Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Iskander · 05-09-2013, 12:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

N/A

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

eudaimonia

In the battle of ideas there is no” orthodoxy” until the conflict ends with the victory of one group representing one of the many opinions battling for power. Anyone of those opinions will become the “ orthodox “ one if only if historians wish to write history in terms of holy and evil,

The power to develop the ideas of the winner is what makes those ideas right. The power of the winner to ignore the ideas of the defeated is what makes those ideas wrong. The winner might say his ideas are orthodox and the loser is a heretic.

In Britain after the battle of ideas is over in a hard fought election, the winning party praises the electorate for their wisdom and advises the losing party to think again.

Clivedurdle · 05-09-2013, 04:07 AM

Quote:

Icelandic Sagas
Duration: 43 minutes
First broadcast: Thursday 09 May 2013
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Icelandic Sagas. First written down in the 13th century, the sagas tell the stories of the Norse settlers of Iceland, who began to arrive on the island in the late 9th century. They contain some of the richest and most extraordinary writing of the Middle Ages, and often depict events known to have happened in the early years of Icelandic history, although there is much debate as to how much of their content is factual and how much imaginative. Full of heroes, feuds and outlaws, with a smattering of ghosts and trolls, the sagas inspired later writers including Sir Walter Scott, William Morris and WH Auden.

With:

Carolyne Larrington
Fellow and Tutor in Medieval English Literature at St John's College, Oxford

Elizabeth Ashman Rowe
University Lecturer in Scandinavian History at the University of Cambridge

Emily Lethbridge
Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Árni Magnússon Manuscripts Institute in Reykjavík

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01s8qx9

This weeks has a fascinating discussion about how one tests if something is historical or fictional. It seems there are legal documents and records that can be cross referenced. This has interesting results - it shows up later editors using legal concepts and practices from later, and also is used to conclude that a name appearing that is not cross referenced is fictional. Many characters do appear time shifted a generation or so.

Triangulation darlings.

Maybe if we discussed the Jewish Sagas?

Iskander · 05-09-2013, 04:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

It's worth restating that there is no evidence in the Talmudic sources or commentaries or midrashim that the 18th benediction on the minim had anything whatsoever to do with any Jewish Christians. It had to do with informers and internal saboteurs, and not necessarily from among the Samaritans, but rather among Saduccees and Hellenists of all varieties. The claim that there were "Jewish Christians" in Judea or Galilee is a myth that has no basis in any actual evidence.
Avraham Yitzchak Kook, who died in 1935, was way off base on this issue and many other issues (which are beyond the scope of this thread).

Do you think Rav Kook is a heretic or a charlatan? Torah org...?

The Catholic doctrine of punishing without mercy the heretic ,but treating the pagan with leniency is also found here as it is the burning of heretic writings and the praise of the perfect hate for the enemies of one’s own idols; the idol Hashem in this case.

Please pay attention to the side note: Dilling discussion of highlighted text text.
http://www.come-and-hear.com/shabbath/shabbath_116.html

Please pay attention to note 16 and 23

Talmud - Mas. Shabbath 116a

The blank spaces15 and the Books of the Minim16 may not be saved from a fire, but they must be burnt in their place, they and the Divine Names occurring in them.... This is its meaning: And the Books of Minim are like blank spaces.

It was stated in the text: The blank spaces and the Books of the Minim, we may not save them from a fire. R. Jose said: On weekdays one must cut out the Divine Names which they contain, hide them,17 and burn the rest. R. Tarfon said: May I bury my son if I would not burn them together with their Divine Names if they came to my hand. For even if one pursued me18 to slay me, or a snake pursued me to bite me, I would enter a heathen Temple [for refuge], but not the houses of these [people], for the latter know (of God] yet deny [Him], whereas the former are ignorant and deny [Him],... Let my Name, written in sanctity, be blotted out in water,20 these, who stir up jealousy, enmity, and wrath between Israel and their Father in Heaven, how much more so;21 and of them David said, Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? And am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee? I hate then with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies.22 And just as we may not rescue them from a fire, so may we not rescue them from a collapse [of debris] or from water or from anything that may destroy them.

(16) Sectarians. The term denotes various kinds of Jewish sectarians, such as the Sadducces, Samaritans, Judeo-Christians, etc., according to the date of the passage in which the term is used. The reference here is probably to the last-named. V. J.E., art. Min; Bacher in REJ. XXXVIII, 38. Rashi translates: Hebrew Bibles written by men in the service of idolatry.
(17) v. p. 429, n. 5.
(18) Lit., ‘him’ — he meant himself but used the third person owing to a reluctance to speak even hypothetically of evil
befalling himself.
(19) Isa. LVII, 8; they know of the true God, but have rejected Him, thrusting Him out of sight, as it were.
(20) The reference is to the trial of a wife accused of adultery; v. Num. V, 23f.
(21) Not only do they themselves go astray from God, but lead many others astray from Him.
(22) Ps. CXXXIX, 21f.
(23) The meeting place of early Christians where religious controversies were held (Jast.). Rashi: the books written for
the purpose of these controversies; v. also Weiss, Dor, III, p. 166 and n. 13. [The meaning of Be Abedan is still obscure
in spite of the many and varied explanations suggested; e.g., (a) House of the Ebionites; (b) Abadan (Pers.) ‘forum’; (c)
Beth Mebedhan (Pers.) ‘House of the chief Magi’; v. Krauss's Synagogale Altertumer, p. 31].

Duvduv · 05-09-2013, 05:15 AM

Kook studied at the prestigious Volozhin yeshiva in Lithuania at the end of the 19th century and married the daughter of a prestigious rabbi. However, beyond studying traditional Jewish texts he became deeply involved in reading the writings of the secularists, as did a fair number of students at Volozhin in those days. He is considered the rabbi summa qua non of the so-called Mizrachi religious Zionist movement. He was ambitious and pandered to the secular Zionist leadership under Chaim Weizman as rabbi of the town of Jaffa. It got him the position of the Zionist-sponsored rabbinate of Jerusalem in 1922 despite the opposition of the traditional rabbis in Jerusalem.

When the Jewish Agency via Weizman managed to obtain a monopoly as official representative of the Jewish communities after WW1 and the Balfour Declaration in around 1920 they used Kook to give a religious sanction to their activities, which continued long after he died in 1935, and continued under the leadership of his son, Zvi Yehuda Kook, who died in 1982.

The traditional Orthodox Jews always vociferously opposed him though he held the power of the purse and was the channel for transfers of charity funds to Jerusalem's Orthodox community from Europe and the US.

His writings are noted for their almost total absence of references to traditional sources such as Rashi, Nachmanides and even Talmudic rabbis, and usually wrote pseudo-kabbalistic ideas about Zionism. However, he is considered an icon among the so-called Mizrachi/settler Zionist community who rates up there with Moses himself but is ignored by most of the so-called haredi ultra-orthodox community.

Iskander · 05-09-2013, 05:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

It's worth restating that there is no evidence in the Talmudic sources or commentaries or midrashim that the 18th benediction on the minim had anything whatsoever to do with any Jewish Christians. It had to do with informers and internal saboteurs, and not necessarily from among the Samaritans, but rather among Saduccees and Hellenists of all varieties. The claim that there were "Jewish Christians" in Judea or Galilee is a myth that has no basis in any actual evidence.
Avraham Yitzchak Kook, who died in 1935, was way off base on this issue and many other issues (which are beyond the scope of this thread).

Lawrence H. Schiffman, Who was a Jew?,
Ktav Publishing House Inc.,Hoboken , New Jersey,1985
ISBN 0881250546
In pages 51 to 67 he discusses Judaism with early Christianity.
In pages 60-61 he writes:

Quote:

It is possible to trace the development of this benediction. The original threat to Judaism was from Jewish Christianity and so a reference against the minim ( a general term here referring to Jewish Christians) was introduced into a previously existing benediction.

Also:

Quote:

Many rabbinic texts speak of the minim and clearly designate believers in Jesus

And

Quote:

The specific effect of the benediction was to insure that those who were minims would not serve as precentors in the synagogue. After all, no one would be willing to pray for his own destruction.

Such a benediction in its original form can have been directed only against Jews who despite their heretical beliefs were likely to be found in the synagogue. Gentile Christians would not have been in the synagogue nor would they have been called to serve as precentors.

When the separation of the Jewish Christians from the synagogue was accomplished, the prayer was retained as a general malediction and prayer for the destruction of the enemies of Israel. Therefore the nosrim was also added.

Iskander · 05-09-2013, 06:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

Kook studied at the prestigious Volozhin yeshiva in Lithuania at the end of the 19th century and married the daughter of a prestigious rabbi. However, beyond studying traditional Jewish texts he became deeply involved in reading the writings of the secularists, as did a fair number of students at Volozhin in those days. He is considered the rabbi summa qua non of the so-called Mizrachi religious Zionist movement. He was ambitious and pandered to the secular Zionist leadership under Chaim Weizman as rabbi of the town of Jaffa. It got him the position of the Zionist-sponsored rabbinate of Jerusalem in 1922 despite the opposition of the traditional rabbis in Jerusalem.

When the Jewish Agency via Weizman managed to obtain a monopoly as official representative of the Jewish communities after WW1 and the Balfour Declaration in around 1920 they used Kook to give a religious sanction to their activities, which continued long after he died in 1935, and continued under the leadership of his son, Zvi Yehuda Kook, who died in 1982.

The traditional Orthodox Jews always vociferously opposed him though he held the power of the purse and was the channel for transfers of charity funds to Jerusalem's Orthodox community from Europe and the US.

His writings are noted for their almost total absence of references to traditional sources such as Rashi, Nachmanides and even Talmudic rabbis, and usually wrote pseudo-kabbalistic ideas about Zionism. However, he is considered an icon among the so-called Mizrachi/settler Zionist community who rates up there with Moses himself but is ignored by most of the so-called haredi ultra-orthodox community.

Shame!
Was he as bad as this prayer which so very important to Judaism and recited in full glory 3 times a day?

See number 12 : For the destruction of apostates and the enemies of God.
http://www.hanefesh.com/edu/amidah.htm
The prayer has been changed since the time of Ezra and the 120 elders

Chili · 05-09-2013, 06:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iskander

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

Kook studied at the prestigious Volozhin yeshiva in Lithuania at the end of the 19th century and married the daughter of a prestigious rabbi. However, beyond studying traditional Jewish texts he became deeply involved in reading the writings of the secularists, as did a fair number of students at Volozhin in those days. He is considered the rabbi summa qua non of the so-called Mizrachi religious Zionist movement. He was ambitious and pandered to the secular Zionist leadership under Chaim Weizman as rabbi of the town of Jaffa. It got him the position of the Zionist-sponsored rabbinate of Jerusalem in 1922 despite the opposition of the traditional rabbis in Jerusalem.

When the Jewish Agency via Weizman managed to obtain a monopoly as official representative of the Jewish communities after WW1 and the Balfour Declaration in around 1920 they used Kook to give a religious sanction to their activities, which continued long after he died in 1935, and continued under the leadership of his son, Zvi Yehuda Kook, who died in 1982.

The traditional Orthodox Jews always vociferously opposed him though he held the power of the purse and was the channel for transfers of charity funds to Jerusalem's Orthodox community from Europe and the US.

His writings are noted for their almost total absence of references to traditional sources such as Rashi, Nachmanides and even Talmudic rabbis, and usually wrote pseudo-kabbalistic ideas about Zionism. However, he is considered an icon among the so-called Mizrachi/settler Zionist community who rates up there with Moses himself but is ignored by most of the so-called haredi ultra-orthodox community.

Shame!
Was he as bad as this prayer which so very important to Judaism and recited in full glory 3 times a day?

See number 12 : For the destruction of apostates and the enemies of God.
http://www.hanefesh.com/edu/amidah.htm
The prayer has been changed since the time of Ezra and the 120 elders

Double shame as not even a Jew! . . . to not understand that Moses was the enemy of Judaism leading the children of God astray, that still today is their greatest fear and here they crowned him king again, in charge of the purse even.

Duvduv · 05-09-2013, 07:09 AM

As I have mentioned, there is no evidence from ancient Jewish sources that the minim referred to any Jewish Christians, because no ancient Jewish sources DO NOT mention the existence of any Jewish Christians. The so-called Ebionites et al who are mentioned by Eusebius and others (based on Eusebius) provide no evidence of any communities of such Ebionites, their members, leaders, geographical locations, etc. If they had existed they would have been mentioned in the Talmud or midrashim or by the gaonim of Babylonia along with the Saduccees, Karaites, Samaritans and Hellenists.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iskander

Quote:

Originally Posted by Duvduv

It's worth restating that there is no evidence in the Talmudic sources or commentaries or midrashim that the 18th benediction on the minim had anything whatsoever to do with any Jewish Christians. It had to do with informers and internal saboteurs, and not necessarily from among the Samaritans, but rather among Saduccees and Hellenists of all varieties. The claim that there were "Jewish Christians" in Judea or Galilee is a myth that has no basis in any actual evidence.
Avraham Yitzchak Kook, who died in 1935, was way off base on this issue and many other issues (which are beyond the scope of this thread).

Lawrence H. Schiffman, Who was a Jew?,
Ktav Publishing House Inc.,Hoboken , New Jersey,1985
ISBN 0881250546
In pages 51 to 67 he discusses Judaism with early Christianity.
In pages 60-61 he writes:

Also:

And

Quote:

The specific effect of the benediction was to insure that those who were minims would not serve as precentors in the synagogue. After all, no one would be willing to pray for his own destruction.

Such a benediction in its original form can have been directed only against Jews who despite their heretical beliefs were likely to be found in the synagogue. Gentile Christians would not have been in the synagogue nor would they have been called to serve as precentors.

When the separation of the Jewish Christians from the synagogue was accomplished, the prayer was retained as a general malediction and prayer for the destruction of the enemies of Israel. Therefore the nosrim was also added.

Chili · 05-09-2013, 07:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iskander

Do you think Rav Kook is a heretic or a charlatan? Torah org...?

The Catholic doctrine of punishing without mercy the heretic ,but treating the pagan with leniency is also found here as it is the burning of heretic writings and the praise of the perfect hate for the enemies of one’s own idols; the idol Hashem in this case.

Please pay attention to the side note: Dilling discussion of highlighted text text.
http://www.come-and-hear.com/shabbath/shabbath_116.html

Please pay attention to note 16 and 23

Talmud - Mas. Shabbath 116a

The blank spaces15 and the Books of the Minim16 may not be saved from a fire, but they must be burnt in their place, they and the Divine Names occurring in them.... This is its meaning: And the Books of Minim are like blank spaces.

It was stated in the text: The blank spaces and the Books of the Minim, we may not save them from a fire. R. Jose said: On weekdays one must cut out the Divine Names which they contain, hide them,17 and burn the rest. R. Tarfon said: May I bury my son if I would not burn them together with their Divine Names if they came to my hand. For even if one pursued me18 to slay me, or a snake pursued me to bite me, I would enter a heathen Temple [for refuge], but not the houses of these [people], for the latter know (of God] yet deny [Him], whereas the former are ignorant and deny [Him],... Let my Name, written in sanctity, be blotted out in water,20 these, who stir up jealousy, enmity, and wrath between Israel and their Father in Heaven, how much more so;21 and of them David said, Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? And am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee? I hate then with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies.22 And just as we may not rescue them from a fire, so may we not rescue them from a collapse [of debris] or from water or from anything that may destroy them.

(16) Sectarians. The term denotes various kinds of Jewish sectarians, such as the Sadducces, Samaritans, Judeo-Christians, etc., according to the date of the passage in which the term is used. The reference here is probably to the last-named. V. J.E., art. Min; Bacher in REJ. XXXVIII, 38. Rashi translates: Hebrew Bibles written by men in the service of idolatry.
(17) v. p. 429, n. 5.
(18) Lit., ‘him’ — he meant himself but used the third person owing to a reluctance to speak even hypothetically of evil
befalling himself.
(19) Isa. LVII, 8; they know of the true God, but have rejected Him, thrusting Him out of sight, as it were.
(20) The reference is to the trial of a wife accused of adultery; v. Num. V, 23f.
(21) Not only do they themselves go astray from God, but lead many others astray from Him.
(22) Ps. CXXXIX, 21f.
(23) The meeting place of early Christians where religious controversies were held (Jast.). Rashi: the books written for
the purpose of these controversies; v. also Weiss, Dor, III, p. 166 and n. 13. [The meaning of Be Abedan is still obscure
in spite of the many and varied explanations suggested; e.g., (a) House of the Ebionites; (b) Abadan (Pers.) ‘forum’; (c)
Beth Mebedhan (Pers.) ‘House of the chief Magi’; v. Krauss's Synagogale Altertumer, p. 31].

Heretic.

You should see heretics as insiders acting like wolves with their own salvation recipe to peddle instead of Gods own. Trenches will do that, were now fear is the motivating force.

This would be similar to Hitler who had a jail-house conversion that amplified his vision pointing to a personal love affair with [their] God instead a distant image as seen from the pew. Such conversion is always followed by a temple ruckus: "Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, you frauds!" Mat. 24:13- all the way to v 38, and this all from the precinct to never set foot in there again.

Then finally consider that he, this Jesus here also known as James, is there only to show the flip-side of Jesus as heretic that we call anti-christ, and it was he who went back to Galilee again to fry there some more until he died nonetheless.

Luther was another one of those with the only difference that he was swept up by the 'soldiers of Jesus' already in trenches ready to fire away, and that caused the great Reform movement to follow where now 'fiery revolving swords' (Gen 3:24) became Jesus worshipers themselves as 'look-alikes' without the seraph on-side (who is woman still working from behind the scene in 'traditional' Jewish Orthodoxy, even today).

This reaction is quite normal and demands the Inquisitor to at least throw some water on the fire burning within.

Iskander · 05-09-2013, 07:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chili

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iskander

Shame!
Was he as bad as this prayer which so very important to Judaism and recited in full glory 3 times a day?

See number 12 : For the destruction of apostates and the enemies of God.
http://www.hanefesh.com/edu/amidah.htm
The prayer has been changed since the time of Ezra and the 120 elders

Double shame as not even a Jew! . . . to not understand that Moses was the enemy of Judaism leading the children of God astray, that still today is their greatest fear and here they crowned him king again, in charge of the purse even.

Triple shame!!

Rav kook was a distinguished Talmudist and an honest man

Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak HaCohen Kook (1865-1935) was a preeminent Talmudic scholar and a Lurian Cabbalist.

"In his penetrating and poetic style, Rabbi Kook teaches that war can often be a catalyst for redemption, uprooting evil, erasing false doctrines, and uncovering Israel's great righteousness." — Rabbi Kook Books (24)

"When one understands that the Redemption of Israel is the goal of world history, one can discover a new spiritual dimension in all of the world's wars and revolutions." — Rabbi Kook (25)

"Modern Western culture, with all of its immorality and falsehoods, will disappear from the world. The holy culture of Israel will be established in its place." — Rabbi Kook (25)

http://www.come-and-hear.com/editor/br_1.html

Professor Schiffman is another top expert and another honest observant Jew.
Chapters 11 & 12 of Hilchos Melachim from the Mishneh Torah of the Rambam are also also top quality and note 5 informative

Rav Asher Meir is top quality in virtual yeshiva

Talmud - Mas. Shabbath 116a is excellent and Dilling’s comments are priceless and i could post many more .

The difference between a religious fanatic and whatever is whichever.!

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05-09-2013, 05:15 AM	#114
Duvduv Veteran Member Join Date: Nov 2011 Location: USA Posts: 4,095	Kook studied at the prestigious Volozhin yeshiva in Lithuania at the end of the 19th century and married the daughter of a prestigious rabbi. However, beyond studying traditional Jewish texts he became deeply involved in reading the writings of the secularists, as did a fair number of students at Volozhin in those days. He is considered the rabbi summa qua non of the so-called Mizrachi religious Zionist movement. He was ambitious and pandered to the secular Zionist leadership under Chaim Weizman as rabbi of the town of Jaffa. It got him the position of the Zionist-sponsored rabbinate of Jerusalem in 1922 despite the opposition of the traditional rabbis in Jerusalem. When the Jewish Agency via Weizman managed to obtain a monopoly as official representative of the Jewish communities after WW1 and the Balfour Declaration in around 1920 they used Kook to give a religious sanction to their activities, which continued long after he died in 1935, and continued under the leadership of his son, Zvi Yehuda Kook, who died in 1982. The traditional Orthodox Jews always vociferously opposed him though he held the power of the purse and was the channel for transfers of charity funds to Jerusalem's Orthodox community from Europe and the US. His writings are noted for their almost total absence of references to traditional sources such as Rashi, Nachmanides and even Talmudic rabbis, and usually wrote pseudo-kabbalistic ideas about Zionism. However, he is considered an icon among the so-called Mizrachi/settler Zionist community who rates up there with Moses himself but is ignored by most of the so-called haredi ultra-orthodox community.

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