Sex and The Bible - Book Review Extract

From a review of David Leeming's "Sex in the World of Myth" by Krešimir Vuković

The chapter on Israel and Canaan presents the multifaceted ancient history of the area in a very interesting way stressing that sexuality plays a great role in many stories which found their way into the canon of the Bible. But again several myths are treated superficially. The author writes that “Satan, in the garden of Eden” tempted Adam and Eve (p. 50). This is now widely accepted in Christian retellings but is in fact a later interpretation (in the New Testament) that finds no basis in the original Hebrew. Satan rarely makes a direct appearance in the Old Testament books (the Book of Job is an exception), and the first potential hint of his involvement in Eden is in the Book of Wisdom 2.24 (composed in Hellenistic Alexandria, probably as late as the 1st century BC). Originally, the snake is only a snake (which could be interpreted in a number of different ways) in the same way that the fruit of the tree that Eve picked was not an apple until the similarity between mălum (evil) with mālum (apple) in the Latin version gave rise to this idea.

The infamous story of angels visiting Lot just before the demise of Sodom and Gomorrah gave rise to the old term ‘sodomy’. The author erroneously supports it on p. 59, giving the impression that the story is actually about sex between men. The Hebrew tradition and commentaries make it clear that the theme of the story is in fact hospitality, and the sin of Sodom is one of arrogance and pride. A gang of Sodomites ask to have their way with Lot’s two heavenly guests (referred to as ‘men’), but Lot refuses and offers his daughters instead. The angels then intervene and blind all the attackers. 

The point of the story is not that Lot is concerned about maintaining heteronormativity but that guests are considered sacred. The fact that homosexual relations were banned in ancient Israel (famously in Leviticus) is true but irrelevant in this context. Lot would rather give up his own daughters than break the sacred law of hospitality, which the Sodomites do not respect. Their threat of gang rape indicates an act of aggression and arrogance that is irrespective of the angels’ gender. The Jewish tradition discussed hospitality as the main issue of the story for centuries. The first negative reference to same-sex attraction in the story of Sodom appears in Philo of Alexandria (1st century AD), and it will take another several centuries for this interpretation to become the prevailing one with the Christian authors of late antiquity.

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Will An Israeli Win By Getting Beaten?

Leafing through Haaretz from a week ago, I spotted an interesting story of Israeli cinema (at the JPost, they have the wrong trailer up, for some reason, but no real story of the film).

According to Haaretz's report, an Israeli film won a Golden Bear award as the best short film in Berlin. Based on this, that makes the film an automatic candidate for next year's Oscars.

The festival site included this description of her film, "The Men Behind the Wall":

Woman seeks men. Man seeks women. Everything could be so simple if she weren’t in Israel and the guys nearby that the app suggests in search mode weren’t in the West Bank. Israeli filmmaker Ines Moldavsky makes herself the subject of her investigation...time and again the talk comes back to their needs, their lust, the possibility of sharing that lust. The filmmaker’s aesthetic strategy is that of a double exposure in her search – she experiences the personally unfamiliar physical space in Palestine as well. The conversations oscillate between virtual phone calls and concrete encounters. The artist stands provocatively at an intersection in downtown Ramallah, dressed in a red spaghetti strap dress, outstretched arms balancing a microphone boom in the air.                                                                                                                 

                                                                                                           Violence resonates – in the search for a violation of boundaries.

Haaretz was a bit more, er, explicit:

The idea for the short seems simple, but her highly experimental documentary actually touches on a multitude of complex themes.

“Every morning, I woke up in my Jerusalem apartment and thought about what it would be like to target Palestinian men that live behind the wall for dates on my dating app,” Moldavsky explains, referring to the West Bank separation barrier.

The 28-minute short shows the filmmaker soliciting Palestinian men in Gaza and the West Bank for BDSM sex via the dating apps Tinder and OkCupid, and then getting in touch with them on the phone and via Skype. It also documents their candid, explicit conversations about lust, hard-core sexual practices and the desire for casual dating.

This reminded me, in a backwards fashion, of a something written in 1977 about Zionism, which I blogged in 2007,  That since the word zayin in Hebrew is the male penis, Zionism is actually the Jews screwing the Arabs.

The filmmaker, Ines Moldavsky, 

said she

wanted to show young Palestinians simply as men; as gentle, sexy, handsome, nice guys who think about the mundane things in life like sex and dating.

She is a graduate of Bezalel. On its site the film's description reads:

זהו מסע פטישיסטי של אישה, ספק מרגלת, ספק אומנית, ספק נימפומנית בשטחים הכבושים. 

which translates as

This is a woman's trip of fetishism - perhaps a spy, perhaps an artist, perhaps a nymphomaniac - into the occupied territories.

As I do not know if actual sex was engaged in, what I do know is that this is at her Facebook page:

and she's been thinking about "occupation" since at least October 2012.

Going back to Hazelton, after reading her, Henry Makow understood her so:

According to Hazleton -- whose analysis overlaps significantly with that of Jay Gonen, the Israeli-born author of A Psychohistory of Zionism -- Zionism's predominant impulse is an acting out of son-mother incest. 

While I am willing to yield that once the area of psychology becomes a dominant element of analysis, there really are no borders.  What was an Arab woman doing exploding herself on a Jerusalem street?  Participating in an orgy? Is that Arab sexual activity?  When an Arab stabbed a Jew near the Ariel junction was he exhibiting homosexual aggressiveness?

These theories are not only outrageous, but, in my opinion, reveal more about the perversions of those who suggest them.

Again, I do not know from the film's descriptions whether or not Ines actually did get physical, whether her sex was violent against her or against the males or whether she was just a talker, and that is none of my business.

What I do think is that she should keep any perverse thoughts about the conflict Arabs have with Israel to herself and what she does with the award is for her private pleasure.

But next year's Oscars will be Israel-centered again.

___________

Cross-post version here. ^

Your Jewish Body Academically Dissected

Here is an "Upcoming Event" that may interest you, or your Jewish body, the Inaugural Jewish Studies Conference for Graduate Students:-

"Jews in Image and Imagination: Jewish Body, Gender, and Sexuality in Representation", to take place  February 7-8, 2013 with Keynote Speaker: Charlotte E. Fonrobert, Stanford University.

What's it about?

The  inaugural conference...will explore the representational relationship between Jews and sexuality, Jews and gender, Jews and physicality, and Jews and the body.  How have Jews imagined themselves throughout history and how do they imagine themselves today?  Or, how do others imagine Jews or even “the Jew”? Appropriate proposals might explore such topics as the new Israeli masculinity in Hebrew literature,  the figuring of queer Jews in  film, Jews on stage, representations of Jews in the medical profession, medicine’s treatment of Jews, or Jews in athletics...

Do I have to be a Jewish feminist to be...anxious - or excited - about this?

^

Sensual Zionism: Is That "Desire" or "Love"?

A new book, written by Boaz Neumann, assistant professor in the Department of History, Tel Aviv University, is out and is described as an "innovative study" in that it

...examines the responses of early-twentieth-century pioneers to "the Land" of Palestine...Neumann argues for something else that historians have yet to identify - desire. Desire for the Land and a visceral identification with it begin to explain the pioneer experience and its impact on Israeli history and collective memory, as well as on Israelis' abiding connection to the Land of Israel...For Neumann, the Zionist revolution was an existential revolution: for the pioneers, to be in the Land of Israel was to be!

The main chapter headings read:

• Pioneers and Pioneerism
• Desire and Rebirth
• Dissolving Boundaries
• Articulating the Physical Territory of the Land
• Articulating the Pioneer Body
• Pioneer Language: The Conquest of Hebrew

"Desire"?

Or love of the homeland?

Well, the theme has been researched previously:

- "Reimagining Herzl and other Zionist sex symbols" by M. Berkowitz, Professor of Modern Jewish History at University College London.
- "Zionism as an Erotic Revolution" by David Biale

and it could be worse or more ridiculous:

Circumcising Zionism, Queering Diaspora: Reviving Albert Memmi's Penis by Jarrod Hayes at Wasafiri, Volume 22, Issue 1, 2007.

How ridiculuous?

Try this:

...Memmi's retrieval of the Jewish diaspora as queer helps to imagine the undoing of Zionism as a political project (as opposed to queering the Israeli state) by allowing the rhizomatic connections of diaspora to return in the process of returning to origins in a homeland of the mind (as opposed to a physical territory already inhabited by Palestinians). Memmi thus allows us to carry forward Gopinath's queering of diaspora by helping us to tease out the queer potential of the very concept of diaspora itself.

While Memmi's revival of his penis relies on the same phallic genealogy Helmreich alludes to, his Jewissance entails spilling his seed rather differently. Indeed, it is not through heterosexual reproduction that he plants the seeds for a Zionist state; rather, the promised land flows forth like milk and honey every time he touches himself ‘to verify [the] definitive mark [of the Orient]’. J and D Boyarin retrieve a feminised diasporic anti-Zionism by performing ‘the double mark of the male Jew’, that is, their circumcision and head-covering, thereby undoing the body/mind opposition...

And you thought that the recent pinkwashing controversy was silly.

^

Sexuality and the Jewish Orthodox Woman

First, I was alerted by Gefen to this book

The Newlywed Guide to Physical Intimacy by Jennie Rosenfeld and David S. Ribner

which has this from a review:

This book surprised me with its clear and thorough explanations considering it was written by and intended for the conservative and ultra-conservative Torah-observant Jewish community. Even though the text itself is without illustrative photos and diagrams, there is a modest packet of explicit drawings tucked into a sealed envelope attached to the inside back cover. As befits a book intended for a chaste and conservative audience, there is a label on that packet warning of its explicit nature...This small book contains useful information that not only provides practical advice about techniques and mechanics, but also nurtures a sensitivity that will benefit both sexual partners.

There are the necessary basics: where things are and how they work; but there is also a strong emphasis on the need for patience and clear communication. To that end, the authors address issues that most people never consider, but which are necessary for an active, fulfilling sex life...this small book is not one to skirt vital issues: how sex smells, sounds, and feels for both the male and female; how to deal with unrealistic expectations; and, lack or orgasm as well as how to maximize orgasmic potential. There is a straightforward discussion of lubrication, how to deal with the constricts of religious observation as it applies to sex, causes of impotence, sex during and after pregnancy and how external pressure can affect a couple's sex life amongst other issues.

and now, Emily Amrousi writes about another book. "Touching Distance," by Naomi Wolfson, a psychotherapist and couples counselor who lives in the settlement of Psagot, she is a mother of eight who covers her hair with a scarf. She has co-authored (with her daughter!) a tasteful yet bold book about sexual intimacy and pleasure. (A previous book is reviewed here)

And Emily relates of her meeting/session:

The sex act, from a Jewish point of view, Wolfson begins without blinking, is not intended merely to fulfill the commandment of "be fruitful and multiply." It is also supposed to give pleasure...Any consensual act between a couple is halachically permissible, she boldly writes, and any act that boosts mutual desire and satisfaction is a blessing. "Distance leads to touching and longing leads to pleasure. Restrictions help you miss your partner and intensifies the passion," she says, and we all lower our eyes to the cookies.

"We are all women, we all want love, we all menstruate, we all have sexuality," says Wolfson in a steady, experienced voice, encouraging us to look up again. "Judaism is responsive to women and gives us space so that on certain days of the month we don't need a filing cabinet of excuses like 'I have a headache,' and can just curl up under the covers or with a good book." We laugh. The ice is broken.

"Then comes passion and the desire to be together. Impurity is not dirtiness, but absence of life. The mikveh is the culmination of a woman's private, internal process. I immerse in primordial waters, feel renewed and then come to my partner full of vitality, energy and sexuality."

What was taking place in that room was not a reform but a revolution...

Truly so.

^

Can TV Sex Entertainment Be Politically Relevant?

Sure, why not?

Look what I found at Pajamas Media:

Larry David’s Curb Confession: Leftist Jews Want to Have Humiliating Sex

with Anti-Semitic, Muslim Women

This piece, by David Swindle, associate editor for FrontPage Magazine and the managing editor for NewsReal Blog, relates how Larry David, the leftist creator-star of HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm has "crafted one of his show’s greatest, most important episodes — and all apparently by accident."  Which is...?

Okay, here it is

(Warning – plot spoilers of course follow)

The premise of the episode: Larry and his friend/manager Jeff discover a new “Palestinian” Chicken restaurant and decide to go in spite of knowing that their fellow Jews would disapprove. Once there they chow down on the best chicken they’ve ever eaten, indifferent to the anti-Semitic posters on the walls. Larry also discovers a new object of lust: the sexy “Palestinian” woman who manages the restaurant...But how does Larry win the affections of the dark-haired Muslim beauty?

Later in the episode Larry and Jeff return to the restaurant with their friend Marty Funkhouser who has recently converted from Reform Judaism to Orthodox. He wears a yarmulke that’s more attention-grabbing and ostentatious than any Orthodox Jew I’ve ever known. Before they enter Larry tries to force Marty to take it off. A fight ensues, attracting the attention of the Muslims eating inside. When the fight is over Larry has ripped off Marty’s yarmulke and frightened him back to his car. When he and Jeff enter they are applauded and embraced as fellow anti-Semites. (One imagines that this is a comparable reaction to what Noam Chomsky got when he visited Hezbollah.) The “Palestinian” manager, Shara, [played by Anne Bedian, who is Canadian-born of Armenian background] then approaches Larry, sexually aroused by this act of a secular Jew tormenting an Orthodox Jew.

The inevitable sex scene between the two of them follows. Shara is the sexual aggressor, dominating over Larry as he lies on the bed. She shouts anti-Semitic slogans all the while. It apparently isn’t just Larry’s fantasy to have sex with a Muslim woman; rather, he wants to be degraded in the process. [note: "So it was weird to sit on top of Larry, and be like, 'You ready?' And he has this cushion patch on his crotch, to prevent any, whatever, accidental contact, and his assistant is bringing him his breath spray.” That’s hot! “ I was like, 'Come on Larry, I'm doing all the work here, you're not doing anything.' And he said, 'That's what's going to make it funny.' "]

But the satirical truth is kicked up to the next level when Marty walks into Larry’s house to hear the Jew-hating cries of passion upstairs. He sits to wait, forced to listen while Larry continues having sex with a woman who wants to exterminate them both. Afterwards Larry is indifferent at what his good friend has just heard, and Shara sees Marty as she leaves. There’s truth behind the satire. Adam Shapiro is the co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement and has a “Palestinian” wife who would likely grab Larry’s attention...The episode ends with Larry walking down between two competing protest lines at the opening of a new franchise of the “Palestinian” Chicken restaurant setting up shop next door to a Jewish deli. The unattractive Jewish wife of Jeff angrily swears and yells at Larry for him to come and join them on the pro-Israel side. Meanwhile, Larry’s new “Palestinian” lover is on the other side and says she has a sister named Yasmine she wants to bring to bed with them next time. The episode ends with Larry wondering which side to join and the audience knowing the answer...

Swindle concludes:

...politically the show was about as evil as one could get. (What next Larry? Going to have a kapo during World War II getting abused by Warden Ilsa?) But I couldn’t contain my laughter — if I was writing my own satire of the Left then this would basically be it. That it was written by a progressive and broadcast on HBO is even better.

Another reviewer, Blair Mandell, has this

...the majority of the show is based around Al-Babbas, a chicken restaurant run by anti-Zionist Palestinians. They're not quite militant and they don't seem to want to co-exist with Jewish people in the Holy Land, but they're relatively tolerant of Larry and Jeff's (Jeff Garlin) presence..Larry is also particularly attracted to Shara (Anne Bedian), one of the owners of Al-Babbas who is particularly outspoken against the Jewish people. In Larry's mind, nothing is more attractive than someone who hates you.

...The highlight of the episode comes when Larry and Jeff prevent Marty from wearing his yamaka in Al-Babbas, earning a standing ovation from the other patrons and amorous attention from Shara. She becomes so taken with Larry that she promises to "f*** the Jew" out of him as she shout outs anti-Jewish slogans to maintain her sexual excitement. It's ludicrous and a little unbelievable, but David still makes it work...Outwardly, Larry and Jeff are against the new Al-Babbas, but their hearts are with their stomachs on this one...the beautiful Shara, [later] promises a three-way with Larry and her sister if he joins her side in the fight. Larry's decision isn't shown, but his first choice will always be in his self interest....Larry's side visit to Funkhouser's Rabbi was also pretty funny as he alternately fought with her over the Palestinian Chicken and then apparently used it to force her to allow Funkhouser to go golfing on the Sabbath.

Btw, for unabashed adults, the sex scene is here. And the text of most of it is here.

Now, I've heard of Muslim women justifying rape of Jewish women as part of the struggle (see: Egyptian Lawyer Nagla Al-Imam Suggests Arab Men Should Sexually Harass Israeli Women and Declares: Leave the Land So We Won't Rape You, Al-Arabiya TV (Dubai/Saudi Arabia) - October 31, 2008 ), but actually doing it themselves and to Jewish men?

^

Sex Cues and the Media

There's a new academic study out entitled "Sexual Cues Emanating From the Anchorette Chair: Implications for Perceived Professionalism, Fitness for Beat, and Memory for News".

Writen by Maria Elizabeth Grabe and Lelia Samson of Indiana University, Bloomington, the experimental study:-

employed one of the most compelling visual cues of female sexual attractiveness (low waist-to-hip ratio) to test the influence of news anchor sexualization on audience evaluations of her as a professional and their memory for the news that she presents. Male participants saw the sexualized version of the anchor as less suited for war and political reporting. They also encoded less news information presented by the sexualized than her unsexualized version.

Conclusions were drawn in line with evolutionary psychology expectations of men’s cognitive susceptibility to visual sex cues. Women participants, on the other hand, did not vary across conditions in their assessments of the anchor’s competence to report on war and political news. Moreover, they encoded more news information presented by the sexualized than unsexualized anchor condition.

The "low waist-to-hip ratio" is compellingly sexually attractive?

When does a viewer ever see that space?

Behind the news desk, she would appear so:

Without the desk, you'd see this:

What are they talking about?

The "low-waist to hip ratio" (WHR) is

...the ratio of the circumference of the waist to that of the hips. Strictly, the waist circumference is measured at a level midway between the lowest rib and the iliac crest, and the hip circumference at the level of the great trochanters, with the legs close together. The waist-hip ratio equals the waist circumference divided by the hip circumference.

I still don't get it.  Even blind men prefer that and they can't see.

Anyone enlighten me?

Ah, this is a bit more clear:

The study was done in a controlled fashion, where men watched the same 24-year-old anchor read the news in a newscast produced by the researchers. In one newscast, the anchor "was dressed in a tight-fitting dark blue jacket and skirt that accented her waist-to-hip ratio," and she wore red lipstick and a necklace, said the study. In the other, the same woman was dressed in a "shapeless and loose-fitting" jacket and skirt. The participants were given a quiz about the stories on the newscast and questions about the anchor's appearance.

P.S.  Another study.  And its good for less heart attacks (avoiding other physiological elements, I guess, is also good for fewer heart attacks, quite).  Dress standards is an issue.

P.P.S.  Check out this humor (originally here):

...the biggest conclusion I get from this study is that universities will throw money at anyone with an idea and a scientific procedure, no matter how predictable the results might be. With that in mind, I'm going to see if I can get funding for the following:

-- A study to examine whether people prefer pizza or Brussels sprouts.
-- A study to see if men drive faster in a Ferrari or a Ford Focus.
-- A study to find out what happens to rain when the temperature dips below 32 degrees.

^

Will Obama Be Involved In The Next Political Sex Scandal?

Check this:

...Obama recognized [Rep. Debbie] Wasserman Schultz [(D-Fla.), chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee] while speaking Monday at a Democratic National Committee fundraising event held in a private home in Miami, part of the chairwoman’s congressional district.


“To Debbie Wasserman Schultz, thank you for letting me in your district,” the president said. “If you're in the foxhole, you want Debbie alongside you, because not only is she charming and has that dazzling smile, but she's tough as nails. And that’s what’s needed during challenging times.”

At another fundraiser that day at the Adrienne Arsht Center, Obama drew attention to what he called Wasserman Schultz's “cute smile.”

“What do you guys think of our new DNC chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz?” the president asked the audience. “We are so thrilled to have her. You want Debbie on your side. She’s a mom, she’s got that cute smile and all that, but she is tough. Don’t mess with Debbie. We are so glad of her leadership.”

Though Obama's remarks were meant to be complimentary, feminists, the media and Democrats would have reacted differently if a conservative politician had said this, said Charlotte Hayes, a senior fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum.

Aw, come on.  There was nothing bulging there, was there?


Was there?

^

Yes, There Is Islamic Sex

The BBC found it:

...sex is there to be enjoyed to the maximum by Muslims - as long as they are married Muslims - and there are numerous religious exhortations on the importance of foreplay, mutual titillation and satisfaction for both partners. Indeed, if a husband fails to satisfy his wife sexually - or vice versa - it is considered grounds for divorce under Islamic law.

In Damascus, I paid a call on one of Syria's most established lingerie makers, Ali Nasser, in his cramped workshop in the Sheikh Saad neighbourhood.

I'm amazed how fast a brand new red satin bra and g-string takes shape from his old sewing machine - his expert eye and skilful hands honed by more than 30 years in the business...In other cultural contexts, this might seem something like a den of smut and vice - but Mr Nasser, a devout Muslim, insists it's more a public service and religious duty.

"Our work is all about igniting the desires of a husband for his wife, so he doesn't go looking elsewhere. It's a good thing and there's nothing wrong it."

New Term: Soulgasm

England's premier book review, the Times Literary Supplement, writes about:-

Soulgasms of the Christian Right
A revolution in American sex, and its Evangelical regulators

and states, in part:-

The Christian Right, as both Dagmar Herzog and the Republican nomination of Sarah Palin make abundantly clear, is not anti-sex. “We are the ones with the babe on the ticket”, gushes the conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh. “Run to the arms of your prince and enter your dream”, advises the author, media star and abstinence-before-marriage advocate Lisa Bevere in her book Kissed the Girls and Made Them Cry, on sale at Palin’s old Pentecostal church in Wasilla. Evangelical conservatives have outflanked their enemies: “Christian sex”, and not what the revolutionaries of the 1960s had to offer, turns out to be “the most amazing sex on God’s Green earth”...

...the religious Right created late twentieth-century sexual politics on the coat tails of the secular Enlightenment’s ways of arguing...It is by secularizing sex that the religious Right made it so central to politics...

...But why, exactly, sex is more deeply enmeshed now in the political life of America than at any time in its history remains puzzling.

Sex and the Synagogue Cantor

I don't usually get to write much about sex on this blog. But it happens.

First of all, it's a political blog and yes, some of our politicians can become embroiled in sexual escapades (Elliot "Shpitz" Spitzer and his #9). Secondly, if you want sex as a topic, believe me, there are many more other intersting and weird sites to go to.

But this item caught my eye if only because I am acquainted with the four gentlemen. Four, you ask?

Read on:-

World-Famous Cantor Allegedly the Target of Entrapment Plot
Scheme Said To Have Involved Hidden Hotel Camera

Naftali Hershtik, the cantor of the Great Synagogue in Jerusalem, has been the target of an entrapment scheme allegedly orchestrated by one of his former students, according to information obtained exclusively by the Forward.

The rumors began weeks ago, when Israeli papers reported that an unnamed cantor had been lured by a young woman into a hotel room wired with a hidden camera, in an attempt to trap the cantor in a compromising position. The Forward has learned from sources close to the case that the target of the entrapment was Hershtik — one of the most famed and respected cantors in the world — and that the man being accused of arranging the plot is Israel Rand, a former student of Hershtik’s.

Photographs of Hershtik, 60, and the young woman, taken by a hidden camera, were sent anonymously to Hershtik’s employer, the Jerusalem Great Synagogue, in an apparent attempt to have Hershtik fired, according to synagogue officials. The Great Synagogue suspended Hershtik, but has since reinstated him, and its officials there are now defending the star cantor.

“It’s a classic case of entrapment except for one fact — that, to my knowledge, the chazzan [cantor] did not fall into that trap of any consequence,” said Rabbi David Fuld, president of the Great Synagogue’s board. Fuld said he reviewed photographs that were sent to the synagogue and that they showed “nothing of significance” that happened between Hershtik and the young woman.

...The scandal turns the spotlight onto the universe of star cantors, where celebrity and flamboyant artistry intermingle with the demands of religious piety...in 1984 Hershtik co-founded the Tel Aviv Cantorial Institute, a school that trains cantors in the classical style, and which has taught many of today’s most important and celebrated cantors, including Yitzhak Meir Helfgot, Eric Moses and Gideon Zelermeyer.

One of those students was Rand, who is still listed on the school’s Web site as one of its prized students...According to his Web site, Rand is currently the chief cantor at the Great Synagogue of Ramat Gan for the High Holidays. In a twist worthy of soap opera, his old position at Schneier’s operation is now held by Netanel Hershtik, Naftali Hershtik’s son and a prominent and respected cantor in his own right.

...On March 17, the Israeli newspaper Maariv reported that a young woman claiming to be a graduate student in musicology approached a “world leading cantor” and asked to interview him for a paper on “cantorial art and liturgy.” She allegedly called him several weeks later with follow-up questions and asked him to meet her at her hotel.

Pictures taken by a camera in the hotel room were then sent to the Great Synagogue, arriving sometime before Rosh Hashanah of 2007. Great Synagogue officials familiar with the contents of the tape contested a report in Yediot Aharonot claiming the tape depicted a sordid sexual affair.

There was “no passionate sex,” said Zelli Jaffe, vice president of the Great Synagogue’s board, who told the Forward he has seen the entire tape. “No sex.”

...Over the Sabbath of March 28 and 29, Hershtik and the choir from the Tel Aviv Cantorial Institute appeared at the New York Synagogue before a packed audience. Although most of the singing was done by the institute’s students, and by Netanel Hershtik, Naftali Hershtik did lead a few prayers, demonstrating his still-powerful tenor voice. Both the Friday evening and Saturday morning services closed with duets between the two Hershtiks.

Jaffe said he expects Naftali Hershtik to lead services at the Great Synagogue this coming Sabbath.

Naftali Hershtik has performed concerts and has led cantorial classes at the Begin Cneter wehre I work. Israel Rand ate with us at the same table and performed at a Shabbat last February a year ago in Tel Aviv. Rabbi Fuld is a well-known educator who I know and I've met also with Zelli Jaffee. I have most of Helfgot's recording, though.

I am not a real cantor - although I do led the congregation occasionally - and I have never been invited to a hotel room by any woman, young or old, so I can't comment on that element of the story.

On the other hand, I have heard and read of dalliance stories. After all, would I go to a hotel room (!) to meet a music student?

And Now - Meretz Logic

Yoav Sivan is the LGBT coordinator [what's that? - YM] of Young Meretz and the International Union of Socialist Youth and blogs here.

Among his opinions is this one -

With the new right in Israel now after the Purest Israel rather than the Greater Israel, we need to make a new distinction between the country's left and right: a left that encourages the integration of the non-Jewish population in the life of Israel, with its Jewish majority; and a right that looks for ways to limit non-Jewish participation in society and politics. Moreover, Yisrael Beitenu makes it clear that the importance of the leftist Zionist parties may lie in convincing the public that Zionist and Jewish values exclude purity and racism, and favor a political integration of the country's minorities.

Just the political integration? You see, Yoav also is a researcher -

There have been few attempts to empirically explain the pursuit of short term relationships and sex in a formal context. Previous work has lamented the paucity of empirical studies which utilize incentive driven behavior to draw conclusions and recommend policy. We provide an empirical approach derived from a game theoretic model of social interaction and apply it to a population of high interest. Specifically, we apply the approach to a population of sexually active men who have sex with men (MSM) in a large metropolitan area and derive qualitative conclusions regarding how individuals behave in the marketplace for sex.

If you want to interact, try [email protected]

Er, Is This the Purim Party-Shpiel We Were Promised?

Was it like this for Vashti?


HOUSE OF PAIN - $3M ESTATE AN 'S&M LAIR'

(Warning! Slightly Non-tzniyusdik pic)

A meshugga madam who taught people how to be sex slaves turned a stately $3 million Westchester home owned by an ultra-Orthodox rabbinical school into an S&M dungeon, police claimed yesterday.

Mistress of "The Sovereign Estate," Sandra Chemero - who advertised the manse online as a place "where submissives and slaves are immersed in training" - was busted on charges of prostitution and weapons possession for having a stun gun.

Chemero's lair is in the same tony Bedford Hills town that's home to convicted felon Martha Stewart, designer Ralph Lauren and billionaire George Soros.

The 46-year-old dominatrix, who was arrested Tuesday, was free on bail by yesterday afternoon. Bedford cops said that they're still investigating and that they are reviewing "seized business records" of her unorthodox operation.

...Eviction papers were served on Chemero yesterday afternoon by a caretaker for K'hal Adas Kashau, the Orthodox rabbinical school next door which owns the property she had been renting for about six months. [check here for a 1991 story in the NYT *] [see the Rebbe here]

"It's against our religion. It's against the Bible. We've never even heard of such a thing," said a man who gave his name only as Samuel and said he was a rabbi at the school.

Samuel said that Chemero rented the house through a local real-estate agent, and that he and his fellow rabbis didn't want police officers to tell them the tawdry details of what had been going on inside.

"Once it's smut, once it's dirt, we don't want to know more details," he said.

...Neighbors said were surprised to hear of the goings-on in the house.

"That's life. There are all kinds of people with all kinds of quirks. I'd be more worried if they were selling drugs," said Theo Anker, 65, a retired stockbroker.

"It's surprising," said Tom Molito, 60. "There's a country song that says you don't know what goes on behind closed doors, and I guess that's true in any socio-economic situation."

An undercover Westchester County investigator met Chemero, who agreed "to engage in sexual contact" on a later date, police said. Mazurak declined to elaborate on what services she offered.

Just in time for Purim.

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* 600 Hasidim May Be Evicted From Suburban Enclave
By JAMES FERON,
Malka Taub, a mother of 10, moved with her family from the Borough Park section of Brooklyn 11 years ago to help establish a yeshiva in this heavily wooded suburb of northern Westchester, escaping what she remembered was a "rough city." Now, with 600 others -- faculty members and students of the K'Hal Adas Kashau yeshiva and their families -- Mrs. Taub faces eviction from this 169-acre site that has been transformed into a Hasidic enclave, because the yeshiva failed to meet its mortgage payme...

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Kashau was in Czechoslovakia but with a Hungairan minority

(Kippah tip: Fark)

So, Have They Resorted to Fists?

Have these girls been reading us bloggers?
(cont'd after the clipping)



Recently, OrthoMom posted her support for Gil Student's (aka Hirhurim) suggestion that Jewish women who are being assaulted should fight back - with Mace (although at OM I had suggested a camera).

According to the above article from Thursday's Ma'ariv, a Yeshiva bachur (no, not this one although maybe this one) propsitioned a seminary girl in a Hareidi town in Yesha. Yup, according to the story, it was a matter of S-x for Money.

She told her friends and classmates, they marched over to the Yeshiva, spotted the supposed felon, started yelling at him, his friends came to his aid and before you could say Jake Rabinowitz, the girls had beat up the boys. Feminine fisticuffs.

Well, are we now into a new age? Or do these girls go to gym and workout sessions?

In anycase, I would strongly suggest Yeshiva bochrim sticking with a blatt gemara.