Should Jews Proselytize? & Dueling Rabbis PART 2 with Sharon Brous & David Ingber
4/14/20261 hr 18 min
Host Jonah Platt moderates part two of a spirited conversation between Rabbi Sharon Brous (IKAR, Los Angeles) and Rabbi David Ingber (Romemu, New York) about how Jewish leaders should balance moral self-critique of Israel with addressing antisemitism, especially after October 7. Ingber argues progressive Jews and rabbis overemphasize public Jewish self-criticism, undercall out antisemitism and extremism from allies, and should name today’s anti-Zionism as an ever-evolving hate movement that erases Jewish self-determination. Brous defends the Jewish tradition of teshuvah and accountability, urges speaking against West Bank settler violence and occupation, and warns that labeling all criticism or Palestinian solidarity as...
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First 90 secondsJonah Platt· Host0:00
[upbeat music] Anytime you're dealing with an institution, and I don't just mean a literal one, I mean anything that's been around for a minute, like say, the Jews, you face the likelihood of getting stuck in behaviors that are no longer relevant nor useful to your purpose. When the prevailing wisdom is, "That's just how we do it," you're not gonna see a whole lot of real-time matching of solutions to current needs. Instead of innovation and evolution, you're gonna see obsolete practices and ideas that fail to meet the current moment. The only way to break out of these patterns is to constantly challenge our assumptions. As Jews, our forebearers did this again and again in every age, a critical aspect of how our tribe outwitted, outplayed, and outlasted through the centuries. And in this generational moment we face today, it is absolutely negligent, bordering on arrogant, to not be challenging each and every assumption we have about the way we approach the survival and thrival of our people. One of the most insurmountable obstacles the Jewish community faces is our size, or lack thereof. No matter how loud we are or how much money we raise or how many friends we have, we will never be more than a drop in the bucket of Earth's population. We are microscopic, and this literal lack of visibility hamstrings us in everything we try to do. Sustain flourishing Jewish communities, influence public opinion and policy, normalize our way of life for the general population. If we were somehow able to affect change in that one regard, our size, it would be a huge, pun intended,