No Rock And Roll Fun

SHUT UP, YOU CULTS: There's been a long tradition of disdain for what we can call Madonna-Kabbalah from genuine Orthodox Jews, who see the showy version of the Jewish mystical tradition as both too slight and an actual slight. Now, though, there are signs that a serious attempt is under way to reclaim the tradition from the culty faddists: Shlomo Perelman has funded a seven minute internet movie which rejects the over-priced strings touted by Madonna, Lindsay Lohan and Britney.

Arthur Green, a professor of Jewish mysticism and theory at Hebrew College in Newton, Mass., and professor of Jewish thought at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass., sees the fad among celebrities as "nonsense" and "a rip off."

"It's commercialization of people's psychological weaknesses. I'm opposed to it at any level," Green said. "This is the most trivial level of Kabbalah. ... There's lots to talk about Kabbalah, but the red string isn't part of it."

Of course, the red string might seem to be the least of the problems with the cash-for-Kabbalah cult. The recent BBC footage of a senior member of the Kabbalah Centre in London's team suggesting that the main problem with the Jews caught in Nazi Germany was that they didn't follow the Kabbalah might also suggest some shortcomings; as does the flogging of ordinary Canadian spring water with the claim that it's some mystic cure-all. But it's a good place to start.

Back when the documentary first ran, Madonna was approached and asked for her opinion on the Holocaust claims; at the time her publicist said she was "too busy" rehearsing for the Tsunami Benefit on NBC to come up with a statement. She must still be really thinking hard, then.

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