America’s Most Popular Rabbi Angela Buchdahl is NOT The Enemy! Jonah Platt Reacts to the Controversy

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Shalom.

Today I'm gonna throw the old Rebbe kippah on and begin with a little bit of Torah!

Let's see if we can learn something about ourselves in 2025 by looking at ourselves

thousands of years ago, shall we?

Three famous Bible stories.

First, the Tower of Babel.

When humankind united by a single language arrogantly,

tries to build a tower to heaven.

God confuses their speech, creating many languages and

scattering them across the world.

When the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah become consumed by wickedness, God

destroys them with fire and ba brimstone.

Yikes.

God sounds like a lot.

Tell you a joke.

And last while Moses communes with God atop Mount Sinai, the Israelites

grow fearful and impatient, and in a frenzy of revelry and idolatry,

abandon their covenant to worship a golden calf leading Moses to shatter

the 10 Commandments in fury, burn the Idol and the Israelites face God's

devastating judgment for their betrayal.

Three stories each.

An example of collective moral failure.

Where humans, whether out of hubris, self-indulgence, cruelty, or fear succumb

to their lowest, most animalistic, most despicable instincts on mosque,

despite knowing full well that what they're doing is wrong, why does

the Torah include these stories?

Obviously, as a warning, don't be like these weak and fallible

human beings, but also as a mirror.

We are these weak and fallible human beings, and at one point or another

we will be overtaken by emotions that lead us to abandoned moral

vigilance in favor of mob mentality that unleashes the very worst

elements of our nature upon the world.

Unfortunately, we see this in decency and immorality every day as our

society has normalized the expression of some of these abhorrent habits.

We've got our own Tower of Babel, and it's called social media.

A unifying language that provides every opportunity for frenzied cruelty

to flourish like a virus, if not kept in check for Jews and non-Jews alike.

One such appalling eruption of gross misconduct occurred this past week when

Rabbi Angela Buck dah of New York Central Synagogue, who appeared recently on

this show for a wonderful conversation.

Declined to add her name to a letter entitled A Rabbinic Call to Action

Defending the Jewish Future, which calls out likely New York City Mayor Zoran

Momani as contributing to quote a culture that treats Jewish self-determination

as a negotiable, ideal, or Jewish inclusion as something to be granted.

End quote, rabbi Buck Doll's decision not to sign.

The letter is neither the focus of my ire nor this monologue.

I frankly don't care much whether this rabbi, my rabbi, or anybody does or does

not sign a public letter about this or anything else though, if you do care,

that is certainly your prerogative, and I understand why and where that comes from.

I know these kinds of letters are in vogue today.

I've signed some myself, not signed others.

It's just not something I feel accomplishes all that much, nor warns that

much conversation, and thus, I digress.

What I wanna talk about is the reaction to Rabbi Buck Doll's decision online.

Certain members of the Jewish community have taken a no holds Bard approach

to drag, denounce and disparage the rabbi in ways I had not thought

possible in polite society, and certainly not in polite Jewish society.

The shocking displays of indecency I have witnessed.

Fall into an all too common modern day behavior whereby the moment, the instant,

a public figure we already do not like for political or identity-based reasons,

does something publicly that offends those political or identity-based sensibilities.

We use that alleged misstep as an excuse to unleash all the disgusting

concealed identity-based hatred we have for this person under the

guise of righteous indignation.

This is as I have categorized such actions before on this

show, a total bullshit behavior.

Now before I curse again and there's gonna be some cursing.

So if you don't like that, go ahead and skip.

Allow me to remove my Rebi kipa and replace it with the backwards hat of

a tell it like it is street tough.

What I have seen online, and I get this all the time personally in my

dms, is not ideological disagreement.

Despite the vehement, protestations to the contrary, disagreement and

disparagement are two different things.

No public figure of integrity has any issue with respectful disagreement

that might look like, Hey, I personally find your argument on this topic.

To be off the mark.

Here is my empirically based counter argument.

I wonder what you think of it.

Thank you for your time.

That's how you disagree.

Hey, idiot.

You're irrational.

You're a fool.

This is dumb.

You've been brainwashed.

Personal insult, personal insult.

Personal insult is not a disagreement.

That's just being a dick, and when the shit being said has actually nothing

to do with the topic being addressed, but is instead a free for all of.

In the case of Rabbi Buck, dah, anti-woman, anti-Asian, anti-liberal,

anti-reform Jew hate, you're not just being a dick, you're being a bigot.

Watching some of these videos online, and God forbid reading the comments

has been like attending a white Christian nationalist rally in reverse.

She's not a real rabbi.

Democrats are not real Jews.

Surprised she's not wearing a kafi.

How did she even get in?

She's plotting a left wing political attack.

She can't be trusted.

Progressive Jews are the enemy.

Reform convert.

Rabbi, what did you expect?

Women, rabbi, there's your answer.

Stop attending Reform shuls.

She needs to uncon convert.

She's a capo on the bema.

She's a wacko.

She's not a real Jew.

Those are the comments from a single post.

Let's keep going.

Here are the comments from just one other post.

Why can't it be consensus that women can't be rabbis and anyone who claims

they can has never studied Torah?

I thought she was Chinese.

Atheist Reform will let a pagan be their rabbi.

They don't care.

Did she ever really have a Jewish soul?

The reform movement is disgraceful.

I don't know who she is, but she's irritating and I don't like her.

I don't know any Jews who support this phony, sham, rabbi.

Another video disparaging the Rabbi was a clip of her speaking to young

trans Jews who might be feeling quote, frightened and alone saying

she supports, loves and values them, and they're created in God's image.

This clip was reposted under the heading of the Rabbi being political.

If the comments on that one include, she is a jihadist, shut up and sit down.

You are an abomination.

Your eyes are brown.

You are full of shit.

Not a Jew, not a rabbi.

Honey.

No, this isn't Judaism.

Do not attach yourself to thousands of years of scripture.

You cannot understand LOLA self-declared rabbi.

Leave it to the reform movement to allow this type of infiltration.

This woman is not Jewish.

People are even giving the Rabbi shit for being on a book tour in

support of her new memoir, as if rabbis making media appearances in

support of the books they have written is somehow unusual or unseemly.

I can tell you from my email inbox that every Rabbi on the planet wants

to make media appearances in support of the books they have written.

Folks also accused Rabbi Bal of being a momani supporter.

Despite her literally never saying a word in support of him, and

consistently espousing deep love for Israel and Zionism as a core tenet

of her rabbinate for its duration.

So we know the accusations here are flatly, disingenuous, and just an excuse

to let the inner asshole flag fly.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that.

None of these comments actually say anything about Rabbi Buck Dahl herself.

What they do reveal is the hateful nature of a frenzied mob of arrogant, bigoted

Jews foaming at the mouth in their excitement to tear down women, non-whites,

liberals and non-Orthodox Jews.

Fears about safety or assimilation or the Jewish future are

legitimate concerns we all share.

Expressing those fears as abject bigoted hate in the public square is not

legitimate, and certainly not something we share for anybody to talk about.

Anybody this way is disgusting.

For Jews to talk about anybody this way is especially disgusting for

Jews to talk about another Jew.

This way is even more disgusting for Jews to talk this way about a rabbi.

A spiritual Jewish leader is beyond disgusting for Jews to talk this way

about Rabbi Angela Bal, a rabbi who has blazed a trail as both the first Asian

American cantor and had rabbi of a major congregation and did so as a woman in

a male dominated field is revolting for Jews to talk this way about the

Rabbi, who through online streaming and TV has more Jews attend her services

than any other rabbi on planet earth.

Who has created a safe and inclusive home for literally 1 million plus

Jews who might otherwise be unengaged is nothing short of a disgrace and

a blight upon the Jewish people.

What kind of oblivious asshole do you have to be to talk trash

about a Jew who has devoted her life to the benefit of our people?

While you what Troll rabbis on the internet, do you

see how ridiculous that is?

Here comes a hard fact that's gonna get me into trouble, but I call it like I

see it, and this is what I'm seeing.

The fact is that I only see this kind of racist, misogynistic, anti

Jew hate spewing forth from the Jews on the right, and I don't say this

with any political agenda or because I subscribe to any particular side.

This is an observation based entirely on hard evidence and my own experience.

I've talked about it on this show and online before, the worst hatred I get

on social media, the rudest comments and the roughest treatment is from

fellow Jews on the political right, Jews who prey at the golden calf of Donald

Trump, who I have credited on numerous occasions for his accomplishments in

the Middle East and fighting anti Jew hate at home, and whom I have also

disparaged on numerous occasions for his flouting of decency and democratic norms.

Just because in Trump world it is acceptable to rip people to

shreds based on their identity.

Does not mean it's acceptable for decent folk to participate

in this kind of public flogging.

And come on, we are Jews.

We're supposed to be better than this.

We're humans.

So we're not, but damnit, we're supposed to be.

And lest you put words into my mouth, no, I am not saying All righty.

Jews are bigots.

Just like I wouldn't say all lefty Jews are terrorist supporters.

I could care less where you fall politically, as long

as you're kind about it.

But the fact remains that most Jewish bigots are on the right and most Jewish

terrorist sympathizers are on the left.

A rbis isn't a square, but a square is a rhombus.

What really gets my goat is the hypocrisy of these people, Jews who claim to

understand Torah, flouting a dozen of its laws and teachings in their sprint to

tell other Jews how non-Jewish they are.

Which Jewish value is that?

Hmm.

We're all made in God's image.

Nope.

Embarrassing someone publicly is like killing them.

Love the stranger.

Learn from the mistakes of Babel Sodom in the golden cath.

Nope, nope, nope.

Wrong or misguided.

Ideas I can handle.

We should all be able to handle being an absolute dickhead for no

good reason that I can't abide.

When I see people treating other people like garbage, I remind myself that

the root cause is almost always fear.

In the words of one of our greatest sages, fear is the path to the dark side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering.

Daba, master Yoda, very wise, you are.

I think, as I have said before, in our relatively safe and

comfortable world, fear is a terrible motivator for personal action.

Unless we are talking about a literal life and death situation in which your

nervous system requires a fear response in order to remove you from an acute

moment of physical danger, allowing fear into the driver's seat is almost

certain to speed you into some kind of regrettable collision, especially when

it's a vague ill-defined sense of fear.

The shape of fear, if you will, which is what so many American

Jews are experiencing today.

Jews are afraid for their general safety, for their ability to move through society

without harassment for our future.

I get it.

We have been attacked and traumatized and continue to be attacked and

traumatized over and over again.

The data is real.

The hate crimes are real.

The concerns are real.

I also understand the fear of assimilation.

We are shrinking.

We are losing people.

The data is real.

The concerns are real.

However, none of that is an excuse to be controlled by fear, the

extreme end of which is becoming that which we fear the most.

According to a 2020 Pew research study Reform, Jews make up the single largest

group of engaged Jews in America at 37%.

If the worry is the preservation of Jewish life.

Does anyone honestly think telling the single largest group of

American Jews that they're not Jewish enough to be in our club?

The answer when our numbers are declining and non-traditional Jews

show up, who actually want to be here?

What kind of dip shit strategy is it to shame, blame and exclude

those people from our community who wants to be in that kind of family?

That's a self-fulfilling prophecy right there.

We need all kinds of Jews in this society.

If we were all harim, we'd have very few Jews integrated in

this country's halls of power.

We need less observant Jews to be our politicians, our sports team owners, our

studio heads, our hospital directors, our lobbyists, et cetera, et cetera.

If we're all home doing Torah study, who's gonna be out there getting

their hands dirty and building the relationships we need in the modern world?

Likewise, we need the Orthodox community to preserve the sanctity of

our people, to maintain our laws and traditions to their highest order to

serve as an example for the rest of us to strive for and to use their voice

and influence and resources as well.

It takes all of us.

There is no one way to be Jewish.

It's a shame that so many Jews themselves seem intent on refusing

to recognize that a house divided against itself cannot stand.

We are surrounded by enemies in all kinds of ways, and yet there are Jews

out here burning their time and energy cannibalizing other well-meaning

members of our own community in public.

There is a difference between disagreement and disparagement

between accountability and shaming.

The former leave room for discourse and growth, the latter are

self-defeating, non-Jewish, indecent, and make you look like an asshole.

Be vocal, be assertive.

Be skeptical.

Just be a racist, sexist, elitist dick about it.

Arrogance, wickedness, mob mentality, and idolatry all still exist today as they did in biblical times.

Only, now we've had millennia to study the playbook on how to avoid them.

We have the answers.

Whether you choose to embody the highest ideals of that playbook or weaponize it

to tear down your own people is up to you.

Being a real Jew is not about your politics or observance level.

Being a real Jew is just about not being a dick.

This is the 46th episode of being Jewish with me, Jonah Platt.