I find it easier to stay healthy when I am not tempted by bad choices.  Fast food was a temptation for me when I was in NY and in Israel. Cheap and tasty. Just for the sake of my own health I find it better to be in an area where fast foods are simply not available.
At one time I would concentrate on black bread, a raw beet and some fried eggs in the morning. That  got my weight down.

Walking or jogging was also pretty good for that.

Sometimes one is however not able to make his or her own choices about where to live.

I was recently in a hellish apartment. So I did not have much ability to take care of my health. Now I thank God that he took me out of that evil place and brought me to a wonderful place. It happened in a kind of ironic kind of way. I broke my foot and spent a month in the hospital but in any case it got me out a place I should have left  a long time ago.

Looking at the kings of Israel, I got reminded that getting rid of idolatry was a central concern. Some of them simply got rid of every last idol they could find in Israel and every single idol worshiper.
I think that I myself have lost sight of this simple idea. Most religious places do worship human beings even though they pretend to keep Torah. But not only that, but furthermore the worship of their particular idol is central to their philosophy.

The first time I was going through Tenach the Old Testament, I noticed  this central concern of many of the great kings only slightly. The next time I began to notice it more so.

My feeling about all this is that it would be great if someone would do like King Asa and just throw out all the idols once and for all. [This is certainly something the Gra wanted to do, but his advice was not accepted. Even the Litvak yeshivas which more or less follow his approach are watered down and diluted and infiltrated.]

I might mention all the idolatry I have seen in the religious world has always bothered me. I just have never spoken up because I figured there must be some excuses for it. After all I have never learned the subject in the Gemara in Sanhedrin 63 in detail. Only after doing the sugia with y learning partner do I feel I have  a better grasp of the issue.

Commandments of the Torah versus Paul.

Though many people think that Paul was a saint, I  think that he said some things which were wrong.  Paul in his letters says there is no need to keep the commandments of the Torah.  He goes over this theme many times. Not just in the book of Hebrews, but it comes up quite often. [Too many times for me to remember. Ephesians is one place off hand I recall.]

If you take a look at the Book of Deuteronomy it says quite often to keep all the commandments. In one place it uses the phrase "כל הימים" "all the days" I think right before the Shema. But that I think was mistranslated in many translations in English  into "כל ימי חייך" "all the days of your life."]

But besides that it does also say "Do not add or subtract from the commandments." And in the later chapter 13 it says a prophet who says true words of prophecy and yet tells you to serve other gods is trying to take you from the commandments of God and so he is  false prophet.



So what ever Paul's reasons might have been, it seems he was trying to claim that people do not have to keep the laws of the Torah and therefore he would be considered a false prophet.
[He was subtracting the commandments.]

P.S. I know that this issue was a debate between Paul on one side and James and Peter on the other as is clear in the Doctrines and Homilies of Clementine. But that seems to be a different issue over there. I am looking at this strictly from the standpoint of Torah.


When Protestants talk about reading the Bible, all they really mean is to read Paul.

What does Buddhism strive for? The destruction of the self.--And it succeeds.

On the subject of constellations of belief I realize that people disappointed with one value system that they have inherited often jump into another value system and tend to project into its leaders all the holiness and light that they expected to see in their former value system but wre disappointed.
So no wonder that given enough time they discover in the new system the same degree of fraud and chicanery.
Mainly here I am referring to the recent scandals in Buddhism but I think my remarks apply in general.

Still I might mention that I do have myself my own constellation of values based on a few fundamental principles based on the Oral and Written Law [the law of Moses].
But I would have a hard time defining my own values. Still just the fact that my son was here in Uman with his interest in Buddhism got me thinking.

First of all I would have to say I disagree with Buddha in terms of the highest ideal being to be unattached to anything or anyone in this world. Non attachment seems to be a good principle when it comes to bad people-- to stay away from them as far as possible. But this is not a good principle when it comes to good and decent people. In particular I see Buddhism as having a goal of breaking family attachments and relationships. That seems frankly as the opposite of getting to one's true self. one's true self is not an isolated bubble in the void.

There are other things also that I am not sure how to phrase. One thing is meditation to come to know one's own mind is not possible since one is only thinking about what one remembers that he or she was thinking a few moments before. You can not think about what you are now thinking because you are thinking it now.

[Besides these I also noticed that the effect of Zen and Buddhism on one friend is to destroy his mind and personality. The more tolerant he thinks he is, the worse he gets. And  that is  what Buddhism strives for--the destruction of the self.--And they succeed. But I am taking Buddhism just as an example. Mysticism in the religious world that I am familiar with seems to have the same mind and morality destroying effect.]

Constellations of Belief

People choose their belief system based on non rational principles. That is they choose a constellation of beliefs that have no rational connections.  For example in politics many beliefs of the Left are unconnected. e.g. animal rights having more value than the rights of an unborn child.
Also these beliefs are resistant to evidence. So clearly these constellations of belief are not based on reasons nor on evidence. Rather they are most often reactions against parents or some perceived opposite social group.


A friend was in Uman for Rosh Hashanah and brought with him a lot of books of Buddhism of the Westernized versions. [Not one authentic Buddhist text.] That got me thinking about this issue of constellations of values.

My basic reaction to Buddhism is that it is a much better than a lot of other things out there.

That is, I do have a basic idea of objective moral values.  So any value system I measure with this measuring stick: does it bring to objective moral values? That is I do not even look at motivation, or words. Acta non verba. [Actions, not words].




A Constellation  of belief means if you believe one axiom of that group that you want to be associated with you have to believe other unrelated axioms or else be kicked out.

"Felix Mendelssohn I think was very great, but simply on a second tier. I mean you have top level Bach Mozart Beethoven. Then the second tier where there are a lot more people Brahms, Mendelssohn, Sibelius etc. Then there are people that are somewhere between those two levels Handel, Hayden Vivaldi etc. and lots of Renaissance.



As for literature --it is hard to tell who is really great. The reason is that takes a lot longer to tell what is of lasting worth. Shakespeare for example has withstood the test of time and even so I am not sure that he is as great as people claim [Not that I read all of his work. After around the play that slandered Joan of Arc I gave upon him.]. In terms of plays and stories on the top level I think Sophocles is a lot better.
{Besides that I think the Rambam would have forbid reading "literature". I doubt if he would have thought there is any intrinsic worth in it. But for that matter he would have also forbid music of any kind. He did not have the same opinion as the Gra about the "seven wisdoms." This basic idea of spending my time learning Torah I would be doing except that I did not get along very well in the religious kinds of places where books of Torah are to be found. So just from simple self preservation I do not go to such places so as not to give them a chance to hurt me any more than they already have.
But if I could I would get my own set of books of Torah and do them at home.--Torah is valid and important but the Sitra Achra has taken over the entire religious world from head to toe.]





I was once playing on the violin on the street in Geula, and a grandson of Rav Israel Abuchatzaira came by and asked me to play something from Felix Mendelssohn. [I think he might have asked specifically for the violin concerto.]
His mother [Avigail Buso] is very much into listening to classical music--i.e. the daughter of Rav Israel Abuchatzeira.
She however did not approve of my playing violin on the street. She offered me this offer: If I would sit and learn Torah she would pay all my expenses. I did not accept at the time because of my grievances against the religious world.They had already done enough damage to me to the degree I did not see this offer as a good thing.

In the book of Isaiah it says in ch 40 "To whom will you liken me?" If God would have any form or substance, then there would be things [Heaven forbid] that one could compare Him to.

In the book of Isaiah it says in ch 40 "To whom will you liken me?"  The Rambam (Maimonides) uses this verse as a commentary on the verses of the Torah that say God has no form.
The Rambam understands this verse to mean simply  that God has no character trait that one could ascribe to anything physical. Thus God has no form, no matter, no substance, no "essence" or anything else that could be ascribe to any physical being.
This is well known and common place, but in the Jewish religious world in the next breath, people will start to talk about God as if he has characteristics that could apply to physical beings or things.

Thus the basic beliefs are self contradictory, and therefore false.

I mean to say that if God would have any form or substance, then there would be things [Heaven forbid] that one could compare Him to. Therefore nothing that one can attribute to a physical being can be applicable to God.
 With the religious this change in the belief system of Torah goes along with worship of their religious teachers. They ascribe Divine traits to their leaders. Thus this change in the philosophy of Torah goes along with a hidden agenda. It is not an innocent mistake.