Re: just checking...

Another jew anyone?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703583404576079823067585318.ht
ml?mod=WSJ_newsreel_opinion

Sarah Palin Is Right About 'Blood Libel' 
Judaism rejects the idea of collective responsibility for murder..Article
Comments (62) more in Opinion >.
   
By SHMULEY BOTEACH 

The term "blood libel"-which Sarah Palin invoked this week to describe the
suggestions by journalists and politicians that conservative figures like
herself are responsible for last weekend's shooting rampage in Tucson,
Ariz.-is fraught with perilous meaning in Jewish history.

The term connotes the earliest accusations that Jews killed Jesus and
enthusiastically embraced responsibility for his murder, telling Pontius
Pilate, "His blood be upon us and our children" (Matthew 27:25). Thus was
born the legend of Jewish bloodlust and of Hebrew ritual use of Christian
blood for sacramental purposes. The term was later used more specifically to
describe accusations against Jews-primarily in Europe-of sacrificing
kidnapped Christian children to use their blood in the baking of Passover
matzos. 

The Benedictine monk Thomas of Monmouth is generally credited with having
popularized the blood libel in his "Life of the Martyr William from
Norwich," written in 1173 about a young boy who was found stabbed to death.
Thomas quoted a servant woman who said she witnessed Jews lacerating the
boy's head with thorns, crucifying him, and piercing his side. While William
was canonized, the Jews of Norwich fared less well. On Feb. 6, 1190, they
were all found slaughtered in their homes, save those who escaped to the
local tower and committed mass suicide. 

Despite the strong association of the term with collective Jewish guilt and
concomitant slaughter, Sarah Palin has every right to use it. The expression
may be used whenever an amorphous mass is collectively accused of being
murderers or accessories to murder.

The abominable element of the blood libel is not that it was used to accuse
Jews, but that it was used to accuse innocent Jews-their innocence, rather
than their Jewishness, being the operative point. Had the Jews been guilty
of any of these heinous acts, the charge would not have been a libel. 


Despite the strong associations of the term, Sarah Palin has every right to
use it.

Jews did not kill Jesus. As the Roman historian Tacitus makes clear, he was
murdered by Pontius Pilate, whose reign of terror in ancient Judea was so
excessive, even by Roman standards, that (according to the Roman-Jewish
chronicler Josephus) Rome recalled him in the year 36 due to his sadistic
practices. King Herod Agrippa I, writing to the Emperor Caligula, noted
Pilate's "acts of violence, plunderings . . . and continual murder of
persons untried and uncondemned, and his never-ending, endless, and
unbelievable cruelties, gratuitous and most grievous inhumanity."

Murder is humanity's most severe sin, and it is trivialized when an innocent
party is accused of the crime-especially when that party is a collective too
numerous to be defended individually. If Jews have learned anything in their
long history, it is that a false indictment of murder against any group
threatens every group. As Martin Luther King Jr. wrote in his Letter from
Birmingham Jail, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
Indeed, the belief that the concept of blood libel applies only to Jews is
itself a form of reverse discrimination that should be dismissed. 

Judaism rejects the idea of collective responsibility for murder, as the
Hebrew Bible condemns accusations of collective guilt against Jew and
non-Jew alike. "The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not
share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the
son. The righteousness of the righteous man will be credited to him, and the
wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him" (Ezekiel 18).

How unfortunate that some have chosen to compound a national tragedy by
politicizing the murder of six innocent lives and the attempted
assassination of a congresswoman.

To be sure, America should embrace civil political discourse for its own
sake, and no political faction should engage in demonizing rhetoric. But
promoting this high principle by simultaneously violating it and engaging in
a blood libel against innocent parties is both irresponsible and immoral. 



-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Mike Findlay
Sent: Thursday, January 13, 2011 6:19 PM
To: DADL (off topic)
Subject: Re: [DADL-OT] just checking...

> If it is to be a battle of experts I'll take my experts.

>"You have your Jews and I have mine," eh?  Well obviously that just begs
the question; it's an extension of that old fallacy, the appeal to
authority.  And it exposes the reason *why* that fallacy is, in fact, a
fallacy: we can always choose the "authorities" that appeal to us.<

No, it isn't.  You have no higher claim to say that it was offensive than I 
do.  And from what you have presented so far your claim is inferior to mine,

I have presented objective facts that there are those, with standing, that 
say it should not be found offensive and that it is ridiculous to claim it 
is offensive.  Just who are the offensive/insensitive police and why do I or

anyone else have to obey them?


>In any case, my argument has no need of "experts".  Everyone agrees what
the term originally meant.  The only point of disagreement now is over
whether the term is offensive *today*, and in *this context*.  And it is
an objective fact that, yes, to some people, it is.<

You haven't demonstrated that it is offensive to anyone.  Unless you think 
saying it repeatedly proves it.  And lets assume you can drag out someone 
who finds it offensive - do you hold that standard for everything you say - 
IOW, I'm sure you can find someone who thinks something is offensive.  So 
what?  People find all kinds of movies, tv shows, books, etc offensive, and 
there is historical evidence that some of the conduct portrayed in those 
mediums was considered taboo, wrong, evil, etc.  But so what.

Ha.  I have more evidence.  Offensive my largess ass.  This blood libel 
nonsense is manufactured outrage.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703667904576071913818696964.ht
ml

That article is dated 1/10/2011 with "blood libel" in the headlines, in fact

I'll bet that's where she got the term from.    A headline in a column two 
days before Palin made her speech and where's the outrage.  Apparently, it 
only becomes outrageous when Palin says it.

You haven't even demonstrated that the term was offensive historically - all

you can show is that the *act* of creating a blood libel was offensive, not 
the term.  Unless of course you are saying that that term can *only* be used

if you are Jewish and claiming that some one is accusing you of killing 
their children to use the blood for your matzahs..

Are you really trying to keep us captive to history?  Sure we can learn from

it but I'm not going to live in it and I'm afraid I don't see where you get 
off expecting me or anybody else to do just that.


> I'm not sure how to explain it any better than that if you don't agree
> that the credibility of one making claims goes to the veracity of the
> claims.

>More of that appeal-to-authority fallacy.  We don't need to appeal to the
credibility of others when we can check the facts for ourselves. <

I'd be glad to check you facts when you present some on this issue.

Mike F.





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