Jewish Quarterly » Rabbi Savage

On Debt

Rabbi Savage — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 17:34:05 +0000

The bible, we often hear, has little relevance to modern, metropolitan life. It records the myths and rituals of primitive men, who lived a hand-to-mouth existence and knew nothing of the Universe. Why should we live our lives according to the fantasies of Neolithic shepherds? In these days of factory farms and cloned sheep, they have a point. But perhaps not all the green Arcadia of the mind is yet concreted over. In the space of a few recent days, two of the biggest bosses in football have issued important dairy-related statements. First it was Rafa Benitez, denouncing the changes made at Liverpool since his departure:

We have a saying in Spanish: ‘White liquid in a bottle has to be milk.’ What does this mean?

Note the classic midrashic style: ‘We have a saying’, replicating the traditional ‘As it is said’; then a quotation; then a rhetorical question. And after that came the meandering exegesis, seemingly unconnected to the opening. Rafa described the way the owners had set about changing the structure of the club and replacing the personnel – including him. He then returned, somewhat cryptically, to his proverb, concluding, ‘So, white liquid in a bottle: milk. You will know who is to blame.’

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Communal Singing

Rabbi Savage — Mon, 11 May 2009 13:48:19 +0000

These days, when only the mentally ill, the professionally hired and the irrepressibly Welsh have the nerve to do it, it’s easy to forget there was a time when public singing was as much a part of daily life as public drinking and public moaning about public transport. Students crooned the anthem of their academy, factory workers lullaby’d their shift away, pubs rattled to the rafters with cryptic lyrics involving sailors (I am basing this largely on Ken Loach films: although of the right age to remember such things, I’m also Jewish, with about as much experience of singing in pubs as I have of abseiling down the Alps). My wife’s grandfather serenaded her grandmother beneath her window through the cruel Transylvanian winter. And while not everyone could be a nightingale, even the croakiest crow knew whether he was tenor, alto or baritone. But say serenade or baritone to my teenage Zak, and he’d assume it was new medication for his attention-deficit disorder.

So what’s happened? Have we got so carried away with portable music players that we’ve lost our own voices? A clue lies, perhaps, in the only areas where it is still deemed acceptable to seek choral pleasure in public: places of worship and football matches (to be succinct, then: places of worship). Is it any surprise that song still embraces us where we are closest to collective transport, to the merging of many minds into one transpersonal being? It is significant that both Jews and football fans took to singing in response to a constraint: in the case of Jews, the prohibition against use of instruments, in the case of fans, the prohibition against physically smashing each others’ heads in.
So what can the music of synagogue and stadium learn from each other? Certainly, some football chants have felt the influence of religious hymns. Some of you may remember the awed, haunting paean to George Best that used to drift around Old Trafford like a mist: Geeooooor-giiieeeee. Anfield today resounds with a similarly dirge like: Liiiii-verpuuule. Liiiii-verpuuule. On the chirpier side, fans all over the country regale their rivals with a delightful ode to the rumoured complications in their family relationships: ‘Yer mum’s yer dad, yer dad’s yer mum, you interbred [insert regional name here] scum.’ Though the tune has been mistakenly ascribed to the Addams Family theme, the alert ear will pick up the clear influence of Adon Olam — in tune, if perhaps not lyrical content.
What, then, of influence in the other direction? Although the hymns of the siddur are replete with the yearning, the mourning, the passion and the joy familiar from the terraces, it could be argued that they are lacking the element of bile. For instance, though we rabbis are regarded merely as teachers, not holy men — eminent, perhaps, but eminently human — congregations tend to treat us with a respect out of proportion to our station. Yet some of the irreverence meted upon football referees might be healthy. We would become more assiduous in our scholarship, as well as less prone to hubris, if, for example, the incorrect pronunciation of a rare Aramaic word was met by rowdy chants of ‘You don’t know what you’re doing’ or ‘What a load of rabbis’.

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Commentary

Rabbi Savage — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 18:16:04 +0000

Last Saturday, while watching Preston North End hammer Bristol City, I was struck not for the first time by the sight of my fellow fans sporting headphones. Now, it’s possible that some were listening to music. Perhaps the spectacle of Stephen Elliott bludgeoning the visiting defence is further enhanced by St Matthew’s Passion or Girls Aloud belting into your eardrums. But I’d wager that the majority was listening to the local radio commentary of the very game they were watching. And this got me wondering: why is commentary so important to us? Why does the thing itself, unfolding unmediated before our eyes, not quite satisfy us? Whether our temple be church, mosque, synagogue or Deepdale Stadium, can we not worship silently and without guidance? Please Login or Register to read the rest of this content.

Exclusion

Rabbi Savage — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 09:28:03 +0000

Of all the wounds that rend the human heart, what aches so keenly or heals so slowly as exclusion? The childhood gang we weren’t allowed to join; the lovers entwined, oblivious to our presence; the decision of Southport’s Reform Synagogue to dispense with our rabbinical services over a matter as trivial as a single Opal Fruit on Yom Kippur; each spurning smoulders on down the years like an Everlasting Light.
And so it has been for all England the last few weeks, as we sat through Euro 2008, envious onlookers at a sumptuous multinational feast. At such times, perhaps, Jews can offer some guidance to our fellow-countrymen. For when it comes to exclusion from the Community of Nations, we have a good millennium or two of experience. As pariahs, we’re unparalleled; as rejects, unqualified successes; as outcasts, way off on our own. So what’s to be done when you’re left without a nation to root for?[hidepost]
First, there is the option of assimilation. This is the one the BBC urged during the Euros, with its strap-line ‘Who will you support?’ If you saw the TV promos, you’ll know just how much the English have to learn about this assimilation business. ‘I’ll go for Romania,’ grinned a bearded skateboarder, ‘Why not? It’ll be funny!’ ‘Italy!’ exclaimed another fan, ‘Cos it’s shaped like a boot.’ Shaped like a boot? When Napoleon asked the Jews of France to define their loyalty to La Republique, they replied as follows: ‘The love of our country is a sentiment so natural, so powerful, and so in keeping with our religious views, that a French Jew feels among strangers in England even if he be among Jews.’ Had they followed the promo’s line, it would have been a very different story: ‘France? Ah oui, Empereur, we’re largely in favour. Excellent cheeses. Plus, “France”, it’s such a nice word! It rhymes with “dance” … er, and “lance”, which is coincidentally what you’re now hurling at us …”’
Indeed, when seeking the correct tone the Beeb could have done worse than glance at a Reform siddur: ‘May the Lord bless Our Sovereign Lady, Queen Elizabeth, and all the royal family … May He give His wisdom to the government of this country, to all who lead it and all who have responsibility for its safety and its welfare.’ You see? That’s how it’s done. Earnest, reverential, more or less entirely craven. Following this model, the skateboarder of the promo might restate his preference as follows: ‘I’m supporting Romania. Thank you so much, Romania, for not hurting me. I promise to be good.’
For those who balk at full national identification of this kind, there is a halfway house between patriotism and parochialism. That is to favour a country on the grounds that one of its players plays for your club side. When Liverpool fans support Spain for Fernando Torres’ sake, or United fans roar on Portugal for Ronaldo’s, they are following a venerable tradition of proxy glory-hunting. They remind me of my Aunt Sadie, a self-declared expert on ‘American Culture’ who knows little of Charlie Parker, Orson Welles or Herman Melville, but turns out to be mysteriously clued-up when it comes to Bob Dylan, Woody Allen and Philip Roth. She may be a bit hazy about what the Constitution is, but she’s pretty sure chicken soup is good for it.
So much for assimilation. Alternatively, you can simply exclude your excluders back — and by this alchemy transform exclusion into exclusivity. The knack lies in convincing yourself that no-one else exists: there is only the Nation — exiled, despised, but surviving. So next time England fails to qualify, its fans should ignore the distressing realities of the present and immerse themselves entirely in the past — specifically, the heady days of 1966. In tribute to the famous Russian linesman, they would dress entirely in black, and following the example of Bobby Charlton shave all their hair except for a single wrap-around strand. Changes to the Laws of the Game as they stood in 1966 would be considered abominations, with goalkeepers proudly handling back-passes as if to say, ‘I am a goalkeeper, and no heretical FIFA mandate will stop me using my hands within the area ordained for such practice by our fathers in days of old.’ Daily conversation would revolve entirely around the Third Goal, whether it crossed the line, the position of lines in general and the importance of determining what does and doesn’t cross them. The beauty of this system is that it allows you to exclude not only the supporters of other countries, but any of your fellow-fans who fail to observe the game with the same ritualistic purity as you. They in
turn can look down on you for your anachronistic literal-mindedness, and punkt! — everybody’s happy.
Of course, you could, instead, put your efforts into restoring your place in the Community of Nations. For England, the next opportunity will be the World Cup 2010 qualifiers. Experience tells us, though, that it’s not as easy as it sounds. The men in charge are inept, or corrupt, or both. The tactics are crude and outdated. The press knows no middle ground between blind adulation and fevered hostility. And every time you think you’ve finally won recognition, a couple of years later you have to fight for it all over again.
If those childhood gangs taught us anything, perhaps, it’s that the best response in the face of exclusion is just to laugh it off. After all, the one field where the Jews and the English really do stand apart from the rest of the world is that of self-ridicule. None of that for me, mind. After all, I’m an England fan, a Man City fan and an unemployed rabbi: if there’s one person I’m not accepting ridicule from, it’s me.[hidepost]

Having spent twenty-one years as a rabbi in his native Morecambe, and a brief spell as inside-right for Preston North End, Rabbi Savage is now a freelance Talmudic Scholar.