Reform

[Raksha]

Quote:
I'm glad you came to a position of mutual respect with Bob X, but it could have happened sooner and with much less friction if you hadn't gotten your back up.
as indeed i dare say we could have done ourselves if you hadn't insisted on getting so unwarrantedly personal.

*I* am the one who so "unwarrantedly personal"? Really? Now THAT is just too much! Let me play back some of the crap you posted to me last week and we'll just see who got "unwarrantedly personal":

what i'm saying is that given that you think pretty much everyone in jewish history is a paternalistic liar or just plain fictional i don't really know why you're so keen to be a part of a club whose rules you despise, whose members you detest and whose history, culture and literature you consider to be the product of systematic falsification.

Taking everything you know about me into account--not just the one post or one part of a post you happen to take offense at--do you really believe this is an accurate description of my attitude towards Jews and Judaism? What really gets me is that "whose members you detest" part. You had no reason to say that whatsoever, and I don't think I've ever said anything comparable to you.

Or is that your famous "British humor" that I just don't get? If so, not get it, not want to get it and not think it's the least bit funny, I think it's just this side of abusive. You seem to think that if someone attacks your BELIEFS or the basis for your beliefs, that you are perfectly justified in attacking THEM.

Just how do you think I felt reading that distorted caricature of my attitude towards Judaism? I think you owe me an apology for that.

--Linda

 

[bananabrain]

*I* am the one who so "unwarrantedly personal"? Really? Now THAT is just too much! Let me play back some of the crap you posted to me last week and we'll just see who got "unwarrantedly personal"

Saying things like "equality need not equal homogeneity" instantly identifies you as a sexist, because that should go without saying. You should really know better than that.

I didn't realize until I read your notes on the other board that you're as much of a traditionalist as you are. Which means I haven't quite decided whether I even WANT your approval or not. I might actually be more comfortable with your disapproval. That would indicate to me that I'm on the right path...by my standards, of course.

As I said on the other board, it wasn't clear to me at first how much of a traditionalist you really are, and in a Jewish context a traditionalist is a sexist by definition. There is no such thing as "separate but equal" in ANY context, but especially not in traditional Judaism which is the great-granddaddy of all patriarchal religions. So I'm not going to apologize for calling you a sexist, although I was when I first started reading your note.

I know I said that earlier about Gatekeeper types in general, but now I'm saying it to you personally. ("There is nothing I despise more than a Gatekeeper, no form of human life lower than a self-appointed spiritual nanny who takes it upon himself to determine who may enter the inner sanctum and who may not.") ....I threw the sexist label at you because it fits, even better than I realized when I posted my earlier note which you quoted. Obviously I was giving you too much credit when I said, "You should know better."

so, who started getting personal with whom again?

Taking everything you know about me into account--not just the one post or one part of a post you happen to take offense at--do you really believe this is an accurate description of my attitude towards Jews and Judaism?

only if what you write is an accurate reflection of your opinions.

What really gets me is that "whose members you detest" part. You had no reason to say that whatsoever, and I don't think I've ever said anything comparable to you.

i refer you to your quoted remarks further up the thread. frankly, i struggle to see the difference between the vehemence of your contempt for traditionalism, orthodoxy and mainstream practice at each and every point and precisely what i wrote. if you *don't* detest these things, feel free to say so, but i'm only basing my conclusions on what you wrote, which was, to say the least, unequivocal.

Or is that your famous "British humor" that I just don't get? If so, not get it, not want to get it and not think it's the least bit funny, I think it's just this side of abusive.

i think i've been more than restrained considering the insults you've slung my way, despite having been on more than one occasion reminded of the famous comic character from viz magazine "millie tant and her radical conscience".

You seem to think that if someone attacks your BELIEFS or the basis for your beliefs, that you are perfectly justified in attacking THEM.

or, to put it another way, you can dish it out, but you don't seem keen on people responding in kind.

Just how do you think I felt reading that distorted caricature of my attitude towards Judaism?

just how do you think *i* felt reading the stuff you called me? i think i've been perfectly reasonable, all things considered. i don't think i've caricatured your positions (at least no more than they caricature themselves) and if i have been left with the impression i've been left with, you have only your own comments to thank for that.

I think you owe me an apology for that.

do you, now? have i asked *you* for one?

look, this has gone on long enough and has stopped being about reform, so unless you have anything else to add, perhaps we should close the thread.

b'shalom

bananabrain

 

[Raksha]

BB,

I don't want to close the thread because I haven't answered Avi's post yet. It's not likely I will answer your last one at all, and if so it won't be today.

--Linda

 

[Raksha]

Quote:
I think you owe me an apology for that.
do you, now? have i asked *you* for one?

BB,

No, you haven't asked me for an apology, but that doesn't mean I don't owe you one for those posts.

If you check the dates, you'll notice that those notes were all posted in late 2007 and early 2008, when I was a newbie here. While my loathing for patriachal Judaism (ALL patriarchal religion whatsoever, in fact) is every bit as intense as I've always said it is, I was wrong to single you out as the exemplar or embodiment of patriarchal Judaism just on the basis of superficialities, without knowing more about you.

You should understand that most of the time, when I realize I've done something wrong I try to apologize to the person I offended as soon as possible after I realize it was wrong. That's also what I taught my children, you know..."Repent now! Avoid the September rush!" In other words, don't save 'em all up for the 10 days before Yom Kippur, when I also neglected to apologize to you. Two years in a row, as a matter of fact.

Another thing: There is usually a certain time lag between actually my doing something wrong and realizing I've done something wrong, which can vary considerably. It can be anywhere from several hours to several months, depending on how defensive I am and how much the other person is contributing to the situation by piling on fresh irritants. But one thing really has nothing to do with the other. If I'm wrong I'm still wrong, regardless of whether the other person is being an a-hole or not.

But instead of apologizing to you directly, I left the forum and stayed away for about a year. In reality it was only about a week after I posted the last of those notes that I realized I was attacking you unfairly. For the record, I made a sin-offering in the form of a small donation to Arthur Waskow's Shalom Center, because I still had a little bit of money for such things at the time. Not any more, unfortunately.

I'm not going to try to defend those posts, because I know I was wrong to single you out like. I am not about to compound it by playing the blame game. I do have to say though that you make it very difficult for anyone to apologize to you. You can't seem to tell the difference between an attack on you personally and an attack on certain aspects of the tradition that you personally find meaning in but I don't. You respond to criticism of both with the same kind of abusive and often very personal sarcasm. That doesn't make "the tradition" look one bit more attractive to me than it did before...to say the least! It also makes it very hard to apologize to you for past sins, because then I get angry at you all over again and any inclination to apologize evaporates.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[Avi]

look, this has gone on long enough and has stopped being about reform, so unless you have anything else to add, perhaps we should close the thread.

BB, it seems like you want to close this thread, so after Linda gives her comment, you are welcome to do so, if you prefer.

On the other hand, there are some new ideas related to Reform Judaism which I would like to explore, and this would be a good thread to continue with that.

It seems that yourself and Dauer feel that denominational division is not a very important aspect in modern Judaism. As I learn more about the denominations I feel that they are actually very important, and they will not be easily combined or even transcended. As my own Jewish identity has grown the last few years, I have identified more strongly with Reform Judaism (even though I was born a Conservative Jew) and I would say the "progressive" or "radical" parts of Reform seem to interest me the most. I feel that they best match my scientific world view. As I have read more about Renewal and Reconstructionism, although there are some aspects of those denominations which I find very interesting, I find that I am drawn back to the powerful nature of fundamental change which Reform represents.

Having said that, if you do close the thread, and the ideas still move me, I can always start a Reform II thread .

 

[Raksha]

Avi and everyone,

Before I reply to any of the last posts here and before BB closes the thread, I'd like to share with you an interesting bit of synchronicity that has developed over the past two days. On November 27th at 3:01 a.m. PST I posted the following response to the conclusion of BB's long post:

It's late and I can't answer your whole post now, except to agree with you and say YES, I would be pleased by that. Furthermore, I consider that one of the truly unique aspects of Judaism--its saving grace you might say. I mean exactly what you're saying there: the concept that the right to challenge God has been given to us by God himself. It is clearly implied in the very word "Israel."

That is the central metaphor of one of the best poems I ever wrote, which I am in the process of trying to reconstruct. Unfortunately, I lost my copy of it in the chaos of my many relocations over the past 10 years. So far, I've been unable to retrieve it from any of the recipients (snail mail or e-mail) and haven't been able to fully reconstruct it either. I've "almost" got it, but not quite.

Right after I posted that, I read something else from another part of BB's post that irritated me, so I replied in a much less conciliatory tone. I ended my post by telling BB he owed me an apology. That provoked the predictable response, namely one MORE round in the endless blame game. BB responded by pointing out that I owed HIM an apology, although he had never asked for one. He dug up a whole bunch of inflammatory quotations from my early posts as newbie here to prove his point.

He won't see my "apology" post until Shabbat ends, but I bet he'll be surprised as hell when he does see it and discovers that I agree with him! What make me decide to post it is that I am getting ready for a major transition in my life.

If all goes according to plan, I will soon be moving from Southern California, where I have lived continuously since I was 11 years old, to Northern California--to Berkeley specifically. Berkeley, California has had a well-deserved reputation as a countercultural epicenter since the 1960s, which may be even MORE true now than it was then.

So I've been starting to go through my stuff to see how much I can get rid of. Last night I decided that any leftover guilt is just extra baggage and will weigh me down too much, so that's the first thing I needed to get rid of to lighten the load. And BB was right anyway, and furthermore I knew he was right!

So shortly after saying I wasn't going to respond for 24 hours (if at all), I changed my mind and posted an apology, which you can read a few posts before this one.

A signed off a few minutes after that, went into my cluttered bedroom (like the rest of this place) and began going through a box of miscellaneous unclassfiable odds and ends. In that box, I found two boxes of old 3 1/2 floppies that had somehow gotten separated from my other floppies. They date from late 1996 to 1999, when I had my old 486 computer, my first computer with a modem. They contain hundreds of old e-mails to my Prodigy Classic friends, many of whom are still my friends.

My second computer, an HB Pavilion with Windows Millennium Edition (which I HATE!) installed, is the one I got in 2000. It has a 3 1/2" floppy drive, so I was able to read those old e-mails and other writing.

I found the poem I've been searching for these past two months on one of those floppies!

I'm sure I found it less than two hours after I posted the apology to BB. Cause and effect? Obviously not, but the classic definition of synchronicity, i.e. a non-causal meaningful coincidence.

It's a damn good thing too, because now that I have read it over I realize I would never have been able to reconstruct it. I originally wrote it in 1984, and parts of it are nothing like the way I remember them.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[Dream]

I am moved by this apology, and I never believed that Raksha hated fundamentalists either. Maybe one or two particularly problematic individuals, but not in general. Sometimes we hurt the ones we love most while trying to be of assistance, and when they hurt us its just very hard to deal with. Its better to do try to do the right thing and make amends for mistakes than to do nothing at all, which is where most people make their mistake -- doing nothing at all. That's always been my weakness, so I'm impressed.

 

[Raksha]

I am moved by this apology, and I never believed that Raksha hated fundamentalists either. Maybe one or two particularly problematic individuals, but not in general.

Dream,

Actually, you're wrong. I really do hate fundies every bit as much as I say I do! But before I get myself in any more hot water on this forum or elsewhere, it would probably be a good idea--strictly as a matter of self-defense if nothing else--for me to be more specific as what I mean by a fundie or fundamentalist...and what I DON'T mean.

First of all, I DON'T mean BB, or a traditionalist in any other religion either. I don't even mean Thomas, as much as he irritates me. After all, there are plenty of people whose beliefs are more conservative than mine. Obviously I can't and don't hate all of them!

I know good and well BB isn't a fundie, but unfortunately I never bothered to make that clear to him. It's completely understandable that he thinks I'm lumping him in with the same extremists he argues with on the Spittoon and elsewhere, and that he'd pretty damn upset about it!

I think what I mean by a "fundie" is anyone whose belief system contains any element of theocracy, anyone who is SOOOO sure for whatever reason that their beliefs are an accurate reflection of "God's will" that they don't care how much they trample on the rights of others or how much misery they cause in the process. Many of them in fact repudiate the entire concept of human rights--it doesn't even exist for them.

Sharia law of course is the extreme example of what I'm talking about, but personally I think any manifestation of theocracy is hurtful and wrong, and the only way to deal with it is eternal vigilance.

It's one reason I've never had any desire to emigrate to Israel, although my sister was really pushing for it one time. She was trying to get our mother and my husband and me to emigrate so she wouldn't be alone there. But I'm such a strong believer in the separation of church and state I'm unwilling to live under any kind of theocracy--a Jewish one very much included! Even though my sister was well aware that "a religious Mafia runs the country," she was more willing to put up with their regressive divorce laws (for example) than I ever would have been. The really odd thing about all that is that she considered herself an atheist!

But this is gets into an area I began discussing with Saltmeister on another board before I got distracted by other issues. It's getting way too long and taking too much time anyway.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[Dream]

Raksha,

Who am I to tell you what you believe? Hatred is inconsistent with your actions. I thought that if you really hated fundamentalists, you'd leave them be. Why are you not able to do that? Lots of other people do it!

 

[Raksha]

Who am I to tell you what you believe? Hatred is inconsistent with your actions. I thought that if you really hated fundamentalists, you'd leave them be.

Dream,

I guess I'm a little bit addicted to hyperbole and overstatement. When it comes right down to it, I don't REALLY hate anyone unless they present an immediate threat to my life or the lives of others. Hardcore religious fanatics tend to fall into that category more often than others. Even then, I don't hate them any more than I'd hate a rabid dog who has to be shot on sight for the protection of the public. After all, that can also be true of an out-of-control violent schizophrenic, but I'd never say I hate such a person any more than you would.

Who do I hate? Who do I really and truly hate? Psychopaths. Neocons. Machiavellian types who cold-bloodedly manipulate the religious beliefs of others, beliefs they don't personally subscribe to, but promote endlessly in order to exploit sectarian differences. All for the sake of gaining power and more power over the world and everyone in it. What I really and truly hate are power trippers who can NEVER have enough!

With fundies I often come on extremely hostile in RL as well as online. I mean the people on street corners and in parks handing out tracts and so on. But even then, what I'm really trying to do is wake them up! I'm trying to get them to ask themselves (and me) what it is about them and their beliefs that could have engendered such hostility. And I'm more than willing to tell them if they do ask...or even if they don't!

That probably isn't a very good way of going about it, huh? But then it's pretty much a lost cause anyway. They are so locked into their closed-loop belief system, nothing and nobody can wake them up until/unless they are ready to wake up on their own.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[Raksha]

BB, it seems like you want to close this thread, so after Linda gives her comment, you are welcome to do so, if you prefer.

On the other hand, there are some new ideas related to Reform Judaism which I would like to explore, and this would be a good thread to continue with that.

It seems that yourself and Dauer feel that denominational division is not a very important aspect in modern Judaism. As I learn more about the denominations I feel that they are actually very important, and they will not be easily combined or even transcended. As my own Jewish identity has grown the last few years, I have identified more strongly with Reform Judaism (even though I was born a Conservative Jew) and I would say the "progressive" or "radical" parts of Reform seem to interest me the most.

Avi,

Getting back to the topic (finally!) I'm with you on this one. I just can't work up much enthusiasm for the whole idea of post-denominationalism. I think denominational differences are still valid and important, and I still self-identify as a Reform Jew. Not only did I grow up in that environment, but that's where my philosophical roots still are.

It's true that I am more mystically inclined than you, BUT that's my own personal choice, consistent with my natural inclinations. It is true that when I was in my teens I became intensely frustrated with the relentless rationalism of my religious environment, and the preoccupation with ethics as (apparently) the sum total of ALL spiritual aspiration. There just didn't seem to be any recognition of religious experience, and that frustrated me more than anything.

But none of that was because I disagreed in any way with the secular humanist approach of Reform Judaism. I accepted it completely and still do. As a matter of fact, in the last few decades as I have watched America become more polarized, as I've watched the fundie theocrats become more fanatical and overt in their hatred of secular humanism, I have come to value it that much more.

I took rationalism and secular humanism for granted in the old days, but I don't any more. They are still my "default" positions with regard to pretty much everything--the documents theory, the keeping of the commandments, the role of women in religious life, etc. It's true that I read everything about Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism that I can get my hands on, just like I always have. AND I love to investigate comparable estoteric traditions in other cultures and compare them...AND I have no inhibitions about adopting practices from other cultures either if I think they will work for me. It won't stop me if someone else considers me a heretic or an idolator for doing so.

BUT I'm quite capable of being a mystic on my own time and in my own way, thank you very much. I DON'T need somebody else's idea of what "true Judaism" is all about imposed on me and don't want to see it imposed on anyone else either.

To tie this in to what I was saying to Dream in my last couple of notes: Orthodox Judaism was the ONLY form of Judaism recognized in Israel until quite recently. I'm not sure how it is now, but in the 1980s the first attempts were made to build a Reform synagogue in Israel, and the haredi establishment fought it tooth and nail! They threw the book at them with zoning laws and everything else they could come up with. It was a lot easier to build a mosque or church in Israel than a Reform synagogue, because the haredim were determined to preserve their religious monopoly.

The Reform institutions in the U.S. retaliated by forming their own liberal Zionist channels for funding. They began asking themselves why should they continue throwing money at the religious Mafia, that not only refused to recognize them but actively opposed them? So they stopped doing it! Many of the affluent non-Orthodox donors began boycotting the religious Mafia, confining their donations to liberal Zionist organizations ONLY.

I remember how happy I was the first time I heard about that. I wondered why they didn't think of it a long time ago.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[bananabrain]

linda,

i'm rather moved by what you've written as well. thank you. i do appreciate it.

I do have to say though that you make it very difficult for anyone to apologize to you.

well, the thing is that i don't actually expect an apology, because i'm actually rather rarely offended. i have quite a thick skin - as you can imagine, i need to. however, that doesn't mean i don't have feelings.

You can't seem to tell the difference between an attack on you personally and an attack on certain aspects of the tradition that you personally find meaning in but I don't. You respond to criticism of both with the same kind of abusive and often very personal sarcasm.

i'm sorry if you've found my personal style caustic, although i think the word "abusive" is rather too strong. the web is a brusque medium, it conveys tone poorly.

I guess I'm a little bit addicted to hyperbole and overstatement.

in terms of confusing attacks on opinions with attacks on people, if i can't tell the difference, perhaps because of the obscuring nature of hyperbole and overstatement, then i tend to trust my own judgement in determining that the attacker has not been careful enough to distinguish the two. to my way of thinking, however, i do my best to avoid personal remarks where possible, although i will sometimes - as you've found out - address the issue in extremely robust terms. as a moderator, too, i cannot avoid the need to come down on what the moderators and the site owner see as unhelpful modes of engagement in terms of our our principal aim of promoting respectful, open dialogue - just as hyperbole and overstatement are not especially helpful in real-life dialogue, they are not especially so on the web either.

That doesn't make "the tradition" look one bit more attractive to me than it did before...to say the least!

i'm not trying to make it look attractive to you. i'm trying to explain why it is attractive to me, whilst at the same time not requiring me to compromise my rationality or critical faculties.

I think what I mean by a "fundie" is anyone whose belief system contains any element of theocracy, anyone who is SOOOO sure for whatever reason that their beliefs are an accurate reflection of "God's will" that they don't care how much they trample on the rights of others or how much misery they cause in the process. Many of them in fact repudiate the entire concept of human rights--it doesn't even exist for them.

i do believe my beliefs are an accurate reflection of the Divine Will for me at any rate - but i would have the same difficulty as you would with the "SOOOO sure" end of things, let alone the trampling and the misery-causing, as it seems pretty clear to me that this is about as forbidden as it gets - "you shall not oppress the stranger, for you were strangers in egypt" - i don't think we should be trying to argue with that. i'm not sure i would agree with the current *formulations* of human rights exactly, but the concept as a whole is part of halakhah - just as it is also a part of shari'a.

Sharia law of course is the extreme example of what I'm talking about, but personally I think any manifestation of theocracy is hurtful and wrong, and the only way to deal with it is eternal vigilance.

in which case, i'd be interested in your reactions to the following piece:

why it is wrong to talk about “banning shari’a law”

which i was also asked to summarise for one of our national (left-wing) broadsheets:

There can be no 'banning of sharia law' | Bananabrain | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

With fundies I often come on extremely hostile in RL as well as online. I mean the people on street corners and in parks handing out tracts and so on. But even then, what I'm really trying to do is wake them up! I'm trying to get them to ask themselves (and me) what it is about them and their beliefs that could have engendered such hostility. And I'm more than willing to tell them if they do ask...or even if they don't!

yes, but that's also what *they* think they're doing for you. empathy works both ways.

If all goes according to plan, I will soon be moving from Southern California, where I have lived continuously since I was 11 years old, to Northern California--to Berkeley specifically.

i wish you a nesi'ah tobah and good luck.

I found the poem I've been searching for these past two months on one of those floppies!

after all this, i feel i'd rather like to see it! if you're not keen to post it in public and if you feel comfortable doing so, you can PM it to me. great passion often creates great art and you certainly have passion.

It seems that yourself and Dauer feel that denominational division is not a very important aspect in modern Judaism. As I learn more about the denominations I feel that they are actually very important, and they will not be easily combined or even transcended.

actually, i don't disagree with this at all, i just don't feel that they're important enough to stop me talking to anyone i dam' well please about anything i dam' well like. i also agree that they won't be easily transcended, but that is no reason not to think it should be all the same and begin to look at the challenge. as it says in the Mishnah, "the work is hard, the day is long and the Master of the house is impatient...."

b'shalom

bananabrain

 

[Raksha]

Quote:
I found the poem I've been searching for these past two months on one of those floppies!
after all this, i feel i'd rather like to see it! if you're not keen to post it in public and if you feel comfortable doing so, you can PM it to me. great passion often creates great art and you certainly have passion.

BB,

That might be a good compromise...MAYBE. It was in order to publish it on my blog that I was so frantically searching for it, and yet now that I no longer have the excuse that I can't find it, I am seriously getting cold feet about the whole project. I'm engaging in the most ridiculous stalling tactics that don't even fool ME! As soon as I found it on the floppy, I copied it out longhand from the screen so that no matter what happens, I won't lose it again.

It has been a couple of days now since I found it, and I haven't even transcribed it yet. If I send it to you by PM that will at least force me to get it on the computer I'm using now. It has never been published before, although years ago I sent it to two people I particularly wanted to see it. Both of them are rabbis. Both of them understood where I was coming from and loved the poem, as I half-expected they would or I never would have shared it with them.

But you aren't like either one of them, and you have a very bad habit of mistaking my intentions. You did that when I tried to tell you about my channeling, thinking I was being political or polemical, and you responded to me on that level. YOU COMPLETELY MISUNDERSTOOD ME, and you hurt me very deeply in the process. I immediately regretted bringing up the subject with you at all.

This poem, more than anything else I've ever written except the Sophia poems, is so deeply personal that I would be taking a huge risk by sending it to you. And you are also taking a risk by asking me to send it to you, although of course that depends on how much my opinion matters to you. If you misundertand me and hurt me in that way again, by mistaking a statement of gnosis kardias for a "political" or polemical statement, and if you respond to it as if it were, I am not likely to have a very high opinion of your discernment from that point on.

It is above all a statement of experience, so therefore any judgments on either the experience itself or my response to it would be completely inappropriate and insensitive.

B'shalom,
Linda

 

[bananabrain]

i've now received the poem. i think it's a good way to sign off this thread. avi, if you want to start talking about reform, please go ahead and start a "reform II" thread.

b'shalom

bananabrain