Have you ever wanted a cool way to explain to someone what food in the Bible is kosher and what is not?
G-dcast.com has a great video and country rock tune to explain.
Lashon Hatov – Good Speech
December 27, 2009 at 11:06 am (Ethics, mitzvot)
Tags: choice of words, good speech, lashon hara, lashon hatov, speech
Do you practice Lashon Hatov? Do you actively try to identify good things to talk about when discussing things related to other people?
I have been reading Rabbi Telushkin’s “A Code of Jewish Ethics Vol 2” subtitled ” Love Your Neighbor as Yourself.” There is a section on Lashon Hatov and it has got me thinking. I like the idea.
I always find the negative so much more difficult to do than the positive. This is not to say that I do not try to avoid Lashon Hara (evil speech) but Lashon Hatov seems a worthy addition.
Lashon Hatov is not about giving compliments. Good speech is about trying to find good things to say about other people on a regular basis. For example, when you are with your spouse at the end of the evening, instead of discussing the days events that the children went through. Pick something positive and specific about each child to say. “Jacob had a really difficult day at school today but he was able to talk about it when he got home and we were able to work through the problems.” This is in contradistinction to “Jacob came home complaining about school and he was picking on his sister and it took us forever to calm him down.”
Or when you are talking about your boss, finding good things to say will go a long way to the commandment of “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Can you do this as much as your complain about other people? Let’s give it a try.
Firing People
December 22, 2009 at 9:34 pm (Ethics)
Tags: Ethics, firing, letting go, no job
Have you ever been fired? Have you been somewhere where they “laid people off?” Terminated. Given the pink slip. Let go.
It is all so cowardly. That is why there are so many words to describe it. People are afraid to call it what it is.
The capital has run short. Expenses need to be brought down to meet the lack of revenue. Something needs to be cut so they decided to “reduce headcount.” You know “to shrink to grow.”
Don’t get me wrong. The people were not let go without any compensation. However, they were escorted out the doors without being given the time to pack anything. They were told their stuff would be sent to them. “Here is your folder, follow me to the door. Good bye.”
It seemed so “legal.” The lawyers were out. The executives came up. The systems were all shut down. It was lock down.
All the excuses were great. “Well what did you expect they need to protect their stuff.” “What other options did they have?”
I think that when it comes to people, we have a collective lack of creativity on how to solve problems. Just make it quick and do not show any emotions – that will be better.
Here is what I think should have been done ethically. I am not saying that this is easy but it would be more ethical. Approach the people that you would like to let go and offer them the package. Show them the problem and let them make an honorable decision to leave. I think you could find 100 people in the organization to leave under those conditions.
What would be the appropriate ethical way to let 100 people go in a 1500 person company?
Wise Men and Their Tales
December 9, 2009 at 9:57 pm (Jewish, Torah)
Tags: book, Elie Wiesel
Wise Men and Their Tales – Portraits of Biblical, Talmudic, and Hasidic Masters by Elie Wiesel
I am not sure what to say about this book. I am plodding my way through and reading about each person. I am learning new things and perspectives.
I have not stopped reading but I am not getting inspired. I have not had many “ah ha” moments. I think that is what I want right now and I am not seeing it here.
Elie Wiesel has some great thoughts about our Biblical family. He has an interesting perspective and a wealth of knowledge to bring to each.
Has anyone else read this? What do you think?
Wisdom of Our Sons: Blessings
December 6, 2009 at 12:53 pm (Ethics, Prayer)
Tags: blessings, son, wisdom
My son Jacob is 10 years old. Here are his thoughts on blessings that boys like him, who run into difficult things in life, should consider.
- Ned walked home from school and he found that his house was messy. He said a blessing that he had a house.
- Frank wanted to have pasta for dinner but his mom made pizza. He made a blessing that he had food.
- Joe walked into the room and found that his toy was broken. He made a blessing that he had toys.
- Ted lost 3 $1.00 bills at school. He made a blessing that he had money to afford different things.
- Bob wanted to have a bird for his birthday but he got a dog. He made a blessing that he had a pet.
- Sams grandmother died yesterday. He made a blessing to keep his family healthy.
- Ed did not want to go to school. He made a blessing that he had an education.
- Jake got sick. He made a blessing that he had medicine to cure it.
- Ari’s mom yelled at him. He was thnkful to have a family.
- Kent finished his homework on a laptop. He made a blessing about having technology.
- Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha olam … to have a world to live in.
- Jacob
Resurrecting Hebrew (book)
November 29, 2009 at 10:09 pm (history)
Tags: book, Ilan Stavans, Resurecting Hebrew
I am reading Resurrecting Hebrew by Ilan Stavans. Stavans decided to do some research and exploration of modern Hebrew, the people involved and the history. In doing so Stavans goes to Israel and meets with different experts and historians. The book documents his travels, interactions and thoughts.
I was expecting the book to be dull and academic but I am enjoying it. Stavans manages to do a nice job giving the information wrapped in a story about his travels. I like to read about the people he meets and the places he goes. I think it makes the story more interesting.
Well Meaning White Guy
November 17, 2009 at 9:56 pm (Ethics, community)
Tags: Jews, racism
Aliza Hausman has an interesting article on racism. The article is interesting because it made me think. A couple of things I thought were interesting was that all white people are described as one. It does not make room for the prejudices that the Italian, Irish and white Jewish people have had, all white people are the same.
I love reading Aliza’s blog. She is one of the few people I put on my blog roll. The second thing I thought about was how much I feel bad for Aliza. I am sure she does not want that, but I feel bad that she sees racism in everything.
Aliza has done something very few people do. Aliza converted from the secular Dominican New York community into the homogenious Orthodox community. This community has very few outsiders nevermind a Dominicana. This community does and says some really weird things. This does not surprise me for a community that is so insular. It is not as if this community hangs out with Dominicans or any other subculture in the US. They are orthodox Jews. It is all about them and no one else. So Aliza is rebelling from their stupid ways.
Taking the definition of racist as anything from a group of people using race as a means to subjugate them to being unaware of stupid things one might say, seems like a bit of a stretch.
White Americans and people of color in this country different significantly in their definitions of racism (Blauner 1994). Most whites think in terms of the oppositional categories “racist” and “not racist.” Whites in the “racist” category are defined as disliking or hating blacks and other minorities, and their animosity is portrayed in acts or statements that are blatanly racist (Jaynes and Williams 1989). The white definition of racism is problematic because it does not recognize racism unless it is blatant and/or intended; neither does it acknowledge institutional racism.
I am not sure how this definition takes into account the well meaning white guy. The “white” definiton of racism is problematic because who the heck are we talking about. Asking people the definition and then taking their point of view is a strange way of defining something.
However, some points I would like to make are: making fun of the way names sound in a different culture is naive perhaps stupid at times but does not qualify as racist. Unintended and institutional ways of putting people down by race is racist, I agree. Intolerance and lack of knowledge between 2 groups does not make one racist. Stretching the definition to everything every person feels is not helpful.
For example, black women report that whites often seem surprised to find that a black person has a college degree or is a professional.
Is this really racist? Could be. Could it be that the people do not encounter black people enough and live in their own segregated world?
As a Jew I am sure you can come up with many of these kind of things. Are they all antisemitic? Are they stupid or naive? “Jews are terrible at sports. Or how about I can’t believe your Jewish cuz your poor?” Does that make the person antisemitic?
All this seems to be much closer to the glass half empty version of the world. It reminds me of the lacromonious historical accounts of Judaism. Jews are so picked on and in every generation someone does it again. It is horrible having the life of a Jew. How about having the life of a minority community that has been wiped off the face of the earth? How about the major communities, Egyptian, Assyrian, Persian, Roman, Greek – which of these communities survived - none.
Please do not think that every stupid comment by a “white” guy is racist and I won’t be blind to the fact that obstacles are still in the way for many minority communities. At the same time remember that you can succeed and you can change the world if you rise above it all
Forever yours,
The Well Meaning White Guy
Infusing Israel in Temple Life
November 12, 2009 at 9:14 am (community)
Tags: diaspora, education, Israel, Judaism
The director of education says she is looking at the ways we can infuse Israel at all levels of education through out the temple. She wants things from the passive charts on the walls to changing the curriculum of the Hebrew school classrooms.
Everyone seemed relatively excited about the idea. It bothered me a bit. Here is note I sent:
Something did not sit quite well with me on this topic so I wanted to let you know of my thoughts. I do believe that it is important to teach the very valuable things that Israel has to offer. I also do think everyone can learn more about Israel.However, my issue is that this can be very one sided. Israel is not something to be worshiped. It is a country. It happens to have a lot of Jews but not all of them. I find that American Jews do not even know about themselves. They do not know about Jewish history in the US. They do not know about the importance of religion in their own lives, in their own communities.If I was to infuse anything it would be the importance of being Jewish in America. Infuse the importance of the Jewish people outside of Israel.So I would ask if we are going to infuse Israel that we also put an equal or more emphasis in infusing the US in the temple or perhaps it is US/Israel in the temple. I think there needs to be a balance in the reality of the Jewish world and that is not having an obsession with Israel only.If there is a map of Israel – how about a map of the Jewish communities throughout the world or the US. If there is talk of religion in Israel, how about some profiles of American communities.Yes it would be great for all people in our community to visit Israel and to know her. But I think it more important to “stand at Sinai” and hear the revelation then it is to stand on Zion and feel its stones.
What do you think? Shouldn’t we be learning equally about outside Israel as we do inside? Am I missing something?
Community: Education
October 15, 2009 at 1:14 pm (community)
Tags: attendance, community, education, learning, place, time
I have taken on the role of leading (with another fellow) the “Adult Learning Committee” as it is named.
One of the questions that has been asked is “why is it when the temple puts on all these cool educational opportunities does the same 30 people always show up? Why is it that no one else comes?”
This is an interesting question about community. When you have a large group of people that affiliate with a synagogue or other organization, how do get people to come? There are plenty of reasons and excuses of why people do not take on these educational opportunities. However, this little committee really cannot answer the question of what it is that the community is looking for?
What if they stopped providing these educational programs would people notice? We do not know.
So what I have asked the people on the committee to do is go out and talk to five people. I want them to start with finding out what the persons relationship to Judaism is. I want to where are people coming from? What is the context of their lives?
From here we will start mapping out what people are interested in. What I am positing is that this process of listening will help define what kind of things we should be offering to bring more people in? How? I think the future will emerge from these conversations and we can look backwards at today and say “what do we need to do to move us toward where people want us to be?”
I think we should be able to get every adult involved in a learning opportunity over the year. My guess is that is around 1000 people.
Photo Challenge: My boy’s 3rd Birthday
September 27, 2009 at 7:05 am (Uncategorized)
Tags: birthday, photo
Jew Wishes send me a challenge to pick the 4th folder and 4th picture and post it.
This is a photo of my son on his 3rd birthday. You can see some of the art work on the walls and his new books on Shabbat. I think he wanted more cake when everyone left and that is why the room is empty.
Anyway – isn’t that boy just squeezeable?
