Leaving Charediism
A.M. Yehuda2011Opinion[Opinion]
Imagine opening the latest issue of the New Yorker magazine, its bright and colorful cartoon cover capturing a quintessential New York moment in pitch-perfect irony and je ne sais qoui. You flip through the pages, chuckle at the cartoons, check out which famous authors are featured in snazzy little pieces this week – when suddenly – you stop short, stunned. The week’s feature in our city’s foremost arts and culture magazine is a 25,000-word exposé on the cult of Charedi Judaism.
The article chronicles the life of a prominent Charedi leader and his dramatic exit from the religious lifestyle while exploring a full range of accusations against the Charedi community. The research is comprehensive and unflinching, presenting an array of claims that are both shocking and familiar. Finally, a wide range of cult-like abuses that you knew all along to be true has been presented in exhaustive detail, supported by extensive interviews and documentation.
The article describes the alienation of family members who’ve left the community, the tremendous financial burden of belonging to the community, the deaths of Charedim whose psychiatric conditions were hidden or ignored, physical violence with tacit approval of religious leaders, extreme emotional and sometimes physical pressure on those who wouldn’t conform, absurd claims of miraculous events that form the community’s basic dogmas, promises of blissful lives to those who follow its guidelines, and historical fabrications and outright forgeries regarding historical religious figures.
Well, don’t go rushing to your mailboxes just yet. There is no such article.
Instead, the New Yorker published a phenomenal piece by Lawrence Wright, titled “Leaving Scientology”, which covers film director and screenwriter Paul Haggis’ experiences as a prominent celebrity Scientologist and his dramatic exit from the religion, while exploring a full range of accusations against the Church of Scientology. It is a brave, groundbreaking piece that pulls no punches in uncovering what goes on under the surface of this highly defensive and well-organized organization.
But Mr. Wright, I challenge you to go one further. Continue to keep your hands free of the dainty gloves of moral relativism, stick to your brave and unflinching approach, and investigate the cult of Charedi Judaism. You will find every shocker you found in Scientology, along with a whole fucking hell of a lot more.
I take your Scientology laundry list and raise you a Charedi megilla.
I give you religiously sanctioned tax fraud, embezzlement, and abuses of the federal welfare system.
I give you forced marriages.
I give you protection of sexual predators.
I give you dozens of cases of corruption, scams and theft implicating community leaders.
I give you bloc voting, denial of women’s rights, deep-seated racism and xenophobia, blatant homophobia, bans on birth control, the Internet, and secular media.
I give you the forced removal of children from parents who dare to leave the community, through cases brought and bankrolled by the community, propelled by sinister character assassinations and decided by judges in the community’s pocket.
I give you the absence of secular subjects in boys’ schools, tolerance of domestic violence, and the hoodwinking of blackmail in the form of withholding religious divorces by vindictive spouses.
It takes nerve and perseverance to take on Scientology, despite longstanding public wariness of its beliefs and practices. What will it take, then, to take on a cultish spin-off of an established religion, a cult so adept at presenting its members to the public as paragons of righteousness and piety, a group so entrenched with political and financial influence that it makes a case against Scientology look like child’s play?
Do you, Mr. Wright, have the balls for that?
28 Responses
It’s Lawrence Wright, not Write. And at the end, you call him Mr. White! What have we come to when even our errors are so inconsistent?
“It’s Lawrence Wright, not Write”
It’s Right, Hedyot, that’s what it is. Every impassioned word is right. What have we come to if we can see words and not meaning?
Kudos to an excellent article. I take your piece and raise you a 2500 word expose.
Mr. Wright, I challenge you to go one further. Continue to keep your hands free of the dainty gloves of moral relativism, stick to your brave and unflinching approach, and investigate the cult of atheism.
You will find every shocker you found in Scientology, along with a whole fucking hell of a lot more: the destruction of Europe by mass killing from 1914 to 1954, followed by a declining birthrate guaranteeing eventual extinction, the conversion of the United States from a military and industrial powerhouse in 1955 to a feeble pile of trailer trash by about 2015, the murder of hundreds by atheists like Jeff Dahmer, etc etc. All this and much more (the mass Communist killings still continuing in East Asia for example) are all direct products of this insane cult of death.
Stein, Stormfront? That’s sick even by your standards.
You are just another guilt ridden Aryan of German descent who has “converted” to Judaism to overcome overwhelming remorse for what your people did to us.
No coincidence that you are attracted to sadistic hatred, just like your German ancestors before you.
You will never be one of us. We shall never forget, and your are never forgiven.
A.M.
For a short moment I enjoyed good writing skills. That’s until you introduced unacceptable language; a clear giveaway that you are wallowing in emotional pain. My advice; seek professional help to help you get over your past ‘abuse’. I know that so many of you are suffering in one way or another and my heart goes out to you. However, carrying on like a bunch of school kids will bring you no results. Focus on improving your newly embraced lifestyles and try to live on.
Now let me address some of your issues: You don’t like the stories of The Ba’al Shem Tov’s flying horses… what’s that got to do with anything? Even the secular world is big on novels…
You becry the misuse of public assistance. Well, I guess you didn’t get enough of it and had difficulties making ends meet. I am nearly convinced that had you succeeded in bilking the system and lived comfortably you would not have been so preoccupied with this matter…
You are up in arms on forced marriages? Our religion has clauses for divorce in its dogma… Get out if you are unhappy. Most of us don’t feel coerced or forced.
You bitch about losing your children to the religious spouse? Well, duh; those who recently left the fold usually showed signs of mental instability. You are not promolgating the granting of sole custody to an unstable parent, are you now? Didn’t YOU have enough as a child?…
So I conclude, get past your anger and hurt and focus on making your chosen lifestyle a success.
Have a great weekend (aka Gut Shabbos)
Jason King-
For once, a response to Jacob Stein is more vile than Stein’s own writing. What’s wrong with Stein has nothing to do with his ancestry (note that the USA, which has the best record in how it treats Jews, has more people of German ancestry than any other type; not to mention that these Germans, having largely left Germany long before the Nazis existed, can’t be guilty of anything). The idea that a member of a group is born evil is wrong, disgusting, and racism of the highest order. Traditional Judaism and current halacha allows Germans to convert; none of Judaism’s movements. Orthodox to liberal, have aproblem with this. Who are you to speak on behalf of Jews like this?
Don’t take this as any defense of Stein, his putrid writings or his behavior; but it’s important to diagnose a problem correctly. Stein’s problem isn’t his ancestry; it’s what’s in his head – an extremist variant of Orthodoxy unleavened by the traditional sense of rachmonus and partial tolerance for human weakness.
Well I’m sorry, however my writings are impeccably sourced.
And just by the way, the idea of an orthodox Jew becoming a neo-Nazi is not my own fantasy. Anyone watched The Believer?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Believer_(film)
Art imitating reality.
JJ–
Just to put this all into context, there is a comment that a moderator has deleted from this site which I assume you did not see, where Stein equates people who criticise Haredi Judaism with Nazi’s.
I clearly suggest a psychological and not a genetic basis for his guilt and barbarity.
*I* decide who *I* accept as one of us. I do not claim to represent you, Samson, Solomon or Ezra, (all of whom have a thing or two to say about Jewish conversion) or anyone else for that matter.
If criticizing Haredism is considered anti-semtic, then let me be the first to say: Heil Hitler!
JJ, your philosophy is humanist and right on, but leave Halacha out of it. Torah bars Moabites and Amonites from conversion and limits the same for Edomites and Egyptians because of the sins of their ancestors, and fosters the idea that Amalekites are born evil, which is wrong, disgusting, and racism of the highest order.
Jason King-
I didn’t see the deleted post. Maybe I did come down on you too harshly. Still, my point remains. Don’t let warped people like Stein elicit warped responses from decent people like you.
Danny Balint- see above.
Apostamus – I’m aware of all this. Nevertheless, current halacha (and the last 2,000 years) has eliminated these items as a practical matter. Surely that has to count for something. Further, it’s not clear that the Amalek rule is based upon racism – rather it may be a practical consideration due to constant multi-generational attacks. Had the Germans started a third World War, for example,even very liberal people would probably be thinking about how to get rid of them.
Imagine seeing the number of Hatzalah on the cover of the New Yorker, advertised for all the humans of NYC. Such an amazing organization, which boasts response rates a fraction those of the FDNY deserves the publicity, and the public deserves to know how to reach them.
Surely they are not a racist organization that aims to save Jewish lives only. It is purely an accident of cross-cultural misunderstanding that they are currently getting phone calls from Jews only.
Perhaps they will start receiving applications from non-Jewish volunteers who also want to aid in saving lives. Hatzalah wouldn’t decline an offer of help on the basis of the applicants religion. The Jewish religion does not forbid getting treated by a Goy doctor. It’s purely by chance that no Goy has ever applied, yet.
Perhaps they will receive an application from a female wishing to respond to emergency scenes and save lives. The Jewish religion has nothing against Doctors treating patients of the opposite sex. Even now male members of Hatzalah may treat Jewish females. It’s purely Hasidic sexism why they have not allowed that until now.
But all of this will change when their numbers will be on the cover of the New Yorker, or the New York Post, or on little stickers on public telephones, or on craigslist…
mishegoyim alle
Had the Germans started a third World War, for example,even very liberal people would probably be thinking about how to get rid of them.
What? suckling infants too? Nonsensical apologetics.
“What? suckling infants too? Nonsensical apologetics.”
Were “suckling infants” spared the firebombings of Dresden and Tokyo? And, in fact, FDR, among others, had serious discussions late in WWII about finishing off the Germans. Obviously these discussions didn’t go anywhere, but it’s not far fetched to speculate that yet another war might have changed that.
There is a huge difference between collateral damage and sanctioned ethnic cleansing. I hope you can see that, master of morals.
But if FDR was considering the latter, you should be condemning him with a measure of vigour far greater than that of your impassioned rant above, as should you the old testament.
Not much difference when you firebomb cities. Cities, not military targets.
As to FDR, I assume his motivation was horror at year after year of American casualties, so no, I don’t condemn him. When you deal with an incorrigible enemy, what’s moral? Leaving them to murder your grandchildren, or destroying them? Not so clear. FDR and the Old Testament may have a point.
Let me explain the difference. Churchill for example bombed Dresden. It was horrific, but he did so a: to weaken German resolve, b: in retaliation for the blitz.
In fact Churchill was horrified by the mayhem he had caused to German civilians and stated a desire to focus on military objectives thereafter.
An incorrigible enemy? I am amazed at the turn of tables here, although you are actually saying that one can be justified in saying Germans are inherently evil, and that that would justify ethnic cleansing, and I merely suggested that some Germans have a chip on their shoulder.
You miss the point. I don’t dispute that the firebombings were geared toward ending the war, not exterminating the Germans. You mentioned “suckling infants”, that is, the biblical injunction to wipe out Amalek is something that the modern sensibility coudn’t tolerate. My response was, actually it might, and I gave a hypothetical. As it was, in the actual world where my hypothetical third world war didn’t come to pass (65 years of passable German behavior later), plenty of “suckling infants” were immolated.
Oddly enough, Churchill also was involved in discussions about wiping out the Germans.
No tables have been turned. I don’t think any person or group is inherently evil. I do think that some cultures are evil, though. And sometimes the culture might not be so bad, but the political system creates evil. Sometimes the culture and political system are not so bad, but the people in charge cause the group to behave evilly. In any case, my point would be that sometimes (rarely) the best estimate is that a group will continue to come after you and yours unless you make sure that they can’t.
If the times would print an article like that it would be denounced as anti semitic and rightfully so. However, it could print an article about a particular organization or personalities within the Orthodox communities. (plural intended).
I think the church of scientology is a much more defined organization but don’t know much about it.
I’m not so sure about that, Sara. I think it’s legitimate to write about widespread attitudes within a certain culture.
Of course, to claim that all adherents to a lifestyle are guilty of it would be too sweeping a judgement. But that doesn’t have to be the claim. An article like that would — like the Scientology piece — focus on individual stories to highlight endemic problems within the Charedi world.
I don’t dispute that the firebombings were geared toward ending the war, not exterminating the Germans
Actually you do. You state above that FDR and the Bible have a point given that both dealt with an incorrigible enemy.
You believe that some cultures are evil. What exactly is culture? It is “the sum total of ways of living built up by a group of human beings and transmitted from one generation to another.”
So you won’t have a problem with a statement such as “No coincidence that you are attracted to sadistic hatred, just like your German ancestors before you.”
“Actually you do. You state above that FDR and the Bible have a point given that both dealt with an incorrigible enemy.”
Actually I don’t. My reference to FDR was about the proposed extermination of the Germans, not about the firebombing.
“So you won’t have a problem with a statement such as “No coincidence that you are attracted to sadistic hatred, just like your German ancestors before you.”
I do indeed have a problem with it. As I wrote earlier-
“What’s wrong with Stein has nothing to do with his ancestry (note that the USA, which has the best record in how it treats Jews, has more people of German ancestry than any other type; not to mention that these Germans, having largely left Germany long before the Nazis existed, can’t be guilty of anything).”
And even if Stein was a German direct from Germany, I would still not automatically assume it was his background that made him demented.
Stein says that he is an Aryan, in those words, on his blog in comments here and there so that is not in dispute.
You have a problem with that statement because you wouldn’t automatically assume that his inherited culture is to blame, fine, that is your view, one which you are of course perfectly entitled to, but what you initially thought was wrong with that statement was that it is in your view “racism of the highest order”.
You say “Oddly enough, Churchill also was involved in discussions about wiping out the Germans.” I would be very much surprised if that were true. Can you provide a source please.
You did bring up Dresden in support of your case for sanctioned genocide, and that is not Hypothetical.
The fact that Nazism is bad does not make Scientology good. Mr. Stein is engaging in a bizarre version of the tu quoque fallacy which excuses anything evil anyone has ever done as long as they weren’t wearing backwards sun wheels when they did it.
Yes, there should be exposes of the cult-like nature of Charedism. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t expose Scientology, Christian Dominionism, the Nestle company, Darfur, the Koch family, rapists and thieves.
As they say “It’s not all about you.”
Nice, but insane.
The haredi community in NYC is by and large descended of holocaust survivors and anti-jewish discrimination is a historical fact of the last 1000 years. Publishing this in a major news-magazine would flare up against the deepest sensitivities of the whole city.
The point though is a very strong one and must be dealt with. The community and haredim are in some cases very sick, dysfunctional and deeply troubled. I have spent my whole life in a nightmare with these characters and something must be done, a little more subtle though.
You should check out my article on the spinka case in the jewish journal. Interestingly, people still hate me for that and the many articles I’ve written about religion. I started out covering jewish journalism because I cared about the community but in the end left because I no longer cared what all those people do. For a journalist to cover that she would have to both care and be immune to criticism.