Meta-Cosmological Questions: Is God's "Being" a Set of Empty Brackets?

In the beginning of Vayeira, the Lord appears to Abraham in the form of three men.  God's ability to morph into various creatures is something that always surprises me. I've got the bias inside of me that God must be a single "Being", and that a Being is one contiguous shape. 

God appeared as three men?Can you regard a society (for example, a group of three men)  as a "Being"?  I'd always assumed that a "Being" had a contiguous shape... (but  I know that that's not true...)

The dictionary defines a "being" as something that "exists". And what exists? 

The terms "exist" and "being" define each other: existence is defined as "being"; "being" is defined as "existence". But this creates a logical problem. Does EVERYTHING exist? 

Apparently any utterance has some sort of meaning, some sort of "existence" in the "world". Even logical impossibilities can exist, because we recognize them as logical impossibilities, and thus, name them as such. 

So, anything that exists can also be regarded as a being unto itself. This would have to include EVERYTHING; if you can name it, then it must exist (in some form or other). 

(Before I go any further, I should note that I'm well aware of the accomplishments of philosophers of language, who've clarified that nonsense words don't have the same type of existence as "real" words. Rather, logical impossibilities "subsist" in the world -- a sort of nether region where logical anomalies get to hang out without feeling ostracized...)

But this can't be right, can it?  Just because you can NAME something, doesn't mean that that that something actually exists. Then what am I talking about? Even nonsense words, or logical impossibilities EXIST. Why? Because they can be named.

Naming, as we learn from the opening words of Genesis, is a creative act. God spoke...and thus created the World. So here's a logical problem (using the logic of the Bible): what if God says something non-sensical? Is that also an Act of Creation?  Yes: God can create logical impossibilities (and even paradoxes) simply by thinking of them!

To clarify: God speaks...(even nonsense terms) and thus CREATES!

What about THINKING? Does that constitute a creative act on God's part? Must thought be verbalized (in the Torah) be have a Creative effect?

For me, it's not clear exactly what constitutes a creative act on God's part. 

If I take my cues from the opening lines of Genesis, then God's speech is the engine of Creation; God speaks, and World, with all of it's creatures, suddenly comes into Being. So, getting back to the opening lines of Vayeira, God appears to Abraham in the form of three men. Does that mean that God said to himself, "I am now three men"? Magic doesn't exist (half true; consider Mose's tricks...), but God's ability to do whatever He wants does. He thus has the power to bring into Being anything He can think up. If he can visualize it, it suddenly exists. If He can speak it, it suddenly exists.

 All of this talk about the power of talk has got me thinking: Who was God addressing when he made his statement, "Let There Be Light"? Why did He have to say anything at all? Why can't he create via THOUGHT? Must he "speak"? In the cosmic void, who's He talking to...Himself?  Where'd He learn how to talk in the first place?

I think I've just caught a glimpse of God. He looks like...a pair of brackets: an empty dynamic category, waiting for you (or Him) to fill the contents...

Kierkegaard's "Akeida" revisited...its a SHIFT in God's Consciousness

Earlier in this blog, I wrote about Soren Kierkegaard's book "Fear and Trembling", which studies the psychological baggage in the "Akeida" story. My conclusion back then was that Abraham failed God's "test" by agreeing to sacrifice his son, for he could just as easily rejected God's request and still come out looking good, for being a "mentsch". Well...that's what you call "post modern thinking": looking at the situation with the wrong CONTEXT. I now look at the story as being important, for it illustrates the shift in the mind of God...the story of Abraham and Isaac are just SYMPTOMS of what the REAL story is: a shift in the mind of God.  Here's my new view on the Akeida (which I'd written as a reply to my earlier post on the subject):

"Lately, I've been having second thoughts about my initial conclusion that Abraham failed the choice, by preparing his son Isaac to be sacrificed. Lately I've been studying Mesoamerican cultures, such as the Olmec, and it appears that they DID use human sacrifice. If you contrast those cultures to the story of the Akeida, I get a different perspective on Abraham: it's necessary for Abraham to prepare for a human sacrifice...but then to be interrupted, having the sacrificial victim spaced, and in his place, a non-human sacrifice is offered up instead. To simply judge Abraham as "wrong" would make sense only if you judge him by TODAY's values. But if you put yourself in the mindset of a pagan worshipper 4,000 years ago, human sacrifice would probably be understood as the way the Universe worked. The Akeida, when looked in its proper historical context, is actually revolutionary in the history of religion. It represents the first nudges towards HUMANISM: the value of human life. While there are still sacrifices, they'll be now be ANIMAL sacrifices...something that we moderns would still recoil from ...

I'd like to cut Abraham some slack. In today's world, his act looks incredibly abusive--and I'm sure it looked that way too way back when. But story is necessary to show the SHIFT away from human sacrifice...and the Akeida gives us a front row seat at the precise moment that that shift happened. Although it's easy to judge Abraham for being a mindless true-believing zealot. But the story isn't really about Abraham, nor is it about Isaac. It's about God. God needs the Akeida to tell the Jews (and thus, all the rest of the World) that human sacrifice is a cruel and unusual way of worshipping the Divine. Although the book first appears a catalogue of horrors, it's actually about a change in consciousness. Even Kierkegaard gets caught up in the psychological dynamics of it all. But I now think that the story is a giant red herring...because the real story isn't about Abraham or Isaac, but rather, a SHIFT in the Mind of God."

(Note: the phrase "Mind of God" is not some cheap effort at appearing "deep"; it is a concept that abounds in the "Zohar" (a classic text in Kabbalah and Jewish Mysticism). The sephirot diagram, as it's described in classes in Jewish mysticism at Temple Emanu-el,  in Tucson AZ, is a "map of the Mind of God"). Our minds are plastic, and can grow. So why can't God's mind too? Well...it can and does! Exhibit A: the Akeida!)

Moses and his Hulk-like tendency to smash

 Why is Moses so short-tempered? Why does he have to take out his anger on precious objects? We're already familar with his smashing of God's tablets (upon seeng the Israelites dancing around a Golden Calf). Now, in Numbers, we've have the Israelites rebelling against Moses...and again, there's the Hulk-like tendency to smash.

In Numbers 20:2 (in Parshat Chukat) the Israelites are thirsty. They become hostile, and (as it is written) they turned against Moses and Aaron.  This provokes Moses to strike the rock of Miraba, which causes water  to pour out. The people have water,   but Moses falls from grace with God: He’s forbidden from entering into the Promised Land..

I’ve always been bothered by Moses’fate here: I’ve often felt that God was too harsh with Moses, forbidding Moses from entering the Promised, all because he lost his temper and stuck a rock with his staff. It was hot, people were dehydrated and complaining…But on closer reading,  I can see that scene is not simply about a leader losing his temper; it’s about ritual impurity, which is the theme that runs thoughout this entire parsha. Let’s look at this scene more closely:

First, as we learned in Leviticus 20:2, the people were without water.   They’re probably overheated and dehydrated, being in the desert.

Then, in the next line (Leviticus 20:3), some of the Israelites say something incredible.  When complaining to Moses for the lack of water,  they say, “if only we had perished when our brothers perished at the instance of the Eternal!”

Perished at the instance of the Eternal? That’s an odd thing for an Israelite to say... unless it’s a clue about how to read what’s coming up next.  I think that it’s a reference  to the fate of Nadab and Abihu,

In line 20:6, we learn that the setting for this scene is actually before the Tent of Meeting. As it is written,  after Moses appeals to God for guidance, God gives Moses these instructions: “You and your brother Aaron take the rod and assemble the community, and before their very eyes order the rock to yield its water. Thus you shall produce water for them from the rock, and provide drink the congregation and their beasts”

I think that the proper way to read this scene. is that God is explaining a ritual to Moses. Moses is to perform the ritual,  God is to provide water from the rock, and the Israelites would praise God for His blessings.

It doesn’t work out that way.  In the very next line, Moses deprives God of the Israelites brucha (for providing water),  and also glorifies himself as a magician.  Angry with the Israelites for their complaining,  Moses says

“Listen, you rebels, shall we get water out of this rock?”, and Moses raised his

hand and struck the rock twice with his rod. Out came copious water, and their

beasts drank”

When Moses strikes the rock in anger, causing water  flow out of it, we’re supposed to look at this as analogous to Aaron’s sons bringing unholy fire into the Temple: it’s a form of ritual impurity.  The whole theme of this parsha is issue of ritual impurity

Many commentators have a hard time figuring out why God is so hard on Moses for this incident at the rock.  I’d like to suggest that if we view Moses’ angry outburst, and his striking of the rock, as a ritual violation,  perhaps that will shed some light on the subject.  Moses needs to be a better Moses! Moses not Hulk!

"Inception", Dr. Strange, & Joseph: Three Dream Worlds

I just saw the movie "Inception", which is about an adventure that takes place in the "dreamworld". It's very much like the old Doctor Strange comics from the 1960's, which had a similar premise: two opposing forces fight it out in dreams. With Doctor Strange (at least in the beginning), troubled people would visit him in his office...but instead of offering psychological counseling or psychoanalysis, he would offer to enter the dream world of his patients by going into a trance, and then visiting his patients demons on their own turf: the world of the dream.

 Since Doctor Strange was a Marvel Superhero, he operated within a moral Universe: there was a force of cosmic Good, and a force of cosmic Bad. A superhero battle in the dreamworld of Doctor Strange thus represented a battle between Good Character (or Good Conscience) vs Bad Character (or Bad Conscience). This made Doctor Strange in interesting and compassionate character. Not only that, but Steve Ditko's artwork, which was a mash up of various schools of modern art (e.g. the surrealism of Salvidor Dali, the angular and geometric look of Russian Constructivism, and the graphic sharpness of Pop Art) So how disappointing that "Inception" has no moral core: it's has no heart. The plot involves some thieves who want to enter someones mind not to heal them, but to rip them off. The main character's motivation is to enter someones mind so he can get hold of a combination to a safe. How disappointing. (His secondary motivation is to convince his wife, who thinks that she's living in a bad dream, that she's not in a dream)

Compare the dreaming in "Inception" to incidents of dreaming of Joseph in the Torah. Joseph has several dreams, each which suggests that Joseph has a future of greatness, whereas his brothers do not. This so enrages Joseph's brothers, that they throw him in a pit, with the intent that he die. As it turns out, Joseph IS destined for greatness. He lives to meet his brothers again, this time as a ruler, and to have the chance to take the high road and reconcile with his brothers, who don't recognize him.

In "Inception", as in "Doctor Strange", the dream world is where the action takes place. Most of the movie is spent navigating the layers of the subconscious. It's got the logic of a video game: hit all your targets on one level before moving to the next level (of dreaming). But in the Joseph story, the dreams are incidental: they provide a motivation for his brothers to get jealous and angry, and thus set the story in motion. Although Joseph did have visions of greatness for himself, it didn't involve him achieving it by ripping off someone else.

Did anyone achieve any "wisdom" in Inception? No...it's all about accomplishing a mission. It's a very aggressive movie. In the Torah, when people dream, it's a sign from God; it's a forecast of the future; it's a sort of esoteric wisdom.  What about the dreams in Inception? Were they holy?. No, in this movie dreams are induced, forcibly entered, and then exploited.

 "Inception" would be far more interesting if it was a movie about sibling rivalry in the dream world. What would "Inception" be like if it used as its source Joseph's dreams of greatness? Suppose that Joseph had his dreams, and then his brothers plotted to enter those dreams in order to extract their revenge,(rather than extracting the ideas out of someone's head)  instead of throwing him in a pit? Perhaps Joseph would morph into Doctor Strange, so that he could confront brothers in his dreams. That would be interesting.