or have key-tiebars fashioned so we can lock our doors against the more unsavory byproducts of modern civilization--we are in a very broad sense "assimilating." The moment a yeshiva divides the day into religious and secular studies, we are assimilating. The question is of DEGREE. The objective of most self-aware CONSCIOUS Jews in the Diaspora (perhaps even in Eretz Yisroel?) is to be IN the world without being OF it, i.e., to avoid being sucked into the kind of non- value systems that pollute much of the culture, irrespective of religious faith and observance. Let us say aloud that much of what goes on in both religious and secular "communities" partakes to a great extent of those non-value systems, even in businesses connected with our faith. A Hasidic sofer once told me that there are men in the New York area who will write a pair of tefillin, swear to their kashrut, and drive a cab on Shabbos. Is the driver assimilated? The photo supply discount business is staffed floor-to-ceiling by Orthodox Jews; many of those stores have a well-deserved reputation for cheating their customers irrespective of race, religion, or country of national origin. Are the personnel of those stores assimilated? An observant Jew owns slum buildings and/or nursing homes in which people pass or end miserable lives in conditions that often beggar description. Is that man therefore assimilated? A matter of definition. By MY definition--"someone who has slopped from the trough of materialism at the expense of the common humanity he/she shares AT LEAST with all other Jews, and with gentiles as well"--they are assimilated. They have adopted an alien value system which has nothing whatsoever to do with any Jewish tradition I ever heard of. I would like someone who has stayed awake to this point to cite me ONE reference in any tractate, commentary or code where the accepted opinion allows a Jew to cheat or abuse another Jew or a non-Jew, as in the examples mentioned above. I am aware that the more commonly-defined assimilation has not done wonders for Judaism as a faith and practice. But let me turn Meth's question around: if life in the pre-Emancipation ghetto was so wonderful, for all its frumkeit, then why did so many Jews in Europe run for the gates the moment they were opened? Are we perhaps romanticizing a period in our history that led to lives that were religious, yes; but also nasty, brutish, and short? And might we attempt in our own lives to recognize that ACCOMMODATION does not necessarily equal ASSIMILATION? -- Ken Wolman Bell Communications Research @ Livingston, NJ lcuxc!kenw (201) 740-4565 . . . not Philip Roth . . .
abeles@mhuxm.UUCP (abeles) (01/29/85)
Hear, hear!
meth@csd2.UUCP (Asher Meth) (01/31/85)
Or leyom chamishi leparshas Beshalach, 9 SHEVAT 5745 In respone to Ken Wolman ..... >Since I am about to "make trouble," Meth first of all deserves an >answer to clear up any misapprehensions about the posting. I was >talking not about assimilationism but about POWER and the misuse of >same. My point--perhaps improperly stated--was that the history >..... I thank you, Ken, for clarifying your point. However, as far as the definition of "assimilation" goes .... Ken writes ... ------ >Second, the word "assimilation" presents problems. How do we >define it? A nonobservant, totally secularized Jew living in >"The Suburbs" is assimilated. A Reform or Conservative rabbi >may be said to be assimilated. An Orthodox Jew living in the >United States, employed by New York University, Bell Laboratories, >or the Massachusetts Institute of Techology--and therefore not >earning his living by interacting primarily with other observant >Jews in a primarily Jewish environment--may also be said to be >assimilated. We may even say Rav Samson Rafael Hirsch was >assimilated. It is a matter of degree and definition. >..... >Like it or not, we have grown up in a late 20th >Century postmodern environment which MUST affect us: we can >accept the culture, we can reject it--but we cannot ignore it. >The moment we seek accommodation with modernism and technology-- >e.g., the moment we install "Shabbos timers" for our lights, >or have key-tiebars fashioned so we can lock our doors against >the more unsavory byproducts of modern civilization--we are in a >very broad sense "assimilating." The moment a yeshiva divides >the day into religious and secular studies, we are assimilating. >The question is of DEGREE. ... >A matter of definition. By MY definition--"someone who has >slopped from the trough of materialism at the expense of the >common humanity he/she shares AT LEAST with all other Jews, and >with gentiles as well"--they are assimilated. They have adopted >an alien value system which has nothing whatsoever to do with >any Jewish tradition I ever heard of. I would like someone who >has stayed awake to this point to cite me ONE reference in any >tractate, commentary or code where the accepted opinion allows >a Jew to cheat or abuse another Jew or a non-Jew, as in the >examples mentioned above. ... >I am aware that the more commonly-defined assimilation has not >done wonders for Judaism as a faith and practice. But let me turn >Meth's question around: if life in the pre-Emancipation ghetto was so >wonderful, for all its frumkeit, then why did so many Jews in Europe >run for the gates the moment they were opened? Are we perhaps >romanticizing a period in our history that led to lives that were >religious, yes; but also nasty, brutish, and short? And might >we attempt in our own lives to recognize that ACCOMMODATION >does not necessarily equal ASSIMILATION? Sorry, Ken; but I must disagree with your definition and your examples. Rav Shamshon Refael Hirsch advocated "Torah 'Im Derech Eretz". I would like to think of this as integrating and synthesizing the worldly knowledge that one can gain from studying secular subjects, etc. into a larger framework of a Torah-true life. We can perhaps interpolate this from the explanation of the pasuk "yaft elokim leyefes, veyishkon beoholei shem", which is explained as - the "yafyafus" (nice, good) of yefes should dwell in the tents of Shem. (Please see the commentaries for explanations of this verse - Bereishis / Genesis 9:27.) There is NO SUCH THING as assimilating the Torah into a secular world. There is NO SUCH THING as accommodating the Torah to a secular way of life. There is, however, a concept of accommodating the good of the secular world and integrating it into a Torah-true life. Examples in history of non-assimilation/accommodation : (1) When Napolean fought the Russian Czar, different sects in the Orthodox Jewish world supported different sides. The Lubavitcher Rebbe, it is told, supported the Czar, even though life was VERY difficult for Jews, especially religious ones, under the czar. He recognized the danger of EMANCIPATION - the Jew would be EQUAL to his non-Jewish neighbor, in all the rights accorded them under the civil law. The Jew, in order to "make it" in this "new, foreign" world, would have to make changes, accommodations, for his religion, in order to be "just like one of the boys". Religion, and its structured code of morality and ethics, would be thrown by the wayside, if need be (and many felt that it was neccesary), for the more "valuable" equality with all others. (2) The Volozhiner Yeshiva closed its doors when the Polish government decreed that ALL schools must offer secular subjects as part of their curriculum. The yeshiva was not lacking students (or applicants) when it closed. The yeshiva felt that if the government were to infringe upon its autonomy, it would lose total control of what it could teach its students, and ultimately, the students would not follow in the footsteps of their teachers, and would become ASSIMILATED. (3) Rav Shamshon Refael Hirsch and the Orthodox Jewish community in Frakfurt-Am-Mein impressed upon the government that their community was NOT the same as the "other" assimilated Jewish (read - Reform, in this case) community. Rather, they were an autonomous Jewish community and should receive their fair share of return of taxes (read - revenue sharing plan). Why were they SO opposed to being considered part of a GREATER Jewish community ?? Because of the fear of ASSIMILATION and the total rejection of the yoke of the Torah propounded by the "other" group. --- Ken, your "broad sense" of assimilation is NOT assimilation; it is working within the framework of the Torah and Halachah to incorporate technology and science into an EXISTING TORAH FRAMEWORK (repetition is necessary, if only to bang this into some people's heads). To quote the title of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan's chumash - we have a LIVING TORAH. Halachic process didn't stop in the past, hasn't stopped now, and won't stop in the future. Torah is a LIVING thing, and it also must be LIVED. The yeshivos that offer a dual program of religious and secular studies realize, as Ken mentioned, that to live in our world today one needs a basic understanding of many different things. However, again, it must all be within the framework of the Torah and its values. I agree that people who adopt a value system different from that put forth by the Torah are "on the wrong track". Call them assimilated, if you want. What if all of society adopted a Torah-true value system - for non-Jews the 7 Noachide Laws, for Jews the 613 commandments ?? What would you call a Jew who threw off the yoke of the 613 and lived like a non-Jew, within the confines of the 7 ?? Is he assimilated ? Is he not living within an accepted value system ? Yet, he is supposed to be within the framework of the 613 !! He is a nice person, an upright member of "society". Ken, he is STILL assimilated. The situation of the Jews who were able to leave their terrible, oppressed lives in Europe and come to America, the "goldene medineh", is a tragedy in and of itself. It was VERY hard to be a religious Jew in America in the early 1900's (read - through the '20's and '30's, if not even later, too). Check out how long a religious Jew held a job - he was hired on Monday, came to his boss early Friday afternoon to tell him that he was going home for Shabbos, and was promptly fired; only to repeat the same sequence of events at another place of business the next week. It is no small wonder that many found it hard to continue living their religious lives as in Europe. Others came to America with the notion that the old way of life is for the old country; in America, especially if you want to make it, you have to be an American. No Shabbos, no mitzvos, etc. You must ASSIMILATE with the populace and be like them. There were those who still kept the traditions, but didn't necessarily pass them on to their children. Hence, at least one lost generation of American Jews. A similar thing happened when people went to Israel. Many people said - it is enough that I live in a Jewish homeland. That is the extent of my Jewishness. The Mitzvos are only there to keep us going if we are in exile. We have now come home to our own land and can therefore live JUST LIKE EVERY OTHER NATION - nationalism is the only important thing; religion is a thing of the past. We all know how perverted our society is - in the last 25 years we have seen society's morals change so drastically that it is terrifying. What kind of a world do we live in ? This is NOT the way the HaShem wants us to live. A person who is "good" and "proper" is just that - a good person. A person who is "bad" and follows an improper value system is just that - let us call him a bad person. If the current trend in society and culture is that "anything goes", even what we would call "bad" things, then one who follows that path can be referred to as assimilating into that system. However, when referring to assimilation in the religious sense, the definition MUST include a framework of religious, moral, and ethical values by which we measure a person. The bottom line is that everything is relative to a given frame of reference. I was referring to one frame of reference, and Ken was referring to another. asher meth allegra!cmcl2!csd2!meth ARPA : meth@nyu-csd2.arpa