#crafting with the rabbis

[dadyomi]

Saturday 7/22, Gittin 67: Rabbi Deez

("Rabbi Deez?" "Yeah, DEEZ NUTZ.")

In reading this list I thought "a scholar when he chooses to be one" was a funny and affectionate backhand. Then I read "a pile of nuts" and laughed out loud, but the explanation is both less funny and more heartwarming, because it's really very kind and complimentary. What a nice and entertaining list of the Sages.

But I'm still definitely the Rabbi Yehuda. Tag yourself!

[newnewyorker93]

Jeff... the Accountant

You know you can pick anything, right?

Yeah, I like the name Jeff, and accounting sounds fancy as fuck.

aka many, many months later my next Our Flag Means Death felt figure is complete! I meant to make more Revenge crew members before repeating characters (and I still will!) but when I hit "The Best Revenge is Dressing Well" on my last rewatch my brain was like NOPE you need to make Ed-as-Jeff immediately, so here we are 😄

Jeff* never turns his back on a challenge**.

Jeff would sooner die.

*me

**stitching a bunch of tiny decorations in evil gold embroidery floss 😅

+ some bonus closeups for details!

(I know Ed's not holding the red silk while in full Jeff costuming, but I couldn't resist ❤️)

[softness-and-shattering]

"Art" is wonderful. It's creative and expressive and beautiful or eerie or anything you want it to be.

"Craft" is wonderful. It's making, sewing, weaving, knitting, felting, making puppets, creating with your hands.

"Art and craft" sounds like you're five and you're gluing paper together, with some stickers and scrawled stick figures on top.

I know it's a class/gender gender thing, men go to school and study fine art and they are artists, and women stay home and darn socks and make clothes for the family and when people show up to march in thousands of pink hats the people in charge ask what factory is producing them because it doesn't even occur that people are at home picking up hooks and needles and making their own and for friends.

(I was reading an article recently that said "and so she crocheted the first knit kippah" and I had to vent to my friends that you do not CROCHET a KNIT kippah, your crochet a crochet kippah and you knit a knit kippah they are different skills! People dont have respect for fiber craft to think "crochet a knit kippah, does something seem off about that, do I know what these methods are in most basic form? Even enough to know that crochet uses one hook and knitting uses two needles. Or that machines can knit but not crochet).

But like. How do you express that you engage in both art and craft without sounding like a kindergartner? Is there a better umbrella term?

[shalom-iamcominghome]

hiii, im a conservative convert who wears tzitzit! it's definitely not the community norm, and you'll probably get some ppl reacting weirdly or telling you you're getting "too frum" (or maybe that's just my shul...), but that's their problem — what matters is whether you find it meaningful, and how it enhances your connection to Hashem. it's always a positive thing to take on a new mitzvah. personally i have found it to be deeply meaningful. and if you're worried about people's reactions, you can always wear them tucked in! i will add that if you're wearing out, it's my opinion that you should not do things publicly that violate halacha such as eating at a non kosher restaurant, but i also recognize that im very stringent in general for myself so of course, you should speak to your rabbi and use your judgement in making those decisions. all this to say — honestly yes, you will probably be the odd one out at a conservative shul if youre wearing tzitzit, but as long as it's something you find joy and meaning in, then it won't matter!

sorry this was a very rambly paragraph lol, but i really do encourage anyone who feels intrigued by this mitzvah to start wearing tzitzit without worrying too much about what people think. i think it's a beautiful way to remind yourself every day of your dedication to Hashem and to Torah <3

Absolutely! I don't really see anything jewish as being "too frum" to observe - because frum people are amazing people and because the things we call frum are just... part of judaism? I've found so much meaning in the things I have been able to do, and I've found... it's not just as simple as "I do this because I'm told to," these mitzvot are meaningful because of how grounded I've felt doing them, how they remind me I'm part of a bigger world that's not just "me," that I represent part of the human condition and I should act like it. I think a lot of people almost... oversimplify these mitzvot to the point where they can't understand why it's meaningful - which isn't really a bad thing, because I get it! We don't find the same meaning in the same things! But I just love celebrating all of these mitzvot because I think they're deep and personal and bigger than just "do this arbitrary thing lol"

[edsonjnovaes]

How to write books by yourself to make money.

50 Book Ideas for Writing a Book You Can Start Today. RABBI EMPIRE But writing a book can mean anything you want it to—it’s not just for novels. There’s the old saying that we should write what we know, and you may know more than you think. To get you started, here’s a list of 50 book ideas, including possible story title ideas, prompts, genres, and topics where you might find your next…

[spacelazarwolf]

here is the reality. whether you like it or not, a large chunk of the global jewish population identifies as zionist, as in they believe that israel should exist in some capacity (regardless of their feelings about the current government). a lot of numbers have been thrown around that i don’t necessarily think are accurate, but it is very safe to say that particularly those who are involved in jewish community organizations and/or are more observant tend to identify as zionist. there are a lot of reasons for this that would take an entire doctoral dissertation to cover. if i wanted to cut myself off from every single jewish zionist or every single jew or jewish organization that believes israel should exist or simply has even one jewish zionist friend or one jewish zionist in attendance, i would have to completely isolate myself from the jewish community, and i am simply not going to do that.

for shavuot, we stayed up until past 3am having difficult conversations about israel and zionism and other rifts in the jewish community and how to talk about them without the inevitable defensiveness that always comes up, how to disconnect the political aspects of zionism from jewish identity and how to have difficult conversations with people who disagree with us without leaving the table. we talked about it through the lens of a story in the talmud about rabbi yohanan and reish lakish, a story that ends in tragedy, a story that is representative of where the community is headed if we aren’t able to start having these conversations.

so when gentiles show up and demand i abandon my community because it’s sinful politically incorrect to associate with sinners people with slightly different political opinions, it pisses me the fuck off. because y’all are constantly going on and on abt jews needing to “unlearn zionism” but then when non zionist jews refuse to just walk away from our people and decide instead to do the difficult work of starting and maintaining important conversations within our community, we get called zionists or accused of “associating with zionists” and therefore zionist by default.

so what do you want? do you want there to be less jewish zionists? because the only way that’s going to happen is if difficult conversations are allowed to happen, and those difficult conversations won’t be able to happen if you insist that all jews who aren’t zionist refuse to associate with the vast majority of our people. or are you simply looking to isolate jews with different political opinions than you because you don’t want to take the time to understand why so many jews identify as zionist. i know because i have had hours upon hours of conversations with the people in my community, and my understanding of their reasoning and motivation has made it easier to have conversations about zionism.

so it’s fucked because. y’all want there to be less jewish zionists. the only way for that to happen is to talk to them and understand them. but associating with them or trying to understand why they identify that way makes you a zionist. and therefore you should also not be associated with. but there should be less jewish zionists. so it sounds to me like y’all are just expecting people to change their minds because. what? because you said so? that is not realistic in the slightest!

anyway this post is not meticulously crafted it’s literally just me venting abt this shit but i’m just sick and tired of goyim who are not part of these difficult conversations deciding that they know better how to deal with jewish zionists (who they will not associate with) than jewish non zionists who are actually trying to have the difficult conversations with their community.

[date-a-jew-suggestions]

Missouri was my home, and I can’t go back because I’m trans.

Before the rest, I want to clarify: I do not get my hrt through a Missouri healthcare provider. This will not impact my medical transition, and I am so very lucky to not have to worry about that. Many, many transgender people living in Missouri do not have that luxury. However, I am hurt, and I am scared. I was not intending to move back to Missouri, because I am a lot happier where I am now. However, I’m very scared about the precedent that this sets. Missouri is the first state to pass legislation that restricts access to medical transition not only for minors, but for ADULTS. I would be very surprised if this was where their anti trans legislation stopped. Based on how they seem to be leading the charge against transgender rights in this regard, it seems very likely to me that within the next few years, trans peoples rights to public spaces in Missouri will be legally restricted. If this happens, I will not be able to visit about half of my family members.

The rest of this post is me coming to terms with that.

I flew to my home city, St. Louis Missouri for Pesach recently. I was so excited to spend the holiday with my family. Several members of my family were unable to get off work/school on the actual holiday, so I flew home on Easter weekend and we had our Seder on Easter. This is because in the USA, Easter and Christmas are federal holidays that get automatic off days, unlike Jewish holidays. The Seder happened at my grandma’s house and my entire extended family was invited, as is our family tradition. I had a lovely weekend with my family.

While I was visiting, I stayed in my grandparents house. Growing up I spent nearly every weekend there. My grandparents have always done their best to make me feel at home there. I have countless memories at that house of Shabbat with my grandma, playing games with my cousins and sister, climbing the big tree in the backyard, play dates with friends, doing all sorts of arts and crafts projects with my grandma, teaching myself to use a sewing machine on the living room floor, playing d&d in the basement, and big extended family gatherings for every Pesach, Rosh Hashanah, and Yom Kippur every year. It is one of the places that makes me feel the safest out of any place on earth. I would consider it my backup home. And as always, our Passover Seder was amazing.

This trip home coincided with my parents selling the house I lived in until I was 18. This has been in the works for a long time, so it did not come as a surprise to me. Even so, both my grandma and grandpa reassured me repeatedly throughout the weekend that I would always have a home at their house. That I could always come back, to visit or stay as long as I need. That this place would always be my home.

One of the things I did while I was staying there was make sure I had copies of all of the family records that my grandma had saved. Things like family trees, Ellis Island immigration records, death certificates, writings of long deceased relatives. I want to preserve as much of our family history as I can, because too much Jewish history has been destroyed by those who hate us. I already knew that my family has lived in the same city in Missouri practically since they immigrated, I think it’s something like 4 generations. Looking through these documents and reading things the previous generation of my family has written was fascinating and deeply moving to me. It cemented in my mind the fact that my family history is completely intertwined with the St. Louis Jewish community.

And of course, the synagogue I belonged to growing up is in Missouri. Where I spent the high holy days, where I was bat mitzvah’d, where I went to hebrew school every week. My Hebrew school teachers. My rabbis. I’ll be visiting it soon for my cousins Bat Mitzvah, and I’m hoping I might get a chance the day after to sit and talk with my rabbis. I feel like I need to say goodbye to them.

I can’t go back to any of these things. It has taken me a long time to write this post because this is so painful for me. I love my family so very dearly, and I have a big family. My cousins were like extra siblings to me growing up, I’m close with all of my second cousins and their partners and kids, my aunts and uncles, my great aunts and uncles, and my great grandparents when they were alive. I don’t go back to St Louis for the city, I go back for them. My grandparents have lived in St. Louis for their entire lives, and they aren’t going to move. Nor do I want them to have to, they’re so happy there. They have carved out a very comfortable and safe place for their family and friends. It’s just not a place I will be welcomed in for much longer, and that is out of our control. They will travel to visit me once in a while, but I know that me not being able to visit Missouri would drastically cut down on the time I can spend with them. And realistically, they are getting old. I don’t know how much longer cross country travel will be safe and feasible for them.

My family took a long time to get on board with my transition, largely because they were lied to by politicians and mental health “professionals” who were unqualified to treat transgender patients. I don’t want to spend too much time talking about that. To me what matters is that they unconditionally support me as a trans man now, and even though they were misinformed and said and did things that hurt me, they have always loved me. And they have made an incredible and effective effort to not only apologize for the harm they caused, but to change the way they treated me in order to express that love. My grandpa, previously the most old fashioned, socially conservative, and transphobic member of my family, will now call me to say things like “the other day this meshuggenah tried to tell me trans people are dangerous, I told him my grandson is transgender and to shut the fuck up. You shoulda seen the look on his face.” My grandma and mom both flew across the country with me to help me prepare for and recover from my top surgery. I could not have asked for better people to care for me post op.

Despite how supportive they are now, it’s only fairly recently that I’ve repaired my relationship with my family enough to enjoy spending long periods of time with them. It is still hard for me to talk to certain family members because I am trans. But the last few trips home have been the first times in a long time I have had a wonderful time with my family, which is something I missed and needed for so long.

I think that is going to be taken away again very soon. And it’s being pushed by the very same people who lied to my family and drove a wedge between us in the first place. This time it is out of our control.

To say I’m heartbroken would be an understatement. It’s hard for me to even conceptualize the concept that my ability to see my family is being slowly taken from me by the Christian zealots in our government. It feels like just now that I’ve been fully accepted and embraced, I’m being forced out again. And once again, it is under the guise of protecting people like me. They expect me to believe that this is for my own good. That all of the bullying and abuse and dysphoria I was forced to endure for my entire childhood was for my own good, because g-d forbid I be transgender and happy.

I had to move across the country to escape unsafe living conditions caused by white Anglo Saxon Christians, and now I’m uncertain of my ability to visit the family members I left behind. Ironically, this is a very Jewish experience. I imagine this is a much smaller version of the pain my ancestors felt when they immigrated to America and left their family behind in Russia and Poland. In a way, this experience connects me to my Jewish heritage in a profoundly painful way.

This was a long and rambly post. I’m just hurting a lot right now, and I needed to talk. Thank you to anyone who read this far.

[unclewaynemunson]

Eddie hated Christmas. He hated it ever since that time in primary school when they had to put on a nativity play and everyone but him seemed to care about that stupid Jesus story; he didn’t even know what it was about until his teacher pulled him aside to explain it to him (which only happened after Brad made fun of him for it). He hated it ever since that time they had to craft some stupid paper mache Santa, when he jumped on a table to yell at all his classmates that Santa wasn’t even real (after which his teacher scolded him and made him stand in the corner for the remainder of the day). He hated it ever since that time their classroom got a Christmas tree and his teacher demanded that he’d participate in decorating it, while refusing to let him bring a menorah from home instead.

He didn’t understand why he was forced to participate in this thing that wasn’t even his. He didn’t understand why his teachers never allowed him share the stories that his uncle always told him during the darkest days of the year: stories about the bravery of the Maccabees, the holiness of the Temple far away in Jerusalem, and the miracle of the candles. His uncle usually never talked much, but whenever they had a holiday to celebrate, he’d share the most wonderful and captivating stories in his slow, solemn voice. (Eddie had believed that his uncle was a rabbi until an embarrassingly late age).

When the first Christmas after he started dating Steve came around, he dreaded it. It was obvious to him that Steve was the kind of guy who’d care a great deal about Christmas. He’d probably want to do it all properly: hang a ridiculous amount of lights, have a big dinner, put presents under a neatly decorated tree... Eddie wanted to be on board with that, for Steve, but by G’d, he hated Christmas.

Little did Eddie know that Steve hated Christmas, too. Steve hated it ever since that Christmas dinner in some hotel in Paris, or Dubai, or maybe it was Buenos Aires, when his parents had systemically refused to talk to each other and the tension in the room was nearly sharp enough to cut the turkey without any knife. He hated it even more ever since his parents gave up on doing holidays altogether and Christmas became nothing but a check and a greeting card for him.

Eddie was baffled when Steve, on a dark evening in early December, told him how much he was struggling with the idea of turning the holiday around to make a new tradition with Eddie. Eddie laughed, full of relief, and told him he shouldn’t worry about it. They both delighted in the discovery that the other also hated Christmas, and Steve was genuinely excited to learn all about Chanukkah instead. Eddie invited him over to the trailer every evening, where they’d light the candles together and eat sufganiyot, and Wayne would tell them all the stories that were so familiar for Eddie and so new to Steve. And even though Steve didn’t share in their history, this tradition became theirs, more than Christmas could ever have.

[matan4il]

Hi, I saw on your posts that you volunteer at Yad Vashem.

I came to Israel as a (gentile) tourist in 2012 for 2 weeks when I was 16 as part of a tour, as one does. In the UK, where I live, it is a statutory requirement to teach the Holocaust in history class before the age of 15, and, unlike a lot of people I could mention, I actually paid attention in history class, learning about Kristallnacht, the Kindertransport, the ghettos, and the Final Solution. And I read and saw all the grisly school displays in the history corridor with pictures of emaciated dead bodies in those striped uniforms. And I read at least 3 books by concentration camp survivors in the school library. And my school got a Holocaust survivor in to talk to us, AND we covered the Holocaust, the Khmer Rouge and Darfur in Religious Studies. Not to mention I had taken history as an elective and done Interwar Europe and WW2.

So I was pretty well-versed on the factual, violent elements of the holocaust.

But when I came to Yad Vashem, there was an aspect to the Holocaust that I wasn't expecting, and that was how people held onto their humanity in the worst circumstances. I remember seeing a photo of people lining up for the cinema they'd organised in the ghetto - people who were lucky to get one meal a day. I remember the story the tour guide told us about a rabbi's son who ended up in a camp with his kid brother and kept him alive.

But the most moving thing of all was the makeshift ram's horn that a rabbi had made in one of the concentration camps.

Not even the camps could stop him blowing the ram's horn. And while I don't know much about Jewish festivals, I felt that the ram's horn was a sign of hope.

Hi lovely!

Thank you so much for sharing this with me. I'm very moved to hear how much you care about the topic of the Holocaust. I personally believe we can't understand human nature, without attempting to understand the Holocaust, all of it, the whole range of human nature as it was expressed back then, from the worst of the worst, to the best of the best. We do very much try to talk about this subject, as we try to generally highlight parts of the Holocaust that we feel have been neglected. So, I am REALLY happy to hear that we could introduce that aspect to you, and that it touched you so much! <3 I personally find a lot of comfort and strength in studying more in depth how people managed to do it, how they maintained their humaneness, even as they witnessed, and were victims of, the most monstrous deeds humans are capable of.

I guess following Oct 7, I feel the same way about seeing Israelis, Jews and allies react in a similar way, and choosing good, in spite of the evil we have experienced again, firsthand.

The ram's horn is a Jewish shofar, and this is the specific one you're talking about, it's found in gallery 8 (which focuses on life for enslaved Jews in the Nazi camps):

And this is Moshe Ben Dov, who crafted it in a Nazi slave labor camp in Poland, in 1943.

He said, "I think I must have softened the horn with my tears." Moshe Ben Dov knew that for using the tools the Nazis gave him, to create an object with Jewish significance, they would kill him if they found out. He wasn't in denial of his pain and of the horrors surrounding him. He didn't blindly ignore the danger. He simply chose to overcome it, to channel that pain into creating something good, a symbol of hope as you said, a holy artifact that would allow Jews to blow the shofar, and maintain their tradition and religious customs, even in the middle of a Nazi camp. I think it's remarkable.

This is why one of my favorite Jewish sayings is, "A little bit of light chases a lot of darkness away." This shofar didn't change the world, but it changed something fundamental about the reality of the Jews enslaved in that camp (they all came to hear the rabbi blowing the shofar on Rosh Ha'Shana), and I believe it can also change us for the better, if we let such incredible deeds inspire us to channel our pain into doing good, too.

Thank you so much again for this ask! I hope you have a wonderful day! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[mariacallous]

BERLIN — The latest effort to craft a path to survival for Germany’s beleaguered rabbinical schools is underway — with help from thousands of miles away in California and Jerusalem.

An American Conservative rabbi and an Israeli Reform rabbi have been tapped to lead seminaries associated with the University of Potsdam.

The Los Angeles-based American Jewish University and its Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies this week announced a “groundbreaking partnership” with the Central Council of Jews in Germany to promote “sustainable” Jewish clergy training at the University of Potsdam.

Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, Ziegler’s dean, accepted the Central Council’s invitation as the founding leader of a new German seminary associated with the Masorti or Conservative movement.

“It’s absurd to have an American rabbi running the school,” Artson said he told the Central Council. “The only thing more absurd is not having a school.”

Meanwhile, Rabbi Yehodaya Amir, professor emeritus at the Reform movement’s Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem, will oversee a liberal or Reform seminary being launched at the university.

The new leaders are stepping into a tumultuous situation.

The University of Potsdam has long been home to two rabbinical schools, the liberal/Reform seminary Abraham Geiger College and its Masorti/Conservative sibling, Zacharias Frankel College, founded in 1999 and 2013 respectively by Rabbi Walter Homolka.

But in late 2022, Homolka resigned from all positions in German Jewish institutions following allegations that he had abused his power and created an atmosphere of fear among students and staff. He eventually sold all his shares of Geiger and Frankel for 25,000 euros to the Jewish Community of Berlin, which intended to keep them going.

The organized Jewish community has since struggled to fund the schools, which previously had the Central Council and the German government as their main backers. In the wake of the Homolka scandal, the Central Council had declared it could no longer support the institutions as they stood. It announced plans to revamp rabbinical training so that no one figure would wield too much power.

This month, the council announced a new foundation to support two new schools — a liberal one named for Regina Jonas and a Masorti one named for Abraham Joshua Heschel, both pioneering rabbis in early 20th-century Germany with global and enduring significance. They are also launching a cantorial school under the name of the 19th-century composer of Jewish liturgical music Louis Lewandowski.

Now, the council has made official its chosen partners to operate the schools — and for both it looked outside Germany.

For the Masorti seminary, it turned to Artson, who also served as dean of the Frankel seminary after Homolka cold-called him to ask for his support — a request that he said had conferred a “sacred mission” upon him.

“I thought that this was an opportunity to step up and to help Europeans get the training they would want, to energize the Jewish community,” Artson told JTA. “And that’s really what we’ve done.”

Artson said he anticipated a limited future for his involvement and that of his fellow Ziegler dean, Rabbi Cheryl Peretz.

“We see our role as stepping in and launching this important program, and then at some point getting out of the way so that Europeans can run it without us,” he said.

Current rabbinical and cantorial students were told last week — as eight new rabbis and cantors were ordained — that they will be invited to transfer seamlessly to the new seminaries.

As for what might change for them, Artson said his focus was on “bringing transparency and equal funding and stability” as well as building stronger ties to the global Masorti movement. “This will be a way of organizing a rabbinical school that’s answerable to the public and will be able to last,” he said.

Amir, the HUC professor of Jewish thought who is heading the liberal seminary, said he was heartened by the fact that the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the North American Reform movement’s rabbinical association, was prepared to certify the new program, meaning that its graduates would have the same status in the movement as Geiger’s.

“The fact that the CCAR is considering to grant us such a status by now, before we have even taken our first steps, is a solid and wonderful expression of trust,” Amir told JTA.

Josef Schuster, chair of the Central Council, said support from the two movements augured “a good day for rabbinical and cantor training in Germany and a good day for the Jewish communities in our country.”

The appointments have elicited dissent. The World Union of Progressive Judaism and its European sister organization accused the Central Council of failing to involve them in their plans and of endangering “the unity of the Jewish community.”

And Berlin’s official Jewish community — which, as owner of the original seminaries, has the most to lose — lashed out over the selection of Artson in particular, noting that he has faced allegations of sexism at Ziegler.

Gideon Joffe, the community’s president, accused the Central Council of “conducting a public defamation campaign against the Abraham Geiger College.”

He added in a statement: “Even the appearance of an abuse of power, as is clearly evident in the allegations against Rabbi Artson, is unacceptable for the management of a rabbinical seminary,”

The investigations add to ongoing tumult at AJU and Zeigler, where Artson has worked since 1999. The school recently sold its campus in Los Angeles and slashed tuition in a bid to attract more students.

A third-party investigation of the sexism allegations commissioned by American Jewish University found no systemic misconduct, according to AJU, which did not release the full report. A second inquiry, by the Conservative movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, is underway.

Artson would not comment on the ongoing investigation, except to say it “is wrapping up.” But he noted that the first investigation found “no systemic homophobia or sexism” at Ziegler. “And so I’m really focusing on building the future.”

The statement is “unworthy of them,” Artson said about the Berlin Jewish Community, known by its German nickname Gemeinde, meaning community. “But I understand that in the moment, they’re letting their emotions run things.”

He added, “I think that the Gemeinde does many valuable and important things, and we certainly want to be able to support them in those enterprises, too, just not in this particular instance.”

An irony of the new arrangement is that in seeking to distance rabbinical training as much as possible from Homolka, who chose the Gemeinde as his successor, the Central Council has selected a rabbi who long worked with him. According to a source with knowledge of the situation, Artson had expenses covered but took no salary while working with the Frankel seminary.

For his part, Artson said he remains inspired by Geiger and Frankel, figures who helped make Germany a powerhouse of Jewish innovation in the century prior to the Holocaust.

“I have in my office portraits of both Rabbi Geiger and Rabbi Frankel,” Artson said. “They remain founding figures, even if their names are no longer on the school.”

But the two new namesakes — Heschel, who narrowly escaped Germany in 1940, and Jonas, the first woman to be ordained as a rabbi, who was murdered at Auschwitz — are “also very special,” he said.

[girlactionfigure]

🔥 Sat night after Shabbat - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

( 1 / 2 )

LAG SAMAYACH, a happy Lag b’Omer, the celebration of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and the mystical portion of the Torah.

▪️MERON RISK.. Security officials discussing the possibility of canceling even the tiny bonfires allowed at the Meron Tomb of Rashbi, due to direct threats of rocket and drone fire at the area.

▪️OBJECTION VIDEO IS FAKE.. on Friday a video was released supposedly from a reserve soldier in Gaza (with a mask on) saying the soldiers are sick of the situation having lost their jobs and homes and should consider rebelling against the IDF General and Defense Minister.

.. HOWEVER, the person who made the video was tracked down and arrested.  NOT in Gaza, NOT in the army!  The video was a fake, the trying to convince people to rebel orders - a crime.  He has been arrested.

🔸DEAL, ROUND 33.. the negotiation talks are expected to resume next week in Doha, Qatar when delegations from Hamas and Israel will arrive to present their positions. The head of the Mossad presented to the mediators the guidelines approved by the cabinet, and agreed with the Prime Minister of Qatar and the head of the CIA to meet again.

.. Senior Hamas official Muhammad Mardawi clarifies: “The ball is in Israel's court regarding the end of the war. A permanent ceasefire is the only way to reach a deal. Any proposal presented to us must include a full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.”

.. A senior Hamas official denied to Reuters the reports of renewed contacts in Cairo for a hostage deal.

▪️TUNNELS.. Israeli National Security Adviser Tzachi Hangabi: So far we have found 11 tunnels on the Philadelphia route between Egypt and Gaza, and we have no evidence if our kidnappers were taken out of Gaza.​​​​ (( The Israeli Representative to the ICC said 50 tunnels.  50, or 11?  Or??? ))

▪️A NOTE ON THE IMPOSSIBLE STANDARD OF THE COURT.. (( As many have noted, the court used as some of its reasoning that Israel is instructing Gaza civilians to move out of the combat zone.  Moving civilians out of a combat zone is wrong, and keeping civilians in a combat zone is wrong.  Per the court - if there are civilians, combat is illegal, if civilians are moved it is illegal.  Defense is therefore illegal in enemy territory - regardless of whether they attacked you. ))

.. Leader ofIsrael Our Home party, MK Avigdor Lieberman: "As I warned, the decision of the Israeli government to appear before the International Court of Justice in The Hague was a serious mistake and falling into a trap with a predetermined end.”

🔥🔥Sat night after Shabbat - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

LAG SAMAYACH, a happy Lag b’Omer, the celebration of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and the mystical portion of the Torah.

( 2 / 2 )

▪️PIECE OF AID PIER BREAKS AWAY.. beaches in Ashdod, US landing craft sent to rescue it also beached in Ashdod.  US says 4 pieces or vessels broke away due to weather, asking the Israeli Navy for help.

▪️US ATTACKS YEMEN.. Saudi Al-Hadath network: in an attack in Yemen yesterday by the US, two Iranians and about ten commanders and terrorists of the Houthis were killed. Among the Houthis who were killed were those who returned from a military college of the Iran Revolutionary Guards.

▪️PROTEST - HOSTAGES & ANTI GOVT. RALLY.. The Kaplan protest area / Begin gate in Tel Aviv, 100,000+ protestors for “deal now” and “govt. resign”. Chants - “The people do not forget Netanyahu the murderer.”

.. and is being broadcast LIVE on Al Jazeera.

⭕ ANTI-TANK MISSILES from Hezbollah at a house in Shatula, 2 houses in Metulla, and a synagogue in Dovev.

⭕ HEAVY ROCKET from Hezbollah HITS the Kiryat Shmona industrial zone.  Significant damage.

⭕ ROCKETS FROM Hezbollah at Northern communities - 10 attacks over Shabbat.  At least one was a barrage of 30+ rockets.

⭕ SUICIDE DRONES from Hezbollah at Northern communities - 6 attacks over Shabbat.

⭕ ROCKETS from Hamas at near-Gaza communities - 1 attack over Shabbat. 1

♦️JABALIYA - central Gaza.. A very big advance - the IDF controls most of the area - most of it is occupied and the rest is controlled by snipers. The next stage - capture of the west of the area.  Rumors say that a commander of Hamas, Iz a Din Al Haddad, is hiding in the west area.

.. Captured and destroyed lathes for the production of rockets.

.. Arrests of men of fighting age for interrogation.

🔅 Sat night Lag b’Omer - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

🔥LAG SAMAYACH, a happy Lag b’Omer 🔥

⭕ EXPLOSION OVER MERON.. An explosion was heard over Miron, due to an interception.

▪️MERON LIMITED LIGHTING DELAYED.. due to the security situation (see item above) and the riot (see item below), permission and safety for a tiny lighting by the Boyaner Rebbe has not yet been approved.

▪️A FEW HUNDRED RELIGIOUS ZEALOTS.. violated the Home Front Command safety ban on entering the Tomb of Rashbi in Meron and rioted when ordered to leave by police - basically trashing the holy site in throwing things at the police.  They were forcibly removed - putting both themselves and the security forces at life risk.

▪️TEL AVIV PROTESTS.. lit large fires in the road (NOT in honor of Lag b’Omer), at which point the police declared the protest illegal and called on demonstrators to disperse.  The riot police, mounted police, and water cannon moving in after they refused to disperse.

▪️ON THE FAKE OBJECTION VIDEO.. (( Commentary by right-wing Channel 14 )) “For many months, the left side of the political map called for a mutiny in the army.  They encouraged refusal and made it legitimate, and called to refuse an order to serve and refuse to obey the political echelon.  Now that it comes from the right (a very wrong and serious thing!) those who did it until a few months ago in the name of 'democracy' are shocked and angry.”

🔸DEAL, HAMAS UPDATES.. Hamas: “Osama Hamdan, told the Al Jazeera network: We do not need new negotiations” (( because EU countries and the ICJ and ICC are doing their job for them. ))

▪️JEW UP FOR EXECUTION IN IRAN.. The request for a retrial of Ervin Nathaniel Kahrmani, a young Iranian Jew who was sentenced to "retribution" (execution) on the charge of "premeditated murder", was rejected by the Iran Supreme Court.

▪️POLICE / CHABAD CONFLICT IN LOD?  Brief report that police are not allowing people to enter the Chabad neighborhood for a planned city Lag b’Omer event - with thousands crowding the police-closed entrance.

♦️COUNTER-TERROR - TULKARM (Samaria).. firefight between terrorists and the security services of the Palestinian Authority in Tulkarm, terrorist Muhammad Ahmed Khatib was killed.

♦️IDF ATTACKING IN CENTRAL RAFAH

♦️IDF WAVE OF ATTACKS - SOUTHERN LEBANON - The Air Force has launched another wave of attacks in southern Lebanon, and is now attacking the targets of Problema al-Sha'ab and Al-Hiyam

[dadyomi]

Tuesday 5/16, Sotah 48: Eat a bag of ducks

These self-indulgent weavers and their singing, driving up the price of ducks...

[nonsensical-raw-material]

Does anyone else like annotating their Chumash? Or even your Siddur?

I know it can be a bit of a cultural taboos but I find it so beneficial to my studying plus it's so much fun! Like I don't see much from Christianity and think "man if only" but I gotta say the girly pop Bible annotations and journaling is kinda iconic.

I won't even lie my ADHD is crazy too like I know I always have my TaNaKh with me. But my study TaNaKhs, a journal, my Siddur, or anything else it comes to be a lot. Plus it saves me from blanking when my Rabbi inevitably asks "Do you have any questions or thoughts" of course I do! But man if I don't be forgetting. Now BOOM! Not only do I have all my questions. Theyre right by the scripture that spurred them.

I love crafting it's so much fun adding pages of notes and what not while I read my study TaNaKhs along side it. Or little additions about the Hebrew as I try to learn and get better. Plus it honestly keeps me more active in my TaNaKh it makes it more engaging to me.

I also like the idea of future generations being able to connect to me through seeing my thoughts and notes. It's also a great way to chronical my own religious learning for myself.

Do yall have anything specific you like to add to your books if you do?

[gatheringbones]

[“It’s easy and tempting to regard other people in a transactional way, and indeed, many of our interactions with other human beings are transactional by their very nature. When you order food in a restaurant, the focus of that interaction is not on the hopes, hurts, and longings of either you or your server—even if the interaction is warm and friendly, the core of that relationship is about both your interest in getting your food in a timely manner, without that allergen on your plate, and your server’s concern about your eating your meal, not causing a fuss, and leaving a decent tip. It’s transactional on both sides.

But there is a difference between transactional and objectifying—a transactional relationship can nonetheless be respectful, courteous, and kind. And there is certainly a difference between a transactional relationship and one in which the other person is regarded in their full subjecthood as a whole, multilayered human being, full of talents and dreams and selfhood, holy and created in the divine image. In which the work is to encounter the other person in their messiness, their fullness, on their own terms, rather than through the lens of your own interests or needs.

Much harm is caused when we regard others as objects, or in transactional ways, and forget to behold their full humanity—to see them as complete human beings whose concerns and feelings matter as much as our own. I believe that a true apology must be an interaction that honors the full humanity of the other; it is not transactional.

As I’ve mentioned before, you don’t apologize at a person. You apologize to them. It’s not, of course, a petulant “But I said I was sorry!” It’s also not about crafting the perfectly contrite words of regret and remorse. There’s a difference between saying you’re sorry because you realize that a thing you did had a bad consequence, and doing so because you really understand that you hurt someone—and that person’s feelings, experience of the world, safety, and self all matter profoundly.

A true apology is about trying to see the human being in front of you, to connect with them and communicate to them, to make it clear—abundantly, absolutely, profoundly clear—that you get it now, and that their feeling better matters to you. Your apology is a manifestation of genuine remorse. It demands vulnerability, and it is a natural by-product of all the work of repentance and transformation that you’ve been doing up until this point. (This is, incidentally, why I think apology comes later in the process—the apology that is needed is generally one that reflects all of the understanding, transformation, and accountability work that has already been taking place.)”]

rabbi danya ruttenberg, from on repentance and repair: making amends in an unapologetic world, 2022

[flamingkorybante]

Like many of my comrades I have been heartbroken by the nationalist fervor coming at me from all directions over the last week. I know it’s difficult for many diasporic Jews to imagine a praxis that integrates all of the ancestral trauma that we carry with the drive for peace and justice for all peoples to which we are commanded, and I want to offer as a possibility that tikkun olam will come when ALL borders fall and ALL states dissolve.

Rabbi Shmuel Alexandrov wrote that in olam haba’a, all borders and laws will dissolve before the light of the divinity present in all things – that even the border between Shabbat and the other days of the week would crumble, allowing the holiness of the Shabbat to infuse into every day (as Jill Hammer writes, this vision of sacredness infused into every day, every place, deconstructing artificial boundaries of space and time, “does not reject the Temple but rather enlarges it”). To divest from loyalty to the state and become instead a cosmopolitan – a citizen of the universe – “testif[ies] to the unity of the Creator and his creation – just as the former is one and undivided, so too the latter.”

“Every border implies the violence of its maintenance.” - Ayesha A. Siddiqi

There is no border between peoples, and consequently no state, that is not created and maintained through dehumanization. When we accept the existence of any state as good or even as a necessary evil, we are accepting the proposition that the people on the other side of the border are not people in the same way as we are, and that their suffering does not matter in the same way that our suffering matters.

It is only when we reject such a fantasy that we can rise together. We do not need the state to protect us from our cousins; we need to join with our cousins to protect each other from the state.

We are in a climate of unbearable propaganda; we are being thrown bodily into the memories of generations of screaming ancestors who yearn for sanctuary. This is being crafted intentionally by agents of states who need us to be too dissociated, too triggered, and too terrified to connect across difference so that they can get on with their work of exploitation and domination. Our only job right now is to resist that, to push through the dissociation and the fear and the trauma to reach out for each other, to dismantle the borders and walls and protections that the fear and trauma spring up around us, to remember that we are not each other’s enemy.

When we tear down the walls around our hearts, we are making ourselves into channels through which olam haba’a can be born, and when we tear down the walls in the world, letting the sacred peace of Shabbat rush in like undammed water, letting the artificial mechanisms of the state -- ANY state , all states -- be washed away by a river of solidarity, we are bringing it to pass.

[handeaux]

Not Exactly Vampires, Many Cincinnatians Indulged A Craving For Fresh Blood

A curious article appeared in the Cincinnati Medical Advance for November 1875, alerting local doctors that a number of their patients had adopted a peculiar diet.

“It may not be generally known that, like New York, Cincinnati has its blood drinkers – consumptives and others who daily visit the slaughterhouses to obtain the invigorating draught of ruddy life-elixir, fresh from the veins of beeves. Lawrence’s slaughter house, opposite the Oliver Street Police Station, has its daily visitants who drink blood; and the slaughter houses of the Loewensteins on John Street, a few squares away have perhaps half a dozen visitants of the same class.”

Yes, you read that correctly. Back when Cincinnati butchers operated abattoirs all over the fringes of the downtown area, they provided free blood to anyone who stopped by and asked for a glass. It is no surprise that a macabre practice such as this would attract Cincinnati’s legendary chronicler of the bizarre, Lafcadio Hearn, and indeed it did. Hearn published his report of a visit to the Loewensteins in the 26 July 1876 edition of the Cincinnati Commercial.

“Between the hours of 2 and 4 o’clock almost any afternoon, the curious visitor may observe many handsomely dressed ladies and others enter the cleanly, well-kept establishment in question, and waiting, glass in hand, for a draught of crimson elixir, yet warm from the throat of some healthy bullock. Just as soon as the neck of the animal is severed by one rapid slash of the ‘Schochet’s’ long blade, glass after glass is held to the spouting veins and quickly handed to the invalids, who quaff the red cream with evident signs of pleasure, and depart their several ways.”

Hearn’s reference to a Schochet identifies the Lowenstein slaughter house as following kosher practices. The Schochet is a ritual slaughterer, certified by the local rabbi to practice his craft. That the Loewenteins followed kosher practice was an important distinction for Hearn, who had previously described his displeasure while observing gentile butchery.

“Many who can drink the blood of animals slaughtered according to the Hebrew fashion, can not stomach that of bullocks felled with the ax. The blood of the latter is black and thick and lifeless; that of the former bright, ruddy and clear as new wine.”

While most of Cincinnati’s blood drinkers were satisfied with a single tumbler of fresh blood, Hearn relates the experience of a “short, well-built but pallid-looking” man who downed glass after glass of blood and strolled away, apparently satiated. When he next reappeared, ten days later, he was asked if all that blood had made him queasy or nauseous. He replied that he could drink gallons of blood at a time but confessed that his latest sanguinary binge had caused him to go blind for a week.

“Yet, having recovered his vision, he believed that he could see better than ever.”

Hearn interviewed several doctors who insisted that drinking fresh beef blood could never produce blindness, temporary or otherwise. In fact, most of Hearn’s medical informants told him they discouraged their patients from imbibing in slaughter-house blood at all.

“I have always warned my consumptive patients against drinking blood,” one doctor told Hearn. “The latter practice is both morally and physically detrimental.”

Despite medical objections, Hearn gulped a tall glass of blood himself and provided detailed tasting notes.

“Fancy the richest cream, warm, with a tart sweetness, and the healthy strength of the pure wine ‘that gladdeneth the heart of man!’ It was a draught simply delicious, sweeter than any concoction of the chemist, the confectioner, the winemaker – it was the very elixir of life itself.”

A decade later, according to an article in the Cincinnati Times [12 February 1885] Cincinnatians were still lining up for bloody drinks. The Times reporter asked an emaciated man how his unusual dietary supplement tasted.

“Like salted milk,” he replied. “And some put salt in the blood, but I do not feel that it makes it more palatable.”

The Times recorded a visit to the slaughter house by a man of eighty years in age, who had walked three miles to get a glass of blood. He claimed that he had been a near invalid when a friend suggested a regular glass of the stuff. The old man boasted he now walked six miles a day and felt stronger than he had when he was fifty.

The proprietor informed the Times that his slaughter house always kept a supply of dark blue glasses on hand for new patients. The tinted glass disguised the color of the drink they were offered and allowed them to get used to the taste. After a few visits, the very demeanor of the blood drinkers changed, often radically.

“I know of one person whom it did change in that way. At first she could not bear even the sight of blood, and was weak, sickly, delicate and timid, but finally she got all over this and liked to see a steer killed, especially if the beast was game.”

One bloody quaff certainly had a dramatic effect on Lafcadio Hearn, who sailed off into a rhapsodic endorsement of this strange elixir, tempered by a premonition that a taste of blood might result in a decidedly unwanted transformation of character.

“No other earthly draught can rival such crimson cream, and its strength spreads through the veins with the very rapidity of wine. Perhaps this knowledge originated that terrible expression, ‘drunk with blood.’ That the first draught will create a desire for a second; that a second may create an actual blood-thirstiness in the literal sense of the word; that such a thirst might lead to the worst consequence in a coarse and brutal nature, we are rather inclined to believe is not only possible, but probable.”

The Schochet informed Hearn that he himself, following Mosaic law, had never tasted blood. Hearn, after pondering the effects of a single warm glass, advised the “healthy and vigorous” to follow the instructions of Moses and abstain. Hearn feared that blood-drinking, while beneficial to the sickly and infirm, would drive healthy individuals onto a bestial quest for even more vile excesses.

“Perhaps it was through occasional indulgence in a draught of human blood (before men’s veins were poisoned with tobacco and bad liquor) that provoked the monstrous cruelty of certain Augustinian Emperors.”