Religion & Beliefs
Responding to Cousin Moishe
By Jewcy Staff / June 3, 2009
Last week, we posted an email sent to "Noah," a Jewish guy about to marry his non-Jewish girlfriend "Sheila," by his ultra-Orthodox cousin "Moishe." Moishe vehemently – and inarticulately – disapproved of Noah’s choice and sent him an email encouraging him to break off the engagement. Here is Noah’s response.
Moishe,
While I was saddened by this email, sadly I was not surprised. I’m going to let you in on a little secret. You’ve always sort of been a family joke.  That wacky cousin, who could never keep a job and kept looking for meaning in his life, bouncing from false hope to false hope (think about how much time you wasted on EST, seriously, how stupid do you have to be to believe in that crap.)  Everyone sort of humored you and thought it was funny, while wondering when you would actually grow up and start acting like a man.  I understand it was difficult without having your father involved daily in your life.
Let me be perfectly clear, I don’t believe in god. Â I’m culturally Jewish, I honor and appreciate the traditions, but I am not religious in any sense of the word. Â So you can continue being the family joke as long as you want. Â As a relative I wish you nothing but happiness. Â As a man I shake my head in disgust at your utter lack of substance and accomplishment.Â
Sheila has twice the substance, character and intellect than you could ever hope to attain. Â You would be lucky to meet a woman as strong both mentally and morally as her. Â But even if you were lucky enough to find such a woman, you would inevitably chase her away with your limited world view, which is predicated on hate and distrust. Â You are the reason there is anti-semitism in the world, with these ridiculous pablums that you spew: "the fact is that a jew is a much more advanced being than a non jew and basically the dynamics behind the relationship could be regarded as one who owns a pet and for what reasons."
There will be a time maybe in 5 years, maybe in 50 years, when you’ll realize you’ve wasted your life and you’ll probably ask for my forgiveness for ever sending this email. Â I will never grant you that wish.
I’ve already written your mother and explained how disgraced she should be that her son would ever send such an email.  And I am confident that once my mom reads this she will cut off communication with you as well. Because the only person I know that believes in god and organized religion less than me is my mom. Â
I consider this email the final communication we ever have. Â Please make no attempt to ever contact me again. Â – NoahÂ
Lest you think Moishe was willing to heed his cousin’s request to back off, in next week’s installment Moishe tries to appeal to Noah’s mother, Rachel.
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perhaps tatanano is saying right. I had to agree with him.
And this shoud our attitude in all matters not only in this one.
miamijewboy, while in understand your sentiment, i’m not sure i understand the argument you have expressed. if your girlfriend is truly nonpracticing, why would there be any fear that your children would ever be subjected to catholicism or be confused by two different religions? (maybe "subjected" isn’t exactly the right word, but you get my point.) presumably if she as a matter of practice has no religion, she should have no opposition to your children being raised jewish. i think our focus here should not be on prohibiting people from, or denouncing people for, intermarrying, but rather on ensuring those who intermarry raise their children jewish. as i believe some commenter noted previously, in this way not only can we ensure the survival of the jewish community, but we can allow for the possibility of exponential growth not otherwise possible.
Leave her, there are tons of babes around. But if you think this is the best girl for you, dropp everything and go after her, if you really belive shes the one, leave all and go be with her, no matter what, give all you have. This is the only thing that will make your life worthy, if you dont do everything you will ask your self later in your life, what could you do…
This so totally happened when my buddy Brandon started dating this less-rich girl from the wrong side of Wilshire Blvd. I Was like, Brandon, even if you marry her, your parents will make you sign a crazy pre-nup, and so she’ll never REALLY be really rich. Your "friends" at the country club will never love her only for her money like they do with you. And then when you divorce her for your trophy wife, she’ll have nothing and your kids you had with her, who you know you’re going to ignore in favor of your new kids, will hate you because she can only live in a smaller McMansion. Also, (whispering) :::::i think she’s jewish, dude::::::::::
I don’t even think he has a valid point. Moishe doesn’t appear to be worried about Jewish survival: he just thinks non-Jews are animals, therefore we should not marry them.What racist nonsense!
Noah’s action here is incredibly restrained, considering. I imagine this is not the first crazy thing that cousin Moishe has said or done: sometimes you’ve just gotta set boundaries with people who can’t set their own.
While "Moishe" sounds pretty much certifiable and it would be laughable if it weren’t pathetic that he thought that this email would change your mind, intermarriage is a huge problem for the Jewish community and Jewish continuity. I am dating a beautiful, intelligent nonpracticing Catholic girl. She has agreed to covert if we marry. If she hadn’t agreed to this, I would have never continued dating her. Beyond the importance of Jewish continuity to me and to the Jewish community, kids growing up with both religions which have incompatible philosophies often become confused and completely nonpracticing of any faith at all. Jews have struggled for too many years for their children to grow up like this. Jews survived in the face of persecution and adversity. The question is can we survive when non-Jews love us in the literal and figurative senses.
Unfortunately Noah left Moishe way too much info to ensure that he won’t be back, in spite of his request for no further contact. Â
Right off the bat, Noah said he was saddened by the email. I can see it now–Moishe will be all revved-up that the saddness only proves his point: Noah, you wouldn’t be sad if you knew that what you were doing was the right thing to do in G-d’s eyes!!
Whew, my heart goes out to Noah & Sheila. As if wedding preparations weren’t stressful enough!  Â
I understand that pubilicizing these personal exchanges is definitely not ideal (although with reality TV we are so desensitized to this kind of thing)…. but since names were changed, at the very least people’s identities are protected.
We need to hear this stuff. As Jews, we should be deeply, profoundly ashamed of "Moishe"’s extreme, illogical, racist ideas – and that these ideas are being promulgated in actual Jewish institutions (what kind of yeshiva teaches this?). This, of course, isn’t a representation of all Orthodox Jews – many are decent and moderate, and it’s the crazy people that get attention. But the very fact that anyone could say such things in the name of Judaism is a huge embarrassment, and the Jewish community should speak up vociferously against any kind of racist rhetoric.Â
It is Moishe’s ideas that misrepresent Judaism and turn people away from religion. Intermarriage is not a threat to Judaism – Jews who present Judaism in an unpalatable way are. The only kind of Judaism that will survive is one that is moderate and adaptable.
I understand Noah’s response. His cousin crossed the line, and sometimes the only healthy thing to do is end communication.
Moishe’s a little bit crazy. Probably a lotta bit crazy. But one shouldn’t treat their family in such a way, no matter what. Better to simply ignore them than to hurt them with such a parting shot.
This looks like the first draft of an angry email that i would write, but then delete in favor of a more tempered approach…I agree with the basic sentiment that this guy seems to be a ridiculous joke, but I’m pretty sure the rabbis said that pubilc humiliation is the equivalent to murder. He wrote you privately to spew his prejudiced nonsense at you, but you chose to shame him in front of the entire internet. Â
Though I guess I can’t blame you for writing this, considering that the guy called you a "modern Jew-killer" and your fiance a dog, so maybe he deserved it…I wonder what the rabbis said to do about narrowminded douchebags?
Not sure that’s 100% taking the high road there. The second to last full paragraph on its own basically says it all.
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