The Schrift - Ancient Jewish Wisdom for Modern Times

In the Torah, there is a law that if anyone touches a corpse, they need to go outside the camp for awhile, or they may infect other people with death.

When the Torah was written, it was simply obvious to everyone that death was bad and life was good.

Yet, this simple premise that "death = bad" and "life = good" has been forgotten in modern days. This is because modern "preachers of death" trick us into thinking that weakness, self-punishment, and guilt are signs of "progress" whereas strength and vivacity are indicators of "sin."

F.W. Murnau's 1922 film "Nosferatu" was about Dracula's visit to Germany to find victims into which he could sink his fangs. Yet, the victims of vampires are also complicit in the seduction process. Murnau, writing in the wake of Germany's loss in World War I, wanted to warn his countrymen to beware of modern-day vampires looking for vulnerable converts.

To recognize the preachers of death always lurking in our society, we must practice mindfulness of emotions meditation. Our emotions and feelings can teach us when we are receiving toxic messages far better than thinking and reasoning can.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Bach - "Toccata in D Minor"

Seinfeld was not a show about nothing. Rather, it was a show about trivialities, trifles, mundane occurrences. This is not nothing. Nothing, in fact, is a lot more complicated -- and, according to Kabbalah, a lot more holy.

One show which really may have been about nothing was Kafka's short story "The Hunger Artist," published in 1922.

Nothingness is not an empty white room, or a black void, or a nihilist's favorite buzzword. Rather, it is a concept which stretches the limits of human imagination.

If you can find nothingness, prepare to be whelmed, if not overwhelmed.

It is not a coincidence that it was in the desert, the realm of pure nothingness, where the ancient Hebrews formed their vast army to eventually conquer Israel.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Mozart - "Turkish Rondo"

Children figure out pretty quickly that even if they're bad they will still get Christmas presents from Santa Claus. So, why be good? Why follow the Mitzvot if God will not smite us? Or will He? Nah, He won't. Right?

Even if you don't believe that God will personally smite you for breaking Shabbat, perhaps the Mitzvot have their own logic, such that if we don't keep them, our personal well-being will suffer, or the Jewish people as a whole will bear the costs.

In Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov learned that if you break a moral law, morality itself will punish you through guilt. Yet, Woody Allen thought differently.

There may be another reason why we receive such an intimidating, haunting, harrowing warning this week in the Torah as to what will happen if we violate the commandments. Kafka's Josef K. helps us discern the answer.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Johnny Cash - "Cocaine Blues

We tend to think of greed and gluttony in financial and caloric terms respectively. And yet, it is possible to be greedy and gluttonous for just about anything in life. Paradoxically, one can even become greedy to not be greedy.

Goethe's Faust marked a turning point in literature as the play showed how previous sins like wealth, drunkenness, and debauchery, had lost their appeal to modern humans. And yet, these same "vices" simply assumed new form in the lusting for bookish knowledge, for Enlightenment, and even to live in the moment.

If we are greedy for the moment, we will remain just as unsatisfied as if we are greedy for some future state of happiness.

Achieving the moment does not happen overnight but through regular practice and cultivation.

The Torah provides a helpful tip on how to break out of the cycle of craving: leaving some of the harvest for the gleaners and leaving some bread on the Shabbat dinner table.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Eduoard Lalo - "Puisqu'on ne peut fléchir ... Vainement, ma bien aimée"

Is there really a difference between simile and metaphor? When Paul Simon sings "I am a rock," no one thinks he actually is a literal pebble on seashore. But then why does he not sing "I am like a rock" instead? In Kafka's The Metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa isn't just "like" a bug, but actually "is" a bug. Yet we, as humans, are quick to transform Gregor back into a human, to the bug as just a "symbol" or an allegory for a human. Meanwhile, Paul Simon's actual rock and Kafka's actual bug get left behind in the metaphorical dust.

Ancient cultures were far more in tune with the inherent aliveness and lifeforce within all objects. While this may seem to be a pagan idea, it actually brings us closer to monotheism. Heidegger's 1950 essay "The Thing" encourages us to see objects as they really are--things which have their own "thingness." It may be that to treat passages from the Torah as only "symbolic" or "metaphorical" or "superstitious" is to castrate both them and ourselves in the process (though, this time, not literally -- don't worry).

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Simon & Garfunkel - "Scarborough Fair"

Today, we tend to dismiss people who are overly concerned with what others think as being egotistical or weak or sensitive. But actually, caring what others think of us, wanting be liked by the group, was an absolutely crucial personality trait in ancient societies. Yet, this remains a difficult reality for us to swallow. Our society tends to glorify the people who stand out from the crowd, who welcome the hissing and booing of an audience, who don’t give a damn what others think. The legacy of Sturm und Drang and the Romantic hero is still very much with us today. When we go into a café and see the troubled man sitting alone in the corner, with long hair, John Lennon glasses, scribbling in his notebooks, what we are seeing is Werther’s progeny. The Torah is particularly sensitive to humans as inherently pack animals, animals that need each other, that need to be part of the group. But it’s by no means a given that every group will want to have us as a member. And yet, sometimes those societies which don’t want us are the same societies which we, perversely, so desperately wish to belong to. Theodor Herzl finally snapped out of automatized thinking to apply mindful self-compassion to his people.

IG: stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Beethoven - "An die Ferne Geliebte"

Kant discovered that our minds are storytelling machines. We are masters at taking a limited set of data from the outside world and weaving this into a narrative. Yet, the narrative we end up telling ourselves often ends up not being a cute and endearing child's bedtime story but more like a scandalous drama or horror film. The storeis we tell ourselves often bring our deepest insecurities to the surface, as evidenced by Shakespeare's Tragedy, Othello. Aaron's reaction to the death of his two sons inside the Mishkan seems to indicate that we should not so quickly presume to connect the dots of what we perceive. Rather, we should mindfully observe our experiences rather than rushing to conclusions. Paradoxically, it may be that Moshe's advice to Aaron shows how stoically observing reality and telling ourselves the stories we want to hear are, in fact, one and the same.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Sigmund Romberg - "Golden Days"

You may not realize it, but each time you say "thank you," you are making a kind of mini-sacrifice. In this sense, you are not so different from ancient peoples who made animal sacrifices to the gods. What is "thank you" other than a momentary emptying of yourself in acknowledgement of a gift or favor you have received. The Torah's emphasis on animal sacrifices was also a reaction in the ancient world toward human sacrifices. The Torah wanted to say: we don't do this anymore. Rather, we sacrifice in a way which is ennobling and elevating. In our daily lives, we often conflate healthy sacrifices with unhealthy sacrifices. Like the Torah, Kafka's 1912 story The Metamorphosis shows how sacrifice can be both deadening and revitalizing.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: The Smiths - "There is a Light that Never Goes Out"

Certain questions cannot be answered with mere logic and reason. When you try to interpret Kafka's literature, each time you answer one question, ten more appear in its place. The convoluted and cumbersome opening lines to Vayikra indicate that speaking directly to the Infinite is not going to be as simple as knocking on the door and being let inside. Romantic irony occurs when a text reflects back on itself and calls itself into question. The early German Romantic Friedrich Schlegel theorized that romantic irony allows a text to dwell in the Infinite, as it both undermines and affirms itself in one instant. While Kafka and the Torah may at times seem impenetrable, if we marvel at the romantic irony within them, they might just open up to us for a second a backdoor pathway to the eternal.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Coldplay - "Help is just around the Corner"

It is not an accident that some people feel they were born to be dentists, and others feel they were born to be professors. Nor is it an accident that some people want to have large families, while others wish to remain single for their entire lives. Our society has a lamentably oversimplified concept of natural selection. We think that our greatest drives are to survive and procreate. Yet, Darwin showed in 1859 that evolution works just as much on the group as on the individual level. We evolved not just for the survival of ourselves, but also for the survival of our species. This is why people have such a wide range of personalities and dream jobs; this variety allows the human species to flourish. Nietzsche once wrote that we should “become who we are.” Yet, what happens if we find ourselves displaced somewhere in which our dream job is no longer in existence? The wandering Hebrews may have an answer.

IG: Stevehead0001

steventobyweinberg.com

Music: Vera Brezhneva – “доброе утро”