What exactly is Jewish "Customary dress"?

Lesia

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 2:15 pm

#BestBubby wrote:

An "enlightened" non-religious Jew once mocked a Chossid asking, "Did Avrohom Avinu wear a shtreimel? Did Avrohom Avinu wear a Kapote?"

The Chossid answered:

"I don't know what Avrohom Avinu wore. But Avrohom Avinu looked what the gentiles are wearing and wore something DIFFERENT."

I highly doubt he did that. There is no evidence anywhere, not even in Torah, that Avraham Avinu dressed differently than the culture he was living in.

amother

Seafoam

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 2:25 pm

I was taught the same thing, that yidden were taken out of Egypt for three merits: not changing their names, keeping their traditional dress, and speaking the Jewish language. Which, in the convictions of my teachers, was Yiddish. This is the pshat we were taught so many times as a deterrent for speaking English. This was used as their proof that Yiddish was the holy language. (The school was anti Zionist and Hebrew was the language of satan.)

As an adult, I look back at this and marvel at how my teachers weren’t embarrassed to teach something that they must have also realized is straight up pure bs. Yiddish didn’t exist at that time, and it certainly isn’t a language that’s any holier than anything else.

My point is that I’d take this particular teaching as something to be disregarded. Until the point when Chassidim decided to freeze time and make one particular style of dress “traditional,” Jews have always worn the clothes of the cultures around them. That’s the whole point of Moshe and daas Yehudis in tznius.

amother

Indigo

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 2:30 pm

amother [ Seafoam ] wrote:

I went to Satmar school from preschool through graduation NEVER has anyone claimed that the language spoken in Mitzrayim was Yiddish. if any of your teachers did, then they must have been dumb and terribly under-educated in Jewish history. I would rather believe that your child brain translated Jewish language to yiddish language without anyone actually saying that.
I personally don't agree on the discouraging English speaking and reading. I don't see why girls shouldn't be fluent in both.

amother

Indigo

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 2:32 pm

amother [ Seafoam ] wrote:

Yiddish and Jewish are both yiddish in the yiddish language so I do see where your confusion is coming from

amother

Seafoam

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 2:33 pm

amother [ Indigo ] wrote:

Okay.

amother

Tangerine

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 3:21 pm

I worked in a public school, and when they first found out I'm Jewish, they were all shocked. Their first reaction was "but you dont DRESS jewish!" Mind you, I'm regular flatbush yeshivish. I cover everything plus more. These people never met another Jew before, and they were basing their assumptions off of stereotypes on TV.

amother

Gold

Thu, Nov 21 2019, 10:59 pm

amother [ Indigo ] wrote:

Google results: Yiddish is about 1000 years old and Modern Hebrew is about 100 years old.

But modern Hebrew is a continuation of Hebrew, which is 3500 years old at least. Throughout history, even when spoken Hebrew was almost completely dormant, Jews wrote Hebrew. That's how a Jew from Yemen and a Jew from Poland could both learn from the same sefarim. If Moshe Rabbenu showed up tomorrow, he could be understood in Tel Aviv.

BadTichelDay

Fri, Nov 22 2019, 5:44 am

amother [ Gold ] wrote:

This! Don't want to divert the thread too far from clothing, but this is a pet peeve of mine! Some groups make a great effort to claim that modern Hebrew is a different language from lashon hakodesh. This is done for ideological reasons, mostly anti-zionism. I've heard that claim from both secular left-wing Jews and anti-Israel Chareidim. Both groups do not want a connection between the "old" and the "new" because it doesn't fit their hashkafa. Technically, modern Hebrew is old Hebrew with a lot of modern vocabulary added. But it is the same language. If you read and speak one, you can read and speak the other with very little adaption (if you are ashkenazi, you'll have to adapt the pronounciation of course). I became frum as an adult and I made Aliyah to Israel an adult. As a result of that, I had to learn both "Hebrews" simultaneously - and let's face it - it is the same language.

sequoia

Fri, Nov 22 2019, 7:25 am

Yiddish is basically Low German with Russian, Ukrainian, Belarussian, Polish, Lithuanian, and Hungarian words thrown in.

If teachers actually taught that it was spoken by the ancient Israelites, in ancient Egypt, millennia ago, and if their students believed them, that’s kind of funny. Or sad.

BadTichelDay

Fri, Nov 22 2019, 7:48 am

Ruchel wrote:

Those who put down yiddish and ladino also put down family name (some even change it!!) and customs

I don't want to put anyone or anything down. But just to think about it, where do Jewish family names come from? Such as Goldstein, Zilber, Rozenbaum, Schwartz, Wolfson, Levandovski and so on? The Jewish way of naming was always Reuben ben Shimon and Rivka bat Sarah and so on. Family names in the modern sense are a European "invention". As far as I know they became customary a few hundred years ago and eventually they were enforced by non-Jewish authorities in Germany, Austria, Poland and Russia, in order to facilitate census and taxation of the population, both Jewish and non-Jewish. My, that is, dh's, family name is derived from a town in Russia. Is that "Jewish"? Well, yes and no at the same time. We have sometimes thought of changing it to Hebrew but never done anything about it. I'm okay with it. But wouldn't a Hebrew word be more Jewish than a Slavic Russian town name?

southernbubby

Fri, Nov 22 2019, 8:03 am

BadTichelDay wrote:

[quote]

I recently found out that Ralph Lauren was born Reuven Lifshitz.

amother

Slateblue

Fri, Nov 22 2019, 8:49 am

BadTichelDay wrote:

I should maybe start a spinoff.
So I was taught that Herzl took Lashon Hakodesh and decided to twist it around and make it into an official language of the new State of Israel. So yes, obviously it's the same language, but modern Hebrew is the result of taking the original holy language and twisting it into something quite different.

Even today, when I no longer hold many of the beliefs I was taught, I'm still confused about this part.