Godwrestling-- Round 2: Ancient Wisdom, Future Paths

by Arthur Waskow

Book Overview

What do we need to do to turn our "religion" into our lives?

This 20th anniversary sequel to a seminal book of the Jewish renewal movement deals with spirituality in relation to personal growth, marriage, ecology, feminism, politics, and more. Including new chapters, Waskow outlines original ways to merge "religious" life and "personal" life in our society today.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1879045729
• ISBN13: 9781879045729
• Release Date: June 1998
• Publisher: Jewish Lights Publishing
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.22 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.0" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Good but loses steam towards the end...

While Jewish Renewel by Michael Lerner is the classic of the genre, this is the pre-eminent books for giving Jews a feeling of spirituality and a mission to great spiritual energy. This is something that is oft-times missing in the Reform, Conservative and even Orthodox movements. This is a great book to give to anyone who is Jewish and trying to be a Wiccan, as Arthur Waskow admits that he takes much of his material from Judaism, while Starhawk tries to pass off her philosophy as secret teachings of Celts or something silly like that. Environmentalism, liberal politics, and feminism were never foreign topics to Judaism. Waskow is one of the Renewelists that reminds us of this fact.Waskow's midrash are interesting. Some of them give new insights into the text, others go a little too much to the personal. The book of Genesis is about brothers fighting but that's not ALL it's about, for example. Other times he tries to impose his politics a little too much into Halacka - such as the Jubilee being a time to give Israeli Land to Arabs as part of the peace talks.Particularly enlightening is the material concerning his marriage, how the first one broke up and the ceremonies he keeps to keep the second one. Problems that I have with this book that I didn't have a few years ago when I read it: Waskow automatically assumes that Orthodox Judaism is outdated and sexist. Several times he "reinterprets" Halacka to suit his own needs because he doesn't agree with the Talmud. This is great for getting people interested in Judaism and getting people excited by Halacka - but "they did the same thing" doesn't really hold water, as "they" were Rabbi Akiva, Hillel, Rabbi Judah the Prince, Jonathan, and hundreds of others with Maimonides, Rashi, Ran, Nachmanides interpreting their works and adding to it. Waskow may be a decent scholar in his own right, but he doesn't measure up to these guys.This is a great read and an invigorating book for people unfamiliar with the more spiritual aspects of Judaism and see it as what they train for when they are 13 and what is keeping them from marrying their shiksa girlfriends. However, the last 50 or so pages has the author trying to work out some plan from his writings as to where to take Judaism. It is here where the book stumbles. As Renewelist services are largely "make-it-up-as-you-go-along" it's kind of impossible to state anything definitive about them. However, there is a serious hippie mentality to them that turns off people who don't like to be hugged by strangers. Waskow assumes that everyone if given a choice would want to be in this kind of Rainbow Gathering inspired ceremony. This is an interesting book and one of the more spiritual books you might read if you aren't particularly interested in traditional Judaism, but it suffers from its own Chutzpah.