the USA, Israel, and national interest

Notably the wise son also questions (in almost the exact same syntax as the wicked son, which is a huge area of interpretation), as does the simple son. The problem w/ the wicked son isn't the expressing doubts or misgivings. It's that he wants to exclude himself from the tribe.

Yeah but the wicked child is a child and you should give such children patience and understanding rather than reinforcing their self-exclusion, I think is the idea.

wait i don't get it. (i have always been confused by the difference between the wise and the wicked sons!) you're saying the wise son says "us" and the wicked one says "you"?

xp

they both say 'to you' is the point, but only one of those the haggadah says is self-exclusionary

he was just kind of a dick about it

Yeah he's the surly kid who's all like "What is this crap? What's the point of it." But in modern psych terms we're supposed to figure that that kid is already angry and already feels excluded and that the answer isn't casting him out.

also these aren't literal children -- they're symbols. the answer to the wicked son's excluding himself is making apparent the consequences of that exclusion. "if you were there, you would not have been saved." ie: the community saves you in times of trouble, and you are at risk if you leave it. It's a pretty parochial message, but the haggadah is essentially all about that theme over and over again ("in each and every generation they have raised up to destroy us.." etc etc).

the child who feels alienated is technically not the wicked son but the one who doesn't know how to ask (the tinuk sh'nishba/stolen child concept). the wicked son knows and purposefully rebels, he's an apikorsis/heretic type of figure.

Well yeah, I think you're analysis is right. But, I mean, that's also why it feels like a metaphor for pressure not to criticize Israel, which is why Jeffrey Goldberg's use of it is irritating, and why I don't like it in general.

your

of interesting note (tho probably OTT at this point), the haggadah says god did this "for me but not for him" instead of the original Mechilta text "for me but not for you" bc no one at the seder should think we're addressing them as the wicked son

http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2011/06/random-thoughts-from-jerusalem.html

Oz’s speech was mostly well received by this audience of Israel’s secular/liberal elite but there was heckling especially when he said that there would have to be a two-state solution along the 67 lines (with modifications) and that Israel would have to give up biblical lands. Oddly Sarah Silverman had hit on this point earlier, “What do you want,” she asked, “acreage or values?”

nothing new really, just, conferences are pretty weird huh

Sarah Silverman OTM

but oy what a weird lineup!

j goldberg not really doing himself any favors here:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/06/who-is-the-wicked-son/240852/

Shakira!

probably no surprise that i love the bit from Lozowick

you make up your own hagada? who in the world do you think you are? and why do you think it's a hagada?

this thread may need subtitles.

afaik, goldberg (and bachman) are right that excisions from the text are very uncommon. there are for sure haggadahs that do it (i'm pretty sure Renewel encourages finding your own way of doing the seder) and probably different denominations have varying texts. I can't imagine most remove the 'wicked son.' Interestingly, tho, some ppl have added sons. A Schechter haggadah I saw years ago talks about the son who isn't there (who didn't make it to the seder) and the Lubavticher Rebbe had a similar idea when he talked about the son who wasn't present and referred explicitly to Soviet Jewry that was still unable to celebrate their religion under communist leadership. Adding it a little different tho, esp wrt Chassidim who have a long tradition of the 5th thing in the seder (specifically Elijah's cup being the 5th cup) as a messianic reference.

(haggadot*?)

The whole thing really feels like they're secretly arguing about intermarriage but can't bear to make it explicit.

sheesh Goldberg is a colossal asshole.

seems like adding things to haggadot is more common than excisions, but the point that this stuff is subject to modification and has been throughout history is what really matters.

lol oranges etc

http://blogs.jta.org/politics/article/2011/06/22/3088261/in-which-i-now-opt-out-of-the-benedikt-thing

John Cook, came across as a jerk for banging not just her but her entire family

From what I could tell, there was then a nasty Twitter post, followed by I believe what is called a Re-Tweet, our own era's manifestation of scrawling messages on bathroom stalls, and that seems to be where things stand.

A much better and more worthy 'personal essay' IMO:

http://www.thenation.com/print/article/161460/romance-birthright-israel

birthright is such a fucked up thing

I don't think that's one of the opinions that are allowed, symsymsysm.

my little sister went and was horrified by the offer of a free honeymoon to israel for couples that meet on birthright

say two people who, im guessing, belong to some kind of nation-state-type set-up

Birthright Israel is kind of a fucked up thing i guess, but the concept birthright is shared by all sides i this conflict afaict

for the record i meant the program Birthright Israel, not the entire concept of citizenship in a nation-state

cobblers to the nation-state imo

shared by all sides

It sure is. But you can't keep using this tired deflection technique forever. One day, all sides will have to stop pointing at each other and change their own ways.

idk gentiles be jealous of the free trip. i loved mine.

I had fun and wish I qualified for other free trips places just for being born

our tour guide was pretty left-wing

ours too. a lot of our trip was about discussing the conflict in pretty judgement free terms. he didn't try to whitewash anything and was pretty open + honest about stuff like the Nakba and Israeli culpability for refugees.

but you know, fucked up! horrific!

we actually went to an hour long talk by a v. left-wing israeli woman in sderot (basically a pariah there) in charge of a group that fosters communication w/ people in gaza

I was there on business earlier this year and got a free (fairly balanced) tour thrown in. I was also taken to the Peres Centre For Peace, which was great.

Figure there's at least as much mileage in selling the country to Jewish kids worldwide as a functioning, pluralistic, modern country as there is in the kind of partisan stuff Birthright are doing.

that sounds very different from my siblings' experience. the endless focus on marrying/hooking up with Jews is what I found creepy

though the discussion about palestinians wasn't particularly balanced, and they weren't receptive to my sister bringing up alternative viewpoints. it sounded a lot like the nation article, basically.

different trips are sponsored by different organizations w/ different agendas. going on, say, a hillel or aish hatorah trip means getting a very religious experience of israel. going w/ a different sponsor often means something else (generally depending on the goals of the organization). some of them focus heavily on hooking up (and there was def even hooking up on my trip which was a more 'adult' version of the generally early twenties trips) and some more on politics or culture. it doesn't make a lot of sense to talk about the entire organization as one monolithic thing. (also look at What We Brought Back -- nextbook collection of non-traditional responses to birthright; disclosure i contributed a piece to the anthology.)

but we're probably not going to agree about 'creepiness' for a different reason which is that I'm very sympathetic to anti-intermarriage projects. probably a whole can of worms there tho.

...

yeah i had a feeling you and iatee went on a different trip, my siblings were on the 'horny drunk americans in their early twenties' trips

http://markoppenheimer.com/front-page/alison-benedikt-here-i-come.html

And here we get to a more homely point: it sounds as if Benedikt's parents screwed up. From what I can tell, they gave her a Zionist education, but not a very good Jewish one. Obviously her essay is not comprehensive, but it is long enough that we'd expect some mention of the joys of Jewish learning or ritual observance, if there were any to be found. But in that department we basically get only that her bat mitzvah party had a Saturday Night Live–themed party.

And if that's Judaism, then who would want it? And if we don't want Judaism, why even bother arguin about Zionism?

Mark Oppenheimer pretty OTM throughout his post.

Second—and to many Jews this is the less obvious point, alas—do not confuse Zionism with Judaism.

can never be said enough, really

It's definitely a problem, esp since Israel is very important theologically (in the seder itself we say, "next year in jerusalem" as the very last words!) and obv got entangled with Zionism in 19th century. In a world where Israel is a reality, what are the ways that you can yearn for it, dream of it, speak of it, etc, without talking about the actual entity that currently exists? One way is to be Neturei Karta, where you are antagonistic towards the State bc you believe you have to wait for the Messianic era to colonize Israel (which was actually a very popular charedi belief up until 1947). You can be critical of Israeli governments tho, but to the extent to which Zionism = the belief that the Jewish people should have a self-determining State in the biblical area of Israel, if you want to be true to Judaism, you need to be a Zionist. (If you believe Zionism also implies other things obv those things aren't necessarily as important...) Of course, the Rambam leaves it out of his 13 principles of faith so you can technically not even believe in Israel as a Jewish land and still not be heretical. Presumably that's what the Neturei Karta rely upon.

And of course I don't want to leave out options for Judaism that aren't theological, and I personally champion a lot of non-sectarian Jewish culture, but the theological + cultural stuff is pretty closely entwined to the point where even a completely "secular" Jew like Philip Roth has to write an entire novel to try and deal w/ his feelings about Israel (at least one novel, really), so it's not like ppl haven't been working through this question already (ways of being a Jew re: Israel).

to the extent to which Zionism = the belief that the Jewish people should have a self-determining State in the biblical area of Israel, if you want to be true to Judaism, you need to be a Zionist.

I.... guess. it's true there is an awful lot in the Torah about God giving that particular tract of land to the Jews, and to deny that (or not take it literally) has some, er, far-reaching implications. maybe I just don't believe in the validity of this particular Israeli state.