DNA with Levine

DNA with COHEN

Eating Live Tadpoles and Other Creatures

Xtian New Testament in Yiddish

In the late 19th and early 20th century Protestant Christians made a concerted effort to convert American Jews. Key to this mission was translating the New Testament into Yiddish, the community’s lingua franca. But for Henry Einspruch, the author of the first complete Yiddish translation, the motivation was as much literary as religious. Einspruch, a Jewish-born Polish convert who eventually became a Protestant minister, was a writer and editor steeped in Yiddish literature.

Einspruch’s translation, not published until 1941, gives Der Bris Khodeshe a distinctive Jewish flavor. At the Last Supper, Jesus and his disciples munch on matzah and, in the Book of Revelation, seven shofars are blown instead of seven horns. Even the volume’s illustrations seem designed to appeal to Jews. In one, an old man with a long white beard, a tallit, and a yarmulke reads a book by candlelight. The image places the New Testament in the familiar context of scholars studying ancient texts late into the night.

Der Bris Khodeshe was appreciated in the Yiddish literary world despite its author’s mission. Meylekh Ravitsh, a Yiddish writer in Mexico City, praised the translation and encouraged Jews to read it. “The New Testament [is] one of the most important books in the world. How, then, can we Jews afford to ignore it?” And with details like matzah-munching disciples and shofars ringing in the air, why would they want to?

NOVEMBER 9, 2012

LGBT Pride Participants - LISTEN WELL

Siddur Avodos Yisrael lists psalms to recite each Sabbath of the year, corresponding to the Torah readings. How fitting that Tehillim 65 was this past Shabbat's Parsha Eikev reading. It came on the hills of the LGBT pride parade in the holy city of Jerusalem! Shame on the LGBT community - as well as the instigators.

Artscroll heads the chapter with the following: A prayer for the time when people will realize the futility of rebelling against G-d, and will completely accept His mastery.

And the verses that stood out for me when I read it.....

5 I said to the perverse, "Do not behave perversely," and to the wicked, "Do not raise the horn.

 ה אָמַ֣רְתִּי לַ֖הֽוֹלְלִים אַל־תָּהֹ֑לּוּ וְ֜לָֽרְשָׁעִ֗ים אַל־תָּרִ֥ימוּ קָֽרֶן

6 Do not raise your horn on high, [do not] speak with [your] fat neck.ואַל־תָּרִ֣ימוּ לַמָּר֣וֹם קַרְנְכֶ֑ם תְּדַבְּר֖וּ בְצַוָּ֣אר עָתָֽק:

Artscroll translates:

I said to the unruly revelers, be not unruly; and to the wicked, raise not your pride. Raise not heavenward your pride, with a haughty neck nor speak insolence.

Teshuva is in order. I would very much like to see my Jewish brothers and sisters written in the Book of Life.As of now, they are the walking dead. The month of Elul begins in a few days. Please do teshuva!

We Protest the Gay Parade in Our Holy City of Jerusalem

Posted 7:00 AM Israel Time

WE PROTEST

We, the undersigned Jewish bloggers, hereby protest – in the strongest terms possible – the parading and glorification of an “alternative lifestyle”, one that is classified in the Holy Torah as an abomination, especially through the streets of the holy city of Jerusalem. 

The Torah demands that we live by a certain code of sexual morality, and as such, we are forbidden from certain relationships that a moral society cannot tolerate.  These include incest, adultery, bestiality, and homosexuality.  All these are considered grave sins in Judaism and incur the punishment of Karet, or excision from the Jewish people.  An act performed with witnesses during the time of the Sanhedrin would incur an even worse consequence – namely, capital punishment. 

And this is only on an individual level.  When the sin is committed on a societal level, it is much worse.  The Torah and our sages record how these acts were catalysts for both the Great Flood during Noah’s lifetime and the destruction of the Five Cities of the Plain.

As such, we consider any attempt to glorify acts that the Torah vehemently forbids by parading any such lifestyle through the streets with horror and utter disdain.  Such parades in New York and San Francisco would be bad enough, but through the streets of the Holy Land of Israel is a thousand-fold worse.  The Torah specifically warns us not to act in sexually abominable ways lest we be vomited out of the land.  One can only imagine how it is viewed in Heaven when people brazenly display to G-d how abominable one can be.  And if the Land of Israel cannot tolerate such acts of utter gall, all the more so in the holy city of Jerusalem, a city that is overwhelmingly religious. 

We in no way wish to minimize the struggles in temptation some may have in this area and view with positivity those who have such inclinations and bravely overcome them.  But those are not the people irreverently parading through the streets with rainbow flags, who show utter contempt for the Holy Torah and all we hold dear.

We therefore vehemently protest the “Pride” Parade in Jerusalem and everywhere else in the world where they may occur.  We hope and pray that those who take part in such parades do a complete Teshuva for their actions, and may we see a rebuilt Jerusalem, speedily in our days, Amen.

Signed,

(in alphabetical order)

CDG from Hava HaAharona

Cosmic X from Cosmic X in Jerusalem

Dassie from Myrtle Rising

Devash from Tomer Devorah

Dov Bar Leib from End of Days

DS from Israel Truth Times

Goldie ZP from Geula613

Rabbi Lazer Brody from Lazer Beams

Yaak from Yeranen Yaakov

Yechezkel Hirshman from Achas L'Maala V'Sheva L'Matta

The Jewish Star - Parshat Balack 5771