#holding my tongue As A Man and not mentioning sheitels

[bringmemyrocks]

On being "more religious"

This post was inspired interaction with orthodox-leaning conservative Jews who measure everything by the standards of Orthodoxy and by a blog post by CrazyJewishConvert, whose page is currently under construction. Archived link here. Text from Hillel: If not now, When? by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin:

...[I[f two Jews are speaking about a third, and one of them asks if the person being discussed is religious, the answer is invariably based on the person's level of ritual, not ethical, observance. "He keeps kosher, he keeps Shabbat; yes, he is religious," or "She doesn't keep kosher, she doesn't keep Shabbat; no, she's not religious." It is virtually inconceivable that you would overhear the following conversation: 

"Is so-and-so religious?" "Oh, definitely." "How do you know?" "Because he's very careful never to embarrass anyone, particularly in public. And he always judges other people favorably."

Conversations such as this simply don't happen. Religiosity today - and perhaps even during Hillel's time - is assessed on the basis of ritual observance. If a Jew is known not to observe Shabbat or kashrut, that individual is regarded as nonreligious, even if his or her ethical behavior is exemplary and is based on what the ethics of the Torah and Talmud demand of him. In such a case, people might say, "Unfortunately, he is not religious, but he's a wonderful person." On the other hand, if a person keeps Shabbat and kashrut, but violates, for example, Jewish laws on business ethics or, in violation of the Torah, speaks unfairly and inappropriately of others, it wouldn't occur to people to say that such a person is not religious. Rather, they might say, "He's religious, but unfortunately he's not ethical."

I would also add that even among people who are more ritually observant (kashrut, keeping shabbat, TH, etc.) there are still differences, and being machmir (extra observant) looks totally different depending on the community, including within orthodoxy.

Not only can we argue that "more religious" does not have to mean "more observant", but what "more observant" even means starts to break down once you examine the orthodox world more closely.

For example, no Jew would take up all of the following practices because they would be contradictory, as they come from different communities:

Daily mikveh immersion (common among men in some hasidic communities)

Studying hasidic texts or following a particular rebbe in the hasidic tradition (Tanya, Likutei Moharan, etc. depending on the hasidic community)

Keeping cholov yisrael (extremely strict kosher dairy observance that R. Moshe Feinstein, followed by many orthodox Jews, ruled was unnecessary). There's an idea among liberal Jews (and even some conservative ones) that more restrictions = more religious, or at least more restrictions = more observant. That simply isn't the case.

Excluding kitniyot over passover if they're not ashkenazi. No matter how religious this person is, if they are sephardic and live in a sephardic community, giving up kitniyot is not sign of additional observance. More restrictions =/= more religious ("machmir").

Holding by sephardic rules (no eggs, no sugar) when making challah if they're ashkenazi/living in an ashkenazi community.

Minhag (community custom) matters a great deal.

So even if we agree that "more religious" = "more observant" rather than "more religious" = "more ethical", the distinctions only carry you so far. Observance is not an either/or decision, even if you agree that orthodoxy is correct.

You can argue "halachah=/=minhag" when it comes to issues of challah, but especially with issues of cholov yisrael, that distinction is blurred to the point of non-existence.

Because if you decide that orthodoxy is correct and all other forms of Judaism should measure themselves in relation to it, you still have to decide which orthodoxy you're measuring by.

#judaism #religion #holding my tongue As A Man and not mentioning sheitels #if you make this about 'cultural christianity' I will force you to eat the worst cholov yisrael chocolate in existence #i