Apologies from a Lapsed Pluralist

This weekend, I really surprised myself, and not in a good way. In a moment of personal anxiety, I took my hurt out on another person rather than dealing with it on my own, and in the process also violated one of my own core beliefs on religious ethics.

While I was in Utah, I had the opportunity to have a discussion with a Mormon couple that both had Jewish backgrounds, but had been baptized LDS. Ostensibly i was talking to them because I wanted to undertand their religious journeys a little bit better, but very quickly the conversation went downhill and became painfully uncomfortable.

For some reason, I had early on directed the conversation to Deuteronomy 13, which discusses false prophets and how to recognize them. namely that even if a prophet should work miracles, or his predicitons should come to pass, if he leads you to worship foreign gods he is a false prophet, additionally, this is immeidately preceded by the injunction to neither add nor subtract from the commandments given to Moses.

Normally I don't bring this up in conversations with Christians. I reserve it for when missionaries won't take no for an answer and I've had enough and just want to end the conversation. Telling other people that their religion isn't legit isn't my style. To the contrary, I've maintained the following for a long time: People are different. They have different needs, abilities to encounter G-d and expectations from G-d. The route that a person takes to strengthen that relationship is between that person and G-d. I barely understand what it is G-d wants from me, and for me to presuppose that I know what is right for someone else is pretty arrogant. And to try to Bully someone into either abandoning their own faith, or adopting another is the best way set yourself up for failure.

What I think happened, was the following. I've been working really hard to find my way back to Judaism. Between trying to establish that my own heritage *is* Jewish and also preparing for Conversion, in the chance that my heritage isn't enough, I've really been faced with a lot of challenges. I've also had people on both sides really question my commitment, my motives and my sanity. And while it's certainly been worht it, it has been far from easy.

So when I met someone that had made the opposite decision. In fact had decided that he didn't want the priviledge that I am working so hard to achieve, I took it as a personal insult. I let my own doubts get the best of me and started acting as if his decisions delegitimized my own. So, rather than confronting my own anxiety, I acted like a child. I tried to delegitimize his beliefs as if that could somehow justify my own, and I went right for the jugular.

Interestingly, at this point he got very quiet, and his wife and I started getting more antagonistic with eachother. I think he realized that I was coming from an injured place and was hoping to let the topic shift, but I had struck a nerve for his wife and we ended up in a battle over who could make the other recant first. It wasn't pretty.

In any case, I'm sorry. I acted badly. Hopefully I won't react so badly next time I feel threatened.

Inside-Out

Being in Utah, specifically here in Provo has once again put me in a situation where I feel like I am almost a part of the group, but am nonetheless only made that much more aware of how much I don't fit in. It's a situation I find myself in not infrequently, in fact almost constantly, but here it has been something of a surprise not by feeling off-put that I don't belong but rather by how close I sometimes feel *to* belonging. It's a somewhat unsettling feeling.

Despite this being my first time really spedning any amount of time with a large group of Mormons, I feel strangely connected to the group. Part of it I'm sure is that the people I am around are all incredibly warm and welcoming people. However, that hardly accounts for all of it.

I'm not entirely surprised, now in hindsight. When i met Ashley, several years ago, she and I read the Book Of Mormon together. Over the past two years I have spent a lot of time asking her about her faith and undertanding Mormon beliefs and developing a Mormon vocabulary. I also spent about 3 months at Institute (LDS scripture study) in Chicago which has given me a decent familiarity withthe Book of Mormon and also LDS readings of Christian literature I was already familiar with from my Catholic upbringing. I've also read the two other uniquely LDS texts, teh Pearl of Great Price and Doctrines & Covenants. So for a gentile (ie non-mormon, not non-Jew) I'm pretty well-versed.

Additionally, I was raised in the Roman Catholic Church, I am familiar with a lot of concepts like personal revelation, salvation etc. And while these aren't all a part of my curren tbelief system, it allows me to talk about my current faith in a way that is very immediately accessible to Mormons.

One of the more interesting moments was Saturday afternoon. I was in Ashley's apartment and seh, her brother, Eric, her roomie, Sarah, and I decided to do some scripture study together. I had shared with them my earlier article on love, and Eric had suggested that we do some reading on how Love is treated in the Book of Mormon. It was a really neat afternoon. We spent about 3 hours reading through Mosiah 4:1-14 (If I remember the citation correctly).

Living in the new Zion

For those of you that don't know, I am spending the weekend visiting a friend of mine out in Provo Utah. She and I had met several years ago doing a summer program in Brandeis, and had not seen each other since as she was sent to Milan on mission...

In any case, I am now here in Provo, UT on the Brigham Young University. I'm having a wonderful time, but there are moments when I feel like I'm in Oz. For starters, I've never been in a place where there was so much active control over students lives. For example, students are required to live in BYU-approved housing. Housing is all segregated by sex, fine no biggie. Guys are not allowed in Girls' bedrooms and vice versa, fine. But guys aren't allowed to use girls' bathrooms?? I'm having a hard time figuring that one out. I mean, how often do you actually find yourself sharing a single bathroom? The best explanation I can come up with is that by preventing the use of eachother's bathrooms it discourages boys and girls from spending so much time in each other's apartments that use of a bathroom would be necessitated.

Maintain Racism for the Sake of Lower Taxes? I Call Shenanigans.

An article recently appeared on the local6.com website entitled: "Alabama Voters Refuse to Remove Racist Language From Law". The following is an excerpt which summarizes the pro and con positions regarding the proposed ammendment:

Opponents claim that part of the amendment could lead to higher property taxes by letting courts declare that education is a constitutional right and then order spending increases for underfunded public schools. Proponents said it would erase segregationist language many consider embarrassing.

Sometimes I wonder who on earth these people even are. I'm having a hard time understanding how it is that removing segregationist language could possibly lead to higher taxes in a bad way. That is to say: if schools are in fact being underfunded and the only reason this isn't being addressed is a result of these underfunded schools serving a primarily black student body, then there *is* a problem that needs to be addressed! Furthermore, what with my background and upbringing which so highly esteems equitable educational opportunities I don't even know how to begin to respond to the suggestion that it should not be considered a fundamental right for everyone to have access to reasonably funded schooling. Whimper.

Ezra D. Feldman Chimes in Re: "Compulsive Love"

(The following was excerpted from an email sent to me in response to my post "Compulsive Love")

...the whole problem of these statements being COMMANDMENTS is a bit
of a straw man. If you look at the Ten Commandments, you will indeed find
that most of them (though significantly NOT the first) are actually in the
imperative mood. But both of the "commandments" you discuss are in a
different mood.

To elaborate: The v'ahavta of Deuteronomy 6:5 is either predictive or
conditional. I think it's conditional, just one part of a whole
conditional paragraph. If you DO these things, then, when God brings you
into the land that he promised you, he'll take care of you. In Deuteronomy
6 there is a clear warning not to forget God, but not a clear enumeration
of the consequences of forgetting him. If, however, you look at the Shema'
as it appear in the liturgy, then the paragraph of v'ahavta is followed by
a very clear description of the other side of the coin.

The v'ahavta of Leviticus 19:18 is pretty clearly in the future tense, and
I think in the context of the verse (Remember that v'ahavta is just the
second part of the first half of a verse!) it describes the consequence of
refraining from certain harmful actions. (In this, my interpretation is
well aligned with your idea that behaviors can encourage emotions.) The
King James Version renders the whole verse as follows: "Thou shalt not
avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD." This translation does
not take into account the grammatical difference in mood between the verbs
"tikom" and "titor" and "v'ahavta."

I would translate the whole verse as follows: "Do not avenge and do not
reserve anger against your people, and you will love your neighbor as
yourself; I am the Lord." In other words, IF you do not avenge and do not
bear grudges, THEN peace will reign; God guarantees it.

posted by Ezra