The recent release of the high-budget video production by JEM seeking to commemorate and celebrate the Rebbe’s monumental leadership and global impact over the past 70 years has certainly sparked robust and passionate discussion within broad segments of the Lubavitch community. This sincere discourse and debate reveals an opportunity for further in-depth dialogue on critical matters of spiritual sensitivity and religious tradition. First, providing proper context is important. The team of creative professionals behind this video invested what was clearly tremendous time, effort and financial resources into the research, writing, filming and editing required to produce this expansive documentary-style project. Their intensive labor was undoubtedly pursued as a sincere labor of love and devotion aiming to inspire and educate both current followers and the broader Jewish public about the Rebbe’s life work in founding and guiding the Chabad-Lubavitch movement to become a dynamic worldwide network. The video utilizes impressive high-end Hollywood production value, with artistic cinematography, an emotional musical score written specifically for this film, and impactful archival footage conveying the drama and scale of the Rebbe’s global activities. Given the polished quality and scope of this ambitious undertaking, the motivations behind it were leshem shamayim without question. The goal was to share the Rebbe’s light with Jewry worldwide. At the very same time, various thoughtful concerns, critiques and objections have been substantively voiced within the Lubavitch community regarding the video production’s adherence to traditional Chabad standards of modesty, discretion and reverence for sacred matters on numerous fronts. As is well-known, sensitivities around upholding the highest levels of refinement, dignity and sanctity in both public and private realms are paramount within Chabad culture, based on the Rebbe’s own well-documented teachings and code of conduct. Two of the most sensitive areas of controversy have been the video’s inclusion of recorded female voices speaking inside a synagogue after prayer services have concluded, as well as the musical accompaniment incorporated during clips of the Rebbe delivering his legendary scholarly talks and discourses on Torah concepts. These artistic choices have deeply disturbed some traditional Chabad followers, who felt the broadcasting of women’s voices from within the sanctified space of a synagogue violated norms of modesty and sanctity, while overlaying any form of background music or soundtrack during excerpts of the Rebbe’s holy words, especially music not of Jewish nature, was religiously inappropriate and showed a lack of deference. Additionally, more fundamentally, some have objected to the very notion of excerpting small portions of the Rebbe’s usually very extensive and philosophically sophisticated talks, speeches and discourses – which the Rebbe would frequently prepare, craft and deliver both extemporaneously and methodically over the course of several hours – and repurposing brief snippets outside of their full, nuanced context. This part has troubled some in the community who felt isolating short clips divorced from the Rebbe’s wider, intricate message neither accurately reflected the depth of the Rebbe’s wisdom nor comported with the traditionally reverential manner in which Lubavitcher chassidim study and engage with the Rebbe’s lectures and writings. Furthermore, the casting of an actor to dramatize and portray specific biographical scenes from the Rebbe’s younger life and upbringing – even with noble artistic intentions – has struck some as uncomfortably crossing the line away from how Chabad chassidim would typically relate to the Rebbe’s persona and legacy […]
The post MAILBAG: Addressing The Controversy Surrounding JEM’s Tribute To Lubavitch appeared first on The Yeshiva World.