Word: messiahs
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Israeli Jews like to tell an old fable of a Russian Jew who goes to his rabbi in search of a job. The rabbi instructs the man to stand at the village gate each morning and wait there to greet the Messiah when he comes. For this, the rabbi offers the man a ruble a month. "The pay is so low," the man complains. "Yes," says the rabbi, "but the job security is excellent...
...group of ultra-Orthodox Jews. Israeli members of the large and powerful Hasidic movement Habad are convinced that at any moment, the Redeemer will arrive in Jerusalem. In a burst of fervor, they have erected yellow billboards across Israel, instructing passersby to PREPARE FOR THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. Bumper stickers carry the same message, as do electrified signs atop Habad cars. A full-page ad announcing "The Time for Your Redemption Has Arrived" has run in the New York Times, and Habad speakers have been crisscrossing the U.S. to deliver their message. And who might the Messiah be? Easy...
...what many other religious Jews say. Critics of Habad, which is also known as the Lubavitch movement, after the Belarussian village of its founding, are both angry and worried. Eliezer Schach, one of Israel's leading ultra-Orthodox rabbis, has publicly called Schneerson "insane," an "infidel" and "a false Messiah." The local papers carried Schach's outrageous charge that Schneerson's followers are "eaters of trayf," food such as pork that is forbidden to Jews. Other detractors fret that Habad's Messianic passions will provoke a schism in Judaism or lead to mass disillusionment, driving believers from the fold. Says...
PRETEND YOU'RE an observant Jew at Harvard. After years of being an undergraduate prisoner to Charlie Tuna, limited to a meager malnutritional diet of Star--Kist and cheese--despite paying full board costs--Mike Berry, head of Dining Services/Mealtime Messiah has taken the first steps to setting you free. You can now be carefree and consume such kosher cuisine as a knish from the Dunster kosher table. For the first time you can be fully integrated into the dining hall scene...
...seems we've found the real McCoy. There's no reason to believe Berry will revert to S.K. the same way Shabbetai Zvi converted to Islam. The Messiah has arrived and even the most ortodox of campus Jews can Join the celebration...