Hendon and the darkness at the edge of town

One of my favourite autobiographies is Bruce Springsteen's recent offering where he candidly discusses his struggles with depression and the darkness that threatened to subsume his life throughout his career. 

Part of my attraction to rock n roll is the urgency, the primal attempt to express something without restraint. The result is not always clear, but it is damn effective. Those chords hit home. I think people expect me to be a classical music snob who pretends he can talk about wines and whiskeys. But since my first exposure to Dire Straits' debut album in 2005, only one genre has truly captured my heart.

 My favourite Springsteen album is probably 'Darkness on the edge of town' because it wonderfully presents the dichotomy between a toiling working life and the satisfaction it can bring, and the fragility that is ever-present, threatening to break it all apart.

You see, despite every success, despite turning points, breakthroughs,  realisations that have been had, there's always a certain darkness on the edge of town.  A certain edginess, a certain darkness to ourselves and our lives that we dare not ignore. What a wonderful image that evoked.

The thing is, I've become increasingly fascinated by this concept - the evil that resides within society and human beings themselves. Again, Jordan Peterson I salute you. 

On Tisha b'av I briefly reflected on the image of Jeremiah engulfed in sorrow and utter confusion upon witnessing the destruction of Jerusalem and his own life. 
Contrast after contrast in the text points to a feeling of being thrown out of a comfort zone and not being able to cope. And from this darkness he calls and finds God. 

Then I returned to the T.V.

Some people, I reflected, have lived lives where they have seen and lived terrible things and been consumed in darkness - thick, bleak misery. Some deep recess of every human being's experience contains the potential for horrors and terror. Makes you wonder.

 The other day, I finished Christopher Browning's Ordinary men about the German police battalion 101, where dull middle class bureaucrats could be transformed into genocidal killers with a combination of factors that are not so exceptional amongst people who were not terribly coerced, nor  particularly pathological. The darkest of darkness penetrating western civilisation.



 And this is where I return to my usual subject.

The greatest trick the devil ever played was pretending that he didn't exist - Usual Suspects.

Tish'a B'av is generally either used to  focus on trying to imagine the temple as a spiritual utopia or the lack of unity within the Jewish people. Or an attempt to evoke sadness with the holocaust followed by a message of hope. 

 But it, like nearly everything else, it becomes very predictable and usually bypasses what most people might consider to be of any relevance to their inner selves. One day more, finished, return to usual.

One thing that differed for me this year was that image of Jeremiah in a state of utter bleakness. And I wished for a moment that this stark reality of the saddest and hardest elements of life could sometimes be addressed properly by our religious leaders on this day. The madness of it all. Because haven't we all seen it at some place and some time? Doesn't its spirit pervade elements of our society with a frequency that we sometimes don't like to admit?

The thing is, you see, darkness is real. In seemingly sterile, law-abiding societies,  large groups of people can gather in mobs and lose inhibitions they would have as individuals. Reckless, chaotic and destructive behaviour is not restricted to the dregs or some blissfully amorphous 'right wing'.

And his heart is laughing, screaming, pounding
The poem across the tracks rebounding
Shadowed by the exit light
His legs take their ascending flight
To seek the breast of darkness and be suckled by the night

Simon and Garfunkel, 'Poem on the Underground Wall'.

 Luckily I have met very few individuals capable of mobilising the worst element of human nature. There is still one person, however, whose image haunts me to this day as the embodiment of evil. 

And the truth is there are times within myself where I can reflect on a certain darkness to my own character. Or at least a desire to be reckless to break the monotony of daily life. 

On the subject of law-abiding societies, welcome to Hendon, my hometown. One of the dullest places on earth, I enjoy telling people. 

I don't want to simply slag it off, there is nothing wrong with it. Many of my friends live there. It all works, people all get by there, do well for themselves. But when I return there I feel this huge urge to do something crazy simply to break the shackles. The whole place seems to be structured along a line that encourages absolute, blissful conformity.

'Let's take a ride, and run with the dogs tonight in Suburbia...'

Jews in England (and probably America too) tend to be very suburban. Solid jobs, decent values, general acceptance of authority.  Job - finance, law or medicine. Religion - ask the rabbi a question. Holiday - Israel, preferably Netanya. And so it goes for forty years. 'It's where the community lives' 'It's not perfect but it's good for raising kids'. And those who move to Israel tend to go to little Hendon and New York. 

But There's a darkness on the edge of town. In private, people do all sorts of things but in public it's a nice obedient face they put on.

And in my experience of conformist societies, the stricter the obedience that is required, the crazier the things that go on behind the scenes. 

The Joker is probably my favourite villain of all time because of his sheer nihilism, a desire to destroy for the sake of destruction, mocking attempts to psychoanalyse his state. He destroys for its own sake. And whilst he is obviously an extreme psychopath who luckily is not representative of the population at large, there is a grain of truth there that most of us don't simply want to obey the rules and get by ok. 

Challenge, adventure and greatness fall dead beside the tedium of dependable daily life. So we try to break it sometimes, well, just coz. 

Reading Crime and Punishment recently, the idea of Napoleon not being Napoleon if he had kept to normal rules is a wonderfully poignant one.

Don't get me wrong, we need boring structures in society, it's what law is all about and I have abandoned my socialist utopian fantasies long ago as delusional nonsense, but one thing I reflect upon when it comes to religion in particular is that it is meant to speak to and activate a deeper part of your being, which aspires and dreams and perhaps is more utopian than mundane existence requires. 

And by and large, those individuals who can harness it are a rarity. We need something more.

Discovering Jordan Peterson was something of a religious epiphany for me as it was one of the rare occasions where I began thinking new thoughts and hearing something unexpected. 

As we saw recently with Rabbi Dweck, the first toppling of the cart when someone actually spoke to people on a level that cut through the BS, which penetrated the bland doldrums of community life, he was silenced.  

And there is this huge gap between the monster inside many of us, be that a creative or dark creature that needs transforming or cultivating, and the life they must lead.
Be sensible, do the right thing, everything will be ok. 

But occasionally, a glimpse into the thick darkness of history, or simply the hazy darkness on the edge of town, illuminates the need to go beyond that. And maybe the need to leave the edge of town.

Birthday story: Mr Maximalist, Mr Minimalist and the problem with taking halakhah too seriously

Another year of my life has passed. And recently I have grown a bit less anxt-ridden about birthdays and may one day even come to enjoy them. A voice in my head sometimes says in a vaguely California accent: 'Maybe I should go travelling?'

And then I see the Facebook pictures of my fellow Hendonites after their fun south eastern Asian adventures and remind myself that actually Cornwall with tea and toast is probably more adventurous than scuba diving with elephants on instagram. 

The Rabbi Dweck affair has affected me far more than I could have possibly imagined and I'm glad it's drawn to a close. 

So for my annual reflection I invented a story about two friends, mr maximalist and mr minimalist which is my semi-trippy reflection on how I see religious society at 26.

The theoretical aspect Orthodoxy tends to be dominated by mr maximalist. Halakhic 'maximalism' is the idea that every aspect of life should be carefully understood and defined within a strict halakhic framework. Halakhah should incorporate everything. 

Mr maximalist is epitomised by rabbis or recent yeshivah graduates trained to see the details found within Jewish law as comprising the entirety of religious experience. 
The more adventurous might locate developments in scientific thought and incorporate them into this framework with permission from superiors, but either way all things claiming to be religious in a Jewish sense must pass through its gates and its approval. 

If the individual is compared to a small village, the halakhah is the boundary that must be passed to visit the big city. Being 'medakdek' or very meticulous in observance is regarded as a prerequisite of authentic religiosity. 

The question of secular studies or knowledge outside of Jewish sources often becomes a question of permissability or apologetics. 

If you observe and study (with passion and devotion) you are a good religious individual. 'A good relationship requires attention to detail' the mantra goes and it is therefore very important to understand the rules, appreciate the rules and embrace  a life in which each tree matters, each law has intrinsic spiritual worth and each externality must pass the test of 'am I allowed to'. 

Mr Maximalist is probably the 'consensus' ideal from a perusal of classical Jewish sources. He is also how most people view being religious in a specifically Jewish sense. More strict incorporation of halakhah, more God, more religious. 

Less strict, less God, less religious.

But time, time time see what's become of me?

Just from looking around, mr maximalist carries a vision which does not cannot last the test of time for (from my own observations and conversations with others) most people. And I say this without being denigrating. His is a time and place-bound vision. 

My thoughts drift to the classical sermon, where people sit, at times attentive, at times half asleep. It's not that it isn't interesting. It's that it belongs to a compartment in their heads labelled 'religion', and cannot honestly encompass their entire being. The sermon is a great example of how Mr Maximalist compartmentalised religion.

Anyone who has read much of this blog knows my rant about ' religion being stuck at eighteen years old forever'. In note form it goes a bit like this:

For the devoted 18 year old: Yeshivah = details, details, analysis of details and a dynamic engagement with texts. Mr maximalist is king. 

Leave the place, discover other things. Priorities begin to compete - life without love becomes a dreaded experience, depressing without progression in financial and lifestyle areas. Friendships expand, some discover the allures of 'going travelling', life comes and goes and new directions are forged and discovered. By about twenty four it becomes increasingly difficult for mr maximalist to be a viable philosophy of life for the simple fact that he is competing with too many other things that must come first.

So for many religion becomes compartmentalised into specific times, places and perhaps people - switch on - switch off. When religious life is defined entirely by mr maximalist, being religious can become time bound too. 

Some try to constantly keep mr maximalist on his throne whenever possible. Some eventually abandon him entirely.

Most remain in an honest situation where they aware that the trials and tribulations of life are far more important to them than each detail of observance but have a good compartment reserved for that aspect which remains a key part of them. There is a strong social and communal aspect and this keeps things ticking along.

Those that champion mr maximalist become leaders or at least the spokespeople for the religion. They are the doctors and professors of maximalism. Their adherents follow them when the time and place is right.  

But the dissonance tends to be as follows - in vital areas of life such as family, relationships, knowledge of the world, science, medicine, philosophy etc. Laypeople are often far more knowledgeable than their leaders. Rightly, there is uproar within the community whenever a leader has been found to have abused his position. But in the specific box labelled 'religion' they defer as in terms of halakhic knowledge they usually know much less.   

The great clash between the mr. men occurs only when someone realises that mr maximalist has overstepped the mark in terms of where his knowledge has led him. Usually this is a question of political and public decisions, institutions and control.

Because whilst mr maximalist doesn't think he knows everything, he usually thinks that he has both the tools and the framework with which he can solve everything. Judaism being a religion dominated by book-knowledge is particularly susceptible to that.

And this can lead him to become overzealous and reckless in the eyes of the other mr men because he hasn't considered a broader context, at least one that to them is self-evident.

From the shadows of the mr men emerges mr. 'Minimalist', who looks with incredulity at how his friend has translated knowledge of sources into a knowledge of everything, and he howls in frustration.

For mr minimalist has always grudgingly accepted that his personal journey to God is somehow inferior to mr maximalist's but suddenly he reacts in confusion. 

He might ask big questions:

How could you not try and know everything about this world? How can you possibly see religion as being restricted to a few texts, no matter how profound? How could God want you to remain ignorant about His universe? How could you ignore the nuances and implications of your actions?

Some mr men just think - something is messed up over here, it just isn't right.

And some lose faith in those institutions they saw as representing their religion. 

Mr minimalist is careful in observance but regards it as a framework for other important values, e.g. kosher encouraging moderation/ limits to animal nature etc, and not necessarily as the most important end in itself. Creative solutions should be sought to problems. Leniancies are found because why make life too difficult, where is God in that? 

For mr minimalist the real arena for religious life lies primarily within his individual self surrounded by the broad framework of halakhah. He must discovering the wisdom within this world and act in a way that is good for his family and society. 

Halakhah is the starting point, it has carefully defined limits, but is not really the emphasis.

The minimalist sometimes reaches radical conclusions that the 'frummest' of mr men are not particularly religious because they are unwilling to explore issues beyond their knowledge of Jewish books. To him, God is found precisely in their areas of ignorance.

If a difficult societal topic is examined without nuance, it is religiously unacceptable as God demands that we improve our thinking. 

 And it is true that the minimalist treads a tricky path that could perhaps collapse beneath him, but he realises that the road he may have travelled once before with his friend has ended, to all intents and purposes. He must of course remain friends with mr maximalist and ensure they live in harmony and speak regularly but he can't obey his authority any longer. 

And mr minimalist knows that he on the same wavelength as most of his fellow mr men and only he can transform a kind of permissiveness and apathy into a vibrant religious life. 

But he knows that most of the leadership do not and cannot think along these lines so he waits patiently... 

And on my twenty sixth birthday, I see these roads, and these mister men, and sometimes think that if only my contemporaries would have been exposed to mr minimalist  earlier in life, perhaps they could have carried religion, not as a dead weight on their back but as a companion and aid to their truest selves, and find the harmony between their intelligence, moral integrity and a religion they truly hold dear.

 Let us see what the next year holds in store ;) 

In support of Rabbi Dweck

I don't usually do this. I pride myself on detachment from subject matter. This will be written in a haphazard way, lacking clear editing, but I feel the need to say it in any instance. Witch hunts against good people are amongst the most vile moral crimes that can be committed. 

And it escalates until you have a mob at the gates with their torches and pitchforks, having forgotten to think about the issues in a critical and perceptive way. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Is this really the issue you should go to town about?

I hate to watch this - the best thing that has happened to the boring horizons of anglo Jewry was rabbi dweck's inaugration as chief rabbi of the SnP a couple of years ago.

 I only met Rabbi Dweck briefly but I was struck by something in particular - here was a man who was both sincerely and deeply religious but was well aware of the problems people faced growing up in a community whose religious leaders remain predominantly chareidi. In short, Judaism was either sweet chilly sauce on a Friday night or a boring sermon to a community waiting for their cholent. 

He was not a postmodernist, which I loved. He didn't try and pretend we could re-read texts and pick the happy parts, compatable with modern thinking. He wasn't an apologist. He didn't quote from French continental philosophers and try and make them into Jewish thinkers. He was unashamedly committed to a proud tradition exemplified by Maimonides of rational thinking and deep piety, unafraid to take those roads less travelled. 

Back then I knew that I had found someone who had that spark that could attract the disaffected youth and young adults and truly help many embark upon the rocky road of the religious journey.

 So perhaps it was inevitable that he would provoke the ire of the rabbinate one day, particularly with hundreds of people packing out his lectures, as he was prepared to rethink many of the areas that had been entrenched for generations as 'Orthodoxy' without losing sight of deep commitment to God and halakhah. 

And when it did break it was over an issue that many people are obviously uncomfortable with, sexuality, and the great fault line between 'Modern' and 'Orthodoxy' reared its ugly head. 

Academia is not flawless. Races for funding, personal smugness and bickering can proliferate. But one of its great strengths is its honest ability to criticise. Personal attacks are not acceptable (at least in theory). They can be criticised and called to order. So I listened to the main attack on Rabbi Dweck and was dismayed at the following issue: Sources were brought left right and centre but almost none of them were relevant to the issue at hand. 

I can also quote a source and make it say what I want it to say, and I knew what was being done - death by musar. 

It was the classic musar schmooze build up - quote here, there and everywhere, bring an anecdote or two about Volozhin and the glory days ( the irony of the musar movement facing far greater opposition than maskilic writings was not lost on me) and then go in for the kill - he is not one of us. 

The main issue that was raised was one of holiness - the Jewish people are holy, how dare you? Our rabbis were all on the same page on this and all cared so much about the greatness of sin, how could you minimise it? 

In short, it was a theoretical projection of an ideal that I had heard thousands of times before about the unanimity of tradition along kabbalistic lines. And it was used to assassinate the character of a good man who adopted a different view, whose points were not engaged with or addressed honestly. Not a perfect, ideal, super rabbi man, a good man.

Of course, the talk chose to ignore the subtleties and issues behind the issue - and this is the second point about the modern world that textual criticism demands - context! You can under no circumstances cherry pick bits and bobs from talks that you hear and bring it before the grand jury until you have considered how, where and why those comments were made.
But this set the wheels in motion. Suddenly everyone could pass judgement about whether he was us or them. And yes, when put under the microscope and have our every word scrutinised, how many of us pass every test? 

He appeared to slag off another rabbi? Grow up - we have all done it, and most of these comments serve a pedagogical purpose of encouraging independent thought. Look at the sefardi rishonim of the middle ages e.g. Ramban and Ibn Ezra - fire and brimstone my friend. Enjoy the debates - this is how great people are made.

The other fault line is freedom of speech. We should be able to express our views and thoughts and have them challenged in a way that is not a threat to our wellbeing. If you have a problem with someone, you talk to them in private. You deal with it in private. Issues with rulings and decisions? Ok, everyone has had problems with rulings - there are many left field halakhic thinkers - speak to the man and ask what is going on! Wait several months before then developing a quiet, nuanced understanding of the issue and have the decency to deliberate before sending a good man to the lions. 

Because as we become adults we realise that the mob mentality is very, very dangerous. And our community cannot afford to become a street gang battle, particularly in the current climate.  

And worst of all, how does this look like to Jews who want to explore the great avenues of our tradition, who want to embark upon the difficult but extremely fulfilling journey that Rabbi Dweck helps to facilitate with his talks and ideas? It looks like they should simply give up on Othodoxy as if this man of great integrity, wisdom and piety is persona non grata then what the heck does that make them? 

Who is wise, our sages say, one who can see into the future. Know the consequences of your silence.

 When a layman of no communal importance such as myself (this is not self deprecating, I have no communal position) has to say that rabbis you should know better to stand up for this human being who has been villified without a shred of evidence, or without public discussion of issues, and without kindness and transparency, it makes me sad. 

If Orthodoxy is truly only paying lip service to its belief in critical thinking and investigation, or its ability to struggle honestly with topics without recourse to denunciations and witch hunts (which is what this is, how must his family be feeling right now?) they should stand up and say so.

Stay strong, Rabbi Dweck. I feel self righteous saying this but I hope you see the respect that so many of us have for you and it gives you some strength. 

I hate to comment about public and controversial issues but if the speakers who insisted on denouncing him thought they were doing so for the sake of heaven, I also cannot 'go gentle into the good night'.

Ode to pessimism

Disappointment is one of those things that you never really know when to expect. Generally I pride myself on having quite low expectations of things, a very British quality having grown up watching Arsenal, the English football team and, of course, cricket.

(I wrote this sentence about two weeks ago. Much has happened since then so I kept rejigging parts of this diatribe. If my work is subjected to form criticism in 100 years, there will be scholars arguing for five authors and an editor in Peru. I digress. )

It's a sort of pessimism that actually turns out to lead to a positive mindset, because if before every significant event, interview, exam etc you expect failure, you work hard to overcome it and feel gratified when success comes its way.

 I don't know, maybe I see people and systems as being inherently flawed, so when scandals arise and famous faces turn out to be criminals its never a surprise, only a curiosity.

And of late, there have been many disappointments. Last week saw a disappointment in the rabbinic response towards one of the great religious leaders of Britain. A disappointment that, for some reason, people's horizons remain resolutely fixed and unwavering despite far more pressing issues in the wider world.

And for all my recent disdain for the left wing naive ideologically driven responses towards every terrorist attack, perhaps those individuals are reflecting a fundamental disappointment in their slow realisation that not all people think the same, and are not motivated by the same things. It reminds me of the book 'Heart of darkness' which I read for A level, and the bewilderment of an encounter with an unknown beyond any previous experience.

 Reality is cruel and uncompromising and weaving an ideology around it that explains and reduces everything to one key factor like power or economics is a nice and convenient way around it.

And yes, even if comrade Corbyn of the people's republic of insanity manages to get his way into power I'm sure I will stand resolute in my pessimiso-cryptico-optimism, having had little faith in the masses to act wisely.

And yet, this all has its limits as soon as it gets personal. And believe me, I have tried to limit the areas that I am personally affected by to the bare minimum.

I, for instance, became very comfortable with the image of myself as a Phd student. The coffee shops, reading and control of my own time. The nice feeling of smugness when disagreeing with Israeli academics who particularly wind me up. And the lack of public office which means that I can say what I want without any consequences.

 And the praise I had received in the past, making it seem that success was an inevitability. So along came the swagger, as if it was a birthright to achieve in this particular area. 

Also a certain smugness that I could actually do something I enjoyed rather than sitting in an office, stony faced in front of a computer.

But then, I was told that I wrote like a secondary school student. I had become so utterly complacent that I had forgotten the abcs of academic writing. Stupid blog with its platitudes.

Stoicism was an attitude I could adopt in all other areas of life but not this one. How do you fail something that defines you? And I resented everyone responsible. It was unfair. They had not applied standards equally etc. 

It took me about a month and a half to realise how much of a sore loser I had become, and how sensitivity to criticism had blinded me to the harsh reality that I had to do better and it would be hard work. Every other area, every other exam had not been 'natural' in success. It had taken hours of toil.

Afterwards you could look back and attribute it to some bland factors like being academic. But the only way that had happened was through painstaking work. As Dylan said once, 'there aint no success like failure, and failure is no success at all'. My naivete had replaced my usual pessimism and I woke up as a result.

In religious life, I suppose we often fall into the same trap. This is meant to have answers, meant to heal and console, at least until something comes along which requires healing and consoling. Meant to provide direction, well at least until you have cause to reject it. And then it doesn't.

Governments are the same. Things like security we take for granted until recently, moaning about everything else like its the biggest problem in the world until suddenly you are exposed by the most basic of fears, for our very lives. 

And suddenly those BBC articles about correct pronouns look a little embarrassing.

Which is when the individual comes roaring back into the picture. Pick yourself up, pick up the pieces and start again.

 I keep going on about religious life as being some sort of impetus to improve or personal aspiration, and whilst it can't be reduced to that alone I think at this stage it is the factor that needs dwelling on the most. 

And my rabbinical friends, when you straight jacket it under the guise of fear you just kill it man.

And what it actually does in situations which demand a response, or rather, whether you engage with it at all when making difficult decisions.

Because at one point the studying of laws and their details and recounting messages stopped having any impact because my mind was telling me to move on, enough was enough, it needed something new. So observance became more of a metronomic structure that has preserved me and the values I have absorbed over the years that I hold dear but no longer feel the need to focus on excessively. And this was not to demean their significance. 

 As I have become older, the law and order element of halakhah and value structures are things I increasingly admire and appreciate. In them I see the fruits of many societies that are created with the aim to do good for the sake of their children and broader society.

 But it was the trigger for the mind to wander to pastures new and with it came a realisation that I can no longer expect external sources to provide guidance from the air. You gotta make em work.

I suppose that life is full of disappointments and as human beings we need to be aware of that, resilient to that and proactive in dealing with that. Governments, rabbis or jobs aren't going to kiss it better. 

Thus ends my Tory manifesto. Let decency prevail.

Into the mystic: My alterego John Lennon

We were born before the wind
Also younger than the sun
Ere the bonnie boat was won as we sailed into the mystic

Van Morrsion

Living in Brighton, I encounter many hippie lefties. Whilst of course they irritate me as a concept, as individuals I love being surrounded by them.

The other week I spoke to a group of people at the Sussex Jewish society on the topic of demystifying mysticism: Prague in the seventeenth century. 

Afterwards, people began to relate to me as something of a mystic. When the rabbi referred to the kabbalah in a sermon, a few of the shul members turned around pointing at me excitedly. 

Financially, this could lead somewhere.

If John Lennon and George Harrison were alive today they would visit my flat in Hove for the inspiration that I clearly provide.
And the guy a few floors above me for the herbal enhancements. 

Of course, if you have read a few of these blog posts, you would say that a cardboard box has more of a mystical disposition than I do.  

My thesis, however, is on the subject of one of the great works of Jewish mysticism, the Shelah ha kadosh, (holy Shelah, an acronym for the two tablets of the covenant). 
Like most mystical works, in the Orthodox world it is mentioned with great reverence, a work which most individuals would never themselves approach, but are aware contains very 'deep' things. 

When I mention to those who have been yeshivah for half a dozen years that I am doing a phd on the topic, they look at me like I'm a scrambled egg. My apparent irreverence towards most aspects of life doesn't easily correlate with a work of such holiness.

Outside that circle, my study of this text appears even more abstract than most academic phds which concentrate on such fascinating topics such as the sociology of gardening or the intersectionality of teddy bears. 

I have never shown any particular interest in anything that is normally considered 'mystical' and my Phd topic came about somewhat by accident. In fact, when I am reading the text I feel more detached than I usually do from Jewish texts. Many of the ideas which were late to form the basis of much of Ashkenazic philosophy are at complete odds with anything I have found engaging in any other walk of life.

Yet something about it engages me. I think one of the most important functions of being religious in a broad sense is the way it demands the process of becoming: there is more to know and more to learn and this never ends because God is infinite and you as an individual are important.

 As an axiom, this is wonderful: Aspiration is something crucial in leading a worthwhile and successful life - you must want to become better at things. Better at yourself, better to those around you, better at refining and developing skills, talents etc. Once that stops, well, life sucks.

This is not some utopian ideal, either. Broad societal transformations are irrelevant if it isn't internalised or appreciated by the individual - as my new hero Jordan Peterson likes to say 'Sort yourself out'. 

So put away your stupid Marxist signs - 'students of the world, disband'.  

The discovery of more knowledge was such a wonderfully giddy sensation of childhood. And as an adult, where the intellect has become more critical and appreciates that there are many different ways to approach new ideas, the world presents many opportunities.

But when you can see a ceiling things become frustrating. It is this point that I have suggested is the reason for so much religious indifference for people my age and older - it feels like there is so little left to explore, nothing left to conquer or pursue. 

Not in terms of quantity, certainly; but if you feel that the aspiration of gaining a greater quantity in a particular area knowledge which doesn't actually do anything for you what is the point? It's like being set more maths homework.

If the people who run the show and embody Judaism seem a little shallow and not particularly interesting then where is the aspiration? It is as if, before us, there is a choice: Do x and  you will be fulfilled, if you join community y you will be doing the right thing, study z and you are doing good by God. But then it stops when you cross the boundary rope. 
The drive to explore finishes.

Wanting what's best for your family or career is self justifying to a large extent, but the pursuit of personal excellence through the prism of the religious life is not.

So, mystical escapism? Not at all. What is quite fun about Judaism is that we don't really do too many abstractions outside of 'real life'. There is not really such thing as mysticism as an abstract expression of trying to feel close to God in most streams of Judaism, which is partly why I become irritated by the academics who love going off on one about the eroticism within kabbalah like a child who has raided the sweetie jar and skipped the meal.

It is interwoven into law and the broader concept of self improvement in pursuit of God through introspection and pursuit of appropriate steps.

Half of me despises the narrow prescriptive nature of the self-improvement Jewish literature, as if this somehow answers issues that can't be answered. 

But if there is a broad theme that exists within mystical literature (that admittedly ignores its specificity and context) it is that you must improve yourself before you improve society, and that you can overcome adversity by accepting the reality of life's evil and trying to transform them. 

And it is this that shines through the great religious literature - an endless quest to understand things more deeply, to incorporate different streams of thought into that timeless question what the hell should we do with our lives and do something about it. Then you will have lived well. 

Whilst many Orthodox groups have taken mystical ideas as literal truths, the profundity of the mystic lies in his refusal to accept things as being merely of surface value, which resonates when it comes to trying to understand society and its strange ways, and the individual's bewildering complexity which, for all intents and purposes, is irreducible to one or two factors.

 And if I was speaking to John Lennon at Woodstock in the summer of '69 I would probably tell him: Hey John, good music but those dumb one liners about saving the world? Yep, in fifty years time people will take them seriously and post them on facebook. Bet you never expected that. 

The blog returns: Teaching religion and science at University

Well, writing comes in fits and bursts doesn't it. I haven't been able to write very much for a while.

Partially because of my new found focus on trying to justify every sentence with a footnote and page, preferably with long citations from the bar ilan database, I think the joy just went away at some point.

Alternatively, it was an aversion to the fact that everyone seems to think they are entitled to an opinion and the old school classicist within me reared his ugly head and objected most profusely. 

December brought with it: 
Ooh Trump is a bigot, homophobe, misogynist etc. etc. we're all going to die.
Or, the left are a bunch of whiney ideologues with the emotional maturity of the average five year old. 

Those are your fun pegs on which to hang your proverbial coat and I'll let the discerning amongst you figure out which way I've drifted in the last few months.

You say it best, a great sage of the nineties once said, when you say nothing at all. 

There is no point writing a blog if you have to do something as sordid as justify your opinions. But when pressed, I didn't really know what those opinions were and it didn't seem to matter very much. 

I was also on a break from listening to Dylan after years of faithful service. In his place, the Smiths, the Kinks and Springsteen took pride of place. 

But I like writing in an informal context and have missed it. And whilst my writing has taken a break, this year I have had my first actual experiences in teaching - something I have been keen to do for a while without quite knowing the whats and whys.

And I suppose experience is a good buzzword here. 

Because I think we are very interested in how other people experience the world so perhaps this has become a new focus of mine.

Maybe because some of us share the same oddities. And oddities are what makes life fun. And I suppose creating oddity combined with a certain conviction of purpose is what life quite often seems to be about. And this is how I see it - there are serious goals, relationships and issues and there is chaos and let's just see who we can wind up today. Hmm. Psycho musings over.

So, having converted from the stagnation of a utopian let's-make-the-world-a-better-place-I'm-young idealistic-and-know-better-than-you approach to the more prosaic do things you enjoy and see how it goes attitude, I decided to try my hand earlier this year at teaching in University. 

 The first course I began to teach on was a fascinating one exploring the relationship between science and religion. My first thought was that this was going to be like the anti-Christ of the kiruv seminars I used to attend where the conclusion was that 'everything is happy and fine'; I enjoyed exploring evolving definitions of the two topics and challenges past and present. 

And I enjoyed exploring the fact that I was at a stage of my life that I could honestly say that being religious meant a great deal to me but that I wanted it to be something of a struggle so as not to get boring.

Give me some good old fashioned existential angst any day rather than  join the frum club of the great shires of north west London. 

Some students asked me how I dealt with some of the questions, particularly as I was keen to be as critical as possible on the issues. 

I replied that life is very dull if you don't have to grapple with things. So far so good. Teaching is great fun.

But I noticed something amongst many students that bothered me slightly because it is in fact one that many religious people hold themselves. 
I noticed that the attitude towards religion was very simply, if it is meaningful to you, go for it. Is it true? If it is to you then great. If not, then great. Everything is fine. Yolo.

If it makes you happy, if it is meaningful to you etc. Everything is about this wonderful term, 'meaning'. Science is true, religion is meaningful. 

You know, I generally love the live and let live approach. But in the twenty first century is there any depth left to describing religion or is it always going to fluctuate between dogmatic intensity and vacuous slogans about social action?

In fact, whenever anyone shoves meaning into every aspect of religious life it becomes incredibly irritating. Just stop talking.

Make shul meaningful? No, go away I don't want it to be meaningful I want you to be quiet.

Be inspired? Sod off. Happy twenty year old giving a long talk about what some aspect of practice really means deep deep deep down? Kiddie, what you smoking. You aint saying nufink.

People talk too much and write too many books infantalising us all trying to say that everything anyone has ever thought can be found in something Jewish and everything is ok and happy.

And yet, despite my sarcasm, to be religious is to recognise something as true in the sense that our experience life would be far poorer without it. I guess love is a parallel.  

And I suppose this is where I must conclude my returning post. Because being religious is fundamental to the part of me which says things like 'this is frum nonsense', criticises everything, becomes irritated when people call me 'Modern Orthodox', 
and flees the cholent where new ideas go to die.

 And I suppose if I keep writing things, which I might not, given the fluctuating fortunes of my thesis, I should write about how different areas of life come together in a way to build a picture that perhaps leads to God, perhaps leads to introspection, perhaps leads to your local cricket ground.  

I'm 25. And by this age, when it comes to this whole religion thing, many of my peers frankly my dear don't give a damn. The trappings are there to some extent, but either 'keep on singing for the sake of the song after the thrill is gone' or just empty shells on a well trodden shore. Money, women, family, career - these are the rock n roll Gods.

And despite my open dislike of much which makes up religious society, I do care a lot. Through my ramblings, sarcasm and self indulgence as a writer. Maybe I'll explore why. 

What links Bob Dylan to Yom Kippur? An Ode to the Nobel Prize winner.

Three disconnected paragraphs coming up and a slightly longer post written in something of a rush:

Last week, Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel prize for literature. I accepted many congratulations on his behalf. For those who are blissfully unaware, I obsess over Dylan like a Golders Green resident obsesses over an Etrog at an all-you-can eat arbah minim sale. 

A metronome is a strange little instrument that is used by musicians to make sure they are keeping with the correct beat. It is also used as an adjective to describe something incredibly consistent. Glenn Mcgrath, the great Australian fast bowler, was often described as possessing 'metronomic accuracy' for landing every ball on the same spot during a career which spanned over 10 years.

I have recently started giving a seminar at University on the relationship between science and religion. One of the most interesting aspects of this for me is the way many people relate to religion: It is something that, if it makes you happy, is a good thing. Ultimately, the way many students address the issue of challenges or contradictions that exist between the religious and scientific spheres is that religion is personal, feeling based and non-binding whereas science is factual and commands obedience.

I find this attitude to be quite familiar in terms of how religious people are encouraged to engage with their religion: make it personal, your own, and meaningful. 'Have a meaningful fast'.  What most people mean by meaningful is something along the lines of personal inspiration, an emotional interaction with the prayer book or general positive thoughts about the year ahead.

Yet in the midst of all this liberal meaning, which in principle I have nothing against, the conservative sporting a tweed jacket and coattails in me rears his ugly head: hogwash - this is about duty. Majesty. God is not simply your nice and warm friend. 
I think the same thing when it comes to people's obsession with halakhic details and general sentiments that religion is effectively about loving halakha in all its minutiae. I don't think the power of halakhic practice is enjoying it at all. It actually helps if you don't particularly love it.
 It is in its stability, its metronomic reliability and permanence that I think lies its real power and is why it is the Jewish expression of religiosity. The metronome, that reassuring presence, like family, which is part of your security and sense of self. Like family, it can also drive you up the wall. But it is always there, giving you a nudge or reminder in the direction of God. As the rabbi in our shul mentioned over Yom Kippur, looking at the list of regrets in the siddur is a bit like the data overload of being on facebook. And this is a point I would like to assert as something which rings true in my own mind at least: halakha provides religious context and boundaries but not necessarily content. 

To explain by example: As I was standing for the repetition of the Amidah during Rosh ha shana/Yom Kippur, I thought to myself: Why am I standing? Instantly I visualised someone running up to me with a Mishna brurah showing me a source. That made me want to lie on the floor and start digging. Nope, not because of that. I thought of all the times I have ridiculed some of the sailor-on a pirate ship-style liturgical tunes of the Ashkenazic community, is that meaningful to me? But nevertheless, there I was, singing my heart out and God knows I wouldn't be anywhere else in the world. Then the metronome came back into the picture. Then came Dylan. The two are linked.

Dylan is my metronome, to be frank. The disconnected, stream-of consciousness lyrics paint pictures that have accompanied me for the past ten years. What do they really mean? Even if I accept the premise of the question, it doesn't matter and I don't care. But they accompany me through many moments. Because the songs are loaded with ambiguities. Ambiguities that seem to produce many simultaneous and sometimes contradictory meanings.

Dylan uses language to penetrate the mind and heart like no other singer. There are no 'Love songs' that are simply descriptive of primal desire or heartbreak. Lyricists today seem to think that by exaggerating emotions as much as possible, they touch on something truly authentic. Well, I beg to differ. Take Adele's 'Someone like you' for instance, widely considered a modern day masterpiece. Or something from Ed Sheeran. Certainly, they manage to communicate something deeply felt but it usually can be summarised by the sentence: Breakups are sad and painful. 

Dylan's words are playfully ambiguous so they can mean several things; most importantly they realise that emotion is usually fraught with tension from several sides. You very rarely only feel one thing. Despair can be accompanied by relief. Words that sometimes sound like the most painful things on earth can in time come to communicate healing and comfort.
 People tell me it's a sin to know and feel too much within I still believe she was my twin but I lost the ring, she was born in spring and I was born to late, brought on by a simple twist of fate. 

Words that have no obvious meaning to the non-initiated start playing automatically in my mind at times that seem oddly appropriate
Aint it just like the night to play tricks when you're trying to be so quiet? 

Or just plain weird:

Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood with his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago with his friend, a jealous monk
Now he looked so immaculately frightful as he bummed a cigarette
And he when off sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet
You would not think to look at him, but he was famous long ago
For playing the electric violin on Desolation Row

Who's the jealous monk? No idea. But I've definitely seen the electric violinists on desolation row.

It is largely for this reason that I can listen to Dylan almost endlessly. It is as though his words adapt to suit the situation that I find myself in at present. This is what links Yom Kippur to Dylan. The power of the metronome. That meaning doesn't need to be some clever construction on the part of the individual, it is enough for it to be a familiar friend giving you a nudge, wink or pat on the back. A call from the ancient past as storms brew ahead.
Everyone likes a good revolution on Rosh ha shana, a reinvention. 
But truth be told, revolutions have a tendency to be bloody, destructive and not particularly effective. 

Atlantic City by the cold grey sea
Hear a voice crying, "Daddy, " I always think it's for me
But it's only the silence in the buttermilk hills that call
Every new messenger brings evil report
'Bout armies on the march and time that is short
And famines and earthquakes and train wrecks and the tearin' down of the wall

Did you ever have a dream, that you couldn't explain?
Ever meet your accusers, face to face in the rain?
She had chrome brown eyes that I won't forget as long as she's gone
I see the screws breakin' loose, see the devil pounding on tin
I see a house in the country being torn apart from within

I can hear my ancestors calling from the land far beyond