Fingernails

Rabbi Dude says:

There is a ridiculous obsession some people have with gathering up their finger- and toe-nails after trimming, wrapping them carefully, and depositing them into the bin. Either that or burning them. And why? Because "it says" (although the exact source I cannot say, as all I've ever heard is "it says," and no-one has ever been able to put a name to "it" for me... any of you know it, by chance?) that loose nails can cause miscarriages. Wherever "it says" that, the whole point is being missed: trimmed nails are not being singled out because they're particularly dangerous per se, but quite the opposite: because that little shard of keratin is about as harmless an object as one could imagine.
We are being taught a lesson as to just how careful we have to be: what’s the most harmless item you can think of? A fingernail. Given that most people dispose of their fingernails after trimming rather than just leaving them lying around, what’s the chance that a nail would accidentally get lost if one took no extraordinary care to prevent it? Not too great. And what’s the chance a fingernail, dropped randomly somewhere on the floor of a home, would wind up under someone’s foot? Small. Even then, what’s the chance the person would be walking around barefoot? Small. And what’s the chance that, even if a barefooted person were to happen to step on a stray fingernail, that he’d get the point of it rather than the smooth side? Very small. And what’s the chance that, even if one were to step on a fingernail, and were to get the sharp side, that it would even be noticeable? Small. And what’s the chance that, even if it were noticeable, it’d cause any pain? Very small. And what’s the chance that that pain would be severe? Minimal. And what’s the chance that the person stepping on it would be female? One in two. And what’s the chance that, even if she were female, she’d also be pregnant? Small. And what’s the chance that the severe pain caused by stepping barefoot on the sharp side of a stray fingernail at just the wrong angle could induce a miscarriage? Practically negligible.
So--after all that--what’s the chance that a fingernail could actually cause a miscarriage? The mathematical field of probability tells us that the answer is "not too great" times "small" times "small" times "very small" times "small" times "very small" times "minimal" times one-half times "small" times "practically negligible." In mathematical terms, that can be simplified to (G)(S^4)(V^2)(M)(N)/2. In plain English: it ain’t gonna happen.
The lesson we are being taught is that, no matter how unlikely a sitauation is, one has to be prepared. If one really cares about doing the right thing and is truly sincere about keeping his obligations properly, he will be prepared for any possibility that may conceivably arise, no matter how unlikely or obscure. Just how careful should we be about preventing harm to others? We should be meticulous to the point that we won’t even leave our fingernails lying around!
Now don’t get me wrong here: I’ve no objection to the custom of wrapping up fingernails and disposing of them carefully per se--after all, no matter how improbable it may be, it does ultimately prevent the possibility of harm--but it’s rather disturbing that so many people would go to such lengths to prevent such an unlikely cause of damage while simultaneously displaying such utter lack of concern for truly realistic situations.
Then again, I guess I shouldn’t cast people as callous in that respect. They probably aren’t wrapping up their fingernails because of concern for a remote likelihood of physical danger, but because they truly believe it is extraordinarily probable. After all, if "it says" that one should be careful about fingernails, it must be that they somehow pose a greater danger than one might normally expect. And that is what is so terribly distressing to me: believing that there’s something special about fingernails, that they’re singled out by the unnamed "it says" because they’re particularly and inexplicably dangerous, shows a certain degree of ignorance and a tendency we see far too often in today’s world to accept without questioning, to believe without thinking, and to do without knowing why.

Learning Tora--knowing the mind of God--means developing our logical skills, not merely learning lists of rules. Understanding, not just knowing, is the goal.

"God Hates Gays"

Rabbi Dude says:
No, he doesn’t.


What? You need more than that? Oh, all right:
As we’ve already said, God created the world in order to have someone else to whom to give. But receiving without earning is meaningless, so he created requirements to earn reward. In order for this system to work, there has to be a desire to do something bad; otherwise, what’s the difficulty? So God created within each person a desire to do the wrong thing. For some it may be cheating on his taxes, for some it may be murder, for some it may be homosexuality; each person has his own obstacles to overcome in life, and it is the surmounting of one’s own desires that earns him his reward.
It’s axiomatic, though, that any system which rewards good actions much have punishment for wrongdoings.
Now, the truth is that God really wants us all to earn our reward; we were only created in the first place because of God’s infinite capacity for love and giving. As such, when God punishes a person for doing something wrong, it’s not because of a vengeful desire to make someone pay; God’s not a two-year old. It’s done with the intent that a person should learn his lesson and return to the proper path. If a father sends his young son to bed early because he ran into the street by himself, you can be sure it’s not because the father feels hatred over his son’s action; it’s because the father loves the son and wants him always to be safe; he feels a burning need to impress upon his dear boy the importance of waiting for a grown-up to take him across the street. Maybe he’ll think about when he went to bed early the next time he gets the idea to run into the street on his own again.
God wants only what’s best for us, and always gives us exactly what we need to help us achieve our best. We may not always understand why what God wants is what’s best, but the child doesn’t get why he can’t cross the street on his own, either. We, as adults, realise that we know better than our children; so too does God know better than we do. We need only trust him and follow his directions and we will do well.

The History of the World

"Why would a perfect God create a world with so much evil in it?"

Rabbi Dude says:

A classic question, it is, and a very good question at that. But anyone who asks that question is missing an even greater point: why would a perfect God need to create a world at all?
God is the ultimate good. He is therefore the embodiment of the ultimate of everything that is good: the loving, caring, giving. Problem is this, though: when you’re the only existence, you can’t love anyone else, care for anyone else, give to anyone else; there’s no-one else to love, for whom to care, for whom to give!
So God created a world and beings in order to have someone else to whom to give. But just receiving without earning is pointless; therefore he created requirements to earn reward in order to make reward meaningful. He created initially one man and one woman and gave them a single commandment: don’t eat the fruit. You follow the instruction, you’ve earned the reward. You eat, you’ve failed the test and lost your chance at the reward. Hence the threat of death for failure.

Well, the man failed, but he was repentant, so God altered the punishment: the man would still die, but his death would be delayed a few hundred years and his life would be difficult. He was sent from his home in the garden of ‘éden and given a few new commandments. Man would have to lead a spiritual life, and, now that there were going to be other people in the world, Man would have to learn to get along peacefully with each other. Therefore, there were six commandments given:

• Do not worship idols
• Do not curse God
• Do not murder
• Do not steal
• Do not engage in any of six prohibited sexual relations: with one’s mother, with one’s father’s wife (even after divorce or death), with one’s maternal sister, with a married woman, with another man, or with an animal.
• Establish courts to enforce the other commandments and to keep the peace.

In the time of Enosh, the first man’s grandson, the human race made a terrible mistake: they decided that, since God had created the sun, moon, stars, et cetera, to serve him and to carry out his will, it was fitting to give them respect (just as one would show respect to the ministers of a king today). That, they thought, was what God wanted from them. However, that was not what God wanted, nobly-intentioned as it may have been. Furthermore, their miscalculation in the matter produced horrendous results: eventually Man forgot about God and thought their idols themselves were the powers. Once the prohibition on idolatry had ceased to be observed and God was no longer in their everyday lives, there was nothing to stop the violation of the other five, and the world became corrupt to no end. God decided, therefore, that there was no more purpose in keeping the world going, as there was no-one earning reward anymore. There was however, one man who still behaved himself properly: Noah.

Noah was a righteous man, perfect within his generation, and he walked in the ways of God. As such, God decided not to destroy the world outright, but instead to spare Noah and his family (who were also righteous like he) and start over from them. This he did, and he gave Noah one concession when he left his boat: he could now eat meat (until that point, the human race had been entirely vegetarian). This was a concession out of necessity driven by the fact that people had been worshiping animals and engaging in sexual intercourse with them, the rationale being that if you’re eating them you probably won’t be worshiping them or having sex with them. After all, you don’t eat your god, and you don’t sleep with your dinner.
However, as they say, with power comes responsibility. "I’m giving you the right to eat other animals, but don’t be cruel to them; at least have the decency to kill them first." There we have the seventh commandment:

• Do not eat flesh torn from a live animal.

These seven commandments are incumbent upon all Mankind.

But a few generations later the whole world had gone off track again. The (now) seven commandments had been thrown aside and God had been forgot once more. And once more there was one man named Avram (well, he wasn’t the only one this time) who recognised God as the creator and ruler of the world. This time, however, instead of destroying the world, God said to him, "OK, Avram, if you choose me, I choose you back. Now go out and tell the rest of the world about me." So Avram was chosen to be the PR agent, spreading the word around that there’s a God and teaching others to live according to his commandments.
In order to accomplish this, however, Avraham (as his name had been changed) was himself given a higher standard to which to live. Whereas the commandments we are given are for the purpose of reaching higher levels of spirituality and, consequently, of reward, the more commandments one is given, the greater one’s spirituality capacity. As such, Avraham’s higher calling was reflecting by the fact that he was given an additional commandment: circumcision. This commandment was not meant for the entire world, but only for Avraham and his descendants.
The son of Avraham, Yitzhak, continued in his father’s footsteps (sadly, his other son, Yishma’él, did not make the cut) and was given another commandment to build on his father’s increased sanctity. His son Ya’akov continued his work (again, the other brother–‘ésaw–did not make it) and was given yet another commandment. Ya’akov (also known as Yisraél) then took his family to Egypt, where his twelves sons developed into twelve branches of a very extended family. While there, the family of Léwi focused on keeping them in their ways of spirituality even through their enslavement by the Egyptains, and the nascent nation of Yisraél received even more commandments through their prophets. Eventually, the nation were taken out by God himself, in keeping with his promise to Avraham, and were given the remainder of their commandments, bringing the grand total to six hundred thirteen: two hundred forty-eight positive commandments ("do this"), and three hundred sixty-five negative commandments ("don’t do this").

The intrinsic difference between the laws of Yisraél and those of the other nations is the level of dedication to spirituality. For a goy, the seven commandments entail a roughly "don’t destroy the world" sort of approach to Life. For a Jew, the commandments form an all-encompassing lifestyle, as there is not a single aspect of Life not governed by Jewish law.
For a goy, God is meant to be brought into one’s life. For a Jew, God is one’s life.
The place of the nation of Yisraél (or the "Jewish People," as we’re usually called today) is to use our higher dedication to God’s mission to teach and to encourage others to live their lives properly.

Reform

"It’s a modern age. We just cannot continue to live according to the antiquated laws of the Tora. It’s time to leave the old way and to take a step forward into the Present."

Rabbi Dude says:

Why? For years the Tora was fine; why change it now? Before the Reform movement was founded in the early 1800's, there was simply no such thing as a Jew who was not observant. It was a given: Jews kept the Tora. Jews did not eat food that was not kashér. Jews did not work on Shabat. Jews prayed thrice daily. Jews did not marry goyim and kept to the restrictions regarding marital relations. Jews observed the Jewish holidays and did not observe the Christian or Muslim holidays. Sure, there was the odd one out--the one who went astray--but, as a whole, the nation of Yisraél were resolute in our observance of the Tora and its commandments.
So what changed? Why is it that until the 1800's no-one saw a need to drop the Tora’s "antiquated laws" but now you do? How is anything different today than it was yesterday? What happened that made the Tora acceptable for thousands of years but unacceptable now? Why was it that keeping the Tora was fine through the forty years in the desert, through the Kena’anite skirmishes, through the Assyrian wars, through the Babylonian expulsion, through the Persian exile, through the Greek occupation, through the Roman subjugation, through the Crusades, through the spread of Islam, through the forced dialogues, through the Spanish Inquisition, through the pogroms and the blood libels, but now it’s "the old way"? Why is today the dividing line between the old time and the new? What changed?

Nothing changed. If the Tora lasted three thousand years, then it’s just as good today, too. If it’s not working today, then it wasn’t so great for those three thousand years, either. But no-one complained or found fault with the Tora then. Three thousand years and no one complains: that seems to me to be proof positive that the Tora is good enough for us. If, over all those years, no-one thought it unacceptable, but you do now, then the fault isn’t with the Tora.

It’s with you.

Giraffe Steak

"Why don't we eat giraffe?"

Rabbi Dude says:

If you’ve lived even a semi-Jewish life for more than a year or so, you’re bound to have heard of the reason: "because we’re not sure where to slaughter it." After all, the giraffe has such a long neck that, even though it is technically kashér (being a ruminant with split hooves), it’s impossible practically to eat it.

Nonsense.

Anatomy is anatomy, and all vertebrate animals have the same basic anatomical structure. It only stands to reason, therefore, that if you can find a point on one animal's body, you should be able to find the corresponding point on any other animal's body.
But that's only assuming we're looking for a single point. In fact, the appropriate place to slaughter animals is not one particular point, but anywhere within a defined range of the trachea and esophagus. As such, it turns out that the giraffe is actually the easiest animal to slaughter: the range is about two centimetres long on a pigeon and about fifteen on a cow, but it's around two metres on a giraffe.

So why don't we eat giraffe? Above all else, because it's illegal. The giraffe is a protected species through most of its range.
Even in those areas where the giraffe is not protected by law, the price would be outrageous. You'd have to go to Africa, find one, capture it in a way it wouldn't become a teréfa (if it weren't already), restrain it (and they are very wild animals), get its neck to a suitable position for slaughtering (or yourself to the neck), drain the blood, cover the blood (and that's a lot of blood), butcher it, soak and salt the meat, and ship it back home. If the authorities in your home country would even allow you to bring it in at all, the import duties would be stupendous. And then you'd still have to find people willing to buy it. By the time you're done with it all you'd be paying $1000. per kilogram for giraffe steak. Is it worth it?
Add to this the fact that people just think it's weird. Forgetting about kashrut issues for a moment: if I invited you to my house and set out a plate of cricket cookies (yes, I've seen a recipe), would you eat them? How about honey-covered ants (a delicacy to some native Africans) or monkey brains (a delicacy in some parts of Asia)? And, of course, let's not forget the good old wichetty grub....

So why does everyone seem to think that the reason we don't eat giraffe is because of the presumed impossibility of locating the appropriate place for slaughter? Well--truth be told--I have no idea where the rumour started, but the fact is that not too many people know anything about the laws of animal slaughter anymore, so most people have no trouble believing it. Again, they can't be blamed for their ignorance as to the laws; it's a topic that's just not commonly taught anymore. That's unfortunate, but it's not catastrophic. What is deplorable, however, is the fact that people would believe such an explanation, as that shows a willingness to believe anything anyone says without questioning, and even in the face of basic logic. That is nothing short of shameful.

Leaving Egypt

Rabbi Dude says:

It is said that the Israelites were redeemed from Egypt in the merit of three factors: they did not change their names, they did not change their clothes, and they did not change their language. They continued to give their children names like Reuvén and Léwi; you never would have heard of an Israelite named Imhotep. They continued to wear the same style tunics they wore in Kena'an, refusing to change their dress to match that of the Egyptians. They may have had to speak Egyptian on the streets in order to be understood, but at home it was always Hebrew.

There are certain groups of Jews descended from Europeans who are trying to follow just that philosophy today (my encounters with them were primarily during the time I spent in New York). They refuse to assimilate into the ways of the Western World, and therefore try to emulate these principles: they will not give English names to their children, instead preferring to give Jewish names; they do not speak in English, instead preferring to keep to a Jewish language; they refuse to dress as Americans do, instead preferring to maintain a Jewish style of dress.
So what happens? Instead of giving names like Bob or George or Elizabeth, they insist upon naming their children Feyge (a German name), Charna (Russian), Shprintze (a Germanisation of the Spanish "Esperanza"), Yenta (again, a Germinsation from Spanish, this time of "Juanita"), or Mendel (a Germanisation of the very old Greek name "Menelaus").
Instead of speaking English, they speak a dialect known as "Yiddish." The origins of this form of speech are from Old German--syntax is typical of a Germanic language--but the tongue picked up quite a few words from Slavic languages as Jews from Germany moved east to Russia, Poland, the Ukraine, and other such countries. It is written in the Hebrew alphabet, with spelling conventions using some letters to represent vowels as an aid to pronunciation.* The use of "Yiddish" is so ingrained in the Ashkenazi's persona that even when writing a divorce document (which is traditionally written in Aramaic, a sister language of Hebrew's and spelled with the same alphabet), he will use spelling conventions particular to this Judeo-German when transliterating English names rather than spelling them out as they would be spelled in Aramaic. I have even--on a few occasions--been referred to as a "goy" (non-Jew) by Ashkenazim because I do not speak their dialect of German. Ironically, the name "Yiddish" comes from the German "Judische," meaning "Jewish." Many Ashkenazim even refer to their speech as "Jewish."
Instead of dressing in modern polo shirts or business suits, they insist upon wearing the long jackets and fur hats of their ancestors in Poland and Russia. However, that form of dress itself was only copied from the Russian nobility. And there is always, of course, the fur hat, which they wear even in Miami Beach in the middle of the summer, because it's "Jewish clothing." Maybe their great-grandfathers wore that sort of hat, but that was because they lived in Russia, and it's COLD in Russia in the winter!

So all they're really doing in their attempts to keep away from a non-Jewish culture is keeping to a different non-Jewish culture. If they really want to give their children Jewish names, let them all be Hebrew. If they really want to speak a Jewish language, let it be Hebrew. But let it be in the home only: remember that bit about speaking Egyptian "on the streets in order to be understood"?* If they really want to dress as Jews, let them wear tunics as we did in ancient times.
The way they act is particular to their culture and is by no means a Jewish way of living. I personally think it's ridiculous, but there's no prohibition in the Tora against being ridiculous. But I will never stop being INFURIATED at those who insist that this is the Jewish way of life and who deride others who do not meet their illogical standards.


*The Hebrew alphabet consists entirely of consonants, as the structure of the language permits it to be written without vowels, which can be understood by the fluent reader; most other languages, on the other hand, are not built that way, and ambiguity would be rampant without written vowelisation.
Consider, for example, writing the letters BT and expecting someone else to guess the word by filling in the vowels: it could be bat, bet, bit, bot, or but. Then again, it could also be bate, bait, beat, beet, bite, byte, boat, boot, bout, butt, or bought. But how do we know it isn't batty, booty, or beta? Or, for that matter, abbot, abet, abut, or about? Of course, buyout is always a possibility....

*I will admit that there are many Sefaradim who go to America and continue speaking Arabic, and I will say that is wrong as well, but at the least it is based upon a selfish form of convenience and not an absurd belief that Arabic is a Jewish language.

Pharaoh's Daughter

Rabbi Dude says:

What was the name of Pharaoh's daughter? You know: the one who found Moses floating up the river. What was her name?

Ask any observant Jew and he'll tell you it was Bathya. Well, due to inaccuracies in pronunciation that have crept into the Hebrew language over time, a Jew from the Middle East would actually say "Batya," and a Jew from Europe would say "Basya." In fact, the original pronunciation would have been "Bathya."
"Would have been"? Yes, would have been. That would have been the pronunciation of her name... if in fact that had been her name.
But it wasn't. Actually, her name was Bithya.
What? Oh, yes. It may not be what you were always told,* by that was, in fact, her name. See Chronicles I 4:18.
Now, I'm willing to hold myself back from condemning everyone who names his daughter Bathya on the simple bases that:

• Most people, unfortunately, never learn Chronicles (nor any part of the Bible except the Tora itself and--sometimes--the portions used for weekly readings from the Prophets).
• Even those who do try to learn the Bible in its entirety are confronted by MANY names and dates to remember--most with no significance (I mean no major significance; don't start branding me a heretic for that...)--and most of which are never discussed in educated Jewish circles because of the relative ignorance of the Jewish world regarding them.
• Everyone seems to think that the name actually is Bathya. If every rabbi you ever had taught you that Noah's wife was named Shirley, would you ever think to question it? This is something that is known to everyone as being true, so why would anyone ever bother to verify it?

But the problem I find is that there are those out there who are so sure of what they have always known that they will not ever question the unshakable truth of their understanding. Such people are pure-bred ostriches; no question about that.
I had one particular experience in which I pointed out this discrepancy over the names to just such a person. He refused to accept it, demanding that I show him in the Bible itself. Well, for that I commend him; too often do I see too many people--even rabbis--accepting whatever anyone claiming to know anything says at face value without first checking out the facts for themselves. So, as requested, I showed him. But even that was not enough. He refused to accept it. He just could not tolerate that something he'd always known to be true (even something so minor as the exact pronunciation of a long-dead woman's name) had been taken out from under him.
So what did he do? He pulled a book--a story book intended for children--off the shelves and showed me that the author of that book (being of European descent) had recorded her name as Basya. He then explained to me that he knew the author of that book to be a "slam genius" and that he couldn't possibly have written "Basya" if in fact the name had been "Bithya."
Now, I see one of two possibilities: either the author of that book is incorrect and the Bible is correct, or the author of that book is correct and the Bible is incorrect. Given the two choices, I would tend to opt for the former.
But why, then, would he have written "Basya"? It would seem to me a fair guess that, since that's what everyone says, and since that's what he's always known to be true, he simply wrote it in as he knew it without bothering to look it up. Even slam geniuses take some things for granted, I suppose....
But the one who showed me the story book and insisted that that constituted conclusive proof, even against the Bible itself? Well, when a person wants to believe something, he'll latch on to any argument available to prove himself correct, no matter how weak and no matter how illogical.

Then again, don't we all do that?


*The word for daughter in Hebrew is "bath," and "Yah" is one of God's names. However, letters in Hebrew represent consonants only, and vowels often change with conjugation, declension, and agglutination. So, while the first person singular possessive is formed by adding "i" to the end of a word, "my daughter" in Hebrew would actually be "biti," not "bati." The way vowels change within words and their effects upon meaning is a very precise--but not difficult--topic which, unfortunately, not enough Jews study anymore, and it would seem obvious that the confusion over the name of Pharoah's daughter arises from combining "bat" and "Yah" and rendering "Batya" without seeing the need to alter vowels.

Rabbi Dude's Favourite Holiday

"Hey, Rabbi Dude, what's your favourite holiday?"

Rabbi Dude says:

Hm. I do so love all the holidays, and each for a different reason:

• The ideal opportunity for a new start is at Rosh haShana. The sound of the shofar--proclaming God as king over the world--brings to mind wishes of a day he might truly be recognised as such by all.
• I take Yom haKipurim very seriously. How could I not? When one is standing in judgment before the king of the universe, begging for nothing more than a chance to live just one more year, I would think anyone else who knows what's going on would take it seriously, too.
• Sukot is a great time to sit outside and to enjoy God's presence in the otherwise unprotected suka. The palm, myrtle, willow, and citron make the holiday feel truly special, and when the weather co-operates it can be oh-so-pleasant....
• Shemini 'atzeret is a final parting to the holiday season. One last day to enjoy our connection to God before a half-year respite (well, at least it was half a year before Purim and Hanuka came along). Séder simhat Tora, too, is always a blast.
• Hanuka is a time of peace and calm. The light shining through the darkness of the cold months (in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway) is poignant and warming. Winter was always my favourite season, and getting the family together at the door or at the window to light the candles against the snow-covered city sidewalks makes for the most beautiful scene my memory can conjure up to warm me and to make me feel at home.
• 15 Shevat is a fine time to reflect upon the greatness of God's Nature and its everyday miracles and the remarkable blessing he has given us in the Land of Israel. Besides, I like pomegranates. It's also one of the rare times you can find me drinking beer (have to get that barley in somehow...).
• Purim is arguably one of the best. How could I not enjoy the one day a year I get to act the way I'd like to act all year round (but people tell me I'm not allowed to)?
• When I was young Pesah was my favourite holiday. I enjoy the pomp and circumstances, the ceremony and the procedure of the séder. Having an English gradfather, these sorts of ritauls have always appealed to me. Besides, I love haroset, and I often make myself proud at my creativity in coming up with meal ideas despite the restrictions. The food still isn't as good as the rest of the year's, but I do well enough with what I have to make it seem better. Last year at se'uda shelishit on the eighth day we had shawarma, for example. Yum.
• La"g ba'omer is a great time for bonfiring and barbecuing. What could be more Aussie than that?
• Shavu'ot is great. Staying up all night learning is a blast, and I have a tradition running back six years now: pizza and palanchiki. This year the palanchiki were more like pancakes than I would have preferred, and we couldn't have vegetable-cheese pies like my wife made last year, and the pizza didn't come out as well as I'd have hoped, but at least I had egg creams....

So, what's my favourite of all the holidays? Well, that's a very simple question to answer, after all:

"Whichever one is coming up next."

Seriously. Anytime one holiday passes I find myself thinking ahead to the next one and getting myself all worked up about it. I get so involved in planning for it and in its meaning that my thoughts turn to little else. I love all our holidays, and I get myself so caught up in whatever's coming that it becomes my favourite.

I wish you all the clarity to see the true joy in whatever God brings your way.