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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (84164)	9/13/2008 7:31:14 PM
From: freelyhovering	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541759

I agree with some of what you say as I have never felt a need to believe. My family was normally neurotic and frustrating but also very secure. My Grandfather studied to be a Rabbi in Russia but had to escape the Kossacks with his twin brother who was an early Bolshevick (1905). While my Grandfather was very religious and I was exposed to Jewish Holiday services as a youth, my Bar Mitzvah was an unpleasant experience because of the family pressure and my interest in after school sports rather than going to Hebrew School to prepare. My son has had a much more positive view of religion as his Bar Mitzvah was a very informative experience for him and us. I think he believes in God but in a very personal way.(By the way, he insisted that if he had to go prepare for his Bar Mitzvah, he demanded that we had to take a class also. We complied and the class we took, "The Old Testament from beginning to End" was a very stimulating experience and consisted of weekly discussions, led by a female lay Rabbi, whose profession was Law and included a very lively group of people from many walks of life. We read through the Books of the Old Testament, trying to understand why they were written, challenging many passages as either contextual necessities of the life of the times in which they were written, or strangely out of tune with the main themes of Judaism as The Book of Job is. It still remains an embarrassment that God would make a bet with the Devil and put Job through such agony. ((see my recent post on "Steambath" for a similar attitude)) Also we discovered that some passages came from pre-monotheistic, rather primitive practices that were just blended into the main thread of the Bible. Probably surprising to some but not those who have really studied the Old Testament objectively, there were many writers, including J, a female, who wrote many of the important passages. While my wife and I might like to continue such an experience, it is not compelling with all the other satisfying and demanding activities that we have in our life.) In college, my son occasionally goes to Friday night services at a very orthodox synagogue because the Chabad Rabbi(an unusual 'sect'of Judaism: en.wikipedia.org his college has a brilliant sense of humor, perfect for young college men, and after the Friday night services, shares a bit of another kind of spirits with them. <g> Now, tho not believing in God, I consider myself to be quite spiritual and express it through TaiChiChuan, Meditation Mindfulness and being a relatively kind Humanist who somehow has incorporated most of what the 10 Commandments teach us. It's enough for me though I'm sure many would say that I will not get to heaven. It is not my most pressing concern. In terms of death, I think the thing that troubles me most is separation from the people I love and enjoy. I have no fantasies of meeting them again someday. My experience with them right now is very precious and enough.