Quick rabbinical wit

Recently I attended a lecture by Rabbi Professor Jonathan Magenot, Vice – President of the World Union of Progressive Judaism and biblical scholar. His topic was inter-faith dialogue between Jews Christians and Muslims. He has been involved in facilitating multi-faith conferences for many years and much of his lecture described the experiences and lessons learned through them. At the end I asked if he agreed that a deep division cutting across differences between faiths was that between liberal and conservative followers of all faiths.He agreed and recalled that often conservative Muslims and conservative Jews found it easier to talk to one another than to the liberal members of their own faith groups. Then came the best line of the evening in true rabbinic style. The convenor of the session asked Rabbi Magenot,  who is a well-known liberal thinker,  if he’d rather have dinner with a liberal Muslim or a conservative Jew. Back came the rabbi’s reply quick as a flash:”That depends on whose doing the cooking! “

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