"Get Out Of Your Head And Into Your Heart"

The concept of "Na’aseh Venishma" used to really piss me off. The term Orthoprax comes to mind. Practice, even if you don’t believe and the belief will come later. Follow orders, even if you don’t understand or believe in them, because you trust in your higher power to lead you in the right direction. Essentially I used to think of Na’aseh Venishma as blind faith. Something between hypocritical and almost cultish.

I think I’ve come to redefine that term.

While having one of my many religious discussions with my dad he recommended that I sit down with my step-mom and discuss my religious issues with her, since she comes from a very different background, being brought up practicing reform in California, Meeting some interesting people like R’ Shlomo Carlebach and R’ David Zeller. eventually moving towards modern orthodoxy, but still maintaining that spiritual side. We decided to go out to dinner last night and talk.

I told my stepmother of the heavy questions that have been bothering me: Why should I follow the laws (specifically the ones with no reasoning behind them) of a god I can’t define nor prove exists? How can I practice a religion with many laws that I see as unfair or unjust? Why should I be apart of a religious community that I don’t fit into? Why should I suffer sitting through a 3 hour long service when I don’t feel any connection to the words in my siddur? If I find meaning and a home in another faith, am I really expected to give it up because I am required to be Jewish forever? How can I accept the prohibition of intermarriage if I end up falling in love with a gentile? How Can I believe in a god that allows the innocent to suffer?

She knew that I had been reading the book of Job with my dad who thought it might help me find some answers. I explained to her that it was not helping and we had decided to stop reading it. In fact it was starting to piss me off. As Job goes God is depicted as a judge, testing his champion, Job, against Satan’s challenges of religious conviction; afflicting Job (who the text clearly states is not worthy of such calamity) with tragedy after tragedy. His children die, his possessions are all stolen, his workers are killed by bandits, and his body is riddled with disease and suffering. Job, the “Ish Tamim” this simple and good man is forced to swallow all this whole, and after meeting with God face to face, can only say with awe that He will never understand how God operates.

Maybe I missed the message, but after a couple of weeks I was only getting more frustrated. The blatant depiction of God in such an impossible and limited manner along with the bombardment of accusations of Job’s friends and wife despite his own innocence got me pretty angry. Where was the justice? I started to realize that this was not a book that would answer any questions.

As an aside, I’ve heard the opinion that suffering is actually a blessing because God would not let a person suffer unless they can handle it, so the fact that they’re suffering shows that they are worthy of the challenge. Others say it's a blessing because it gives them a chance to do a Kiddush Hashem like with Rabbi Akiva's Kiddush Hashem while being tortured by the romans, screaming out 'Shema Yisrael' just before dying. This sets off my bullshit meter. I’m not saying that all suffering is bad , and I can definitely see where some suffering is necessary in specific situations, even dying for something you believe in has merit, but to say that cancer and AIDS and leukemia are actually a blessings from god, and victims of torture and violence are actually being gien a gift is IMHO nothing short of utter bullshit. If they are, I hope we eradicate those “blessings from God” in our lifetimes.

So back to my Stepmother and me. Mostly she spoke and I listened, adding in questions where i felt it necessary. "The heavy questions you're asking about God and suffering and justice, all those 'big' questions, chances are you won’t be able to answer in a book”, she said. “Find the things that you spiritually connect with, regardless of how you feel about god or religion or what-not. Let go of those big questions and simply do the things that bring you meaning and fulfillment, Identify those connections and why they bring you fulfillment, the answers to those big questions will come later.”

We talked about what brings me spiritual meaning and joy. I mentioned I like music where I can dance and sing, not to god or anyone in particular, just for the sake of dancing and singing, with a community of people I respect, with words and songs that are actually meaningful. I talked about music in general in which I have experienced the high and the places it can take you. I even enjoy certain prayers where I can connect and feel something. I talked about meditation, and volounteering for charity work and just being a part of a community and knowing that I'm not alone as things that bring meaning to my life.

I presented my stepmother with a query. “But how can I find my answers if I’m just doing these smaller things, without the deeper acceptance of god and religion? Isn’t it just fluff if you do the little things without the rooted “big” commitments? Like the acceptance of the torah as a divine book, or the belief in an all powerful and just god. What good are the little things like singing and praying and maybe a little meditation and Shabbat if I don’t really accept or understand the big things?”

She responded with her own query, and this is what I am still thinking about; “Why do you think the things you mentioned that are meaningful to you are ‘little things’? What do you think Na’aseh Venishma is?”

She continued “You yourself said that if you are forced to do things that you don’t want to do, you won’t do them, or will literally suffer through them to satisfy someone else who is bugging you. This is natural. No one likes to waste time and if you’re forced to do things in which you find no connection or meaning, you’ll suffer through them and eventually stop doing them. So instead, do what you actually like doing; Stuff that you’ll want to get up for and do. Find those things that motivate you to get off your butt because they bring you joy or meaning or at least something and do it. Try it for a while and see where it takes you. I’m pretty sure you won’t regret it”

“Get our of your head and into your heart”

She explained that to her, Na’aseh Venishma means you find the things that you connect with, the things that bring you meaning, even if you can’t explain them and even if you don’t believe. The connection, the meaning, the high is what matters. “To me, observance is done with the senses”, she said. “You need to feel something. Take those things that make you feel and make them your ‘big things’”.

I’ve thought a lot about this. Maybe I am taking the wrong approach in my issues of faith. Maybe I need to go back to the activities and people that I’ve made a connection with and start there. I have a couple of items in have in mind, currently working on a plan of what to do next. While I am not going to forget those big questions of aguna and suffering and all that, I plan on putting them on the shelf while I try to “get out of my head and into my heart” maybe those “head-y” questions can be answered at a later date.

Jews Be Jewish, Or else...

According to my Mom, The biggest mistake I could ever make is to marry a non-Jew. She has told me more than once that this would devastate her and she has made me promise over and over that I will marry a Jewish girl. This leads me to question the Idea of marrying Jewish.

I’m pretty sure the Torah agrees with my parents; Intermarriage is biblically considered to be one of the most serious heresies. The entire story of Pinchas pretty much reinforces that view. Pinchas, in a moment of zeal, skewers Zimri, a Jewish prince and Cazbi, a Midianite princess, supposedly while in mid-coitus. This is in response to the most beautiful women of Midian who are enticing the Jewish men to fall to idolatry. He is praised by god for his zealousness. This pretty much paints idolatry and sleeping with idolaters as really really bad.

So if a jew intermarries, converts, or sleeps with a non-jewish person, is it really better to kill them than to just let them go?

If I am born Jewish am I really obligated to remain Jewish for the rest of my life? Is it wrong that my family and community will excommunicate me if I marry a non-Jew? Does the continuation of the Jewish faith to another branch of the family tree really trump the love of a mother of father for their kid? Why is their biggest dream to pass on the faith to the next in line? Is the next in line obligated to practice even though they do not believe?

Am I not allowed to say that Orthodox Judaism isn’t for me? Am I supposed to fake it until I’m old and gray and realize I’ve been lying to myself all this time? That I exchanged my happiness and spiritual well being for my family’s love and my community’s acceptance?

When does an individual get to say, “I have done the research, I’ve tried this out, and it’s not for me. I’ve met someone who makes me happy and I don’t care if she’s not Jewish. We will raise our kids with an open mind and be happy with however they choose to practice the faith, or lack thereof, whether it’s Judaism, Christianity, Atheism or Scientology. We will love them no matter what they believe”? I’m not saying I’m at this point, but I am considering it. Do I really want to restrict my scope of dating to just Jews?
Abandoning Eden is struggling for her parents’ acceptance in the midst of her engagement and eventual marriage to an atheist man. She herself has become an Atheist as well, yet she clings to the hope that someday she will able to return to some sort of “normal” relationship with her parents, That someday her parents will be able to acknowledge her husband, that they may someday be able to sit at a table together and talk as a family instead of a daughter who has left her faith, her heathen husband, and the parents who will never fully forgive their daughter for crushing their dreams. (**Edit - BTW I very much respect and admire her for her dedication to her family)

It is most likely that if you’re brought up orthodox, if you marry a non-Jew you are crushing your parents’ dreams. I know I will for mine. No matter how much I try to have a “normal” relationship with my family, if I married a non-Jew they would forever secretly possess the shame that somehow they didn’t impart the right Jewish values that would have kept me Jewish. They would be angry with me, but more importantly, they would blame themselves, and nothing I could do would be able to erase that blame. If I married a non-Jew, I’d run, fast, away from my family. I’d leave a nice note to my parents telling them I love them but I married someone they will never approve of and I won’t stand for their judgments and shame in the face of my own happiness, and when they are ready to talk to me as their actual son and not their prodigal son, I will be ready to listen.

Apples to Apples

I've recently gotten into the apple craze. Apparently this year was a very good year for apples, So I've been trying different Kinds to see what I like most. Here is a list of apples I enjoy from 1-8, with 1 being my favorite and 8 being my least favorite:

1. Honeycrisp
2. Fuji
3. Yellow Ginger
4. Gala
5. Pink Lady
6. Golden Delicious
7. Grape Apple (grapple)
8. Red Delicious
9. Macintosh
10. Granny Smith
11. Rome

My Grandmother Is Voting So She Can Cancel My Vote

Most of the Jews in my community who I’ve spoken to regarding the election have said the most important factor they weigh when picking a president is “who is best for Israel?”

Hands down, they have said Mccain. My community is voting Mccain, my familyis voting Mccain, all for the same reason: “He’s better for Israel”. All the other issues on the table are secondary to Israel.

I will cast my vote for Obama in the name of all the shortsighted Jews out there. Until now, I thought 100% of all politicians were lying sacks of crap. Obama gives me the hope that maybe only 99.9% of all politicians are lying sacks of crap.

I choose obama because:

1. He taught constitutional law for 12 years (edit) at the university of Chicago (1992-2004)
2. He was an editor and President of the Harvard Law Review (editor in chief and supervisor over 80 editors)
3. He won 2 grammys for audiobooks of Dreams of my Father and The Audacity of Hope
4. He’s pro gay rights
5. He knows what the internet is, uses his Blackberry like a beast, and has a better website than John Mccain
6. He was against the war in Iraq from the get-go
7. He will do more to avoid an avoidable war with Iran and help us focus fighting the guys that attacked us in the first place – The Taliban.
8. He will help us repair our international reputation
9. He supports universal healthcare

I don’t care if he adds taxes to people making over 250k a year, I don’t care about his previous pastor, I don’t care about Bill Ayres, And I certainly don’t care that He’s black or Christian.

At this point, I don't care about israel. Both are pro, but Mccain is a little more pro. So what? Israel has it's own elections coming up in Feb I think and It would be an understatement that they have thair own issues to deal with. I also know there's a good chance Israel's survival depends on America's economic survival, So the sooner America recovers, the better off Israel, and IMHO the world will be.

I'm Sorry, But You Two Can't Get Married...Ever.

A topic of conversation at the shobbas table:

If a man divorces his first wife, and gets remarried to another woman, He can never go back to the first wife again. Ever. I asked my parents if they felt this was fair, and they basically rationalized that the torah tries to discourage spouses from divorcing on a whim and wants them to think twice before actually getting divorced. “But” I replied to them, “What about that ‘forbidding’ part? Don’t you think that’s a little harsh? The torah actually calls this an “abomination”. What is so abominable about it? Doesn’t that lead to problems in the future? What if a woman’s husband’s ship sinks and the body can never be recovered, she gets a ‘heter’ from the rabbi to remarry, only to have her husband show up at her doorstep, then what? Or what if a man or woman actually falls back in love with each other after they remarry someone else? Who are we to tell them they can’t marry for no other reason but because they’re fickle or acted too quickly? How do you forbid people from loving each other or worse, letting them love each other but forbidding them from ever being together?"

Boy, I am one angry Jew.

This touches on my issues with the Mamzer and the Kohen(priest), the divorcee and the Kohen, and now this, a divorcee who has remarried who is now forbidden from ever remarrying their first spouse; basically anyone who is forbidden by the Torah to marry or sleep with one another, even if both people are Jewish, and healthy, and most importantly, in love.

I Accidentally Saw A Seminary Girl Naked In The Shower. I Am So Going To Hell.

When I was 19 I was living in the shana-bet(2nd years) Apartment, up the road from my yeshiva. The apartment upstairs from us was the shana-bet apartments for the girls at the religious, American girls seminary next door to my yeshiva. The apartments were tiered, so to get to your apartment from the shops above, one would have to descended a flight of stairs while facing the back windows of your neighbors. One evening, as I was descending the stairs after going food shopping, I heard water running in one of the windows and looked up. I saw one of the shana-bet girls who I regularly see around our courtyard or waiting for the bus; attractive, always dressing in long flowy skirts that covered her knees and tight long sleeved shirts that didn’t show anything below her collarbone and always covered her elbows. I looked up and realized I was looking into her bathroom window and there she was, this 19-year-old seminary girl, naked, walking around the bathroom for about a minute, and then stepping into the shower and closing the curtain. She was beautiful.

It was a very long minute. As I looked, I made a mental comparison of what she looked like in her long skirts and sleeves and how she looked for that minute, with no clothes to protect her from what she would probably call “the gazes of those disgusting yeshiva boys”. I felt strangely vindicated. She had failed, and I had seen something special, unique, beautiful, something that would be seen by an exceptionally lucky few and, by nothing short of an accident, I had turned into one of those lucky few. As I descended the rest of the stairs and walked into my apartment, I smiled and thought, “I am so going to hell”.

And Now For My Next Act, I Will Dissapear!

A popular question is asked in Judaism, I myself have heard it asked and have asked it before:

"Why doesn't God reveal himself to us? Why is there no real proof that God exists?"

And I hear, as if rehearsed, the same answer by rabbis, teachers, and adults alike, in different forms that pretty much goes like this:

"If there was proof that God exists, we'd all turn into Jewish robots, devoid of free will."

This, in my opinion, is a bull-poop answer. According to the Torah, God constantly reveals himself to the Jews and they continue to act with free will. They still sin. The Prophets, those that spoke with God "directly" still sin. Even Moses, the greatest of all prophets, wasn't perfect. Even Adam and Eve screwed up, and they were practically raised by G-d.

So clearly God, revealing himself in all his glory and splendor, does not turn us into robots, devoid of free will. We still doubt, and we still screw up. We still steal and we still kill.

This leads me to a perplexing question: God reveals himself to us, and we mess up. God remains hidden, and we also mess up. So what difference does a revelation really make?

Um.... A LOT. Humanity is hard-coded to follow a carrot of some sort. We strive for something; Transcendence, enlightenment, happiness, peace, prosperity, forgiveness, love, serenity, healing, growth, justice, God; These are all noble causes, and when we reach a point of success, we celebrate the accomplishment. We get a chance to "see the carrot". Maybe even take a little nibble. Then it's back to the grind, the mussar, the schteig, plodding forth, learning attaining, growing whatever. Without the carrot, the struggle loses meaning. We eventually give up, because we realize we will never be able to get the carrot. The only reason a person would keep trying to reach a carrot they can never get is because they are insane or addicted (which really is another form of insanity anyway.

But with God's lack of presence in this world, there is no carrot. There is no "revelation", no ultimate proof. And if you believe the biblical texts literally, there hasn't been proof for thousands of years, and if you don't, then there never was proof to begin with. Either way, the miracles, the pillars of fire and plagues and red sea splits, the proverbial carrot, God, has done a magic trick and disappeared, and the audience is waiting for him to reappear so they can clap at how real it looked and they were convinced that he might have disappeared forever but now he's back and oh what a jolly good time.

We live in a world where divine justice, if it exists, does not exist in the physical world, at least not in any obvious manner like in the biblical stories. The evil prosper, the good suffer. Children are suffering right out of the womb, born with disease and deformity that they clearly don't deserve. War where the innocent suffer. Murder and rape with no justice. Corruption and scandals. Money talks and the poor get screwed over. Of course, this is no different than any other time in history. Humans have always lied, cheated, stolen and murdered each other. The rich have always made the rules. Natural disasters like floods and earthquakes killing millions is not new. The stock market has crashed before. The magic trick is taking a long time and the audience is getting nervous.

With God, You never catch the dragon (South Park: Guitar Hero episode reference).

But the Torah tries to tell us that there was a time when God actually gave a damn and did something about it. God performed miracles viewed by the public, communicated to a mass nation on Mount Sinai, and protected them from natural and made-made disasters and guided them to a new home. And God (If you believe the Torah is the word of God) actually tells the Jews to live a certain way. To dress and act a certain way. To limit our consumption, to perform rituals and celebrate holidays. To abide by many laws and to punish those that break them. Many of which make little sense.

In this situation, how can we not doubt the existence of God? Job himself endures the loss of all his wealth, the death of his children, and terrible disease and plague, which he, according to the text does not deserve. He is merely tested by God, who is challenged by the devil that his favorite, Job, is not up to the task of enduring a truckload of pain and suffering.

God, at the end of Job gives the typical answer that most people give when faced with the question of how God works and why he takes a back seat to the suffering in this world; "I've got my reasons."

Is that what belief really is? A hope? An investment that may or may not pay out? A farce? A doubt?

How can one believe when all the signs are indicating that suffering is random, life has no meaning, and there is no justice in this world?

Isn't religion supposed to have answers?