Look But Don't Touch: Non-Jews aren't the sexual holy grailSince Tamar and Laurel have weighed in on the whole pre-marital sex thing, I wanted to take a shot at it myself. I think enough clever things have been said about talking to frum girls about sex, but what about the guys? One of the responses to Tamar’s post made me cringe. The notion that pre-marital sex with non-Jewish women—or as a charming ex of mine once said “shiksa’s are for practice”—is one that gives me the dry heaves.

First off, what does that say about us as a nation if we consider women who are not of our faith to not count when it comes to sex? To my mind, that’s the same as negating the inherent value of another human being. Not cool.

And, more importantly, not even close to being an halachically sound notion. This might be a new term for many out there, but there’s a clearly little known concept described as menuval birshut hatorah—which basically translates to mean being slimy while remaining within the technical confines of halachah.

Yes, it’s halachically slightly more acceptable to sleep with non-Jewish women because the rules of niddah do not apply to them. But that still doesn’t mean it’s a good plan.

When discussing this topic with my parents—hey, I’m weird like that, what can I say—my dad wisely pointed out: “Remember Pinchas?”

For those who don’t, a quick refresher course: Pinchas is a biblical character renowned for his religious zeal, which earned him the honor of being appointed as a Cohen by G-d.

But let’s go back to Bamidbar 25 3-13, where Pinchas earns this honor.

And one man of the B'nai Yisrael came, and brought to his brothers a Midianite, in the sight of Moshe, and in the sight of all the congregation of B'nai Yisrael, and they were weeping at the door of the Ohel Mo'ed. And Pinchas, ben Elazar, ben Aharon HaKohen saw it, he rose up from among the congregation, and took a spear in his hand. And he went after the man of Yisrael into the tent, and stabbed both of them, the man of Yisrael, and the woman, through her belly. And the plague was stopped from the B'nai Yisrael. And those that died in the plague were twenty-four thousand. And Hashem said to Moshe, saying. Pinchas ben Elazar ben Aharon HaKohen has turned my anger away from the B'nai Yisrael

Please, please, please don’t think that by quoting this story I am suggesting that I think pre-marital sex of ANY kind, be it between Jews and non-Jews or two Jews, warrants a death penalty. We don’t live in Biblical times, and killing someone with a spear would certainly be a far greater crime than getting a little action, despite what the religious right may want you to believe. I’m just saying, there aren’t any stories in the Torah about men getting speared for sleeping with Jewish girls, whether or not they’re married. So maybe, just maybe, sleeping with non-Jewish women isn’t the solution to the Jewish male libido.

It's just that easy: All it takes is a Rabbi and a poleThe other day I was having lunch with a friend, explaining to her how complicated our home search had been, trying to find a place that was the right size, in walking distance from the shul, and within the eruv.

The quizzical look on her face made me realize that, while the years I spent living in and around the New York area made me take an eruv for granted, not everyone knows exactly what one is. Even those of us who know what it is don’t know exactly how/why it works.

So, here goes…a mini lesson in practical halachah.

First of all, the reason behind an eruv is the prohibition against carrying an object from the private to the public domain, i.e. our apartment to the street, and vice versa.

This particular melachah can cause some inconveniences, particularly to women with young children who are unable to walk and need to be carried, because while it is easy to drop a cake off at a friend’s house on Friday afternoon, dropping your kid at another person’s house and leaving it there for the duration of shabbos might be deemed neglect.

But halachah came up with an answer to this problem—the eruv.  There are three types of eruvin, but for our purposes, we will only deal with the kind of eruv that allows us to carry on shabbos.

Simply out, as a Boston Jewish community web site explains:

“Eruv” means merging. Technically, an eruv is the legal procedure that temporarily merges many private domains each Shabbat. [The Eruv] is a mechanism for a community to come together as a domain physically bounded by partitions. The partitions can be more symbolic than substantive, for example existing utility wires can often be used as a symbolic “lintel.” By adding a vertical post under each end of the wire, a symbolic “doorway” can be made. The resulting “form of a doorway” can be a valid part of the boundary.

So, by just putting up a few posts under some telephone wires, an entire Jewish community can be transformed—more young couples will be attracted to the area, more kids will be in shul. Isn’t it amazing the halachic solutions to pressing problems that can be found when there’s a will to find them?

Continue reading...

Tyra Banks: Pushing nudity?I have to preface this post by saying that I’m a huge fan of America’s Next Top Model, a modeling reality show where one character is eliminated each week until the final woman standing is awarded a huge modeling contract.

 For the most part, I’ll agree that it’s a pretty mindless form of entertainment, but in between the cat fights, weekly cries of shock when “Tyra Mail” appears and the random shots of models preparing food to assure us that they really do eat, there are some valuable lessons that can be learned.

I’d like to go back in time to 2003, the first season that this show aired. Among the cast of models were two devout Christians, Shannon and Robin. Despite tension in the house between these devout models and the others, self-proclaimed atheists, the two young women made it into the group of the final four contestants, who were taken to Paris to learn about modeling in a foreign country.

And now, courtesy of Wikipedia, a recap of the particular episode I’d like to discuss (it has since been re-enacted in photo shoots on later episodes of the show)

The final four aspiring models tried on couture outfits for Parisian designers and were asked to pose naked in their photo shoot for diamond jewelry. Robin Manning and Shannon Stewart refused due to their personal sense of morality. Subsequently, these two contestants were called forward as the bottom two, and Robin was ousted.

On the surface, what happened seems clear—the two girls refused to do the task, and they got punished for it. On a deeper level, though, they stood up for their personal sense of tzniut, and they were rebuked for sticking to their beliefs.

Suffering for modesty is something a lot of Jewish men and women can relate to; how many Yeshiva boys have been mocked for playing sports in crisp white shirts and long black pants? How many women have sweated through long sleeved shirts in the summer or had to explain to their job supervisors why they won’t uncover their hair in the office?

  The lesson buried in all this, you ask? Religious Jews, Christians and Muslims share a common bond. Dedication to their values keeps them from fully integrating in mainstream society, but they are willing to make that sacrifice. If we could focus on similar values and beliefs instead of differences, maybe we’d get along better? For more reading on this topic, check out this JTA article by Lisa Sopher.     

I want to call everyone’s attention to a recent JTA editorial by Edgar M. Bronfman on the need for changes in the synagogue. When I saw the title, “Synagogues must experiment to remain vital in Jewish life,” I got all excited because I, like many of us out there, get bored sitting in shul for hours and end up showing up at 10 to cut into the drudgery.

But reading on a little bit, I got confused by some of his suggestions:

In the world of Orthodoxy, why wouldn’t a rabbi experiment with some forms of gender equality? Even within the limitations of Orthodox Jewish law, why wouldn’t a rabbi try to propose that instead of a minyan of 10 men, there should be one of 10 men and 10 women?

Um, excuse me? Has he been in any Orthodox shul outside of New York recently?  In my shul, we have a minyan signup sheet because attendance is so low, and still on most days the only names on the sheet are those of the rabbi and the cantor. If we can’t get 10 people to show up, what makes Mr. Bronfman think we can get 20?

He goes on with another suggestion, and here’s where I really get steamed up:

Why wouldn’t a rabbi in a Reform congregation experiment with dispensing of the Torah reading as it is done now, ask the congregants to read the parshah before the service begins, and then have a discussion involving any congregant who wants to be involved? Perhaps the same rabbi would refrain from giving a sermon to allow time to thoroughly discuss the Torah reading.

Come on now. Get rid of Torah reading altogether, but only possibly get rid of the sermon? And, based on his later observations that people don’t want to spend that much time in shul, how many people does he think are actually going to read the parshah at home? A discussion with one congregant isn’t a service, it’s a tutorial.

I agree we need to change, but these types of changes lead to one thing, which even Mr. Bronfman hints at in his editorial.

The Evangelical churches burgeoning across the country prove that if done properly, congregational life can be meaningful and relevant to the lives of people and a source of communal identification. 

I’ve never attended an Evangelical service, but from what I’ve heard, they basically consist of singing some Gospels and listening to the preacher. If we eliminate the davening and torah reading from shul, we’re eliminating some of the very things that separate us from the other religions. If we sell Judaism to young people by saying, ‘our services are just like the Church’s,’ then soon the only reason they’ll have to choose shul over church is a preference for sleeping in on Sundays.

Continue reading...

Yum: Don't you want some?For many of us out there, a Jewish holiday is preceded by a trip to the butcher. It’s often followed by a few days of detox, whose activities includes but are not limited to, hitting the gym, eating lots of fruits and veggies and groaning over and over again, “I can’t believe I ate all that meat.”

Now, I’m not one of those people; in fact, quite the opposite. I am more carnivore than omnivore. When I was growing up, my family ate meat ON EVERY HOLIDAY, and that included Shavuot, when most people celebrate the giving of the Torah by eating dairy foods.

This chag, my husband is protesting my love of meat, requesting at least one dairy meal. So, to gear myself up, and just for fun, my personal Top Ten list of why to eat dairy this Shavuot.

10. Cheese costs less than steak

9. Ice cream for dessert (or as an appetizer, whatever your preference)

8. The gematria for the word Halav (milk) is 40. We eat dairy on Shavuot to remember the 40 days Moshe spent on Har Sinai before we received the Torah.

7. Yummy (and easy!) recipes like this one:

This cheesecake can be topped with any flavor of canned pie filling
for a finishing touch.
INGREDIENTS:
8 oz. pkg. cream cheese, softened
3 Tbsp. lemon juice
14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk (NOT evaporated)
1 9" graham cracker crust
PREPARATION:
In medium bowl beat cream cheese until smooth and fluffy. Add lemon
juice and sweetened condensed milk and mix until very well combined.
Pour into graham cracker crust and chill. Makes 8 servings

6. In the Torah, Israel is referred to as the “Land of Milk and Honey”—we celebrate receiving the Torah and the promises in it by eating milchig food

5. The Torah itself is compared to milk as, according to some interpretations, it says in Shir Hashirim 4:11: “Like honey and milk [the Torah] lies under your tongue”

4. You finally get to break out the ‘company’ dairy dishes you so wisely registered for

3.  With the giving of the Torah, the Jewish nation became obligated to keep kosher. The Torah, however, was given on Shabbat, so no utensils could be koshered and no animals could be killed. As a result, on that day the Jews ate dairy, and we do so in solidarity with them

2.  Another gematria: Gevinah (cheese) has a value of 70, equivalent to the 70 faces of the Torah

1.  Because you can always eat meat after milk, but do it the other way around and you’ll have to wait a few hours!!!

The United States officially separates church and state, something for which everyone, from Jewish storeowners opening shop on Sunday to kids not saying other religions’ prayers in school, is grateful. 

But a recent court case in Nashville, TN makes me wonder if people are forgetting the importance of these separations.

Some background, as explained by the Nashville Jewish Observer:

Metro Nashville’s Charter requires that runoff citywide elections (necessary if any one Mayoral candidate does not receive greater than 50% of the electoral vote) be held on the second Thursday in September, which this year falls on Rosh Hashanah.

Enter Elinor Gregor, who files a federal law suit challenging the actions of the government. She claims that

The scheduling of the election deprives observant Jews of their rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, and the Fourteenth Amendment right to Equal Protection of the Laws.

Her lawyer, George Barrett, explains:

“Ms. Gregor will be required to vote, if she can vote at all, on a date earlier than election day. So election day will be available to all other, non-Jewish voters, but not to Jewish voters. That deprives her—and all other Jewish voters—of the equal protection of our voting laws. It takes away from Jewish voters an opportunity to vote that everyone else has.”

Am I missing something here? Didn’t he just say that Jewish voters will still have the right to vote early? Has he never heard of absentee ballots? Should all the soldiers currently overseas file similar suits because they don’t have the same chance to vote as other Nashville residents, thus violating their First Amendment rights? Nonetheless, despite what seem to be obvious flaws in this case, there’s been public support from both the Jewish and non-Jewish communities on this.

But here’s the thing—of the greater than 1.4 million Metro Nashville residents, fewer than 15,000 are JewishAt a Crossroads: The separation of church and state may be at risk.  While it’s tempting to challenge such perceived affronts to our community, it’s a slippery slope we’re standing on here. 

In the Diaspora, Jews are a minority. If we expect our faith to be given pre-eminence in government decisions, it’s only a matter of time before we see other religious groups imposing spiritual demands on the public. Do we want to see a return of the blue laws, or worse yet, blue, green, red and yellow laws, a different set to please each religious group in the country? Now, I’m all for people going to shul on Rosh Hashanah, but come on guys, figure out a way to get everything done without a government injunction. Keep your religious beliefs in the private realm, if you want to maintain the freedom to worship as you alone choose.

Just as a closing note, the government completely disagrees with me….