Greg emails: Hi Luke,
I really enjoyed your post about Tova Schreiber. After so much troubling commentary, it is such a relief to hear a Jewish voice that offers possibility for rapprochement between goys and Jews.
I used to be a big supporter of Israel. I thought that this was one of the places Jews and Christians had a commonality of purpose and values.
After listening to my friend Rabbi Rabbs, I realize that most of the frummie community are not Zionists. And I listened on an earlier YouTube to his explanation about the idea of the messianic role before a return to the Holy Land was illegitimate.
So now I merely approve of Israel and no longer describe myself as a supporter. I vaguely wondered why Benjamin Netanyahu spoke at a Conservative temple down here, and now I guess I know why.
I appreciate the fact that most Orthodox Jews are conservative politically and economically. However, that deceived me into believing that Orthodox Jews found a virtue in hard work. Rabbi Rabbs disabused me of this notion when he explained the Orthodox interpretation of the Torah relative to the difference between learning and work. Apparently Jews value learning and have a mediocre approval of work. And moreover apparently there is the colloquial notion that goys should be providing the work. (Protestant work ethic and all.)
Dennis Prager creates something of a dilemma, because when one such as I listens to Dennis, he is flooded with the warm unity of values between Christians and Jews. The place of values deriving from Judeo-Christianity are often seen as one movement, two communities that share the highest and noblest basis for our mutual respect.
Then, of course, one reads the article by Heshy Fried entitled “Orthodox Jews Are Not Usually Friends with non-Jews.” Apparently we do not have a neshamah. We’re not about hashem. One moves into an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood and perhaps listens to our friend Rabbi Rabbs, and then one begins to realize that Dennis Prager is a man with conspicuous virtues and wisdom.
I once had a Jewish friend who said to me in an unguarded moment, “I’ll f*** all the shiksas I want, but I’ll marry a nice Jewish girl.” Since then I’ve heard similar sentiments from other Jewish men, and I’ve heard you and Rabbi Rabbs express the same attitude.
My mother is a shiksa, and Luke, so is yours. And so are all of our sisters and cousins and aunts and grandmothers. They’re all shiksas. And by the way, I don’t want anyone to be envious, but I married a shiksa.
This is all part of a continuing education program for me, and where I expected to find mutuality, I seem to find antithesis. One thing I really do like about frummie Jews and Rabbi Rabbs (whom I nominated for a pickup truck and an NRA sticker) is that at least you guys not only talk the talk, but you walk the walk. That means something.
RABBI RABBS RESPONDS: Greg is dead wrong. He mistakenly claimed that Rabbi Rabbs’ approach turns off non-Jews. Greg needs to be aware that almost all of my Torah Talk viewers, chat room participants, and general followers, fans, and friends are Goyim. FACT.
So, even if it were true what others have written that Jews tend to not befriend non-Jews, that is certainly not the case of Rabbi Rabbs, a breath of fresh air, who came along and has become what one of his loyal non-Jewish followers said on the radio last week, “the Goyim’s best friend”. FACT.
Goyim respect Rabbi Rabbs because he presents himself as a Jew and doesn’t water down his beliefs nor tries to blend in with the non-Jews. Whereas, it is the Jews that have problems with him.
If I served to only do one thing with Greg, to educate him that Zionism goes against Judaism, then my Torah Talks were worth the effort. And, because it took so many years for someone to come along and have the guts to go public and say the truth about Zionism in a way that reached Greg, then I would switch the headline quote of the blog to “Rabbi Rabbs is a breath of fresh air”.
