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I went to check out a place called the Jewish Academy of Religion. It's theoretically a transdenominational rabbinical program, which sounded interesting - I really don't get on well with denominational labels - so I went to see if it was any nice.
I sat in on a class about Denominations. The subject of the class was Zionism - approaches in the various denominations. Some of it was indeed interesting - we looked at various texts and sources I hadn't met, and spent a while looking at how the Reform movement went from one extreme to the other on the subject. That was interesting, although the punchline was a little disappointing - "The Reform movement changed," which wasn't all that subtle, and not a word about why it might have done that. In a movement which prides itself on being able to adapt to changing situations, in 100 years its viewpoint changed? No kidding!
The teacher seemed to assume that everyone shared her own views on Israel, and made derogatory comments about Diaspora Jews who aren't really all that bothered about Israel. Now, while I think that Israel is probably generally a good thing, I personally don't feel the need to be all ra-ra about it; I can justify that theologically, it's a legitimate position (if you don't like it, let it drop, I'm not in the mood to argue about it). But the class, led by the teacher, were making comments on exactly such people ranging from incredulous to disgusted, and I felt rather uncomfortable.
The class concluded with a great many statements quoted from Chareidi anti-Zionist types. They were rather extreme statements, the kind which say Zionists are horrible heretics and worse. Now, while I don't necessarily like that kind of approach, I assume that there's a reason behind it, and that it's also a legitimate position, at least theoretically. But the class read out the statements one by one and laughed at them. Chareidi-bashing is not good for your inner being, because it's nasty to be mean about other people (ok, I know. But I'm not mean when I'm the teacher, okay? Nor when I'm the role-model). It's also not intellectually worthwhile - anyone can make any kind of extremists look stupid, it doesn't require a great deal of thinking. So that was both academically rather disappointing and, from a supposedly pluralist institution, rather disturbing.
I'm going to go back shortly and try a different class - maybe that was just an unlucky chance.
And I bought BREAD! YAY YAY YAY.
I sat in on a class about Denominations. The subject of the class was Zionism - approaches in the various denominations. Some of it was indeed interesting - we looked at various texts and sources I hadn't met, and spent a while looking at how the Reform movement went from one extreme to the other on the subject. That was interesting, although the punchline was a little disappointing - "The Reform movement changed," which wasn't all that subtle, and not a word about why it might have done that. In a movement which prides itself on being able to adapt to changing situations, in 100 years its viewpoint changed? No kidding!
The teacher seemed to assume that everyone shared her own views on Israel, and made derogatory comments about Diaspora Jews who aren't really all that bothered about Israel. Now, while I think that Israel is probably generally a good thing, I personally don't feel the need to be all ra-ra about it; I can justify that theologically, it's a legitimate position (if you don't like it, let it drop, I'm not in the mood to argue about it). But the class, led by the teacher, were making comments on exactly such people ranging from incredulous to disgusted, and I felt rather uncomfortable.
The class concluded with a great many statements quoted from Chareidi anti-Zionist types. They were rather extreme statements, the kind which say Zionists are horrible heretics and worse. Now, while I don't necessarily like that kind of approach, I assume that there's a reason behind it, and that it's also a legitimate position, at least theoretically. But the class read out the statements one by one and laughed at them. Chareidi-bashing is not good for your inner being, because it's nasty to be mean about other people (ok, I know. But I'm not mean when I'm the teacher, okay? Nor when I'm the role-model). It's also not intellectually worthwhile - anyone can make any kind of extremists look stupid, it doesn't require a great deal of thinking. So that was both academically rather disappointing and, from a supposedly pluralist institution, rather disturbing.
I'm going to go back shortly and try a different class - maybe that was just an unlucky chance.
And I bought BREAD! YAY YAY YAY.