#former mod's posts

I quit.

I get routine death threats from Neo-Nazis, I’m regularly told, in explicit detail, how they want to kill me and mutilate my body.  But I’m getting blamed for stating that I want to defend myself and others. 

So I’m joining @janothar in taking a break from Tumblr for the next few weeks.  Because I’ve had enough of this shit.  I have better things to do with my time than deal with Jumblr discourse that protects Nazis and demonizes Jews. 

And that’s all I can ask for. We can’t change the past, but we can change the future.  My opening suggestion?  I know that there are some Jewish occultists among my followers; I’d suggest with start opening some dialogues with them for a perspective on how to treat the Jewish cultural elements in your tradition with respect.  

And I thank you for having an open mind.  It makes for such a pleasant change from the usual :)

I get that.  I even understand that.  And, to some extent, I even sympathize with that.  But, as the (incredibly appropriate in this context) saying goes, “Intent is not magic!” 

Now, I hate it when I make a simple mistake and people jump all over me, so I’m going to say this much: your correction?  A very good first step, and I applaud you for doing so.  The fact that you owned up to the mistake is good, instead of getting defensive, and I’m specifically going to take this point to ask my followers to not jump down your throat and make you defensive. 

But still, at the end of the day, you are still part of a cultural tradition that has been built by directly stealing bits of Jewish cultural heritage and shoehorning it in nearly at random.  This is not a thing for which I blame you, but instead a thing that I blame the system that taught you. 

“Heavily ingrained in the occult”.  Yeah, and the reason for that is due to centuries of cultural appropriation by Christian occultists, frequently using Jewish holy symbols in ways that are actively sacrilegious, such as using the Tetragrammaton.  The only good thing from your post’s advice means that your followers wouldn’t be pronouncing the Name correctly. 

We are very much aware of how Western Magick occult practices views Jewish traditions and motifs as a buffet bar, and have for centuries.  “Oh, I’ll take some Arcane Mispronounced Hebrew Chanting from this tray, and mix it with some Names For God from this tray, and sprinkle it with a helping of Alchemical Symbols from the spice rack, and use some Christian interpretations of King Solomon to bulk things out.”  And all we see is a bunch of outsiders that come in, take things completely out of context, and then smugly say that they know how to “properly” use our cultural heritage that they’ve stolen.

A good and close friend of mine and my family, Barak BenTor,  Barak Mordechai Ben Ediit HaKohen, is in the Cleveland hospital tonight (2/21/16), dying of cancer.  He is 43 years old.  He and his wife, Elana, have two children, Dovid and Devorah. 

He is expected to pass at any time.  I just got the call. 

If people could say Tehillim for him, it would be very much appreciated.

-Joseph

Short version: I have access to a restaurant supply store, and I got a case of chicken on Wednesday.  Yesterday involved processing that case.  As a direct result, I now have in the neighborhood of more than a quart of fresh chicken schmaltz in my fridge.

I will admit that I am at a loss at what to do with so much schmaltz; in the past, most of my experiences with cooking with schmaltz involved using the small volumes skimmed off of the top of chicken soup.  This is... much, much more than that.  

I’m reading @jimhines‘s Revisionary, and there’s a shul called Am HaTorah whose rabbi is running an underground railroad stop for magical people being hunted by the government!  :D  And he all but says that he’s doing it for צֶדֶק צֶדֶק תִּרְדּף (Justice, Justice, You Shall Pursue), that, even if it’s possibly futile, you do the right thing because it is right.