SACT5

People are human, everyone has sins. That’s why we have communal confessions on Yom Kippur. I have yet to hear of an orthodox shul where they say, oh we skip that part since obviously no one among us has sinned.

Just my view, but I’ve never liked the labels Orthodox, Conservative, & Reform for people. They are affiliations for synagogues or organization. People are Jewish. They can be more or less observant/frum. You can say you grew up in or belong to an O/C/R shul, but even individuals within the same family and over the course of their lives have varying levels of observance.
Here’s a few examples of why I think O/C/R as individual labels don’t work.
There’s a Refom (non-congregational) Rabbi who reads Torah weekly at a local Modern Orthodox shul where I believe he is a member. What is he? Reform? Orthodox?
(Reform + Orthodox)/2= Conservative?
No, he is Jewish.
My friend had a Jewish father and Christian mother, he was Baptized in the church and had a Bar Mitzvah at a Reform synagogue. What is he? A Reform Jew? No, not Jewish.
My friend was ‘raised Conservative,’ he married a non-Jewish woman, they have children, everyone in the home keeps kosher. What are they? One lonely Jew.
Someone who was ‘raised Orthodox’ but no longer is observant? He is Jewish.
A BT or FFB? They are Jewish.
When the little boy at religious school drop-off asks me skeptically if we are Jewish since our family is visibly less observant than others, I say without qualifiers, yes we are Jewish.

“In NYC, however, there has always been a massive amount of Antisemitism that people seem to just tolerate.”
I think it gets lost within the general violence of a big city. Not going to be front page news over yesterday’s 75 other crimes. In a small town where Jews are rare and crime is rarer its more likely to make headlines.

Also being from OOT I feel the need to clarify this statement, edited

@ujm “Orthodox Jews as a whole, not just Chareidim, are very Republican”

The survey says “Orthodox Jews have been trending in the opposite direction, becoming as solidly Republican as non-Orthodox Jews are solidly Democratic. In the run-up to the 2020 presidential election, 75% of Orthodox Jews said they were Republicans or leaned Republican, compared with 57% in 2013.”

Since the survey doesn’t split out orthodox subgroups isn’t it also possible that rather than more non-haredim orthodox Jews moving right politically, that haredim in the last 7 years have become a larger proportion of the overall orthodox group accounting for some of the percentage shift to the political right?

I also wonder if any Democratic leaning Orthodox Jews felt pushed out by the conservative political leanings of their congregations?
I know I’ve personally recently strongly felt the inverse of that (having moderate politics no longer feeling comfortable in a liberal congregation).

@CTLawyer – May I ask do you know the political affiliations of others in your minyan from personal chit-chat or is there a push at a congregational level where it is clear what the politics of the shul are?

Using #s from wikipedia Jewish population by metro area (#s in thousands) using top 10 US metro areas just for a ballpark figure.

Northeast: 2,279
NYC 1,600
Boston 248
D.C. 216
Philly 215

West: 847
LA 519
San Fran 228
San Diego 100

Midwest: 292
Chicago 292

South: 239
Atlanta 120
Miami 119

Not in the top 10:
Cleveland 87
Detroit 72
Cincinnati 27
Milwaukee 26
Columbus 23

NCB – I think you are underestimating the numbers on the West Coast even if you assume there are a lot of questionably Jewish people in interfaith families out there.

Ran across this on the wikipedia page for Lithuanian Jews yesterday when trying to figure out if my ancestors called themselves Litvaks 100 years ago as a geographic or a religious affiliation.

“Lithuania became the heartland of the traditionalist opposition to Hasidism. THEY NAMED THEMSELVES “misnagdim” (opposers) of the Hasidi. The Lithuanian traditionalists believed Hassidim represented a threat to Halachic observance due to certain Kabbalistic beliefs held by the Hassidim, that, if misinterpreted, could lead one to heresy as per the Frankists.”

If the term misnagdim was a title they created for themselves then originally it was not pejorative to them. However since it emphasizes the dangers they saw in chassidism it was perhaps originally pejorative towards them. So maybe it’s been twisted since but the discontinuance of that term seems more about Litvish accepting Chassidim today then finding it offensive.

When I was younger (school age) if I noticed I disliked someone for no real reason (perhaps based on assumptions or mild jealously whatever it was) I would force myself to try to become friends with them. Getting to know them usually worked to overcome whatever was causing that feeling and better than that I’d often end up with a new friend.
My suggestion would be to find someone you assume you dislike and reach out in some way and try to find common ground. Like amiricanyeshivish pointed out just happened earlier in this thread.
Remember sinas chinam is a two way street. In my opinion it’s harder to hate someone you know and when there’s no “real reason” it should be easier than you might expect to overcome.

yungermanS – beautifully said!

provaxx – thanks for the stories 🙂

n0mesorah – “If you hate other Yiden because they lost their way, is there any place for them to come back to?” – *applause*

“Why are people so obsessed with this?”
The issue even has it’s own wikipedia page!
Sorry, no links
In my ignorant open-minded not-so-frum opinion its controversial because if it was an “official” position that the Rebbe is the mashiach it would cause Lubavitch to become a new splinter religion like one of many splinter groups that have their origins in Judaism. (See Besalel’s comment.)
The biggest difference between Judaism and Christianity is accepting “you know who” as the messiah. As a Jew who grew up among way too many Christians, when religion came up, I was often asked about this. They could not understand that ‘he’ had no place in our religion nor my headspace.
Between the different groups within Judaism today the major differences are all generally based on religious practices not theology.

I’ve only seen the topic discussed when Chabad is brought up, not just as a casual conversation.
But I was regretfully warned off of Chabad growing up because of it. I went to a shabbos dinner once at the request of a friend but that was my only involvement. I heard various comments from people I personally respected (not really frum but religiously knowledgable individuals) like, “what’s the closest religion to Judaism that’s not Judaism? -Lubavitch” and “they aren’t really Jewish due to their belief in the Rebbe as Moshiach.” Having no personal experience with or understanding of the group myself, I had no way to evaluate these statements on my own (this predated wikipedia). Recently I’ve been feeling unfulfilled, looking for more religiously (hence me hanging out in the CR), and searching for a new “Jewish home.” Very recently I realized that Chabad checks all of the boxes I have been looking for so I plan to really explore what they offer. There are limited choices for observant Jewish experiences where I live and I am quite thankful for the opportunities they provide.