{"id":68,"date":"2010-08-23T15:39:32","date_gmt":"2010-08-23T15:39:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/rabbishmuleyunleashed\/2010\/08\/extravagant-weddings-and-bar-mitzvahs-humiliate-the-jewish-community.html"},"modified":"2010-08-23T15:39:32","modified_gmt":"2010-08-23T15:39:32","slug":"extravagant-weddings-and-bar-mitzvahs-humiliate-the-jewish-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/rabbishmuleyunleashed\/2010\/08\/extravagant-weddings-and-bar-mitzvahs-humiliate-the-jewish-community.htm","title":{"rendered":"Extravagant Weddings and Bar Mitzvahs Humiliate the Jewish Community"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

How embarrassing.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Last Sunday the LA Times ran an article about extravagant Jewish Iranian weddings in California that exposes our community as a bunch of shallow, boastful, materialists who think the purpose of a marriage ceremony is to tell your friends how much money you have. Some of the details quote in the article, confirmed to me by people who actually attended, included a bride placed in a glass coffin to be opened by her half-masked ‘Phantom of the Opera’ bridegroom. The coffin did not open for an hour and the wedding was nearly ruined by a shaken and tearful bride gasping for breath. But the coffin, on that occasion, was a telling symbol of the utter death of Jewish values that such ridiculous extravagances betray.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n


<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n


\n<\/p>\n


\n<\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The article further cites the regularity of film crews at these
\nweddings consisting of five or more cameramen with ‘a 25-foot crane over the
\ndance floor.’ In television this is called a jib, and to give you an idea of
\nhow expensive they are I can tell you that through the first season of ‘Shalom
\nin the Home’s’ multi-million dollar budget, we couldn’t afford one.<\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Strangely enough, the article then quotes a Rabbi from Sinai Temple in
\nLos Angeles, with thousands of Iranian Jewish members, who ‘makes a point of
\nnot judging — and even sees virtue in the enormous family gatherings.’<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Give me a break. I there really a point to Rabbinic leadership if it
\ndoes not come with value judgments? Do we in the Jewish community not –
\nrightly, I might add – lecture our Muslim brothers and sisters that they must o
\nweed out violent extremists lest their religion be brought into utter
\ndisrepute? And while murder in the name of G-d is much more serious than
\nshopping in the name of excessiveness, there can be no question that keeping up
\nwith the Schwartz’s has become a cancer that threatens to kill off the
\nflickering Jewish soul. How ironic that a people who have for centuries
\nsurvived forced baptisms are now drowning in an ocean of profligacy.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

American Jews often exhibit the worst tendencies of immigrant
\ncommunities, endeavoring their best to show how they not just landed but
\narrived. Security is defined not in terms of spiritual virtue and nobility of
\npurpose but stocks and bonds and money in the bank. And what’s the point of
\nhaving it your friends are ignorant of your success? The whole reason you made
\nthe money in the first place was to show off. So go ahead. Smoke ’em if you got
\n’em. And what better opportunity then at the public celebrations of a Bar of
\nBat Mitzvah or wedding where, at no extra cost, you can utterly vulgarize the
\nspirituality of the occasion by transforming it into a showcase of material
\nconsumption and excess.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I remember growing up in Miami Beach and the over-the-top, utterly
\nridiculous Bar Mitzvahs that were de rigueur. One in the late ’70’s featured
\nDarth Vader and R2D2 greetings guests as they arrived at the reception. To be
\nsure, it was memorable seeing C3PO in a tails and Chewbacca’s beard
\ncomplimented with a Hassidic hat, but one wondered, apart from its celestial
\nsetting, Star Wars had with the spirituality of the moment. On another occasion
\nI arrived to see a full ice sculpture of the Bar Mitzvah boy, which perfectly
\nsuited the freezing cold religious aspect.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

A wealthy Jewish businessman shared a story with me of how he instills
\nvalues in his children. His twelve-year-old son had come to him and said, “Dad,
\nI want a famous sports star at my Bar Mitzvah. Let’s get Eli Manning.” So the
\nfather replied, “Son, you have to have manners.  You don’t tell<\/i>
\nyour father to get Eli Manning. You ask him politely<\/i>.” Apparently it
\nnever dawned on the dad that his son had aped his own shallow materialism and
\nhad, already at 12, become an insecure braggart.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

A remedy is needed. Rabbis should be thundering from the pulpit that
\nextravagant weddings are not only a betrayal of a sense of personal inadequacy,
\nbut are an abrogation of Jewish values. You’re so rich? Then impress your
\nfriends by giving the money to charity. Rather than focus on the twenty-piece
\norchestra for your son’s bar mitzvah, take him to twenty classes where he can
\nlearn about the Abraham and Sara, Moses and Pharaoh, David and Goliath, and the
\nglory of Solomon’s Temple Give him an inner identity, based on values and
\ncharacter, rather than a shallow external identity based on money and objects.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

So why aren’t the Rabbis giving sermons about gross materialism which
\nwraps itself, in the memorable phrase of Matt Taibbi, like a ‘vampire squid,’
\naround the Jewish conscience? Because they are about as likely to criticize
\ntheir own congregants as Romeo is to renounce Juliet. But what’s the point of
\nbeing the head of a congregation if you’re not also the leader of a community?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The story goes that in Israel, a few decades ago, the Gerer Rebbe,
\nhead of one of the largest Hassidic sects and seeking to stop a destructive
\ngame of material one-upmanship, enacted an edict that none of his followers can
\nhave a wedding with more than 200 guests, still large by some measures. One of
\nhis wealthiest followers and supporters approached him and said, “Rebbe, surely
\nthis does not apply to me. I’m a very rich man,” to which the great Rabbi
\nresponded, “Very well, then. If you’re so rich, go buy yourself a new Rabbi.”<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Yes, some things in life can be put on a credit card. But rabbis who
\npreach values and can’t be bought? Priceless.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n


\n<\/font><\/p>\n

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How embarrassing.   Last Sunday the LA Times ran an article about extravagant Jewish Iranian weddings in California that exposes our community as a bunch of shallow, boastful, materialists who think the purpose of a marriage ceremony is to tell your friends how much money you have. 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