{"id":59426,"date":"2018-03-27T09:52:52","date_gmt":"2018-03-27T14:52:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/?p=59426"},"modified":"2018-04-08T08:19:03","modified_gmt":"2018-04-08T13:19:03","slug":"anti-semitic-canards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/inspiration\/anti-semitic-canards\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-Semitic Canards"},"content":{"rendered":"

There have been a lot of accusations of anti-Semitism lately, and an equal number of excuses.<\/p>\n

First, Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested that Jews, rather than Russians, might be behind US election tampering. This was generally accepted as an unfounded attack on a minority group, though defenders pointed out<\/a> that Putin was responding to a journalist\u2019s question and that cultural differences between the US and Russia keep us from appreciating the innocuous nature of his reply. Draw your own conclusions.<\/p>\n

Then, jaw-droppingly, Washington, DC, council member Trayon White, Sr., actually blamed the Jews for the weather, specifically, \u201cthe Rothschilds controlling the climate to create natural disasters they can pay for to own the cities.\u201d He later apologized, saying, \u201cI did not intend to be anti-Semitic, and I see I should not have said that after learning from my colleagues.\u201d (Really? You needed to be told that?) And, of course, there were defenders who said that he was never anti-Semitic in the first place, speaking about the Rothschilds in particular (their religion apparently irrelevant, centuries of anti-Semitic conspiracy theory notwithstanding) and not Jews in general (because, you know, the Rothschilds are such a relevant force in our daily lives).<\/p>\n

No discussion of anti-Semitic canards would be complete without Minister Louis Farrakhan, Sr. Farrakhan called Judaism a \u201cgutter religion\u201d in 1984 and things haven\u2019t gotten any better since. (Some people \u2013 including Farrakhan \u2013 have claimed that Farrakhan never actually said that but the Chicago Sun-Times<\/em> caught it on tape<\/a>.) Nevertheless, there are those who justify Farrakhan\u2019s hate speech<\/a>, saying, \u201cIt\u2019s just his brand; nobody takes his words seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

As hateful, ignorant or, in some cases, silly as we might see comments such as these, there was one recent canard that offended me more than any of them. And I was shocked<\/em> that it didn\u2019t get more coverage. The comment in question came from Henryk Zielinski, a Polish priest and the editor-in-chief of a weekly Catholic publication called Idziemy<\/em>. Speaking on Polish national television TVP about the flap surrounding the recent Holocaust legislation, Zielinski asserted that Jews have \u201ca completely different system of values, a different concept of truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor us,\u201d he said, \u201cthe truth corresponds to facts.\u201d (I\u2019m not clear to whom the pronoun \u201cus\u201d refers. Catholics? Christians in general? Poles? Everyone but Jews?) \u201cFor the Jew, truth means something that conforms to his understanding of what\u2019s beneficial. If a Jew is religious, then truth means something God wants.\u201d<\/p>\n

The justification that \u201ctruth means something God wants\u201d might almost be a defensible statement \u2013 almost<\/em> \u2013 if Zielinski had stopped there. But he didn\u2019t. Rather, he continued that, for irreligious Jews, \u201cthe truth is subjective or whatever serves Israel\u2019s interests.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is such a dangerous statement it\u2019s not even funny. It purports that Jews regularly perpetrate a \u201cpious fraud\u201d to justify whatever they want. It goes so far as to paint this as a religious duty, when it is, in fact, the exact opposite.<\/p>\n

The truth is of paramount importance in Judaism. The Torah tells us to \u201ckeep far away from a false matter\u201d (Exodus 23:7) and the Talmud in Shevuos (31a) shows us the lengths to which one must take that. Specifically, one is not even permitted to lie even in order to secure a just outcome in a court case. For example, let\u2019s say that John, Paul and George are each owed $1,000 by Ringo. If they each take Ringo to court separately, they might win and they might lose. But let\u2019s say that George takes Ringo to court saying that he owes him $3,000. If John and Paul act as witnesses, they\u2019ll win in a slam-dunk and then each can take the $1,000 they\u2019re owed. This would be an equitable outcome because each litigant recoups the amount he is owed. Nevertheless, it is completely prohibited because, equity notwithstanding, it\u2019s just not true.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how seriously we take truth. Father Zielinski would have the world believe otherwise. So who\u2019s the one twisting the truth to suit his purposes?<\/p>\n

There are entire web site devoted to \u201cexposing\u201d Jews because of \u201chorrible\u201d things the Talmud says. They claim that we see non-Jews as sub-human (we don\u2019t) and that it\u2019s permitted for us to rob and kill them (it isn\u2019t). They claim that our religion permits sex with toddlers. (It doesn\u2019t. Discussing the legal impact of an act does not mean that the act is permitted, just that we need to know the implications should it occur!) Sometimes these claims are actual quotes taken out of context and other times they\u2019re fabricated out of whole cloth. Once, someone contacted me with a handful of such quotes that an anti-Talmud web site attributed to a completely non-existent tractate of Talmud. When I told this person that, not only were the quotes fraudulent, no such tractate of that name existed, his response was along the lines of, \u201cOf course you\u2019d say that!\u201d It has become a “pious fraud” that we<\/em> perpetrate “pious frauds!”<\/p>\n

While it doesn\u2019t help us if Putin throws Jews under the bus with idle speculation or if White says we control the weather (if only that were true!), I think the damage in such statements is limited even if they are not immediately called out. What Zielinski said is far more dangerous! We believe that \u201cthe seal of God is truth\u201d (Shabbos 55a \u2013 an actual<\/em> Talmudic quote!).<\/p>\n

Integrity is the most important thing we have. Sometimes it\u2019s the only thing we have! Do individuals fall short on occasion? Of course. We\u2019re only human. But fallible as humans are, we should never let it go unchallenged if someone should charge that the Torah is ever for anything less than truthful conduct. This is so even if a lie is a more expedient path to the same outcome.<\/p>\n

In Judaism, a just goal accomplished through falsehood ceases to be just. If our detractors would follow the same principle instead of smearing us with unfounded accusations, imagine what could actually be accomplished!<\/p>\n

Rabbi Jack Abramowitz is Torah Content Editor at the Orthodox Union. He is the author of six books, including\u00a0The Tzniyus Book<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0The Taryag Companion<\/a>. His latest work,\u00a0The God Book<\/a>, is available from\u00a0OU Press<\/a>\u00a0as well as on\u00a0Amazon<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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