Most of you have heard about it, so here's the Jewish Week's take on the “Reaching for the Infinite: The Lubavitcher Rebbe – Life, Teachings and Impact” Conference held at NYU this week.
in answer to why? One angle is thus: written history is important...recent jewish history chronicled thus far by art scroll or for that matter lubavitch publishers may be interesting but is not timeless academic material and very often is self serving ...if moshiach doesn't come sooner than later (CH v SH), if Chabad doesn't get intensely involved in chronicling history at university standards (perhaps commissioning top notch professor types) then there will be tremendous room for revisionism about chabad history and accomplishments...guys like berger will have university style texts on the shelf as reference guides for academics and we will be maligned thru the prism of these half baked legacy seekers or those who deliberately look to minimize Chabads accomplishments (berel wein, art scroll, etc). Perhaps the conference was a start in this direction?
berl, thanks! HT,You can't please everybody all of the time....There are some sophisticated guys out there who have a soul, are very literate jewishly/chabad, and would do a tremendous job with a little direction, prestige and solid gelt (foxbrunner, mintz (is he still alive?)). also, every historian is a hack...so its a matter of getting your hack writting it the way you want before the next guy does...
a professor type of course doesn't guide the fate of frum yidden, but he is rather a professional at 'assembing and packaging information'and if we want to create a record of events that will not become obsolete over time and is universally accepted and credible by frum, not yet frum, the world, then this kind of history recording is a must....of course with guidance from rabbonim..etc.
you seem to be attached to your blog managing to post at sll times of day and night. do you do anything else????
ReplyDeletedo anything else?! hah!
ReplyDeletebelieve me friends, if I had time the blog would be hopping all the time!
btw, the times posted are לאו דוקא
i dont buy that one about the times posted!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteWhat was the stated goal of the symoposium? Since when do we make an acedemic symposium about a Rebbe? Was this a kiruv tool?
ReplyDeleteFarfel,
ReplyDeleteA post can be written any time, and posted in a free moment ...
the quetion is "when is that any time"?
ReplyDeleteThe symposium was sponsored by the Rohr family, און אף א גביר פרעגט מען מיט קיין קשיות
ReplyDeleteHow many people attended, and what type of people?
ReplyDeleteFriend
ReplyDeleteya gotta read the article.
in answer to why? One angle is thus: written history is important...recent jewish history chronicled thus far by art scroll or for that matter lubavitch publishers may be interesting but is not timeless academic material and very often is self serving ...if moshiach doesn't come sooner than later (CH v SH), if Chabad doesn't get intensely involved in chronicling history at university standards (perhaps commissioning top notch professor types) then there will be tremendous room for revisionism about chabad history and accomplishments...guys like berger will have university style texts on the shelf as reference guides for academics and we will be maligned thru the prism of these half baked legacy seekers or those who deliberately look to minimize Chabads accomplishments (berel wein, art scroll, etc). Perhaps the conference was a start in this direction?
ReplyDeleten, nice take on the whole thing.
ReplyDeleteN
ReplyDeleteif Berl compliments you then you know you did well. However, some people will see such historians as hacks hired to do a job.
berl, thanks!
ReplyDeleteHT,You can't please everybody all of the time....There are some sophisticated guys out there who have a soul, are very literate jewishly/chabad, and would do a tremendous job with a little direction, prestige and solid gelt (foxbrunner, mintz (is he still alive?)).
also, every historian is a hack...so its a matter of getting your hack writting it the way you want before the next guy does...
n -"timeless academic material" ?
ReplyDeleteVos meint dos ?
Vos a professor shreibt iz limaala min hazman ???
may I answer for N?
ReplyDeleteht, please do....
ReplyDeletea professor type of course doesn't guide the fate of frum yidden, but he is rather a professional at 'assembing and packaging information'and if we want to create a record of events that will not become obsolete over time and is universally accepted and credible by frum, not yet frum, the world, then this kind of history recording is a must....of course with guidance from rabbonim..etc.