"a view in the Palestinian Talmud that non-Jews do not even exist"?Many Jews are familiar with negative images from the Koran if only because these are used frequently in the ongoing propaganda wars between Zionist and anti-Zionist groups. Yet many Jews are unaware that within Jewish sources there are also many negative stereotypes about “the other”, the most radical perhaps being a view in the Palestinian Talmud that non-Jews do not even exist.
These sorts of jarring views are sadly common place in almost all religious literature and as a consequence religion has all too often played a negative role in this conflict.
Dan refers to himself as a "left wing Orthodox Jew" and his bio reads:
Dan Rickman is an alumnus of an ultra-orthodox Jewish school in London and Oxford University who currently works in the IT industry. He has an MA in Hebrew and Jewish studies from the University of LondonIs he referring to this?
"The Jews are human beings, but the nations of the world are not human beings but beasts. (Baba Mecia 114-6)."
which is countered:
Baba Mecia 114-6. This quotation is a complete fabrication. Even the numbering is incorrect. There can be no 114-6; it has to be 114a or 114b.
Maybe this?
In a parallel story in the Talmud Yerushalmi, Rabban Gamaliel responds to the criticism (there concerning whether property stolen from a non-Jew could be used) by reversing the law--and forbidding the use of an object stolen from a gentile--lest the law cause God's name to be profaned (Talmud Yerushalmi Bava Kamma 4:3, 2c).
Even from here I can't figure it out.
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10 comments:
hi thanks for blogging about my article feel free to comment there as well
there is material there which I don't like posting directly and there are sites out there that re-cycle quotes and get them wrong however check out http://www.daatemet.org/articles/article.cfm?article_id=119&LANG=en
Tfiya was short-lived and represented a very minor element within the extreme nationalist camp, Kahanist basically. The author runs Machon Shilo which takes outlandish positions on kitniyiot, etc. But whatever, that you wrote a throw-away line - "in the Palestinian Talmud" - without context, without discussion, etc. is a very poor way of dealing with the subject especially as, presumably, you know that 99% of Rabbis do not interpret any Gemara dealing with goyim in a way that could be understood either as referring to "non-Jews" with no other definitions or as as actually in practice today instead of being theoretical. You certainly did a disservice in your "scholarship".
Oh, and depending on Shahak and listing him at your blog is reprehensible. The guy was psycho - I knew him.
hi the purpose of sending that link was to demonstrate that these are real quotes which your original post didn't seem to acknowledge.
In passing, whilst I don't agree with their politics, the Machon Shilo position on kitniyot actually makes sense to me but that is another story - I hear that they received death threats from the kashrut inspectors who would have lost their jobs so this was a non-starter anyway...
The question is to what extent less extreme but still highly negative views of non-Jews permeate modern halakhic responsa. I'd suggest that this is a real issue from what I have seen of these responsa and some work done in the scholarly world. There are modern responsa which are negative about non-Jews and un the religious zionist world which often cite Sheva Umot and Amalek as archetypes. More to the point, where is the reaction of the alleged "mainstream" to say those who interpret halakha along these lines are wrong - if you are aware of any such responses I'd be grateful for references, to the best of my knowledge such voices are few and far between and there is an increasing parochialism in modern responsa.
As for the scholarship, whilst people like Marc Hirshman in his book Torah lekhol ba'ei haolam argue against this to some extent, the consensus is along the lines of Gary Porton in his book Goyim: Gentiles and Israelites in Mishnah-Tosefta who suggested that in these early rabbinic works "The gentiles and Israelites represent two classes of human beings". I'd like to think this was wrong.
The idea of an essential difference between Jew and non-Jew is certainly reflected in mystical literature and you can see this in all strands - don't forget the influence of such thinking via Rav A Y Kook and the influence of works such as the Tanya through Habad and the mainstream religious zionist movement etc.
Whilst Shahak (who I never met) was without doubt a troubled person his works have been very influential especially on the left and are widely available. Again where is the rabbinic response - apart from the late Rabbi Jakobovits who I referred to in my article and a very small number of mixed and assorted responses on the web, where is the response to this?
Shahak didn't make up his quotes even though he was selective. I made some effort to honestly address the issues he raised which are out there in the public domain already - this needed to be done in my view and I make no apology for doing so. The people who in my view need to do more are the silent mainstream who appear to not speak up when "extreme" rabbis say intolerable things and who also fail to address these issues head-on (and they are not easy but they are pressing)
a) just for the record, which Talmud Yerushalmi quotation were you referring to?
b) since most of the disputation and discussions dealt not with actual physical conditions but spiritual, etc., and you note even mystical, your throw-away line was most unfortunate.
see yBerakhot 9:1 and alsp in similar vein bMeg 28a and various midrashim on Isaiah 40:17 e.g. Vayikra Rabba 27:7, Pirkei deRabbi Eliezer 9:6. Amd other references
on your second point, the Talmudim deal with all sorts of subjects from a range of perspectives to describe them as dealing with "spiritual" conditions is bizarre and in any case in what way does this lessen the impact rather than make it worse - spiritual matters are after all generally timeless, physical ones more likely to be temporally bound
Odd, especially for someone who claims to have gone to an Orthodox Yeshiva to use those quotation references. Your first source should be Talmud Yerushalmi Chapt. 9, Halacha 1, Page 63b. Anway, it is written there:
ברוך שלא עשאני גוי שאין הגוים כלום כל הגוים כאין נגדו.
referring to an opinion, which we do not follow, that only three blessings are recited first thing in the morning and one of them is: "blessed is He who has not made me a non-Jew for the non-Jews are nothing, and are as nothing as compared to Him". The context there is in the spiritual realm as the other two benedictions are
לא עשאני בור and שלא עשאני אשה
that the ignoramus has no awe of sin and a woman is not commanded for many of the mitzvot.
To refer to this as support for your position as published is not wise.
The second reference is quite unique in that it follows a description of a Rabbi being compared to a beast in pasture but that you skip and jump to a part where a Rabbi says 'I would be blessed if I didn't need to look upon a non-Jew or a Kuti'. That's it there at Megillah 28a. Pretty weak support.
I'll stop here. This is leading us nowhere. It would seem your scholarship is quite second-hand and not primary.
some of my scholarship is from dealing with primary sources and some comes from scholarly material i.e. secondary sources - hardly astonishing. I cited that list of references from a secondary source well spotted
I didn't expect to impress you but thanks in any case for taking an interest
I'd suggest that the lack of wisdom is not on my part but doubtless we will never agree in that regard
Well, finally, here is something you could use:
"Rabbi Yitzhak Shapiro, who heads the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva in the Yitzhar settlement, wrote in his book "The King's Torah" that even babies and children can be killed if they pose a threat to the nation.
Shapiro based the majority of his teachings on passages quoted from the Bible, to which he adds his opinions and beliefs.
"It is permissable to kill the Righteous among Nations even if they are not responsible for the threatening situation," he wrote, adding: "If we kill a Gentile who has sinned or has violated one of the seven commandments - because we care about the commandments - there is nothing wrong with the murder."
a) i don't agree with this and I will be seeking out the book to go over his sources;
b) i doubt he could get 10 Rabbis to support him;
c) Od Yosef is a radical Yeshiva and surely is as representative of mainstream Judaism as Toldot Aharon or Neturei Karta.
have a look at this thread from the UK Guardian regarding the use of rodef by Geoffrey Alderman representing his understanding of an orthodox viewpoint
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jan/12/judaism-gaza-israel-halachah
I think there is a moral imperative to counter such views
you also need to be aware as I say that Shahak is out there and needs to be countered - the attempts to do so are far and few between afaik
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