Philosophy

The worship of Israel as a state, especially by Jews abroad, is a recent invention. Not even after its founding in 1948, was this the popular sentiment. Only after 1967 did this become the mainstream, a way for Jews to express their Judaism even if they didn’t believe in...

Join Shlemple on a whimsical journey of soul crushing death and destruction. Sure to be a direct hit for the whole family.

This one’s a doozy. Bear with me. Also, if you have a bit of context, you’ll know this ones strike quite close to home. TL;DR at the end. Here’s how the spiel goes: Judaism is amazing. It’s enlightened. It’s changed the world for the better. Judeo Christian values are da...

Unofficially, using mainly common sense as our guide, we can think of two definitions of terrorism. The term gets thrown around rather freely, and is used by governments to police and invalidate a wide range of individual and social behaviors. Definition #1: Deliberate Attacks on Civilians Part of the terrorist...

Sometimes when I wake up from a particularly deep sleep, my subconscious comes online before my conscious mind has a chance to. I forget the context of my life (what time is it? What bed/room/house am I in?) and I'm hit in the face with a felt sense reality. A...

Judaism teaches that our interpersonal relationships are just a key to relating to God, especially our romantic ones. So, capitalizing on the bestselling book that opened people’s eyes to the fact that not all people are exactly the same, here’s our appropriation of this pop psychology masterpiece. The first...

As I continue to publicize my criticism of Israel and Zionism, a specific kind of criticism has emerged from people in my life, frequently enough that it has become a pattern. The gist of their argument is this: "We agree with you in theory that Israel is doing many terrible...

It's been a while. Can you tell I'm angry? I guess this one has been too painful to even make fun of until now. I think this claim is probably the most pretentious and disappointing claim I encountered in Judaism. Let's leave aside the whole Rav Arush bullshit about women being the...

See also, Hashgacha Pratis.

Without the Holocaust, Zionism would not have succeeded. It was a fringe movement, ignored by assimilated secular Jews as unnecessary, and by religious Jews as oppositional to its beliefs. The Holocaust was critical for the formation of the state of Israel - it shifted the views of Jews around...