Rabbi David Wolpe Quits Harvard Anti-Semitism Committee, Calls School’s Ideology ‘Evil’
“the system at Harvard along with the ideology that grips far too many of the students and faculty, the ideology that works only along axes of oppression and places Jews as oppressors and therefore intrinsically evil, is itself evil”
The hits just keep coming for Harvard. A well-known rabbi named David Wolpe, who is a visiting scholar at the school, has just quit the school’s anti-Semitism committee, calling the school’s ideology ‘evil.’
Harvard’s image has been severely diminished over the last several weeks.
The New York Post reports:
Prominent rabbi quits Harvard antisemitism committee, brands college’s ideology ‘evil’
A prominent rabbi and visiting scholar at Harvard University quit the school’s antisemitism committee Thursday, writing on X that the college is helping to cast Jews are “oppressors.”
“The system at Harvard along with the ideology that grips far too many of the students and faculty, the ideology that works only along axes of oppression and places Jews as oppressors and therefore intrinsically evil, is itself evil,” David Wolpe wrote.
The exit came just days after Harvard President Claudine Gay’s controversial congressional testimony on the school’s handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict.
The visiting scholar at Harvard Divinity School praised Gay as a “kind and thoughtful” person, but said her congressional comments were “painfully inadequate” in addressing spiraling antisemitism on the Cambridge campus and elsewhere.
“Ignoring Jewish suffering is evil,” he wrote. “Belittling or denying the Jewish experience, including unspeakable atrocities, is a vast and continuing catastrophe.
Rabbi Wolpe’s tweets are below:
1/3 Resigning, a Hanukkah Message: As of today I have resigned from the antisemitism advisory committee at Harvard. Without rehashing all of the obvious reasons that have been endlessly adumbrated online, and with great respect for the members of the committee, the short…
— David Wolpe (@RabbiWolpe) December 7, 2023
Full text:
1/3 Resigning, a Hanukkah Message: As of today I have resigned from the antisemitism advisory committee at Harvard. Without rehashing all of the obvious reasons that have been endlessly adumbrated online, and with great respect for the members of the committee, the short explanation is that both events on campus and the painfully inadequate testimony reinforced the idea that I cannot make the sort of difference I had hoped. Still, there are several points worth making. I believe Claudine Gay to be both a kind and thoughtful person. Most of the students here wish only to get an education and a job, not prosecute ideological agendas, and there are many, many honorable, thoughtful and good people at the institution. Harvard is still a repository of extraordinary minds and important research.
2/3
However, the system at Harvard along with the ideology that grips far too many of the students and faculty, the ideology that works only along axes of oppression and places Jews as oppressors and therefore intrinsically evil, is itself evil. Ignoring Jewish suffering is…
— David Wolpe (@RabbiWolpe) December 7, 2023
Full text:
2/3 However, the system at Harvard along with the ideology that grips far too many of the students and faculty, the ideology that works only along axes of oppression and places Jews as oppressors and therefore intrinsically evil, is itself evil. Ignoring Jewish suffering is evil. Belittling or denying the Jewish experience, including unspeakable atrocities, is a vast and continuing catastrophe. Denying Israel the self-determination as a Jewish nation accorded unthinkingly to others is endemic, and evil.
3/3 Battling that combination of ideologies is the work of more than a committee or a single university. It is not going to be changed by hiring or firing a single person, or posting on X, or yelling at people who don’t post as you wish when you wish, as though posting is…
— David Wolpe (@RabbiWolpe) December 7, 2023
Full text:
3/3 Battling that combination of ideologies is the work of more than a committee or a single university. It is not going to be changed by hiring or firing a single person, or posting on X, or yelling at people who don’t post as you wish when you wish, as though posting is the summation of one’s moral character. This is the task of educating a generation, and also a vast unlearning. Part of the problem is a simple herd mentality – people screaming slogans whose meaning and implication they know nothing of, or not wishing to be disliked by taking an unpopular position. Some of it is the desire to achieve social status by being the sole or greatest victim. Some of it is simple, old fashioned Jew hatred, that ugly arrow in the quiver of dark hearts for millenia.
In this generation, outside of Israel, we are called to be Maccabees of a different order. We do not fight the actual battle but we search for the cruse of oil left behind. Remember the oil was to last one night, but lasted eight – which means there were seven nights of miracle. But of course the first night was the greatest miracle — because the motivation to light the initial candle, to ensure the continuity and vitality of tradition in each generation, that is the supreme miracle. Dispute but also create. Build the institutions you value, don’t merely attack those you denigrate. We are at a moment when the toxicity of intellectual slovenliness has been laid bare for all to see. Time to kindle the first candle. Create that miracle for us and all Israel — Blessing to you and Hag Urim Sameach.
Here’s a Hanukkah message from Wolpe:
The meaning of Hanukkah this year. pic.twitter.com/VnUz1TtSaC
— David Wolpe (@RabbiWolpe) December 7, 2023
Featured image via Twitter video.
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Comments
As a Christian, I say this man is to be highly respected. Blessings on you, Rabbi.
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Not to disparage the Rabbi’s intentions but has he exited Harvard completely or just this one committee? And the praise heaped on that race grifting hack Claudine Gay gives me pause.
I hope he stayed; acting from within and being fearlessly outspoken is far more effective than beating on the castle walls from the outside.
But he’s not acting from within. He resigned from the committee. If he’s still there, he’s working for Harvard, not against it.
Visiting scholars have terminating contracts that will run their course and not renew unless necessary. I don’t see the need for him to resign. Take a little more of Harvard’s money.
Not sure the nature of the employment is relevant. The Rabbi may have his reasons for not leaving now. I suspect though that. contrary to your view, money is not one of them.
Why not? He can donate it to a cause that will look to oust or at least oppose what he is against.
Either way, it’s not a big deal to resign the position because it ends soon.
Hey, hey…ho, ho! Claudine Gay has got to go!
(repeat 10x)
Is he still visiting? And, what’s the deal with his using “adumbrated?” I don’t think the good rabbi knows what the word means. It’s a dumb rated missive.
Perhaps he meant that the reasons have been endlessly referred to, and waved at with many hands, but never actually specified.
Nah, you’re right, he’s not using the word correctly. He’s at the very epicenter of the penultimate evil — perhaps even the antepenultimate! — and yet it seems as if he could care less. 🙂
Sorry. I have a problem here. Remember this:
First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
—
well, in the 12st century:
First they came for the christians
And I did not speak out
Because Christians are judgemental
Then they came for the men
And I did not speak out
Because I was not “that kind of man”
Then they came for the straight folks
And I did not speak out
Because gays have been so oppressed
Then they came for the white folks
And I did not speak out
Because white people are so mean
Then they came for the jews
And suddenly I care about the problem.
forgive me if I find his protestations of the idealization of an “ideology that works only along axes of oppression and places Jews as oppressors and therefore intrinsically evil, is itself evil”
guess what – none of the other groups are intrinsically evil either. It is only evil when it happens to you? too little too late.
Is it also evil to deny a country the determination to make itself a white, Christian nation?
Dennis Prager said that he would rather live in a “White Nationalist Christian Nation” then a secular Leftist one. This just reinforces that the Left wants to transform (destroy) the nation into an amoral (at best) socialist state. Spoiler alert: Lenin said communism was socialism in a hurry… speed not destinatioin.
Perhaps not, but it would be right to deny anyone the determination to make the USA into such a nation, which it was explicitly founded not to be.
Unfortunately as the few remaining moderate voices disassociate themselves from the toxic cesspools of intellectual thought that many colleges have become, they will be replaced with even more extreme woke progressive lefties. There will be no “course correction”. They will double down on stupid.
David Wolpe’s political views are decidedly on the left. But remarkably he has spoken out against rabbis talking politics from the pulpit, and injecting their own political views into their preaching. He’s for gun control, but not from the pulpit. He spoke at the Democrat convention, but wouldn’t repeat that speech in the temple, where it would offend some congregants to no good purpose.
Wolpe is by no means an innocent bystander. His academic-marxist ideology nurtured the evil we see happening on campuses nationwide. Oh, but he’s a Jew! Poor fellow! That horseshit finds no purchase here.
Note his denunciation of Harvard comes long after Progressive Frankenstein is rampant in Gotham..
It’s like not noticing how nazi’s hated Jews until blizzards of ash fell on villages near extermination camp crematoria.
He’s no victim, he’s a perpetrator.