[WikiEN-l] Response to Jayjg's claims

Fri Aug 6 18:08:50 UTC 2004

Jayjg writes:
> I've had a chance to briefly peruse RK's lengthy 
> complaints about me regarding the 
> [[Relationships between segments of Judaism]] article. 
> Needless to say, I dispute their accuracy and veracity. 

So what? One man's disputation of facts is no excuse for
forgery and libel. You have publicly attacked the
leadership of Reform Judaism as haters of Orthodox Jews, by
falsely claiming that they view Orthodox Jews as 9/11-style
terrorists. Yet the text you keep inserting is a series of
proven libels based not on fact, and not on quotes. There
are zero Reform sources which back up your claims.

Rather, your text is based on the claims of one Rabbi Avi
Shafran, a fantic ultra-Orthodox rabbi who has publicly
stated that all Reform and Conservative rabbis are heretics
that should be put to death. (Quote below) The quotes and
positions Shafran states about Reform Jews DO NOT EXIST
ANYWHERE. He is making them up. In contrast, you
disingenuously keep deleting actual verifiable quotes from
the leadership of Reform Judaism. How you can delete
verifiable quotes, and substitute paranoid claims from a
fanatic person who admits to hating the subject?

By the way, most of us here agree that incitement to murder
non-Orthodox Jews mark one as a most unreliable source. 
(Shafran's quote is included below.)

Jayjg's claims about the founding documents and principles
of Conservative Judaism are equally false. THE QUOTES AND
BELIEFS HE MENTIONS DO NOT EXIST in any of those documents
or principles of the movement. The quotes do not exist on
any of the websites of Conservative Judaism. They do not
exist in any of the official publications or classroom
materials of the Conservative Jewish movement. His repeated
claims are provably wrong. 

I myself own a large library of documents and books related
to Conservative Judaism, and have access to the library of
the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. I have never
found any official or quasi-official teachings of the
Conservative movement which take the position you attribute
to them. No textbooks have them either.

Perhaps Jayjg's rabbi may somehow believe that Conservative
Jews teach that Orthodox Jews are "stupid" (your own words)
and that Reform Jews are "insane". But the Conservative
movement simply doesn't teach this, and never has.  Thus,
NPOV could allows us to write that "According to a few
right-wing Orthodox rabbis, the Conservative moevement
views Orthodoxy as "stupid" and Reform as "insane"; However
Conservative rabbis and leaders dispute this, and no
official documents, wesbites, books, or classroom materials
contain any such teachings." 

That would phrase the same information in accord with our
NPOV policy. The problem is that Jayjg is not writing in an
NPOV way. He is taking ultra-Orthodox propaganda and
presenting it as if that was the POV of Reform and
Conservative Judaism, and is deleting actual quotes from
the movements! That is unjustifiable as well as dishonest.

> In some cases I am simply baffled; for example,
>  he has insisted on inserting numerous quotes 
> from Haredi Rabbis into the article, 

You aren't baffled; you are just trying to hide the
discussion of these events within their historical context.
Our NPOV policy demands that we not only present a
position, we are obligated to try and present such
positions within context. (e.g. What chain of events led to
a particular position?)  You keep removing any and all
discussion of chains of events and historical context, thus
destroying the article.

Jayjg writes:
> I have pleaded with RK to work with me on the 
> article. I have on many occasions requested that 
> RK support his edits in the Talk: page, with limited
success. 

That is outrageously false. As anyone can see, I have spent
a month patiently working with him, spending a vast amount
of time writing in the Talk page of this article and many
others. I have even complimented him and worked
productively with him on many articles.

Jayjg responds by reverting all quotes and verifiable
sources from articles, and inserting unsourced
ultra-Orthodox propaganda as if it were fact.

And now, as promised, here are words from one major source
of many of Jayjg's claims about Reform and  Conservative
Judaism, the ultra-Orthodox rabbi Avi Shafran, author of
"JewThink: A Guide to Real Judaism for the Thinking
Individual" (New York: Sepher-Hermon Press, 1977). 

Shafran states that Conservative and Reform leaders
"qualify for the infamous titles of min and apikoros" and
"are the followers of Korach;" Shafran states that "these
man-made 'religions' [Conservative and Reform] are the most
destructive forces in the history of the Jewish people and
all those who seek to spread their noxious heresies are
mesisim, instigators whose aim is to lead astray the
masses;" 

Shafran writes about Conservative and Reform leaders that
there is "a law which orders loyal Jews to kill these types
of people if at all possible," a law which was declared
inapplicable today by the Chazon Ish but which "remains
valuable for the light it sheds on the way Real Judaism"
regards such people.

Rabbi Shafran then elaborates "These people are not so much
meant to be hated as enemies and wished dead for the sake
of 'revenge' or to see them dead. The way we hate such
people is not like the 'cat hates the mouse,' but rather
like the 'storekeeper hates the vermin' which infest his
store, not hating the vermin themselves but wanting them
gone in order to arrest the damage they are causing. We
resent their existence. So, in lieu of the fact that we are
not allowed to physically harm these people today, we
should still treat them with utter contempt and disrespect,
avoiding contact with them as one would with any
destructive fiend." 

(These quotations are from Chapters 15 and 18 of the book,
which is available on an out-of-print basis through
Amazon.com. )

Does any of this sound familiar?  His identity of
"non-Orthodox Jews" with "vermin" that should be
exterminated should cause readers to pause and consider who
else has such violent teachings.

Robert (RK)

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