27 December, 2024 10:24

My mom of blessed memory would say her favorite piece / section / writing from Torah tradition is Ecclesiastes [known also as Kohelet].

Ecclesiastes is almost exclusively attributed to King Solomon. Which, seemingly most of the world knows about the Wisdom of Solomon.

Which is ironic, because almost every line in Eccleasiastes / Kohelet is themed on how meaningless everything is!!!

Fame !! Wealth !! Power !! Rock and Roll !!

It is all vanities of vanities. So, why do anything at all? Why get out of bed? Why write Eccleasiastes?

Who is out there? Who will re-tweet, like, share, comment??? Did King Solomon look at his feed and wait for comments, did he get a rush when someone liked his post?

Did it ruin his day if no one responded to Eccleasiastes? Who was he writing for if the main theme is that everything is a big fat waste of time???? What a bummer!

And you know — well, maybe you don’t, but anyway, judaism comes along and says, hey you know how on Shabbot you are supposed to be happy??? And Sukkot, the Torah itself calls it Tzman Simcha-tanu??? Our times of happiness??? Well, you know how hilarious our sages are — they were like "hell na"!!! We are in deep long exile, and no way – no way y’all supposed to be "too happy" so you know what we’ll do [the sages and wise leaders] … we will have everyone hear Eccleasiatis [kohelet] read on Shabbot !!!! Ha !! Go and ahead and try to be happy. We are in miserable god-forsaken exile!! What is wrong with you people trying to actually be happy!!! Do not dare !! We have Kohelet for ya.

So, I am not quite sure I am kidding around, but, the point is, just in case you get too happy, the wily and wise rabbis have a solution.

On the other hand, the same wily, wise and ever worried rabbis, constantly concerning themselves for thousands of pages about "what if someone rides a horse on shabbot and comes to break a branch" ; or "what if two guys sleep in ruined building [do not dare to do that either!!], and MILLIONS of "what if scenarios", the same rabbis, came up and enacted Purim and Chanuka!!!!

Purim — we dress up / change our clothes, and can drink !, party, give gifts !! Know your neighbor!!! Have a generally good time. Sure 10s of thousands of people died in the Purim story, … and Gods many names not mentioned in the story, but aside from that, go out and have a great time.

And Chanuka and it’s multiple ways to spell in English…. putting aside the most powerful army in the known Western world trying to wipe out judaism — well, actually we mention that in the prayers, and in the songs, and the fact that the religious zealots who fought and actually defeated the Greeks, and by the way, al a gav, killed people who they deemed to be not on-board with their views, and despite the fact that just a few years later the Maccabiim themselves were the corrupt ones, PUTTING all that aside, Chanuka is the best !!!

So, what I am trying to get around to is.. ..

Yeh, sure, all the rants, and posts, and memes and well, everything does in fact "seem" to be utterly meaningless…. and it can really in truth be too much…

How does King Solomon — the Michael Jordan of Jewish Kings… is King David, Lebron James?.. see, what we need is mindless silly "torah" commentary similar to the endless and truly havel haveliim sports talk … but anyway, King Solomon, perhaps the Lebron James to King David = Michael Jordan… or is Jordan is King Solomon?

Even King Solomon knew how to throw it down — get the last second shot. King Solomon knew how to get to the winning drive in the final seconds of the Super Bowl.

He knew, that sure it all a giant waste … [but] [and] God.. … God exists.

That is how he wraps up what might be one of the most famous blog posts in all of Judaism.