Are the synagogues paying for it? Are the synagogues tax exempt? Do people who pay into this wire project by donating to the synagogue get to write it off on thier taxes as a charitable contribution? Than it affects tax payers. This is a general problem with the tax exempt status of religious institutions in general and not specific to Judaism by a long shot.
Giving religious groups special access to public spaces also seems problematic to me. Christians often expect it during christmas for their nativity displays for example. And I am definitely against that.
For some reason I thought it meant rei+ligare or connected to the light, connected to the king/ruler. I seem to remember a Joseph Campbell interview where he said something similar and his explanation seemed credible to me. Clearly it’s meant to evoke some sort of connection or tie.
You wouldnt be edging on the “sneaky jews getting rich off others” trope would you?
I see from the rest of your comment that you are basically ignorant of Jewish law and how it works. FYI when looking at any legal system, you want to look beyond the text of the law to legal scholarly opinions, judges rulings, case examples, etc.
The entire paragraph was 100% correct and big fist bump to you for knowing this stuff! I know lots of Jews who have less understanding that that paragraph.
The Orthodox answer is we cant. Essentially in these times we lack a “supreme court” (Sanhedrin) until the coming of the Messiah. No we cant just convene a new Sanhedrin, there are rules and laws about this.
Not that particularly clever. I knew a dog who refused to go through a sliding glass door forwards and only backed through it because he bonked his head against it as a puppy.
No, I’m right on the trope of “sneaky priests getting rich off others,” a practise which certainly hasn’t been limited to rabbis over the millennia. Whatever the religion, the clergy find a way to wet their beaks. Eruv inspections are just one of many religious rackets.
Who’s “us”? The royal “we”? Or are you now the Voice of All Jews? Perhaps your photo will one day replace Schneerson’s as a graven idol on the walls of Jewish homes.
For your information, the person who pointed out the NYC eruv wire to me years ago was a Reform Jew, and it was he who called it a ridiculous loophole when he explained its purpose. But perhaps the Voice of All Jews would consider him not to be a proper Jew – apparently that attitude is present amongst many Orthodox Jews.
Yeah. That part time gig sounds like a highly lucrative “racket”. You’ve got to be kidding me. This is a massively pessimistic view of ritual. I suppose it makes for a rather tidy worldview, when you can attribute behaviors so easily to market forces.
Quite the contrary: if anything my worldview believes market forces should ideally have less involvement with ritual and superstition. If a rabbi is so concerned about maintaining the integrity of an imaginary ancient city wall, he should do so at no charge to the community beyond his regular salary. A racket doesn’t necessarily have to be lucrative, although high markups based on sanction from an unseen authority are usually a characteristic.
I will cop to being massively pessimistic and cynical about some religious ritual. The eruv, as a shoddy loophole that people charge money to maintain, is one of them.
It’s not my religion, but the thought that there’s a group that has observed complicated rules for thousands of years, and has been gaming those rules for just as long is somehow comforting. (Or at least a good belly laugh, which is much the same.)
If the comments on this thread have convinced me of one thing, it’s that I’m going to stop making fun of my fundamentalist xtian sibling. Thanks for the mirror.
