halacha « Rejewvenate!

Netilat Yadayim Redux

July 28, 2009 at 7:30 am | In culture, halacha, orthodox | 5 Comments

A little while back, I was invited to guest post on DovBear. I wrote about how Orthodox Judaism has emphasized the ritual and symbolic value of its practices at the expense of the concrete and pragmatic values of those practices. One example I used was Netila Yadayim, ritual hand-washing. Netilat Yadayim has significance connected to ritual purity, but it is also undeniably part of a rich Jewish tradition of cleanliness. In my own personal practice I’ve sought to reclaim the practical value of cleaning my hands prior to eating, and also raising that value to the level of religious virtue by washing my hands with soap and water, and then rinsing with a traditional pitcher of water poured ritualistically over my hands.

Introspective Hareidi, a commenter helped, albeit unwittingly, illustrate my point. He noted that my practic,e of Netilat Yadayim might well lead me to saying an invalid blessing (bracha l’vatalah) because if there was still soap on my hands when I rinsed them, that soap would act as a block (chatzitza) between my hands and the water, thus invalidating my hand-washing and turning my blessing into an act of taking God’s name in vain. I’ll admit to having a pretty good laugh when I read the comment. How absurd! This guy was worried about the soap, but evidently, he had no concern about the dirt that the soap was washing away!

According to the halacha, Netilat Yadayim must be performed with hands that are already clean, precisely because dirt on the hands will block the water and invalidate the ritual efficacy of the hand-washing. But if you position yourself to observe people doing Netilat Yadayim, almost none of them pre-wash with soap. Culture trumps law, as usual.

I bring all this up because my engagement with Netilat Yadayim has been a really fascinating journey. I grew up with Netilat Yadayim being part of the Shabbat. I knew that it was something you were supposed to do at every meal with bread, but practically, it was a Shabbat thing. Having chosen to take it on as an adult for both its ritual and practical sides, I finally found myself meaningfully engaged in religion in a way that has been absent from my life for a long time.

The reason behind my new commitment to Netilat Yadayim was precisely because it was both ritual and purposeful. But in order for it to be purposeful, it needed to include soap. And that meant that the whole shape of the ritual was up for grabs. For a while I experimented with different approaches, before finally settling on a practice. Along the way, I puzzled over why we recite the blessing for Netilat Yadayim after we perform the act, and also tried on for size eliminating the entire ritual rinse in favor of just a good old-fashioned washing your hands with soap. This exploration alone was a tremendously rich experience.

The richest part of the experience, however, was not around the specifics of the practice. It was about the commitment to the practice. Sometimes I would forget to wash my hands, and remember only in mid-meal. Even though my hands were basically clean, I felt a pull to wash them, a pull I largely honored. Other times, I would be about to start a meal shortly after washing my hands for some other purpose, like if I had recently been to the restroom. My hands were clean, so did I need to wash them again? I didn’t really think so, but I often did, simply to retain the habit. In the few weeks since I adopted the practice, I felt like I was going through thousands of years of Jewish ritual evolution aimed at meeting my commitment both to ritual and to the practical value of having clean hands.

I’m certain that most Orthodox Jews reading this will shake their heads, perhaps in amusement, and perhaps in disdain. I don’t begrudge them those reactions. I just wish that on some level, they will also nod their heads in recognition. The struggle around religious practice is dignified by human initiative. My choices felt meaningful, powerful, and sometimes, when everything balanced out just right, they even felt holy. That’s an experience that I’ve rarely felt in the Orthodox world, and I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that absence.

Dealing with Dweck

July 26, 2009 at 2:54 pm | In culture, economics, ethics, halacha, jewish denominations, jewish ethics, orthodox, politics | 4 Comments

I’m not really a current events blogger, but the corruption scandal in NJ raises some interesting questions around a topic I am very interested in: the relationship between the US government and the American Jewish community.

Lots of websites and commenters have been throwing around the term moser to describe Solomon Dweck, the FBI informant who cooperated with authorities to help implicate rabbis, politicians and other notables in the recent sting. A moser, according to traditional halacha, is a Jew who delivers other Jews into the hands of secular authorities. The sin of mesirah is a grave one, and the violator is considered worthy of being killed, even in an extrajudicial manner (as in, vigilante justice). It makes no difference whether those being informed against are innocent or guilty, by the way. The law prohibits turning Jews over to non-Jewish authorities even if these Jews are despicably evil.

It’s easy to understand how Maimonides, for example, who writes in such terms about a moser, might feel so strongly. Whether living in Christian Spain or Muslim Egypt in the 12th and 13th centuries, little could be expected by way of justice, fairness, or humane treatment by the prevailing governments and legal systems. Some would argue that the Dreyfuss Affair, the trial and convictions of Julius and (especially) Ethel Rosenberg, and Jonathan Pollard suggest that modern democracies and even American democracy don’t have a much better track record. The point, though clearly an overreaching, is well-taken.

In the modern world, where does this leave us? We know that child-molestors like Baruch Lanner and Yehuda Kolko were left free to ruin more lives and abuse more innocent victims precisely because rabbis in the Orthodox community refused to turn them into secular authorities. These same rabbis also lacked the tools and powers to prevent these men from committing further abuses.

Omerta may be appropriate when secular authorities are capricious at best and violently cruel and antagonistic at worst. Faced with such an enemy, the Jewish community must be secretive, protective, and devious. Yakov deals with Lavan, just such an enemy, b’mirmah, deceitfully. Trust, honesty, and openness must be mutual to be meaningful.

However, in the United States, where Jews live with a government that they too elect, and in a nation that is unprecedented in history for its embrace of Judaism, Jewish culture, and Jewish leadership, this culture of silence is a corrosive and corrupting influence, particularly when silence is coupled with zero enforceability. Instead of protecting us from an exploitative and dangerous authority, it actually endangers us further, because it encourages corruption, extortion, bribery, and a general disrespect and abuse of the system of laws and justice that protect all of us.

If our communities are built on corruption, we encourage hatred of Judaism by Jews and non-Jews alike. How many Jews felt a sense of revulsion upon hearing this latest sordid story? The Syrian community feels betrayed and slandered. The Orthodox community at large feels a pit in its stomach, particularly as this is the period of the Nine Days, a particularly tragic and mournful time in Jewish history. And the broad family of Jews is sickened as well by yet another story of financial malfeasance that seems to confirm all the worst hatreds and stereotypes still held by some non-Jews, even in this, the fairest of nations.

The answer is a difficult one. If we hold fast with the prohibition of mesirah than we, as a community, are the true criminals, for failing to police ourselves, and for allowing this evil to take root in our midst. Alternatively, we can turn over the powers of investigation and enforcement to the State, and lose some of our dignity, identity and uniqueness in the process. What is for sure is that this is not an isolated incident, and that a culture of corruption and contempt for government and for Gentiles is thriving, particularly in some Orthodox communities. We need to address the moral and economic causes underlying this immediately, lest we breed a new generation of anti-Semites, and lest we fail to treat our fellow American with the full measure of justice and fairness that he surely deserves.

The Gap Between Hareidim and Modern Orthodox

July 24, 2009 at 8:40 am | In beliefs, ethics, halacha, israel, jewish denominations, orthodox | 3 Comments

In XGH’s most recent post, How to stop Chareidim breaking the law, the suggestion was to emphasize Kiddush Hashem/Chillul Hasehm (sanctification/desecration of God’s name, usually through public conduct) and its implications for practical conduct in the public square.

While I agree with the sentiment of the post, I think it misses a fundamental point.

There is a 3,000-year old debate in Judaism as to whether human initiative and human judgment is of value.

One position is that God has laid out for us the manner in which we should act, and that the human challenge is to submit to that, to yoke ourselves to that path, and to blind ourselves from anything that might lead us astray. This is the path adopted by Hareidim today.

The other position is that we have been granted a Divine gift of judgment and decision-making, and that we must use those faculties to choose a proper path through an ever-changing world. This is the Modern Orthodox (MO) position.

When the MO look at the Hareidi world, they level a critique based on observed facts. How can it be, they say, that you are following the Divine path, if your real-world outcomes are so poor? Your institutions are built on corruption and theft, your youth are delinquent, uneducated, and filthy, and your communities rally behind th emsot odious villains and act out violently as thier only means of expression. Surely this can’t be God’s will!

In turn, when Hareidim look at the MO, they don’t look so much on the facts on the ground as much as the influences. If you, the MO, want to believe your judgment is sanctified and in line with the Divine will, you must purify yourselves. If you were influenced only by Torah and expressed excellent character traits, perhaps we could believe in your judgment. But instead, your homes have televisions and internet showing obscene images and abhorrent culture. Your children grow up knowing more rock songs by heart than mishnayot, idolizing movie stars instead of Gedolim, and wasting their time on Harry Potter instead of Halacha.

I’m not sure how to bridge this gap, but I do know that the first step towards bridging it is understanding it. This is an ancient Machloket. It’s the same as the argument over whether the world was created in Tishrei or in Nisan. It’s the same as the argument over whether God performing miracles on your behalf is a good reflection on your or a bad reflection on you. It’s the same as the argument over whether we should start the Haggadah with the story of our slavery in Egypt or our idolatrous roots in Mesopotamia. And this isn’t something we’re going to easily resolve.

Conversions in Controversy: The Orthodox Patrilineal Descent

June 28, 2009 at 9:51 pm | In beliefs, dating and marriage, halacha, jewish denominations, orthodox | 6 Comments

By now you’ve all heard about Hareidi Rabbi Avraham Sherman, who heads Israel’s High Rabbinical court, and his ongoing retroactive nullifications of conversions to Judaism. This story has been building for some time, as the Hareidi establishment in Israel, which has long controlled the rabbinic arm of the government, has sought to monopolize power over the definition of who is a Jew.

There are excellent political and religious reasons for them to do so, of course. The question of who is a Jew defines who may claim the right to citizenship in Israel through the Law of Return, and with that citizenship, the basket of Aliyah benefits. From the Hareidi perspective, limiting aliyah only to Hareidi Jews, or at least Orthodox Jews, means that all the money flows to them, and that no money is spent on Russian immigrants, South American converts, or people converted by non-Orthodox clergy.

Many are rightfully tearing their hair out over the potential confusion that retroactive nullification of conversion creates. The Wolf, for example, wonders if uncertainty over conversions will lead to converts being unreliable for any kind of religious obligation, from testimony to minyan. He further speculates in a later post:

And how about things that have long-reaching consequences? What if you use a convert as a witness to your wedding? Or even worse, what if a convert serves on a bais din (or is a witness) to a divorce? Can you imagine the halachic nightmare that would result from a witness (or judge) on a divorce case (or multiple cases) being found to be not Jewish retroactively, throwing all those divorcees, their new spouses and children (and grandchildren) into some halachic purgatory from which they and their descendants may never escape? What about a convert who sits on a bais din for other conversions — you could have multiple “generations” of invalidated conversions, each wreaking havoc on countless individuals and society as a whole. And, don’t forget, this doesn’t go just for the convert, but for any descendant of a female convert as well!

I believe that this path leads to both a cleavage between Hareidi Judaism and the rest of us, but also to the complete abandonment of Judaism as a hereditary status. By performing these retroactive nullifications, Hareidi Judaism is casting into doubt conversions done by otherwise-respected institutions of MOdern Orthodoxy, like the RCA. As such, the RCA will eventually be forced to reject Hareidi hegemony over them, and will have to work against Hareidi authority over the Israeli Rabbinate. They already are in alliance with the Religious Zionists on this issue, but they will need to work with the Masroti movement and even the Reform movement to rewrite the rules. For all that, they may not even be successful.

What will be true is that between intermarriage, patrilineal descent, and Hareidi conversion nullification, the question of who is a Jew and who is not will have many answers and no clarity of any kind. For many, the only pragmatic way of dealing with this reality is to rely on people and their self-identifications. Sure, when it comes to weddings some people might ask for a bit more background on a person’s Jewish provenance, but for the gabbai at a shul, the question of Kohen, Levi, or Yisrael will remain the standard by which Judaism is defined in the day-to-day. Whether this is good for Judaism or not I don’t know, but it does represent another stage in our evolution away from a tribal religion and towards something much greater, but also more diffuse.

Sefirat Ha-Omer

April 6, 2009 at 7:51 pm | In Shavuot, halacha | Leave a Comment

With all the Peasch craziness, I just want to remind everyone that the Omer is coming up too. You can sign up to get text message remidners at my partner site, CountTheOmer.com. I’ve been running this for a few years now, and nearly everyone who signs up counts every day with a bracha (blessing). A portion of the proceeds go to tzedaka too, so everyone wins.

Ok, back to work. I’ve still got a stovetop to blowtorch!

Bracha for the Election

November 5, 2008 at 8:41 am | In culture, halacha, politics | Leave a Comment

Yesterday I posted about what bracha to make over voting. Last night, as I walked down the streets of Harlem, and witnessed the celebrations, the dancing in the streets, and the tears on the faces of young and old, and the words of an extraordinary man booming from out every open car and apartment window, I too spontaneously broke out into prayer. I made the bracha of She-hechiyanu, and I can’t recall ever having more kavana than last night. God bless America.

My Voting Prayer

November 4, 2008 at 10:16 am | In culture, halacha, politics | 1 Comment

Recently, some of the blogs I visit have been posting this prayer, written by Rabbi David Seidenberg, founder of NeoHasid.org. Personally, I’m not so into it. For one, I have a strong preference for re-purposing existing prayers over composing new ones. Here’s my suggestion. When you come to the polling place, and prepare to cast your vote, say the following bracha: Baruch ata Adonai Eloheinu Melech Ha-Olam, She-chalak Mi-Kvodo Li-Bnei Adam – Blessed are you, God, King of the World, Who has given a portion of His honor to mankind.

This bracha is the one you say when you see a king, and it is meant to be an acknowledgment that kingship stems from God and is reflected in mankind. In a democratic country, that blessing is appropriate for meeting the President. But on election day we are al kings. We vote and make the decision of who will rule over us, and in my opinion there is no greater Kiddush Hashem in secular society than Election Day. Seeing people freely choosing their government and peacefully transferring enormous power is a reflection of God’s honor as well. Each of us, each of us who votes, is a king, and a reflection of God’s glory in this world.

Now go out and vote!

Homogeneous Orthodox

October 27, 2008 at 12:30 pm | In beliefs, halacha, jewish denominations, orthodox | 6 Comments

A friend of mine recently challenged me to name my biggest problem with the Orthodox community. I told him he had two choices: he could take me out to the bar and pay for my drinks while I ranted and raved, or he could give me a few days to think about it and then check my blog. In a display of fiscal discipline that I both envy and regret, he chose the latter option.

While I’ve spent lots of time on this blog and many others debating Jewish philosophy, the problem of evil, challenges to Divine authorship of the Torah and the historicity of the Tanach, these pale in comparison to another issue. My biggest problem with Orthodoxy is the requirement that everyone be the same, have the same relationships to one another, to their community, and to God.

The central assumption that Orthodoxy rests upon is that there’s really only one way to be Jewish, and that’s by following Halacha – or rather, by following a system of rules that is based in halachic thinking, but which has clearly evolved beyond it to encompass many extra-halachic rules and requirement. Put another way, it is the equation of Orthodox culture with Jewish validity.

One of the best features of Jewish learning is that it is so personal. Attributing what we’ve learned to the person who taught it to us is redemptive in our tradition. It turns our attention not only to the words themselves, but to the men behind them, and when we look at these men we discover a tremendous diversity in their religious expressions.

Even as they reveal this diversity, the Midrash and Talmud also try to paper it over. In many passages they struggle with Biblical figures violating contemporary halachic norms, and they introduce novel, apologetic interpretations that recast the characters, most frequently, as ingenious halachic acrobats. Mordechai, for example, is questioned over why he refused to bow to Haman, which would have been halachically permissible. The Midrash posits that Haman wore an idol, thus putting Mordechai in a predicament. An interesting idea, but it suggests that Mordechai’s only appropriate lens for choosing his actions is the halacha.

My sense is that the Midrash and Talmud were not engaging in revisionist history and asserting that halacha was indeed the driving force in th thought process of Mordechai or any other Biblical character. I think they were engaging in an imaginative exercise to bring these long-dead figures into focus. The question is whether the the lens they used was the only correct one, or whether it was the right one for their situation. I woudl go further and say that Midrash and Talmud were ‘inside baseball’, not intended for mass consumption. The modern-day Orthodox conception of halacha as the sole arbiter of values was not even shared by the master halachicists themselves, and movement from Mussar to Kabbala to Hassidut explored other soruces of value and other normative traditions that do not emerge from the Talmud or the Shulchan Aruch.

I’m probably going to be posting more critical thoughts on Orthodoxy, but I think that they all stem from this point. Orthodox Judaism today equates normative value with halacha, and halacha with Orthodox culture. Both of these connections are suspect, and they leave me yearning for something real, something true, something that gives religious significance to my own sense of right and wrong, to my own sense of sacred and profane, to the soul within me that finds no nourishment in the Orthodoxy around me.

Aguna Matata

August 13, 2008 at 9:19 pm | In dating and marriage, halacha, orthodox | 2 Comments

A soon-to-be-married friend asked me for some guidance on the Agunah Prenup, a prenuptial agreement meant to deter husbands from denying their wives a get (Jewish writ of divorce). In short, the agreement provides that the husband must pay the wife $150 per day for every day that they no longer live together but remain married. The agreement is enforceable in US courts.

I signed this agreement, and I know that some rabbis will refuse to marry a couple unless they sign an agreement of this kind. Many in the Orthodox movement welcomed the development, as I did. Today though, I just didn’t feel as good about it.

Women should have the right to leave a marriage, and this agreement does not grant them that right within the halachic system. It punishes the husband so that he will exercise his exclusive right to end the marriage. Worse, it does not engage any halachic powers against the husband, it instead turns to the government and its ability to enforce contracts. It’s a ruse – the structural halachic problem is side-stepped entirely.

On the one hand it’s very neat, and is even in keeping with the halachic tradition that says that a Bet Din would force a recalcitrant husband to give a get even through corporeal punishment (i.e. beating him until he relents). On the other hand, neither beating a man until he consents to follow a religious ritual nor binding a woman to a marriage against her will are particularly progressive ideas. In the end, the prenup is a non-halachic solution to a halachic problem, and as such it does nothing for injecting life and relevance into the halachic system.

Kosher Klothes?

July 31, 2008 at 7:46 am | In economics, ethics, halacha, kosher, orthodox | 8 Comments

Growing up, my father always expressed suspicion about kosher certification. As he saw it, a shochet (ritual slaughterer) was considered trustworthy, without need for supervision, unless he specifically did something to lose that trust. The Kashrut industry turns that presumption on its head, by insisting that nobody can be trusted without supervision, but even a non-Jew who never spent a minute learning the laws of kashrut can be trusted for many things, so long as the threat of an inspector coming exists.

What truly jaundiced my father to the whole business was when products like water and bleach began to receive the OU, and when chickens were sold as Glatt Kosher (a halachic category which does not apply to fowl). It was then that he realized that kashrut was a business, and had little to do with religious duties. At that time, perhaps twenty years ago, he said to me that a business like kashrut can only grow in one of two ways. The first is to increase the number of customers who keep kosher or are interested in buying kosher. This is relatively difficult, though the industry has had success in this area. The second, and far easier method, is to certify more goods, irrespective of the whether there is any halachic imperative to certify them.

Why do I bring all this up? Because, as The Wolf reports, there is a movement underfoot to create a Vaad Hatzniyut (Modesty Council) in Lakewood. In Israel, there already exist organizations that will give a ‘hechsher’ to clothing store. My father was right – the industry needs to grow (after all, proceeds from the kashrut business prop up the yeshiva world system).

What makes this even more bitter is the response to the Agriprocessors scandal from within the Orthodox community, and the hostility towards the Conservative movement’s Hecsher Tzedek, which would grant certification to businesses with ethical practices. The outcry from many corners in the Orthodox world has been that, for example:

The fact remains that no one has challenged AgriProcessors in terms of its conformity to the laws governing the production of kosher food. Rather, there have been attempts to graft onto those laws issues that, while important in and of themselves, simply do not relate to kashrut as it is properly and historically understood.

That from the Jewish Press. The stink of hypocrisy doesn’t only taint the Kashrut industry and its apologists, it is humiliating to the entire Kosher community. Here, the zealous guardians of my kashrut observance, who have made sure that I don’t eat non-kosher bleach, or lettuce, or even water, suddenly wake up to the ‘proper and historical’ understanding of Kosher to justify their cruelty to man and beast.

Where has this led us? Raids by the US government on the largest kosher slaughterhouse in the US. Exposes in leading magazines. Investigative articles in the New York Times. A Chillul Hashem. A Shande fun deGoyim, a black eye, a gift to antisemites, arrows in the quiver of those who seek to ban kosher slaughter entirely. A sickening, gut-wrenching parade of rabbis and community leaders lining up to defend a rotten conspiracy all in the name of cheap meat and easy money.

I’ve had it. I won’t touch a Rubashkin product again. Moreover, I will try to avoid purchasing products that have certifications when they are not required. That’s right. I will favor uncertified bleach! I will not drink OU water. I won’t even shy away from “untrustworthy” certifications. We all see exactly how far the trustworthy ones got me, whether with regards tot his scandal or the Monsey chicken scandal. At this point, if the old boys of the Kashrut industry don’t trust or like you, you must be doing something right.