Today our day was filled with great activities, which was great for Rina, who is on vacation, and crazy-commuting for Jon, who is not.
Rina spent her morning with a fellow Toronto ex-pat finding secreted and exciting locations around the city centre. They visited two museums, and lunched on falafel. In the Ticho House there were exhibits on history, women in art, and a massive chanukia collection that puts Jon's parents' to shame. The second museum was maintained and stocked by a single artist, whose colorful and whimsical (read 'hallucinogenic') pictorial representations of prayers and Hebrew letters were astounding in their scope, intricacy, and imagination. Who knew that Judaism could be pretty and fun?
Jonathan met up with Rina and some other friends in the early afternoon at the OU Center for a series of lectures about heresy in Judaism today. The entire event, from the staff to the speakers to the audience, reminded us very much of a Torah in Motion event, moreso as it was all about confronting the challenges of modernity (if you believe that fundamentalism is a modern challenge that needs confronting). The three speakers, Rabbis Cardozo and Brovender and a Hebrew U professor, each approached the topic from a different angle, but all seemed to agree on one fundamental and important point - without a specific definition of what is involved in a Jewish identity nobody can be branded a heretic, and there is no person or group today with the authority to authorize that definition. Other interesting ideas that were discussed included a proposal to get rid of Rambam's Thirteen Principles of Faith, rabbis recently excommunicated, and the Lubavitch movement. While some of what was presented was challenging or off-putting, the series as a whole was very engaging and interesting.
After a short break following the five hours of lectures, we headed over to Marvad HaKsamim on Emek for dinner with Jon's A.P. English class from last year. He foolishly promised them a meat dinner if they performed well on the exam, which they then did, to his chagrin. The all-you-can eat appetizers, salads, dips, and meat were far more than we could eat, and will therefore coldly furnish forth our Shabbat table. Hurray! While it was a little weird to slip back into the 'Mr. Parker' persona, the whole evening was lots of fun.
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7 comments:
You bribed your class with free dinner? PARKER! Oy.
Rach says, "packed-jam?"
Ger says, "AP?"
1. It wasn't a bribe, it was a reward.
2. Rina used to have problems with phrases like jam-packed, and would mix them up. I would tell you the others but it is more fun to laugh at her in the context of the mistakes, as they show up in conversation.
3. Did they shut down my Advanced Placement programme? But everyone got a 4 or a 5! Grrr. At least I got lots of wraps out of it, I suppose.
as I've heard it, it wasn't Rina who had trouble with packed-jam...
Right you are - the trouble began with a misguided young seminary student. But Rina has difficulties such that when she mocks someone repeatedly, she eventually takes on the exact trait that she found so amusing. For example, try to get her to assume any accent other than a Polish one - she can't. Every foreign accent to her is Eastern European. It's ridiculous. Ridiculous! Rina says that this is actually my problem, but the way I see it we're married and share everthing.
A young seminary student? Is it possible that there were two different people who both got this wrong? Maybe I'm misremembering - you know, could have been in a coma or something - ask Rina what the term for that is...
Ah, you must have been either an English major or a Family Psychologist at some point, as you have pointed out yet another linguistic difference between Rina and I. Rina says that "seminary" is a specific school, while I contend that only Seminary is a specific school, and that "seminary" can be any institute of higher religious training. Sort of like how "seminal" and "Seminole" are entirely different.
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