This is a guest post by Laura Zelle, the Director of Tolerance Minnesota, an award-winning program of the JCRC which promotes cultural, racial and lifestyle understanding through innovative diversity education and professional development training.
Today, January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, has been declared International Holocaust Remembrance Day by the United Nations. In their own ways, members of the Jewish communities of Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota will join the international community on January 27 in honoring the more than six million Jews who were murdered in the Holocaust and we will pay tribute to those Holocaust survivors who paid the ultimate price for resistance and those who continue to remind others to “Never Forget.”
For more than 50 years, the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas (JCRC) has served as the community’s source for Holocaust education, providing Jews and non-Jews, schools, religious institutions, civic organizations, and businesses information about the Shoah (Holocaust) and inspiring programming that honor survivors and their descendants.
This coming spring, Tolerance Minnesota, a program of the JCRC, will present Discrimination by Design to the community. This program will feature a Midwest tour of the exhibit: Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933-1945 from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Programming around this exhibit will include lectures, films, panel discussions, workshops and docent tours to educate the public of the danger of laws being used to marginalize and discriminate. For example, the JCRC is particularly pleased to sponsor a lecture by Professor Dale Carpenter, a noted conservative legal scholar from the University of Minnesota Law School. Professor Carpenter will be speaking about his forthcoming book on the landmark Lawrence v. Texas Supreme Court decision, which essentially decriminalized homosexuality in the United States and how hateful rhetoric can tragically lead to legalized discrimination.
The JCRC aims to broaden the public’s understanding of the Holocaust by educating people of all backgrounds about the little known history of the marginalization, imprisonment and murder of thousands of homosexuals by the Nazis in the years leading up to and during World War II.
Though there can be no responsible direct comparison between the atrocities of the genocidal Nazi regime and the current debate over marriage equality for gays and lesbians, the JCRC is not oblivious to the fact that this debate over marriage will be sure to engage Minnesotans over the next eleven months and during the run of the exhibit. Moreover, as an organization whose board of directors just recently voted unanimously to oppose the Minnesota Marriage Amendment “on the grounds that marriage is a fundamental human right and that the Minnesota Constitution should not be used as a vehicle for restricting rights and civil liberties,” the JCRC hopes that by bringing this exhibit to Minnesota at this critical time, Minnesotans from all backgrounds will be reminded of the danger for all of us when we use law to marginalize insular minorities in general, and our GLBTQ friends, family, and neighbors in particular.
Click here for more information regarding the exhibit opening in April 2012.
For more details about Discrimination by Design, please contact me at [email protected].
(Photo: Robonline)
Holocaust Memorial Day
very moving!
For Laura Zelle to infer that because homosexuals cannot legitimately marry it will someway, somehow eventually lead to Nazi-like oppression and genocide is a grossly hyperbolic assertion. It is she who mentioned both subjects in the same article.
Miss Zelle has to know that halakha is clear. Homosexual behavior is considered an abomination before G-d (see footnote). It states so in Torah. Normative Judaism could never imagine that homosexual behavior, much less “same sex marriage” could be ever be considered legitimate.
I will then ask Miss Zelle a question: do you, a public representative of the Jewish Community Relations Council:
1. Consider Torah to be “hateful rhetoric”, and
2. That preventing homosexuals from marrying somehow renders – pursuant to your inference – that Judaism, G-d forbid, is the basis for genocidal, Nazi like oppression?
A glaring omission is Miss Zelle’s failure to state, even in passing, the objective fact that homosexuals were at the highest ranks of the Nazi movement at its inception, including the SA, prior to the Night of the Long Knives. They were instrumental in forming and the promotion of the Nazi movement.
[1] Vayikra 18:22; 18:24. See also: behavior of Sodomites, Bereshis 19:5; destruction of the cities, Bereshis 19:24-25, 19:28; penalty for homosexual behavior emphasizing the severity of the offense, Vayikra 20:13.
Listen here Nachman…
Including your pal Adolf Hitler, some of the biggest critics of homosexuals were in fact homosexuals themselves. You know, a few hundred Catholic priests, that megachurch moron Ted Haggard, Senator Larry Craig, Rep. Mark Foley, and on and on. They all spewed hate and recited plenty of bible text and scripture. But they all had the same little secret…
Just sayin’
A Jew responds to an article in with an objective fact, and Mr. Mandell offers his counterargument: an ad hominem attack claiming that I, and by extension, Jews who recognize what Torah states clearly are – paraphrasing – “friends of Hitler”.
You then go on to recite the worn cliche of another ad hominem attack: by claiming that a Jew who states what can be found in any Torah, that Jews must be homosexual. Does that include countless millions of other Jews, including women? Does that include those Orthodox Jews who perished in the Shoah, HY”D?
Torah stands as the foundation of Judaism. It is an objective fact what Torah states. You cannot remove the core family standards of Judaism that have sustained us for thousands of years through persecutions and oppression.
It is you, Mr. Mandell who may be projecting his behavior, since it is you who reacted with fury and hatred.
Just sayin’.
Anyone can hide their own hatred and ignorance behind the words of others. We have 4 Republican Presidential candidates who seem to be doing that each and every day.
The Torah teaches a lot of things, but it also teaches us to think for ourselves.
So I think I’ll stand behind the following ancient Jewish texts – but I won’t do so blindly, without considering common sense, human decency, and a love for others.
“I call heaven and earth to witness: whether Jew or Gentile, whether man or woman, whether servant or freeman, they are all equal in this: that the Holy Spirit rests upon them in accordance with their deeds!”
(translated: G-d doesn’t care if you’re gay or straight. He cares that you’re a good person.)
“To an earthly king, if a poor man greets him, or one who has a burn on his hand, it is a disgrace, and the king does not reply, but God is not so, everybody is acceptable to Him.”
(translated: G-d loves everyone, gay or straight.)
God created the human being in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
(This one is self-explanatory.)
And you’re right Nachman, I did respond with hatred and fury. I’m not a big fan of anyone who calls human beings abominations because a book says so.
“I’m not a big fan of anyone who calls human beings abominations because a book says so.”
It is the behavior that is condemned. Next.
“The Torah teaches a lot of things, but it also teaches us to think for ourselves.”
It also says not to punish another man for your own sins. Taking your assertion seriously would infer that you just may think for yourself when you are to be punished for some misdeed. You’ll tell the court – who would also think for themselves – to select another man at random, and punish him for your sins.
You quoted Seder Eliyahu Rabbah:
““I call heaven and earth to witness: whether Jew or Gentile, whether man or woman, whether servant or freeman, they are all equal in this: that the Holy Spirit rests upon them in accordance with their deeds!””
Does this abrogate Torah? No, it does not. Torah is the foundation of Judaism, and Torah still condemns homosexual behavior. Your political agreement with the homosexualists, the DFL, the Greens, the DRC, Reform, the JCRC – contradicts Torah.
I am presenting objective fact. You – nor Miss Zelle or the JCRC – cannot reconcile the contradiction.
“It is the behavior that is condemned. Next.”
-What behavior are you speaking of? Because if it’s the “behavior” you suggest, then plenty of non-homosexuals are as guilty, if not more. Then what? Will the abomination police come knocking on my door too? Oh wait, never mind – I had some delicious bacon yesterday, so I know I’m doomed.
Don’t tell me about my sins. The Torah is a book – words on paper. It doesn’t know me – nor does it know anyone else on this Earth. The majority of the world doesn’t believe what you believe. It doesn’t make them wrong.
I also quoted the Torah – but you ignored that part. G-d created us all in his image. I’m not sure he would call himself an abomination, now would he?
And my argument for common sense and human decency has nothing to do with politics. You can throw politics around all you want, but I don’t fit into any of the categories you listed. You forgot to mention that I might be a human being – you know, one of those people who treats others with respect. Can you believe it? A proud Jew (as Jewish as you by the way) who thinks for himself, judges people by their deeds (and not by whom they choose to love), and also doesn’t fall into any of your preconceived groups? Amazing.
What’s funny is that you didn’t like what I said about you, but you have no qualms about singling out an entire group – millions upon millions of people – and saying some pretty horrible things about them. Oh yeah, you didn’t say it – the Torah said so. Thanks Newt Romnorum!
You are presenting your interpretation, not a fact. Unless you were with the author and he explained every word to you, it’s just an interpretation. The fact is that your personal argument is a minority opinion among millions of Jews around the world – most of whom actually care about ALL of our fellow human beings.
In your honor Nachman, I’m putting on some Elton John for a Sunday afternoon dance party with the kids. Maybe some Crocodile Rock or Bennie and the Jets – what do you think?
I am no Torah scholar. I am reminded of passages that require punishment and even death for planting of multiple crops and mixing fibers. And stoning. I love my faith and the Torah from which it comes, but I do not take every word as strict mandate for my life. Perhaps that makes me a bad Jew. I did watch a documentary called “For the Bible Tells Me So” (2007), which addresses biblical reasoning behind the movement against homosexuals by some Christians. I did hear Ellen Degeneres speak to the desire of 40,000 women who want to control who hires her because she is gay, and her contention that, “I want to be clear. … I stand for honesty, equality, kindness, compassion, treating people the way you want to be treated, and helping people in need. To me those are traditional values, and that’s what I stand for.” I like that. I would like my children to follow that lead. Finally, in response to ‘the fact’ (I do not know) that some of those who started the Nazi party might have been gay, it reminds me of the quote from pastor Martin Niemölle. You have heard it. It includes, “Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.” Perhaps those gay Nazis hated Jews, but never expected that the hatred would be turned upon them. And perhaps that is why Ms. Zelle contends that hatred/bias/discourtesy directed at one group may not remain so focused, and may turn its eye to another group, and another, until the original group becomes a target of the ill will it chose to give out originally. Again, I am no Torah scholar, but I try my best to be a mensch.
Michael – you are confusing tolerance with acceptance. Judaism may give allowance for the existence of homosexuality, however, Judaism cannot allow acceptance of homosexual behavior. That is clear.
I do not care what a movie on evangelical fundamentalist Christians asserts. I do not care what Ellen Degeneres – a lesbian on television – says. Her opinion is immaterial to Judaism. She is to the Jews today as the Greek Hellenists were to the Jews in that day.
You, too, make the hyperbolic inference that if Jews assert their actual belief in Judaism as stated in Torah, it will lead down a slippery slope to Nazi like oppression. This is a particularly vile argument.
You know as well as I do – or at least I hope that you know – there are Torah mitzvot that are not binding in the diaspora, that are not binding since the Temple does not exist, and there is no universally recognized Sanhedrin.
If you and the current generation of “progressives” believe that you (or a lesbian on a television show) holds more wisdom and knowledge than our Torah, our Sages, and the thousands of years of Jewish experience, examination and scholarship, then I assert such belief is based upon hubris and narcissism.
A correction or two, Nachman, and perhaps a counterpoint.
Progressive? Yes, as compared to any fundamental reading of faith, those who practice or suggest change are progressives. I’m okay with that label. What I’m not okay with is your assumption in my text of ‘Nazi like.’ What I wrote, and what is not out of the realm of possibility in my eyes, is that Jews who practice discrimination or intolerance of another group should not be surprised if and when another group says, “Yeah. Bad gays. And while we are at it, bad Jews!”
You bring up that rules have changed in the Diaspora. That must have been quite progressive thinking at the time. Might not some have reacted with outrage, disgust, perhaps even talk of hubris and narcissism at the thought of the rabbis changing what the Torah mandates? Is there a sub-paragraph which states that these rules apply until the Diaspora? I wonder if there was the ability for Jews of the time to communicate as we are now, how many of the decisions made by the rabbis would have been challenged or discussed, as we do now? Would rabbinic action have been, as it has been in other-than-Orthodox circles, spurred by the desire for change, or fairness, or humanity, or staunch conservative values? Perhaps by all of those, as they are now. Just as Devarim 17:11 gave rabbis the authority to declare certain Torah laws inert, does it not allow rabbis today to make this determination, given what we know now and what society is like? How is it different, outside the fact that it doesn’t jibe with your world view? My rabbis agree with me; is he and is she not ‘real’ rabbis to you? (Perhaps that is more the root of our discussion, the validity of any form of Judaism that is not Orthodox. We shall not solve that one today, I wager.)
My point, sir, is this: I am comfortable in valuing acceptance where there is no harm. It is not a perfect philosophy, but it is one which allows me live side by side with those different from myself (including articles of faith) and respect all the good they do, and the goodness they bring into the society. I do not appreciate Ellen Degeneres in spite of her sexual orientation. It doesn’t play a part. I invite you to read that quote again, and tell me what part of her lifestyle harms you or Judaism in any way. Perhaps in the Diaspora- until Moshiach comes- perhaps we are allowed to let that part of the Torah lapse too. It has precedent.
“What I’m not okay with is your assumption in my text of ‘Nazi like.’”
You injected the subject into the debate. I just ran with it. My premise is this: You cannot change or abrogate Torah because your present-day political ideology (along with the goyim) tell you to. Jews have a set of standards, and it is obvious you, Mr. Mandell, and Miss Zelle do not take them seriously. Either you want the Jews to survive or you want submit to the ideology of the homosexualists or whatever you can do to be accepted by them. You can’t have it both ways.
What next? Is it ok, Michael, to just forget that part of Torah that forbids idol worship? Human sacrifice? Eating the flesh from a live animal?
G-d forbid.
“My point, sir, is this: I am comfortable in valuing acceptance where there is no harm.”
Tolerance or acceptance? If it is tolerance, then you let people live as they would without agreeing with their behavior. If it is acceptance, then you agree their behavior is of no consequence to you or to civil society.
It is clear that Torah forbids homosexual behavior, as it forbids human sacrifice. That is an objective fact. You either accept that objective fact or you don’t.
And again, Nachman, you seem to allow for changes in observance of some things (Diaspora changes) but not others. Please help me to understand why Jews are not held to the original text for some things because the Rabbis said so, and this, if the Rabbis of today say so? (My Rabbi supports what I do.)
I cannot agree with Jeff that the Torah is just a book, as I hold it holy. And as I also value the U.S. Constitution, and see power in its ability to adapt to the times while retaining the original purpose, I see the Torah. As we Jews have studied conflicting interpretations of Torah for millennia, we do so now. We speak of the differences in society and apply them. And we will continue to do that, regardless of the notion that one Jew or group of Jews says that they have the only answer.
Michael – thank you for your response.
From the 1946 edition of the USCJ’s Sabbath and Festival Prayer Book, I leave you with this:
“I will continue to hold my banner aloft. I find myself born – aye, born – into a people and a religion.
The preservation of my people must for be for a purpose, for G-d does nothing without a purpose.
His reasons are unfathomable to me, but on my own reason I find little dependence; test it where I will, it fails me.
The simple, the ultimate in every direction is sealed to me.
It is as difficult to understand matter as mind.
The courses of the planets are no harder to explain than the growth of a blade of grass.
Therefore I am willing to remain a link in the great chain.
What has been preserved for four thousand years was not saved that I should overthrow it.
My people have survived the prehistoric paganism, the Babylonian polytheism, the aesthetic Hellenism, the sagacious Romanism; and it will survive the modern dilettantism and the current materialism, holding aloft the traditional Jewish ideals inflexibly until the world shall become capable of recognizing their worth.”
Powerful quoute, Nachman. All the best.
Mr. Mandel wrote:
“You are presenting your interpretation, not a fact.”
After citing a specific Torah verse that – by any objective standard – exists, and where the language of the verse is clear – there is no point in continuing.
Boy, I have really enjoyed you guys ripping out each other peyos. Way to go!
There is an old Russian anecdote, that goes something like this:
An old Armenian on his deathbed is giving his last advice to his family. With his last breath, he utters “Armenians! Look after the Jews!” The room immediately turns quiet, until one of the grandchildren asks “Grandpa, but why should we take care of the Jews?!” “Because,” the old man answers, “after they get rid of the Jews, they will come for us”…
Pious Jews, non-pious Jews, secular Jews, Reform Jews, Communist Jews, Eastern European Jews, Western European Jews, gypsies and Homosexuals have shared room and board before. I do not think that I need to remind you where. And the crematoria, near as anyone can remember, were rather agnostic of the religion, piousness, sexual orientation, and race.
It is not up to the state to mandate the definition of marriage, divorce, religion and piousness. If limitations are placed on one group, other limitations on other groups will inevitably follow — for reasons of skin color, length of peyos, amount of leftover foreskin, glatt kosherness, etc. It is not up to the state to mandate such exclusion. So, on moral ground, the marriage amendment must be opposed.
The separation of church and state must be maintained. The state has a responsibility to acknowledge the union between the two responsible adults. The state has no business defining the nature of this union.
Needless to say, in Israel, where Orthodox “pious” thugs turned the marriage and funerals into a racket, many of the immigrants are forced to travel abroad to marry, because no one cares to provide proof of their Jewishness to some dirty, unwashed, unshaven idiot. Many complain that they were persecuted as Jews in Soviet Union, yet they are forced to prove to some uneducated moron that they are Jews. Eventually, this type of behavior forces people to turn away from Judaism altogether.
As to the pious peyos and top hat wearing Torah-adhering ones, Nachman, perchance you have some explaining to do. After my Mom, who is a Nazi concentration camp survivor, watched their recent antics in Israel, with spitting at little kids and dressing themselves and their children up as concentration camp prisoners, she was utterly disgusted. There is a Russian phrase that she uttered when she saw them: подлые пейсатые сволочи.