Category Archives: Talmud

Copperhead snakes are some of the more commonly seen North American snakes. They're also the most likely to bite, although their venom is relatively mild, and their bites are rarely fatal for humans.

These snakes get their name, fittingly, from their copper-red heads, according to the biology department at Pennsylvania State University. Some other snakes are referred to as copperheads, which is a common (nonscientific) name.Water moccasins (cottonmouths), radiated rat snakes, Australian copperheads and sharp-nosed pit vipers are all sometimes called copperheads, but these are different species from the North American copperhead (Agkistrodon contortrix).

Copperheads are pit vipers, like rattlesnakes and water moccasins. Pit vipers have "heat-sensory pits between eye and nostril on each side of head," which are able to detect minute differences in temperatures so that the snakes can accurately strike the source of heat, which is often potential prey. Copperhead "behavior is very much like that of most other pit vipers," said herpetologist Jeff Beane, collections manager of amphibians and reptiles at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences.

Copperheads are medium-size snakes, averaging between 2 and 3 feet (0.6 to 0.9 meters) in length. According to the Smithsonian National Zoological Park, female copperheads are longer than males; however, males possess proportionally longer tails.

According to Beane, copperheads' bodies are distinctly patterned. Their "dorsal pattern is a series of dark, chestnut-brown or reddish-brown crossbands, each shaped like an hourglass, dumbbell or saddlebag on a background of lighter brown, tan, salmon or pinkish," Beane said. He further described the saddlebags as "wide on sides of body, narrow in center of back the crossbands typically have darker margins and lighter lateral centers." Meanwhile, "some crossbands may be broken, and sometimes small dark spots may be in the spaces between the crossbands."

Several other nonvenomous species of snakes have similar coloring, and so are frequently confused for copperheads. However, copperheads are the only kind of snakes with hourglass-shaped markings.

In contrast to its patterned body, the snake's coppery-brown head lacks such adornments, "except for a pair of tiny dark dots usually present on top of the head," said Beane. He described copperheads' bellies as "whitish, yellowish or a light brownish, stippled or mottled, with brown, gray or blackish, often large, paired dark spots or smudges along sides of [its] belly."

Copperheads have muscular, thick bodies and keeled (ridged) scales. Their heads are "somewhat triangular/arrow-shaped and distinct from the neck," with a "somewhat distinct ridge separating [the] top of head from side snout between eye and nostril," said Beane. Their pupils are vertical, like cats' eyes, and their irises are usually orange, tan or reddish-brown.

Young copperheads are more grayish in color than adults and possess "bright yellow or greenish yellow tail tips." According to Beane, "this color fades in about a year."

Copperheads reside "from southern New England to West Texas and northern Mexico," said Beane, advising those interested to check out range maps in a number of field guides.

There are five subspecies of copperhead distributed according to geographic range: the northern, northwestern, southern and two southwestern subspecies. According to the Smithsonian National Zoological Park, the northern copperhead has by far the largest range, from Alabama to Massachusetts and Illinois.

According to Beane, copperheads are happy in "an extremely wide range of habitats," though usually "at least some semblance of woods or forest habitat is present." They are "particularly fond of ecotones," which are transition areas between two ecological communities. They like rocky, wooded areas, mountains, thickets near streams, desert oases, canyons and other natural environments, according to Penn State; Beane added that they like "almost any habitat with both sunlight and cover."

According to the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, copperheads are "quite tolerant of habitat alteration." This means that they can survive well in suburban areas. Copperheads can sometimes be found in wood and sawdust piles, abandoned farm buildings, junkyards and old construction areas. They "often seek shelter under surface cover such as boards, sheet metal, logs or large flat rocks," said Beane.

Copperheads are semi-social snakes. While they usually hunt alone, they usually hibernate in communal dens and often return to the same den every year. Beane said that populations in the "montane" (a forest area below the timberline with large, coniferous trees) often spend the winter hibernating "with timber rattlesnakes, rat snakes or other species." However, "Piedmont and Coastal Plain snakes are more likely to hibernate individually," Beane said.They also can be seen near one another while basking in the sun, drinking, eating and courting, according to the Smithsonian Zoo.

According to the Ohio Public Library Information Network, copperheads are usually out and about during the day in the spring and fall, but during the summer they become nocturnal. They especially like being out on humid, warm nights after rain. While they usually stay on the ground, copperheads will sometimes climb into low bushes or trees in search of prey or to bask in the sun. Sometimes, they even voluntarily go swimming.

According to Animal Diversity Web (ADW), a database maintained by the University of Michigan Museum of Zoology, scientists have hypothesized that copperheads migrate late in the spring to their summer feeding area, then return home in early fall.

He described copperheads as being "mobile ambush predators." Mostly, they get their prey by "sit-and-wait ambush"; however, they sometimes do hunt, using their heat-sensing pits to find prey.

The ADW explains that when attacking large prey, copperheads bite the victim, and then release it. They let the venom work, and then track down the prey once it has died. The snakes usually hold smaller prey in their mouths until the victim dies. Copperheads eat their food whole, using their flexibly hinged jaws to swallow the meal. According to Penn State, adult copperheads may eat only 10 or 12 meals per year, depending on the size of their dinners.

Copperhead mating season lasts from February to May and from late August to October, and it can be a dramatic affair. "Males may engage in ritual combat (body-shoving contests) when two or more meet in the presence of a receptive female," said Beane. According to Penn State, the snakes that lose rarely challenge again. A female may also fight prospective partners, and will always reject males who back down from a fight with her.

Copperheads are ovoviviparous, which means that eggs incubate inside the mother's body. Babies are born live. After mating in the spring, females will give birth to "from two to 18 live young in late summer or fall," said Beane. According to The Maryland Zoo, after mating in the fall, the female will store sperm and defer fertilization for months, until she has finished hibernating. Baby copperheads are born with fangs and venom as potent as an adult's, according to the Smithsonian Zoo.

Young copperheads are 8 to 10 inches (20 to 25 cm) long and are born with both fangs and venom, according to Penn State. They eat mostly insects, especially caterpillars.

Beane pointed out that young copperheads may exhibit different hunting patterns than adults. "Young snakes may sit otherwise motionless, flicking their yellow tail tips," he said. "This is known as 'caudal luring'; the tail resembles a small caterpillar or other insect and may attract a lizard or frog [to come] within striking range."

According to the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS), the taxonomy of copperheads is:

Kingdom: Animalia Subkingdom: Bilateria Infrakingdom: Deuterostomia Phylum: Chordata Subphylum: Vertebrata Infraphylum: Gnathostomata Superclass: Tetrapoda Class: Reptilia Order: Squamata Suborder: Serpentes Infraorder: Alethinophidia Family: Viperidae Subfamily: Crotalinae Genus & species: Agkistrodon contortrix Subspecies:

Copperheads bite more people in most years than any other U.S. species of snake, according to the North Carolina State University Cooperative Extension Service. Fortunately, copperhead venom is not very potent.

Unlike most venomous snakes, copperheads give no warning signs and strike almost immediately if they feel threatened. Copperheads have hemotoxic venom, said Beane, which means that a copperhead bite "often results in temporary tissue damage in the immediate area of bite." Their bite may be painful but is "very rarely (almost never) fatal to humans." Children, the elderly and people with compromised immune systems may have strong reactions to the venom, however, and anyone who is bitten by a copperhead should seek medical attention.

Despite this, Beane thinks you should still let a Copperhead snake live in your back yard. He told North Carolina's Blue Ridge Public Radio that, "if you encounter them and they're coiled up somewhere where they want to be, they'll remain completely still and hope that you don't see them or bother them... If you do disturb them, the first thing they'll probably do is try to get away. If you move them... they're going to try to get back to something that's familiar."

Bean also talked about the benefits of having a Copperhead near your house: "They eat a lot of species that we don't like, like mice and rats, that can cause diseases and problems. And [by] eating a lot of rodents, snakes are swallowing a lot of ticks. And ticks cause things like Rocky Mountain spotted fever and Lyme disease. One study showed that snakes are significant tick destroyers in Eastern forest sites."

According to recent research on the US National Library of Medicine, snake venom in general is "recognized as a potential resource of biologically active compounds" that can be used in cancer treatments. Scientists have found that a chemical in copperhead venom may be helpful in stopping the growth of cancerous tumors. Researchers at the University of Southern California injectedthe protein contortrostatin from the southern copperhead's venom,directlyintothe mammary glands of micewherehuman breast cancer cellshad been injected two weeks earlier.

The injection of the protein inhibited the growth of the tumor and also slowed the growth of blood vessels that supply the tumor with nutrients. The venom's protein also impaired the spread of the tumor to the lungs,one sitewhere breast cancer spreadseffectively.

More:

Copperhead Snakes: Facts, bites & babies | Live Science

Verbal Abuse and Sefirah

By Rabbi Yair Hoffman for 5tjt.com

12,000 pairs of Rabbi Akivas students died during the period of Sefirah. Why? Because they did not speak to each other with the respect that was due to them.

Every Yom Tov and every period of time in the Jewish calendar has its own special Avodah in which we can grow. When Chazal point out the reason for their passing away to us, perhaps they are indicating that the growth we should eb working on during this period is to avoid verbal abuse and to respect others.

THE VERSE

THERE IS A VERSE in VaYikra the import of which has been little understood. The verse is velo sonu Ish es amiso (VaYikra 25:17). The Mitzvah is generally called Onaas Dvarim or just plain Onaah.

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THE MAIN REASON

The Sfas Emes explains that the main reason behind this Mitzvah is so that we will all have a sense of complete oneness as a people. Causing another pain was prohibited because it causes division within us as a people.

THE SERIOUSNESS OF THE ISSUE

There is an interesting debate between Rav Henoch Leibowitz zatzal and Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz zatzal in regard to Pnina and Chana. Pnina realized that the reason Hashem was withholding children from Chana was because she was not davening to Hashem with the requisite intensity. She took it upon herself,leshaim shamayim,to help Chana intensify her prayers by teasing her that she had no children. Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz zatzal (Sichos Mussar) points out that the notion of what goes around comes around (or the Middah keneged Middah) regarding causing someone else pain exists even when the underlying intention is 100% proper. Rav Henoch Leibowitz zatzal held that it must be that Pnina was only 99.999% Lishma but there was a subtle, infinitesimally small trace of improper motivation in Pninas actions. Regardless, we see how serious the issue of causing another pain actually is.

RAV ELYASHIV ZATZALS RULING

A question was once posed to Rav Elyashiv Zatzal: A man was not giving his wife a get. Is it permissible to try to get his parents to influence the son to give a get by threatening to expose an illegal activity that one of the parents was doing? The response from Rav Elyashiv was, No. There is no permission whatsoever to cause pain to another, no matter what his son is doing.

BIBLICAL FIGURES SUFFERED

The Midrash Rabbah (Bereishis 14:19) explains that Menashe, Yosephs son was punished for finding the goblet in Binyamins sack even though he did so on his fathers instruction. He caused the Shvatim pain, they ripped their clothes in agony over the fate of Binyamin. The Midrash explains that Menashes portion of his inheritance was also ripped.

Rachel Imeinu, stole the Teraphim of her father Lavan. Her intent, of course, was absolutely proper. She wished to wean her father off of his belief in worshipping idols. Yet the Zohar tells us (VaYeitzei 164b) that she did not merit to raise those whom she loved because she deprived her father of what he loved!

EXAMPLES

Examples of this violation include reminding a Ger of the actions of his fathers, or a Baal Teshuvah of his original behaviors or sins. Asking someone a question in a subject area where the person being asked does not know the subject well is also a violation of Onaah (See Rambam Hilchos Mechira 14:12). Similarly, inquiring the price of item where one has no intention at all of purchasing the item is also a violation of Onaah (See Bava Metziah 58b).

EVEN THROUGH INACTION

In discussing this Mitzvah, Rav Yechiel Michel Stern cites the Chikrei Laiv (YD Vol. III #80) that this prohibition could also be violated through inaction. For example, if someone recites a Mishebarach for a number of people but purposefully leaves one person out he is in violation of this prohibition. A sad aspect of this prohibition is that violators are often unaware that that they are verbally abusing or causing pain. Often they may characterize the recipient of their statement, words or actions as overly sensitive.

Different manifestations of Onaas Dvarim include, demonstrating Kaas (anger) at another, name calling, threatening, and blaming ones own behavior on someone elses actions. Certain criticisms are also subsumed under the category of Onaas Dvarim as well.

THIN LINE

Sometimes, there is a very thin line between proper parenting and Onaas Dvarim. This thin line must be navigated very carefully. For example, lets assume that a mother is concerned and convinced that in todays atmosphere where thin is in her daughter needs to lose the excess weight. [The prohibition even applies to little children the exceptions, of course, are when it is necessary for parenting (See Sefer HaChinuch 251)]. At what point, however, does the mothers comments turn from constructive parenting into a Torah violation of Onaas Dvarim? Often, most people do not get the message unless the issue is made clear to them in no uncertain terms.

There is a story of a young single man who never showered. His Rav approached him and told him that he had to start showering daily. The young man responded that in his particular line of work showering would not be effective because he constantly sweatsin his particular line of work and he would have to shower several times a day in order to be clean. The Rav told him that that was his obligation and put his foot down. Within two months the young man got engaged and was told by his fianc that she did not even so much as look at him prior to his complete turnaround.

The point of the story is that, generally speaking, when people have an underlying issue, nicely telling them is not going to do the trick. Since that is the case, the issue is very pertinent at what point is it Onaas Dvarim and at what point is it constructive criticism or constructive parenting?

The answer to this question depends upon the persons response. The Torah in many places stresses the obligation for one to be intelligent, and to be able to accurately assess likely responses of people. This situation is no different. An accurate assessment of the persons likely response must be made. If it is unlikely that a change will be effected, then further pressing the issue would be a violation of Onaas Dvarim. This does not mean, however, that one should give up. One should constantly be thinking how to coordinate a change within the person but one that would be effective.

IF ONE VIOLATES IT

What if one violated this prohibition? What must he do? The Talmud (Yuma 87a) tells us that there is an obligation to try to placate him to undo the damage. The Talmud quotes verses in Mishlei as to what he must do, Press your plea with your neighbor There are opinions that one must make nice in front of three rows of three people too.

The conclusion of all this is that the violation is a very serious one. It is a Mitzvah that has also, somehow, fallen off the wayside. There is another prohibition called Onaas Mamom monetary abuse. The Talmud (Bava Metziah 58b) states that quotes three sages who explain how the prohibition of verbal abuse is by far more serious than the prohibitions of monetary abuse.

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More:

Verbal Abuse and Sefirah - VINnews

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The book, with its kitschy cover illustration of a red rose, has made the rounds for years. By the time I became a bride in 2015, it was status quo, passed around alongside the traditional recommended readings on ritual purity and Jewish marriage. The Surrendered Wife is a title frequently invoked among Orthodox Jewish women, quoted during mom walks with strollers and discussed in WhatsApp groups. Premarital teachers recommend the text to young brides-to-be. Rabbis and their wives preach from it, framing it around selective quotes from the Torah and Talmud.

In the controversial 2001 best seller, the American author Laura Doyle argues that the key to a happy marriage is a wife relinquishing control and allowing her husband to handle all decision making, including household finances, a lifestyle that is rooted in conservative biblical principles. When you surrender to your husband, you accept that a supreme being is looking after you both, reads one passage. The more you admire your husbands magnificence and how everything about him is just as it should be, the more you will feel Gods presence. Though these tenets are rooted less in Jewish textual traditions than in the New Testament and in fundamentalist-Christian notions of wifely submission, they have seeped into the Orthodox community over the past two decades.

The Surrendered Wifes popularity highlights how an insular religious group with carefully preserved boundaries can in fact be quite porous to outside influenceparticularly to views popular on the American Christian right. A mini-industry of Orthodox Laura Doyle coaches and educators have emerged, most of them unlicensed yet fashioning themselves as quasi-therapists, offering marital-harmony courses and workshops. Drawing from Doyles text (albeit sometimes without Doyles direct involvement or instruction), they teach women how to accept their husbands, to never criticize, and above all, to be aidel, the Yiddish word for refined or demure. But recently, the books proliferation in the community has stirred controversy, as some Orthodox women began to publicly criticize this sort of marriage education.

Traditional Jewish texts are complex regarding marriage. Though ancient Jewish law sees marriage as a sort of financial transaction, giving husbands control over their wifes vows and ability to divorce, the idea of female surrender as a virtue is a foreign import. As intra-community struggles over Orthodox womens rights have grown more heated in the past decade, this sort of literature has found a home within the community. Social media has created grassroots platforms for religious women to speak up about issues such as female erasure in public spaces, the right to divorce, access to female-provided emergency medicine, and sexual abuse. And in response, theres a real communal concern about what would happen if women would start to assert themselves, Rivka Press Schwartz, an Orthodox educator, told me. There is something scary for individual women about the power of their own anger, and its easier to say, I choose to be surrendered in order to make my husband happy, to make me happy.

Read: The unorthodox art of an ultra-Orthodox community

Whats more, The Surrendered Wife has attracted many Orthodox Jewish women who see it as a solution to what they perceive to be a marriage crisis. I just wanted to share that I can honestly say that Laura Doyle book saved my marriage, one woman wrote in a letter published on an Orthodox Jewish womens lifestyle blog. Others see female submission as harkening back to a more traditional past. May I venture to say that the reason why [Doyle] is so controversial is that she is going back to what marriage used to look like? wrote another woman in that blogs comment section. Her concepts are very much in line with the Torah perspective Many rabbonim [rabbis] approve of her method. (Doyle did not respond to multiple requests for comment.)

One of the most popular proponents of reframing Doyles work for Orthodox Jewish audiences is the American-born, Jerusalem-based author Sara Yoheved Rigler, who in 2013 created the Kesher Wife Workshopa virtual seminar series that she has described as offering basic ideas from The Surrendered Wife amplified by the Torah. Rigler has said that she has given this workshop to 2,000 Jewish women internationally. On a popular Orthodox podcast last year, she spoke about reframing dissatisfaction with ones husband as heaven-sent. This is from Hashem, she tells her students, using the Hebrew word for God. Its not from my husband. Im going to stop blaming my husband, criticizing my husband, because everything that happens to me is from Hashem. That perspective, she suggested, takes the sting out of it.

But some women are calling into question the merits of these parallels drawn to Jewish doctrine. Leslie Ginsparg Klein, a scholar of Jewish womens history and an Orthodox educator, told me that seminars like these are a retelling of a completely non-Jewish ideology in Jewish terms in order to push girls and women into adopting a new social norm. Another woman I spoke with, Rachel Tuchman, was engaged to be married when she first heard of the ideology, in 2003. I couldnt believe that it had infiltrated our community, she told me. In her work as a licensed mental-health counselor in Cedarhurst, New York, where many of her clients are from varying Orthodox backgrounds, Tuchman told me she observes firsthand the consequences of subscribing to The Surrendered Wifes ethos. A lot of kallah [premarital] teachers are recommending the book, and I think thats why its getting [attention] Then people end up in therapy and [Im] like, Where did you learn that this is how you should have a relationship? Doyles book may have gained nearly doctrinal status among many women, but, Tuchman said, its not based in Orthodox principlesits really a cultural-societal influence.

To some religious women, though, the question of authenticity is not as urgent as seeking the key to a happy marriage in a terrifyingly modern world. Theres kind of a sense of family life being under attack, that the world out there is not welcoming to families, that the world out there is trying to get everyone divorced, said Keshet Starr, the director of the Organization for the Resolution of Agunot, which is devoted to resolving contentious Jewish divorce cases. Some women, she said, are looking for this perfect formula: Just follow these rules, and youll have a perfect, amazing marriage. Fear of the outside world is prevalentand, ironically, the solution to dealing with that fear comes from the outside, too.

According to historians, the American embrace of wifely submission was popularized in the 19th century with the cult of domesticity, or the cult of true womanhood. As men went to work outside the home and middle- and upper-class white women stayed back to manage the household, American religious literature and womens magazines began to preach four virtues for the ideal wife: domesticity, purity, piety, and submission. Female labor outside the home was needed during the world wars, but afterward, the notion of wifely submission reentered the popular discourse, in an attempt to return to some myth of an idyllic America. Part of that is reimagining the home, Beth Allison Barr, a history professor at Baylor University and the author of The Making of Biblical Womanhood, told me over Zoom. Part of it was What do we do with all these displaced men who have just gone through this horrible thing? Part of it is Lets get them back in jobs; lets build back their self-esteem. And part of that was reordering the household.

Read: Unpacking the immense popularity of Shtisel

The pendulum swung back and forth: The 1960s brought the sexual revolution, and then, Barr said, the early 70s brought a desire for religious education. Some 1,600 women were enrolled in Southern Baptist divinity programs, many of them likely seeking ordination. If all of those women came through, there was going to be significant displacement [of men]. And it is at that time that we see that crackdown, Barr noted. In 1979, the Southern Baptist Convention experienced a conservative resurgenceand within a few years came conservative Christians widespread adoption of the verses in Ephesians 5: Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. Barr characterizes the rise of the wifely-submission ideology, and the use of language like biblical womanhood, largely as a reaction to ascendant female religious power. And then it just explodes onto the scene.

Many religious Americans, both Christians and Jews, point to Gods punishment of Eve (And he shall rule over you) as proof of female submission being divinely commanded. That reading sees the text as prescriptive. In fact, the central description of the ideal wife, according to Genesis, is as a helpmate opposite him. It is this phrase in Hebrew, ezer knegdo, that is most cited in the Orthodox Jewish community: in girls schools, at wedding ceremonies, in eulogies. The phrase suggests that a spouse ought to be a foil, a point of contrast, neither a mirror nor a servant. The righteous wife is also often referred to as akeret habayit, the bedrock of the home, in a complementarian sort of way; families sing an ode to the woman of valor at the Sabbath table weekly, praising the Jewish wife as both a domestic queen and a shrewd businesswoman.

But as todays Orthodox women attain educations, pursue careers, become breadwinners, access the wider world through the internet, and even build independent platforms for themselves, that complementarianism has been challenged. Some community influencers have turned to conservative American Christian thought for its language on submission within a religious framework, in order to maintain a certain status quo around gender. This sort of anxiety isnt newthe history of modern-day Orthodoxy is one long chain of reactions to outside influences, whether dominant religious cultures or secularism. Orthodox Judaism as a whole has grown more stringent, in what sociologists call a slide to the right, as a response to the pervasiveness of secular culture. And yet, as Doyles influence shows, this communitys boundaries are, as ever, permeable. Theres no way to exist in American culture and not be in some way influenced by it, Ginsparg Klein, the Jewish womens-history scholar, said. Throughout history, the Jewish community has been influenced by its surrounding culture and has likewise influenced its surrounding culture.

Indeed, the Orthodox Jewish adoption of The Surrendered Wife is part of a bigger trend: As large swaths of the community have aligned themselves with the Christian right, theyve built political alliances based on the idea of a shared Judeo-Christian worldview, on concerns about social issues regarding abortion and gender, and on a general sense of an existential threat posed by secular progressivism. Concurrently, a younger generation of religious women that is plugged in to online discourse is being exposed to alternative critical voices. The tension will only continue to grow. As this community struggles with assimilation and with its boundaries around authenticity, the outcome of that struggle will likely set the tone not just for the design of a home, but also for female visibility and leadership in the Orthodox sphere.

Excerpt from:

The Controversial Marriage Book That's Dividing Orthodox Jewish Women - The Atlantic

By junior high school, a girl-besotted Mills is sent to a coed summer camp funded by the UJA-Federation, a Jewish philanthropic organization. The director, Dan Farinella, with his big shoulders, powerful arms and broad chest, a pack of cigarettes rolled up in his left shirtsleeve, likes to horse around with male campers.

One night, after a sex-ed film, Farinella summons Mills, saying, Dont worry, you didnt do anything. I just like to get to know my campers. He then proceeds to test and groom Mills, taking him for long walks, quizzing him about masturbation, preying on his isolation. Mills is flattered, as are his parents when Farinella shows up in the off-season, bringing a box of cannoli when he whisks Mills away for a weekend of projects at camp.

Once on their beds in the infirmary, Mills says, Farinella tosses him a pornographic magazine, pushes him down on a mattress and fellates him. I closed my eyes and prayed, Mills writes. Im not here. Im not here. When he opens his eyes, I was floating, looking down at my body, as if it belonged to someone else.

Anyone whos listened to accounts of abuse survivors will recognize certain characteristics the disassociation, the shame, the self-flagellation. But Mills has his fathers instincts as a writer. He fills his story with indelible details the Brylcreem in his predators hair, the cloying compliment Farinella pays Millss stepfather when he arrives to invite Mills to the Bahamas for Christmas. And Mills does a nuanced job of capturing his own emotions, how he blames himself for getting aroused, how he delights when Farinella gives him a Led Zeppelin album, how he imagines the glowing letter of recommendation his abuser will write to colleges.

That commitment to honesty continues in the books second section, Flight, as Mills opens up about his descent into drugs, petty crimes and paranoia. He sabotages promising relationships with women, joins a yeshiva in Jerusalem, drops out of grad school, then volunteers at a refugee camp in Thailand, where he becomes ill. When a doctor tells him hes suffering from post-traumatic stress, Mills returns to New York to seek help.

Continued here:

At a Place Where He Was Supposed to Be Safe, He Was Molested - The New York Times

Elisha Wiesel speaks with Lubavitch International about his famous father and raising his children to love Yiddishkeit

Your father, Elie Wiesel, put the tragedy of his personal experience in the Holocaust to work, raising awareness about the danger of antisemitism and the evil of hatred. You yourself have begun to speak out against antisemitism, sometimes as you did at the UN this past February with indignation, even anger. Is that something youd say came from your father?

My father was not an angry person, so I wont blame him for this. But I think theres a time and a place to get appropriately angry. Today, being a victim seems to be the only way to get the microphone. We shake our heads and sit there stunned, shockedfor exampleby the stupidity of the argument against Israel about disproportionate killing. This rhetoric is absolutely antisemitic, absolutely hateful, because the only way to get proportionality is to turn off the Iron Dome for an hour so that more Jews die. So we need to raise our voices. We need to respond. Sometimes, you have to get angry with these people, because its the only way that they realize they have crossed a linefrom pontificating to calling for absolutely murderous results.

The world knows Elie Wiesel as the most famous Holocaust survivor, a prolific author, activist, and Nobel Peace Prize winner. Who was Elie Wiesel to you, his only child?

When I was young, I thought my father was a weak person. A lot of the other kids had parents who were throwing a baseball with them, teaching them how to catch a football, taking them skiing. That was not my father.

At age eight or nine, Id hear a friend say his father had served in the IDF and was now flying planes for El Al. Another would say his father was a pharmacist, saving people with his medicines. I would say, I think something really bad happened to my father, and he talks about it.

But my impression of my father changed a lot over the years. In my twenties, I began to appreciate the person who existed before the war. He was a bright, engaged, curious student, full of affection. I began to appreciate the incredible childhood that he had and I could see the young person that hed been. I no longer saw him as just a snapshot.

You once said that you struggled as a child: it was difficult being in your fathers shadow and trying to carve out your own identity. What were you looking for?

I felt that there was this path that had been constructed for me, and an expectation that I would be a mini Elie. I went to a Modern Orthodox yeshivah where my father was very well known. So, of course, I was supposed to be the best-behaved student in class. I mean, your father is Elie Wiesel, so how could you possibly be goofing off and not paying attention? I felt very boxed in by all of the expectations of who I was supposed to be. I was desperate to break out.

What did that look like?

As an adolescent, I went through a very strong inflection point. I began to question everything. I felt Yiddishkeit was useless to me, and I found myself completely on the other side.

How did your father relate to your adolescent frustrations?

He didnt always know how to connect with me. My parents were first-generation immigrants from European families. They didnt get a guidebook on how to be an American parent in the twentieth century, and I think they struggled with it. My father was a very patient man, and he continued to love me no matter what horrible things I said or did. Ultimately, I think that that served him well as a parenting strategy. Its one that I try to remember. But Im sure it was very hard for him.

I think my father felt that he had placed a big burden on me by bringing me into this world. At a time when it was hard for anyone to keep faith and fight the forces of assimilation, it was a difficult thing to be the sonthe only sonof a famous Holocaust survivor whose family had been almost decimated. And he felt bad for me that all that weight was on my shoulders. He tried to lessen the burden. He tried to protect me and let me live my own life.

What was the turning point in your relationship with your father?

In 1995, I joined my father on a trip to Sighet, his childhood hometown. That was a turning point. We also went to Auschwitz on that trip, but thats where the Jewish community went to die. Sighet is where the Jewish community lived. In Sighet, my father could describe what his day looked like, how he would run home from cheder, or from choir practice, stopping at his grandmothers windowon Fridays she had a fresh challah to give him as she asked him what he learned that day. This was powerful for me.

This is where my father grew up, and its charged with all fourteen or fifteen years of his memories before Auschwitz. Being there allowed me to see him as someone who had this incredible strength to persevere, with life, with family, with Yiddishkeit, and to engage with the world after the Shoah.

Where do you think that resilience came from?

It came from the way he was raised. My father was not raised in a vacuum. I could feel my grandparents fingerprints in all this.

My father loved Judaism, loved the world. He had an incredible thirst for knowledge. You dont get that in a vacuum. He was raised in a loving home. He had a strong sense of identity. And when you have that, you have the self-confidence that can take you forward in life.

This is something that I only appreciated when I had kids of my own and started thinking about what shapes character and what shapes destiny.

Were there other turning points for you?

Growing up, I didnt get to experience a big family or joy in Judaism, and that was really missing for me. But my father gave me a gift when he passed. He wanted me to say Kaddish for him, and when I started to visit shuls to do so, I saw joy. I saw joy in the davening, joy in everythingfrom Birkat HaMazon, to the Torah class, to the kids running around.

The joy of Yiddishkeit seems to be an important theme in your family life.

We only get this narrow window to give our children the values and experiences we want them to remember. I want my son to have experiences hes going to remember ten years from now, when he has to make his own decisions about life. I dont feel Im going to get my kids to have a lifelong interest in Judaism by lecturing or giving them rational arguments.

What he will remember is that he and a friend would sit in shul and have a good time together, and occasionally theyd get up and dance with us and run around. Hell remember the experience of the lively singing, and hell know the songs and be able to sing along. Hell remember that great feeling at the Shabbos Kiddush in shul, where youre schmoozing and the food is great, and people are happy to see each other. These are things hes going to rememberin his heart, not in his head. So Im much more focused on that.

My son is almost sixteen. And Im respectful of his time and his choices. He knows that I expect him to wear tefillin with me every day. He doesnt go to a Jewish school, so we daven together every morning. We go to shul together when we can, and we experience the liveliness, the spirit of Yiddishkeit.

Your father was a serious student of Gemara. He loved learning Talmud, he said. You also are studying Talmud. What has that been like?

Im on this seven-year adventure, making my way through all of Shas, seeing every corner of the Talmud. I study with a chevruta. I could spend the rest of my life studying, because how can you possibly master this conversation thats been occurring for 2,000 years? Were flying 1,000 miles an hour at 30,000 feet, so I know that Im not getting it in depth. But occasionally theres something that I want to double-click on and go deeper. Im keeping a journal of the things that I find the most memorable so that when I do it the second time around, I can go even deeper. It has been an incredible experience.

Its also taught me to appreciate the depth in which my father was swimming, and what he was inspired by. Ill be sitting in shul and reading a certain Haftorah, and I know what my father would have been thinking about.

In a 2012 interview in these pages, your father spoke about his personal relationship with the Lubavitcher Rebbe. He said the Rebbe urged him to marry and have a family.

I have only one side of their correspondencethe letters the Rebbe wrote to my father. No matter what they would be talking about, the Rebbe would end by saying, By the way, are you married yet?

He was constantly reminding my father that this was the most important thing he could do to really defeat Hitler. To really show that he stood for all the things he said he stood for: You need to get married, you need to have kids, and they should grow up to be Chasidic, G-d-fearing kids. And if theyre not Lubavitch, thatll still be good. He did it with a sense of humor.

Did your father live to see the way you have evolved?

He didnt live to see my sons bar mitzvah, which Im very sad about. But he lived to see my kids have Jewish literacy. He taught my son alef-bet on his knee. And he saw that we were beginning to make Shabbos a joyful time, that I could raise a Jewish family with joy very much at the center of the experience.

This article appeared in the Spring 2022 issue of the Lubavitch International magazine. To download the full magazine and to gain access to previous issues pleaseclick here.

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Memories of the Heart - Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters - Lubavitch.com

When it comes to drinking on Purim, the Talmud clearly understood what the scroll of Esther was all about. In practically every chapter of the Megillah, someone is imbibing heavily at a drinking party. And the scroll concludes with Mordecais instruction to the entire Jewish people to celebrate these days as yemei mishteh vsimchah, days of drinking and rejoicing(Esther 9:22).

In Talmud: Rava said: It is ones duty levasumei, to make oneself fragrant [with wine] on Purim until one cannot tell the difference between arur Haman (cursed be Haman) and barukh Mordekhai(blessed be Mordecai) (Babylonian Talmud,Megillah 7b).

That could be interpreted in many ways, including getting black-out drunk, so for the purposes here, lets just assume were all going to drink responsibly.

On Tuesday, March 15th, Nishmah & the St. Louis Jewish Book Festival are hosting a pre-Purim cocktail party, featuring local author Rachel K. Miller.

Last year, Miller publishedThe Illustrated Cocktail, a gorgeously illustrated collection of more than 60 cocktail recipes. Each recipe is a full-color drawing, with the facing page containing a black-and-white figure sketch as well as some humorous text or interesting facts about the drink.

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Miller divided the cocktails into six sections, arranged by the dominant alcohol used so that theres a vodka, gin, rum, whiskey, tequila and wine, and brandy section, as well as one on shots. Twenty additional pages contain tips on home bartending, setting up a bar, and collecting vintage glass, along with other adult beverage information.

For this event, youre invited to grab a nosh and a drink, and then hear from Miller, as she discusses her inspiration behind her book.

I am so excited about this event with The Jewish Book Festival and Nishmah, said Miller. These organizations are so important to the community. I am very honored that they have chosen my book to promote with this event. My hope is, that people will come by, enjoy the evening, also learn a little more about JBF and Nishmah and get excited about my book too.

The price of admission to the event is $36, and includes a copy of The Illustrated Cocktail, which retails for $54.99. This is an incredible opportunity to get the book at this crazy discounted price. This price is only good for the event.

March 15 @ 7:00 pm8:30 pm

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JCC pre-Purim party featuring free copies of The Illustrated Cocktail with ticket - St. Louis Jewish Light

Why did a group of Dominican monks, in Paris, 1233, set fire to a pile of the philosophical works of Maimonides?

On a somber day in 1233, in a public square in Paris, a group of Dominican monks set fire to a huge pile of the philosophical works of Maimonides, the leading rabbi of his generation. According to some historical sources, a number of Jewish followers of the rabbis who opposed Maimonides accused him of heretical views, denounced his works to the Dominicans and demanded they be consigned to the flames. The Dominicans were only too pleased to accommodate them.

The conflagration sent shock waves through the Jewish communities of Medieval Europe and brought an end to a controversy that threatened to tear the rabbinate apart. But not entirely. Although the Guide for the Perplexed, the magnum opus of Maimonides philosophical works, is universally accepted as a central pillar of the Jewish scholarship, some circles still view it with suspicion and fear.

Who was Maimonides? What was his role in Jewish history and scholarship? Why did the views he expressed in the Guide spark so much incendiary controversy? Why were his opponents so frightened that they enlisted the help of the Christian authorities in an internal Jewish dispute?

Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, known to history as Maimonides, was no stranger to controversy. He was born in 1135 in Cordoba, Spain, during the time when rival Muslim caliphates competed for power in Spain. In 1148, the fanatical Almohads conquered Cordoba and threatened to convert its Jews forcibly. The Maimon family fled and moved from city to city until they arrived in Fez, Morocco. In 1166, the family arrived in Egypt and settled in Fostat, the Jewish suburb of Cairo.

During this nomadic period of his life, despite the upheavals, dangers and hardships, Maimonides completed his Commentary on the sixty tractates of the Mishnah, the core element of the Talmud. The work was an incredible display of genius and scholarship that immediately elevated its author to the highest echelons of the rabbinate.

Maimonides authored the magisterial Mishneh Torah, the first formal codification of Jewish law written in clear, concise and easy-to-understand Hebrew. It rocked the rabbinate.

The first controversy came 15 years later. At the age of 45, Maimonides authored the magisterial Mishneh Torah, the first formal codification of Jewish law written in beautiful, clear, concise and easy-to-understand Hebrew. It was a work of art and science that rocked the rabbinate. Moreover, with fears of it affecting their livelihood, some of the less illustrious rabbis of the time responded with furious opposition and condemnation.

Some were concerned that it simplified and watered down the complex, interlocking tapestry of the authoritative Talmud. Until that point, questions of law and custom presented to rabbis were adjudicated solely by reference to the Talmud, the grand depository of all Jewish law. But the Talmud is not the kind of law book to which we are accustomed, in which all the laws are arranged in a series of articles and sub-articles. Rather, the Talmud is a voluminous transcript of wide-ranging and often contentious debates among the Sages of the first millennium of the modern area. The debates veer off into numerous tangents, and debates that begin in one tractate often reappear in other tractate with other proofs and arguments. The debates are rarely resolved in the two thousand pages of the Talmud, leaving it to later generations to derive the law as it should be applied to practical cases.

Consequently, in order for a rabbi to issue a ruling he needed great skill and experience in navigating the highways and byways of the Talmud. Ordinary people had no recourse to books that would give them guidance regarding issues that arose in daily life. Their only choice was to consult rabbinic experts who formulated their particular interpretations of the issues and issued rulings based on their personal conclusions. Most of these rabbis supported themselves and their families by the fees they collected for their services.

Maimonides felt there was an urgent need for a uniform set of laws that all rabbis would apply in their rabbinic courtrooms, and based on his encyclopedic knowledge of the Talmud, he provided just such a code. Furthermore, he believed that rabbis should not charge fees for their services but should seek trades by which to support their families while they studied the Torah. Maimonides himself earned a living as a physician and eventually became the personal physician to the royal family in Cairo.

His opponents raised numerous objections to his code. They claimed that people would stop studying the Talmud because they would find no need for it. They also complained that Maimonides had not given sources for his rulings.

The storm raged for a short while, and then it subsided. The Mishneh Torah became one of the pillars of Jewish learning, which it remains to this very day. But the resentment this work had triggered continued to simmer under the surface, and ten years later, it burst forth in a blaze of rage.

In 1190, Maimonides published his Guide for the Perplexed, a work of Jewish theology that aimed to forge a synthesis between the traditions of the Torah and the principles of Aristotelean philosophy and thereby place Judaism on a firm footing of rationalism and science. The Arabs had translated the works of the ancient Greeks into Arabic, and young Jewish intellectuals were drawn to them. Maimonides wrote his book to demonstrate that faith and reason were not contradictory.

In the book, Maimonides accepted Aristotles propositions. A good part of the book, however, is devoted to a vehement refutation of Aristotles claim that the world always existed. There can be only two possibilities, either the world always existed, or it was created ex nihilo by a God in the Jewish conception. Maimonides demonstrates that the second option is much more rational than the first.

The book is magnificent in its scope and originality. It presents a brilliant system of Jewish theology such as had never been previously formulated. It addresses all anthropomorphic references to God, such as laughing, flying, sitting, having hands and feet and so forth, that might be construed as corporeality, and it explains each one as a metaphor for one or another of Gods actions. It discusses prophecy, divine providence and the underlying reasons for all the commandments. In its totality, it defends and elucidates the basic tenets of Jewish theology, but the authors detractors found much fault with it.

The Jewish communities in medieval times were insular, as was the broader Christian community. They had a great fear of Greek philosophy, believing that it would lead to heresy. They were leery of the fine line Maimonides had drawn and did not believe that his readers would stay on the right side of it. They also took exception with some of the authors Torah interpretations they considered radical.

Maimonides limited the reliance on the supernatural to explain natural phenomena, whereas others saw miracles everywhere. Maimonides interpreted many episodes in the Torah, such as Balaams talking donkey, as taking place in prophetic visions rather than in real life. Maimonides believed there were limits to divine providence, allowing for strands of randomness in the world. Moreover, Maimonides failed to write about the physical resurrection of the dead, an omission he corrected in one of his later epistles.

Some firebrands denounced the book to the Dominican monks and it was consigned to the flames. The shock of this incredible event brought the rabbinate to its senses.

The controversy raged in the rabbinate for decades after Maimonides passed away, with many rabbis condemning the book and many others coming to its defense. Adding injury to insult, two very prominent rabbis issued a cherem a ban on the book, a shocking development considering that Maimonides was universally acknowledged as the greatest rabbi of his generation. Seismic tremors rippled through the Jewish community. Numerous hotheads emerged on both sides of the dispute and stirred the cauldron of dissension. Finally, some of these firebrands denounced the book to the Dominican monks, and it was consigned to the flames.

The shock of this incredible event brought the rabbinate to its senses. The rabbis who had issued the bans retracted them and publicly repented, and the book was widely embraced and quoted as one of the most important expositions of Jewish theology ever written. A shameful episode in Jewish history came to an end.

It is unlikely that the book posed a serious threat to the faith of the average Jews of the time, since it can only be penetrated after long and painstaking study. Although the other works of Maimonides are written in a clear and beautiful style, the Guide is written in an entirely different style, convoluted and almost opaque, most probably resembling the style of Muslim philosophers against whom it competed.

Furthermore, there is very little in the book that could be considered even a tiny window to heresy, but the very idea of giving validity to Greek philosophers caused consternation in the insular communities. Even today, there is some residual reluctance to study the book and approach Judaism from the perspective of rationalism rather than simple faith.

Most Jewish people in todays age of almost unlimited access to information, however, are open to the combination of faith and reason with the understanding that the synthesis strengthens both.

Rabbi Reinman is author of the recently published A Guide to the Guide: A Chapter-by-Chapter Summary of the Guide for the Perplexed (Amazon), in which he summarizes the thoughts of Maimonides in modern, easy-to-understand English. Click here to order.

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When They Burned Maimonides' Books: The Controversy behind The Guide for the Perplexed - aish.com - Aish

In this weeks sedra Tzav we read about the offerings brought to the Temple, and the one that was totally consumed, the Olah. But immediately we are told: Each morning, the priest shall kindle wood on [the altar] Thus, there shall be a constant fire kept burning on the altar, without being extinguished. (Leviticus 6:5-6)

So far, very much about human action. It seems that there is a commandment to keep fire on the altar by a daily placing of wood. The Talmud (Tractate Yoma 21b) states that Even though fire came down from the Heavens, there is a commandment that a human should bring.

Sefer HaChinuch, a 13th century compendium of the commandments, explains that there is something positive about miracles being carried out by God in a way that would be perceived as hidden by people, rather than open. For example, the splitting of the Red Sea was a great miracle, but may have been experienced in natural terms such as a strong wind parting the sea.

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This makes me think of the Talmudic concept that one should not rely on a miracle (Shabbat 32a). We are a religion that is anchored in a belief in God and his ongoing involvement in the world, alongside our own efforts to build a better world. We do so by observing the mitzvot and bringing the values of the Torah to the world. This is why, for example, God asks Moses to go into the Red Sea after a short prayer, rather than awaiting reliance on a miracle to save the Children of Israel.

And so with our growing Climate Crisis. An approach based on belief in miracles might say that God would not allow His world to be destroyed, and will miraculously save it. But we too must not rely on miracles. Like Moses, we need to pray alongside taking action to protect our planet, bringing Jewish values to the fore in doing so. Campaigns such as the United Synagogues Dorot phasing out disposables campaign and the Board of Deupties EcoSynagogue initiative enable us to be part of protecting our world.

Even avoiding single use plastics and other disposables in our home, our place of work and our community is significant from a Jewish perspective. This week the United Synagogues head office and nearly a third of US shuls have gone disposables-free or have committed to do so as part of the Dorot initiative and I commend them for doing so.

This recognises the very real responsibility we have for the future of humanity. These small acts may counter the feel of disillusionment borne by the question what difference can I make? Eschewing disposables is a role we can play in protecting Gods creation.

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Making Sense of the Sedra: if God undertakes miracles, what is the point of human action? - Jewish News

This liberal sentiment stresses the importance of any single individual, any one of us. And, as difficult and distressing as it may be, this has to be a central part of how we think about war: personally.

So we should think about the wounded pregnant woman who was pictured being carried on a stretcher from a maternity hospital in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol after it was shelled by Russian forces.

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Her pelvis had been crushed and her hip detached. Taken to another hospital for treatment, she cried out kill me now! as realised she was losing her baby. Despite the efforts of medical staff, both she and the child died.

What happened was documented by journalists from the Associated Press, a highly respected news agency, and yet, with the glib certainty of liars, Russias government swiftly dismissed the account. According to them, no patients or medical staff were present when the missiles hit home, and the photographs of the woman who died and other expectant mothers at the scene were fakes.

Murderers caught with blood-red hands, spouting nonsense as they angrily insist on their innocence.

But Vladimir Putin is not the only killer in the international community, there are others. The world's liberal democracies have to learn the lesson he is teaching us about despots whose main concern is their iron grip on power. Just as Russia is being belatedly shunned, the West should also be turning away from other oppressive regimes before they decide to copy the Kremlin.

The central pillars of liberal democracy have long been undermined by Putin, his agents and his political fellow-travellers in the West, but his invasion of Ukraine and suppression of dissent in Russia have demonstrated beyond dispute just how important they are to the preservation of fundamentals like the right to life. If there is one positive to this war, it is that it has re-energised our commitment to democratic values.

So, amid the desensitising effect of regular death tolls, think of the husband who last month was looking forward to the joy of a new child, but who instead found himself collecting the bodies of both his wife and baby, his world destroyed entire.

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The Chidon Ha-Tanach (International Bible Contest) is an international competition on the Tanach (Torah, Prophets, and Hagiographic Writings) for middle school and high school Jewish students sponsored by the Israeli government and held annually in Jerusalem on Yom Haatzmaut (Israel Independence Day).

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The Chidon was conceived by David Ben Gurion who, ironically, exhibited a cognitive dissonance of sorts with respect to Torah-true Judaism. On one hand, he did not believe in the G-d and the Sinaic revelation but, on the other hand, he believed Torah knowledge to be fundamental to Jewish existence. Nonetheless, he was enormously well-versed in scripture and Jewish learning, and he held regular weekly meetings at his home with the Prime Ministers Bible Study Circle, a select group of students of the Bible including many prominent Israeli biblical scholars.

The role of Judaism and the Bible in his life may perhaps be best summarized by his famous statement: Since I invoke Torah so often, let me state that I dont personally believe in the G-d it postulates . . . I am not religious, nor were the majority of the early builders of Israel believers. Yet their passion for this land stemmed from the Book of Books . . . [and the Bible is] the single most important book in my life. In one famous episode, when he appeared before the Peel Commission and was challenged to produce a land deed proving Jewish ownership of Eretz Yisrael, he held up a Bible and exclaimed: Here is your land deed! He often adopted biblical messages in public speeches and characterized the Bible as underscoring Jewish destiny.

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In 1958, Israels Society for Biblical Research, with Ben Gurions enthusiastic support, inaugurated a Chidon Ha-Tanach for adults as, ironically, a one-time special event. This first Chidon was overseen by Yechezkel Kaufmann (1889-1963), a Jewish philosopher, biblical scholar, and author of many highly-regarded scholarly works, the greatest of which is his ambitious The Religion of Israel from its Beginnings to the Babylonian Exile (1960). In this masterwork, he traces the history of religion and biblical literature and presents his thesis that Jewish monotheism did not evolve from paganism or any of the cultures surrounding the first Jews but, rather, was an entirely new religion. He was awarded the first Bialik Prize for Jewish thought (1933) and the prestigious Israel Prize, for Jewish studies (1958).

The first Bible Quiz, which was heavily text-based and extraordinarily challenging, commenced on August 4, 1958, at the International Convention Center in Jerusalem. The questions were treated as national security secrets and extraordinary measures were instituted to preserve the integrity of the contest, including the assignment of 300 police officers and sending a special contingent to guard the examinations and the 14 translators sequestered at an undisclosed hotel. The final, which was held in the open-air amphitheater at the Hebrew University, was attended by 2,400 spectators, including members of the Israel Cabinet and Knesset, diplomats, heads of religious communities, and other dignitaries.

During the tightly run proceedings, each contestant appeared on stage backed by an illuminated country flag, which demonstrated not only the internationality of the contest, but also the role of Israel as a Jewish nation taking its place amongst the family of nations, an important propaganda goal during Israels early years. Television and private radio broadcasts in Israel did not exist at the time, so the entire country tuned in to the broadcast of the event by Kol Yisrael (Israels public radio station). The Chidon became a matter of great interest and positive discussion not only in Israel, but also worldwide, although several of the first participants and others were upset to learn that the questions were limited to the Old Testament.

The two leaders among the nine male and six female finalists from 14 countries were Israels representative, Amos Hakham, and Irene Santos of Brazil. The American contestant, Mystelle Davis, the wife of a Georgia farmer, won the Bible quiz and a spot in the finals on the popular $64,000 Question television show. Hakham (1921-2012), a remarkable man at the center of an incredible and deeply moving story, was the first-prize winner. A solitary man who kept mostly to himself, he became a national hero; he was thrown into the spotlight and idolized by both the press and the public, and his name became synonymous with Bible study.

Hakham had sustained a head injury as a young child that caused a speech impediment such that his father, Noah, feared that his son would be ridiculed and, as such, declined to enroll him in school. Instead, Noah who earned a doctorate at the Jewish Theological Seminary in Vienna, became the founder of the Seminary for Teachers of the Mizrachi movement, and was a scholar in his own right personally taught him Bible. When Hakhams father died, he was forced to become the familys only breadwinner and, with no formal education and having learned no trade or craft, he took a low-paying position as a clerk with the Institute for the Blind. While devoting himself to the study of Bible on his own time, he also aided disadvantaged blind students attending regular schools in Jerusalem and helped to create a Hebrew Braille Bible.

When news of the coming Chidon Ha-Tanach began to circulate, Hakhams neighbors, who were aware of the breadth and depth of his scholarship, urged the shy and quiet man to become a contestant and, mired in extreme poverty, he had to borrow a suit for the competition. The combination of his victory and his modest personal story made him the center of national and international attention to the point that Israeli newspapers proclaimed that he had become the most popular person in Israel.

After Hakhams great triumph, Ben Gurion took him on a national tour, and he was offered a position as a Bible teacher at the Ayanot Agricultural School. He later formally studied Bible to earn an academic degree and he went on to write eight volumes (including Psalms, Job, and Isaiah) of the seminal Daat Mikrah, a series of biblical commentary in Hebrew published by Mossad Harav Kook, which serves as a foundation of contemporary Israeli Orthodox Bible scholarship. He is credited with creating the model for a methodological, word-by-word, verse-by-verse commentary.

The success of the Chidon Ha-Tanach launched other Bible contests, including a competition sponsored by the IDF (Israel Defense Force), and numerous local and regional quizzes, usually also held on Yom Haatzmaut, reflecting the broad popularity of learning Torah even among secular Israelis. Two years after the inaugural Chidon, Israel instituted an international Bible quiz for adults marked by great publicity.

The success of this adult competition led to Israels establishment of Chidon Ha-Tanach Le Noar Yehudi, a Torah Quiz for Jewish Youth, with the first such contest held in 1963 on Yom Haatzmaut in Jerusalem with much pomp and ceremony. The change in emphasis from the adult population to Jewish high school students was seen by many as the fulfillment of the quintessence of the transmission of Judaism the Torah of Israel, in the land of Israel, for the people of Israel to the next generation. Even the secular Ben Gurion, who delivered the final questions at the first Youth Chidon during his final year as prime minister, characterized it while witnessing the annual grand military procession as the spiritual parade alongside the military parade.

The Youth Chidon Ha-Tanach, which is today run by the Jewish Agency, begins at the regional level and then nationally, with each country setting its own rules, and the national winners, about 20 finalists from about 60 countries, are invited to Jerusalem to participate in the finals of the international competition. Following the precedent set by Ben Gurion, the final questions are delivered by Israeli notables, including prime ministers. The first-place winner is awarded a full scholarship to study at Bar Ilan University, and the highest finisher from the Diaspora is awarded a scholarship to study at Machon Lev (the Jerusalem College of Technology).

The 2020 Youth Chidon, which had no live audience because of COVID, generated some controversy when the master of ceremonies, Avshalam Kur, repeatedly berated and demeaned Diasporan contestants for not making aliyah. Below are ten sample questions from the 2020 U.S. national finals (the answers are intentionally not provided):

For many years, the youth event overshadowed the adult Chidon, which was discontinued in 1981. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert sought unsuccessfully to revive it in 2007, but it was Prime Minister Netanyahu, whose son Avner beat 12,000 participants to win the Youth Chidon in 2010, who succeeded in getting it reinstituted in 2012, and many former youth competitors from different countries now participate in the adult Chidon.

Most scholars and educators see the Chidon Ha-Tanach as an important pedagogical tool that inspires broad interest in the Torah and in Torah study among Jews, including particularly among secular Jews who may not have been fortunate to have parents who enrolled them in a yeshiva. As time passes and we get ever further from Sinai, the lack of Jewish education has become a growing problem and presents a greater threat to Jewish survival than our worst enemies ever could. As all reliable and statistically credible studies show, there is a direct correlation between a lack of Jewish education and intermarriage.

As such, anything that promotes and encourages Torah study on whatever level is to be embraced and promoted. Even if the level of knowledge required to participate in the Chidon is rudimentary, as some critics argue (see below), there can be no dispute that having a stable base of fundamental biblical knowledge is a condition precedent to higher Jewish learning, such as the study of Talmud and halacha. Even given that this level of study should not constitute an end in itself, public events such as the Chidon, and Bible quizzes in general, generate interest and promotes learning that may someday lead to greater in-depth study.

Nonetheless, there are critics who object to the Chidon on the grounds that Bible study is supposed to be for its own sake. They argue that the Torah is not a book of stories and history but, rather, a guidebook for a way of life and that the competition undermines the Torah study by turning it into a sport, where scoring points becomes more important than absorbing the halachic and ethical essence of the Torah. Moreover, they contend that the contest rewards rote memorization rather than the deep understanding of G-d and his ways that can only come from a lifetime of toiling in Torah.

In this regard, I recall a favorite theme of my Rav, teacher, and friend, R. Amnon Haramati, ah, who was always highly critical of yeshivot that only taught Talmud and that deemphasized the study of the Prophets. He would observe that the prophets were generally not discussing such things as putting on tefillin, or sitting in a sukkah, or eating matzah on Passover but, rather, they were all about ethical teaching and the importance of being, above all, a mensch. The Rav explained that virtually all their prophesies of doom were not because Jews had failed to perform mitzvot but, rather, because their conduct was inconsistent with how G-d expected them to behave.

Thus, I would argue, by promoting the study of even no more than the text of the Prophets, the Chidon Ha-Tanach facilitates the extrapolation of the very values and principles that the critics maintain that the Chidon discounts. Moreover, Chidon participants learn Hebrew; a love for Eretz Yisrael, both through their studies and through their travel in Israel as part of the Chidon experience; and experience the Jewish unity that is cultivated through exposure to other Jews from around the world whom they would likely never have had the opportunity to meet.

An important issue concerning the Chidon arose after Israels victory in the Six-Day War. For thousands of years, Jews romanticized the sites in Eretz Yisrael that they could only read about but never experience directly but, after 1967, they were able to follow in the footsteps of their holy biblical ancestors and walk the land of Jerusalem, Hebron, and Judea and Samaria. Religious Zionists, always a minority in Israel and across the world, saw the 1967 victory in religious terms as a manifestation of the hand of G-d in Jewish history, as the Torah and the prophetic visions of the ultimate Jewish conquest and settlement of all of Eretz Yisrael which they had been studying for 2,000 years was coming true before their very eyes.

For most secular Jews, however, the miraculous not only became commonplace, but it also became a political issue that weakened cultural Zionism as, sadly, many began to question the right of Jews to live in their own historic land. The result was that while even secular Jews like Ben Gurion, for example had historically seen the Bible as critical to Jewish identity and existence, one of the ways that the erosion of the Zionist ethos after Six-Day War manifested itself was that many, if not most, of the Chidon competitors were Jews with no real emotional investment in either Torah or Judaism.

In fact, some argue that the Chidon Ha-Tanach today has become a source of political and religious tension and conflict and is therefore antithetical to fostering Jewish unity in the name of Torah. For example, during the 2008 competition on Yom Haatzmaut marking Israels 60th anniversary, a leading contender was a Jew for Jesus, which resulted in a call by many Torah-observant Jews to boycott the event. A year later, the winner presented then-prime minister Netanyahu with a request that Israel become more active in the attempt to secure the release of Jonathan Pollard. Nonetheless, the Chidon remains an important pedagogical and cultural phenomenon that remains internationally popular.

Originally posted here:

Pros And Cons Of The Chidon Ha-Tanach - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com