The New York Post had a package on Sunday taking aim at the Kabbalah Centre.

Allan Nadler, director of the Jewish studies program at Drew University, wrote an piece slamming the take on Jewish mysticism being sold to and sold by celebrities:

It is a vulgar distortion and shamelessly self-promoting abuse, by Hollywood’s Kabbalah Centre, of an ancient, noble and highly esoteric canon of Jewish mystical teachings.

Real kabbalah followers quietly devote themselves to the study of the sacred Hebrew and Aramaic texts of the Torah and rabbinical literature, and their profound teachings about the nature of God.

The two most prominent principles of real kabbalah, shared by all devotees, is a strong reticence, bordering on secrecy, and a stoically unforgiving denial of the basest yearnings of their egos, to say nothing of their loins.

Hollywood kabbalah is directed to our basest and most narcissistic impulses - its barely literate books and Web site are filled with breathless promises of eternal bliss and every imaginable form of personal gratification.

However well reasoned and written, Nadler’s piece will probably do little to slow the Kabbalah Centre. But the other main article — shining a light on the center’s 10 free parking passes — could prove to be quite a nuisance:

There are about 400 permits given annually to clergy and houses of worship, but religious groups usually get just one or two such passes - not 10. So far, the city has no plans to cut the number of placards given to private groups as prescribed by city law, a City Hall spokesman said.

But with the city slashing the number of placards given to its workers, it’s time to take a hard look at other groups who get the benefit, said Wiley Norvell of Transportation Alternatives, an advocacy group critical of placard abuse.

“There really can’t be any rationale for giving parking perks to private citizens,” Norvell said. “It doesn’t make sense. These sorts of permits should be at the top of the chopping block.”

City officials initially denied that religious institutions, including the Kabbalah Centre, got the plum passes.

“They have to be fakes,” a spokesman insisted.

The following day - after The Post provided photos of the parking permits in cars left outside the center - officials admitted that the center was given the permits.

Several of the cars sat outside the center for nearly six hours, violating the permits’ three-hour limit.

Yesterday we linked to an opinion piece in the Jerusalem Post criticizing Orthodox outreach programs aimed at non-Orthodox young people. One of the groups in question — the Orthodox Union’s NCSY — has actually been receiving some good press, with participants on one of its Israel trips visiting the home of Ehud Goldwasser, one of the two slain soldiers returned by Hezbollah on Wednesday.

The New York Times:

In Nahariya, the hometown of Sergeant Goldwasser, which is a few miles
south of Rosh Hanikra, residents and a busload of American teenagers in the country for a summer education program lighted candles and prayed.

The Jerusalem Post:

At one point, in front of the two story red roofed Nahariya home where the Goldwassers were sitting waiting for news, a bus load of American teens touring Israel pulled up and lit a few tea lights on the sidewalk.

“When we heard what was happening here we wanted to come and show our support,” said Gwenn Barney of Pittsburgh.

Here’s the press release issued by the O.U., with comments from some of the participants: (more…)

With a lawsuit pitting a mother and father against each other over whether to circumcise their son, the Oregonian takes a look at the ritual — and the forces fighting against it.

In addition, the paper interviews a Jewish woman about her decision not to circumcise her son:

Was [the father's] argument persuasive?

Well, I couldn’t get my mind around it. If I were having a daughter, why wouldn’t she want a visceral, spiritual experience?

Then I asked myself, would I really accept this practice without question? It’s not something I do, especially in regards to another person’s body. I had been doing so much to protect my son — eating well, walking, doing prenatal yoga. And no matter what people told me, I could not imagine a way in which circumcision would not hurt him.

What about medical arguments?

Research suggests no medical reason to do it. Why cut off a piece of a child’s body if I don’t have to? I didn’t believe this is what would make my son Jewish.

What will?

Celebrating Shabbat, keeping Tikkun Olam (Hebrew for “repairing the world”). Being Jewish is internal, a way of connecting to the rest of the world, to tradition and to history. It is a way of questioning as well.

What about the argument that circumcision connects generations of Jewish men to each other and to God?

I did think about the Holocaust, how people had not been able to practice circumcision — or risked their lives to do so. That was impressive to me.

Writing in the Jerusalem Post, Danielle Kubes takes aim at Aish Hatorah, NCSY and other Orthodox outfits running outreach programs for non-Orthodox youth:

The organizations present their Judaism as the uniquely accurate one, the Halacha that the non-Orthodox have merely forgotten but that all their ancestors invariably followed. Their assumption that all our great-great-grandparents grew up in an Eastern European shtetl contributes to divisiveness among Jews, for it fails to acknowledge that Halacha has had a variety of interpretations across different times and cultures. …

A false dilemma is presented: Be secular and remain in impurity, where life is merely a game played for fun - or move toward a purpose and filled with holiness.

When presented so simply, which road seems more attractive?

The organizations transmit these teachings through trip leaders who often succeed in making observance seem fun and relevant, at least for the duration of the program.

But the teachings are superficial and the Orthodox world they present bears not a trace of dissatisfaction.

The Christian Science Monitor takes a look at the “black conversion movement” — as in conversion to Judaism.

Numbers are hard to pin down. Besides well-known conversions such as that of the late entertainer Sammy Davis Jr., black Jews remain an unfamiliar part of the American religious landscape. Yet Lewis Gordon, director of the Center for Afro-Jewish Studies at Temple University in Philadelphia, estimates there are as many as 1 million blacks with Jewish blood in the US.

Another recent study by the Institute for Jewish and Community Research in San Francisco estimates that there are as many as 150,000 practicing black Jews in the US today, with synagogues across the country reporting increasing numbers of blacks either exploring or converting to Judaism.

The story has a few interesting details/quotes, but doesn’t come close to backing up the ambitious claim in its subhead: “Conversions to Judaism among African-Americans are growing in a way that could affect the presidential election.”

The writer takes a stab or two at pushing this thesis:

Sen. Barack Obama is lighting up connections to the black-Jewish alliance of the 1960s while at the same time trying to calm Jewish fears over his Muslim middle name and ties to pro-Palestinian activists. This could have critical implications in key states with large Jewish populations such as Florida and Pennsylvania.

In the end, though, the article fails to produce a single black convert to Judaism who is voting against Obama because he’s bad for the Jews. It does have a few quotes from Dov Hikind, a Democratic state assemblyman from Brooklyn, explaining why black hatted Jews will note vote for Obama.

I’ve heard of niche publishing, but a kosher Japanese cookbook aimed at people who don’t keep Shabbos?

Kinue Imai Weinstein, the author of Japanese Kosher Cooking – With Ingredients From Your Refrigerator - will talk how easy it is to cook Japanese food kosher at Kinokuniya Bookstore located at 1073 Avenue of the Americas (between 40th and 41st St.) New York, NY (Tel: 212-869-1700) at 3 pm on Saturday, July 19. She will also talk about Jews in Japan with slide presentation followed by a book signing session until 4 pm.

The first Jewish merchant arrived in Japan in 1861, two years after Japan opened the country. Despite Japan allied to Germany during WWII and many anti-Semitic works were translated into Japanese from German, the Japanese did not adopt the anti-Semitic attitude of the Nazis. Today, there are about 1,000 Jews living in Japan .

The cookbook, the first of its kind, was published in English by KTAV Publishing House last November. “Making Japanese food kosher is easier than you think. All you need is kosher soy sauce, which is readily available,” says Kinue. Among the 107 kosher Japanese recipes, 46 of them can be easily modified for vegetarians.

Another week of stunning revelations out of Postville. Let’s recap:

• The PR firm Agri hired to help revive its image, 5WPR, ran into some image problems of its own when evidence emerged connecting the publicity company to comments to various Web sites in the name of Rabbi Morris Allen, an advocate for ethical kashrut standards who has been one of Agri’s fiercest critics. So far Agri has been mum on the issue, but a blogger at PRBlogNews says the company is making publicists look bad and the executive responsible should be fired.
• The Des Moines Register ran a lengthy piece reviewing worker injury claims at Agriprocessors going back several years and found that state inspectors were routinely denied access to the plant to investigate complaints. Three amputations at the plant within five weeks of each other in 2005 resulted in state fines of $7,500. The Register followed with a scathing editorial calling such incidents “unconscionable.”
• The New York Times also had a good original story followed by an editorial. The story was about a Spanish language translator who worked on the judicial proceedings against the detained Postville workers who wrote an essay criticizing the process. In the editorial, the Times argues that Agri’s workers charged with identity theft weren’t looking to steal, only to get jobs, and shouldn’t be treated like criminals.
• Also in the Times, journalist Sam Freedman traveled to Postville to write about Father Paul Ouderkirk, a Catholic priest who came out of retirement to help parishioners coping with the aftermath of the federal raid.

Here’s the fake quote attributed to Rabbi Morris Allen that was posted to the JTA site:

There is a war going on here, the war between the kashrut standards of Orthodoxy and Conservatives. For so long, Orthodoxy has controlled the “industry” and we see what has happened.

Tzedek will set a standard set by a committee and it will be certain to protect workers from abuse. An added benefit it that it will protect the IRS from being defrauded, because Tzedek will entail honesty on taxes as well.

We will give a pass to small stores where illegals work, but not large companies - that is to much leeway. If an owner has a housekeeper or nanny, he or she better be legal.

Then again, if these illegals are paid well and treated well, maybe it won’t matter that they are illegal. This hasn’t been worked out yet.

Meanwhile, the Agriprocessors matter should continue until we get what we deserve. Tzedek on out terms, Tzedek for our beliefs, and a Tzedek that we can regulate.

5WPR’s founder and president, Ronn Torossian, just issued this statement about the controversy engulfing his company [UPDATE: This is the revised version that the company sent out a few minutes after the first one]:

While traveling earlier this week with my family out of the country, my IT department investigated accusations which we have now learned to be true. A senior staff member failed to be transparent in dealing with client matters. He has taken full responsibility.

We have been in business since January 2003 – and according to Odwyer’s 2007 rankings our revenues exceeded $11.5M, and we are the 21st largest independent PR firm in the United States.

Growing companies often have problems in their expansion, and we continue to strive for the highest performance. We have instituted internal measures to ensure this cannot happen again. We continue to strive for the highest ethical standards.

This battle is not about blogging, it is however about protecting the highest levels of Kashrut in the Jewish community. We as a firm feel personally and professionally passionate about these, and related issues.

Critics of traditional Judaism have chosen to smear the largest provider of the highest level kashrut meat in the world. We stand with protecting kashrut.

And treif meat, too.

Seriously, though, one of the most intriguing aspects of this entire story is that 5WPR has managed to carve out two seemingly contradictory niches, representing both traditionalist Jewish groups and celebrities associated with the raunchier side of American pop culture (for example, Girls Gone Wild — that’s Torossian on the left at the 28-second mark — and Lil’ Kim). The media equivalent would be Fox, which has an entertainment division that has arguably done more than any other company to create the debased standards of decency on television that the traditionalist/conservative folks over at the news division love to rail against.

UPDATE: The Forward’s Nathaniel Popper hit on this irony back a few years ago with this profile on Torossian.

Shidduch vetting in the Orthodox world has gotten out of control, writes Tamar Snyder in the Wall Street Journal:

Just as the economy is headed to recession, the shidduch system is in crisis mode. Or so the rabbis moan, noting the surplus of women eager to marry and the corresponding shortfall in the quality and quantity of available Jewish men. It’s not that there are more Orthodox women than men out there; experts instead attribute the shortage to the broader sociological trend of postponing marriage, which works to the disadvantage of women looking for spouses their own age or just a few years older. Men who are 30 will date women as young as 18 and may turn their noses up at dating any woman past the age of 25. The 20% or 30% of women who don’t get hitched right away begin to worry they’ll be left out in the cold for good.