My latest Opinion piece on Keeping Shabbat and the Status Quo for the Jerusalem Post (Israel is a land of Miracles, Compromises and the Status Quo) and Yeshiva University ‘Entirely Right’ in Appeal to Supreme Court Over LGBTQ Club Legal Challenge, Lewin Says and On Jews, Muslims, and Matters of Life and Death by Varda Meyers Epstein and Israeli Scientists: Aquaculture Tech Can Help Ease Global Food Crisis by Hana Levi Julian
Yehuda Lave is an author, journalist, psychologist, rabbi, spiritual teacher, and coach, with degrees in business, psychology and Jewish Law. He works with people from all walks of life and helps them in their search for greater happiness, meaning, business advice on saving money, and spiritual engagement.
Israel is a land of Miracles, Compromises and the Status Quo
David Ben Gurion's famous quote about life in the Jewish State:
"In Israel, in order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles," quipped David Ben Gurion, Israel's first Prime Minister.
Israel's return to its homeland after 2,000 years of exile – an event completely in the annals of history – is miraculous.
As such Israel is considered a Jewish State because we accept as proof that the Hebrew Bible promises the Jewish People to live in the land of Israel. As such, we believe in Jewish values such as Shabbat as policy of the Jewish State, but we do not force anyone to keep the Shabbat, but it is a public policy. The Jerusalem Post does not publish on Shabbat and in many places, we do not have public transportation
As that is the basis as to why the Jewish people are in the land of Israel, a series of compromises allow us to live and prosper in the land. We are able to live here because the world and the United Nations split our country into an Arab and Jewish community. After this was done on November 29, 1948, the UN didn't support its own resolution and when Ben Gurion declared a Jewish state based on this resolution, we were attacked by six Arab armies and were able to survive until a ceasefire was agreed. A ceasefire is a compromise. Neither party is happy but the shooting stops and the blood stops flowing. A compromise can also be considered a Status Quo.
The bible commands us to set up a series of Courts and Judges. The Judges are encouraged to always have the litigants reach an independent compromise rather that force the Judges to come to a decision, the bible, considered G-d's wisdom, teaches us it is better to have two people partially unhappy than a winner and a loser, because losers, seldom give up and so peace is not accomplished, the goal of having Courts and Judges, a forum to have compromise instead of bloodshed.
Many issues have to be decided one way or another. In our recent two years a decision was reached by the majority that vaccinations were necessary for our survival. Those opposed started whole industries and media to say the other side is 100% wrong. Compromise recognizes there are two sides to a story. There is no thing as 100% wrong or right, but a decision has to be made on an action so the idea of Status Quo entered our vocabulary and lives. When the state was formed, there were areas (like Haifa) where there was public transportation, so it was left alone. In other places it wasn't in place, so it was kept. Keeping the Status Quo allows us to function even when there is no agreement.
The Status Quo is not like the Ten Commandments that are unchangeable, but subject to reasonable review when the basis for the compromise changes. There will be a day when the trains (not the buses which work on gas and have different Halachic rules) will run without drivers and without having to break Shabbat to use them. We allow Shabbat elevators under these principles. When this happens the issues of the trains running on Shabbat will be revisited and a new Status Quo may come about.
What is unfair in the media is to promote a course of action, with words of attack, without recognizing the reality that there are always at least two sides to an issue, and if your side is not chosen to say you are under attack (or Sabotage--a word implying violence).
While it is fair to discuss nearly any issue (there are of course exceptions to any rule), the reality of making a decision carry with it a cost that means those that disagree will be unhappy. This is the basis of compromise and Status Quo, which the Bible teaches us is better than winners and losers.
The Jewish People have something to teach to the world. Our laws and ideas have provided the basis for modern civilized society. The reality is that Moses was called the Lawgiver and is universally accepted in modern society as the Lawgiver is the basis of compromise and Status Quo.
Rabbi Lave writes a daily motivational Blog based on the Torah at YehudaLave.com He can be reached to receive the blog at Yehudalave@gmail.com
The Three Musketeers at the Kotel
The Three are Rabbi Yehuda Glick, famous temple mount activist, and former Israel Mk, and then Robert Weinger, the world's greatest shofar blower and seller of Shofars, and myself after we had gone to the 12 gates of the Temple Mount in 2020 to blow the shofar to ask G-d to heal the world from the Pandemic. It was a highlight to my experience in living in Israel and I put it on my blog each day to remember.
The articles that I include each day are those that I find interesting, so I feel you will find them interesting as well. I don't always agree with all the points of each article but found them interesting or important to share with you, my readers, and friends. It is cathartic for me to share my thoughts and frustrations with you about life in general and in Israel. As a Rabbi, I try to teach and share the Torah of the G-d of Israel as a modern Orthodox Rabbi. I never intend to offend anyone but sometimes people are offended and I apologize in advance for any mistakes. The most important psychological principle I have learned is that once someone's mind is made up, they don't want to be bothered with the facts, so, like Rabbi Akiva, I drip water (Torah is compared to water) on their made-up minds and hope that some of what I have share sinks in. Love Rabbi Yehuda Lave.
On Jews, Muslims, and Matters of Life and Death By Varda Meyers Epstein
Life is a supreme Jewish value. So much so that it's customary to make charitable donations or monetary gifts in multiples of 18: the numerical value of the Hebrew word for life: chai. When we drink in celebration we say, "L'Chaim," as popularized by the song from Fiddler on the Roof.
We Jews place life on a pedestal not only in times of celebration but in times of mourning too. Anglo-Jews from Britain and communities in the former Commonwealth, for example, are likely to conclude a condolence call with "I wish you long life."
In Islam, on the other hand, life appears to take a backseat to death. The goriest murders, butchery, death, and suicide seem not to faze Muslims at all. Whereas Jews are preoccupied with life, the Muslim thinks more about death. In a 2004 op-ed, Aspiration not Desperation, Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook detailed the final words of a suicide bomber, describing her joy at the prospect of blowing herself to smithereens.
"I always wanted to be the first woman who sacrifices her life for Allah. My joy will be complete when my body parts fly in all directions."
These are the words of female suicide terrorist Reem Reyashi, videotaped just before she killed four Israelis and herself two weeks ago in Gaza. What is surprising about this horrific statement is that she put a positive value on her dismemberment and death, distinct from her goal to kill others. She was driven by her aspiration to achieve what the Palestinians call "shahada," death for Allah. She had two distinct goals: To kill and to be killed. These independent objectives, both positive in her mind, were goals greater than her obligations and emotional ties to her two children. This aspiration to die, which contradicts the basic human instinct for survival, is at the core of the suicide terrorism fervor.
Contrast this with the Jewish concept of dying "al Kidush Hashem," in sanctification of God's name. Every Holocaust victim, every Jewish terror victim, is considered to be a holy martyr. But Jews don't strive for that holy eventuality—we don't court death for the sake of martyrdom. Which is what all too many Muslims seem to do.
Most people can't stand the sight of blood, but blood doesn't seem to generate the same revulsion in Muslims. Take the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, which commemorates what we Jews still call the Akedat Yitzchak, the binding of Isaac. The Muslim version, which of course postdates Jewish scripture substitutes "Ibrahim" for Abraham, and "Ismail" for Isaac. Jews remember the Akedah by reciting the story from the Torah before the congregation on the second day of Rosh Hashanah. Muslims, on the other hand, celebrate their version of the story with mass slaughter of livestock. So many animals are killed on this holiday, that in 2016, the streets of Dhaka, Bangladesh ran red with blood.
Judaism is possibly the only religion that prohibits all forms of castration. This taboo creates grave challenges to pet owners, modern animal farming and scientific research. However, when one becomes aware of the ubiquity of sterilization in the utilization of animals, one may also appreciate the subtle protest Judaism articulates against the mechanical exploitation of animals. The prohibition on sterilization of animals and humans underscores further the special regard in Judaism to the capacity to generate life. According to Sefer Ha'hinnukh, castration articulates a nihilistic attitude towards life. Contemporary scholarship on Judaism and human rights also interpret God's admonition "Choose life!" as a call for hope and engagement in worldly life, not as a strict refusal to recognize situations in which loss of life is the more dignified and just course of action.
In regard to shedding blood, Barilan writes,
Ironically, the first prohibition on bloodshed is articulated in terms of the death penalty. "Whoso sheds man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for in the Image of God made he man."
The Torah does not tell us directly, "do not kill" the way God proscribed eating from the tree of knowledge. From the story on Cain and Abel we learn that this knowledge is self-evident; every person must recognize it naturally.
Many Muslims, apparently do not. There is ample evidence of the Muslim thirst for bloodshed.
As Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook documented in their aforementioned op-ed, "Palestinian society actively promotes the religious belief that their deity craves their deaths. Note the words of a popular music video directed at children, broadcast hundreds of times on PA TV, which depicts the earth thirsting for the blood of children: 'How sweet is the fragrance of the shahids, how sweet is the scent of the earth, its thirst quenched by the gush of blood, flowing from the youthful body.'"
Life is so important to Jews that we are allowed to break just about any religious commandment in order to save the life of a human being. Look at that last sentence carefully. There is rabbinical consensus that we are commanded to breach Torah laws not only in order to save Jewish lives, but in order to save the life of any human being in peril.
In Jewish law, human life comes first. We understand how important a man's life is—any man's life—by the early mention of the concept in Scripture:
"And God created man in His image, in the image of God He created him." (Genesis 1:27)
Judaism is life-affirming. Islam, on the other hand, cares little for life, and instead embraces death with a whole heart. More from Marcus and Crook:
PA ideology rejects the value of 'life' that other societies hold supreme. As expressed by a senior historian, Professor Issam Sissalem, in a lecture on PA TV: "We are not afraid to die, and do not love life."
This attitude was echoed by Nidal Malik Hasan in wrapping up a presentation he created for his fellow doctors, two years before he killed thirteen and wounded 29 at Fort Hood: "We love death more than you love life!"
According to the National Post, the sentence originates with "a 7th-century Muslim commander who threatened his enemies with the prospect of 'an army of men that love death as you love life.'"
The Post then references a 2004 interview with Hezbollah head Hassan Nasrallah. Professor Richard Landes quotes the same interview in Lessons from Kafr Qana:
"We have discovered how to hit the Jews where they are the most vulnerable. The Jews love life, so that is what we shall take away from them. We are going to win, because they love life and we love death."
Landes, describing Muslim awareness of their own obsession with death, writes:
"Why do expressions of tolerance, moderation, rationalism, compromise, and negotiation horrify us [Muslims], but [when we hear] fervent cries for vengeance, we all dance the war dance?… Why do other people love life, while we love death and violence, slaughter and suicide, and [even] call it heroism and martyrdom?"
Hatred towards death and love of the world is the outcome of an ignorant person's mind, who thinks that the happiness of this world is his prosperity and good fortune. The world beset with numerous troubles and anxieties is about to end in misery and does not enjoy eternity, perpetuity and sincerity. A poet has referred to this in the following words – "Do not give your heart to this world, for its example is of an unfaithful bride who has never loved you, even for a night."
Unknown also writes:
[Hazrat Qasim], the son of [Imam Hasan Al-Mujtaba], when asked concerning death at Karbala, answered: "death to me is sweeter than honey."
He continues (emphasis added):
Usually, most of the people are alarmed and fearful upon hearing the word `death', and to them, death appears dreadful and terrifying, whereas, according to the Islamic ideology, this terminology or this subject has a different appearance and can be perceived in a different way. Basically it can be said that those who fear death, consider it to be a negative entity.
According to this insight, death is an end of life and a moment of everlasting separation of man with his life. They believe that with death, the compounded substances of the body suffer a breakdown and return to nature and man too, is nothing except this very broken-down body. Hence, with death, everything ends with no hope remaining!
Indeed, with this view and insight, death is darker and more dreadful than every other thing and perhaps, no calamity, pain, sorrow and tragedy can be greater and more painful than the tragedy of death, because death would mean the burial of all the desires, hopes, longings and in short, the termination of all things for man – that man who loved life and eternity very dearly.
Anyway, Islam does not possess such a dark and fear-instilling view of death because according to the Islamic view, death is a positive entity.
The idea of death as a "positive entity" is informative, here–perhaps more than anything else. Jews and incalculable numbers of Muslims stand in diametric opposition to each other when it comes to our most essential and sacred beliefs.
But it is more than that, of course. It's more than our differing views on life and death, but the gruesomeness of the Muslim culture of death, the horrifying bloodlust that accompanies those beliefs; the nature of the killings; and the lack of even the tiniest drop of the milk of human compassion when choosing their victims.
Yeshiva University in New York City asked the Supreme Court on Monday in an emergency filing to block a court order forcing the Orthodox Jewish university to officially recognize an LGBTQ club on campus.
Renowned attorney Nathan Lewin, who has argued many times before the Supreme Court, says Yeshiva is "entirely right" to fight that court order, which he said violates the First Amendment.
In an email exchange with JewishPress.com, Lewin said, "Yeshiva is entirely right in its constitutional claim that the New York courts violate the First Amendment by invoking a state law prohibiting gender discrimination to order Yeshiva to grant formal recognition as a student club to the Pride Alliance organization."
In YU Pride Alliance v. Yeshiva University, a small group of students is demanding that the University officially recognize an LGBTQ Pride Alliance club on campus.
The lower court rulings would force Yeshiva to put its stamp of approval on a club and activities that are inconsistent with the school's Torah values and the religious environment it seeks to maintain on its undergraduate campuses.
"The Torah guides everything that we do at Yeshiva — from how we educate students to how we run our dining halls to how we organize our campus," said Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University.
"We care deeply for and welcome all our students, including our LGBTQ students, and continue to be engaged in a productive dialogue with our Rabbis, faculty and students on how we apply our Torah values to create an inclusive campus environment. We only ask the government to allow us the freedom to apply the Torah in accordance with our values."
Yeshiva said in its emergency application to the Supreme Court that it has taken steps within a Torah framework to support its LGBTQ students, prohibiting harassment or discrimination and updating its diversity, inclusion and sensitivity training to reflect the students' concerns.
"Not only is the court order contrary to the First Amendment's Free Exercise of Religion Clause, but it is also void under Supreme Court decisions governing First Amendment protections for speech and association," Lewin says.
The school maintains that recognition of the so-called "YU Price Alliance" Club would directly contradict its religious beliefs. The club advocates for gay rights and would host events such as school-sponsored LGBTQ "Shabbatons" and other LGBTQ-themed events.
Yeshiva University, a 136-year-old Jewish institution, was founded initially to prepare students for the rabbinate. The nation's oldest Jewish university, Yeshiva has been fighting in New York State courts for more than a year over this issue.
The Becket Fund is a nonprofit, public interest legal and educational institute that works to protect the religious rights of those who are caught at the crossroads between church and state.
"When secular authorities try to tell Yeshiva University that it is not religious, you know something has gone terribly wrong," said Eric Baxter, VP and senior counsel at Becket, as well as lead counsel on the case.
"The First Amendment protects Yeshiva's right to practice its faith. We are asking the Supreme Court to correct this obvious error," he said.
"The emergency nature of the Becket Fund's extraordinary request for Supreme Court review leaves little time for extensive briefing," Lewin comments.
It is not yet clear if or when the Court could respond to the application, since it is still out on its summer recess and not expected to begin oral arguments for its next term until Oct. 3.
"The National Jewish Commission on Law and Public Affairs ("COLPA"), which has filed scores of friend-of-the-court briefs in the Supreme Court, will submit a brief this week supporting Yeshiva's Supreme Court application," Lewin says.
"The brief should be endorsed by major national American Jewish Orthodox organizations," he adds.
Israeli Scientists: Aquaculture Tech Can Help Ease Global Food Crisis
Researchers from Tel Aviv University and the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute in Haifa have developed an innovative technology that enables the growth of "enriched seaweed" infused with nutrients, proteins, dietary fiber, and minerals for human and animal needs.
According to the researchers, the state-of-the-art technology significantly increases the growth rate, protein levels, healthy carbohydrates, and minerals in the seaweed's tissues – making the "enriched seaweed" a natural superfood with extremely high nutritional value, which can be used in the future for the health food industry and to secure an unlimited food source.
The research was led by Ph.D. student Doron Ashkenazi, under the guidance of Prof. Avigdor Abelson from the School of Zoology, George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences at Tel Aviv University and Prof. Alvaro Israel of the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute (IOLR) in Tel Shikmona, Haifa. The article was published in the scientific journal Innovative Food Science & Emerging Technologies.
Doron Ashkenazi explains that in the study, local species of the algae Ulva, Gracilaria and Hypnea were grown in close proximity to fish farming systems under different environmental conditions. The special conditions allowed the seaweed to flourish, and enabled a significant improvement in their nutritional value to the point of their becoming "enriched seaweed," which is a superfood.
It will also be possible to use the enriched seaweed in an applied manner for other health industries, for example as nutritional supplements or as medicine, as well as in the cosmetics industry.
"Seaweed can be regarded as a natural superfood, more abundant in the necessary components of the human diet than other food sources," Ashkenazi adds.
"Through the technological approach we developed, a farm owner or entrepreneur will be able to plan in advance a production line of seaweed rich in the substances in which they are interested, which can be used as health foods or nutritional supplements; for example, seaweed with a particularly high level of protein, seaweed rich in minerals such as iron, iodine, calcium, magnesium, and zinc, or in special pigments or anti-oxidants.
"The enriched seaweed can be used to help populations suffering from malnutrition and nutritional deficiencies, for example disadvantaged populations around the world, as well as supplements to a vegetarian or vegan diet."
"Moreover, unlike terrestrial agriculture, aquaculture, and in particular our proposed seaweed farming approach, does not require extensive land, fresh water or large amounts of fertilizer," he said.
"It is environmentally friendly, and preserves nature and the ecological balance by reducing environmental risks. The new methodology in fact offers an ideal situation, of sustainable and clean agriculture."
Today, integrated aquaculture is beginning to receive support from governments around the world due to its environmental benefits, which include the reduction of nutrient loads to coastal waters and of the emission of gases and carbon footprints. In this way, it contributes to combatting the climate crisis and global warming.
Doron Ashkenazi concludes: "Technologies of this type are undoubtedly a model for a better future for humanity, a future where humans live in idyll and in health in their environment." The research was conducted in collaboration with other leading researchers from around the country, including Guy Paz and Dr. Yael Segal of the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute (IOLR) in Haifa, Dr. Shoshana Ben-Valid, an expert in organic chemistry, Dr. Merav Nadav Tsubery of the Department of Chemistry in the Faculty of Exact Sciences at Bar-Ilan University, and Dr. Eitan Salomon from the National Center for Mariculture in Eilat.
