The annual reggae music festival Rototom Sunsplash that takes place in Benicassim, north of Valencia, Spain cancelled its scheduled appearance by famed Jewish rapper Matisyahu, Spanish daily El Pais reported Saturday.Valencia has developed a strong BDS campaign and organizers have accused the Jewish artist of being a “Zionist” who supports the practice of “apartheid and ethnic cleansing.”The Rototo organization conceded to pressures from the BDS movement, ultimately cancelling the performance after they issued Matisyahu an ultimatum to sign a statement supporting a Palestinian state, which he refused to do.
Matisyahu has really changed his look.
Here's what he used to look like:
3 comments:
Appearances alone suggest Matisyahu left the Hasidic movement.
HuffPo 9/15/2012: Matisyahu, Former Hasidic Reggae Star, ...
NEW YORK — A chapter in one of the most unusual spiritual journeys ended in, of all places, a Supercuts.
It was in one of the chain's salons on Manhattan's Upper West Side that Matisyahu's life as the world's first Hasidic reggae superstar came to a swift end in a pile of hair.
He walked in with a decade's worth of uncut dark beard, the result of his devotion to orthodox Judaism, and walked out clean-shaven. The 33-year-old Matisyahu is far from the one who lived for years in a modest apartment in Crown Heights, the Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn. He's moved his wife and three sons to Los Angeles, favors pastels over dark suits, ditched the yarmulke, changed his management team, and is self-releasing his music.
"The last decade of my life has been immersed in Judaism and Jewish culture and Jewish religion and Jewish spirituality and I really took that trip as far as I could take it. And then I started to find other things resonating," he says.
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According to wiki:
"Though there is no one version of Hasidism, individual Hasidic groups often share with each other underlying philosophy, worship practices, dress (borrowed from local cultures), and songs (borrowed from local cultures)."
[snip]
"Hasidic men most commonly wear dark (black or navy) jackets and trousers and white shirts. They will usually also wear black shoes. On weekdays they wear a long, black, cloth jacket called a rekel and on Jewish Holy Days the bekishe zaydene kapote (Yiddish, lit. satin caftan), a similarly long, black jacket but of satin fabric traditionally silk. The preference for black comes from a decree made by community rabbis in the 18th century stipulating that black outer garments be worn on the Sabbath and Jewish Holy Days out of the home, as opposed to the shiny, colorful kaftans that were worn prior to that time. The rabbis feared that brightly colored clothes might arouse resentment among non-Jews thereby leading to violence. Indoors the colorful tish bekishe is still worn."
I find his statement odd? What is he saying, he's bored with his religion?
The HuffPo link tells a bit of his story, which appears to suggest that this "Arteeest" is evolving - still finding himself - certainly not one to allow his work to be constrained within the Lubavitcher (Hasidic movement) matrix.
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