Reliance upon the mind of man, the created, over the outstretched hand of the Creator. And how well has that stubbornness worked through the ages?

Christians believe in this Rock; cleft, wounded for us. God, the Rock of Ages, has made a space for us in the wounds of Jesus. He has hidden us in the cleft of Jesus’ heart as He hid Moses in the cleft of the rock when He passed by.

The story of Hanukkah and Christmas is one story. As C.S.Lewis says, this narrative is the revelation of a true myth. It is true materially and spiritually; full of light.

All true light comes to us from the Father of Lights.
I love you Naomi!

Mark 10:45 The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many

The great Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, called the Rambam by us and Maimonides by the rest of the world, was an admirer of Aristotle. He lived in the 12th century. He was certainly no Hellenist, but rather one of our most revered religious scholars. We hold that there is wisdom among the Nations, but there is Torah only among the Jews.

It is true that Aristotle has flaws, which always gave his enemies an opening. But now the opening has been closed [by Ayn Rand].

The solution to the crisis of our age is love, as everyone says. But the love we need is not love of God or the neighbor. It is the love of the good for being the good. The good, in this context, includes reality, man the hero, and man’s tool of survival [reason].

Some remnant of such love still survives in the West. Above all, it survives in the people of America — which despite its decline, is still the leader and beacon of the world.” – Objectivist philosopher Leonard Peikoff

The solution is love, love of this earthly, natural not supernatural, life and world. Love of man and his rational nature which gives him the power to become a hero, which means rejecting the doctrine of Original Sin and accepting that a man is innocent until proven guilty.

Love one another not as sacrificial animals and profiteers-on-sacrifice, as victims and parasites, but as productive, independent, sovereign, human beings. Neither sacrificing yourselves to others, nor sacrificing others to yourselves.

“Durant refers to Aristotle as “this amazing Greek who . . . upset three religions.” Barnes writes, “He bestrode antiquity like an intellectual colossus.” Aristotle continues to upset the religions, and he now bestrides the modern Western world. His philosophy provides a proper understanding of the method of reason—and from that comes all that is good in modern secular culture: rational philosophy, the arts, the sciences, medicine, technology, prosperity.

Durant, speaking of the medieval renaissance, writes, “Aristotle’s philosophy was a Greek gift to Latin Christendom, a Trojan horse concealing a thousand hostile elements. These seeds of the Renaissance and Enlightenment were . . . ‘the revenge of paganism’ over Christianity.” To put it more accurately: the Renaissance and the Enlightenment were the triumph—not the “revenge”—of Greek rationalism over Christianity. More precisely still, these monumental events were the triumph of Aristotle over religion.”- Andrew Bernstein

“The Enduring Positive Legacy of Aristotle – Aristotle Versus Religion (7 of 7)”

The Enduring Positive Legacy of Aristotle – Aristotle Versus Religion (7 of 7)

A very old and moving Yiddish song. Thanks for the memories of my own relatives, now of blessed memory, as well as my own life with my shiksa goddess.

Chag sameach.