I happened upon a chabad (Judaism, of the aggressively fundamentalist kind) website and read many of the recent posts, most of them highly emotional. I think it's helpful for secular humanists, from time to time, to get a look at fundamentalists' mentality, test the depth of their convictions, and experience the intensity of their hostility toward anyone who believes otherwise.
The posts express relative degrees of antagonism toward marrying outside the Jewish religion. At one extreme are those who equate intermarriage with the Holocaust, inasmuch as, according to their cockamamie demographics and genetics, the marrying of a gentile precludes the birth of untold generations of Jews, thus achieving the same result as the Nazis' Final Solution. (The site moderator does not agree, fortunately.)
I will not dignify this comparison with any discussion, except to say the Holocaust was the darkest moment in human history, and nothing -- repeat NOTHING --can be compared to it, actually or metaphorically.
But yes, some of those folks do believe that intermarriage is the moral equivalent of The Holocaust.
I put up a post that advanced what I consider to be some reasonable truths (e.g., that all humans are of the same genus and species and differences between us are infinitesimal), and took the King (Martin Luther and Rodney) approach, namely, "Can't we all get along?" Here is the text of my post:
Elisha [my wife] showed me this site. I am really impressed by the emotion in these posts. Intermarriage = Holocaust???
Can we all agree that everybody has a right to his/her own beliefs, but that nobody has a right to force those beliefs on others? To do so is to disrespect the other's humanity, and to me this is the basic fact: we are all human beings, The actual differences between us are infinitesimal.
I was born Jewish but got a secular education and had no trouble ignoring God when he failed to do the things he did in the Bible (I was about 7). Still got bar mitzvah'd, though.
After all these years (many of them spent with Rabbi Sherwin Wine, who found a way to reconcile Judaism with modernity) and after reading the Torah cover to cover and writing a book about it, I'm not so sure what is so special about being Jewish -- or belonging to any group, except the human race. It's tribalism that will do us in.
Shalom to all,
I got the following in reply:
Wow, Alan - thanks for adding your "atheist/secular humanist" insight into our discussion; "Intermarriage = Holocaust???" We have been discussing this topic for quite some time now - did you read any of our posts on this subject? They've been going on for months and months. Are we too deep for you? Too simplistic? Too mean? Too sympathetic? Too empathetic? What aspects of this analogy do you not understand?
Listen to me carefully, Alan. You (as a atheist/secular humanist) and Elisha can marry whomever you want. You can marry your cat, as far as I am concerned. And Orthodox Jews can marry whomever they want.
As for this: "after reading the Torah cover to cover and writing a book about it, I'm not so sure what is so special about being Jewish". You "read the Torah from cover to cover (was it good? are they coming out with a movie?) and you "still can't see what is so special about Judaism?" Wow! what an intellect! What's the title of your book, by the way?
[You ask,] "Can we all agree that everybody has a right to his/her own beliefs, but that nobody has a right to force those beliefs on others?"
Well, yes. I believe that's what happens in a democracy. Ergo, Orthodox Jews are allowed to believe what they want - without prejudice.
Raising one's children in line with one's religious (or political) beliefs is one of the freedoms available to those lucky enough to be born into a democracy. That's why your parents were able to raise you in the secular home that reflected their beliefs.
Now, you broadly state that, "[t]he actual differences between us are infinitesimal." What kind of differences do you refer to? Physical, emotional, cultural? And what is your empirical evidence for this statement? In fact the cultural differences between groups are often so enormous as to be unbreachable. And even physical (beyond the obvious need for oxygen, water, food and shelter) and emotional needs vary from group to group.
It's really super-duper that "Rabbi Sherwin Wine, "... found a way to reconcile Judaism with modernity". So it works for Rabbi Wine and his followers. With all due respect - so what? What has that got to do with our discussion? I think we have already agreed that, in a democracy, one can hold whatever beliefs one wishes.
You do realize this is a Chabod site? What else would you expect to find but Orthodox Judaism? I find posters like you and like Elisha, either don't fully comprehend the purpose of this site - it is not a forum for your religious views, Alan - or are simply using it to espouse their own religious or philisophic views. If someone asks, on an Orthodox Jewish site, why "for a Jew to marry a non-Jew is worse than the Holocaust" and Orthodox Jews give an answer - it's finished. Whether you agree with the answer is irrelevant. It is still the correct answer to the question.
What did you think you would find on this site? Encouragement to inter-marry? Grow up.
I responded with the following:
Yes, you're right -- and wrong. If I go to a porn site, I know what to expect. Same for chabad. But it's not out of immaturity; your advice to grow up is misguided.
I was conducting a sort of rhetorical experiment, and I got my data. So far, you fundies, have, without exception, reacted to my stating of reasonable truths with insult and invective. Every time.
Please don't be sarcastic about my reading of the Torah (movies have been made of certain portions of it, but not of Genesis, Ch. 34, which would make a great R-rated film). I read the best available translation. It turned out to be just the ramblings of primitive shepherd-priests, and to maintain otherwise is to live in a delusional world. I don't deny the subjective reality of your God and Bible; you are welcome to them. I was just wondering if we could differ so deeply and share the world without the fundie attacking me, my integrity, and my intelligence. The Jews have a rich and fascinating 3,000 year history, but the Torah is not it. On that, you and I will disagree forever. But at least I put in my best effort to determine what the Torah actually says, as far as we can tell, and I have the academic credentials to do so. I invite you to read my book; I'll send an autographed copy ("An Atheist Reads the Torah").
I have indeed read many posts; they were the source of my comment on passion. My point was that we humans are all biologically almost alike -- same genus and species. We don't even have the Neanderthals to kick around. I am not the first and only one to say that imposed differences in religion and culture are not in the best interests of humanity as a whole and that they have the power to ignite large-scale, very dangerous (9/11) violence.
Sigh. We will also have to agree to disagree on the Holocaust analogy. That was humanity's darkest hour, and NOTHING can compare to it.
Can we disagree this deeply and still share the world with peace and tolerance?
shalom,
Alan
Why couldn't the writer simply and patiently have explained to this theological idiot... just why the Torah is profound and being Jewish is so special? Why, instead, do fundamentalists get angry so easily and resort to ad hominem arguments, insults, and condescension ("Listen carefully...", "super-duper")? Why are they so oblivious to the hypocrisy, the luxury, one might say, of having a belief system based on a primitive shepherd culture...and spreading it via electronic technology that is the product of science -- that is, of questioning accepted knowledge, of finding new answers, creating new hypotheses, inventing something better than the old? We don't use Old Testament urology (although there is urological advice in the Torah) -- so why should we accept their cosmology, their worldview?
I'll keep you posted on the dialogue. In the meantime, here are three questions that fundies have yet to answer satisfactorily:
(1) Who made God? (No fair answering with meaningless BS like "God is beyond space and time," "God always was" -- and other pseudo-language that sounds profound but means nothing.)
(2) If God is so powerful, why does he need middlemen, why does he need millions of clerics and pious people to spread his doctrine and do his killing and torturing for him? Why doesn't he just obliterate all the nonbelievers in one stupendous bolt of lightning (of course, the logic here is that every religion regards everyone else as unbelievers, so all the gods would either fight it out or kill everyone -- not a happy prospect, in either case)?
(3) If God is all-powerful and all-knowing, why does he need constant obeisance, prayers, praise, and general ass-kissing? Sounds like a pretty vain and petty SOB to me.
I'm getting more and more convinced that believers' brains work differently, having been conditioned since childhood to do so. Only a lucky few escape.
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