Am Yisrael - The Saviours of the World?

Today in class, we talked about a non-Jewish historian (whose name I can't remember) who truly believed that the Jewish people was clearly put on this Earth for a divine purpose. Apparently, the Jews always have a solution before the rest of the world even discovers the problem requiring said solution.
 For example, Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zichai, who figured out how Judaism could continue without a Beit Hamikdash (the Holy Temple). You might say that it can't have been that hard, because the Jewish people operated for many years before the Beit Hamikdash, but there are several things to consider. 
For one thing, the culture and traditions of our people have been rapidly changing ever since the religion was founded. Since they had the Beit Hamikdash for so many years, the traditions of the Jewish people had long since evolved to be heavily dependent on it, and the priests.
For another, we are now in an era that is post Tanakh, and therefore with much more distance between us and many of the influences present during the Tanakh. 
Finally, there have been generations of religious leaders since our last time without the temple who did their own part to connect the Jewish people to the temple, writing their own commentaries and opinions and presenting them to the culture as law. 
Therefore, in my mind, it isn't such a stretch that finding a way to survive without the Beit Hamikdash in that setting is such a huge feat. 
As to whether or not that means Jews are a people divinely chosen to be ahead of the game... Well, as much as Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zichai had the foresight to be prepared, I don't think that the same can be said for the entire Jewish people. Every religion has their share of wise ones, cautious ones, and strategizing ones, not just the Jews. On the flip side, every religion has their fair share of idiots, and the Jews are no exception. My point is that it is the individuals within the people of Israel who are gifted, and not  people as a whole. The Jewish people are not perfect. My conclusion, therefore, is that while those are pretty words and nice compliments, they do not hold any basis in fact.

Intermarriage

The article that I read this week was on intermarriage (between Jews and non-Jews). This one is a very controversial issue. Many Jews believe that intermarriage will be the downfall of the Jewish people. Others, though, claim that it is just the breath of fresh air that we need. There are facts and statistics to back up both of them: there is a higher percentage of Jews who turn away from religion that only had one Jewish parent than two, but the percentage of Jews with one Jewish parent who stay Jewish is rising rapidly.
I have personal experience with this issue. After all, one of my best friends (you know who you are if you're reading this, and you'd better be!) has a Christian mother, and the same with my first cousins. Thus, I have a strong stance. My best friend went to a Jewish day school with me for nine years, and there is no way that you could say that she isn't Jewish! That alone probably tells you, I'm all for allowing intermarriage. Just as with same-sex marriage, I don't see why anyone else should be able to tell someone who they can and can't love. I do, however, think there should be some stipulations. If an intermarried couple decides to have children, they need to have a clear path for how they want to raise their children, religiously and spiritually speaking. It is important to give your child a sense of identity. I personally am not going to say that you need to raise your children Jewish, because it is completely up to you whether you pick your religion or your spouse's religion. You could even give them limited exposure to both, so long as you make it clear to them which one they are. And, of course, they can make their own decisions as to which parent's religion they follow once they are of an age when they can consider those things intelligently.
What do you think?

Is the Tanakh of Divine Creation?

On the test that we had recently in Jewish History, we were given five essay questions and told to pick two to write about. However, there was a third that caught my eye, and so I decided to save it for a blog post (if you're interested, I'd be happy to type up my other essays at some point and post them). The topic is the question stated in the title: Is the Tanakh of Divine Creation?
Here is my response.
In my opinion, the Tanakh is of human origin, not divine. Not only that, but I think that there were multiple writers. In class, we discussed four, but also the possibility of as man as hundreds more. This is evidenced by the many different voices found within its pages. As a writer, I'm very familiar with the idea of each person having their own unique style of writing, a different "voice" if you will, and the same can be said for the writers of the Tanakh. It's clear when the writing changes hands. Also, each writer focuses on different things, and uses different phrases/titles.
All together, that shows me that, unless God wove together an intricate plot to make us think that the Tanakh was written by humans in order to hide the fact that it was written by God (which is highly unlikely; why on earth would anyone go to such trouble for something so trivial?), the Tanakh was clearly written by humans.
What do you think?

What Drives Success: My Commentary

I'm going to preface this post by stating that there will be many blunt statements put forth in the following paragraphs, probably many of them less than politically correct. However, that's how I found my assigned article to be, so that's how I will be writing.

The article that I read this week discussed stereotypes that are present in American culture, how they make themselves known to society, and the amount of truth that there is to each of them. I found the article both interesting and informative, and also somewhat surprising. I've always known that there are stereotypes out there, most of them shallow and none too pleasant. However, what I didn't know was the grain of truth that lies within most of them.

The article presented these ideas as facts, so that's how I'll speak of them. The facts expressed are mostly along the lines of a correlation between status and ethnicity/religion/race. Immigrants in general are always notoriously either very well off, or some of the poorest in the nation, depending on where in the world they are from. For instance, Africans tend to be placed in the “poor and uneducated” category, while Asians are often put in the “rich and intelligent” one. Nobody that I know of has ever claimed to back those stereotypes with facts, but that's exactly what this article is doing.

I don't really know how I feel about that. After all, it has been my life long goal to not judge people at all, let alone by any physical characteristic. Then again, the facts sometimes line up to disprove prejudices, like in the case of the Nigerians at Harvard. In that case, I have to side with the facts. And, as I don't like to be blind or one-sided, I must therefore also accept that the facts often line up in favour of stereotypes.

Despite the fact that I accept the grain of truth in many stereotypes as proven to me in the article, I'm still sure that I won't let this revelation colour my judgement in the future.

The article in question can be found here.

THE DOOR FELL OFF IN JEWISH HISTORY TODAY 
THEN THEY CAME AND FIXED IT
AND NOW IT ACTUALLY CLOSES WHICH IS A FIRST

The Kotel

So I'm sitting on my bed while my roommate Jenna is chatting with her friends. Occasionally, I will throw in a comment. Right now though, they're discussing the Kotel. They all have different views on the holy place, and I find it very interesting. For instance, one boy called the Kotel a shrine. After taking a moment to think it through, I discovered that I agree with him. After all, as he pointed out, a shrine is a place where people can have physical contact with an important part of their religion. The Kotel is all that remains of the Beit Hamikdash, our holiest of holy temples, and it was believed to be a physical house for God. However, one girl had a rather vehement reaction in the negative to that suggestion. She was shocked that he could even consider calling something so ancient and unique like the Kotel something so common as a "shrine". When pressed, she explained that her connection, as well as most other Jews' connections, were much too deep to be defined in such a way. I find it interesting the way that people's views and feelings in regard to the same religion and culture can differ so easily and widely.

Services and Shabbat

This Shabbat has been an interesting experience for me. The customs and traditions of Reform Judaism are much more different from my own than I would have expected. Many of the prayers that we, at the Reconstructionist congregation of Kol Halev, do in whole, are shortened or simply omitted. Other prayers that we do here, we don't do at all back home. Still more have radically different tunes, or a few changed words here and there. 

For instance, in the blessing before reading from the Torah, at my temple we say "asher kervanu la'avodato," while here (and I think in most other places) they say "asher bachar banu mikol ha'amim." The difference is that, in Reconstructionist Judaism, all references to the Jewish people being above the other people, or the chosen people, are removed. We also say "with the other nations" as opposed to "from the other nations" whenever that comes up.

It has been difficult for me for other reasons too. Most everyone here has attended some form of Reform camp, and they all seem to know the same tunes, games, songs, and traditions.  It's hard, not knowing half of the prayers. I am trying to learn all of the tunes that I don't know, but it isn't quite the same as having known them all along and being very familiar with all of them, like so many of my peers are. It reminds me that I am different, and though I don't usually mind that, it will make things harder during the religious aspect of this trip.

I appreciate the strong connection that most of this community has, but I hope that soon I can find my own place in it as well. It's a beautiful thing, friendship, and not one that I would ever want to miss.