Huh. No idea this was even a thing. I did visit NYC in 2004 so I probably walked around some areas with this, but no idea to look for it.
Sorry if this has been asked but:
I assume this is mainly an issue for certain sects like orthodox?
So what did they do before 1999? Just stay home home?
Why is that chunk out in the south west area? Like is there a reason for it, or just hasn’t been put up yet?
Is it actually one long perimeter, or say various blocks that join together? If say just one block has a break, does it break the whole thing?
$100K a year? In NYC? Shit, that sounds hella cheap. Do they just pay a rabbi one day a week to look things over (vs a full time gig)? I imagine most of the cost is bucket crews which do not come cheap!
I’m sorry but every point you brought up in there you were basically mistaken. There is no scenario where I can ask a non-Jew to open/close the refrigerator door or operate an elevator and definitely not drive my car.
Sure, but depending on which side of the dispute you favor, certain levels of hinting are permitted - especially if the gentile does it for their own benefit.
Everything from “I cannot go home until I’m on the 3rd floor” to “A present could await you if you visit me on the 3rd floor.”
I personally find it ridiculous that eruvim are ok, but I can’t put cheese on a piece of chicken even if I slaughter it myself with the rationale that someone, somehow, might confuse a chicken wing with beef/goat/etc. At this point, it is just tradition though.
Or try to argue you can make your own unleavened bread during passover sometime. Like everyone thinks store-bought matzah is the only thing you can make with flour that quickly (I can make a pancake and naan in a fraction of the time it takes matzah makers to make their crackers).
Still, I often think about how much easier Sephardi have it - especially during passover.
I think if religion is a container, it comes prefilled with culture that would not otherwise survive without that protective sheathing, and thus never penetrate into the gestalt mind of society and…cough you get the idea.
Well sure, but at the time the rumour was spread many observant Jews were literally and figuratively “ghettoised,” often against their wishes but sometimes due to self-segregation. In re: the latter situation it’s understandable that Enlightenment-era and 19th century Jews who wanted to break free pushed for things like modern dress.
Also, the enlightened secular humanist view that individuals should be free to wear whatever outfit they want is a relatively recent development. The foundation of this view was laid by Enlightenment thinkers like the Maskilim, who said you don’t have to wear medieval garb to be a proper and observant Jew.
I know, but why do people think you have to make crackers? One can make any number of unleavened flatbreads in less than 18 minutes. As long as I have a hot surface to work with, I can make frybread in less than 10 minutes and Naan in about the same amount of time.
I am not sure that I do! Sure, many people bring a crazy amount baggage to the concept of religion, but that’s a choice and doesn’t make the basic framework any less value-neutral. It’s like saying that computers are only for porn. Many - both for and against - would agree, but that doesn’t preclude anyone from using it for purposes they find personally or socially better.
If you took the bad parts of religion away, like the social repression and the bizarre supernatural delusions…all you have left is some off-brand rituals trying to compete with events carrying greater utility, and some nice architecture.
Eating matzah is only required for the first two days of Pesach (outside Eretz Israel, inside only the first day) after that it is just customary. But most people dont know the halacha and have a tradition of eating matzah all eight days of Peasach.
This is the second “Jew stuff is weird” post I’ve seen today in liberal outlets. The Breitbartization of America???
Yes, Jewish people do stupid, irrational stuff because God. The ultra Orthodox especially.
There are a lot of people who demonize us because of religious practices that seem odd to outsiders. I get it, I feel the same way when I read about some Mormon practices or Amish. But I am worried about this trend. Maybe it was just a coincidence?
Maybe it’s a reaction to the uptick in antisemitic hate crimes?
Way I see it is that understanding a particular religious practice removes the mystery around it to outsiders and makes it more of a normal, everyday thing. More knowledge = less fear, sorta thing.
ETA: Of course, there’s always gonna be dickheads who use any mention of anything as an excuse to get their hate on.
I doubt it’s anything sinister. @frauenfelder is a liberal guy and IIRC may be Jewish himself in belief or heritage. There’s no demonisation going on in the original article or the Mentalfloss one, and no real anti-Semitism I can see in the comments. BoingBoing publishes a lot of stuff about the weird and interesting and silly and semi-invisible, so this fits in well with the other content.
What’s the other “Jew stuff is weird” link you saw?
No, but beaver may be classified as a fish and eaten during Lent, a good example of a Christian loophole.
“While the rules of abstinence generally only allow seafood, there are a few exceptions… in response to a question posed by French settlers in Quebec in the 17th century, beaver was classified as an exception”
AFAIK, there is no official Church position on beaver puns during Lent, but if we turn a few Jesuit scholars loose on it I’m sure they can work it out. My personal opinion is that such puns are their own penance, but I’m no theologian.
As an outsider with no stake in the matter, I read posts like this more as “people stuff is weird and fascinating”. I don’t think the intent here is to demonize anyone, any more than the BB threads about Mormon underwear or Morris dancing I’ve read in the last year or so. (I recognize that one of these things is not like the others.)
There’s an eruv in Toronto. There was an article about it in a local newspaper not long ago.
Or that whoever they’re paying to put the wire up and maintain it aren’t feeding their families and donating to charity. It’s not like the wire itself is $100,000 worth of raw materials.
Ah, so carrying some things down the street on a Saturday is verboten, but gassing or anally electrocuting factory-farmed animals solely for their pelts to make completely unnecessary luxury items is A-OK. Got it.
