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"We also seem more willing to accept Russian Christians as converts or as settlers in Israel, even without conversion, than people with the 'wrong' racial backgrounds. These attitudes reveal a failure to appreciate that Judaism is a world religion with a universal message that has attracted admirers and potential converts from many different backgrounds in many different eras... Even in the most trying times in Jewish history, we have taken in converts. We should also not forget that, historically, royal families, and with them a significant number of their subjects, adopted Judaism in places as diverse as Adiabene (northern Iraq), Himyar (Yemen), and Khazaria (the Crimea). Today, their descendants are completely indistinguishable from other Jews." - quote from Myer Samra, in his article "Bring in the B'nai Menashe", The Canadian Jewish News (March 7, 2002)
"I oppose the lachrymose conception of Jewish history that treats Judaism as a sheer succession of miseries and persecutions." - quote from Salo Wittmayer Baron, 20th-century Jewish history professor
"...Zionists have argued for the necessity of the establishment of a Jewish state on the grounds that Jewish powerlessness after the destruction of the Second Temple left us vulnerable to the cruel, anti-Semitic whims of non-Jewish rulers... As the result of this viewpoint, in the first decades of the State, secular Israeli Jews virtually eliminated from the curriculum the study of post-Destruction diaspora Jewish history and culture. Their models and heroes were biblical prophets and kings and heroic halutzim (Zionist pioneers), not talmudic sages, and certainly not the generations of medieval Jews - powerless, persecuted, and unenlightened - whose traumas Zionism sought to transcend in its pursuit of the normalization of the Jewish people... The great historian of Judaism, Professor Salo Wittmayer Baron, sought to correct this attitude, which he labelled 'the lachrymose view of Jewish history.' Most medieval Jews in most places in most years were not the targets of pogroms. Most lived lives that, protected by geniz charters and privileges, were far more secure and prosperous than the overwhelming percentage of non-Jews around them. And contrary to our expectation, even those communities that were savaged by attack often demonstrated a resiliency that led them to flower demographically and culturally immediately afterwards... But those of us who have chosen not to live in Israel, and who are devoted to a vital, evolving Jewish community, cannot afford to buy into that myth. It is a myth that foretells our own destruction. It is the Zionist myth of shelilat hagolah (the negation of the diaspora)." - quote from Jacob Staub, professor of medieval Jewish civilization
"I think that if all the Jews in the world moved to Israel, it would have a bad effect on the wealth of Judaism. Israel may be the center of the Jewish people, but it cannot be the only address for all the Jews in the world." - Roman Shopshovich, President of International Solomon University, Kiev, Ukraine, quoted in Ha'aretz, October 15, 2001, in the article "`In' in the new Ukraine" by Daniel Ben Simon
"There used to be a division between the Zionist notion that all Jews need to move to Israel and the non-Zionist notion that they can also stay and develop. Today we still encourage aliya but we recognize the Diaspora isn't going anywhere nor should it." - Natan Sharansky, Jewish Agency for Israel Chairman, quoted in the Jerusalem Post, October 22, 2010, in the article "PM: Future of Jews depends on ensuring Israeli security" by Gil Shefler
"Upon naming their sons, Moshe Rabbeinu and Yosef recognized the significance of remembering the past. There are people who attempt to erase the past, to eradicate the memories of the previous generation, its culture and way of life. Some are even ashamed of the past, considering it to be obsolete and antiquated. Not so the Torah-oriented Jew. He remembers the past; he venerates the past; he lives the present and builds toward the future based upon the foundation of the past. This is the reason that when they name their children, who symbolize the future of our people, they use names that recall the past... Only by connecting to the past, are we assured of a promising future... One strengthens his Jewish identity and heightens his Jewish pride when he becomes acutely aware of the many significant achievements of his ancestors throughout history. One who becomes acquainted with his Jewish past will identify and take pride in it, as he integrates this knowledge into his own life. Lastly, he will see how many of today's issues, problems and challenges have been confronted in the past." - quote from Rabbi A. Leib Scheinbaum
"It's important to avoid a lachrymose view of Jewish history. Of course we must never forget the Holocaust, but we must also not forget the thousand years of Jewish life that preceded it." - quote from Aaron Lansky, founder of the National Yiddish Book Center
"A Rabbi named the Hai Gaon, the last of the Gaonim with any authority (as quoted by Adret, in Responsa, VII #292) stated that a Jew who converted out of the faith was no longer a Jew. This idea was shared by numerous rabbis, which can be seen in the Responsa literature of Simon ben Zemah of Duran, Samuel de Medina, Judah Berab, Jacob Berab, Moses ben Elias Kapsali, and others in the Middle Ages. ... The very famous rabbi, Moses ben Maimon, called Maimonides, also wrote that if a Jew converted to Christianity, he or she was no longer a Jew. See Maimonides, Hilchot Mamrim Perek 3, Halacha 1-3, as well as in Maimonides's Mishnah Torah, Avodat Kochavim 2:5." - quote from Rabbi Stuart Federow
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