Torturing the Image of God

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Tuesday April 28, 2009 · 8:31 AM PDT

2009/04/28 · 08:31

One of the central teachings of Torah is that all human beings are made in the Image of God. That teaching and what flows from it are at the heart of Jewish prohibitions on the use of torture.

Indeed, the Rabbis –-- living under the Roman Empire –-- enrich that teaching as a direct challenge to the power of Rome, the Imperial fount of torture. One of them asks, “What does this mean, 'In God’s image?'” And another answers, “When Caesar puts his image on a coin, all the coins come out identical. When that One who is beyond all rulers puts the divine image on a 'coin,' all the coins come out unique.”

Torture tries to destroy the Image of God and replace it with Caesar's image on the human soul and body. In the experience of the Rabbis, it was Imperial Rome that used torture.

Awaskow

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Monday April 06, 2009 · 12:40 PM PDT

2009/04/06 · 12:40

First: For the downloadable, printable text of our new Freedom Seder for the Earth, see our website at www.shalomctr.org It's the 2d story on the home page.

Secondly; Ask yourself: "Why is there charoset on the Seder plate?"

That's the most secret Question at the Seder – nobody even asks it. And it’s got the most secret answer: none.

Yes, there's an oral tradition. (Fitting for something that tastes so delicious!) You've probably heard somebody at a Passover Seder claim that charoset is the mortar the ancient Israelite slaves had to paste between the bricks and stones of those giant warehouses they were building for Pharaoh.

But that's a cover story. Really dumb. You think that mortar was so sweet, so spicy, so delicious that every ancient Israelite just had to slaver some mortar on his tongue?

No. The oral tradition transmitted by charoset is not by word of mouth but taste of mouth. A kiss of mouth. A full-bodied, full-tongued, "kisses sweeter than wine" taste of mouth.

Charoset is an embodiment of by far the sexiest, kissyest, bodyest book of the Hebrew Bible ---- the Song of Songs. Charoset is literally a full-bodied taste of the Song. The Song is the recipe for charoset.

Awaskow

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Thursday February 19, 2009 · 12:05 PM PST

2009/02/19 · 12:05

Dear fellow-healers of the earth and humankind --

Thousands of people will be taking part in a major protest against Coal Power that will be taking place in Washington DC on the afternoon of Monday, March 2.

The protest will include: a prayer vigil for those who wish; an effort (again for those who choose) to block entrances to the coal-powered Capitol Power Plant through nonviolent civil disobedience; and (for those who choose not to risk arrest), a support and protest demonstration. (More details below.)

The Shalom Center has endorsed this action and God willing/ im yirtzeh hashem/ inshallah, I will be taking part, with the intention of joining with an expected 1500 other people, in the civil disobedience, arrest-risking part of the protest and in a prayer vigil that will immediately precede it. People of all ages, faiths, regions, and cultures will take part.

There will also be many people -- possibly thousands more -- taking part in a major non-arrest support presence as part of the protest.

Awaskow

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Monday February 09, 2009 · 9:29 AM PST

2009/02/09 · 09:29

DO NOT TRY TO OCCUPY AFGHANISTAN
(Signed: The British Empire, 1842, 1884, 1919;
The Soviet Empire, 1988;
The United States of America, 2012)

Dear co-walkers on the path of seeking justice, peace, and healing --

Nine months ago, I wrote the beginning of a message about Afghanistan for The Shalom Report. Over and over, I thought something else was more important to send: Bigger (like Global Scorching) or More Urgent (like the Economic Crisis) or More Morally Compelling (like the Israeli invasion of Gaza) or More Religiously Relevant (like God's ever-presence in our presidential campaign).

Why now, then? Because now the Obama Presidency has begun with one more boring "drone" bombing and one more boring bunch of civilian deaths and more boring wails and screams and protests from the survivors on the Afghan-Pakistan border. And I, like Bill Moyers who was President Lyndon Johnson's press secretary through much of the Vietnam War, and his guests on PBS, feel my heart sink.

Last week's Torah reading is about the most powerful army in the world drowning in the Sea of Reeds. Or maybe it really became the Red Sea, as the old mistranslations said – the Red Sea, swamped in blood.

Awaskow

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Monday January 26, 2009 · 7:53 AM PST

2009/01/26 · 07:53

The Shalom Center is creating a 40th Anniversary New Interfaith Freedom Seder for the Earth to help us free ourselves from the greatest dangers of our time: the dangers of global scorching, the climate crisis, enormous disruptions of human civilization, and massive species extinctions.

The New Freedom Seder, a specially transformed retelling of the Exodus from slavery under Pharaoh, will especially draw on the ancient story of the Ten Plagues. Each of them was an ecological disaster brought on by Pharaoh's hard-heartedness, stubbornness, and addiction to his own power. Each of them shattered human society as well as the fruitful earth.

What are the Ten Plagues endangering the earth and human life today; who/what are the Pharaohs of today imposing these plagues upon us; and what are the Ten Blessings we ourselves can bring to heal the earth and our own societies?

Awaskow

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Monday January 12, 2009 · 4:37 PM PST

2009/01/12 · 16:37

Subversive Prayer in Time of War –
to Shatter Pyramids of Callousness

Two weeks after the outbreak of carnage and war in Gaza and in Southern Israel, as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue, as children die from bombs made with our money, as the present government of the United States refuses to act to end these wars -- our religious and ethical communities gather to mourn and to act.

This is no time for solidarity with governments – American, Palestinian, or Israeli. It is a time for solidarity with God -- the God Who is Compassion and calls for compassion, Who demands that we seek peace and pursue it even when it is running away from us, Who reminds us that in the suffering of a human being mangled and killed, God's Own Self is mangled and killed.

Rabbi Abraham J. Heschel taught that prayer, which he called the song the universe sings to itself, is useless unless it is subversive –-- shattering pyramids of callousness. He also taught that some kinds of political action – not all – could become a form of prayer, as when he said after marching for voting rights alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, "I felt that my legs were praying."

Awaskow

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Monday January 05, 2009 · 12:55 PM PST

2009/01/05 · 12:55

What might Israel do differently from what it is doing to stop the rockets — without regard to US policy or longer-range peacemaking?

It is pretty clear that Hamas in Gaza is not just a "terrorist gang" but is deeply interwoven with the fabric of Gazan society, through its social-welfare and religious networks. That means influence goes in both directions.

So this sketch would mix carrots and sticks in a month-by-month, mostly reversible attempt to engage the Gazan and broader Palestinian civil society in having a stake in peacemaking, as well as the Hamas elites. If Hamas failed to keep pace with the steps Israel takes, the process would go into reverse. (Of course specifics are not sealed in concrete but an effort to point in new directions.)

Step 1: Israel announces the following month-by-month commitments, including those to go into effect after twelve months in a row of forward movement toward peace.

Israel will now withdraw ground troops from Gaza and halt the present air attacks, and will --

(

Awaskow

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Sunday January 04, 2009 · 12:49 PM PST

2009/01/04 · 12:49

We need to resist recurrent efforts by some Jews to define what is kosher for other Jews to say and do -- at the moment, about Gaza.

The most important and most disappointing effort to do this is by Rabbi Eric Yoffie, head of the Union of Reform Judaism. He attacked J Street for urging a cease-fire -- an immediate end to the bombings, to rocket attacks by Hamas against Israel, and to the Israeli blockade of food, fuel, and medicines from entering Gaza.

I urge our readers and members to click to the J Street website and make a contribution of $36 or more. (This number is in Hebrew numerology the symbolic affirmation of two lives – in this case, Israelis and Palestinians.)

At that URL, you will find a space called "In honor of." I suggest that if your sense of humor leans that way, you fill it in with "In Honor of Rabbi Eric Yoffie."

Awaskow

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Monday December 29, 2008 · 9:50 AM PST

2008/12/29 · 09:50

Late on Saturday night, I asked us to live with the vertigo of choosing between two versions of the Jewish future: the vision of Zechariah, which we read every year on Shabbat Hanukkah -- "Not by might and not by power but by My breathing-spirit, says YHWH Infinite" and the vision of permanently using --as right now in Gaza -- -- superior power to impose superior violence.

I received many brickbats, many thank-yous and blessings, and one calm question: What's the alternative?

So after simply living with the despair of what seem like impossible choices, we might begin to ask ourselves the necessary question: What's the alternative?

Awaskow

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Saturday December 27, 2008 · 10:27 PM PST

2008/12/27 · 22:27

Not by Might, and not by Power -- – OR:
Israeli Gaza Strike Kills More Than 225

Today the starkest choice of values and visions of the future was laid before the Jewish people throughout the world.

Two texts:

Not by Might, and not by Power --- but by My Breathing Spirit, says YHWH Infinite. -- Zechariah 4: 6. Read in every synagpgue in the world on the morning of 12/27/08 as the Prophetic passage for Shabbat of Hanukkah.

OR
12/27/08

"GAZA — Waves of Israeli airstrikes destroyed Hamas security facilities in Gaza on Saturday in a crushing response to the group’s rocket fire, killing more than 225 — the highest one-day toll in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in decades.

Awaskow

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Tuesday December 23, 2008 · 3:14 AM PST

2008/12/23 · 03:14

California voters voted 52%-48% for "Proposition 8," which canceled their Supreme Court's decision that same-sex marriage is a constitutionally protected right. But many religious progressives in California have been working to overturn Proposition 8 through a lawsuit. They are arguing that depriving any group of people of a basic human right guaranteed by the California Constitution is so basic a change in the Constitution that it can only be done only by the super-majorities required for a basic "revision," not a limited amendment.

A wide spectrum of religious organization have filed a brief supporting this view. You can see and sign the brief by clicking to http://www.thedatabank.com/...

I hope the court upholds this argument. But the deeper task of those who support same-sex marriage is to mobilize public opinion.

Given the importance of doing this, I am deeply disappointed by the decision of President-elect Obama to have Rev. Rick Warren invoke God at the Inauguration on January 20. Rev. Warren was not only a leading supporter of Proposition 8; he has said that homosexual acts are as sinful as pederasty or bestiality.

Awaskow

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Tuesday December 16, 2008 · 3:29 PM PST

2008/12/16 · 15:29

Newsweek magazine recently published a cover article endorsing same-sex marriage. The article caused a storm. I think the article could have taken the same bottom-line position, and yet imaginably have stirred a lot more thought and maybe even a little less explosion. Here is why:

Preparing for the article, a Newsweek reporter interviewed me at considerable length about my theology of same-sex marriage, Then she called back to say her boss had said to ask me whether I thought Judaism should be inclusive toward gays. I answered yes, and then that pretty simple-minded question and response were how I got quoted in the cover article.

Nothing about how I view the biblical proscription of male homosexuality, and why I think the oft-quoted lines in tbe Hebrew Bible are no longer God's will - and how the Torah seeks to transcend itself on several dimensions of sexual ethics. If my experience was replicated by others, no wonder opponents of same-sex marriage thought the article ignored the serious religious issues. It did.

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Torturing the Image of God

R-rated Recipe for Passover & "New Freedom Sewder for the Earth"

Old King Coal is a Lethal old soul: protest in DC, March 2

AFGHANISTAN: Obama's disaster or Our new way of thinking?

Freedom Seder for the Earth

Subversive Prayer in Time of War

Israel -Gaza: Unconventional short-range peacemaking

Gaza: Is criticism Kosher?

Gaza & Beyond: What's the Alternative?

"Not by Might" OR "Kill 225 in Gaza"

Same-sex marriage: Prop 8 & Inauguration Day

"Newsweek," Same-Sex Marriage, and the Bible