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Jewish Journal

Connect. Inform. Inspire.

April 12, 2001

The Jewish Tax

Leave a Comment / Rob Eshman /

Every April 15, we are reminded that many of the things we hold dear literally don’t come cheap. Democracy demands its pound of flesh, or its 30 percent, and on Tax Day the bill comes due.

According to demographer Pini Herman, the median Jewish household income in the greater Los Angeles area for 2000 was $57,100. The median Jewish household in Los Angeles has to work until March 24 to pay its federal taxes and until May 16 to pay off other income, property and sales taxes. That median Jewish family’s estimated total tax bill this year: $21,300.

On top of this, there’s the Jewish tax. Being Jewish may be wonderful, but it isn’t necessarily a bargain. "Jewish taxes" for a small $5,100 basket of Jewish services — temple membership, minimal Jewish education and recreation, modest Jewish organizational membership and charitable gifts, Jewish ritual events and Jewish articles — will keep the median Jewish household working until June 17 to pay off this "tax."

A larger basket of Jewish services (i.e. day school and camp for two children) can easily reach $22,000 a year in Los Angeles. That figure is unaffordable for those Jewish households at or below the median income level.

Indeed, the price of engaging in Jewish communal life has become daunting. Most synagogues, day schools and camps are willing to arrange scholarships or discounts, but sticker shock or shame often scares off potential members. Institutions and individuals have begun to take the problem seriously. Synagogue 2000, an organization leading naionwide synagogue transformation efforts, has begun encouraging alternative approaches to dues structures in attracting new members. In San Francisco, Temple Emanu-El is experimenting with voluntary dues.

Jewish day schools, which budget far less money per pupil than their public counterparts, are themselves struggling with deficits. The four year-old Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education is focusing on fostering the growth of new day schools, providing grants and fundraising expertise to the schools. A number of foundations, including Avi Chai, have experimented with providing tuition subsidies to encourage people who would not be eligible for financial aid to consider day schools.

For many, these changes cannot happen fast enough. They face rising bills now, especially as the bear market extends its grip to both end-users and potential donors.

Short-term answers are to appeal to donors to continue giving, and to encourage the efforts of places where participating in Jewish life is still relatively inexpensive and richly rewarding, such as museums, libraries and the Jewish Community Centers.

But for the longer term, we need to take steps to ensure that Jewish communal life does not become solely an upper-middle class entitlement. Other wealthy and resourceful communities have explored massively-funded regional endowments for day school tuitions. An endowment structure could also be used for synagogue memberships. It just might work– and contributions would be tax-deductible.

The Jewish Tax Read More »

Repairing the World

Leave a Comment / Worldwide /

According to a popular joke, a group of American Jewish tourists in Israel ask their tour guide, “How do you say tikkun olam in Hebrew?”

Tikkun olam, of course, is a Hebrew term, one that describes the Jewish obligation to repair the world.

The joke’s humor lies in the fact that many American Jews are more literate in social activism than in Hebrew.

According to a new study, however, most American Jews not only don’t know it’s Hebrew but aren’t even familiar with the term tikkun olam.

And with only 31 percent reporting that Israel is personally very meaningful to their Jewish identity, chances are they won’t be asking Israeli tour guides much of anything.

The findings were two pieces of a recent study measuring American Jewish attitudes toward “social justice,” a somewhat vague term that can fit a variety of causes, depending on the speaker’s politics.

The study’s major finding — that American Jews remain strongly supportive of predominantly liberal social justice causes — is being used to promote the new organization that commissioned it.

Amos: The National Jewish Partnership for Social Justice was officially launched last week. It aims to place social justice higher on the Jewish communal agenda and to provide training and other support for Jewish groups that want to address social justice issues.

Amos’ founding comes as a number of people tout social justice and community service as a means of engaging unaffiliated young Jews:

  • A new organization in its planning stages, Partnership for Service, seeks to increase community service rates among young Jews while teaching what Jewish tradition has to say about volunteering.
  • Through a project called Tzedek Hillel, several campus Hillels are focusing on volunteer efforts, including spring break programs in which students do things like build houses for the poor.
  • Several Jewish organizations are discussing the possibility of joining forces for a Jewish Peace Corps in which recent college grads would commit to a year or two of service, combined with Jewish learning.

The new study, based on phone interviews with 1,002 U.S. Jews, indicates strong Jewish support for social justice. But it also reveals a fundamental paradox that likely will affect Amos and similar efforts.

The overwhelming majority of American Jews say social activism is important to their identity as Jews, and they feel proud that Jewish organizations do that work. In fact, 56 percent say social justice is more important to their Jewish identity than Torah or text study.

Nonetheless, a clear majority — 74 percent — don’t care whether their own social activism falls under Jewish or secular auspices.

“If you don’t perceive your community as sponsoring social justice activities, you’re not going to say you prefer to do them with other Jews,” said Leonard Fein, the founder of Mazon, a Jewish hunger-relief organization and one of Amos’ architects.

Jewish organizations need to address the “big issues of our time” to show Judaism’s relevance, Fein said.

Not everyone interprets the survey as a clarion call for more social justice activities.

“When I see these surveys that show that for many Jews” the “meaning of Jewish identity is social justice, I worry, because among other things that doesn’t tell you why you shouldn’t marry a Unitarian,” said Elliott Abrams, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, a conservative think tank in Washington. “I don’t know that spending more energy on those activities is an effective strategy for Jewish continuity in America.”

Abrams, who serves on the advisory committee of the American Jewish Committee, said selection of social justice causes should be done on the basis of “the higher the Jewish content, the better.”

“Jewish groups have to be very careful not to allow partisan politics … to creep in,” he said.

It is not yet clear how Amos will manage to assist Jewish organizations and champion social justice while avoiding controversy over its choice of causes.

Amos’ survey indicates that American Jews’ favorite causes include abortion rights, fighting against anti-Semitism, access to affordable health care and strengthened gun-control laws.

Few causes enjoy complete consensus, however.

In recent years, some Jewish leaders, particularly Republicans, have questioned community activism on issues that are not explicitly of Jewish concern.

In 1999, top leaders with UJA-Federation of Greater New York urged the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA), which coordinates the policies of Jewish organizations on social issues, to narrow its focus to issues of direct concern to the Jewish community, such as elder care and Jewish rescue.

The JCPA and the United Jewish Communities (UJC), the federation umbrella organization, still are hammering out what role each should play on social justice issues.

However, Hannah Rosenthal, the JCPA’s executive director, downplayed the lack of consensus.

A recent survey conducted by the JCPA showed that the “overwhelming majority of Jewish federation donors support social justice public policy and efforts,” she said.

In particular, Rosenthal said, there is widespread support not just for aiding Jews in poverty but for “public policy that deals with the poor throughout the country.”

Diana Aviv, the UJC’s vice president for public policy and a board member of Amos, said, “As the federation system thinks about what its own mission is, the scope of the work it engages in relative to its resources may be a subject for federations to talk about, but federations do embrace social justice.

“We work on immigration issues not just so Soviet Jewish refugees can come, but so that we have generous policy for all,” Aviv said. “When we work for better conditions in our nursing homes, it’s for all recipients, not just for Jews.”

It is not yet clear how large Amos will be, how it will be funded or how many organizations it will work with. It has a preliminary arrangement to work with the JCPA on poverty-related issues, and for now it is being funded primarily by three private Jewish foundations.

Rabbi Sid Schwarz is founder and director of the Washington Institute for Jewish Leadership and Values, which offers teen and adult seminars on the connection between Judaism and social activism. He said he welcomes Amos.

However, Amos needs to stick to its mission of training and consulting and not champion specific causes, Schwarz said.

“Some of the principals in Amos, when they see issues, they just start to salivate,” Schwarz said. “Unless they discipline themselves in this area, they’ll quickly become a shadow of the JCPA.”

However, Rosenthal said she thinks Amos will augment, not duplicate, the JCPA’s work by helping to train leaders and mobilize resources.

“They are the increased capacity that local communities cannot afford,” Rosenthal said. “It’s a perfect fit.”

Study Links Jews, Social Justice

The following number are some of the highlights of a new study on American Jews and social justice:

  • 94 percent agree that "social justice work by Jewish organizations makes me proud to be a Jew."
  • 85 percent disagree that "Jews have enough problems of their own without worrying about broader society."
  • The social causes that the largest number of respondents "strongly favor" are assuring freedom of choice for women seeking abortions, ensuring access to affordable health care and fighting anti-Semitism. Of the predominantly left-wing causes examined by the study, "declaring a moratorium on" capital punishment was the only one that a majority (53 percent) opposed.
  • More than half are not familiar with the Hebrew phrase "tikkun olam." Literally, the phrase means repairing the world and has been loosely interpreted to mean a Jewish obligation to work for social justice.
  • Asked if they would rather volunteer to help needy Americans with a Jewish group or a nonsectarian group, only 15 percent chose a Jewish group, while 73 percent said it would not matter.
  • Sixty-nine percent associate the term "social justice" with both Judaism and Christianity, while 8 percent associate it only with Judaism and 23 percent associate it with neither. Of the 49 percent who said they had participated in a social justice activity, 24 percent had participated in one sponsored by a synagogue.
  • Making the world a better place ranked highest as the activity most personally meaningful for being Jewish, followed by belief in God and celebrating Jewish holidays. Ranking lowest were keeping up with Jewish art, music or literature, and studying Torah and other Jewish texts.
  • Asked to choose which is more important as a Jew — studying Torah or working for social justice — 56 percent chose social justice, while 36 percent said both are equally important. Agency

Repairing the World Read More »

Ten Commandments for Modern Orthodoxy

Leave a Comment / Worldwide /

While many Orthodox Jews these days are discussing what must be done to make tradition more "relevant," I believe the far more important challenge is to make tradition more valuable, more directly beneficial to individual Jews as well as the larger social order.

Modern Orthodoxy should take up this challenge: to broaden the attractiveness of tradition. To do so, the Modern Orthodox movement must audaciously articulate a clear ideological stance on issues that truly matter to most people — issues of attitude, morals and spirit, not just ritual. Then it must promulgate its beliefs into organized curricula and manifest community conduct.

Modern Orthodoxy rightfully can claim to have forged an authentic synthesis between the world of halacha and the Western intellectual tradition. But a little more daring is required to further narrow the considerable gap between strict Jewish observance and modernity.

Here then, are 10 challenges, or commandments, for Modern Orthodoxy:

1. Emphasize Human Relations.

Modern Orthodoxy should vigorously espouse renewed devotion to the commandments governing human relations. Unfortunately, religious pride and self-confidence, themselves worthy and necessary values, often lead to condescension and arrogance. We need to teach, in an organized fashion and as a Torah priority, the centrality of humility ("Walk humbly before your God"), and the importance of love, respect, honor and peace — what the sages called ahavat habriot, or love for all creation.

2. Teach Judaism and

Democracy Together.

They are complementary, not contradictory, value systems. Jewish law obligates us to support a Jewish and democratic State of Israel, and a knowledgeable Modern Orthodox Torah Jew should be able to demonstrate this from biblical and Talmudic sources. We must teach this principle in all schools, religious and secular.

3. Promote the Community of Israel as a Religious Concept.

Preserving the community of Israel supersedes all other values in our tradition, including the sanctity of life, and it certainly outweighs the winning of most organizational battles. At the very least, the importance of unity demands that we restrain our ideological passions and denominational dreams when these irreconcilably conflict with those of other committed Jews, including the Reform and Conservative. We know how to die for Israel and Jewish continuity, but do we know how to live for klal Yisrael?

4. Establish New Religious Para-meters on Relating to the Secular.

Because tradition casts nonobservance as an aberration, as a temporary failure, there are no formal halachic guidelines for relations with secular Jews. Today, however, secularism is an entrenched way of life. Observant Judaism cannot ignore this fact and must find a way to halachically incorporate secular Jewish commitment within klal Yisrael. Nonobservers can no longer be dismissed as malfunctioning, lost Jews.

5. Pursue Socioeconomic Justice.

The prophets postulated that care for the orphan and widow, the quest for justice and human rights, and the eradication of corruption and economic exploitation are religious priorities. Our community cannot be silent about the growing, frightening income gap between rich and poor in Israel, or the rights of foreign workers, or the pervasive corruption in government.

6. Recommit to Zionism.

For decades, Modern Orthodoxy was synonymous with religious Zionism and was a great producer of olim (new immigrants). But even the Modern Orthodox public increasingly is becoming post-Zionist and unmistakably materialistic. I say: revamp educational curricula to reignite the spirit and values of classical Zionism, including aliyah, and to reaccentuate the centrality of the State of Israel. We should lead the Jewish public in doing so.

7. Confront Science and Culture.

Despite the fact that our youth become doctors and accountants and go to movies, our schools have not yet confronted head-on the ideological challenges that astronomy, physics, art, philosophy and modern sexual permissiveness pose to traditional dogma. Modern Orthodox youth have to be formally schooled in understanding the ideological choices they confront.

8. Modernize the Study of Jewish Law, Especially Talmud.

Make Talmud study exciting and relevant using state-of-the-art teaching methodologies and reference to modern-day legal problems and precedents. Adopt strategies that teach Talmudic issues, not merely pages of Talmud. The sad truth is that Talmud is the most unpopular subject in many Orthodox schools.

9. Advance the Status of Women.

Great social change in the status of women is already underway within Orthodoxy. We must continue to develop Torah-study opportunities for women, support the assumption by women of leadership in rabbinical courts and in family law areas, and push harder to resolve problems faced by women in Judaism, such as the plight of agunot.

10. Produce More

Broadly Educated Rabbis.

Modern Orthodoxy is as good as its rabbis. None of the above developments will be possible without rabbis who possess the halachic erudition and the broad, worldly knowledge necessary to make religious law intellectually powerful and emotionally appealing. Can we produce such leaders?

Ten Commandments for Modern Orthodoxy Read More »

Draining the Swamps

Leave a Comment / Other Voices /

Passover in Jerusalem, the holiday of freedom. Wildflowers decorate the hillsides, allergic sneezers fill the sidewalk cafes, schoolchildren on vacation munch matzah at the zoo, and Israel’s month-old national unity government, top-heavy with the biggest number of ministers in our little country’s history, faces a dizzying array of Herculean challenges.

It is a truth nearly universally acknowledged in Israel and the United States that we offered the Palestinians peace, and they chose bloodshed. More Jews and Arabs are killed almost daily. Clearly this situation is untenable. How to end it?

Sharon’s position is that negotiations with the Palestinians cannot continue unless the violence is brought to an end. What makes this challenge mightier is that from the Palestinian point of view, Israel’s enforced occupation in Gaza and the West Bank is itself a manifestation of perpetual violence. Will greater Israeli force solve anything? Is ending the occupation the only way to end the violence? Which is the cart, and which the horse?

According to a recent poll in Yediot Aharonot, 70 percent of Israelis believe that the way to go at this point is "unilateral separation" from the Palestinians. In other words, simply pack up and leave the Palestinians with some variation of the deal that Barak offered Arafat at Camp David and that Arafat turned down. Interestingly but not surprisingly, only half the Israelis who supported this idea also told the pollsters that they believed it could be implemented. Indeed, only 38 percent of the public, after half a year of the renewed intifada, think that peace can be achieved with the Palestinians.

So what now? We could all sink into depression, since it would appear that the best the Sharon government can hope for on the Palestinian front is to minimize bloodshed and avert an all-out conflict. On the other hand, this new administration, which is after all a unity government including ministers from many sides of the political aisles, could make a virtue of necessity and set about the long-neglected challenge of seriously addressing the myriad social, cultural, educational, environmental and economic problems plaguing the country.

In fact, the new education minister, Limor Livnat, has announced her intention to do just that. She has declared war on the so-called phenomenon of "post-Zionism," which like its semantic cousin "postmodernism" is a concept so vague and variegated as to serve brilliantly the needs of both its proponents and its detractors. If I am reading her right, what Livnat has most in mind is the alleged assault on Zionist values by historians (and by school textbooks written under their influence) who have sought to demythologize Israeli history and draw attention to the injustices wrought upon the Palestinians in the name of Jewish nationalism. "The new Israeli schoolbooks," she opined in the Jerusalem Post, "silence the sufferings of the Jewish people and its connection to the Land of Israel." The chief bugbear of Livnat and others in her camp is a ninth-grade textbook titled "A World of Changes," which turned out to be full of sloppy errors of omission and commission, and which a professional committee has ordered back onto the drawing board.

But are textbooks really the point? The larger question is this: Is the traditional ideology without which the State of Israel could never have come into being and have drawn the support of the community of nations — that Jews are forever besieged and beleaguered, that we automatically command the moral high ground, that we are David fighting off an Arab Goliath — accurate or germane in today’s world? And if it needs updating, does that somehow invalidate or undermine the security and well-being of Israel?

I’m one of those Israelis who believes that reworking our familiar worldview doesn’t weaken the Zionist enterprise but rather invigorates it. Sure, it’s true that many young Israelis are turned off to Judaism and to traditional Zionist ideology, but the way to win them back is not through indoctrination. The original Zionist idea may have been the creation of a country in which everyone was Jewish, but it hasn’t turned out that way; nearly one-fifth of the country is Arab, and discrimination against Arab citizens of Israel — economic, educational, infrastructural — is deep-seated and legion. Some Israelis interpreted the rioting last fall of Israeli Arabs, alongside the outbreak of the intifada, as confirmation of their disloyalty to Israel. A much fairer and more productive assessment is that the riots were an expression of legitimate, long-standing grievances. Thirteen Arab demonstrators were shot dead by Israeli police; would this have occurred if these citizens were Jews? Indeed, the latest round of demonstrations by Israeli Arab citizens — on "Land Day" at the end of March, an annual protest against the confiscation of land by the Israeli government — was strikingly nonviolent, following an accord reached between police and local Arab officials.

Now listen to Ron Pundak, a respected Israeli academic instrumental in originating the Oslo peace process, who lately called in Ha’aretz for a "Zionism of renewal, a Zionism of the 21st century, a Turbo Zionism": "What we need is a state that not only serves the Zionist idea but is capable of adjusting its center of gravity; a state that can start, first and foremost, to serve its citizens and residents, while upholding … ‘the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of race, creed or sex; [and] will guarantee full freedom of conscience, worship, education and culture’ as stated in Israel’s Declaration of Independence."

Not since the early settlers drained the malarial swamps has Israel faced such a bracing challenge: to be a Jewish and democratic state at the same time, in the fullest sense. Can Israeli society, at long last, treat non-Jews as equal citizens, as its founders pledged? Can a way be found to ensure that all Israelis — religious and secular, Arab and Jew — fairly shoulder the responsibilities of citizenship? There is every reason to hope that the members of a new generation, their eyes wide open to the compromises and paradoxes of Israeli life, will prove no less ingenious and dedicated than their pioneering grandparents.

Draining the Swamps Read More »

Grammar Police

Leave a Comment / Singles /

My name is Teresa Strasser and I’ve made grammatical errors.

My story begins with a piece I wrote several months ago. Give me a second, I need to compose myself.

It’s hard to admit this, even to a group as supportive and nurturing as you. Let me just take a deep breath. Okay, here goes. I used the phrase "My mother and I" when I should have said, "My mother and me." I’ll be honest; I did this not once but twice in one column.

I can’t tell you what a shame spiral I’m in. Did I just end that sentence with a preposition? Will I ever learn?

Numerous readers have sent me notes, admonishing me, chiding me, circling those two errors with red pens before stuffing the offending articles in envelopes with nasty notes.

It’s not bad enough that I have to deal with the disappointment of my friends and family, my own searing sense of total inadequacy for making such obvious mistakes. Now, the Grammar Police are after me. We’ve all had our tangles with the Grammar Police, those rock-bottom moments when we’ve been busted, when we lose our great battle with the rules of the English language.

"Please review the rules of grammar. These errors are quite egregious," wrote one woman from Studio City, her anger manifest in her slashy handwriting.

It’s been far too long since I’ve consulted the Good Book. And by that I mean Strunk and White’s "The Elements of Style." I’ve gone renegade and now I’m paying the price. Shut-ins all over this town are taking time out from entering sweepstakes and filing coupons alpha-numerically to inform me of my shortcomings.

I know it’s for my own good. I understand that proper grammar only helps us to communicate our ideas more precisely, to preserve the integrity of our language.

Still, I must confess something to you here and now. I dislike the Grammar Police. I loathe their letters with the unbridled intensity of an angry poet on open mic night.

When you think about it, what is a grammar-corrector really saying? It all boils down to one simple insight: "I’m smarter than you!" I know we Jews are the People of the Book, but does that mean we have to keep throwing it at one another?

The Grammar Police deliver their little corrections with such glee. (My apologies for the qualifier, as Strunk and White call qualifiers such as "little" and "rather" the leeches that "infest the pond of prose, sucking the blood of words.")

Maybe I’m sliding in my grammar recovery if I say this, but I feel I must. Don’t these people ever make mistakes? Are they so perfect? Let he who has never dangled a participle throw the first stone!

I’d be remiss if at this point I didn’t point out the difference between the casual corrector and the hardcore grammarian who takes the time to write. Let’s face it, my fans aren’t out there circling and sending. I get the sneaking suspicion that those who find fault with my grammar really just can’t stand me. They’re picking on my subject/verb agreement when the real problem runs much deeper.

It’s like when your relationship is ending, and you can’t stand your mate, but all that comes out is your over-wrought reaction to his parking, the soap he picked out, his loud chewing. You’re nit-picking when what you should really do is break up.

When this most recent flood of letters came in, perhaps my anger was not so much at my own grammatical shortcomings, but at the subtext of the corrections. If you hate me, just feel free to lash out at me directly. I can take it. Okay, maybe not. Feeling the Grammar Police’s disapproval of me, not just of my pronouns, I phoned a friend to vent.

"The Grammar Police won’t leave me alone," I wailed. "They don’t read my column for content. They read my column just hoping for a mistake so they can circle it and send it to me. It’s like they’re laying in wait."

He paused and said just one thing.

"That’s ‘lying’ in wait."

Grammar Police Read More »

Redemption Pesach 5761

Leave a Comment / Torah /

One of the enduring memories of my childhood is waking up the morning after Pesach was over. I would rush into the kitchen, and sure enough, everything was gone. The Pesach dishes and counter covers, the contact paper lining the sink, all vestiges of the seders — all gone. You could almost imagine that it had never happened at all. (Of course, my parents who had been up until the wee hours switching the kitchen back would not share this flight of imagination.) In the eyes of a child, it was a wondrous thing. But through my current eyes — the eyes of a parent and teacher — it presents an important challenge. What is left of Pesach after all the matzah is gone? Where do we go from here? What are we supposed to do now?

One answer to these questions requires us to look at a shocking prediction that the prophet Jeremiah once made. In attempting to assure us that God would one day redeem us from the coming (Babylonian) exile, the prophet boldly declared, "Behold, days are coming, when people will no longer speak of God who took the children of Israel out of Egypt, but of God who brought the seed of Israel back from the northern lands and from all the lands to which He had formerly exiled them." So great would be the magnitude of God’s second redemption that the first redemption — the exodus from Egypt — would be forgotten from the lips! The sage Ben Zoma (of haggadah fame) concluded, based upon this verse, that in the age of the Messiah we will no longer be commanded to remember the exodus at all. (And even the sages who disagree with Ben Zoma concede that the original redemption will pale in comparison to the later one.)

In what way will the ultimate redemption so outstrip the original one? Jeremiah’s prediction did have an initial concrete, historical fulfillment that we can analyze for clues. This was when Cyrus, king of Persia, permitted the Jews who had been exiled by the now-defeated Babylonians to return to Jerusalem. When we contrast the behavior of Pharaoh and Cyrus in the two redemption stories, the critical difference between the redemptions becomes clear, and our charge as we emerge from the Pesach holiday starts to come into focus as well.

Pharaoh, as is stated repeatedly, did not release us from Egypt; he expelled us from Egypt. He expelled us out of fear of death. He did not act out of a moral recognition that people deserved to be free or out of a religious understanding that all people, including himself, were the subjects of the one, universal God. He threw us out when he could no longer bear God’s direct application of deadly force. The exodus from Egypt represented a very crude form of redemption — one that did not leave behind a moral or religious footprint. And we should consider this as we fold up the matzah cover and put it away for next year.

By contrast, Cyrus was at least partially motivated by the belief that exiled peoples should have the right to return to their land, rebuild their national lives, and worship their god. The nobility of Cyrus’ motives is affirmed through Isaiah’s repeated reference to Cyrus as the anointed one (mashiach) of God. This second redemption was, then, far more exalted than the first. The ultimate redemption — the one that embraces both Israel and all the nations of the world — will be animated by the most exalted spirit of all. The land will become filled with the knowledge of God, says the prophet, as the sea is filled with water. People will accord each other respect and dignity and recognize one another’s human rights not because they are compelled to do so by some outside force but because we will all understand that all are the children of the God of the creation.

No wonder the story of the Exodus will fade from memory.

The message then, that we take from Pesach is that the process of redemption also needs redemption and that it is we who are called upon to push it forward. Our retelling of the original story is a reminder to us that what we seek to bring to this world is the finer, more God-conscious model of redemption. This is a challenging task in a world that grows more competitive even as it allegedly shrinks, and at a time when our immediate neighbors in our national homeland have returned to the most primitive model in attempting to achieve their redemption. But we are a people of unflagging creativity and undying faith.

Pesach ends, and the matzah is gone. And these are the signals that the next chapters are calling to us anew.

Redemption Pesach 5761 Read More »

Kishon Feted

Leave a Comment / Entertainment, Up Front /

Ephraim Kishon, Israel’s premier humorist and satirist, stood smiling on the stage of the ornate Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood last week as he accepted a "Lifetime Visionary Award," bestowed by the 17th Israeli Film Festival to mark the opening of its eight-day run in Los Angeles.

"I’m glad to be in Los Angeles and actually get an award," said the 76-year-old author, playwright and filmmaker.

The predominantly Israeli audience got the point.

Kishon had come to Los Angeles in 1964, when his initial filmmaking effort, "Sallah," became the first Israeli movie to be nominated for an Oscar as best foreign-language film.

He returned in 1973, when "The Policeman" was similarly nominated. In both cases, the Academy Award eluded him.

Two nights after he appeared at the Egyptian, Kishon was greeted by another enthusiastic Israeli audience at the Zanuck Theatre on the 20th Century Fox studio lot, for a free-flowing interview on his life and times, complemented by screened clips from five of his movies.

Under less-than-astute questioning by American-Israeli actor Mike Burstyn, Kishon quickly disposed of the first 25 years of his life in Budapest, where his name was Ferenc Hoffman and he was once hailed by the Communist minister of culture as "the hope of Socialist humor."

Some Kishon observations:

"When I first showed ‘Sallah’ [arguably the most famous and funniest of all Israeli movies], the critics walked out and petitioned the government not to let the film out of the country lest it shame Israel’s name. My own wife told me that it was terrible and to forget about making any more movies."

"We have now in Israel a pool of talented actors and directors and the best equipment, but we don’t have audiences. There’s too much competition from the Internet and porno videos."

"The Disney studio optioned my film ‘The Big Dig’ and sent me a 40-page contract. I wrote back that I would sign only a four-page contract, so next day they sent back a four-page contract. Then they paid $250,000 to someone to write a script, which missed the main point of the movie. It never got made."

"You ask what are my future plans. I’ve now passed the biblical age [of 70]. My goal is to be healthy and rich.

Kishon Feted Read More »

Focusing on Israel

Leave a Comment / Israel, Up Front /

After a lengthy hiatus, American Jews, especially younger ones, are again focusing on Israel as a top priority.

“During the last seven to eight years, American Jews thought that Israel’s worst problems were over and turned their attention to domestic communal problems,” said Kenneth Jacobson, director of international affairs for the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

A similar attitude has prevailed on Capitol Hill. “It used to be that senators and congressmen were familiar with Israel’s problems and had visited there,” Jacobson said. “That largely changed with the new Congress elected in 1994 and coincided with the end of the Cold War and a sharp upturn in the Israeli economy.”

Newly elected Prime Minister Ariel Sharon seems aware of the need to reinvigorate his country’s relationships with these two key constituencies. During his recent trip to the United States, he made a point of mending ties with Congress and emphasizing the importance of American Jewry.

“Both Prime Ministers Binyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak relied more on their personal relationships with the White House. In a sense, Sharon seems to be returning to an older Israeli policy,” Jacobson commented during a recent visit to Los Angeles.

Jacobson, who also serves as ADL’s assistant national director, has written extensively on Israel and the Middle East in a number of books and major newspapers.

Despite a perception among many Jews that the American media are biased against Israel, Jacobson noted that a survey of editorials in 50 leading newspapers showed the majority to be pro-Israel.

Similarly, polls conducted by ADL and other organizations found strong sympathy for Israel and little for the Arabs.

“We cannot be complacent, but there certainly is no groundswell against Israel, either in Congress or among the general public,” Jacobson said.

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Incidental Intelligence

Leave a Comment / Entertainment, Film, Up Front /

British actor Ben Kingsley has played a number of Jewish characters with such authenticity that questions frequently pop up about his possible Jewish background.

He was unforgettable as the accountant Yitzhak Stern in "Schindler’s List" and earlier had the title role in the TV movie "Murderers Among Us: The Simon Wiesenthal Story."

He portrayed a less inspiring Jewish figure, mobster Meyer Lansky, in "Bugsy" (1991) and will play father Otto Frank in the ABC miniseries "Anne Frank" (May 20-21).

Kingsley (born Krishna Banji, the son of an Indian physician and a British model and actress) phoned me this week from England to draw attention to a PBS reprise of "Schindler’s List," so I asked him about possible Jewish antecedents.

"I am not absolutely certain, but to the best of my knowledge, I am one-quarter Jewish on my mother’s side," he said. Then he added, with a touch of irritation, "It gets a little ludicrous to quantify such things. It’s liking counting chromosomes or measuring the shapes of noses."

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Free Hebrew School

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People insist that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. But HaShalom, a small Sephardic Orthodox congregation in the Pico-Robertson area, is offering local public school children exactly that. When students in grades K-8 arrive at HaShalom at the end of their secular school day, they enjoy a hot meal, courtesy of Haifa Restaurant. And along with the food, they receive, absolutely free, classes in Hebrew and Jewish tradition.

The co-principals of this one-of-a-kind Hebrew school are Rabbi Hagay Batzri and his wife, Luna. Both grew up in Jerusalem, where Luna trained as a teacher. The goal of the Batzris is to provide Hebrew and religious instruction for Jewish youngsters whose parents cannot — or choose not to — send them to day schools. With the help of a congregant honoring his father’s memory, they have so far established four twice-a-week classes catering to different age groups. The school has been in existence only since November, but it has already attracted 72 students. Another 30 are on a waiting list until additional class levels can be organized.

The students at HaShalom come from a variety of Jewish backgrounds, with many tracing their roots to Morocco, Iran, Russia, and even Mexico. Luna Batzri explains that "most of them are not religious." Nonetheless they are highly responsive to what they are learning: "They’re sitting with their mouths open. This is their history, and they love to hear it. They want to know where they are coming from." As the children discover traditional Jewish practice, the Batzris avoid embarrassing those who are not observant at home. "Our way is the way of love," Luna Batzri said. But they firmly convey to their class of eighth-grade boys that bar mitzvah is a fitting time to choose a Jewish lifestyle.

HaShalom has received so many inquiries from Valley parents that the Batzris are now committed to founding a second branch of their school somewhere in the mid-Valley, beginning this fall. Another goal is a new bat mitzvah class in which 12-year-old girls can learn the traditions of Jewish womanhood. Rabbi Batzri would like to see HaShalom start a nationwide trend: "I hope this will motivate other congregations across the United States to make a revolution in Jewish education. [By establishing free Hebrew schools,] we can save a lot of public school children who are getting lost."

For more information, call HaShalom Congregation at (310) 652-9014.

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