Our relationship to Torah is not based on asserting its factual historicity — whether based on “proofs” or “assertion despite reason.” Instead, each individual’s connection to scripture is based on the premise that the biblical narrative reflects an authentic religious experience that envelops some sort of reality and expresses it in a narrative and poetic fashion.”
— Rabbi David Bigman, “Refracting History Through the Spiritual Experience of the Present”
Tag: Learning Jewishly
“A little Torah is all anyone knows.”
A Talmud of Civility
When faced with [a piece or opinion of Torah] that is on its face absurd or contradictory, the rabbis do not dismiss it, but actively work to understand it. What would it look like for us, when someone says something apparently illogical and absurd, to assume that they are making some kind of internal sense and actually thoughtfully work to understand their reasoning?”
— Sara Ronis, “A Daily Dose of Talmud (Pesachim 78),” @myjewishlearning.com
The Torah Guides’ Torah Guides
THE TORAH CAN BE A great read — inspiring, comforting, uplifting, provocative — but without the explanatory input of generations of commentators, it can also be a bit daunting. Fortunately, Jewish tradition has portioned this essential text into weekly bites for easier consumption. In the spirit of Simchat Torah, which begins Saturday night and marks the (at least) 2,355th end and rebeginning of the annual Torah reading cycle, here are some of the resources used by our local community over the years we’ve spent engrossed in this Book of Books.
The Sapirstein Edition: Rashi (5 volumes)
Author/Publisher: Artscroll
Slant: Very Traditional (11th to 12th Century CE)
Points: Rashi is the commentator par excellence. He is strictly concerned with elucidating the Torah’s plain meaning, and he brings to bear on each verse nearly the entire corpus of the Jewish textual tradition as it existed in his time. Use this if you want to understand Torah as Serious Jews have done for almost a thousand years. (Nice literal translation too.)
Caveats: A good deal of Rashi’s work has to do with Hebrew grammar, so keep that in mind — he can sometimes be a tad dry. Also keep in mind that he was a literalist, operating from the model that the Torah was Divinely written. Even if you don’t share that view, there’s a tremendous amount of classical Torah nutrition here. Continue reading “The Torah Guides’ Torah Guides”
5 Thoughts: It’s Not a Bug, It’s a Teacher
1. EVANGELICAL ATHEISTS LIKE TO STATE two reasons why the Torah is irrelevant: 1) It was written in the Bronze Age, and 2) it’s festering with contradictions.
2. Leaving aside the point that many of our species’ current intellectual systems also date from the Bronze Age, I’d like to address the so-called contradictions. Sure, they exist. But my argument is that they’re not accidental, but intentional. Continue reading “5 Thoughts: It’s Not a Bug, It’s a Teacher”
First Graf: Torah
(BE HONEST — YOU MUST HAVE known I’d get around to this one eventually, right?)
I make no rigid claims of authenticity, accuracy, or authorship for this work. As far as I’m concerned, this is “simply” a collection of ancient Jewish campfire didactics which were knit together in somewhat final form some 2,500 years ago. And everything about it is open to (ideally informed) debate. That’s kind of the point, actually: to give us, and have given us, something to discuss as a community as we grope our way through the often-cruel centuries. Torah (literally, “teaching” or “instruction”) is what has kept us going for as long as we’ve been here — it ain’t the lox and bagels, folks. Continue reading “First Graf: Torah”
5 Thoughts: Pattern Matching
1. THERE ARE TWO TORAH STORIES which have troubled me for some time.
2. The first is about the giving of the Ten Statements (AKA the “Ten Commandments,” but “statements” is closer to the actual Hebrew). What should have been a joyful event was marred by the incident of the Golden Calf — epiphany ruined by idolatry.
3. The second has to do with the consecration of the Tabernacle: the portable God-tent containing, among other things, the Ark of the Covenant (which itself contained the aforementioned Statements). Continue reading “5 Thoughts: Pattern Matching”
Minute Mitzvah: Play Nice
Today: Don’t shame anyone.
Explanation: When you make someone feel painfully self-conscious, you destroy a little piece of the world — and not only for them. Your own soul / psyche / personality suffers as well. In today’s hyperpartisan social climate, the temptation exists to make others hurt as much as they want to hurt you; but that’s a trapdoor without a bottom.
Exercise: Ask yourself: “Do I really want to be That Guy?” Tone down the snark, online and off. And act according to your ideals.
On the Other Hand…
My point, once again, is not that those ancient people told literal stories and we are now smart enough to take them symbolically, but that they told them symbolically and we are now dumb enough to take them literally.”
— John Dominic Crossan
A Universe Full Of “Learn Here” Stickers
There was a time when every brief saying one heard was regarded as a ‘Torah’ (teaching, guidance), and everything one saw was perceived as an instruction in his Avoda (worship, service) and conduct.”
–Daily Hayom Yom newsletter
Temple of the Holy Reruns
HAVE YOU EVER SAT IN a theater after the movie ended so you can see it again? Then you’ll understand Simchat Torah.
Simchat Torah, or “Rejoicing of (the) Teaching,” will be celebrated by the worldwide Jewish community beginning tonight through tomorrow. It marks the end of the yearly Torah-reading cycle and the beginning of a new one. We’ve been doing this for at least (best guess here) 2,569 years; when we reach the last words of Deuteronomy (“Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moses … [with] all the great might and awesome power that Moses displayed before all Israel”) we immediately rewind to “In the beginning of G?d’s creating heaven and earth…” To paraphrase a line from Guys and Dolls, among other things Judaism can be called the oldest established permanent floating book club on Earth. Continue reading “Temple of the Holy Reruns”
Day of At-Onement
IT’S HARD TO DESCRIBE THE feeling I get around 1 or 2 p.m. on Yom Kippur afternoon with no food since the previous evening. It’s an intellectual, buzzy sort of consciousness: colors are brighter, outlines sharper, and an almost euphoric state of clarity sets in. At our synagogue we take a service-break from about 12:30 until 4:30 p.m. — some people go home to nap or introspect, others hang out at the sanctuary to pray or meditate or just sit in community. As for me, I go home to feed the cat, engage in (what I hope is) honest self-criticism, and study something appropriate. Continue reading “Day of At-Onement”
Why I Hate Jay Michaelson ;-)
IT’S THAT ANYTHING I CAN do, he can do better. It’s his unaffected, artless prose. It’s his vast non-dualist scholarship and experience. It’s his light touch. It’s his unpretentiousness. It’s that he neither talks down to or over the heads of his audience, but speaks directly to their hearts. It’s that he makes what he does look so damned easy. It’s his open-faced sense of humor. It’s his genuineness. It’s that he knows a lot, but doesn’t come off as a know-it-all. It’s that I’ve been avidly following his career almost since he began writing professionally. It’s the anticipatory glee I get when I see his byline. Continue reading “Why I Hate Jay Michaelson ;-)”