Shahak Chapter Two
Kim Bebbington
alabama.birmingham.general, <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>This is worth reading, as few things are.
>RLA
Just in case the good people of Birmingham, Alabama, haven't yet
worked it out - Roger L. Alexander is quoting material from a Nazi
website (in England - the production of Nazi propaganda is illegal in
Germany)
The site is http://abbc.com/nj/index.htm
Its raison d'etre -
Die Kampfgemeinschaft gegen antideutsche Politik und fur die
Wiederherstellung der Menschenrechte in Deutschland!
The fighting community against anti-German politics and for the
restoration of human rights in Germany!
It is a website devoted to the vilification of Jews.
We can see from where Mr Alexander draws his inspiration as well as
his pirated materials.
Roger Alexander
the fact remains that Israel Shahak has a rational, moral
point of view which is worth the time of those concerned with
Israel and why Israel acts in such crazy ways. I have found
his work invaluable in my attempts to understand what
at first blush appears unfathomable.
I note for the record, that aside from attacking the author,
and attacking the web site where it is carried, no one of
the many Zionists have been able to rebut the force of
Mr. Shahak's ideas. I suspect they are simply too hot
to handle.
RLA
Mike Medved
numerous times in numerous articles. Some articles
have been published on t.p.m., some on other NGs.
If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
As we know, Roggie, you only read stuff that agrees with
you, so posting those for you would be a waste of time.
In talk.politics.mideast Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
: I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
Avital Pilpel
> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
Nonetheless, post it. It might help others not fall for the "But Shahak
said" one-trick pony.
Avital Pilpel
But, Roger, doesn't the fact that it is carried by a neo-nazi sight tell you
*something* about how likely it is to be the "objective truth" about jews
and/or Israel?
Would you trust, say, material on black people you find on KKK web sites to
be the "objective truth" about blacks, even if it wasn't the KKK members who
actually wrote it?
This claim that you "don't care" where the material is carried is very odd.
Stan Engel
Mike Medved wrote in message <7le6n4$c...@dfw-ixnews14.ix.netcom.com>...
>Shahak was shown to lie, distort, and make up facts
>numerous times in numerous articles. Some articles
>have been published on t.p.m., some on other NGs.
Another fraud along the same lines as Shahak is Dr. Alfred Lilienthal who
falsified reports from the April 23, 1948, Times of London concerning what
happened at Haifa.
Those interested might do a Deja-News check on my posting:
Subject: Re: What Palestinians? \ Lilienthal
Date: 1999/04/16
Mike Medved
:> If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
:> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
: Nonetheless, post it. It might help others not fall for the "But Shahak
: said" one-trick pony.
------------------------------------
here it is (warning - long)
You think Roggie will admit after reading
the long involved explanation of Shahak's
blatant lie that Shahak is a liar? Nah,
Roggie cannot even admit that he himself is
a liar.
------------------------------------
Here is an example of a lie that Shahak promulgated in his book.
(Posted by Richard Schultz sch...@ashur.cc.biu.ac.il)
In his book _Jewish History, Jewish Religion_ (London:
Pluto Press, 1994), Shahak tells his story of having witnessed an
"ultra-religious Jew refuse to allow his phone to be used on the Sabbath
in order to call an ambulance for a non-Jew who happened to have collapsed
in his Jerusalem neighbourhood (p. 1)." Shahak goes on to say
Instead of simply publicising the incident in the press,
I asked for a meeting with the members of the Rabbinical
Court of Jerusalem, which is composed of rabbis nominated
by the State of Israel. I asked them whether such behavior
was consistent with their interpretation of the Jewish
religion. They answered that the Jew in question had behaved
correctly, indeed piously, and backed their statement by
referring me to a passage in an authoritative compendium
of Talmudic laws, written in this century. . . .Neither
the Israeli, nor the diaspora, rabbinical authorities ever
reversed their ruling that a Jew should not violate the
Sabbath in order to save the life of a Gentile. They added
much sanctimonious twaddle to the effect that if the
consequence of such an act puts Jews in danger, the violation
of the Sabbath is permitted, for their sake (p. 1).
Shahak returns to the subject later in the book (pp. 80-87). He expands on
the principle (that he calls "sanctimonious twaddle") that it is permitted
to help a Gentile on the Sabbath if refusing to do so would put Jews in
danger. On page 81, he quotes a 17th century source that says that
"Not only is there no interdiction against helping them [non-Jews], but
we are even obliged to pray for their welfare," and comments that the
responsum "does not go nearly as far as the apologetics pretend, for
it advocates _removing the ban_ on saving a Gentile's life, rather than
making it _mandatory_ as in the case of a Jew. . . (emphasis his)."
So the question is quite simply is there a rabbinical authority who rules
that a Jew should violate the Sabbath to save the life of a non-Jew?
If the answer is yes, then Shahak is wrong; if the answer is yes, and Shahak
knew it, then he is a liar.
As it happens, there is such a responsum, which was given by I. J. Unterman
who was at the time the chief Ashkenazic rabbi of Israel. Unterman's
responsum is given a lengthy explication in an essay by Immanuel
Jakobovits
(later Chief Rabbi of Great Britain) in the Summer 1966 issue of _Tradition:
A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought_, pp. 58-65, entitled "A Modern Blood
Libel -- L'Affaire Shahak."
In this essay, Jakobovits states that "overlooked was the circumstance that
the rabbinate, far from having confirmed Dr. Shahak's allegation, had in
fact ruled that the Sabbath must be violated to save non-Jewish no less
than Jewish lives (p. 59)." Thus, right at the outset of the essay,
Jakobovits provides exactly what Shahak said had not been provided: a
rabbinic authority who ruled that a Jew should, indeed *must*, violate
the Sabbath to save the life of a non-Jew. I recommend the essay to
anyone who is interested in the issue.
One of Shahak's claims is that halakhah states that "as for Gentiles,
their lives _must not_ be saved (p. 80, emphasis his)." In contrast,
Unterman's responsum begins, not with the Sabbath, but with the
following:
According to the Mishnah (Gittin 59b), the non-Jewish
poor are not to be prevented from collecting the
gleanings, the forgotten sheaves, and the corner of the
field 'because of the ways of peace.' The Talmud adds:
'One feeds the poor, visits the sick, and buries the dead
of the non-Jews with those of the Jews, because of the ways
of peace (61a).' In practice, this law requires such
services to be rendered to non-Jews even if they are not
together 'with Jews' (Yoreh De'ah, 151:12; a.l., 19). In
fact, the wording 'with the Jewish poor' may imply that
indigent non-Jews must be supported out of funds
collected for distribution to poor Jews. Maimonides (Hil.
Melakhim, 10:12) bases this rule on the verses 'The Lord
is good to all; and His tender mercies are over all his
works' (Ps. 145:9) and 'Its ways are the ways of pleasant-
ness, and all its paths are peace' (Prov. 3:17)
(Jakobovits, p. 60).
Jakobovits then goes on to point out that the "objective, to secure
harmonius human relations, motivates several ordinances enacted by the
rabbis 'on account of enmity,' that is, to prevent jealousy and
disharmony (p. 61)."
After this introduction, he discusses the subject of Sabbath observance in
general. His basic idea is that Sabbath desecration was considered in
classical rabbinics to be on a par with idolatry "because they both involve
a denial of God's creation (see Tosaphot, Sanhedrin 78b)" and thus there
must be a specific sanction in the Torah for saving life on Sabbath:
otherwise, it would be like idolatry, where one is supposed to choose
death over violation of the prohibition. Their reasoning was that, as
Exodus 31:16 says that "the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath
to observe the Sabbath," it is permissible to violate the Sabbath to
save the life of a Jew in order that he be able to live to observe
many Sabbaths later (citing Yoma 85b; Sabbath 151b; Mekhilta, Tissa).
But what about a non-Jew, for whom this line of reasoning does not
apply? In this case, "even Biblical violations of the Sabbath [as
opposed to violations of rabbinic enactments, for which there is in
general considerably more leniency] are warrented for non-Jews 'on
account of enmity.' i.e., if the refusal to render such aid may
imperil Jews (p. 62)." Thus, despite Shahak's characterization of the
reasoning as "twaddle", the net result is exactly what he said it wasn't:
Jews are required to violate the Sabbath to help non-Jews. Jakobovits
goes on to say
Quite obviously, any discrimination between Jews and
non-Jews in this matter would inevitably lead to such
'enmity' today, and it cannot therefore be sustained
in Jewish law. . . . Similar considerations prompted
R. Moses Isserles to rule in the _Shulchan Arukh_ that
there is no difference between Jewish and non-Jewish
property in extinguishing a fire on the Sabbath (_Orach
Chayyim_, 334, end gloss).
In sum, then, 'the ways of peace,' as a basic ingredient
of the ethics of Judaism, motivated the Talmudic sages
in their legislation no less than they compel our
religious obligations today (p. 62).
Interstingly, Jakobovits also says that there "is _nothing new_ in
Rabbi Unterman's conclusion that in practice the Sabbath must be set aside
even for the saving of a non-Jewish life (p. 62, emphasis mine)." That
is, not only is Shahak wrong about current practice, but that his
conclusions about earlier practice are wrong as well. Jakbovits cites
(p. 63) an opinion of the thirteenth century rabbi Menachem Meiri
(four centuries *before* the opinion Shahak cites) that the prohibition
to desecrate the Sabbath for non-Jews applied "only to the ancient
heathens. . . because they professed no religion at all, nor did they
acknowledge their duty to human society (Bet Habechirah on Yoma 84b and 85a;
see also Shittah Mekubetset on Bava Kamma 38a)."
Jakobovits then comments further, on Unterman's responsum, that
What is novel in Rabbi Unterman's responsum is his
suggestion that the Sabbath in principle belongs to
the three cardinal laws and that, as such, it would have
to be observed even at the cost of life if the Torah
had not expressly sanctioned its violation. . . for
the preservation of a Sabbath-observing life.
Also original is Rabbi Unterman's emphasis on the 'enmity'
principle as an intergral element in rabbinic ethics. . .
Was this principle, as enunciated in the Talmud and
expanded by later rabbinical authorities, meant merely
to recognize the _force majeure_ of attitudes which might
embitter or imperil Jewish-Gentile relations, or was it
deliberately introduced as a purely ethical counterindication
to laws which might otherwise be conducive to immoral
results? In practice there may be little difference
between these two alternatives, for they both lead to
pragmatic verdicts compatible with amicable Jewish-Gentile
relations and with the highest ethical standards. But
in moral reasoning, the second alternative would
represent a bold and ingenious device of the rabbis to
operate and ethical corrective in their legislation
even to the extent of overriding Biblical laws conflicting
with this principle (pp. 63-64).
Thus, we can see that Shahak's claim that there is no rabbinical
authority either in Israel or in the diaspora who reversed the ruling
he claimed to have received is false. In fact, since Unterman was
in Israel and Jakobovits in New York at the time, the ruling has
been reversed by at least one authority in each. But did Shahak
know of Unterman's decision? In his essay, Jakobovits quotes an
article from the 20 May 1966 _London Jewish Chronicle_ that says
"How right. . .is Dr. Shahak in condemning Rabbi Unterman's feeble,
permissive edict, as morally false." So neither Shahak nor [Yigal] Arens
can pretend that Shahak is or was unaware of the ruling I have discussed
here. Jakobovits's conclusions include
But even for those unacquainted with the sizeable
literature on Jewish-Gentile relations in Jewish law,
one final set of questions must seem inescapable.
Assuming that the charges against the Talmud had some
substance, and it did contain laws which were
"discriminatory," "inhuman" or "abominable" as is
alleged [by the _London Jewish Chronicle_ article].
What are today's rabbis to do in order to 'wipe out'
such a 'stain and stigma'? Other than reinterpret
the law, which they in fact did on the basis of the
Talmud itself, are they to censor new editions of the
Talmud, or perhaps burn it at the stake, as the medieval
Jew-baiters did? Or should they, rabbis in Israel,
denounce the Talmud as immoral, as Rohland and Streicher
did? Or should they brazenly falsify the truth as
Shahak did? (p. 65)
As for me, I conclude that
(1) Shahak claimed that no rabbinic authority has ruled that a Jew
must save the life of a non-Jew on the Sabbath, and that a Jew who
refuses to help a non-Jew on the Sabbath is not behaving "piously."
(2) Rabbinic authorities (Unterman and Jakobovits) have ruled precisely
as Shahak said they had not.
(3) Shahak knew of these rulings when he made the claim in (1).
(4) Therefore, Shahak is a liar.
Q.E.D.
Richard Schultz
Copyright (c) 1995 Richard Schultz. Permission to reproduce this
essay,
either in print or electronically, is granted on condition that the
entire
text (including this disclaimer) is reproduced unaltered.
Mike Medved
:> If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
:> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
: Nonetheless, post it. It might help others not fall for the "But Shahak
: said" one-trick pony.
-----
here is another proof that Shahak blatantly lies in his books
-----
INTRODUCTION
In his book _Jewish History, Jewish Religion: the
Weight of Three Thousand Years_ (London: Pluto Press,
1994), Israel Shahak tries to demonstrate that
Judaism is fundamentally intolerant and xenophobic.
In three previous essays, I have taken some passages
from that book and shown how, in order to arrive at
these conclusions, he had to lie about the content of
the sources on which he claimed to have based them,
and in one case, about an event that he claims to have
witnessed that appears never actually to have occurred.
Here, I would like to examine a longer passage from
Shahak's book, found on pages 25-26 and part of a section
entitled "The Deception Continues." He is trying to prove
a central part of his thesis, namely, that Judaism is
fundamentally anti-Black (as opposed to there being
certain individual Jews who are, unfortunately, racists).
Interestingly enough, although Shahak seems to think that
this anti-Black attitude is a fundamental one to Judaism,
so much so that he claims that the rabbis who marched with
the civil rights movement of the 1960's had to be
"schizophrenically" switching back and forth between their
liberal notions and the ingrained racism of their religion,
he only provides one example of a traditional source to
support his claim. As I show below, not only is his
discussion of this source, a quotation from Maimonides'
_Guide for the Perplexed_, filled with errors that can
be most charitably ascribed to incredibly shoddy research,
but it is also so distorted that when the quotation is
actually read in its proper context, it is revealed to
say practically the exact opposite of what Shahak claims.
SHAHAK ON MAIMONIDES
.. . .Apart from his work on the codification of the Talmud,
he was also a philosopher and his "Guide to the Perplexed"
is justly considered to be the greatest work of Jewish
religious philosophy and is widely read and used even today.
Unfortunately, in addition to his attitude toward non-Jews
generally and Christians in particular, Maimonides was also
an anti-Black racist.
Towards the end of the Guide, in a crucial chapter (book III,
chapter 51) he discusses how various sections of humanity can
attain the supreme religious value, the true worship of God.
Among those who are incapable of even approaching this are:
"Some of the Turks [i.e., the Mongol race] and the nomads in the
North, and the Blacks and the nomads in the South, and those who
resemble them in our climates. And their nature is like the
nature of mute animals, and according to my opinion they are not
on the level of human beings, and their level among existing
things is below that of a man and above that of a monkey because
they have the image and the resemblance of a man more than a
monkey does."
Now, what does one do with such a passage in a most important
and necessary work of Judaism? Face the truth and its
consequences? God forbid! Admit (as so many Christian scholars,
for example have done in similar circumstances) that a very
important Jewish authority held also rabid anti-Black views,
and by this admission make an attempt at self-education in
real humanity? Perish the thought. I can almost imagine Jewish
scholars in the USA consulting a among themselves, "What is to
be done?' -- for the book had to be translated, due to the
decline in the knowledge of Hebrew among American Jews.
Whether by consultation or by individual inspiration, a happy
'solution' was found: in the popular American translation of
the Guide by one Friedlander, first published as far back as
1925 and since then reprinted in many editions, including
several in paperback, the Hebrew word Kushim, which means Blacks,
was simply transliterated and appears as 'Kushites', a word
which means nothing to those who have no knowledge of Hebrew,
or to whom an obliging rabbi will not give an oral explanation. [22]
During all these years, not a word has been said to point out
the initial deception or the social facts underlying its
continuation -- and this througout the excitement of Martin Luther
King's campaigns, which were supported by so many rabbis, not to
mention other Jewish figures, some of whom must have been
aware of the anti-Black racist attitudes which forms part of
their Jewish heritage.
Footnote 22 reads as follows:
22 "I am happy to say that in a recent new translation (Chicago
University Press) the word 'Blacks" does appear, but the heavy and
very expensive volume is unlikely, as yet, to get into the 'wrong'
hands. Similarly, in early 19th centry England, radical books
(such as Goodwin's) were allowed to appear, provided they were
issued in a very expensive edition."
A LITANY OF ERRORS
The above passage may sound damning, although on examination, it
becomes considerably less so. Let us begin with the errors in
the above passage.
First, let us consider his description of the translation of the
work itself. Contrary to what he implies in the passage, the
_Guide_ was not originally written in Hebrew, but in Arabic,
although Hebrew translations appeared very soon after its original
composition; Shmuel ibn Tibbon's translation, which was until
the 20th century the standard one, received Maimonides' personal
approval, in fact. More to the point, the translation to which
Shahak refers was not done in the USA, nor was it done in 1925.
Nor was the "one Friedlander" some random person assigned by
the Jewish Conspiracy to translate Maimonides in such a way as
to conceal its meaning.
The translation to which Shahak refers was done by Michael
Friedlander, who was a scholar of sufficient note to rate his
own entry in the Encyclopedia Judaica (vol. 7 of the 1971
edition). Friedlander, who lived from 1833 to 1910, was born
in Germany, but from 1865 until 1907 served as the principal of
Jews' College in London (England's rabbinical seminary). His
scholarly work includes a translation of ibn Ezra in addition
to his translation of the _Guide for the Perplexed_. This
translation, incidentally, was made between 1881 and 1885, with
a revised edition appearing in 1904, not in 1925, as Shahak
would have it. I do not know which edition Shahak was reading,
but the ones I have seen make it clear that the original editions
date from when Friedlander was actually alive to have written
them. Apparently, the concept of "title page" is one with which
Shahak is unfamiliar. In any case, although the translation was
reprinted in the United States, it is fact not an "American"
translation any more than the King James Version of the Bible is
an "American" translation because it happens to have been
reprinted numerous times in America.
And what of Shahak's objection to the word "Kushite"? I suspect
that Friedlander's original audience (British late 19th century)
would have been much more familiar with the term "Kushite" for
"Black" (cf. the OED) than Shahak gives them credit for. In any
case, it is hard to see why it never occurred to Shahak that if
one is unfamiliar with the term, one need not go to a rabbi for
advice. Apparently, "dictionary" is a concept with which Shahak
is unfamiliar.
Regardless of whether they would have been more likely to
understand the term "Kushite" than the average late-20th century
American, Friedlander's original audience would certainly have been
more familiar with the Bible, at least in English translation, than
Shahak is. And this is quite interesting, because the word
"Kushite" appears in English Bible translations, both Christian
ones such as the King James, and Jewish ones such as the 1917
Jewish Publication Society (and the "new" JPS of the 1960's as
well). The passage to which I am referring is Numbers chapter
12. In this passage, we learn that Miriam (Moses' sister) objected
to Moses having a "Cushite" wife, and that she was punished (with
"leprosy") for voicing such an objection. Thus, rather than being
a code word for "some ethnic group whose identity must be kept
secret" -- a position made more silly by Friedlander's open use of
the word "Turk" in the same passage -- someone who didn't know what
a "Kushite" was would be led to the conclusion that it is someone
whom we are fundamentally *forbidden* from criticizing because of
his or her ethnic background.
Shahak mentions, in the footnote, the later Pines translation (which
he calls "recent," although it was actually done in 1963). And here
he errs once again (shoots himself in the foot might be a better way
of putting it). Shahak's argument is that the more accurate Pines
translation was deliberately made expensive so that it would be kept
out of the hands of inappropriate readers. Apparently, the concept
of "public library" is one with which Shahak is not familiar. But
more to the point. The Pines translation is readily available in
paperback, in a two-volume edition that totals $50, hardly excessive
for a scholarly work, and only $25 for the volume that contains the
quotation in question. More amusingly, the list price of Shahak's
own book is $59.95!
The matter of "deliberate concealment" is, however, even more silly
than that. The standard college textbook for courses on Maimonides
is _A Maimonides Reader_, edited by Isidore Twersky (which,
incidentally, has a list price of $15.95). For his selection from
the _Guide_, Twersky chose (inter alia) the very chapter from which
Shahak chose his example -- and Twersky uses the Pines translation!
Thus, one is forced to conclude that if the idea was to keep this
dangerous knowledge of Maimonides' supposed racism out of the hands
of the public, the people in charge of keeping this so-called secret
are not doing a very good job of it. In fact, there is a much more
likely explanation of the entire passage, as I discuss below, but
the point is that, once again, Shahak's research for _Jewish
History, Jewish Religion_ is shoddy at best, since 10 minutes with
_Books in Print_ clearly shows that his argument is untenable.
A DELIBERATE DECEPTION
While it is possible that the above errors are merely the product
of Shahak's poor research skills, no such excuse can explain away
his deliberate distortion of the text that he quotes. In fact,
despite what Shahak says, the passage does not contain a blanket
condemnation of Blacks as being "below the level of a man." One
thing to keep in mind in considering this passage is that Maimonides
was strongly influenced in his philosophical thinking by the ideas
of Aristotle. Aristotle, in Book 1 of the _Nicomachean Ethics_,
considers the soul to be divided into three parts: one, the
"vegetative soul," is common to all living things. He further
subdivides the higher functions of the soul into an "irrational
soul" and a "rational soul." So in this passage, Maimonides appears
to be describing the Turks and Blacks (i.e. the "uncivilized" types
who live on the far reaches of the world) as lacking in this
highest part of the soul.
Why would he do this? To understand, we have to read the entire
passage, not just the excerpt that Shahak provides. Maimonides
opens the chapter with a famous simile (this is taken, by the way,
from the Friedlander translation):
A king is in his palace, and all his subjects are partly in
the country, and partly abroad. Of the former, some have
their backs turned toward the king's palace, and their faces
in another direction; and some are desirous and zealous to
go to the palace, seeking 'to inquire in the temple,' and
to minister before him, but have not yet seen even the face
of the wall of the house. . . [Maimonides goes on to describe
the people who are increasingly close to the palace, and within
the palace, increasingly close to the chamber in which the king
is found]. I will now explain the simile which I have made.
The people who are abroad are all those that have no religion,
either neither one based on speculation nor one received by
tradition. Such are the extreme Turks that wander about in
the north, the Kushites who live in the south, and those in
our country who are like these. I consider these as irrational
beings, and not as human beings; they are below mankind, but
above the monkeys, since they have the form and shape of a man,
and a mental faculty above that of the monkey.
Those who are in the country, but have their backs turned
toward the king's palace, are those who possess religion,
belief, and thought, but happen to hold false doctrines, which
they either adopted in consequence of great mistakes made in
their own speculations, or received from others who misled
them. Because of these doctrines they recede more and more
from the royal palace the more they seem to proceed. They are
worse than the first class. . .
Now when we place the quotation in context, what do we find?
We find that Maimonides is *not* arguing that Blacks (or Kushites,
if you prefer) are inherently less human than Whites. When one
reads the sentence prior to the place where Shahak begins his
quotation, it is clear that "those who resemble them" does not
refer to a physical resemblance (as one might think from Shahak's
out-of-context quotation), but to people in our lands with
no religion, who *spiritually* resemble the people who live far
from civilization in that they have no religious feeling, and
are thus lacking in the "rational" soul, that is, the highest
moral functions of a human being. While one might argue with
Maimonides' choice to equate the "rational soul" with religious
feeling, it is clear that he is not singling out Blacks for
disdain, but those with no religion.
Maimonides makes this point even more clear in the next paragraph,
where he says that people with "false doctrines" are worse than
the people with no religion at all (in fact, he says that
sometimes it may be necessary to kill people who hold false
doctrine in order that its spread be checked). To return to
Maimonides' simile, the people with no religion can be brought
closer to the palace (even if they happen to be Blacks), while
those with false doctrines are moving away from the palace
(even if they happen to be Whites). Thus, there is no possible
reasonable reading of this passage from Maimonides that interprets
it as a racist diatribe against Blacks, unless one goes to some
effort to distort it.
And distort it Shahak does. Besides the quote out of context that
changes the entire import of the paragraph from a discussion of
spiritual and moral values to a racist diatribe, Shahak makes a
subtle but significant change in the passage in order to further
make it look like Maimonides had a virulent hatred of Blacks.
In describing those people who lack religious feeling, Maimonides
says that he considers them below mankind because they lack the
spiritual component of the soul that makes one truly human.
But, he says, they are higher than the monkeys, because they look
like humans, and have the mental faculties of humans. How does
Shahak render this passage? He claims that Maimonides describes
Blacks (and Turks) as having the "image and resemblance of
a man more than a monkey does." According to Shahak, Maimonides
claims that these people look *more* human than a monkey, which
must mean that they do not actually look human. Shahak is clearly
trying to see the passage from Maimonides as a racist tract in
the context of traditional anti-Black racist literature, which
frequently tries to compare Blacks with apes. But if one looks
at what the passage actually says (as opposed to what Shahak
wants it to have said), Maimonides clearly states that the people
who lack religious feeling do have the image of a human.
Now it is possible that the mistakes referred to above are merely
products of Shahak's ignorance, or shoddy research techniques
(one would have thought, for example, that he would have taken
the trouble to find out something about Friedlander before
commenting on the translation). But there is no way that he
can be excused for his out-of-context quotation. If he read the
passage that he quotes in his book, Shahak must have read
the sentence that precedes it, and he must have known that that
one sentence proves that his interpretation of the text is
completely at odds with what it actually says. And if Shahak
was aware of the Friedlander and Pines translations, his
rendering of the final sentence of the passage must have been
a deliberate distortion of its contents.
Since this quotation from Maimonides is the only text that
Shahak brings to support his contention that Judaism is
fundamentally racist, one has to conclude that he considers it
the best evidence for this alleged racism. And since this best
evidence was manufactured by Shahak out of whole cloth, what
is left to support his argument? What can one say about a
person who resorts to such deliberate distortions in order
to try to make an argument? Apparently, "intellectual
honesty" is a concept with which Shahak is unfamiliar. And
if he will lie about the central points of his argument, what
does that suggest about his veracity regarding more tangential
matters?
I cannot speak for anyone else, but it appears to me that
(1) Shahak claims that Maimonides was a rabid racist.
(2) The quotation Shahak cites to support his claim says
nothing of the sort, and Shahak must have known this.
Therefore,
(3) Israel Shahak is a liar.
--
Copyright (c) 1996 Richard Schultz. Permission to reproduce this essay,
Kim Bebbington
<rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
dltjxx
>On Tue, 29 Jun 1999 17:21:00 -0500, Roger Alexander, in
>alabama.birmingham.general, <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>>This is worth reading, as few things are.
>>RLA
>Just in case the good people of Birmingham, Alabama, haven't yet
>worked it out - Roger L. Alexander is quoting material from a Nazi
>website (in England - the production of Nazi propaganda is illegal in
>Germany)
>The site is http://abbc.com/nj/index.htm
>Its raison d'etre -
>Die Kampfgemeinschaft gegen antideutsche Politik und fur die
>Wiederherstellung der Menschenrechte in Deutschland!
>The fighting community against anti-German politics and for the
>restoration of human rights in Germany!
>It is a website devoted to the vilification of Jews.
>We can see from where Mr Alexander draws his inspiration as well as
>his pirated materials.
Thanks for the info, Kim. We know that the rogerer is a Jew-hating
Nazi, but it's good to have proof.
Deborah
Murray Kastner
wrote:
> On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
> <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>
> >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>
> You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
> opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
> are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
>
> You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for precisely the
reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting such
antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental disease
here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
Avital Pilpel
>You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
>opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
>are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
</sarcasm on/>
Hey, Kim, I just found out the awful truth: Blacks are a bunch of savage
animals!
It was written by someone with a "Dr." before his name, so you KNOW it's all
true!
Of course, I found this information on a KKK web site, but surely THAT
doesn't matter...
all I have to say is that "I don't give a big rat's dupa" about where I
found it and claim the " fact remains" that the writer is a great guy!
After all, saying that makes it so, right?
</sarcasm off/>
Roger Alexander
post them. I am just happy the Shahak book is online. Why is it
that you cannot deal with what it says, but must attack the site,
n.b., where it is posted. That, of course, is par for your sourse,
Avital, but it does get old.
RLA
Roger Alexander
bunch of intelligent sophisticated liars as I have on this board.
It has been an education in polemics. For that alone, I am
grateful. The rest, the personal attacks, the lies, the propaganda,
you can keep. If you have something that shows or tends to
show that Mr. Shahak is wrong or has an evil intent,
post it.
RLA
Mike Medved wrote:
> Shahak was shown to lie, distort, and make up facts
> numerous times in numerous articles. Some articles
> have been published on t.p.m., some on other NGs.
>
> If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
> As we know, Roggie, you only read stuff that agrees with
> you, so posting those for you would be a waste of time.
>
> In talk.politics.mideast Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> : I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
> : the fact remains that Israel Shahak has a rational, moral
> : point of view which is worth the time of those concerned with
> : Israel and why Israel acts in such crazy ways. I have found
> : his work invaluable in my attempts to understand what
> : at first blush appears unfathomable.
> : I note for the record, that aside from attacking the author,
> : and attacking the web site where it is carried, no one of
> : the many Zionists have been able to rebut the force of
> : Mr. Shahak's ideas. I suspect they are simply too hot
> : to handle.
> : RLA
>
> : Kim Bebbington wrote:
>
> :> On Tue, 29 Jun 1999 17:21:00 -0500, Roger Alexander, in
Roger Alexander
Murray Kastner wrote:
> In article <378e3897...@nnrp.gol.com>, ki...@gol.com (Kim Bebbington)
> wrote:
>
> > On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
> > <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> >
> > >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
> >
> > You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
> > opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
> > are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
> >
> > You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
>
> Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for precisely the
> reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting such
> antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
> intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental disease
> here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
Because you are a hopelessly infected Zionist, I generally ignore your
posts, Mr. Kastner. I note only that I did not post Mr. Shahak's
work on any Jewish NG. Soc.culture.israel should by rights be for all
the people of Israel, who are not all Jews. TPM
is definitely not a "Jewish" NG either. I didn't even post to them, but to
alabama.birmingham.general. I hope to continue.
But it seems to me that a Jewish NG is precisely the place where Mr.
Shahak's work would be best posted, since it points out the craziness
of Zionism, in context of the separatism of Judaism from the rest of the
world.
The world needs a thorough airing of all these issues. If you have a bone
to pick with Mr. Shahak's writing, why not put it up?
I think his writing strikes too close to home, and you cannot deal with it.
RLA
Omri Schwarz
>
> I try to be fair minded.
Not trying very hard.
> I have never been exposed to such a
> bunch of intelligent sophisticated liars as I have on this board.
That's Rogerese for "I keep getting presented with counterevidence I
have
no choice but to ignore."
> It has been an education in polemics. For that alone, I am
> grateful. The rest, the personal attacks, the lies, the propaganda,
> you can keep. If you have something that shows or tends to
> show that Mr. Shahak is wrong or has an evil intent,
> post it.
Read the NG's archives on Shahak. He's a nut.
--
Omri Schwarz ---
Timeless wisdom of biomedical engineering:
"Noise is principally due to the presence of the
patient." -- R.F. Farr
Shalom Farber
Kim Bebbington wrote in message <377aa77f....@nnrp.gol.com>...
>On Tue, 29 Jun 1999 17:21:00 -0500, Roger Alexander, in
>alabama.birmingham.general, <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>
>>This is worth reading, as few things are.
>>RLA
>
>Just in case the good people of Birmingham, Alabama, haven't yet
>worked it out - Roger L. Alexander is quoting material from a Nazi
>website (in England - the production of Nazi propaganda is illegal in
>Germany)
>
>The site is http://abbc.com/nj/index.htm
>
>Its raison d'etre -
>
>Die Kampfgemeinschaft gegen antideutsche Politik und fur die
> Wiederherstellung der Menschenrechte in Deutschland!
>
> The fighting community against anti-German politics and for the
> restoration of human rights in Germany!
>
>
>It is a website devoted to the vilification of Jews.
>
>We can see from where Mr Alexander draws his inspiration as well as
>his pirated materials.
MR ALexander is a Nazi asshole!
Why do you bother with him?
Let him climnb back into the primeval ooze from whence he arose.
>
Murray Kastner
<rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> Murray Kastner wrote:
>
> > In article <378e3897...@nnrp.gol.com>, ki...@gol.com (Kim Bebbington)
> > wrote:
> >
> > > On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
> > > <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
> > >
> > > You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
> > > opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
> > > are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
> > >
> > > You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
> >
> > Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for precisely the
> > reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting such
> > antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
> > intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental disease
> > here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
>
> Because you are a hopelessly infected Zionist, I generally ignore your
> posts, Mr. Kastner.
Thanks! Coming from you, that's a high compliment.
>I note only that I did not post Mr. Shahak's
> work on any Jewish NG. Soc.culture.israel should by rights be for all
> the people of Israel, who are not all Jews. TPM
> is definitely not a "Jewish" NG either. I didn't even post to them, but to
> alabama.birmingham.general. I hope to continue.
> But it seems to me that a Jewish NG is precisely the place where Mr.
> Shahak's work would be best posted, since it points out the craziness
> of Zionism, in context of the separatism of Judaism from the rest of the
> world.
> The world needs a thorough airing of all these issues. If you have a bone
> to pick with Mr. Shahak's writing, why not put it up?
> I think his writing strikes too close to home, and you cannot deal with it.
> RLA
I don't entirely disagree with Shahak but I do take issue of the way you
use him to forward your own agenda, which is quite transparent no matter
where you post it.
Roger Alexander
Murray Kastner wrote:
My only agenda is ending the oppression of Palestinians and lebanese by
the Israelis. I have been pretty transparent.
RLA
Roger Alexander
RLA
Omri Schwarz
>
> Rather puny put downs, and no evidence re Shahak.
> RLA
>
Mike Medved has already posted two examples of Shahak's
dishonesty for your perusal.
JGa...@worldnet.att.net
>
> Dear Matthew, brother,
>
> Forgive me for intruding, but why do you care to read the postings
> of this rabid nazi dogs? This is an Israeli group. I wouldn't mind
> an israeli arabic democratic citizen expressing his ideas about
> living together with jews. But this would be another matter, don't
> you think?<
Exactly what do you mean by "an Israeli Arabic democratic citizen
expressing his ideas about living together with Jews?" What does that
mean? Is it like black people expressing their ideas on how to live with
whites in America? Or Albanians expressing their ideas about how to live
with Serbs in Kosovo? What exactly do you mean? Do you mean how to live
in the same building, or how your kids can go together to the same
schools, or exactly what? What do you mean? What ideas should they come
up with?
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
Roger supports Revisionist NAZIS
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
The National Socialist White People's Party, in its own words:
The National Socialist White People's Party: An Introduction
The newly reformed National Socialist White People's Party has fast
become the foremost organization of healthy Aryan racial resistance in
North America. The Party's program and revolutionary political line are
founded on the dynamic world view of National Socialism, as set forth by
the great German statesman and philosopher Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) in
his book MEIN KAMPF and his other spoken and written works. (The much
misunderstood term "Aryan" does not refer solely to people with blond
hair and blue eyes; it is simply the Nordic expression for White
people.)
The N.S.W.P.P. was originally founded in 1958 by the late U.S. Navy
Commander George Lincoln Rockwell (1918-1967) as the American Nazi
Party. The name was changed to the National Socialist White People's
Party in 1967, in order to better reflect the true nature and purpose of
the organization. Commander Rockwell's subsequent assassination in
August of that year led to a lengthy period of confusion and dormancy
for the Party, but in the 1990's it has revived and is gaining ground
steadily in numbers and influence among racially conscious White
Americans.
The essential basis of the National Socialist world view is race. We
believe that the Aryan race is our nation, rather than any particular
piece of geography or any specific government. In this sense we are
internationalist, in that we believe White Americans have far more
interest in common with White Germans, Britons, Australians, or any
other Aryan people than with non-Whites who by some accident of history
or quirk of government policy happen to hold U.S. Citizenship. The Party
examines every aspect of life from this racial viewpoint, whether the
specific issue involves economics, religion, politics, foreign policy,
science or whatever.
We believe that the Aryan race is under attack worldwide, and that there
exists a very real possibility that White people may vanish from the
face of the earth altogether if something is not done to halt, and then
to roll back, the advancing tide of liberalism and racial admixture
which liberal democracy has brought about. To do this it is necessary to
stop and then to reverse the massive non-White immigration into North
America which has taken place over the past generation, and to return
control of this continent to the Aryan peoples who originally conquered,
populated, and created its culture and political institutions.
Beyond immediate political and pragmatic goals, as outlined in the
Program of the N.S.W.P.P., the Party believes that the primary function
of National Socialism is to bring about a complete spiritual and moral
overhaul of our own people, to reinvent Aryan man, so to speak. The evil
things that have happened to our race during this century are not
primarily the result of the actions of our racial enemies, detrimental
as those actions have been. The White race has lost control of our own
destiny because we have become spiritually lost and morally weak,
embracing alien ideologies and false principles, such as racial equality
and liberal democracy, which are Judaic rather than Aryan in origin.
The guiding concept of the Party is best expressed in the immortal
Fourteen Words of David Lane: "We must secure the existence of our
people and a future for white children." In order to do this we must
overcome the true enemy of our race-the man or woman we see in the
mirror every morning. Before we can defeat our external enemies, we must
first meet and defeat everything in ourselves that is weak, lazy, and
cowardly; everything in our character that is materialistic rather than
spiritual, which seeks weak compromise and accommodation rather than
struggle and victory.
Once we win the battle within our own souls, we will be fully armed and
prepared for the battle in the streets of America. The National
Socialist White People's Party is history's instrument for that
attainment of both these victories.
For further information please send $1 to cover shipping and handling
to:
N.S.W.P.P.
PO Box 9140
Seattle, WA 98109
Call our Hotline: 206-782-9898
-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
- ------
The text of this Usenet article was posted on August 11, 1995, to three
newsgroups separately: alt.revisionism, alt.politics.nationalism.white,
and alt.skinheads. Some formatting has been added by Nizkor. The
original plaintext version of this file is available via ftp.
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:the fact remains that Israel Shahak has a rational, moral
>:point of view which is worth the time of those concerned with
>:Israel and why Israel acts in such crazy ways. I have found
>:his work invaluable in my attempts to understand what
>:at first blush appears unfathomable.
>:I note for the record, that aside from attacking the author,
>:and attacking the web site where it is carried, no one of
>:the many Zionists have been able to rebut the force of
>:Mr. Shahak's ideas. I suspect they are simply too hot
>:to handle.
>:RLA
>:
>:Kim Bebbington wrote:
>:
>:> On Tue, 29 Jun 1999 17:21:00 -0500, Roger Alexander, in
>:> alabama.birmingham.general, <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>:>
>:> >This is worth reading, as few things are.
>:> >RLA
>:>
>:> Just in case the good people of Birmingham, Alabama, haven't yet
>:> worked it out - Roger L. Alexander is quoting material from a Nazi
>:> website (in England - the production of Nazi propaganda is illegal
in
>:> Germany)
>:>
>:> The site is http://abbc.com/nj/index.htm
>:>
>:> Its raison d'etre -
>:>
>:> Die Kampfgemeinschaft gegen antideutsche Politik und fur die
>:> Wiederherstellung der Menschenrechte in Deutschland!
>:>
>:> The fighting community against anti-German politics and for the
>:> restoration of human rights in Germany!
>:>
>:> It is a website devoted to the vilification of Jews.
>:>
>:> We can see from where Mr Alexander draws his inspiration as well as
>:> his pirated materials.
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Matthew Ackerman
http://www.deja.com/~rla_parody/
http://www.nizkor.org <== best site on antisemitism available
matthew_...@rocketmail.com
mac...@kwiknet.net http://www.kwiknet.net/~macker
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:I try to be fair minded. I have never been exposed to such a
What a Laugh, RLA is a supporter of NAZI Revisionists and a PROVEN
ANTI-SEMITIC NEO-NAZI by his own slip ups.
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
- ------
>:bunch of intelligent sophisticated liars as I have on this board.
>:It has been an education in polemics. For that alone, I am
>:grateful. The rest, the personal attacks, the lies, the propaganda,
>:you can keep. If you have something that shows or tends to
>:show that Mr. Shahak is wrong or has an evil intent,
>:post it.
>:RLA
>:
>:Mike Medved wrote:
>:
>:> Shahak was shown to lie, distort, and make up facts
>:> numerous times in numerous articles. Some articles
>:> have been published on t.p.m., some on other NGs.
>:>
>:> If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
>:> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
>:> As we know, Roggie, you only read stuff that agrees with
>:> you, so posting those for you would be a waste of time.
>:>
>:> In talk.politics.mideast Roger Alexander
iQA/AwUBN3wIkkrJdnqhxWUVEQKoJwCffDx0xmMBIlkNQegNTnq8+2ajSwIAnjcA
DPI9Qiqpcb0WBKSkuGPyZ+/l
=F9V/
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
As RLA would also support the Rockwell Hate speaches against JEWS To be
on line for him to quote from no doubt.
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
- ------
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:See my post replying to you in detail. If you still have questions,
>:post them. I am just happy the Shahak book is online. Why is it
>:that you cannot deal with what it says, but must attack the site,
>:n.b., where it is posted. That, of course, is par for your sourse,
>:Avital, but it does get old.
>:RLA
>:
>:Avital Pilpel wrote:
>:
>:> > : I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:>
>:> But, Roger, doesn't the fact that it is carried by a neo-nazi sight
tell you
>:> *something* about how likely it is to be the "objective truth" about
jews
>:> and/or Israel?
>:>
>:> Would you trust, say, material on black people you find on KKK web
sites to
>:> be the "objective truth" about blacks, even if it wasn't the KKK
members who
>:> actually wrote it?
>:>
>:> This claim that you "don't care" where the material is carried is
very odd.
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=dsPj
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, "Avital Pilpel" <ap...@columbia.edu> wrote:
>:> : I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:
>:But, Roger, doesn't the fact that it is carried by a neo-nazi sight
tell you
>:*something* about how likely it is to be the "objective truth" about
jews
>:and/or Israel?
Roger IS, I fully believe a NEO-NAZI, he has voiced support and almost
all those that support him are Neo-nazis, many more honest about being
such than himself.
He SEVERAL TIMES called MATT Giwer a FRIEND and voiced SUPPORT of his
JEW HATRED POSTS. For those that want to, those posts of RLA's CAN be
found in deja.com archives. For information on RLA'S Buddy, Giwer, just
visit www.nizkor.org. They have files of his postings and Threatening
emails he sent to jews.
RLA also Called McTavish, AKA Doc Tavish, AKA DIRTY GUNGUS McGee a
"FRIEND" in more than one post. Again they can be found in Deja.com's
archives. McTavish while at pheonix.net sent DEATH THREATS to JEWISH
POSTERS and was turned into the FBI for it. When the FBI tried to serve
a Search Warrant the Neo-nazi ISP above destroyed all their files, disk
drives and servers to prevent them finding this FRIEND OF RLA. A copy
of one of the Death threats was in fact posted but RLA chose to CONTINUE
TO SUPPORT Tavish.
HE posted again today supporting Neo-nazi Revisionists.
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
- ------
>:
>:Would you trust, say, material on black people you find on KKK web
sites to
>:be the "objective truth" about blacks, even if it wasn't the KKK
members who
>:actually wrote it?
>:
>:This claim that you "don't care" where the material is carried is very
odd.
>:
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=nj46
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, ki...@gol.com (Kim Bebbington) wrote:
>:On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
>:<rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>:
>:>I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:
>:You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
>:opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
>:are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
>:
>:You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
His sources Many times are neo-nazi sites. HE SAYS he does not care.
That is because RLA is also a NEO-NAZI JEW HATING SOB.
>:
>:>the fact remains that Israel Shahak has a rational, moral
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=7gns
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, mur...@NOSPAMjonction.net (Murray Kastner)
wrote:
>:In article <378e3897...@nnrp.gol.com>, ki...@gol.com (Kim
Bebbington)
>:wrote:
>:
>:> On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
>:> <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>:>
>:> >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:>
>:> You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
>:> opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
>:> are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
>:>
>:> You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
>:
>:Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for precisely
the
>:reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting
such
>:antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
>:intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental
disease
>:here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
No RLA is not a Stupid man, he is a smarter than average JEW HATING
TROLL and NEO-NAZI.
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
No Herr Alexander the JEW HATER SOB,
You post in support of the aims of the neo-nazis.
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
- - ------
The text of this Usenet article was posted on August 11, 1995, to three
newsgroups separately: alt.revisionism, alt.politics.nationalism.white,
and alt.skinheads. Some formatting has been added by Nizkor. The
original plaintext version of this file is available via ftp.
>:
>:Would you trust, say, material on black people you find on KKK web
sites to
>:be the "objective truth" about blacks, even if it wasn't the KKK
members who
>:actually wrote it?
>:
>:This claim that you "don't care" where the material is carried is very
odd.
>:
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:
>:
>:Murray Kastner wrote:
>:
>:> In article <378e3897...@nnrp.gol.com>, ki...@gol.com (Kim
Bebbington)
>:> wrote:
>:>
>:> > On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
>:> > <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>:> >
>:> > >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
>:> >
>:> > You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
>:> > opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what
you
>:> > are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow
that.
>:> >
>:> > You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
>:>
>:> Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for
precisely the
>:> reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting
such
>:> antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
>:> intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental
disease
>:> here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
>:
>:Because you are a hopelessly infected Zionist, I generally ignore your
>:posts, Mr. Kastner. I note only that I did not post Mr. Shahak's
>:work on any Jewish NG. Soc.culture.israel should by rights be for all
>:the people of Israel, who are not all Jews. TPM
>:is definitely not a "Jewish" NG either. I didn't even post to them,
but to
>:alabama.birmingham.general. I hope to continue.
>:But it seems to me that a Jewish NG is precisely the place where Mr.
>:Shahak's work would be best posted, since it points out the craziness
>:of Zionism, in context of the separatism of Judaism from the rest of
the
>:world.
>:The world needs a thorough airing of all these issues. If you have a
bone
>:to pick with Mr. Shahak's writing, why not put it up?
>:I think his writing strikes too close to home, and you cannot deal
with it.
>:RLA
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
Shalom,
If you check it out, most of alabama.birmingham.general have in fact
kill filed the Nazi Roger, the rest keep sending complaints to his ISP
for those posts.
They know the dung he really is and wish he would emulate his hero,
Adolf with a Black Capsule and a bullet through the roof of his mouth to
his ass where RLA keeps what he calls his brains.
In talk.politics.mideast, "Shalom Farber" <shl...@iafrica.com> wrote:
>:
>:Kim Bebbington wrote in message <377aa77f....@nnrp.gol.com>...
>:>On Tue, 29 Jun 1999 17:21:00 -0500, Roger Alexander, in
>:>alabama.birmingham.general, <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>:>
>:>>This is worth reading, as few things are.
>:>>RLA
>:>
>:>Just in case the good people of Birmingham, Alabama, haven't yet
>:>worked it out - Roger L. Alexander is quoting material from a Nazi
>:>website (in England - the production of Nazi propaganda is illegal in
>:>Germany)
>:>
>:>The site is http://abbc.com/nj/index.htm
>:>
>:>Its raison d'etre -
>:>
>:>Die Kampfgemeinschaft gegen antideutsche Politik und fur die
>:> Wiederherstellung der Menschenrechte in Deutschland!
>:>
>:> The fighting community against anti-German politics and for the
>:> restoration of human rights in Germany!
>:>
>:>
>:>It is a website devoted to the vilification of Jews.
>:>
>:>We can see from where Mr Alexander draws his inspiration as well as
>:>his pirated materials.
>:
>:MR ALexander is a Nazi asshole!
>:Why do you bother with him?
>:Let him climnb back into the primeval ooze from whence he arose.
>:>
>:
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, Omri Schwarz <ocsc...@MIT.EDU> wrote:
>:Roger Alexander wrote:
>:>
>:> I try to be fair minded.
>:
>:Not trying very hard.
Omri, Roger's middle initial is L. The "L" stands for LIAR.
Get it?
>:
>:> I have never been exposed to such a
>:> bunch of intelligent sophisticated liars as I have on this board.
>:
>:That's Rogerese for "I keep getting presented with counterevidence I
>:have
>:no choice but to ignore."
That is because facts do not support RLA's NAZI views. He is a neo-nazi
that continues to support neo-nazis and their lies.
Here in this newsgroup today he wrote in support of neo-nazi
revisionism. and Here is what others, ROger's own kind, NAZIS have said
the reason or aim of ALL such is.
- From the page:
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
party/nswpp-0895.html
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Haim Guivon
Forgive me for intruding, but why do you care to read the postings
of this rabid nazi dogs? This is an Israeli group. I wouldn't mind
an israeli arabic democratic citizen expressing his ideas about
living together with jews. But this would be another matter, don't
you think?
You loose your energies talking to nazis for whom the only possible
answering could be crushing them like a cockroach.
Please, Matthew, I am sure we have enough israeli and jewish themes
to argue about.
Cordially,
Khayyam
======================================
Matthew Ackerman wrote:
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> No Herr Alexander the JEW HATER SOB,
>
> You post in support of the aims of the neo-nazis.
>
> - From the page:
>
> http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples-
Roger Alexander
Omri Schwarz wrote:
> Roger Alexander wrote:
> >
> > Rather puny put downs, and no evidence re Shahak.
> > RLA
> >
>
> Mike Medved has already posted two examples of Shahak's
> dishonesty for your perusal.
>
> --
> Omri Schwarz ---
Mostly I don't read Medved. You are getting about as bad.
RLA
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
Your agenda also includes support of neo-nazi revisionists.
You are perfectly clear, that you are a JEW HATING SOB
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:
>:
>:Murray Kastner wrote:
>:
>:> In article <377BA26C...@bellsouth.net>, Roger Alexander
>:>
>:> Thanks! Coming from you, that's a high compliment.
>:>
>:> >I note only that I did not post Mr. Shahak's
>:> > work on any Jewish NG. Soc.culture.israel should by rights be for
all
>:> > the people of Israel, who are not all Jews. TPM
>:> > is definitely not a "Jewish" NG either. I didn't even post to
them, but to
>:> > alabama.birmingham.general. I hope to continue.
>:> > But it seems to me that a Jewish NG is precisely the place where
Mr.
>:> > Shahak's work would be best posted, since it points out the
craziness
>:> > of Zionism, in context of the separatism of Judaism from the rest
of the
>:> > world.
>:> > The world needs a thorough airing of all these issues. If you
have a bone
>:> > to pick with Mr. Shahak's writing, why not put it up?
>:> > I think his writing strikes too close to home, and you cannot deal
with it.
>:> > RLA
>:>
>:> I don't entirely disagree with Shahak but I do take issue of the way
you
>:> use him to forward your own agenda, which is quite transparent no
matter
>:> where you post it.
>:
>:My only agenda is ending the oppression of Palestinians and lebanese
by
>:the Israelis. I have been pretty transparent.
>:RLA
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, Roger Alexander <rlalex...@bellsouth.net>
wrote:
>:
>:
Translation RLA Was shown to be a Neo-nazi JEw hating sob again by yet
another poster so he resorts to pretending not reading the posts from
now on. Yet he keeps replying to those he does not read.
ROTFLH
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, Omri Schwarz <ocsc...@MIT.EDU> wrote:
>:Roger Alexander wrote:
>:>
>:> Rather puny put downs, and no evidence re Shahak.
>:> RLA
>:>
>:
>:Mike Medved has already posted two examples of Shahak's
>:dishonesty for your perusal.
But the L in RLA is for LIAR or LIBELER, So he could care less that his
source is also a liar.
RLA mimics the stile of his mentor Goebbels telling his lies often
enough.....
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Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
In talk.politics.mideast, Haim Guivon <gui...@netvision.net.il> wrote:
>:Dear Matthew, brother,
>:
>:Forgive me for intruding, but why do you care to read the postings
>:of this rabid nazi dogs? This is an Israeli group. I wouldn't mind
>:an israeli arabic democratic citizen expressing his ideas about
>:living together with jews. But this would be another matter, don't
>:you think?
If you check above I am posting this from talk.politics.mideast, not
soc.culture.israel. Also If you check my sites, I am part of nizkor
list and the theme of the site is to take on nazis like Roger and his
supporters.
As to the subjects you suggest, look in the archives for a thread
"Salaam waShalom" which I and those interested in such participated. It
was in soc.culture.israel, soc.culture.jewish, and I believe small
portion got cross posted to talk.politics.mideast.
You will find Arabs (Palestinians), Muslims, Christians, Jews, Israelis,
Americans, Canadians, and others took part in that thread.
I Will answer you about why I "waste my time" with responding to nazis
by suggesting you visit the Reasons Page at the "Anti-Semitism In Usenet
Postings/Posters" Site. You can access that page directly at
http://homestead.deja.com/rla_parody/reasons.html
Or you can visit the home page and navigate around it to see a bit more.
That site is the at
http://www.deja.com/~rla_parody
It is currently in the process of being moved and renamed (The html
names) but that is being done one linked page at a time as time permits.
The new site allows for ftp of text versions of content.
I am willing to email you the personal reasons, not post them for
confronting such neo-nazis as RLA and his friends. If you want that,
just send me an email and I will send it to you as a reply.
Same for anyone that thinks they may be really interested in why I am
compelled to confront such persons every time I see such as them.
(Roger of course and his rabid dog h--e@erols the bow wowser would have
to get new accounts somewhere to get that :-). They are forbidden to
send me email as their own ISPs have even informed them of such.)
>:You loose your energies talking to nazis for whom the only possible
>:answering could be crushing them like a cockroach.
Actually not. I get more energy from it every time I do. I am keeping
a promise to a man on his death bed who once had thought as you do, and
paid a high price for it. (for more see above about emailing me).
>:Please, Matthew, I am sure we have enough israeli and jewish themes
>:to argue about.
>:
>:Cordially,
>:Khayyam
>:======================================
>:
>:Matthew Ackerman wrote:
>:>
>:> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>:> Hash: SHA1
>:>
>:> No Herr Alexander the JEW HATER SOB,
>:>
>:> You post in support of the aims of the neo-nazis.
>:>
>:> - From the page:
>:>
>:>
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/national-socialist-white-peoples
- -
>: > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
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<http://www.pgp.com>
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>:>
>:> Matthew Ackerman
>:>
>:> http://www.deja.com/~rla_parody/
The above is on anti-semitism in the newsgroups (usenet)
>:> http://www.nizkor.org <== best site on antisemitism available
Join nizkor email list, for ideas on how to handle neo-nazis like RLa
and his friends.
>:> matthew_...@rocketmail.com
>:> mac...@kwiknet.net http://www.kwiknet.net/~macker
A simple site, but you may actually find it interesting, Khayyam.
It has part of the reasons for not ignoring nazis like RLA but attacking
them every chance I get.
"I stood in silence, and my silence was as if it were consent.
When they came for the Gypsies, I said nothing, for I was not a Gypsy.
When they came for the Poles, I said nothing, for I was not Polish.
When they came for the Jews, I still said nothing, for I was not Jewish"
Then when they came for me, there was no one to speak out, they were all
gone."
The above sentiments were expressed not by a Jewish Victim of the
Holocaust, not by a Polish, slavic, Gypsy, but a German Pastor, Pastor
Neimuller.
"If you prick us do we not bleed, if you poison us do we not die. If you
wrong us shall we not revenge." William Shakespeare - a jewish
character in his play.
Silence...
Silence is in essence the same as consent with those views. If one does
not speak out at every opportunity, every instance, against the hatred,
against the lies, then one is shouting their agreement, their approval,
their consent. In the choices of moral issues, there is but agreement
or disagreement. One cannot be a sometimes virgin, they are or they are
not. One cannot be sometimes promiscuous, one is or one is not. In
silence of the masses, over 12 million civilians were sent to Camps. In
silence of the masses, 12 million sent to the camps were murdered. In
silence a nation of people allowed that to happen. In silence, they
gave their consent to it being done.
In silence they hid their heads, averted their eyes. In silence they
allowed it to happen. In Silence.....
In silence, of not shouting, NO, they gave their consent, not with words
spoken or written, but in silence....
In silence of the world, 12 million were murdered, half of them Jews, so
it falls on Jews to never be silent. It falls on Jews to shout out at
the nazis and about them again this day....
In silence, consent, or in confrontation rejection of such ideals again
about to be played.
Silent then, but never more.......
Sorry folks that one, "Silence....", is mine. Soon to be a page at my
site. I am however looking for a good Jpg file to adorn that page. I
am tired of putting Eichmann, Goebbels, Hitler, or Himmler on all the
pages. Any ideas or submissions for that will be welcomed.
Content of the site is at the discretion of the members and anyone can
join. Read the charter and white board before joining though. There is
only one rule about content I will, no must, enforce as it is in a
GENERAL AUDIENCE section so to speak.
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Avital Pilpel
> >:> dishonesty for your perusal.
> >:Mostly I don't read Medved.
> >:RLA
Gee, that means the evidence doesn't exist, then.
Haim Guivon
I get your point, Matthew. A good jew you are, indeed. With respect
to the nazi dogs:
I insist: as a group, they must be crushed.
As sick individuals, they should better be ignored. Otherwise, you
are making them happy by biting the bait.
I am simply being egoistic, the clutter makes me mad. You are
following, unwillingly, the play of the beasts, filling our
discussion group with strange stuff.
Now, if you take soc.culture.israel out of the spam, it would be OK
with me.
Cordially,
Khayyam
==============================================
--
Best wishes,
..................
Haim Guivon
Gutel Levin 42/16 - Ramot Sapir
Tel. 972-4-8236087
Haifa 32922
ISRAEL
..................
Roger Alexander
Now I have no way of knowing what is the truth. Has there been
a scholarly debate? Does Shahak have a reply? Has he changed his
work in a new edition?
RLA
Mike Medved wrote:
> Avital Pilpel <ap...@columbia.edu> wrote:
> :> If it will convince you that Shahak is a lying loon,
> :> I will repost those articles. But only if it will.
>
> : Nonetheless, post it. It might help others not fall for the "But Shahak
> : said" one-trick pony.
> -----
> here is another proof that Shahak blatantly lies in his books
> -----
>
> INTRODUCTION
>
> In his book _Jewish History, Jewish Religion: the
> Weight of Three Thousand Years_ (London: Pluto Press,
> 1994), Israel Shahak tries to demonstrate that
> Judaism is fundamentally intolerant and xenophobic.
> In three previous essays, I have taken some passages
> from that book and shown how, in order to arrive at
> these conclusions, he had to lie about the content of
> the sources on which he claimed to have based them,
> and in one case, about an event that he claims to have
> witnessed that appears never actually to have occurred.
>
> Here, I would like to examine a longer passage from
> Shahak's book, found on pages 25-26 and part of a section
> entitled "The Deception Continues." He is trying to prove
> a central part of his thesis, namely, that Judaism is
> fundamentally anti-Black (as opposed to there being
> certain individual Jews who are, unfortunately, racists).
> Interestingly enough, although Shahak seems to think that
> this anti-Black attitude is a fundamental one to Judaism,
> so much so that he claims that the rabbis who marched with
> the civil rights movement of the 1960's had to be
> "schizophrenically" switching back and forth between their
> liberal notions and the ingrained racism of their religion,
> he only provides one example of a traditional source to
> support his claim. As I show below, not only is his
> discussion of this source, a quotation from Maimonides'
> _Guide for the Perplexed_, filled with errors that can
> be most charitably ascribed to incredibly shoddy research,
> but it is also so distorted that when the quotation is
> actually read in its proper context, it is revealed to
> say practically the exact opposite of what Shahak claims.
>
>
> SHAHAK ON MAIMONIDES
>
> .. . .Apart from his work on the codification of the Talmud,
> he was also a philosopher and his "Guide to the Perplexed"
> is justly considered to be the greatest work of Jewish
> religious philosophy and is widely read and used even today.
> Unfortunately, in addition to his attitude toward non-Jews
> generally and Christians in particular, Maimonides was also
> an anti-Black racist.
>
> Towards the end of the Guide, in a crucial chapter (book III,
> chapter 51) he discusses how various sections of humanity can
> attain the supreme religious value, the true worship of God.
> Among those who are incapable of even approaching this are:
>
> "Some of the Turks [i.e., the Mongol race] and the nomads in the
> North, and the Blacks and the nomads in the South, and those who
> resemble them in our climates. And their nature is like the
> nature of mute animals, and according to my opinion they are not
> on the level of human beings, and their level among existing
> things is below that of a man and above that of a monkey because
> they have the image and the resemblance of a man more than a
> monkey does."
>
> Now, what does one do with such a passage in a most important
> and necessary work of Judaism? Face the truth and its
> consequences? God forbid! Admit (as so many Christian scholars,
> for example have done in similar circumstances) that a very
> important Jewish authority held also rabid anti-Black views,
> and by this admission make an attempt at self-education in
> real humanity? Perish the thought. I can almost imagine Jewish
> scholars in the USA consulting a among themselves, "What is to
> be done?' -- for the book had to be translated, due to the
> decline in the knowledge of Hebrew among American Jews.
> Whether by consultation or by individual inspiration, a happy
> 'solution' was found: in the popular American translation of
> the Guide by one Friedlander, first published as far back as
> 1925 and since then reprinted in many editions, including
> several in paperback, the Hebrew word Kushim, which means Blacks,
> was simply transliterated and appears as 'Kushites', a word
> which means nothing to those who have no knowledge of Hebrew,
> or to whom an obliging rabbi will not give an oral explanation. [22]
> During all these years, not a word has been said to point out
> the initial deception or the social facts underlying its
> continuation -- and this througout the excitement of Martin Luther
> King's campaigns, which were supported by so many rabbis, not to
> mention other Jewish figures, some of whom must have been
> aware of the anti-Black racist attitudes which forms part of
> their Jewish heritage.
>
> Footnote 22 reads as follows:
>
> 22 "I am happy to say that in a recent new translation (Chicago
> University Press) the word 'Blacks" does appear, but the heavy and
> very expensive volume is unlikely, as yet, to get into the 'wrong'
> hands. Similarly, in early 19th centry England, radical books
> (such as Goodwin's) were allowed to appear, provided they were
> issued in a very expensive edition."
>
> A LITANY OF ERRORS
>
> The above passage may sound damning, although on examination, it
> becomes considerably less so. Let us begin with the errors in
> the above passage.
>
> First, let us consider his description of the translation of the
> work itself. Contrary to what he implies in the passage, the
> _Guide_ was not originally written in Hebrew, but in Arabic,
> although Hebrew translations appeared very soon after its original
> composition; Shmuel ibn Tibbon's translation, which was until
> the 20th century the standard one, received Maimonides' personal
> approval, in fact. More to the point, the translation to which
> Shahak refers was not done in the USA, nor was it done in 1925.
> Nor was the "one Friedlander" some random person assigned by
> the Jewish Conspiracy to translate Maimonides in such a way as
> to conceal its meaning.
>
> The translation to which Shahak refers was done by Michael
> Friedlander, who was a scholar of sufficient note to rate his
> own entry in the Encyclopedia Judaica (vol. 7 of the 1971
> edition). Friedlander, who lived from 1833 to 1910, was born
> in Germany, but from 1865 until 1907 served as the principal of
> Jews' College in London (England's rabbinical seminary). His
> scholarly work includes a translation of ibn Ezra in addition
> to his translation of the _Guide for the Perplexed_. This
> translation, incidentally, was made between 1881 and 1885, with
> a revised edition appearing in 1904, not in 1925, as Shahak
> would have it. I do not know which edition Shahak was reading,
> but the ones I have seen make it clear that the original editions
> date from when Friedlander was actually alive to have written
> them. Apparently, the concept of "title page" is one with which
> Shahak is unfamiliar. In any case, although the translation was
> reprinted in the United States, it is fact not an "American"
> translation any more than the King James Version of the Bible is
> an "American" translation because it happens to have been
> reprinted numerous times in America.
>
> And what of Shahak's objection to the word "Kushite"? I suspect
> that Friedlander's original audience (British late 19th century)
> would have been much more familiar with the term "Kushite" for
> "Black" (cf. the OED) than Shahak gives them credit for. In any
> case, it is hard to see why it never occurred to Shahak that if
> one is unfamiliar with the term, one need not go to a rabbi for
> advice. Apparently, "dictionary" is a concept with which Shahak
> is unfamiliar.
>
> Regardless of whether they would have been more likely to
> understand the term "Kushite" than the average late-20th century
> American, Friedlander's original audience would certainly have been
> more familiar with the Bible, at least in English translation, than
> Shahak is. And this is quite interesting, because the word
> "Kushite" appears in English Bible translations, both Christian
> ones such as the King James, and Jewish ones such as the 1917
> Jewish Publication Society (and the "new" JPS of the 1960's as
> well). The passage to which I am referring is Numbers chapter
> 12. In this passage, we learn that Miriam (Moses' sister) objected
> to Moses having a "Cushite" wife, and that she was punished (with
> "leprosy") for voicing such an objection. Thus, rather than being
> a code word for "some ethnic group whose identity must be kept
> secret" -- a position made more silly by Friedlander's open use of
> the word "Turk" in the same passage -- someone who didn't know what
> a "Kushite" was would be led to the conclusion that it is someone
> whom we are fundamentally *forbidden* from criticizing because of
> his or her ethnic background.
>
> Shahak mentions, in the footnote, the later Pines translation (which
> he calls "recent," although it was actually done in 1963). And here
> he errs once again (shoots himself in the foot might be a better way
> of putting it). Shahak's argument is that the more accurate Pines
> translation was deliberately made expensive so that it would be kept
> out of the hands of inappropriate readers. Apparently, the concept
> of "public library" is one with which Shahak is not familiar. But
> more to the point. The Pines translation is readily available in
> paperback, in a two-volume edition that totals $50, hardly excessive
> for a scholarly work, and only $25 for the volume that contains the
> quotation in question. More amusingly, the list price of Shahak's
> own book is $59.95!
>
> The matter of "deliberate concealment" is, however, even more silly
> than that. The standard college textbook for courses on Maimonides
> is _A Maimonides Reader_, edited by Isidore Twersky (which,
> incidentally, has a list price of $15.95). For his selection from
> the _Guide_, Twersky chose (inter alia) the very chapter from which
> Shahak chose his example -- and Twersky uses the Pines translation!
> Thus, one is forced to conclude that if the idea was to keep this
> dangerous knowledge of Maimonides' supposed racism out of the hands
> of the public, the people in charge of keeping this so-called secret
> are not doing a very good job of it. In fact, there is a much more
> likely explanation of the entire passage, as I discuss below, but
> the point is that, once again, Shahak's research for _Jewish
> History, Jewish Religion_ is shoddy at best, since 10 minutes with
> _Books in Print_ clearly shows that his argument is untenable.
>
> A DELIBERATE DECEPTION
>
> While it is possible that the above errors are merely the product
> of Shahak's poor research skills, no such excuse can explain away
> his deliberate distortion of the text that he quotes. In fact,
> despite what Shahak says, the passage does not contain a blanket
> condemnation of Blacks as being "below the level of a man." One
> thing to keep in mind in considering this passage is that Maimonides
> was strongly influenced in his philosophical thinking by the ideas
> of Aristotle. Aristotle, in Book 1 of the _Nicomachean Ethics_,
> considers the soul to be divided into three parts: one, the
> "vegetative soul," is common to all living things. He further
> subdivides the higher functions of the soul into an "irrational
> soul" and a "rational soul." So in this passage, Maimonides appears
> to be describing the Turks and Blacks (i.e. the "uncivilized" types
> who live on the far reaches of the world) as lacking in this
> highest part of the soul.
>
> Why would he do this? To understand, we have to read the entire
> passage, not just the excerpt that Shahak provides. Maimonides
> opens the chapter with a famous simile (this is taken, by the way,
> from the Friedlander translation):
>
> A king is in his palace, and all his subjects are partly in
> the country, and partly abroad. Of the former, some have
> their backs turned toward the king's palace, and their faces
> in another direction; and some are desirous and zealous to
> go to the palace, seeking 'to inquire in the temple,' and
> to minister before him, but have not yet seen even the face
> of the wall of the house. . . [Maimonides goes on to describe
> the people who are increasingly close to the palace, and within
> the palace, increasingly close to the chamber in which the king
> is found]. I will now explain the simile which I have made.
> The people who are abroad are all those that have no religion,
> either neither one based on speculation nor one received by
> tradition. Such are the extreme Turks that wander about in
> the north, the Kushites who live in the south, and those in
> our country who are like these. I consider these as irrational
> beings, and not as human beings; they are below mankind, but
> above the monkeys, since they have the form and shape of a man,
> and a mental faculty above that of the monkey.
> Those who are in the country, but have their backs turned
> toward the king's palace, are those who possess religion,
> belief, and thought, but happen to hold false doctrines, which
> they either adopted in consequence of great mistakes made in
> their own speculations, or received from others who misled
> them. Because of these doctrines they recede more and more
> from the royal palace the more they seem to proceed. They are
> worse than the first class. . .
>
> Now when we place the quotation in context, what do we find?
> We find that Maimonides is *not* arguing that Blacks (or Kushites,
> if you prefer) are inherently less human than Whites. When one
> reads the sentence prior to the place where Shahak begins his
> quotation, it is clear that "those who resemble them" does not
> refer to a physical resemblance (as one might think from Shahak's
> out-of-context quotation), but to people in our lands with
> no religion, who *spiritually* resemble the people who live far
> from civilization in that they have no religious feeling, and
> are thus lacking in the "rational" soul, that is, the highest
> moral functions of a human being. While one might argue with
> Maimonides' choice to equate the "rational soul" with religious
> feeling, it is clear that he is not singling out Blacks for
> disdain, but those with no religion.
>
> Maimonides makes this point even more clear in the next paragraph,
> where he says that people with "false doctrines" are worse than
> the people with no religion at all (in fact, he says that
> sometimes it may be necessary to kill people who hold false
> doctrine in order that its spread be checked). To return to
> Maimonides' simile, the people with no religion can be brought
> closer to the palace (even if they happen to be Blacks), while
> those with false doctrines are moving away from the palace
> (even if they happen to be Whites). Thus, there is no possible
> reasonable reading of this passage from Maimonides that interprets
> it as a racist diatribe against Blacks, unless one goes to some
> effort to distort it.
>
> And distort it Shahak does. Besides the quote out of context that
> changes the entire import of the paragraph from a discussion of
> spiritual and moral values to a racist diatribe, Shahak makes a
> subtle but significant change in the passage in order to further
> make it look like Maimonides had a virulent hatred of Blacks.
> In describing those people who lack religious feeling, Maimonides
> says that he considers them below mankind because they lack the
> spiritual component of the soul that makes one truly human.
> But, he says, they are higher than the monkeys, because they look
> like humans, and have the mental faculties of humans. How does
> Shahak render this passage? He claims that Maimonides describes
> Blacks (and Turks) as having the "image and resemblance of
> a man more than a monkey does." According to Shahak, Maimonides
> claims that these people look *more* human than a monkey, which
> must mean that they do not actually look human. Shahak is clearly
> trying to see the passage from Maimonides as a racist tract in
> the context of traditional anti-Black racist literature, which
> frequently tries to compare Blacks with apes. But if one looks
> at what the passage actually says (as opposed to what Shahak
> wants it to have said), Maimonides clearly states that the people
> who lack religious feeling do have the image of a human.
>
> Now it is possible that the mistakes referred to above are merely
> products of Shahak's ignorance, or shoddy research techniques
> (one would have thought, for example, that he would have taken
> the trouble to find out something about Friedlander before
> commenting on the translation). But there is no way that he
> can be excused for his out-of-context quotation. If he read the
> passage that he quotes in his book, Shahak must have read
> the sentence that precedes it, and he must have known that that
> one sentence proves that his interpretation of the text is
> completely at odds with what it actually says. And if Shahak
> was aware of the Friedlander and Pines translations, his
> rendering of the final sentence of the passage must have been
> a deliberate distortion of its contents.
>
> Since this quotation from Maimonides is the only text that
> Shahak brings to support his contention that Judaism is
> fundamentally racist, one has to conclude that he considers it
> the best evidence for this alleged racism. And since this best
> evidence was manufactured by Shahak out of whole cloth, what
> is left to support his argument? What can one say about a
> person who resorts to such deliberate distortions in order
> to try to make an argument? Apparently, "intellectual
> honesty" is a concept with which Shahak is unfamiliar. And
> if he will lie about the central points of his argument, what
> does that suggest about his veracity regarding more tangential
> matters?
>
> I cannot speak for anyone else, but it appears to me that
>
> (1) Shahak claims that Maimonides was a rabid racist.
>
> (2) The quotation Shahak cites to support his claim says
> nothing of the sort, and Shahak must have known this.
>
> Therefore,
>
> (3) Israel Shahak is a liar.
> --
> Copyright (c) 1996 Richard Schultz. Permission to reproduce this essay,
> either in print or electronically, is granted on condition that the
> entire
> text (including this disclaimer) is reproduced unaltered.
LoneStar
>
> In article <378e3897...@nnrp.gol.com>, ki...@gol.com (Kim Bebbington)
> wrote:
>
> > On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 17:31:59 -0500, Roger Alexander
> > <rlalex...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> >
> > >I don't give a big rat's dupa who carries the material.
> >
> > You're dipping into a shit-encrusted chamber pot to dish out your
> > opinions. You can tell us, as many times as you like, that what you
> > are offering is pure and moral. But nobody is going to swallow that.
> >
> > You really are a sick and twisted man, Alexander.
>
> Unless I have scads of extra time, I usually ignore RLA for precisely the
> reasons mentioned above. He is obviously also a stupid man, posting such
> antisemitic tripe on a Jewish newsgroup. (...also insulting our
> intelligence) But I guess it is better for him to vent his mental disease
> here rather than, say, take an AK-47 down to his local McDonalds...
I disagree. McDonald's food is very un-kosher, especially
the breakfast menu. Fire away, Alex.
--
"Each stereotype should be judged on an individual basis."
Howard Aubrey
you possibly be reading these posts???
LOL at the biggest loser on the Net, Matthew 'nutsy' (this term from his
own ISP) Ackerman, whose entire life revolves around reading ALL of
these posts while pretending to ignore them. Perhaps your lying is why
you've been booted from so many ISP's, right Matthew???
HJA
>
> Translation RLA Was shown to be a Neo-nazi JEw hating sob again by yet
> another poster so he resorts to pretending not reading the posts from
> now on. Yet he keeps replying to those he does not read.
>
> ROTFLH
>
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>
> Matthew Ackerman
>
> http://www.deja.com/~rla_parody/
> http://www.nizkor.org <== best site on antisemitism available
>
> matthew_...@rocketmail.com
> mac...@kwiknet.net http://www.kwiknet.net/~macker
>
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Share what you know. Learn what you don't.
Matthew Ackerman
Hash: SHA1
This from the LIAR and RABID DOG LOVER OF Roger LIBELER Alexander
He claimed that IDT had "notified me that they were Canceling My
Account" according to their Technical Support Persons. He was proven a
LIAR in that one.
I had asked they post the facts about Howard the NAZI LIAR and his LIES.
Here is something they emailed me.
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Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 15:06:43 -0400 (EDT)
From: IDT Abuse Department <ab...@idt.net>
To: mack...@IDT.NET
cc: ab...@IDT.NET
Subject: Your request
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.95.990413...@hq.idt.net>
X-Loop: ab...@IDT.NET
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Mr. Ackerman,
I have discussed your request with our legal department and they
have instructed me not to make any posts to any news groups discussing
your account. We generally do not disclose any information about our
users
to anyone, whats more they feel we are not responsible for these posts
which you object to. When someone calls our tech support (or customer
service) department, it is standard procedure and mandatory for all IDT
reps to leave notes in our database, under the proper account, stating
what the call was about and what the end result was. No such notes under
your account state any converstion occurred between our reps and anyone
about your account closing. Once again, however, our reps are trained to
not to discuss any information about our users with anyone except the
account holder themself. Also our tech support staff does not handle any
issues involving billing, cancelling or signing up accounts so they
would
have no such knowledge about your account being closed as of April 30,
1999. If you have any questions regarding this matter please direct them
to our legal department. Thank you.
Steven
ab...@idt.net
IDT Abuse Dept.
http://www.idt.net/usage
ab...@idt.net
You can reach Steven at IDT and he will tell you that this Howard Aubrey
is a LIAR and a dung heap that they laugh about at IDT at this point.
In talk.politics.mideast, Howard Aubrey <howard...@my-deja.com>
wrote:
>:Path:
typ11.nn.bcandid.com!cyc12.nn.bcandid.com!hub2.ispnews.com!hub1.ispnews.c
om!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail
>:From: Howard Aubrey <howard...@my-deja.com>
>:Newsgroups: soc.culture.israel,talk.politics.mideast
>:Subject: Re: Re: Shahak Chapter Two
>:Date: Sun, 04 Jul 1999 14:24:34 GMT
>:Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't.
>:Lines: 46
>:Message-ID: <7lnqqt$t2b$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>
>:References: <377946CC...@bellsouth.net>
<377aa77f....@nnrp.gol.com> <377A9ADE...@bellsouth.net>
<7le6n4$c...@dfw-ixnews14.ix.netcom.com>
<377B9E9B...@bellsouth.net> <377BC101...@MIT.EDU>
<377C1831...@bellsouth.net> <377C259A...@MIT.EDU>
<377CB67B...@bellsouth.net>
<1L6f3.2262$qU5....@typ31b.nn.bcandid.com>
>:NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.172.165.52
>:X-Article-Creation-Date: Sun Jul 04 14:24:34 1999 GMT
>:X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.05 [en] (Win95; I)
>:X-Http-Proxy: 1.0 x25.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client
207.172.165.52
>:Xref: hub1.ispnews.com soc.culture.israel:154048
talk.politics.mideast:76320
>:
>:In article <1L6f3.2262$qU5....@typ31b.nn.bcandid.com>,
Simply PUT Howard Aubrey according to RCN is a TEENAGED SON OF THE USER
THat PAYS FOR THE ACCOUNT, His MOTHER E. Aubrey of Pittsburgh PA and is
a KNOWN NEO-NAZI SUPPORTER according to the Pittsburgh PA police where
he has a long Juvenile RECORD.
He in the past threatened me in his posts with Bodily harm. He is a
NEO-NAZI SLIME not worth reading. He comes for a while then when I post
the TRUTH about him and send in his posts to the LEGAL OFFICES of RCN,
he disappears again for a month at a time.
He is the LIAR and NUT CASE here. He is insane with desires to suck
RLA's Penis I think. But he is too ugly as Jews he attacked beat his
face in for it.
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