A rebuttal submitted by CGI member MAXtheMAGAnificent.

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As a devout Jew of senior age who has attended services all of my life in Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox synagogues, I feel that I am qualified to say that this article by Jim Stone is a complete and utter fiction created to bring harm upon the Jewish people. To prove this I debunk the article point by point as follows:

1. Stone says that his first instance of rejection of Judaism came as a result of his experience at the first service of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when the Kol Nidre chant (it is not actually a prayer) is intoned by the cantor (chazzan). There is so much to unpack here about what Stone says so I will break these points out:

a. Stone says, “I discovered that there was a special prayer book that came out, a book which NO OUTSIDER is allowed to see. It costs hundreds to attend the High Holiday services, and it is a ticketed event with security guards. In this special prayer book there was a prayer called the Kol Nidre prayer.” First of all, the “special prayer book” that Jim refers to is called the Machzor and it is, and has always been, available to anyone who wants to read it. Today it is available as a pdf on the Internet at multiple sites. The idea that NO OUTSIDER is allowed to see the Machzor is a total falsehood beyond the ridiculous. Secondly, the idea that the High Holiday service is a ticketed event that costs hundreds of dollars to attend is often actually true. However, the reason for this is that many synagogues require that their congregants’ synagogue dues be paid up in order that they can attend these services. In other words it is a forcing function for the payment of synagogue annual dues and I personally believe that it is a very bad practice that is contrary to the tenets of the Jewish religion. However, it is not a special service to which congregants rush to buy really expensive tickets because it is like the Super Bowl. Jim tells us that attendance at this service is so much in demand because congregants get to join in on a special really evil prayer only recited at this one servicecalled the Kol Nidre, which is not true, but more about that later. I assume that the security guards about which Jim speaks are the people taking the tickets to get into the service, but if there were actual security guards, they were probably there to protect the people attending the service from terroristic acts that are often done against Jewish places of worship on the High Holidays.

b. Jim says that the reason all the Jews want to be at the first service of Yom Kippur is that they get to join in on a prayer called the Kol Nidre (All Vows) which Jim describes as follows: “This prayer is FILTHY. It's like an oath to Satan himself, where you basically say to God that you intend to lie and not honor contracts during this year, that you should be forgiven for lying and not honoring contracts in the last year, because you never agreed to be honest in front of God and therefore cannot be punished!” First of all, the Kol Nidre is not a prayer, it is a declaration which is generally described as follows: “Kol Nidre (“all vows”) is an ancient formula, said on Yom Kippur eve, declaring all unintentional vows we may make over the coming year null and void. Kol Nidre serves a technical function, ensuring that we do not unknowingly transgress vows we may not even know we’ve made. This is similar to the declaration made on the morning before Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year). On a deeper level, it reflects the way we enter this sacred day, when we are wholly united with God and each other, leaving behind our self-imposed limitations, proclaiming—to ourselves and God—that we regret and distance ourselves from the poor decisions that we humans inevitably make.” Hardly filthy or satanic…right Jim? Jim declares himself to be “a man of honesty and honor” but he lies and deceives constantly in this article.

2. Jim says, “I need to mention how various rabbis spoke about a Jewish victory over mankind, that was soon on the horizon but not guaranteed because the Internet was messing things up. I never got more detail than that.” It’s a little hard to tell but I assume that Jim is referring to the idea that the Jews pray for an ultimate messianic period when all mankind will seek out holiness in a kingdom of God…this is God’s victory over evil if you will, not a Jewish victory over mankind. The idea thatthe Internet “was messing things up” as far as the coming of a kingdom of God is as silly as saying that the Internet is causing the delay in the second coming of Jesus. Again, great fiction Jim!

3. Jim says, “before every service they make good and sure they know if there are guests present, non Jewish people, ect, and if there are any unconfirmed people attending services, they change the nature of the service. They don't care how many get messed up.” This is wild! This is again, pure fiction. This never happens, period, and the idea that the nature of the services are changed if there are any “outsiders” or “guests” there is so ridiculous that it is beyond even response. The Jewish prayer services like the Catholic mass are what they are and what they have been for centuries…nobody changes them for any reason. What a load…excuse me, but I have to say it.

4. Jim says that speakers that he heard at Jewish services declared the following: “The Jews, in violation of 501C3 status, use their religious services as political and war planning venues. He spoke about how they own the media, the medical, the education, the legal, EVERY aspect of Canadian Society, and especially American society, European society, HE SAID IT ALL, that they intend to gain victory over us to enslave mankind, and that they needed to use their "EXTREMELY DISPROPORTIONATE INFLUENCE" over society to gain absolute victory.” War planning? Enslavement? Never heard anything like that at any of the Jewish services I have attended over the past sixty years…or at any Jewish gatherings or seminars or anything. Never heard of it among my fellow Jews in conversation. This is just a total lie. Doesn’t happen, doesn’t exist. Just another trope aimed at the Jewish people.

It is so frustrating that people like Jim Stone for some reason hate the Jewish people so much that they are willing to write and say things that can ultimately lead to violence and death against them. This goes for Clif High as well. The Jews are probably the most persecuted people in history because they are an easy minority to scapegoat for whatever ills may beset the larger societies in which they exist. Jim Stone is just another one of these lying persecutors whom the Jews have had to face down over the centuries. It is so tiresome.

MAX