Jihad
Baal Devarim2011
Recently, I found myself at a family simchah (celebration), seated next to some pious and scholarly friends and relatives. While I don’t particularly enjoy the scholarly kind of discourse this usually entails, it’s certainly better than the stupid and inane discussions of Hasidic politics and which Rebbe now hates whose brother and who exactly is going to which Hell that usually passes for pleasant chit-chat at these events, and I have much more to contribute, too. So the discussion is going along swimmingly — Talmudic quotes, halachic nitpickings, comments on the food — until the attention turns to the poor guy sitting at the other table in jeans and brown shirt, small kippah perched atop a head-full of unruly hair, the neat store-bought folds clearly identifying the kippah as new and the wearer as an ‘outsider’.
“Who’s he?” someone asks.
“Oh, he’s Yankel’s brother,” someone else says, “the one who went to live with his father after the split. Remember?”
There’s an audible gasp and from the audience around the table with eyes opened wide in pained surprise, as if an invisible boot just collectively kicked everyone in the gonads.
“Him??? Wow. Look at him. He’s a regular goy now!”
This is followed by much clucking of tongues and shaking of heads. An unbelievable sight, he is. He could’ve grown up such a nice Chassidish young man, just like his brother. Instead, he doesn’t look like us at all!
We didn’t get much time to digest this tragedy when the most pious at the table quickly turned the discussion back to practical matters. First, there’s the matter with the wine. He surely doesn’t keep Shabbos even in public, and thus can turn the wine into yayin nesech — unkosher wine, just by touching it. There’s some discussion on that, and I start feeling uncomfortable. Next, the discussion veers to more weighty matters: are we allowed — nay, are we commanded — to kill him, as we do a heretic? Again, there’s some discussion pro and con — while I can’t help thinking, Jeezus christ on a stick! here we go again! Are these people listening to themselves? Are they totally unaware that they sound exactly like the despised Muslim Jihadis? I need to say something. But what?
At last, the most learned of the group pronounces the verdict: we’re not allowed to kill him, but we’re also not allowed to save him from mortal danger — a concept known as lo ma’alin v’lo moridin. After this exhausting scholarly dialogue, the conversation turns back to the mundane. Needless to say, I’m totally exasperated at this point. “What a pity,” the fatwa originator is now saying, “he could’ve grown up such a nice young man, instead of the worthless, brainwashed secular soul he is now.”
I see my chance. “You realize” I cheerfully intone, “that he thinks exactly the same of you?” That elicited a smug chuckle, exactly as expected. Seeing me as an ally, he couldn’t help interpreting my words the opposite from how I intended it. Everyone around the table was quick to agree. Sure, he thinks the same of us. He thinks WE are brainwashed. Ha ha, how incredibly silly of him — he can’t see the truth in front of his very eyes! I give some time for this self-congratulatory groupthink to sink in. Finally, the gabble subsided.
“You know the difference between him and us, though,” I lean in conspiratorially. Of course everyone knows the difference. He’s wrong, and we’re right! He wants to eat pig and have lots of degenerate sex, while we’re holy and pious! He’s silly, we’re smart!
“Well, he wouldn’t even dream of killing you, and I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have second thoughts about saving you if he sees you in mortal danger!”
Silence. Some uncomfortable shifting in the seats. “Huh???”
“As I said. Doesn’t that mean he’s actually right about the brainwashing, while you are all wrong?”
More uncomfortable silence. “Uh, uhm, err, well, see, I certainly would save him in THIS day and age. Those things are not applicable today.”
“Thank God! You sounded pretty self-righteously serious when you discussed this just five minutes ago.”
And we all went back to eating the food. To the Jihadi’s credit though, I’m pretty sure he finally thought about it. Twice.
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Originally published on The Other Side on 10/31/07, and reprinted here with permission. Authors have asked us to note that as the essays featured in “Best of the Blogs” document journeys of transformation, the author’s views may have changed since initial publication.
18 Responses
very nice. very nice. He waited until the right time and then told it to them like it is.
jewish jihadis
not willing to die for their cause
but oh so willing to kill
they’ll swallow the spoonful of sugar
while giving everyone else the pill
I was having a bummer of a day, but that sure cheered me up!
““Well, he wouldn’t even dream of killing you, and I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have second thoughts about saving you if he sees you in mortal danger!”
How exactly do you know that? It seems to me, if my memory serves me, that Jewish communists in the soviet union enthusiastically killed rabbis in the 1920’s and 1930’s.
Rabbis killing Jewish communists – can’t say I heard about that.
I wonder which way the “brainwashing” is going…
Jacob,
Russia in the 20’s & 30’s? Huh? Did I miss something? I thought this was a contemporary piece…and you know very well what the point being made was.
But, yes, it is interesting. In 1920’s Europe, the escapees wanted to physically destroy the establishment — while the establishment, for the most part, wanted to be left alone to live according to their convictions — while today most who get out would simply like to be granted the respect and acceptance to pursue their dreams and follow their principles in peace.
Perhaps the difference is that those Pre-WW days were more forceful militaristic times when one’s convictions were a fighting matter? Take the Spanish Civil War for example: people killed and died for their convictions right and left for years and years – that isn’t too likely today…perhaps it’s a good thing, perhaps not.
Jewish communists under Stalin and Jewish Ghetto Police under Hitler are two contemporary examples of secular Jews engaging in mass killings. Orthodox Jews killing people, pretty rare.
Levi Aron was the first known orthoprax killer.
well written
Let’s translate this to another culture and see if it sounds just as holy.
Yes. I’m being in your face and using socially unacceptable words. That’s the point. Disgusting bigoted bullshit is disgusting bigoted bullshit whether excreted in Yiddish or English.
I was sitting around with a bunch of my White relatives. There was a discussion about saving lives. They decided it would be wrong to save a drowning coal burner (White woman who has a Black boyfriend). Just watch her go down. That’s the right thing to do. And if you find a nigger’s wallet? No reason to give it back. You only return property to humans, not shitskins. In fact the only reason to be polite to a nigger is fear. If you’re rude those jungle bunnies will probably just kill you. So best to paste on that fake smile.
Yep. It sounds just as good that way as it does when Jews do it.
Jacob Stein, if you know anything about the chareidi community, you’ll know that given the power, without repercussions, they would carry out the law as they see fit. Meaning that in their own country they would kill any non-Jew who steals or goes to church (they believe that Christianity is idol worship). They would abolish all women’s rights; No right to divorce or testify, women to the back of the bus, etc. They would allow non-Jews to die on the Sabbath (they cannot violate laws to save a non-Jews life, and the only reason that they do now (when they do) is to prevent animosity). And a host of other problems would accompany them. If you want a little perspective on the side of those that left the community in the late nineteenth century, read a little I.L. Peretz. You’re examples of the secular Jews that killed are of secular Jews with power that had no repercussions to their actions. Think of a group that fits that category in the ultra-orthodox community. I don’t know of any, therefore you analogy doesn’t pan out. But we both know, that given power, what chareidim are capable of.
Oh, ok, so orthodox Jews we all agree don’t really kill however you speculate that they would given the right circumstances, which have never existed. Non-orthodox Jews however do really kill.
Jacob, but Orthodox Jews routinely commit arson, gang assault with deadly weapons, terrorism and rioting. Not a few notable ones in bizarre circumstances but pretty much every damned week. Non-Orthodox generally consider this sort of thing criminal and shameful. The pious are only sad they can’t do more of it.
Todd I love your first comment , it illustrates your point so well , assuming that the readers aren’t racist themselves, and think black people are a memutza (connection cattegory) between people and animals as the Rebbe Rashab (the fifth chabad Rebbe once wrote.
To Todd, Jacoob, and Yitzchak- this conversation seems to be two conversations mangled together. One is who’s better regarding their moral code , I assume Todd and Yitzchak go the route of yafas toar , get , agunah etc, and Jacob says without G-d there is no morality.
The second conversation is who is better practically . I think the two sides are chareidim use gang violence as a way of policing their communities , secular Jews took part in the yevsexia.
My point is very simple.
The author wrote
“Well, he wouldn’t even dream of killing you, and I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have second thoughts about saving you if he sees you in mortal danger!”
My question is: What on earth makes you assume that? How do you know he won’t like to gun you down just like Jewish communists murdered thousands of innocent people? Or just like Levi Aron butchered that child? (He was orthoprax; after his arrest he told detectives he doesn’t keep kosher.)
Velvel, some people learn from history and life’s trials. When they are oppressed and treated badly they learn to treat others well and fight injustice. Others lust for the day when they can hold whip. Just a hint, if a cult cosplays Jew-hating Polish aristocrats so its members can pretend to be rich and powerful like them it’s probably not the first sort. If these guys were starting up today the different sects would dress as Brown Shirts, Klansmen and SS Officers.
And Sholom Schneerson is something yellow-brown that I scrape off the bottom of my shoe.
Jacob, how do you know Orthodox Jews didn’t do these things? You learned it in yeshiva? Your sect’s seforim say so? I’m sorry to break it to you, but they did. There’s plenty of documentary evidence. The reason there weren’t as many as kapos is simple. What we’d call Charedim these days were a tiny minority of Jews. If 1/100 of Jews were Black Hats you wouldn’t expect more than 1/100 of Communist enforcers or Ghetto police to be Black Hats.
“Jacob, how do you know Orthodox Jews didn’t do these things?”
A Jewish communist by definition would have had to convert to atheism.
Can you point to any documented case of a member of the Jewish ghetto police who before and after the war was orthodox?
And then even take present day america. The “Son of Sam” was a convicted non-orthodox Jewish serial killer.
Son of Sam was not Jewish at all – his adoptive parents were, from whom he got the name Berkowitz.