{"id":63,"date":"2008-12-24T07:43:36","date_gmt":"2008-12-24T07:43:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/belief\/argument-and-preaching\/chapter-14c-god-is-in-the-details\/"},"modified":"2009-02-10T17:21:45","modified_gmt":"2009-02-10T17:21:45","slug":"chapter-14c-god-is-in-the-details","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/belief\/argument-and-preaching\/chapter-14c-god-is-in-the-details\/","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 14c &#8211; God Is in the Details"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a short and very partial list, just to get an idea of some of the more peculiar religious Jewish verdicts mentioned in the Israeli media during the last few years. All have good religious explanations. Note that some of them obviously contradict others:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to pick your nose on the Sabbath.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to comb your hair on the Sabbath, except if using a soft brush.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s forbidden to kill lice and mosquitos on the Sabbath.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to put lemon in hot tea on the Sabbath.<\/li>\n<li>If life is at risk, it\u2019s okay to operate an electrical appliance on the Sabbath. In such a case, you should insert the plug into the outlet not directly, but try doing it using your mouth, elbow or head.<\/li>\n<li>If life is at risk, it\u2019s okay to use the phone on the Sabbath, but one must dial using a pencil rather than using the fingers.<\/li>\n<li>Video pictures from security video cameras in religious neighborhoods, must be displayed on two screens alternately during the Sabbath.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s okay to download software from the Internet on the Sabbath, provided you begin downloading before the Sabbath, you turn off the screen\u2019s power supply, and the web site is operated by non-Jews.<\/li>\n<li>For children younger than thirteen years, it\u2019s okay to play with Lego on the Sabbath.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to watch movies on computers.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to use cellular phones with color screens.<\/li>\n<li>The Internet should not be used, even for professional purposes.<\/li>\n<li>If you drop your Palm computer, which contains religious prayers in it, then you must kiss the computer when you pick it up.<\/li>\n<li>A visit to the planetarium is forbidden.<\/li>\n<li>Baking of cakes in army bases is forbidden.<\/li>\n<li>Blood transfusion from a secular source is not recommended.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s forbidden for a Jew to donate organs to a non-Jew.<\/li>\n<li>Jews of priestly heritage (e.g., those who carry the last name of <em>Cohen<\/em>) should not fly over cemeteries.<\/li>\n<li>Tattoos are forbidden, with the exception of a small heart on a man\u2019s arm.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s forbidden to use the services of a non-religious court.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s forbidden to participate in a census. The recommended way to count the population is by using coins.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to read a Hebrew newspaper while in the toilet.<\/li>\n<li>A person in the toilet is not allowed to talk to a person outside.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s forbidden to kiss during the marriage ceremony.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s not allowed to step on ants.<\/li>\n<li>Sex is allowed only at night, preferably in a room with no flies.<\/li>\n<li>A woman should not wear a wig.<\/li>\n<li>Organs such as eyes, ears or arms should be removed from toy dolls.<\/li>\n<li>A man should not walk between two women.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s strictly forbidden to swim in a pool that contains both men and women.<\/li>\n<li>Women should not pray while cleaning the house.<\/li>\n<li>In case of political dispute between a husband and a wife, it\u2019s recommended for the wife not to vote in the elections.<\/li>\n<li>If a paramedic has two patients \u2013 a man and a woman \u2013 the man must be taken care of first.<\/li>\n<li>Women should board a bus from the back door.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It should be emphasized that many of these strange rules are generally not kept by most people, and often are not even known. Sometimes they simply represent the result of some internal argument between various religious subgroups.<\/p>\n<p>It should further be mentioned that religious belief fills a whole spectrum of shapes and forms. In most Western religions, there are many people who \u201csort of believe\u201d. They keep some of the rituals, abandoning others, not even knowing about most of them. Sometimes they claim to carry the flag of \u201ckeeping the tradition\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Is it better or worse? Does it make sense to avoid pork but eat a cheeseburger (welcome to McDonald\u2019s in Israel!)? Or does one avoid both but sell things on Saturday (welcome to Burger King in Israel!)? Isn\u2019t it kind of hypocritical to fast on <em>Yom Kippur<\/em> but drive on Saturdays? Is it forgiven to go to church on Sunday but perform adultery on Wednesday? Don\u2019t you piss off God more when you disobey your rabbi, and wait only three hours between a juicy steak and a cheesecake?<\/p>\n<p>The answer, like always, is in what <em>you<\/em> decide. It\u2019s the god in <em>you<\/em> that is pissed off by some details and is ready to accept others. It\u2019s the god you\u2019ve created.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/belief\/argument-and-preaching\/chapter-14b-god-is-in-the-details\/\">&lt;&lt; Prev<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/publish-my-book\/\">Contents<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/media\/book\/chapter-15a-killing-me-softly\/\">Next &gt;&gt;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a short and very partial list, just to get an idea of some of the more peculiar religious Jewish verdicts mentioned in the Israeli media during the last few years. All have good religious explanations. Note that some of them obviously contradict others: It\u2019s not allowed to pick your nose on the Sabbath. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,14,27,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-argument-and-preaching","category-book","category-judaism","category-the-truth-is-wrong"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetruthiswrong.com\/indeed\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}