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Monday, May 14, 2007

Rabbinic Judaism Inc.




A Portable God for the World’s First Multinational Business

Sources:
Paul Johnson, A History of the Jews (Phoenix Grant, 1987)
Israel Shahak, Jewish History, Jewish Religion (Pluto Press, 1994)
Dan Cohn-Sherbok, The Crucified Jew (Harper Collins,1992)
Henry Hart Milman, The History of the Jews (Everyman, 1939)
Josephus, The Jewish War (Penguin, 1959)
Leslie Houlden (Ed.), Judaism & Christianity (Routledge, 1988)
Karen Armstrong, A History of Jerusalem (Harper Collins, 1999))
Jonathan N. Tubb, Canaanites (British Museum Press, 1998)
Norman Cantor, The Sacred Chain - A History of the Jews (Harper Collins, 1994)

Whatever daughter religions might spin off from old Judaism, the parent religion itself had inevitably to refashion itself for the new era. After the disaster of 135 AD, a number of Jews retreated into asceticism, banning meat and wine altogether, since sacrifice in the temple was no longer possible. Others lost themselves in mysticism, attempting to reach the ‘celestial throne’ via their imagination, the forerunners of the later ‘Kabala’.

But for all their suffering, most Jews were not ready to bastardise their traditional creed by infusing it with the dying godman mythology. The vacuum was filled by ‘Rabbinic Judaism’, the inheritor of the Pharisee tradition.

"The rabbis, a smallish group (perhaps a hundred or so in the whole Roman empire) of religious specialists descended from the Pharisees, gradually enhanced their status and developed a specifically Jewish way of arguing, which marked them off quite dramatically from both Christians and Romans." (Keith Hopkins, A World Full of Gods, p234)

In Palestine itself, where the Jews were now a minority, what remained of traditional Judaism turned inward. No longer could its priests use the ‘temple magic’ once used to summon divine favour, no longer could Judaism be proselytised.

The Rabbis became ‘clericalised’ – obsessed with cultic ‘rules’ as a practical substitute for the lost temple. They peopled the air itself with beneficent and malign spirits. A Jewish ‘code to live by’ - the Mitzvoth (the forerunner of ‘monastic rules’) detailed no fewer than 613 rules, governing every pious moment from waking to sleeping, to keep the Jew on the right side of an all-seeing God.

‘His rising from his bed, his manner of putting on the different articles of dress, the disposition of his fringed tallith, his phylacteries on his head and arms, his ablutions, his meals, even the calls of nature were subjected to scrupulous rules – both reminding him that he was of a peculiar race, and perpetually reducing him to ask the advice of the Wise Men, which alone could set at rest the trembling and scrupulous conscience.’ (Milman, History of the Jews, p165)

Within a few generations Judaism would be codified anew, into a portable (albeit confining) religion which could accompany and – fatally – identify this pseudo-race in their wanderings in the centuries ahead. By the close of the fifth century, the total population of Jews would be half of what it was at the beginning of the ‘Christian era’.(See, Cantor, ibid)

The Jewish people – dispersed but bonded by an exclusive faith, uniquely among ‘peoples’ – established enclaves in every major city from India to Spain, from Arabia to Britain. Capitalising upon this network of ‘safe havens’, and with a filial presence in every major resource, from African ivory to Germanic slaves, the Jews threw themselves into the commerce of the ancient world.

Jewish merchants traversed with impunity the hostile frontiers between Rome and Persia, sailed the sea lanes from the chilly rivers of Germany to the balmy seas off the Horn of Africa. The Jews became dealers in amber and fur, gold and silver, slave-traders and money-lenders.

But they were also dealers in superstition as well as produce:

‘The empire swarmed with Jewish wonder-workers, mathematicians, astrologers, or whatever other name or office they assumed or received from their trembling hearers.’
(MiIlman, History of the Jews, p158)

Levies on their new wealth paid for a programme of synagogue building, and in turn, the synagogues strengthened the bonds of the Jewish communities. Rarely assimilating into their host cultures, convinced they were especially favoured by the deity (and thus strengthened in their faith), the heady mix of piety and mercantilism rewarded the Jews with an unparalleled financial success – and an unequalled and universal opprobrium.



Sound familiar? UOJ

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is it true that there was a guy at last night's Agudah dinner wearing a UOJ cap, that was asked to leave???

Anonymous said...

"Is it true that there was a guy at last night's Agudah dinner wearing a UOJ cap, that was asked to leave???"

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Shafran & Wachsmann must have had an "Emergency" a la Charlie Hynes.

Anonymous said...

Does UOJ agree with the take of the secular historians that korbanos and following the leadership of the rabbonus are pagan like ?

If not, then why was this posted?

Does UOJ not believe in the tzivuy to listen to rabbonim?

I thought this campaign was against current rabbonim who are corrupt - NOT the old ways of Klal Yisroel.

Paul Mendlowitz said...

Does UOJ agree with the take of the secular historians that korbanos and following the leadership of the rabbonus are pagan like ?

If not, then why was this posted?

Does UOJ not believe in the tzivuy to listen to rabbonim?

I thought this campaign was against current rabbonim who are corrupt - NOT the old ways of Klal Yisroel.
________________

The scope of the post is entirely meant to have focused on the DIFFERENCE between Chazal and the clowns of today!

Paul Mendlowitz said...

GOD FOR SALE TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER!

Anonymous said...

Why are you so surprised that Agudah gave the fellow the heave-ho? It’s typical Agudistic free speech suppression. If it’s anything to protect the innocent you can’t say it.

Example 1: When people started complaining about the at-risk-teen phenomenon and placed partial blame on the school, Agudah responded by starting the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation, to teach Just Shut Up.

Example 2: The Agudah/Torah Umesorah teamed up with Project Derech when the truth came out that some parents were abusing their children physically and emotionally. This bullshit organization taught kids to Just Take It. Again putting kids in harms way.

Example 3: When the truth came out about Agudah’s employees involved in sexual abuse perpetration or cover-ups (Kolko, Eiseman, Heinneman, Belsky, and Neustadt) the fools made a convention to quash the blogs. Thus enabling further abuse against the Jewish people’s most valuable assets, the children.

Example 4: Two months after the Monsey meat scandal broke, did the Jewish Observer write a choppy half-ass article about the Kosher problems. Maybe it’s because the publisher is a neighbor of Mrs. Shevach, or maybe Kosher is only for the older generation as Effy so eloquently stated.

It’s time to choke the money lifeline off of Agudah.

Ronnie Schreiber said...

Karen Armstrong, A History of Jerusalem (Harper Collins, 1999))

UOJ,

I'm not so sure how reliable Armstrong is. She has a bit of a universalist agenda and habitually whitewashes the unsavory aspects of Islam. Check out Robert Spencer's Jihad Watch and Dhimmi Watch sites to see an alternate view on Armstrong.

Paul Mendlowitz said...

Ronnie,

I believe I read everything published by Armstrong, checked and double checked her references and sources, I found her totally credible historically, perhaps with a bias.

Ronnie Schreiber said...

UOJ,

Read what Spencer has written about Armstrong. He makes a pretty convincing argument that her bias leads her to misrepresent both Quranic scripture and the hadiths so as to portray Islam and Mohammad in an idealized light.

Armstrong excuses Mohammad's attacks on the Jews of the Arabian peninsula, including his slaughter of the Jews of the Yathrib and the Bani Quraiza (sp?).

I'll take the Rambam's word about big Mo over Armstrong's. HaIsh HaMeshuga HaZeh.

Armstrong, along with John Esposito and Juan Cole are the preeminent apologists for Islam in the West.

I've seen guys like them since I was in school, majoring in Studies In Religion. All of the so called "critical" approaches that they apply to the Tanach and l'havdil the NT, like textual analysis and positing multiple authors, all of their questioning of the tenets of Judaism and Christianity, are not to be found when they turn their eye towards the Quran and Islam. They accept the orthodox Muslim party line as authoritative.

Anonymous said...

The Rambam himself said something similar regarding korbonos. UOJ should have quoted the rambam directly instead of these.............

Paul Mendlowitz said...

Let's not forget that better than 50% of the Rambam's writings never survived the torches and fires of the enlightened rabbis of his day.

Paul Mendlowitz said...

Armstrong has a definite bias; her historical facts are just that, facts. I'll take the facts any day from anyone, as long as they are indeed facts!

Anonymous said...

Very appropriate that the gerrer rebbe who can barely read is pictured in this article. This clown regulates how mny times men can have sex with their wives, how late they can talk to their wives, location of furniture in their bedrooms --and them he has to close his dormitory in boropark because it has become such a homosexual predators free for all....

Anonymous said...

uoj,
You may find the following interesting.
This past shevuos the Bais Horah of Flatbush (Located directly across from Glatt Mart) which is Headed by Rabbi Tzvi Spira And financially run by his father in law "Moshe Binik" (From Moshe`s Grosery) hired both (Rabbi) Shlomo Mandel and his younger brother (Rabbi)Yaccov Mandel to speak through out the shvuos yom tov at the shul which is used also as the bais horah.

Anonymous said...

And why exactly do you pick on the Gerer Rebbe every time?

You seem to have some serious bias against Ger.

Interesting. given that there are molesters in every community.

I know you'll probably answer under some assumed name "well, the Gerer Rebbe conspired with Leizrowits blah blah blah"

Sorry to bust your bubble. The Gerer Rebbe is the one who is keeping Leizrowits away from any Gerrer yeshivah.

I know a bit of what went on behind the scenes when the Leizrowits scandal broke. To say that the Gerer Rebbe conspired and covered up for Leizrowots is nothing further than the truth.

Maybe it doesn't add up to what you want. Well, delete it or censor it just like you do to all who don’t lick your posterior.