casualstarunknown

[casualstarunknown]

Saw a video of a beekeeper snapping in half a parasitical insecte which had invaded a bee hive.

It hit me that being a bee keeper amounts to being a bee God.

Do they pray when God lifts the world's roof and light pours in, I wonder.

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the thing about antisemitism that offends me the most (outside of, you know, horrific violence) is the sense of *ownership* over judaism from non-jewish, especially (in my experience) christian, society. it’s the evangelicals holding seders and the atheists casually joking about “YHWH”. it’s the sense that to them, jews are nothing but a prequel. we are irrelevant, and therefore in the public domain. in more overt examples, it’s holocaust inversion and jokes about “the goyim”. they look at us and say, “all that was yours now belongs to me.” it’s the assumption that our life and culture is open to all, and that we are somehow greedy by not letting them have it.

when we do exist to christian society, it’s as a means to an end: “good thing the jews are still around, otherwise how would they all be gathered in zion?”, or its being treated as a relic, as living replicas of the Old Times: “those silly jews, they’re stuck living in the past!”

it’s dehumanizing, and frustrating, and i hate it.

we had avraham first. we had yaakov and sarai and it is. still. ours. you shouldn’t get to pretend like we don’t exist anymore. we aren’t extinct, no matter how hard some people wished we were, and that isn’t going to change.

[casualstarunknown]

I've been doing a lot of reflection as of late, especially after this past class.

This past class was about the Torah and Tanakh in general, and the way the rabbi talked about the commandments (specifically the ten commandments) has made me really reflect on how I interpret them, specifically the fifth commandment, or honoring your mother and father.

This is a commandment I have wrestled with for a long time - in fact, it brought me away from g-d at multiple times. I was severely abused when I was incredibly young by my mother, and I used to feel insulted at the implication that I were to honor her while she got to live a better life. It was hypocritical, in my eyes.

But this rabbi surmised that this particular commandment was because parenthood is an act of creation, something that is like the g-d from which we come from. My realization is this: I don't think we're necessarily meant to take even these commandments literally.

I this particular commandment is more of a call to honor creation - creation is a gift, and like any gift, many people simply will not like it and will discard it. The person who abused me created me, but she did not honor creation. She didn't honor me, but I can still honor it.

I have started to honor creation much more. I'm too young, too unstable, not mature enough to be a father (though I fantasize about it), but I create all the time. I create relationships, I create with my hands through crochet. I create memories, I create my world. And I can honor who I am and where I came from that made me who I am. I've been learning one of the mother tongues of my family (Italian, since part of my family originates there) and it was judaism that inspired me to do this.

I don't think g-d wants me to honor my abuser. I think He wants me to remember the Holy action of creation. When I am a father, that act of creation will be Holy, and indeed, I am already joyful about the thought.

I have seen many people struggle with this particular commandment, but I think this perspective helps me personally. I don't think I ever have to forgive my abusers (plural), and I don't think I am commanded to simply because they happened to be family. I am commanded to recognize the holy, to elevate the mundane. In doing so, I will remember g-d. Through creation, I honor g-d and everything he has done for us, for me, and for our collective people.

[casualstarunknown]

"You Missed the Point by Idolizing Them" Starter Pack

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“…I discovered - to my great surprise and delight - that Judaism not only permits questions, it sometimes even requires them. It happened during a study session with my rabbi, a pious and solemn soul. I was answering question after question that he posed me, as I had done each week for nearly a year. Suddenly he posed a problem to which I could not respond. “Don’t you know the answer?” He asked. “I know the answer,” I finally replied, “but I do not agree with it.” This ever stern rabbi underwent a total transformation. Elated, he rose from his desk and, with his eyes shining and his voice booming, banged his fist upon the table. “Baruch Hashem!” He shouted. “Bless the Lord! You are finally thinking like a Jew!””

—

Your People, My People: How to Find Acceptance and Fullfiment as a Jew By Choice - Lena Romanoff with Lisa Hostein. Preface. (via keshetchai)

I still love this. :) 

(via keshetchai)

[casualstarunknown]

You know, something I love about being Jewish that I don’t think you can appreciate to its fullest possible extent unless you were an evangelical first is how much Judaism REJOICES.

Like. I grew up in this atmosphere where Jesus is the most wonderful thing ever (and don’t you forget it), such that very simple pleasures were to be shunned. Don’t get so excited over rain, it’s idolatry. Put Jesus first. You like how Starbucks tastes? Why aren’t you praying instead of running the risk that people will think of you as someone who likes coffee? (You think I’m joking. I’M NOT JOKING. That is an actual thing that was actually said to me at an actual revival.) You’re supposed to be grateful for everything, but it’s in this extremely slavish way where everything ends up sounding like “oh have mercy on us because we experienced a moment of enjoyment when we’re such putrid worms, Jesus.”

Meanwhile Judaism is like. Go dance in the rain! G-d is glad you’re enjoying it! Loved the eclipse? Awesome! There’s a blessing for that! Blessed are you, G-d, who put coffee beans on this earth so I could have a brew this morning, it was really good. Check out that weird rock! What a wonderful world we live in, that has rocks like that!

Of course this can be loved and enjoyed and appreciated without having lived in a culture of death first. But there truly is something to be said about coming from a culture that lionizes death and self-degradation into a culture of such LIFE.

Anyway, I was driving home this morning and the clouds were sitting on top of the mountains. Isn’t it lovely, to live in a world where we get to appreciate that?

[casualstarunknown]

I've always admired how the Jewish tagline for a deceased person is "May their memory be a blessing." It's a sober appraisal that the loved one is gone, and while that's sad, the rest of us are still alive, and we have to keep on living. All we have is their memory to sustain us.

It's a simple and honest reaction to the finality of death. You don't long to join them in death. You don't wish they'd still be here.

I mean "rest in peace" isn't bad, but it does subtly allude to a belief that that person lives on in some form. Requiescat Pace is talking about someone, not of someone. It's hoping that this person rest in peace (in the next life). I prefer the Jewish position that focuses on the memory of the person. That is, not their soul, not their alleged afterlife, but how we carry them with us and how we honor them as we go on living. Judaism is so much more focused on life and the sanctity thereof, than on death.

And that's to say nothing of this nonsense I've been seeing lately like "glory to the martyrs," that just gets a failing grade immediately in my book. Ahem 👀

[casualstarunknown]

i wanna rip into the flesh of the divine with dog-like teeth and see if disguising myself in their blood will make them consider me holy

[casualstarunknown]

I do have an interest in theology and religion history. My most recent "discovery" was Judaism. It was Islam five years ago, New Age witchcraft before that, all the way back to Egyptian polytheism when I was a kid.

When I show I have even the most basic knowledge of Judaism and Jewish culture, most of the non-Jews around me react weirdly. It is hard to point down exactly, but it looks like wariness and uncertainty, like they don't know where I stand suddenly in their worldview.

Nowadays, I refrain from revealing that interest to people who don't already know. Especially after October 7. I've been accused of supporting Israel by a friend just because I told him people could convert to Judaism.

How insane is it, that as a non-jew, I don't feel comfortable revealing I have basic knowledge of Jewish history and theology?

I can only imagine the barrage of ignorance and passive aggression Jewish people have to endure from non-jews, the "but in the Torah they say *insert smth from the Talmud uncovered or out of historical context*". At least me, they don't try to convert me or convince me that Judaism is a bad religion.

And people ask me why I feel for Jewish people.

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guys if they have Christmas in the Dream SMP, did they have to nail Jesus on the cross three times, once for every canon life?

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i have so much rage in me one day i think i will explode. i dont think i know how to forgive as much as i know how to forget

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do fish ever get to repent? or are they doomed to swim around forever bearing the sins we have tossed to them to consume over the many years?

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an incomplete collection of tweets i consider to be short poems

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Cookies represent the body of Santa while the milk represents the blood of Santa

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its christmas eve and look whos on tumblr

all of us

[casualstarunknown]

everytime god closes a door, thats a challenge. god doesnt think u got what it takes to smash that door to splinters. but god doesnt know you. god doesn't know you fuck doors like that for breakfast. no. god has no fucking clue at all.