You Say You Want a Revolution

[This morning while sitting in the Nashville International Airport reading the newspaper a mustachioed Frenchman sitting next to me starts up a conversation. In the interest of space and clarity I’m skipping my part of the conversation. I will also resist the desire to recreate hees speech zo zat you can read zees without hees Frehnch axaunt.]

Occupy Wall Street is a paper tiger. All drums and no message. If you want to change the system under which you Americans suffer you must stop collaborating with it.

First, the 99% should go on strike. Do it the day after your Thanksgiving. No one of the 99% goes to work. Do you think the fat cats on Wall Street can survive even a day without the 99%? Can they brew their own lattes? They will be defeated in moments.

Second, the 99% should boycott all elections except, maybe, the most local. It doesn’t matter which party wins in your system. The only difference between them is which corporations get to feed off the people. Don’t vote. Let the 1% elect their man, they do so anyway. Boycotting the elections says you know the system is stacked against you.

Third, the 99% should refuse to file tax returns. Instead everyone should file for an extension and mail it in on April 15^th when your taxes are due. You are not refusing to pay, only filing for a legal extension. And keep filing for extensions until there is no money to feed the beast. Again you are sending a message: the people have the power because the people have the numbers.

Do these things until your demands are met: a minimum living wage, universal single payer health care, publically funded education from pre-school through college, ending corporate welfare and the “corporations are people” nonsense, and removing the influence of money from politics and government.

So, three things: call a general strike on November 25; file for tax extensions on April 15^th; and boycott the elections on November 4^th.

Will you do it? Of course not. Why? Because you would rather chant than change, and organize drum circles than a revolution. Because the government-military-corporate-entertainment complex keeps you fat, stupid, and afraid. Because given the choice between change and cable, you will choose cable every time.

But who am I to talk? I am going back home to watch the EU dissolve, and wait for America to drag us into a war with Iran and China. Bon chance, mais ami.

His plane to Chicago was called, and he got up and walked away. Who was this mustachioed Frenchman? Obviously I have no idea, but I suspect he would have left me a silver bullet if he could have gotten it passed security. Bon chance indeed!

The Promise of Interfaith

Where can interfaith dialogue take us? I was asked this recently, and want to share my answer with you here.

There are many levels of inter-faith dialogue: sharing accurate information and correcting of misinformation about our respective religions; sharing our personal faith journeys; sharing our respective scriptures on a topic of mutual interest; finding common ethical ground and working toward common social goals; etc. All of these are important, and all of them can work toward the creation of a more loving community.

I would like to suggest one more. All our religions are, to borrow a phrase from Zen Buddhism, fingers pointing toward the moon; none of them is the moon itself. I want to get to the point where we can say with the Hindu Rig Veda that “Truth is one, different people call it by different names;” and then, even deeper still, to say with the Taoists, “the tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao.”

I long for an interfaith dialogue where participants, while steeped in their respective traditions, read these traditions as metaphor and myth pointing toward truths that can be articulated in no other way. I want to be in dialogue with people who not only learn about one another, but from one another; and where the participants can be changed by what they learn.

This kind of interfaith dialogue would be rooted in deep humility. All we could affirm is that we know we don’t know what ultimate Truth or Reality is; all we could say is that real meeting happens when we step out of our scripts and speak together from a place of common questioning rather than uncommon answering.

This is why I put so much effort into interfaith work. I want it to take us through religion and beyond religion to stand together in awe of What Is. At this moment silence reigns, opinions cease, and there is a wordless wonder that leaves us each humbled, hopeful, loving, and courageous.

Can interfaith dialogue bring us to this place? Yes. I have experienced it with the faculty of the Spiritual Paths Institute, with the participants in Father Thomas Keating’s Snowmass Group, and with the participants at my twice-monthly interfaith luncheons at Wisdom House.

I know this kind of encounter is possible. My hope is that more and more people get to experience it.

I'm A Believer (But Not in the Right Things)

During a wonderful conversation I had this morning it struck me (once again) why I have such trouble fitting in even with interfaith groups: I am not a believer.

I don’t believe religions are of divine origin; I don’t believe theologies tell us anything about God (though they may tell us a lot about the humans who invent and adhere to them); I don’t believe scriptures are written or revealed by God; and I don’t believe the claims a religion makes about itself are anything more than self-serving marketing slogans.

I do believe all beings are manifestation of a singular Reality I call God; I do believe that we can realize this Reality in, with, and as ourselves through a variety of contemplative practices found in all of the world’s religions; I do believe that when we realize the Divine this way we move beyond religion to a state of open-hearted compassion and hard-headed justice and reason; and I do believe each of the world’s religions and all of their sacred texts contain timeless truths, but that these truths have to be culled out from a lot of time-bound bias and religious propaganda.

My beliefs make it impossible for me to hold “the Jewish line” on anything. Certainly I can challenge misinformation about Jews and Judaism, but I cannot personally assert that the Jews are the Chosen People or that the Torah is the one true revelation, or that Israel is the Promised Land (though I can explain why many Jews do believe these things). As the only rabbi in an entire county, however, I am expected to believe things I have long since abandoned. And when I don’t it is very confusing to people.

I love Judaism as a civilization of argument and doubt; I love its iconoclasm; I love its capacity to hold multiple and conflicting meanings on issues of doctrine, practice, text, and life; I love that Judaism is at home with paradox; but what I love about my people and our civilization is so very hard to get across to those who expect all faiths to be fundamentally creedal: We Jews believe “X;” I’m a Jew therefore I must believe “X” as well, and if I don’t I am no longer a Jew.

It is difficult, perhaps impossible,  for a Christian or a Muslim to deny the divinity of Christ or the authenticity of the Qur’an and still be a Christian or a Muslim. But Jews have been denying the truth claims of Judaism for centuries and still cling to being Jews. I refuse to abandon my people or our civilization, but I wish it were easier to explain the nature of the Jewish mindset. 

I was going to put this in a comment, but I wanted to make sure you all got to see it, so I am posting it this way.

First, if my previous blog implicated Mr. Leith in my opposition to religious violence in scripture and theology, that was not my intent. This is my issue, not his.

Second, Jerry and I continue to email and he has provided a 13 word declaration that I am hopeful many if not most of the clergy in our country will sign: "We condemn the religious persecution of anyone in the name of any religion."

Jerry and I are already talking about tweaking this a bit, so the final wording may differ slightly, but I urge you to take this declaration to your own clergy and see if you get them to affirm this in public.

Ending Violence in our Religions

In the Focus section of today's Daily News Journal (Murfreesboro's newspaper of record) Jerry Leith wrote a letter calling me out by name, and challenging me to stand up against religiously sanctioned violence, murder, and persecution. Amen, Brother Leith! Jerry and I had a brief email exchange, and I would like to accept and expand his challenge in the following ways. Since I have no idea what will happen to this idea, I thought I would share it all with you. If anyone wants to borrow it for their own communities, please feel free to do so. 

I don't have permission to reprint Mr. Leith's letter, but you can find it on line at http://www.dnj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2011110300314

After reading Jerry's letter I suggested we expand the issue this way:

First, the examples offered in Mr. Leith are limited to Islam, but all religions have violent elements and extremists who exploit them. I suggest our call for nonviolence be expanded to clergy and laity of all faiths.

Second, he focuses on Imam Bahloul, Rev. Watson, and myself; I suggest we broaden the call to include all clergy in Rutherford County.

Third, he focuses on this-worldly violence alone, and I think it is important to do away with violence in the after-life as well. Believing that God will damn and torture nonbelievers or differently believing believers in the next life makes it easier for lovers of this God to persecute, torture, and murder them in this life.

Mr. Leith generously offered to pay 50% of the cost of an ad in the DNJ. I will pick up the other 50%. Here is the text I propose we run:

“We, the undersigned clergy of Rutherford County, agree to immediately cease all expressions of violence in our religious organizations, theologies, liturgies, sacred texts, and sermons; and urge clergy and laity of all faiths to disassociate themselves from of any organization, religious or secular, that promotes violence in the name of God or as the will of God in this world or the next.”

If this is the ad Mr. Leith has in mind, I am grateful to him and his generosity, and honored to be the first to sign it.

Nailed It

Controversial filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici claims to have discovered two of the nails used in the crucifixion of Jesus. This is no small matter.

If the nails are those of Jesus, they must contain the blood of Christ. We can test this blood for DNA. If it contains only female chromosomes, as the blood of a baby born of a Virgin must, we will have incontrovertible proof that these nails pierced the body of Jesus. But wait; there’s more.

If this blood is the blood of Christ could we clone Jesus anew? Scientists in Britian have cloned mice from fully developed blood cells. Could we not clone the Lamb? Could the Second Coming be a cloning of Christ?

While you may be disappointed that the Rapture did not happen today as predicted (I am), and that the world didn’t come to an end today as predicted (I am), it could still be an amazing day if today is the day we begin the cloning of Jesus.

I can only say, “Ecce Homo,” Simcha Jacobovici, “Ecce Homo!”

What I Believe

Every once in a while it is good to sit down and clarify what you believe. I did this recently and came up with the following:

1. Everything is a manifestation of the one thing I call God.

2. God is not good; good and bad are human categories about which God cares not one bit.

3. Life is not controllable, but you can learn to navigate it, and do some good in the process.

4. Prayer cannot change God's mind, but it might change your attitude.

5. Religion is a human invention designed to give us the illusion of control from which we can then create a sense of meaning without admitting we are creating it. In truth, we have no control, we invent what meaning there is.

6. Sacred texts always reflect the bias of their intended audience. Don’t be surprised that the Torah’s Jews are God’s Chosen; that the Gospels make Jesus the Christ; that the Bhagavad Gita sees Krishna as God; that the Qur’an holds Mohammad as the final Prophet; or that the Harry Potter series makes Harry rather than Hermione the hero. 

7. Priests, rabbis, pastors, imams, swamis, lamas, and gurus sometimes have your best interest in mind, and always have their best interests at heart. Learn from them, but never turn your life over to them.

8. At its best religion is about personal freedom, social justice, compassion for all living things, and realizing your connection with God. At its worst it is about power and control. Religion is rarely at its best.

9. Human beings can learn to see through propaganda—religious, political, commercial, etc.—overcome its divisiveness, create loving communities, and glimpse the truth through science, art, music, literature, and spiritual practice. We just don't want to.

10. Spiritual practice cuts through self and selfishness, reduces conflict, increases compassion, and reveals the nonduality of God in, with, and as all reality. 

Now it's your turn.....

Of Gods and Turtles: an Unpublished Interview

I’ve been giving a few interviews lately. This one, I am told, will not be published, so I am publishing it. I am keeping the interviewer’s name out of it as per his request.

Rumor is that you find Judaism too narrow for your tastes, and too small to hold your spiritual experiences. When did you stop being a Jew?

A Jew can’t stop being a Jew any more than a Chinese person can stop being Chinese or a Navaho stop being Navaho. I was born Jewish and I will die Jewish, and I am quite proud of being a Jew. As for Judaism being too small, all religions are too small.

What do you like best about Judaism?

Its pedagogy. Jews are doubters, arguers. We prefer questions to answers, and as soon as we have answers we think it best to question them. We deliberately misread our texts and in so doing reinvent them.

We don’t believe in fixed meanings. Meaning comes from the interaction of story and reader/listener/interpreter—the three are really one.  We have this wonderful phrase, Elu v’elu d’vrei Elohim Chayyim. Roughly translated it means: All opinions, no matter how mutually exclusive, are the words of the Living God if their intent is to search out the truth. I don’t know any other culture that values argument and doubt the way we Jews do. That alone makes me want to be a Jew.

What do you like least about Judaism?

Rules.

Do you worry about the future of Jews and Judaism?

Worry? No. Worry doesn’t do anything. But I am concerned that Jewish education has shifted to the western model of seeking answers rather than the Jewish model of learning how to sharpen one’s questions. We need an old/new kind of Jewish academy that focuses on questions and hones one’s creative, imaginal, and critical thinking skills. What we’ve got are Jewish schools that teach you the rules of Jewish life rather than how to cultivate the genius of the Jewish mind.

I’ve heard you say you are not only Jewish.

Yes. While I am tribally and culturally Jewish, and Judaism is my primary source of spiritual nourishment and expression, I draw from the wisdom and practices of many religions, especially Vendanta Hinduism and Zen Buddhism.

And you find the same capital “T” Truth is all of these?

No. I find useful insights into how to best live my life, and powerful practices that open me to realities beyond those my normal waking mind can fathom, but Truth with a capital “T” is something else. No system can articulate Truth. To paraphrase Lao Tzu, the Truth than can be named ain’t the Real Truth.

Most of your time is spent writing. If the Truth can’t be named, what is the point of writing?

I write because I have no choice. When I don’t write I feel ill.  But I never write to articulate the Truth, only to share my opinions.

What do you feel is the future of the book?

I think digital books will dominate the market sooner rather than later. I’m not one to make a fetish out of paper, though I do own hardcover copies of those books that have defined my life.

Such as?

The writings of Camus, Borges, and Edmund Jabes, Kafka, Nachman of Breslov, Martin Buber, Krishnamurti, Alan Watts, Ramana Maharshi, and Ramakrishna.

You also teach writing and religion. What have you learned from your experiences in these fields?

First, most people can’t write. Second, most people don’t read, which may be why most people can’t write. Third, most people studying the religions of the world are careful to defend their own against any intrusion from the outside. Fourth, some people are curious enough and courageous enough to let their defenses down and actually be touched and perhaps transformed by other religions. These are the people I love to talk with, teach, and learn from.

You work extensively in the field of interfaith. Do you find the same thing to be true there as in the classroom?

Yes. Most so–called interfaith dialogue is really interfaith monologue. True dialogue is unscripted, leaving the partners open to surprise and transformation. Few people are ever changed in what passes for interfaith dialogue today. They are too busy defending their truth to be open to challenging it, let alone changing it.

What about your experiences of the Divine Mother? You have written about this, so it is no secret that you think God is a woman.

God isn’t a woman or man. God is Reality. In Hinduism we speak of God with Attributes and God without Attributes. When I experience God with Attributes my experience is clearly feminine, relational, the voice I hear is that of the Divine Mother. But this is not to say God is a woman. God without Attributes, the most pure manifestation of God is ungendered. It is pure being, pure consciousness, pure bliss.

And you have experienced both?

No. When I experience God, I experience the Divine Mother. The pure Godhead is not experienced for there is no “I” to experience and no “other” to be experienced. All there is, I suspect, is the pure I Am of God, Reality in and of itself.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future of humanity?

Both. If people change—if we learn to overcome our intrinsic ignorance, arrogance, greed, fear and violence—I am optimistic. If we don’t, I am pessimistic. While we are good at improving the longevity of our lives, we suck an improving the quality of our living. While we get better and better at distracting ourselves; we suck at improving ourselves.

What about global warming? Do you think we will reverse this trend?

No. It’s too late for that. And, besides, I like my air-conditioning and central heating too much to give them up, and I imagine that when one billion Chinese have these luxuries as well they won’t want to give them up either. The question isn’t can we stop global climate change, but can we adapt to it and survive it? I don’t know the answer to that, but I suggest that millions of us will die while millions also survive.

You don’t think we will switch to alternative sources of energy?

Probably not in time to save our civilization. There comes a moment in the life of every empire when they have to choose to embrace the future or cling to the past. Usually they cling to the past. And when they do they begin a long slow and often bloody decline. The American moment is now. We can choose a green future and reinvent our civilization, or we can cling to our addiction to dead dinosaurs and follow them into extinction. Right now dinosaurs are winning.

So you don’t think we can turn things around?

You know the phrase, “come hell or high water?” Well, they’re both coming, and soon.

So how does that impact your work as a spiritual leader?

I’m a teacher not a leader. I don’t like following others, and I certainly don’t like others following me. But to answer your question, my concern is with cultivating compassion and loving-kindness. No one will survive what is coming alone. If we close our hearts out of fear, we will maximize the horror of what is coming, and those who do survive it will be the most heartless of all. But if we learn to open our hearts and work together in love more will survive, and do so with heart and soul intact.

Don’t you think God will intervene? Have you no hope?

Counting on God hasn’t really worked out so well for us Jews, so I don’t do that. But what I said doesn’t preclude hope. I have no hope that we will avoid the hell and high water that is coming with climate change. I have no hope that we will create a just and equitable society in place of the plutocracy we have now, but I do have hope that we can live our dying with love and compassion.

Last chance. Is there no way we can save ourselves at all?

All right, you want hope here’s hope. I have hope in Yertle the Turtle.

Yertle the Turtle? Like the Dr. Seuss book?

Exactly. Though not in Yertle himself, for he was the king. My hope is in Mack the lowest of things. Dr. Seuss’ story is about a society where the top turtle, Yertle, rests on the backs of all the lesser turtles beneath. Mack, the lowest turtle, complains about this injustice and is told to keep still. Mack burps and topples the entire system. I have hope that some Mack will burp and the whole system will crash.

This sounds like the Tea Party.

Not at all. Tea Party turtles worship the giant tortoise on the top. They worship the system that keeps them on the bottom even as it promises them a turn at the top. Tea Party turtles never burp. The true Macks are those who realize that the entire system is sick, and that maintaining it is wrong. They are mad as hell and just won’t take it any more. Tea Party turtles are mad as hell and just keep taking it. The faux Macks will stay where they are and allow the system to continue to exploit them. The real Macks will burp, and having burped walk away. It’s like a reverse Atas Shrugged.

Ayn Rand’s novel?

Right. In the novel the creators at the top shrug off the world of the takers at the bottom. In the Yertle version the takers are at the top: the wealthy and powerful, the greedy security-military-government-industrial-financial-media complex whose only concern is with maintaining their own power, and who add nothing of real value to human civilization. In the Rand novel the average person cannot live without the genius of the superior folks. In the Yertle version the powerful cannot live without the Macks lower down. When we Macks at last know our true worth we will burp. And when we do—watch out!

Interfaith and Abrahamic Faith

I got an interesting email from an NGO promoting interfaith efforts around the United States. As founder and director of Wisdom House, an interfaith center in Nashville, I am all for such efforts. What I found interesting, however, was the opening line of the promo:

“Religious diversity is an essential value in many faiths, including Christianity, Islam and Judaism.”

Really?

The Hebrew Bible makes it clear that there is only one true faith, and the Jews have it. If biblical Jews had any interest in other religions it was to destroy them, and while rabbinic Judaism lacked the power to continue in that vein, and with some amazing Medieval Jewish-Sufi exceptions, I don’t see where the rabbis were all that eager to claim equality with other religions. 

Jesus in the New Testament doesn’t sound like a universalist to me: “I am the way and the truth and the life, No one comes to the Father except through me,” (John 14:6). And the Catholic Church’s extra ecclesiam nulla salus (outside the Church there is no salvation) doesn’t sound all that welcoming of interfaith.

And while the Qur’an does say “Mankind! We created you from a male and female, and made you into peoples and tribes so that you might come to know each other,” (The Qur'an , 49:13), Islam still argues that the Qur’an is the only uncorrupted revelation from God, and Judaism and Christianity are less than perfect faiths.

So are interfaith efforts really part of mainstream Abrahamic thinking? I don’t think so.  If religious diversity were really an essential value in Christianity, Islam and Judaism, why would we need an NGO to promote it?

Let’s be honest: no religion is all that interested in any other religion, and authentic interfaith dialogue, dialogue that could lift us out of our respective boxes and into a more universalist frame of mind and heart, is revolutionary and subversive work. Which is why it is so desperately needed.

Jewish Fall Holy Days

We Jews are in the early weeks of our fall holy day period. There are three parts to this season that are of spiritual interest: Selichot, Yamim Noraim, and Sukkot.

The month of Elul is the final month of the Jewish liturgical calendar, and is devoted to the practice of selichot, seeking forgiveness. While Jews do teach about the importance of forgiving others, our primary focus is on asking others to forgive us.

When we ask forgiveness we humble ourselves, and when we humble ourselves over the hurts we have caused others, we are more willing to forgive the hurts others have caused us. Throughout the month of Elul and even more intensely during the Yamim Noraim (Days of Awe from Rosh haShanah to Yom Kippur) we approach family members, friends, co-workers, neighbors, and others with whom we interact and say, “If I have hurt you in any way knowingly or unknowingly, advertantly or inadvertently, I ask your forgiveness.”

What if the other person refuses to forgive us? We must ask again. How many times must we ask? While Jesus said we must ask 490 times (7 x 70, Matthew 18:22), our rabbis capped it at three. If after sincerely asking forgiveness three times the other still refuses, God will forgive you, and the matter, at least as far as you are concerned is settled.

Rosh haShanah, the first of the Days of Awe, is the anniversary of creation, and our time to honor God, the Source of Creation. (This year Rosh haShanah begins at sundown on September 28^th) For me God is the Source and Substance of all reality, and Rosh haShanah is the time when I remember that all life is a unique yet temporary manifestation of God the way each ray of sunlight is a unique and temporary manifestation of the sun. I use Rosh haShanah as a time to realign my life with creation so that my living is in service to all life.

Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement (At-One-ment, October 7^th at sundown) is the culmination of all this effort. We have made peace with our neighbor, peace with nature, and now it is time to make peace with God.

For me, making peace with God is about remembering that God isn’t about salvation or damnation, reward or punishment. God is about reality for God is reality. I make peace with God by realizing that life is wild, unpredictable, often horrifying, and yet always hopeful. I remind myself to not expect things to be other than they are, and to be thankful for all that they are. With this act of radical acceptance comes radical forgiveness, and, for me, this is what Yom Kippur is all about.

A few days after Yom Kippur we celebrate Sukkot (October 12 at sundown), our holy week celebrating the fall harvest. We build and dwell in flimsy booths (sukkah/sukkot, plural) to remind ourselves of our nomadic origins, our wanderings in Sinai, our sheltering of both harvesters and harvest during the autumn ingathering, and the fragility of life. We decorate our sukkot with fruit, give thanks for the earth’s bounty in a ceremony of waving lulav (a palm front bound with myrtle and willow branches) and etrog (fruit of a citron tree), study the Book of Ecclesiastes, and share meals with friends during the week.

The harvest decorations remind us of the power of fertility even in the midst of fragility. Eating with friends reminds us that friendship is best way to navigate the chaos of life. And studying Ecclesiastes links all of this to a way of life: eating and drinking in moderation, finding meaningful work, and cultivating strong friendships.

This is a challenging season for Jews both logistically and spiritually. There is lots to do, and much to ponder. And while the doing may be for Jews, the pondering is a good idea for everyone.

Jews for Krishna

The fall issue of Reform Judaism magazine contains a passionate, even angry, attack on Jesus, Krishna, and John Lennon’s “Imagine” by Dr. Ze’ev Maghen of Bar-Ilan University. The essay is adapted from his book John Lennon and the Jews. I looked the book up on Amazon and it supposed to be an emotionalist appeal to Jews to love Judaism. I didn’t feel the love.

 In the essay, Dr. Maghen writes about meeting Israeli Hare Krishnas at Los Angeles Airport (LAX). After a few moments comparing notes about life in Israel, he wants to know why these Jews have dropped Torah for Gita. They explain that their new religion is better than their own religion, which drives Dr. Maghen crazy. The Krishnas reply in kind, and yet another opportunity for real meeting and dialogue is lost in the haze of emotionalism. Somehow this leads him to John Lennon.

 Dr. Maghen doesn’t want to imagine there’s no heaven...no hell…nothing to kill or die for…no countries …no religion, etc. Me, I am more Lennon than Lubavitch. In fact I’m more Lennon than Lennon—I don’t have to imagine there’s no heaven or hell, I know there’s no heaven or hell; I think religion and politics are human inventions, and heaven and hell are just carrot and stick used to keep people in the fold. While I would be willing to die to save lives, and can imagine myself killing someone to protect lives, killing and dying for abstractions like religion doesn’t appeal to me at all.

True, I find the idea of “living for today” shallow, preferring to live in the moment rather than for the moment, all-in-all I like Lennon’s song. Anyway, Hare Krishnas don’t agree with Lennon either, so what’s the fuss all about?

My real problem with Dr. Maghen: He writes, "I passionately believe we ought to subordinate head to heart and rationality to emotionalism" (p. 213); "So far from being a function of logical or pragmatic thinking, Jewishness today is both a product and a producer of passion” (p. 248); and “love is a better motivation than Truth" (p.261). I believe just the opposite, and prefer head to heart, reason to emotion, logic to passion, and Truth to love. People who don’t often scare the crap out of me.

Here’s my advice to Dr. Maghen: The next time you meet Jews who have left Judaism talk with them don’t yell at them. Ask them why they left? Ask them what they found in their new faith that they couldn’t find in their old faith? Share in a passionate but nonjudgmental way why Judaism works for you. We can learn much from those who leave the faith.

And here’s my advice to Jewish Hare Krishna’s: stay away from LAX.