This is part of an email I wrote to someone about my relationship to all this religious stuff. I think there are some insights here that y'all would want to see. I have always intended to open some of my thoughts and wrestlings here on the 'stu, but have been lazy, and never sat to do so. I haven't proofread it to see if it's blogworthy. Chances are, I might read it over in a week or a month and find some glaring fallacies.
Or not.
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NOTHING I do religiously is to appease the anger of a jealous and vengeful Deity. I don't know if there is such a Deity out there. It seems silly to me. (though i leave room for the fact that i might be wrong).
i struggle constantly with God. usually i relate to God as the Universe, the Unity of all that exists- all physical matter and all that which is beyond the physical, that i cannot perceive very well nor conceive. I personally- I, Stuart Bennett Siegel- do not relate to a threatening God, and demanding God, a punishing God. Even the idea of a commanding God- which is perhaps the central tenet of Judaism- is tricky for me. yes, there is tons of that imagery in the Bible. But it is clearly impossible that THAT is the "personality" of God. If God is the Unity of All, how could It be angry or jealous?? The descriptions of God as such must be allegory, or humans' limited perspective of the Universe, but not the reality of God. Many of the Jewish philosophers have dealt with this issue.
When I pray or do rituals, it is part of an large-scale project to align my soul, my being with the universe, with a higher modality than the base, physical world of pleasures and pain which has shown itself (to folks like me and you and many we know) to be so fruitless and alienating. Even before I got into Judaism, maybe from LSD-i dunno, I believed that the Universe was a unified whole, and that our minds had power to transcend that which we see before us and enter into a more fluid intercourse with that Unity of which we are a part.
trippy shit, and it turns out that that is at the core of Judaism.
i don't believe much in Truth. I DO believe that the Rabbis (your Pharisees) had, many of them, insights into mystical secrets of the universe which pervade all of there teachings, even if imperceptibly. By connecting to their Tradition, there is a chance that i will also be able to "Feel the Force" as Han Solo might put it.
To claim that the Rabbinic tradition is just a clever way to control people, subjugate women and be racist by instilling the fear of God is to make an uneducated and immature generalization about a tradition that is far too complex to have such a simplisitc (and paranoid) purpose.
when I make a blessing, i am not trying to assuage the bubbling wrath of an insecure God. i am participating in a Tradition that has been with my people for thousands of years, and i am trying through the power of ritual and tradition (and maybe a little mystical incantation), to connect more deeply to the Universe. Does it happen at that moment, every time? No. But it is another piece, which is hopefully building something within my being.
i don't know much about the Christian faiths, but i tend to see them as demanding one principle of belief that is an all-or-nothing bright line. No Jesus, no religion.
Judaism is nothing like that. There are elements of belief, there are ritual practices, there are mystical pathways to Divinity, there are disciplines of self-betterment, there is the history of the people, there is the bloodline, there's the corned beef.... people connect to their Jewishness in various ways-- some folks are religious anti-Zionists. some are secular Zionists. Some love to study Jewish Law and hate the mushy stuff, some ignore the Law and love to hug and bless each other.
you have to stop thinking of it as monolithic. Judaism is the opposite of monolothic religion.
if i didn't see that my connection to Halakha (the laws of Judaism) and Torah would allow me to continue to be as iconoclastic, skeptical and sensual as i pride myself on being, i wouldn't be here.
Or not.
______________
NOTHING I do religiously is to appease the anger of a jealous and vengeful Deity. I don't know if there is such a Deity out there. It seems silly to me. (though i leave room for the fact that i might be wrong).
i struggle constantly with God. usually i relate to God as the Universe, the Unity of all that exists- all physical matter and all that which is beyond the physical, that i cannot perceive very well nor conceive. I personally- I, Stuart Bennett Siegel- do not relate to a threatening God, and demanding God, a punishing God. Even the idea of a commanding God- which is perhaps the central tenet of Judaism- is tricky for me. yes, there is tons of that imagery in the Bible. But it is clearly impossible that THAT is the "personality" of God. If God is the Unity of All, how could It be angry or jealous?? The descriptions of God as such must be allegory, or humans' limited perspective of the Universe, but not the reality of God. Many of the Jewish philosophers have dealt with this issue.
When I pray or do rituals, it is part of an large-scale project to align my soul, my being with the universe, with a higher modality than the base, physical world of pleasures and pain which has shown itself (to folks like me and you and many we know) to be so fruitless and alienating. Even before I got into Judaism, maybe from LSD-i dunno, I believed that the Universe was a unified whole, and that our minds had power to transcend that which we see before us and enter into a more fluid intercourse with that Unity of which we are a part.
trippy shit, and it turns out that that is at the core of Judaism.
i don't believe much in Truth. I DO believe that the Rabbis (your Pharisees) had, many of them, insights into mystical secrets of the universe which pervade all of there teachings, even if imperceptibly. By connecting to their Tradition, there is a chance that i will also be able to "Feel the Force" as Han Solo might put it.
To claim that the Rabbinic tradition is just a clever way to control people, subjugate women and be racist by instilling the fear of God is to make an uneducated and immature generalization about a tradition that is far too complex to have such a simplisitc (and paranoid) purpose.
when I make a blessing, i am not trying to assuage the bubbling wrath of an insecure God. i am participating in a Tradition that has been with my people for thousands of years, and i am trying through the power of ritual and tradition (and maybe a little mystical incantation), to connect more deeply to the Universe. Does it happen at that moment, every time? No. But it is another piece, which is hopefully building something within my being.
i don't know much about the Christian faiths, but i tend to see them as demanding one principle of belief that is an all-or-nothing bright line. No Jesus, no religion.
Judaism is nothing like that. There are elements of belief, there are ritual practices, there are mystical pathways to Divinity, there are disciplines of self-betterment, there is the history of the people, there is the bloodline, there's the corned beef.... people connect to their Jewishness in various ways-- some folks are religious anti-Zionists. some are secular Zionists. Some love to study Jewish Law and hate the mushy stuff, some ignore the Law and love to hug and bless each other.
you have to stop thinking of it as monolithic. Judaism is the opposite of monolothic religion.
if i didn't see that my connection to Halakha (the laws of Judaism) and Torah would allow me to continue to be as iconoclastic, skeptical and sensual as i pride myself on being, i wouldn't be here.
5 comments:
Well, no real surprises in here for me, though I do appreciate the candid discussion of where you're coming from. What this really does is make me curious about the e-mail/letter/discussion you're responding to. Good on ye'!
so you mean it's thanks to the prismatic nature of judaism that I had a crazy pirate for a roommate?
..still that doesn't explain the uncanny matching clothes moment..
perhaps nothing can.
who wears jeans, a white sweater, and white crocs anyways? that's just weird to begin with..
I've always struggled with the idea of a vengeful, wrath-imposing God myself. To me, God who gives us everything doesn't exact retribution as well. But I could be totally wrong.
Hano Solo didn't buy into the force.
To wit "Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid."
Sure, Josh, young Han said so. But later, when the fate of the whole Rebellion was at stake, he said something different:
May the Force be with you.
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