mentalblog.com comments:
Tzemach,
This is one of the classic conflicts of Jewish cultural history. Of old, the Jews were warriors. Many centuries of strict mussar training were required to lead the macho Jewish men of battle away from their pride, hauteur, and easily provoked ferocity; that, and the oppressive hand of the conqueror who forced them to live as dhimmis or as pariahs wherever they went. The ideal character so esteemed by the mussarists was self-effacing, humble, meek, forgiving, kind, gentle -- the veritable Bontsche Schweig par excellence. The true golus mentality. They suceeded. The meek Jew, ever forced to turn the other cheek and absorb whatever punishment the master class or the master race deemed fit to dispense.
This humiliation is what the men of the early aliyah sought to overturn, and replace with the new Israeli Jew, the communist, farmer, fighter. The 6-Day War proved that the project to make the New Jew, to re-create what Menahem Begin ztl in the hauntingly beautiful preface to "The Revolt" un-self-consciously termed "the fighting Jew," had succeeded. But at the price, it has seemed to many, of losing his Jewish identity. The lack of knowledge and the lack of respect for the Jewish tradition among the secular generations of Israel has been remarked on by more than a few commenters.
In my opinion, these modes of living are not necessarily contradictory. The mainstream of Jewish life surely is broad enough to encompass the irascible fighter and the humble scholar, as well as the irascible scholar and the humble fighter. Perhaps these roles might be assumed by the same neshomoh in the same guf at different times.
A mature national culture would be able to acknowledge a place for both aspects of its national character; just as Yisroel Avinu acknowledged the different characters and contributions of his sons.
Gandalin, this is not exactly what I am talking about and a bit oversimplified. Dhimmis notwithstanding during the retched golus there was a perception of the jewish world domination, not entirely without precedent I might add. Converesly there is a perception of Israeli chronic dependence on others.
Gandalin! Why do you have to turn this into a discussion about Jewish male cultural archetypes throughout four thousand years of freakin' history?! Talk about emotionally numb!
You just effed up a great post.
Tony Montana,
Why do you have to insult me? Are you an archetype or a stereotype yourself?
What I am showing you, is that there is a reason for the problems that Tzemach describes, and it is not divorced from historical developments. And Tzemach, I am not talking about world domination vs dhimmitude. I am talking about the lifestyle and the attitude of individual Jews.
When you take a nation of warriors, who very nearly kicked the ass of the Roman Empire, and force them to live as subservient milquetoasts, you have got to expect some pathologies.
I am talking about the individual Jew who had to stay inside during the rain in Persia, so his najis wouldn't contaimnate the pure Shi'a faithful. I am talking about the individual Jew who had to wear a humiliating uniform with a special hat or a badge, and who had to pay a tax to the Roman authorities while they ceremoniously slapped his face. I am talking about the individual Jew who had to look down, keep quiet, refrain from complaint.
Internalizing all of that is the work of mussar. That's how you turn macho into meek. Stifling your anger. Stifling all forms of 'agency.'
You just don't get it.
And by the way, why do you think the pop-culture TV psychologists were teaching mainstream American males the same bullshit -- to turn themselves into feminized, complaisant, "nice," nebbishy, above all harmless wimps? They're not teaching little boys in Gaza and Tehran to behave like that, are they? Americans are being set up to become pushovers and dhimmis to the left's new macho darlings. Not the Red muzhiks this time, but the jihadis. The eradication of authentic masculinity is the number one priority of the cultural left in this country, and with its disappearance will go the family, too.
Gandalin, the post is about the choice a man takes AFTER rejecting societal influences. This is about the internal path not external pressures of Islam, communism or political correctness. Imagine you are the king, what will you teach your people.
Gandalin, I am not trying to insult you. You're an intelligent guy capable of some penetrating insight. I'm just being forthright about my dismay that while on one hand you make a call for a return to primal masculinity you demonstrate academic, HIGHLY impersonal postulating on the other.
Do YOU get it?
If you want to get personal, I'm all ears. If you want to turn this into a doctoral thesis, then I'm not too interested.
Notice, Tzemach, that we've got three guys commenting on what is perhaps the most important post on your blog in months. One guy is asking a question and getting no answers because everyone is too out-of-touch with their feelings to even understand his question. The other guy is inadvertantly obfuscating the whole conversation by talking about cultural archetypes because it is so UNREAL to actually have to relate this question to ONESELF. And the third guy is just haranguing everybody for being out-of-touch.
Can we (myself included) get it together, please?
Tony,
Thanks for your clarification. I'm not trying to obfuscate. I'm trying to situate the dilemma which Tzemach has described, in order to emphasize how important it is, beyond what you or I may actually "feel." I don't think there is necessarily a contradiction between machismo and "feeling." Part of machismo is the sense that a man behaves in a masculine way, regardless of how he "feels." (In Baltimore, the War Memorial [Post WWI] proclaims "Fatti Maschi Parole Femine.")
Anyway, Tzemach himself, in the original post, posted: "I could not help thinking about my former main complaint about the spiritual upbringing of Jews in general and BTs in particular." So I don't think that my comments about the upbringing of Jews in general are inappropriate or impertinent.
Tzemach writes about initiation into "this cruel world." I agree, but I would say initiation into this cruel and beautiful world.
We have an inborn tendency to understand "things" in terms of polarities (hot/cold, dark/light, male/female, weak/strong, good/evil) and it is very difficult to imagine the existence of any "thing" without also imagining its polar opposite. Unless I misunderstand it, Lurianic theognosy offers a reasonable explanation for the reasons that our world is so beautiful and so cruel.
What's important is not so much the way the world is, anyway, but how do we react to it.
Tony, you are forgetting that anyone that Tzemach doesn't like gets an earful - that tends to diminish the interest in posting.
guravitzer, fuck like or dislike. I think you are great guy, I like you a lot. But you tend to post superficial snide comments. Never exposing yourself or your ideas. Try that for change. Write a comment longer than three lines. Try to get out of the reactive mode. This is your real problem.
Gandalin, you wrote:
Anyway, Tzemach himself, in the original post, posted: "I could not help thinking about my former main complaint about the spiritual upbringing of Jews in general and BTs in particular." So I don't think that my comments about the upbringing of Jews in general are inappropriate or impertinent.
I am referring to the spiritual tradition that transcends political settings. Once again what’s the ideal forever, regardless of the circumstances? When a Jew is in a “the world was created for me” mood, what he decides to do?
Tzemach,
If THIS isn't the world created for the Jew, then where is it?
It is the feeling you have, a true aristocracy. This is how you feel in a Spanish court or in desperate camps. You feel like a king always! No amount of abuse can change this.
Schkoiach & l'chaim! I'll drink to that.
In other words, if you were a true pnimi, how would your masculinity express itself?
In my next post I reject the impermeable, onto itself, Clint Eastwood-like ideal of a King. I relate to the ideal of the King that behaves silly, lowers himself down to play with “Ephraim’s Chachkes”. Isn’t this the metaphor of creation of this lowly world? If G-d wanted to be self sufficient macho man, why would he need us? Shouldn’t we learn from this?
Tony Montana,
"In other words, if you were a true pnimi, how would your masculinity express itself?"
With both chesed & gevurah, sometimes the one predominating and sometimes the other.
As Tzemach says,
"Isn’t this the metaphor of creation of this lowly world? If G-d wanted to be self sufficient macho man, why would he need us? Shouldn’t we learn from this?"
"With both chesed & gevurah, sometimes the one predominating and sometimes the other."
Yes! Now we're getting somewhere. That is, we would be GENUINE.
"Isn’t this the metaphor of creation of this lowly world? If G-d wanted to be self sufficient macho man, why would he need us? Shouldn’t we learn from this?"
No, he doesn't NEED us. He WANTS us! That is strength, that is the vulnerability of a true macho man. He needs nothing, but he wants you. And that is most gratifying to both mashpioh and mekabeil.
I think I have finally understood this just now, after hearing this for years.
And your problem is that you confuse verbiosity with eloquence and content. If there is a point to be made, it can be made in 3 lines.
And aside, in the anonymity of the blogosphere, we are only our comments - and I refer to those you dislike as your dislike for their blogastic persona.
In many cases over the past years, if you would have chilled a little in your reactions, you could have kept commenters involved, kept a debate alive on many levels instead of only one, and perhaps even taught some of those stupid morons a thing or two. Instead only the commie-line towing toadies and the thick skinned remain.
Nothing personal, of course.
Tzemach,
I think your response to Tony Montana's last comment was very moving. It deserves to be the last word in this thread.
guravitzer, I am conflicted about what you write. I do not have a perfect answer. But please do not practice counterseak by invoking the communist thing.
I will try if you will.
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