My previous post (Judaism is Dying) elicited an email response to which I wish to respond publicly. Here’s the email:
“You are a heretic, but not one who is brave enough to come out and say so. So I am calling you out! In twenty-five words or less per topic tell me what you would do with God, Torah, Israel, etc. in your heretical Judaism.”
Reading this I felt like an aging gunslinger being called out from the saloon by a young’un hopin’ t’ make a name fer hisself by killin’ the old man. So I’m strappin’ on my two six shooters an’ steppin’ out to face— oh, forget it. Here is a brief look at my “heretical Judaism” for the 21st century.
God: God is Reality and the creativity that fuels Reality, keeping it fresh, new, surprising, and awe-inspiring.
Torah: Torah is wisdom. Wisdom comes from science, art, music, myth, and literature. Torah study should be the study of wisdom in all its forms.
Israel: Israel, Yisrael, is one who wrestles with God, i.e. engages Reality in such a way as to find meaning and purpose in life.
Rabbi: Rabbis should be Jana yogis (masters of wisdom through intellect and mind) helping people open up to wisdom through meditation and study.
Cantor: Cantors should be Bhakti yogis (masters of wisdom through the heart) helping people open up to wisdom through chant, prayer, and other devotional practices.
Synagogue: Synagogues should be places of meeting; safe houses for doubt, dialogue, questioning, wrestling with Life, and ecstatic surrender into the One Who lives it.
Mitzvot (Commandments): Mitzvot are historic resources drawn from Jewish and other traditions that help one live with compassion, justice, creativity, fearlessness, hope, and humility.
Shabbat (the Sabbath): Shabbat is a day for purposeless play. If you pray, pray playfully. If you study, study playfully. Play helps us regain our sanity and recover our divinity.
Kashrut: Kashrut means linking all your consuming with your highest ethical and environmental values.
Tzedakah: Tzedakah means earning and using your money in a manner that serves both self and society, person and planet.
OK, that’s eleven bullet points. All these need to be fleshed out, of course, but I think I survived the challenge. Notice I saved one bullet just in case my friend is still moving.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Judaism is Dying
Judaism is dying. Not the Jewish people; not Israel; not Jewish Studies programs or Jewish PACs or Jewish philanthropies; but Judaism herself: the idea that God so loved the Jews that He gave us His one true revelation that we might bring justice and compassion to humankind. This Judaism is dying.
The fact that Judaism is dying doesn’t worry me. It has died before. What worries me is that this time it may stay dead.
In the past the death of one Judaism was followed by the birth of another. The death of the shamanic Judaism of Abraham was followed by the birth of the priestly and sacrificial Judaism of Aaron. The death of sacrificial Judaism was heralded by prophetic Judaism and followed by rabbinic Judaism. Now rabbinic Judaism is dying, and there is nothing to come after it.
Rabbinic Judaism is dying because its foundational idea—that God gave Moses two Torahs on Mount Sinai (one Written, one Oral) over which only rabbis have authority—is dying. Indeed for most Jews it is already dead.
We know it is dying because most Jews, perhaps the majority of Jews, do not take halacha (Jewish law) seriously; and most of those who do pick and choose among the mitzvot (divine commandments) and adapt them to their personal lifestyles. A Judaism of personal choice and convenience is not what the rabbis had in mind.
Rabbinic Judaism is a Judaism not of orthodoxy but orthopraxy, not of one mind but one practice. Conformity of behavior rather than conformity of thought was their concern. “Think what you want, and do what we say” was the unofficial rabbinic motto. But today most Jews do what their rabbi says only if the rabbi says what they want to hear. And if she or he doesn’t, they will change rabbis until they find one who does.
The death of rabbinic Judaism has been coming for quite a while, and a number of Judaisms have contended to replace it. All of them have failed.
Zionism failed because, as it turns out, most Jews have no desire to live in a Jewish state or serve in a Jewish army, and because, having sold its soul to the most Orthodox among us, Zionism has nothing but archeology to offer Jews as an alternative to rabbinic Judaism. Stones a plenty; Tablets, not a one.
Humanistic Judaism failed because it denied God rather than reinvented God. A religion focused on the self alone is too narcissistic to be spiritually compelling. Gathering together simply to gather together gets old very fast.
Reform Judaism failed because by making the self sovereign over God (you decide which of God’s laws to obey) it pulled the rug out from under rabbis altogether. Rabbinic authority rests on the fiction of the Dual Revelation. When the Torah is no longer binding rabbis are no longer relevant, which is why Reform rabbis are more like Protestant pastors than Talmudic sages.
Conservative Judaism, which sought to maintain the rabbinic conceit of the Talmudic sage by insisting that Jewish Law matters, failed because most Jews outside of Orthodoxy just don’t find a religion of law run by a cabal of lawyers spiritually compelling.
Reconstructionism was a true reinvention of Judaism outside the rabbinic frame, but the bold genius of its founder (and my teacher) Mordecai Kaplan was abandoned for a neo-conservatism that substituted leftist social mores and inclusive community (two good ideas in my opinion) for the radical Emersonian/Taoist reinvention of God and Judaism that was the soul of Kaplan’s heresy. Modern Reconstuctionism’s liturgical innovation of using lots of names for God doesn’t substitute for the fact that, without Kaplan, they have no compelling theology of God.
Jewish Renewal, another Judaism I value, failed because it requires a deep commitment to learning— Biblical, Talmudic, Kabbalistic and Hasidic— in which most Jews have no real interest. Rising in the shadow of its real promise is a pseudo (rather than the much needed and intended neo) Hasidism in which everyone is a rebbe and no one is a hasid, where new age platitudes pass for deep introspection, and hand-clapping and table pounding substitute for true ecstasy.
So what’s left? Orthodox Judaism of one stripe or another, of course. Orthodoxy, like other fundamentalisms, succeeds because it believes what it says and what it says is without nuance and therefore immune to irony and self-doubt. But Orthodoxy, too, has failed because most Jews just cannot take it seriously, and it is impossible to run an empire when everyone knows the emperor has no clothes.
So you can see why I am not hopeful about the future of Judaism. For all our poetic genius our liturgies are, by and large, lifeless and stultifying. For all our education we still lack a compelling vision of a postmodern and post tribal Judaism. For all our creativity our worship is, by and large, dull, predictable, and uninspiring. For all our Nobel Prize winning scientists we still promote a pre-Newtonian worldview irrelevant in our post-Einsteinian world.
But I haven’t given up all hope. There must be Jewish heretics out there burning with a new Judaism that will enflame our people with a new, creative, and intrinsically compelling understanding of God, Torah, and Israel. No, I’m not one of them. I’m too old, too jaded, and I’ve read too much Krishnamurti.
Why don’t we hear from them? Because they don’t have the means to unleash their memes. Those with new ideas have no funds, and those with funds are afraid of new ideas.
Instead of funding life support for the dying Judaism of the rabbis, we ought to be funding think tanks for heresies, and training camps for heretics. Sure, most of these will fail, but some might catch on, and even those that don’t may, in their dying, give rise to something even more heretical and enlivening, that we might again exclaim, “Judaism is dead. Long live Judaism!”
Will we? I doubt it. And Judaism will spiral ever faster into obsolescence. Jews will live, but we just won’t remember what for.
The fact that Judaism is dying doesn’t worry me. It has died before. What worries me is that this time it may stay dead.
In the past the death of one Judaism was followed by the birth of another. The death of the shamanic Judaism of Abraham was followed by the birth of the priestly and sacrificial Judaism of Aaron. The death of sacrificial Judaism was heralded by prophetic Judaism and followed by rabbinic Judaism. Now rabbinic Judaism is dying, and there is nothing to come after it.
Rabbinic Judaism is dying because its foundational idea—that God gave Moses two Torahs on Mount Sinai (one Written, one Oral) over which only rabbis have authority—is dying. Indeed for most Jews it is already dead.
We know it is dying because most Jews, perhaps the majority of Jews, do not take halacha (Jewish law) seriously; and most of those who do pick and choose among the mitzvot (divine commandments) and adapt them to their personal lifestyles. A Judaism of personal choice and convenience is not what the rabbis had in mind.
Rabbinic Judaism is a Judaism not of orthodoxy but orthopraxy, not of one mind but one practice. Conformity of behavior rather than conformity of thought was their concern. “Think what you want, and do what we say” was the unofficial rabbinic motto. But today most Jews do what their rabbi says only if the rabbi says what they want to hear. And if she or he doesn’t, they will change rabbis until they find one who does.
The death of rabbinic Judaism has been coming for quite a while, and a number of Judaisms have contended to replace it. All of them have failed.
Zionism failed because, as it turns out, most Jews have no desire to live in a Jewish state or serve in a Jewish army, and because, having sold its soul to the most Orthodox among us, Zionism has nothing but archeology to offer Jews as an alternative to rabbinic Judaism. Stones a plenty; Tablets, not a one.
Humanistic Judaism failed because it denied God rather than reinvented God. A religion focused on the self alone is too narcissistic to be spiritually compelling. Gathering together simply to gather together gets old very fast.
Reform Judaism failed because by making the self sovereign over God (you decide which of God’s laws to obey) it pulled the rug out from under rabbis altogether. Rabbinic authority rests on the fiction of the Dual Revelation. When the Torah is no longer binding rabbis are no longer relevant, which is why Reform rabbis are more like Protestant pastors than Talmudic sages.
Conservative Judaism, which sought to maintain the rabbinic conceit of the Talmudic sage by insisting that Jewish Law matters, failed because most Jews outside of Orthodoxy just don’t find a religion of law run by a cabal of lawyers spiritually compelling.
Reconstructionism was a true reinvention of Judaism outside the rabbinic frame, but the bold genius of its founder (and my teacher) Mordecai Kaplan was abandoned for a neo-conservatism that substituted leftist social mores and inclusive community (two good ideas in my opinion) for the radical Emersonian/Taoist reinvention of God and Judaism that was the soul of Kaplan’s heresy. Modern Reconstuctionism’s liturgical innovation of using lots of names for God doesn’t substitute for the fact that, without Kaplan, they have no compelling theology of God.
Jewish Renewal, another Judaism I value, failed because it requires a deep commitment to learning— Biblical, Talmudic, Kabbalistic and Hasidic— in which most Jews have no real interest. Rising in the shadow of its real promise is a pseudo (rather than the much needed and intended neo) Hasidism in which everyone is a rebbe and no one is a hasid, where new age platitudes pass for deep introspection, and hand-clapping and table pounding substitute for true ecstasy.
So what’s left? Orthodox Judaism of one stripe or another, of course. Orthodoxy, like other fundamentalisms, succeeds because it believes what it says and what it says is without nuance and therefore immune to irony and self-doubt. But Orthodoxy, too, has failed because most Jews just cannot take it seriously, and it is impossible to run an empire when everyone knows the emperor has no clothes.
So you can see why I am not hopeful about the future of Judaism. For all our poetic genius our liturgies are, by and large, lifeless and stultifying. For all our education we still lack a compelling vision of a postmodern and post tribal Judaism. For all our creativity our worship is, by and large, dull, predictable, and uninspiring. For all our Nobel Prize winning scientists we still promote a pre-Newtonian worldview irrelevant in our post-Einsteinian world.
But I haven’t given up all hope. There must be Jewish heretics out there burning with a new Judaism that will enflame our people with a new, creative, and intrinsically compelling understanding of God, Torah, and Israel. No, I’m not one of them. I’m too old, too jaded, and I’ve read too much Krishnamurti.
Why don’t we hear from them? Because they don’t have the means to unleash their memes. Those with new ideas have no funds, and those with funds are afraid of new ideas.
Instead of funding life support for the dying Judaism of the rabbis, we ought to be funding think tanks for heresies, and training camps for heretics. Sure, most of these will fail, but some might catch on, and even those that don’t may, in their dying, give rise to something even more heretical and enlivening, that we might again exclaim, “Judaism is dead. Long live Judaism!”
Will we? I doubt it. And Judaism will spiral ever faster into obsolescence. Jews will live, but we just won’t remember what for.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Michael Novak, What Were You Thinking?
Monday’s USA TODAY (July 21st, 2008) featured an essay by conservative columnist Michael Novak entitled Reconciling Evil with Faith. I found the essay so outrageous that I am writing a longer than usual blog as commentary. To be fair, you ought to read Mr. Novak's entire essay for yourself.
Michael Novak writes, “One of the oldest accusations against God in the Bible and in every generation since has been that there is too much evil in this world for there to be a good God… Of course ceasing to be a Jew or a Christian does not wipe these evils away… The rejection of God does not diminish evil in the world by a whit.”
Mr. Novak is absolutely correct. It doesn’t matter if you believe in God or disbelieve in God, evil continues. But what does this fact tell us? Only one thing: what you believe has no bearing on reality.
Mr. Novak continues: “In fact, the turn of Russia and Germany from more or less Christian regimes to boastfully atheist regimes did not lessen, but increased, the number of humans who have horribly suffered, by nearly 100 million.”
Again I am not certain what this fact tells us. Is it that atheists are more barbarian than theists? Or that theists are less technologically sophisticated than atheists when it comes to murdering human beings? And who said Hitler’s Germany was atheistic? In Mein Kamf Hitler wrote: "I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."
Mr. Novak even enlists atheist science to make a point (though again I am uncertain as to what his point is): “Even under atheistic interpretations of science, the vast suffering under ferocious competition for survival, for a vastly longer era than was known, far exceeds the evils earlier generations knew.”
What does this mean? Is he saying that it is better to believe the world is only 10,000 years old as the Young Earth Creationists argue because then suffering is so much briefer? Is he saying that only atheists believe the world is billions of years old? It seems to me that the only difference between the atheist and the theist on this point is one of semantics. Whether one is an atheist or a theist, one cannot deny the facts of suffering. Given these facts we can either say that nature is a bitch or God is a bastard, depending on our theological leanings. Neither interpretation reduces the suffering Novak admits.
Then he goes on to say, “[T]hose who suffer most from injustice and oppression seem to find more consolation and dignity in the Jewish/Christian faith than in any other worldview.” How does he know this? Buddhism, for example, is all about suffering and the ending of suffering? Can it be that Judaism consoles better than Buddhism?
And it gets worse:
“Judaism and Christianity seem very good religions for those who suffer because they bestow on them justice and dignity. The realistic point of Judaism and Christianity is that suffering is a normal part of every human life.” Is this true? Again Buddhism also says that suffering is natural to human experience, but what it doesn’t say, and what Judaism and Christianity to do, is that suffering is caused by God because of the sin of Adam and Eve. Buddhism makes suffering natural; Judaism and Christianity insist it is the act of a wrathful God.
And as far as Judaism and Christianity bestow justice and dignity on those who suffer, just ask the slaves in Christian Europe and America. Ask the colonized peoples of Africa and India. Ask the Palestinians in the West Bank. Ask those tortured by Americans in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. What Judaism and Christianity seem to do is comfort the afflicted by holding out justice in the next world, while giving this world over to the madness of men and women whose god is more sadistic then they are, and who excuses every evil that they do.
And it gets worse still:
“In fact, the poor also delight in the beauties of God’s creation. On balance, even with their acute suffering, the poor also feel blessed. They sense the rapture of sunlight flashing across lake or ocean, and soft breezes at sunset, and the great starry sky.”
This is obscene! The fact that acute poverty cannot rob human beings of their sense of awe, wonder and mystery is a testament to human soulfulness, but is this a defense of faith? Does the fact that Jews in Nazi death camps managed to find some beauty in a rainbow somehow make the evil of Nazism less evil?
And it gets even worse:
“For Christianity, the interpretive key to this world is the cross—the cross on which the Son of God died. For Judaism, it is the long, long exile and pain of the Jewish people. If God has so treated his only son, and also his own people, why should anyone else expect Easy Street?”
I love this! In other words, if God is a sadistic abusive murderous S.O.B., well, what can you expect? If this isn’t an argument for atheism, I don’t know what is!
And it never ends:
“Worse, the world seen by evolutionary biology alone is even more rife with suffering, yet rather more merciless. That world is characterized by raw chance, accident and the death of about 90% of all species that have ever lived. Perhaps earthquakes, tsunami, tornado, disease and famine derive from chance, and signify nothing.”
Yes, maybe they do, but what is the alternative? If earthquakes, tsunami, tornado, disease and famine do not derive from chance (and they don’t, they derive from the necessities of nature) then they are God’s work and thus signify something horrible, evil, and malign. If nature is blind and shit happens, I can live with that. But if, as Michael Novak seems to imply, God is doing this to people on purpose, we should be tearing down every house of worship to this monstrous deity we can find!
I just don’t see what Mr. Novak thought he was doing with essay. If this was a defense of belief, it failed miserably. If it was an atheistic attempt to recruit new members using reverse psychology, it may have succeeded mightily. I don’t see how anyone reading this piece could continue to believe in God at all. At least not the conventional God of mainstream Judaism and Christianity.
He ends his essay with this, “Whether our lives are meaningless, or not, is not a trivial question.” I agree. This is a question worth asking and exploring. But to assume, as Michael Novak does, that science and atheism (which are not the same: science is a methodology, atheism is an ideology) are somehow on the side of meaninglessness, while God and religion are on the side of meaning is just too much to bear.
Evolution does not make life meaningless! Evolution is the way life develops a level of consciousness capable of discovering meaning; it is the way life becomes self aware and moral; it is the way life comes to think about its Source and Substance. Evolution is the way God manifests in time and space. Evolution is the way God gets to discover Herself and say, “Wow!”
To anyone who wishes to think far more profoundly than USA TODAY gives you credit for, I recommend three books:
Thank God for Evolution by Michael Dowd,
The View From the Center of the Universe by Joel Primack and Nancy Abrams, and
God and the Big Bang by Daniel Matt.
If I could afford it I’d send copies of each to Michael Novak and invite him to think this through again.
Michael Novak writes, “One of the oldest accusations against God in the Bible and in every generation since has been that there is too much evil in this world for there to be a good God… Of course ceasing to be a Jew or a Christian does not wipe these evils away… The rejection of God does not diminish evil in the world by a whit.”
Mr. Novak is absolutely correct. It doesn’t matter if you believe in God or disbelieve in God, evil continues. But what does this fact tell us? Only one thing: what you believe has no bearing on reality.
Mr. Novak continues: “In fact, the turn of Russia and Germany from more or less Christian regimes to boastfully atheist regimes did not lessen, but increased, the number of humans who have horribly suffered, by nearly 100 million.”
Again I am not certain what this fact tells us. Is it that atheists are more barbarian than theists? Or that theists are less technologically sophisticated than atheists when it comes to murdering human beings? And who said Hitler’s Germany was atheistic? In Mein Kamf Hitler wrote: "I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."
Mr. Novak even enlists atheist science to make a point (though again I am uncertain as to what his point is): “Even under atheistic interpretations of science, the vast suffering under ferocious competition for survival, for a vastly longer era than was known, far exceeds the evils earlier generations knew.”
What does this mean? Is he saying that it is better to believe the world is only 10,000 years old as the Young Earth Creationists argue because then suffering is so much briefer? Is he saying that only atheists believe the world is billions of years old? It seems to me that the only difference between the atheist and the theist on this point is one of semantics. Whether one is an atheist or a theist, one cannot deny the facts of suffering. Given these facts we can either say that nature is a bitch or God is a bastard, depending on our theological leanings. Neither interpretation reduces the suffering Novak admits.
Then he goes on to say, “[T]hose who suffer most from injustice and oppression seem to find more consolation and dignity in the Jewish/Christian faith than in any other worldview.” How does he know this? Buddhism, for example, is all about suffering and the ending of suffering? Can it be that Judaism consoles better than Buddhism?
And it gets worse:
“Judaism and Christianity seem very good religions for those who suffer because they bestow on them justice and dignity. The realistic point of Judaism and Christianity is that suffering is a normal part of every human life.” Is this true? Again Buddhism also says that suffering is natural to human experience, but what it doesn’t say, and what Judaism and Christianity to do, is that suffering is caused by God because of the sin of Adam and Eve. Buddhism makes suffering natural; Judaism and Christianity insist it is the act of a wrathful God.
And as far as Judaism and Christianity bestow justice and dignity on those who suffer, just ask the slaves in Christian Europe and America. Ask the colonized peoples of Africa and India. Ask the Palestinians in the West Bank. Ask those tortured by Americans in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. What Judaism and Christianity seem to do is comfort the afflicted by holding out justice in the next world, while giving this world over to the madness of men and women whose god is more sadistic then they are, and who excuses every evil that they do.
And it gets worse still:
“In fact, the poor also delight in the beauties of God’s creation. On balance, even with their acute suffering, the poor also feel blessed. They sense the rapture of sunlight flashing across lake or ocean, and soft breezes at sunset, and the great starry sky.”
This is obscene! The fact that acute poverty cannot rob human beings of their sense of awe, wonder and mystery is a testament to human soulfulness, but is this a defense of faith? Does the fact that Jews in Nazi death camps managed to find some beauty in a rainbow somehow make the evil of Nazism less evil?
And it gets even worse:
“For Christianity, the interpretive key to this world is the cross—the cross on which the Son of God died. For Judaism, it is the long, long exile and pain of the Jewish people. If God has so treated his only son, and also his own people, why should anyone else expect Easy Street?”
I love this! In other words, if God is a sadistic abusive murderous S.O.B., well, what can you expect? If this isn’t an argument for atheism, I don’t know what is!
And it never ends:
“Worse, the world seen by evolutionary biology alone is even more rife with suffering, yet rather more merciless. That world is characterized by raw chance, accident and the death of about 90% of all species that have ever lived. Perhaps earthquakes, tsunami, tornado, disease and famine derive from chance, and signify nothing.”
Yes, maybe they do, but what is the alternative? If earthquakes, tsunami, tornado, disease and famine do not derive from chance (and they don’t, they derive from the necessities of nature) then they are God’s work and thus signify something horrible, evil, and malign. If nature is blind and shit happens, I can live with that. But if, as Michael Novak seems to imply, God is doing this to people on purpose, we should be tearing down every house of worship to this monstrous deity we can find!
I just don’t see what Mr. Novak thought he was doing with essay. If this was a defense of belief, it failed miserably. If it was an atheistic attempt to recruit new members using reverse psychology, it may have succeeded mightily. I don’t see how anyone reading this piece could continue to believe in God at all. At least not the conventional God of mainstream Judaism and Christianity.
He ends his essay with this, “Whether our lives are meaningless, or not, is not a trivial question.” I agree. This is a question worth asking and exploring. But to assume, as Michael Novak does, that science and atheism (which are not the same: science is a methodology, atheism is an ideology) are somehow on the side of meaninglessness, while God and religion are on the side of meaning is just too much to bear.
Evolution does not make life meaningless! Evolution is the way life develops a level of consciousness capable of discovering meaning; it is the way life becomes self aware and moral; it is the way life comes to think about its Source and Substance. Evolution is the way God manifests in time and space. Evolution is the way God gets to discover Herself and say, “Wow!”
To anyone who wishes to think far more profoundly than USA TODAY gives you credit for, I recommend three books:
Thank God for Evolution by Michael Dowd,
The View From the Center of the Universe by Joel Primack and Nancy Abrams, and
God and the Big Bang by Daniel Matt.
If I could afford it I’d send copies of each to Michael Novak and invite him to think this through again.
Monday, July 21, 2008
God vs. Catwoman
I love comic books. I started reading them when I was a kid, and I never stopped. My favorite comic book heroes are Dr. Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts, and The Shadow. I tell you this lest you think me anti-comic book when I bemoan a new poll ranking the top superheroes of the American comic reading public.
Four things trouble me about the poll. First, I was not asked to participate. Second, none of my heroes made the top ten. Third, the fact that Batman tied for sixth place with Catwoman. And, fourth, that God and Jesus ranked below Batman and Catwoman.
This is scandalous. Clearly the Dark Knight trumps Catwoman in brains, brawn, bucks, and literary depth. If people can’t see the superiority of Batman over Catwoman, I have to question their wisdom altogether. Which brings me to the ranking of God and Jesus.
Whatever your thoughts about Batman, neither he nor Catwoman can resurrect the dead. And as dark as the Dark Knight is, even he pales next to the Jesus of Revelation who wallows in the blood of his enemies in a manner that would make Vlad the Impaler flinch. But are God and Jesus really superheroes?
Before you answer that, it pays to remember that Thor, the Norse God of Thunder, was a god and is today a superhero with a very successful comic franchise and Marvel movie in the works. True Jesus also had a successful box-office run but his film was in Aramaic and he dies at the end which makes a sequel awkward at best (unless of course you happen to be a Christian in which case you are waiting for just that).
So God can be a superhero, but how many people go to the Temple of Thor and worship the God of Thunder any more? Maybe getting your own comic is what happens to gods when they are put out to pasture. Is this what is happening to God and Jesus now that they are listed as superheroes, seven lengths back from Spider-Man?
And it is not just superhero fans who feel that God is somewhat lacking. The two television shows that actually featured God or Jesus (Joan of Arcadia which featured God in various guises, and NBC’s Book of Daniel that featured Jesus as a Rogerian psychologist, “Well, what do you think ought to be done to save your soul?”) were both short-lived. The Jesus show lasted only two weeks! Compare that to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Ghost Whisperer, two long lasting shows of the supernatural that never mention God or Jesus. Of course Buffy and Ghost Whisperer have a sexual subtext that God and Jesus lack, so if we want to raise God's standing we might have to forgo the Virgin Birth for something a little more, shall we say, Zeus-like?
So what can we God-lovers do to raise the status of our hero? I think we need to hire better writers and artists to tell his story. A Frank Miller version of Job or an Alan Moore take on Esther could be promising. Or how about a Stephen King version of the Gospel According to John? We could call it The Last Godslinger.
With the right artists and colorists, God might give at Catwoman a run for her money. Spider-Man, however, is probably beyond even God’s reach.
Four things trouble me about the poll. First, I was not asked to participate. Second, none of my heroes made the top ten. Third, the fact that Batman tied for sixth place with Catwoman. And, fourth, that God and Jesus ranked below Batman and Catwoman.
This is scandalous. Clearly the Dark Knight trumps Catwoman in brains, brawn, bucks, and literary depth. If people can’t see the superiority of Batman over Catwoman, I have to question their wisdom altogether. Which brings me to the ranking of God and Jesus.
Whatever your thoughts about Batman, neither he nor Catwoman can resurrect the dead. And as dark as the Dark Knight is, even he pales next to the Jesus of Revelation who wallows in the blood of his enemies in a manner that would make Vlad the Impaler flinch. But are God and Jesus really superheroes?
Before you answer that, it pays to remember that Thor, the Norse God of Thunder, was a god and is today a superhero with a very successful comic franchise and Marvel movie in the works. True Jesus also had a successful box-office run but his film was in Aramaic and he dies at the end which makes a sequel awkward at best (unless of course you happen to be a Christian in which case you are waiting for just that).
So God can be a superhero, but how many people go to the Temple of Thor and worship the God of Thunder any more? Maybe getting your own comic is what happens to gods when they are put out to pasture. Is this what is happening to God and Jesus now that they are listed as superheroes, seven lengths back from Spider-Man?
And it is not just superhero fans who feel that God is somewhat lacking. The two television shows that actually featured God or Jesus (Joan of Arcadia which featured God in various guises, and NBC’s Book of Daniel that featured Jesus as a Rogerian psychologist, “Well, what do you think ought to be done to save your soul?”) were both short-lived. The Jesus show lasted only two weeks! Compare that to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Ghost Whisperer, two long lasting shows of the supernatural that never mention God or Jesus. Of course Buffy and Ghost Whisperer have a sexual subtext that God and Jesus lack, so if we want to raise God's standing we might have to forgo the Virgin Birth for something a little more, shall we say, Zeus-like?
So what can we God-lovers do to raise the status of our hero? I think we need to hire better writers and artists to tell his story. A Frank Miller version of Job or an Alan Moore take on Esther could be promising. Or how about a Stephen King version of the Gospel According to John? We could call it The Last Godslinger.
With the right artists and colorists, God might give at Catwoman a run for her money. Spider-Man, however, is probably beyond even God’s reach.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Ice Cream is God
Baskin-Robbins is not a place I go for religious insight, but I have to credit them for a true epiphany.
The other day I am talking with a radio producer about doing an interview with me. “In twenty-five words or less,” he said, “tell me your approach to God and religious diversity.” Out of the blue I came up with this:
“Religion is like Baskin-Robbins, and God is like ice cream.” Twelve words!
“OK,” he said, “I’m hooked, now elaborate a bit.” This is what I said:
Baskin-Robbins has 31 flavors of ice cream, but even if you taste them all, you still have no idea what ice cream itself tastes like. The flavors mask the actual taste of ice cream. In fact as far as Baskin-Robbins is concerned there is no such thing as “ice cream itself.” If you order ice cream they want to know what flavor ice cream, and if insist that you don’t want a flavor of ice cream but ice cream itself they have nothing to offer you.
When it comes to Baskin-Robbns ice cream I prefer mocha almond. Imagine you and I go to a Baskin-Robbins, and you order strawberry, and I say, “No, that’s wrong. You are wrong to order strawberry. True ice cream is mocha almond; anything else is something else. If ice cream is what you want, mocha almond is what you must get.” You’d think me mad.
Now think of this in terms of religion. Judaism is one flavor, Christianity another, Islam, Hinduism, Paganism, Buddhism, etc are still others. You may prefer one flavor to all the others, nothing wrong with that. But you would be a fool to insist, as I did in my little fable, that only one of the many flavors is the true one.
“What about Stone Cold Creamery where you make your own flavor?” the producer asked.
Well, I said, you don’t actually make your own flavor you just customize an existing one. This is like a Christian who incorporates something from Native American spirituality into her primary flavor of Christianity. You still don’t have ice cream in and of itself.
“OK,” he said, “so what is the flavor of ice cream? What is God?”
Ice cream without any flavor is unknown and unknowable. It has no taste. Sure, I may be pushing the analogy here, but you get the idea. What mystics desire is to taste ice cream itself, to get beneath all the flavors to the thing itself. And when they do they can go back to the 31 flavors with all their preferences in tact and yet know that preferring mocha almond doesn’t make rum raisin and those who love it wrong or damned.
I like this analogy. I don’t know if I will be asked to go on air with it, but at the very least I should get some payola from Baskin-Robbins.
The other day I am talking with a radio producer about doing an interview with me. “In twenty-five words or less,” he said, “tell me your approach to God and religious diversity.” Out of the blue I came up with this:
“Religion is like Baskin-Robbins, and God is like ice cream.” Twelve words!
“OK,” he said, “I’m hooked, now elaborate a bit.” This is what I said:
Baskin-Robbins has 31 flavors of ice cream, but even if you taste them all, you still have no idea what ice cream itself tastes like. The flavors mask the actual taste of ice cream. In fact as far as Baskin-Robbins is concerned there is no such thing as “ice cream itself.” If you order ice cream they want to know what flavor ice cream, and if insist that you don’t want a flavor of ice cream but ice cream itself they have nothing to offer you.
When it comes to Baskin-Robbns ice cream I prefer mocha almond. Imagine you and I go to a Baskin-Robbins, and you order strawberry, and I say, “No, that’s wrong. You are wrong to order strawberry. True ice cream is mocha almond; anything else is something else. If ice cream is what you want, mocha almond is what you must get.” You’d think me mad.
Now think of this in terms of religion. Judaism is one flavor, Christianity another, Islam, Hinduism, Paganism, Buddhism, etc are still others. You may prefer one flavor to all the others, nothing wrong with that. But you would be a fool to insist, as I did in my little fable, that only one of the many flavors is the true one.
“What about Stone Cold Creamery where you make your own flavor?” the producer asked.
Well, I said, you don’t actually make your own flavor you just customize an existing one. This is like a Christian who incorporates something from Native American spirituality into her primary flavor of Christianity. You still don’t have ice cream in and of itself.
“OK,” he said, “so what is the flavor of ice cream? What is God?”
Ice cream without any flavor is unknown and unknowable. It has no taste. Sure, I may be pushing the analogy here, but you get the idea. What mystics desire is to taste ice cream itself, to get beneath all the flavors to the thing itself. And when they do they can go back to the 31 flavors with all their preferences in tact and yet know that preferring mocha almond doesn’t make rum raisin and those who love it wrong or damned.
I like this analogy. I don’t know if I will be asked to go on air with it, but at the very least I should get some payola from Baskin-Robbins.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Monkey See, Monkey Sue
Last month a committee of the Spanish Parliament passed a resolution that would give great apes (chimpanzees, gorillas, bonobos, and orangutans) the right to life, freedom from arbitrary captivity, and protection from torture, which gives the great apes more rights than any human declared an “enemy combatant” by President Bush.
In Austria the judicial system is poised to declare a chimp a person. The chimp’s lawyer, Eberhart Theuer, a top banana in Austria’s legal system, said that if he wins his client’s case Europe would have to give great apes the same rights as people. If he looses the case he plans to…. wait for it…. a peel!
All monkeyshines aside, I, for one, am thrilled by these developments. If a corporation can be a person, why not an ape?
Apes are people too, that’s my motto. Chimpanzees and bonobos differ from humans by only 1% of DNA. I believe this means that I am closer to my chimp friends imprisoned in the local zoo than I am to some of my neighbors who, while not swinging from trees themselves seem only too eager to see other humans do so.
Sure there are some differences between the apes and us. Here are some of them:
1. All great apes recognize themselves in a mirror, but few if any worry about the size of their butts.
2. Chimpanzees and bonobos can exchange blood and kidneys with humans, and, like humans, most lack health insurance, but unlike humans, they expect their employers (zoos and the like) to pay for it. Apes are socialists by nature, I guess.
3. Great apes have displayed love, fear, anxiety and jealousy, so they, like us can appreciate the drama of daytime television, but, unlike us, few have televisions.
4. Great apes, like humans, can learn and use language through signs and symbols but lack the vocal anatomy to master speech, which means that, unlike us, they can’t host talk shows on cable.
5. Apes, like us, may be persons with rights, but, unlike us, they won’t be able to sue either other apes or humans. This is a terrible mistake which, when we humans destroy our civilization and apes take over the planet, will be the loophole the apes use to enslave our species.
Of course you might think that if I am pro ape-as-person I must be pro fetus-as-person, and I would be if a fetus could recognize itself in a mirror.
Anyway, in researching for this blog I discovered that the United Kingdom banned experiments on great apes in 1997, but allow experimentation on marmosets, which, if I am not mistaken, are chocolate covered marshmallow cookies. Now this I found troubling. Why experiment on cookies? But I am not scientist so I won’t judge.
In Austria the judicial system is poised to declare a chimp a person. The chimp’s lawyer, Eberhart Theuer, a top banana in Austria’s legal system, said that if he wins his client’s case Europe would have to give great apes the same rights as people. If he looses the case he plans to…. wait for it…. a peel!
All monkeyshines aside, I, for one, am thrilled by these developments. If a corporation can be a person, why not an ape?
Apes are people too, that’s my motto. Chimpanzees and bonobos differ from humans by only 1% of DNA. I believe this means that I am closer to my chimp friends imprisoned in the local zoo than I am to some of my neighbors who, while not swinging from trees themselves seem only too eager to see other humans do so.
Sure there are some differences between the apes and us. Here are some of them:
1. All great apes recognize themselves in a mirror, but few if any worry about the size of their butts.
2. Chimpanzees and bonobos can exchange blood and kidneys with humans, and, like humans, most lack health insurance, but unlike humans, they expect their employers (zoos and the like) to pay for it. Apes are socialists by nature, I guess.
3. Great apes have displayed love, fear, anxiety and jealousy, so they, like us can appreciate the drama of daytime television, but, unlike us, few have televisions.
4. Great apes, like humans, can learn and use language through signs and symbols but lack the vocal anatomy to master speech, which means that, unlike us, they can’t host talk shows on cable.
5. Apes, like us, may be persons with rights, but, unlike us, they won’t be able to sue either other apes or humans. This is a terrible mistake which, when we humans destroy our civilization and apes take over the planet, will be the loophole the apes use to enslave our species.
Of course you might think that if I am pro ape-as-person I must be pro fetus-as-person, and I would be if a fetus could recognize itself in a mirror.
Anyway, in researching for this blog I discovered that the United Kingdom banned experiments on great apes in 1997, but allow experimentation on marmosets, which, if I am not mistaken, are chocolate covered marshmallow cookies. Now this I found troubling. Why experiment on cookies? But I am not scientist so I won’t judge.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Corpse in a Can
Frederic J. Baur, the designer of the Pringles potato chip died recently. While I rarely eat Pringles, I admit to enjoying them when I do. But Mr. Baur has earned my respect not for his chip but for his decision to have his cremated remains stored in a Pringles can.
I can’t tell you why I love this idea, but I do. And it got me thinking: In what kind of container would I like to be buried?
While I understand the egalitarian rationale behind Judaism’s insistence that one be buried in a plain pine box, doing so is boring. Why not put some creativity into it?
So the question becomes: Into what kind of container shall I place my ashes? I am assuming cremation because this allows for the widest range of container options, but I must state unequivocally that I am equivocating on the issue of cremation itself.
I used to be a firm believer in cremation, but I have read recently that cremation is far more damaging to the environment than is traditional burial, releasing gases in the cremation process that contribute to global warming. I am already a major producer of methane gas, so I may not opt for cremation in the end, but for argument’s sake, let’s assume I do. Where would I want my ashes stored?
The first container that comes to mind is the original 1984 version of the Macintosh computer. I owned one of the first Macs to be produced and loved it. Unfortunately I passed it on when the next generation Mac came out, so I will have to look elsewhere for a suitable container.
Books are the centerpiece of my life, so I could have myself buried in a book. Which book? It would be a toss up between Ecclesiastes and the Tao Te Ching.
I watch a lot of television, so maybe I should be buried in one of those. I have an old TV with a built in VCR. I could make a VHS tape about my life and what I believe, and have it play over and over again with my ashes inside the television itself.
Then again, I walk five miles every morning, so maybe I should place my remains in a pair of New Balance running shoes and have strung over an electric power line so that people might wonder who is walking around without his shoes never suspecting that I am still in them. Or how about being buried in an enchilada? I love Mexican food.
The more I think about this the more items I can imagine. Perhaps I should spread my ashes out into a whole host of products and keep them all in a mausoleum where people could come and browse. There would be a souvenir shop next door where you could buy replicas of my ashes in various products. This idea appeals to me the most, and I will pursue it. I can see a chain of Rami’s Remains stores across the country. Our motto might be Don’t Get Left Behind, Choose to Stay Behind.
While I work out the details of my burial, I invite you to add your own ideal burial containers in the comments section of this blog.
I can’t tell you why I love this idea, but I do. And it got me thinking: In what kind of container would I like to be buried?
While I understand the egalitarian rationale behind Judaism’s insistence that one be buried in a plain pine box, doing so is boring. Why not put some creativity into it?
So the question becomes: Into what kind of container shall I place my ashes? I am assuming cremation because this allows for the widest range of container options, but I must state unequivocally that I am equivocating on the issue of cremation itself.
I used to be a firm believer in cremation, but I have read recently that cremation is far more damaging to the environment than is traditional burial, releasing gases in the cremation process that contribute to global warming. I am already a major producer of methane gas, so I may not opt for cremation in the end, but for argument’s sake, let’s assume I do. Where would I want my ashes stored?
The first container that comes to mind is the original 1984 version of the Macintosh computer. I owned one of the first Macs to be produced and loved it. Unfortunately I passed it on when the next generation Mac came out, so I will have to look elsewhere for a suitable container.
Books are the centerpiece of my life, so I could have myself buried in a book. Which book? It would be a toss up between Ecclesiastes and the Tao Te Ching.
I watch a lot of television, so maybe I should be buried in one of those. I have an old TV with a built in VCR. I could make a VHS tape about my life and what I believe, and have it play over and over again with my ashes inside the television itself.
Then again, I walk five miles every morning, so maybe I should place my remains in a pair of New Balance running shoes and have strung over an electric power line so that people might wonder who is walking around without his shoes never suspecting that I am still in them. Or how about being buried in an enchilada? I love Mexican food.
The more I think about this the more items I can imagine. Perhaps I should spread my ashes out into a whole host of products and keep them all in a mausoleum where people could come and browse. There would be a souvenir shop next door where you could buy replicas of my ashes in various products. This idea appeals to me the most, and I will pursue it. I can see a chain of Rami’s Remains stores across the country. Our motto might be Don’t Get Left Behind, Choose to Stay Behind.
While I work out the details of my burial, I invite you to add your own ideal burial containers in the comments section of this blog.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
I, Black Pervert
“Are you the black pervert whose been stalking me? I’m ready for you this time!”
The speaker was a very round white woman in her late forties or early fifties who, like me, always dresses monochromatically (she in white, I in black), and who, unlike me, always carries a thin plastic grocery bag stuffed with I don’t know what. She’s new to the forest through which I walk every morning, but we’d seen each other three times over the past three days. This was the first time she had spoken to me. It was not the first time I have been mistaken for a black man.
Last week while visiting my parents in Agawam, Massachusetts, my mother, seeming out of nowhere, but which I now think was a near-death confession, told me that when I was a baby people routinely mistook me for African American. Of course no one used that term back in the 1950s.
“I would be pushing you in your stroller,” my mother said, “and people would stop and say, ‘Oh, my, what a cute little colored boy.’ It was true, you were so dark that you looked like a black boy.”
This was a stunning revelation, and I knew it was true: I am black. I had always known I was black. Not just because I like the blues and gospel music; or because my dad is so white that he could pass for an albino; or because he and I are so unalike that there is no way he could be my biological father, but because being black explains why I am obsessed with imitating black preachers, and why I cried inconsolably when Eddie Murphy dressed up as an old Jewish man in The Nutty Professor.
“I’m not black,” I lied to the white woman with the plastic bag.
“Alright, officer, I’ll be careful,” she said deciding that if I wasn’t black I must be a police officer. “But I have this with me just in case!” She reached into the slash pocket in her skirt, and pulled what was sure to be a 22-caliber revolver. My first reaction was to recite the Shema: “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” This is what Jews are supposed to say at the moment they die. Then I remembered I was black, and my mind searched franticly for something black people might say at that same moment. All I came up with was Martin Luther King’s “I Had A Dream" speech. Fortunately she was unarmed, and pulled out a Sprint cell phone instead.
“You keep safe,” I said and turned back to my walk.
“Jesus keeps me safe,” she said.
I love Jesus, and I love people who love Jesus, and I just couldn’t let this moment pass. So a turned back to face her, and right there in the 88-degree heat and near 100% humidity this woman in white and this man in black stood in prayer. "Yes, He does!" I shouted, no longer the middle-aged white Jew but rather the now grown up little black boy in the stroller who had devoted his life to Jesus, "Yes He does!" And the two of us prayed and prayed and came to Jesus.
She seemed genuinely touched that a lonesome black pastor would seek her out in the woods to pray to Jesus. And I found it somehow comforting to hear her call to me over her shoulder as we walked away from one another, "I'm ready for you next time, you black pervert!"
The speaker was a very round white woman in her late forties or early fifties who, like me, always dresses monochromatically (she in white, I in black), and who, unlike me, always carries a thin plastic grocery bag stuffed with I don’t know what. She’s new to the forest through which I walk every morning, but we’d seen each other three times over the past three days. This was the first time she had spoken to me. It was not the first time I have been mistaken for a black man.
Last week while visiting my parents in Agawam, Massachusetts, my mother, seeming out of nowhere, but which I now think was a near-death confession, told me that when I was a baby people routinely mistook me for African American. Of course no one used that term back in the 1950s.
“I would be pushing you in your stroller,” my mother said, “and people would stop and say, ‘Oh, my, what a cute little colored boy.’ It was true, you were so dark that you looked like a black boy.”
This was a stunning revelation, and I knew it was true: I am black. I had always known I was black. Not just because I like the blues and gospel music; or because my dad is so white that he could pass for an albino; or because he and I are so unalike that there is no way he could be my biological father, but because being black explains why I am obsessed with imitating black preachers, and why I cried inconsolably when Eddie Murphy dressed up as an old Jewish man in The Nutty Professor.
“I’m not black,” I lied to the white woman with the plastic bag.
“Alright, officer, I’ll be careful,” she said deciding that if I wasn’t black I must be a police officer. “But I have this with me just in case!” She reached into the slash pocket in her skirt, and pulled what was sure to be a 22-caliber revolver. My first reaction was to recite the Shema: “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” This is what Jews are supposed to say at the moment they die. Then I remembered I was black, and my mind searched franticly for something black people might say at that same moment. All I came up with was Martin Luther King’s “I Had A Dream" speech. Fortunately she was unarmed, and pulled out a Sprint cell phone instead.
“You keep safe,” I said and turned back to my walk.
“Jesus keeps me safe,” she said.
I love Jesus, and I love people who love Jesus, and I just couldn’t let this moment pass. So a turned back to face her, and right there in the 88-degree heat and near 100% humidity this woman in white and this man in black stood in prayer. "Yes, He does!" I shouted, no longer the middle-aged white Jew but rather the now grown up little black boy in the stroller who had devoted his life to Jesus, "Yes He does!" And the two of us prayed and prayed and came to Jesus.
She seemed genuinely touched that a lonesome black pastor would seek her out in the woods to pray to Jesus. And I found it somehow comforting to hear her call to me over her shoulder as we walked away from one another, "I'm ready for you next time, you black pervert!"
Sunday, July 06, 2008
Jesus for Jews or Rock of Ages
A decade or so ago David Jeselsohn, an Israeli-Swiss antiquities collector, bought a three-foot tall stone tablet inscribed with 87 lines of Hebrew text. Mr. Jesesohn didn’t know exactly what he had, but when he invited an Israeli archeologist to examine it interest in the tablet grew. It took ten years of study, but yesterday the tablet had it global debut as the New York Times featured the stone tablet in an article by Ethan Bronner entitled “Tablet Ignites Debate on Messiah and Resurrection.”
The gist of the matter is this: Most scholars up to today believe that the ancient Jews awaited a military messiah who would be a defeat the enemies of Israel in battle, and liberate the Jewish people from bondage. Before and after Jesus there have been a number of such figures, all of whom failed.
Jesus, the most successful Jewish messiah of all time, was something radically new and different. Jesus did not see himself as a military figure, nor did he expect the Jews to defeat Rome on the battlefield. Jesus saw himself as the suffering servant of the Lord mentioned in Isaiah 53. He expected to die at the hands of Rome and to be resurrected after three days, and in this way to defeat the kingdom of Caesar and usher in the Kingdom of God.
Because this notion of a dying and resurrected messiah seemed to be a new idea in Judaism, Christians have held that Jesus was unique, and therefore the true anointed of God (messiah means “anointed”). Jews, on the other hand, explained the people’s ultimate rejection of Jesus as messiah by pointing to his failure to lead a rebellion against Rome and thus live up to the Jewish notion of what a messiah is supposed to be.
Jeselsohn’s tablet turns both arguments on their heads. If the tablet is proven to be authentic, and every indication thus far is that is it is authentic and predates Jesus by decades, then the notion that Jews restricted their messianic hopes to a military leader is false. In fact, the tablet seems to show, Jesus’ suffering messiah idea was a long established Jewish option.
This tablet records the words of the Angel Gabriel to a Suffering Messiah called Prince of Princes who, the text is unclear here, may be a Jew named Simon. Gabriel tells the messiah that he will die and be resurrected after three days, and in so doing redeem the Jewish people from oppression. What was hitherto thought to be a unique element of the Jesus narrative speaking powerfully to the authenticity of Jesus as messiah, now proves to be an established Jewish position with which Jesus identified.
This is incredibly important. Not only was the idea of a messiah who would be killed by Israel’s enemies part of Jewish thinking, the detail that he would be resurrected after three days was also well known. Further, the messianic idea associated with the death and resurrection of the messiah had nothing to do with “dying for the sins of humanity,” and everything to do with redeeming the Jewish people.
Will this shake Christianity to its foundation? Not at all. Religions are rooted in their own narratives rather than history. Christians will go on believing as they choose. What this tablet does, however, is offer Jews a way to reclaim a favorite son long ignored.
If Jesus saw himself as one of a line of messianic figures awaiting the right time for God to fulfill His promises to the Jewish people; if he provoked the powers that be to bring about his death; if he believed he would be resurrected after three days; and if he believed that resurrection would announce the redemption of Israel, then he was a Jew through and through, and needs to be honored as a great teacher and martyr not unlike Rabbi Akiba whom the Romans tortured to death some six decades later for his involvement in the messianic rebellion of Bar Kochbah.
I have long been a student of Jesus, seeing him as a God intoxicated Jewish mystic. I am currently co-writing a book about the Sermon on the Mount with Dr. Mike Smith, a Baptist minister (www.mountandmountain.blogspot.com), and I believe strongly that Jews, especially liberal Jews, would benefit greatly by reclaiming Jesus as a great rabbi sage and prophet. I am excited by this archeological find, and hope you will be as well.
The gist of the matter is this: Most scholars up to today believe that the ancient Jews awaited a military messiah who would be a defeat the enemies of Israel in battle, and liberate the Jewish people from bondage. Before and after Jesus there have been a number of such figures, all of whom failed.
Jesus, the most successful Jewish messiah of all time, was something radically new and different. Jesus did not see himself as a military figure, nor did he expect the Jews to defeat Rome on the battlefield. Jesus saw himself as the suffering servant of the Lord mentioned in Isaiah 53. He expected to die at the hands of Rome and to be resurrected after three days, and in this way to defeat the kingdom of Caesar and usher in the Kingdom of God.
Because this notion of a dying and resurrected messiah seemed to be a new idea in Judaism, Christians have held that Jesus was unique, and therefore the true anointed of God (messiah means “anointed”). Jews, on the other hand, explained the people’s ultimate rejection of Jesus as messiah by pointing to his failure to lead a rebellion against Rome and thus live up to the Jewish notion of what a messiah is supposed to be.
Jeselsohn’s tablet turns both arguments on their heads. If the tablet is proven to be authentic, and every indication thus far is that is it is authentic and predates Jesus by decades, then the notion that Jews restricted their messianic hopes to a military leader is false. In fact, the tablet seems to show, Jesus’ suffering messiah idea was a long established Jewish option.
This tablet records the words of the Angel Gabriel to a Suffering Messiah called Prince of Princes who, the text is unclear here, may be a Jew named Simon. Gabriel tells the messiah that he will die and be resurrected after three days, and in so doing redeem the Jewish people from oppression. What was hitherto thought to be a unique element of the Jesus narrative speaking powerfully to the authenticity of Jesus as messiah, now proves to be an established Jewish position with which Jesus identified.
This is incredibly important. Not only was the idea of a messiah who would be killed by Israel’s enemies part of Jewish thinking, the detail that he would be resurrected after three days was also well known. Further, the messianic idea associated with the death and resurrection of the messiah had nothing to do with “dying for the sins of humanity,” and everything to do with redeeming the Jewish people.
Will this shake Christianity to its foundation? Not at all. Religions are rooted in their own narratives rather than history. Christians will go on believing as they choose. What this tablet does, however, is offer Jews a way to reclaim a favorite son long ignored.
If Jesus saw himself as one of a line of messianic figures awaiting the right time for God to fulfill His promises to the Jewish people; if he provoked the powers that be to bring about his death; if he believed he would be resurrected after three days; and if he believed that resurrection would announce the redemption of Israel, then he was a Jew through and through, and needs to be honored as a great teacher and martyr not unlike Rabbi Akiba whom the Romans tortured to death some six decades later for his involvement in the messianic rebellion of Bar Kochbah.
I have long been a student of Jesus, seeing him as a God intoxicated Jewish mystic. I am currently co-writing a book about the Sermon on the Mount with Dr. Mike Smith, a Baptist minister (www.mountandmountain.blogspot.com), and I believe strongly that Jews, especially liberal Jews, would benefit greatly by reclaiming Jesus as a great rabbi sage and prophet. I am excited by this archeological find, and hope you will be as well.
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
A Nation of Heretics, Part Two: Cafe and Camp
Yesterday I suggested that the findings of the new Pew Forum poll on religion in America offer those of us devoted to free spiritual inquiry a unique opportunity. The opportunity is to invite Americans into conversation with the wisdom teachings of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome, Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Taoism, Christianity, Islam, Paganism, Native traditions, etc., plus parallel wisdom from science, art, and music, and in this way support the emergence of a truly global wisdom tradition that will serve seekers of all faiths and none.
Let me suggest three ways of doing this, two for adults, the third for teens.
For those adults with the necessary time, energy, desire, and finances, I would suggest enrolling in programs such as the Spiritual Path Institute’s two-year program in Interspirituality. I have been part of this venture since its founding and cannot recommend it too highly. You can check it out for yourself at www.spiritualpaths.net/.
For those adults who cannot or have no interest in pursuing a formal education track, I would suggest we establish Wisdom Cafes around the country where people gather to read and discuss the teachings of the worlds Wisdom Traditions. My son and I have been testing this on a small scale throughout Tennessee over the past five years. Our last venture at Scarritt-Bennett Center in Nashville had 35 participants who came together for two hours each Wednesday evening for twelve consecutive weeks.
To take this to the next level would mean creating a website where people can download an ever-expanding data base of texts and question guided readings, an annual training seminar for people wishing to host Wisdom Cafes, and an annual gathering of Wisdom Café participants featuring some of the leading scholars on the books we study.
I would like to adapt the Wisdom Café idea for teens by creating a Wisdom Camp where high school kids could study Wisdom texts for college credit over the summer. The camp day would be divided in to three parts: mornings would be spent in study and conversation; afternoons would be spent in traditional camping activities featuring martial arts, Chi Gong, cooperative games, swimming, boating, etc; and evenings would be spent in contemplative practice sessions and socializing.
Preliminary investigations have shown how difficult it is to set up a camp from scratch, but there are several camps around the country that are in need of fresh concepts and content. If you know a camp looking to reinvent itself, put them in touch with me.
Obviously I am being quite general here, and avoiding all details. This is just an outreach essay to see if anyone is interested in helping with either project. As always money is the issue. The Café needs writers, web designers, and a marketing program. The camp needs curriculum specialists and, well, a camp. But if we are serious about the future of religion and spirituality, and if we want to take advantage of this unique moment in our nation’s spiritual evolution, we need to talk to like-minded people in our communities and see if we can put something like this together. I would be happy to speak with anyone with the interest and means to take the Café and Camp ideas to the next level.
Let me suggest three ways of doing this, two for adults, the third for teens.
For those adults with the necessary time, energy, desire, and finances, I would suggest enrolling in programs such as the Spiritual Path Institute’s two-year program in Interspirituality. I have been part of this venture since its founding and cannot recommend it too highly. You can check it out for yourself at www.spiritualpaths.net/.
For those adults who cannot or have no interest in pursuing a formal education track, I would suggest we establish Wisdom Cafes around the country where people gather to read and discuss the teachings of the worlds Wisdom Traditions. My son and I have been testing this on a small scale throughout Tennessee over the past five years. Our last venture at Scarritt-Bennett Center in Nashville had 35 participants who came together for two hours each Wednesday evening for twelve consecutive weeks.
To take this to the next level would mean creating a website where people can download an ever-expanding data base of texts and question guided readings, an annual training seminar for people wishing to host Wisdom Cafes, and an annual gathering of Wisdom Café participants featuring some of the leading scholars on the books we study.
I would like to adapt the Wisdom Café idea for teens by creating a Wisdom Camp where high school kids could study Wisdom texts for college credit over the summer. The camp day would be divided in to three parts: mornings would be spent in study and conversation; afternoons would be spent in traditional camping activities featuring martial arts, Chi Gong, cooperative games, swimming, boating, etc; and evenings would be spent in contemplative practice sessions and socializing.
Preliminary investigations have shown how difficult it is to set up a camp from scratch, but there are several camps around the country that are in need of fresh concepts and content. If you know a camp looking to reinvent itself, put them in touch with me.
Obviously I am being quite general here, and avoiding all details. This is just an outreach essay to see if anyone is interested in helping with either project. As always money is the issue. The Café needs writers, web designers, and a marketing program. The camp needs curriculum specialists and, well, a camp. But if we are serious about the future of religion and spirituality, and if we want to take advantage of this unique moment in our nation’s spiritual evolution, we need to talk to like-minded people in our communities and see if we can put something like this together. I would be happy to speak with anyone with the interest and means to take the Café and Camp ideas to the next level.
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
A Nation of Heretics
Heretics rule! That is the finding of the Pew Forum’s of religious belief in America. Of course that is not how they are spinning the data, but that is the unavoidable conclusion. The word “heresy” comes from the Greek hairesis meaning choice; and “heretic” comes from the Greek hairetikos, one who chooses. Americans, even religious Americans, like choice, and that should make their leaders very unhappy.
According to the Pew Forum survey 70% of us say that there is more than one way to attain eternal life. This is huge! The foundational teaching of the dominant religion in America states just the opposite: My way or the very, very, very low way.
The official position of the Catholic Church is that there is no salvation outside the Church. Of course if you ask your favorite Catholic neighbor about this he or she may well deny it. And if she does she is mistaking her belief for that of her Church. Why? Because she just cannot imagine that her Church could be so narrow minded!
The same could be said for most Evangelical Protestants as well. Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me (John 14:6), thus making very clear that without faith in Jesus as your Lord and Savior you are doomed. It seems that the vast majority of EPs ignore this doctrine in favor of heresy.
Before you imagine a wave of atheism engulfing the US, take a breath. Nothing could be further from the case: 92% of Americans believe in God. Of course the survey doesn’t ask people what they mean by “God,” so the statistic is fairly meaningless, but still we are nation of believers.
More helpful are the questions regarding Heaven and Hell. 74% of Americans believe in Heaven, and define it as a place where good people go and are eternally rewarded. 59% of Americans believe in Hell, and define it as a place where bad people go and are eternally punished. I find this last idea very tragic as it removes all hope for compassion and redemption after death. But the amazing thing is that the criterion for entry into Heaven and Hell is deeds not faith. Again, this is huge! Martin Luther staked his entire Protestant Reformation on the notion of “faith alone,” deeds are worth nothing when it comes to salvation. But America says, “No!”
Listen to this: 68% of the people polled said, “there’s more than one true way to interpret the teachings of my religion.” That is heresy, pure and simple; and those people who said it are heretics.
Why am I so happy about this? Because it shows that with all its clout, with all its money, with all its ability to threaten people with eternal damnation, organized religion cannot totally defeat the innate skepticism of the American people.
But more than this it means that we who love spirituality, who believe that seeking the Divine unity through reason, intuition, art, music, contemplation, study, etc. have a wonderful opportunity to reach out to people. More on this is my next post.
According to the Pew Forum survey 70% of us say that there is more than one way to attain eternal life. This is huge! The foundational teaching of the dominant religion in America states just the opposite: My way or the very, very, very low way.
The official position of the Catholic Church is that there is no salvation outside the Church. Of course if you ask your favorite Catholic neighbor about this he or she may well deny it. And if she does she is mistaking her belief for that of her Church. Why? Because she just cannot imagine that her Church could be so narrow minded!
The same could be said for most Evangelical Protestants as well. Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me (John 14:6), thus making very clear that without faith in Jesus as your Lord and Savior you are doomed. It seems that the vast majority of EPs ignore this doctrine in favor of heresy.
Before you imagine a wave of atheism engulfing the US, take a breath. Nothing could be further from the case: 92% of Americans believe in God. Of course the survey doesn’t ask people what they mean by “God,” so the statistic is fairly meaningless, but still we are nation of believers.
More helpful are the questions regarding Heaven and Hell. 74% of Americans believe in Heaven, and define it as a place where good people go and are eternally rewarded. 59% of Americans believe in Hell, and define it as a place where bad people go and are eternally punished. I find this last idea very tragic as it removes all hope for compassion and redemption after death. But the amazing thing is that the criterion for entry into Heaven and Hell is deeds not faith. Again, this is huge! Martin Luther staked his entire Protestant Reformation on the notion of “faith alone,” deeds are worth nothing when it comes to salvation. But America says, “No!”
Listen to this: 68% of the people polled said, “there’s more than one true way to interpret the teachings of my religion.” That is heresy, pure and simple; and those people who said it are heretics.
Why am I so happy about this? Because it shows that with all its clout, with all its money, with all its ability to threaten people with eternal damnation, organized religion cannot totally defeat the innate skepticism of the American people.
But more than this it means that we who love spirituality, who believe that seeking the Divine unity through reason, intuition, art, music, contemplation, study, etc. have a wonderful opportunity to reach out to people. More on this is my next post.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
If You're Presbyterian, It's OK to Demonize the Jews
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has a problem with me. Well, not with me personally, but with my people. No, not white men in their late fifties who still read comic books; Jews, most of whom are not white, or in their late fifties, or readers of comic books (though we do create a lot of them).
To help themselves overcome their problem with Jews the Presbyterian Church has published a resource document entitled “Vigilance Against Anti-Jewish Ideas and Bias.” When you have to publish a book like this to help your members stop their anti-Jewish ideas and biases, you know you have a serious anti-Jewish problem. But still, this document seemed like a good idea. At least they are dealing with the problem.
Or are they?
To test out their ideas the authors of the document sent advance copies to various rabbis. The response was positive. After getting a nod of approval from these Jews, however, the authors of the document removed several of the key passages from the new final version.
Here is one example that I find most heinous. The version of the document shown to the rabbis contained the following sentence:
We Presbyterians can and should confront stereotypes and biases we may hold regarding Israel, characterize the concerns and positions of Jews accurately, and avoid stereotyping and demonizing the Jewish people.
This is a very positive and important sentence. In fact, given that the document is all about ending anti-Jewish ideas and bias among Presbyterians, this sentence is crucial to the entire document. And yet, after winning the praise of the rabbis, the sentence was taken out of the final version. So, in their vigilance against anti-Jewish ideas and bias it is still OK for Presbyterians to mischaracterize and demonize Jews.
Anyone with a basic understanding of Jew-hatred among Christians knows that demonization of the Jews goes back to the New Testament where Jesus says to the Jews, “You are of your father the Devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires (John 8:44). While Jesus was not talking about all Jews (his followers were Jews), and while he may have been speaking metaphorically, later Christians did take it literally and did apply it to all Jews, and used Jesus words to validate the torment, torture, and slaughter of millions of Jews from the moment the Church had the power to do so.
While one might applaud the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for honoring its roots and sticking with the demonization of Jews, it doesn’t bode well for my people and me. Is it any wonder why I have no faith in religion?
So let me ask this of my Presbyterian readers. Please, no matter what your denomination tells you, it isn’t OK to demonize Jews. If you want to demonize someone, demonize the Papists.
To help themselves overcome their problem with Jews the Presbyterian Church has published a resource document entitled “Vigilance Against Anti-Jewish Ideas and Bias.” When you have to publish a book like this to help your members stop their anti-Jewish ideas and biases, you know you have a serious anti-Jewish problem. But still, this document seemed like a good idea. At least they are dealing with the problem.
Or are they?
To test out their ideas the authors of the document sent advance copies to various rabbis. The response was positive. After getting a nod of approval from these Jews, however, the authors of the document removed several of the key passages from the new final version.
Here is one example that I find most heinous. The version of the document shown to the rabbis contained the following sentence:
We Presbyterians can and should confront stereotypes and biases we may hold regarding Israel, characterize the concerns and positions of Jews accurately, and avoid stereotyping and demonizing the Jewish people.
This is a very positive and important sentence. In fact, given that the document is all about ending anti-Jewish ideas and bias among Presbyterians, this sentence is crucial to the entire document. And yet, after winning the praise of the rabbis, the sentence was taken out of the final version. So, in their vigilance against anti-Jewish ideas and bias it is still OK for Presbyterians to mischaracterize and demonize Jews.
Anyone with a basic understanding of Jew-hatred among Christians knows that demonization of the Jews goes back to the New Testament where Jesus says to the Jews, “You are of your father the Devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires (John 8:44). While Jesus was not talking about all Jews (his followers were Jews), and while he may have been speaking metaphorically, later Christians did take it literally and did apply it to all Jews, and used Jesus words to validate the torment, torture, and slaughter of millions of Jews from the moment the Church had the power to do so.
While one might applaud the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for honoring its roots and sticking with the demonization of Jews, it doesn’t bode well for my people and me. Is it any wonder why I have no faith in religion?
So let me ask this of my Presbyterian readers. Please, no matter what your denomination tells you, it isn’t OK to demonize Jews. If you want to demonize someone, demonize the Papists.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Religion as Story
I seem to be on a roll lately when it comes to ticking people off. My June 16th post, Judaism and Christianity are Incompatible, was in response to people who were angry about a previous post (Baha’is in Danger, June 15, 2008). Now this post is in response to people who are angry about that post.
The problem seems to be the last paragraph, or rather that last sentence of that paragraph:
Does this mean that individual Jews and Christians cannot invent variations of their respective faiths that make room for some of the teachings of the other? No. Individuals can do lots of things, but unless and until their private innovations become the norm for masses of people they cannot pretend that what they do is what God intended them to do. And even if their innovations catch on it is still a matter of pretend, because all religion is pretend.
It seems that lots of people who read this blog do not agree that religion is pretend, and want me to explain what I mean when I say it is pretend. So here goes…
To pretend is to give one the feeling that something is true when in fact it is not. Judaism, for example, pretends that God chose the Jews and gave them the one true revelation, the Torah, by which they are to establish the perfect kingdom (Israel) and become a “light unto the nations.” It is a wonderful fiction, but it is still fiction; we made it up.
Christianity understands this and thus denies the Jewish story in favor of its own: God sent His Son to die for our sins and thereby provide believers with a ticket to Heaven. Islam denies both stories, and offers a third: Allah through the angel Gabriel revealed the perfect revelation (the Qur’an) to Muhammad (Peace be upon him). Baha’is deny these stories and offer one of their own, as do Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, and Scientologists.
The only thing that religions prove is that people love to create religions.
I have no problem with people choosing to believe any of these stories. I do have a problem when they think their story gives them the right (even the obligation) to murder those who believe a different story (or no story at all), and I do have a problem with those who want to rewrite the stories so they all say the same thing. I like the stories. I like that they differ. I like that they clash. We don’t have to agree on matters of religion. We just have to agree not to oppress or kill those with whom we disagree.
I believe that religion is a story, a matter of pretend. There is nothing wrong with this. When we pretend we invent worlds that might be better than our own, and which might give us insight into how best to improve our own as well. This is the beauty of the Bible at its best and most moral. It is also the beauty of great sci-fi writers. In fact it is the power and beauty of all great fiction. Knowing religion is a story doesn’t denigrate religion, it liberates it.
At least that’s my story.
The problem seems to be the last paragraph, or rather that last sentence of that paragraph:
Does this mean that individual Jews and Christians cannot invent variations of their respective faiths that make room for some of the teachings of the other? No. Individuals can do lots of things, but unless and until their private innovations become the norm for masses of people they cannot pretend that what they do is what God intended them to do. And even if their innovations catch on it is still a matter of pretend, because all religion is pretend.
It seems that lots of people who read this blog do not agree that religion is pretend, and want me to explain what I mean when I say it is pretend. So here goes…
To pretend is to give one the feeling that something is true when in fact it is not. Judaism, for example, pretends that God chose the Jews and gave them the one true revelation, the Torah, by which they are to establish the perfect kingdom (Israel) and become a “light unto the nations.” It is a wonderful fiction, but it is still fiction; we made it up.
Christianity understands this and thus denies the Jewish story in favor of its own: God sent His Son to die for our sins and thereby provide believers with a ticket to Heaven. Islam denies both stories, and offers a third: Allah through the angel Gabriel revealed the perfect revelation (the Qur’an) to Muhammad (Peace be upon him). Baha’is deny these stories and offer one of their own, as do Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, and Scientologists.
The only thing that religions prove is that people love to create religions.
I have no problem with people choosing to believe any of these stories. I do have a problem when they think their story gives them the right (even the obligation) to murder those who believe a different story (or no story at all), and I do have a problem with those who want to rewrite the stories so they all say the same thing. I like the stories. I like that they differ. I like that they clash. We don’t have to agree on matters of religion. We just have to agree not to oppress or kill those with whom we disagree.
I believe that religion is a story, a matter of pretend. There is nothing wrong with this. When we pretend we invent worlds that might be better than our own, and which might give us insight into how best to improve our own as well. This is the beauty of the Bible at its best and most moral. It is also the beauty of great sci-fi writers. In fact it is the power and beauty of all great fiction. Knowing religion is a story doesn’t denigrate religion, it liberates it.
At least that’s my story.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Desperately Seeking Prophets
I received an email this morning referencing a two-year-old speech by Barach Obama in which he challenges us to be careful when using the Bible as our moral guide. Referencing the Bible’s sanctioning of slavery and its condemnation of eating shellfish, he warns us about the impracticality of governing the country by biblical principles.
In response, James Dobson, head of the evangelical Focus on the Family, attacked Obama on his radio show for citing antiquated dietary codes and passages from the Old Testament (sic) that are no longer relevant to the teachings of the New Testament.
“I think he's deliberately distorting the tradition (sic) understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology,” Dobson said.
Dobson is right. Obama was making the Bible fit his worldview. But so what? Everyone who cites the Bible does that. That’s why it is a poor tool for governance.
The fact is the Bible is filled with inane ideas and moral evils. And while both the rabbis and Jesus (who was himself a rabbi) do their best to reinterpret the Bible according to their more enlightened worldviews, neither does away with slavery or the prohibition against shellfish. It is Peter, not Jesus, who hears God tell him he can have a cup of lobster bisque (Acts 10:9-16). And millions of Jews (myself included) reject Peter and eschew (which may be Latin for “not chewing”) foods forbidden in the Torah.
But here’s the part that really annoys me: Joshua DuBois, Obama’s National Director of Religious Affairs, responded to Dobson saying that Senator Obama is “committed to reaching out to people of faith and standing up for American families.” What kind of response is this? It says nothing at all. Where is Jeremiah Wright when you need him? Where is the prophetic fire that would challenge the insanity of fundamentalisms of all stripes? Where is the passion for truth and reason that America so desperately needs?
To take refuge behind wimpy talk of “reaching out to people of faith and standing up for American families” is embarrassing. Clearly Obama wants to win the presidency more than he wants to be presidential. The same is true for McCain, of course, and anyone else running for office in this country. We have to pander to everyone and offend no one, and so we elect artful dodgers rather than bold leaders.
If I were Barack Obama’s National Director of Religious Affairs I would have responded this way, “Dr. Dobson’s understanding of the Bible reflects Dr. Dobson’s understanding of the world. This is why he believes God is anti-women, anti-gay, anti-liberal, anti-Moslem, anti-Jew, and anti anything else to which Dr. Dobson himself is opposed. Because the Bible is a Rorschach blot validating our prejudices rather than challenging them, Senator Obama rightly warns us against its misuse. Senator Obama will stand up for the rights and freedoms of all Americans, taking on Fundamentalism wherever it seeks to undermine democratic values.”
This is, of course, why I will never be anyone’s National Director of Religious Affairs.
In response, James Dobson, head of the evangelical Focus on the Family, attacked Obama on his radio show for citing antiquated dietary codes and passages from the Old Testament (sic) that are no longer relevant to the teachings of the New Testament.
“I think he's deliberately distorting the tradition (sic) understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology,” Dobson said.
Dobson is right. Obama was making the Bible fit his worldview. But so what? Everyone who cites the Bible does that. That’s why it is a poor tool for governance.
The fact is the Bible is filled with inane ideas and moral evils. And while both the rabbis and Jesus (who was himself a rabbi) do their best to reinterpret the Bible according to their more enlightened worldviews, neither does away with slavery or the prohibition against shellfish. It is Peter, not Jesus, who hears God tell him he can have a cup of lobster bisque (Acts 10:9-16). And millions of Jews (myself included) reject Peter and eschew (which may be Latin for “not chewing”) foods forbidden in the Torah.
But here’s the part that really annoys me: Joshua DuBois, Obama’s National Director of Religious Affairs, responded to Dobson saying that Senator Obama is “committed to reaching out to people of faith and standing up for American families.” What kind of response is this? It says nothing at all. Where is Jeremiah Wright when you need him? Where is the prophetic fire that would challenge the insanity of fundamentalisms of all stripes? Where is the passion for truth and reason that America so desperately needs?
To take refuge behind wimpy talk of “reaching out to people of faith and standing up for American families” is embarrassing. Clearly Obama wants to win the presidency more than he wants to be presidential. The same is true for McCain, of course, and anyone else running for office in this country. We have to pander to everyone and offend no one, and so we elect artful dodgers rather than bold leaders.
If I were Barack Obama’s National Director of Religious Affairs I would have responded this way, “Dr. Dobson’s understanding of the Bible reflects Dr. Dobson’s understanding of the world. This is why he believes God is anti-women, anti-gay, anti-liberal, anti-Moslem, anti-Jew, and anti anything else to which Dr. Dobson himself is opposed. Because the Bible is a Rorschach blot validating our prejudices rather than challenging them, Senator Obama rightly warns us against its misuse. Senator Obama will stand up for the rights and freedoms of all Americans, taking on Fundamentalism wherever it seeks to undermine democratic values.”
This is, of course, why I will never be anyone’s National Director of Religious Affairs.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Religious Incompatibility
My last post on Baha’is in Iran (Baha’is in Danger, June 15, 2008) seems to have gotten me into a bit of hot water. At issue is the following statement I wrote as part of that blog entry:
In a sense the Baha’i Faith is to Islam what the early Christian Church was to Judaism, and just as a believing Jew could not accept the overthrow of Torah that is central to the Church, so a believing Muslim cannot accept the overthrow of Muhammad and the Qur’an that is central to the Baha’i Faith.
A number of people wrote to tell me that being a Christian does not require the overthrow of Torah: Jesus said, "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill it… Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 5: 17 & 19).
While this may have been the teaching of Jesus, it is not the teaching of Christianity. Nowhere do we find Christians behaving like Orthodox Jews. The Jewish Christianity of James, the brother of Jesus, lasted only a short time, while the Gentile Christianity of Paul became the dominant form of the faith.
Paul, over against Peter and James, established a Gentile church in which converts could become Christians without first having to become Jews obligated to Jewish law. Paul did not require his converts to Christianity to observe the laws of circumcision or kosher, for example, two observances that are central to Jewish life. Nor where they required to sacrifice in the Jerusalem Temple, another key feature of Judaism at that time. Indeed, in his Letter to the Galatians Paul seems say that those who try to promote circumcision are perverting the true teaching of the new faith. He becomes so incensed at these Judaizers as to wish they would castrate themselves (Galatians 5:12).
Paul makes it clear that it is faith in Jesus as Christ rather than keeping the commandments of the Torah that is the key to entering Heaven: “For if justification comes through Torah, then Christ died for nothing” (Galatians 2:21).
At the heart of both Christianity and biblical Judaism is the notion that God is only appeased through blood sacrifice. This is an idea as old as religion itself. The Bible’s innovation was to put an end to human sacrifice and focus instead on the sacrifice of animals. This is the meaning of the near sacrifice of Isaac by his father Abraham.
Christianity returns to the theme of human sacrifice, arguing de facto that animal sacrifice is not sufficient and that only a human sacrifice would do. The Christian innovation is that only one final sacrifice is necessary and that is the sacrifice of the God/Man Jesus.
Both religions maintain their sacrificial foundation even today. Traditionally observant Jews pray daily for the restitution of the Temple and its slaughter of animals, and traditionally observant Christians participate in the sacrifice of Jesus through the act of Communion.
While I find the entire notion of a God requiring blood sacrifice absurd, it does seem clear to me that Judaism and Christianity are incompatible religions. Each denies the essential tenet of the other.
Does this mean that individual Jews and Christians cannot invent variations of their respective faiths that make room for some of the teachings of the other? No. Individuals can do lots of things, but they ought not pretend that their private innovations are the norm of their respective faiths. But then again all religion is pretend, so, please, invent away.
In a sense the Baha’i Faith is to Islam what the early Christian Church was to Judaism, and just as a believing Jew could not accept the overthrow of Torah that is central to the Church, so a believing Muslim cannot accept the overthrow of Muhammad and the Qur’an that is central to the Baha’i Faith.
A number of people wrote to tell me that being a Christian does not require the overthrow of Torah: Jesus said, "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill it… Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 5: 17 & 19).
While this may have been the teaching of Jesus, it is not the teaching of Christianity. Nowhere do we find Christians behaving like Orthodox Jews. The Jewish Christianity of James, the brother of Jesus, lasted only a short time, while the Gentile Christianity of Paul became the dominant form of the faith.
Paul, over against Peter and James, established a Gentile church in which converts could become Christians without first having to become Jews obligated to Jewish law. Paul did not require his converts to Christianity to observe the laws of circumcision or kosher, for example, two observances that are central to Jewish life. Nor where they required to sacrifice in the Jerusalem Temple, another key feature of Judaism at that time. Indeed, in his Letter to the Galatians Paul seems say that those who try to promote circumcision are perverting the true teaching of the new faith. He becomes so incensed at these Judaizers as to wish they would castrate themselves (Galatians 5:12).
Paul makes it clear that it is faith in Jesus as Christ rather than keeping the commandments of the Torah that is the key to entering Heaven: “For if justification comes through Torah, then Christ died for nothing” (Galatians 2:21).
At the heart of both Christianity and biblical Judaism is the notion that God is only appeased through blood sacrifice. This is an idea as old as religion itself. The Bible’s innovation was to put an end to human sacrifice and focus instead on the sacrifice of animals. This is the meaning of the near sacrifice of Isaac by his father Abraham.
Christianity returns to the theme of human sacrifice, arguing de facto that animal sacrifice is not sufficient and that only a human sacrifice would do. The Christian innovation is that only one final sacrifice is necessary and that is the sacrifice of the God/Man Jesus.
Both religions maintain their sacrificial foundation even today. Traditionally observant Jews pray daily for the restitution of the Temple and its slaughter of animals, and traditionally observant Christians participate in the sacrifice of Jesus through the act of Communion.
While I find the entire notion of a God requiring blood sacrifice absurd, it does seem clear to me that Judaism and Christianity are incompatible religions. Each denies the essential tenet of the other.
Does this mean that individual Jews and Christians cannot invent variations of their respective faiths that make room for some of the teachings of the other? No. Individuals can do lots of things, but they ought not pretend that their private innovations are the norm of their respective faiths. But then again all religion is pretend, so, please, invent away.
Monday, June 16, 2008
Iranian Baha'is in Danger
I both love and fear religion, and believe religion to be one of the most beneficial and dangerous creations of humankind. Most of time I use the light of humor to shatter the darkness (social, intellectual, and spiritual) in which the roaches of religious insanity, irrationality and intolerance hide, but sometimes things just aren’t funny. This is one of those times.
On May 14th six of the seven leaders of the Iranian Baha’i community were arrested and imprisoned by Iranian authorities. The seventh leader was already in jail having been arrested this past March. A similar purging of Iranian Baha’i leadership occurred in August of 1980 with the arrest and execution of nine members of the Baha’i National Spiritual Assembly. Baha’is are Iran’s largest religious minority, comprising around 300,000 members (there are approximately five to six million Baha’is worldwide), and more than 200 Baha’is were killed in Iran between 1979 and 1998.
The Baha’i Faith was founded by the 19th century Persian (today’s Iran) mystic and prophet Bahá'u'lláh who emphasized the oneness of God, the oneness of humanity, and the underlying unity of the world religions. Baha’is teach that God regularly sends spiritual messengers to humanity to help us evolve spiritually. Among these messengers were Abraham, Moses, Zoroaster, the Buddha, Krishna, Jesus, Muhammad and, most recently, the Báb (who announced the coming of Bahá'u'lláh) and Bahá'u'lláh.
Baha’is believe that the purpose of life is to know and worship God, to act virtuously, and to promote global unity and the advancement of humankind. They believe that all people are created by God and form one human family, and that each person has a soul, fashioned at conception, that will evolve spiritually until it attains the presence of God.
Two fundamental conflicts with Islam are clear. First, Islam (like Judaism and Christianity, and unlike individual Moslems, Jews, and Christians who may disagree with the official positions of their respective mainstreams) claims that it is the one true faith, whereas Baha’is believe that all religions have an underlying core of truth.
Second, Islam holds that Muhammad (Peace be upon him) is the seal of the prophets (just as Judaism holds that Moses was the greatest of the prophets and that prophecy itself ended with the prophets mentioned in the Hebrew Bible), while Baha’is believe that God continues to send prophets to humankind, and that Bahá'u'lláh is the most recent.
In a sense the Baha’i Faith is to Islam what the early Christian Church was to Judaism, and just as a believing Jew could not accept the overthrow of Torah that is central to the Church, so a believing Muslim cannot accept the overthrow of Muhammad and the Qur’an that is central to the Baha’i Faith. Rejecting a teaching and murdering its teachers, however, are two very different things, and the world cannot remain silent as the Iranian authorities inflict another round of killings on Iranian Baha’is.
What can we do about this? My only suggestion at the moment is to contact your local Baha’i center, and ask how you can help. I would also urge you to bring this to the attention of your local interfaith council and your own clergy. We may not be able to stop it, but we can at least deny the Iranians the ability to murder in silence and secrecy.
On May 14th six of the seven leaders of the Iranian Baha’i community were arrested and imprisoned by Iranian authorities. The seventh leader was already in jail having been arrested this past March. A similar purging of Iranian Baha’i leadership occurred in August of 1980 with the arrest and execution of nine members of the Baha’i National Spiritual Assembly. Baha’is are Iran’s largest religious minority, comprising around 300,000 members (there are approximately five to six million Baha’is worldwide), and more than 200 Baha’is were killed in Iran between 1979 and 1998.
The Baha’i Faith was founded by the 19th century Persian (today’s Iran) mystic and prophet Bahá'u'lláh who emphasized the oneness of God, the oneness of humanity, and the underlying unity of the world religions. Baha’is teach that God regularly sends spiritual messengers to humanity to help us evolve spiritually. Among these messengers were Abraham, Moses, Zoroaster, the Buddha, Krishna, Jesus, Muhammad and, most recently, the Báb (who announced the coming of Bahá'u'lláh) and Bahá'u'lláh.
Baha’is believe that the purpose of life is to know and worship God, to act virtuously, and to promote global unity and the advancement of humankind. They believe that all people are created by God and form one human family, and that each person has a soul, fashioned at conception, that will evolve spiritually until it attains the presence of God.
Two fundamental conflicts with Islam are clear. First, Islam (like Judaism and Christianity, and unlike individual Moslems, Jews, and Christians who may disagree with the official positions of their respective mainstreams) claims that it is the one true faith, whereas Baha’is believe that all religions have an underlying core of truth.
Second, Islam holds that Muhammad (Peace be upon him) is the seal of the prophets (just as Judaism holds that Moses was the greatest of the prophets and that prophecy itself ended with the prophets mentioned in the Hebrew Bible), while Baha’is believe that God continues to send prophets to humankind, and that Bahá'u'lláh is the most recent.
In a sense the Baha’i Faith is to Islam what the early Christian Church was to Judaism, and just as a believing Jew could not accept the overthrow of Torah that is central to the Church, so a believing Muslim cannot accept the overthrow of Muhammad and the Qur’an that is central to the Baha’i Faith. Rejecting a teaching and murdering its teachers, however, are two very different things, and the world cannot remain silent as the Iranian authorities inflict another round of killings on Iranian Baha’is.
What can we do about this? My only suggestion at the moment is to contact your local Baha’i center, and ask how you can help. I would also urge you to bring this to the attention of your local interfaith council and your own clergy. We may not be able to stop it, but we can at least deny the Iranians the ability to murder in silence and secrecy.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Gays and Their Monkeys
Periodically I report on conversations I have with some of my fellow citizens in Murfreesboro, TN. Most of the time you don’t believe these stories, and accuse me of inventing them. You give me too much credit. Case in point, I overheard a guy in Barnes and Noble saying that we should limit the number of homosexual African men we allow to enter the United States because they all have AIDS. As usual, and without thinking, I stuck my nose where it didn’t belong.
“Do you really think all gay men from Africa have AIDS?”
“Absolutely. They caught it from their monkeys.”
“Their monkeys? What do you mean, ‘their monkeys’?”
“The gover’ment says that AIDS comes from monkeys, and that it started in Africa. AIDS is passed on by sex, so you don’t have to be no genius to figure out that gays have sex with monkeys. So I’m against letting African gays into this country. Especially if they bring their monkeys.”
“What are you talking about? Gay people don’t have monkeys!”
“If they didn’t have no monkeys they wouldn’t have no AIDS. It’s that simple. We don’t have to let monkey-loving gay people into America. And besides I think it’s illegal to own monkeys in this country so we oughtta go after the monkeys in gay communities in America as a health issue. Without their monkeys the gays might learn to like girls.”
“That is insane! Homosexuality has nothing to do with monkeys!”
“Are you gay?”
“No.”
“Do you own a monkey?”
“No.”
“No monkey, not gay. You prove my point.”
For a moment I thought he was putting me on. I stopped talking, and was about to laugh in order to say, “OK, I get it. You’re kidding.” But the way he looked at me suggested that he wasn’t kidding. I feared that if I let the conversation drop he would think I was agreeing with his logic. So I calmed down, and said, “Look, this is absurd. Most gay men do not have AIDS, and they certainly don't own monkeys. And while it is true that I am straight and do not own a monkey, ever since I read Tarzan novels when I was a kid I wanted to own one. I thought that would be fun.” I hoped the conversation would now come to a natural close. My mistake.
“Homosexuality isn’t fun. Monkey sex isn’t fun. And if you’re saying Tarzan is gay, you don’t know squat. Tarzan’s got Jane. So his monkey and him aren’t having sex. And if you’ve been thinking about monkeys for that long, maybe you are what they call a closet gay, which is a gay who keeps his monkey in the closet, which is cruel even if you aren’t having sex with it, so I don’t want to talk with you at all.”
The guy got up, motioned to his friend with whom he had been conversing before I so stupidly butted in, and the two of them moved on. I just stood there. I still hoped he was putting me on. I also hope that someday I will get a chimp like Cheetah. Umgawwah.
“Do you really think all gay men from Africa have AIDS?”
“Absolutely. They caught it from their monkeys.”
“Their monkeys? What do you mean, ‘their monkeys’?”
“The gover’ment says that AIDS comes from monkeys, and that it started in Africa. AIDS is passed on by sex, so you don’t have to be no genius to figure out that gays have sex with monkeys. So I’m against letting African gays into this country. Especially if they bring their monkeys.”
“What are you talking about? Gay people don’t have monkeys!”
“If they didn’t have no monkeys they wouldn’t have no AIDS. It’s that simple. We don’t have to let monkey-loving gay people into America. And besides I think it’s illegal to own monkeys in this country so we oughtta go after the monkeys in gay communities in America as a health issue. Without their monkeys the gays might learn to like girls.”
“That is insane! Homosexuality has nothing to do with monkeys!”
“Are you gay?”
“No.”
“Do you own a monkey?”
“No.”
“No monkey, not gay. You prove my point.”
For a moment I thought he was putting me on. I stopped talking, and was about to laugh in order to say, “OK, I get it. You’re kidding.” But the way he looked at me suggested that he wasn’t kidding. I feared that if I let the conversation drop he would think I was agreeing with his logic. So I calmed down, and said, “Look, this is absurd. Most gay men do not have AIDS, and they certainly don't own monkeys. And while it is true that I am straight and do not own a monkey, ever since I read Tarzan novels when I was a kid I wanted to own one. I thought that would be fun.” I hoped the conversation would now come to a natural close. My mistake.
“Homosexuality isn’t fun. Monkey sex isn’t fun. And if you’re saying Tarzan is gay, you don’t know squat. Tarzan’s got Jane. So his monkey and him aren’t having sex. And if you’ve been thinking about monkeys for that long, maybe you are what they call a closet gay, which is a gay who keeps his monkey in the closet, which is cruel even if you aren’t having sex with it, so I don’t want to talk with you at all.”
The guy got up, motioned to his friend with whom he had been conversing before I so stupidly butted in, and the two of them moved on. I just stood there. I still hoped he was putting me on. I also hope that someday I will get a chimp like Cheetah. Umgawwah.
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Be Happy: Hate Thy Neighbor
Studies show that happy people are more kind, more generous, have better marriages, make better parents, and act with more integrity than unhappy people. That makes sense. If I am miserable I tend to make the people around me miserable as well. This is why Dennis Prager rightfully says, happiness is a moral issue.
What surprised me about happiness studies was the finding that conservatives are happier than liberals. And yet this statistic—44% of conservatives say they are happy or very happy as against 24% of liberals—has been constant for decades. What does it mean?
Conservative talk show hosts argue that this statistic proves that it is better to be conservative than liberal. Liberals argue that conservatives aren’t more happy, but only more self-referential. That is to say conservatives only care about themselves and do not let the unhappiness of others influence their happiness. Liberals, they argue, are less happy because they are troubled by the needs of the poor and the powerless.
I really have no way of deciding who is correct in this debate. In fact, it isn’t a debate in which I want to engage. No, what I want to know if 44% of conservatives and 24% of liberals are happy, what of the other 32%? Are these people miserable?
A 2007 survey found that 58% of Republicans claimed there were in excellent mental health, while only 43% of independents and 38% of Democrats feel the same. That means 62% of all Democrats feel some sense of mental disease. Add to that the 42% of Republicans and the 57% of independents who also rated their mental health as less than excellent and you have one very distressed country.
Still it is better to be a conservative Republican than anything else. So this electoral season I am going to change my allegiance from Independent to Republican. To help me get into the Conservative Republican Happy Zone I am pasting red, white, and blue elephant stickers all over my house, inside and out. And I am going to argue against affirmative action, and better benefits for veterans, and for curtailing civil rights in our never ending war on terror. I’m also printing bumper stickers that read, “Bring Our Troops Home Later…A Lot Later;” “A Free Iraq By 2108;” “Let the Babies Live, Let the Mothers Die;” “Zygotes for Peace;” and “Gay: It’s a Choice, Just Like Hell.”
In fact just saying these things makes me feel better. I wonder if that is why Conservative Republicans are so happy and mentally healthy? It’s fun to hate the enemy. But that can’t be right. If hating one’s enemies is the key to mental health and happiness, I know a lot of liberal Democrats who should be ecstatic.
What surprised me about happiness studies was the finding that conservatives are happier than liberals. And yet this statistic—44% of conservatives say they are happy or very happy as against 24% of liberals—has been constant for decades. What does it mean?
Conservative talk show hosts argue that this statistic proves that it is better to be conservative than liberal. Liberals argue that conservatives aren’t more happy, but only more self-referential. That is to say conservatives only care about themselves and do not let the unhappiness of others influence their happiness. Liberals, they argue, are less happy because they are troubled by the needs of the poor and the powerless.
I really have no way of deciding who is correct in this debate. In fact, it isn’t a debate in which I want to engage. No, what I want to know if 44% of conservatives and 24% of liberals are happy, what of the other 32%? Are these people miserable?
A 2007 survey found that 58% of Republicans claimed there were in excellent mental health, while only 43% of independents and 38% of Democrats feel the same. That means 62% of all Democrats feel some sense of mental disease. Add to that the 42% of Republicans and the 57% of independents who also rated their mental health as less than excellent and you have one very distressed country.
Still it is better to be a conservative Republican than anything else. So this electoral season I am going to change my allegiance from Independent to Republican. To help me get into the Conservative Republican Happy Zone I am pasting red, white, and blue elephant stickers all over my house, inside and out. And I am going to argue against affirmative action, and better benefits for veterans, and for curtailing civil rights in our never ending war on terror. I’m also printing bumper stickers that read, “Bring Our Troops Home Later…A Lot Later;” “A Free Iraq By 2108;” “Let the Babies Live, Let the Mothers Die;” “Zygotes for Peace;” and “Gay: It’s a Choice, Just Like Hell.”
In fact just saying these things makes me feel better. I wonder if that is why Conservative Republicans are so happy and mentally healthy? It’s fun to hate the enemy. But that can’t be right. If hating one’s enemies is the key to mental health and happiness, I know a lot of liberal Democrats who should be ecstatic.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Safe or Saved: Christian Little League
I had never heard of Christian Little League before, and I imagine I never would have if Little League Baseball, Inc. weren’t suing them over trademark infringement. Once I heard of it, though, I had to check it out.
First of all their website makes is clear that they “are not affiliated with Little Baseball, Inc. or directly affiliated with any church, but we are affiliated directly with God through his Son Jesus Christ!”
That’s impressive. This is baseball the way God wants it played.
What is it with Jewish fathers and their sons and baseball, anyway? My dad loves baseball (also golf and football), and pushed me into Little League when I was a kid. I thought maybe he was unique in this, but now I learn that God forced Jesus to play as well. I wonder if Jesus felt as self-conscious about his level of play as I did?
You might think that since Jesus is God’s Son He played better than me, but I doubt it. The reason I doubt it is that every time I struck out or dropped a ball (I played right field), I always heard people mistaking me for Jesus Christ, and calling to me as if that were my name, “Jesus Christ!” Maybe we looked and played enough alike for people to confuse us.
Given that I suck at sports, I was intrigued with Christian Little League’s statement that there are no losers. How do you have a team sport with no losers? On their website they quote Jesus, “Thou shalt not judge for in the same measure in which you judge ye shall be judged.” I guess there are no umpires at Christian Little League games; that certainly eliminates a lot of pressure.
Of course if everybody wins, there really are no winners. So where is the fun? I mean what do the winners chant at the end of the game, “Two, four, six, eight who do we appreciate? Everyone who came today even if they struck out, dropped the ball, never got off the bench, or hit two billion home runs.” It is hard to chant this. Try it for yourself.
There isn’t much more on their website, so I was left with a few unanswered questions: Can gay boys play on the team? What about Jews or Muslim kids? And if I really could play well but didn’t believe Jesus died for my sins would I still go to Hell? Probably. So much for no losers. But, hey, I’d risk Hell if I could strike out to a cheering, rather than jeering crowd.
Maybe I should start Jewish Little League. We would have umpires and winners (we the Chosen, after all), and each kid would have her own lawyer so she could argue every call.
First of all their website makes is clear that they “are not affiliated with Little Baseball, Inc. or directly affiliated with any church, but we are affiliated directly with God through his Son Jesus Christ!”
That’s impressive. This is baseball the way God wants it played.
What is it with Jewish fathers and their sons and baseball, anyway? My dad loves baseball (also golf and football), and pushed me into Little League when I was a kid. I thought maybe he was unique in this, but now I learn that God forced Jesus to play as well. I wonder if Jesus felt as self-conscious about his level of play as I did?
You might think that since Jesus is God’s Son He played better than me, but I doubt it. The reason I doubt it is that every time I struck out or dropped a ball (I played right field), I always heard people mistaking me for Jesus Christ, and calling to me as if that were my name, “Jesus Christ!” Maybe we looked and played enough alike for people to confuse us.
Given that I suck at sports, I was intrigued with Christian Little League’s statement that there are no losers. How do you have a team sport with no losers? On their website they quote Jesus, “Thou shalt not judge for in the same measure in which you judge ye shall be judged.” I guess there are no umpires at Christian Little League games; that certainly eliminates a lot of pressure.
Of course if everybody wins, there really are no winners. So where is the fun? I mean what do the winners chant at the end of the game, “Two, four, six, eight who do we appreciate? Everyone who came today even if they struck out, dropped the ball, never got off the bench, or hit two billion home runs.” It is hard to chant this. Try it for yourself.
There isn’t much more on their website, so I was left with a few unanswered questions: Can gay boys play on the team? What about Jews or Muslim kids? And if I really could play well but didn’t believe Jesus died for my sins would I still go to Hell? Probably. So much for no losers. But, hey, I’d risk Hell if I could strike out to a cheering, rather than jeering crowd.
Maybe I should start Jewish Little League. We would have umpires and winners (we the Chosen, after all), and each kid would have her own lawyer so she could argue every call.
Friday, May 23, 2008
I Won! And So Can You!
I don’t know if I should share this news or not, but I am so exited I can’t help myself. As many of you may know I don’t have a regular job, but cobble together different gigs in order to bring in a few dollars above the official poverty line. I’m not complaining, but, to be honest, with rising gas and food prices and inflation, it is getting more and more difficult to make ends meet. And the less discretionary money you have, the harder it is for me to find gigs.
But that worry is over. Forever. Three days ago, on May 20th, I won—WON!—the British Lottery. How much did I win? £1,500,000. That is $2,965,350!!! This is no joke. I got the ticket number, the serial number, and the address to send my Social Security Number, Passport Number, and $5000 to cover processing fees.
And there’s the rub. I don’t have $5000. And the deadline for sending in the money is too soon for me to earn it. So I am going to make my readers an offer. And, again to be honest, because I am nothing if not honest, it is killing me to make this offer. I want this money, all of it. But I can’t get any of it if I can’t raise the $5000, so here is the offer.
For everyone who sends me money toward this $5000 I will send them, once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account, ten times what you send me. TEN TIMES! You send me one dollar, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) ten dollars. You send me one hundred dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) one thousand dollars. You send me one thousand dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) ten thousand dollars. You send me five hundred dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) five thousand dollars. And, if you send me the entire $5000, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) fifty thousand dollars. Yes, FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS. You cannot make this kind of return on an investment anywhere else.
So I have a two–week window to take in the $5000. Now I know what you are thinking, what if I send him $5000 and someone else sends him $5000 how will he know whom to choose? I thought of that also, and I’m going to be as fair as I can. I will take in as much as comes in (up to $296,535) and still make the ten to one return once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account. I realize that is a huge sacrifice on my part, but this way I won’t have to have you all competing. Everybody wins.
Now I know what you are thinking after you were thinking the other thing: What if something goes wrong and he never gets the $2,965,350? Well, I can’t see how that could happen. After all it is the British Lottery, British government we are talking about, not some bogus Nigerian princess who has inherited a paltry $500,000. These people backed us in Iraq, they won’t screw us in the lottery. But, on the off chance that they do, all your money is forfeit.
So, what do you say? Do you want to be rich? I thought so! So send me the money now!
But that worry is over. Forever. Three days ago, on May 20th, I won—WON!—the British Lottery. How much did I win? £1,500,000. That is $2,965,350!!! This is no joke. I got the ticket number, the serial number, and the address to send my Social Security Number, Passport Number, and $5000 to cover processing fees.
And there’s the rub. I don’t have $5000. And the deadline for sending in the money is too soon for me to earn it. So I am going to make my readers an offer. And, again to be honest, because I am nothing if not honest, it is killing me to make this offer. I want this money, all of it. But I can’t get any of it if I can’t raise the $5000, so here is the offer.
For everyone who sends me money toward this $5000 I will send them, once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account, ten times what you send me. TEN TIMES! You send me one dollar, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) ten dollars. You send me one hundred dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) one thousand dollars. You send me one thousand dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) ten thousand dollars. You send me five hundred dollars, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) five thousand dollars. And, if you send me the entire $5000, I’ll send you (once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account) fifty thousand dollars. Yes, FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS. You cannot make this kind of return on an investment anywhere else.
So I have a two–week window to take in the $5000. Now I know what you are thinking, what if I send him $5000 and someone else sends him $5000 how will he know whom to choose? I thought of that also, and I’m going to be as fair as I can. I will take in as much as comes in (up to $296,535) and still make the ten to one return once the $2,965,350 is deposited in my account. I realize that is a huge sacrifice on my part, but this way I won’t have to have you all competing. Everybody wins.
Now I know what you are thinking after you were thinking the other thing: What if something goes wrong and he never gets the $2,965,350? Well, I can’t see how that could happen. After all it is the British Lottery, British government we are talking about, not some bogus Nigerian princess who has inherited a paltry $500,000. These people backed us in Iraq, they won’t screw us in the lottery. But, on the off chance that they do, all your money is forfeit.
So, what do you say? Do you want to be rich? I thought so! So send me the money now!
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Go To Shell: Happy World Turtle Day
Now that the weather is warming up I often see a family of turtles sunning themselves on a large boulder jutting into the river along which I walk in the morning. Whenever I see them, I am moved to stop and just marvel at them. I don’t know what species of turtle they are, but I call them the Slowski’s after their Polish counterparts in the Comcast Internet ads. I didn’t see them this morning but I expect to see them all dressed up tomorrow because tomorrow, May 23rd, is their very special day: World Turtle Day.
World Turtle Day has only been around since the year 2000 so it isn’t as old as Shemini Atzeret (look it up), but for me it has more meaning than Shemini Atzeret (I mean it, if you want to know what this is, look it up yourself. Do I have to do all the work in this blog? Don’t answer that.) I don’t know why I love turtles, but I do.
Perhaps it is because they are, mythically speaking, the living embodiment of tranquility, and as an Enneagram Type 9, I am all about tranquility. Perhaps it is because the Cheyenne believe (along with Hindus and many others) that the earth is carried on the back of Old Grandmother Turtle, and I am very fond of the earth and old grandmothers. Perhaps it is because, as the Yoruba say, the turtle is also the trickster, and I was once given the name Coyote Rebbe by a Native American medicine man for whom coyotes are tricksters and who was impressed that every time he passed me the pipe in a pipe ceremony the coyotes in the surrounding hills began to howl. Perhaps it is because the Chinese say that the origin of the I Ching hexagrams is linked to the markings on a turtle shell. Or perhaps it is because I can take the day off for World Turtle Day by claiming it is a Jewish holy day no less important than Shemini Atzeret (LOOK IT UP!!!).
My love of turtles goes back to my youth when I managed several turtle farms, each of which ended in the death of all my turtles and their subsequent burial at sea (toilet, really). I now know that keeping turtles in a small plastic dish and using them to scare the crap out of your little sister is not what turtles are for, but it took me years to learn this.
Here is how I will celebrate World Turtle Day tomorrow. First, I will light a yahrzeit (memorial) candle in memory of all those turtles I murdered in my youth. Second, assuming I can find and afford one, I will place a giant turtle statue by my back door, which, according to Feng Shui, attracts good blessings to the house. Third, I will attend the celebration of turtles at our local science museum. Fourth, I will eat a turtle sundae. And fifth, I will help defend our reptilian Grandmothers by working to end the following: 1) the eating of turtles, 2) the racing of turtles, 3) turning turtles into pets, 4) polluting turtle habitats, and 5) running turtles over as they try and cross the road. (Why did the turtle cross the road, by the way, is the second most important question asked by humankind. The first is Why did the chicken cross the road?)
It is also customary to send World Turtle Day greeting cards and gifts to friends and family on World Turtle Day. Or it will be as soon as someone convinces Hallmark they can make money promoting this. In any case, I want to wish you all a happy World Turtle Day. And don’t forget to celebrate Shemini Atzeret which falls on October 21st.
World Turtle Day has only been around since the year 2000 so it isn’t as old as Shemini Atzeret (look it up), but for me it has more meaning than Shemini Atzeret (I mean it, if you want to know what this is, look it up yourself. Do I have to do all the work in this blog? Don’t answer that.) I don’t know why I love turtles, but I do.
Perhaps it is because they are, mythically speaking, the living embodiment of tranquility, and as an Enneagram Type 9, I am all about tranquility. Perhaps it is because the Cheyenne believe (along with Hindus and many others) that the earth is carried on the back of Old Grandmother Turtle, and I am very fond of the earth and old grandmothers. Perhaps it is because, as the Yoruba say, the turtle is also the trickster, and I was once given the name Coyote Rebbe by a Native American medicine man for whom coyotes are tricksters and who was impressed that every time he passed me the pipe in a pipe ceremony the coyotes in the surrounding hills began to howl. Perhaps it is because the Chinese say that the origin of the I Ching hexagrams is linked to the markings on a turtle shell. Or perhaps it is because I can take the day off for World Turtle Day by claiming it is a Jewish holy day no less important than Shemini Atzeret (LOOK IT UP!!!).
My love of turtles goes back to my youth when I managed several turtle farms, each of which ended in the death of all my turtles and their subsequent burial at sea (toilet, really). I now know that keeping turtles in a small plastic dish and using them to scare the crap out of your little sister is not what turtles are for, but it took me years to learn this.
Here is how I will celebrate World Turtle Day tomorrow. First, I will light a yahrzeit (memorial) candle in memory of all those turtles I murdered in my youth. Second, assuming I can find and afford one, I will place a giant turtle statue by my back door, which, according to Feng Shui, attracts good blessings to the house. Third, I will attend the celebration of turtles at our local science museum. Fourth, I will eat a turtle sundae. And fifth, I will help defend our reptilian Grandmothers by working to end the following: 1) the eating of turtles, 2) the racing of turtles, 3) turning turtles into pets, 4) polluting turtle habitats, and 5) running turtles over as they try and cross the road. (Why did the turtle cross the road, by the way, is the second most important question asked by humankind. The first is Why did the chicken cross the road?)
It is also customary to send World Turtle Day greeting cards and gifts to friends and family on World Turtle Day. Or it will be as soon as someone convinces Hallmark they can make money promoting this. In any case, I want to wish you all a happy World Turtle Day. And don’t forget to celebrate Shemini Atzeret which falls on October 21st.
Monday, May 19, 2008
A New Pastime
I’ve just invented a new pastime. If you use Microsoft Word you can analyze your writing using the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level tool that appears after you run the spell-check program, and determine the grade level at which you write. For example, thus far in this blog I am writing at a 9.2 grade level. If I remove the term “Flesch-Kincaid” it drops down to a 2.3 grade level. I guess that means to go from second to ninth grade you only learn two new words, Flesch and Kincaid. And you thought school was tough.
Anyway, my new pastime is to type out passages from famous authors and see how smart they are. For example, Shakespeare wrote “To be or not to be, that is the question.”
Did you know he was writing at a 1.2 grade level? Shakespeare was writing at a first grade level! I mean he probably wrote: “See Spot. See Spot run. Out, out damned spot.” Whoever turned that into Macbeth was a genius, but it clearly wasn’t Bill Shakespeare.
Let’s try another. How about Charles Dickens: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Clearly the guy was confused, and why? Because he was writing at a .8 grade level. Point eight! That is below first grade level. He was dumber than Shakespeare!
He probably wrote this when he was four or five years old. If he had been my kid and said, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” I would have said, “Well, that makes no sense; you have to choose. Which was it: the best or the worst of times?” And if he refused to make up his mind, I would have taken him to a therapist. Best of times, worst of times. The kid has problems.
I am detecting a trend here. Shakespeare wrote before Dickens, but Dickens wrote dumber than Shakespeare. You would think we would get smarter over time, but no, things only get worse.
To test out my theory I went to the Author Himself who wrote: “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was unformed and void.” This tests out at 6.3. Not bad. God is a sixth grader, way beyond Shakespeare and Dickens. But even God can’t help us here because by the time we get to “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God” God’s writing skills fall to a 4.2 grade level.
So it seems that when it comes to writing devolution is the norm. But there are mutants. Abe Lincoln is my favorite: “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that “all men are created equal.” That is 12th grade prose. Lincoln wrote better than God! Could that be why He had him killed? Inquiring minds want to know.
By the way, if you’re wondering, this completed blog tests out at 4.4 grade level. My mother would be so proud.
Anyway, my new pastime is to type out passages from famous authors and see how smart they are. For example, Shakespeare wrote “To be or not to be, that is the question.”
Did you know he was writing at a 1.2 grade level? Shakespeare was writing at a first grade level! I mean he probably wrote: “See Spot. See Spot run. Out, out damned spot.” Whoever turned that into Macbeth was a genius, but it clearly wasn’t Bill Shakespeare.
Let’s try another. How about Charles Dickens: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” Clearly the guy was confused, and why? Because he was writing at a .8 grade level. Point eight! That is below first grade level. He was dumber than Shakespeare!
He probably wrote this when he was four or five years old. If he had been my kid and said, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” I would have said, “Well, that makes no sense; you have to choose. Which was it: the best or the worst of times?” And if he refused to make up his mind, I would have taken him to a therapist. Best of times, worst of times. The kid has problems.
I am detecting a trend here. Shakespeare wrote before Dickens, but Dickens wrote dumber than Shakespeare. You would think we would get smarter over time, but no, things only get worse.
To test out my theory I went to the Author Himself who wrote: “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was unformed and void.” This tests out at 6.3. Not bad. God is a sixth grader, way beyond Shakespeare and Dickens. But even God can’t help us here because by the time we get to “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God” God’s writing skills fall to a 4.2 grade level.
So it seems that when it comes to writing devolution is the norm. But there are mutants. Abe Lincoln is my favorite: “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that “all men are created equal.” That is 12th grade prose. Lincoln wrote better than God! Could that be why He had him killed? Inquiring minds want to know.
By the way, if you’re wondering, this completed blog tests out at 4.4 grade level. My mother would be so proud.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Behind the Eight Ball
How do fortunetellers make money? I notice Palm Reader shops in high rent areas, and I never see lines of people waiting to get in. So how do they manage?
I ask this because I have to find a job this year. Adjunct teaching is fun but not financially rewarding. Writing books, blogs, and magazine columns is even more fun, but only slightly more financially rewarding. So I need to find a job.
I went to a temp company, but they had no idea how to place a guy whose only skill is public speaking and Torah commentary. Of course I could look for a rabbinic position, but I want something more satisfying than pretending that Judaism has anything of spiritual value to offer twelve-year-old kids and their harried parents. A local church offered me a job, and I admit to being tempted by the chance to damn to hell people who disagree with me, but in the end I have decided on fortunetelling.
Not astrology, mind you, that’s too hard. You actually have to be able to make and read charts, and, to be honest, I can’t remember all twelve Zodiac signs. Tarot Card reading is out as well. If I can't remember twelve Sun Signs, there is no way I can recall the meanings of the 22 Major Arcana. Palm reading, too, isn’t for me, since I don’t like the idea of having to touch people’s palms. Who knows where they have been?
No, my plan is to use a proven fortunetelling tool that has been with me for over half a century: The Magic Eight Ball. I trust the Ball. You can ask it anything, and it always answers.
To prepare for my new career, I spent New Year’s Day asking deep personal questions of my round Seer.
“Will I loose this year the fifty pounds that I failed to lose last year?” OUTLOOK NOT SO GOOD. “Will I have to work hard to make ends meet this year?” AS I SEE IT, YES. “Will this be the year that I stop hurting people I love?” DON’T COUNT ON IT. “Will this year find me finally changing the way I live and think so that I can at last do both with true serenity and integrity? MY SOURCES SAY NO. AND WHILE WE ARE ON THE SUBJECT YOU ARE A REAL BUTTHEAD.
See: it never fails. So I have the tool for my trade, now I just have to figure our how to ply it. Maybe I should rent space in the town square. MY REPLY IS NO. Or maybe I should set up a roadside stand. VERY DOUBTFUL. Hey, I’m not even asking the Ball these questions. WITHOUT A DOUBT. Then who is feeding me these answers? BETTER NOT TELL YOU NOW. This is weird. IT IS DECIDEDLY SO. OK, knock it off. MY REPLY IS NO. All right, fine.
Anyway, I think people will go for this. I will charge five dollars for an answer, and another ten to explain the answer. And if I have no idea what my client is talking about— REPLY HAZY. TRY AGAIN. That’ll be five dollars, please.
I ask this because I have to find a job this year. Adjunct teaching is fun but not financially rewarding. Writing books, blogs, and magazine columns is even more fun, but only slightly more financially rewarding. So I need to find a job.
I went to a temp company, but they had no idea how to place a guy whose only skill is public speaking and Torah commentary. Of course I could look for a rabbinic position, but I want something more satisfying than pretending that Judaism has anything of spiritual value to offer twelve-year-old kids and their harried parents. A local church offered me a job, and I admit to being tempted by the chance to damn to hell people who disagree with me, but in the end I have decided on fortunetelling.
Not astrology, mind you, that’s too hard. You actually have to be able to make and read charts, and, to be honest, I can’t remember all twelve Zodiac signs. Tarot Card reading is out as well. If I can't remember twelve Sun Signs, there is no way I can recall the meanings of the 22 Major Arcana. Palm reading, too, isn’t for me, since I don’t like the idea of having to touch people’s palms. Who knows where they have been?
No, my plan is to use a proven fortunetelling tool that has been with me for over half a century: The Magic Eight Ball. I trust the Ball. You can ask it anything, and it always answers.
To prepare for my new career, I spent New Year’s Day asking deep personal questions of my round Seer.
“Will I loose this year the fifty pounds that I failed to lose last year?” OUTLOOK NOT SO GOOD. “Will I have to work hard to make ends meet this year?” AS I SEE IT, YES. “Will this be the year that I stop hurting people I love?” DON’T COUNT ON IT. “Will this year find me finally changing the way I live and think so that I can at last do both with true serenity and integrity? MY SOURCES SAY NO. AND WHILE WE ARE ON THE SUBJECT YOU ARE A REAL BUTTHEAD.
See: it never fails. So I have the tool for my trade, now I just have to figure our how to ply it. Maybe I should rent space in the town square. MY REPLY IS NO. Or maybe I should set up a roadside stand. VERY DOUBTFUL. Hey, I’m not even asking the Ball these questions. WITHOUT A DOUBT. Then who is feeding me these answers? BETTER NOT TELL YOU NOW. This is weird. IT IS DECIDEDLY SO. OK, knock it off. MY REPLY IS NO. All right, fine.
Anyway, I think people will go for this. I will charge five dollars for an answer, and another ten to explain the answer. And if I have no idea what my client is talking about— REPLY HAZY. TRY AGAIN. That’ll be five dollars, please.
Thursday, May 08, 2008
"Evangelical" Defined
For many the word “evangelical” is a fighting word. Depending on your personal beliefs “evangelical” means standing for the truth or standing for narrow-mindedness and bigotry. It really means neither.
Evangelical is an adjective used to describe someone who propagates the Good News of Jesus Christ. In and of itself the term is somewhat neutral, though over the past decades it has been associated with the right wing of the Republican Party. An evangelical Christian, which is really an oxymoron given that all Christians are charged with spreading the Gospel, may or may not be in favor of abortion, capital punishment, evolution, deregulated capitalism, the Rapture, or dancing. Yet the word continues to be used as if it told us something.
To help correct matters some, the Evangelical Theological Society has issued an evangelical manifesto that requires those who label themselves evangelical to adhere to two principles: the inerrancy of Scripture, and belief in the triune God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as “separate but equal in attributes and glory” and essential for salvation. Now evangelicals can vote Democratic and dance at the inauguration balls. Good for them!
But I am now more troubled than before. I know that most evangelicals accepted the idea that the Bible was without error. Most of my Bible students at Middle Tennessee State come into my class with this belief, and, much to my dismay, leave with it intact as well. But I didn’t know that the Trinity required a belief in a separate but equal clause; the key word being “separate.” If Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are separate then they are distinct, they are three not one, and hence evangelicals are polytheists. That surprised me.
To look deeper, I checked the Catholic Encyclopedia and learned that according to the Athanasian Creed: "the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three Gods but one God." Obviously someone can’t count. Each of the three Persons of the Trinity is co-eternal and co-equal: all alike are uncreated and omnipotent. Which means, despite creedal assurances otherwise, that there are three Gods. You can’t be co-anything if you are the same thing. So I stand corrected. I thought the charge of Christian polytheism was a slur, but now I don't think so. I think they do believe in three gods, but have found it politically inexpedient to just come out and say so.
Now I have no problem with people believing what they like. I stand with Tom Jefferson on this, “It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. (Notes on Virginia, 1782). Believe what you like, but be honest about it. If you believe in three Gods, say so, but don’t pretend that you really believe in one God.
The Hindus have their trinity: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva but say they these gods are attributes of the One God Brahman and not three co-equal deities. And the Hindu Rig Veda, the oldest scripture in the world says, “Truth is One, different people call it by different names.” This is my understanding as well, but it isn't the evangelical or Catholic position. I just find it fascinating that in the 21st Century people still believe in multiple gods. But then I am still amazed that you get two scoops of raisins in every box of Post Raisin Bran. Every box!
Evangelical is an adjective used to describe someone who propagates the Good News of Jesus Christ. In and of itself the term is somewhat neutral, though over the past decades it has been associated with the right wing of the Republican Party. An evangelical Christian, which is really an oxymoron given that all Christians are charged with spreading the Gospel, may or may not be in favor of abortion, capital punishment, evolution, deregulated capitalism, the Rapture, or dancing. Yet the word continues to be used as if it told us something.
To help correct matters some, the Evangelical Theological Society has issued an evangelical manifesto that requires those who label themselves evangelical to adhere to two principles: the inerrancy of Scripture, and belief in the triune God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as “separate but equal in attributes and glory” and essential for salvation. Now evangelicals can vote Democratic and dance at the inauguration balls. Good for them!
But I am now more troubled than before. I know that most evangelicals accepted the idea that the Bible was without error. Most of my Bible students at Middle Tennessee State come into my class with this belief, and, much to my dismay, leave with it intact as well. But I didn’t know that the Trinity required a belief in a separate but equal clause; the key word being “separate.” If Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are separate then they are distinct, they are three not one, and hence evangelicals are polytheists. That surprised me.
To look deeper, I checked the Catholic Encyclopedia and learned that according to the Athanasian Creed: "the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three Gods but one God." Obviously someone can’t count. Each of the three Persons of the Trinity is co-eternal and co-equal: all alike are uncreated and omnipotent. Which means, despite creedal assurances otherwise, that there are three Gods. You can’t be co-anything if you are the same thing. So I stand corrected. I thought the charge of Christian polytheism was a slur, but now I don't think so. I think they do believe in three gods, but have found it politically inexpedient to just come out and say so.
Now I have no problem with people believing what they like. I stand with Tom Jefferson on this, “It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. (Notes on Virginia, 1782). Believe what you like, but be honest about it. If you believe in three Gods, say so, but don’t pretend that you really believe in one God.
The Hindus have their trinity: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva but say they these gods are attributes of the One God Brahman and not three co-equal deities. And the Hindu Rig Veda, the oldest scripture in the world says, “Truth is One, different people call it by different names.” This is my understanding as well, but it isn't the evangelical or Catholic position. I just find it fascinating that in the 21st Century people still believe in multiple gods. But then I am still amazed that you get two scoops of raisins in every box of Post Raisin Bran. Every box!
Friday, May 02, 2008
Are You A Harley Man?
Forever in pursuit of deeply accurate and meaningful categories in which to pigeonhole people, I am now prepared to argue that there are only two kinds of American men: Harley Men and Vespa Men. I am a Vespa Man suffering from Harley-envy. Worse still, I’m a Vespa Man without a Vespa. Where is Dr. Freud when you need him?
Now before you go ballistic on me for reducing all men to their wheels, New Scientist magazine, reports on a study of male rhesus monkeys (these are monkeys made from a mixture of chocolate and peanut butter for you scientifically challenged readers) who, when given a choice between playing with dolls or trucks, ignore the dolls and choose the trucks every time. Darwin rules! Men are evolutionarily designed for motorized locomotion. If that doesn’t prove Intelligent Design nothing does.
The problem with my peanut butter filled primate cousins is that they cannot distinguish between cool wheels, i.e. a Harley Davidson motorcycle, and metrosexual wheels such as a Vespa. I, on the other hand, can and do.
I have ridden a Harley once and sat on one twice. When I was a student at Tel Aviv University I had a friend who looked like the rock star Meatloaf and who owned a Harley. I would sit behind him, my arms wrapped tightly around his ample middle, as we sped through the streets of the not-so-holy city. I think he would have preferred it if the person pressed against him was wearing a miniskirt or bikini but I refused.
My second Harley experience was at the Jewish Community Center in South Miami-Dade when I sat on the bike of a friend. Unaccustomed to being in the driver’s seat I pressed a bare leg (I was wearing gym shorts not a bikini) against the hot muffler and burned myself badly. If only there had been a dragon embossed on the side of that muffler I would have had a cool tattoo ala Kwai Chang Kane, but, just my luck, there was only a welt. It was then, I suspect, that I knew I was a Vespa Man.
Why am I bringing this up today? Because yesterday I read a full page Harley-Davidson ad in USA TODAY: We don’t do fear. Over the last 105 years in the saddle, we’ve seen wars, conflicts, depression, recession, resistance, and revolutions. We’ve watched a thousand hand-wringing pundits disappear in our rear-view mirror. But every time this country has come out stronger than before. Because chrome and asphalt put distance between you and whatever the world can throw at you. Freedom and wind outlast hard times. And the rumble of an engine drowns out all the spin on the evening news. If 105 years have proved one thing, it’s that fear sucks and it doesn’t last long. So screw it, let’s ride.
Yeah! Let’s ride! I said, LET”S RIDE! CAN YOU HEAR ME? I HAVE TO SCREAM OVER THE SOUND OF MY EN… Oh, yeah. Vespa Man. I’m riding a scooter that whines rather than roars. And while those Harley Men are racing away from whatever it is those other men are throwing at us, I keep getting hit in the back of the head.
Actually it’s worse than that. I can’t afford a Vespa, so I’m walking. It is easy to throw stuff at a guy whose walking. I move at about 3.8 MPH, and I go from 0 to 60 in about, well, never. I guess I will just have to make my peace with fear.
Now before you go ballistic on me for reducing all men to their wheels, New Scientist magazine, reports on a study of male rhesus monkeys (these are monkeys made from a mixture of chocolate and peanut butter for you scientifically challenged readers) who, when given a choice between playing with dolls or trucks, ignore the dolls and choose the trucks every time. Darwin rules! Men are evolutionarily designed for motorized locomotion. If that doesn’t prove Intelligent Design nothing does.
The problem with my peanut butter filled primate cousins is that they cannot distinguish between cool wheels, i.e. a Harley Davidson motorcycle, and metrosexual wheels such as a Vespa. I, on the other hand, can and do.
I have ridden a Harley once and sat on one twice. When I was a student at Tel Aviv University I had a friend who looked like the rock star Meatloaf and who owned a Harley. I would sit behind him, my arms wrapped tightly around his ample middle, as we sped through the streets of the not-so-holy city. I think he would have preferred it if the person pressed against him was wearing a miniskirt or bikini but I refused.
My second Harley experience was at the Jewish Community Center in South Miami-Dade when I sat on the bike of a friend. Unaccustomed to being in the driver’s seat I pressed a bare leg (I was wearing gym shorts not a bikini) against the hot muffler and burned myself badly. If only there had been a dragon embossed on the side of that muffler I would have had a cool tattoo ala Kwai Chang Kane, but, just my luck, there was only a welt. It was then, I suspect, that I knew I was a Vespa Man.
Why am I bringing this up today? Because yesterday I read a full page Harley-Davidson ad in USA TODAY: We don’t do fear. Over the last 105 years in the saddle, we’ve seen wars, conflicts, depression, recession, resistance, and revolutions. We’ve watched a thousand hand-wringing pundits disappear in our rear-view mirror. But every time this country has come out stronger than before. Because chrome and asphalt put distance between you and whatever the world can throw at you. Freedom and wind outlast hard times. And the rumble of an engine drowns out all the spin on the evening news. If 105 years have proved one thing, it’s that fear sucks and it doesn’t last long. So screw it, let’s ride.
Yeah! Let’s ride! I said, LET”S RIDE! CAN YOU HEAR ME? I HAVE TO SCREAM OVER THE SOUND OF MY EN… Oh, yeah. Vespa Man. I’m riding a scooter that whines rather than roars. And while those Harley Men are racing away from whatever it is those other men are throwing at us, I keep getting hit in the back of the head.
Actually it’s worse than that. I can’t afford a Vespa, so I’m walking. It is easy to throw stuff at a guy whose walking. I move at about 3.8 MPH, and I go from 0 to 60 in about, well, never. I guess I will just have to make my peace with fear.
Thursday, May 01, 2008
Tossing and Turning: the Insanity of Religion
Do you think religion makes people do weird things? I don’t. I think people make religion do weird things. People invent religion to excuse weird behavior that they want to do, but that they need some excuse for doing. They know what they want to do is insane, but they want to do it anyway, so they invent a god who will punish them for all eternity if they don’t do it. It gives them the perfect cover.
Take for example the Jewish custom of kaparot (kapores where I come from): turning a rooster or a hen over your head (a rooster is you are male, a hen if you are female) during the High Holy Day period and believing that by doing so your sins are passed to the bird and that by slaying the bird you are free from those sins. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten chicken to die for our sins? Does this make sense to you? Is this the best my ancestors could come up with when they sought to borrow from their Christian neighbors?
I can imagine a bunch of rabbis gathering in a shul saying, “Look we’ve got to modernize to fit in. We have to be more goyish. The Christians believe Jesus died for their sins, why don’t we run with that. They’ll appreciate the sentiment. Say, I have an idea, instead of Jesus, why not go with a chicken?”
This kind of magic is ridiculous. But, if you don’t really care about the welfare of chickens, quite fun. You take this bird squawking and screaming, grab it by its feet and spin it around your head like you were a finalist on Dancing with the Stars or representing Israel in the Winter Olympics ice skating competition. I’ve seen this done, though not on Dancing with the Stars or at the Winter Olympics. No, I’ve seen it done in Israel. And in Haiti. In Israel it is called Judaism. In Haiti it is called Voodoo.
And then there is baby tossing. Indian Muslims at the Shrine of Solapur have for the past five hundred years dropped their infants from a fifty-foot tower into a taught sheet held by the faithful many feet below. In this way God will bless the baby either with a long and healthy life, or a very short one lasting no more than the time it takes to hit the ground after having been tossed from a fifty-foot tower. Maybe these Muslims read Nietzsche, “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.”
Rooster swinging and baby tossing. No wonder Christopher Hitchens is angry. Religious people are insane.
And then there is the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The man is angry about American Indian genocide, the enslavement of millions of Africans, Jim Crow laws, lynching, the interment of Japanese Americans during World War II, Vietnam, the treatment of blacks in South Africa during Apartheid, the treatment of Palestinians by Israel, and the fact that Barack Obama dissed him on national television. I mean get over it. What if we Jews kept harping about the destruction of the Temple, or our problems with ancient Egypt, Persia, and Rome, or our expulsion from Spain, or the Crusades, or the Holocaust, or the fact that classic Star Trek with two Jewish leading men got cancelled while the oh so goyish Capt Picard gets to fly where nobody has gone before for longer than the guys who did it first? People would think we are just using history to promote our own agenda.
But maybe you think there is a difference between the prophetic call for justice and the killing of a chicken to ransom you from your sins. Maybe you think decrying slavery then and racism now is somehow more righteous than tossing your six-month-old off the top of a tower. Maybe you think. But if you do you probably aren’t among the truly faithful.
Take for example the Jewish custom of kaparot (kapores where I come from): turning a rooster or a hen over your head (a rooster is you are male, a hen if you are female) during the High Holy Day period and believing that by doing so your sins are passed to the bird and that by slaying the bird you are free from those sins. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten chicken to die for our sins? Does this make sense to you? Is this the best my ancestors could come up with when they sought to borrow from their Christian neighbors?
I can imagine a bunch of rabbis gathering in a shul saying, “Look we’ve got to modernize to fit in. We have to be more goyish. The Christians believe Jesus died for their sins, why don’t we run with that. They’ll appreciate the sentiment. Say, I have an idea, instead of Jesus, why not go with a chicken?”
This kind of magic is ridiculous. But, if you don’t really care about the welfare of chickens, quite fun. You take this bird squawking and screaming, grab it by its feet and spin it around your head like you were a finalist on Dancing with the Stars or representing Israel in the Winter Olympics ice skating competition. I’ve seen this done, though not on Dancing with the Stars or at the Winter Olympics. No, I’ve seen it done in Israel. And in Haiti. In Israel it is called Judaism. In Haiti it is called Voodoo.
And then there is baby tossing. Indian Muslims at the Shrine of Solapur have for the past five hundred years dropped their infants from a fifty-foot tower into a taught sheet held by the faithful many feet below. In this way God will bless the baby either with a long and healthy life, or a very short one lasting no more than the time it takes to hit the ground after having been tossed from a fifty-foot tower. Maybe these Muslims read Nietzsche, “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.”
Rooster swinging and baby tossing. No wonder Christopher Hitchens is angry. Religious people are insane.
And then there is the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The man is angry about American Indian genocide, the enslavement of millions of Africans, Jim Crow laws, lynching, the interment of Japanese Americans during World War II, Vietnam, the treatment of blacks in South Africa during Apartheid, the treatment of Palestinians by Israel, and the fact that Barack Obama dissed him on national television. I mean get over it. What if we Jews kept harping about the destruction of the Temple, or our problems with ancient Egypt, Persia, and Rome, or our expulsion from Spain, or the Crusades, or the Holocaust, or the fact that classic Star Trek with two Jewish leading men got cancelled while the oh so goyish Capt Picard gets to fly where nobody has gone before for longer than the guys who did it first? People would think we are just using history to promote our own agenda.
But maybe you think there is a difference between the prophetic call for justice and the killing of a chicken to ransom you from your sins. Maybe you think decrying slavery then and racism now is somehow more righteous than tossing your six-month-old off the top of a tower. Maybe you think. But if you do you probably aren’t among the truly faithful.
Monday, April 21, 2008
To Press or Not to Press, Is This the Question?
Do you have free will? Now before you answer, think about this:
If you don’t have free will and you answer, “Yes, I do have free will,” why are you programmed to lie to yourself regarding free will?
On the other hand if you do have free will and you answer, “No, I don’t have free will,” why are you so mistaken about something that is so essential to your every action?
A new study on the brain has proven (yet again) that a person’s decision whether or not to press a button can be detected up to seven seconds before the person herself realizes she has made a decision. Get that? By the time you say to yourself, “OK, I am going to press that button” your brain has already decided the matter. Your self-talk about decision making is a delusion. You, and by “you” I mean the “you” that says, “OK, I am going to press that button” is simply a puppet responding to a decision made without you in your brain!
When I first read this I was troubled. I want to believe I have free will, but I am a science oriented person so if a scientist tells me otherwise who am I to disagree? Then I looked into this experiment a bit more deeply and realized that the only thing this test proves is that I have no free will when it comes to pressing buttons.
I spent the next day at home counting how many buttons I press (as opposed to switches I flip, levers I pull, dials I turn, etc.). Not counting the keys on my Powerbook G4 the number came to two: the button that starts my blender that makes my fruit drink in the morning, and the button that starts my toothbrush that cleans my teeth after I have had my fruit drink in the morning. I press the toothbrush button twice a day, the blender button once. Had I not spent the whole day indoors counting buttons, I might have taken my car somewhere and then I would have pressed a lot more buttons on my radio, cd player and air-conditioner, but I decided not to go out and to stay in counting buttons.
Or did I?
Maybe the test has implications beyond buttons. Maybe I decided to type that last sentence seven seconds before I actually typed it. Maybe I, the “I” that takes credit for whatever the brain has decided seven seconds before the “I” that takes credit for it even knows a decision has been made, is just commenting on decisions made by someone else, the real me, the real me that I have never met or known, because the only me I know is the seven-second-delay me who is really nothing much at all. I am simply an afterthought.
This idea is somewhat exciting. As an afterthought I am always surprised: What will that crazy ol’ brain of mine decide to do next? It could be anything. I have no idea. How about this: Let’s wait seven seconds to see what
If you don’t have free will and you answer, “Yes, I do have free will,” why are you programmed to lie to yourself regarding free will?
On the other hand if you do have free will and you answer, “No, I don’t have free will,” why are you so mistaken about something that is so essential to your every action?
A new study on the brain has proven (yet again) that a person’s decision whether or not to press a button can be detected up to seven seconds before the person herself realizes she has made a decision. Get that? By the time you say to yourself, “OK, I am going to press that button” your brain has already decided the matter. Your self-talk about decision making is a delusion. You, and by “you” I mean the “you” that says, “OK, I am going to press that button” is simply a puppet responding to a decision made without you in your brain!
When I first read this I was troubled. I want to believe I have free will, but I am a science oriented person so if a scientist tells me otherwise who am I to disagree? Then I looked into this experiment a bit more deeply and realized that the only thing this test proves is that I have no free will when it comes to pressing buttons.
I spent the next day at home counting how many buttons I press (as opposed to switches I flip, levers I pull, dials I turn, etc.). Not counting the keys on my Powerbook G4 the number came to two: the button that starts my blender that makes my fruit drink in the morning, and the button that starts my toothbrush that cleans my teeth after I have had my fruit drink in the morning. I press the toothbrush button twice a day, the blender button once. Had I not spent the whole day indoors counting buttons, I might have taken my car somewhere and then I would have pressed a lot more buttons on my radio, cd player and air-conditioner, but I decided not to go out and to stay in counting buttons.
Or did I?
Maybe the test has implications beyond buttons. Maybe I decided to type that last sentence seven seconds before I actually typed it. Maybe I, the “I” that takes credit for whatever the brain has decided seven seconds before the “I” that takes credit for it even knows a decision has been made, is just commenting on decisions made by someone else, the real me, the real me that I have never met or known, because the only me I know is the seven-second-delay me who is really nothing much at all. I am simply an afterthought.
This idea is somewhat exciting. As an afterthought I am always surprised: What will that crazy ol’ brain of mine decide to do next? It could be anything. I have no idea. How about this: Let’s wait seven seconds to see what
Friday, April 18, 2008
New Questions for Passover
USA TODAY ran a lengthy front page article on the ways different people touched by the horror of 9/11 are dealing with their faith (April 18-20, 2008). Some found God through the attack, others lost God because of it. At the heart of the article is the question, “Where was God on 9/11?”
There were the expected answers: God was with the victims; He was with the mourners; He was with the rescuers. But the one answer that I wanted to hear, the one that we must hear, and the one that was missing was this, “God was flying those planes into the Towers, the Pentagon, and the ground.”
The terrorists were people of faith. They were prayerful men of God carrying out His Will. True, I think they were evil and their god a projection of that evil, but I do not question the authenticity of their faith. According to them, it was God who told them to kill thousands of Americans, and I have no way of proving them wrong.
I mentioned this to a rabbi friend the other day and he said, “God protects the innocent. The way you know God is God is that He protects the powerless.”
I wish it were so, but here we are on the eve of Passover when millions of Jews around the world are going to celebrate God’s torment and murder of thousands of innocents! The Torah is filled with God sanctioned violence and acts of genocide. If that was God’s Will then, how can I be certain that it isn’t God’s Will now? Is the best I can say is that the true God wouldn't target me and mine? That too is disproved by the Torah where God is more than happy to wipe tens of thousands of Israelites whenever they displease Him.
Believing in God is dangerous business.
I am not demeaning the faith or lack of faith of the people mentioned in the article. I am only suggesting that a deeper discussion is necessary. For me, no religion whose god sanctions violence is true. Judaism included.
The terrorists worshipped their own projections, feeding their own egos, excusing and sanctioning their own madness and murderous rage. There are passages of Torah that do the same. The only difference is who is doing the killing. Can it be that the Israelites who heard God command them to exterminate Amalek or the inhabitants of Jericho were right, while the Moslems who hear God command them to exterminate their enemies are wrong? Or is right and wrong simply the byproduct of who is claiming to hear what from Whom? This is a crucial question on the eve of Passover.
Tomorrow night we Jews are going to celebrate a destruction no less horrifying to the ancient Egyptians than the Twin Towers attack is horrifying to modern Americans. I can't do this any more. I know we want to say it isn't the same; I know we want to say our God is good and true, and their god is evil and false, but our story does not bear this out.
So this Passover I will ask four new questions and invite you to do the same:
1. Why on this night do we celebrate the slaughter of innocents when on all other nights we decry it?
2. Why on this night do we link ourselves to a murderous god, when on all other nights we are horrified by others who do the same?
3. Why on this night do we read this nightmare of liberation and pretend that doing so doesn’t continue the jihadist mentality that plagues all three Abrahamic faiths?
4. Why on this night do we spill a little wine from our cups so as not to rejoice at the suffering of others when we should refuse to drink at all, saying to God and to ourselves, “Enough! You stamp out the righteous along with the wicked! It is a sacrilege to You! Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?” (from Genesis 18:23-25).
Chag Sameach Pesach!
There were the expected answers: God was with the victims; He was with the mourners; He was with the rescuers. But the one answer that I wanted to hear, the one that we must hear, and the one that was missing was this, “God was flying those planes into the Towers, the Pentagon, and the ground.”
The terrorists were people of faith. They were prayerful men of God carrying out His Will. True, I think they were evil and their god a projection of that evil, but I do not question the authenticity of their faith. According to them, it was God who told them to kill thousands of Americans, and I have no way of proving them wrong.
I mentioned this to a rabbi friend the other day and he said, “God protects the innocent. The way you know God is God is that He protects the powerless.”
I wish it were so, but here we are on the eve of Passover when millions of Jews around the world are going to celebrate God’s torment and murder of thousands of innocents! The Torah is filled with God sanctioned violence and acts of genocide. If that was God’s Will then, how can I be certain that it isn’t God’s Will now? Is the best I can say is that the true God wouldn't target me and mine? That too is disproved by the Torah where God is more than happy to wipe tens of thousands of Israelites whenever they displease Him.
Believing in God is dangerous business.
I am not demeaning the faith or lack of faith of the people mentioned in the article. I am only suggesting that a deeper discussion is necessary. For me, no religion whose god sanctions violence is true. Judaism included.
The terrorists worshipped their own projections, feeding their own egos, excusing and sanctioning their own madness and murderous rage. There are passages of Torah that do the same. The only difference is who is doing the killing. Can it be that the Israelites who heard God command them to exterminate Amalek or the inhabitants of Jericho were right, while the Moslems who hear God command them to exterminate their enemies are wrong? Or is right and wrong simply the byproduct of who is claiming to hear what from Whom? This is a crucial question on the eve of Passover.
Tomorrow night we Jews are going to celebrate a destruction no less horrifying to the ancient Egyptians than the Twin Towers attack is horrifying to modern Americans. I can't do this any more. I know we want to say it isn't the same; I know we want to say our God is good and true, and their god is evil and false, but our story does not bear this out.
So this Passover I will ask four new questions and invite you to do the same:
1. Why on this night do we celebrate the slaughter of innocents when on all other nights we decry it?
2. Why on this night do we link ourselves to a murderous god, when on all other nights we are horrified by others who do the same?
3. Why on this night do we read this nightmare of liberation and pretend that doing so doesn’t continue the jihadist mentality that plagues all three Abrahamic faiths?
4. Why on this night do we spill a little wine from our cups so as not to rejoice at the suffering of others when we should refuse to drink at all, saying to God and to ourselves, “Enough! You stamp out the righteous along with the wicked! It is a sacrilege to You! Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?” (from Genesis 18:23-25).
Chag Sameach Pesach!
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Going to the Dogs
Do pets go to heaven? According to Gary Kurtz in Cold Noses at the Pearly-Gates the answer is yes. I’m not so sure, and would like to pose three questions of Gary:
1. Do animals have souls?
2. Does my pet have to believe in Jesus as Christ to enter heaven?
3. If so, how can my pet achieve this faith; or if not, how is it that God is more generous to an unbelieving beagle than He is to an unbelieving human?
Let’s take up each question in turn.
Do animals have souls? The Buddhist variant of this question, Does a dog have Buddhanature, is the first koan given to most students of Rinzai Zen. The answer is Mu! which means No! or Nothing, but which is better translated as Stop asking stupid questions and wake up from the delusion that plagues your life right now!
I tend to side with the Buddhists. I don’t believe in souls. To me souls are just projections of the ego refusing to admit to its own annihilation at death. Souls perpetuate the delusion that you are separate from the One Who is all.
Do animals have to believe in Jesus to get to heaven? No, there is no heaven. Heaven is not a place you go to; heaven is the place you are right now if you would wake up to the true nature of reality and act accordingly. When you know all beings are God you engage all life with godliness. That is heaven. Hell is everything else.
Is God more generous to animals than humans? No, God manifests as both. True, I’d rather be a human than a dog, and a dog than a cat (I’ll get hate mail for that revelation), but each of these is fully God just as every wave is fully the ocean in which it arises.
Of course by denying souls and heaven I’m really avoiding the questions rather than answering them. So it seems to me that if there were souls and animals had them they would have to be held to the same entry standard as humans: Jewish dogs are out, Baptists dogs are in. My neighbor has a great dog and they are Jehovah’s Witness. Will Rusty make it to heaven or not? Is it his fault that his doghouse gets a subscription to Watchtower magazine?
Chuck Colson in the April 08 issue of Christianity Today says Kurtz is wrong and animals do not have souls or an afterlife. While Pastor Colson acknowledges that this may be harsh news to the followers of the Good News, he is adamant that we realize that only humans have souls, for to do otherwise would require us to grant the same rights to animals that we grant to people.
By arguing that only humans have souls, Christians “can make a logical defense of the uniqueness of human life. But if out of sentimentality we treat our pets as if they have souls, we give away the argument. What a tragic irony if the church finds it has been conquered on behalf of our beloved pets.”
I am not sure what the irony is, but I would agree that if we aren't vigilant all religion, and not just Christianity, is going to the dogs.
1. Do animals have souls?
2. Does my pet have to believe in Jesus as Christ to enter heaven?
3. If so, how can my pet achieve this faith; or if not, how is it that God is more generous to an unbelieving beagle than He is to an unbelieving human?
Let’s take up each question in turn.
Do animals have souls? The Buddhist variant of this question, Does a dog have Buddhanature, is the first koan given to most students of Rinzai Zen. The answer is Mu! which means No! or Nothing, but which is better translated as Stop asking stupid questions and wake up from the delusion that plagues your life right now!
I tend to side with the Buddhists. I don’t believe in souls. To me souls are just projections of the ego refusing to admit to its own annihilation at death. Souls perpetuate the delusion that you are separate from the One Who is all.
Do animals have to believe in Jesus to get to heaven? No, there is no heaven. Heaven is not a place you go to; heaven is the place you are right now if you would wake up to the true nature of reality and act accordingly. When you know all beings are God you engage all life with godliness. That is heaven. Hell is everything else.
Is God more generous to animals than humans? No, God manifests as both. True, I’d rather be a human than a dog, and a dog than a cat (I’ll get hate mail for that revelation), but each of these is fully God just as every wave is fully the ocean in which it arises.
Of course by denying souls and heaven I’m really avoiding the questions rather than answering them. So it seems to me that if there were souls and animals had them they would have to be held to the same entry standard as humans: Jewish dogs are out, Baptists dogs are in. My neighbor has a great dog and they are Jehovah’s Witness. Will Rusty make it to heaven or not? Is it his fault that his doghouse gets a subscription to Watchtower magazine?
Chuck Colson in the April 08 issue of Christianity Today says Kurtz is wrong and animals do not have souls or an afterlife. While Pastor Colson acknowledges that this may be harsh news to the followers of the Good News, he is adamant that we realize that only humans have souls, for to do otherwise would require us to grant the same rights to animals that we grant to people.
By arguing that only humans have souls, Christians “can make a logical defense of the uniqueness of human life. But if out of sentimentality we treat our pets as if they have souls, we give away the argument. What a tragic irony if the church finds it has been conquered on behalf of our beloved pets.”
I am not sure what the irony is, but I would agree that if we aren't vigilant all religion, and not just Christianity, is going to the dogs.
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Body as Billboard
If I ever called my father and told him I was going to get a tattoo he would have a fit. And if I defended myself by saying that he had already tattooed me himself when I was eight days old, he would think me insane. But it is true—I wear God’s brand on my penis.
This is on my mind because of a conversation I just had with an eighteen-year-old guy with a tattoo of the Nike swoosh on his calve. I asked him if Nike paid to have him advertise for them, and he said “no,” he just liked the image and the idea of “Just do it!” that the swoosh implied.
I told him that some companies buy body space on which to ink their message. He said he has lots of skin available for billboards, and the friend he was with began a very raunchy riff on products that might be associated with various body parts. That’s when I thought about circumcision.
God is advertising on the head of my penis. As a theologian I find this insight intriguing. What does it tell me about God? Actually not much. After hours of contemplation all I could come up with is this: God needs to hire a new advertising firm.
What is the point of placing an ad where no one will see it? Maybe the original command was to place God’s sign on your forehead rather than foreskin, but that amidst all the thunder and lightening people misheard what Moses was saying. This would make much more sense. First, it would be open to both men and women. Second, lots of people would see it. Third, it would explain why yarmulkes (skullcaps) don’t have brims (they would hide the sign). And fourth, it would make it much more difficult for Jews to pass as Gentiles. And it might be true: foreskin from forehead is not such a huge jump (at least in English which as every believer in the King James Bible knows was God’s original language of choice).
My point is this: mistakes happen. For example, according to one rabbi (that would be me) when Moses told the people not to boil a calf in its mother’s milk they had such trouble hearing him that they thought he said, “Thou shalt not mix dairy with meat and must have separate dishes for meat and dairy and separate sets of dishes, one for meat and one for dairy, for everyday use and for when guests drop by, and separate sets of dishes for Passover one each for meat and dairy, one set for guests and another for everyday.” That is eight sets of dishes. Add that to the decorative plates the Israelites undoubtedly bought as they sojourned from place to place in the desert and during their various exiles, and we are talking about a lot of china. How practical is this? If God thought about dinnerware at all, He probably imagined that each person would have one bowl for dairy and one for meat. But mistakes happen. Maybe circumcision is just one of those mistakes.
So if you are planning a bris, think about using a different body part. A crisply printed “Ask me about Yaweh” on the forehead might be nice.
This is on my mind because of a conversation I just had with an eighteen-year-old guy with a tattoo of the Nike swoosh on his calve. I asked him if Nike paid to have him advertise for them, and he said “no,” he just liked the image and the idea of “Just do it!” that the swoosh implied.
I told him that some companies buy body space on which to ink their message. He said he has lots of skin available for billboards, and the friend he was with began a very raunchy riff on products that might be associated with various body parts. That’s when I thought about circumcision.
God is advertising on the head of my penis. As a theologian I find this insight intriguing. What does it tell me about God? Actually not much. After hours of contemplation all I could come up with is this: God needs to hire a new advertising firm.
What is the point of placing an ad where no one will see it? Maybe the original command was to place God’s sign on your forehead rather than foreskin, but that amidst all the thunder and lightening people misheard what Moses was saying. This would make much more sense. First, it would be open to both men and women. Second, lots of people would see it. Third, it would explain why yarmulkes (skullcaps) don’t have brims (they would hide the sign). And fourth, it would make it much more difficult for Jews to pass as Gentiles. And it might be true: foreskin from forehead is not such a huge jump (at least in English which as every believer in the King James Bible knows was God’s original language of choice).
My point is this: mistakes happen. For example, according to one rabbi (that would be me) when Moses told the people not to boil a calf in its mother’s milk they had such trouble hearing him that they thought he said, “Thou shalt not mix dairy with meat and must have separate dishes for meat and dairy and separate sets of dishes, one for meat and one for dairy, for everyday use and for when guests drop by, and separate sets of dishes for Passover one each for meat and dairy, one set for guests and another for everyday.” That is eight sets of dishes. Add that to the decorative plates the Israelites undoubtedly bought as they sojourned from place to place in the desert and during their various exiles, and we are talking about a lot of china. How practical is this? If God thought about dinnerware at all, He probably imagined that each person would have one bowl for dairy and one for meat. But mistakes happen. Maybe circumcision is just one of those mistakes.
So if you are planning a bris, think about using a different body part. A crisply printed “Ask me about Yaweh” on the forehead might be nice.
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