Selling Judaism by the Pound

Just a note about something I heard which was truly shocking to behold. A prominent reform rabbi in the UK is ditching the normal friday night proceedings to celebrate with the local muslims. The community will "pray" with the muslims (of regents park) and break bread together in the name of interfaith dialogue. I have heard of another reform rabbi who is, surprisingly enough, quite observant and who will be unable to attend the interfaith event because they cannot get to the venue on Shabbat. Upon hearing of this inability to attend the head rabbi said that it is a problem that this person keeps Shabbat because it excludes them from the events organised by the synagogue.

This initially conjured up all sorts of images as I have been very interested recently in the Disengagement Plan (disaster) of Gaza and have watched lots of videos on the subject. It is surreal to watch Jews forcing Jews to leave a place they were invited to by the government. Here is a situation whereby large established communities were forcibly removed from their homes on land that was not in contention even as far as the international community were concerned, by Jews themselves in order to foster better relations with their Muslim neighbours. In time it was hoped that the population of Gaza would grow to be self-sufficient and self-sustaining and would come to use the existing agricultural infrastructure to this end. Not one of the desired outcomes became a reality and the expulsion was in vane. The episode mentioned above is (at least in my mind) quite similar. Here we have a situation where a community leader leads his community away from their place of worship with intention to eat with Muslims (sacrificing Kashrut) in the hope that this will increase peaceful relations between interfaith communities.

If we learn anything from the failure of the Tochnit HaHitnatkut (plan of disengagement) it is that selling your people and your way of life for the sake of peace is simply not worth it. Muslims will not compromise on their practice and if the intention is to meet them on terms which are agreeable to both Jews shouldn't compromise either. During the month of Ellul we should be very careful not to be Choteh (commit a wrong act) and be Machtii (causing other to commit wrong acts).

Thanks for reading

For videos on this subject please visit:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbzOVJCWykw&feature=related