Presence

Post Pesach Potporri

Lots of odds an ends from over Pesach, lots of strands in the old Duder's head. Here's a quick rundown:

• I'm ten chapters into Nefesh HaChaim. The beginning is all about how Man is the "soul" of the world, and how various things, like the Avos, are all "chariots" for the Divine Presence. So far, I think that whole thing could be easily transposed into a non-metaphysical context (whenever I read anything that goes off too much into speculations on how the metaphysical world really works, I either begin the non-metaphysical recontextualization process, or chuck it). I'm probably wrong, but I think it was meant to be taken that way. Anyway, strangely enough, I think I'm beginning to understand ma'aseh merkava, at least conceptually.


• I don't understand why we can't do away with 1) Yom Tov Sheni and b) kitnios. The former would certainly present a greater challenge than the latter, but I think we should just bite the bullet and take them both down. I'm all for maintaining a mesorah and a masoretic process, but we're also a rational religion, and these two things are both demoralizing and ridiculous at the same time, and there's no good reason to keep them around.


• A post by David Guttman that mentioned Birchas Kohanim reminded me of something that bothers me each Yom Tov. There's a good number of folks who reposition themselves to a more centralized location during Birchas Kohanim. I've looked around, and as far as I can tell, there's no basis for this whatsoever. Even if you're even with the kohanim (or perhaps their hands) you're cool, even if you're all the way on the side of the shul. I once asked someone why he did this, and he replied that there is, "an inyan" to do so, which to me is a code word for, "I have no reason, I just think it looks good." Please enlighten me if I'm wrong.


• There are some things you just can't blog, no matter how much you want to.


• I read this article from the latest Azure. Maybe it didn't translate well from the French, but I don't think it said much of anything.
  


• I've become obsessed with MySpace, in both a personal and professional capacity. I have been seeing how many people I can find from the frum community. I've found kids from all the schools. I wonder if parents are aware of what their kids are writing about. Parents: are you? (and if you're not, would you pay me a monthly retainer to track your child's activities and summarize them for you?)


• I spent a good deal of time reviewing the source material on showering on Yom Tov. It would appear that the best route to a heter would be to advance the claim the showering is of universal enjoyment, rather than taking the approach of the Rambam (that an enjoyment of the body is not subject to qualification) and then attempting to subvert the gezerah of the bathouse, either with preheated water or by some form of modification to the bathing process. I still think that "washing one's entire body" refers to taking a bath, and that a shower should be considered "limb by limb," but apparently everyone disagrees with me. Oh well, they've been wrong before. ;)


• Dr. Shalom Kellman gave a very interesting shiur on the Lechem HaPanim. I had heard some of it beforehand, but was quite amazed at the additional information he found in Josephus in support of his theory. Towards the end of the shiur, he made a distinction between the concepts of building and serving (binyan and avodah). My chavrusah and I have been developing a theory over the last few years that distinguishes between work and service (melacha and avodah). The pattern of melacha followed by avodah can be found throughout the Torah. It seems to be the "godly" way of doing things; those that go straight to avodah, without the requisite melacha beforehand, suffer. The best example of this is Cain. Anyway, it was a very interesting shiur, I don't think it's available anywhere, which is a shame.


• HarperCollins republished C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, but they messed up the ordering of the stories, arranging them in chronological order by Narnia time, not by publication time. I had copies of the original books 1-4, managed to get A Horse and His Boy (originally book 5) from the library, but can't find The Magician's Nephew, since it was book 6 originally, but now it is Book 1. I hate the Pikesville Library.


• Presence got it's first advertiser! Check out the ad to the left right. Looks interesting.