explorations-in-judaism - Tumblr blog

[explorations-in-judaism]

Isn't the mitzvah covering your head, not necessarily wearing a kippah? If your hood covers your head, I feel like no modifications would be necessary

quick halachic question:

can the hood of a sweatshirt count as a kippah? if it's cut off the sweatshirt? what if i made the edges nice and round?

if not and i need to make it smaller or something, at what point in my tailoring would it cease being a hoodie and start being a kippah?

[explorations-in-judaism]

Guess who's now officially a conversion candidate!

[explorations-in-judaism]

[grabs your shirt] listen. listen to me. the practical is holy. the everyday is sacred. the simple act of surviving is divine. do you get it? sanctity begins at home, in the hands that build and the lives we live and the deaths we die and the worms that eat our bodies. if making something by hand is not worthy of veneration then nothing is.

[explorations-in-judaism]

[explorations-in-judaism]

A general tip for students who are sending those dreaded Religious Absence Emails to your professors: Rather than asking permission to take the day(s) off, politely let them know that you will be taking the day(s) off.

In other words, consider not saying this:

"May I miss class on [date] so I can observe [holiday]?"

It's not that there's anything wrong with the above, per se. But because it's phrased as a request, it risks coming across as optional — a favor you hope to be granted. Problem is, favors are not owed, and so unfortunately asking permission opens the door for the professor to respond "Thanks for asking. No, you may not. :)"

Instead, try something along the lines of:

"I will need to miss class on [date] because I will be observing [holiday]. I wanted to let you know of this conflict now, and to ask your assistance in making arrangements for making up whatever material I may miss as a result of this absence."

This is pretty formal language (naturally, you can and should tweak it to sound more like your voice). But the important piece is that, while still being respectful, it shifts the focus of the discussion so that the question becomes not "Is it okay for me to observe my religion?", but rather, "How can we best accommodate my observance?"

Because the first question should not be up for debate: freedom of religion is a right, not a favor. And the second question is the subject you need to discuss.

(Ideally, do this after you've looked up your school's policy on religious absences, so you know what you're working within and that religious discrimination is illegal. Just in case your professor forgot.)

[explorations-in-judaism]

“There’s a great Yiddish expression that says, “If I knew God, I’d be God.” In fact, I think that claiming that you “know God’s will” is an act of incredible hubris. Instead, what we say about God has much more to say about us than about God. There are, in fact, a whole range of different theologies within Judaism (you can find some of them in the terrific books “Finding God” and “The God Upgrade,” both of which describe a whole range of differing, and sometimes even conflicting, theologies.) And while I can only speak personally here, to me, “God” isn’t really a noun at all—it’s a verb. Here’s why. The most common name that God gives Godself in the Torah is “YHWH,” a name that is sometimes thought to be so holy that no one was allowed to pronounce it. But that’s not exactly right—it’s not that “YHWH” was not allowed to be pronounced, it’s that it is literally unpronounceable, since it consists of four Hebrew vowels (yod, hay, vav and hay). By the way, that’s also why some people incorrectly call this name “Yahweh,” since (as Rabbi Lawrence Kushner once said), if you tried to pronounce a name that was all vowels, you’d risk serious respiratory injury. But even more importantly, the name YHWH is actually a conflation of all the tenses of the Hebrew verb “to be.” God’s name could be seen as “was-is-will be,” so God isn’t something you can’t capture or name—God is only something you can experience. And indeed, when Moses is at the burning bush, having just been told by God that he will be leading the Israelites out of Egypt, he says, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?” God responds that God’s name is “Ehyeh asher ehyeh,” which is often translated as “I am what I am.” But it could also be translated as, “I am what I will be.” So God is whatever God will be—we simply have no idea. Indeed, for my own theology, I believe that God is found in the “becoming,” transforming “what will be” into “what is.””

— Rabbi Geoffrey A. Mitelman

[explorations-in-judaism]

“The entire Torah is names of God.

In Hebrew the word kore means both "read" and "call."

When we read the Torah, we are not only reading, but also calling God by name,

And God calls back.

During the Torah reading we are passive,

We don't say anything

We don't respond at all

Only listen.

From within the congregation one rises,

The Torah reader,

And calls God in the name of us all,

And the Holy Blessed One calls back in response.

Torah reading is the time in our prayer when we stop for a moment,

We cease saying our part in the prayer,

And listen to what the Holy Blessed One has to tell us this week.

This is not the time for ideas about the weekly reading,

Or for studying the Torah's commentaries,

Rather for the Torah reading, for the calling:

A time for listening to Divine speech

Bursting from the Torah.

We direct our hearts to listen to the reading,

To awaken, to evoke the ancient words,

To transform the reading to a calling,

To hear the Torah calling to us.”

— Dov Singer, Prepare My Prayer, Page 183.

[explorations-in-judaism]

being religious is fun and sexy, actually, sorry that organized religion wasn't for you, but that has nothing to do with me ❤️

[explorations-in-judaism]

“Prayer is wider than the earth and deeper than the seas.

It hovers over the pages of the prayer book

Whispered from one person to the next

Given over through the beats of the heart.

It is revealed through the flow of life

In a state of consciousness, in the quality of speech.

Often we direct our prayer

Toward our God in Heaven

Or perhaps to the God who fills all worlds.

Prayer invites us to direct it internally, Inward.

From my flesh I saw God

To speak to the body

With enormous mercy

To uncover the light within it

To turn to it, to thank it, to request of it, to entreat it,

To pray through it.”

— Dov Singer, Prepare My Prayer, Page 98-99.

[explorations-in-judaism]

Thinking about how G-d literally transed Adam's gender

[explorations-in-judaism]

"How can you say you do not believe in G-d just because you do not see him?

But in the forest, you see a footprint of a bear, do you not believe that there was a bear there even though you do not see it? Do you not continue to look for that bear even if it is unclear how long ago it left that print?

We look around at everything around us. We see His footprints. Should we not believe in Him? Should we not continue to look for Him?"

--This was something my boss at work said once. He was remembering religious school when he was growing up in Pre-revolutionary Iran when they were allowed to learn about other religions.

I thought it was a beautiful way to look at things.

[explorations-in-judaism]

explains a lot really

[explorations-in-judaism]

“Let us strip the “they-of-all-people” argument down to its very basics: gentiles telling Jews that we killed six million of your people and that as a result it is you, not us, who have lessons to learn; that it is you, not us, who need to clean up your act. It is an argument of atrocious, spiteful insanity. Do not accept it; turn it back on those who offer it. For it is us, not you, who should know better.”

—

Chas Newkey-Burden, Oy Va Goy (via firefly-in-the-dark)

Truth.

[explorations-in-judaism]

Really sucks how shabbat is the hardest to get together when you need it most

[explorations-in-judaism]

Does anyone know of any places to read about the first and second intifadas in Israel with minimal bias?

I'd like to learn more but the Wikipedia page seemed really biased against Israel so I'd like a 2nd opinion