Love At First Site

Turning the clock back a couple of weeks, let me tell you what I saw when I first arrived at work.
In the cubicle adjacent to mine, a man was surrounded by lots of little colorful scraps of paper. Scraps of paper which, upon further perusal, turned out to be minute Facebook images that had been scaled down, painstakingly cut out, then organized upon the rather ugly green carpet. He had a camera with him and was snapping lots of pictures of the forlorn, shipwrecked Facebook images.

"Wow," I marveled to myself. "He has an insane amount of patience. If I had to sit in a cubicle, cut out snippets of paper, pin them to the wall or tape them to the ground and then arrange them and rearrange them in various patterns, I think I would go mad. It seems like a particularly refined form of torture."

At some point, since he's friendly, the man introduced himself as Chaim Gross. I told him my name was Olivia and asked him what in the world he was doing.

"It's called stop-motion photography," he explained. Basically, the way that it works is that he takes something like 15 still frames per second, makes very slight changes between shots, puts them together and makes it seem as though the pictures are animated. I was skeptical until he pulled up some YouTube examples and showed me how cool the finished product could look.

With that in mind, all you Facebook and NCSY lovers should watch "Love At First Site." Premiering for the first time ever...right here. Alternatively, like the NCSY page on Facebook and watch it there.

The Well of Her Heart

A story

The Well of Her Heart

~

Credits: Dream is Collapsing from "Inception"

BHJCC: The Bachelor, Greg, Dodgeballs & Chaia Being Fabulously Insane

So you're not going to understand this unless you've worked at the Bernard Horwich JCC, but for those of you who have...it's time to party.

Tolstoy Writes About Shidduchim

The following is an excerpt from Tolstoy's The Kreutzer Sonata, a book he wrote after he had his religious experience and decided that sex was awful and everyone should be virgins.

Leaving that aside, his depiction of the world in which women lived then is pretty accurate as far as the shidduch system goes.

~

Chapter VIII

"Well, so my rank, my fortune, my good clothes, the excursions in boats did the job. Twenty times it did not succeed, but this time it succeeded like a trap. I am not jesting. You see, nowadays marriages are always arranged- like traps. Do you see how natural it is? The girl has arrived at maturity and must be married. What could be simpler when the girl is not a monster and there are men who wish to get married? That is the way it used to be done. The girl reaches the right age; her parents arrange a marriage/ So it has been done, throughout the world, among the Chinese, the Hindus, the Mohammedans, among the common Russian people- among at least ninety-nine per cent of the human race. It is only among a small one per cent, among us libertines and debauchees, that this custom has been found to be bad, and so we have invented another. Now, what is this new way? It is this: the girls sit round and the men come, as at a bazaar, to take their choice. And the girls wait and wonder and have their own ideas, but they dare not say, "Dear sir, take me!" or "No, me!" or, "Not her, but me!" or, "Look at my shoulders and all the rest!"

"And we, the men, all walk around and look them over and are quite smug. 'I know a thing or two; I won't be caught.' They go around, they look, they are satisfied that this is all arranged for their specia pleasure. 'Look, but don't get taken in!' "

"What is to be done then?" I asked. "You would not expect the young women to make the offers, would you?"

"Well, I can't say exactly how; but if there is to be equality, then let it be equality. If the system of the matchmaker is considered humiliating, this is a thousand times more so! In the first case the rights and chances were equal, but in our method the woman is either a slave in a bazaar or the bait in the trap. Tell any mother or the girl herself the truth, that she is only occupied in husband-catching - my God, what an insult! But that is the truth and they have nothing else to do. And what is really dreadful is to see poor innocent young girls involved in all this. It wouldn't be so bad if it were done openly, but it is all deception. "Ah, the origin of species, how interesting!' 'Lily is greatly interested in painting.' 'And will you be at the exhibition? How instructive!' And the carriage rides and the theater and the symphony. 'Oh, how remarkable!' 'My Lily is crazy about music!' 'And why don't you share these views?' And the boat rides. And always one thought: "Take me!" "Take my Lily!" "No, me!" "Just try your luck!" Oh, what vileness and falsehood!' he exclaimed, and swallowing the last of his tea, proceeded to put away his utensils.

-pages 20-21

Your Magic Has Been Sent

I was sending a Gmail Message today and instead of reading "Your message has been sent" after pressing "Send," I read "Your magic has been sent."

And then it occurred to me- how beautiful- I like that.

My magic has been sent. ;)

He Took My Heart

One of my best friends wrote an exquisite piece entitled "He took my heart and in its place he put a stone" that everyone, everyone should read. No matter who you are, if you've ever wanted not to have to feel, if you've ever felt shattered, if you've ever met the cold people whose blood used to burn with fire, then you'll want to read this.

The Yeshiva-Queens Question

Enrollment at Yeshiva University is down.

This is not surprising, given the following numbers. A male student can choose between attending Yeshiva College and paying tuition of $44,915 dollars per year (I added all the costs under the Full Time Students slot) or attending Queens College for about $4,838.25 dollars (I added the cost of two semesters for students who live in New York plus the Activity Fee.) It's true that YU gives generous scholarships (generally anywhere from $2000-full tuition), but even so, it can't compare to the cost of Queens.

You caution me, however, what about the ability to spend part of one's day learning in yeshiva with Rabbanim? What about the shiurim and programs YU offers? Can a Queens College student get that?

The answer is yes. There are a lot of Queens College attendees who learn at YBT or other Five Towns yeshivot and in this way balance their Judaic and secular commitments in the same way that YU students do. There's a large Jewish community and plenty of kosher restaraunts in Queens. In short, what's not to like?

So let me ask you, in your opinion, what's the draw of a Yeshiva University education over a Queens College+ Yeshiva Of Your Choice (YOYC) education? How is YU to continue attracting students? And if you are a college-aged student, or the parent of one, where would you send your child?

Tales of an Entertained Bride

So folks, I'm a bride! Yes, a bride, a maiden soon to be wed, which is variously exciting and fascinating and peculiar. I have discovered wonderful artifacts of clothing that are sold specifically for brides and find myself wishing I could own them. I have talked to pretty salesladies of every age and ethnicity, conferred about shoes and pranced about endlessly. That's the way my cookie crumbles, after all!

Some intriguing observations:

Invariably, every single bridal store I enter informs me that I am the rare exception to the rule because I am happy. Yes, happy to be wed to my soon-to-be husband. It seems their normal clientele is stressed to the point that they forget this is a joyous occasion. I refuse to be stressed to that point by simply ignoring whatever needs to be done. An amusing, if flawed strategy.

I have been offered every method known to man to slim down before my wedding. Facebook tells me about diets and women in stores try to sell me all sorts of contraptions. Does it occur to no one that if the man asked to marry me knowing my size and weight he hardly wishes me to go on some sort of crash diet for his sake? He did use his eyes, now did he not?

In any case, my particular life is such that I chose my bridal gown and selected our lodgings exactly two days prior to my flying out to camp. It was complicated to attempt to offer my say on wedding decisions whilst being forbidden to use a cell phone openly, but I managed it. (Doubtless my years of Bais Yaakov training, with cell phones hidden in bathrooms, aided me.)

In terms of what I do with my everyday life, let us just say that in large part it is completely unconnected to my status as bride, and it makes me laugh when people assume that brides are incapable of using brain space for any other projects during their career as Lady in White. Speaking of which, I finished reading The Woman in White and enjoyed it very much. I'm on a bit of a classics kick; anyone have some new ones to recommend? (Beware, I've read most of them.)

At some point I should detail for you the extremely unique dates that Heshy and I have embarked upon. They range from attending shechitas to wandering through Pomegranate in Brooklyn (it was an exploratory date, and as there were no rain forests, this was considered a good second choice), hanging out with homeless people on the subway, arguing about "Inception," getting arrested (or rather, summoned to criminal court) in Central Park, taking standardized tests and all manner of fun peculiarities that confuse others and delight us.

In any case, onward bound to argue with credit card companies and claim that yes, I do exist, and yes, this is in fact my address.

Have a blessed day, as Jay the Subway Preacher would say.

The Birth of a Movie

"The Matrix" + "A Beautiful Mind" = "Inception"

Drug & Alcohol Abuse in the Orthodox Jewish Community

Less than a month ago, I opened up my email to find an extremely powerful essay authored by Rabbi Dr. Gershon and Kirbie Pincus, Rabbi Dr. Elie and Aliza Feder, Noah and Nava Pincus Greenfield, and Chaviva Pincus about the life and loss of their beloved son and brother, Avi Pincus. This essay has been published online by the Orthodox Union under the title "Dying to Recover: The Life and Loss of Avi Pincus." He died of a drug overdose. Unlike others, who desire to cover up this information, the Pincuses and Greenfields wanted to share their story in the hope of helping others "to be more caring of others, more sensitive to the pain around us, and more appreciative of the difficult circumstances in which so many find themselves."

I was impressed to discover that this issue had formerly been addressed in Issue 278 of Mishpacha Magazine, the Mega Succos Edition, published on September 30, 2009. The article there was entitled "Drinking From the Cup of Bitterness: A Family Cherishes the Legacy of a Beloved Son" and was written by Malki Lowinger. Yehuda Mond z"l passed away at the age of 19 from a drug and alcohol overdose.

The Mond family decided to take their tragedy and turn it into a powerful effort to raise awareness of the dangers of drug and alcohol abuse within our world. They started a foundation, the website of which is YehudaMondFoundation.org. What is more, they created a DVD which includes personal testimonials, endorsement of rabbis such as R' Twerski, a dramatization telling the everyday story of yeshiva bochurim and alcohol along with the Mond family speaking directly into the camera and speaking very movingly about their son. You can watch the DVD here or below:

The dangers and pitfalls of alcohol from Yehuda Mond Foundation on Vimeo.

I think it's fantastic this issue is being discussed in the Orthodox world, and I'm glad people are taking measures to spread awareness and combat the cavalier, dapper, unconcerned attitude many people feel on both sides of the spectrum.

The Elegance of Understated Cinematography

Something which truly impresses me about Swedish filmography- or perhaps it's only that of directors Niels Arden Oplev and Daniel Alfredson, as I'm not that familiar with Swedish films in general- is the understated simplicity and elegance with which it tells its story. The film versions of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" and "The Girl Who Played With Fire" are simply exquisite because they do not fall prey to the maudlin sentimentality and looming soundtracks that often characterize Hollywood blockbusters. Salander is not sexed-up; her awkwardness, innocence and frightening violence are all represented matter of factly. This fact struck me most when watching the torture scene in "The Girl Who Played With Fire." It is not night outside. It is not thunderstorming. There is no sense of classic horror to the scene. The scene is kept the same as it was in the book; Salander is simply a girl going about her business, acquiring the information she is looking for. It is the fact that there is no clashing crescendo of trumpets or instruments, that her predicament is not weirdly exaggerated but is presented as a simple truth, that affects us so powerfully. We relate to Salander because our emotions have not been manipulated at all. The film tells a story but it doesn't tell us how to feel about it. While in Hollywood, Berger's open marriage and her affair with Blomkvist would have been played up big time, it's hardly mentioned in the Swedish film at all. And Lisbeth's violence is not glamourized- it's not action-popping glorious and therefore unbelievable- but is factual.

Here's the torture scene I am referring to:



See how factual, clean and clear that scene is? Notice the sunlight, the lack of terrifying music, and the simplicity with which Salander goes about her task. That elegant and horrifying truth gets to us because it is presented so honestly, without any glamour or any dressing it up.

Compare to the scene where we see another painted face talking- compare to Hollywood.

There's good reason that The Joker is a comic book character whereas Lisbeth Salander can be seen as a real human being. Notice that the Joker needs to be in a background suitable to his violence- in a bare prison cell, with harsh fluorescent lights upon him, and eerie music building up to a feverish pitch- in order for us to take the scene seriously. Not so with Salander.

Here's an excellent example of where America gets it terribly wrong:



This film should have been the story of the horrors of physical abuse. It should have been simple, understated, elegant, featuring Rihanna and Eminem with Rihanna as the abused victim and Eminem as the abuser. Instead, we get pretty people trying to act out some sort of love story- Megan Fox and Dominic Fee- which is patently absurd and not even remotely true to how domestic violence actually plays out. We get Rihanna in reddish-pink hair and pink claws baring a lot of skin outside the artfully designed burning house. We get Eminem in some random field in the middle of nowhere. And what they've done by presenting this travesty, this utter mockery of a music video, is killed the power of the song. They've alienated the listeners. The reason we were interested in "Love The Way You Lie" was because we felt that the people who were singing it really knew what they were talking about. Anyone who has listened to Eminem's "Kim" knows that he has the vicious feelings of a potential abuser. And we all know about Chris Brown and Rihanna. It should have been them acting out this video- and acting it out in a way that left us sickened, disgusted and horrified by the trauma and pain of domestic abuse. It should have had the understated elegance of the scenes in Daniel Alfredson's movies, not the blowsy color of a whore decked out in cheap polyester, rayon and a thick layer of clown makeup.

Alas, here in America, we've been given this arty, pathetically inaccurate portrayal which makes domestic abuse look kind of sexy- and which makes houses burning down kind of cool.

Way to go, Joseph Kahn. Great job directing a film that's going to make every girl in America wish she were abused- as long as it's the abs-baring Dominic Fee who wanders around punching the odd mirror and mournfully consoling her with rose-bearing teddy-bears.

It's about as tasteful as pretending rape is fun.

Invincible Innocence: The Haredi World as Wharton's New York

I recently reread Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence. It struck me that the book is an excellent metaphor for the Haredi world as a whole. While the work actually speaks of the elite crust of society in New York during the 1870s, it seems that much is the same in the Haredi enclaves that exist today.

Those families that boast yichus (pedigree), wealth and have Rebbes in their lines can be equated with the upper echelon of society.

Those families where the parents work or the children are 'working boys' rather than those who choose to spend their days in Kollel are considered lower class.

And those who are in-between (not blessed with an excellent pedigree or wealth but striving to be accepted by that upper class) are the middle class.

As to the women, they are as sheltered as ever they were in 1870.

The Age of Innocence stars Newland Archer, a wealthy young man who is engaged to the pretty maiden May who is related to the unusual Countess Olenska, a woman who dared to flee from her colorful husband. Archer is dissatisfied with his world and his life and feels a vague, directionless ache and desire to search for an alternative. The Countess unknowingly provides that alternative since she does not conform to society's mores until she is taken in by Newland's noble talk of living for society's mandates and values, preaching such virtues as selflessness, honor and nobility. In this case, the selflessness takes the form of not breaking the engagement with May even though he is hopelessly in love with the Countess and she with him. The Countess, in turn, does not divorce her husband due to the scandal it would cause and the shame that would be cast upon her family, to whom Archer will soon be related. Their high-minded consideration of others ends in tragedy; the two of them are made to part by a civilized dinner that ushers the Countess away.

There are several scenes in the work where Archer's perception accords entirely with the state in which Haredi women commonly find themselves. Here's one such excerpt:

Archer had reverted to all his old inherited ideas about marriage. It was less trouble to conform with the tradition and treat May exactly as all his friends treated their wives than to try to put into practice the theories with which his untrammelled bachelorhood had dallied. There was no use in trying to emancipate a wife who had not the dimmest notion that she was not free; and he had long since discovered that May's only use of the liberty she supposed herself to possess would be to lay it on the altar of her wifely adoration.

Archer believes that women ought to be allowed the same opportunities as men, yet he faces a peculiar situation: his own wife would not accord with him as she does not feel herself to be constrained in the least. The well-brought-up Bais Yaakov attendee would agree; she does not perceive herself as lacking freedom.

The innocence which Archer hopes his wife May will not possess is exactly that innocence which is so carefully cultivated by insular communities:

"Poor Ellen--she was always a wayward child. I wonder what her fate will be?"

"What we've all contrived to make it," he felt like answering. "If you'd all of you rather she should be Beaufort's mistress than some decent fellow's wife you've certainly gone the right way about it."

He wondered what Mrs. Welland would have said if he had uttered the words instead of merely thinking them. He could picture the sudden decomposure of her firm placid features, to which a lifelong mastery over trifles had given an air of factitious authority. Traces still lingered on them of a fresh beauty like her daughter's; and he asked himself if May's face was doomed to thicken into the same middle-aged image of invincible innocence.

Ah, no, he did not want May to have that kind of innocence, the innocence that seals the mind against imagination and the heart against experience!

And yet it is precisely that form of invincible innocence which the Haredi community strives to cultivate, mistrustful of the outside world and of anything secular, condemning imagination as a tool of Satan.

The stigma of divorce and the shame the entire family faces is also paralleled in the Haredi world, where children whose parents are divorced are considered to come from 'a broken home' and their shidduchim are therefore affected negatively.

There is much more within the book that accords with that world but it is not polite to note it. What I enjoyed was realizing once more that literature never ages.

The Ladies' Auxiliary

The Ladies' Auxiliary is like Stargirl for Jews. Worth reading, vividly written and certain to make the outcast Jew feel at home.

Batsheva is a convert who joins the Memphis Orthodox Jewish community. Her emotionally heartfelt service of God is pure and honest, but the community prefers rigid strictures over true connection. In a clash of small-town scruples and a desire to uphold the way things were, tradition wins over innovation, exacting an iron price. But in Batsheva we find a heroine- someone pure and free, willing to look at the world and still open her eyes with wonder upon discovering its beauty.

Your Most Difficult Moment

What was the hardest thing you ever did in your life?

When I ask this I refer to the emotional side of the spectrum, not physical labor. What was the most difficult emotional experience you ever voluntarily (or involuntarily) chose to experience and why did you choose it? What made you do this very difficult thing?

Lisbeth Salander

(Warning: This post contains spoilers.)

There are few heroines that speak to me the way Lisbeth Salander does.

Stieg Larsson has become famous. Everyone has heard of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest. But the works speak to me in a way that is perhaps more profound than they do your average reader. I admire Lisbeth Salander, that skinny waif of a girl who is so strong and has so much heart. I love her spirit. I think her tattoos are beautiful. I think every single one of them is a 'f--k you' to all the people who hurt her. I love that she alternatively dresses like a goth, a punk or mixes up the social stratas to be blonde, wealthy women such as Irene Nesser.

And I really love the Swedish film version of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"- which I just rented off of iTunes and watched tonight! It was so brilliantly done. It was the fragile, sexy, clever, intelligent, lonely, antisocial and beautiful Salander brought to the forefront. There's a part in "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" - the book version- which is so token Salander. She's talking to Blomkvist and she says that Harriet Vanger was a coward and a weakling because by fleeing to Australia she didn't report Martin and allowed him to keep abusing women for the rest of the time that he was alive. And she holds Harriet responsible for that, for the cowardice that allowed Martin to continue to hurt so many other people. And there's an element of justice in that, testament to the unique moral code that Salander follows, that resonates so strongly with me. In Salander's world there is right and there is wrong and choosing to be weak and allowing others to be hurt because you haven't got the guts to condemn them or fight them is wrong.

The movie demonstrates this in a pivotal scene where Salander and Blomkvist are talking and the conversation goes like so:

Blomkvist: What happened out there? [pause] He didn't die in an accident, did he? [pause] Damn, Lisbeth. His father taught him to kill when he was 16 years old. That would make anyone sick in the brain.

Salander: Don't make him into a f--king victim. He nearly killed you. He was a killer and a rapist and he enjoyed it. He had the same chances as everyone else. You choose who you want to be. He wasn't a victim. He was an evil motherf--ker who hated women.

Blomkvist: How did he die?

Salander: He burned to death.

Blomkvist: Could you have saved him?

Salander: Yes.

Blomkvist: But you let him burn.

Salander: Yes.

And the Salander in that scene is all avenging angel justice-in-black-leather with delicate piercings scattered across her eyebrow, nose and ears. You can't help but love her.

She's a goddess in black leather who drives motorcycles, can access your computer and beats people up with golf clubs. She'll only hurt you if you deserve it and she'll dole out justice where it's due. She won't let anyone intimidate her, frighten her or otherwise manipulate her. She's independent in every single way and scary as hell.

She's Froken Salander...and she's a diminutive 4 foot 9 or so.

She's also the answer to Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. McMurphy died to set his ward free...but Lisbeth Salander's going to make sure anyone who wants to hurt her goes down screaming, the smell of gasoline in their nostrils and an axe through their head. Her motto isn't to get revenge; it's simply to get even.

Salander's the answer to girls like Bella Swann or Lexi Gray, the ones who let themselves get pushed around and allow their lives to revolve around men. She's complex, complicated, incredibly intelligent and nobody's b*tch. Buffy the Vampire Slayer looks pitiful next to her.

In short, she's a little bit like my dream girl. And evidently, not just mine, based on the 21 million copies sold of the book.

Long live Lisbeth Salander...the woman who combines femininity, mystery, stubbornness, independence, detective skills and sheer cheek with amazing survival abilities and a wonderful ability to make us readers laugh while she's doing it.

2010 Top 50 Judaism Blogs

So this is exciting...I opened up my email and discovered I'm included in a list of the 2010 Top 50 Judaism Blogs!

Thanks so much to those who nominated me. Hope all of you are doing well!

Update: Alas, this award was merely eloquent spam. Saddening.

My Lady of the Radiance

Sometimes we cry only for ourselves.

It's a selfish kind of crying. We feel sad or unhappy; we feel as though God has treated us unfairly. We don't understand the challenges He has chosen to give us and rebellious, we cry out to Him and tell Him that we are angry or upset. We cry because we cannot move forward; we are stuck and stagnant. Our feet are caught within swirls of desert sand and as we attempt to plod along, we find that we are unable to do so. We cannot go on anymore. From our parched throats comes only a helpless, "Why?"

And sometimes we cry for other people. Because we don't understand why God has chosen them as His unique recipient of suffering. They're brilliant, bright, radiant and joyous. They're smart, intelligent, lively and clever. Why is it they who must suffer? Why is it they who must bleed publicly, having lost people whom they love and what is worse, lost them voluntarily? What is one to do when one realizes that one did not really know a person? How should they carry on?

It reminds me of a quote in the book Beach Music:

We were like moons that gave off no light, attracted to the same illusory orbit. Shyla could barely recover her self-respect after having slept with Capers and having shared every secret with him for more than a year. It was not that he had lied about the war that most troubled her, it was that he had told her every night about his love for her, his undying admiration for all she stood for, his adoration of her body, and his ardent desire that they spend their entire lives together. That she could not sense such treachery and dissimulation in her own lover disturbed her far more than that he'd been secretly working for the state. It was not any residue of Capers and his bad faith she feared, but she did not know how to ever regain trust in herself and her own judgements again. Shyla had always considered herself reliable and incorruptible, but never had she thought of herself as an easy mark or gullible to the point of dishonor. She could easily accept the legal consequences of her own actions, but she could not bear being made a laughingstock or a fool for love. So she turned to me and I turned to her, neither of us knowing that we were both keeping a ruthless appointment with a bridge in Charleston.

~Beach Music by Pat Conroy, page 719

There is no horror quite as horrible as having given oneself wholly to another, having trusted them with your soul, having offered them all that was valuable in oneself, only to find that you were wrong, that you had judged their character incorrectly. You blame only yourself and you cannot feel confident in your judgments again, for it has become clear to you that you are not as accurate a judge of character as you once were. The betrayal grows within your mind until you are unsure what to think and whether it was you or he who created it and caused it. Were you too quick to make decisions? Or was he really the one at fault? The way at which we guess at ourselves, guessing and second-guessing, permeated by the fact that we still may love the traitor because after all, we did give him our souls...makes life unbearable.

So, my dear one, who is currently in the midst of a very public unhappiness, may you be blessed forevermore; may you meet someone truly deserving of your radiance; may you shine and glow brighter than you ever have and may your heart re-knit itself even though now it must feel shattered all to pieces. The fact that you were the author of its destruction notwithstanding, the pain you must feel is indescribable, so harsh that it must hurt to breathe. Remember only that you are loved by very many, who wish for your health and happiness, that you are a goddess and an inspiration to many, and that this one sadness should not undermine your own sense of reliance or faith in yourself. You are a whole person and your decisions are sound; you could not judge based on what you did not know.

May you be blessed and may you shine like the sun.

Heart to Heart, Lev B'Lev, Hart to Heart: The Shabbat Experience

I recently heard about a fantastic initiative undertaken by a man named Hart Levine, an attendee of the University of Pennsylvania. Levine founded the 'Hart to Heart' initiative, namely a way to expose interested Jews to Judaism without any pressure. Jews who are interested in a Shabbat experience can attend a beautiful Shabbat meal and spend time with other Jews - without anyone actively trying to change their views. Thus, this is not your typical kiruv group and it isn't run by a big organization: it's not NCSY, Aish or anything similar.

Levine's blog is accessible at LevBLev.blogspot.com. He coordinates Shabbatonim at various campuses, so if you are interested in having him create a Shabbaton at your secular college, please email him at levblev at gmail.

If you're curious about the organization, then check out the Heart to Heart Project, which has a wealth of informative information, including the group's mission statement:

"Heart to Heart"/"לב בּלב" is a network of committed Jewish students interested in sharing Judaism with Jews on college campuses. Based on the values of ahavat Yisrael and caring for others, the goal is to connect Jews to Judaism through peer-to-peer relationships. The means are endless, but often start with a welcoming smile, a friendly greeting, and an invaluable invite. There is much beauty, meaning, and value in our Jewish knowledge, experiences, and communities and one of the greatest manifestations of appreciation thereof is to share it with others.

I haven't attended a Heart2Heart Shabbaton myself (though I'm sure it would be a fantastic experience) but this group seems to embody my vision of Judasim. Jews get to have a Jewish experience with other Jews who happily answer their questions, should they have any, and everyone gets to learn from one another and respect one another. I'm not sure how I can help out with this project, but if there's a way, I'd love to do it. Hurrah!

The Loss of Sophisticated Innuendo

The rabbi here pointed me to this interesting quote in an Op-Ed in the New York Times.

The elemental power of sexuality has also waned in American popular culture. Under the much-maligned studio production code, Hollywood made movies sizzling with flirtation and romance. But from the early ’70s on, nudity was in, and steamy build-up was out. A generation of filmmakers lost the skill of sophisticated innuendo. The situation worsened in the ’90s, when Hollywood pirated video games to turn women into cartoonishly pneumatic superheroines and sci-fi androids, fantasy figures without psychological complexity or the erotic needs of real women.

It's the old argument for tzniut: namely, that the girls are sexier because of what they don't show as opposed to what they do show. A little entertaining to find it in the NYT.

The Eighth Principle: Our Torah Is Not Exactly The Same

The Adept pointed this out in class, for which I thank him. Rabbi Yaakov Weinberg was the Rosh Yeshiva of Ner Yisrael & was involved in Torah UMesorah, Agudath Israel of America and other such programs. In short, he's part of the yeshiva/Haredi world. He authored a book entitled Fundamentals and Faith: Insights Into the Rambam's 13 Principles. It's worthwhile to note his understanding of the Eighth Principle, which regards the divinity of the Torah. See excerpt below.

~

The Inscriber of God's Words

The Ani Ma'amin version of this Principle reads: "I believe with complete faith that the entire Torah which is now in our possession is the same as that which was given to Moshe Rabbeinu, may he rest in peace." This rendition of the eighth Principle expresses the belief that the Torah we have now is the same Torah that was given to Moshe Rabbeinu at Sinai. Although the phrasing chosen by the author of Ani Ma'amin is reminiscent of the actual text of the Rambam, it does not reflect his main concern in this Principle.

The text of this Principle reads:

"We believe that the entire Torah in our possession today was given [to us] by the Almighty through Moshe Rabbeinu, by means of the medium we metaphorically call "speech." No one knows the real nature of this communication except Moshe, to whom it was transmitted. He was like a scribe receiving dictation. He wrote the history, the stories, and the commandments. Therefore he is called [the] 'inscriber'."

Clearly, the thrust of this Principle is the conviction that every letter of the Written and Oral Law transmitted through Moshe Rabbeinu was of Divine origin. Moshe Rabbeinu merely served as a conduit for communicating it, or as a "scribe", as the Rambam himself describes him.

In contrast, it is difficult to understand Ani Ma'amin literally, i.e. that the Torah we now possess is the same Torah given to Moshe Rabbeinu. It is true that as long as the Temple stood and the Torah scroll which Moshe Rabbeinu wrote was kept there, the Jewish People had a standard to which to compare all new Torah scrolls that were written. But we are told (Sofrim 6:4) that after the destruction of the Temple, when Ezra returned to Israel, he found three Torah scrolls which were either considered valid. Even so, there were minor discrepancies among them, which were maintained or discarded depending on whether they appeared in two of the three scrolls. Although the Torah itself instructs Jews to follow the majority in making a decision, one suspects that after many such occurrences, his decisions are not going to produce absolutely accurate reproductions of the original Sinai version. The Talmud, too, says we are no longer experts in the exact spelling of many words. Consequently, the rabbis could not count the exact number of letters in the Torah (Kiddushin 30a). Certainly, these were very minor variances- such as spelling a word with a hei or an alef, or with or without a vav- changes which did not seem to affect the meaning significantly.

The Rambam knew very well that these variations existed when he defined his Principles. The words of Ani Ma'amin and the words of the Rambam, "the entire Torah in our possession today," must not be taken literally, implying that all the letters of the present Torah are the exact letters given to Moshe Rabbeinu. Rather, it should be understood in a general sense that the Torah we learn and live by is for all intents and purposes the same Torah that was given to Moshe Rabbeinu. The real emphasis of this Principle is that this Torah, which includes both the Written and Oral Law, is word for word, letter for letter from the Almighty, and absolutely none of it was edited by Moshe in any way whatsoever. There is not one phrase, not one letter that Moshe added to clarify or explain what was transmitted to him. He had no input of any kind but functioned only as the mouthpiece of the Almighty.

~Fundamentals and Faith by Rabbi Yaakov Weinberg, pages 89-91

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So no matter your affiliation, you are under no obligation to believe that every single jot, tittle and letter in today's Torah- in the literal sense- is precisely the same as it was when it was given to Moses at Sinai. Which is exciting, because it means you don't have to believe against reason and rationality. Hurrah!