Jerusalem – Israel’s Sephardic chief rabbi, Yitzhak Yosef, likened a black child born to white parents to a “monkey” in explaining a point of ritual.
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Rabbi Yosef, speaking Saturday evening, was speaking of the traditional blessing of the trees that takes place during Nissan, the current month on the Hebrew calendar. He was addressing whether Jewish law requires saying the blessing upon seeing one tree or two.
Comparing the blessing of the trees to other blessings, he cited the blessing required when one sees an unusual or “differentiated” creature and noted that one does not need to seek two such creatures to bless them.
In a video obtained by Ynet, the online version of Yediot Acharonot, Rabbi Yosef goes into an extensive discourse on recounting the blessing when one sees a black person. He repeatedly uses the term “Kushi,” which derives from the biblical term for Ethiopia. The term was commonplace in Israel’s early decades but has been seen since at least the 1980s as a mild pejorative.
Rabbi Yosef said the blessing does not apply to every black person.
“You don’t bless every Kushi, you walk in American streets, every five minutes you see a Kushi, are you going to deliver the blessing of the differentiated? It has to be a Kushi whose mother and father are white … if you know, however you know, that a monkey son came forth from them, that it came from them this way, then you say on him, the blessing of the differentiated creature. So, you’re going to say, do you need two Kushis (to say the blessing)? No!” he said.
Ynet obtained a response from Rabbi Yosef’s office which noted that the Talmud uses the example of a black person to explain appropriate uses of the blessing of the differentiated, and also mentions monkeys. However, the passage cited does not compare black children to monkeys. Instead it appears to list differentiated creatures that would require blessing, including black people, elephants and monkeys. Additionally, the use of the term Kushi is normative in the Talmud, but no longer so in everyday Israeli speech.
nothing controversial said.
Frum Jews are, along with white supremacist neo-Nazis, the last bastion of all-out prejudice and bigotry toward all other goups, particularly toward blacks. Perhaps that’s why Trump finds his strongest base of supporters among white redneck bigots and frumme yidden. Mi K’Amcha Yisroel — oy vey.
Ynet, in its usual anti-Torah way, took the Rav’s words out of context. He did NOT liken the child to a monkey.
Of course the leftist Jews will take everything out of context when it comes to Chareidim.
This is not even as important as teaching our children that we Do have to return an Aveido to a Goy, even if nobody will ever know, and we do have to return To’os Akum, and we do have to pay a Goy if we (or our ox) are Mazik his Nechosim, and we do have to consider a danger to a Goy’s child’s life as Pekuach Nefesh (Yes, they’re Humans just as we are), and we should never exclude Goyim who are not well from our Tefillos. And, yes, we should stop using the word Shegetz.
Then HKB”H will stop instigating anti-Semitism against us.
If you do an Internet search on “rabbi hershel schachter women monkeys”, you’ll find that Rabbi Schachter (of YU) seems to have made a similar halachic statement in 2004.
Big deal. Only leftists get into a tizzy when halacha is discussed.
You don’t like it, STAY THE SHAYGITZ YOU ARE!
He is discussing a gemara, and detailing the halacha stated there. What is controversial here??
Simple question: In order to be an authentic frum Yid, does a person have to be a racist?
If a prominent priest likened a Jewish child to a monkey as part of some Catholic theological discussion, I am sure all of you would be similarly understanding and concerned about ‘the context’ and proper transation. I am SURE nobody would say it was antisemitic, if based on a quote from some ancient church text, right?
In most every brand of hasidim in new york ,today you will find ‘african american ‘jews with them. There is no discrimination because of color.
I want to ask the Geonim here about the saying in Gemara Kiddushin: “10 measures of drunkenness descended to the world; 9 took the Kushim, 1 the rest of the world.” How does one explain this today?
A black child born to white parents isn’t a monkey, but his mother has some explaining to do.