One of my regular followers, Michael Derfler, just told me of this book he wrote and I thought you might be interested in looking into it.
Amazon writes:
This unique book is a thought-provoking journey through the first five books of the Hebrew Bible. The focus is on the fundamental ideas that shape society, reframing the values that unite us and suggesting one core issue that divides us. All material is drawn from among the greatest minds in Jewish history. Most topics are broad enough to make them relevant to the widest audience. The content demands thoughtful readers who have the initiative to look up and review relevant Biblical passages. Open mindedness to new and challenging ideas is required. The rewards are a deeper appreciation of the Bible and a new way of speaking about life and the world.
Hiilawe Mitchellon
This book is a thinking person’s book, deep and mindful subject matter with possibly life-changing ideas. Sometimes I just “had to read one more piece” and sometimes I had to read sentences over and over to absorb the full meaning. This book could be a great resource toward peaceful, purposeful, and persistent co-existence with people of all mindsets. I did not receive a copy of this book in exchange for a review, but did have the pleasure of meeting the author and discussing some of the material within. Sometimes my ideas were challenged and I really loved to delve into the ideas!!!! Great!!
@ Sebastien Zorn:
https://youtu.be/eSijB9-Hw7g
https://youtu.be/AJdkhAE-72Q
“It is not so much what you believe in that matters, as the way in which you believe it and proceed to translate that belief into action.”
– Lin Yutang
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lin_Yutang
@ Sebastien Zorn:
The most realistic part of the Torah for me is the the part about Moses’s sin. God told him to speak to the rock to produce water by way of providing a miracle to prove he was God’s emmissary but he hit it (presumably ruining the miracle by providing a possible scientific explanation — though today, thousands of years later, somebody might say it was a bluetooth rock so speaking could also be explained away.) Moses misunderstood, did something else, and God got mad.
How many times a day do I see this, every day? Person A gives person B an instruction which person B doesn’t expect and especially if it doesn’t make sense. Almost 100% chance that person B will either not hear it at all or mis-hear it, and that person A will feel slighted and frustrated and get mad.
We only perceive what we expect. How many times have you been unable to find some everyday thing in plain sight because it was situated at a funny angle and you just didn’t see it though it was right in front of you. The purloined letter principle is based on this, as well.
That’s why foundational doctrinal statements are so repetititive. Say something to somebody they don’t expect to hear and, at a minimum, they will ask you to repeat it. Later, you are likely to find they didn’t take it in at all and don’t even remember. Remember the game of telephone in grammar school recess? Everybody would form a circle. The first person would whisper something into ear of the next person who would then repeat it to the next until it came back around to the first person who would then say what he heard aloud. It would always be changed. A lot.
God, in the story, clearly doesn’t understand human psychology.
One could say that this bolsters the idea of Tikkun Olam, since the world wouldn’t have to be fixed if God hadn’t screwed up creation.
This idea of a flawed God was one of the things that enraged Mohammed. Of course, for him, the main reason he said that we distorted the scriptures is that we didn’t mention him, Ha ha. What a psychotic narcissist. Geez!
Today, he’d be in the criminally insane wing of a mental hospital. Or teaching in a university.
Or just gunning a lot of people down somewhere in a paroxysm of “workplace violence.”
The enduring thing about the Tanakh, as with all popular ideologies, religious or secular, is that there’s something in there for everybody and all you have todo is cherry pick — the U.S.Constitution is like that, too — oldest in the world. Personally, I like the stuff about compassion for animals and slaughtering anti-semites.