Left side. 2nd or 3rd one down, I forgot my book at home. Understanding.
I think we were supposed to pick a facet of the refracted God image [the diamond thing] and explain it, but I could be wrong. I'll do my best. I know this is 2 in one day, but I need to do this because it's my only free moment this week. And I only have 10 minutes, so I'll try and add later, but if I don't...
There is a moment. For me it ususally happens on a test. Last year, during Geometry, it happened on every single test, as I was writing the proof for some square or rectangle or whatever we had to prove existed. Or didn't. Or should, or shouldn't. [I didn't like Geometry.] Anyway, the moment came. God, it was like sex. Suddenly, even though I hadn't understood anything about what square shouldn't exist or whatever before, suddenly I did. I felt it, I understood it, I put all the proverbial pieces together and the proverbial image was pasted together inside its proverbial frame. This facet of God, understanding, is just that. Knowledge, unexplainable and probably undeserved. That moment, when I understand, is definitely a blessing from God. I understand this much more than I do Spinoza. I can't think of another way to say this.
This is a short one, I know. But it's a facet I need, I crave, I depend upon.
26 March 2007
Everything and Nothing
God is everything. It's something I've learned since before I knew I was learning it. "There is a little bit of God in everyone, even in robbers," my mother would tell me. [I used to be very afraid of robbers.] Yeah... that was sweet. And it was a nice little sugarspun idea, but the cupcake sort of wore away by the time I knew that there were fully bad people in the world. Pantheism seems too farfetched, too sweet and cute and perfect for me, the jaded teenager, I guess.
Spinoza, evidentally, lives in a little fantasyland, where the worst thing that can happen to you is falling into a big bad molasses swamp, and the point of life is to get to a castle made of peppermint candies and cake. That's what I thought when I first re-heard of pantheism a few years ago. Of course, I didn't know it had a name, I didn't know Spinoza was even involved. But that idea, that God is everywhere - that God is everything - was too ideal, too perfect for me.
That was the prologue. The first question for this [last week's] assignment was: Why do you think the Rabbinical community excommunicated Spinoza? I thought it was obvious at first: his ideas countered theirs and maybe they didn't like that. He was stating that God was not the creator, to copy a quote I used in some other post down there, but instead actually was the creation. Well! How can we worship something we... wait, something we are? I can't worship myself, it goes against Judaism, but that's what Spinoza was claiming. Our existence is God, and our being is God, so therefore, according to my, perhaps twisted, logic, I am God. [I do not think I am God.]
So why excommunicate him? Because they thought he was a little smudge on their perfect drawing? Well that just ruins my entire image of the LEADERS OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY FOR DECADES! No, I think it was something larger. This is me being a pop psychologist, but maybe they agreed with him and the idea that I just stated, that they could be facets of God themselves, was terrifying. Impossible. Chaotic. I could keep going. It would be impossible to be God without disrespecting God, and it would be impossible to worship God and be God, so Spinoza presented them with a paradoxical situation that the Rabbis could not reconcile. Whether excommunication was the right choice, I do not know. Frankly, for a group that "hates to conform," though that is under some debate in my mind @themoment, excommunication seems pretty goyish.
Part II was How can pantheism be meaningful to you [ergo, me]? Well, I don't know. I don't actually agree with it all that much so I don't find it all that meaningful. I believe God is everywhere, but the idea of God being everything, also, seems impossible. It is an incredibly humbling thought. I mean, God is everything, so God is as much of a mouse as he is Oprah. They seem completely different, one on a different plane of existence, but apparently they would not be. I think that's an incredibly cool idea, really, but it also makes me think: then, humans are demigods. We should be more powerful. What would life be like if I could smite those who bothered me? Not that I would, but God knows [lolol] that I sometimes want to.
The idea also brings up questions: Was God Hitler? Was God the Nazis? Is God Hezbollah? Is God the Bio teacher I think should die? Is God my history test, and if so, why did I fail? Little everyday problems, or global genocides, are all God. I can't reconcile myself with a God who kills Jews, or who fails hardworking students. I can't do it. So it means something to me, but in a way, if I subscribe to pantheism, I subscribe to the ending of my own faith. I don't like that it's that way, but for me, it is. So I'm sorry that I wasn't able to adequately answer that question. It wouldn't be possible for me to find that meaningful in a positive way.
Spinoza, evidentally, lives in a little fantasyland, where the worst thing that can happen to you is falling into a big bad molasses swamp, and the point of life is to get to a castle made of peppermint candies and cake. That's what I thought when I first re-heard of pantheism a few years ago. Of course, I didn't know it had a name, I didn't know Spinoza was even involved. But that idea, that God is everywhere - that God is everything - was too ideal, too perfect for me.
That was the prologue. The first question for this [last week's] assignment was: Why do you think the Rabbinical community excommunicated Spinoza? I thought it was obvious at first: his ideas countered theirs and maybe they didn't like that. He was stating that God was not the creator, to copy a quote I used in some other post down there, but instead actually was the creation. Well! How can we worship something we... wait, something we are? I can't worship myself, it goes against Judaism, but that's what Spinoza was claiming. Our existence is God, and our being is God, so therefore, according to my, perhaps twisted, logic, I am God. [I do not think I am God.]
So why excommunicate him? Because they thought he was a little smudge on their perfect drawing? Well that just ruins my entire image of the LEADERS OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY FOR DECADES! No, I think it was something larger. This is me being a pop psychologist, but maybe they agreed with him and the idea that I just stated, that they could be facets of God themselves, was terrifying. Impossible. Chaotic. I could keep going. It would be impossible to be God without disrespecting God, and it would be impossible to worship God and be God, so Spinoza presented them with a paradoxical situation that the Rabbis could not reconcile. Whether excommunication was the right choice, I do not know. Frankly, for a group that "hates to conform," though that is under some debate in my mind @themoment, excommunication seems pretty goyish.
Part II was How can pantheism be meaningful to you [ergo, me]? Well, I don't know. I don't actually agree with it all that much so I don't find it all that meaningful. I believe God is everywhere, but the idea of God being everything, also, seems impossible. It is an incredibly humbling thought. I mean, God is everything, so God is as much of a mouse as he is Oprah. They seem completely different, one on a different plane of existence, but apparently they would not be. I think that's an incredibly cool idea, really, but it also makes me think: then, humans are demigods. We should be more powerful. What would life be like if I could smite those who bothered me? Not that I would, but God knows [lolol] that I sometimes want to.
The idea also brings up questions: Was God Hitler? Was God the Nazis? Is God Hezbollah? Is God the Bio teacher I think should die? Is God my history test, and if so, why did I fail? Little everyday problems, or global genocides, are all God. I can't reconcile myself with a God who kills Jews, or who fails hardworking students. I can't do it. So it means something to me, but in a way, if I subscribe to pantheism, I subscribe to the ending of my own faith. I don't like that it's that way, but for me, it is. So I'm sorry that I wasn't able to adequately answer that question. It wouldn't be possible for me to find that meaningful in a positive way.
12 March 2007
Advance
For once, I'm not doing this at the last minute. Everyone should be proud of me.
For the assignment:
1. God is not material.
2. God is not tangible.
3. God is not mortal.
4. God is not predictable.
5. God is not definable.
We learned on Sunday that God can only be discribed in negatives, like I put above. We learned some other stuff, but what I really want to say is that I don't completely agree. I think what was meant was that God cannot be consistently definable in positives. However, in the story of Sodom and Gemorrah, God is vengeful. Same with Jonah. For my #4, God is not predictable, but He [gender issues ignored] is unpredictable, at least in stories like last week's carob trees and city walls. God is intangible, undefinable, immortal. He is many things. In many parts of the Torah, and the Passover seder, we hear that God is kind. It can be argued that God is selfish, to want himself to be the only god the Jews will worship, but maybe he is truthful, because the others are false. He is, like humans, inconsistent.
Maybe this means something. In the Renaissance, people believed they were special because they were created in God's image. [The Sistine Chapel's ceiling shows that - Adam reaches for God.] Well, the Hebrew Bible says that too, right in Genesis, and we are unpredictable, and inconsistent, just like God. I don't know if it's complete blasphemy to contradict Maimonides, but something tells me that it's our job as Jews. I think I posted something about that before. And I do, because I was created in God's image, and that makes, as the Renaissancians believed, me very special.
I have another contradiction for you. If, for example, you say "God is not kind," wouldn't that contradict tons of examples of extreme kindness in just the Torah alone?
The final one, which I thought of at 7:45 [too early] in the morning, and I'm not sure if this makes sense AT ALL, so just bear with me, is if you say "God is God." That's definitely a positive, but you can't do that. Saying "God is not human" doesn't cover all the options - maybe God is a seal if you go by that. You can keep on adding things until, basically, you say "God is not anything on Earth." But God is everywhere, right? So how can you say that? I guess my point is that defining God in any way just seems sort of... silly. Much like my musical philosophy, actually, I believe that if you believe God exists, He [g.i.i.] exists for you, and if he doesn't, defining Him won't bring you any closer to believing.
For the assignment:
1. God is not material.
2. God is not tangible.
3. God is not mortal.
4. God is not predictable.
5. God is not definable.
We learned on Sunday that God can only be discribed in negatives, like I put above. We learned some other stuff, but what I really want to say is that I don't completely agree. I think what was meant was that God cannot be consistently definable in positives. However, in the story of Sodom and Gemorrah, God is vengeful. Same with Jonah. For my #4, God is not predictable, but He [gender issues ignored] is unpredictable, at least in stories like last week's carob trees and city walls. God is intangible, undefinable, immortal. He is many things. In many parts of the Torah, and the Passover seder, we hear that God is kind. It can be argued that God is selfish, to want himself to be the only god the Jews will worship, but maybe he is truthful, because the others are false. He is, like humans, inconsistent.
Maybe this means something. In the Renaissance, people believed they were special because they were created in God's image. [The Sistine Chapel's ceiling shows that - Adam reaches for God.] Well, the Hebrew Bible says that too, right in Genesis, and we are unpredictable, and inconsistent, just like God. I don't know if it's complete blasphemy to contradict Maimonides, but something tells me that it's our job as Jews. I think I posted something about that before. And I do, because I was created in God's image, and that makes, as the Renaissancians believed, me very special.
I have another contradiction for you. If, for example, you say "God is not kind," wouldn't that contradict tons of examples of extreme kindness in just the Torah alone?
The final one, which I thought of at 7:45 [too early] in the morning, and I'm not sure if this makes sense AT ALL, so just bear with me, is if you say "God is God." That's definitely a positive, but you can't do that. Saying "God is not human" doesn't cover all the options - maybe God is a seal if you go by that. You can keep on adding things until, basically, you say "God is not anything on Earth." But God is everywhere, right? So how can you say that? I guess my point is that defining God in any way just seems sort of... silly. Much like my musical philosophy, actually, I believe that if you believe God exists, He [g.i.i.] exists for you, and if he doesn't, defining Him won't bring you any closer to believing.
08 March 2007
Victory over Defeat
This is a side note: I'm going to be quite honest. Working up the energy to go to school, much less come home and do homework, today, was hard. Doing this post was something I had to do. It won't be my best.
Compare the king image of God to the Shekhina [sp?] and also the God portrayed in the story of [again, sp?] Tamur B'achnai.
Defeat is a funny thing. I know from experience that it makes you crawl up in a corner, literally or figuratively, and wish that you'd never even tried to enter whatever contest, again, l. or f., in the first place. You fight and you fight, hard, and nothing comes of it. One must wonder, then, why God is very okay with the idea that his rule, in the story we read [Tamur B'achnai? the one with the carob trees and the walls, etc.] does not win. As a competitive person myself, this would be devastating. Mind-shattering, earth-shaking, chaos-inducing! If God is supposed to rule, let God rule! But something changes.
I guess understanding this concept is hard for me. Coincidentally, we're learning in my history class about the Renaissance and how the humanity of Jesus Christ, as the Christian Messiah, was more important than his divinity. I get why it was important, I do, but I still don't really understand it, just as I don't really understand how the humanity God created could be more powerful than the Creator. [cite: quote from my temple's prayer book: "He is God who made them all, the Creator, not the Creation." This doesn't have anything to do with anything, it's just so I don't get punished for possible plagiarism.]
Another thing I want to point out in my difficulty in understanding this concept is that God is king. In every history class I've ever taken, people who disobey kings are punished, not commended. Though I don't like it about myself, I'm a submissive person, and especially when it comes to authority. The idea of challenging God is so pro-confrontational it makes me scared just thinking about it.
I'm not honestly sure where I'm going with this, or even if I was going anywhere in the first place. Perhaps, in a weird contrary mood, the Jews decided, like the 1776 Americans, that they'd had enough of living under kings, and they wanted something new. Maybe they should have written a Declaration of Independence and fought a war for their religious autonomy, except that they had it, which is what confuses me so much. God gave humans free will, and so why would anyone argue? He [need I give me gender apology again?] gave us an opportunity to choose whether we wanted to follow His rule or not. By arguing with him, wouldn't that say that you didn't want to follow him?
I know I sound very discouraging towards Rabbi Yehoshua [or was it Eliezer? I left my folder somewhere.] but I actually love that about Judaism, and at the risk of offense, it's something people usually imagine old Jewish ladies doing. We fight in a what could be considered unnecessary battle, but we fight, because it's what we believe. It's stubborn, but still, very admirable.
Now that I've babbled in a stupid way for a while, I'll finish. I'll, by my own choice, go to sleep. Then, I'll, by my own choice, wake up. Maybe I'll argue it with God for a while. Just because I can. Because our God, at least this week, is one that accepts criticism, that gives out a free comment card with your free will and doesn't throw it away when he sees something rated as "1 : Poor." Because we're Jews, and we were chosen, and that's just too cool to pass up.
Compare the king image of God to the Shekhina [sp?] and also the God portrayed in the story of [again, sp?] Tamur B'achnai.
Defeat is a funny thing. I know from experience that it makes you crawl up in a corner, literally or figuratively, and wish that you'd never even tried to enter whatever contest, again, l. or f., in the first place. You fight and you fight, hard, and nothing comes of it. One must wonder, then, why God is very okay with the idea that his rule, in the story we read [Tamur B'achnai? the one with the carob trees and the walls, etc.] does not win. As a competitive person myself, this would be devastating. Mind-shattering, earth-shaking, chaos-inducing! If God is supposed to rule, let God rule! But something changes.
I guess understanding this concept is hard for me. Coincidentally, we're learning in my history class about the Renaissance and how the humanity of Jesus Christ, as the Christian Messiah, was more important than his divinity. I get why it was important, I do, but I still don't really understand it, just as I don't really understand how the humanity God created could be more powerful than the Creator. [cite: quote from my temple's prayer book: "He is God who made them all, the Creator, not the Creation." This doesn't have anything to do with anything, it's just so I don't get punished for possible plagiarism.]
Another thing I want to point out in my difficulty in understanding this concept is that God is king. In every history class I've ever taken, people who disobey kings are punished, not commended. Though I don't like it about myself, I'm a submissive person, and especially when it comes to authority. The idea of challenging God is so pro-confrontational it makes me scared just thinking about it.
I'm not honestly sure where I'm going with this, or even if I was going anywhere in the first place. Perhaps, in a weird contrary mood, the Jews decided, like the 1776 Americans, that they'd had enough of living under kings, and they wanted something new. Maybe they should have written a Declaration of Independence and fought a war for their religious autonomy, except that they had it, which is what confuses me so much. God gave humans free will, and so why would anyone argue? He [need I give me gender apology again?] gave us an opportunity to choose whether we wanted to follow His rule or not. By arguing with him, wouldn't that say that you didn't want to follow him?
I know I sound very discouraging towards Rabbi Yehoshua [or was it Eliezer? I left my folder somewhere.] but I actually love that about Judaism, and at the risk of offense, it's something people usually imagine old Jewish ladies doing. We fight in a what could be considered unnecessary battle, but we fight, because it's what we believe. It's stubborn, but still, very admirable.
Now that I've babbled in a stupid way for a while, I'll finish. I'll, by my own choice, go to sleep. Then, I'll, by my own choice, wake up. Maybe I'll argue it with God for a while. Just because I can. Because our God, at least this week, is one that accepts criticism, that gives out a free comment card with your free will and doesn't throw it away when he sees something rated as "1 : Poor." Because we're Jews, and we were chosen, and that's just too cool to pass up.
02 March 2007
Memory
Apparently, it's something I don't have. I knew I forgot something this week. In fact, I actually thought about the questions today. Anyway...
1. What does it mean to have a walking God? It means a lot of things. To me, it presents a conundrum: I never quite believed in intelligent design. I mean, yes, I believe God created the world, but I've always had a hybrid theory, that God caused evolution or something. The ocular evidence provided by bones was more than my faith, I guess, when I invented this theory. But to have a walking God means that God actually did create us in His [again, gender issues aside] image and that his purpose may have been more selfish than, if you will, humanitarian. If he walked among us, also, it seems to imply, and this is definitely going to seem blasphemous, that it's possible for a human form. Perhaps this is endorsement for Christianity, even if I don't believe it myself? In addition, a walking God would mean that it [He] has a distinct form. We're supposed to be talking about images of God - mine has always been the fire-brimstone-clouds-and-lightning version of God, as opposed to the walking dude in some garden. I have to say, this question made me rething a lot of what I assumed I believed in fully before.
2. How do you feel about God as a king? I guess I've always sort of assumed that's how it was. If God is omnipotent, it's also feasible to imagine Him lording over all, sort of watching his subjects [with eyes? haha] from above. I don't really see if this would be a problem, but I'm not sure I like it. I'm an independent person about some things, and though I've always believed it to be true, the idea of a God who knows and sees all is sort of like my opinion about the Patriot Act: our free will and our choices are ours, so why are you intruding? I guess I'd have to meet this king to form a true opinion, or at least one that makes sense (:\) but I accept it, as I accept [but do not endorse] other things.
[P.S. Sorry, Josh, I had tonsss of work this week and I completely forgot this was due by Thursday :\]
1. What does it mean to have a walking God? It means a lot of things. To me, it presents a conundrum: I never quite believed in intelligent design. I mean, yes, I believe God created the world, but I've always had a hybrid theory, that God caused evolution or something. The ocular evidence provided by bones was more than my faith, I guess, when I invented this theory. But to have a walking God means that God actually did create us in His [again, gender issues aside] image and that his purpose may have been more selfish than, if you will, humanitarian. If he walked among us, also, it seems to imply, and this is definitely going to seem blasphemous, that it's possible for a human form. Perhaps this is endorsement for Christianity, even if I don't believe it myself? In addition, a walking God would mean that it [He] has a distinct form. We're supposed to be talking about images of God - mine has always been the fire-brimstone-clouds-and-lightning version of God, as opposed to the walking dude in some garden. I have to say, this question made me rething a lot of what I assumed I believed in fully before.
2. How do you feel about God as a king? I guess I've always sort of assumed that's how it was. If God is omnipotent, it's also feasible to imagine Him lording over all, sort of watching his subjects [with eyes? haha] from above. I don't really see if this would be a problem, but I'm not sure I like it. I'm an independent person about some things, and though I've always believed it to be true, the idea of a God who knows and sees all is sort of like my opinion about the Patriot Act: our free will and our choices are ours, so why are you intruding? I guess I'd have to meet this king to form a true opinion, or at least one that makes sense (:\) but I accept it, as I accept [but do not endorse] other things.
[P.S. Sorry, Josh, I had tonsss of work this week and I completely forgot this was due by Thursday :\]
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