Another American Hero: Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch

Another brave American fighting for our constitutional freedom is bestselling author Robert Spencer. He is the founder and executive director of JihadWatch, website: http://www.jihadwatch.com/ This site updates on the latest acts of terrorism around the world by radical Islamic Jihad.

 

The following are Robert Spencer's books including his best-sellers. Read these and pass them around! (Thanks Wikipedia for the list :)

Best sellers

• The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion, Regnery Press, 2006 (NYT bestseller list – 2006-10-29) ISBN 1-59698-028-1
• The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (And the Crusades), Regnery Press, 2005. (NYT bestseller list – 2005-10-16) ISBN 0-89526-013-1

Other books

• Pamela Geller; Robert Spencer (July 27, 2010). The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War on America. Threshold Editions. p. 400. ISBN 978-1439189306. 
• The Complete Infidels' Guide to the Koran. Regnery Press. September 21, 2009. p. 260. ISBN 978-1596981041. 
• Stealth Jihad: How Radical Islam is Subverting America without Guns or Bombs. Regnery Press. October 28, 2008. ISBN 978-1596985568. 
• Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't, Regnery Publishing, 2007, ISBN 1-59698-515-1
• The Myth of Islamic Tolerance: How Islamic Law Treats Non-Muslims (editor), Prometheus Books, 2005. ISBN 1-59102-249-5
• Onward Muslim Soldiers: How Jihad Still Threatens America and the West, Regnery Publishing, 2003. ISBN 0-89526-100-6
• (with Daniel Ali) (2003). Inside Islam: A Guide for Catholics: 100 questions and answers. Ascension Press. p. 197. ISBN 0-9659228-5-5. 
• Islam Unveiled: Disturbing Questions About the World's Fastest Growing Faith. Encounter Books. October 25, 2002. p. 202. ISBN 1893554589.

An American Hero: David Yerushalmi - "The Man Behind the Anti-Shariah Movement"

David Yerushalmi is a lawyer who has created the bill that calls for only American Laws in American Courts. Sad that we have come to this - that we have to lobby to put a bill in place that insures our own courts practice our own law! (Whole blog coming revealing court cases that have upheld Islamic Sharia Law above our own Constitutional law.)

Pamela Geller's comments on the NY Times article on her lawyer Yerushalmi:

David Yerushalmi: "The Man Behind the Anti-Shariah Movement"

The New York Times has a lengthy piece on a man I consider a national treasure, and I am not just saying that because he is my lawyer, representing me in numerous cases (i.e., the $10,000,000 lawsuit brought by Rifqa Bary's parents; the violation of free speech in the banning of my freedom buses; the NYC transit ban on my Ground Zero mosque buses, etc.).

The Times gets it wrong, of course. It woud be kind of wonderful for the likes of Andrea Elliot to practice her craft in a sharia-compliant country and spare us her smears and deceptive whitewash of the most brutal ideology on the face of the earth.

It's a smear piece, and a heads up to Ms. Elliot, America is behind the anti-shariah movement.

NY Times article below:

The Man Behind the Anti-Shariah Movement

By ANDREA ELLIOTT

Published: July 30, 2011

NASHVILLE — Tennessee’s latest woes include high unemployment, continuing foreclosures and a battle over collective-bargaining rights for teachers. But when a Republican representative took the Statehouse floor during a recent hearing, he warned of a new threat to his constituents’ way of life: Islamic law.

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Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

David Yerushalmi has quietly led a national movement.

Multimedia

Video Feature

Islamic Law and American Courts

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Erik Schelzig/Associated Press

Residents watched in downtown Nashville as state lawmakers discussed an antiterrorism measure.

The representative, a former fighter pilot named Rick Womick, said he had been studying the Koran. He declared that Shariah, the Islamic code that guides Muslim beliefs and actions, is not just an expression of faith but a political and legal system that seeks world domination. “Folks,” Mr. Womick, 53, said with a sudden pause, “this is not what I call ‘Do unto others what you’d have them do unto you.’ ”

Similar warnings are being issued across the country as Republican presidential candidates, elected officials and activists mobilize against what they describe as the menace of Islamic law in the United States.

Since last year, more than two dozen states have considered measures to restrict judges from consulting Shariah, or foreign and religious laws more generally. The statutes have been enacted in three states so far.
Voters in Oklahoma overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment last November that bans the use of Islamic law in court. And in June, Tennessee passed an antiterrorism law that, in its original iteration, would have empowered the attorney general to designate Islamic groups suspected of terror activity as “Shariah organizations.”

A confluence of factors has fueled the anti-Shariah movement, most notably the controversy over the proposed Islamic center near ground zero in New York, concerns about homegrown terrorism and the rise of the Tea Party. But the campaign’s air of grass-roots spontaneity, which has been carefully promoted by advocates, shrouds its more deliberate origins.

In fact, it is the product of an orchestrated drive that began five years ago in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in the office of a little-known lawyer, David Yerushalmi, a 56-year-old Hasidic Jew with a history of controversial statements about race, immigration and Islam. Despite his lack of formal training in Islamic law, Mr. Yerushalmi has come to exercise a striking influence over American public discourse about Shariah.
Working with a cadre of conservative public-policy institutes and former military and intelligence officials, Mr. Yerushalmi has written privately financed reports, filed lawsuits against the government and drafted the model legislation that recently swept through the country — all with the effect of casting Shariah as one of the greatest threats to American freedom since the cold war.

The message has caught on. Among those now echoing Mr. Yerushalmi’s views are prominent Washington figures like R. James Woolsey, a former director of the C.I.A., and the Republican presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Michele Bachmann, who this month signed a pledge to reject Islamic law, likening it to “totalitarian control.”

Yet, for all its fervor, the movement is arguably directed at a problem more imagined than real. Even its leaders concede that American Muslims are not coalescing en masse to advance Islamic law. Instead, they say, Muslims could eventually gain the kind of foothold seen in Europe, where multicultural policies have allowed for what critics contend is an overaccommodation of Islamic law.

“Before the train gets too far down the tracks, it’s time to put up the block,” said Guy Rodgers, the executive director of ACT for America, one of the leading organizations promoting the legislation drafted by Mr. Yerushalmi.

The more tangible effect of the movement, opponents say, is the spread of an alarmist message about Islam — the same kind of rhetoric that appears to have influenced Anders Behring Breivik, the suspect in the deadly dual attacks in Norway on July 22. The anti-Shariah campaign, they say, appears to be an end in itself, aimed at keeping Muslims on the margins of American life.

“The fact is there is no Shariah takeover in America,” said Salam Al-Marayati, the president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, one of several Muslim organizations that have begun a counteroffensive. “It’s purely a political wedge to create fear and hysteria.”

Anti-Shariah organizers are pressing ahead with plans to introduce versions of Mr. Yerushalmi’s legislation in half a dozen new states, while reviving measures that were tabled in others.

The legal impact of the movement is unclear. A federal judge blocked the Oklahoma amendment after a representative of the Council on American- Islamic Relations, a Muslim advocacy group, sued the state, claiming the law was an unconstitutional infringement on religious freedom.

The establishment clause of the Constitution forbids the government from favoring one religion over another or improperly entangling itself in religious matters. But many of the statutes are worded neutrally enough that they might withstand constitutional scrutiny while still limiting the way courts handle cases involving Muslims, other religious communities or foreign and international laws.

For Mr. Yerushalmi, the statutes themselves are a secondary concern. “If this thing passed in every state without any friction, it would have not served its purpose,” he said in one of several extensive interviews. “The purpose was heuristic — to get people asking this question, ‘What is Shariah?’ ”

The Road Map

Shariah means “the way to the watering hole.” It is Islam’s road map for living morally and achieving salvation. Drawing on the Koran and the sunnah — the sayings and traditions of the prophet Muhammad — Islamic law reflects what scholars describe as the attempt, over centuries, to translate God’s will into a system of required beliefs and actions.

In the United States, Shariah, like Jewish law, most commonly surfaces in court through divorce and custody proceedings or in commercial litigation. Often these cases involve contracts that failed to be resolved in a religious setting. Shariah can also figure in cases involving foreign laws, for example in tort claims against businesses in Muslim countries. It then falls to the American judge to examine the religious issues at hand before making a ruling based on federal or state law.

The frequency of such cases is unknown. A recent report by the Center for Security Policy, a research institute based in Washington for which Mr. Yerushalmi is general counsel, identified 50 state appellate cases, mostly over the last three decades. The report offers these cases as proof that the United States is vulnerable to the encroachment of Islamic law. But, as many of the cases demonstrate, judges tend to follow guidelines that give primacy to constitutional rights over foreign or religious laws.

The exceptions stand out. Critics most typically cite a New Jersey case last year in which a Moroccan woman sought a restraining order against her husband after he repeatedly assaulted and raped her. The judge denied the request, finding that the defendant lacked criminal intent because he believed that his wife must comply, under Islamic law, with his demand for sex.

The decision was reversed on appeal.

“It’s wrong to just accept that the courts generally get it right, but sometimes get it wrong,” said Stephen M. Gelé, a Louisiana lawyer who represents a nonprofit organization that has promoted Mr. Yerushalmi’s legislation. “There is no reason to make a woman play a legal game of Russian roulette.”

While proponents of the legislation have seized on aspects of Shariah that are unfavorable to women, Mr. Yerushalmi’s focus is broader. His interest in Islamic law began with the Sept. 11 attacks, he said, when he was living in Ma’ale Adumim, a large Jewish settlement in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

At the time, Mr. Yerushalmi, a native of South Florida, divided his energies between a commercial litigation practice in the United States and a conservative research institute based in Jerusalem, where he worked to promote free-market reform in Israel.

After moving to Brooklyn the following year, Mr. Yerushalmi said he began studying Arabic and Shariah under two Islamic scholars, whom he declined to name. He said his research made clear that militants had not “perverted” Islamic law, but were following an authoritative doctrine that sought global hegemony — a mission, he says, that is shared by Muslims around the world. To illustrate that point, Mr. Yerushalmi cites studies in which large percentages of Muslims overseas say they support Islamic rule.

In interviews, Islamic scholars disputed Mr. Yerushalmi’s claims. Although Islam, like some other faiths, aspires to be the world’s reigning religion, they said, the method for carrying out that goal, or even its relevance in everyday life, remains a far more complex subject than Mr. Yerushalmi suggests.

“Even in Muslim-majority countries, there is a huge debate about what it means to apply Islamic law in the modern world,” said Andrew F. March, an associate professor specializing in Islamic law at Yale University. The deeper flaw in Mr. Yerushalmi’s argument, Mr. March said, is that he characterizes the majority of Muslims who practice some version of Shariah — whether through prayer, charitable giving or other common rituals — as automatic adherents to Islam’s medieval rules of war and political domination.

It is not the first time Mr. Yerushalmi has engaged in polemics. In a 2006 essay, he wrote that “most of the fundamental differences between the races are genetic,” and asked why “people find it so difficult to confront the facts that some races perform better in sports, some better in mathematical problem-solving, some better in language, some better in Western societies and some better in tribal ones?” He has also railed against what he sees as a politically correct culture that avoids open discussion of why “the founding fathers did not give women or black slaves the right to vote.”

On its Web site, the Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish civil rights organization, describes Mr. Yerushalmi as having a record of “anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant and anti-black bigotry.” His legal clients have also drawn notoriety, among them Pamela Geller, an incendiary blogger who helped drive the fight against the Islamic community center and mosque near ground zero.

A stout man who wears antique wire-rimmed glasses and a thick, white-streaked beard, Mr. Yerushalmi has a seemingly inexhaustible appetite for the arguments his work provokes. “It’s an absurdity to claim that I have ever uttered or taken a position on the side of racism or bigotry or misogyny,” he said.

When pressed for evidence that American Muslims endorse the fundamentalist view of Shariah he warns against, Mr. Yerushalmi argues that the problem lies with America’s Muslim institutions and their link to Islamist groups overseas. As a primary example, he and others cite a memorandum that surfaced in the federal prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, a Muslim charity based in Texas whose leaders were convicted in 2008 of sending funds to Hamas.

The 1991 document outlined a strategy for the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States that involved “eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within.” Critics emphasize a page listing 29 Muslim American groups as “our organizations and the organizations of our friends.” Skeptics point out that on the same page, the author wrote, imagine if “they all march according to one plan,” which suggests they were not working in tandem.

Nevertheless, a study by the Abu Dhabi Gallup Center to be released next week found that only a minority of American Muslims say that domestic Islamic groups represent them. It also concludes that American Muslims have as much confidence in the judicial system as members of other faiths and are more likely than the other groups to say that elections in the United States are “honest.”

“There’s a conflation between the idea of Islam being a universalist, proselytizing religion and reducing it to a totalitarian movement,” said Mohammad Fadel, an associate professor specializing in Islamic law at the University of Toronto. “All good propaganda is based on half-truths.”

Reaching Out

The movement took root in January 2006 when Mr. Yerushalmi started the Society of Americans for National Existence, a nonprofit organization that became his vehicle for opposing Shariah. On the group’s Web site, he proposed a law that would make observing Islamic law, which he likened to sedition, a felony punishable by 20 years in prison. He also began raising money to study whether there is a link between “Shariah-adherent behavior” in American mosques and support for violent jihad.

The project, Mapping Shariah, led Mr. Yerushalmi to Frank Gaffney, a hawkish policy analyst and commentator who is the president of the Center for Security Policy in Washington. Well connected in neoconservative circles, Mr. Gaffney has been known to take polarizing positions (he once argued that President Obama might secretly be Muslim). Mr. Gaffney would emerge as Mr. Yerushalmi’s primary link to a network of former and current government officials, security analysts and grass-roots political organizations.

Together, they set out to “engender a national debate about the nature of Shariah and the need to protect our Constitution and country from it,” Mr. Gaffney wrote in an e-mail to The New York Times. The center contributed an unspecified amount to Mr. Yerushalmi’s study, which cost roughly $400,000 and involved surreptitiously sending researchers into 100 mosques. The study, which said that 82 percent of the mosques’ imams recommended texts that promote violence, has drawn sharp rebuke from Muslim leaders, who question its premise and findings.

Mr. Yerushalmi also took aim at the industry of Islamic finance — specifically American banks offering funds that invest only in companies deemed permissible under Shariah, which would exclude, for example, those that deal in alcohol, pork or gambling.

In the spring of 2008, Mr. Gaffney arranged meetings with officials at the Treasury Department, including Robert M. Kimmitt, then the deputy secretary, and Stuart A. Levey, then the under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence. Mr. Yerushalmi warned them about what he characterized as the lack of transparency and other dangers of Shariah-compliant finance.

In an interview, Mr. Levey said he found Mr. Yerushalmi’s presentation of Shariah “sweeping and, ultimately, unconvincing.”

For Mr. Yerushalmi, the meetings led to a shift in strategy. “If you can’t move policy at the federal level, well, where do you go?” he said. “You go to the states.”

With the advent of the Tea Party, Mr. Yerushalmi saw an opening. In 2009, he and Mr. Gaffney laid the groundwork for a project aimed at state legislatures — the same year that Mr. Yerushalmi received more than $153,000 in consulting fees from Mr. Gaffney’s center, according to a tax form filed by the group.

That summer, Mr. Yerushalmi began writing “American Laws for American Courts,” a model statute that would prevent state judges from considering foreign laws or rulings that violate constitutional rights in the United States. The law was intended to appeal not just to the growing anti-Shariah movement, but also to a broader constituency that had long opposed the influence of foreign laws in the United States.

Mr. Gaffney swiftly drummed up interest in the law, holding conference calls with activists and tapping a network of Tea Party and Christian groups as well as ACT for America, which has 170,000 members and describes itself as “opposed to the authoritarian values of radical Islam.” The group emerged as a “force multiplier,” Mr. Gaffney said, fanning out across the country to promote the law. The American Public Policy Alliance, a nonprofit organization formed that year by a political consultant based in Michigan, began recruiting dozens of lawyers to act as legislative sponsors.

Early versions of the law, which passed in Tennessee and then Louisiana, made no mention of Shariah, which was necessary to pass constitutional muster, Mr. Yerushalmi said. But as the movement spread, state lawmakers began tweaking the legislation to refer to Shariah and other religious laws or systems — including, in one ill-fated proposal in Arizona, “karma.”

By last fall, the anti-Shariah movement had gained new prominence. ACT for America spent $60,000 promoting the Oklahoma initiative, a campaign that included 600,000 robocalls featuring Mr. Woolsey, the former C.I.A. director. Mr. Gingrich called for a federal law banning courts from using Shariah in place of American law, and Sarah Palin warned that if Shariah law “were to be adopted, allowed to govern in our country, it will be the downfall of America.”

Also last fall, Mr. Gaffney’s organization released “Shariah: The Threat to America,” a 172-page report whose lead author was Mr. Yerushalmi and whose signatories included Mr. Woolsey and other former intelligence officials.

Mr. Yerushalmi’s legislation has drawn opposition from the American Civil Liberties Union as well as from Catholic bishops and Jewish groups. Mr. Yerushalmi said he did not believe that court cases involving Jewish or canon law would be affected by the statutes because they are unlikely to involve violations of constitutional rights.

Business lobbyists have also expressed concern about the possible effect of the statutes, as corporations often favor foreign laws in contracts or tort disputes. This is perhaps the only constituency that has had an influence. The three state statutes that have passed — most recently in Arizona — make corporations exempt.

“It is not preferable,” Mr. Yerushalmi said. “Is it an acceptable political compromise? Of course it is.”

An American Heroine: Pamela Geller

America has a woman who deserves our admiration and respect. Pamela Geller is contending valiantly for our freedom of speech and constitutional rights that is being threatened by the infiltration of Islam in our nation.

Pamela Geller is an award-winning blogger and author. She breaks news faster than any news reporter out there. Keep up to date with the activities of Islam Supremacists by reading her site: (her site receives over a million hits a month!)

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2011/08/index.html

She has a new book coming out in September called Stop the Islamization of America: A Practical Guide to the Resistance. 

Pamela is sticking her neck out there for the sake of America's freedom - for our families. She receives hundreds, if not thousands of hate mail from muslims who hate her exposure of their covert actions to bring America under Islamic domination. It's not by bombs or guns, but by an undercover infiltration - especially via education.

We must stand behind people like her and take action for our children and our children's children! We are not persecuted now by radical Islam, but if we do nothing now to prevent the on-coming tidalwave, then our children will be the ones to suffer for it. Get education and informed...then be moved to TAKE ACTION!

Loving My Neighbor Part II

Love Your Neighbor By Sheila Segal

Every summer, when the weather heats up and sane people take refuge inside their apartments, I breathe a sigh of relief when I switch on the air conditioner. Not only for the instant blast of cold air, but also for the sense of satisfaction I get when I hear the whir and hum of the motor coming off my living-room porch. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me start at the beginning of my story. The best place to install the unit would be off your utility porchOnce upon a time, in the city of Jerusalem, there lived a family. An ordinary, typical family that you might find living anywhere. There were a father, a mother, and eight children. There were fifteen other families living in their apartment building, and they had a good relationship with their neighbors. Some neighbors were of the "Hi, can I borrow some milk?" variety, while others were of the friendly-nod-and-a-smile genre. One day, this family decided that the time had come to invest in central air conditioning. Careful thought, frugal budgeting, and thorough research into the various models resulted in a call to Avi, the cooling system expert. "Avi, this is Sheila Segal. My sister, Esther Kahan, recommended you very highly. We're interested in putting in central air conditioning in our home. Yes, I know it's only February, but I wanted to beat the summer rush. Fine, I'll see you Monday." Avi inspected the Segals' apartment. "All right, Mrs. Segal. I can fit you in about two weeks from now. In my opinion, the best place to install the unit would be off your utility porch, next to the bathroom. That would make most efficient use of the space you have." He described how he would build a drop ceiling in the bathroom to hide the pipes, and would run tubes and construct air vents in the bedrooms and other living areas. His professional manner impressed the Segals, and they were soon negotiating the price. "Just think—no gasping in front of antiquated fans to get a bit of relief from the heat this summer," the children gloated. "We're only the second family in our building to get air conditioning," pointed out one of the children. "We'll invite everyone here to cool off on hot days," generously predicted another. Mrs. Segal laughed. "I think you're getting a little carried away. It will be months before we have to consider sweltering temperatures. It's not even spring yet," she pointed out. The months passed, and that summer of 2004 was a record-breaker. Temperatures climbed regularly into the high 90s, and Sheila blessed her mother repeatedly for insisting that they install air conditioning. "Sheila, do yourself a favor. Why suffer so much in the heat? You'll see what a difference it makes in your quality of life," Sheila's mother would gently prod her. The torrid weather continued well into September. It was Sukkot when Sheila got an unexpected knock on her door. "I need to talk to you and your husband." Mrs. Klein, their downstairs neighbor, had a hard, unpleasant look on her face. Sheila felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Had one of the children had a fight with one of the Klein kids? Visions of broken windows and damaged property flitted rapidly through her mind. "Uh, I'll go call my husband. I think he's outside in the sukkah." Mrs. Klein stood belligerently in the living room, one hand on her hip. "I'll get straight to the point. Your air conditioner has been driving us crazy. I've suffered the entire summer from the awful noise the motor makes, but I haven't said a word. But, now, over Sukkot, it has become unbearable. We can't enjoy a meal in our sukkah without the racket of that machine. You've got to get rid of it!" Sheila and her husband were dumbstruck. They had realized that the unit was positioned outside, over her garden, but it had never occurred to them that it might disturb her. The Segals lived on the second floor, one floor above the Kleins. They had always enjoyed cordial relations with their neighbor, although they were by no means close friends. Sheila was pained that she had been disturbing her neighbor so disagreeably the entire summer. She ran to turn off the air conditioner. "I'm so sorry. We'll certainly try to find a solution," promised Mr. Segal. He retreated back to the sukkah while Sheila uncomfortably showed Mrs. Klein out. "What are we going to do?" Jacob, the Segals' fourteen-year-old son, asked. He had witnessed the entire scene and was worried. "Don't we have a right to use an air conditioner if we want to? It underwent a metamorphosis that transformed it into an object of pride and satisfaction"Yes, but not by causing others aggravation," his mother answered. "We'll find a way around this problem, don't worry." Her confident words belied the troubled look on her face. That evening Sheila struggled with her conflicting feelings. She recalled, with some asperity, the many times she had been forced to close her bedroom window throughout the long, hot Shabbat afternoons. The neighbors' children played riotous games of ball and tag in their garden, and the loud voices and shouts had disturbed her weekly Shabbat nap. Repeated requests for quiet during the accepted rest hours of 2:00 to 4:00 had fallen on deaf ears. "Listen, it's our private garden. The kids need somewhere to play," countered Mr. Klein. "All right, I'll tell them to keep the noise level down," he promised, somewhat abashed by her exasperated expression. But it never seemed to help much. The children would start off quietly enough, and then gradually their voices would escalate to a low roar that never failed to infuriate Sheila. "This is so inconsiderate," she would fume. "Why can't they keep their kids indoors in the afternoon, like I do?" Left with no choice, she would close her bedroom window, blocking out not only the noise but also any stray wisps of air that might cool off the hot, stuffy room. Confusing thoughts chased each other like pesky flies, droning provocatively in her ear. By the following morning, her decision was made. "Avi, we have a serious problem. Please come over," she requested the week following Sukkot. Succinctly explaining the problem to the technician, she waited for his suggestion of an alternate location for the machine. "Mrs. Segal, I've installed hundreds of air conditioning units, and this is the first time I've ever heard of such a complaint. They have no legal standing at all to demand that you move the unit." "I realize that, but that isn't the issue. We must move it. I cannot possibly run the air conditioner when I know that it disturbs someone else." Her voice was soft, yet a thread of steel ran through her words. Avi shrugged. "Fine, it's your money." He examined the bedroom windows, and discarded each one as a possible alternative. "No, it's too far," he muttered. "I would have to change all the piping, ridiculous." Measuring tape in hand, he checked the living-room porch. "This is the only solution I see," he said briskly. "It's still not a perfect answer, but it's the best I can come up with for you. You'll lose about 5% efficiency, but you probably won't even feel the difference." Sheila was distressed. The unit would jut out from the wall, an offensive eyesore on her sunny porch. "All right, if that's how it has to be. Just go ahead and do it," she instructed. Two hours and 1,500 shekel later . . . "It's so ugly," pronounced one teenaged daughter. "I'm going to bump my head on it every time I play on the porch," moaned another child. "It's all a question of how you look at it," pondered Mr. Segal. "To me, it's beautiful." The children gaped at their father, stunned by his words. The children gaped at their father, stunned by his words"Yes, it is beautiful," he repeated emphatically. "We didn't have to move the air conditioner. It is doubtful we are in any way obligated to do so. It's really behavior that is not expected of us. On the other hand," he suggested slowly, "a good relationship with our neighbors is a central value in our lives. Every time I see that unit on the porch, it won't upset me. On the contrary, it's an object of infinite value, since we elevated it to the status of a mitzvah." "I guess so," Sheila agreed hesitantly. "Um, maybe it's not so ugly, after all," she conceded. It took a little longer for the rest of the family to adjust their point of view. As the days, then weeks, passed, fewer complaints were heard about the inconvenience of having the unit on the porch. Gradually, it underwent a metamorphosis that transformed it into an object of pride and satisfaction. And that pretty much explains why pressing the remote switch that activates the air conditioner in my home gives me so much pleasure. It's not every home that can boast an appliance that connects them so readily to spiritual reward. I like to think of it as my modest contribution to enhancing that well-known commandment of Love Your Neighbor.

The Audacity of Idiocy

Friday, May 20, 2011

The following is an excellent article by Cami Davis from http://www.wakeupandsmellthefalafel.blogspot.com/

After hearing Obama's Middle East speech yesterday, I read a comment that one of my Jewish friend's posted. She said, "This is one of the worst days of my life. I feel sick." Was she just being dramatic? Or were her strong feelings justified?

If you didn't hear Obama's speech, here it is in a nutshell: Blah, blah, blah, pre-1967 borders blah, blah, blah.

Those three words are what left my friend and so many others who love the Jews living in Israel, disgusted, angry, and feeling sick. Because pre-1967 borders can mean only one thing to Israel. Death.

Rewinding to pre-1967 borders would leave Israel 9 miles wide in one area. Did that register? Nine. Miles. Wide. Tell me this. Would you live in a town less than 10 miles away from a mass of people who had publically declared that they want to kill you and your children? (Psst, and they didn't make that declaration just once and just recently. Let's just call that declaration of hate and death a pre-1967 declaration.)

Rewinding to pre-1967 borders would leave Israel's airport 3 miles away from a hotbed of Hamas devotees. (Psst, Hamas is a terrorist organization.) Tell me this. Would you take off from an airport less than 3 miles away from a mass of people who had publically declared that they want to kill you and your children and who had an arsenal of surface-to-air missiles?

Rewinding to pre-1967 borders would take away Israel's strategic protective mountain ranges. U.S. 
Lieut. General Thomas Kelly, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of
Staff during the Gulf War, once pointed out that Israel would be virtually
indefensible without those mountainous areas. He said, "I look out from those
heights and look onto the West Bank and say to myself, 'If I'm the chief of
staff of the Israel Defense Forces, I cannot defend this land without that
terrain.'" It doesn't take a Liet. General to know that.

Rewinding to pre-1967 borders could endanger Israel's water supply. A significant portion
of Israel's water originates in Judea-Samaria. A retreat to the 1967
borders would leave these crucial water sources under Arab control. Tell me this. Would you drink or let your children drink water from an area controlled by people who had publically declared that they want to kill you and your children?

Rewinding to pre-1967 borders would divide Jerusalem. The Temple Mount, the Western Wall, the Jewish Quarter and the Mount of Olives cemetery would all be turned over to the Arabs. Talk about a psychological and spiritual death. Have you seen the way Arabs treat Jewish holy sites? Have you seen what they did to Joseph's tomb? Do you know that Arabs have a little national pastime of murdereing Jews at Jewish holy sites? Have you seen the footage of Palestinians rampaging the Temple Mount last week? It was a swath of irreverential destruction; physically and spiritually. Tell me this. How would you feel if the synagogue or church you went to or the cemetery your family was buried in was about to be given to a group of people who had publically declared that they want to kill you and your children?

For those who truly love Israel and its people, the thought of pre-1967 borders is one of the worst scenarios imaginable for Israel. Unless . . . unless the thought of a world leader suggesting this wakes up Israel. The only thing that calms my fears for Israel and my frustrations over the stupid, arrogant, audacity of Obama is to remember that Obama is only a pawn in Hashem's hand.

"Why do nations gather, and regimes talk in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand against Hashem and his anointed [Israel]. But He who sits in heaven will laugh, and will mock them. Then in His anger and wrath He will terrify them. For Hashem annuls the counsel of nations, He thwarts the designs of peoples," per Psalms 2 & 33.

G-d let Obama become president. He let those words come out of his mouth yesterday. Now the question is, how will the Jews respond? Will this be the straw? Will this be the turning point of Jews waking up and turning to the G-d of Israel for advice, for direction, for protection, instead of turning to the nations. I hope so. I pray so. Because the other alternative is unimaginably heartbreaking.

How Great is Your Mercy

The Mysteries of God! How we delight to seek You in all Your mysterious ways!


One of the most oft used names for God in Judaism is that of "HASHEM". In conversation and throughout Scripture, this name is used. Why? This name is especially special because it is His name that means "mercy". The name "ELOHIM" means "judgement". Of course you would want to call upon His name of mercy rather than that of judgement in the majority of cases - unless you were perhaps praying that God would bring judgement to His enemies!

What is even more astounding, yet not that surprising, is that God Himself prefers His name HASHEM, that of mercy, to that of ELOHIM, judgement. Throughout Scripture, you find the name HASHEM many many more times than ELOHIM! Even more meaningful, is that the sages teach that God literally weeps when He must leave His throne of mercy to that of judgement! The Psalms teach us that God weeps a thousand tears to one of ours! We shouldn't be surprised to find that a God who prefers to use His name of mercy throughout Scripture, would weep in compassion when He must assume His throne of judgement!

The Messiah is a representation of God's kindness and mercy towards us. Messiah is also represented by the Hebrew letter mem, specifically a closed mem. There are two forms of this letter: it can be an open mem or a closed mem. It is in the form of a closed mem that it represents Messiah, who represents God's mercy towards us.

Why the lesson on the Hebrew letter mem? To point out that in the name "HASHEM" there is a closed mem at the end of it! The Hebrew letters in the name "HASHEM" are: hey-shin-mem. The form of the mem here is a closed mem. But of course, you say, it is God's name for mercy, it makes sense that there would be a representation of Messiah there! Yes, you would be correct.

Now look at "ELOHIM". The Hebrew letters composing God's name of judgment are: lamed-hey-yud-mem. Notice again that there is a mem at the end of this name as well! Furthermore, the form here is also a closed mem! Meaning, that our God is so kind and merciful, that even in His name of judgment there is an element of mercy hidden! You would never know it to simply say or read the name ELOHIM, but looking deeper, you find the closed mem that represents Messiah! Knowing that He must have judgement as well as mercy, He made a way for His judgement to be satisfied by hiding Messiah away from the beginning of time. Showing us that even His attribute of judgement is softened by mercy! What an incredible God we serve!!!

If God Himself, who has all the reason to judge against us, would be so merciful and compassionate that He would weep to give judgement, how much more should we, who have no right to judge anyone, show mercy to our fellow mankind?

Loving My Neighbor

Leviticus 19:18 - "You shall not take revenge and you shall not bear a grudge against the members or your people; you shall love your fellow as yourself - I am Hashem."

The great rabbinic sage Hillel, who died around 10 BCE, and probably conversed with Yeshua, was asked one time by a would-be convert if he could be converted while standing on one foot. The convert had first asked the same question to Hillel's great contemporary Shammai; and this sage, being of much less patient temperament for foolhardy questions then Hillel, chased him away with a stick. To Shammai, it was impossible to teach all that was necessary of Torah to a convert during the time he could stand on one foot. Hillel however, said to the man, "Don't do to others what you wouldn't have them do to you. That is all the Torah; all the rest is commentary. Now go and learn it." Hillel was willing to convert him to Judaism in literally three sentences! Notice though, that in the third sentence, Hillel tells him to go and learn the rest of it! This of course would require a lifetime of study.

The point though, is that Hillel, like Yeshua, so desired that all gentiles "come nigh to Torah" and learn the greatness therein, that he with great wisdom, provided a seemingly quick and easy conversion. Yet in reality, it is a great challenge to all people of all nations - to not do to others what we wouldn't do to ourselves. How many of us stop to think about whether what we are saying or doing or thinking affects another person negatively? How many of us reflect on how it would make us feel if that was being said or done or thought about us? That is what Hillel is telling this man he must do. He must examine everything he does to see if he would do it to himself. This applies to all of us - Do you hold captive every thought? Or hold fast your tongue? Hillel is simply giving the reverse of the same commandment given in Torah and re-iterated later by Yeshua.

In Torah, commandments are either a positive commandment or a negative commandment. Hillel took the positive command given in Torah "Love your fellow man as yourself" and paraphrased it to a negative command "Don't do to others what you wouldn't do to yourself". Why did he say it this way? He knew it would be easier for people to think of what NOT to do, then of what they SHOULD do for others.

Why would Hillel say this is "all the Torah; all the rest is commentary"? Actually it makes perfect sense when you think about it: if everyone were to love our fellow man as we love our own selves, then it is easy to obey Torah and none of the other "you shall not" commandments would be necessary!

There has been debate about which commandment is greater (See Mark 12): "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength" or "Love your neighbor as yourself". If you think about it, if you follow the second, then you are obeying both! In a sense, to love God IS to love and care for what He has made! (Of course Yeshua made it clear that the first mentioned is greater in Mark 12:28-34, but also made it clear that there are no other commandments greater than these two!)

Do you have days when you are frustrated with someone and you ask yourself "just how far should I go in loving my neighbor?" Here are some challenging and insightful examples of how you should fulfill this great commandment from a respected Torah commentary HaKsav V'HaKabbalah:


1) Your affection for others should be real, not feigned

2) Always treat others with respect

3) Always seek the best for them

4) Join in their pain

5) Greet them with friendliness

6) Give them the benefit of the doubt

7) Assist them physically, even in matters that are not very difficult

8) Be ready to assist with small or moderate loans and gifts

9) Do not consider yourself better than others


Loving my neighbor means I should seek the same prosperity and success for others that I desire for myself and my family! Do you not wish to be financially well-off? Do you not wish for great health and long life? Of course! Now look deep into your heart and ask yourself -"Do I wish these things for my neighbor, my fellow man as well?" We are called to be a righteous people; striving for greater righteousness doesn't mean going half way, rather we should desire to be more righteous by going beyond just the minimal expected requirements. That, my neighbor, my fellow man, takes some chutzpah!

The Ten Plagues Expose the Ten Highest Egyptian gods!

AND THE EGYPTIANS SHALL KNOW

by Rabbi J. Kirshblum

It is puzzling why the ten miraculous plagues were needed in order to free the Children of Israel. G-d could have caused Pharaoh to free them immediately without all these dramatic events.

Moshe and Aharon had a dual mission. Not only were they to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, they were to introduce the concept of a monotheistic G-d to the Egyptians. The Egyptians believed in a whole collection of gods, goddesses, major and minor gods, along with god consorts. The main temple of the Egyptians at the time of the Exodus was in the city of Heliopolis. There, the nine supreme gods were worshipped. In addition to the nine gods of Heliopolis, of course there was the pharaoh himself who believed that he too was a god. He was the tenth god.

When Moshe and Aharon informed Pharaoh, "So said YHVH, the G-d of the Israelites, 'Send forth My people…'" (5:1) Pharaoh responded, "Who is YHVH that I should hearken unto His voice and send forth the Israelites? I do not know of YHVH…" (5:2). Pharoah was telling Moshe and Aharon that the G-d of the Israelites was not a member of his group of gods and therefore he is not obliged to listen to Him.

Perhaps each of the ten plagues was presented to demonstrate the ineffectiveness of each of the Egyptian ten god's. Osiris was the Egyptian god of the Nile. The Egyptians believed that Osiris gave life and sustenance to the people because the Nile itself was the vital life-source of ancient Egypt. The first plague was Blood. The waters of the Nile turned to the symbol of death, blood. That was a sign of G-d's superiority over Osiris.

The second plague is called Frogs. The famous commentator of the Mishna, Rabbenu Ovadiah Bartenurah, tells us that the plague was not really frogs. It was Crocodiles! (Bartenurah's Memoirs of His Travels) That certainly adds a new dimension of terror to the plague. The crocodile god Sobek was the earthly representative of his mother, Nut, the goddess of virility. The Medrash (Shmos Rabah 10:3) tells us that the crocodiles bit the Egyptian males at the "normally covered parts of the body" and deprived them of their virility. This plague showed that G-d was superior to virility- goddess, Nut, and her crocodile son, Sobek.

The famous sun-god, Ra, was lord over the earth. The Egyptians thought he reigned supreme over the whole earth giving it life. Aharon hit the earth and then the dirt and dust turned into a massive swarm of lice. Ra was powerless to stop the plague.

The forth plague was an invasion of swarming creatures, scorpions and venomous snakes. (Rashi 8:17) The Egyptian god of destruction was the serpent-god Set. Yet he was helpless, unable to destroy the plague that afflicted his Egyptian people.

The fifth plague was a Pestilence that afflicted the cattle of the Egyptians. The horned-goddess, Isis, was the goddess of fertility, nurture, and protection especially over the cattle. Yet she had to stand by idly as her cattle died by the tens of thousands.

The sixth plague was Boils. The Medrash (Shmos Rabah 11:6) says that the Egyptians were afflicted with leprosy that causes the flesh to decay. This plague was to show the ineffectiveness of Nephythys, the mother-goddess of embalming, the preservation of the flesh.

The seventh plague was a destructive Hail-storm. The deity, Tefnut, was supposed to be the beneficent rain-goddess. The Egyptians prayed to her to stop the devastating hail. The Egyptians quickly learned that she had no power over the G-d of Israel.

The eighth plague was Locusts. The swarm of locust blocked out the sun and feverishly devoured the crops of Egypt. The god of vegetation, Geb, was rendered impotent.

The ninth plague was Darkness. Rashi (10:21-22) tells us that the air became thick and black. It was so thick that the Egyptians were trapped in the very position they had assumed when the plague struck. They were unable to move. This plague was to demonstrate that the Egyptian god of air, Shu, was no match for the G-d of Israel.

The tenth plague was the Death of the Firstborn. Pharaoh believed that he too was a god. Yet, he had to plead with Moshe to spare his own life. Some god!

G-d had told Moshe, "And the Egyptians shall know that I am G-d" (7:5). After the tenth plague, Pharaoh and all of Egypt knew this to be true. The baseless faith in the Egyptian pantheon had been duly demonstrated.

It is interesting to note that according to the ancient Egyptian historian, Manetho, and the Jewish historian, Josephus Flavius, the name of the Pharaoh at the time of the Exodus was Amenophis, more commonly called Amenhotep. His son and successor, Akenaten, did away with the Egyptian collection of gods and taught a monotheistic religion throughout the land. However, he also taught that he was godlike since he was god's conduit to earth. Some habits are hard to give up.

The Passover Lamb - An Egyptian Diety!

Background: Pesach means "Passover" in Hebrew and is the Jewish celebration of the Exodus from Egypt when God asked the Israelites to slaughter a lamb and place it's blood on the inside of the doorpost in order to save the lives of their firstborn children.

While there are obvious reasons why God chose the lamb to be the sacrificial animal for Pesach, there are other interesting reasons that are not as well known.

Did you know that during the time of the Israelite immigration, slavery and exodus from Egypt, the lamb was worshipped as the animal form of one of the highest of all Egyptian gods? So much so that the Egyptians would not eat sheep! They were treated similarly to the way cows are treated in India. This was an advantage and disadvantage to the Israelites. A disadvantage because the Egyptians automatically looked down on them in distaste. An advantage because the Egpytians would avoid the Israelites and leave them alone in their monotheistic beliefs.

As viceroy and second in command of Egypt, Joseph of course knew that the Egyptians worshipped sheep, which is why he asked Pharoah to let his family live in Goshen outside of the main area of Egypt - because Jacob and his sons were sheepherders! This was a degrading occupation to the sophisticated Egyptians as it was absolutely abhorred to slaughter and eat sheep. Joseph also chose the site of Goshen so his family could be sustained by the fruitfulness of the land, but not easily assimilated into the culture of Egypt. He wanted them located away from the pagan, hedonistic people of Egypt so their belief in the one true God would remain intact.

The lamb was not the only animal worshipped as diety - each of the 10 plagues were specifically chosen by God to come against the top 10 Egyptian gods! (See next blog for details on each diety each plague was created to expose) The Nile River that provided Egypt with water for their crops was another high diety worshipped by the Egyptians - and it was turned into blood and rendered useless! The God of heaven took on the highest false gods of Eygpt! He utterly exposed them in front of all of Egypt - and countless other nations when news spread of these miraculous events! It is VERY interesting that the next Pharoah in Egypt was a monotheistic Pharoah - WONDER WHY?!

Regarding the lamb, when people would come to inquire of the gods, the pagan Egyptian high priests would take a lamb and would write incantations in the ear of the lamb. They would then repeat the words to invoke demonic spirits to appear!

So how interesting is it that God would have the Israelites take a lamb by it's ear and tie it to the bedpost for 4 days and nights and then slaughter it?! What chutzpah and faith in God the Israelites had to of had to take a high Egyptian diety by the ear into their homes and then slaughter it when they at this point were simply slaves!

And why did God have them purchase their lamb on the Sabbath? Because the Egyptians had taken away their Sabbath day of rest and made them slaves every day of the week. So here they are saying to the Egyptians that they are re-taking and re-claiming their day of rest!

As you can see, there is ALWAYS more behind the surface meaning of Scripture! There is NO portion of Scripture that we read in the English that doesn't have a much deeper level to learn in the Hebrew language and culture of the day! As far as the Passover story, this simple blog only scratches the surface of this intensely deep portion of Scripture!

Queen Esther: Story of Redemption

Notes on Purim message Sunday, March 20, 2011:

Theme I - Redemption Comes through Repentance

Theme II - We Must Defeat the Spirit of Amalek - The Spirit of Doubt!

Mordechai was a Benjamite and a descendant/grandson of Shimei, the man who was of the same clan as Saul's family and who threw rocks at King David and cursed him (2 Samuel 16:5-13). The king's officials asked if they should cut this man down, and King David said "no, let him live"; for he foresaw that this man would have a descendant who would rescue Israel through Esther. Mordechai is this descendant and redeems his ancestor with his actions. Mordechai is also part of the Sanhedrin - the entire Sanhedrin were taken in to exile. Mordechai's name means "tried by fire".

Amalek was a descendant of Esau through one of Esau's concubines. He had very low self-esteem, and even worse, sought to make others have low self-esteem, doubt and cut others down with gossip. It is this spirit of doubt and low self-esteem Jacob himself fought before he faces Esau.

Haman was a descendant of Agag, the King of the Amalekites. The book of Esther calls Haman an Agagite. Haman exists because King Saul to his own great detriment as well as Israel's, spared the life of the Amalekite King, Agag. (1 Samuel 15) For this reason Saul loses the right to the kingship because God told the Israelites to not spare a single Amalekite so they would be blotted out completely from the face of the earth for the terrible action they took when the Israelites emerged from Egypt. What should have been a huge high point spiritually for the Israelites was taken away because the Amalekites attacked them from behind and stirred up the spirit of doubt. (Exodus 17:8-16). For this action against Israel, God says to Moses in Exodus 17:14 - "Write this in a book as a memorial, and recite it to Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven."

In 1 Samuel 15: 2-3, God tells King Saul through Samuel to go to war against Amalek and to not spare a single Amalekite. Not only does King Saul capture and spare Agag, the Amalek king, he lies to Samuel saying that he did destroy them all, and he does not immediately repent for his actions. 1 Samuel 15:11, God says "I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned his back from following me, and has not carried out my commands." Because Saul did not completely destroy the Amalekites, Haman is born and strives as his ancestors did, to destroy the Jews. Could it be that Haman's Amalekite spirit of doubt and low self-esteem is stirred when Mordechai will not bow to him? So he "became full of wrath" and since he had been told Mordechai's nationality, Haman sought to destroy all Mordechai's people.

But this plot of Haman's will allow Mordechai and Esther to redeem Saul's actions!

Esther was a Benjamite, from the house of Saul, the daughter of Mordechai's uncle. Esther means "hidden", just as God is hidden in the book of Esther. Her real name is Hadassah, which is Aramaic and means "Myrtle". Although God's Name is not explicitly written anywhere in the book, His Name "Yud Hay Vav Hay" can be found in the Hebrew text in both Esther 5:4 and Esther 7:7.

Esther's first action is to call the Jewish people to teshuvah -repentance- through fasting and prayer. Ultimately is not Mordechai and Esther who redeemed Israel, it was the fact that Israel humbled herself before God and repented that moved God to rescue them. As Benjamites, it is through their actions that Esther and Mordechai redeem the actions of their Benjamite ancestors, Saul and Shimei!

Once again, God is all about redemption through repentance!!

King Darius II is Esther's son/descendant through King Ahasuerus. He clearly had to be influenced by Queen Esther as it is he who orders the building of the Second Temple 70 years after the First Temple is destroyed. He also allows the Jewish people to return from their exile to their land of Israel.

Sadly, the descendants of Amalek and the spirit of Amalek still exist today -though God will one day completely blot them out! The spirit of Amalek, of doubt and low self-esteem can be found everywhere. Anywhere there is gossip and cutting down of others self-esteem and causing doubt, you will find the spirit of Amalek.

We must fight against the Spirit of Amalek from amongst us!

The physical descendants of Amalek are living in Gaza today - just look at the news to see the war actions Gaza is taking against Israel - such as firing rockets!

When the ten sons of Haman are hanged, their names were written in the book of Esther in Hebrew and have a small "tov", "shin", and "zayin" that foreshadow another "Haman plot" against the Jews - the holocaust. Rabbis have concluded that the ten men who were hung at the Nuremburg trials on Oct 16, 1946 were the fulfillment of this prophecy found in the book of Esther. Interesting that even in a modern time as 1946, they were also hung just like Haman and his sons.

Your Taxes are Paying for Terrorist Education

Why is Israel calling for the West to stop funding the Palestinian educational system and media until there is satisfactory supervision of what is taught?

Palestinian education and media teach from the Islamic religious books, the Quran and Sharia law. Arab muslims in Palestine are infiltrated from childhood in their schools, mosques and local media to kill non-muslim infidels - especially Christians and Jews! There is no adequate censor on what is being taught - some schools are completely unsupervised!

Ibn Taymiyyah, considered the spiritual father of the Islamic revolution, preached that "Jihad should be waged against those who do not follow the teaching of Islam". Jihad is an important religious duty to combat against non-muslim believers. Muslims are taught "self-sacrifice" for Islam - suicide!

The Muslim Brotherhood teaches a strict interpretation of the Quran, which emphasizes glorified suicidal violence!

See this quote:

"Where does this extreme, brutal cruelty come from?

You don't have to look far. They are taught by the Quran. For those who still doubt whether Islam, it's Quran and Sharia law are really teaching the murder of Jews and other infidels (Christians, among others) here is a quote from it:

"The stones and trees will say O Muslims, O Abdullah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him."

The murderers were taught since their early childhood to do just that."

And yet, the US is funding Palestinian education and media!! And it's no wonder Israel is calling for a halt to funding until there is better supervision of what is taught.

Look at it another way....your US tax dollars are going to educate Palestinian Arab Muslims on how to kill us!

To be perfectly clear about it - your hard-earned money in part went to educate the suicidal terrorists who took over US planes and bombed the US Twin Towers!

And more recently, murdered an innocent Jewish family in Gaza for absolutely no reason!

America, we should be outraged to the point of action - in prayer and deed!!!!

Article on "Should I Convert to Judaism?"

For those Gentiles wondering if they should convert to Judaism, the following article is very insightful and should help in that decision. Shalom!

Should I Convert to Judaism? Is Judaism For Everybody? By Rabbi Tzvi Freeman

Question: I came across your site and wow--I really want to become Jewish. My mother was a fairly devout Italian Catholic and my father an Anglican skeptic who never went to church. I was always so confused. But now your site has really turned me on to Judaism, a real coming home for me. What's my next step? Response: Your next step is to become a better person. Develop greater faith in your soul, in your destiny, and in your Maker. Do more good, reach out to more people. Learn more wisdom, apply whatever you learn, and make life worth living. But you don't need to become Jewish to do any of that. Plenty of wonderful people doing beautiful things in the world are not Jewish, and G‑d is nonetheless pleased with them. You see, there's Judaism and there's Jewishness, and the two are not one and the same. Judaism is wisdom for every person on the planet and beyond. We call it the Torah, meaning "the teaching," and it's a divine message to all human beings containing the principles that much of humanity has already accepted as absolute truths. The idea that human life is beyond value is a teaching originating from Torah, as is the related concept that all human beings are created equal. So too, the right of every individual to literacy and education was brought to the world through Torah. And world peace as a value and goal was preached exclusively by the Torah and its prophets thousands of years before it became popular in the rest of the world. And of course, the idea that there is a single, incorporeal Being who creates and sustains all of reality, and is concerned over all that occurs with each individual, thereby giving each person, creature, event and object meaning, purpose and destiny--this is a core teaching upon which everything else rests, and the central teaching of the Torah. This teaching was not only preserved, but unfolded, explained, illuminated and applied in so many different ways by Jewish sages since it was given, over 3300 years ago. They've applied it to serious matters of medical ethics, business ethics, politics, personal enlightenment--every facet of human life. Today it is all readily available for all humanity to partake of and learn from, as a beacon of light and an inspiration to all. That's Judaism. Then there is Jewishness. To be Jewish means to belong to an ancient tribe, either by birth or by adoption. It's a strange and unique tribe, because it is the only one to have survived into modernity while retaining most of the characteristics of a Bronze Age tribe. Anthropologist Jared Diamond describes in his book, "Guns, Germs and Steel," how a New Guinea tribesman, when visiting a nearby village of the same tribe, will immediately start the conversation with an investigation of, "So, who are you related to? Do you know so-and-so?" to establish tribal relations. Well, that's exactly what Jewish people do today when they meet one another all over the world. Because, whether living in Manhattan or Joburg, Tel Aviv or Vladivostok, we are still all one tribe. And for good reason: To preserve the teachings of an ageless Torah for the world, the Jewish People themselves need to be ageless, remaining outside of time, as it were, even while traveling within it. Tribes have rituals. So do Jews. Males of the tribe wear particular items of clothing, such as tzitzit and kippot. Women keep a certain mode of modest dress and married women cover their hair. Men also wrap leather boxes containing parchment scrolls on the heads and arms every morning, while robed in woolen sheets with more of those tzitzit tassels. In our services, we chant ancient Hebrew and read from an ancient scroll. We have holidays that commemorate our tribal memories and establish our identity as a whole. Certain foods are taboo and other food is supervised and declared fit-for-the-tribe. Nope, you can't get much more ancient-tribal than any of that. The point is, none of that ritual stuff was ever meant as a universal teaching, except perhaps in a more generalized way. Modest dress--yes, a good idea for all. Why should the human being be reduced to a body icon? A chat with your Maker every morning? How can a human being do without it? And injecting some spirituality into your food consumption--what a great way to transcend the mundane. But as to the particular rituals in their Jewish form, as meaningful as they are to us, there's simply no meaning in someone outside the tribe taking them on. (If you don't believe me, take a look in the source-text, where G‑d tells Moses, "Speak to the Children of Israel and tell them to...") Now, what I'm saying is not very PC nowadays. We live in a world of hypermobility. Not just because we own our own cars and reserve our own tickets online to go anywhere, anytime--but because we imagine our very identities to be just as mobile as our powerbook. Pick me up and take me anywhere. Today I'm a capitalist entrepreneur, tomorrow an Inuit activist, and the next day a Californian bohemian. And we can mix and match--today, you can be Italian, Nigerian, Chinese and Bostonian all in the same meal. So who is this Freeman character to tell me which tribe I belong to and which not? To be frank, because this Freeman character considers the hyper-identity scheme to be a scam, a mass delusion and a social illness. You can switch your clothes, your eating habits, your friends, your social demeanor, your perspective on life and maybe you can even switch to a Mac. But G-d decides who you are, and the best you can do is discover it. Two friends of mine joined the Peace Corps back in the sixties and were posted in Southeast Asia. Together, they visited a little-known guru in the jungle to whom they announced, "We want to become Buddhists." "Well, what are you now?" he asked them. "Nothing," they replied. "Where did you come from? What were your parents?" "They were Jews." "So why are you coming to me?" he asked. "Go and be Jews." Now it's my turn to return the favor and tell the Southeast Asians, the Italians, the Nigerians, the Inuits and all the rest of humanity this little piece: I believe that what G-d wants from each person is that s/he examine the heritage of his ancestors, discover the truths hidden there and live in accordance with them, knowing that this is what his Creator wants from her/him. The truths are there because all of human society was originally founded upon the laws given to Adam and to Noah, along with those laws that all the children of Noah accepted upon themselves. These truths are found by examining one's heritage through the light of Torah. The Jewish Tribe are the bearers of that light. But you don't need to become Jewish to partake of it. Light shines for all who have eyes. Help spread the light.

A Simple Letter from a Holocaust Survivor

A Simple Letter from a Holocaust Survivor

by Shorashim Shop on Saturday, March 12, 2011 at 11:48pm

Along with the terrible news of the earth quake in Japan, and Kadaffi slaughtering his own people, last night we had our own slaughter. Two Palestinians terrorists penetrated a Jewish settlement and slaughtered a family of five: a 36 years old man, his wife, two young children and a nine month old baby.

A twelve year old daughter who came back home found her family murdered. What is specially heinous about the killings was the nine month old baby was found with her throat cut. The parents and the babies old brother and sister had multiple stabbing wounds.

I lived four years under the Nazis and I saw their brutalities; they even sent mothers and babies to the gas chambers, but I have never seen even an SS man who would take a baby and cut her throat. Where does this extreme, brutal cruelty come from?

You don't have to look far. They are taught by the Quran. For those who still doubt whether Islam, its Quran and Sharia law are really teaching the murder of Jews and other infidels (Christians, among others) here is a quote from it:

"The stones and trees will say O Muslims, O Abdullah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him."

The murderers were taught since their early childhood to do just that.

Solly

P.S. It seems there is a debate going on in the States concerning whether Islam is teaching extremism. Anyone who bothers to read this passage won't have any doubts. As if 9/11 didn't teach the Americans to what extent the extremist of Islam will go to kill Americans.

Discovery of Dead Sea Scrolls - Coincidence?

The most ancient manuscript discovery of modern time - the Dead Sea scrolls found in the caves of Qumran by a bedouin youth and first identified by archeologist Eleazar Sukenik of Hebrew University the same day, nay, even the same hour, that the United Nations voted to allow Israel to become a nation!

DIVINE SYMBOLISM?

The story of the Dead Sea Scrolls is far more fascinating than one might think at first! The scrolls were written by Essene scribes who were meticulous about writing down the exact letters of Scripture. The WORDS of Scripture were written on animal skin - the majority being lamb skin parchments. Then fearing the scrolls destruction later, the Essenes wrapped them in linen cloths, placed them in clay jars and hid them in caves in the Qumran. There they remained safe until the appointed time for their discovery to occur!

The WORD was written on lamb skin, wrapped in linen cloths and placed in a tomb-like clay jar!!

How incredibly symbolic! The WORD, Yeshua, became flesh and dwelt among us, the Lamb of God who was slain, then was wrapped in linen cloths, placed in a tomb, and resurrected at the appointed time!!

DIVINE TIMING?

Hundreds of years later, the first of these scrolls were discovered by bedouin during the winter-spring of 1947, who were pasturing their goats near the caves. They hung the scrolls on tent poles within their camp not knowing their worth or significance, and then it was suggested that they sell the scrolls to make money from them. The bedouins sold them in Bethlehem for a cheap price to two Arab antiquities dealers who did not know their significance either. One dealer sold 4 scrolls to Syrian Orthodox Archbishop of Jerusalem who did not know what they were, but bought them for about $250. The other dealer contacted Hebrew University professor and archeologist Eleazar Sukenik who went to Bethlehem November 29th, 1947 and immediately recognized the significance of the scrolls the very same hour and day that the United Nations voted to allow Israel to become a nation. Could this be mere coincidence?

COULD GOD HAVE BEEN SENDING A MESSAGE TO THE ENTIRE WORLD?

What are the odds that the most ancient scrolls, 1000 years older than any other copies, would be found the day the UN allows Israel to become a nation?? Almost as if God was saying, "Take heed all nations, these are My people and this is their land and here are the manuscripts to prove it!" There is no other greater proof that shows how much of a right Israel has to that land than Scripture - it is the foundation of Judaism!

Almost as if, in a sense, the day the nation was founded, the founding papers were established as well!

Judaism During the Time of Yeshua

Why does Yeshua seemingly denounce the Jews so often in the Gospels? In order to understand this, one must look at the culture during which Yeshua lived.

Judaism from 30 B.C.E to 70 C.E. for the first time was divided into two religious schools: the School of Hillel and the School of Shammai. The schools debated, not on the law of Torah, but on the oral tradition passed down by Moses that had recently been put into writing for fear of losing it. The majority of the teachings of Bet Hillel (followers or "sons" of Hillel) were upheld by Yeshua throughout the Gospels; however, it is the teachings of Bet Shammai (followers or "sons" of Shammai) that Yeshua continually denounces and vehemently opposes.

Why does Yeshua rebuke them continually over and over in the Gospels (as does Paul in the epistles)?

For one, Bet Shammai Pharisees not only were adamant that gentiles had no place in the World to Come and could never merit salvation, but they also were involved with the murderous Zealots who refused to allow gentiles and especially the hated Romans, to bring offerings or tax to the Temple. This infuriated Yeshua! He came that gentiles may be grafted into the Abrahamic covenant, and it's no wonder Yeshua drove them out with a whip! Bet Hillel Pharisees on the other hand, taught that gentiles did have a place in the World to Come and even sought to bring gentiles "nigh to the Torah".

(This Temple refusal and numerous other actions by the Zealots incited the wrath of the Romans as well, and it is the Zealots hatred of gentiles and the Romans that is believed to be a great part of what ultimately resulted in the Temple destruction in 70 C.E. Interestingly, the school of Shammai died out at this time, and to this day the teachings of Hillel are followed by Jewry world-wide with very few teachings of Shammai still followed. It should also be noted that Hillel and Shammai, the teachers themselves, lived peacably with each other; and it was their followers in the coming decades between whom tensions greatly increased.)

Secondly, during Yeshua's time, it was Bet Shammai who were in control of the rabbinic community, so therefore Yeshua often targets the leaders and teacher's of the law accusing them of foresaking justice, mercy and faithfulness, over strict adherence to their own self-created laws. In addition, the Pharisees of Bet Shammai and the Zealots were frequently called by the 1st century rabbis as a "brood of vipers" and "children of the devil", so it was normal for Yeshua to call them such. When Yeshua speaks of the seven woes to the Pharisees in Matthew 23, it is to Bet Shammai Pharisees and the Zealots that Yeshua is referring to and calling hypocrites! At the beginning of this passage, Yeshua exhorts the people and tells them "The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in the seat of Moses', so you must obey them and do everything they tell you", but then continuing, He refers to Bet Shammai when He says, "But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. They tie up heavy loads and put them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them."

So does Yeshua reject all Jewry, His own people? Absolutely not! In fact, to coin a phrase used by Bridges of Peace, Yeshua was a fully Torah observant, tallit wearing, synagogue attending, feast-keeping, kosher Jew! Why would he observe all these things if he wanted to do away with Torah?

Moreover, how ironic it is that Yeshua's words, ALWAYS used to uphold Torah law, are the very words gentiles use to say Yeshua did away with the law! How ironic it is, that the church fathers, and current theologians, not understanding the culture of Judaism during this time and that Yeshua was targeting a specific Jewish group, NOT the rest of the Jews, take those passages to mean that the church supplants Israel! Yeshua and Paul often speak of the gentiles being the wild olive branch grafted into the covenant, but never do either speak of the wild olive branch taking the place of the covenant with Israel.

Yeshua said, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." All is not accomplished until after Yeshua's return as King!!

More examples of Yeshua observing Torah law, but rebuking followers of Shammai will be posted soon. Also answering: Why did Yeshua heal on the Sabbath? Why did Yeshua curse the fig tree? Why did He wait 3 days before raising Lazarus? Why did He tell the young man to leave the burial of his father and let the dead bury the dead?


For a more detailed look at Judaism and the differences between these two schools, read:

They Loved the Torah - What Yeshua's First Followers Really Thought About the Law by David Friedman, Ph.D.

Jesus the Pharisee - A New Look at the Jewishness of Jesus by Rabbi Harvey Falk

Jesus Through Jewish Eyes: A Rabbi Examines the Life and Teachings of Jesus by Rabbi John Fischer, Ph.D, Th.D.