This Week in Sephardi-Eraser Rabbi Meir Soloveichik (4/11)
David Shasha
This is How to Destroy the Sephardic Heritage
In the previous Self-Hating Sephardim notes I once again presented Marc Angel, deposed rabbi of formerly-Sephardic Congregation Shearith Israel, and the man he considers to be his Rav Muvhak:
https://groups.google.com/g/davidshasha/c/pCLYbGwdHQA
That would be the Sephardi-hater and prominent White Jewish Supremacist, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik:
https://www.jewishideas.org/article/rabbi-joseph-b-soloveitchik-judaism-and-modernity
Just before Shabbat and the end of the Passover holiday, the current SI rabbi proudly sent out the following letter:
Dear Friends,
I begin by expressing how grateful I am to all those from our community and beyond who have joined me for lectures and shiurim during the past year. From the members of Shearith Israel, to the larger Jewish community in the tristate area, to listeners as far away as Australia, we have studied the "Art of Torah," prepared for Shabbat with Friday Night Lights, compared Shakespeare and Shushan, and prepared for Shabbat HaGadol and Shabbat Teshubah. Learning together has sustained me and energized me over the past many months.
Starting this coming Tuesday, I will be launching a new seven lecture series that I will deliver each week until Shabuot: "Providence and Politics: Zionism From Herzl to Begin." This series will tell the miraculous story of Zionism in an unusual way, by visiting cities and sites around the world, and pondering how only Providence can fully explain the events through which the state of Israel came into being. The series will coincide with our observance of Yom HaShoah, Yom HaZikaron, Yom Ha'atzma'ut, and Yom Yerushalayim, and will hopefully make our marking of these days more meaningful. And because my usual annual talk on the first night of Shabuot is not yet possible, the final seventh lecture will serve as a special pre-Shabuot shiur.
I close with a request. Whether you are a Shearith Israel member or not, whether you are in New York or elsewhere, if you have benefited from our lectures over the last year, I hope you will consider helping Shearith Israel by sponsoring one, or more than one, of the forthcoming lectures, or the entire series. All sponsors will be recognized in a beautiful content-rich commemorative booklet that we will send you after the close of the series. For complete details and sponsorship opportunities, click here. Shearith Israel will not have our usual fundraising event this spring, and we need the support so that we can continue to do all that we do.
The titles, dates, and times of my lectures follow below. Please consider supporting Shearith Israel at this time, and I am so looking forward to taking this journey around the world with you.
Indeed, SI has become a major Tikvah Fund hub; in the process serving to help erase the classical Sephardic heritage.
Once again, here is Soloveichik’s upcoming lecture schedule that will be taking place in the Synagogue itself:
Opening Session: Tuesday, April 6, 7:30pm
via Livestream from the Main Sanctuary
"Neighbors in Vienna: Herzl, Freud, and the Wonder of Jewish History"
Session #2: Tuesday, April 13, 7:30pm, via Conference Call
"Blue and White in Basel: The Zionist Congress and the Israeli Flag"
Session #3: Tuesday, April 20, 7:30pm, via Conference Call
"London Battle: Jew vs. Jew and the Balfour Declaration"
Session #4: Tuesday, April 27, 7:30pm, via Conference Call
"From Louisville to Washington: The Extraordinary Evolution of Louis Brandeis"
Session #5: Tuesday, May 4, 7:30pm, via Conference Call
"Missouri Miracle: Harry Truman, Eddie Jacobson, and the Birth of Israel"
Session #6: Tuesday, May 11, 7:30pm, via Conference Call
"God and Man in Tel Aviv: The Declaration, the Altalena, and the Israeli Air Force"
Session #7: Thursday, May 13, 7:30pm,
via Livestream from the Main Sanctuary
"The Synagogues of the Jewish Quarter: A New Understanding of Jerusalem"
I am not sure it is necessary to point out that Sephardim are completely
absent from the lectures.
But more than this, Soloveichik’s Right Wing HASBARAH is meant to undermine the Sephardic tradition of Convivencia, as it promotes the Ashkenazi Shtetl racism or the New Zionist Sparta.
It is a sad situation all around.
“Splitting the Yam Suf and Splitting the Delaware”!
Just a short time after he posted his Ashkenazi HASBARAH filth to the SI community, Soloveichik posted his Friday Night Lights source sheet:
https://files.constantcontact.com/9a50190d001/4ad9358d-b392-4fbb-8c7b-524d1f72f0f4.pdf
As is his usual duplicitous routine, he connects George Washington to the Settlers – here in the figure of Gush Etzion macher Rav Medan:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaaqov_Medan
Here is the text from the source sheet:
...God conducted the war through His heavenly army. But the resilience of the home-front, of the people of Israel, was of paramount importance for the success of God's war against Pharaoh and the Egyptian army of chariots.
The people of Israel entered the sea with their wives of children, in the midst of a strong east wind that lifted the waterway over their heads, roaring waves that were held up by the strong wind alone and to the human eye seemed liable at any moment to fallback down with force to their natural place on the sea. Try to imagine a Jewish mother holding an infant with one hand and pulling along her two-year old toddler with the other, the deafening noise of the wind making his crying inaudible. She heads down to the bed of the sea in the darkness of night in the midst of the water that is lifted up high, only because this is what Moshe had told her to do in the name of God. She marches on with her husband and her older children, like a well-disciplined army following the orders of Moshe, and she does not turn back. The sheep and the donkeys that are carrying the family's possessions advance with them. Only after we internalize this awesome sight can we understand the aforementioned statement of Chazal..
Medan is just like George Washington:
We must ascend the Temple Mount!
https://www.haaretz.com/1.5315625
Beware Muslim Domination!
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/133952
His ambivalence toward Homosexuality:
https://www.makorrishon.co.il/nrg/online/1/ART1/856/165.html
As the Hebrew article states:
But even though the rabbi warned of the danger that religious gay organizations would create an atmosphere of legitimacy not only for people but also for the very forbidden act, he surprised by expressing a position supporting religious gays out of the closet. "I am not in favor of storing anyone in the closet, God forbid for us," the rabbi said. "I think whoever is to blame for these things has no reason to be ashamed of these tendencies. If people in the community know that the organization does not drag young people and does not legitimize the phenomenon, I am convinced they will accept this public with love. If they know this public knows and pushes to do everything in front of God and saying, "We tried to change and we did not succeed," they will receive this public with great love. "
That is the kind of Settler rabbi that should be promoted in SI!
David Shasha