Jims of Wyzdom

I’ve always been in the right place at the right time. Of course, I steered myself there. [Comedian Bob Hope]

If you like Shakespeare, I hope you are watching the wonderful new series on PBS, “Shakespeare Uncovered” Fridays on PBS. Each episode is hosted by a well-known actor, or director and features many scenes from the play being considered. If you have cable you can catch up “On Demand” or you can go to WQED’s website where they are all streamed complete.

My idea of forgiveness is letting go of resentment that does not serve your better interst, ridding yourself of negative thought. All they do is make you miserable. Believe me, you can fret and fume all you want, but whoever it was that wronged you is not suffering from your anguish whatsoever. [Actress Della Reese]

All People of Faith should be grieving for the tragedy that unfolded at the Tree of life synagogue in Squirrel Hill last weekend sabbath. It inspired me to write my first letter to the editor of the Post—not yet posted. I it, I wanted to remind readers of some facts. I, for one, was born and raised a Christian—not my choice, just the way it was—but much later in life, after reading Karen Armstrong, Huston Smith, John Shelby Spong and Paul Tillich, I learned these truths:

• Jesus Christ was a Jew, called rabbi, and practiced his faith his entire life.
• All of Jesus’ followers were observant Jews.
• The term “Christian” did not come into usage until about 88 C.E., the year that the Jesus Followers and the Jews amicably parted ways. This would have been about 3 generations following the death of Jesus at the hands of Romans, not Jews.
• The early Christian church fathers and scholars felt they had to ally Jesus with the Hebrew scriptural tradition of the prophets. They used the Jewish liturgy and appropriated all the Jewish Holy Days, simply re-purposing them. They did the same to some major Roman holidays, simply to attract pagans to this new faith.
• For Islam-- Jews, Christians and Muslims are all “People of the Book,” having come from the same lineage of Abraham, founder of all three faiths and ALL must be revered and respected.

So, if you didn’t learn some of these basic truths in Sunday School, then you need to do more reading! At the very least, members of all three Abrahamic faiths need to combine their prayers and teachings on forgiveness to pardon those who are so badly misguided and ignorant that they could go into a sacred place on the sabbath and slaughter fellow brothers and sisters in the faith. It couldn’t hurt to demand of our leaders the same reverence for life and the Eternal of their understanding. May the Eternal bless and keep us in Peace.

Just Jim