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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>RMB wrote:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>>>It's not "chokhmah bagoyim ta'amin" that distinguishes them, as
the notion<BR>that anyone can have chokhmah (that isn't Torah) would include R
as well.<BR><BR>And so, I would still argue the ukimta that Austritt has no
target<BR>bizman hazeh.<<<BR><BR></DIV></FONT></DIV>
<DIV>>>>>></DIV>
<DIV>"Chachma bagoyim ta'amin" with regard to Reform and Conservative means that
you can use a secular textbook that happens to have been written by a
Reform Jew, or you can go to a doctor who is a Reform Jew. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>It most certainly does NOT mean that on anything in which the fact of their
being R or C is relevant -- that you can read or use the "wisdom" of Reform and
Conservative Jews.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>As for your "no target bezman hazeh" I am having trouble even grasping what
you mean to say, but I suspect that you have been influenced by RRW's many posts
decrying austritt and defining austritt as the shunning of some O rabbis by
other O rabbis. However, R' Gershon Seif addressed this
question absolutely correctly when he wrote, >>I think Hirsch's insistence
on separating his Kehilla from the WR etc. wasn't the Austritt he was really
trying to make happen. That was a bitter and unfortunate result of "stuff that
happened." He stuck to his guns because of the other Austritt from the Graetz's
and the Geigers. He felt without a clean separation from R & C, Orthodoxy's
mission would be diluted. That was all a side fight that was a distraction from
the real fight. I have a hunch that was RNB's understanding too.<<</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>The intra-Orthodox struggles, IOW, are a side-show -- NOT the main
show.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>The "target bizman hazeh" remains what it always was, the Reform and
Conservative movements and any body or program in which Conform clergy
share a platform with Orthodox rabbis on a basis of collegiality and equal
status. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>There is no reason people can't be friendly on a private, personal basis
with R and C Jews and even with some R and C rabbis -- depending on the
circumstances. A private "friendship" with, say, a Reform rabbi who had
Orthodox smicha and who had made a public career of denouncing Orthodoxy would
still be inappropriate. But the main "target" of austritt is communal,
official, public Heterodoxy.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>No one has ever showed me why the same policy we follow with regard to Jews
for Jesus should not apply equally to the Conform movements.<BR></DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#0000ff size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"><STRONG></STRONG><BR><B>--Toby
Katz<BR>=============<BR><BR></B><BR></FONT></DIV></FONT><BR><BR><BR><DIV><FONT style="color: black; font: normal 10pt ARIAL, SAN-SERIF;"><HR style="MARGIN-TOP: 10px">Get the scoop on last night's hottest shows and the live music scene in your area - <A title="http://www.tourtracker.com?NCID=aolmus00050000000112" href="http://www.tourtracker.com?NCID=aolmus00050000000112" target="_blank">Check out TourTracker.com</A>!</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>