The End of Certainty: A New Jewish Theology – A Conversation with Yehudah Ber Zirkind

In this episode of Truths: Jewish Wisdom for Today—part of the Seeking Ecstasy season—Rabbi Dr. Levi Brackman visits Jerusalem to sit down with Yehuda Ber Zirkind for their second full-length conversation. After their first discussion in New Haven sparked passionate debate, they explored:

What “Jewish theology” really is: A living dialogue about God, tradition, and community rather than a fixed creed.

The possibility of knowing the Divine: Wrestling with doubt, agnosticism, and the nature of spiritual “knowledge.”

Personal versus collective faith: How individual experiences and Jewish peoplehood shape one’s spiritual journey.

Cultivating holiness today: Practical guidance for infusing the mundane with sanctity and living ethically in a secular age.

About Rabbi Yehudah DovBer Zirkind
A senior research fellow at Herzog College’s Hasidic Research Institute and the David Cardozo Academy, and a graduate student in Yiddish literature at Tel Aviv University, Zirkind lectures on Hasidism, Jewish thought, Yiddish and Hebrew literature, and folklore. His forthcoming thesis examines “The Sacred, the Secular, and the Sacrilegious in the Life and Literary Works of Chaim Grade.”

Transcript

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It is been about a year ago or so that I sat down the first time with Rabbi Bear Zukin for our first full length conversation in New Haven. That episode stirred more than a few passionate responses and some controversy. On my recent trip to Israel, I traveled to Jerusalem to sit with him again this time in his own home to continue our exploration of faith doubt, and the quest for meaning. This season is titled Seeking Ecstasy because I believe that the deepest truths often emerge at the edge of our certainty. In this conversation, you heard the bear and I dive into what Jewish theology really means. Not as a fixed set of doctrines, but as a living, breathing conversation about how we relate to God, to tradition and to one another. In the conversation we discuss where the true knowledge of the divine is even possible. How our own experiences shape our beliefs and what it looks like to live a holy life in an age of doubt and secularism. A few words about who Rabbi Bear Zukin is. De Bear is a senior research fellow at the Hasidic Research Institute of Hertza College and the David Cardo Academy in Jerusalem, and a graduate student in Yida literature at Tel Aviv University. He studied at various ha Shivas. And today lectures and writes on contemporary Jewish thought, Yiddish and Hebrew literature, Hasidism, Yiddish music and folklore, and Judaic bibliography. His forthcoming thesis is titled The Sacred, the Secular, and the Sacrilegious in the Life and Literary Works of Hai Grada. So pour yourself a cup of tea or coffee or any other drink. And join us as we weave together philosophy. Personal story and perhaps a little bit of controversy. So now let us begin our conversation. it's good to be here in Jerusalem with you. Yeah. Likewise. Last time we, no pleasure. Last time we had the, this recorded conversation, it was in Connecticut, in the United States. People ask me what brings you here? And I feel like I don't need an excuse to come to Israel as a Jew. But I'm also doing a new season of the podcast and it is being titled Seeking Ecstasy. So I'm really excited to have this conversation with you and, let's see how we can weave, seeking ecstasy, into this conversation. Right? I wanna talk about Jewish theology and narrow it down to like a personal Jewish theology. So tell me a little, some of your thoughts on Jewish theology. Yeah. Okay. So, um. I think it was important to mention just from the very outset, that people talk about Jewish theology and, and the truth of the matter is there are many Jewish theologies. Mm-hmm. There's more than one Jewish theology. Should we define theology first so we know what we're talking about? I think that is a very, very good question because. Sometimes theology, spirituality, psychology, anthropology, and all kinds of Gs can, can get woven into the mix. Uh, so I think it is essential to define our terms and sometimes I would say that the endeavor of Jewish theology, the quest for Jewish theology is engaging in that question. In other words, it could be that we don't have our terms fixed when entering the conversation, and part of the conversation is trying to figure out the different strands that are woven within the enterprise called Jewish theology. So I feel that anthropology, peoplehood, spirituality, existentialism, all these psychology could all be part of Jewish theology. But what I would say for me, what Jewish theology is I. Primarily discussion about God or the divine and religion. Um, how does my life relate in, in the broadest terms possible to the notion of God, divinity, religion, um, and part of today's discussion? I mean, the, contemporary discussion of theology revolves around the question of, do we know anything about. About God, uh, anything metaphysical and that, that is an issue I grapple with a lot. Um, and the question is, can there be a Jewish theology when in doubt when being agnostic, when questioning when, uh, being uncertain? Mm-hmm. And can the discussion about Jewish theology be richer when we don't have all the answers when we're not pedaling fixed dogmas. That's very much my, my, um, approach to it, my entry point, if you will. Okay. So when you say, you don't know, define knowledge what do you mean know? Because can anyone really know something which is metaphysical? Well, well, I think, uh, again, e every, every person is, is situationally. I. Um, fixed meaning. Mm-hmm. Whatever, whatever we talk about is relative or in relation Yeah. To who we are, where we're coming from, where we're going. So we don't live in a vacuum. We weren't born in a vacuum. Um, and for me personally growing up, uh, growing up as an Orthodox Jew and being very much, uh, in the, in the fold for many years. Mm-hmm. Um. There is a certain belief and trust in what we call the mess, the tradition. Mm-hmm. The theological package that we're taught. Yeah. Um, and that is almost taken as a self-evident truth. We hold these truths to be self-evident. And so is that the knowledge that we are talking about here, that is the, that one is daunting or, yes. For me at least, for me, the knowledge is not a firsthand knowledge. Um, because I don't have the hubris to say that I know anything firsthand about God or the divine, uh, that I can be sure of God's existence or not, or of anything else. There, there I have my own experience that I might interpret. Mm-hmm. In light of certain beliefs. Uh, I have strong religious impulses, but there's a difference between a religious sensibility, a religious impulse, and saying, we know, I think, I think we have to be. Um, I. Cognizant and, um, I think the word is acknowledged that we're living in a very, very strong age of secularization and doubt, especially about the metaphysical. Mm-hmm. Um, so the question is, what does it mean to be religious? What does it mean to seek the divine and an age where I can just, um, work off, uh, dogmas that I accept blindly blind faith. Right. Or, or, or, or there are those that are really convinced. That's not my experience. So I'm not coming from a place where I have real concrete knowledge that I can be certain of. Definitely not mathematical knowledge, like anything near two plus two equals four. Yeah. And anything of that sort. It is more of a, a spiritual orientation to life. Um, and the question is, and, and I wanna broaden the conversation both for those that are more. Uh, greater believers, meaning that they're more inclined to belief in God, uh, more, more inclined towards accepting, let's say, for Jews the 13 principle of, uh, uh, principles of faith as articulated by the Ramban, by Maimonide, but also, uh, for those that may be agnostic, for those that may even be atheists. For people that doubt is there. Is there anything about divinity, or call it the quest for transcendence that can somehow be. Loosely titled Theology in the sense of what I think is really the essence of religion. I'm right away giving an answer on a certain level. Yeah, and I think really the essence of religion, at least for me, is the quest for transcendence. The quest for transcendence, whether or not that transcendence is, uh, reaching a deity, a God, which is beyond the world as a real, a real entity. Ontological being outside the world. Mm-hmm. Imagine as, as a being that has, as a personal God, even, uh, who has will, who can command, who can create, or for some people may be skeptical of that a incidental element of reality, a higher order of being, what we might use a word, a word, hay versus hay Shah, eternal life. The true nature of being ultimate reality. Mm-hmm. As opposed to fleeting reality or, or day-to-day concerns. Uh, and I think right away, I, I, I think that for me, the, the struggle of living a religious life broadly defined has how to sanctify life and, we'll, we'll get to that soon. Yeah. But also the differentiating between the, the holy and the mundane. We'll use the word profane, but the mundane. And we can talk a little bit more about that as well. in general, in terms of Jewish theology, there has been a, um, narrative arc, if you will, like the literature, a trajectory, a, a, a process of learning, understanding, changing my mind. Uh, on different, different ideas. And, um, growing up in, uh, the Froom world, the orthodox world, the habad world has given me a certain vision of theology, which is, uh, focus very much on what called religious obedience conformity, piety in conformity, I. Mm-hmm. And, and accepting and accepting the package that I was taught, that's a kind of, sorry to use that word, gospel truth. This is the truth. Um, and there is a Jewish theology and not only is there our Jewish theology, but um, the Jewish theology is of cosmic significance. Meaning, not only did I grow up with one view or one version of what truth about God, about divinity is all about, but I was, uh, taught to believe that there a particular doctrine about life, which is God's blueprint for the world. And one could call that a very fundamentalist view. Um. That we know what God wants. We know what God's purpose and creation is. Um, we are cosmic players. Mm-hmm. And that is very empowering on some level because if you are part of the grandest game, uh, to ever take place, then of course you feel Boyd by that sense of mission. And, uh, you essentially become a missionary. Uh, you, you try to convert other people to that truth. But do, do you think that in the beginning, let's go all the way to the beginning of the gracious. Yeah. The God created man in his image. Yeah. Was that not some kind of a sim? We are cosmic people now. If we all created in God's image in some way, are we not cosmic people? Is that a theology which, which you have brought up with? Or is that a biblical Jewish theology? Um, I think it is a biblical, uh, Jewish theology. I think that that, that the image of we are created in God's image is something which is a very, very profound religious idea. Yeah. The question though is, do I take the, that particular picture, that particular image. As the be all and end all of the entire purpose and plan and master plan of creation growing up, haba with the belief of ah, of that God, uh, the, the expression of God desired that he should have a dwelling place in the physical world comes from a measure somehow. Right. It comes from a, from a measures, right? Correct. Um. I dunno if it's, or if I'm mistaken, uh, forgive me, but, but, um, the idea of being because in gives a different music and that was, if you want some of my earliest heretical thoughts where I read and learned that they, on how, based on other catalyst of sources gives another reason for the creation of the world. God's nature is to be good. So God wants to be benevolent and beneficent and share, give humans, uh, bestow upon them as bounty. Yeah. And that is why he set up a whole system of Toyota, Mrs. And all that. What I'm trying to say is that I grew up with a very, very, um, clear Yeah. Uh, but also fundamentalists in the sense that we are, this is the fundamental truth. Um, and we know exactly what we're doing, why we're doing it. Yeah. And that's why, by the way, I believe that is all where I come from. They have why they're so successful because they believe that going out there, I don't know, in India or in China or in Idaho, Montana, wherever it is, and, and spreading, again, using that, spreading the, the, the message. That is, uh, relevant, that is fulfilling the cosmic purpose, God's master plan. So there's something very comforting. But for somebody who starts doubting, they don't have that certainty anymore. Yeah. And a theology is a small tea, not the Jewish theology, not the master plan of creation. And, and I guess a lot of things where I differ, and this is what I'm gonna get into where I differ, is that I was taught that the. The God's blueprint for creation, God's, guidebook, playbook for his purpose and creation. Mm-hmm. And that's very much the room, worldview. Today I look at the Toyota as my, as a guide for life. Mm-hmm. Um, as a Jewish person, I learned from the Toyota and I and I, I deemed the Toyota as a sacred. Sacred and essential to my religion, but I'm less, um, certain about knowing for sure this represents God's master plan for, for. So what does, what theology does the Tara suggest to you? Um, so first of all, I think that it would be correct to point out that. The way I see it now, coming from a more, uh, I guess, critical academic approach, not critical in, in criticizing, but evaluating carefully. Mm-hmm. Uh, there is more than one theology in the te and as, uh, I heard from a, uh, a young Bible scholar by the name of Dr. Ariel Saari Levy. He says that the Torah is the first book of ti, right. Torah itself is a book on Jewish thought. In other words, in the, in the mainstream orthodox conception, if one views the Torah as reveal God revealing his definitive truth. So it is not a book about Jewish thought. This is God revealing himself. Mm-hmm. God is telling him the truth about life. It's like, like, uh, I was like, this is the DNA, the spiritual DNA code about life. Yeah. And it's not a reflection about life. This is actually telling you the DNA of life. Yeah. But in my conception now, I, I, to me it makes more sense that the Terah may have been divinely inspired, but that they also reflect different human conceptions of the divine and the human quest for the divine. And most importantly for me, this is the book of my people, but there's also an inherent pluralism in that book the same way we have be sha and beel in the G. Yeah. We also have, I would argue, be Sha and Beel in Humm. So, for example, we're talking about, um, these Parra talks a lot about the temple. Um, so the question is, what is the temple? Is the temple more like God's palace or the White House? Mm-hmm. Where the president lives? Is that literally God's abode? Or literally whenever we say literally we always say as it were, but still Yeah. Very much a, a anthropomorphic image of God's dwelling place. And therefore you have to es carboni, LaMi Hai. God has to be given his bread. There is a certain energy, electricity that is surging through the mik dust that cannot be defiled. Mm-hmm. And if you come too close and you're not wearing protective gear, you're gonna be zapped. A very dynamic. Mm-hmm. Real electrically charged sense of holiness as if one were, be, were in the White House and the President is going around and, and you have to make sure every move you make is not gonna disturb the president or, or the king in a palace. Or is a war like the embassy. And I think an embassy, which is not the literal dwelling place of the king, but it's more of a representation or a physical, a concrete. Symbol mm-hmm. Of the king's, uh, sovereignty and rulership. So I think for example, in the em, uh, uh, says, use the expression, God will dwell or place, there's another expression to place his name there. So it's more like this is a place which is, um. God's address or a symbol of his presence for people to interface with him. Mm-hmm. Like an embassy, but not that this is literally the house of God and, and that if you walk in, uh, you'll be zapped. If it's a different conception in the, it also says at the end of the volume that the person who brings, the, the, and er. And he says, Look from your dwelling place, your holy dwelling place from the heavens. Yeah. And he says, it's in the, in the temple lip. Mm-hmm. Meaning that while, even though it is called the House of Hashem, but it's like an embassy. Hasan's real dwelling place is above what he has below is like a, is like an ambassador. Like an ambassador, which is a, delegation or a representation of the divine. Uh, so I'm just pointing out there are different theologies and I do feel that one of the strong, uh, aspects of Jewish theology is the theology of ion, the idea of holiness ion to you that one should be older. Um, so, and, and holiness is defined as, holiness is a vague term, admittedly, and it can mean many different things and, and, and, and different people, different commentators have meant different things. But I think that your question before about the difference between a scholarly approach and personal Yeah. Is, is relevant and useful there because. On a personal level, I think for me KAA means trying to, trying to live a more noble life. Trying to live a life which is more in consonance with the divine. Mm-hmm. Uh, which means being holy, being more moral, being more ethical, uh, being preoccupied with, um. Noble causes, which I would term meaning there's a difference between hay sha, which is temporal matters and hay eternal matters, God implanted in us the eternal, life. And I think what it means by that, the way I take it is on a personal level that whereas let's say other creatures don't necessarily have a concept. Of eternal truth or eternal values that transcend their being. Mm-hmm. And everything is more of, more of a means to an end to enable their own life. An animal has instincts for self-preservation and self survival. So we can also work in that mode of shaw, the, the, the temporal life meeting, the needs of the moment. But then there's also a higher dimension, which is lum, which is acknowledging that there's a higher plane of existence. Which is eternal. There are values that are eternal. Justice. Kindness, truth are eternal values. Yeah. They're not, they're not contingent upon my life. So, so when we talk about theology, theology literally means study of God, divinity, right? Yeah. So, so, so how is, is this what you've described to, to, to summarize the need for holiness? Ethical moral holiness is what you're describing. And this idea of preoccupation with which is more of a transcendent, concerns rather than the mundane physical concerns of she called Isha. How does that relate to the study of God theology? And the the other follow up question, which I have for you is are the influences? You spoke a lot about your upbringing. What used to be, and now here we are talking about what it is now. Correct. The way you see it now. Right? So you've come to this, new formulation of a theology, personal theology, which is why, very often there's any number of people I could sit down with. I've been asking that theology, and they would just basically par fashion. Something they read in, in, in a book summer, or they heard that A sheer summit. Right. Which is a lot less interesting for me sitting here, having these conversations for the, seeking ecstasy season of the podcast because, and look up those books. Whereas you've come to this differently from a much more thoughtful perspective. So the follow up is like how, how did you get from what it wasn't to what it is. Okay. For me, although I don't want to be arrogant and say. Know what isn't. Uh, I, I, I feel or what, what isn't for you today? We, yeah, we're where I've, um, maybe grown, matured, thought about maybe some will think regress, but I feel pro progress, not regress. Um, so first of all, the idea of holiness as related to God, I think is rooted in. The parsha that we just read last week says Sunday pars, but was yesterday. Right. And be holy because I am holy. And one of the interpretations is known as the Metaio Day imitating the Divine. Mm-hmm. And say that you go in the ways of God, just as God is holy. So to you, beholding. So what I, if we translate it based on the interpretation we gave before, what it means is, is that I move away from my corporeality, from my body, from my temporal human needs, and I plug into a higher realm of existence, which is the divine existence, true existence. Um, and that can mean different things. Uh, but for our purpose right now, what it means is, is God is on a holier level, represents, uh, morality, some degree of per perfection. But I don't want to confuse that with the medieval concept of perfection. There's an atilian concept of God being perfect. I don't want to get into that. Here's more. Perfect in, in, in, in action or representing nobility. A kind of moral perfection. So why do you want to admit God? Um, is that because it esna terror, or there's a, um, so first of all, I think as a, as a human being, we all have the need to for self-transcendence. Yeah. If life is just about, if, if we are the end, yeah. There's no higher end. Then, then we're in a really, uh, bemoan state because if the buck ends with us, then really the question is why go through it? All the reductionist, physicalist kind of perspective. Yeah. There's nothing more than, and not only that, if life is only self-serving, if what I call is, if we believe in selfism as an ideology. Mm, that all there is to life has the self aggrandizement and, and, um, we live also in a consumerist world where everything is about consumption and, and about, um, commodities that satisfy our needs and our interests of consumption. Um, and life is all about. And also marketing is about creating an imaginary need. And creating that need will mean that there, there's a consumer who's gonna buy it. So the, the company is gonna make more money, but as a kind of, uh, philosophy of life where, what, what really we're in we're, we are here for instant gratification, for self gratification. So I just think even on a human level, the quest for religion, spirituality is understanding that if life, if the buck stops with us, if there's nothing greater than just enjoying life. So if we're going through a hard time, why, why go? Why go through life? If it is only about ourselves, and that's very, very empty. Whereas if we can understand that there's a level of meaning and purpose, or as JFK said, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. Mm-hmm. Meaning that there are higher ends, that I am in the service of higher ends. So then it, even, even on a selfish level, it gives my life more meaning I upgrade my own life from Shaw to ca. I upgrade my own life from just being we're talking about God, so clearly God is a religious concept. Right? Right. Some people like, William James would consider any kind of religious experience to be a deeply personal experience. And, any kind of personal theology we're talking about is by definition religious. Would you agree with that? That if you have a personal theology, which you're living by, then that's by definition, religious. In other words, can you have a theology for your life, which isn't religious? Well, I, I, I think that one could have a, the, that's a good question.'cause Theo, I think means a deity, right? So technically the definition of theology might preclude. Uh, somebody who's a non deist or doesn't have for God. Right. However, I, I would argue that in a broader sense, one can be, one can be religious without believing in God. Because if religious means, uh, a, a propositional faith, which is contingent on certain beliefs or on a certain metaphysical facts, so then maybe an atheist or an agnostic cannot really be religious. Mm-hmm. But if religion is about a sensibility. If religion is about a sensitivity to the, uh, transcendence and, and, and if religion is, is, is framed not necessarily as the quest to, uh, be obedient to God. Yeah. Or it is not about belief, what I believe or what I do in terms of religious conformity, but it is a quest to. Raise my life above, above the mundane dimension of existence to a hol a higher and holier realm. Like for example, I would argue that even a a, even a, an avowed atheist mm-hmm. Can also an avowed atheists do have a sense of sacred. Same thing. Yeah. It's interesting'cause if you listen to Sam Harris, and, and his wife, who I just got her latest series. She's got a, very, very interesting series on, consciousness which can get an audible it's a kind of an audio, documentary on her quest to understand consciousness better. And, both Sam and his wife are both, meditators. And you can sense that they have a sense of a transcendence and what they call consciousness or that deepest sense of self, which is not the exterior itself. It's high, you know, not high show. So, but when I listen to them, I hear them talking about God, just not saying the name, God. In other words, they're dancing around it. I think God's been given a bad name from the very supplemental views that a lot of people have of what God is now God to most more sophisticated thinkers, God isn't, this is old man sitting on the counter with a long white beard. Right, right. That's a span clauses version of God. Right. So, so, um, so the question is, this transcendence that you're talking about, how is that, is, are we talking about God or are we talking about something else? Uh, the question is how do you define God? Do you define God as a, uh, a noun or an adjective? Meaning is God a being, an ontological being and, and I, I'm, I'm saying I don't, I, I, I have my metaphysical questions. I have my doubts. I don't know. I don't know one way or the other. Yeah, I, I don't have any conviction because, let's be quite frank, because. My, I don't have firsthand experience or definite experience of God. God did not reveal himself to me in such a way that I can be certain that the God of the Bible exists. I didn't have that. Rather, I had a certain trust in what we call the cellular, which means the tradition. Mm-hmm. The tradition that I grew up with. Once I lost my trust in that tradition. Yeah. Because there were all kinds of questions that made me question this. All of a sudden, how do I know? What the tradition tells me about God is true. Nevertheless, I I am not readily gonna dismiss. I'm not a reductionist who's gonna readily dismiss all claims of God. Like, oh, do you believe in a fairy or the tooth fairy or bigfoot? There, there are a lot of atheists who use that example. Well, do you believe in a unicorn? Do you believe in UFOs? So why should I believe in God? Uh, okay, I I hear them. I understand. I, I can be skeptical as well. I, I do question. But first of all, it doesn't, is a different, not only is a different magnitude of, of, of it has more relevance, the question of God, whether or not a unicorn exists or not, or whether demons exist. But, but also I think that there's a bigger question because the question of God really touches on ultimate reality. Yeah. Whereas a question of Bigfoot does not touch on, on, on ultimate reality. And I think whatever, that's a more important question. Yeah. Yeah. And, and therefore, um. I am open. What I'm trying to say is I think there is a notion of, of, of theology or religiosity that one could, in the, in the most conspicuous or the most obvious sense, would be related to God as a deity. But also if one looks like God, views God as an adjective, uh, as a definition of reality of a scriber reality. Um, divine goodness to be good is to be divine. The divinity in the, in the universe. Um, the dimension of the universe, which, which, which, um, inculcates meaning always transcends the physical, which transcends the physical, right? The things that we deem eternal. So then, yes, that there can be the divinity as an adjective. And I think there are many people that even if they did not believe in the supernatural deity and ontological deity, they definitely had a sense of godly myth. Mm-hmm. As, as, as a, as an adjective, as a, as the godly dimension of reality. And therefore, what I'm trying to argue is, is that while I a hundred percent traditional Judaism or, or any traditional theistic religion for that matter, is rooted in the belief and a deity, I think the concept of holiness of transcendence is not dependent solely on, on that conception of God. Yes. We can, we can gloss over whether God came down on Mount Sinai. No, let's not gloss over that because that's, that's a really for, for Jewish religion, that's a really important, uh, part of the theology is that God descended upon Mount Sinai and spoke to man and gave them the 10 Commandments. Uh, and then, you know, in a sense, betrothed the Jewish people. When you think about that and you think about all the people we, uh, you know, received revelation from God in the, in, in the terror, right? Abraham, I, Jacob, they all had these revelations. What was going on there? Uh, what did they tell you? What does it, what does it, uh, what does it tell you to you in your life? I mean, what, what's, how, how do you view that? Um. So first of all, I wasn't there. I'm, I'm not privy to such an experience to be, to be quite honest. I'm not, I'm not trying to be cynical and brush it. I'm, I'm just trying to be honest, meaning, yeah. Um, I believe and I do, I truly believe that those descriptions in the Toyota are not fiction. They describe something. Yeah. What it is. I don't know what exactly it is because, because I wasn't there. It takes one to know one, I'm not one. Yeah. So therefore, I don't know, meaning I don't, I don't know exactly what it's referring to. James Kugel in his book, the Great Shift Deals a little bit with it. Uh, but I don't, I don't have that. I'm not, I wasn't privy to that kind of revelation, so I don't know what that means. Uh, there can be moments of insight, there can be moments, there have been moments in my life where I felt that whatever is happening is being divinely orchestrated. Mm-hmm. In other words, there's a power beyond me. That is taking hold of me. Not in a vision or, in a, possessing me in, in a spiritual way, but that there were times in my life that I felt that whatever was happening, although I thought I was making the, the plans, I was pulling the strings. Really? There was something else pulling the strings. One can call it god, one can call it fake, one can call it destiny. Yeah. But that there was something higher, greater than me or beyond me. That was that I was fitting into a larger script and I wasn't the one who was writing that script. Yeah. I was a pawn maybe, or a puppet and somebody else's. Okay. So take going back to Yes, to the theology and, and, and what one takes them from. So they weren't fiction, right. They represent something real. You just don't know what it actually represents. And I do feel, I definitely do feel that part of it, like you take the SCO. Uh, Ito's vision of the Merva and, and, and, and, and, and other that they are ascribing a What may be the, uh, the theologian, Rudolph Otto would call the numinous? The great power, the great power that is both ing and terrorizing. And, and in the rah there's this word used a lot, phrase em and it describes that the em, the glory of Hashem, the ma of Hashem, the vision of Hashem is like, like a burning fire. So there was an understanding that the, the divine glory is manifest as a real power, like, like the sun, for example. Mm-hmm. That the divine dimension is, is of enormous power. And that, that that power does reveal is both impersonal and personal. Yeah. It's, it's transfers greater than personal, but it's not less than personal. Um, and for somebody who questions, so the question is do I take this literally or can I take it in a direction of. There is a greater force. There is a, there is a transcendence. There is the greater whole. Yeah. Which is pulling me to move away from my own ego. Yeah. Or like this work that I heard from Professor Michael Fiba of I Shane of a called Lady de meaning the way, literally it means I am asleep, my heart is awake, the voice of my beloved is knocking on the door and he says, open up the the door for me. He, uh, from the Song of Songs, from the song, from the song of Songs, he interprets it in his book on Shira, Shira, the JPS commentary, and also in his book, uh, fragile Finitude. That what a, when the eye, when the ego is asleep, then the lead be the heart could be aired, can be alert, can be awake to call Duty Day fake. So is it possible that Cold Duty Day fake is happening the whole time? Absolutely. And yeah. Right. There's a revelations which are going on the whole time and if that is shame enough how you're going to experience that revelation. That revelation being attuned to the new music of the cosmos. Yeah, and you know what it's like, it's like here that you have a park right near nearby. If I'm busy thinking or I'm listening to my music, I can't hear the chirping of the bird. Right. But if during the nighttime when the buses are not humming and buzzing, then I can hear the chirping of the birds. Or in the morning, early morning, I'm usually there. So then you do know what's, what, what happened there? Perhaps. I don't know exactly what happened there, but I, they were inviting people who were in tune with the customer. They, I think that is part of it. I don't know. I don't Is that higher item to you or, um, I, I think. Part of the great, and this is part of Jewish mysticism, it's not necessarily biblical theology, but I definitely feel as a part of the cabalistic theology is self annihilation. Beto Hayes, where the, the Ani morphs into the ion, the I turns into the greater nothingness. And that nothingness is, is, is like the, the drop of the ocean that loses his individuality, but becomes part of the whole ocean. So there is a sense where, to what extent am I focusing an I as a separate entity, and to what extent am I part of the great cosmic flow of life? I am part of, to what extent am I a a particle that is separated from the light? Mm-hmm. And to what extent am I particle or a wave, whatever you want to call it, uh, a a, a sliver of light myself. And I think part of it is. Tuning down the ego and, um, dialing up the God the higher energy. But particularly with the Toyota, the language is still be holy. Be a holy people imitate God. Mm-hmm. Be moral. Don't, don't hate your fellow. Love your fellow as yourself. Uh, don't lie, don't cheat, don't do humas, don't do violence. Don't do evil. Um. Because all that is seen as anti-God. That is the realm, maybe of the demonic, the realm of, of tma, the realm of sha oil, uh, of the, of the underworld, the netherworld. Um, there is, even in biblical theology, one can argue a separation between, I wouldn't say that they're two different beings, like in Zora, uh, Zoroastrianism, a dualism between the good, bad and God and the bad God. But there are intimations, enough intimations, even within ana of a conception of the kingdom, the realm of of, of the other world, whether it's personified or not. But there is a realm of desolation, um, that you have, you should not serve to the, to the, uh, to the goats, to the demons. They served to demon. There was an understanding that there was some kind of people worship to powers of, of destruction, the gods of destruction and that the biblical God is the God of life, not the God of destruction. So part of Kaa very much was part of Kha is about life, but not only in the Hasid, in In has stories. There's a famous story of. Who came to the AL and he asked him for ab, not the life of a peasant. Yeah, and and I think that is really what Kadu is, the life that we should live. One can live for a very long time and every moment of it is only haw. And then one can be, in other words, one could be high. By doing one deed in which the person transcends their mortality or their very contingent reality. Their limited reality. Yeah. And they do something for humanity, for kindness, for justice, for goodness, for holiness, and which is a redemptive act. They do something heroic in which they're able to transcend who they and, and sometimes that one moment. Yeah. Which makes the difference whether or not a person will be remembered for eternity or not. That's that transformational moment that transforms their life. I, I mean, because I mean, there's a lot of, uh, conversation around that. Uh, I know, um, uh, William James talks about a lot that you have this, you have, you have, you can have this one religious conversion moment. Yeah, exactly. Where, where, where all of a sudden you have this unit experience where everything gets clear. People have this epiphany and then something then changes, that people who describe, or that people who are addicts and other kinds of things, before all of a sudden they don't have desire to drink anymore. And they've become just different people see the light in the moment. Yeah. They saw the light and they, they convert. So it's living more of a spiritual life. I mean, this is a very traditional kind of viewpoint. It sounds to me, first of all, it, it is traditional in many ways. I'm not gonna deny it. Uh, we'll, we'll talk about the more untraditional stuff in a moment. But there are different levels of, of, you're taking it to seeking ecstasy, looking for some kind of supernatural or, or mystical experience. I think the holiness of the Toyota is a very part of the expression, prosaic holiness, at least on a basic level. Sanctify yourself in the mundane reality. Yeah. Don't cheat, don't steal. It's not about meditating on a mountain and getting any deep insights into reality. It is taking part of Kaha. Uh, and I think this is very much the biblical concept is infusing IL with Kish. And now I'm gonna get into the more critical on the one end though. Yeah. First of all, the revelation cyanide itself was not sure the mystical experience but then you do have later where the ian on the ian went up. Right. And they saw these visions, right. Soccer get so much. Right. So, you know, these were very mystical experiences that were happening. It certainly was some kind of mystical experience. So with the, Terry it's not just do's and don'ts, it's also No, a hundred percent. And, and I would add, I mean, something that I can relate to in a very different, in a different, very different way, but perhaps related is the, I remember when I was 12 years old, I went to Vienna and there's a place called SCH the Palace is where? France, Joseph's Palace. Mm-hmm. I remember, uh, when I first saw it, there was actually a observation point or a, like on top of the hill when you can look down and see the entire estate. That, and I was just like, my mind wide open. I never saw splendor in my life. It was an incredible moment. Like mm-hmm. It was like the little child who discovers thing for the first time, like I was. Wide open, gaping wide, open my mouth. Like, and, and, and I would think that nu seeing that, let me see this great site. Yeah. Or you, ka ka ka. Um, yes, that it was a visual experience of something very, very profound. Something that Hessel would call an something tremendous and seeing that vision of la however we understand it, is what may be ADO would call the luminus. You saw like somebody who never saw the sun and all of a sudden they see the sun. Wow. H how did, how did I, how did I know, or, or in today's day and age, when you first discover ai, what AI can do it, it is a discovery, it is an epiphany of sorts. Like it changes your view. Some people call looking at planet earth from, from, from outer space. They never did it. Obviously the overview effect still happen. Yeah. They're still overview effect. Yeah. All of a sudden there's a mystical experience of seeing a, a certain grandeur. That, that there was a certain grandeur, and Heschel talks a lot about that. Uh, his way of religiosity is cultivating a sense for the ineffable, radical amazement. All wonder, the grandeur of being, uh, it could be on a certain level, one can interpret visions and AK in a similar way. I think the effect was similar. Right. Meaning they saw the word is mo I'm going, all of a sudden I am shifting gears. I'm, I'm shifting consciousness. You have people that say their first psychedelic trips. I had never had one. I never took any of them, but that that was mind altering for them. They saw vision, which completely changed the way they look at things. So yes, there is an element of ecstasy there, but I think for the Jewish tradition. There Ma, Mahar Sinai, it was again, sanctification because of the great power, God's presence being revealed at Mount Sinai. But when vo after the revelation, see, hey Bahar, you can go. You come back up. What is the continuation of Edina is a mish. Yeah. And the mish gun is very much about. The, the Holiness in the camp. So I think a good way to describe it, the, the biblical theology of holiness as a following way. Imagine, I think even imagine our bodies, we have a heart, and the heart has to pump blood to all different veins. What happens if we start eating stuff or doing things, not keeping our, our, our, our watching our health, we end up the, the arties start being clogged. Mm-hmm. And essentially what I see the theology of holiness of the Toyota is that the desire is that that blood flow or that electrical current should suffuse all of reality. The means that God's presence, holiness, should be manifest throughout all of Israel. Now, in the biblical conception, God's domain is not only the temple, but also the land of Israel. That's why if somebody does, if somebody clogs the arteries, yeah. If somebody does an ave, somebody defiles the temple and the sacred grounds, the, a spate of the king, the land is gonna chase them out, is gonna, is gonna literally vomit them. Why? The same way if a virus starts coming, a healthy body is going to fight against it. Yeah. So essentially the way I see the Toyota, the. There is a fight or a fight, a struggle, a a, a process between the forces of God, the forces of duche, which is, is God gonna be present? Life holiness, beauty meaning in, in a, in a broader sense. But is the duche, the holiness of God, gonna be manifest? Is the king to use an example of the palace, is the king gonna feel comfortable in his entire palace? Yeah. Or are we gonna chase them away? So this is biblical theology. Based on the scholarship in other Right. This isn't just, uh, kaza, this is not just Za, it's not just before. Right. This seems to be what Te Kain is saying. Right. And, and I, I'll for example, illustrate the difference because one of the great. Uh, Bible scholars on Vara. Uh, the book of Leviticus was somebody by the name of Jacob Milgrom. Mm-hmm. Uh, Jacob Milgrom wrote, uh, three, uh, volume massive commentary. Yeah. On Leviticus containing like 20, 2700 pages. Uh, now Jacob Milgrom, he actually views the, a little bit differently than Al. He argues, for example, that when it says in certain times. Time places in the Toyota that by you doing the sins, you are gonna be contaminating the temple. It doesn't mean only as Kaza would have it, only by entering the, the, the, the, mm-hmm. The temple. He, he, he, he refers to it as the priestly portrait, uh, of Dorian Gray. Dorian Gray, as a character from an Oscar of Wild novel or play, again, I'm not familiar with the literature part of it so much. Where he argues where the, the, the, the, the, the, um, the image is that if, uh, that if Dorian Gray does something wrong, it won't be noticeable on him, but there's a portrait of him hidden somewhere else, and the more he does something wrong, the more it will affect his portrait. So Groms argument is that the temple, the, the mish gun is the epicenter right of God's vitality and energy. When somebody does an Avera in the, for example, interfere with it, it it, it, for example, it, it, it, it casts pollution or radiation is airborne and it reaches the temple and therefore the carbona that are brought. For example, the carbon, which we usually, uh, translate as a sin offering or an offering of atonement or yaki, put in the, the day of atonement, uh, which is seen as forgiving of sins. He actually says he put in comes, which also means to sanitize, to clean. Mm-hmm. And katas, if, how do you say, a, a disinfected in, in, in, in, in, in Hebrew modern Hebrew. There's right sso. You find that also in the Toyota sso, not you'll sin, but you will purify and he has the following theory and with a very interesting theory, which illustrates his point. There are three different types of sacrifices to purify the temple. One Haas, one purification offering the blood of it is doubted on the corners of the altar. In the aro or the animal sacrifice alter, which is in the courtyard, which is not in the holy, which is the lowest level that is for sins that are perpetrated by individual Israelites unwitting sins bge. A unwitting sin that was done by the, this is from, by the, or the entire congregation that warrants an offering. That is actually the blood is, doubted on the inner altar, the one which was already in the ish. And finally, once a year there is a carbon that the carbon that Thedo brings into the actual re the Holy of Holies to, purify, the inner sanctum, the re. From the wantons, the brazen sins Yeah. Of, of the Israelites throughout the year. So the theory is that, that there is a, if you will, a a, I won't use the word tug of war, but there are two opposing forces that are, that are wor, that are at play here. On the one hand, there is the force of holiness, and the more, the more calm, the closer to the sun you are. Yeah. The, the more likely you are to get burnt and therefore. Um, a cado is a concept of greater ho graded holiness. Yeah. Somebody, in order to enter the Ian one has to be really holy and that makes them, that protects them against the, the dangerous, the high voltage and therefore only the cado can go in. Somebody else, A stranger will, will die. Somebody who's not the ca or azo that goes into the ish. Then there's a lesser level of, the. And the, the notion being that at the one hand, the more intense the, the holiness, like I'll say, did not do his ki properly. They would die. Yeah. Um, but then there's a counter idea, which is that the forces of impurity of TMA can actually defile the temple. And there's this whole vision of the abominations of the Israelites actually cha chasing God away from the temple, like flogging the arteries. That, that diagram of the priestly picture of portrait of Dorian Gray. Illustrates the concept of the, the greater sin as like a, a stronger bullet that can penetrate further right. That a a wanton sin has to be, can penetrate into the rad. And, and then, and, and so in today's where we don't have the tabernacle right, and we're not bringing any sacrifices, this might be seen from a moral perspective, you're saying. And also, somehow, God resting his glory. The covered, which is rests on the mishka. And that, by sinning, that pushes it away. So in today's day and age, I mean the similar kind of thing. If you want to have the glory, if you want have connectivity, communion with the divine, then you have to make sure that you are pure, you are holy, you are acting in an ethical, moral way, but you are also not, you're not, not showing that away. You're not. You're not called blocking the arteries, so to speak. Right. Okay. Who's gonna send a mountain of God, the, of our label? Somebody who's, uh, yeah. Queen of, interactions. Yeah. So this would be, I think we hear clearly the differences, slight differences from the scholarly perspective, versus the, the far, but how, how do you personally take this you know, in, in my personal life. Because your biblical scholar. Uh, well, that's my hobby today. Well, more than I, we haven't discussed in this, session conversation. Yeah. But we have discussed how biblical scholarship with the documentary hypothesis is something which you've been convinced about. A version of the composite authorship of the te as opposed to the strict model known as a documentary hypothesis, but Okay and, and I, I also want to take it on a personal level. Go ahead. Yeah, yeah. So, even someone who studies that can still look at the, take this and say, okay, I can take this to my life and, live it. In other words. Having the documentary on prothesis in your life doesn't preclude taking these teachings, these truths to one's lives as a, uh, as a, as a guide for life in many ways. Yeah. Even if one doesn't believe them as being necessarily, uh, they, they have to be an infallible truth that can never be, um, reinterpreted, if you will. Yeah. Um, so on a personal level, I think an example that more people can relate to today. Um, and this is apropos our current par of, of Emir, uh, where there are clear distinctions between a regular cayan and a and a and a Cayan Gado. For example, a regular cayan is not allowed to defile himself, render himself in pure to a aqua to a dead body. But with the exception of six relatives and a claim, God is not even allowed to do that. Caen has allowed to marry a, widow, but he is not allowed to marry a, a divorce sea. The cado has to marry a virgin according to the, this week's par. The idea again, is great at holiness. Yeah. But the way I would take it in today's day, for example, a question that people can relate to us, let's say about vegetarianism. Mm-hmm. Vegetarianism is a, a certain ethical ideal. And, they're of cook. Wrote a whole monograph called The Vision of Vegetarianism, and he actually argues, and that's right. That before, no, before the blood, the the, we were, yeah, we weren't allowed to eat animal meat. So it was really a concession to human frailty to human blood loss. That, that we eat meat. So he believes that when the shiia will come in the future, it will be a return to this vegetarian ideal. Even claims that the Caras will also be vegetarian, but min is made of flowers. Is, vegan. It's not it not animal. What I'm trying to say is, is that I think on the one hand there is a a question. There's always that aspiration of increasing holiness. And that can also be on a moral level. Like maybe at one stage I'll reach the point I'm not vegan or vegetarian, but maybe at one point I will be meaning and also questioning am I really on that level? Am I on that? Am I a ca gale? Am I a ca now or not? Am I on that level?'cause sometimes if we're not on that level and we, and we take on. Uh, holiness, then we can be a hostage, then it can be misplaced, and it can even be destructive. Like Ralph Cook says, if somebody's into animal rights and they don't care about human rights, it can be, it can be a travesty. Uh, so in that regard now more, more importantly, and also talking a little bit more broadly about my own journey, I think where, where, where I differed a lot from my previous upbringing is. Um, Judaism can be defined in two ways. Judaism can be defined as a religion, Judaism, like Islam or Christianity as a religion. And then there is Jewishness being ethnicity and nationality nationalism. Mm-hmm. Uh, in the world and the throne world, Habad world where I grew up, it was very clear that Judaism is defined by the religious definition of Judaism. Mm-hmm. In other words, if my Jewish ethnicity doesn't really matter in, in the greater scheme of things, uh, what really matters is being a religious Jew, being God's chosen people, which is a religious concept and following and following the, the laws with the conception. That this is a book that was given to us by God and represents the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth very much that a Christian. You see there's an interesting parallel to Christianity.'cause Christianity is a religion of faith and belief in God. If somebody doesn't believe in Jesus or they can't call themselves a Christian, but somebody could be Jewish even if they're an atheist. So, but as far as one would argue as far as because Huh? How is that, why is that? Because we are a people. We are a ethnicity. We are, we are a people. Mm-hmm. And it's not just we're genetically Jewish. Huh? Genetically Jewish. We're, we're, we're part of a people, we're part of an Yes. Genetically Jewish by lot, whatever it is. I don't want to get into all kinds of theories or whatever, but we are a people, we're not just a religion. Christianity may feel a sense of solidarity with other Christians, but, but in, in Islam, you also have the difference between being Arab and being Muslim. Right. But they do have also this concept of the umma. The Uma. Right. Which is the, um, true, right, but what, what I want, what I wanna get at, what I wanna get at, at least as far as Judaism is concerned,'cause this is our topic that I, I grew up very much with the mindset that what really matters is the religious principles of Judaism. If I don't believe the religious truths of truth claims of ju of Judaism, so then I'm just a secular person. Yeah. And I, I wanna share an insight where I, where I really had like 180 degree turn on this, uh, shift. And I, I wanna preface it with a statement that has really been, or of work that has been percolating in me, especially since October 7th es that I heard in Yiddish. Um, right. And Jews do not make kd. The non-Jews will make dulan, and the way I interpret it in a modern day idiom is the following. If Jews don't have a positive reason to be Jewish mm-hmm. Based on a sense of sacredness, of sacred duty, of sanctifying, their nationhood and their peoplehood. If we don't make kiddish, if we don't, if we're not ish ourselves, we don't sanctify ourselves if we don't live up to the mission of being. So then we will be forced to be Jewish for a negative reason because of antisemitism, because the non-Jews will discriminate against us. So the question is, take your pick. Do I wanna be Jewish today in a post-OC October uh, seventh World? Uh, because, uh, the non-Jews hate me or some non-Jews hate me? Not saying all of them do. Um, because I am aware of the haah. In, in a negative sense, or do I wanna be Jewish? Because in, in the positive sense, I have a sense of being part of a holy nation. So going back to the shift that I had, this is the vt, the VT of living, the, the nature of Jewish identity, not just based on the Holocaust as what causes Jewish identity and self-consciousness, but based on Sinai. Yeah. Knowing that we, however, we view Sinai as a literal event, as, as, as, as a narrative in a t as a concept. But that notion, the notion of Sinai, the tradition says that we become a nation of, of, of priests and explains the idea. Ma kish means that the same way we're supposed to be like priests and other nations Yeah. Who are devoted to God and, and and the temple or to God and not necessarily monastic lifestyle, though. Not necessarily a monastic lifestyle. And that is why I feel that, uh, living here in Israel especially makes me, uh, feel much more part of the, the, the peoplehood. Yeah. But, but I wanna first, so the shift, the shift when I wanna get to the shift is one of the things that I've, uh, blurred from border high capital, even though there are a lot of things I disagree with them about. But that notion of the centrality of Jewish peoplehood. Mm-hmm. In other words that the reason, if I were to go with the old paradigm of, I believe I am Jewish because I believe in the 13 in the the, the Maimon is 13 principles of faith. I believe Judaism is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth and all the other religions are false. So then if I questioned that, my relationship to Judaism would be very tenuous. Because it's based on a metaphysical belief system, based on, the veracity of certain religious truth claims. If, however, my religiosity is based on the understanding that we, the people like the preamble of the constitution. Yeah. Meaning that we are the Jewish religion is the religion of the Jewish people. Yes. Yeah, Jews proceed ontologically the Toyota. The Toyota is there for the Jewish people now, yes, the mission of the Jewish people is, is to bring God into the world. To bring holiness into the world. But if I understand, it's not a question of I, I no longer adhere to the fundamentalist view that I know exactly why God created the, the entire universe. I know God's, blueprint for, I don't know. I, I remain agnostic about that. What I do know is that I'm a biological Jew. Mm-hmm. And I do know that part of the Jewish tradition, part of our self-concept, whether it was revealed by God on, on, on Mount Sinai, or whether this was a divinely revealed insight by, uh, a prophets who had an inner revelation of God, or even if it was made up, quote unquote, by Jews, my ancestors. Who were seeking the divine, who were seeking that transcendent connection. Yeah. And they viewed themselves. They came to believe themselves as, as children to God and as I think that remains the cornerstone. Yeah. That should remain the cornerstone of Jewish identity, even as somebody who's totally secular. And I think that even today, even really secular Jews. Which leads to like a very, very interesting paradox, if I may. Because what you're saying is right, that, yeah, that, yes, she grab a finger. Yeah. What you're saying. One second. Yeah. What you're saying is on the one hand, right, I don't need to believe that the TER is necessarily the truth. Capital, capital T, right? Didn't come from God necessarily 100% dictated by God to Moses, et cetera. Yeah. However, in this book. Which came about somehow or other from our ancestors. It says that God came and he told us that we should be. Therefore we should be dedicating ourself to God as ish. So in other words, start off with agnosticism about the veracity of the book or about the origins of the book. Correct. Right. But because this is our book, therefore now we're gonna become religious people because the book tells us to become religious people. Do you see the some? Absolutely. It's not somewhat. It is a great paradox, but I would, I would, I would say that even if you take, uh, let's say a liberal Jewish notion of tku lam. Yeah. Even if there's some aspects of, of, of it that I think are, are, are downright dangerous and, and, and extreme, and especially in today's climate, I don't want to get into that. Yeah. But, but at the heart of it, at the core, I'm not talking about the cellulous. Yeah. Uh, about the waste byproduct of it. But at the core is a sense that we are supposed to be a light onto the nations. Right. And I think even the most secular Jew understands that what justifies their existence. Is t la that we need to make the world better. We need to bring God into the world. However they understand divinity, make the world a better place. Yeah. And I, I, I, and again, so everyone gets to the same place in the end, but let me, let me, let me broad, yes or no, uh, because I think a religious person will focus more on the ritualistic myths. For example, Eros, let's say, will be more important, let's say, than vegetarianism. Who sheta it is will be a more of a burning issue than whether or not we should be vegetarian. Yeah. The question of shana's and a bag egg will be more important, let's say than, being honest in business and stuff like that.'cause that's more of an ethical misa for the liberal person and including myself, who relates more to Ben. That takes center stage. Not that I don't, not that I don't observe ritually, but it's a matter of emphasis. It's a matter of emphasis so that, that's why I do feel there isn't, there is an element of yes and no, and I would also add to what I said before. Mm-hmm. Is that to me, the idea of can be understood, prescriptively and descriptive. A real, a religious person is gonna believe this a hundred percent and gonna believe that this is God's blueprint for the world, and therefore there's the mandate, Ian. This is an absolute word of God, but there's also a descriptive approach, which is to understand that throughout the generations, because my ancestors believed this to be true, this was their mission. Mm-hmm. And, and they sanctified themselves based on that belief. So here is not the question of origin, but the question of result. What is the result as a Jewish person? Yeah. What is, how do I view myself? How do I, how do I make the most of my Judaism? That becomes like, tradition is also traditional, but if it's not just traditional, that becomes how we as Jews do it. Right? And, and therefore, it's not just like Morde Kaplan says Jewish folk ways like dancing, the horror, singing hava. Drinking barsch, eating bagels and locks. It's not just the custom eating Canadian LA and Lakas, it is really a higher divine mission, which does is religiously based. In other words, I believe very much that even a secular version of Ju Judaism or even a less orthodox, of Judaism is whether you like it or not. Uh, based on the religious conception of Judaism, of being a, a nation of priests, uh, uh, a kingdom of priests in a holy nation, even reformed Jews or even completely secular Jews who are the warriors of social justice and tikun ola, there may be secularizing, a religious concept, but it begins from ation to it begins for, for ish. Yeah. And I, and therefore, again, be what, what I'm trying to say is, unlike my. Previous paradigm where this is the truth and there's a binary between truth, hood and falsehood. This is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth and other religions aren't today I can believe and I do believe that there are holy people of other faiths and they also are able to approach God in their own way, and I believe there's a lot of value and perhaps truths and other religions as well. But the reason why I'm practiced Jewishly and I'm not interested in another form of practice is because this is my language. Yeah. And if someone's gonna say that English is true and French is false, for example, or Hebrew is true, and Yiddish is false, then you miss the book. Yeah. The point is, this is your language. Uh, now I know this sounds theoretical to a typical from point of view, but that's not my, this is where I am today. Yeah. This is what I've come to understand. I could be proven wrong, I could be mistaken. But based on my critical approach to scholarship, the idea of Jewishness as a form of national identity is a starting point. I infuse that with a religious consciousness. I would argue further that even secular Jews have essentially secularized a religious concept, a religious definition of Jewish nationalism. Yeah. Which is to be moral, to be holy. And they understand that to be their mandate. Because I'm also a religious person. I see value in reli and ritual observance, either as promoting holiness, like shabbas, I think is a great example of a day that is meant to focus on, not on, on what is transcendent, what is eternal, not on what is temporal. Mm-hmm. Um, but, but overall, and, and I, I, I also do many, many ritual mis'cause I think, and also part of the nationalism, let's say kosher. Uh, rabbi Louis Jacobs spoke about the genetic fallacy. Genetic fallacy is people say, well, it could be that kosher or laws of, of purity, laws of needle, let's say, emerged from primitive taboos. It says, yes, maybe as a critical scholar, we think about it, but on the other hand, because as a nation, this is how we sanctify ourselves, so it can also be symbolic. In a certain sense, the hookin and the M button can come become ada. What I mean by that is there's a classic medieval, classification of ada, which are testimony like missiles that we do. We do tro because God put us, set us up in dwelling booths. Uh, and then there's m say, don't kill, which is natural morality. Uh, and then there is a, that we don't understand, like things that we don't understand. What I'm arguing is, is that those, even those missiles that are, which are either super rational or maybe they do originate from, from primitive taboos as a, as a Bible scholar, they put up as they end up as ada. I'm doing it as bearing witness to traditions, to my people, to their idea of sanctification. I don't have to believe that God literally command. To be part of the ak. I'm not saying that I don't believe it, but even if I'm not sure about it, how does that get you to any kind of a spiral sort or, or any kind of, uh, VA or, because it seems like or does it not? In other words, does this get you to a kind of fractious religious spiritual sense? Or is this just, uh, this is how my nation does it. They're probably going to do it. So, first of all, there is, or we all know too well, the problems of this kind of nationalistic euphoria or, or collective effervescence that Emil Durkheim talks about, a sense of national, uh, identity. I don't wanna turn nationalism into a. Because I feel that the national, it could bring its own fervor is what you're saying. It could bring its own fervor. Okay. And also, well, what I'm trying to say is perhaps unlike maybe what you were intimating before, yes, I do get ecstatic. I can listen to music and get involved in what may be turned a mystical experience on some level. But I think as a Jewish person, or as I told you, I told you many times, for me, I feel a, a greater. Need that impulse to Davin to pray when I'm among my people than when I'm, when I'm on my own. When I'm my own, I'm an individual. I'm either bird, zirkin. Yeah. But it's when I'm with the, uh, the seaboard so convey to show you when I feel the pulse of my people, that is where I feel I have an urge to pray. And even if I'm not gonna dive in every day, every filler, but when I'm walking into a shul and somebody's diving in, I, I'm, I'm gonna join them usually. If I didn't da, I'm going, I'm gonna, I'm gonna join their, their les. Why? Because, not it, it is about me. Yeah. It's about Makayla Makayla join the Marys of Jews. Hey Ra, you know, be together. I feel that I am that, and, and, and that also brings a certain degree of ecstasy. Yeah. And I also believe that. Um, I'm not against individual ecstasy during prayer or meditation. There's room for that as an individual. And I also believe in generic religion, which is unrelated to any specific religion. It could be meditation. And I think as somebody who is a post fundamentalist, I, I'm, I'm a little bit of a perennial list, meaning I believe there are truths in every religion and we're all trying to reach a divine. So I could appreciate a, a kind of nons institutionalized or even non-Jewish, non-specifically Jewish form of religious slash spiritual expression and meditation, or even in being kind to other people in immoral way, even though that's not the ecstasy. But I think the r also has to come with a sh The accent also has to be grounded. The spiritual, the great spiritual soring also has to, land I can't just live in the cave, like trash me. Yeah. Like we were approaching like we, we, we also have to live in this world. And Ash b, when he, he was so intense, when he looked according to the, when he looked, he burnt everything, that he burnt everything in his wake. So this is where I feel that for me. For me, there is a mission of belonging to the Jewish people, belonging to a collective form of religion and spirituality. Mm-hmm. And it's not just about nationalism, it's also that we have a mission, we have a role to play in the world. Yeah. Whether it means that we're it, I'm not going there. And there is some ability to lose one's own identity or one's own self image, or to be subsumed. Once it was consumed in that greater whole, which can lead to a unitive experience or a sense of ecstasy yes, a hundred percent. I mean, you're not giving yourself up to God necessarily in some way, be giving up to the peoplehood and to the Jewish people. And by doing that, you end up giving yourself up to God'cause conditioned to you. Very useful. Right? Like for example, like if, let's say sometimes at the, at the, at the, at the, at the Kotel. Yeah. And I'm among hundreds or thousands of Jews praying. Let's say there's a moment of Yeah. You know, that is a moment. It, for me, that's a very strong divine moment. Yeah. Like encounter with the divine. As a very moment of deep biblical import that turns of the, because of priestly blessings is, is written in the Toyota. And it is a, is a biblical blessing, but also because I connect to my people, I connect to tradition. And when I go to the, I also feel that vertical, vertical and horizontal connection, I think that's key because just Peoplehood is only a horizontal connection. I'm connecting with my people, right? And that, that is more secular, but through, because it's the Jewish people, which has in it the terror, right? Which is connectivity with God. You end up. With the birth. I, I, I, I believe that in order for us to sustain ourselves, in order for us to be a people that can justify, that can justify our own existence ourselves, let alone to the world, yeah. We need to live up to a higher moral mandate. And I think whether we like it or not, the world doesn't expect of us to be que whether we like it or not. But we do need to live up to that. And I think, again, that I believe in nationalism, but not in the idol. In other words, the flag. Just waving the flag Yeah. Is not what it's all about. Yeah. It, it represents a moral duty. Yeah. And again, what I'm saying is very typical, even in a, in a broader Jewish sense, this doesn't necessarily have to be, uh, uh, uh, untraditional, even in therum sense of being, or which is the particular manifestation or the emphasis that I place on nationalism as the comedian point for that. And I view religion as an extension of peoplehood rather than religion, as this truth that I know that Judaism is true and all the other religions are, are, let's say false from a fundamentalist point of view. Yeah. Yeah. So that, that's the base. Eddie, very clear. Yeah. Thank you very much. You're very welcome. My pleasure down again for another, recorded conversation and a pleasure as always. Thank you. Thank you for your hospitality in your home. Pleasure