A song in the night

I woke up in the middle of the night convinced that Psalm 93 held all the answers. Mind you, I don't really know my Psalms, certainly not by number (except 23, because that's pretty much common knowledge). So when I got up this morning, I read it. If it's relevant to anything currently going on with me, I don't know what it would be, but I thought I might as well post the text anyway.

(JPS translation)

PSALM 93

The LORD is king,

He is robed in grandeur;

the LORD is robed,

He is girded with strength.

The world stands firm;

it cannot be shaken.

Your throne stands firm from of old;

from eternity You have existed.

The ocean sounds, O LORD,

the ocean sounds its thunder,

the ocean sounds its pounding.

Above the thunder of the mighty waters,

more majestic than the breakers of the sea

is the LORD, majestic on high.

Your decrees are indeed enduring;

holiness befits Your house,

O LORD, for all times.

*****

Maybe I'm supposed to visit the ocean? I grew up in the middle of the country, far from any ocean, and now I'm on a coast, so the ocean's right here, and I do love it and don't visit it often enough.

Or, more likely, my brain just seized on a random number for no particular reason.

The Jewish race

This article followed on the heels of a talk I attended given by Dr. Eliza Slavet, author of Racial Fever: Freud and the Jewish Question, in which she discussed racial Judaism.

As a convert, my first reaction to Dr. Slavet's talk was to find the concept of "who is a Jew" as defined by racial Judaism offensive, since, to the best of my knowledge, I have no Jewish blood.* Then I took a step back and remembered that racial Judaism and religious Judaism are, while inextricably intertwined, not the same. One of the rabbis who led our Introduction to Judaism class made it very clear, via Venn diagram, that the only way to enter Judaism without being part of the Jewish race is through religion. He also made it very clear that those of us who were converting would be no less Jewish than any other Jew.

I'm also intrigued by the idea of racial memory. I don't know that I buy into it, but perhaps it explains my propensity for pennywhistles, whiskey and lingonberries.

Or, y'know, not. Anyway, now I have yet another book I want to read, to add to my ridiculously long list.

*Odds are, since parts of my family come from Germany and the Netherlands, there is some Jewishness in there somewhere, but not so's I could trace it.

More linkage

Anonymous peace message sent to Muslim community.

Amein.

Parasha B'reishit 5771

According to Plaut:

"Japheth: ...His name is identical with Iapetos, a Titan, father of Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Atlas, all of Greek mythic fame."

So I didn't exactly quite finish Deuteronomy on time, so now I'm trying to keep up with the beginning and the end of the Torah. One thing I've really enjoyed about the Plaut commentary is the explanations of the parallels between the Torah and other ancient Near Eastern literature and other written texts. I realize that the people who most need to hear that Scripture didn't spring fully formed from the head of Moses are those most likely to refuse to accept this, but I appreciate having context.

Simchat Torah!

Tonight begins Simchat Torah, where we read the end of Deuteronomy straight through the beginning of Genesis. In our synagogue, we unwrap as many Torah scrolls as it takes to encircle the entire sanctuary (I think it's about two-and-a-half); one rabbi reads the end of Deuteronomy; the cantor chants the beginning of Genesis, and then we re-roll the scrolls and dance with them.

I asked one of our rabbis, Rabbi New Guy (who needs a different alias), why it is that the end of Deuteronomy and the end of the Jewish calendar year don't exactly coincide. Of course, there's no one answer, but he suggested that it has, in part, to do with the parashot for each Shabbat and such, and also with hiding the seams between years.

My thought is that it's like an elided cadence in music; one part of the music begins before the next ends, creating a seamless transition into a new theme instead of an abrupt stop and restart.

I love Simchat Torah.

L'shana tova...Eid Mubarak

Here's an article about a group of Reform Jews who attended their local mosque and had lovely discussions with their Muslim neighbors about their respective holidays, forming deeper connections in the process.

I live closer to a mosque than I do to our synagogue, but I've never been in, not because I have anything against Islam per se, but because I'm afraid of making a terrible gaffe of some kind. I need to get over myself.

"Teshuvah, in Three Acts"

This was my first High Holy Days as a Jew. I have been surprised at how different it feels than past years. Although I don't think I'm really doing teshuvah "right", I do feel that there's more of a chance for me to get there now than there used to be. And I feel more at peace than I have in a long while. And that's about all I can say right now; I have to be with these feelings a while longer before I can write about them.

Meanwhile, I have some linkage to share, to take place over a few posts.

The first one is by Rabbi Ayelet Cohen, who here discusses teshuvah in the lives of three congregants.

Here we go again

The High Holy Days are upon us again...as our synagogue e-mails keep reminding us, "September comes early this year". Which I'm not sure is exactly what they mean, but no matter.

I've been meaning to blog this article since the last High Holy Days. Here's the first paragraph:

Somewhere along the way in Jewish history in North America, we created a myth. This myth continues to be perpetuated each year in most communities, though there are a few bold, practical thinkers who attempt to shatter it. The myth is that it costs money to pray, especially during the High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and advanced-purchase tickets are required.

C and I have long had issue with the way our synagogue handles dues, both how much they are and how they're determined. Yes, we get them abated each year, but it does something to one's dignity to have to go talk to the executive director every year and explain that we don't have any more money than we did last year because we both work for non-profits, and this isn't liable to change at any point in the foreseeable future. Yes, the executive director is very kind and understanding and interested in making sure we don't promise to pay more than we can afford, but still...it's demeaning. But for now, our synagogue is our crazy Jewish family of whom we are fond, so we keep returning.

More HHD fun to follow.

The corners of our fields

Leviticus 19:9] When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. 10] You shall not pick your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen fruit of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger: I the Eternal am your God.

Plaut commentary: This passage (and its parallels) is not an appeal to the landowners' generosity. It confers the right to glean and to harvest the uncut edge on those who have no resources of their own. It is perhaps the oldest declaration that the disadvantaged members of a society have a right to support from that society. They should not be dependent on voluntary benevolence alone -- though the latter is constantly stressed as well.

Anath's comment: And so many people who would use Leviticus to deprive certain people of their civil rights will also insist that the poor, the homeless, the mentally ill are blights on our society who have no right to assistance. . . read a little further from your pet chapter and verse, folks.

I wasn't looking for this...

There is an answer to the doctor's question. All the Dachaus must remain standing. The Dachaus, the Belsens, the Buchenwalds, the Auschwitzes - all of them. They must remain standing because they are a monument to a moment in time when some men decided to turn the Earth into a graveyard. Into it they shoveled all of their reason, their logic, their knowledge, but worst of all, their conscience. And the moment we forget this, the moment we cease to be haunted by its remembrance, then we become the gravediggers. Something to dwell on and to remember, not only in the Twilight Zone but wherever men walk God's Earth.

The ending narration to Deaths-Head Revisited.

Some identifiers

I decided I'm relying overly on initials and vague descriptors to identify people in my Jewish life, so I'm going to shift some things around a bit. Here is my new plan; none of these are actual names or initials of those involved, and yes, our synagogue has four rabbis and a cantor:

My spouse: Chai

My best friend: Tav

My sponsoring rabbi: Rabbi T

The rabbi who's about my age: Rabbi G

The rabbi a little younger than me who's leaving soon: Rabbi L

The senior rabbi: Rabbi P

The cantor: Cantor (that one was easy)

We'll be getting a new rabbi soon; I do know who it is, but I don't know him yet, and I can't remember his last name, so I'll give him an initial when warranted.

Oh hey

It's been a while, hasn't it?

Short form news:

1) I converted. I have my Jew license and everything.

2) C and I are getting remarried Jewishly in a couple weeks.

I have plenty to say about both, but I figure a brief recap will suffice for now.

Completely out of season

In going through a Random Pile O' Stuff, I found this paragraph. I'm not sure where it came from, since it looks like it was cut out of a larger piece of paper, and I don't remember having seen it before. I also can't credit it. It has to do with Tashlich, the Jewish custom practiced on Rosh Hashanah afternoon of casting our sins away in the form of throwing bread into a moving body of water.

"Each quality, even those that seem bad, contributed somehow to our self-preservation. It had a good life-affirming purpose at one point, even this that is now no longer true. In order to let go of such a habit, I need to give it a 'testimonal' to send it away with my thanks. 'I needed you, and there you were, and I thank you for it. And now, with full appreciation, I know that I no longer need you and I can send you away.' This is different from trying to stamp it out. We no longer say, 'I'm sorry I did this. I'm throwing that behavior away.' We say, 'Thank you, God, for this gift. I needed it then; I no longer need it now. I am returning it to the universe in the hope that it can help generate life elsewhere as it did for me.' And this needs to be true for all the things we want to say good-bye to at Tashlikh. This is what we mean by biodegradable."

I suppose one hardly needs to wait for Tashlich for this, and I suppose Pesach is also a particularly good time to think of those habits and ways of thinking which we could stand to cast off. And considering shedding those habits as regifting rather than destroying may come in great use.

Baruch who? Aror who?

This is the first year we've actually celebrated Purim. While we did not get too drunk to differentiate between Mordechai and Haman (and there's an intriguing analysis of that mitzvah here), we did go to the PurimShpiel at our synagogue. Although I was slightly disappointed that this year did not feature rabbis cross-dressing, I enjoyed the improv troupe they had instead. Also free snacks. Afterwards, we went out for sushi with several friends, and our conversation devolved into "making beef stroganoff" as a euphemism for other activities.

This is probably why the rabbis who taught our Intro to Judaism class recommended Purim or Chanukah rather than the High Holy Days as one's first Jewish holiday. Oops.

Helpful Hint

I was talking to my friend Esther about my anxiety concerning the Beit Din, and she said, "If they ask you what Jewish person you most admire, just don't say Jesus Christ. Otherwise, you can't really screw up a Beit Din."

And now for something completely different

A friend of mine posted a link to this article about why Jews don't write fantasy literature (as differentiated from science fiction). Narnia* and Middle Earth, Prydain and Oz played a large role in my childhood (some who know me would ask if anything's changed), and I had noticed a lack of Jewish representation in the genre. The article helps explain why.

*I didn't realize for years after I read the Chronicles of Narnia that they're a Christian allegory. That helped explain why I had such a hard time handling the last book, The Last Battle, since from what I understand, it's based on the Book of Revelation. I found it confusing and unsettling, in a way that the other books weren't. I read the other six over and over, but I think I only read The Last Battle once. I should probably read it again; I think it would make more sense to me now.

Also, I become cranky at the sets of the Chronicles of Narnia that reorder the books to be in chronological order. If Lewis had wanted them that way, he would have ordered them that way himself. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, while chronologically second, is intended to be the reader's introduction to Narnia. By the time you get to The Magician's Nephew, chronologically first, but sixth in the series, you should have five books worth of Narnian background, so you have the knowledge of what's going to happen to the country in its future.

And at this point, C would be teasing me with something like "There's no such thing as chronological order for things that didn't happen." C prefers to read books based in reality. I think reality is overrated.

Un-boring Exodus

So we're in the portion of Exodus which goes into long and painful...I mean painstaking...detail about the construction of the Tabernacle and the priestly garments and every little thing.

The cantor ran last Shabbat's Torah study, and he brought to us a text from Rabbi Arthur Waskow. I excerpt it here, but it really should be read in its entirety.

*****

"For twenty-five years, week in, week out, I have danced and wrestled with the Torah. I have always found new life in the weekly reading. Never, never, have I found a portion boring....

-- except for the string of readings near the end of Exodus. T'rumah (Exodus 25-27:19). On how to build the Mishkan, that portable golden sanctuary in the desert. And Tetzaveh (Exodus 27:20-30:10), on exactly how the high priest should dress.

Not to speak of their twins soon afterward, on the very same subjects all over again -- Vayak'heyl (Exodus 35-38:20) and Pekudeh (Exodus 38:21-40).

I confess. If it hadn't been for the Golden Calf in the middle, if there had been four weeks in a row of this drivel, I might have run wild-eyed out of shul, I might have forgotten to come back again.

All the details about how and when and where to design, and carve, and sculpt, and sew, and erect. Obsessive. Niggling. Petty. And then to repeat the whole thing, all over again in the later weekly portions!

Who cares where the grommets went? What were grommets anyway? Aha -- those connector loops and rings! But now that I know, I still don't know who cares. Who cares how long the hinges were? Who cares whether the skins were dolphin fur or badger fur, who cares whether the dyes were scarlet or purple or indigo?"

. . .

"Until the year that a friend of mine came back from the first great march on Washington for gay rights -- the largest march in fifteen years, she said.

She spoke on a Friday night in my congregation. She talked about the sense of joyful self-discovery, the liberation from years of secrecy, the tears of welcome that gay people gave their non-gay families and friends who marched alongside them in love and solidarity.

And then she talked about the enormous quilt, more than two blocks square, that the gay community had come to make together.

It was a Quilt of Names, a memorial for the thousands of people who had already died of AIDS. Each square was made by the friends and family of one person who had suffered and died -- most of them young, full of excitement and energy and hope until the disease laid hold of them.

A few of the squares were in dark and mournful colors. Many more were bright, crimson and purple and indigo, crocheted and knitted and embroidered with flowers and symbols and words and names. Each one a tombstone in cloth. There on the grass of the Mall in Washington, a whole graveyard in cloth. Thousands of squares.

And now the time had come, she said, to join these squares together in one gigantic quilt. Each one had been made with grommets so that it could be connected to the ones around it. Those who remembered each person who had died, those who had celebrated and remembered and memorialized each life, began to tie one grommet to another.

When the quilt was completed, she said, it was ready to be carried from city to city. A holy memorial to life much more than death, to hope much more than fear, to courage much more than pain.

The third time she mentioned "grommets," it came like a rush to me. The Mishkan, the golden Shrine. The great portable sanctuary in the wilderness, to be carried from place to place as the people journeyed. The people had come to build it with so much love, so many gifts, so much excitement, that Moses had needed to call a halt to the outpouring."

. . .

"The Quilt of Names was a Mishkan, I realized with a rush.

The newly free community of gay men and lesbians were celebrating their first taste of freedom with a first act of communal responsibility -- making sure that their dead were not forgotten. Making sure that the world turned its attention to ending this plague and curing its victims. Turning what the world called their "transgressions" into freedom and community.

Building. Creating. Sewing. Weaving. Carrying. Connecting.

A Mishkan not only in the sense of a portable shrine.

A Mishkan in the sense of a Place where the Shekhinah dwells, a Place where God's presence can be felt in our very midst.

God dwells where the newly free remember their pain with tears and create their future in joy."

*****

Amein.

QotD #1

"Religion is man's effort to elicit meaning and value from confrontation with the holy." -- Robert M. Seltzer, Jewish People, Jewish Thought, p. 47

This breaks down, of course, when dealing with those who don't believe in "the holy". I haven't read anything by Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens, not because I'm against atheism (I was, after all, raised atheist), but because I resent being told that because I'm not an atheist, I must necessarily be stupid or deluded or both.

There is a whole long rambling post in my opinion of the nature of the divine...actually, there are probably several, since said opinion tends to fluctuate. I really hope my Beit Din doesn't ask me about my relationship to God, since I'm afraid I'll end up stuttering and flailing and having no answer whatsoever.

Only the Jews...

From our synagogue's perpetual library sale, I acquired a book of Yiddish short stories (in translation, of course).

I've read a lot of short story collections. Never before have I read one which had a seventy-page introduction apologizing for its existence.

"One could not say of Yiddish literature, as the critic Chernyshevsky has said of the Russian, that it 'constitutes the sum total of our intellectual life', but one can say that the Yiddish writers came before their audience, as did the Russian writers of the nineteenh century, with an instinctive conviction that their purpose was something other than merely to entertain and amuse. The achievements of Russian literature are obviously greater than that of the Yiddish, but both share the assumption that the one subject truly worthy of serious writers is the problem of collective destiny, the fate of a people. " (30)

"Only if they took the myth of the Chosen People with the utmost seriousness, yet simultaneously mocked their pretensions to being anything but the most wretched people on earth, could the Jews survive. " (26)

(From A Treasury of Yiddish Stories, eds. Irving Howe and Eliezer Greenberg)

Yes of course, the introduction is more than an apologia. I know very little of Yiddish, and what I know of life in the shtetl comes mostly from Fiddler on the Roof, so it's very educational. Every time I read about an aspect of Judaism, I'm reminded how very much I don't know. Baby steps, baby steps.

Trusting one's senses

So back a bit, we had the story of Jacob stealing his brother Esau's blessing from their father Isaac, who at the time of the occurence was blind.

Gen. 27:18] Going then to his father, he [Jacob] said, "Father!" and he [Isaac] replied: "Here I am; which son of mine are you?"

19] Jacob said to his father, "I am Esau your first-born. . .

21] "Pray come near me," said Isaac to Jacob, "so that I can feel you, son. Are you really my son Easu, or are you not?" 22] Jacob approached his father Isaac, who felt him and said, "The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau!". . .

25] He [Isaac] said, "Bring [it] near me and I will eat of my son's game, so that I can give you my heartfelt blessing.". . .

27] As he came near and kissed him, [Isaac] smelled the scent of his clothes and blessed him, saying: "See, my son's scent is like the scent of a field blessed by the Eternal."

Humans rely mostly on our sight to get information, followed by our hearing. Smell, taste and touch come in a distant third through fifth. I find it very interesting that Isaac, deprived of his sight, then distrusts his hearing when he recognizes Jacob's voice, but trusts his other three, far less developed senses to convince himself that he is blessing Esau. Of course, there is a whole bunch of midrash around this concerning whether Isaac is really deceived, is he deceiving himself, or does he know all along that the blessing needs to go to Jacob?

And of course, much could be said about how we today so often manage to fool our own senses and blind ourselves what we don't want to see, but that's maybe for next year.

The time has come, the rabbi said...

I went for a meeting with my sponsoring rabbi yesterday (henceforth to be known as Rabbi T [not her real initial]). Her assistant met me at the top of the stairs and let me know that Rabbi T had tried to come in, but was so sick she had to turn around and go home, and would I be willing to talk to her on the phone?

Oh, sure, I was already there anyway.

So I went into the conference room and got on the phone with the rabbi, who did sound like she felt miserable. We talked a bit, and she said that it would be fine with her if I wanted to ask the other rabbi I'd talked to (henceforth to be known as Rabbi L) if she would work with me until I was ready.

"I am ready," I said, without thinking about it. "Most of the time, I forget I haven't converted yet. It's really only when I'm talking to someone about their Jewish childhood experiences that I remember I'm not Jewish. But now I'm ready."

"Yes. I think you are ready," she said.

Now, I've been claiming (to others) that I've been ready for years. I think in many ways, that was true. A couple of my other JBC (Jewish By Choice) friends have said that becoming Jewish was less of a choice than a discovery; it's a process of uncovering who we've been all along. In that sense, I think I've always been Jewish.

But this time, when I told the rabbi that I feel ready now, those words weren't coming from a place of defensiveness like they have been for so long. They came from somewhere deeper and truer, and I don't really have the words to explain beyond that.

After we hung up, I sat and and tried to pray* and cried a little. I had no idea what a weight I've been carrying around; living as a Jew without having undergone the conversion process was a burden. I thought that by now, the ceremony would seem anti-climactic; I've been identifying as a Jew for what seems like YEARS (it's really only been a couple years, and it has, of course, been a journey), but the relief and joy I felt at realizing that now is the time completely surprised me.

So now it remains to get my best friend here from halfway across the country (exciting!), schedule the Bet Din (scary!) , go to the mikveh (wet!) and have the conversion ceremony itself at the synagogue (unknown quantity!). Also a party (drinks!).

I managed to just be happy about this for almost two whole hours before I started fretting about logistics. I'm quite pleased with myself.

*My prayer style tends towards that of Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. Seems to be a very Eastern European shtetl way of relating to the Divine.

While looking for something else...

I found this here (jewfaq.org has been a wonderful resource for me):

Shabbat Shirah

Unlike the other special Shabbatot, Shabbat Shirah does not have an additional reading, but rather is dictated by the presence of a standard reading. Shabbat Shirah is the Shabbat when we read Parshat Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16), which is the Torah portion that includes the Song at the Sea.

Tradition teaches that there are only ten true Songs (Shirot, the plural of Shirah) in the history of the world. These true Songs are not mere melodies; they are expressions of the harmony of creation and mark monumental transitions in history. Another of these Songs appears on the haftarah portion for the week (Judges 4:4-5:31): the Song of Deborah. The Song of Songs is, of course, one of the Ten Songs. Interestingly, the Tenth Song has not yet been sung: it is the Song of the coming of the Mashiach, which will be sung at the End of Days (see Isaiah 26:1).

*****

That would have been this past Shabbat, in which I skipped Torah study because I was tired and cranky and saving my energy for the Tu B'Shevat seder. (I shouldn't skip Torah study for those reasons, since it's usually quite renewing; even when I go in cranky, I usually come out calmer.)

I'll try to remember for next year.

*****

Further research brought me to this (footnote indicators removed for readability):

We don’t sing when we are frightened, despairing, sleepy, or after a heavy meal. We sing when we are pining after one we love, when we are yearning for better times, when we are celebrating an achievement or anticipating a revelation.

We don’t sing when we are complacent. We sing when we are striving for something, or when we have tasted joy and are climbing it to the heavens.

Song is prayer, the endeavor to rise above the petty cares of life and cleave to one’s source. Song is our quest for redemption.

The Midrash enumerates ten preeminent songs in the history of Israel—ten occasions on which our experience of redemption found expression in melody and verse. The first nine are: the song sung on the night of the Exodus in Egypt, the “Song at the Sea,” the “Song at the Well,” Moses’ song upon his completion of writing the Torah, the song with which Joshua stopped the sun, Deborah’s song, King David’s song, the song at the dedication of the Holy Temple, and King Solomon’s “Song of Songs” extolling the love between the Divine Groom and His bride Israel.

The tenth song, says the Midrash, will be the shir chadash, the “new song” of the ultimate redemption: a redemption that is global and absolute; a redemption that will annihilate all suffering, ignorance, jealousy and hate from the face of the earth; a redemption of such proportions that the yearning it evokes, and the joy it brings, require a new song—a completely new musical vocabulary—to capture the voice of Creation’s ultimate striving.

*****

I do sing when I'm frightened and despairing, sad and anxious, depressed and lonely. To sing, you have to breathe, and remembering to breathe lets me release at least a little bit of whatever pressure's weighing on me. I think I've mentioned before, one aspect of our congregation that really drew me in was all the singing. I agree completely with the above that "song is prayer"; it's long been easier for me to pray in music instead of (or in addition to) words.

Various Baggage

At kiddush the other week, two other JBC friends and I were talking to a PBJ (Person Born Jewish) about our conversion journeys. The woman to whom we were talking is, I'd guess, in her 60s; my two friends are both between 45 and 55. I'm a bit younger than they are.

The PBJ* said that she thinks we're fortunate to have been able to choose Judaism. She grew up in a nearby community (which is, incidentally, fairly heavily Jewish, at least now), and she and her brother were often the only two Jews in the public school they attended, and she absolutely hated the feeling of being singled out like that. She grew up before bat mitzvahs were common, and she has had trouble accepting the sense of being an outsider in the world-at-large and an outsider, as a woman in Judaism, of the community that should have been a safe retreat from said world.

She said she's envious of us, in a way, that we don't have that baggage; that we can come into Judaism without mixed feelings.

I wouldn't say I don't have mixed feelings, but they come from a completely different place from hers.

Yesterday, I was talking to another friend, whom I'll call Marnie, because I'll start running out of single letters one of these days. She and her Jewish husband are taking the Introduction to Judaism class at the synagogue where C and I are members. She finds herself in a similar situation to mine, in that she's approaching Judaism from a standpoint of having been raised as nothing, whereas most of the other converts we know were raised in some aspect of the Christian faith. Again, this creates a whole different mindset; we're not having to let go of other beliefs, nor do our immediate families think our eternal souls will be condemned if we reject the idea of Jesus Christ's divinity and messianism.

I'm looking forward to talking with Marnie more. She and her husband are neighbors of ours, so I think we'll be seeing them fairly often.

*Please forgive both the acronym and my use of it to refer to this person, but I cannot remember her name, and she's not likely to appear often enough in this blog to warrant an alias.

Eitz ha'chayim

At Torah study, when we've completed our discussion and return the Torah to the ark, we (often, but not always, depending on who's leading the service) sing a song, Eitz ha'chayim, which calls the Torah a "tree of life".

One of the seder leaders yesterday had us discuss, in pairs, why that comparison, originally found in Psalms, is made and how we think the Torah may be like a tree.

My discussion partner had mentioned, in response to a previous question, that she has hiked dormant volcanoes and was amazed at the sight of saplings growing in crevices of long-cooled lava, that even from such destruction, life springs. I suggested that Judaism itself was somewhat like a tree; there are so many historical events that it should not have survived, and it's taken hold and is thriving in some highly unlikely places.

Just now, as I was making my previous post, I thought about it's being winter where we are, so most of the trees are dormant, but we trust that in the spring, they'll awaken and regrow their leaves. The new growth won't make any tree a different tree; it's just a slightly changed aspect of the tree that's been there all along. So maybe sometimes our connection with Torah and with God feels distant and dormant, but with time, we'll find new aspects and find ourselves growing again in newly perceived warmth.

Happy New Year, trees!

Yesterday, C and I went to a Tu B'Shevat seder at our synagogue. It began with a guided imagery, in which we were guided to imagine ourselves as seeds growing into trees (and if that sounds cheesy, it really wasn't), and from there, we moved, physically and mentally, into the seder itself, which involved readings, music, fruit and wine.

(I think all seders, for any occasion, involve wine. I expect to not be disabused of that notion.)

The seder itself went through the seasons of the year, and for each season, we drank a different wine (starting with autumn: white, white-with-a-little-red, red-with-a-little-white, red) and ate a different fruit (fruits with hard shells but soft insides [e.g. almonds]; fruits with edible seeds [e.g. pomegranates] fruits with edible outsides but something inedible inside [e.g. olives, dates], wholly edible fruits [e.g. figs, berries]).

I think. Did I mention that I'm doing this from memory and there were four cups of wine? Also, I'm not quite sure how the miniature apple strudels fit into this scenario, but they were rather tasty.

Anyway, where we live is in a cold snap right now, so it was quite lovely to be in a warm synagogue with friends and food, celebrating nature and knowing that soon, it will be warm enough outside to properly appreciate the cycle of the seasons again.

Sarah laughed

Gen. 18:11] Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in years; the way of women had ceased for Sarah --- 12] so Sarah laughed inwardly, thinking: "Now that I am withered, will I have pleasure, with my lord so old!" 13] But the Eternal One said to Abraham, "Why is Sarah laughing so, thinking: 'Am I really going to bear a child, when I have grown so old?' 14] Is any wonder too difficult for the Eternal? At this fixed time, next year, I will return to you, and Sarah shall have a son. 14] Sarah, then denied it, for she was afraid, and said, "I did not laugh"; but [God] said, "Ah, but you did laugh!"

In Torah study, we often discuss Sarah's laughter upon learning she and Abraham will have a son and how the word for her laughter (ותצחק va-titzchak) is related to that son's name (יצחק yitzchak, Isaac). I don't recall it being mentioned, at least not often, that Abraham laughed first.

Gen. 17:17] Abraham fell flat on his face and laughed, thinking: "Can a child be born to a man of 100? Can 90-year-old Sarah bear a child?"

It seems to me too that there is something discussion-worthy in contrasting Sarah's inward laughter with Abraham's falling on his face laughing, but I'm not sure what that is at the moment.

Um...

I spoke in passing to my sponsoring rabbi for the first time in quite a long while (I did e-mail her assistant to set up a meeting). I think she called me by my last name. Granted, my last name is a fairly common first name among Jews, but I'm just going to hope I misheard her. She did seem to want to meet with me.

Postin' fool

I now have as many posts this month as I had for the two years preceding. Hm.

I e-mailed my sponsoring rabbi's assistant; she said she'd get back to me shortly. I really shouldn't be as nervous about this as I am.

Not interfaith

For a while, C and I were on our synagogue's Interfaith mailing list, and I finally got around to asking them to take us off. I know "interfaith" is often defined as "Jew + not-a-Jew", but I never felt the label really fit us; most interfaith stuff around here is geared towards couples and families in which Judaism plus another religion are being practiced.

There's an interfaith dinner at our synagogue soon, and a Jewish-by-choice friend is going (sans Jewish husband, who's not much into the whole synagogue life thing), and she asked if we wanted to go. C was kind of interested, so I suggested C and friend go and see what kind of rumors get started. I'm actively not interested at the moment, to the point of being hostile to the idea, and I'm not sure where that's coming from. I suspect a fair amount of defensiveness on my part, since I still haven't converted official-like.

That reminds me that I really should e-mail my sponsoring rabbi's assistant to set up a meeting. I'll do that now.

And God saw...

(Another post started and never posted until now)

בראית 1:31

וירא אלהים את-כל-אשר עשה והנה-טוב מאד ויהי-ערב ויהי-הקר בקר יום הששי

B'reishit 1:31 Vayareh Elohim et kol asher asah v'hinei tov m'od vay'hi erev vay'hi voker yom hashishi

Genesis 1:31 God then surveyed all that [God] had made, and look--it was very good! And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

"Tov m'od" really means "mostly good." -Nachmanides

(I typed the Hebrew myself and transliterated it myself from a fully vocalized edition; any errors are mine, and I'm sure there are plenty in the transliteration. I did not, however, translate it myself. I know the following words without looking them up: Elohim, kol, asher, tov, erev, yom. These are useful, but do not make for a particularly accurate translation. Also, there will be no vowels until I figure out how to make them...it doesn't seem like it should be that difficult, but the consonants are sufficient for now. So while the original purpose of this post was to point to the Nachmanides quote, it seems to have turned into Hebrew practice. Which is fine, since I'm fairly certain I'm the only one reading this anyway.)

Hebrew Alphabet Practice

I installed the Hebrew keyboard option on my Macbook (I love my Macbook) some time ago, but I haven't tried to work with it until now. Of course, the font in the Wikipedia article is different from the font in my Torah, so I thought I'd type up a little practice here.

א Alef (T)

ב Bet/Vet (C)

ג Gimel (D)

ד Dalet (S)

ה Hei (V)

ו Vav (U)

ז Zayin (Z)

ח Chet (J)

ט Tet (Y)

י Yod (H)

כ Kaf/Chaf (F)

ך Final Chaf (L)

ל Lamed (K)

מ Mem (N)

ם Final Mem (O)

נ Nun (B)

ן Final Nun (I)

ס Samech (X)

ע Ayin (G)

פ Pei/Fei (P)

ף Final Fei (;)

צ Tzadi (M)

ץ Final Tzadi (.)

ק Kof (E)

ר Reish (R)

ש Sin/Shin (A)

ת Tav (,)

The difference between the vav and the final nun is very subtle, and the font used in the article is exceptionally confusing for such purposes; I figured it out through process of elimination.

Clearly, I need to study more.

And that shows me I made some considerable mistakes in my next post, in which I tried to transcribe directly from my Torah (well, the commentary), which I shall fix before I actually put it up.

Gripes

The rabbi with whom I get along best is leaving our congregation to go far away. I'm happy for her, but I'm cranky about the situation. Grr.

Plaut commentary quotes

Well, I just discovered a couple of posts that seem to have been saved as drafts that apparently never actually posted. Therefore:

"History neither confirms or denies religious commitment. Acknowledging that Martin Luther was a historical figure does not make us Lutherans; denying the historicity of Moses does not preclude our fervor as Jews." "The Torah and the Jewish People", Plaut commentary p. li

"Though the Torah contains chapters that are, at most, of historical interest only, it also contains much that is relevant and vital today. If it sometimes expresses moral judgments we have discarded as unsatis actory, it also challenges us with ideals we are far from having attained. Moreover, for us as for our ancestors, the line between written and oral Torah cannot be drawn oversharply. We too read the text in the light of the experiences and associations that have become attached to it. Every great classic suggests or reveals new insights to each succeeding generation. And the Torah is the classic of classics." ibid.

Every week, I am amazed at the lessons people are still drawing from Torah. Many people in the Torah study I attend are...at a later life stage than I am...and they talk about what a certain passage used to mean to them and what it means now, and I'm fascinated by such discussions.

This week's portion is Va-eira, concerning the Israelites in Egypt and the plagues. This year, it coincides exactly with Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday weekend (I can't quite think of a better way to phrase that). The discussion, drawing parallels between the Israelites' plight in Egypt and the plight of black people in this country, especially between the 1860s and the 1960s, ranged from Egypt to Birmingham to Haiti, and someone commented on the amount of money that is (rightly) being sent to Haiti right now, and why didn't New Orleans get that kind of attention after Katrina, and is sending Haiti money just a Band-aid on a severed artery?

Of course, no conclusions were reached, but I never leave a Torah study without having gained something.

Reassured?

I keep restarting Jewish People, Jewish Thought, simply because it's so textbooky. It's excellent, mind you, just dry.

I found this on page ten: "The overall theme of the biblical narrative is Israel's successes and failures--mainly failures--in fulfilling the divine demands."

I think I feel better.

Rambling about the afterlife, eventually

from the Plaut commentary on Lech L'cha (yes, I'm that far behind; I should be caught up by next year):

"Few biblical dicta have been more clearly reflected in history than the statement that those who bless Israel will be blessed and those who curse it will be cursed, or that those who are blessed bless Israel and those who are cursed curse Israel. The decline of a nation can often be clearly related to the way it has treated the Jew, and its prosperity stands in direct proportion to its sense of equity and human dignity. For if "this people Israel" does rest at the fulcrum of spiritual history, its condition must be essential to the welfare of its environment."

. . .

"To be sure, the world has but rarely given credence to this view. It has not usually seen the Jews as a "great nation," typifying humanity's highest and noblest aspirations. Christians and Muslims have exalted Abram/Abraham as their spiritual father and at the same time have denied validity to the religious quest of the Jews."

I know sadly little about Islam, and I've not had an in-depth conversation about religion with a Muslim (this ought to change), but one thing that has always bothered me about a certain type of Christian (by no means all, just a certain type) is their conviction that Judaism ought to be over. I feel fortunate that I haven't run into the situation described by several of my classmates in my Introduction to Judaism class, in which close friends and family members were horrified at their decision to convert.

According to their own stories, these particular people came from only-casually-Christian backgrounds and were therefore surprised at their kith and kin's vehemence; I'm not sure the rabbi teaching the class really got that those Christians were honestly afraid for my classmates' souls. Judaism isn't so much into the idea of eternal damnation, but a fair amount of Christianity is, and nobody wants to see someone they love condemned to hell for eternity.

Although my personal idea of what happens after death varies from moment to moment, swinging from "nothing" to "Sheol" to "reincarnation" to "it doesn't actually matter, what matters is what we do while we're here", the idea of being condemned to hell forever with no hope of redemption has never quite rung true for me. I can't think of many people who would deserve that, and even if there are, it's not my judgment to make. Clearly.

(As a side note, I am aware that traditional Judaism believes in physical resurrection in the Messianic Age, and that's why cremation is right out. [That, and Shoah, but that happened later.] Of course, many thousands of years have passed for some people, so there is probably less left of them than ashes, and if the Almighty can somehow restore them to a physical body, why can't He restore ashes?)

(As a side note to the side note, if there is an afterlife, do we get to see our pets again?)

Jacob, Jacob and Sons

A question came up in Torah study this week as to whether the order of Jacob's sons in Exodus 1:1-4 was significant. It took me a couple minutes to refer back to Genesis to confirm what I was thinking, by which point the discussion was three or four topics beyond that question, and I didn't feel like trying to take us back, but:

1:1] These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob, each coming with his household: 2] Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah; 3] Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin; 4] Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher. 5] The total number of persons that were of Jacob's issue came to seventy, Joseph already being in Egypt.

Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar and Zebulun are Leah's sons, born in that order. Benjamin, tacked onto the end of those six brothers, is Rachel's younger son, Joseph (already in Egypt) being the elder. The break after Judah may refer to Leah's having had the first four before any other wife or concubine had a child.

Dan and Naphtali are the sons of Bilhah, Rachel's maid, who were born before Gad and Asher, the sons of Zilpah, Leah's maid.

So the grouping makes sense that way. (Poor Dinah, Jacob and Leah's daughter, never gets mentioned again after the Shechem incident.) Whether there is any further significance, I do not know, although I'm sure it has been discussed many times by the rabbis and later scholars. And regular folks sitting in Torah studies.

Wabbit Season!

I've been wondering for some time how the word "nimrod", the name of a great hunter in the Bible, became an insult.

Apparently, we have Bugs Bunny to blame. He calls Elmer Fudd a "poor little Nimrod", and, people failing to catch the allusion, the name transformed into a put-down.

From that link comes one to an article claiming that Bugs Bunny is Jewish. "Of course, being smart asses, we have to add that RABBIT - T = RABBI."

Not mentioned in that article is that he generally solves his problems by talking his way out of danger rather than through physical means, a time-honored tradition among our people.

Oh, and just for fun...

THOSE CANAAN DAYS (from the aforementioned musical)

Do you remember the good years in Canaan?

The summers were endlessly gold

The fields were a patchwork of clover

The winters were never too cold

We'd stroll down the boulevards together

And everything round us was fine

Now the fileds are dead and bare

No joie de vivre anywhere

Et maintenant we drink a bitter wine

Those Canaan days we used to know

Where have they gone, where did they go?

Eh bien, raise your berets

To those Canaan days

Do you remember those wonderful parties?

The splendour of Canaan's cuisine

Our extravagant, elegant soirees

The gayest the Bible has seen

It's funny but since we lost Joseph

We've gone to the other extreme

No-one comes to dinner now

We only eat them anyhow

I even find I'm missing Joseph's dreams

Those Canaan days we used to know

Where have they gone, where did they go?

Eh bien, raise your berets

To those Canaan days

It's funny but since we lost Joseph

We've gone to the other extreme

Perhaps we all misjudged the lad

Perhaps he wasn't quite that bad

And how we miss his entertaining dreams

Those Canaan days we used to know

Where have they gone, where did they go?

Eh bien, raise your berets

To those Canaan days

Eh bien, raise your berets

To those Canaan days

Go Go Go Joseph!

So the past few weeks of Parashot have involved the Joseph story (Joseph was taken to Egypt in chains and sold/Joseph was taken to Egypt in chains and sold), and I've had a hard time listening to Torah study because I keep getting songs from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat stuck in my head.

I mentioned this to one of our rabbis, who kind of curled her lip in polite disdain. I don't think she's an Andrew Lloyd Webber fan.

I didn't intend to be either, but Cats came out when I was a 1o-year-old with a subscription to Cat Fancy magazine, and Phantom of the Opera came out when I was a pudgy, overly-romantic 14-year-old, so I hope I can be forgiven the nostalgia value.

Cherubim

As I prepare to return to work after a rather blissful week off, a gleaning from the Plaut commentary on B'reishit:

The Cherubim

According to tradition, they were angels of destruction, while those hovering over the ark (Exod. 24:22) were guardian angels. All had the faces of children. From this we may learn that if children are trained properly they resemble the cherubim of the ark; if not, those of Eden. -- Moshe Mordecai Epstein

This seems about right.