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A new play tells the true story of a former Hasid who translated the New Testament into Yiddish
(New York Jewish Week) — The true story of a formerly Hasidic Baltimore man who encouraged Jews to convert to Christianity during the Holocaust serves as the unlikely jumping-off point for a new, Yiddish-language play beginning previews this week in Manhattan.
“The Gospel According to Chaim” is based on the life of missionary Chaim Einspruch, who was born into a Szanzer Hasidic family in Poland and “found” Christianity before immigrating to the United States in 1913. Einspruch eventually translated the New Testament into Yiddish and self-published it in 1941 after a Yiddish print shop turned down the job.
A production of the New Yiddish Rep, a New York-based theater company dedicated to Yiddish-language theater, “Gospel” is being billed as the first new, full-length Yiddish drama written in the United States in 70 years. According to David Mandelbaum, the company’s artistic director, the last original Yiddish drama in this country was written in the 1950s by famed Yiddish writer Leivick Halpern, author of the dramatic poem “The Golem.”
“The Gospel According to Chaim” is also the first full-length Yiddish play by Mikhl Yashinsky, a 33-year-old who has made a name for himself in New York as Yiddish writer, actor, teacher and translator.
Yashinsky stumbled upon Einspruch’s story in 2016 when he was a fellow at the National Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts. Fellows are required to conduct tours of the center and, as such, Yashinksy become familiar with the Yiddish printing type Einspruch’s widow donated to the institution, which is on display in a recreated but non-functional Yiddish print shop. Some of Einspruch’s printing type will be used as props in the play.
“It got me thinking about the irony inherent in this singular individual,” Yashinksky told the New York Jewish Week. “He was a Christian who believed in the divinity of Jesus but was also a very proud Jew culturally. It made me want to look further into this person.”
Yashinsky wrote the first act of “Gospel” while he was in Amherst, naming one of the characters in the play Sadie after a colleague there. He completed the play in 2020 in Charleston, South Carolina, where he lived for a time during the pandemic before returning to New York more than a year ago.
Chaim Einspruch’s Yiddish translation of the New Testament. (Jon Kalish)
In the 1940s, Chaim “Henry” Einspruch drew the ire of Baltimore Jews by standing outside Orthodox synagogues and preaching about Christianity in Yiddish to Jews leaving Shabbat services. In addition to his translation of the New Testament, Einspruch also translated 100 Christian hymns into Yiddish in a collection titled “Hymns of Faith (Lider fun gloybn).”
Many Jews view efforts to encourage Jews to embrace Christianity as offensive and even antisemitic, with Jews for Jesus and other contemporary Messianic movements drawing particular scorn. But Yashinsky said he felt none of that as he sought to bring Einspruch to life.
“I wasn’t interested in just portraying him as a villain and having the play be a piece of propaganda against missionaries,” Yashinsky told the New York Jewish Week about his inspiration. “I really tried to understand why he was doing it. I don’t think Einspruch felt he was being malevolent in anything he did.”
Fascinatingly, Einspruch never formally converted to Christianity, “deeming his allegiance to evangelical Lutheranism a true fulfillment of his Judaism rather than apostasy or betrayal,” writes Naomi Seidman, a humanities professor at the University of Toronto whose scholarly article on translations of the New Testament into Yiddish was published in the Berkeley Journal of Religion and Theology. After Einspruch immigrated to the United States he earned a doctor of divinity degree at Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania. (Seidman will deliver a lecture on Thursday at YIVO, “A Very Jewish Christmas: When Jesus Spoke Yiddish,” discussing Einspruch’s New Testament translation, among others.)
“His native language was Yiddish and he enjoyed Yiddish literature,” Yashinsky said of Einspruch. “His innovation was writing this [New Testament translation] in a truly refined, literary, poetic, idiomatic Yiddish. It reads beautifully.”
Indeed, as Einspruch declares in one scene of the play — which takes place during Hanukkah and Christmas in 1940 and continues into 1941: “The holy Yiddish language is very precious to me.”
Yashinsky plays Einspruch in the production but that was not his original intent. A would-be actor who grew up as a Lubavitcher Hasid was in rehearsals to play Einspruch in a reading done last March but wasn’t up to the task, Yashinsky said. So the playwright decided to take the part himself. “The role felt good to me,” he said.
The other two characters in the play are Gabe, a printer Einspruch approaches to print the Yiddish New Testament, and Sadie, a friend of the printer and an anti-fascist activist alerting Jews to the atrocities happening in the Holocaust in Europe. During the course of the play, Sadie, whose father converted to Christianity, urges Gabe to turn down the New Testament job; Gabe, meanwhile, needs the business but is reflexively repulsed by the idea of Jews converting to Christianity.
The role of Gabe the printer will be shared by actors Sruli Rosenberg and Joshua Horowitz. Rosenberg, 30, grew up as a Satmar Hasid in Williamsburg and now lives in Monsey, a different Hasidic community upstate. He describes himself as “reformed hasidische” and said most of the time he doesn’t he doesn’t wear a kippah but he continues to observe Shabbat — meaning that Horowitz will play the printer then.
In an effort to master the English language, Rosenberg stopped reading and writing Yiddish as a teenager. He had little contact with the Yiddish arts revival until the Spring of 2021 when he attended Generation J, a Yiddish arts program in Germany, thinking he may want to become a writer. While he was there, Rosenberg was baffled when other participants informed him of the Yiddish theater scene in New York. “I’m, like, ‘No there isn’t. I would’ve known of it,’” he recalled.
Inspired, Rosenberg returned to New York and got a job as the assistant to New Yiddish Rep’s Mandelbaum, helping him move sets around the office and driving him around town. When Rosenberg was feeding lines to actors auditioning for “The Gospel According to Chaim,” Yashinsky asked him why he didn’t audition himself. Now, Rosenberg makes his professional acting debut in the play.
Sadie, a fiery antifacist organizer is played by Melissa Weisz, 40. In the play, on Christmas Day, she asks Einspruch: “And what are you going to give him as a gift, your messiah, huh? It’s his birthday, after all. Maybe a barrel of Jewish blood? A fitting gift. Maybe the extermination of another shtetl of Jews in Europe? His followers have been giving him such gifts for thousands of years, and it seems he never gets tired of it.”
Weisz, too, grew up as a Satmar Hasid in Borough Park and made her acting debut in 2010 playing Juliet in the feature film “Romeo and Juliet in Yiddish,” which set the Shakespearean tale in Hasidic Brooklyn. She also had one of the leads in a New Yiddish Rep production of “God of Vengeance,” the Sholem Asch play about lesbian love.
“These two characters come from very different places but they’re both trying to figure out how to save people,” she said of the link between protagonists Sadie and Chaim.
Yashinsky said he sees a wide audience for the show, despite its niche topic and language.
“Many will come who are attracted to Yiddish and to the various dramas and emotions and curious personalities that are part of its tumultuous 20th-century history,” he said. “But I hope anyone also comes who may have ever wondered about the entanglements of opposing religions, the holiday wars in America, the confluence of ethnicity and faith and identity and human ambition.”
The recent Yiddish-language version of “Fiddler on the Roof,” which had a revival last year after an initial run interrupted by the pandemic, introduced audiences to “supertitles” — English-language translations that are projected behind the actors. But Yashinsky said even people who do not know Yiddish will benefit from hearing it on stage.
“The language should not hold anyone back,” he said. “On the contrary, I hope it draws them in.”
A bigger question is whether native Yiddish speakers in the city are likely to see the show. Rosenberg acknowledged that his Hasidic mother was not crazy about his career path. “Isn’t that the universal quarrel that parents have with their children going into the arts?” he said. “She definitely did not take well to it. She doesn’t get it. I don’t blame her.”
And new Yiddish Rep’s Mandelbaum chuckled when asked whether there might be chartered buses bringing theatergoers from Borough Park to see the play. But he does think that Yiddish plays can appeal to the Hasidic Orthodox community, as well as a more secular one: During the 2019 Folksbiene production of Leon Kobrin’s classic Yiddish comedy “Di Next-Door’ike (The Lady Next Door),” Mandelbaum said there were shows filled with young Hasidic Jews who had played hooky from their yeshivas.
Well aware of the Yiddish music revival that’s going strong in New York and abroad, Mandelbaum concedes that Yiddish theater has not enjoyed that same kind of renaissance.
“If Yiddish theater is to really have a life, then it is essential that there be people who are going to write Yiddish plays,” he said during a rehearsal break. “Yiddish theater ought to be more than re-staging things from the past. We need to have young Yiddish writers writing plays.”
Then he declared, “May there be many Yashinskys.”
“The Gospel According to Chaim (Di psure loyt khaim)” is performed in Yiddish with English supertitles. Previews begin on Thursday, Dec. 21; the world premiere is on Sunday Dec. 24 at 7:30 p.m. There will be a total of 21 performances through Sunday Jan. 7 at Theater for the New City (155 First Ave.).
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The post A new play tells the true story of a former Hasid who translated the New Testament into Yiddish appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees
US Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaking at a press conference about the United States restricting weapons for Israel, at the US Capitol, Washington, DC. Photo: Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Six US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas this week requesting that he increase security measures along the northern border in response to Canada accepting an influx of refugees from Gaza, the Palestinian enclave ruled by the terrorist group Hamas.
The six Republican lawmakers — Sens. Marco Rubio (FL), Ted Cruz (TX), Joni Ernst (IA), Tom Cotton (AK), Mike Braun (IN), and Josh Hawley (MO) — said they were “deeply concerned” that refugees from Gaza could sneak into the United States. The senators warned that allowing unvetted Palestinian refugees to cross the border poses a serious national security threat.
“On May 27, 2024, the Government of Canada announced its intent to increase the number of Gazans who will be allowed into their country under temporary special measures,” the senators wrote. “We are deeply concerned and request heightened scrutiny by the US Department of Homeland Security should any of them attempt to enter the United States at ports of entry as well as between ports of entry.”
After arriving in Canada, the Palestinian refugees will be given a “Refugee Travel Document,” which serves as a valid form of identification, the letter claimed, adding that US Citizenship and Immigration Services recognizes these documents as a valid substitute for a passport. The senators warned that “individuals with ties to terrorist groups” could potentially enter into the United States.
The letter argued that the US should maintain “common-sense terrorist screening and vetting” for any individual attempting to enter its borders from a foreign country. The lawmakers lamented that the Biden administration’s “”ax border enforcement” has rendered the country vulnerable to potential terrorist attacks. From April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024, the US Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Field Operations intercepted over 233 suspected terrorists at the northern border, according to the letter.
“[T]he possibility of terrorists crossing the US-Canada border is deeply concerning given the deep penetration of Gazan society by Hamas,” the senators wrote. “It would be irresponsible for the US to not take necessary heightened precautions when foreigners attempt to enter the United States.”
On Oct. 7, Hamas launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its Oct. 7 invasion of and massacre of 1,200 people across southern Israel. The Palestinian terrorist group also kidnapped over 250 hostages.
In response, Israel launched defensive military operations in Gaza with the aim of freeing the hostages and permanently dislodging Hamas from the neighboring enclave.
The vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza, as well as the West Bank, still support Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel that started the ongoing war, and they would prefer a “day after” scenario in which Hamas remains in control of Gaza rather than the Palestinian Authority, which governs in the West Bank, or other Arab countries, according to recent Palestinian polling. The same polling found that, when asked about support for Palestinian political parties and movements, a plurality chose Hamas.
US lawmakers are split along party lines as to whether the United States should accept refugees from Gaza. Republicans are largely opposed to importing refugees from Gaza, arguing that individuals from the war-torn enclave present “a national security risk” to the United States.” In May, Ernst and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) sent US President Joe Biden a letter, urging him not to accept any refugees from Gaza.
In June, however, a group of 70 Democratic lawmakers sent Mayorkas a letter, requesting he create “pathways” for more refugees of the Israel-Hamas war to resettle in America.
The post US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin
Screenshot of a widely circulated video published on social media showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel. According to reports, the video appears to be fake and of Russian origin.
A widely circulated video published on social media this week showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel appears to be fake and of Russian origin, according to reports.
The video — published on Tuesday on social media networks including X/Twitter and Telegram — featured a keffiyeh-clad man with his face covered, delivering an Arabic-language address threatening France with violence due to the country’s alleged support for Israel amid its ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza.
Addressing “the people of France” and “French President [Emmanuel] Macron,” the masked individual said, “You supported the Zionist regime in its criminal war against the people of Palestine. You provided Zionists with weapons; you helped murder our brothers and sisters, our children.”
“You invited the Zionists to the Olympic games. You will pay for what you have done!” continued the man, who wore a shirt adorned with a Palestinian flag. “Rivers of blood will flow through the streets of Paris. This day is approaching, God willing. Allah is the greatest.”
The video, published on X/Twitter by the account @endzionism24 and retweeted by Palestinian activist Ihab Hassan, ended with the speaker holding a prop severed head complete with fake blood up for the camera.
He is not a Palestinian:
A video clip has surfaced showing an individual wearing a keffiyeh and a Palestinian flag badge, threatening France with a “river of blood” at the Olympic Games.
It is glaringly obvious to any Arabic speaker that this person is not Arab; his dialect… pic.twitter.com/rwWGkkbiAi
— Ihab Hassan (@IhabHassane) July 23, 2024
Hassan and other social media users immediately noted that the man speaking was clearly not a native Arabic speaker, citing his reasonably fluent but awkward and occasionally incorrect pronunciation.
Many social media users aware of the mispronunciations seemed to blame Israel for the video, implying the clip was a false flag meant to fearmonger and demonize Palestinians and Muslims. They did not address the fact that Israel has access to hundreds of thousands of native Palestinian Arabic speakers who would sound far more convincing than the man in the video.
On Wednesday, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said that “French secret services and their partners have not been able to authenticate the veracity of this video.”
According to researchers at Microsoft, however, the video appears to be part of a Russian-linked disinformation campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics, which began with the opening ceremony on Friday.
The researchers from Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center told NBC News that the clip appears to have come from a Russian disinformation group known as Storm-1516, an outgrowth of Russia’s Internet Research Agency.
The latest clip was linked to a similar disinformation video falsely alleging that Ukraine had sent arms to Hamas — a claim for which there is no evidence. According to the researchers, the more recent video appears to be part of a Russian scare campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics.
The video came just days before France’s rail infrastructure was hit on Friday, ahead of the start of the Olympics, with widespread acts of vandalism including arson attacks, paralyzing travel to Paris from the rest of France and Europe just hours before the opening ceremony of the Olympics. French authorities described the acts as “criminal” and “malicious.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said that the sabotage of France’s high-speed rail network was directed by Iran, which Western intelligence agencies have for years labeled as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
“The sabotage of railway infrastructure across France ahead of the Olympics was planned and executed under the influence of Iran’s axis of evil and radical Islam,” Katz wrote on X/Twitter. “As I warned my French counterpart [Stéphane Séjourné] this week, based on information held by Israel, Iranians are planning terrorist attacks against the Israeli delegation and all Olympic participants. Increased preventive measures must be taken to thwart their plot. The free world must stop Iran now — before it’s too late.”
Katz was referring to a letter he sent on Thursday to Séjourné raising alarm bells about what he described as a plan by Iran to attack Israel’s Olympic delegation.
Darmanin and French National Police both announced previously that they are taking increased security measures to ensure the safety of Israel’s Olympic delegation while they are in Paris amid mounting threats. These measures include providing them with round the clock security from French police. The Israeli delegation will also receive additional security details from Israel’s Shin Bet security agency during the Olympics.
The post Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’
US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) raises her fist as US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) addresses a pro-Hamas demonstration in Washington, DC. Photo: Reuters/Allison Bailey
The editorial board of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the largest daily newspaper in Missouri, has endorsed the opponent of US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), pointing to the incumbent congresswoman’s lack of legislative accomplishments and stance on the Israel-Hamas war.
The Post-Dispatch argued that Bush’s position on Israel and the Gaza war should be “disqualifying” for any elected representative. The outlet took umbrage with Bush for equating a close democratic ally of the US with a genocidal terrorist organization.
“Israel’s conduct of the war has been far from perfect, but it remains a democracy fighting for survival against an evil terrorist organization. Bush’s tendency to equate both sides — and even to side with the terrorists, as when she cast one of just two House votes against a resolution to bar Hamas members from the US — should in itself be disqualifying for re-election,” the editorial board wrote.
Bush has established herself as one of the most vocal critics of Israel in the US Congress. Only nine days after Hamas’ Oct. 7 slaughter of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel, Bush called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group. As the war dragged on, Bush’s rhetoric toward Israel sharpened, with the congresswoman accusing the Jewish state of committing “genocide” in Gaza and “apartheid” in the West Bank. Bush has also accused Israel of inflicting a “famine” in Gaza without providing evidence.
Bush seems more interested in pandering to the far-left fringes of the progressive movement than serving her constituents, the Post-Dispatch argued. Bush’s membership in “The Squad” — a clique of far-left progressive, anti-establishment lawmakers in the House of Representatives — has rendered her completely incapable of “accomplishing anything” in the halls of Congress, according to the newspaper.
The editorial board urged its readers to vote for Wesley Bell, pointing to his moderated approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an example of his pragmatism and moral clarity.
“On Israel, Bell offers an appropriately measured stance, acknowledging the need to protect Gazan civilians and work toward a two-state solution, while supporting America’s closest ally in the Middle East,” the outlet wrote.
In contrast to Bush, Bell has expressed more sympathy to Israel’s military operations in Gaza, emphatically rejecting the notion that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute “genocide” or “ethnic cleansing.”
Moreover, Bell has strengthened his ties with the Jewish community over the course of his campaign. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the foremost pro-Israel lobbying group in the US, donated a reported $5 million to Bell’s campaign through its United Democracy Project super PAC. A group of 30 St. Louis-area rabbis penned a letter endorsing Bell, accusing Bush of a “lack of decency, disregard for history, and for intentionally fueling antisemitism and hatred.” Bell also brought about an official “director of Jewish outreach” to increase turnout among the Jewish community.
A poll commissioned by McLaughlin & Associates and sponsored by the CCA Action Fund, a pro-Bell super PAC, showed Bell with a commanding 56 percent to 33 percent lead over Bush.
Supporters of Israel see the primary race as a prime opportunity to oust another opponent of the Jewish state from the halls of Congress. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), a progressive lawmaker, lost his primary race to a pro-Israel challenger on June 25. Over the course of his reelection campaign, Bowman accused Israel of committing “genocide” and enacting “apartheid” against Palestinians. Bowman’s comments incensed Jewish constituents in the leafy suburbs of Westchester County, New York.
Furthermore, observers are looking to the race as a potential indicator of the Democratic electorate’s position on Israel. Opinions of the Jewish state among Democrats have soured in the months following Oct. 7, calling into question whether anti-Israel views are still a liability with American liberals.
The post Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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