Jewcy readers, I would be horribly remiss if I let this week pass without offering praise to Hashem for this week's Toyrah portion, Ki Tavo. Because, boy, does it make for a fantastic read! Hashem really gets into full-on Jonathan Edwards mode, I'm talking sinners in the hands of a seriously pissed-off (and fucking deranged) Hashem!
Over at Jewish Mosaic, the Jewish Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity, Jhos Singer gives a great (and sympathetic to the Toyrah) discussion of this week's portion, in which he describes Ki Tavo as "like it might have been penned by Jimmy Swaggart and Charles Bukowski with just a little editing by Stephen King." He's not kidding.
For those of you who aren't keeping up with this year's Toyrah action, let me fill you in: this week Hashem decides its time to really flow straight with the Yidden, no more playing games, he's going to let us know exactly what he's got in store for us if, in a moment of weakness, we should surrender to temptation and yoke an ox and a mule to the same plow. I'm using the JPS Hebrew-English Tanakh translation for this.
If we're bad,
You shall eat your own issue, the flesh of your sons and daughters…because of the desperate straights to which your enemy shall reduce you. He who is most tender and fastidious among you shall be too mean to…the children he has spared to share with any of them the flesh of the children that he eats…and she who is most tender and dainty among you, so tender and dainty that she would never venture to set foot on the ground, shall begrudge the husband of her bosom, and her son and her daughter, the afterbirth that issues from between her legs and the babies she bears; she shall eat them secretly, because of utter want.
Oh, Hashem…don't be eeeeeevvvilllll!
Hey, anyone know if Zeus is still in the market for a people?
Hashem has lots of other petty tortures lined up for us, including three different forms of inflammation! If you're not yet sated, here's a sample:
* "Hashem will strike you with…hemorrhoids, boil-scars, and itch, from which you shall never recover."
* "Cursed shall be your comings and goings"
* "If you pay the bride-price for a wife, another man shall enjoy her."
* "Hashem will let loose against you calamity, panic, and frustration."
* "Hashem will strike you with madness, blindness, and dismay."
* "You…shall be constantly abused and robbed."
* "You shall be abused and downtrodden continually, until you are driven mad by what your eyes behold."
* "Hashem will strike you with consumption, fever, and inflammation, with scorching heat and drought, with blight and mildew; they shall hound you until you perish."
* "Hashem will make the rain of your land dust, and sand shall drop on you from the sky, until you are wiped out."
* "Hashem will afflict you with a severe inflammation, from which you shall never recover–from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head."
* "Hashem will inflict extraordinary plagues upon you and your offspring [ed. note: the same offspring we later have to eat?? Gross.], strange and lasting plagues, malignant and chronic diseases."
Amen!
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