"Transcend and include... this is the self-transcending drive of the Kosmos—to go beyond what went before and yet include what went before... to open into the very heart of Spirit-in-action." Ken Wilbur, A Brief History of Everything
"No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man." Heraclitus, quoted in Plato's Cratylus
It's been 11 years since I last lived in Israel. I was fresh out of high school then, cloistered within the four cubits of an Orthodox Jerusalem yeshiva for two years. I was a different person then, and the Jerusalem I knew was a different city. I'm back in Jerusalem for a year of study, but this time I'm here as a liberal, non-Orthodox rabbinical student.
I lived here for the year in the fifth grade, only a few blocks from my new apartment. Memories from then and from my post-high school stay are flooding back- sights, smells, emotions. And so I find myself awake at 2 am on the day of my arrival, blogging on my mirpeset.
Since I last lived here my path has taken me through every contemporary American Jewish denomination and movement. I no longer identify with any denomination- or rather I identify, in part, with all of them; all of my experiences along the way inform my current identity. My goal with this blog is to highlight, starting from my own experience, the variety of the socio-religious landscape of contemporary religion and religious life, Judaism in particular.Many of my posts this year will likely be about my experiences in Israel. I expect that there will be a healthy dose of music-related posting as well.
It's time to dive in.
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