Neal @ July 20, 2009 # No Comment Yet
And now, another Monday Mitzvah with a side of motivation.
Today: Hold God in awe.
THIS ONE’S TRICKY FOR ATHEISTS, so in the interests of universality, let’s assume we’re not talking about the Cranky Old Man raining smites and frights whom we learned to scoff at in Hebrew school but rather Something a good deal less childish [...]
Neal @ April 16, 2009 # No Comment Yet
Of all the apparent opposites which Judaism wrestles to reconcile — free will v. predestination, universalism v. particularism, applesauce v. sour cream — one of the most paradoxically fertile is words v. the Wordless.
Maimonides, the great 12th century rabbi and commentator, wisely stayed out of this fray — he was more comfortable describing God in [...]
Neal @ September 20, 2002 # No Comment Yet
FOR SOME REASON, THREE SIGNIFICANT dates fell out fairly close together recently: Sonoma’s first (?) 9/11 commemoration, Simchat Torah and the autumnal equinox. The first marks the end of American innocence; the second, the annual restarting of the synagogic Torah cycle; the third goes on regardless of human observation (unless, of course, Time only exists [...]
Neal @ April 24, 2001 # No Comment Yet
from a pre-Blogger blog
Conversation with a 12-year-old bat mitzva candidate, who I’m tutoring by probing the meaning of the prayers:
Okay, read me the first part of the Sh’ma in English.
“Hear O Israel, the Eternal is G-d, the Eternal is One.”
Okay… what’s that mean?
“Well, G-d is one.”
What else?
“Well, that monotheism is something Jews believe in.”
Okay. But [...]
