Tag: danya ruttenberg

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Just one more war

I’m going to wade right into discussions of war, foreign policy and faith. What could go wrong?

No simple stories

First of all, I want to acknowledge these matters are complex. And simple demonization of either side of a conflict doesn’t speak to the truth. And simple wishing for peace can feel really naive, ignoring the real reasons people are upset and afraid.

Through-out the brutal war in Gaza I’ve appreciated the voice of Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, who consistently faces the harsh reality of what’s going on and refuses to dehumanise either side. She can unpack the history, the ideology, and the politics on both sides of a conflict. She can call out wrongdoing when she sees it. And she can draw us back to the truths tied up in our shared humanity.

Her post from the days after the October 7th terrorist attacks on Israel, and then the Israeli military response in Gaza, talks to the complexity – and the truth of hurt – on both sides. But then calls us to the greater truth. Her 19 dot points still are helpful grounding points several years into this war.

We can refuse to root for the safety and lives and rights of human beings like they are sports teams.

In which there are winners and losers. In which safety is a finite resource that must be hoarded.

I don’t know what the way out is politically, but I believe in finding the will, and in finding the way. If we choose to look for it, we can get there.

At the end of the day, everyone must be safe, free and allowed to flourish, because everyone is holy, created in the image of the divine.

Nobody’s children should be killed. Nobody’s.

Danya Ruttenberg, A Lot of Things Are True

Read it here: A Lot of Things Are True (by Danya Ruttenberg)

Bombing Iran, and dangerous concepts of God

So this month, that war expanded, and Israel attacked Iran, with a seemingly overwhelming mix of air strikes and assassinations. The justification was over Iran’s nuclear program getting too close to completion – though what the global intelligence community has publicly shared so far doesn’t give confidence there was a strong consensus. (Also as Jon Stewart points out, Netanyahu’s government has been warning they’ve been weeks or months away from the bomb for well over a decade. Perhaps it was more real this time??)

After being so successful in their first strike and with Iran not having much ability to fight back, Israeli leadership wanted to eliminate the nuclear threat. But Iranian nuclear facilities were buried in a mountain, so without a land invasion, only one country has the kind of bombs that could help. So Netanyahu asks the US to help with their “bunker buster” bombs. And here in comes the awful mix of faith and war.

Mike Huckabee’s, the US ambassador to Israel, sent this message to Trump. A mix of patriotism at Trump’s writing level, ass-kissing, and weird theology:

Mr. President,

God spared you in Butler, PA to be the most consequential President in a century—maybe ever. The decisions on your shoulders I would not want to be made by anyone else.

You have many voices speaking to you Sir, but there is only ONE voice that matters. HIS voice.

I am your appointed servant in this land and am available for you but I do not try to get in your presence often because I trust your instincts.

No President in my lifetime has been in a position like yours. Not since Truman in 1945. I don’t reach out to persuade you. Only to encourage you.

I believe you will hear from heaven and that voice is far more important than mine or ANYONE else’s.

You sent me to Israel to be your eyes, ears and voice and to make sure our flag flies above our embassy. My job is to be the last one to leave.

I will not abandon this post. Our flag will NOT come down! You did not seek this moment. This moment sought YOU!

It is my honor to serve you!

Mike Huckabee

Source: MSN

And then Trump authorises bombing. And in his press conference afterwards, ends on this note:

There’s no military in the world that could have done what we did tonight, not even close. There has never been a military that could do what took place just a little while ago.

Tomorrow, General Caine, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, will have a press conference at 8am (12:00 GMT) at the Pentagon, and I want to just thank everybody, and in particular, God.

I want to just say, “We love you, God, and we love our great military. Protect them.” God bless the Middle East. God bless Israel, and God bless America.

Thank you very much. Thank you.

Source: Al Jazeera

Trump has often claimed Christians as his followers but hasn’t often given much lip-service to following Christ himself… but it seems when the obsession some Christians have with prophecy about the middle east and the end times mixes with conspiratorial thinking and ego-stroking… it’s cutting through and influencing his decision making.

Diana Butler Bass wrote about this in War and Prophetic Ecstasy: Bombing Iran and Evangelical Dreams – also worth reading to understand how this branch of Christianity mixes ideas about “end times prophecy” with nationalism and ego to create this horrible system.

Which makes me think: when Christians talk about demonic activity and “powers and principalities”, often the thinking is about some kind of spiritual force taking over an individual. But my mind goes to the power of systems, where many people don’t feel evil, they might even feel they’re doing good, but somehow the whole collective system works for evil, destroying and degrading humanity as it goes.

When people make the state a god, they make it a demon. We see it all around us in our world, too, even though a good many people would mock the idea of there being actual demons. We, too, appeal to the “forces” of economics, of political theories; or, at a personal level, to the forces of aggression and sexuality; and increasingly people talk about such forces as if they are known to be things that it is pointless to resist. The pattern is that of paganism, even though in polite society we ignore [the real pagans].

From The Crown and the Fire by NT Wright. Read in “Bread and Wine: Readings for Lent and Easter“.

But did it work?

I was in an online chat with friends and one said this line:

Israel may feel that they have achieved their goals.

At a cursory look it seems that way. They’ve significantly weakened the Iranian military and killed much of the leadership. They’ve convinced the US to drop bombs on the nuclear sites, they’ve survived the retaliation and now there’s a ceasefire.

But has it actually taken away the nuclear threat that they said justified it? Trump says yes, leaked memos from his intelligence agencies say it’s likely only set back a few months, and it’s clear he won’t accept anyone saying his victory was anything but complete. So who knows how far set back Iran’s nuclear program actually is.

But they’ll definitely want a nuclear bomb now, because what else could act as deterrence when your enemies have so much air superiority? If there was any chance they were not rushing for a bomb before, I find it hard to imagine they’re not now.

And back to that idea that Israel may feel they have achieved their goals… is the ultimate goal to block nuclear weapons, or is it safety for their own people? Like Danya Ruttenberg said in the post I quoted earlier – it is flawed thinking to treat safety as a finite resource.

Making your neighbour less safe won’t make you more safe!

Terrorising people with overwhelming force might subjugate them for now, but it’s going to breed enmity for generations.

And this story is evidence of that! Iran and the US had good relations, until the UK and USA helped back a coup in 1953, taking down the democratically elected government to protect their oil companies. Iran’s current “Death to America” slogan emerged in the revolution, in large part because of the anger over that coup and US support for the authoritarian monarchy. Then Iran taking American hostages in 1979 built up enmity on the US side. And so the cycle has continued over and over.

The kind of peace Jesus’ calls for

Jesus also lived in a time and place where cycles of violence perpetuated over and over. And some of his followers hoped he would bring peace for Israel – by crushing the Romans. But that would merely continue the cycle of violence.

Instead he came with a message: “love your enemies“.

And with an example to follow: “do not resist an evil person“. (The examples he gives in this are a different form of resistance, a non-violent resistance).

The cross of Christ was the price of his obedience to God amidst a rebellious world; it was suffering for having done right, for loving where others hated, for representing in the flesh the forgiveness and the righteousness of God among people both less forgiving and less righteous. The cross of Christ was God’s method of overcoming evil with good.

…

Christians whose loyalty to the Prince of Peace puts them out of step with today’s nationalistic world, because they are willing to love their nation’s friends but not to hate their nation’s enemies, are not unrealistic dreamers who think that by their objections they will end all wars. On the contrary, it is the soldiers who think that they can put an end to wars by preparing for just one more.

From “He came preaching peace” by John Howard Yoder. Read in “Bread and Wine: Readings for Lent and Easter“.

Reflection and response

It upsets me deeply that violence is being done in the name of Jesus who preached peace and pioneered it with non-violence. It feels so wrong.

But scrolling news articles and analysis endlessly won’t help. I’m probably overly attentive to the news cycle, particularly politics and foreign affairs. And when Trump is in power the whole cycle is designed to generate news and outrage non-stop. I escaped the addiction of social media to fall into the addiction of the news cycle. It’s heavy, but following the latest outrage isn’t making it any lighter.

Again, Danya Ruttenberg has wise advice, and a link to a beautiful prayer for this moment:

Make conscious, intentional space for your feelings. Something that’s not, “scrolling endlessly while feeling kinda sad, and sublimating your emotional life into intellectual, political things,”– which we all do, especially these days, but I urge you to Make. Time. To. Stop. And. Feel. (And this is for all of us, with regards to everything going on these days. Please.)

Danya Ruttenberg: On Hostages and Broken Hearts

And this “Prayer of the Mothers” from Rabbi Tamar Elad Appelbaum and Sheikha Ibtisam Mahamid, is a beautiful interfaith prayer for the current moment:

God of Life
Who heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds
May it be your will to hear the prayer of mothers.
For you did not create us to kill each other
Nor to live in fear, anger or hatred in your world
But rather you have created us so we can grant permission to one another
to sanctify Your name of Life, your name of Peace in this world.
For these things I weep, my eye, my eye runs down with water
For our children crying at nights,
For parents holding their children with despair and darkness in their hearts
For a gate that is closing and who will open it while day has not yet dawned.
And with my tears and prayers which I pray
And with the tears of all women who deeply feel the pain of these difficult days I raise my hands to you
please God have mercy on us
Hear our voice that we shall not despair
That we shall see life in each other,
That we shall have mercy for each other,
That we shall have pity on each other,
That we shall hope for each other
And we shall write our lives in the book of Life
For your sake God of Life
Let us choose Life.
For you are Peace, your world is Peace and all that is yours is Peace
And so shall be your will and let us say Amen.

This “Prayer of the Mothers” is from Rabbi Tamar Elad Appelbaum and Sheikha Ibtisam Mahamid. Translated by Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie.

Writing this post has helped ground me in what I believe – even in the midst of such turbulence. But ultimately, the work of peace is a big and lifelong work, and it needs to permeate all parts of my life – from the internal world, to friends and family and colleagues and neighbours and local people I just don’t like, to nations and world religions and empires.

Jesus showed us what peace looked like. And it’s far harder work than dropping another bomb and then demanding a ceasefire.

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Tanya Luhrmann on hearing the voice of God

Luhrmann’s provocative theory is that the church teaches pray-ers to use their minds differently than they do in everyday life. They begin by holding conversations with God in their heads, modeled on the kind of chummy conversations they’d have with their best friends. As they talk to Him, tell Him about their problems and imagine His wise counsel and loving response, they are training their thoughts, much as people use weights to train their muscles. The church encourages them to tune into sounds, images and feelings that are louder or more intense or more unfamiliar or more powerful—and to interpret these internal cues as the external voice of God.

Hearing the Voice of God – Stanford Magazine

Steve McCready mentioned Dr Tanya Luhrmann’s research on Sunday and I read several articles about it and am going to order a copy of her book. I’ve always been fascinated with descriptions of prayer that try to not shut out those with a material-only worldview, or suspicion of the spiritual, or just a view of spirituality that doesn’t fit “invisible person who speaks english and other languages”. The fact she also studied witchcraft as an anthropologist is just fascinating to me. I’m keen to read more.

The other description of pray I loved was from Danya Ruttenberg’s “Nurture the wow”. The whole chapter was amazing, here’s a sample quote:

It is this outward offering that turns “feeling feelings” into prayer: We don’t just experience them, we offer them up to someone, something. We say, “Here, can you hold on to at least a tiny piece of this anger, frustration, and despair for just a second?” We connect our heart to the great infinite everythingness, the gushing, pulsing stream of life within and around us. We reach out. It’s about tuning in to that which interlinks us all, that which is found within and between us.

Danya Ruttenberg, Nurture the Wow
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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg: Food. Money. Sex. Tech.

This post by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg speaks of a spiritual practice for the month of Elul that she learned from her rabbi – Rabbi Alan Lew. It sounds like the whole month has a theme of preparation, reflection, and repentance in the lead up to the high holy days Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. I don’t know much about Jewish traditions – though the Wikipedia page’s section on customs has a decent introduction – but Lent feels like the closest parallel season in Christian calendars – and the practice she outlines I’d love to adopt for lent.

Rabbi Lew would suggest you spend a month paying close attention to one area of your life.

He would often to teach this around this time, as a way of helping people to wake up, to find a way to see their whole lives. 

Because once we get clear on what’s driving us– and what we’re resisting, and afraid of, and reacting to, and can start to figure out why– in one area of our life, the whole picture becomes illuminated all at once, sometimes. 

He would suggest that you pick one of the following three: 

Food, money, or sex.

given that things are– how they are now– I might suggest the following addition of a fourth contender for potential scrutiny. That is, I propose that we broaden the list to: 

Food, money, sex OR tech.

Pick one of them. Not all of them. One of those four things, and your relationship with it. 

And spend the next month paying really, really close attention.

Danya Ruttenberg in Food. Money. Sex. Tech.

The specific examples paint a picture of very intentional mindfulness on a particular area, with the view to self understanding, compassion, and maybe repentance.

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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg on when the character of God in the Bible doesn’t match our experience

I need to pause and take a moment to talk a little more directly about God, and the character of God as depicted in the Torah/Bible. Which, at least for me, aren’t necessarily always the same thing.

I know that for some people, it’s really important to be able to track how every verse in the Bible can be totally consistent with every other verse in the Bible and also their theology, but that’s never been my jam, honestly.

Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg – Life is a Sacred Text: Theology Interlude

And later

…it was already OK with me that God in the Torah wasn’t necessarily always going to be acting like the God I’d begun to meet in prayer, in mystical encounters, in the woods and on my long, winding walks outside at night.

Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg – Life is a Sacred Text: Theology Interlude

For something funny, but still on the topic of understanding God’s character via weird Bible stories: After A Long Pandemic Layoff, God Interviews For A New Job by Jonathan Weisberg.

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Whatever happens, you will understand, won’t you?

A photo of a teddy bear sitting on a stage staring at the camera

Then, suddenly again, Christopher Robin, who was still looking at the world with his chin in his hands, called out “Pooh!”
“Yes?” said Pooh.
“When I’m — when — Pooh!”
“Yes, Christopher Robin?”
“I’m not going to do Nothing any more.”
“Never again?”
“Well, not so much. They don’t let you.” Pooh waited for him to go on, but he was silent again.
“Yes, Christopher Robin?” said Pooh helpfully.
“Pooh, when I’m — you know — when I’m not doing Nothing, will you come up here sometimes?”
“Just me?”
“Yes, Pooh.”
“Will you be here too?”
“Yes, Pooh, I will be really. I promise I will be, Pooh.”
“That’s good,” said Pooh.
“Pooh, promise you won’t forget about me, ever. Not even when I’m a hundred.” Pooh thought for a little.
“How old shall I be then?”
“Ninety-nine.”
Pooh nodded.
“I promise,” he said.

Still with his eyes on the world Christopher Robin put out a hand and felt for Pooh’s paw.
“Pooh,” said Christopher Robin earnestly, “if I — if I’m not quite —” he stopped and tried again — “Pooh whatever happens, you will understand, won’t you?”
“Understand what?”
“Oh, nothing.” He laughed and jumped to his feet.
“Come on!”
“Where?” said Pooh.
“Anywhere,” said Christopher Robin.

So they went off together. But wherever they go, and whatever happens to them on the way, in that enchanted place on the top of the Forest a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.

The House at Pooh Corner, by A. A. Milne

I first read this beautiful end to a Winnie the Pooh story in Danya Ruttenberg’s fantastic book “Nurture the Wow”. It’s a book that explores parenting from the perspective of Jewish faith, and it was formative for me at one of the hardest points of early parenting, when I felt like I had no time for anything, self care was at all time lows, friendships drifted, and church and faith was something I used to do, and hoped to do again one day, but didn’t have headspace for anymore.

The book as a whole paints a beautiful picture of the mystery of faith, and the wonder of watching new life grow, and the hardships of parenting, and how they are all intertwined.

She quoted the Pooh story to talk about the wonder and play and imagination of childhood, and how soon it’s lost, and that it is a loss, and that we should honour it:

Even if we can’t keep our babies at the age when they’re happily talking to their bear all day — nor, maybe, would we want to — we do have a little power. We can keep the play from being squashed out of their lives. We can make sure they have time to do Nothing. We can guard that jealously for them, and even join them, sometimes, in Pooh Corner, if they’ll let us.

Nurture The Wow, by Danya Ruttenberg

I finished the chapter and closed the book, determined to make that space for play and imagination and Nothing in my kids lives. And presumably got busy again, called back into the demands of a young family.

Later that day, in a quiet moment, a parallel truth dawned on me: it’s not just the kids who lose something when they lose the space for Nothing. Kids get busy with school. And I was neck deep in my own busyness: cooking a meal, cleaning up a toilet training accident, responding to a meltdown, discussing sleep routines and health appointments and trying to still get in enough hours for my job to call it a full day of work. They don’t let you do Nothing any more.

And just as Christopher Robin had the looming sense that he would be so busy – that without the time for imaginative play, he’d lose his closest friend – so I realised how little space I gave to my connection with God.

See one of the beautiful things about the Christian faith I grew up with is the absolute insistence that you can know God, and be known. That there’s not just a spirituality or transcendence on offer, but a relationship.

(Make what you will of the parallels I’m drawing between having an imaginary friendship with a stuffed bear and a relationship with God! 🤣)

Growing up, and through my young adult years, that had been deeply deeply meaningful to me. My relationship with God. A sense of closeness, trust, shared joy, back-and-forth, relationship with the divine everythingness that we called God. The closest relationship in my life was the one with God. And a lot of the richness there came from the quiet times, the times of doing Nothing. Walking out at night and staring up at galaxies. Sitting at home and picking up books from my parents library on faith and history and love. Talking with friends until it was midnight, 2am, 5am, and trying together to sense how God was active in our lives, and how we could tune in more.

And then, life got busy.

And then, almost a decade into a marriage, and several years into hard-mode parenting, I still believed in God, mostly. And I still tried to live in line with the same values, mostly. But I realised how long it had been since I took part in that relationship.

And I started to weep.

I’d forgotten the deepest connection I had known.

And as I wept, I remembered another story, from the movie The Notebook. (Spoiler alert!) An elderly woman suffering from dementia and memory loss is in a nursing home, and a volunteer comes in to read her a story. It’s a love story, and she follows along intently. And only at the climax of the story when she asks what’s going to happen, does she realise that it’s not just a story, it’s her story, and the one reading it is not just a volunteer, it is the love of her life. And she has a few minutes remembering the richness of their love, before the reality of it dissipates again and she’s left wondering who is this stranger she’s with.

It felt like I was having one of those moments. The reality of it, the depth of relationship, the richness of love, came flooding back, and I remembered, and wept. Yes, I remember, I remember you, I remember this.

And the love was still there, intermingled with the grief that I could have forgotten for so long.

And like Christopher Robin asked Pooh, I asked in prayer: Promise you won’t forget about me? Even when I forget about you? Whatever happens, you will understand, won’t you?

And all I felt in response was love, understanding. And the confirmation that God was still there, had never left, and that the relationship was still there too, open for me when I was ready to be open to it.

So if you’re reading this…

… and like me, you have known that love, but when there was no time to do Nothing, it got crowded out by the concerns of life: may you find enough stillness to hear the quiet voice of God again, and when you’re ready, rediscover the richness of that loving connection.

… or if you know the love I’m talking about, and you’re still connected to the source, may you safeguard the quiet moments that nurture that relationship and make it real for you.

… or if you have never known it, may you find it, in the way that resonates with you most. The thing that unites all of us at some level isn’t just an idea or energy or “the universe”, I believe it’s a person. And they are hoping we will perhaps reach out, and perhaps find them, though they’re never really far from any of us. God connects with a thousand people in a thousand different ways. May you notice the small invitations to connect, and have the courage to respond.

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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg on finding a spiritual community even you feel like they’re not your people

First, a reminder that even if the rabbi of a synagogue is preaching stuff that does not align with your political beliefs–that does not necessarily mean that every single person in that community is similarly aligned. There may be other folks who are much more kindred spirits than you might think at first blush — and it might take a second or two to find them, but that does not mean that they are not there or impossible to find. Synagogues are often comprised of communities within communities, and it may be possible for you to find yours. How? Well, first you have to start showing up to things where you might be able to meet people. Is there a social justice or social action committee doing stuff? Are there other subgroups within the synagogue that feel like they might be more likely to have folks on your wavelength? Is there a younger folks group — even if they call it “Young Professionals“ or some such thing, you may find some true kindred spirits there — you never know. I say this from experience, as someone who showed up to a Conservative synagogue in my early 20s, as the youngest (by about 15 years) and queerest (by far) person I could see for miles. With some patience and digging, eventually I connected with an amazing intergenerational group of people (some of whom knew each other before, some not), some of whom I am still in touch with today, many many many years later. 

Second of all, even though it is lovely and comfortable to go to community that has been built, don’t discount your own power to build community. You can (eg) host Shabbat dinner for a motley group of people–some of whom may be Jews, some of whom may not be, some of whom may be familiar with Jewish practice, some of whom may not at all. ‏ Make it potluck, or do a simple pot of soup and salad and frittata. Or make a vat of chili get some chips and guac you’ve got dinner. Get some wine or juice and challah– bam! Get this going as a monthly thing and see if you can get enough of a community together to get some text study or prayer action before or after dinner (davening first, study after). Etc. Do a lunch! Make it a picnic when the weather improves! Host holiday things! Get creative! Start slow, build.

Rabbi Danya Ruttenburg – You asked I answered

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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg on the scriptures in Leviticus used to justify homophobia

Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg has been one of my favourite religious teachers for a few years now. Recently she’s written up two posts exploring what she calls “clobber” texts: verses in the Bible (Hebrew Bible in this case) that are used to clobber the LGBTQ community and justify homophobia / transphobia.

Links to the two articles:

Her analysis is useful (and entertaining) and I imagine I’ll be coming back to these if I ever find myself in a discussion with someone trying to justify homophobia based on the Bible.

Beyond her unpacking of these verses and ways to interpret them, two things stood out to me. First: the role of scripture teachers in a world where religious fundamentalism is taking hold again. She lives in the USA where fundamentalist Christians are gaining significant political power and shaping laws to force their worldview onto others. The reality in Australia’s politics is different, but you see the same religious fundamentalism play out in power structures at the level of families and schools and communities.

Because in the days when drag bans are getting passed and gun bans aren’t, knowing your text inside and out matters.

We have to fight against the encroaching theocracy in many ways at once. One of those ways includes disemboweling bad readings of sacred texts—especially the bad readings that are used to harm people—at every available opportunity.

The other thing that stood out was her willingness to criticise the patriarchal and homophobic ideology when that’s what is in the text. Growing up evangelical, I had been taught “all scripture is God breathed”, and when something in there was completely out of step with our contemporary values, we either tried to change our values to match, or tried to reinterpret the text in some way that downplayed the parts we disagreed with. The Rabbi on the other hand isn’t afraid to question and criticise the scripture itself and the major rabbinic commentary through history – acknowledging it as tainted by human prejudices – even while somehow approaching it with care, treating it as sacred, and allowing it to speak.

As much as I love to hold up the more optimistic texts in my corpus, it’s still a very patriarchal tradition and we have plenty with which to reckon.