Talk:Baal teshuva/Archive 1

Archive 1

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Starting the article

Hi, I was the original writer of this piece on the Ba'al Teshuva Revolution now submitted. I have now officially logged in, so I look forward to more comments. 25 Dec. 2002 User:IZAK

Hi, IZAK. It was a very interesting piece but one of the things we have to be careful of is NPOV (neutral point of view). Also, some of the facts are questionable. How widespread is the baal teshuva movement really? How does it compare with people leaving Orthodoxy? Other facts to be careful with--my mom graduated from Stern College before I was born and I am pushing forty. In other words, it is not a new institution, like you make it out to be (especially when compared to Drisha). Danny

I didn't put in the piece about Stern altho it is part of the longer term build-up

User:IZAK

I think it would be useful to contrast the return to Judaism with the spiritual odyssey of many Israelies who effectively had no Jewish religion, and instead turned to Indian forms of religion. Also, in the new list of names added to the bottom of the article, should the title Rabbi be part of their name? How would this work on a Wikipedia Search, if someone only typed in the name, without the title? RK

Have edited the titles, the "Rabbi" of the rabbis. Yes, I agree,there should be some deeper insights into why and how Israelis turn to Oriental religions. As well as why Jews become "Messianics" such as "Jews for Jesus".User:IZAK

Good thoughts, Izak. Please see the article on Messianic Judaism; maybe you could add some thoughts. RK

Manipulation?

This section is routinely removing all text that doesn't promote this movement in a purely positive light. This si not a history of the movement, it is an advertisement for Jews to become Orthodox.66.108.169.109 04:03, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

This page is being manipulated to promote one form of Judaism above all others, and to deligitimize any form of religious Judaism other than Orthodoxy. The repeated deletions of material from non-Orthodox Jewish sources is a clear violation of Wikipedia NPOV policy. None of our articles on Christianity favor and support one particular denomination of Christianity, the same must be true with our articles on Judaism (and on all other religions.) Most galling is the editing which implies that someone who returns to observant Judaism must be becoming an Orthodox Jew. That implication is purely an Orthodox rhetorical attack; many non-Orthodox baal teshuvas exist, no mater how much Orthodox Jews might dislike this. RK

With the exception of some conservative congregations, calling a non-orthodox Jew who observes more baal teshuva, is like calling a christian who starts going to church once in a while a born again christian. Where's the effort that signify's the action? SF2K1 04:37, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Russia is not the former Soviet Union

It is wrong to equate Russia with the former Soviet Union. Jews are to be found in Lithuania, the Central Asian countries etc, not just in the RF alone.

Keeves

I agree fully with Keeves' revert[1]. JFW | T@lk 13:55, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

"They were confronted with the question of the importance of activity of the living or the primarity of the genotype in the vitality of an organism, or the consequences of the similarity of all living in their genotype." Keeves, I'm sorry, but what is it about this point that you don't understand, exactly?? More seriously, I think the anon editor is just trying to say, "many people believe baal teshuvas are just dumb people looking for answers. However, many baal teshuvas are highly intelligent, and it is in their intense intellectual inquiry that they have been persuaded of the truth of Judaism." Or something like that. Not sure how we could present that POV in the article. Babajobu 16:36, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

It was one very long paragraph, with many very long sentences. It also had many spelling and grammar errors, which were rather minor individually, but collectively they were just too distracting to me. I felt it was just too difficult to decipher, but maybe I was just being lazy. If you understood it, and want to clean it up a bit and reinsert it, then please, that's what Wikipedia is all about! --Keeves 23:44, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

External links

The "online resources" section of the external links does not seem suitable for an encyclopedia. It's like, "and if you'd like to consider embracing the faith of your fathers, please join us at these websites!" They're not encyclopedic, they're resources for prospective ba'al teshuvas. Does anyone disagree? If not, I'm going to zap them. Babajobu 07:11, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

• Hello Baba: Do not let your POV and bias show here. If you will look at the edit history of this article, you will see that many editors and contributors put those links together. The links help as a guide to show how real this phenomenon really is, and that this is not just some shmatte ("junky") topic. Furthermore, because there are a huge variety of organizations in this field with many competing approaches, the external links are meant to assist the reader understand this topic, and NOT as you claim: "and if you'd like to consider embracing the faith of your fathers, please join us at these websites!" Somehow I doubt very much that people who "want to embrace the faith of their fathers" are going to come looking in Wikipedia articles for inspiration, especially if the majority of Wikipedia readers are not Jewish and do not wish to embrace the faith of the Jews' fathers. So your logic is also full of holes. You know, when it's a subject like September 11, 2001 attacks that has tons of links no-one thinks it's a problem. So maybe go find another article to attack. IZAK 12:46, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi IZAK, thanks for your comments. I think many of the external links are useful: for example, the list of Ba'al teshuva yeshivas is certainly relevant. Nor is there any reason not to have loads of external links, so long as they are all relevant. My concern is that some of the external links are duplicated--why is it important that we have two external links to the same page of the same Aish site, ditto as regards the Chabad site. Moreover, some of the links in the online resources section really have nothing specifically to do with ba'al teshuvas. Why a link to a site with d'var torahs or lectures regarding the mitzvot, for example? Those links are relevant to Jews generally, but do they really have specific relevance to ba'al teshuvas? I'm sorry you regarded my comment as an "attack". I only intended to be a question on a talkpage. Babajobu 03:16, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Baba: What you say makes sense, indeed, double links to the same sites, such as Aish and Chabad or links to just general Torah lectures should be removed, especially since we have no shortage of links here as it is, so go ahead and be my guest to cut down on duplicates and irrelevant ones. IZAK 05:57, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks IZAK. I'd removed the duplicate links...and now went ahead and removed some links that I thought were generally relevant to Jews, but not specifically so to ba'alei teshuva. If I removed any links you think are specifically relevant to ba'alei teshuva, then go ahead and restore them. Thanks again. Babajobu 06:12, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Baba:...I glanced at it, wow, and this we call a "trimmed" list...well to be fair, how can we justify cutting links to some Baal teshuva organizations at the expense of others, everyone deserves their day in court I guess... IZAK 06:35, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

IZAK, well, it's possible that other links should be cut as well, I don't know. I only focused on links in the "Online Resources" section that seemed either to duplicate links in other sections or to be relevant to Judaism generally but not ba'alei teshuva specifically. It's possible that some of the links to yeshivas and organizations should be cut as well, but I'm not knowledgeable enough in this area to know which are the makhers and which are the pischers. Cheers, Babajobu 06:48, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Baba: I will look at them, hopefully soon, but right now I gotta get sleep. IZAK 07:10, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I call foul -- all information important to this movement but not flattering has been removed by the Orthodox Jews. I will reinstate links and text over the coming weeks, but demand this page not be used as a recruiting mechanism by proselytizers. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by unknown editor (talk • contribs).

I agree with baba. Too many ex-links. In wp jargon - linkspam and it doesn't matter if there are from significant organizations either. The list of BT yeshivas might also be too long, but is interesting nonetheless. The entire 'online resources' though has got to go. I'd be bold, but willing to listen to any last minute claims. The we will work on the 'organizations' list. --Shuki 21:35, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Agree. There are about 43 External links without the online resources. I would suggest creating a separate article for all the BT yeshivos and organizations, with a little info about each Yeshiva. Shlomke 01:06, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Bad intro

The intro is based on modern day Chabad usage of the term. The Jewish usage of the term is someone who mastered teshuva, not someone who did teshuva, even chasidut uses the term this way. The intro should really be cleaned up. ems 11:29, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

The intro quite faithfully reflects the use by English-speaking Jews and is factually correct. What, in your view, is a better definition? JFW | T@lk 22:28, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Orthodox rabbis in outreach

The section titled "Orthodox rabbis in outreach - First generation" DOES mention the things which rabbis Schneerson, Kook, and Hutner did in the area of outreach. But it does NOT specify what rabbis Soloveitchik, Ruderman, Miller, Mendlowitz, and Lebowitz did for outreach. I have no objection to the idea that they were great rabbis and great roshei yeshiva, but unless someone can give details of what they did for outreach, I will be tempted to delete them from this section. Please add more info! --Keeves 17:41, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I think it is unreasonably exclusive, and that listing a few individuals detracts from the work of others. A full listing of those in outreach would overwhelm this page (thank God), so I'd rather the list gets deleted. JFW | T@lk 21:56, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I attempted editing the list to reflect Keeves' comment as I also agree. Shykee 00:52, 1 May 2006 (UTC)shykee

Original Definition

Does more not need to be made of the original (torah/rabbinic) definition as well as the modern? 82.21.255.249 20:26, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

There already actually is a separate article on the original definition called "Repentance in Judaism". It does need to be expanded. Perhaps you could help. I will add a link to it in this article. Shykee 17:46, 14 July 2006 (UTC)shykee

Schneerson

how come there is no mention of the fact, that since Schneerson died without anyone to inherit his position as head of Chabad Lubavitch, and that this has contributed to the development within Chabad of believing Schneerson to be ha Moshiach (Messiah). As far as I can tell parts of Chabad have become quite messianic nature over the last decade or so, is this only relevant to the Messianic Jews section?

Exactly! The article does accurately state that his chassidim are continuing his work in many areas. The controversies which have sprung up since his death are mentioned in other articles, but not very relevant to this one. If someone really wants to, I guess they can include a VERY short comment like "For the controveries about Chabad philosophy which has risen since his death, see xxxxx." but even that might be to much for here. Anyone who wants to can easily click on Chabad. --Keeves 11:54, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

article flow

The article needs to be copyedited for flow. It starts out in the past tense, and then sort of moves into current tense with no break. --80.179.114.5 06:50, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Sfaradim !

This very good article does miss a few words about the Teshuva movement among Sfaradim in the last years which followed quick secularization due to colonisation of arab countries by european powers and then migration to either Israel or Europe. Because Sfaradim now live everywhere as a minority among Ashkenazim, this Teshuva means generally for them joining an ashkenazi/hassidic movement. Sfaradim make a big part of Chabad and Breslov in Israel. Almost all chabadnikim are Sfaradim in France. Even the development of the Shas movement is of litvak inspiration. Some words could be written on its Shuvu school system devoted to outreach Mizrahim, especially russian speaking ones.Ezra haGuer 18:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Disagree. Yes, there should be sefaradim tshuva movement section which would talk about the 80s and 90s success of Rabbi Amnon Yitzchak and Shas. In fact, the sefardim tshuva movement has lost steam and the new tshuva movements are national religious (mostly ashkenazi). Calling the sefardim a minority is not accurate. Almost all Jews are sfaradim in France. --Shuki 10:47, 31 May 2007 (UTC)