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[rhu]

I've been too busy to blog, but I've been keeping a list of things I wish I could be blogging about. So here's my meta-blog post:


ON RELIGION

- Kaddish: the only time an Orthodox community has people trying to recite (not sing) something out loud in sync with one another. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't; listening for others; implicit choice of a "leader"
- Correct phrasing on "Al ha-Tzaddikim" -- there's gotta be a break there someplace, or else we're asking to be like ourselves. But where?
- We start our devotion to God by reciting thirteen formal principles of logic. How cool is that?
- (With apologies to Mike Selinker for stealing the format) The most beautiful prayer (and five runners-up). [No, I'm not going to post a spoiler for what my list is. Yet.]
- A review of the Sacks Rosh ha-Shanah machzor. [It is awesome and awe-inspiring. It needs ribbon bookmarks.]
- "Religion" is "life philosophy that is open to the possible existence of something sentient beyond our universe." but that need not imply divine intercession. Deism vs. hashgacha pratit. God isn't Santa Claus. If so, what is the purpose of prayer? (To affect us, not to influence God.) Minimal assumption is an unprovable God. Importance of rationalism (cf R' Slifkin's construct of rationalist vs mystical Judaism.) R' Sacks: "We are subject to empirical reality." There's a lot of schlock pseudo-religion out there; just as there's a lot of schlock pseudo-science (e.g. homeopathy), the bad should not be allowed to define the good
- Liturgical things I'm wondering about: Why no half-kaddish after Torah reading at minchah? When did Ka Keli become common? When did standing for the end of Tachanun originate/spread?

ON PUZZLES
- Why cryptic crosswords are so awesome. (Each clue is a complete stand-alone puzzle; therefore a cryptic crossword is overspecified. This allows for error-correction puzzles; variety cryptics are actually metas where each individual clue is a single puzzle.)

ON LIFE
- Every moment we live, we become greater than we were before (because we have new experiences and have improved ourselves) and we become less than we were before (because we had other choices that we could have done that are now closed to us).

LIFE UPDATES
- Running the kids' tefillot at shul
- Running the shul library
- What it was like being an avel on Simchat Torah
- Puzzles I've enjoyed lately
- Progress (or lack thereof) on my various other projects.


If you want to influence the order in which I write those, feel free to comment.

Comments

[elainetyger.livejournal.com]

I like the summary above. Maybe a summary of the progress on the unmentioned stuff, since I always wonder what I'm missing.

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

"- What it was like being an avel on Simchat Torah"

I'd like to put in a request for this one.

[jedusor.livejournal.com]

Because I am shocking and unpredictable, I vote for the cryptic crossword post and the one about puzzles you've enjoyed lately. :P I'm also interested in the one about the thirteen formal principles of logic, and the one about what religion is.

[cellio]

I'm interested in reading almost all of those, but I'd like to put in requests for the most beautiful prayer and runners-up, "on life", and the 13 principles.

[kirisutogomen.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm intrigued by '"Religion" is', too. I am accustomed to devotion correlating almost perfectly with certitude, so anything that bucks that trend is interesting.

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

I'd give preference to the life updates.

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

Oh, one note that I want to not forget: memories of my dad saying Kaddish