From: mannj@acf9.nyu.edu (Jordan Mann)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish
Subject: Re: On Orthodox Monopoly (was can of worms...)
Date: 7 Sep 92 17:05:32 GMT
Organization: New York University

MASH@WEIZMANN.WEIZMANN.AC.IL (Michael Shimshoni) writes:
>gertler@ptms_dev.sbi.com (User - Don Gertler):

>>For fear of opening up the wrath of the anti-trust laws, I must mention
>>that Jewish law had, for a long time, resided with this one sect of the
>>Jewish religion.

>Almost true, but  see below.  At the  time the so called  Oral Law was
>introduced (invented?) by  a certain Jewish sect or  sects, there were
>others (roughly during the last couple  of hundred years of the second
>Temple), who  understood the  Jewish religion differently  (and others
>still, see  below).  Roman destruction  of the Temple, and  some other
>political conditions,  made this  sect of  Rabbinic "Oral  Law" people
>become  almost the  only expression  of  the Jewish  religion in  many
>parts,  although  both Samaritans  (very  weakly)  and Qara'ites  more
>numerous that the Samaritans, survived.

Even so, Conservative and Reform Judaism are still modern inventions.  
Surely you don't claim that these movements are the continuation or the
spiritual heirs of Saducees, Samaritans, or Qara'ites!  After all, they
accepted all of the Written Torah.  A Judaism based on rejection of
the Written Law differs not only from Orthodox Judaism but all of the
sects you mentioned.

>>                  Then came along a rebellion within the Jewish world,
>>and the new sect arrogated the name "Jewish," albeit with a modifier.
>>The new sect's Jewish character was strictly in its membership list.

>This is  not so new in  the history of religious  development.  It has
>happened to  others as well.   After some time  of a development  of a
>religion in a certain direction, some  people wake up to the fact that
>the leaders who  were responsible to that development  have moved away
>from what the religion was supposed to be, or to be more accurate that
>is what these people feel.  They  start a movement of removing all the
>"bad" things which have been added to the original "pure" religion and
>had "perverted" it. 

Is this an accurate description of Conservative and Reform Judaism?
If their intent were to restore Judaism "the way it was supposed to be",
without the "distortion" of the Halakha as it is today, I would think
they would reintroduce the laws of tum'ah and taharah (ritual purity)
and start bringing sacrifices.  Rather, these movement espouse wholesale
rejection of many parts of the Torah.

>              This happened to Christianity in the 16th century
>when Luther declared  that the Church had left  the original teachings
>of Jesus and  he started his version of a  "purified" religion. (I was
>told off  recently, for misusing  the term Lehavdil, thus  please feel
>free to add Lehavdils wherever you feel they should be put.)

>Few people  these days will deny  the right of the  Lutherans or other
>Christian sects  to be called Christian,  and for clarity all  use the
>term (Roman) Catholic  Christians for the rites of  those who remained
>faithful to that 16th century interpretation, and other adjectives for
>the others.

I don't see why the use or misuse of the term "Christianity" should have
any bearing on the proper use of the term "Judaism".

>[...]

>I  mentioned before  a couple  of times  "see below",  so here  we are
>"below".  These days the religious  leaders of the Ethiopian Jews, the
>"Keisim"  (sp?) are  demonstrating against  the Orthodox  Rabbinate in
>Israel which refuses  to recognize them as Rabbis, i.e.  as people who
>are allowed to perform weddings, divorces etc. for the Ethiopian Jews.
>The Orthodox  leadership in  Israel (which, as  is well  known, denies
>such   rights  also   to  Conservative   and  Reform   Rabbis)  claims
>(correctly!) that  the Keisim  cannot be  recognized because  they are
>ignorant of the  Halakha.  While this claim is correct,  it only shows
>that a group of Jews which were cut off from the rest of the Jews, are
>quite naturally unaware  of all the additions and/or  changes (or some
>may call it  even distortions) of the Jewish religion  during the last
>2000  or  so years.   Does  Don  wish from  now  on  to be  called  an
>Orthojudaist,  returning  the  term  Judaism and  Jewish  Law  to  the
>Ethiopians?

Surely Michael cannot be confident that Judaism as practiced in Ethiopia
is an accurate representation of Judaism as practiced 3000 years ago.
After all, there is a body of opinion that they are descended from people
who never actually converted to Judaism, but just adopted many of its
customs.  And even if they originally practiced Judaism as it was 
practiced at the time, their isolation and persecution could have caused 
them to forget and/or distort their practice considerably.

>>-Don Gertler

>  Michael Shimshoni
--

Jordan Mann at NYU      (mannj@cims.nyu.edu)