Jewish: August 2006 Archives

In this season of teshuva leading up to the yamim nora'im religious discussions primarily focus on personal change. We look to change our practices, ideally becoming more committed to Torah. We seek to change our religious perspectives, hopefully reconnecting with the Divine. For Rambam, this process of change is not simply behavioral, but existential. As we acknowledge and renounce our transgressions we also take measures demonstrating that we have changed to the point where we "are no longer the same person who committed these actions" (Hilchot Teshuva 2:4).

But what does it mean that we are no longer the same person? How does the process of teshuva effect a change so substantive that it alters our fundamental identity? In order to fully understand this transition we must tackle the philosophical question of what is the true essence of our personal identity - to find the essential determinant which makes us "us" such that changing this element constitutes a meaningful change in our identity. While this challenge may seem daunting to lesser minds, it is no match for the discerning duo of The Incredible Hulk...and an Oxford PhD.

In this season of teshuva leading up to the yamim nora'im religious discussions primarily focus on personal change. We look to change our practices, ideally becoming more committed to Torah. We seek to change our religious perspectives, hopefully reconnecting with the Divine. For Rambam, this process of change is not simply behavioral, but existential. As we acknowledge and renounce our transgressions we also take measures demonstrating that we have changed to the point where we "are no longer the same person who committed these actions" (Hilchot Teshuva 2:4).

But what does it mean that we are no longer the same person? How does the process of teshuva effect a change so substantive that it alters our fundamental identity? In order to fully understand this transition we must tackle the philosophical question of what is the true essence of our personal identity - to find the essential determinant which makes us "us" such that changing this element constitutes a meaningful change in our identity. While this challenge may seem daunting to lesser minds, it is no match for the discerning duo of The Incredible Hulk...and an Oxford PhD.

Weddings are supposed to be happy occasions celebrating the love and commitment of two individuals who choose to spend the rest of their lives together. And yet for some reason, bands play songs which are completely incongruous with the theme of the day, and incredibly they do so often at the couple's request.

AskMen listed 10 Wedding Songs to Avoid where people think these songs are romantic but have obviously never listened to the lyrics. While many Jewish weddings don't usually play secular music in full, every now and again the band will play a riff or two from rock songs just to shake things up a bit. And here too many of the selections can seem a little bit strange.

I first commented on this a while back, and noticed it again at the first wedding I officiated. Since I hear new things all the time I've decided to keep a running list of all the well intentioned but probelmatic songs I've actually heard at weddings. To narrow things down, I'm just focusing on songs in which the lyrics don't fit in with the spirit of the day. For example, while Get Down Tonight might not be the most romantic or subtle song in the world, it still makes sense in its own way. On the other hand, the ones listed below are a little more difficult to explain.

• Live And Let Die
• Od Lo Ahavti Dai
• Mrs. Robinson
• Angry Young Man
• Beat It
• Stairway To Heaven1
• Baker Street - The sax solo doesn't mitigate the song's meaning
• I Will Survive²
• Desperado

I'm sure I'll be adding more in the future - especially if I get married myself.

1. Though in fairness, Robert Plant does refer to Stairway as a "bloody wedding song."
2. For Jewish weddings, note that the "Yiddin" dance fits perfectly.

Weddings are supposed to be happy occasions celebrating the love and commitment of two individuals who choose to spend the rest of their lives together. And yet for some reason, bands play songs which are completely incongruous with the theme of the day, and incredibly they do so often at the couple's request.

AskMen listed 10 Wedding Songs to Avoid where people think these songs are romantic but have obviously never listened to the lyrics. While many Jewish weddings don't usually play secular music in full, every now and again the band will play a riff or two from rock songs just to shake things up a bit. And here too many of the selections can seem a little bit strange.

I first commented on this a while back, and noticed it again at the first wedding I officiated. Since I hear new things all the time I've decided to keep a running list of all the well intentioned but probelmatic songs I've actually heard at weddings. To narrow things down, I'm just focusing on songs in which the lyrics don't fit in with the spirit of the day. For example, while Get Down Tonight might not be the most romantic or subtle song in the world, it still makes sense in its own way. On the other hand, the ones listed below are a little more difficult to explain.

• Live And Let Die
• Od Lo Ahavti Dai
• Mrs. Robinson
• Angry Young Man
• Beat It
• Stairway To Heaven1
• Baker Street - The sax solo doesn't mitigate the song's meaning
• I Will Survive²
• Desperado

I'm sure I'll be adding more in the future - especially if I get married myself.

1. Though in fairness, Robert Plant does refer to Stairway as a "bloody wedding song."
2. For Jewish weddings, note that the "Yiddin" dance fits perfectly.

As word gets around of my proficiency and legality in performing weddings I've been getting more questions about the laws of weddings and keeping track of everything which is required. I complied a checklist for the first wedding I officiated and I've already needed to forward much of the contents a few times to other people asking similar questions. So once again as a combination of personal convenience and public service, I give to you the Jewish Wedding Checklist.

I'm going to assume that you have the big things like a wedding date, a hall, F.L.O.P.1 (or F.L.O.P.S2 as the case may be) taken care of and I'm going to focus on the aspects relating to the actual marriage ceremony. Note that some of the things will be taken care of by the mesader kiddushin or the caterer/wedding hall. While this should be useful in preparing for the ceremony and knowing what to expect, all halakhic matters should be discussed with your mesader kiddushin.

You might remember the post we did a while back on extravegant Bat Mitzvahs. Today's Fark links to a cameramen's detailed account of the $10 Million Bat Mitzvah held at New York's Rainbow Room last November. Quoth the cameraman:

This wasn't a concert in a restaurant. This was a f-----g arena show tucked into a closet. This was overkill. This was excessive. This was a rich man's fantasy concert, not a Bat Mitzvah.

Hard to argue with the assessment given the entertainment:

• Eagles Don Henley and Joe Walsh
• Stevie Nicks
• 50 Cent
• Tom Petty
• Aerosmith's Steven Tyler and Joe Perry

I can't imagine what her wedding will be like, but if it's also going to be in NYC, I'm available.

As of this afternoon and in accordance with New York City regulations, I can now legally officiate weddings in the city of New York. While anyone could be a mesader kiddushin, clergy need to register with the city in order to sign the marraige licence.1

While I'm not planning on officiating any weddings in the near future, you never know when it could come in handy. A few years ago I was Shabbat walking through Fort Tryon Park and I was approached by a Hispanic contingient asking me if I was a Justice of the Peace. Apparently their minister was late and who else goes walking through the park on a Saturday in a suit. Sadly I was not able to perform the ceremony - I was still in smikha at the time - but it did get me thinking that I could otherwise be in a position to help out some people. The rabbinic prohibition against getting married on Shabbat would be inapplicable (B. Shabbat 148b) and I doubt that it would violate existing RCA policy (not that I'm currently a member).

At any rate, if you're planning on getting married in NYC and need the marriage licence signed, you know where to find me. Words of Wisdom at no extra charge.

1. This is only for weddings performed in the city of New York proper, and I do not believe it is necessary for the rest of the state. I know that in New Jersey all that is require is an address. A few years ago there was an issue where a Conservative cantor was found to be a fraud and the state government needed to pass an emergency legislation to retroactively validate those weddings.

As of this afternoon and in accordance with New York City regulations, I can now legally officiate weddings in the city of New York. While anyone could be a mesader kiddushin, clergy need to register with the city in order to sign the marraige licence.1

While I'm not planning on officiating any weddings in the near future, you never know when it could come in handy. A few years ago I was Shabbat walking through Fort Tryon Park and I was approached by a Hispanic contingient asking me if I was a Justice of the Peace. Apparently their minister was late and who else goes walking through the park on a Saturday in a suit. Sadly I was not able to perform the ceremony - I was still in smikha at the time - but it did get me thinking that I could otherwise be in a position to help out some people. The rabbinic prohibition against getting married on Shabbat would be inapplicable (B. Shabbat 148b) and I doubt that it would violate existing RCA policy (not that I'm currently a member).

At any rate, if you're planning on getting married in NYC and need the marriage licence signed, you know where to find me. Words of Wisdom at no extra charge.

1. This is only for weddings performed in the city of New York proper, and I do not believe it is necessary for the rest of the state. I know that in New Jersey all that is require is an address. A few years ago there was an issue where a Conservative cantor was found to be a fraud and the state government needed to pass an emergency legislation to retroactively validate those weddings.

Most people probably do not consider utilitarian philosopher John Stuart Mill to be any sort of an authority on Judaism. In fact, I doubt Mill himself would have considered himself to be such an expert. But I did find one passage of his which perfectly captures the state of discourse and debate in Orthodox Judaism.

The following paragraphs are from the beginning of Mill's The Subjection of Women which I proudly bought for $6 at a Barnes and Noble moving sale. Mill's basic argument is against the automatic social, economic, and political disadvantages imposed on women from birth. As an introduction to his argument, Mill explains the uphill battle he faces in challenging the widely accepted status quo. While his observations are generic enough to be applicable in many other areas (politics, business, academics etc), I'd like to put this in the context particularly in how Orthodox Jews engage matters of religion be it halakhic or theological, and perhaps recalling my own personal hashkafa series.

Note: Although I tried copying verbatim, I apologize for any spelling and punctuation errors. Because Mill has a tendency for run-on sentences, I bolded one particular segment for particular emphasis so as not to get lost in the paragraph.

When we last looked at Kosher Delight's health inspection report we found that they failed their 05/05/2006 inspection with 33 points of violations and required a full reinspection.

I just noticed that the reinspection was done on 07/13/2006 with a marginal improvement. KD did pass this inspection scoring 26 violation points - the failing mark is 28 points.

The violations cited are disturbingly similar to what was found previously. In addition to "Facility not vermin proof. Harborage or conditions conducive to vermin exist" and "Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility's food and/or non-food areas" this time we also have "Evidence of flying insects or live flying insects present in facility's food and/or non-food areas" and "Evidence of roaches or live roaches present in facility's food and/or non-food areas."

Kind of makes you want to go vegetarian elsewhere.

One of the perks of living in America is that religious institutions are exempt from several taxes. Of course, there are rules for such things and of course, they're not always followed.

Take this recent example from the Jewish penal colony known as Rockland County. A multiple family house owned by a shul was granted a property tax exemption under the pretense that it would house the Rabbi and two assistant rabbis. The problem is that there were several illegal conversions to the building and there was no proof that the other rabbis actually lived there.

Gedalia Oberlander, who identified himself to the Assessment Review Board as the rabbi of the congregation, said he lived in one of the apartments, and two assistant rabbis lived in the others.

"I feel that not having a certificate of occupancy shouldn't interfere with having the exemption," Oberlander told the board at its meeting Thursday.

Even more comical is that they're having trouble finding the shul itself:

"There was no CO (certificate of occupancy) and we're unable to confirm the location of the synagogue itself, seeing that it wasn't in that location," Shedler said yesterday.

And for the coup de grace, the name of the shul?

Congregation Merkoz Halacha

It seems like ages ago, but we once discussed college rankings, and how YU fared much more poorly by standards other than those used by US News.

On that note, Washington Monthly has a new ranking system aimed at determining the educational value of the universities, a metric which is unfortunately overlooked in choosing a college and nearly impossible to define based on most ranking systems.

But what's missing from all the rankings is the equivalent of a bottom line. There are no widely available measures of how much learning occurs inside the classroom, or of how much students benefit from their education. This makes the process of selecting a college a bit like throwing darts at a stock table. It also means that colleges and universities, like our imaginary mutual-fund managers, feel little pressure to ensure that students learn. As anyone who's ever snoozed through a giant freshman psychology 101 lecture knows, sitting in a classroom doesn't equal learning; knowledge doesn't come by osmosis.

Although there are tests out there to help guage students' collegiate academic progress (CLA, NSSE), most universities apparently keep their results to themselves. So, WM devised their own system which focuses on the university's social impact.

And so, to put The Washington Monthly College Rankings together, we started with a different assumption about what constitutes the "best" schools. We asked ourselves: What are reasonable indicators of how much a school is benefiting the country? We came up with three: how well it performs as an engine of social mobility (ideally helping the poor to get rich rather than the very rich to get very, very rich), how well it does in fostering scientific and humanistic research, and how well it promotes an ethic of service to country. We then devised a way to measure and quantify these criteria.

How does YU measure up? Despite ranking 45 in US News' survey, YU weighs in at an embarrassing 200 of 245 schools.

In fairness, WM's methodology took military and peace corps service into consideration, neither of which are areas which are conducive to perpetuating an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle. Furthermore, many YU students do in fact enter communal service, bet it as teachers, social workers, psychologists, and the occasional Rabbi. However since these professions serve a relatively small and exclusive community, these contributions would likely be overlooked.

Still, it might be nice for Yeshiva University to look beyond the 4 cubits of the Jewish world. Although there have been notable exceptions, most students I've known are either not interested or ideologically opposed to contributing to the non-Jewish world. We've covered some of the drawbacks of taking federal funding, and it might be a nice idea to contribute something to the society at large. Not only would probably help in kiddush hashem and tikkun olam departments, but it may also have other significant religious benefits.