Here is a Guest Discussion put on by UATX, featuring Shabbos Kestenbaum on free speech, the future of American Judaism, Christian nationalism, and Islam’s place in Western society
I thought this was actually a really good discussion and like Mr. Kestenbaum a lot more now. I thought his defense of free speech and his Harvard lawsuit made sense, and his example of denying immigration based on values and the comparison to defending the University as an institution was well put.
That said, a couple slightly more disagreeable comments:
On his introduction as to the Israel-Gaza war - yes, sending in aid to Gaza, despite being at war, is a good thing. However, I think a big part of the concern here is simply the reality of the way in which the war was waged. When you wage an air war for 1200 people, and kill 10s of thousands of innocent civilians, by your own admission, and completely annihilate all infrastructure in their home, that goes beyond what is morally permissible.
Everyone recognizes that in a hostage situation, say, in NYC, you can't just kill every innocent person around in order to save the one hostage. There's a recognition of their dignity, and you can't use immoral means to achieve a moral end. At least with some of the ethno-religious zealots in Israel, there doesn't seem to be that recognition. And that's why the war is problematic.
"Racism is not particularly a black people problem because most blacks for the most part, aren't really racist" (20:14) - If you're defining racism as racial hatred, sure. But if Mr. Kestenbaum is defining racism as in group preference, black people display a high in group preference - it's only whites that do not. Arguably this is actually a white people problem - the lack of in group preference, because it allows us to be attacked as a group without being able to defend as a group. I'm not sure Mr. Kestenbaum has really thought this out since he does make reference to not apologizing for being white at 5:06. It he implying that racism might be a white people problem? I don't think he clearly does, but clarity here is probably important given the elephant in the room of the perception that his ethnic group tribing up is good, whereas other ethnic groups tribing up perhaps is problematic.
"To repair the world through the kingship of God" (29:00) - A beautiful idea, but we cannot give what we do not possess. Only God can repair the world, and the law cannot save. God's grace is needed, which is why the King of the Universe came to take on our nature in order to heal us and enable us to share in his nature, to repair the world
(33:15). The portion on Jonah is very insightful, and shows Jonah as a type of Christ, who did come down to be with the lepers and whores and outcasts of society, in order to save them from their sins, and make atonement, providing the lamb of God that was promised to Abraham and the sign of Jonah.
"To be fair Christians were killing us at the time" (36:30)- Blood libel, just for the record. Jewish historiographers love to hand-waive all of history and say it was just a long train of persecutions against them, while overlooking any of their own crimes and historical nastiness. If you want to imagine what medieval Jews were like, as compared with those evil Spanish Inquisitors, just look at some of the most bigoted hateful Israeli settler terrorists of today.
Jews allied with the Persians to massacre Christians in the 600s, they allied with the Mohammedans to conquer Christian Spain in the 700s, and Talmudic Judaism itself is fundamentally founded on their nastiness to Christians from the very beginning - Jews spent 1000s of years saying, praying, and writing nasty things about Christians and festering that hate in their heart after their rejection of Christ, which when discovered in their Talmud naturally produced a backlash. The best Jews actually mass converted in Spain in the 1300s after getting crushed in debate - a fact much suppressed/distorted in favor of all sort of exaggerations and lies about the Inquisition.
"I'm not telling muslims what they should do" (40:53) - They should repent of their belief in a false prophet warlord pedophile and believe in the Gospel.
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