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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lazarus_Long who wrote (73048)	11/13/2000 4:38:02 PM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

1.There is a form of excommunication available in Judaism. However, absent a central authority, it may not be universally recognized. Lieberman was, in fact, excommunicated by a rabbinical group in Brooklyn. 2. Some were, some weren't. 3. Support of partial birth abortions, primarily. 4. Suffice it to say that there are quite a few Democrats actively hostile to traditional morality, although not all, certainly.......

To: Lazarus_Long who wrote (73048)	11/13/2000 4:47:07 PM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 769670

From Jewish Law Modern rabbinical courts can and do excommunicate. Indeed, excommunication and its lesser cousin, shunning, remain valid expressions of religious will within the Jewish community to this very day, and they are used to express communal disdain for a person's actions28. Three different issues must be addressed, each of which is central to the question of why and how Jewish law exclude people from its religious sub-community: The functioning of the power to exclude in Jewish law; The balance developed in Jewish law between the right to form a community of like minded people and the right of those who wish to deviate from the practice of society; and finally The insistence of American and Canadian constitutional law that civil and criminal authority not be given to insular religious groups to be used by those groups to control its members and prevent religious deviation -- and how Jewish law responds to that directive. The Talmud discusses the legal rules related to shunning in some detail29; as time passed the legal rules have grown in detail and purpose30. One over-arching theme emerges from a review of the legal discussion: unlike the many forms of punishment found in classical Jewish law, the purpose of the exclusion process was to deter future violations of Jewish law -- primarily by other members of society, but also by the excluded person. Punishment and retribution as aims were not thought to be part of the process, as they were in classical Jewish criminal law31. Any analysis of the rules relating to excluding people from the Jewish community, immediately draws one to two major issues constantly raised in the Jewish law discussion of shunning. These two issues demonstrate the purpose of exclusion: May one shun or excommunicate a person when the shunning process might (or will) drive this person completely away from the religious community or religious observance?32; and May one shun or exclude the relatives of a person in order to encourage the person to cease his or her activities? These two questions are central to the seminal issue of this paper: what is the purpose of excluding people from the community? The problem of excluding people from the community when they will abandon religious observance in response to such treatment is part of a very important discussion as to whom Jewish law is seeking to deter through the process of excommunication. Is it the person who is flaunting community standards, or is it the community at large that will witness the person's exile from the community, and thus be deterred? If it is the former, then one does not shun a person who will abandon the faith when shunned; if it is the latter, then that factor is not relevant. Indeed, this discussion reflects the ultimate reality concerning all shunning cases: in modern times and democratic countries, the penalty of exclusion only works on the one being shunned if he or she desires the approbation of the faith that is excluding him. This fact itself reflects a profound historical change in the purpose of excluding people from the community. In other historical eras, it has been remarked that: "it is said that a person on whom an excommunication ban lies can be regarded as dead."33 Indeed, flogging was perceived as a more merciful punishment than excommunication in classical Jewish law34. In a closed and tightly knit community, surrounded by a generally hostile society, exclusion from the Jewish community was a very severe penalty. Due to its severity, many classical Jewish law authorities simply would not shun or excommunicate under any circumstances35. This has changed in post-emancipation times. As noted by a secular critic: Shunning and excommunication became so common in the later centuries that they no longer made any impression and lost their force [to the uncommitted]. They became the standard rabbinic reaction to all forms of deviation or non-conformity considered incompatible with or dangerous to Orthodoxy As such, they are sometimes imposed by extreme Orthodox authorities at the present day, but as neither the person afflicted nor the public at large regard them as bound by them, they have ceased to be a terror or have much effect36. Particularly in our modern society, a person who is shunned can simply leave the community and join a different community adhering to different religious principles37. Rabbi Moses Isserless, one of the codifiers of Jewish law, writing in his glosses on Shulchan Aruch38, resolves the issue of the purpose of exclusion by stating: We excommunicate or shun a person who is supposed to be excommunicated or shunned, even if we fear that because of this, he will bring himself to other evils [such as leaving the faith]. The rationale for this is explained clearly by later authorities. The purpose of the shunning or excommunication is to serve notice to the members of the community that this conduct is unacceptable, and also, secondarily, to encourage the violator to return to the community. In a situation where these two goals cannot both be accomplished, the first takes priority over the second39. This is true even in situations where there is a reasonable possibility that the person will leave the Jewish faith completely and simply abandon any connection with the community to avoid the pressures imposed on him. The shunning and excommunication can be said to have accomplished its goals in such a situation -- even if the shunned person continues in the path of defiance and leaves the faith community40. Not unexpectedly, the vast majority of civil suits related to excommunication involved people who have left the faith community in response to their exclusion41. jlaw.com