Tag Archives: God

November 21, 2011 · 8:29 am

On Creativity

by Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)

Dribbling my pen in the poetic backcourt,
I am urged by my Cosmic Coach
“to let the game come to you.
Creativity is such a fickle bounce of the ball;
you can’t force your shots.
You have to pick your time and place
and then fire your words
upwards in a rainbow arc.”
I throw up a wild shot of a poem,
one that possesses little rhyme or reason.
“You’re trying too hard,” Coach reminds me.
“Take a seat on the bench, young man,
and keep your eyes on the flow of the Game.
When I think you’re ready,
I’ll put you back on the floor,
to distribute, like passes,
the words I have given to you,
allowing you to rise to your full height
which will increase your personal stats
by the time the final buzzer sounds.”

The author of twelve books for young adults, Mel Glenn has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years.  Lately, he’s been writing poetry, and you can find his most recent poems in a new YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy,  edited by M. Jerry Weiss.

If you’d like to learn more about his work, visit: http://www.melglenn.com/

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September 5, 2011 · 11:30 am

What’s God’s Name?

by Jennifer Singer (Sarasota, FL)

When someone says “I don’t believe in God” the obvious question is, “Which God don’t you believe in?”

Often the answer is a third grade version, something like, “a guy sitting in the clouds with a big white beard,” or perhaps “the scary judge who’s going to punish me for every tiny infraction.”

I don’t believe in those versions of God either.  I’m not sure exactly what God I believe in, but I do know It/He/She/Whatever isn’t something tangible, or even conceivable.

That’s the point, right?  God is beyond definition or description.  God is Beyond.

One of the Hebrew names for God is Ayn Sof –  אין סוף — without end, infinite.  This kind of mystical name for God is a lot easier for me to swallow than the third grade models.

In the bible, when Moshe asked God to identify Himself, God said: Ehyeh asher ehyeh.  The Hebrew looks like this:  אהיה אשר אהיה

It’s sometimes translated as “I am that I am” but in fact it’s in the future tense and more accurate translations are:

”I will be what I will be,” or

“I will be who I will be,” or perhaps even

”I will be because I will be.”

(The middle word, asher, can be translated as what, who, because, or that, depending on the context.)

Rabbi Marcia Prager put it this way at DLTI (Davvennin’ Leadership Training Institute):

“Making the words [of the prayer book] release deep truths is a struggle — words like God, which are in many ways so unfortunate and unfortunately over- and badly used.  We need to engage our internal translators, and sometimes it’s not so easy.”

Reb Marcia teaches that the root of the word Adonai, one of the names most used in Judaism, isn’t from the word for “sir” but rather from the word for “joints, connectors.”  Thinking of God as Connector rather than Sir makes more sense to me.

And yet…. I still struggle.

Jennifer Singer, a rabbinic student with the Aleph program of the Renewal movement, has served as Foundation Director at the Sarasota-Manatee Jewish Federation, worked as an educator at the Flanzer Jewish Community Center, and taught in programs across the community for adults and children.

In 2006, she earned a Master of Arts degree in Jewish Education from the Jewish Theological Seminary, and currently works as a fundraiser for Technion University, as well as part-time at Kol HaNeshama, a Reconstructionist congregation, where she leads services and a Family Education program called Doorways to Judaism.

She shares her home with her husband, two daughters, four dogs, three parrots, two cats, and a turtle.

You can read more of her work at her blog SRQ Jew (http://srqjew.wordpress.com/) where this piece first appeared. It’s reprinted here with the kind permission of the author.

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March 14, 2011 · 8:22 am

A Life

by Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)

It’s possible to miniaturize my essence
by examining the contents of my
desk drawer filled with junk.
To wit: writing notebooks, bank statements,
Swiss Army knife, business cards,
glasses case, stamps, address book –
a life residing in a box before the
end of life in a bigger box.
Perhaps God is looking at His junk drawer
deciding how to arrange all the scattered
people and things collected over the eons.
Maybe he should just leave the box alone,
let the contents shift for themselves,
or maybe he should wash away
the whole drawer and start life anew.
In His cleaning and arranging,
and in mine, we both like
to make order out of cosmic chaos.

The author of twelve books for young adults, Mel Glenn has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years.  Lately, he’s been writing poetry, and you can find his most recent poems in a new YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy,  edited by M. Jerry Weiss.

If you’d like to learn more about his work, visit: http://www.melglenn.com/

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February 14, 2011 · 9:04 am

Believing in God

by Jennifer Singer (Sarasota, FL)

Had an interesting conversation today with my friend Geoff Huntting, aka Rabbi Huntting.  We were commenting on the conundrum of not believing in God and yet being comforted by God-talk.  I’m always happy to talk to a like-minded person who isn’t uncomfortable with the seeming contradiction this poses.

It reminds me of a comment by my teacher at JTS (Jewish Theological Seminary), Rabbi Neil Gillman, who said that he is capable of being a rational Columbia University professor on Tuesday morning, and then feeling like he’s standing at Sinai with the Children of Israel on Saturday morning.

Note that I’ve now cited not one but two rabbis.  Thus, I hope, strengthening my case that it’s okay to have a complicated relationship with God and with God-talk.  If you ask me whether I believe in God, the answer will always be “no.”  But if you ask me if I’m comfortable with prayer that talks directly to God, or anthropomorphizes God, the answer is “yes.”

My friend Randi Brodsky (not a rabbi, but she is a physician so that should count for something) commented on my recent post called My Lucky Day (http://srqjew.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/my-lucky-day/), and said something very profound:

“Seems silly that I will ascribe good things that happen to me to God, but dumb things I will ascribe to bad luck, not that God is punishing me.  If I think about this too much, my head spins!”

I’m with her all the way on this, especially the part about it making my head spin.

It’s true — we call it bad luck when things go wrong and thank God when things go right.  And despite its confounding nature, I think this is both perfectly natural and absolutely correct.

I, for one, do not want to walk around blaming the Deity for the bad things that happen, whether they’re big (such as explosions at airports or 9-year-old girls getting shot and killed in Arizona) or little (such as why does my left elbow hurt and why won’t it stop).  I’m perfectly happy with seeing those as people-driven rather than God-driven.  (I think the elbow thing has a lot to do with texting and typing, meaning that it’s my own damn fault.)

But I also think it’s great to thank God for the good things, like my dog Xander being such a cutie (he’s snuggling the aforementioned elbow – I wonder if he can tell that it hurts), or the fact that the 12th anniversary of my cancer diagnosis is just a couple of days away.

Who cares if there’s a God Who’s listening?  Certainly not I.  Doesn’t matter if my gratitude is directed to a specific Someone or just the cosmos in general.  As long as I remember to be grateful.

Thus I will blithely continue to insist that I don’t believe in God while I continue to be perfectly happy with prayer.

Jennifer Singer has served as Foundation Director at the Sarasota-Manatee Jewish Federation, worked as an educator at the Flanzer Jewish Community Center, and taught in programs across the community for adults and children.

In 2006, she earned a Master of Arts degree in Jewish Education from the Jewish Theological Seminary, and currently works as a fundraiser for Technion University, as well as part-time at Kol HaNeshama, a Reconstructionist congregation, where she leads services and a Family Education program called Doorways to Judaism.

She shares her home with her husband, two daughters, four dogs, three parrots, two cats, and a turtle, and hopes one day to attend rabbinical school.

You can read more of her work at her blog SRQ Jew (http://srqjew.wordpress.com/) where this piece first appeared. It’s reprinted here with the kind permission of the author.

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October 18, 2010 · 9:06 am

Finding My Place

by Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)

Standing outside the temple,
I hesitated at the door, deciding
whether I would enter for the High Holidays.
“You speakin’ to me?” I asked when
I thought I heard Him inside my head,
beckoning me to come in and pray.
I was reluctant to go inside.
Honestly, I’m just not that comfortable
with the old men chanting in indecipherable tongues,
with standing up, sitting down, repeated too many times.
But then the thought came to me, (through Him?)
religion is not a matter of comfort, but gratitude.
I thought of not being pressed into a cattle car,
thought of living three score and more,
thought of having two fine sons,
and finally, of being, at least tangentially
a part of a 5,000 year old legacy, reasons enough
to rethink a few procedural questions.
“Well,” He said, “coming in?”
“Yes,” I said, firmly, walking in, finding my place.

The author of twelve books for young adults, Mel Glenn has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years.  Lately, he’s been writing poetry, and you can find his most recent poems in a new YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy,  edited by M. Jerry Weiss.

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January 11, 2010 · 9:31 am

The Diner

by Mel Glenn (Brooklyn, NY)

God’s sitting at the next table over,
amid the noontime rush,
consulting the menu the angelic
waitress has placed before him.
I wonder what he’s ordering,
what celestial meal will be to his liking.
There are so many questions I would like to ask,
but I don’t want to appear rude,
like some overzealous autograph seeker.
I’d like to ask if he made the universe eons ago,
and whether these days he takes an active hand
in the petty and paltry affairs of man.
I’d like to know why over the course of time
he has let so many disasters go unattended,
and more selfishly, what plans does he have for me?
But I will sit here quietly at my own table
and not presume upon his meal.
He has enough on his plate, I would think,
though I do wonder whether he leaves a large tip
as he finishes his coffee, checks his BlackBerry,
and contemplates what miracles
he has to accomplish by evening.

The author of twelve books for young adults, Mel Glenn has lived nearly all his life in Brooklyn, NY, where he taught English at A. Lincoln High School for thirty-one years.  Lately, he’s been writing poetry, and you can find his most recent poems in a new YA anthology, This Family Is Driving Me Crazy,  edited by M. Jerry Weiss.

“The Diner” was prompted, Mel says, by “the Job-like questions I still have about God and what He is not doing lately.”

You can read more about his work at his website: www.melglenn.com

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