Did you hear the one about the "Rabbi" who Walks into a non-Kosher Restaurant?

ערב שבת חוהמ״ס תשע״ה

The Algemeiner: Rabbi Says Booted From Jackson, Mississippi Restaurant for Being Jewish
Shiryn Ghermezian, September 24, 2014

An American rabbi said that he was thrown out of a Jackson, Miss., restaurant on Tuesday after the person taking his order found out he was Jewish, the local Clarion-Ledger reported.

The victim, Rabbi Ted Riter of Beth Israel Congregation, recounted on Facebook what he said transpired when he went to Wraps in Maywood Mart for lunch and ordered a salad. According to Riter, a man he believed to be the owner asked him, “A full size or a Jewish size?”

When Riter asked for an explanation, the man said, “It’s small. Jews are cheap and small. Everybody knows that.”

Shocked by the comment, Riter responded, “Did you really just say that?” The man then asked him if he was Jewish. When Riter replied in the affirmative, he was told to leave the restaurant. (cont.)

(Tip: Life In Israel)

Esser Agaroth (2¢):
I was quite surprises to see that the following comment of mine was actually published. Points to The Algemeiner!

Why do you insist on referring to such individuals as “rabbis??”

Individuals who distort, play with, and deny parts of the Torah have a dubious din (status) at best, and they are called rabbis??

In the future, I ask that at the very least you put the word rabbi in quotation marks or parentheses.

Like many un-Jews, it is not his fault that he lacks even the most remote understanding of Torah. In my opinion, the history of the so called "Reform" movement is based in the lack of belief in any of the Torah. However, knowing that the Torah was to powerful to attack head on, the "Reformers" took a lesson from the Tzadoqim (Sadducees), and chose to attack it one part at a time, the Oral Torah first. Like he has been indoctrinated into a Western/assimilationist (ie. anti-Torah) perspective of the Torah.

All through the Torah, Jews are commanded regarding various distinctions and separations, be they types of food, seeds, plants, fibers, potential marriage partners, or national borders. However, assimilated Jews rationalize these distinctions and separations away, or simply ignore them. Instead, they take the route of "building bridges" between distinctions and separations, and work toward the erasing of these Torah-mandated boundaries. In other words, when the Torah says to distinguish and separate things, they mix them together instead.

מערבב
"mixer"

Hmm...mixing,

...as in "mixed"

...as in "mixed-up"

...and as in "mixed multitude," (Erev Rav/ערב רב) those false converts who came up out of Egypt with us, and having causing us trouble to this day (Exodus 12:38).

וְגַם-עֵרֶב רַב, עָלָה אִתָּם, וְצֹאן וּבָקָר, מִקְנֶה כָּבֵד מְאֹד.

And a mixed multitude also went up with them; and flocks, and herds, even a great deal of cattle.

Oh, don't worry. Although this logic sounds a little silly on the surface, the same works in Hebrew as well. I simply wanted to make it accessible to the followers of Ted Riter and the like, those who actually think that such an individual is a "rabbi," a man of Torah, a teacher of Torah.

Some would say that it is a mistake for me to be so harsh, as I am in this post. Perhaps instead, I should be more delicate and diplomatic. This approach might attract Jews to my way of thinking, instead of frightening them away with a post, which you may see as "self-righteous," "negative," and any other descriptors you choose to insert.

I believe that it is true, that various approaches are now needed in order to reach the diverse kinds of Jews out there, during this difficult and confusing time in which we live. Some of these Jews, who are buried deep in their assimilation, have absolutely no chance of being dug out with kind, diplomatic words and patient reasoning. They need to be [proverbially] smacked in the face with the truth, in order to be woken up.

Jews like Ted are not necessarily Erev Rav, but most certainly the Erev Rav's tools, its "mixers," if you will.

Leaders in the so-called "Reform Movement," and other distorters and deniers of Torah, are another story, picking at the Torah piece by piece, knowing that they are unable to attack it head on.

The news reports of Ted Riter's venture into a non-kosher restaurant have all focused on Ted as the victim, Ted as the party who rises above the attacks on his people, Ted as the peaceful "bridge-builder," Ted who desires to reconcile and embrace his attacker.


Why hasn't anyone asked, "What in the heck was he doing at a non-Kosher restaurant, in the first place?"

Having a salad? I know Buddhists and vegans who are stricter about avoiding the ingestion of bugs, often found in salad vegetables.

But, this is really all immaterial.

It is one thing to try to get along with non-Jews, while we are in exile in THEIR lands. But, this is by no means license for the complete disregard for our nature as a distinct and separate people, a concept perhaps even more important important while in exile than not. No matter how the Erev Rav wants us to be, we are simply NOT just like every people.

These boundaries have been, and continue to be necessary for our survival. All it takes is for one Jew, who, for better or for worse, garners respect from the local Jewish community, to guide that community through his example, step by step to the paths of genocide, assimilation and intermarriage. History has shown us that danger to our people's very existence has been based on much less than having a salad in a non-kosher restaurant.