Whenever I walk by a Victoria’s Secret store I feel sapped of male energy. Women’s underwear to me is what Kryptonite is to Superman. (The green kind, not the red.) I often suspect that this is the “secret” Victoria is keeping from us: women’s underwear is hazardous to men’s health.
For years I thought I was alone in this; in fact it was fear of having panties and bras thrown at me while on stage that prevented me from pursuing a career as a rock star. That and the fact that I suck at playing music, but mostly the panties.
Recently, however, I have discovered that I am not insane, only Burmese. It seems that the men of Myanmar (formerly Burma) believe that coming into contact with women’s underwear saps their strength. Damn straight! Of course I should make it clear that they are talking about women’s underwear sans women. I have no idea what the men of Myanmar experience when they see women wearing underwear. Personally I find women’s underwear with women in them far less frightening than women’s underwear without women in them. I suspect this is true of Myanmar men as well.
Anyway, now that the truth is out regarding the lethal power of panties and bras, a global network is forming to exploit it. People all over the world are shipping packages of panties and bras to Myanmar’s embassies hoping to topple the junta by sapping the strength of the men as then open the packages. This is like sending anthrax to congress people and newscasters, but trust me, women’s underwear is far easier to get.
Ordinarily I shy away from such violence, and given the fact that panties are dangerous to men I hesitate to suggest that men and women join in this effort for fear that men will suffer from handling the underwear, but the junta in Myanmar is evil and the Buddhist priests can’t defeat them alone. Especially since they, too, have no immunity against women’s underwear.
So, tossing caution to the wind, I am forming the Thongalese Liberation Front for the Liberation of Myanmar (TLFFTLOM), urging all my readers to join the “Panties for Peace” campaign and send women’s underwear to the Myanmar embassy nearest you.
Here are some slogans you might incorporate into your mailing: “Lift and Separate: Free the People of Myanmar!” “Thongs for the Memories: Don’t Forget Myanmar!” “Be BRAve!” “BRAvo Buddhists!” “Throw the Panty-loons Out!”
As the CEO of TLFFTLOM I am trying to contact the president of Victoria’s Secret to enlist the support of the company in making public service announcements showing Victoria Secret models taking off their underwear and throwing it at Myanmar embassy officials. But don’t wait for me. Approach your local Victoria’s Secret and speak to the manager about working with you to free the people of Myanmar.
[Warning to men. Do not handle women’s underwear without protection. I am pretty certain the power sapping capacity of the underwear cannot penetrate lead, so you might want to wear colored plastic gloves and aprons made in China.]
Friday, November 02, 2007
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Self, Candy, and Being Present for Halloween
Tomorrow evening is Halloween. I plan to dress up as my self. Not my true Self, there is no costume for that; and not my polished persona, there is little that is scary about that. No, I plan to dress up as my ordinary self: my ego.
What will this look like? The Tasmanian Devil on steroids: a tornado of conflicting thoughts and feelings that change so fast that no one, not even me, can make sense of it.
I will fly up to a neighbor’s door, bang loudly, and when the door is opened scream, “Trick or treat, no wait, treat, treat, treat! No! Tricks just tricks. Gimme candy. And a new Prius and an iMac. Gimme something really cool, but even if you do I won’t care about it two minutes later so you better have something even more cool to give me after that. Oh, forget it. I don’t deserve anything anyway. Just keep your crappy candy. What I really need is a hug and a pat on the head. Good boy. Yeah, say, ‘Good boy,’ that would be nice. But what the hell do you know about me anyway? You don’t know me, so don’t pat my head or kick my butt. And don’t think I won’t kick yours. Who cares about you anyway? Unless you have candy. Gimme candy. And what about that car…”
Long before I finish all this I am certain my neighbor has called 911 or taken a shot at me himself, after all I noticed he subscribes to Guns and Gardens, a new magazine about life in the South (no, I’m not kidding). I don’t blame him. Meeting me would be terrifying, to me as well as to you. But I don’t know you, so I will focus on me.
I hate meeting me. I’m so messy. I try hard not to meet me by staying so busy that there just isn’t time. Yet I do bump into myself once in a while, coming and going; always on the fly or on the run. Never on the sit, which is the one place I really need to schedule the meeting.
So maybe that is what I will do this Halloween. Rather than run next door as me, I might just sit on my meditation cushions and spend some time with me. Which reminds me of a story Roshi Norm Fisher tells about Zen Master Ryon (I’m not certain of the spelling).
The master would call out loud to himself saying, “Rayon!” “Yes, master, here I am!” Rayon would reply. “Pay attention!” “Yes, master, I will.”
This is a good story and an even better practice. Call it Hinneni (Hebrew for Here I Am) practice. This is the way to meet myself: “Rami!” “Yes, rabbi, hinneni, I’m here!” “Pay attention! Don’t get wrapped up in the drama! Do justly! Love mercy! Walk humbly!” “Yes, rabbi, I will.”
My plan now is to sit on my cushions, and call to myself. And then I’ll walk next door and get that candy from my neighbor.
What will this look like? The Tasmanian Devil on steroids: a tornado of conflicting thoughts and feelings that change so fast that no one, not even me, can make sense of it.
I will fly up to a neighbor’s door, bang loudly, and when the door is opened scream, “Trick or treat, no wait, treat, treat, treat! No! Tricks just tricks. Gimme candy. And a new Prius and an iMac. Gimme something really cool, but even if you do I won’t care about it two minutes later so you better have something even more cool to give me after that. Oh, forget it. I don’t deserve anything anyway. Just keep your crappy candy. What I really need is a hug and a pat on the head. Good boy. Yeah, say, ‘Good boy,’ that would be nice. But what the hell do you know about me anyway? You don’t know me, so don’t pat my head or kick my butt. And don’t think I won’t kick yours. Who cares about you anyway? Unless you have candy. Gimme candy. And what about that car…”
Long before I finish all this I am certain my neighbor has called 911 or taken a shot at me himself, after all I noticed he subscribes to Guns and Gardens, a new magazine about life in the South (no, I’m not kidding). I don’t blame him. Meeting me would be terrifying, to me as well as to you. But I don’t know you, so I will focus on me.
I hate meeting me. I’m so messy. I try hard not to meet me by staying so busy that there just isn’t time. Yet I do bump into myself once in a while, coming and going; always on the fly or on the run. Never on the sit, which is the one place I really need to schedule the meeting.
So maybe that is what I will do this Halloween. Rather than run next door as me, I might just sit on my meditation cushions and spend some time with me. Which reminds me of a story Roshi Norm Fisher tells about Zen Master Ryon (I’m not certain of the spelling).
The master would call out loud to himself saying, “Rayon!” “Yes, master, here I am!” Rayon would reply. “Pay attention!” “Yes, master, I will.”
This is a good story and an even better practice. Call it Hinneni (Hebrew for Here I Am) practice. This is the way to meet myself: “Rami!” “Yes, rabbi, hinneni, I’m here!” “Pay attention! Don’t get wrapped up in the drama! Do justly! Love mercy! Walk humbly!” “Yes, rabbi, I will.”
My plan now is to sit on my cushions, and call to myself. And then I’ll walk next door and get that candy from my neighbor.
Monday, October 29, 2007
Spirit, Nature, and Story
[Here is a summary of a short talk I gave as part of an environmentalism conference called Spirit and Nature in September of ’07.]
Judaism loves the earth. In the Bible it, along with all creation, is judged “tov” and “tov meod”: good and very good. In the Psalms we are told that God’s glory permeates creation. In the Wisdom literature we are told to learn from the animals even the ant (Proverbs 6:6). In Jewish mysticism ancient, medieval, and modern creation is God manifest. So Judaism loves the earth. Jews, on the other hand, are something else.
Like every other people, most Jews are driven by fear, greed, alienation, and scarcity consciousness. Like almost every other person on this planet we suffer from the delusion of separateness, dualism, and The Other. The people who teach us “Love your neighbor” have lived in fear of their neighbors for two thousand years. “The people who teach us “Love the stranger” are themselves estranged and afraid. This wasn’t our doing, but it is our reality. It is our psyche wound that we have yet to name, let alone heal.
I know this sounds harsh, but it is necessary if we are to avoid the vapid romanticism that so often permeates meetings such as this one. Don’t romanticize religion or tradition, for all its good there is a concomitant evil. Don’t romanticize indigenous peoples, pretending that they somehow escape the human predicament. This demeans them and is a subtle form of racism. Don’t romanticize nature. She is both wondrous and terrifying. Global warming is not a threat to the earth but to humanity. Gaia will take care of herself and remove four billion of us in the process. This is not going to be pretty.
When we stop romanticizing the earth we will stop demonizing humanity. People are as natural to this planet as the earthworm. Yes, the herd must be thinned, but we still matter. On this planet we are one of the ways, perhaps even the only way, that Gaia gets to see herself and say, “Wow!”
The problem with humanity is that fewer and fewer of us still know how to say, “Wow!” We have lost the capacity to wonder, to stand in awe. We have lost the ability to tremble before infinite manifest in the finite.
To reclaim our capacity to wonder and tremble, we need to regain our capacity to tell stories.
At our core we humans are story–telling animals. It is through story that we make sense of our lives, our world, and ourselves. But our stories have grown stale, and for many, and here I would says Jews suffer greatly, insular. We need a new story of creation that honors what we know from science and provides meaning to human existence. We need a story that spans billions of years rather than six days. We need a story that makes explicit what Genesis leaves implicit: all is God. We need a story that establishes a new tribe, the tribe of the living. Unless and until we humans can tell a new and healing story, all our efforts to live in harmony with Gaia will fail.
Judaism loves the earth. In the Bible it, along with all creation, is judged “tov” and “tov meod”: good and very good. In the Psalms we are told that God’s glory permeates creation. In the Wisdom literature we are told to learn from the animals even the ant (Proverbs 6:6). In Jewish mysticism ancient, medieval, and modern creation is God manifest. So Judaism loves the earth. Jews, on the other hand, are something else.
Like every other people, most Jews are driven by fear, greed, alienation, and scarcity consciousness. Like almost every other person on this planet we suffer from the delusion of separateness, dualism, and The Other. The people who teach us “Love your neighbor” have lived in fear of their neighbors for two thousand years. “The people who teach us “Love the stranger” are themselves estranged and afraid. This wasn’t our doing, but it is our reality. It is our psyche wound that we have yet to name, let alone heal.
I know this sounds harsh, but it is necessary if we are to avoid the vapid romanticism that so often permeates meetings such as this one. Don’t romanticize religion or tradition, for all its good there is a concomitant evil. Don’t romanticize indigenous peoples, pretending that they somehow escape the human predicament. This demeans them and is a subtle form of racism. Don’t romanticize nature. She is both wondrous and terrifying. Global warming is not a threat to the earth but to humanity. Gaia will take care of herself and remove four billion of us in the process. This is not going to be pretty.
When we stop romanticizing the earth we will stop demonizing humanity. People are as natural to this planet as the earthworm. Yes, the herd must be thinned, but we still matter. On this planet we are one of the ways, perhaps even the only way, that Gaia gets to see herself and say, “Wow!”
The problem with humanity is that fewer and fewer of us still know how to say, “Wow!” We have lost the capacity to wonder, to stand in awe. We have lost the ability to tremble before infinite manifest in the finite.
To reclaim our capacity to wonder and tremble, we need to regain our capacity to tell stories.
At our core we humans are story–telling animals. It is through story that we make sense of our lives, our world, and ourselves. But our stories have grown stale, and for many, and here I would says Jews suffer greatly, insular. We need a new story of creation that honors what we know from science and provides meaning to human existence. We need a story that spans billions of years rather than six days. We need a story that makes explicit what Genesis leaves implicit: all is God. We need a story that establishes a new tribe, the tribe of the living. Unless and until we humans can tell a new and healing story, all our efforts to live in harmony with Gaia will fail.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Insult Voter
I am used to reading about Values Voters, Security Moms, and the dozen or so other sub-groupings of Americans who may vote in the 2008 presidential race. Today I would like to add another group to the list: the Insult Voter. The Insult Voter is a Christian Conservative who bashes a candidate’s religion while supporting his or her politics. The best example of an Insult Voter is Bob Jones III of Bob Jones University.
Jones said that while he is “completely opposed to the doctrines of Mormonism,” he is endorsing the former Massachusetts Governor candidacy. His logic? “What’s the alternative, Hillary’s lack of religion or an erroneous religion?” In other words, better to back a conservative who believes in a lie then a liberal who does not.
Logic aside, some in the press are dumping on Mitt for not defending his faith and rejecting the endorsement. But this isn’t fair. Most people who support Governor Romney now, and most of those who will vote for him in the primaries agree with Bob Jones III that Mormonism is a false religion. They aren’t voting for Mitt because he’s a Mormon, they are voting for him because he is, at least at the moment, pro-God, pro-Guns, pro-Life, and anti-Gay. They’d vote for the Anti-Christ if his politics were red enough, and the Rapture didn’t take them first.
Yet some claim that Mitt’s failure to defend his faith is a sign that he stands for nothing but winning. True he did seem willing to lean “blue” to become the governor of Massablusetts, and now he is leaning red to become president, but every candidate is doing that to one degree or another. Candidates essentially buy votes by backing policies that serve constituencies rather than the nation as a whole. And they stay in power by selling influence to wealthy special interests. So Governor Romney isn’t doing anything unusual here. In fact being able to make a deal with Bob Jones might suggest that Mitt has the capacity to broker agreements with America’s enemies, something our current Crusader in Chief cannot do.
But I think Mitt Romney ignored Bob Jones’ insults for a different reason. Mitt knows that as a good Mormon man he may someday become a god ruling over his own planet. At that point he can take his revenge on anyone he damn well pleases. In the meantime there is the New Hampshire primary to worry about.
Jones said that while he is “completely opposed to the doctrines of Mormonism,” he is endorsing the former Massachusetts Governor candidacy. His logic? “What’s the alternative, Hillary’s lack of religion or an erroneous religion?” In other words, better to back a conservative who believes in a lie then a liberal who does not.
Logic aside, some in the press are dumping on Mitt for not defending his faith and rejecting the endorsement. But this isn’t fair. Most people who support Governor Romney now, and most of those who will vote for him in the primaries agree with Bob Jones III that Mormonism is a false religion. They aren’t voting for Mitt because he’s a Mormon, they are voting for him because he is, at least at the moment, pro-God, pro-Guns, pro-Life, and anti-Gay. They’d vote for the Anti-Christ if his politics were red enough, and the Rapture didn’t take them first.
Yet some claim that Mitt’s failure to defend his faith is a sign that he stands for nothing but winning. True he did seem willing to lean “blue” to become the governor of Massablusetts, and now he is leaning red to become president, but every candidate is doing that to one degree or another. Candidates essentially buy votes by backing policies that serve constituencies rather than the nation as a whole. And they stay in power by selling influence to wealthy special interests. So Governor Romney isn’t doing anything unusual here. In fact being able to make a deal with Bob Jones might suggest that Mitt has the capacity to broker agreements with America’s enemies, something our current Crusader in Chief cannot do.
But I think Mitt Romney ignored Bob Jones’ insults for a different reason. Mitt knows that as a good Mormon man he may someday become a god ruling over his own planet. At that point he can take his revenge on anyone he damn well pleases. In the meantime there is the New Hampshire primary to worry about.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Dinesh D'Souza, A Response
In his essay “A Christian Foundation” (USA Today, October 22, 2007) Dinesh D’Souza argues, “Christianity has shaped the core institutions and values of the USA and the West. Christianity is responsible even for secular institutions such as democracy and science. It has fostered in our civilization values such as respect for human dignity, human rights, and human equality that even secular people cherish.”
While not wrong, Mr. D’Souza’s statement is meaningless. The West was overwhelmingly Christian, so of course the heroes of the Western democracy and science were Christian, but so too were the despots and madmen. Substitute “white men” for “Christianity” in his argument and, while still true, its silliness becomes even clearer. The fact that people of European Christian heritage brought us democracy and science does not mean that Christianity supported either.
For example, Roman Catholicism, and the Anglican and Lutheran churches supported the divine right of kings, not democracy; and Calvinist churches sought only to limit the king’s power not end it. And while it is true that the Puritans sought to escape the Anglican theocracy of Britain, they did not extend freedom of thought or worship to those who disagreed with them, and set up their own theocracies in America.
Regarding science Mr. D’Souza says, “The greatest scientists of the West…were Christians,” and lists Copernicus and Galileo to prove his point. Again this is meaningless! Copernicus feared death at the hands of the Inquisition if he published his theory that the earth orbits the sun. And when his “Revolution of the Celestial Spheres” was published after his death, the Church put it on its Index of Prohibited Books. And Galileo was forced by the Inquisition to recant his findings because they went against church doctrine, and then spent that last years of his life under house arrest. While Christian scientists struggled on in search of truth, they did so without the blessing of Christianity.
D’Souza then turns to the self-evident notion that “all men are created equal.” This, D’Souza claims, was only self-evident in Christian countries where “[e]very life has a worth no greater and no lesser than any other.” Ask Jews in Christian Europe if they were of equal worth. Ask Native Americans. Ask Africans slaves. Ask Indians. Ask women.
To prove the superiority of Christian civilization D’Souza then says, “Greek and Roman culture was built on slavery” implying that Christian culture was not. Talk about denial! Not only was America built on slavery; the overwhelmingly Christian South went to war because it was certain it could not survive without it. Yes, many devote Christians were passionate abolitionists, but Christian slaveholders were equally devote, and both justified their positions by citing their Christian values.
According to Mr. D’Souza, since Americans were (and are) overwhelmingly Christian, all things American are rooted in Christianity. Following this line of reasoning we could argue that Christianity is also responsible for slavery, the Civil War, the KKK, genocide against Native Americans, and racism. This wouldn’t be wrong, but it would be totally misleading.
I sympathize with Mr. D’Souza’s desire to defend his faith, but to do so in such an intellectually disingenuous manner does more harm than good.
While not wrong, Mr. D’Souza’s statement is meaningless. The West was overwhelmingly Christian, so of course the heroes of the Western democracy and science were Christian, but so too were the despots and madmen. Substitute “white men” for “Christianity” in his argument and, while still true, its silliness becomes even clearer. The fact that people of European Christian heritage brought us democracy and science does not mean that Christianity supported either.
For example, Roman Catholicism, and the Anglican and Lutheran churches supported the divine right of kings, not democracy; and Calvinist churches sought only to limit the king’s power not end it. And while it is true that the Puritans sought to escape the Anglican theocracy of Britain, they did not extend freedom of thought or worship to those who disagreed with them, and set up their own theocracies in America.
Regarding science Mr. D’Souza says, “The greatest scientists of the West…were Christians,” and lists Copernicus and Galileo to prove his point. Again this is meaningless! Copernicus feared death at the hands of the Inquisition if he published his theory that the earth orbits the sun. And when his “Revolution of the Celestial Spheres” was published after his death, the Church put it on its Index of Prohibited Books. And Galileo was forced by the Inquisition to recant his findings because they went against church doctrine, and then spent that last years of his life under house arrest. While Christian scientists struggled on in search of truth, they did so without the blessing of Christianity.
D’Souza then turns to the self-evident notion that “all men are created equal.” This, D’Souza claims, was only self-evident in Christian countries where “[e]very life has a worth no greater and no lesser than any other.” Ask Jews in Christian Europe if they were of equal worth. Ask Native Americans. Ask Africans slaves. Ask Indians. Ask women.
To prove the superiority of Christian civilization D’Souza then says, “Greek and Roman culture was built on slavery” implying that Christian culture was not. Talk about denial! Not only was America built on slavery; the overwhelmingly Christian South went to war because it was certain it could not survive without it. Yes, many devote Christians were passionate abolitionists, but Christian slaveholders were equally devote, and both justified their positions by citing their Christian values.
According to Mr. D’Souza, since Americans were (and are) overwhelmingly Christian, all things American are rooted in Christianity. Following this line of reasoning we could argue that Christianity is also responsible for slavery, the Civil War, the KKK, genocide against Native Americans, and racism. This wouldn’t be wrong, but it would be totally misleading.
I sympathize with Mr. D’Souza’s desire to defend his faith, but to do so in such an intellectually disingenuous manner does more harm than good.
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Is Peace Possible?
[This is the text for a speech I plan to deliver this morning at Christ Community Church in Grand Haven, MI.]
Is peace possible? Not simply the absence of conflict, but true peace, the ability to engage life without anger, greed, jealousy, or hostility of any kind? Or are we doomed by our very nature to war, inner and outer?
I am not asking for an opinion or a conviction, but for an investigation. You may think one way or another, but your thinking is conditioned by your parents and peers, your religion and your politics. You may have been taught that peace is possible, and you may have spent your life cultivating it personally, professionally, and politically, but this doesn’t mean peace is really possible, only that you have been conditioned to think so. Or the opposite may be the case: you were taught that life is a zero-sum game; that if you are going to win others must lose; and that the only way to win is to grab all you can when you can regardless of the consequences.
I was taught the latter. I was taught that life is war, and I am warrior, albeit not a very effective one. My personality isn’t geared for war. I dislike conflict and shy away from it whenever possible. I would rather surrender my slice of pie than defend it. Of course there are limits; there are things for which I will rally, but I prize quiet and calm and being left alone too much to fight for much.
But quiet isn’t peace. The silence of guns and gangs isn’t peace. Being left alone isn’t peace. The battles continue in my own mind, and as long as there is war inside, there will be war outside.
So I am asking, can you be peace? I cannot answer this for you, I can only explore it for myself, and ask that you do the same. So lets look at this for a moment.
I am not peaceful now. I am even at this very moment a jumble of conflicting stories, drives, passions, longings, hungers, etc. To end this inner turmoil is only to add another conflict to the mix. It is bad enough that I am at war internally, now I must be at war with the fact that I am at war. I must declare war on my warring nature. I must defeat my desire to defeat. This is simply more of the same thing.
So, is peace possible? Not if I define peace as being other than I am. Yet if I simply accept what I am and act on it, that is not peace either. So I am damned if I do and damned if I don’t. A classic double bind.
Double binds are the gateway to transformation. The key is to learn to hold reality in a larger context, a bigger mind. Can I simply make room for war without identifying with it? Can I realize that anger, greed, jealously, hatred, fear, and the rest are a part of me, but not all of me? Can I allow them space without allowing them to define me?
This isn’t peace. This is freedom. Freedom allows me to engage the moment in a manner unscripted by my psychological, political, and religious conditioning. I can’t say in advance what this engagement will look life. There is only the truth of the moment. But coming from freedom rather than conditioning I suspect that compassion rather than conflict will be the norm.
Freedom isn’t won. That is another war. Freedom isn’t cultivated, or earned. That is more struggle. Freedom is here and now if you simply look at the reality within you. There is no awakening, or enlightenment, or salvation, or transformation. All these are trapped in linear time, and time implies change and change means conflict as you move from one way of being to another which you imagine is better.
Forget better and worse. Forget peace and conflict. Forget being other than you are. Simply see all that you are. The one who sees is free from what is seen. And that makes all the difference.
Is peace possible? No. Conflict is systemic to the human ego. Is freedom possible? Yes. There is something greater than the ego. And that something is the real you. Live from that.
Is peace possible? Not simply the absence of conflict, but true peace, the ability to engage life without anger, greed, jealousy, or hostility of any kind? Or are we doomed by our very nature to war, inner and outer?
I am not asking for an opinion or a conviction, but for an investigation. You may think one way or another, but your thinking is conditioned by your parents and peers, your religion and your politics. You may have been taught that peace is possible, and you may have spent your life cultivating it personally, professionally, and politically, but this doesn’t mean peace is really possible, only that you have been conditioned to think so. Or the opposite may be the case: you were taught that life is a zero-sum game; that if you are going to win others must lose; and that the only way to win is to grab all you can when you can regardless of the consequences.
I was taught the latter. I was taught that life is war, and I am warrior, albeit not a very effective one. My personality isn’t geared for war. I dislike conflict and shy away from it whenever possible. I would rather surrender my slice of pie than defend it. Of course there are limits; there are things for which I will rally, but I prize quiet and calm and being left alone too much to fight for much.
But quiet isn’t peace. The silence of guns and gangs isn’t peace. Being left alone isn’t peace. The battles continue in my own mind, and as long as there is war inside, there will be war outside.
So I am asking, can you be peace? I cannot answer this for you, I can only explore it for myself, and ask that you do the same. So lets look at this for a moment.
I am not peaceful now. I am even at this very moment a jumble of conflicting stories, drives, passions, longings, hungers, etc. To end this inner turmoil is only to add another conflict to the mix. It is bad enough that I am at war internally, now I must be at war with the fact that I am at war. I must declare war on my warring nature. I must defeat my desire to defeat. This is simply more of the same thing.
So, is peace possible? Not if I define peace as being other than I am. Yet if I simply accept what I am and act on it, that is not peace either. So I am damned if I do and damned if I don’t. A classic double bind.
Double binds are the gateway to transformation. The key is to learn to hold reality in a larger context, a bigger mind. Can I simply make room for war without identifying with it? Can I realize that anger, greed, jealously, hatred, fear, and the rest are a part of me, but not all of me? Can I allow them space without allowing them to define me?
This isn’t peace. This is freedom. Freedom allows me to engage the moment in a manner unscripted by my psychological, political, and religious conditioning. I can’t say in advance what this engagement will look life. There is only the truth of the moment. But coming from freedom rather than conditioning I suspect that compassion rather than conflict will be the norm.
Freedom isn’t won. That is another war. Freedom isn’t cultivated, or earned. That is more struggle. Freedom is here and now if you simply look at the reality within you. There is no awakening, or enlightenment, or salvation, or transformation. All these are trapped in linear time, and time implies change and change means conflict as you move from one way of being to another which you imagine is better.
Forget better and worse. Forget peace and conflict. Forget being other than you are. Simply see all that you are. The one who sees is free from what is seen. And that makes all the difference.
Is peace possible? No. Conflict is systemic to the human ego. Is freedom possible? Yes. There is something greater than the ego. And that something is the real you. Live from that.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
A Religious Litmus Test
For a nation that supposedly separates Church and State, it is both sad and ironic that we have a religious litmus test for those who wish to become President of the United States.
The test is an odd one, however. First you have to belong to a religion that doesn’t make most Americans nervous. At the moment that means Christianity and Judaism (Islam has made it into Congress, but it will take awhile to get beyond that). Belonging to Wicca or Santeria, for example, will probably keep you out of the Oval Office, for the foreseeable future.
Second you have to be willing to deny your faith in public: not deny that you are a believer, only deny that being a believer matters when it comes to being president: “While I have my personal beliefs, I seek to be president of all Americans, and will not foist my beliefs on others.” And with that we are all supposed to sigh with relief.
A president who can turn off his or her personal convictions for political gain, however, troubles me. If you really believe abortion is murder, then stand up, say so, and try to have it made illegal. I can respect that. But waffling on morality makes me nervous.
If we are going to have a religious litmus test let’s find out exactly what our presidential candidates believe. I would like to see presidential debate moderates ask the following questions:
“Is it true, Governor Romney, that as a Mormon you believe God has a wife?”
“Those of you who deny evolution in favor of creationism, just how old do you think the earth is?”
“Those of you professing the Christian faith, do you believe that non–Christian Americans are going to burn in hell for all eternity?”
“To those of you who profess to be Catholics, I would like to know how you are willing to risk your eternal soul and support American policies and laws the Catholic Church finds offensive?”
“Do you believe homosexuality is an abomination to God, and how do you feel about woman’s rights and their status within your respective churches?”
I would find the answers to these questions very helpful in making my choice on Election Day. I would not vote for a president who refused to take science seriously. I would not vote for a president who thought I was going to be tormented in hell for all eternity. I would not vote for a racist, a homophobe, a misogynist, or surrogate for the Pope. I would not vote for a person who simply accepted religious doctrine without thinking it through and questioning it and coming to her or his own conclusions. In short, I would not vote for a person so totally unlike myself as to make me feel threatened in my own country. But unless we ask these kinds of questions, we won’t know for whom we are voting until it is too late.
The test is an odd one, however. First you have to belong to a religion that doesn’t make most Americans nervous. At the moment that means Christianity and Judaism (Islam has made it into Congress, but it will take awhile to get beyond that). Belonging to Wicca or Santeria, for example, will probably keep you out of the Oval Office, for the foreseeable future.
Second you have to be willing to deny your faith in public: not deny that you are a believer, only deny that being a believer matters when it comes to being president: “While I have my personal beliefs, I seek to be president of all Americans, and will not foist my beliefs on others.” And with that we are all supposed to sigh with relief.
A president who can turn off his or her personal convictions for political gain, however, troubles me. If you really believe abortion is murder, then stand up, say so, and try to have it made illegal. I can respect that. But waffling on morality makes me nervous.
If we are going to have a religious litmus test let’s find out exactly what our presidential candidates believe. I would like to see presidential debate moderates ask the following questions:
“Is it true, Governor Romney, that as a Mormon you believe God has a wife?”
“Those of you who deny evolution in favor of creationism, just how old do you think the earth is?”
“Those of you professing the Christian faith, do you believe that non–Christian Americans are going to burn in hell for all eternity?”
“To those of you who profess to be Catholics, I would like to know how you are willing to risk your eternal soul and support American policies and laws the Catholic Church finds offensive?”
“Do you believe homosexuality is an abomination to God, and how do you feel about woman’s rights and their status within your respective churches?”
I would find the answers to these questions very helpful in making my choice on Election Day. I would not vote for a president who refused to take science seriously. I would not vote for a president who thought I was going to be tormented in hell for all eternity. I would not vote for a racist, a homophobe, a misogynist, or surrogate for the Pope. I would not vote for a person who simply accepted religious doctrine without thinking it through and questioning it and coming to her or his own conclusions. In short, I would not vote for a person so totally unlike myself as to make me feel threatened in my own country. But unless we ask these kinds of questions, we won’t know for whom we are voting until it is too late.
Monday, October 15, 2007
What's The Big Idea? Part Three: Anti Up
If you have read parts One and Two of my rant against the Big Idea contest sponsored by the Bronfman Foundation you know that I think the idea is well meaning and doomed. There is no Big Idea that will transform American Jewry because American Jews just don’t care about Judaism all that much. Sure it’s nice to know that we’re The Chosen, but if the Bid Idea is to get us to be more Jewish, it just isn’t going to happen.
But, once again, I seem to have blogged too soon, and I want to formally apologize to the Bronfmans and their Foundation for not thinking this through more carefully. I now believe that there is a Big Idea out there that can rekindle the Jewish passions and ethnic identity of American Jews. It’s called anti-Semitism.
Think about it. If the Greco-Syrians hadn’t demanded Jews bow down to their god we wouldn’t have had the Maccabean War. If American medical centers had hired Jewish doctors, we wouldn’t have so many Sinai Hospitals.
When the Southern Baptists declared that God doesn’t hear the prayer of Jews, we Jews went ballistic. The fact that most of us don’t pray or even believe in a God who listens to prayer, was irrelevant. The great Satan of Christian anti-Semitism had reared his ugly head, and we would rise to destroy him. Or at least get him to be quiet.
Similarly, the recent statement of the godly Ann Coulter that Jews need to be “perfected,” that is we need to become Christians, got us hot and bothered.
We may not know how to get Jews excited about Judaism, but we do know how to get them feeling Jewish: anti-Semitism works. The Big Idea that the Bronfman Foundation needs to fund, the one sure fire way to get Jews focused on their Jewishness is an all out revival of American anti-Semitism.
We don’t need a messiah, we need an anti-messiah. The Bronfman Foundation should secretly fund a charismatic Christian Rightist who will get America declared a Christian Nation, and set a Christian litmus test for political office holders. He or she will hold public burnings of the Talmud, and lobby Congress to outlaw circumcision, kosher food (I would add Chinese food as well just to be safe), and Seinfeld reruns.
Of course they would have to funnel money into Jewish organizations fighting this puppet madman so that Jews could rally and fight for their religion and ethnic pride. I am certain this would work. I am also certain nothing else can.
But, once again, I seem to have blogged too soon, and I want to formally apologize to the Bronfmans and their Foundation for not thinking this through more carefully. I now believe that there is a Big Idea out there that can rekindle the Jewish passions and ethnic identity of American Jews. It’s called anti-Semitism.
Think about it. If the Greco-Syrians hadn’t demanded Jews bow down to their god we wouldn’t have had the Maccabean War. If American medical centers had hired Jewish doctors, we wouldn’t have so many Sinai Hospitals.
When the Southern Baptists declared that God doesn’t hear the prayer of Jews, we Jews went ballistic. The fact that most of us don’t pray or even believe in a God who listens to prayer, was irrelevant. The great Satan of Christian anti-Semitism had reared his ugly head, and we would rise to destroy him. Or at least get him to be quiet.
Similarly, the recent statement of the godly Ann Coulter that Jews need to be “perfected,” that is we need to become Christians, got us hot and bothered.
We may not know how to get Jews excited about Judaism, but we do know how to get them feeling Jewish: anti-Semitism works. The Big Idea that the Bronfman Foundation needs to fund, the one sure fire way to get Jews focused on their Jewishness is an all out revival of American anti-Semitism.
We don’t need a messiah, we need an anti-messiah. The Bronfman Foundation should secretly fund a charismatic Christian Rightist who will get America declared a Christian Nation, and set a Christian litmus test for political office holders. He or she will hold public burnings of the Talmud, and lobby Congress to outlaw circumcision, kosher food (I would add Chinese food as well just to be safe), and Seinfeld reruns.
Of course they would have to funnel money into Jewish organizations fighting this puppet madman so that Jews could rally and fight for their religion and ethnic pride. I am certain this would work. I am also certain nothing else can.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
AC-JC and the Perfected Jew
Ann Coulter, in a nationally televised interview, said Jews need perfecting. By “perfecting” she means that Jews need Jesus.
AC wants a nation devoted to JC. It would be more convenient and efficient, she said. Pluralism and freedom are messy. And messy is just what the terrorists want. So come on, Heebs, if you are really loyal Americans you will accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior.
Ann Coulter’s capacity to outrage is in direct proportion to her capacity to make money, so the fact that she said this doesn’t surprise me. I have no intension of picking a fight with her. In fact, I think she has provided us with a wonderful opportunity to gauge the heart of Christian America.
In an age when Christians complain that American Muslims don’t speak up when their coreligionists attack America (verbally and otherwise) it will be interesting to see which if any Christian leaders speak out against the anti-Semitic ravings of one of their own.
Judging from her mock surprise that Jews might be insulted by her notion that they need perfecting, I suspect few true-red Christian will find anything offensive in her comments. After all, as far as they are concerned only Christians are going to heaven, and Jews (along with everyone else outside their self-defined circle of the saved) are damned to hell for all eternity. So what’s to be shocked? We have heard this crap for two thousand years. We should be used to it by now.
But wait, this isn’t supposed to happen in America. George Washington promised us that America not was a Christian nation and would welcome Jews. Thomas Jefferson said there is a wall between church and state that would protect us from state sanctioned religious persecution. America is different.
But America may not be America any more. Driven more by fear than reason, blaming everything from 9/11 to Iraq on Jews and the Israeli Lobby, informed by a media obsessed with ratings, and mistaking decibels for dialogue, we are a people more and more willing to sacrifice our values to secure our vices. As we move closer to electing a new president we seem to be thoughtlessly condoning increased levels of homophobia, misogyny, and racism. We are afraid to stand up for what we used to stand for, and toss our civil rights aside for fear of being soft on terrorism.
Ann Coulter certainly isn’t soft on terrorism, and neither is her Jesus. The Jesus Ms. Coulter wants us Jews to accept is more about the Kingdom of Greed than the Kingdom of God. He is more about sanctioning war than preaching peace. He is a Christ of conformity who wants a nation of June and Ward Cleevers. He is a Jesus whose baptism is water boarding, and whose sacrament is swallowing our conscience.
I hope to hear a lot of good Christians decrying Ann’s anti-Semitism. I won’t be surprised if I don’t. Sad, but not surprised.
AC wants a nation devoted to JC. It would be more convenient and efficient, she said. Pluralism and freedom are messy. And messy is just what the terrorists want. So come on, Heebs, if you are really loyal Americans you will accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior.
Ann Coulter’s capacity to outrage is in direct proportion to her capacity to make money, so the fact that she said this doesn’t surprise me. I have no intension of picking a fight with her. In fact, I think she has provided us with a wonderful opportunity to gauge the heart of Christian America.
In an age when Christians complain that American Muslims don’t speak up when their coreligionists attack America (verbally and otherwise) it will be interesting to see which if any Christian leaders speak out against the anti-Semitic ravings of one of their own.
Judging from her mock surprise that Jews might be insulted by her notion that they need perfecting, I suspect few true-red Christian will find anything offensive in her comments. After all, as far as they are concerned only Christians are going to heaven, and Jews (along with everyone else outside their self-defined circle of the saved) are damned to hell for all eternity. So what’s to be shocked? We have heard this crap for two thousand years. We should be used to it by now.
But wait, this isn’t supposed to happen in America. George Washington promised us that America not was a Christian nation and would welcome Jews. Thomas Jefferson said there is a wall between church and state that would protect us from state sanctioned religious persecution. America is different.
But America may not be America any more. Driven more by fear than reason, blaming everything from 9/11 to Iraq on Jews and the Israeli Lobby, informed by a media obsessed with ratings, and mistaking decibels for dialogue, we are a people more and more willing to sacrifice our values to secure our vices. As we move closer to electing a new president we seem to be thoughtlessly condoning increased levels of homophobia, misogyny, and racism. We are afraid to stand up for what we used to stand for, and toss our civil rights aside for fear of being soft on terrorism.
Ann Coulter certainly isn’t soft on terrorism, and neither is her Jesus. The Jesus Ms. Coulter wants us Jews to accept is more about the Kingdom of Greed than the Kingdom of God. He is more about sanctioning war than preaching peace. He is a Christ of conformity who wants a nation of June and Ward Cleevers. He is a Jesus whose baptism is water boarding, and whose sacrament is swallowing our conscience.
I hope to hear a lot of good Christians decrying Ann’s anti-Semitism. I won’t be surprised if I don’t. Sad, but not surprised.
Friday, October 12, 2007
What's The Big Idea? Part Two: Annointing a Secular Messiah
I have been giving more thought to the Bronfman Foundation’s contest to find the Big Idea that will transform American Judaism, and the more I think about it the more I pity the winner.
In effect the Foundation will anoint a secular messiah, set her or him on an academic throne for two years, and pay her to perfect the Big Idea. Can you imagine the stress this person will be under? The winning idea is supposed to change everything, to create a Judaism that will capture the imagination of millions of Jews, and it must be produced under the pressure of peer review, foundation watchdogs, and unrelenting media attention: “Have you got IT yet? Have we been transformed yet? Are we there yet? Huh, Mommy? Are we?”
And when it doesn’t work, and it won’t, what happens to our anointed one then?
Why won’t it work? Because we American Jews don’t want to be transformed. We like things just the way they are.
Think about it. If we wanted a more mystical Judaism, we could join CHaBaD Hasidism or Jewish Renewal. If we wanted a more secular Judaism we could join the Society for Humanistic Judaism. If we want a lot of tradition we have Orthodox Judaism, if we want less tradition we can try Conservative or Reform Judaisms. If we want to blend progressive humanist values with tradition we can become Reconstructionist Jews. And if we want Zionism we can make aliyah to Israel. There isn’t anything missing from our options. There is no Big Idea out there.
But even if there were such a Big Idea and a Bigger Brain to think it, it would never last the two years at Brandeis the Foundation is giving the winner to produce it. Why? Because we Jews are hyper-critical. We would pick the idea apart so viciously that the Thinker would have to rethink it so often that she would forget what the original idea was in the first place. Look at me: I am criticizing the very idea of a Big Idea. Just think what I will do to the poor sap who wins the Messiah contest? I will crucify him, and I promise you I won’t be alone.
In effect the Foundation will anoint a secular messiah, set her or him on an academic throne for two years, and pay her to perfect the Big Idea. Can you imagine the stress this person will be under? The winning idea is supposed to change everything, to create a Judaism that will capture the imagination of millions of Jews, and it must be produced under the pressure of peer review, foundation watchdogs, and unrelenting media attention: “Have you got IT yet? Have we been transformed yet? Are we there yet? Huh, Mommy? Are we?”
And when it doesn’t work, and it won’t, what happens to our anointed one then?
Why won’t it work? Because we American Jews don’t want to be transformed. We like things just the way they are.
Think about it. If we wanted a more mystical Judaism, we could join CHaBaD Hasidism or Jewish Renewal. If we wanted a more secular Judaism we could join the Society for Humanistic Judaism. If we want a lot of tradition we have Orthodox Judaism, if we want less tradition we can try Conservative or Reform Judaisms. If we want to blend progressive humanist values with tradition we can become Reconstructionist Jews. And if we want Zionism we can make aliyah to Israel. There isn’t anything missing from our options. There is no Big Idea out there.
But even if there were such a Big Idea and a Bigger Brain to think it, it would never last the two years at Brandeis the Foundation is giving the winner to produce it. Why? Because we Jews are hyper-critical. We would pick the idea apart so viciously that the Thinker would have to rethink it so often that she would forget what the original idea was in the first place. Look at me: I am criticizing the very idea of a Big Idea. Just think what I will do to the poor sap who wins the Messiah contest? I will crucify him, and I promise you I won’t be alone.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
What's The Big Idea?
Everybody loves a magic bullet; even people who should know better. The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Foundation, one of the most innovative and generous Jewish philanthropies, is looking for the “killer app” that will transform Jewish life. The Foundation is offering a two-year gig at Brandeis and a six-figure salary to the person with the next Big Idea. I have no doubt they will find one, and no doubt it will fail.
The project is offered in the spirit of the 1929 effort by then Sears Roebuck and Company chairman Julius Rosenwald who offered $10,000 to the person who could best answer the question, “How can Judaism best adjust itself to and influence modern life?” The winner was Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, my teacher, hero, and founder of Reconstructionist Judaism.
Is Bronfman looking for the next Kaplan? I hope so. MK was one of the most radical Jewish thinkers of all time, redefining “Who is a Jew” and “What is God” in drastically humanistic ways that did much to change Judaism over the ensuing decades. But the fact that few people today know who Kaplan is, and that the Reconstructionist movement itself is no longer Kaplanian or even neo-Kaplanian in its orientation suggests that no one person, no matter how brilliant, can trigger a real transformation of Jewish life.
It is not that Judaism lacks big ideas and geniuses to think them; it is that the day of the Big Idea for social transformation has passed. Even the Internet, the last great transformation trigger, was not one Big Idea of a many Big Ideas and many more little ones. The Internet birthed a continuing revolution, something Judaism needs but most likely cannot sustain. Indeed, the Bronfman idea of putting the Big Idea in a book and the Big Thinker at Brandeis will render both irrelevant a week after the New York Times prints its book review.
Judaism needs a drastic revolution akin to the rabbinic reinvention of Judaism following the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. But it takes a disaster to trigger such a revolution, and Jews don’t take Judaism seriously enough to experience a disaster. The only disaster that would register in the minds of most Jews is an all out military attack on Israel’s survival, and that disaster would trigger a nuclear war that will make concerns about Jewish survival pale to insignificance.
The Bronfman Foundation shouldn’t be seeking to tap the wisdom of one Jew, but the wisdom of the Jewish crowd. My suggestion would be to create an on-line Jewish think-tank that invites Jews to solve their own problems without looking to a Big Thinker or any other authority figure.
It just so happens that I am working on this idea through www.simplyjewish.com (forthcoming). It will be a place where Jews are invited to solve the challenges of Jewish life not by finding one solution but by experimenting with many. I will write more about this when the site is up and running (which means when I get some serious money to build it, so don’t hold your breath). In the meantime, I’m praying that the Bronfman’s find another Mordecai Kaplan.
The project is offered in the spirit of the 1929 effort by then Sears Roebuck and Company chairman Julius Rosenwald who offered $10,000 to the person who could best answer the question, “How can Judaism best adjust itself to and influence modern life?” The winner was Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, my teacher, hero, and founder of Reconstructionist Judaism.
Is Bronfman looking for the next Kaplan? I hope so. MK was one of the most radical Jewish thinkers of all time, redefining “Who is a Jew” and “What is God” in drastically humanistic ways that did much to change Judaism over the ensuing decades. But the fact that few people today know who Kaplan is, and that the Reconstructionist movement itself is no longer Kaplanian or even neo-Kaplanian in its orientation suggests that no one person, no matter how brilliant, can trigger a real transformation of Jewish life.
It is not that Judaism lacks big ideas and geniuses to think them; it is that the day of the Big Idea for social transformation has passed. Even the Internet, the last great transformation trigger, was not one Big Idea of a many Big Ideas and many more little ones. The Internet birthed a continuing revolution, something Judaism needs but most likely cannot sustain. Indeed, the Bronfman idea of putting the Big Idea in a book and the Big Thinker at Brandeis will render both irrelevant a week after the New York Times prints its book review.
Judaism needs a drastic revolution akin to the rabbinic reinvention of Judaism following the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. But it takes a disaster to trigger such a revolution, and Jews don’t take Judaism seriously enough to experience a disaster. The only disaster that would register in the minds of most Jews is an all out military attack on Israel’s survival, and that disaster would trigger a nuclear war that will make concerns about Jewish survival pale to insignificance.
The Bronfman Foundation shouldn’t be seeking to tap the wisdom of one Jew, but the wisdom of the Jewish crowd. My suggestion would be to create an on-line Jewish think-tank that invites Jews to solve their own problems without looking to a Big Thinker or any other authority figure.
It just so happens that I am working on this idea through www.simplyjewish.com (forthcoming). It will be a place where Jews are invited to solve the challenges of Jewish life not by finding one solution but by experimenting with many. I will write more about this when the site is up and running (which means when I get some serious money to build it, so don’t hold your breath). In the meantime, I’m praying that the Bronfman’s find another Mordecai Kaplan.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
The End of Judeo-Christian
New times often require new language, and while I am not going to coin a term in this essay, I am going to suggest we retire one and replace it with another.
The term I wish to retire is “Judeo–Christian.” The term with which I want to replace it is “Abrahamic.”
I recently participated in an interfaith panel on community building. As I listened to several wise and well–meaning Christian speakers share their thoughts on the matter I cringed every time they used the word “Judeo–Christian” to refer to the values Jews and Christians share. First of all, the values they cited were no less Buddhist and humanist than Jewish or Christian, and, second, the term Judeo-Christian is insulting to Jews and Muslims alike.
It is insulting to Jews because it makes Judaism an appendage of Christianity, something many Christians believe it to be, and something no Jew would accept. Judaism is a religion in its own right. It doesn’t need to be completed by Christianity any more than Christianity needs to be completed by Islam. So, if for no other reason, let’s retire the term because it is insulting to Judaism. But there is another reason.
The other reason is that it is time (actually it is long passed time) that Jews and Christians recognize that there are three civilizations with roots in the Hebrew Bible: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. While there are clear differences among them, there are equally clear commonalities, and each traces its roots back to Abraham. By speaking of Judeo–Christian civilization we exclude Islam. By shifting to the term Abrahamic we widen the circle of inclusivity and speak more accurately. And, as we get more used to the term Abrahamic, I hope we will find ourselves encouraged to seek out basic knowledge about the three Abrahamic faiths and thereby find common ground on which to build true community.
But I want to urge caution when using the term as well, especially when it is used to define a set of values. Using the term “Abrahamic values” is not more helpful than Judeo–Christian values. For all his concern for hospitality and justice, Abraham also treated his consort and his sons in ways that would land him in prison today. And Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have and in some cases continue to countenance behavior that most thinking people would find reprehensible and immoral. So when it comes to “Abrahamic values” we must spell out what we mean, and when we do so we shall discover we are talking about a far more universal value set than the term Abrahamic allows.
Language matters. Let us take care to use words that are as accurate and as clear as possible. It is time to retire “Judeo–Christian,” adopt “Abrahamic,” and find a new term for values all humans share.
The term I wish to retire is “Judeo–Christian.” The term with which I want to replace it is “Abrahamic.”
I recently participated in an interfaith panel on community building. As I listened to several wise and well–meaning Christian speakers share their thoughts on the matter I cringed every time they used the word “Judeo–Christian” to refer to the values Jews and Christians share. First of all, the values they cited were no less Buddhist and humanist than Jewish or Christian, and, second, the term Judeo-Christian is insulting to Jews and Muslims alike.
It is insulting to Jews because it makes Judaism an appendage of Christianity, something many Christians believe it to be, and something no Jew would accept. Judaism is a religion in its own right. It doesn’t need to be completed by Christianity any more than Christianity needs to be completed by Islam. So, if for no other reason, let’s retire the term because it is insulting to Judaism. But there is another reason.
The other reason is that it is time (actually it is long passed time) that Jews and Christians recognize that there are three civilizations with roots in the Hebrew Bible: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. While there are clear differences among them, there are equally clear commonalities, and each traces its roots back to Abraham. By speaking of Judeo–Christian civilization we exclude Islam. By shifting to the term Abrahamic we widen the circle of inclusivity and speak more accurately. And, as we get more used to the term Abrahamic, I hope we will find ourselves encouraged to seek out basic knowledge about the three Abrahamic faiths and thereby find common ground on which to build true community.
But I want to urge caution when using the term as well, especially when it is used to define a set of values. Using the term “Abrahamic values” is not more helpful than Judeo–Christian values. For all his concern for hospitality and justice, Abraham also treated his consort and his sons in ways that would land him in prison today. And Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have and in some cases continue to countenance behavior that most thinking people would find reprehensible and immoral. So when it comes to “Abrahamic values” we must spell out what we mean, and when we do so we shall discover we are talking about a far more universal value set than the term Abrahamic allows.
Language matters. Let us take care to use words that are as accurate and as clear as possible. It is time to retire “Judeo–Christian,” adopt “Abrahamic,” and find a new term for values all humans share.
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Word Wars
This morning I had this civilized chat with a fellow at a local coffee house:
Him: “Are you going to watch the Republican debates on TV?”
Me: “I doubt it. So far all the debates have been too scripted.”
Him: “But we have to know who to vote for; who thinks like us.”
Me: “You are assuming that you and I think alike.”
Him: “Don’t you? I’m Pro-life, Pro-Guns, Pro-Marriage, and Pro-family. Aren’t you?”
Me: “Yes, I am all of those things, but I wonder if we mean the same things by them. For example: I am Pro-Life. That means that in many cases I favor the life of the mother over the life of the unborn. That means I promote sexual education and the use of birth control. That means I am concerned with environmental sustainability and the survival of species other than my own. That means I am concerned with poverty, and social justice, and global climate change.
And I am Pro-gun. I want to see guns in the hands of responsible people: the police and the military. I want to see that civilian gun owners are trained in the use of firearms and have a license to own them, and that no one but the military and police have access to military-like hardware.
And I am Pro-Marriage. I want to keep the government out of our private lives, and leave marriage up to religion. The state should provide civil unions, and in this there should be no discrimination between gay and straight. If a couple wants a religious marriage they should go to a clergyperson who will provide such a service for them.
And I am Pro-Family, all kinds of families, gay and straight. And…
Him: Whoa! This isn’t what those words mean. You’ve got it all backwards.
Me: That is what they mean to me. If they mean the opposite to you, you should say so. You should ay you are anti-moms, anti-nature, anti-law and order, anti-religion, and anti-family. I would respect that. I just hate it when you take my words and use them for the opposite ends.
Him: Look, we own those words. They mean what we say they mean. We own ‘em because we coined ‘em. We own ‘em because we are the majority and the majority gets to decide what words mean. And you should stop using these words that way.
From here things degenerated into “I know you are, but what am I.” Still, he was a nice guy.
Him: “Are you going to watch the Republican debates on TV?”
Me: “I doubt it. So far all the debates have been too scripted.”
Him: “But we have to know who to vote for; who thinks like us.”
Me: “You are assuming that you and I think alike.”
Him: “Don’t you? I’m Pro-life, Pro-Guns, Pro-Marriage, and Pro-family. Aren’t you?”
Me: “Yes, I am all of those things, but I wonder if we mean the same things by them. For example: I am Pro-Life. That means that in many cases I favor the life of the mother over the life of the unborn. That means I promote sexual education and the use of birth control. That means I am concerned with environmental sustainability and the survival of species other than my own. That means I am concerned with poverty, and social justice, and global climate change.
And I am Pro-gun. I want to see guns in the hands of responsible people: the police and the military. I want to see that civilian gun owners are trained in the use of firearms and have a license to own them, and that no one but the military and police have access to military-like hardware.
And I am Pro-Marriage. I want to keep the government out of our private lives, and leave marriage up to religion. The state should provide civil unions, and in this there should be no discrimination between gay and straight. If a couple wants a religious marriage they should go to a clergyperson who will provide such a service for them.
And I am Pro-Family, all kinds of families, gay and straight. And…
Him: Whoa! This isn’t what those words mean. You’ve got it all backwards.
Me: That is what they mean to me. If they mean the opposite to you, you should say so. You should ay you are anti-moms, anti-nature, anti-law and order, anti-religion, and anti-family. I would respect that. I just hate it when you take my words and use them for the opposite ends.
Him: Look, we own those words. They mean what we say they mean. We own ‘em because we coined ‘em. We own ‘em because we are the majority and the majority gets to decide what words mean. And you should stop using these words that way.
From here things degenerated into “I know you are, but what am I.” Still, he was a nice guy.
Monday, October 08, 2007
Doomed If We Do; Doomed If We Don't
Let’s say, if only for argument’s sake, that there is a Creator God—self conscious, all–knowing, all–powerful, etc.—living somewhere outside of where and when, space and time. Let’s say, again if only for sake of argument, that this God created the world as the Hebrew Scriptures says He did: by sheer will in six days. Or, at the very least, let’s pretend that we are all believers in Intelligent Design admitting that the Bible may not be a science book, but that there is nonetheless a Wise and Intelligent Being beyond creation who initiated and shapes creation.
Given either position one must be ready to answer the question: To what end? Why did God create the heavens and the earth in such a manner as to have them end in total desolation?
There are currently three leading theories regarding the destiny of the universe: Accelerated Expansion, the Big Rip, and the Big Crunch.
Accelerated expansion argues that the universe is expanding at an ever increasing rate, and that in time, say 30 billion years from now give or take, everything will be so far away from everything else that you and I will die a dark, cold, death.
The Big Rip is no less appealing. As dark energy continues to strengthen over the next 30 billion years the universe, from atoms to galaxies, will suddenly be ripped apart like a size 34 pair of Dockers trying to hold a size 38 butt as it bends over to tie a shoelace.
And then there is the Big Crunch that argues that dark energy is not growing but fading, and gravity will eventually pull the universe back into the original point from which the Big Bang banged. Perhaps to bang again. Perhaps not.
These are our only options: death, death, or death. You choose. My question is why would God create a world that was doomed? Sure, 30 billion years is a long time, but only to those of us still young enough to enjoy it. What about your great, great, great… grandchild born just a few years from spread, rip, or crunch? What about her? Huh? Don’t you care about her? Doesn’t God care about her?
I guess not. The universe is doomed.
This is why I have decided to believe in the Rapture. It is not enough to get off the planet. The Chinese will eventually have colonies on Mars. We have to get out of the universe, and there is no other way to do this ‘cept the Rapture. According to Rapturists true believers in Jesus will be lifted up to heaven before the earth is destroyed by the Prince of Peace. While this will happen long before the 30 billion year lease on life is up, I am told that those who are raptured will escape the fate of creation.
So, Lord, take me now, or at least sometime in the next 29 plus billion years, ‘cause I certainly don’t want to be here at crunch time.
Given either position one must be ready to answer the question: To what end? Why did God create the heavens and the earth in such a manner as to have them end in total desolation?
There are currently three leading theories regarding the destiny of the universe: Accelerated Expansion, the Big Rip, and the Big Crunch.
Accelerated expansion argues that the universe is expanding at an ever increasing rate, and that in time, say 30 billion years from now give or take, everything will be so far away from everything else that you and I will die a dark, cold, death.
The Big Rip is no less appealing. As dark energy continues to strengthen over the next 30 billion years the universe, from atoms to galaxies, will suddenly be ripped apart like a size 34 pair of Dockers trying to hold a size 38 butt as it bends over to tie a shoelace.
And then there is the Big Crunch that argues that dark energy is not growing but fading, and gravity will eventually pull the universe back into the original point from which the Big Bang banged. Perhaps to bang again. Perhaps not.
These are our only options: death, death, or death. You choose. My question is why would God create a world that was doomed? Sure, 30 billion years is a long time, but only to those of us still young enough to enjoy it. What about your great, great, great… grandchild born just a few years from spread, rip, or crunch? What about her? Huh? Don’t you care about her? Doesn’t God care about her?
I guess not. The universe is doomed.
This is why I have decided to believe in the Rapture. It is not enough to get off the planet. The Chinese will eventually have colonies on Mars. We have to get out of the universe, and there is no other way to do this ‘cept the Rapture. According to Rapturists true believers in Jesus will be lifted up to heaven before the earth is destroyed by the Prince of Peace. While this will happen long before the 30 billion year lease on life is up, I am told that those who are raptured will escape the fate of creation.
So, Lord, take me now, or at least sometime in the next 29 plus billion years, ‘cause I certainly don’t want to be here at crunch time.
Friday, October 05, 2007
PC is BS
There are few things more absurd than political correctness. I am listening to an NPR pod cast dealing with religious radicalization of prisoners, both Christian and Muslim. The concern is that prisoners are recruited for terror–prone religious organization, and upon leaving prison, will turn to terrorism in the name of God. The show is interesting and the host and guest are well informed and intelligent.
Then the calls from listeners begin.
One caller says the entire concern is silly because everyone in America is radicalized. To prove his point he sights cheerleaders and their passion for their school’s sports teams. There is no difference between passion for your team and passion for your God and His Team, the caller says.
Had I been the host I would have jumped all over this caller. First, he is mistaking passion for radicalization. It is one thing to cheer your team on and chant for victory, it is another to plant bombs in the opposing team’s locker room. Second he is ignoring the fact that religion, not sports, is responsible for global terror.
What did the host do? He simply deflected the caller’s observation on to his guest, who did his best to justify it. Madness!
Several Muslim callers sought to defend Islam in the prisons, despite the fact that no one was attacking Islam. In the course of doing so, however, they latched on to all kinds of conspiracy theories to claim that so–called Islamic terrorists were in fact US government agents trying to stir up trouble among otherwise peace loving Wahabis.
What did the host do? Nothing. He didn’t ask for evidence to back up this claim, or challenge it in any way. This is worse than madness. This is complicity.
One caller even raised the question why the government might be concerned about Islam which was certainly a religion of peace. No one bothered to point out to the caller that at present the vast majority of active terrorists in the world are Muslims. It may well be that America’s fears of Islam are overblown, but they are in no way unfounded.
What bothers me is the willingness of intelligent people to allow stupidity to pass as legitimate opinion in order to stay politically correct.
When you hear BS call it BS regardless of PC mores. Otherwise there is no hope for intelligent dialogue or democracy. Terrorism won’t silence America, but politically correct cowardess might.
Then the calls from listeners begin.
One caller says the entire concern is silly because everyone in America is radicalized. To prove his point he sights cheerleaders and their passion for their school’s sports teams. There is no difference between passion for your team and passion for your God and His Team, the caller says.
Had I been the host I would have jumped all over this caller. First, he is mistaking passion for radicalization. It is one thing to cheer your team on and chant for victory, it is another to plant bombs in the opposing team’s locker room. Second he is ignoring the fact that religion, not sports, is responsible for global terror.
What did the host do? He simply deflected the caller’s observation on to his guest, who did his best to justify it. Madness!
Several Muslim callers sought to defend Islam in the prisons, despite the fact that no one was attacking Islam. In the course of doing so, however, they latched on to all kinds of conspiracy theories to claim that so–called Islamic terrorists were in fact US government agents trying to stir up trouble among otherwise peace loving Wahabis.
What did the host do? Nothing. He didn’t ask for evidence to back up this claim, or challenge it in any way. This is worse than madness. This is complicity.
One caller even raised the question why the government might be concerned about Islam which was certainly a religion of peace. No one bothered to point out to the caller that at present the vast majority of active terrorists in the world are Muslims. It may well be that America’s fears of Islam are overblown, but they are in no way unfounded.
What bothers me is the willingness of intelligent people to allow stupidity to pass as legitimate opinion in order to stay politically correct.
When you hear BS call it BS regardless of PC mores. Otherwise there is no hope for intelligent dialogue or democracy. Terrorism won’t silence America, but politically correct cowardess might.
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
It Pays Not To Sow
Heterosexual intercourse is simple: Insert Tab A into Slot B. Repeat. It is the simplicity of the thing that worries our government. Almost anyone of a certain age can do it, and almost any female of a certain age can become pregnant from doing it. Since the government believes that babies are best born to a couple that has everything in common except gender, they are eager to make sure that Tab and Slot do not meet until man and woman are wed. Hence the millions of federal dollars now being spent to spread abstinence among unmarried adults up to age 29.
Abstinence programs don’t work with younger kids for whom sex is a curiosity, so the government must be thinking that it will work better among twenty-somethings who may not be so curious given the fact that over 90% of them have already had sex.
I love abstinence programs. They are simple, neat, and totally within the control of the people choosing to practice them. The fact that few people choose to practice them is a drawback, but one that is due, so the pro–abstinence faithful tell me, more to human depravity than an error in policy.
The government is concerned about the fact that unwed mothers gave birth to 998.262 babies in 2004. They believe that the only way to effectively reduce this number is to
“just say no” to sex. They are right, of course. Condoms and pills might help but they are not as effective in stopping pregnancy as is avoiding intercourse. To date only one birth to a virgin is on record. So while not 100% fool proof, abstinence is much closer to being so than any other method we know.
To see if this program has a chance in hell of succeeding, I spoke with a variety of university students, most of whom are devote Christians. I did find some who planned to wait until marriage to have sex, and some who had married young in order to have sex, and some who decided that waiting was foolish and that a couple should be sexually compatible before deciding to get married. Most of the sexually active students I spoke with use birth control even if their churches frown on it. While in no way a scientific study, I am pretty confident that abstinence won’t work with the twenty-something crowd any more than it does with teenagers.
When talking about sex, several male students used a farming metaphor: sowing one’s seed. That’s what triggered my own plan to lower the number of out–of–wedlock births. Just as the federal government pays farmers not to sow a variety of seeds, they could pay boys not to sow their seed. This would be a kind of reverse prostitution: you get paid not to have sex.
When I suggested this plan, a number of young men said they would abstain from sexual intercourse for an annual fee of $10,000. I don’t know how this stacks up against traditional farmers, but it seems reasonable. Of course the plan discriminates against women, but a similar discrimination exists among farmers as well. So share this with your government representatives as the election draws and let’s see what happens.
Abstinence programs don’t work with younger kids for whom sex is a curiosity, so the government must be thinking that it will work better among twenty-somethings who may not be so curious given the fact that over 90% of them have already had sex.
I love abstinence programs. They are simple, neat, and totally within the control of the people choosing to practice them. The fact that few people choose to practice them is a drawback, but one that is due, so the pro–abstinence faithful tell me, more to human depravity than an error in policy.
The government is concerned about the fact that unwed mothers gave birth to 998.262 babies in 2004. They believe that the only way to effectively reduce this number is to
“just say no” to sex. They are right, of course. Condoms and pills might help but they are not as effective in stopping pregnancy as is avoiding intercourse. To date only one birth to a virgin is on record. So while not 100% fool proof, abstinence is much closer to being so than any other method we know.
To see if this program has a chance in hell of succeeding, I spoke with a variety of university students, most of whom are devote Christians. I did find some who planned to wait until marriage to have sex, and some who had married young in order to have sex, and some who decided that waiting was foolish and that a couple should be sexually compatible before deciding to get married. Most of the sexually active students I spoke with use birth control even if their churches frown on it. While in no way a scientific study, I am pretty confident that abstinence won’t work with the twenty-something crowd any more than it does with teenagers.
When talking about sex, several male students used a farming metaphor: sowing one’s seed. That’s what triggered my own plan to lower the number of out–of–wedlock births. Just as the federal government pays farmers not to sow a variety of seeds, they could pay boys not to sow their seed. This would be a kind of reverse prostitution: you get paid not to have sex.
When I suggested this plan, a number of young men said they would abstain from sexual intercourse for an annual fee of $10,000. I don’t know how this stacks up against traditional farmers, but it seems reasonable. Of course the plan discriminates against women, but a similar discrimination exists among farmers as well. So share this with your government representatives as the election draws and let’s see what happens.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Cherry Picking My Faith
I cherry pick my religion. I take what I like and leave the rest. Most Jews do this, so no one says anything, but few readily admit it. I admit it.
For example, I choose Abraham as my spiritual grandfather. My Abraham was an iconoclast who shattered the idols of his father and brothers. My Abraham was a visionary who intuited an ethical monotheism in a world that had never heard of such a thing. My Abraham put God on hold to rush off and feed three strangers who happened upon his camp [yes, they were angels but he didn’t know that]. My Abraham took up arms to rescue his nephew but did not maintain a standing militia afterward. My Abraham put God to the test demanding that justice and mercy trump divine wrath. My Abraham had no intension of killing Isaac and used the opportunity to see if God was just another bloodthirsty deity deserving only rejection. My Abraham continued to have contact with his first son and built the Ka’abah with him (see the Koran). I ignore the fact that Abraham pimped his wife (twice!), and sent his mistress and firstborn off to die in the wilderness.
For example, I redefine kosher as vegetarian and expand it to speak to consuming things in general challenging myself to limit my consumption in pursuit of simplicity and ecological sustainability.
For example, I redefine Shabbat as a day for deep play. This includes prayer, but allows for many more activities that tradition would continence.
So, in a sense, I am founding my own religion. The only difference between me and other founders of religions is that I do not market my faith as something others can follow. I don’t expect people to follow me. I don’t want people to follow me. I don’t even want to follow me.
What I do want is for people to recognize that they too cherry pick their faith. The reason there are so many versions of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism is that Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists cherry pick their religions. You don’t want to feel guilty for not practicing the 613 mitzvot? Become a Reform Jew. You don’t want to worry about what the Pope might say? Become a Protestant. You don’t want to deal with caste? Become a Buddhist. You don’t want to deal with Buddhism? Become a Zen Buddhist. There is always a way to make your religion more like you.
I encourage people to create their own religions. I ask only that they be honest about it. If we were honest the violence we use to mask the fact that we are making up our religions to suit ourselves would end, and religion might be more a provider of hope that horror.
For example, I choose Abraham as my spiritual grandfather. My Abraham was an iconoclast who shattered the idols of his father and brothers. My Abraham was a visionary who intuited an ethical monotheism in a world that had never heard of such a thing. My Abraham put God on hold to rush off and feed three strangers who happened upon his camp [yes, they were angels but he didn’t know that]. My Abraham took up arms to rescue his nephew but did not maintain a standing militia afterward. My Abraham put God to the test demanding that justice and mercy trump divine wrath. My Abraham had no intension of killing Isaac and used the opportunity to see if God was just another bloodthirsty deity deserving only rejection. My Abraham continued to have contact with his first son and built the Ka’abah with him (see the Koran). I ignore the fact that Abraham pimped his wife (twice!), and sent his mistress and firstborn off to die in the wilderness.
For example, I redefine kosher as vegetarian and expand it to speak to consuming things in general challenging myself to limit my consumption in pursuit of simplicity and ecological sustainability.
For example, I redefine Shabbat as a day for deep play. This includes prayer, but allows for many more activities that tradition would continence.
So, in a sense, I am founding my own religion. The only difference between me and other founders of religions is that I do not market my faith as something others can follow. I don’t expect people to follow me. I don’t want people to follow me. I don’t even want to follow me.
What I do want is for people to recognize that they too cherry pick their faith. The reason there are so many versions of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism is that Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists cherry pick their religions. You don’t want to feel guilty for not practicing the 613 mitzvot? Become a Reform Jew. You don’t want to worry about what the Pope might say? Become a Protestant. You don’t want to deal with caste? Become a Buddhist. You don’t want to deal with Buddhism? Become a Zen Buddhist. There is always a way to make your religion more like you.
I encourage people to create their own religions. I ask only that they be honest about it. If we were honest the violence we use to mask the fact that we are making up our religions to suit ourselves would end, and religion might be more a provider of hope that horror.
Monday, October 01, 2007
Center for Seeking
“If you were to start another synagogue, what would you do?”
The question was emailed to me this week, and for a moment it captured my imagination. When the moment passed I realized I have no desire to lead a synagogue of any stripe. The purpose of a synagogue is to pass on the received wisdom and traditions of the Jewish people. It is an honorable goal and I am honored whenever I am asked to speak at such a place. Judaism, and those Jews who take Judaism seriously, have a gift to offer the world that can only be given by them. The prophetic legacy is the heart of Judaism as I understand it, and serious Jews (religious and secular) should be at its service always.
As a Jew I too seek to live out the prophetic call for justice, compassion, and humility, and support Jewish institutions that do the same. But as a human being I have no desire to limit my search for wisdom to “things Jewish.”
If I were to create something it would be a place for seeking rather than finding. It would be open to all people and all scriptures, both those coming to us from religion and those coming to us from art, music, literature, and science. It would have no fixed liturgy or holy days. Our meetings would blend silence and conversation. We might meet at night to lay out under the stars; or at dawn or dusk to sense the earth turning before the sun; or at the ocean or by a lake or river to learn the Tao of water that is at the heart of compassion and justice.
I used to think that finding trumped seeking, but I had it backwards. When seeking ends, what has been found rots. We should never rest on the known. What we seek is not a fixed thing to be found, but an unfolding mystery to be glimpsed. Seeking is dynamic, challenging, and rooted in questions and doubt rather than certainty and faith. Indeed, my faith is doubt, and my hope is in not knowing.
I would want a Center for Seeking that embraced doubt not as a hurdle to be overcome but as a gift to be cultivated and celebrated. My Center would be a salon for scientists, mystics, artists, writers, poets, musicians—holy rascals who are always willing to step beyond what we know. We would draw on human wisdom and experience. We would read Buddha and Blake, Ecclesiastes and Emerson, Job and Jesus, Paul and Patanjali, but we would not limit ourselves to any canon or to words alone. Math would matter alongside metaphor, and the Hubble Deep Space Field would remind us of the true holy land. We would have no creed but humility, no practice but kindness, no liturgy but wonder.
But we would have dues. You can’t have a center without dues. Well, now. This is something to ponder.
The question was emailed to me this week, and for a moment it captured my imagination. When the moment passed I realized I have no desire to lead a synagogue of any stripe. The purpose of a synagogue is to pass on the received wisdom and traditions of the Jewish people. It is an honorable goal and I am honored whenever I am asked to speak at such a place. Judaism, and those Jews who take Judaism seriously, have a gift to offer the world that can only be given by them. The prophetic legacy is the heart of Judaism as I understand it, and serious Jews (religious and secular) should be at its service always.
As a Jew I too seek to live out the prophetic call for justice, compassion, and humility, and support Jewish institutions that do the same. But as a human being I have no desire to limit my search for wisdom to “things Jewish.”
If I were to create something it would be a place for seeking rather than finding. It would be open to all people and all scriptures, both those coming to us from religion and those coming to us from art, music, literature, and science. It would have no fixed liturgy or holy days. Our meetings would blend silence and conversation. We might meet at night to lay out under the stars; or at dawn or dusk to sense the earth turning before the sun; or at the ocean or by a lake or river to learn the Tao of water that is at the heart of compassion and justice.
I used to think that finding trumped seeking, but I had it backwards. When seeking ends, what has been found rots. We should never rest on the known. What we seek is not a fixed thing to be found, but an unfolding mystery to be glimpsed. Seeking is dynamic, challenging, and rooted in questions and doubt rather than certainty and faith. Indeed, my faith is doubt, and my hope is in not knowing.
I would want a Center for Seeking that embraced doubt not as a hurdle to be overcome but as a gift to be cultivated and celebrated. My Center would be a salon for scientists, mystics, artists, writers, poets, musicians—holy rascals who are always willing to step beyond what we know. We would draw on human wisdom and experience. We would read Buddha and Blake, Ecclesiastes and Emerson, Job and Jesus, Paul and Patanjali, but we would not limit ourselves to any canon or to words alone. Math would matter alongside metaphor, and the Hubble Deep Space Field would remind us of the true holy land. We would have no creed but humility, no practice but kindness, no liturgy but wonder.
But we would have dues. You can’t have a center without dues. Well, now. This is something to ponder.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Coward
I am an avid listener to radio podcasts such as Speaking of Faith and Interfaith Voices. I learn a great deal from their interviews with religious leaders, theologians, and scientists with a deep interest in spirituality. Yet, I wish they would broaden their scope.
It is comforting to have Krista Tippett interview a Moslem cleric who insists that terror done in the name of Allah perverts Islam, which is really a religion of peace. Yet it is also less than satisfying. What would she say to a believer in terror as a legitimate tactic against the Great Satan?
I enjoy listening to her speak with a scholar of Judaism who reminds me of how deep the stories of Exodus are, yet I long for her to confront an ultra–orthodox Jew who thinks that woman are unclean and Gentiles lack higher souls.
Why should we assume that the liberal end of the religious spectrum is truer than the ultra¬–conservative end?
I am on my way to a conference on religion and the environment. Speaker after speaker will step up the podium to recite some version of “My religion loves the earth.” Do I really need to pollute the atmosphere with jet fuel to hear this? Do I really learn anything from “we love the earth” pabulum? [So why am I going? Because these are my friends and I love them and wish to be supportive. And, besides, American Airlines was flying to LAX with or without me.]
I want to talk with a scholar who says, “The earth is ours to exploit as we wish.” At least then I would have something to talk about.
Interfaith gatherings are too nice. Even when we really think the other person is going to hell for his or her beliefs, we refrain from saying so. If religion was really as kind and enlightened as interfaith conferences make them sound, the world would be a much better place for all living things.
I am beginning to suspect that religious liberals like myself are cowards. We shill for our respective faiths rather than confront them. I only hope someone on the panel will speak the whole truth and model an honest assessment of their religion and how it is lived. I can assure you it won’t be me.
It is comforting to have Krista Tippett interview a Moslem cleric who insists that terror done in the name of Allah perverts Islam, which is really a religion of peace. Yet it is also less than satisfying. What would she say to a believer in terror as a legitimate tactic against the Great Satan?
I enjoy listening to her speak with a scholar of Judaism who reminds me of how deep the stories of Exodus are, yet I long for her to confront an ultra–orthodox Jew who thinks that woman are unclean and Gentiles lack higher souls.
Why should we assume that the liberal end of the religious spectrum is truer than the ultra¬–conservative end?
I am on my way to a conference on religion and the environment. Speaker after speaker will step up the podium to recite some version of “My religion loves the earth.” Do I really need to pollute the atmosphere with jet fuel to hear this? Do I really learn anything from “we love the earth” pabulum? [So why am I going? Because these are my friends and I love them and wish to be supportive. And, besides, American Airlines was flying to LAX with or without me.]
I want to talk with a scholar who says, “The earth is ours to exploit as we wish.” At least then I would have something to talk about.
Interfaith gatherings are too nice. Even when we really think the other person is going to hell for his or her beliefs, we refrain from saying so. If religion was really as kind and enlightened as interfaith conferences make them sound, the world would be a much better place for all living things.
I am beginning to suspect that religious liberals like myself are cowards. We shill for our respective faiths rather than confront them. I only hope someone on the panel will speak the whole truth and model an honest assessment of their religion and how it is lived. I can assure you it won’t be me.
Friday, September 28, 2007
A New Jew
I met a young woman the other day who had only that afternoon found out she was Jewish. Adopted at birth, she had recently discovered her birth mother was Jewish. Knowing nothing about Judaism or Jewishness, she was startled to learn that having a Jewish mother makes one a Jew as well. Her shock was only compounded when she mentioned this to a friend and was accosted by an eavesdropper who said, “Oh, you don’t want to be a Jew, they’re going to hell!”
Imagine discovering you are a Jew one moment and that you are going to hell because of it the next moment. Many Jews experience Jew-hatred, and many more encounter popular ignorance about what it is to be a Jew, but most Jews have a few years of positive Jewish experience before the downside of being Jewish is dropped on them. This woman had none of that:
“Hey, guess what? I’m Jewish!”
“Yeah? Well, guess what? You’re going to hell!”
I asked her what she thought of all of this, and she really didn’t know what to make of it. Her adapted mother was an atheist and raised her without religion. She didn’t know what it means to be a Jew, and couldn’t fathom someone going to hell at all. Being chosen by God and damned by the God-fearing all in the same breath was just beyond her grasp.
I offered to be a resource if she wished to explore her newly discovered heritage, and then we parted company. I don’t know if I will ever see her again, but I am certain her story will stick with me.
Given where I live, prejudice against Blacks, Jews, Hispanics, and Catholics (unless they are pro-life and sitting on the US Supreme Court) is as indigenous as love of June and Johnny, Dolly, and Elvis. What bothers me is not that some stranger believes Jews are going to hell, but that he jumped on this young woman without giving her a moment to get to know her birth culture.
So please, all you Jew haters out there, if you have to scare Jews with hell at least wait until they know a little bit about Judaism first. Print up cards with your name and phone number on them and hand them out to Jews saying, “When you are ready to escape from the fires of eternal damnation for being a Jew, call me.” Or wear a button that says: “Ask me about Jews and Damnation” or design one with a picture of the Devil in the Uncle Sam pose saying, “Jew! I want you!” I promise when we need you we will find you.
Imagine discovering you are a Jew one moment and that you are going to hell because of it the next moment. Many Jews experience Jew-hatred, and many more encounter popular ignorance about what it is to be a Jew, but most Jews have a few years of positive Jewish experience before the downside of being Jewish is dropped on them. This woman had none of that:
“Hey, guess what? I’m Jewish!”
“Yeah? Well, guess what? You’re going to hell!”
I asked her what she thought of all of this, and she really didn’t know what to make of it. Her adapted mother was an atheist and raised her without religion. She didn’t know what it means to be a Jew, and couldn’t fathom someone going to hell at all. Being chosen by God and damned by the God-fearing all in the same breath was just beyond her grasp.
I offered to be a resource if she wished to explore her newly discovered heritage, and then we parted company. I don’t know if I will ever see her again, but I am certain her story will stick with me.
Given where I live, prejudice against Blacks, Jews, Hispanics, and Catholics (unless they are pro-life and sitting on the US Supreme Court) is as indigenous as love of June and Johnny, Dolly, and Elvis. What bothers me is not that some stranger believes Jews are going to hell, but that he jumped on this young woman without giving her a moment to get to know her birth culture.
So please, all you Jew haters out there, if you have to scare Jews with hell at least wait until they know a little bit about Judaism first. Print up cards with your name and phone number on them and hand them out to Jews saying, “When you are ready to escape from the fires of eternal damnation for being a Jew, call me.” Or wear a button that says: “Ask me about Jews and Damnation” or design one with a picture of the Devil in the Uncle Sam pose saying, “Jew! I want you!” I promise when we need you we will find you.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Theotherapy
[In response to my post entitled “Atheology” several people wrote me asking that I elaborate a bit on my own beliefs regarding God. You can read my theological speculations in my books, especially “Minyan” and “The Sacred Art of Lovingkindness,” so I took a slightly different approach here.]
I believe in the god of my own imagination. I suspect you do too.
My god is infinitely patient, merciful, and forgiving. Not because I am these things, but because I need these things. I don’t need a god who is dunning, angry and ready to pour out his wrath every time I fail to live up to my ideals. I have enough people like this in my life already. So I imagine a god who gives me what I need: not money, health, or happiness, but forgiveness, grace, and hope.
I don’t mistake my god for God, I just assume that I can’t really know anything about that God. When it comes to theology I am a Taoist: the tao that can be named is not the Eternal Tao. If you can know the will of God, it isn’t God’s will you are knowing but your own.
That’s why I enjoy talking with people about God. The more they tell me about the god they believe in the more they reveal about themselves. If your god is angry all the time, chances are you are afraid most of the time. If your god is into inflicting eternal torture on those who believe differently than you, my guess is you are a powerless person who dreams of being the bully for a change.
I am toying with the idea of starting a new school of therapy. Call it theotherapy. You tell me about god and what god does and needs and wants from you, and I will tell you all about yourself and how you can heal.
I need a god who is patient? I need to cultivate patience in my own life. I need a god of compassion? I need to become more compassionate myself. I need a god of forgiveness? I need to forgive myself and others. I also need a god who weighs around 155, lifts weights three times a week, and can stare down a bag of Doritos without eating any of them.
I hope theotherapy catches on. I can see myself as a theotherapist taking high paying clients, and freeing them from the gods they worship and helping them cultivate humility and compassion in the face of the True Unknown. I can envision starting a training program for religious studies majors who wish to become theotherapists, and publishing “The Mirror, a Journal of Theotherapy.” This could really have legs. At least it would give religion majors some way to earn a living.
I believe in the god of my own imagination. I suspect you do too.
My god is infinitely patient, merciful, and forgiving. Not because I am these things, but because I need these things. I don’t need a god who is dunning, angry and ready to pour out his wrath every time I fail to live up to my ideals. I have enough people like this in my life already. So I imagine a god who gives me what I need: not money, health, or happiness, but forgiveness, grace, and hope.
I don’t mistake my god for God, I just assume that I can’t really know anything about that God. When it comes to theology I am a Taoist: the tao that can be named is not the Eternal Tao. If you can know the will of God, it isn’t God’s will you are knowing but your own.
That’s why I enjoy talking with people about God. The more they tell me about the god they believe in the more they reveal about themselves. If your god is angry all the time, chances are you are afraid most of the time. If your god is into inflicting eternal torture on those who believe differently than you, my guess is you are a powerless person who dreams of being the bully for a change.
I am toying with the idea of starting a new school of therapy. Call it theotherapy. You tell me about god and what god does and needs and wants from you, and I will tell you all about yourself and how you can heal.
I need a god who is patient? I need to cultivate patience in my own life. I need a god of compassion? I need to become more compassionate myself. I need a god of forgiveness? I need to forgive myself and others. I also need a god who weighs around 155, lifts weights three times a week, and can stare down a bag of Doritos without eating any of them.
I hope theotherapy catches on. I can see myself as a theotherapist taking high paying clients, and freeing them from the gods they worship and helping them cultivate humility and compassion in the face of the True Unknown. I can envision starting a training program for religious studies majors who wish to become theotherapists, and publishing “The Mirror, a Journal of Theotherapy.” This could really have legs. At least it would give religion majors some way to earn a living.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
I am an Atheologist
Mixed metaphor department update:
I am cursed with a literalist mind: I want my metaphors to make sense. The other day I participated in a worship service where we sang this refrain: God, unchanging and ever-flowing. Isn’t that a contradiction? How can something that is unchanging be ever-flowing? Unchanging means static, and flowing is, well flowing.
So which is it? Is God unchanging or is God ever-flowing. If we say God is unchanging then petitionary prayer is a waste of time. If God has decreed that so-and-so is to die of cancer, for example, praying for healing is really asking God to change his mind, something that an unchanging god cannot do.
Now I don’t think God can change his/her mind. God doesn’t have a mind. God is what is and what is is the way it is because it can be no other way at the moment it is anything at all. God is bound by God’s own nature. If the conditions are such that death is necessary, you will die. This is not because God wills it, but because God is it. God cannot be other than God.
Yet as I look around I see nothing that is static and fixed. Everything is wriggling, dancing, gyrating, and flowing. God is not unchanging at all. God is change. This is what the Torah tells us when it has God say that God is “Ehyeh asher Ehyeh” (Exodus 3:14): I will be what I will be. God is unfixed and changing. God cannot be any one thing, for God is all things dancing into and out of existence.
Here’s the fun part: If God is change, then God is unchanging for change is constant. God is unchanging not in the sense of God being fixed and static for all eternity (Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover), but in the sense of Shiva/Shakti’s never-ending dancer.
Maybe this is what the refrain is trying to tell us. God is unchanging change, and being unchanging change God is fundamentally unknowable and unlabelable. You cannot classify or categorize something that is unfixed and flowing. You cannot have a theology about a God that won’t stand still for the portrait. And it is only when you drop all knowing about God (and certainly all your projections about “God’s will”) that you have any chance of meeting God at all.
So maybe the refrain is right. Maybe it is paradoxical because paradox is the only way we can point to the ceaseless changing that is God. I think the Hindu’s have the best phrase for this: Neti Neti, not this, not this. God is everything, but as soon as you point to one thing and say “This is God” you have stopped the flow that is God and so the thing to which you point (now reduced to an idea in your mind) is no longer God in any living way.
So it seems to me the atheists have it all wrong. You cannot be an atheist. How can you deny something that defies definition? What we should be are atheologists, people who refuse to reduce God to a god that we might worship or reject.
Think about it.
I am cursed with a literalist mind: I want my metaphors to make sense. The other day I participated in a worship service where we sang this refrain: God, unchanging and ever-flowing. Isn’t that a contradiction? How can something that is unchanging be ever-flowing? Unchanging means static, and flowing is, well flowing.
So which is it? Is God unchanging or is God ever-flowing. If we say God is unchanging then petitionary prayer is a waste of time. If God has decreed that so-and-so is to die of cancer, for example, praying for healing is really asking God to change his mind, something that an unchanging god cannot do.
Now I don’t think God can change his/her mind. God doesn’t have a mind. God is what is and what is is the way it is because it can be no other way at the moment it is anything at all. God is bound by God’s own nature. If the conditions are such that death is necessary, you will die. This is not because God wills it, but because God is it. God cannot be other than God.
Yet as I look around I see nothing that is static and fixed. Everything is wriggling, dancing, gyrating, and flowing. God is not unchanging at all. God is change. This is what the Torah tells us when it has God say that God is “Ehyeh asher Ehyeh” (Exodus 3:14): I will be what I will be. God is unfixed and changing. God cannot be any one thing, for God is all things dancing into and out of existence.
Here’s the fun part: If God is change, then God is unchanging for change is constant. God is unchanging not in the sense of God being fixed and static for all eternity (Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover), but in the sense of Shiva/Shakti’s never-ending dancer.
Maybe this is what the refrain is trying to tell us. God is unchanging change, and being unchanging change God is fundamentally unknowable and unlabelable. You cannot classify or categorize something that is unfixed and flowing. You cannot have a theology about a God that won’t stand still for the portrait. And it is only when you drop all knowing about God (and certainly all your projections about “God’s will”) that you have any chance of meeting God at all.
So maybe the refrain is right. Maybe it is paradoxical because paradox is the only way we can point to the ceaseless changing that is God. I think the Hindu’s have the best phrase for this: Neti Neti, not this, not this. God is everything, but as soon as you point to one thing and say “This is God” you have stopped the flow that is God and so the thing to which you point (now reduced to an idea in your mind) is no longer God in any living way.
So it seems to me the atheists have it all wrong. You cannot be an atheist. How can you deny something that defies definition? What we should be are atheologists, people who refuse to reduce God to a god that we might worship or reject.
Think about it.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
What's Your Banner
Each fall the campus of Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) is host to a vicious anti–abortion campaign that links abortion to genocide and sets up huge posters graphically depicting murderous scenes of the Holocaust and other genocidal acts of human cruelty. The anti-abortion people themselves are quiet, well healed, and so narrow minded that I imagine one could pass their heads through the eye of a needle. Yet they don’t have to say anything; their photographs talk loudly, albeit falsely.
Sometimes pro-Choice advocates line up in the “protest the protest” section nearby and chant their disgust at the obscenity of linking abortion to genocide and woman who have abortions to Nazis and homicidal maniacs.
Both sides are fueled by anger, fear, and hatred. Neither is centered in anything remotely spiritual, though I imagine many on the anti side consider themselves so.
Compare this to a pro¬-democracy rally in Rangoon, Burma (now called Myanmar to avoid the obvious comparisons with the shave cream product) where hundreds of Buddhist monks and nuns challenged the government to release the leader of the pro–democracy movement, Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest. The Buddhists marched under a huge yellow banner that read, “Love and kindness must win over everything.”
I don’t want to romanticize the Buddhists of Burma, nor do I claim to know what is in the hearts of every protester there. But I cannot imagine such a protest in the United States. Our banners are in-your-face attacks. It is a class of egos and wills, lacking any sense of compassion for the other side.
What does that say about us as a people? What does that say about our dominant religions and the moods they foster?
I mentioned this to one anti-abortion supporter who said it was like the Jews circling Jericho and blowing their trumpets until the walls fell. “That was a peaceful protest,” he said. I reminded him that as soon as the walls fell Joshua ordered his soldiers to slaughter the inhabitants of Jericho. “Yeah, well,” the man said and walked away.
It is hard to imagine a Buddhist monk or nun screaming into a television camera or making harsh if not obscene comments about those who disagree with them. Yet that is what passes for political and social debate in our country. I am trying to imagine Ann Coulter, or Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O’Reilly, or Bill Maher and Al Franken for that matter, marching under a “Love and kindness must win over everything” banner.
Love and kindness aren’t even on the agenda in America. Maybe they never were. I think we find such sentiments silly. We live in a world where money and power matter not love and kindness. I can’t help but wish it were otherwise.
Would I rather live in Myanmar? Not yet. But if the Buddhists have their way and love and kindness are the standards by which their society is run, we would be fools not to visit and see what we can learn.
Sometimes pro-Choice advocates line up in the “protest the protest” section nearby and chant their disgust at the obscenity of linking abortion to genocide and woman who have abortions to Nazis and homicidal maniacs.
Both sides are fueled by anger, fear, and hatred. Neither is centered in anything remotely spiritual, though I imagine many on the anti side consider themselves so.
Compare this to a pro¬-democracy rally in Rangoon, Burma (now called Myanmar to avoid the obvious comparisons with the shave cream product) where hundreds of Buddhist monks and nuns challenged the government to release the leader of the pro–democracy movement, Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest. The Buddhists marched under a huge yellow banner that read, “Love and kindness must win over everything.”
I don’t want to romanticize the Buddhists of Burma, nor do I claim to know what is in the hearts of every protester there. But I cannot imagine such a protest in the United States. Our banners are in-your-face attacks. It is a class of egos and wills, lacking any sense of compassion for the other side.
What does that say about us as a people? What does that say about our dominant religions and the moods they foster?
I mentioned this to one anti-abortion supporter who said it was like the Jews circling Jericho and blowing their trumpets until the walls fell. “That was a peaceful protest,” he said. I reminded him that as soon as the walls fell Joshua ordered his soldiers to slaughter the inhabitants of Jericho. “Yeah, well,” the man said and walked away.
It is hard to imagine a Buddhist monk or nun screaming into a television camera or making harsh if not obscene comments about those who disagree with them. Yet that is what passes for political and social debate in our country. I am trying to imagine Ann Coulter, or Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O’Reilly, or Bill Maher and Al Franken for that matter, marching under a “Love and kindness must win over everything” banner.
Love and kindness aren’t even on the agenda in America. Maybe they never were. I think we find such sentiments silly. We live in a world where money and power matter not love and kindness. I can’t help but wish it were otherwise.
Would I rather live in Myanmar? Not yet. But if the Buddhists have their way and love and kindness are the standards by which their society is run, we would be fools not to visit and see what we can learn.
Monday, September 24, 2007
Metaphor. Handle with Care.
I love metaphor and believe that metaphoric thinking is key to spiritual understanding. But metaphor can be misleading when the feeling the metaphor evokes trumps the wisdom it is meant to impart. Martin Buber’s metaphor “the eclipse of God” is a case in point.
Krista Tippett in her lovely and sometimes maddeningly frustrating book “Speaking of Faith,” uses Buber’s metaphor to introduce the idea that God has turned His Face away from humankind. This is metaphoric thinking at its worst. First of all, it isn’t at all what Buber meant. Secondly, it is theologically false.
An eclipse is not linked to the actions of that which is eclipsed. The sun does not turn away during a solar eclipse; the moon simply gets between us and the sun, and blocks our view. The sun is still shining; we just can’t see it. Buber didn’t mean that God has turned away from us, but that our ideas of god have blocked us from the living Presence of God. Even the word “God” is a block: “It is incumbent upon the human being to get rid also of the name Elohim [god], for it by necessity creates a relation based on an assumption of nearness” (Buber, Eclipse of God, 24).
God is not a being you can locate in or out of space/time. If God is in space/time, then God is no different from us. If God transcends space/time, God is irrelevant to us. For centuries theologians have tried to overcome the irrelevancy of a supernatural god by figuring out how a god who transcends space/time can interact with creatures bound by space/time. The whole enterprise, however, is silly, since the problem only exists in the minds of the people trying to solve it.
It is like a person who comes to you with a brown paper shopping bag and says, “I have a full size elephant in this bag. Can you tell me how I got it in there?” Now you can spend hours imagining all kinds of weird ways to get an elephant into a bag, or you can say, “You can’t have an elephant in that bag,” and walk on. When it comes to matters theological, I prefer to walk on.
It is we who say God is in or out of space/time. If the idea doesn’t make sense, stop saying it. Rather than trying to bridge a gap that we ourselves create, stop creating the gap in the first place.
God is not in space/time; space/time is in God. The reason we may feel eclipsed from God is that we have placed blinders over our eyes at noon, and then convinced ourselves that day has been eclipsed by night.
Of course if you really understand the reality of God in, with, and as all things, even the blinders are God, and you just take them off or leave them on as the mood moves you without imagining that either state effects your real relationship with God at all.
So please handle metaphors with care, making sure they speak truth rather than just evoke feelings.
Krista Tippett in her lovely and sometimes maddeningly frustrating book “Speaking of Faith,” uses Buber’s metaphor to introduce the idea that God has turned His Face away from humankind. This is metaphoric thinking at its worst. First of all, it isn’t at all what Buber meant. Secondly, it is theologically false.
An eclipse is not linked to the actions of that which is eclipsed. The sun does not turn away during a solar eclipse; the moon simply gets between us and the sun, and blocks our view. The sun is still shining; we just can’t see it. Buber didn’t mean that God has turned away from us, but that our ideas of god have blocked us from the living Presence of God. Even the word “God” is a block: “It is incumbent upon the human being to get rid also of the name Elohim [god], for it by necessity creates a relation based on an assumption of nearness” (Buber, Eclipse of God, 24).
God is not a being you can locate in or out of space/time. If God is in space/time, then God is no different from us. If God transcends space/time, God is irrelevant to us. For centuries theologians have tried to overcome the irrelevancy of a supernatural god by figuring out how a god who transcends space/time can interact with creatures bound by space/time. The whole enterprise, however, is silly, since the problem only exists in the minds of the people trying to solve it.
It is like a person who comes to you with a brown paper shopping bag and says, “I have a full size elephant in this bag. Can you tell me how I got it in there?” Now you can spend hours imagining all kinds of weird ways to get an elephant into a bag, or you can say, “You can’t have an elephant in that bag,” and walk on. When it comes to matters theological, I prefer to walk on.
It is we who say God is in or out of space/time. If the idea doesn’t make sense, stop saying it. Rather than trying to bridge a gap that we ourselves create, stop creating the gap in the first place.
God is not in space/time; space/time is in God. The reason we may feel eclipsed from God is that we have placed blinders over our eyes at noon, and then convinced ourselves that day has been eclipsed by night.
Of course if you really understand the reality of God in, with, and as all things, even the blinders are God, and you just take them off or leave them on as the mood moves you without imagining that either state effects your real relationship with God at all.
So please handle metaphors with care, making sure they speak truth rather than just evoke feelings.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Somebody Else
On my daily walk this morning an elderly man driving a slightly rusted white Corolla slowed down and pulled up beside me. I kept walking but turned my head smiling in his direction. He smiled back, waved a kind of apology, and said, “I thought you were somebody else.”
“I am somebody else,” I said, but my reply was drowned out by the car’s engine as the man picked speed and left.
“I am somebody else.” It’s true. I am somebody else than who he thought I was. I am somebody other than who he is. And, the more I thought about it, I am somebody other than who I think I am as well. I am somebody else.
The person I was when I went to bed last night isn’t the person I was when I awoke in the morning. The things that preoccupied yesterday’s me had largely fallen away by the time I awoke. And the distractions and dramas in which I awoke had faded by the time I went out to walk, and certainly by the time I returned home, once again as somebody else.
The only thing that ties “yesterday me” to “this morning me” and “right now me” is this story I am spinning about these many me’s. They are all characters in a narrative, and the only thing they have in common is the narrative. But still there must be a “real me,” after all who is telling this story? Isn’t “storytelling me” the real me?
When I go to investigate this I discover that “storytelling me” is simply another character in what is now a slightly more expansive tale that includes this story and the me who is telling it. And when I try to identify this new larger me I find only that it is subsumed into an even larger me, who is subsumed…. You get the point.
If I stop looking I can maintain the illusion that the last me to look is the real me. But this fiction can only be maintained by not looking. Yet as soon as I admit that I am not looking I am in fact looking at not looking and hence discovering yet another me. There is no end to “me” or to the stories told about “me.” And as for a storyteller behind the whole affair, I can’t find one.
So the old man in the Corolla was right: I am somebody else. In fact there seems to be nobody else but somebody else. Which of course leads to another story.
“I am somebody else,” I said, but my reply was drowned out by the car’s engine as the man picked speed and left.
“I am somebody else.” It’s true. I am somebody else than who he thought I was. I am somebody other than who he is. And, the more I thought about it, I am somebody other than who I think I am as well. I am somebody else.
The person I was when I went to bed last night isn’t the person I was when I awoke in the morning. The things that preoccupied yesterday’s me had largely fallen away by the time I awoke. And the distractions and dramas in which I awoke had faded by the time I went out to walk, and certainly by the time I returned home, once again as somebody else.
The only thing that ties “yesterday me” to “this morning me” and “right now me” is this story I am spinning about these many me’s. They are all characters in a narrative, and the only thing they have in common is the narrative. But still there must be a “real me,” after all who is telling this story? Isn’t “storytelling me” the real me?
When I go to investigate this I discover that “storytelling me” is simply another character in what is now a slightly more expansive tale that includes this story and the me who is telling it. And when I try to identify this new larger me I find only that it is subsumed into an even larger me, who is subsumed…. You get the point.
If I stop looking I can maintain the illusion that the last me to look is the real me. But this fiction can only be maintained by not looking. Yet as soon as I admit that I am not looking I am in fact looking at not looking and hence discovering yet another me. There is no end to “me” or to the stories told about “me.” And as for a storyteller behind the whole affair, I can’t find one.
So the old man in the Corolla was right: I am somebody else. In fact there seems to be nobody else but somebody else. Which of course leads to another story.
Friday, September 21, 2007
The New D List
After her controversial “Suck It, Jesus” acceptance speech at the Emmy Awards, Kathy Griffin is number one on a new “D” list, the list of the damned.
In her speech, Griffin said "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus." I don’t think this is offensive. In fact, having seen her show, I would be saddened to learn that Jesus had anything to do with it. It sucks.
She went on to say that if Jesus had his way someone else would have won award. I can see how this remark is troubling to Christians. After all they believe that Jesus does get his way. So either Jesus secretly likes her show and wanted her to win, or he isn’t as powerful as some Christians would have us believe. Heresy either way.
Ms. Griffin then ended her remarks by holding her Emmy aloft shouting, “Suck it, Jesus! This award is my god now!” This is the statement that really seems offensive to many Christians. I will withhold judgment until I get through to Ms. Griffin or her staff, and find out what the “it” is Jesus is supposed to suck.
Some offended Christians are not waiting for clarification, and have taken out a full–page ad in USA TODAY called “Enough is Enough.” The ad asks people to “Stand up for Christ!” and sign a petition against bigotry.
Certainly a petition drive is better than calls for the death of Ms. Griffin, something that I imagine would have happened if she had dissed Mohammed rather than Jesus. But there is something about this particular petition that troubles me. Indeed, it makes me question whether the people behind the petition are really Christians, and what their true agenda is.
The petition says in part, “It is time for people of faith around the country to stand firm against religious slander, bias, and bigotry of all types including Christianity.”
Read this carefully and I think you will discover that the phrase “bigotry of all types including Christianity” means that Christianity is a type of bigotry! Now this is more offensive that anything Ms. Griffin has said. It sounds like something godless liberals would say, not something a God fearing Christian would promote. I have a call into Ann Coulter to ask about this, and until I hear back from her and Ms. Griffin, I am asking people to stand by Jesus, and not defame Christianity by signing this petition.
Enough is enough!
In her speech, Griffin said "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus." I don’t think this is offensive. In fact, having seen her show, I would be saddened to learn that Jesus had anything to do with it. It sucks.
She went on to say that if Jesus had his way someone else would have won award. I can see how this remark is troubling to Christians. After all they believe that Jesus does get his way. So either Jesus secretly likes her show and wanted her to win, or he isn’t as powerful as some Christians would have us believe. Heresy either way.
Ms. Griffin then ended her remarks by holding her Emmy aloft shouting, “Suck it, Jesus! This award is my god now!” This is the statement that really seems offensive to many Christians. I will withhold judgment until I get through to Ms. Griffin or her staff, and find out what the “it” is Jesus is supposed to suck.
Some offended Christians are not waiting for clarification, and have taken out a full–page ad in USA TODAY called “Enough is Enough.” The ad asks people to “Stand up for Christ!” and sign a petition against bigotry.
Certainly a petition drive is better than calls for the death of Ms. Griffin, something that I imagine would have happened if she had dissed Mohammed rather than Jesus. But there is something about this particular petition that troubles me. Indeed, it makes me question whether the people behind the petition are really Christians, and what their true agenda is.
The petition says in part, “It is time for people of faith around the country to stand firm against religious slander, bias, and bigotry of all types including Christianity.”
Read this carefully and I think you will discover that the phrase “bigotry of all types including Christianity” means that Christianity is a type of bigotry! Now this is more offensive that anything Ms. Griffin has said. It sounds like something godless liberals would say, not something a God fearing Christian would promote. I have a call into Ann Coulter to ask about this, and until I hear back from her and Ms. Griffin, I am asking people to stand by Jesus, and not defame Christianity by signing this petition.
Enough is enough!
Is Atonement Possible?
Tonight is Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, and I am looking into the meaning of atonement. I am not concerned with the idea of atonement, its history, or its various definitions and uses. I want to know if, in fact, you and I can achieve atonement, and, if we can, how can we do so.
What is atonement? My Oxford English Dictionary defines it as the reconciliation of God and man through the death of Jesus Christ. Not much help there. In Hebrew the word atonement is kippur and carries connotations of ransom, koppair. We are held captive by our sins, and need to be freed from these.
In ancient times our ransom was paid in blood. Two he–goats were brought the High Priest on Yom Kippur. One was sacrificed to God as ransom for our sins, the other, called Azazel after the cliff over which it was to fall to its death was symbolically laden with the sins of the people and chased out into the wilderness (Leviticus 16: 6–22). With the fall of the Temple in 70 CE the rabbis put an end to vicarious atonement, and shifted emphasis from blood to contrition. Followers of Jesus stuck to the older Temple model and saw Jesus’ death as the final sacrifice. Vicarious atonement through death lingers in Judaism in the tradition of kapparot where hens (for women) and roosters (for men) are symbolically laden with your sins and then killed. The meat is given to the poor, who, I guess, are too hungry to think about the consequences of eating your sins.
Yet neither the death of Jesus, Azazel, or Big Bird, however, speaks to me. If someone has to die for my sins, it should be me.
I do find meaning, however, in the English word itself: atonement, at–one–ment— which I understand as unity with God the source and substance of all reality. Can we achieve at–one–ment? No. You cannot get what you already have: you are always and already one with God. Knowing this is humbling. Being humbled is liberating. Being liberated shifts your focus from achieving atonement to acting from it: doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly in, with, and as God.
So here is your homework (or shulwork) for Yom Kippur. Whenever you find yourself thinking about atonement, stop. Whenever you find yourself wrestling with matters of the spirit, indulging the desire to do theology and thus push What Is into the category of What May Be In The Future, stop. Stop worrying about your relationship with God, and start having godly relationships with the world.
What is atonement? My Oxford English Dictionary defines it as the reconciliation of God and man through the death of Jesus Christ. Not much help there. In Hebrew the word atonement is kippur and carries connotations of ransom, koppair. We are held captive by our sins, and need to be freed from these.
In ancient times our ransom was paid in blood. Two he–goats were brought the High Priest on Yom Kippur. One was sacrificed to God as ransom for our sins, the other, called Azazel after the cliff over which it was to fall to its death was symbolically laden with the sins of the people and chased out into the wilderness (Leviticus 16: 6–22). With the fall of the Temple in 70 CE the rabbis put an end to vicarious atonement, and shifted emphasis from blood to contrition. Followers of Jesus stuck to the older Temple model and saw Jesus’ death as the final sacrifice. Vicarious atonement through death lingers in Judaism in the tradition of kapparot where hens (for women) and roosters (for men) are symbolically laden with your sins and then killed. The meat is given to the poor, who, I guess, are too hungry to think about the consequences of eating your sins.
Yet neither the death of Jesus, Azazel, or Big Bird, however, speaks to me. If someone has to die for my sins, it should be me.
I do find meaning, however, in the English word itself: atonement, at–one–ment— which I understand as unity with God the source and substance of all reality. Can we achieve at–one–ment? No. You cannot get what you already have: you are always and already one with God. Knowing this is humbling. Being humbled is liberating. Being liberated shifts your focus from achieving atonement to acting from it: doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly in, with, and as God.
So here is your homework (or shulwork) for Yom Kippur. Whenever you find yourself thinking about atonement, stop. Whenever you find yourself wrestling with matters of the spirit, indulging the desire to do theology and thus push What Is into the category of What May Be In The Future, stop. Stop worrying about your relationship with God, and start having godly relationships with the world.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Jew Tree
I have been thinking a lot about the Jena Six lately. These are the six African American teens accused of beating up a white teen in Jena, La (pronounced JEEN-uh). Tensions reached the boiling point over a year ago when black students at Jena High (pronounced JEEN-uh Hi) asked to sit under a tree “claimed” by white kids. The day after the request three nooses were swung over the tree’s branches. Threatening blacks with lynching didn’t do much to build interracial harmony.
When talking with my own students about this incident I discovered there was a “black tree” on campus. Complete with a bench, this was the unofficial African American hangout. The irony of having a bench for “Blacks Only” was lost on my African American students. They simply wanted a place to feel at home.
I have no problem with this. People tend to congregate with other people they call “us,” and often feel awkward among those they call “them.” Certainly Jews (pronounced JOOS) should understand this. We are masters of “us” and “them” mentality, as well some of its greatest victims.
In my hometown, for example, the country club was Judenrine (German for “Free of Jews”), so the Jews built their own club. My little sister and her girl friends did the same thing when my friends and I built a Boys-Only Fort in the woods behind our house. So I wish African Americans and their tree all the best.
What does trouble me, however, is this: Where is the Jew tree? It turns out that there is no Jewish Tree on campus. This may not surprise you. Ever since the Garden of Eden the only tree that matters to Jews is Torah, which isn’t really a tree at all, but is called one by rabbis deliberately misreading Proverbs 3:18, “She is a Tree of Life to those who hold her close.” The Proverb is referring to Wisdom, God’s Daughter, but the rabbis imagine the reference is to Torah. True, Jews do love to plant trees on our New Year of the Tree (Tu b’Shevat) and there are whole forests of trees with little plaques bearing my name on them, but we prefer the metaphorical tree of Torah to the real thing probably because you can house it in an air-conditioned room rather than have to deal with actual weather.
Nature not withstanding, I took it upon myself to secure a Jewish Tree on campus. Our tree will be close to the library, and its Starbucks. After all what is the point of congregating under a tree if you can’t schmooze about books and share a little nosh?
The initial response to my proposal was positive, though I ran into trouble when I asked for a second tree across from the first. When asked why Jews needed two trees (if you know the joke, forgive me), I explained that given the fractious nature of Jewish culture we Jews needed one tree under which some of us would gather and another under which some of us would never gather. (If you don’t know the joke, ask a Jewish friend about the Jew stranded on a desert island. If you don’t have a Jewish friend, find a Jew Tree and make one.) My proposal is pending.
When talking with my own students about this incident I discovered there was a “black tree” on campus. Complete with a bench, this was the unofficial African American hangout. The irony of having a bench for “Blacks Only” was lost on my African American students. They simply wanted a place to feel at home.
I have no problem with this. People tend to congregate with other people they call “us,” and often feel awkward among those they call “them.” Certainly Jews (pronounced JOOS) should understand this. We are masters of “us” and “them” mentality, as well some of its greatest victims.
In my hometown, for example, the country club was Judenrine (German for “Free of Jews”), so the Jews built their own club. My little sister and her girl friends did the same thing when my friends and I built a Boys-Only Fort in the woods behind our house. So I wish African Americans and their tree all the best.
What does trouble me, however, is this: Where is the Jew tree? It turns out that there is no Jewish Tree on campus. This may not surprise you. Ever since the Garden of Eden the only tree that matters to Jews is Torah, which isn’t really a tree at all, but is called one by rabbis deliberately misreading Proverbs 3:18, “She is a Tree of Life to those who hold her close.” The Proverb is referring to Wisdom, God’s Daughter, but the rabbis imagine the reference is to Torah. True, Jews do love to plant trees on our New Year of the Tree (Tu b’Shevat) and there are whole forests of trees with little plaques bearing my name on them, but we prefer the metaphorical tree of Torah to the real thing probably because you can house it in an air-conditioned room rather than have to deal with actual weather.
Nature not withstanding, I took it upon myself to secure a Jewish Tree on campus. Our tree will be close to the library, and its Starbucks. After all what is the point of congregating under a tree if you can’t schmooze about books and share a little nosh?
The initial response to my proposal was positive, though I ran into trouble when I asked for a second tree across from the first. When asked why Jews needed two trees (if you know the joke, forgive me), I explained that given the fractious nature of Jewish culture we Jews needed one tree under which some of us would gather and another under which some of us would never gather. (If you don’t know the joke, ask a Jewish friend about the Jew stranded on a desert island. If you don’t have a Jewish friend, find a Jew Tree and make one.) My proposal is pending.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Hell Yes!
Sometimes religion is just plain scary. Case in point: Robert Peterson’s article “The Darkside of Eternity: Hell as Eternal Conscious Punishment” in the current issue of Christian Research Journal. Peterson argues “the wicked will suffer the pains of hell forever.” The wicked, I assume, are those who don’t agree with Robert Peterson, and what Peterson imagines for us (I am not a believer, thank God) is that the Prince of Peace and the Lord of Love will keep us fully conscious as fire sears our every moment.
I had hoped that the author would feel bad about this, but he shows no more remorse than the god he worships. Instead he blithely cites chapter and verse to prove his point: Jesus condemning the unsaved to eternal damnation in Matthew 25:41, and making the case for eternal suffering in Mark 9:47-48. There are other citations, but the point is clear: “the sufferings of hell consist in everlasting conscious punishment.”
The god of unconditional love that some Christians proclaim is, at least according to this theory, a lie, and those who propagate this compassionate theology will pay dearly for all eternity. God’s love is conditional: you have to believe the party line (good luck in figuring out which is the right party, however), in order to receive it, and if you don’t this god condemns you to eternal conscious torture. Obviously Rev. Peterson’s god has never read the Geneva Convention. Or, if he has, he has no more respect for it then Alberto Gonzales. But at least Rev. Peterson is honest: his god is a sadist.
This is one reason I love being a Jew. While our god is more than willing to commit genocide in this world, he doesn’t carry his hatred over into the world to come. Better still, this is why I love being a descendant of Abraham who had the guts to challenge god over Sodom saying, “Shall not the Judge of all the earth, himself do justly?” Abraham offers a check to God’s power: justice and compassion. And it works. If Abraham had argued God down to one righteous person rather than ten the city would have been saved. He simply misjudged the depravity of the people. While he certainly had his faults (ask Sarah, Hagar, Ishmael, and Isaac), he was far superior to both Rev. Peterson and Rev Peterson’s god.
I believe we create gods in our own image. Rev. Peterson and the millions of Christians who believe as he does must be very angry, fearful people who are either too cowardly to challenge their god, or who delight in knowing that those who disagree with them are going to burn for that slight. Their god doesn’t scare me, but they do.
I had hoped that the author would feel bad about this, but he shows no more remorse than the god he worships. Instead he blithely cites chapter and verse to prove his point: Jesus condemning the unsaved to eternal damnation in Matthew 25:41, and making the case for eternal suffering in Mark 9:47-48. There are other citations, but the point is clear: “the sufferings of hell consist in everlasting conscious punishment.”
The god of unconditional love that some Christians proclaim is, at least according to this theory, a lie, and those who propagate this compassionate theology will pay dearly for all eternity. God’s love is conditional: you have to believe the party line (good luck in figuring out which is the right party, however), in order to receive it, and if you don’t this god condemns you to eternal conscious torture. Obviously Rev. Peterson’s god has never read the Geneva Convention. Or, if he has, he has no more respect for it then Alberto Gonzales. But at least Rev. Peterson is honest: his god is a sadist.
This is one reason I love being a Jew. While our god is more than willing to commit genocide in this world, he doesn’t carry his hatred over into the world to come. Better still, this is why I love being a descendant of Abraham who had the guts to challenge god over Sodom saying, “Shall not the Judge of all the earth, himself do justly?” Abraham offers a check to God’s power: justice and compassion. And it works. If Abraham had argued God down to one righteous person rather than ten the city would have been saved. He simply misjudged the depravity of the people. While he certainly had his faults (ask Sarah, Hagar, Ishmael, and Isaac), he was far superior to both Rev. Peterson and Rev Peterson’s god.
I believe we create gods in our own image. Rev. Peterson and the millions of Christians who believe as he does must be very angry, fearful people who are either too cowardly to challenge their god, or who delight in knowing that those who disagree with them are going to burn for that slight. Their god doesn’t scare me, but they do.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Changing American Jew, part 2
I came across a wonderful story by Edgar Allan Poe that speaks to yesterday’s post regarding emerging trends among American Jews. The story is called “A Descent into the Maelstrom.”
Three brothers who regularly fish the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Norway are caught in a hurricane. One brother ties himself to the mainmast to keep from being blown overboard, but the mast breaks and carries him into the sea where he drowns. As their ship is sucked into the vortex, the second brother notices that lighter objects caught in the vortex are pushed out to safety. He explains this to the third brother, ties himself to a barrel, and abandons ship. The third brother chooses not to follow, convinced that the ship will survive the whirlpool. As the barrel carrying the second brother is flung out of harms way, the ship is crushed and the third brother dies. When the surviving brother is rescued he explains how he survived but his rescuers don’t believe him.
We American Jews are these brothers, Judaism is our ship, and the maelstrom is reality. Staying on board dooms us. Only by grabbing a barrel and trusting the chaos can we hope to survive. Most of us prefer to stay on board, either lashed to the mast of tradition or clinging to one rail or another. Not all of us will disappear, but those who remain will be the Jewish equivalent of the Amish: quaint and irrelevant. Only those who grab a barrel and brave the storm will make it.
What is the barrel? Torah broadly defined as the Jewish literature from the Bible to Chabon. With our stories intact, we can do what we have always done: create new understandings from old texts that continue to speak our timeless truth: justice and compassion as the way to and the way of holiness.
Story is at the heart of identity. Tradition is the way we live the story, but when tradition comes to replace the story the sap is gone from the tree and the tree dies. But try to tell this to people and they think you are mad. They are attached to the form and cannot imagine surviving without it. Yet that is the genius of the Jew.
There is no one form that has defined us. We adapt. We create. But whatever we create is linked back to Torah, to our story. In the Bible alone we find a host of Judaisms: Abrahamic, Priestly, Prophetic, and a Judaism of Wisdom that is almost atheistic in its iconoclasm. Which one of these is THE true Judaism? None and all. And then there is rabbinic Judaism, and kabbalistic Judaism, and Yiddish secular Judaism, and the plethora of modern Judaisms. If any one of these had to encompass all Jews for all time, there would be no Jews or Judaism at all.
We don’t need another survey telling us there is a maelstrom brewing; just stick your head out the window and you will see that is so. What we need is a barrel, some rope, and the guts to jump ship.
Three brothers who regularly fish the Arctic Ocean off the coast of Norway are caught in a hurricane. One brother ties himself to the mainmast to keep from being blown overboard, but the mast breaks and carries him into the sea where he drowns. As their ship is sucked into the vortex, the second brother notices that lighter objects caught in the vortex are pushed out to safety. He explains this to the third brother, ties himself to a barrel, and abandons ship. The third brother chooses not to follow, convinced that the ship will survive the whirlpool. As the barrel carrying the second brother is flung out of harms way, the ship is crushed and the third brother dies. When the surviving brother is rescued he explains how he survived but his rescuers don’t believe him.
We American Jews are these brothers, Judaism is our ship, and the maelstrom is reality. Staying on board dooms us. Only by grabbing a barrel and trusting the chaos can we hope to survive. Most of us prefer to stay on board, either lashed to the mast of tradition or clinging to one rail or another. Not all of us will disappear, but those who remain will be the Jewish equivalent of the Amish: quaint and irrelevant. Only those who grab a barrel and brave the storm will make it.
What is the barrel? Torah broadly defined as the Jewish literature from the Bible to Chabon. With our stories intact, we can do what we have always done: create new understandings from old texts that continue to speak our timeless truth: justice and compassion as the way to and the way of holiness.
Story is at the heart of identity. Tradition is the way we live the story, but when tradition comes to replace the story the sap is gone from the tree and the tree dies. But try to tell this to people and they think you are mad. They are attached to the form and cannot imagine surviving without it. Yet that is the genius of the Jew.
There is no one form that has defined us. We adapt. We create. But whatever we create is linked back to Torah, to our story. In the Bible alone we find a host of Judaisms: Abrahamic, Priestly, Prophetic, and a Judaism of Wisdom that is almost atheistic in its iconoclasm. Which one of these is THE true Judaism? None and all. And then there is rabbinic Judaism, and kabbalistic Judaism, and Yiddish secular Judaism, and the plethora of modern Judaisms. If any one of these had to encompass all Jews for all time, there would be no Jews or Judaism at all.
We don’t need another survey telling us there is a maelstrom brewing; just stick your head out the window and you will see that is so. What we need is a barrel, some rope, and the guts to jump ship.
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Changing American Jew, Part 1
A new study of American Jews points to the emergence of what authors Steven Cohen and Ari Kelman call a “privatized Judaism” rooted in “a more open notion of community, a more fluid conception of Jewish identity, and a more critical approach to peoplehood and belonging.” Not surprisingly, privatized Jews tend to be young (35 and under), intermarried, and less attached to Israel then their elders.
Jews love this kind of study. It feeds our paranoia that we are about to die out. We have been feeding this fear at least since the second century BCE when a study showed that young, cosmopolitan Jews were attracted to Greek philosophy and culture.
We aren’t dying; we are changing. Of course we may die out, but if we do it will be because we have become irrelevant, at which point our disappearance is deserved and not to be mourned. Irrelevance, not change, is the real challenge to Jewish life and survival.
Ask most Jews why they should be Jewish and they have no idea. Those that do most often speak of loyalty to parents, tribe, and culture; maybe even God and Torah. But rarely will someone say, “I am a Jew because the world needs Jews and the prophetic Jewish message of universal justice and compassion.” Yet it is this that really matters.
The Jewish mission is to promote Ethical Monotheism, the idea that One God gives rise to one world, one humanity, and one moral code: justice and compassion for all. At the heart of who we are is the prophetic call to do justly and love mercy. Where is the survey measuring that? As long as we measure Jewishness by love of Israel or synagogue attendance we will never address the core problem. Jews will love Israel when Israel becomes a light unto the nations, a beacon of justice and compassion. Jews will come together in community when the community does something worthy of their time and energy.
If Jewish youth are redefining community, identity, peoplehood, and belonging let’s fund a study that shows us what these new definitions are and where they may be going. Then let’s work with these new realities to create a compelling Judaism that can infuse the life of the emerging Jew with the prophetic call for justice and compassion and a Judaism that embodies it.
Jews love this kind of study. It feeds our paranoia that we are about to die out. We have been feeding this fear at least since the second century BCE when a study showed that young, cosmopolitan Jews were attracted to Greek philosophy and culture.
We aren’t dying; we are changing. Of course we may die out, but if we do it will be because we have become irrelevant, at which point our disappearance is deserved and not to be mourned. Irrelevance, not change, is the real challenge to Jewish life and survival.
Ask most Jews why they should be Jewish and they have no idea. Those that do most often speak of loyalty to parents, tribe, and culture; maybe even God and Torah. But rarely will someone say, “I am a Jew because the world needs Jews and the prophetic Jewish message of universal justice and compassion.” Yet it is this that really matters.
The Jewish mission is to promote Ethical Monotheism, the idea that One God gives rise to one world, one humanity, and one moral code: justice and compassion for all. At the heart of who we are is the prophetic call to do justly and love mercy. Where is the survey measuring that? As long as we measure Jewishness by love of Israel or synagogue attendance we will never address the core problem. Jews will love Israel when Israel becomes a light unto the nations, a beacon of justice and compassion. Jews will come together in community when the community does something worthy of their time and energy.
If Jewish youth are redefining community, identity, peoplehood, and belonging let’s fund a study that shows us what these new definitions are and where they may be going. Then let’s work with these new realities to create a compelling Judaism that can infuse the life of the emerging Jew with the prophetic call for justice and compassion and a Judaism that embodies it.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Merry-Go-Round Mind
First I have to apologize to anyone who thinks I am a basher of Christianity, or anyone who feels that I focus on the dumbest elements of that faith. I don’t mean to do either. But I do tend to find myself talking to people who, when I report what they say to me, sound dumb. This is one of those conversations.
I stepped in my local bookstore to use the free Wi-Fi, and there is a Bible study group meeting at an adjoining table. Someone raised a question about the Koran, and asked why the Koran says that God did not impregnate Mary and father Jesus.
The Bible study leader said the Koran was wrong, and that it propagated this lie because it was the book of the devil, Allah.
I waited a moment to see if anyone in the group would challenge this, and when they did not I leaned over and spoke up.
“The Koran claims to be the direct Word of God— Allah being not a devil but the Arabic word for God. When Arabic speaking Christians pray in Arabic they pray to Allah. They are not Satanists, so why assume that Muslims are? And there is no way to prove that the Koran is not the Word of God.”
“You are so mistaken,” the teacher said, making room for me at his table. “The Bible says, for example, that Isaac was almost sacrificed by Abraham. The Koran says it was Ishmael. But we know that Ishmael had been banished, so he could not have been with Abraham on the mountain.”
“But the Koran does not say Ishmael was banished.”
“Proving that it is wrong. And there is the matter of God having Son. We know that Jesus is God’s Son through Mary. The Koran denies this. It is wrong.”
“But how do you know it is wrong.”
“Because the Bible tells me different.”
“But how do you know the Bible is true?”
“Because it is the Bible.”
“Oh.”
“See?”
What I saw is that this fellow’s reasoning goes in circles, and there is no way off the merry–go–round of his faith. I didn’t take the place at his table. I wonder if I should have.
I stepped in my local bookstore to use the free Wi-Fi, and there is a Bible study group meeting at an adjoining table. Someone raised a question about the Koran, and asked why the Koran says that God did not impregnate Mary and father Jesus.
The Bible study leader said the Koran was wrong, and that it propagated this lie because it was the book of the devil, Allah.
I waited a moment to see if anyone in the group would challenge this, and when they did not I leaned over and spoke up.
“The Koran claims to be the direct Word of God— Allah being not a devil but the Arabic word for God. When Arabic speaking Christians pray in Arabic they pray to Allah. They are not Satanists, so why assume that Muslims are? And there is no way to prove that the Koran is not the Word of God.”
“You are so mistaken,” the teacher said, making room for me at his table. “The Bible says, for example, that Isaac was almost sacrificed by Abraham. The Koran says it was Ishmael. But we know that Ishmael had been banished, so he could not have been with Abraham on the mountain.”
“But the Koran does not say Ishmael was banished.”
“Proving that it is wrong. And there is the matter of God having Son. We know that Jesus is God’s Son through Mary. The Koran denies this. It is wrong.”
“But how do you know it is wrong.”
“Because the Bible tells me different.”
“But how do you know the Bible is true?”
“Because it is the Bible.”
“Oh.”
“See?”
What I saw is that this fellow’s reasoning goes in circles, and there is no way off the merry–go–round of his faith. I didn’t take the place at his table. I wonder if I should have.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Moments
In his classic work, Shobogenzo, Dogen Zenji, the 13th century founder of the Soto Zen school in Japan, claims there are 6,400,099,180 moments in a day. Now you could check out his math, assuming you could figure out what he meant by a “moment,” or you could simply be impressed that he has a number at all. I choose the later. I just find the number—6,400,099,180—compelling, and somehow comforting; it leaves plenty of time for mistakes.
A mistake is what it says it is: a missed opportunity to take advantage of a moment. Something is held out to me and I just don’t notice. It could be that what is offered is not something I would choose to grasp anyway, but I won’t know if I don’t pay attention. Unlike many games, the game of life requires you to be present in order to win.
I usually find myself reacting to moment 6,373,199,102 when moment 6,373,199,103 is being offered. I don’t realize I am living in the past until the past I am living in has long passed. There are some spiritual masters who tell me this is an error on my part, and that it keeps me from achieving enlightenment. But I don’t think so.
It seems to me that the “me” itself can only be a reaction to the past. “Me” and “I” are products of the past. The “I” I take myself to be at this moment (moment #4,273,100,736 but who’s counting?) is simply a reflection of the “I” I was in the last moment. And by the time I realize this I am already in the next moment dragging the past along with me.
There is no “I” or “me” in the present moment. That is why I don’t trust people who claim to live in the present. First of all everyone and everything lives in the present, there is no alternative. But the “I” that knows it is living at all is never in the present, but always in the past. Living is always in the present; the liver is always in the past (so are lungs, kidneys, and hearts).
What Dogen is saying (to me anyway) is that I have 6,400,099,180 chances to realize this every day. Of course “realizing” too is of the past, so what he is really saying is that I will experience 6,400,099,180 failures of realization every day. That’s a lot of failures. And in a culture that values success over failure it is very humbling. I like “humbling.”
I like the freedom that comes with being humbled, with knowing that failure is the norm. Of course failure, no less than success, is in the past, so maybe failure and success are both meaningless. Maybe realization and nonrealization are both insane goals. Maybe there are just moments: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… 6,400,099,180.
Does this bother you? It thrills me. Just moments—no point, no goal, no purpose, just moments: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… 6,400,099,180.
A mistake is what it says it is: a missed opportunity to take advantage of a moment. Something is held out to me and I just don’t notice. It could be that what is offered is not something I would choose to grasp anyway, but I won’t know if I don’t pay attention. Unlike many games, the game of life requires you to be present in order to win.
I usually find myself reacting to moment 6,373,199,102 when moment 6,373,199,103 is being offered. I don’t realize I am living in the past until the past I am living in has long passed. There are some spiritual masters who tell me this is an error on my part, and that it keeps me from achieving enlightenment. But I don’t think so.
It seems to me that the “me” itself can only be a reaction to the past. “Me” and “I” are products of the past. The “I” I take myself to be at this moment (moment #4,273,100,736 but who’s counting?) is simply a reflection of the “I” I was in the last moment. And by the time I realize this I am already in the next moment dragging the past along with me.
There is no “I” or “me” in the present moment. That is why I don’t trust people who claim to live in the present. First of all everyone and everything lives in the present, there is no alternative. But the “I” that knows it is living at all is never in the present, but always in the past. Living is always in the present; the liver is always in the past (so are lungs, kidneys, and hearts).
What Dogen is saying (to me anyway) is that I have 6,400,099,180 chances to realize this every day. Of course “realizing” too is of the past, so what he is really saying is that I will experience 6,400,099,180 failures of realization every day. That’s a lot of failures. And in a culture that values success over failure it is very humbling. I like “humbling.”
I like the freedom that comes with being humbled, with knowing that failure is the norm. Of course failure, no less than success, is in the past, so maybe failure and success are both meaningless. Maybe realization and nonrealization are both insane goals. Maybe there are just moments: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… 6,400,099,180.
Does this bother you? It thrills me. Just moments—no point, no goal, no purpose, just moments: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5… 6,400,099,180.
Monday, September 10, 2007
No Shul for Me this Rosh haShanah
I’m not going to Rosh haShanah services this week. Synagogue holds no fascination for me. Neither does the liturgy nor the babble of rabbis and pundits. Despite the fact— or perhaps because of it— that Rosh haShanah (the Jewish New Year) and Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) are the times when most Jews, even nonobservant Jews go to shul, I am staying home.
This will be the first time in over fifty years that I have not attended synagogue on the High Holy Days. I did not pursue a High Holy Day pulpit this year, and one did not pursue me. I knew that if I were to lead services other than those I myself would compose, I would be forced to pretend to beliefs I do not hold, or forced to mangle words in order to make them seem to say what I want them to say, rather than what they do say.
And what they do say is that there is a God “out there” somewhere who watches and judges and decides my fate. I haven’t believed this since I was a kid. There is no “out there” and judging and deciding require a human–like consciousness that God, as I understand God, just doesn’t have.
I have been told I should go to shul not for God but for community. But there is no real meeting with people at High Holy Days. It is too crowded, too formal. To sit in pews and read words that only antagonize me is not a catalyst for community. I would rather sit in silence and then speak intimately with others from the heart.
So I shall go on retreat for Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur. I shall leave town and walk in the woods and make a sacred pilgrimage to the center of my being by walking a local labyrinth. And I will pray. I will pray as I always do: speaking directly to God without a fixed text; simply pouring my heart out to Her and having Her reflect my suffering and my joy back to me that I might better learn how to shoulder the burdens of my life and lessen the burden I place on other lives.
Yet I will pray one traditional piece of liturgy: “Who shall live? Who shall die?” This is the one liturgical insight that matters to me: who shall live and die and suffer and rejoice… We don’t know (though in a sense the answer is “me”). The prayer solves nothing, reveals nothing. It says that we cannot know today what will befall us tomorrow, but that we can live each day with repentance, prayer, and generosity. This is a New Year challenge that never grows old or stale or meaningless for me.
Another Rosh haShanah tradition I value is asking for forgiveness, so let me close with this: If I have hurt any of you this year, knowingly or unknowingly, advertantly or inadvertently, I ask your forgiveness. And if I have not caused you pain, just give me time.
L’Shana Tova
This will be the first time in over fifty years that I have not attended synagogue on the High Holy Days. I did not pursue a High Holy Day pulpit this year, and one did not pursue me. I knew that if I were to lead services other than those I myself would compose, I would be forced to pretend to beliefs I do not hold, or forced to mangle words in order to make them seem to say what I want them to say, rather than what they do say.
And what they do say is that there is a God “out there” somewhere who watches and judges and decides my fate. I haven’t believed this since I was a kid. There is no “out there” and judging and deciding require a human–like consciousness that God, as I understand God, just doesn’t have.
I have been told I should go to shul not for God but for community. But there is no real meeting with people at High Holy Days. It is too crowded, too formal. To sit in pews and read words that only antagonize me is not a catalyst for community. I would rather sit in silence and then speak intimately with others from the heart.
So I shall go on retreat for Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur. I shall leave town and walk in the woods and make a sacred pilgrimage to the center of my being by walking a local labyrinth. And I will pray. I will pray as I always do: speaking directly to God without a fixed text; simply pouring my heart out to Her and having Her reflect my suffering and my joy back to me that I might better learn how to shoulder the burdens of my life and lessen the burden I place on other lives.
Yet I will pray one traditional piece of liturgy: “Who shall live? Who shall die?” This is the one liturgical insight that matters to me: who shall live and die and suffer and rejoice… We don’t know (though in a sense the answer is “me”). The prayer solves nothing, reveals nothing. It says that we cannot know today what will befall us tomorrow, but that we can live each day with repentance, prayer, and generosity. This is a New Year challenge that never grows old or stale or meaningless for me.
Another Rosh haShanah tradition I value is asking for forgiveness, so let me close with this: If I have hurt any of you this year, knowingly or unknowingly, advertantly or inadvertently, I ask your forgiveness. And if I have not caused you pain, just give me time.
L’Shana Tova
Sunday, September 09, 2007
The Browning of a Terrorist
By the time you read this, Osama Bin Laden has released his new video. I saw an advance photo of him from the video, and I must say, “Osama, you look marvelous!”
Osama has colored his beard, and it has taken years off his face. He looks like a young terrorist again. His message is clear: “Cave living is good for you. It makes you younger. If you think worrying about the Americans is getting me, aging me— well think again.”
The more I thought about the new beard color, however, the more curious I became as to how he did this. Do you think he just walked into a Pakistani salon and said, “Salaam aleikem, Habibi, can you do something with this gray? It’s making me feel so, you know, 9/11. It’s been six years with the same look. Let’s get crazy! The gray has got to go.” I doubt it.
For one thing, the paparazzi would have been all over him. Photos of Osama sitting in the beauty parlor chair reading the latest issue Beneath the Burka (for the essays, of course) would have appeared worldwide in hours. So going to a salon is out of the question.
Maybe he just walked into his cave, mixed some hair dye he had ordered on–line, and reemerged a younger man. Yet this doesn’t make sense either. After all what would his fellow terrorists think?
“Have seen the O-man? He has gone so metrosexual!”
“You know, I was thinking the same thing. It’s like he’s thinking about dating again. Just between you and me I heard he really bombs in bed. Get it? Bombs in bed? I’d send that joke to The New Yorker if we didn’t hate that city so much.”
No, a shocking change from gray to brown would be too much for his people to bear. I think he would have had to do this gradually so as not to disturb his followers. My guess is that he planned this for months, and that the reason we haven’t seen him for so long is that he was slowly washing away the gray.
To be certain, however, I contacted a source in Pakistan, and asked about available hair color products. For safety’s sake he asked me to call him “Abdul” (his real name is Hassan). “Abdul” told me that you can’t buy most American hair products in the mountainous regions of Pakistan where Bin Laden is living.
Vidal Sasson is not available because the Sassons are Jews. Clairol is prohibited be cause it has the letter “i,” “o,” and “l” in its name, which spells “oil” and links Clairol to the Saudi Royal Family which Bin Laden hates. According to “Abdul” Grecian Formula is Osama’s brand of choice. “You must remember that we Arabs were the ones who kept Greek philosophy alive. We love Aristotle, so anything Greek is cool with us.”
And with me. I just know the new color will make Osama stand out more clearly against the pale backdrop of the Pakistani hills. I just pray someone is looking.
Osama has colored his beard, and it has taken years off his face. He looks like a young terrorist again. His message is clear: “Cave living is good for you. It makes you younger. If you think worrying about the Americans is getting me, aging me— well think again.”
The more I thought about the new beard color, however, the more curious I became as to how he did this. Do you think he just walked into a Pakistani salon and said, “Salaam aleikem, Habibi, can you do something with this gray? It’s making me feel so, you know, 9/11. It’s been six years with the same look. Let’s get crazy! The gray has got to go.” I doubt it.
For one thing, the paparazzi would have been all over him. Photos of Osama sitting in the beauty parlor chair reading the latest issue Beneath the Burka (for the essays, of course) would have appeared worldwide in hours. So going to a salon is out of the question.
Maybe he just walked into his cave, mixed some hair dye he had ordered on–line, and reemerged a younger man. Yet this doesn’t make sense either. After all what would his fellow terrorists think?
“Have seen the O-man? He has gone so metrosexual!”
“You know, I was thinking the same thing. It’s like he’s thinking about dating again. Just between you and me I heard he really bombs in bed. Get it? Bombs in bed? I’d send that joke to The New Yorker if we didn’t hate that city so much.”
No, a shocking change from gray to brown would be too much for his people to bear. I think he would have had to do this gradually so as not to disturb his followers. My guess is that he planned this for months, and that the reason we haven’t seen him for so long is that he was slowly washing away the gray.
To be certain, however, I contacted a source in Pakistan, and asked about available hair color products. For safety’s sake he asked me to call him “Abdul” (his real name is Hassan). “Abdul” told me that you can’t buy most American hair products in the mountainous regions of Pakistan where Bin Laden is living.
Vidal Sasson is not available because the Sassons are Jews. Clairol is prohibited be cause it has the letter “i,” “o,” and “l” in its name, which spells “oil” and links Clairol to the Saudi Royal Family which Bin Laden hates. According to “Abdul” Grecian Formula is Osama’s brand of choice. “You must remember that we Arabs were the ones who kept Greek philosophy alive. We love Aristotle, so anything Greek is cool with us.”
And with me. I just know the new color will make Osama stand out more clearly against the pale backdrop of the Pakistani hills. I just pray someone is looking.
Friday, September 07, 2007
The "G" Word
The Anti–Defamation League has broken with most Jewish organizations and has called the Turkish slaughter of Armenians what is was: a genocide. The Turks continue to deny their history, and have used their leverage with the United States and Israel to keep these nations quiet as well.
I understand why Jews and many Israelis are reluctant to use the “g” word. Turkey is very important to Israel on a number of fronts, and poking a stick in the eye of the Turks is bad for business and Israeli security.
I understand that Israel is not a nation of saints or a saintly nation. Zionism was about realpolitik, building a homeland for Jews not a homeland for Jewish ideals. Many of us in the Diaspora conflate the two, and demand that Israel be a holy nation, but this is not possible. Nations, like corporations, have only one obligation: to see to the best interests of their stakeholders. If allowing the denial of the Armenian holocaust to continue is the price of Turkish cooperation, then so be it.
But understanding a problem doesn’t help my nausea over the fact that we Jews, of all people, are willing to help a country turn a blind eye to its genocidal past.
I am naïve, I suppose, but I want Jews in both Israel and the Diaspora to stand for something other than tribal solidarity and survival. The world doesn’t need Jews in name only. The gifts of the Jews to humanity have little to do with our genetic code and DNA, and everything to do with our prophets and wisdom sages. From Abraham to Jesus we stood against the status quo. And yes, when we were the status quo we exploited our own as a nation like every other. But we continually rose above our baser instincts and realpolitik and called ourselves and the world to a universal justice, compassion, and humility that trumped and transcended tribal concerns.
I just can’t get over how Jews, with our oh so sanctimonious “Never Again,” can pretend that other people don’t suffer genocidal madness of homicidal regimes. We all know the Armenian Holocaust happened, but we are too timid to say so.
Rabbi Hillel said two thousand years ago: In a place where there are no heroes, be a hero. Bravo to the heroism of the ADL for their willingness to use the “G” word and allow the Armenians and their suffering its rightful place in history. How sad for the rest of our institutions, and the State that claims to speak for all Jews, that our fear is greater than our shame.
This is the season of asking others for forgiveness. It would be a powerful first step toward regaining our honor if our Jewish organizations and State asked the Armenian people to forgive our cowardice. By admitting we are cowards we might find the prophetic passion to be heroes once again.
I understand why Jews and many Israelis are reluctant to use the “g” word. Turkey is very important to Israel on a number of fronts, and poking a stick in the eye of the Turks is bad for business and Israeli security.
I understand that Israel is not a nation of saints or a saintly nation. Zionism was about realpolitik, building a homeland for Jews not a homeland for Jewish ideals. Many of us in the Diaspora conflate the two, and demand that Israel be a holy nation, but this is not possible. Nations, like corporations, have only one obligation: to see to the best interests of their stakeholders. If allowing the denial of the Armenian holocaust to continue is the price of Turkish cooperation, then so be it.
But understanding a problem doesn’t help my nausea over the fact that we Jews, of all people, are willing to help a country turn a blind eye to its genocidal past.
I am naïve, I suppose, but I want Jews in both Israel and the Diaspora to stand for something other than tribal solidarity and survival. The world doesn’t need Jews in name only. The gifts of the Jews to humanity have little to do with our genetic code and DNA, and everything to do with our prophets and wisdom sages. From Abraham to Jesus we stood against the status quo. And yes, when we were the status quo we exploited our own as a nation like every other. But we continually rose above our baser instincts and realpolitik and called ourselves and the world to a universal justice, compassion, and humility that trumped and transcended tribal concerns.
I just can’t get over how Jews, with our oh so sanctimonious “Never Again,” can pretend that other people don’t suffer genocidal madness of homicidal regimes. We all know the Armenian Holocaust happened, but we are too timid to say so.
Rabbi Hillel said two thousand years ago: In a place where there are no heroes, be a hero. Bravo to the heroism of the ADL for their willingness to use the “G” word and allow the Armenians and their suffering its rightful place in history. How sad for the rest of our institutions, and the State that claims to speak for all Jews, that our fear is greater than our shame.
This is the season of asking others for forgiveness. It would be a powerful first step toward regaining our honor if our Jewish organizations and State asked the Armenian people to forgive our cowardice. By admitting we are cowards we might find the prophetic passion to be heroes once again.
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Mustard Seeds
Next week is Rosh haShanah. I brought this to the attention of my students at Middle Tennessee State University to tell them why we will have no class next Thursday. But then I tried to give them some insight into what Rosh haShanah is.
Of course we looked at the relevant Torah portions (this was in Bible class after all), but that told them little. And we explored the idea of forgiveness and devoting the month of Elul that leads up to Rosh haShanah to forgiveness, but that too didn’t get at the heart of the matter.
Then I told them about Reb Nachman and his pun on Rosh haShanah as seeing “rosh” as head and “shanah” as “shinui,” change. Rosh haShanah is a day to change your head.
Still blank stares. “Metanoia,” I said. This is what Jesus asks of you, “metanoia,” literally to change your mind, to change your head, to change you level of consciousness. This is what Jesus is asking you to do, and the Jews have a special season for doing it. Of course Jesus, being a Jew, knew this and tried to come up with metaphors that would speak to his understanding of what a changed head might be like.
He called living with a changed head the Kingdom of Heaven. You no longer thought with an earth–bound, selfish, egoic mind. You now though with a cosmic mind, seeing God in, with, and as all things. One metaphor for the Kingdom of Changed Heads is the mustard seed. This is a troubling metaphor.
My students told me that saying the Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed is saying that it starts small and grows big. We need to plant the seed of change and God will nurture change within us. OK, except…
OK, except that the mustard seed was a weed that would choke off your garden, kill off other produce. It was a cancer. No one planted mustard seed except in highly controlled situations. It was dangerous. It killed the old, the counted on, the safe. And that is why it is a good metaphor.
Changing your head, thinking with a new mind, a new consciousness that goes beyond the egoic mind of last year, is not fun or comfortable. It means chocking off the old; killing off what you thought was in your best interest and seeing something new.
Rosh haShanah should be a mustard seed planted at the head of the year. It should bring about a changed head, a new heart and new spirit (Ezekiel 18:31). It should take over your life and kill off all that is old and not longer life-giving. Otherwise the only “new” in New Year is the number “8” in 5768.
L’shana Tovah, this year’s changes be for the good.
Of course we looked at the relevant Torah portions (this was in Bible class after all), but that told them little. And we explored the idea of forgiveness and devoting the month of Elul that leads up to Rosh haShanah to forgiveness, but that too didn’t get at the heart of the matter.
Then I told them about Reb Nachman and his pun on Rosh haShanah as seeing “rosh” as head and “shanah” as “shinui,” change. Rosh haShanah is a day to change your head.
Still blank stares. “Metanoia,” I said. This is what Jesus asks of you, “metanoia,” literally to change your mind, to change your head, to change you level of consciousness. This is what Jesus is asking you to do, and the Jews have a special season for doing it. Of course Jesus, being a Jew, knew this and tried to come up with metaphors that would speak to his understanding of what a changed head might be like.
He called living with a changed head the Kingdom of Heaven. You no longer thought with an earth–bound, selfish, egoic mind. You now though with a cosmic mind, seeing God in, with, and as all things. One metaphor for the Kingdom of Changed Heads is the mustard seed. This is a troubling metaphor.
My students told me that saying the Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed is saying that it starts small and grows big. We need to plant the seed of change and God will nurture change within us. OK, except…
OK, except that the mustard seed was a weed that would choke off your garden, kill off other produce. It was a cancer. No one planted mustard seed except in highly controlled situations. It was dangerous. It killed the old, the counted on, the safe. And that is why it is a good metaphor.
Changing your head, thinking with a new mind, a new consciousness that goes beyond the egoic mind of last year, is not fun or comfortable. It means chocking off the old; killing off what you thought was in your best interest and seeing something new.
Rosh haShanah should be a mustard seed planted at the head of the year. It should bring about a changed head, a new heart and new spirit (Ezekiel 18:31). It should take over your life and kill off all that is old and not longer life-giving. Otherwise the only “new” in New Year is the number “8” in 5768.
L’shana Tovah, this year’s changes be for the good.
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