Salaam.

Salaam.

I’d like to apologize for my outbursts here. As a wiser man than I pointed out, they are not a good witness for Islam.

The points I have been making here are truthful, and they need to be expressed. But I am in a lot of pain over them and that pain is influencing how I express them.

 

…

Steam.

Any American who wakes up and becomes conscious of the tyranny and slaughter upon which his nation’s greatness is based is bound to feel ashamed. He may also feel angry at having been lied to, and at having helped to perpetuate lies and oppression and murder. His anger is the correct response. His indignation can help to right the ship of state and turn his country onto a more moral course.

And any Jew who wakes up may feel similarly, with equal or even greater justification. For our nation of residence does not determine who we are. A nation’s character is determined by that of its residents and rulers.  A person’s character, however, is determined by his genetics in combination with his culture.

My vote can help to get the US out of Iraq, stop the slaughter of innocents in Afghanistan, and withdraw support from fascistic and racist Zionism. But I have no vote in the character or goals of Judaism. I cannot make Jews “good” or undo thousands of years of selfish and arrogant destruction of self and others.

There are good Jews, of that I have no doubt. I know a few. But I find that they are good despite, not because of, their Jewishness. They tend to be good in direct proportion to their universalism and in inverse proportion to the strength of their Jewish identity.

The Jewish scriptures are based on tribal superiority and tribal dominance. Dashing the heads of our enemies’ infants against rocks. Killing every man, woman, and child – except for those girls who have not yet known a man. And the Jews have the audacity to criticise Muslims. I’m sick of it. 

I see America today. I protect my children from the media that Jews, in large part, created. I see the Jewish hobby of destroying all notions of honor and uprightness that were once the hallmarks of the admittedly imperfect American dream. Jews spit on morality, decency, and goodness in the name of “realism,” and “art,” and “freedom.” Jews called decency and righteousness “discrimination,” and “hypocrisy,” and “fascism.” And what is the result? Filth of every kind on the television, radio, and movies. Children addicted to porn getting their fix on the computers in the public libraries. Churches being forced to pay for abortions, the last American sacrament. Taxpayers being forced to pay for sex-change surgeries. A popular culture which mocks and  demonizes Christianity and Islam. Which mocks even the idea of goodness. A popular culture terrified to offend Jews.

It makes me sick. I could renounce my American citizenship if I felt that America were beyond hope. But how does one renounce their ancestry, their genes, their blood? It is an indelible stain.

Today’s post, in which I say aloud what we all know.

I admit it: I am a self-hating Jew. I am an “antisemite.”

No matter what I do, the Jewish stain will always be there. It’s like a malformation that I wish I could cut out of myself. This is why Adam Gadahn, Yusuf al-Khattab, and Maryam Jameelah became what they are – to try to cut out that stain. But we can’t. It’s always there; in our faces, in our names, in our neuroses. And if we’re not willing to take part in the bacchanal, the cultural debauch, we have nothing but our shame. Every people has a proud past but the Jews. Every people has a golden age but the Jew. For the Jew, his golden age was still an age of brutalising the original inhabitants of the Middle East. The rest is all cowering under the boot of every other people – until Zionism restored us to overt power and brutality.

The only course left for a Jew once he wakes up from the lies is the course of the self-hating Jew. I envy the Arab. I envy everyone who is not Jewish. And here, even my rage comes out as a whine. Because that is what we do. And you who are reading this, both Jew and Gentile, you know all this to be true. Thank god I’m saying it so that you don’t have to. But you were thinking it – you, my Jewish readers as well as my non-Jewish readers.

That’s it. That’s all, but it will suffice. Because that’s all I’ve got.

Screw you, Abe Foxman.

U.S. Election 2012

Obama’s legacy as the president who pioneered secretive, charge-less executions

U.S. Law May Allow Killings

Obama just as bad as, or worse than, George W. Bush.

Jewish Converts to Islam – Episode 2

Episode 2 of this series features Laura Miller.

I don’t know anything about Ms. Miller aside from what is revealed in the video, but I’m featuring her this time because I suspect that she is the Jewish convert to Islam that Rebbetzin Lori Palatnik of “Lori Almost Live” discussed in the video I featured in my last post.

Next time I plan to profile the man whom I consider to be the most inspiring Jewish convert to Islam – Abdullah ibn Salaam.

My Gut Response.

Here’s an interesting video I found while looking up info on Jewish converts to Islam. Lori Almost Live is a regular video feature at Aish.com, a trustworthy source for information about religious Judaism. And there was a time that I agreed with Lori’s sentiments and I tried to find what I needed in Judaism. But I couldn’t. I thought I’d share some of the reasons here.

• Nationalism is not a part of Islam. I am free to be a Muslim without needing to support Iran or Syria, etc. Zionism (which is Jewish nationalism), however, is a part of Judaism. To those who might disagree, I’d point to Neturei Karta, the Orthodox Jewish organization that is opposed to Zionism, and how they are vilified by other Jews. Good, “orthodox” Muslims are not required to support Muslim dictators and radicals based purely on their shared faith or ethnicity. But for a Jew to complain about Israeli policies as they relate to the treatment of indigenous Palestinians, or to complain about the tactics used against the land’s prior inhabitants during the founding of the state of Israel, or to complain about Israel’s actions in the Gaza strip, in Lebanon, or the constant drumbeats for war against Iran, is to be called a self-hating Jew. Believing in God and seeking to follow His Will should not force me to accept a particular nation and all of its policies in some kind of package deal.
• I am not willing to accept the racial superiority of Jews over Gentiles. As I was seeking to expand my knowledge of legitimate Jewish spirituality, I was dismayed to find that Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, in his book Derech Hashem, compares the souls of Gentiles to those of animals. But even before I bought this book, I remember my family would say that anyone who was stupid had a “Goyische kup” – a Gentile head. We Jews, I was told, are so much smarter and better than the Goyim.
• I was disgusted when I saw a discussion of otherwise rational Jews talking about being willing to kill an Amalekite toddler child because it would be God’s will. Admittedly, not all of the Jews involved were willing to do it, but enough were. Now, there are certainly Muslims willing to kill Jewish children (and indeed those who have done so), so this is not to say that Islam is superior in this regard. It is, however, to say that Judaism is not superior in this regard. I had been taught that the Jews were the “good guys” fighting barbaric Muslim hordes. The discussion I mention here was not on some radical Jewish board, or a JDL board or anything of the kind. I was disgusted. Especially if you consider that some Jews see the Palestinians as Amalekites, and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netyanyahu has said that Iran is Amalek.
• I can’t join a Reform or a Conservative Jewish congregation because their overwhelming support for every liberal political cause under the sun made community life impossible for me. Also, their frequent vocal distaste for political conservatives made it clear that I was unwelcome. And I can’t join an Orthodox congregation because I do not accept the Talmud or the rabbinically-imposed “fence around the Torah,” which in many cases seems absolutely absurd to me. I realized this most fully when I found out that the prohibition of “work” on the Sabbath included the tearing of toilet paper.
• Jesus. I find nothing problematic about Jesus (pbuh) as he is portrayed within the Christian scriptures. To the contrary, I find him inspiring. My Jewish family, however, called him a “whoremonger.” Muslims don’t believe that he is God, but they call him an honored prophet.
•  I am ashamed of the Jews I see in the culture which surrounds me. While Jews and Muslims are pretty equally matched in the violence and terrorism department, in the profanation of popular culture department, the Jews have no equal. Whenever my wife and I hear of someone insulting Christianity or petitioning for the removal of religion from public life in America, or making a new “comedy” that pushes the limits of taste, or calling for infanticide, I cringe and say to her, “Please tell me they’re not Jewish.” Alas, she is usually unable to help me. Whether it’s Sarah Silverman’s skits in which she has sex with God, or Judd Apatow’s self-proclaimed mission to get more bare penis into every one of his films, Jewish bioethicist Peter Singer’s defense of bestiality and infanticide, etc. This list is far from exhaustive. Despite being such a tiny percentage of the American population, Jews are in prominent positions on every front of the wrong side of the culture war, and have been since we got here. Julius & Ethel Rosenberg, Ayn Rand, Emma Goldman, Andrea Dworkin, Al Goldstein, Anton Lavey, Annie Sprinkle, Philip Roth, Erica Jong, Roman Polanski, Bernie Madoff, Saul Alinsky, Henry Kissinger, Rosa Luxemburg, Anthony Weiner, Eliot Spitzer, Seymore Butts, Sacha Baron Cohen, Ron Jeremy, Jack Ruby, Bugsy Siegel, Paul Wolfowitz, Allen Ginsburg, Irving Kristol, Gloria Allred, Leslie Feinberg, Abe Foxman, Meir Kahane, Bernardine Dohrn, Nina Hartley, Norman Mailer, Gertrude Stein, etc.
• Cost of admission. When I phoned a local Rabbi to request his help, I was told that he didn’t have time to meet with people who weren’t members of his synagogue (membership costing hundreds of dollars). In order to attend High Holy Day services at another synagogue, I had to pay for tickets. I did have the alternative of applying for their charity (an embarassing prospect), but why should anyone have to default to paying money to worship God on the holiest days of the year? I can walk into my local masjid and worship. I donate willingly, a few bucks here and there whenever I can, but I won’t be turned away for not having a ticket to services. I paid over two hundred dollars (that doesn’t include what I paid for the required books) for a beginner’s Judaism class at a local Conservative synagogue. I’ve attended free classes at several churches, both Catholic and Protestant. Why does money seem so central to Jewish worship? And don’t throw cheesy Christian televangelists in my face – I’m talking about mainstream congregational worship.
• Personal connection to God. I met with a Chabad Rabbi many times over the course of a couple of years. He was honestly baffled when I tried to talk to him about talking with God and feeling that God was talking back. He wasn’t joking with me. He honestly could not understand it, and kept trying to understand it in terms of auditory hallucinations. As a Catholic, I felt God in my life, and I felt His presence when I would ask him for guidance. Is this feeling infallible? Of course not. Could it be wishful thinking? Of course. But there are times when it is hard to deny that it is real. And it changes lives. It changed mine. It’s like making a phone call and knowing that someone has picked up the phone; you’re not just calling out into an empty darkness. Why would God speak to the people in the Tanakh but not to us today?

Even if all that these points accomplished was merely leveling the field between Judaism and Islam, that’s enough for me. All else being equal, the only thing that Judaism has going for it is the fact that I am of Jewish descent. But that is far from enough when it comes to choosing to follow God. Abraham left his family and his family’s gods when the God of the Jews (and of the Christians and of the Muslims) called him.

I believe that there are probably many good and holy individual Jews. But I don’t believe that Judaism is the final or the most complete revelation of God to man.

This isn’t a very logical case I’m presenting. It’s not a well-developed argument. In fact, it’s not logical at all. Neither is it much of an argument. But I’m willing to bet that many Jews (and former Jews) will recognize themselves in it. Most of them will not turn to Islam. Many will turn to Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, the New Age, Wicca, Socialism, and Atheism instead. But they are turning elsewhere.