Opuscula Don’t tell me How to shake My lulav!

OUR MINYAN TODAY (it was the second day of Sukot) hit a rough spot.
Mostly we are a bunch of easy going men; it’s a mixture of Sefardim and Ashkenazim. But today, failing to learn from the past, the person who organized the minyan committed the faux pas of his predecessor.

WHAT OUTRAGE DID THIS MAN CAUSE?

He had the hazan tell us the ”correct” way to wave the lulav.

UNFORTUNATELY, how the lulav is waved is a matter of MINHAG.

There is an Ashkenazi way.

There is a North African way.

There is a “Yerushalmi” way.

I am sure there are sub-sets of each of the above and many I don’t know about.

A year ago we had a different person at the helm and he made the same mistake.

“You must do it the Yerushalmi way.” (He was ignored and later left to form his own minyan. We wish him success with the blessing for the czar.)

Not “this is the Yerushalmi way,” but this is the way it will be done.

The former “helmsman” and the current “helmsman” often were at odds despite having the same general background.

Its is not that the Yerushalmi way is “wrong,” or that the other ways are wrong.

I follow Moroccan minhag.

I have two sedurim: וזרח השמש and אבותינו . BOTH books tell me that “in this city and surrounding area, people do it this way, while in another area people do it differently.”

Never mind that BOTH places are in Morocco.

I also have, thanks to my Syrian brother-in-law (once removed), a copy of R. Israel Meir Lau's excellent יחדות הלכה למעשה that addresses issues from multiple traditions. (R. Lau was Chief (Ashkenazi) Rabbi of Israel and has the respect of observant Jews of all types.)

If a former chief rabbi can accommodate/recognize minhagim other than his own, surely our minyan “helmsman” — an otherwise nice enough fellow — can do the same.

If the rabbinical luminaries in Morocco — and there are many — and Israel can do likewise for those who follow Moroccan traditions, it seems to me that we all should follow their lead and be accepting of different minhagim.

I will concede that a Sefardi or Mizrachi Jew needs to keep a sharp eye on the Ashkenazi standing next o him since the Ashkenazi — rather than turning around and around as the Sefardi and Mizrachi do, at some point waves his lulav over his shoulder — possibly a dangerous move to anyone standing nearby.

As long as no one is injured by a waving lulav, what is wrong with a mix of minhagim in a small congregation?

True, the basic rule is that everyone “follows the rov (majority),” and I know of an Orthodox Ashkenazi rabbi who chases Sefardim and Mizrachim out of his minyan during hol ha’moed because Ashkenazim don tefillin during those days and Sefaridim don’t. (On the other hand, Ashkenazim don a tallit when leading minhah and marariv (aravet). Should they be banned from a mostly-Sefardi minyan?) If you have a basic minyan and you banish anyone, there goes the minyan and THAT is everyone’s loss.

Some Ashkenazim build sukot with sold wood walls so the wind will not move them. Sefaridim often use colorful sheets. (Did anyone have solid walls when we wandered around the midbar (wilderness) for 40 years? I suppose the question could be asked: “Did we have colorful kingsize sheets back then?”)

When did we ‐ Jews — become so narrow-minded that we cannot accommodate other traditions as long as they are within basic halacah?

We manage to (more or less) accommodate different pronunciations of Hebrew, even if sometimes the meaning is questionable. I’m referring not only to the variations between Ashkenazi Hebrew and Sephardi Hebrew, but between Yemenite Hebrew as well.

Making an issue of how to wave a lulav, especially in a mixed minyan is, to my mind שטיות ומיץ עגבניות.

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Opuscula Israeli Arabs Demand police Provide protection

UPDATE for 10/11/2019

According to Israel HaYom: Israel Police to assign hundreds of new officers to Arab sector.

Arab MKs, top police officials meet with Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan. In addition to 620 new police officers, responsibility for Arab organized crime to be transferred to Lahav 433 Major Crimes Unit.

Follow link to read full article: https://tinyurl.com/yxjdbl4y

ISRAELI ARABS — Arab citizens of Israel — are demanding that the government provide police protection to rid their communities of gangs and guns.

Dry Bones cartoon for 10/10/19 @ https://tinyurl.com/y6j3chko

According to The Times of Israel, Joint List leaders want to meet public security minister and demand prison sentences and heavy fines for possession of illegal firearms, crackdown on organized crime.(https://tinyurl.com/y6euo4nx)

While some Joint List MKs are a thorn in the side of the government, the most recent election shows they do represent a sizable number of Israeli citizens.

It behooves the government to increase the number of police; an organization that is sadly understaffed compared to U.S. community served by local police, sheriff’s deputies, and state police.

COOPERATION POSSIBLE?

If the Israeli Arabs want more police protection — and as Israeli taxpayers that is their due — they must do their part and cooperate with police.

That may prove to be the Israeli Arabs’ greatest stumbling block to safer neighborhoods.

In the U.S., too many black neighborhoods refuse to cooperate with police even when the police also are black.

SELF POLICING

Both the Israeli Arabs and the American blacks need to do some self-policing.

That doesn’t necessarily mean risking their lives by trying to arrest criminals, but by being observant and relaying relevant information to the police.

They also need to cooperate with the police when the cops attempt to make an arrest if only by not interfering with the arrest.

ADD MORE COPS

Israel would do well to add more Israeli Arabs to the police ranks; it would do well to add more policemen — Jewish, Arab, or “other” — to its understaffed organization.

Today Israel depends on Border Police and the army to supplement the regular police. These people are mot trained to deal with citizens; rather they are trained for border conflicts and infiltration by non-citizens bent on harm to Israeli citizens.

עינים להם ולא יראו * אזנים להם ולא יאזנו

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

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Opuscula nazis taunt Jews on Rosh HaShana In German city

A DRY BONES CARTOON (below) sent me scouring the WWW for confirmation that national socialism is alive and well in parts of Germany.

On Rosh HaShana, neo-nazis marched through the German city of Dortmund, waving flags of the nazi Third Reich, chanting "Palestine help us, Israel still exists" and "Israel no more" (Dry Bones for 10/3/2019 @ http://tinyurl.com/y4hw8x7y )

An aside I cannot bring myself to capitalize the “n” in nazi. These people and their hate-laden philosophy are beneath contempt.

UNFORTUNATELY, the Dry Bones cartoon was politically accurate.
I surfed the web and found at least five articles on the presence of nazis in Germany.

   German Neo-nazi Party Demands Addresses of All Jews in Dortmund (http://tinyurl.com/y5utsycs)
   Neo-nazi protestors in Germany call for Palestinian help against Israel (http://tinyurl.com/y3ed75yq)

   Neo-nazis wave Palestinian flags in protest against Israel (http://tinyurl.com/y33cqugb)

   Hundreds of neo-nazis chant anti-Semitic slogans in Dortmund, Germany (http://tinyurl.com/yyo8d9kq)

   A Neo-nazi’s Political Rise Exposes a German City’s Ethnic Tensions (http://tinyurl.com/y2r637ae)

Most of the publications failed to make the Rosh HaShana connection.

Sadly, a resurgence of national socialism is not limited to Germany.

In other countries, notably France, anti-Semitism is coupled with xenophobia brought about by the Muslim “refugee” influx and sharia law trumping French law.

On a less physically threatening level, xenophobia — the fear of anything “different” — is behind the recent spate of anti-shechitah laws (that also generally apply to observant Muslim slaughter practices).¹

The Dortmund Germany exhibition of stupidity and hate is the first time this scrivener has heard about a call for “help from the ‘Palestinians’.” The so-called “Palestinians” cannot even help each other (PLO-controlled areas vs. Hamas/Islamic Brotherhood in Gaza), not can it pay it’s bills despite massive and continuing cash input from fellow-Muslim states and the UN.

Dortmund is hardly the only place where nazis apparently run free.

The World Socialist Web Site (http://tinyurl.com/yyo8d9kq) reported On Friday evening, several hundred neo-nazis marched through a residential area in the working-class German city of Dortmund.
That same day, radical right-wingers once again marched through the city in Chemnitz. According to media reports, followers of the “Pro Chemnitz” alliance attacked the offices of the Left Party,
On Saturday, in the Bavarian city of Bamberg, a so-called “anchor centre” for refugees was burnt down.
At the end of August, a dozen neo-nazis had attacked the Jewish restaurant “Shalom” in Chemnitz.

Yes, Virginia, there IS a difference between a “real” socialist and a “national socialist” (a/k/a nazi).

The World Socialists contend that the German government is the cause of the current unrest. 85 years after the seizure of power by the nazis and the subsequent fascist terror in Europe, which cost the lives of 6 million Jews—nazi gangs are again marching through the streets and chanting anti-Semitic slogans under the eyes of the police is the product of the policy of the German government. The grand coalition of the Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU) and Social Democrats (SPD) is responsible for the return of the nazi hordes. The nazis managed to murder hundreds of socialists along with anyone else who opposed/might oppose their philosophy or who was physically or mentally unable to become cannon fodder for the reich.

According to the RIAS Berlin Commission, a federal organization that documents antisemitism in Germany, the police officers who escorted the neo-nazis (in Dortmund) didn’t see fit to dismantle the rally (http://tinyurl.com/y3ed75yq).

That may have been the best option and was similar to the police inaction when American nazis marched in Skokie IL with the blessing of the U.S. and Illinois supreme courts.² Violence was avoided, although citizens, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, were offended.

Sources

1, http://tinyurl.com/y2cfqdxy

2. http://tinyurl.com/n575qhd

עינים להם ולא יראו * אזנים להם ולא יאזנו

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

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