<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Feb 21, 2008 at 6:16 PM, Michael Makovi <<a href="mailto:mikewinddale@gmail.com">mikewinddale@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
It seems impossible to deny that the word "ger" doesn't mean, strictly<br>
speaking, a convert, but rather anyone who is a stranger or foreigner<br>
or alien. Indeed, Avraham and Moshe call themselves gerim, and we are<br>
described as having been gerim in Egypt, and obviously no conversions<br>
were involved. <br>
<br>
Mikha'el Makovi</blockquote><div><br>this point ws brought to my attendtion jsut last night in my restaurant by a relatively new Ba'al Teshuva. he expressed great mis-givings about how Rabbis {meaning today's rabbis not hazal per se] can be trusted when they morph the meaning of a word like Ger to mean something else. and he quoted some of the above. The fellow is NOT a scholar and know very little but he has found these kinds of transmigrations of the word disturbing. <br>
<br>I had no answer for him. I could probably muster some sophisticate answer that would satisfy the scholarly types but not one that would help him. <br></div></div><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Kol Tuv / Best Regards,<br>
<a href="mailto:RabbiRichWolpoe@Gmail.com">RabbiRichWolpoe@Gmail.com</a><br>see: <a href="http://nishmablog.blogspot.com/">http://nishmablog.blogspot.com/</a>