Elliot Ratzman

Throughtout Mr. Ratzman's speech, I was impressed with the way he alluded to different religions, races, and groups and managed to portray everyone as equals and talk about each with the same tone and sense of familiarity. I thought everything tied in well to his argument that Jews as a group may not be directly involved in any one world problem or service group, but we do fight in many areas against prosecuting other minorities. For example, concerning the issues with Darfur, we realize that a minority is in need of help and so we do what we can to better the situation, regardless of the fact that the minority does not consist of Jews. Ratzman commented on Manuel Levinas' idea that human responsibility to one another is "infinite," same as our "infinite" relationship to God. I thought that was a great connection and an interesting theory. Lastly, I was intrigued by his opinion that, traditionally, Jews offer a "twist" for dealing with issues and rescuing others: we concentrate on both the social and material aspects in dealing with problems.