martillo@ihuxt.UUCP (Yehoyaqim Martillo) (05/18/84)
I have received several questions about my last article about my usage of the words malevolent and fraudulent. Because I do not wish to spend to much time on this issue, I will confine myself to the malevolence of the Reform Jewish leadership. Remember the root meaning of malevolent is desiring ill (for someone else). Gershom Sholem demonstrated several decades ago the descent of the German Reform movement from German Jewish Sabbatianism. The Sabbatis were extremely hostile to non-Sabbati Jews. In Poland the Frankists (a Sabbati offshoot) incited violence against the Jewish community. The basis of Sabbati hostility probably lay in their awareness that they were no longer truly members of the Jewish community. (Their practice of wife-swapping and orgies on Yom Kippur gave them the stigma of mamzerut.) Consequently observance of Jewish Law was an anathema to them. Thus fourth and fifth generation Sabbatis developed an ideology to minimize the importance of Jewish Law and began to consider themselves Germans of Mosaic faith rather than members of the Jewish Nation. At this point the German Reform movement begins. Quickly the Reform Leadership demonstrated their malevolence. When the Syrian Muslims during the 1840's were massacreing Damascene Jews. Jews throughout Western and Central Europe protested to their governments to try to stop the persecution. The response of the Reform leadership was fearless. They asserted that they were Germans and the persecuted were Arabs and that Germans of Mosaic faith had no reason to be concerned. Later in the 1870's and 1880's when Rumanian Jews were being persecuted. The Reform leadership of that generation took exactly the same fearless position. The logical conclusion of the Reform ideology was that Jews really being Germans or Poles or Russians or Arabs were no longer in exile. Since traditional Judaism held that Jews would return to Israel and rebuild the Temple when the Messiah comes, the Reform Jews began calling their Houses of Peculiar Worship (battei `avodah zarah) temples specifically to deny this article of faith. In fact this denial is still a principle of the Reform movement even though the leaders lie about the reform position to their followers and pretend to support Israel. During WWII, the Reform Jewish Leader Stephen Wise demonstrated his malevolence toward Jewish interests. Before the attack on Pearl Harbor Japan had already become a refuge for many Jews. The Japanese felt they were receiving bad press. The Japanese offered to admit several thousand more Jews if Stephen Wise publically stated that the Japanese were treating the refugees well (which was true). The State Department said to go ahead (after all the refugees might come to the USA). However, Stephen Wise put empty displays of patriotism before several thousand Jewish lives and flat out refused to make the requested statement. Currently, reform Jewish leaders are most likely to drool sympathy for Arab Nationalish goals while they ignore the feeling of Jews who have been persecuted by Arabs. I do not go around drooling sympathy for German or Polish or Ukrainian or Russian nationalist goals. I feel justified in terming reform Jewish leaders malevolent historically and currently. Careful readers will note I have even left out one important issue. I could make a similar analysis of the other aberrations which exist among Ashkenazim but the analysis would be repetitive. The question what is a fraudulent way of being Jewish is easily answered in consideration of the question what is a fraudulent way of being American. Claiming merely knowing a little bit about about American history and tradition is sufficient to being American is fraudulent. Accepting American law but denying the validity of Anglo-Saxon common law and claiming the right for individuals to interpret the constitution in obliviousness to the legislative and judicial tradition is a fraudulent way of being American. Reform claims knowing a little about Jewish history and Jewish tradition is sufficient to being Jewish. Conservatism claims to accept authority of the law but denies the validity of the Jewish Common Law (Torah shebe`al peh) and claims the right to interpret the constitution (Torah shebiktab) in obliviousness to the legislative and judicial (rabbinical) tradition. These positions constitute fraud, and the leaders of these movements are guilty of lipnei `iwer. Of course, since most American Jews have nothing to do with anything Jewish these arguements are not very important.