Sunday, September 26, 2004

What this is and where it's going

In a couple of weeks, Jews around the world will complete the yearly cycle of reading the Torah - and immediately start up all over again, with Bereishit (literally "created" but known in English as Genesis). I attend synagogue each Shabbat (a Conservative shul in central New Jersey) where we read each week's portion (in Hebrew "parshah"). There are, of course, tons of Torah commentaries out there, and I will eventually start linking to them. What I want to do is post my own thought on each week's parshah. I was born Jewish but for most of my life was not observant. A few years ago I got interested in Judaism and am now fairly observant. But I'm coming at this from my lifelong beliefs in history, science and skepticism. I don't take things simply the way they are given, including my faith. I'm not claiming any unique or profound observations, but I just want to reflect on each week's Torah portion and what it says to me from my perspective. We'll see where this leads me. This is as much for me as it is for anyone else, as a kind of discipline. There's a lot of stuff in the Torah that I have found, over the past couple of years, to be interesting and a lot that I don't find all that appealing. I want to talk here about both. I don't even care if anyone else listens.