Stephen said it, I believe it, and that’s good enough for anyone.
(P.S. to the Incomparable Bird of Paradox himself: Good to see “your back”.
In the spirit…
… of its content, this might have been posted 12/28/6, the day I wrote and sent it to my coworkers. But it wasn’t:
Friends,
If you can imagine a universe-sized sponge made of galaxies surrounding bubble-like voids, congratulations: you’re hip to the current scientific model of the Big Picture.
We humans don’t always do too well with the Big Picture, though. Our tiny brains like to slice reality into assimilable, us-sized bites. Instead of Limitless Space, we distinguish between Here and There; instead of Eternity, we think about Then and Now. Sometimes, we even think about Later.
Every time our planet completely circles its star, many of us commit to doing (often changing) something as we travel the orbit to come. (That orbit doesn’t actually start on January 1st — that’s a date as arbitrary as the alphabet I’m using to type this email — but as the man draining the swamp said, “You have to start somewhere.”) If it’s your custom to do that, may you have the strength to live up to your commitments. If it’s also your custom to become frustrated with yourself a week later, take heart — it’s a big universe, with enough room to start over and enough time for patience.
Happy New Year, whenever it finds you.
Der Apikoyrus Rebbe
RABBI AKIVA TATZ IS A turned-on guy whose shiurim (lectures) are ripe with mystic but rational Torah learning. R’Tatz tells a wonderful story about apikorsim (singular “apikorus,” from the Greek “Epicurean;” one who disbelieves the divine origin of Torah and the rabbis’ interpretations thereof). I couldn’t find it anywhere on the ‘Net and don’t remember which specific shiur it’s from, but here’s the gist:
A young Jew once found himself possessed of unassailable doubts about Torah and decided that he was an apikorus. A good friend of his, knowing that the young man was not one to do anything by half-measures, advised him to seek out the Apikorus Rebbe.
“There’s an Apikorus Rebbe?” asked the young doubter.
“Oh, yes. He’s famous. And you can’t be a proper apikorus without his guidance.”
So the young man set off to find the Apikorus Rebbe, who lived in [insert heavily Orthodox community here]. He arrived one late Friday afternoon and was directed by a passerby to the Apikorus Rebbe’s house. Knocking at the door, he was surprised to find it answered by a woman wearing a sheitel [wig] and long dress. The heady aromas of Jewish comfort food warmed his nostrils and confusion.
“Excuse me, but I’m looking for the Apikorus Rebbe,” he said.
“Oh, he’s at the mikveh,” the woman answered. “He’ll be home after ma’ariv [evening services]. Do you have a place for Shabbos? Would you like to join us?”
So the young man entered, noting with perplexity the spotless white tablecloth, the shining brass candlesticks, the groaning bookcase filled with Torah, Talmud, Midrash and all the classics. His perplexity increased when, after a suitable interval, the Apikorus Rebbe appeared — dressed in shtreimel [big furry hat]and robe, with long peyos [sidelocks].
After a long and delicious Shabbos dinner (made longer by the Apikorus Rebbe’s insistence on singing every zemir in his well-thumbed benscher), the young man could no longer contain himself.
“Are you really the Apikorus Rebbe?” he asked.
“I am,” replied the great sage.
“But you live a traditional life,” the young man answered. “What makes you an apikorus?”
The Apikorus Rebbe pointed to a well-thumbed copy of Tao Teh Ching on the coffee-table.
“THAT’S IT?!?” cried the young man in astonishment. “That’s what makes you an apikorus? That’s nothing!”
“Well,” calmly replied the Apikorus Rebbe, “what would you do if you were an apikorus?”
“Anything I wanted!” said the youth. “I’d rob! I’d steal! I’d kill!”
“You’re not an apikorus,” said the sage. “You’re a pig.”
Contradicting the Paradox
“Most people don’t worship God. What they do is make an image of what they think God is, and worship that.”
— James “Sputnik” Gjerde
The biggest problem with Aristotelianism is that it posits false dichotomies (good/evil, up/down, is/ain’t, tastes great/less filling, et al) and forces us to choose between (and subsequently defend) inaccurate pictures of reality.
I don’t like doing that, nor should any sane person. But the Aristotelian Heresy (TM) so underlies our Western linguistic thought-frame that its perniciousness oft goes unnoticed. This is particularly true when applied to theology or other non-mystical apprehensions or understandings of [your favorite metaphor for nondualism here]. One classically smug statement of this sort of ontological oafishness is:
Can God make a rock so heavy He can’t lift it?
Rather than wasting time explaining the inapplicability of language to direct perception, perhaps the best response may be:
Yes — but He can lift it anyway.
Focus: Israel
As the situation in Israel continues to develop, many are turning to the “local papers” for better coverage than that offered by CNN or (grf) the BBC. The following offer in-depth reportage and up-to-the-minute English-language breaking news:
– Haaretz (left-leaning)
– Arutz Sheva (right-leaning)
– Jerusalem Post (centrist)
– Yediot Ahronot (centristy)
Other sites of note:
– Debka – Military/intelligence analysis, often scooping the American press by a week or more.
– Middle East Media Research Institute – Translations from the Arab press
– Honest Reporting – Countering media bias
– Israeli blogs
– Interactive map of bloggers from Israel, Lebanon and the Territories.
And:
Put A Note in the Western Wall
Be well, all of us.
37 Years Ago Today
“But the Eagle has landed; tell your children when
Time won’t drive us down to dust again.”
— Leslie Fish, Hope Eyrie
One of the most embarrassing things which ever happened to me was falling asleep for the 90 or so seconds surrounding one small step.
I was seven years old and living in middle-class Matawan, New Jersey. A precocious child, I’d been hard-bitten by the space-and-science-fiction bug; 2001 had blown my wee mind the previous year and infected me with star-pricked visions of silver and flame. There was NO WAY I wasn’t staying up to “watch those guys walk on the moon,” as I so often and loudly put it. My parents were pretty cool with the idea, and as the hour approached we ate McBurgers picnic-style on the living room floor.
The last thing I remember, Neil Armstrong was opening the Eagle’s metal mouth.
The next thing I remember, my mom was shaking me awake. “Honey! You missed it!” she said.
I think I cried for a week. (The trauma has leached from my mind the exact duration.) But ever since, whenever I look up at the moon (which is often) my eye automatically lands on the Sea of Tranquility.
“That’s where we first touched you,” I say to myself (and anyone within earshot).
Since then, albeit with with robot fingertips, we’ve touched Mars, Saturn’s moon Titan and the asteroid Hayabusa ; we’ve grabbed bits of the Sun, crossed its outermost echo and even marked a comet. And, please God, we’re just getting started.
Homo sapiens explorator. Cheers, mate.
Message From Beyond
NOT ALL MITZVOT TURN INTO ghost stories — but when doing holy work, it’s always a good idea to expect the unexpected.
Ann and I are members of the Sonoma County Chevre Kadisha, which literally means “holy fellowship;” it’s a centuries-old Jewish institution committed to preparing the dead for burial. Doing this is considered to be the most selfless of all mitzvot (commandments), partly because there’s no way the beneficiary can pay you back.
In 2002, we joined a crowd of about 50 at Cotati’s Congregation Ner Shalom where, over the course of an afternoon and under the tutelage of Rabbi Elisheva (Sachs) Salamo, we learned — as one participant put it — to “gift-wrap people for sending them back to God.”