Inter-Culturalism

Why Jews Around the World are Praying for the Victory of the Egyptian Uprising

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2/1/2011 Note from Dave Belden: we are delighted to see this piece by Rabbi Lerner is prominent on the Al Jazeera English website today (permanent link here). Ever since the victory over the dictator of Tunisia and the subsequent uprising in Egypt, my email has been flooded with messages from Jews around the world hoping and praying for the victory of the Egyptian people over their cruel Mubarak regime. Though a small segment of Jews have responded to right-wing voices from Israel that lament the change and fear that a democratic government would bring to power fundamentalist extremists who wish to destroy Israel and who would abrogate the hard-earned treaty that has kept the peace between Egypt and Israel for the last 30 years, the majority of Jews are more excited and hopeful than worried. Of course, the worriers have a point. Israel has allied itself with repressive regimes in Egypt and used that alliance to ensure that the borders with Gaza would remain closed while Israel attempted to economically deprive the Hamas regime there by denying needed food supplies and equipment to rebuild after Israel’s devastating attack in December 2008 and January 2009.

Judaism

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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This week’s spiritual wisdom comes from Chaya Kaplan-Lester on parshat Mishpatim. Kaplan-Lester is a Jersualem-based educator, psychotherapist, and writer who works to enhance the collective Jewish spirit. She is the founder of Havayah. Mishpatim: “An Eye for an Eye” from a Mystical Perspective
by Chaya Kaplan-Lester
Each week Jews read a portion (“parsha”) of the Torah. This week we read parshat Mishpatim, the parsha of “Laws.”

Judaism

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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This week’s spiritual wisdom on the Torah portion of Yitro comes from Rabbi Zalman Kastel. Kastel illuminates the virtues and limitations of authority and encourages us to always question authority, yet to submit to it when appropriate. Kastel is National Director for the Together for Humanity Foundation. Authority Trashed, Tucson, and Tunisia: Problems and Opportunities of Democracy of Opinion
by Rabbi Zalman Kastel

In rejecting elitism and in pursuit of freedom, we now face the idea that all opinions, not just people, are of equal value. Is this democratisation of opinion, combined with a breakdown in authority, a contributing factor to the madness in the world?

Empathy

When Generosity, Love, and Kindness are Public Policy, the Violence We Saw in Arizona will Dramatically Diminish

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The attempted assassination of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the murder of so many others in Arizona has elicited a number of policy suggestions, from gun control to private protection for elected officials, to banning incitement to violence on websites either directly or more subtly (e.g., Sarah Palin’s putting a bull’s-eye target on Giffords’ congressional district to indicate how important it would be to remove her from the Congress). On the other hand, we hear endless pleas to recognize that the assassin was a lonely and disturbed person whose choice of Hitler’s Mein Kampf as one of his favorite books reflects his own troubled soul, not his affinity to the “hatred of the Other” that has manifested in anti-immigrant movements that have spread from Arizona to many other states and in the United States and has taken the form of anti-Islam, discrimination against Latinos, and the more extreme right-wing groups that preach hatred toward Jews. The problem with this debate is that the explanatory frame is too superficial and seeks to discredit rather than to analyze. I fell into this myself in the immediate aftermath of the murders and attempted assassination. I wrote an op-ed pointing to the right wing’s tendency to use violent language and demean liberals and progressives, and its historical tie to anti-Semitism and anti-feminism.

Culture

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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Three poems by Elizabeth Cunningham. IT’S NOT ALL PRETTY
It’s not all pretty. The earth knows terrible things. She receives all deaths,
gentle and brutal. She bears the pain of every birth.

Judaism

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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Tikkun sponsors a weekly Torah commentary on our home page. Each weekly portion is called a Parsha and its name is drawn from the first new significant Hebrew word in the first sentence of that week’s reading. To many, the form of commentary may seem somewhat pedantic, but the content often takes us to new spiritual ideas. So reading these commentaries requires careful attention, but they are often worth it! This week’s parsha is called Va’era.

Christianity

The Spiritual Messages of Chanukah and Christmas — and Their Downsides

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Christmas and Chanukah share a spiritual message: that it is possible to bring light and hope in a world of darkness, oppression and despair. But whereas Christmas focuses on the birth of a single individual whose life and mission was itself supposed to bring liberation, Chanukah is about a national liberation struggle involving an entire people who seek to remake the world through struggle with an oppressive political and social order: the Greek conquerors (who ruled Judea from the time of Alexander in 325 B.C.E.) and the Hellenistic culture that they sought to impose. The holiday celebrated by lighting candles for eight nights (the first night is tonight) recalls the victory of the guerrilla struggle led by the Maccabees against the Syrian branch of the Greek empire, and the subsequent rededication (Chanukah in Hebrew) of the Temple in Jerusalem in 165 B.C.E. However, there was a more difficult struggle that took place (and in some dimensions still rages) within the Jewish people between those who hoped for a triumph of a spiritual vision of the world embedded (as it turned out, quite imperfectly) in the Maccabees and a cynical realism that had become the common sense of the merchants and priests who dominated the more cosmopolitan arena of Jerusalem. The cynical realists in Judea, among them many of the priests charged with preserving the Temple, argued that Greek power was overwhelming and that it made far greater sense to accommodate it than to resist. The Greek globalizers promised advances in science and technology that could benefit international trade and enrich the local merchants who sided with them, even though the taxes that accompanied their rule impoverished the Jewish peasants who worked the land and eked out a subsistence living.

Politics & Society

Try a Spiritual Progressive Approach to Thanksgiving This Year!

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No matter how difficult it may be in a world filled with pain and cruelty, there are moments when it is important to stop looking at all the problems and focus on all the good. And that’s part of what Thanksgiving could be about for you this year. Life is so amazing, and our universe so awesome, filled with realities that transcend our capacity to comprehend, and inviting us to awe and wonder and radical amazement! Give yourself and your friends a day dedicated to truly feeling those kinds of feelings! I don’t mean only a moment of sharing “something we all appreciate” during the traditional meal.

Christianity

Spiritual Wisdom of the Week

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This week’s spiritual wisdom comes to us from progressive activist and novelist James T. Dette, who urges Christians today to reflect on their Jewish roots. A native of New Jersey, Dette has long been active in local and national politics, and has contributed to such publications as The New York Times, Irish America, and Street News. THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JOHN
I grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in Passaic, New Jersey, two blocks from the synagogue, Ahavas Israel. Most of my boyhood friends were Jews. My Irish mother played mah-jongg with her Jewish neighbors.