I have to say, divorce is tough, moving on is tough. There are so many things that carry on, after the relationship is over. One thing is my password to all the websites that I go to. e-mail, bank accounts, facebook, and all the various web sites that I am subscribed to. I am subscribed to a dozen websites, maybe two dozen, and all my passwords are some variation of my ex-wife's name. I don' know what other people do, maybe they keep lists of completely unique passwords, I know that is what you are supposed to do, but I just use one password, and there are two or three variations, and if one doesn't work, I just try the other variation. When I first started I had someone who worked for me set up a bigfoot e-mail account, does anyone else remember bigfoot.com? Well he basically gave me a password that was my wife's name, albeit horribly misspelled, and it stuck, and since then that has been my password. Now, that is what I use for all my accounts. I just feel like I should change my password, but I can't figure out what to replace it with. I guess it is a metaphor, I can't seem to replace my ex-wife's influence in my life. While in reality I guess I don't have to, and that time will probably take care of that to one degree or another, I should find some other password. I guess it is a  good thing I never got a tattoo. Passwords are easier to change.

Today made me sad. There was a million people in Jerusalem that got together to show their strength, and make a statement. The statement was about their dedication to their way of life. Their commitment to their beliefs. I personally agree with their beliefs and commitment, but I understand that other do not agree.

I wish that those who do not agree would examine their ideas. The same old tired slanders, the same poor excuses to hate other Jews. The same fear, the same self righteous smugness. I am not saying that it only flows in one direction, how I wish I could make that claim, but I can't. But the fact that 20% of the population of the country came together with one purpose should give liberal, democratically minded  people pause. I don't think that the activists who have instigated this law have really give thought to the effect the law will have on the mindset of the charedim. The charedim are turning inward, the law is having the opposite effect of what its authors have intended, at least what they say they have intended. I think there is a small, but wicked group of people who are glad that this is happening, they are happy to see the Jewish people in a state of strife. Both sides have a small wicked group. There are charedim who reject the Jewish community in Israel, as a means of feeling self righteous, just as there are people on the left who would seek to destroy the Jewish community. These small minorities feed off the bad feelings of the larger communities. They have small hearts, and smaller minds and they reject whatever is not like them. It is up to us, the larger communities, wether religious or not, to find the courage to hang on to our values while rejecting the haters in our midst. At the end of the day we are all the children of Yisrael, wether we learn torah, or keep shabbos, or just have a passion for social justice, or a love of the land of Israel. We are all deeply wounded by 2,000 years of exile. Some of us pray for it to end, some of us are the grandchildren of people who prayed for it to end. What I find saddest of all is that the majority feel the need to parrot the haters among us. The arguments are so stupid, ten minutes of honest reflection will allow a person to understand his neighbor and answer his complaints against us. But instead, we bicker, and we disrspect each other. The history of the Jewish community in Israel is complex, but not that complex. We live in the Middle East and e have picked up some nasty attributes from our neighbors. The fear of being a friar has replaced brotherly cooperation. Screaming at each other has replaced reasoned debate. Grabbing and impatience has become the watch words of our society. We are tearing ourselves apart, and all so that a small group of people can get elected to the knesset on the backs of hate.
Somebody said recently that the whole country feels like it is waiting for  a bus to arrive. We need to eat before the bus gets here, we need to pay the rent, and build roads, but we are all waiting. The religious recognize it as waiting for Moshiach, the secular folks are not sure, or maybe they are waiting for disaster to strike. But whatever it is, we are waiting.  No one is just living, we are all taut as a bow string, the stress is so great the whole country is tense, waiting to snap. Snap we do at each other, but I wish nothing but peace on all of klal yisroel. I hope that what we are all waiting for arrives quickly, and brother can sit down with brother without strife or bickering, united in purpose at last.

It is amazing, I lost the new post button, I couldn't find it for almost a week. sneaky little thing...

Quote of the day from five days ago.

Experience is a cruel teacher, but you learn, by god, how you learn. -C.A.Lewis
I didn't want to put that up as my status, it seemed too public. I figured anyone who would be here could see it, it is technically "on the internet" now.

Maybe the secret is to kill the dragons when they are small, so that they don't become big dragons to slay. Because while it is true that we all need quests to live happy lives, you don't want to have your arm torn off by a dragon that you spent years feeding. Just a thought.

Good evening to all of you out there, and all the ships at sea.

I have big news folks! Elite is making a chocolate bar with pop rocks(tm) inside. That is right, chocolate that pops and fizzes inside of your mouth and head!  What abomination is this? I hear you ask, well folks, it is yet another thing we can blame on science! Yes science, whenever we find blasphemy you can be sure that that ugly little word science is lurking somewhere behind the scenes.

First a little background on pop rocks(tm) and why I have to ad that little trademark symbol lest I be sued for using those words. How do they get those magical evil little candies to pop inside your head. Wel folks, it seems that you take simple sugar and water and boil it up, and you reduce it and thiscken it. at this point you can let it cool and harden and you would get little sugar candies, the wholesome kind, the kind that the sweet candyman gave to the children at shul. They may be bad for your teeth, but they are wonderful for your heart. But could evil science leave well enough alone? We ll know the answer to that one.

Before the sugar had time to cool down, Science decided to blow carbon dioxide through the almost congealed sugar syrup. They blaste the carbon dioxide into the sugar at 600 psi! that is a lot of pounds no matter how many inches we are talking about. As the sugar cooled and crystalized, the carbon dioxide became trapped in the candies. When you put those little peices of sugar into your mouth, they slowly melt, releasing those high pressure bits of carbon dioxide, which makes a pop on the inside of your mouth, and inside of your brain pan. This process is actualy patented, which is why I have to put a little (tm) every time I say pop rocks(tm) otherwise I would be in violation of trade agreements. 

Now Elite decided to mix this stuff into chocolate!  Hence creating the biggest candy sensation since Mr. Belsky fell off his ladder and his chocolate bar landed into Mrs. Peterson's tub of peanut butter!

I am so glad to be able to bring this stuff to ya!

One of the things about a blog, has been how often am I supposed t update it. Am I supposed to tell people what I had for dinner? What color sox I chose to put on? Perhaps I should wait until some big deal worth reading shows up, but then, maybe Something wise won't show up for weeks or even months, and then who knows if I will remember to write it down? So I will take the middle path, I will try to post something every day, sometimes it will be more momentous than others. Perhaps I will spend a lot of time defending what I believe, or apologizing for it. Because this blog is really going to be about things that I believe to be true. The things that we believe, or know to be true re the things that makes us who we are. For better or worse, or just because. Sometimes I meet people who have spent time asking themselves what they believe, and why they believe it. Those are the more interesting people. Many of us go through life just sort of believe in what we believe, either because it is group think, or because it is what our parents told us to think that way, or sometimes, we just made a decision, and that decision is lost so far back in the mists of time, that we are not sure why we believe as we do.

One thing that I must break my train of thought is, I despise people who cannot write in the English language. I said "far back in the mists of time", and I know some person is going to decide that I meant "far back in the midst of time". There are certain things that I cannot deal with, they make me "loose" my mind.

Back to the subject at hand. What do I believe. Not what do I believe in, just simply what do I believe to be true, what I depend on in my daily life will become apparent as time goes on. I believe that there is a Creator that created the universe as an act of will and sustains it from moment to moment. Yeah, you know I was going there. The identity I have built for myself over the past 25 years is one of a Religious Orthodox Jew. I am going to be spending a lot of time on religious themes, when I speak of my beliefs. I am not cynical about my beliefs, to the contrary I try, every day, to look at the world in a fresh way. I do not always succeed, on the contrary, I fail almost every day, but every so often I do look at the day through a new pair of eyes, and boy, then I will have a blog post worth writing down!

I believe this entity that created the world, created it for a purpose, and he communicated that purpose and much much beyond that on mount Sinai, around 3,500 years ago. I believe we still have access to that purpose, and that the communique that we were given is called the torah.

I choose of my own free will and volition to believe these things. I do not believe them through overwhelming evidence, although there are those who can make that argument, but there are many who claim to disprove them. I simply choose to believe because I would rather live in a universe that has a purpose, and in a universe where I have a role in that purpose, rather than live in a place where all actions are simply reactions to random events. In a world where there is no rhyme or reason to actions and events. At the very beginning of Davening, before you even get into shul, a person is supposed to say "Reishis chochmah yiras Hashem. (Proverbs 1:7)The beginning of wisdom is the fear of god. Why is that? Why does wisdom begin with the fear of god? Maybe wisdom begins with a clean notebook and a sharpened pencil? Or maybe wisdom begins with a cup of coffee? Why with the fear of God?

What is Wisdom? To me wisdom is to get out of the rain when it is raining. There was a certain game that characterized intelligence as knowing that it was raining, and wisdom was the understanding to get out of the rain. If one wants to acquire wisdom, there is one fundamental piece of knowledge, and you get to build from there.

There are two models of the universe, a non godly one, based on observational science and scientific theory, that leads us to the conclusion that everything is random, stars form essentially randomly, Habitable planets formed randomly, and life itself happened by lucky accident. Wether a lion catches that specific gazelle, or the other one, depends on which gazelle tripped, nothing but  an accident. While we can use observation to tell us how things happen, science is not very good at why things happen. When pressed it will just give you another layer of how, all the way back to the big bang, but there is no why, and that I think is a failing in just the scientific method.

 The other model of the universe that has a creator, and a created universe, and a god who is interested in the outcome of each lion hunt, or of every, or especially of each human encounter, those are two very different universes, and it is up to each of us to choose which universe you would like to live in. In this universe we can at least theoretically begin to answer why something happened, not only the how of it.

Now if god did create the universe, and he contacted us about it, and the rules are not random, but they are knowable, then the beginning of wisdom, is the awareness of god's existence. the universe is not a crap shoot, there are rules, the way the universe is more knowable than mysterious, and then the beginning of wisdom is the awareness that there is a god, and there are rules. which is a pretty good base. without it, one wonders how one can pursue wisdom at all?

We say that sentence every day in morning prayers, we know Judaism is full of mysterious wisdom, but this one sentence... We need to look at our daily lives, through fresh glasses, every day.

All comments are welcome. TL;DR would be nice to know now, rather than in 5 weeks.

I look forward to any and all comments I reserve the right to choose to engage you or not, but each comment shows interest in my writing, so I am looking forward to it.

I am torn in making this blog. Is it a good idea in general? I don't want to appear foolish. I also don't know if this blog is going to be mostly about my own personal musings, or more about Torah ideas and topics. I think that me personal musings are less interesting that the Torah ideas, however personalized they may be, so I think that is what we will be talking about.

So which is it? Am I writing this for me or for you? Somebody please comment, lets have a debate, about the purpose of the blog Maybe if you know me, do you want to hear about Torah, or what is going on inside my head, or maybe you think I should put the computer down. Or perhaps you do  have questions, and I have bits and sparks of wisdom (ha), that you would like to hear? Or perhaps some medley of both.  I will publish this now and see if it has a comment section. If it does I will advertise it on my facebook page. lets see what happens, and we will begin the adventure.

However one Jewish proverb does seem to be crossing my mind, as well as others. Better to keep you mouth closed and be thought a fool, than to open it and remove all doubt. Let us see to the truth of that statement, because there is another one. "All beginning are difficult". No doubt there is someone wiser than I who can tell when to apply each bit of wisdom in it's correct time. I am not that person.

I tend to overshare. Becoming embarrassed as something stupid flies out of my mouth for everyone to hear is one thing. It is embarrassing, and it makes me want a hole to open up and swallow me whole, but the feelings pass, most people are not paying attention, and the ones who do, usually have enough going on in their brain that the thought of how stupid Avrahom Rothenberg doesn't stay up on the top ten things to do for very long But a blog, oh a blog is different,  it takes that   over sharing to a much higher level. It is in print forever, and it stays forever. Stupid positions, stupid arguments, and general silliness can be pulled up and presented to you on your 75th birthday. "hey remember that time you predicted capitol punishment for heavy metal bands?" Or losing your house because you littered. and all you can do is go "yeah thanks" cuz this here blog is a record.

Despite the fact that it may a record, I will be writing down my thoughts on current events, my emotional reaction to different things in my life, and the occasional bit of Torah, that I have either heard from my Rebbe, or things that I have come up with myself, but I have been told that it was correct. I would like to present myself as the caped defender of Judaism, God and his Torah, but I am woefully inadequate for the job, and that kind of pressure would paralyze me for far longer than it already has. I am simply a guy who has worked on a few questions for a while now, and I have something to say. Perhaps I shouldn't say it, either because it is wrong, or just plain confusing, but here I am saying it nonetheless. I hope God grants me the (write) things to put in the keyboard.