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The Croatian's rich vein of scoring continues.
Eduardo da Silva scored his fifth goal in three games to help Arsenal to a 2-0 win over West Ham that kept the Gunners top of the Premier League.
With second-place Manchester United beating Birmingham 1-0, Eduardo and Emmanuel Adebayor scored to keep Arsenal two points ahead of the defending champions.
Chelsea stayed third with a 2-1 win at Fulham, while Everton and Portsmouth also won on New Year's Day.
Arsenal lost twice to West Ham last season but was on its way to completing a pair of victories in this campaign when Cesc Fabregas set up Eduardo for the opening goal in the second minute.
The Spain midfielder chipped a pass into the area and Eduardo controlled the ball on his chest and volleyed it into the net, adding to the two goals he scored against Everton on Saturday.
The Croatia striker has not been a regular pick this season, but he may be now.
He also scored two goals two weeks ago in a League Cup win at Blackburn.
West Ham's Anton Ferdinand had an effort cleared off the line by Gael Clichy and goalkeeper Manuel Almunia saved from former Arsenal midfielder Fredrik Ljungberg, but Arsenal went 2-0 ahead in the 18th.
Adebayor got past West Ham goalkeeper Robert Green and scored off the post from a narrow angle.
Arsenal moved to 50 points from 21 games, two more than United, which gave up the lead on Saturday when it lost 1-0 at West Ham.
United got back on track Tuesday, dominating lowly Birmingham and winning through a 25th-minute goal from Carlos Tevez.
Tevez found Cristiano Ronaldo with an overhead kick and the Portugal winger returned the ball with a back-heeled pass. Tevez ran on and shot past goalkeeper Maik Taylor from about 10 meters (yards).
Chelsea had trailed to a 10th-minute penalty from Fulham midfielder Danny Murphy, awarded when Joe Cole tripped Moritz Volz.
Fulham, playing its first match under new manager Roy Hodgson, dominated the first half by pressuring its opponent into mistakes and almost went 2-0 up when Murphy curled a free kick over the bar.
Chelsea replaced Steve Sidwell with John Obi Mikel at halftime and drew level in the 53rd when Alex headed on a corner kick to Salomon Kalou, who headed it into the net.
Michael Ballack, playing just his fourth match since returning from eight months out injured, then had his shirt tugged by Clint Dempsey in the area.
The Germany midfielder picked himself up from the ground and hit the 62nd-minute kick low to the goalkeeper's right.
Chelsea now has 44 points, seven more than fourth-place Liverpool, which hosts Wigan in one of Wednesday's four matches.
Everton moved ahead of Manchester City into fifth place with a 2-0 win at Middlesbrough, secured with second-half goals by Andy Johnson and James McFadden.
Reading had defender Ibrahima Sonko sent off in the third minute for conceding a penalty kick and went on to lose 2-0 to visiting Portsmouth.
Niko Kranjcar hit the post with the kick, but Sol Campbell and John Utaka scored to clinch victory.
In the day's late game, Aston Villa defender Martin Laursen struck the winner with five minutes remaining after Jermaine Defoe had levelled the scores eight minutes earlier.
Aston Villa had gone ahead thanks to a first half goal to Olef Mellberg as Spurs problems from set pieces continued.


text:
Sedra Summary
Rabbi Eric H. Hoffman
38. KORACH 5780
June 22, 2020 January 6, 2021 ~ sedrasummary from Rabbi Eric H. Hoffman
FROM THE TORAH
Numbers 16:1-18:32
Although Moses and Aaron have endured the murmurings of the Israelites who, in previous sedras, remember Egypt in strangely idealized terms, the endurance of the two leaders is condemned in Sedra Korach by various detractors: their cousin Korach and apparently other Levites, certain Reubenites, and 250 other leaders of Israel. The rebels accuse Moses and Aaron of overreaching. Moses sees in their protests motives of demagoguery and usurpation. Following a demonstrative judgment, duties and perquisites of Priests and Levites are demarcated.
Rebellion Rejected
KORACH AND OTHERS CONFRONT MOSES AND AARON
Korach (Korach) son of Yitzhar son of Kehath son of Levi takes it upon himself to join with the Reubenites Dathan and Aviram sons of Eliav and On son of Peleth, and 250 renowned and esteemed leaders of the Children of Israel. Together they rise and assemble against Moses and against Aaron. "The two of you have gone too far," they protest, "for all the congregation are holy, with the Eternal in their midst, why do you exalt yourselves over the Eternal's community?"
MOSES RESPONDS TO THE CHALLENGE
Hearing this, Moses falls upon his face and responds to Korach and his group: In the morning the Eternal will make known who is His, who is holy, whom He would draw near to Him. The one whom He chooses He will draw near to Him! Let all of you take fire pans, put fire in them and incense on top of the fire, before the Eternal tomorrow. The man whom the Eternal chooses shall be the holy one. You have gone too far, O sons of Levi!
To Korach, Moses delivers this message: Is it not enough that the Eternal has separated you, O sons of Levi, from the congregation of Israel to bring you near to Him for service in His Tabernacle and to minister to the congregation? Thus distinguished already, you and your fellow sons of Levi, seek also the Priesthood! But, really, you and your company are joining together against the Eternal, for why should Aaron be the target of your complaint?!
DATHAN AND AVIRAM ACCUSE MOSES
When Moses summons Dathan and Aviram sons of Eliav, they refuse, accusing Moses of bringing them up from a land flowing with milk and honey (cf. Exodus 3:8) in order to kill them in the wilderness and in the meantime to rule presumptuously over them. Even if you had succeeded in bringing us to a land flowing with milk and honey, they argue, where our portion would be fields and vineyards, you would not even then have the right to punish us!
MOSES DEFENDS HIMSELF
Moses angrily entreats the Eternal to disregard their offering, and he adjures: Not even a single ass have I taken from them, not one of them have I harmed!
THE ETERNAL INTERVENES
Moses orders Korach: You and all of your company, appear with Aaron before the Eternal tomorrow! Let each man offer a fire pan with incense before the Eternal: 250 fire pans and yours and Aaron's! So each man takes a fire pan, puts fire in it and incense on top of the fire, and they stand at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting together with Moses and Aaron.
Korach has assembled there all of the congregation against them, and the dense presence of the Eternal appears. The Eternal directs Moses and Aaron to separate themselves from the congregation as He shall immediately destroy it. But they fall upon their faces and entreat: O God of the spirits of all flesh, if one man sins, will You be angry with the entire congregation?! The Eternal bids Moses direct the congregation away from the dwellings of Korach, Dathan and Aviram. Accompanied by the Elders of Israel, Moses goes to Dathan and Aviram and has the congregation remove itself from the tents of those wicked men and avoid contact with anything of theirs so as not to be swept away by their sins.
In the meantime, Dathan and Aviram have themselves come out and are standing at the entrance of their tents, accompanied by their wives, their children, and their youngest. Moses declares: If all of these die in a manner that reflects the common fate of men, then the Eternal has not sent me on His behalf. But if the Eternal causes the earth to open its mouth and swallow them and theirs alive down to Sheol, then you shall know that these men have spurned the Eternal! Immediately upon the conclusion of his words, the ground is divided under them, the earth opens its mouth, and it swallows them, together with their houses, everyone associated with Korach, and all of their possessions. They all descend alive to Sheol, the earth covers them, they disappear from the midst of the community.
All of Israel standing around them flee at their cry, fearing: lest the earth swallow us as well! A fire goes forth from the Eternal, consuming the 250 men offering the incense.
DISPOSAL OF THE SACRED REMAINS OF THE FIRE
The Eternal bids Moses charge Elazar son of Aaron the Priest with the responsibility of disposing of the remains of the fire pans of the sinners who lost their lives and of the fire. As they were offered before the Eternal, they became holy. The remains of the fire are to be scattered away. The fire pans are to be made into plates of metal as a covering for the Altar due to their sanctity and as a sign for the Children of Israel. Thus does Elazar the Priest with the copper fire pans to remind the Children of Israel that only a descendent of Aaron may offer incense before the Eternal. Any other would suffer the fate of Korach and his company.
THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL PROTEST THE DEATHS
The next day all of the congregation of the Children of Israel complain against Moses and against Aaron: You have killed the Eternal's people! As the congregation assembles, they see that the Tent of Meeting is covered by the cloud and there appears the dense presence of the Eternal. As Moses and Aaron reach the Tent of Meeting, the Eternal speaks to Moses: Remove yourselves from the midst of this congregation and I shall destroy them immediately! They fall upon their faces.
Moses orders Aaron: Put some of the fire from the Altar in a fire pan, add incense, and go quickly to the congregation to seek atonement for them, because the punishing effect of the Eternal's wrath has begun. Aaron runs into the midst of the community, where the plague has begun, and there, where he stands between the dead and the living, the plague is arrested. The number of dead is 14,700, beyond the number of those who died in the affair of Korach (cf. 16:31ff.). As the plague is arrested, Aaron returns to Moses at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting.
AARON'S STAFF
The Eternal bids Moses charge the Children of Israel to collect from the chief of each father's house his staff, twelve staffs in all, and to inscribe each man's name on his staff, with the name of Aaron on the staff of Levi. Place the staffs in the Tent of Meeting before the Testimony, at the place where I meet with you, and the staff of the man whom I choose shall sprout. Thus shall I rid Myself of the complaints that the Children of Israel lodge against you.
Moses so instructs the Children of Israel, whose chiefs provide him their staffs, with the staff of Aaron among them. Moses deposits the staffs before the Eternal in the Tent of Meeting. On the next day, when Moses enters the Tent of Testimony, the staff of Aaron of the house of Levi has sprouted and blossomed, producing almonds. Moses brings out all of the staffs for all the Children of Israel to see and for the staffs to be returned. But the Eternal has him keep Aaron's staff before the Testimony as a sign for rebels, to stem their complaints against Him, so that they do not die. Moses does exactly as the Eternal commands him.
THE ISRAELITES FEAR
But the Children of Israel say to Moses: We are dead, we are lost, all of us are lost! If one should even come near the Tabernacle of the Eternal, he shall die. Shall we ever finish dying?
SACRED CHARGES OF LEVITES AND PRIESTS
The Eternal says to Aaron: You, together with your sons and your father's house, shall be responsible for any iniquity of the Sanctuary. Keep with you your brothers of the Staff of Levi, the tribe of your father, that they may be attached to you and serve you and your sons before the Tent of Testimony. Let them keep your charge and the charge of all the Tent but without coming near to the sacred implements or to the Altar, so that they and you do not die. Only they shall be attached to you for all the service of the Tent of Meeting; no outsider shall draw near to you. I have taken, from the Children of Israel, your brothers the Levites as a gift for you, dedicated to the Eternal.
Only you, with your sons, shall be responsible for any iniquity of your Priesthood. The Priesthood of you and your sons shall apply to everything of the Altar and that which is behind the Dividing Curtain. You shall keep the charge of the Sanctuary and of the Altar so that there may be no more wrath upon the Children of Israel. The outsider who encroaches shall be put to death.
SANCTITIES ACCRUING TO PRIESTLY ANOINTMENT
18:8-10,14-18
The Eternal speaks to Aaron: I grant you charge of My sacred donations, all of the sanctities of the Children of Israel that accrue to your anointment and to that of your sons as an everlasting statute. This applies to the most holy offerings by fire; their meal offering, their sin offering, and their guilt offering, shall be yours and your sons'. You shall eat it in the most holy place, every male; it is consecrated to you.
Any devoted thing in Israel shall be yours.
The first issue of the womb of any animal, man or beast, that is offered to the Eternal, shall be yours. But you must see that the first-born of man and the first-born of an unclean animal are redeemed. Its redemption price, from the age of one month, shall be the equivalent of five silver shekels of Sanctuary weight, that is, twenty gerahs. Do not redeem the first-born of an ox, a sheep or a goat; they are holy. You must dash their blood against the Altar and turn their fat into smoke, a fire offering of a pleasant aroma to the Eternal. Their meat shall be yours, like the breast of a wave offering and like the right thigh.
FOR THE PRIESTS AND THEIR HOUSEHOLDS
18:11-13,19
Gift offerings shall also be yours, the wave offerings of the Children of Israel: I give them to you, to your sons, and to your daughters with you, as an everlasting statute. Everyone in your household who is pure may eat of it.
The freshest and choicest oil, wine and grain, and all first fruits of the Land, that is given to the Eternal, I give to you. Everyone in your household who is pure may eat of it.
All of the sacred donations which the Children of Israel donate to the Eternal, I give to you and to your sons and to your daughters with you, as an everlasting statute, an eternal covenant of salt before the Eternal, for you and for your offspring with you.
CONSIDERATIONS OF PRIESTS AND LEVITES
The Eternal says to Aaron: You shall not be entitled to their land or to any portion in their midst. I shall be your portion and your entitlement amidst the Children of Israel! And to the sons of Levi I grant every tithe in Israel in consideration of their service of the Tent of Meeting. No others of the Children of Israel shall approach the Tent of Meeting and thereby die of that sin. Only the Levite shall perform that service and be responsible for their iniquity appertaining to it, an everlasting statute throughout your generations. The Levites shall not be entitled to any portion among the Children of Israel, as their inheritance is the tithe of the Children of Israel which is separated for the Eternal.
TITHE FROM THE TITHE
The Eternal speaks to Moses: Speak to the Levites regarding the tithes that they receive from the Children of Israel. I have given them to you as your possession. From all of your tithes you shall take a tithe for the Eternal, which you shall give to Aaron the Priest. It will be considered your sacred gift, like grain from the threshing floor, like the fullness from the vat. The part that is to be so consecrated must be its best part. The rest of it may be considered as the produce of your threshing floor or vat and therefore may be eaten anywhere by you and your household. You shall not be guilty of any sin as long as you have separated from it its best portion. Do not profane the sanctities of the Children of Israel, and you shall not die.
FROM THE PROPHETS
Haftarah for Shabbat Korach
I Samuel 11:14-12:22
Rebellion Accepted
Samuel convenes the nation at Gilgal to inaugurate the kingship of Saul. There, before the Eternal, they offer sacrifices of peace, and Saul and all of the men of Israel rejoice greatly.
Samuel addresses all of Israel: I am setting over you a king, as you have asked. The king will walk before you. I am old and gray; my sons are with you. I have walked before you from my youth until this day. Answer me in the presence of the Eternal and in the presence of His anointed: Whose ox have I taken, or whose ass? Whom have I defrauded, or whom have I oppressed? From whom have I taken a bribe to look the other way? If so, let me return it! They respond: None of these have you done!
Samuel continues: The Eternal is the Source of Moses and Aaron and all that they achieved, and it is He who brought up your fathers from the land of Egypt. It is He who brought them to this place. But as they forgot the Eternal, their God, He sold them into the hand of Sisera, captain of the army of Chatzor, and into the hand of the Philistines and into the hand of the king of Moab. They fought against them, and they cried out to the Eternal: We confess our sin and acknowledge our idolatry to the idols of Baal and Ashtoreth. We ask for Your deliverance and promise that we will serve You.
The Eternal sent Jerubaal (cf. Judges 6:32ff.) and Bedan and Jephthah (cf. Judges 11:8ff.) and Samuel, and He saved you from your enemies. But when you saw that Nachash, king of the Ammonites, was coming against you, you called for a human king (cf. 11:2ff.), when the Eternal your God was your king! But here is the king whom you have chosen and whom the Eternal has placed over you. If you are true to the Eternal and obey Him, both you and your king, good and well. But if not, then the hand of the Eternal will be against you and against your fathers.
Now stand still and observe this great thing which the Eternal will perform before your eyes! It is already the season of the wheat harvest, yet I shall call to the Eternal that He send thunder and rain. Know and see thereby that your evil is great for having asked for yourselves a king.
Samuel calls to the Eternal, who sends thunder and rain on that day. The people are in great fear of the Eternal and of Samuel. They entreat Samuel to pray to the Eternal on their behalf, admitting their sin in having asked for a king. Samuel says to the people: Fear not, for though you have done this evil, turn not away from following the Eternal; serve the Eternal with all your heart! For by turning away from following the Eternal, you would go after vanities which can neither help nor deliver. The Eternal will not forsake His people, for the sake of His great name, for the Eternal has resolved to establish you as His people.
FROM TALMUD AND MIDRASH
Numbers Rabbah 18:1,14
Harsh Disputes
"A brother offended
is harder to reconcile
than the strongest city,
and such disputes
are like the bars of a castle."
(Proverbs 18:19)
This teaching applies to Korach's dispute with his cousin Moses.
They were both grandsons of Kohath, son of Levi.
Korach rebelled against his Kohathite "brother" by demeaning the honor that they already shared as fellow Levites and Kohathites, and his disputes caused the earth to raise its bars against him. How are they "bars of a castle?" Because he rebelled not simply against Moses but against God in His "palace" as well!
The bars of God's palace are immovable, as we find in its construction: "The middle bar within the boards extends from one end to the other." (Exodus 26:28) Such also were Moses and Aaron, the bars of His Tabernacle.
"The strongest city" may be likened to the Torah, as was said, "The Eternal grants strength to His people," but also, "May the Eternal bless His people with peace!" (Psalms 29:11)
Numbers Rabbah 18:2
Korach's Method and Motivation
"Korach takes…"
He took words to persuade most of the leaders of Israel to follow after him. Similarly, "Moses and Aaron took these men who were designated by names" (Numbers 1:17), which are words. When the Eternal tells Moses, "Take Aaron and his sons with him" (Leviticus 8:2) to install them, Moses explains to the congregation, "This is the word which the Eternal commanded to do" (ibid., 5). The prophet prescribes, "Turn, O Israel, to the Eternal your God" (Hosea 14:2), but how? "Take with you words" (ibid. 3). When Abram and Sarai enter Egypt, she was taken to the palace of Pharaoh because Pharaoh's officers praised her beauty, that is, spoke words about her to Pharaoh. So we see that words of persuasion are associated with taking, and "Korach takes" means that he enticed their hearts with his words!
But what was his own motivation? Korach was the "son of Yitzhar son of Kehath son of Levi" (Numbers 16:1). Korach thought: My father Yitzhar was one of four sons of Kehath: "Amram, Yitzhar, Chevron, and Uzziel" (Exodus 6:18). From Amram the firstborn came his sons Aaron the High Priest and Moses the Ruler. Who would be in line then for the next honor? The second son of Kehath, my father Yitzhar! But who was made head of the house of Kehath? My cousin Elitzaphan son of Uzziel (Numbers 3:30): Uzziel was fourth in line while my father Yitzhar was the second! I, as his son, should have been head of my family's house instead of Elitzaphan son of the youngest! Korach therefore held it against Moses for passing over him and sought to undo everything that had been implemented by Moses. For that reason he took words to persuade most of the leaders of Israel to follow after him.
Talmud Yerushalmi Sanhedrin 10:1
Tanchuma Buber Korach 4
Korach the Apikoros
These words follow directly upon the conclusion of the preceding Sedra Shelach-Lecha: "Let them make for themselves tzitzith…" (15:37ff.). Rav taught that Korach was an apikoros (an irreverent character). Based upon the preceding mitzvah of tzitzith, which prescribes a thread of techeylet (a particular color such as violet) among the corner fringes of a tallit (cloak), Korach floated the following halachic question to Moses: Suppose the cloak itself is colored entirely of techeylet, would it then require tzitzith (with its required single fringe of techeylet on each corner)? Moses answered that it would, based upon a verse found further on in the Torah: "Fringes shall you make for yourself upon the four corners of the cloak with which you cover yourself!" (Deuteronomy 22:12) So Korach muttered: A tallit that is made entirely of techeylet does not fulfill the mitzvah, but four threads of techeylet do?!
Then Korach turned to the mitzvah of mezuzah: Would a house that is full of holy books still require a mezuzah (which contains two small portions of the Torah)? Moses answered that it would, based upon the verse: "And you shall inscribe them upon the doorposts of your house…!" (Deuteronomy 6:9) So Korach muttered: The entire Torah, with its 275 parshiyot, does not fulfill the mitzvah of mezuzah for a house, but two parshiyot (Deuteronomy 6:4-9 and 11:13-21) within a mezuzah do?!
To Korach, Moses said: Your questions are not based upon reverence for the commandments; rather, you are attempting to refute them because of your own heart (out of reverence for yourself)! The words, "Korach takes…," then, should be understood in accordance with the same words that Eliphaz hurled against Job: "Why does your heart take you (carry you away)?" (Job 15:12)
Influence of Neighbors
Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai asked his students:
What is the virtuous path for man to follow?
Rabbi Yosi answered: A good neighbor.
What is the evil path for man to avoid?
Rabbi Yosi said: An evil neighbor.
(Mishnah Avot 2:9)
Dathan and Aviram were neighbors of Korach. As for Korach, grandson of Kohath, "the Levites would encamp around the Tabernacle of Testimony…" (1:53), and "the families of the sons of Kohath (son of Levi) would encamp along the south side of the Tabernacle." (3:29) As for Dathan and Aviram, grandsons of Reuben, "the Children of Israel would encamp around the Tent of Meeting at a distance (on the outer circle)" (2:2), and "the banner of the camp of Reuben was positioned in the south…!" (2:10)
But Judah and Issachar and Zebulun were neighbors of Moses and Aaron, as is written: "Those who would encamp directly east of the Tabernacle, east of the Tent of Meeting, were Moses and Aaron and his sons…" (3:39), and "encamping on the easternmost side (on the outer circle) under the banner of the camp of Judah…" (2:3) were also, "alongside him, the tribe of Issachar…" (2:5) and "the tribe of Zebulun…" (2:7)! Since Judah and Issachar and Zebulun were, in effect, adjacent to the Torah, they became learned of Torah, as is written, "Judah, my legislator" (Psalms 60:9), "of the sons of Issachar, who possess knowledge of the seasons…" (I Chronicles 12:33), and "from Zebulun, who hold the staff of a scholar" (Judges 5:14)!
Since Dathan and Aviram were neighbors of a demagogue, they were punished with him and thus disappeared from the world.
Numbers Rabbah 18:20,4
Talmud Sanhedrin 110a
Advice of Wives
"And On son of Peleth…"
So named because he was the beneficiary of miracles (pela'ot). Rav taught: His wife saved him by convincing him that he had no interest in Korach's dispute: whether Aaron is High Priest or Korach, in either case your status will be the same, that of a disciple, as they said, "All of the congregation are holy!" (16:3) So what did she do? She gave him wine and put him to bed and sat at the door with her hair loosened. Thus, when anyone came for On her husband—when he saw her, he turned away. Eventually they were all swallowed up.
"The Eternal speaks to Moses:
Take the Levites from amidst the Children of Israel and purify them…
Sprinkle upon them water of purification
and have them shave all of their flesh…"
(Numbers 8:5-7)
Thus did Moses to Korach, and Korach sought his wife's advice: Not only that, but Moses also held my hands and my feet and waved me and declared me pure! She said to him: Look at what he has done: Moses is the king, he has made his brother the High Priest, the sons of his brother the Attending Priests, he has assigned terumah to the Priests, and of the ma'aser that he grants you he says give one-tenth of it to the Priest. He treats you with disrespect and he is jealous of your hair! But her husband pointed out that Moses had done the same to himself. She replied that since Moses had coopted all of the honor, his thinking was resigned like that of Samson when he pulled down the pillars of the temple of Dagon upon the Philistines and upon himself: "I might as well die with the Philistines!" (Judges 16:30)
So we learn in Proverbs (14:1): "The wisest among women builds her house"—that is the wife of On son of Peleth—"while a foolish woman destroys it with her own hands"—and that is the wife of Korach!
The Fourth Offense
"They assemble against Moses and against Aaron…:
'You take too much upon yourselves,
for all the congregation,
all of them, are holy,
and the Eternal is in their midst;
why do you exalt yourselves over the congregation of the Eternal?'
When Moses heard,
he fell upon his face."
(16:3-4)
Korach said to Moses and Aaron: All of them heard at Sinai, "I, the Eternal, am your God…" (Exodus 20:2ff.)! So why do you exalt yourselves over the congregation of the Eternal? If you alone had heard it, and they had not heard it, then you would have reason. But now that all of them have heard it, too, "Why do you exalt yourselves?"
Moses was frightened by this dispute because this was already the fourth such offense that the people had committed.
It may be compared to a prince who offends his father, the king, once, twice, three times. Each time the king is mollified by a devoted friend. But when the prince offends for a fourth time, the friend's hands grow weak. "How many times can I beg the king?" thinks the friend.
The devoted friend here is Moses. When they sinned with the golden calf, "Moses implored the Eternal…: Why should Your anger…blaze forth against Your people…?" (Exodus 32:11) When the people complained bitterly against the Eternal at Taverah, "Moses prayed to the Eternal…." (Numbers 11:2) With the scouts, "Moses said to the Eternal: When Egypt will hear…." (Numbers 14:13) Now, with this dispute of Korach, how much more can I entreat the Omnipresent? Therefore, his hands grew weak and "he fell upon his face."
Tanchuma Korach 5
Moses's Guarded Response
"Moses…responds to Korach and his group:
In the morning the Eternal will make known who is His…"
Why "in the morning?"
Moses thought: Perhaps they have raised their protest out of overindulgence in food and drink. So, between now and tomorrow morning, perhaps they will repent of their dispute. In order to justify the delay in ascertaining God's decision, he says to them: I am not allowed to enter God's presence just now. Of course God does not engage in eating and drinking Himself, as might have been inferred from Moses's waiting. But now we can see that the real reason was because of our indulging in eating and drinking!
Another explanation: Moses was saying to them that the Holy One, blessed be He, has established boundaries in His world. For example, are you able to combine day and night? The answer is found in the first verses of creation: "There was evening, and there was morning…" (Genesis 1:5) and "God made a separation between the light and the darkness" (Genesis 1:4). This was done for the operation of the world. And just as He made a separation between the light and the darkness, so also He separated Israel from the other nations, as was said: "I have separated you from the other peoples to be Mine." (Leviticus 20:26)
Similarly, He has separated Aaron, as was said: "Aaron was set apart to be consecrated as most holy…" (I Chronicles 23:13). If you were able to blur the distinction which He has made between light and darkness, then you would be able to override this distinction (between Aaron and the congregation), too. Such is the reason why Moses said, "In the morning the Eternal will make known who is His…": It has already been designated, like the separation between evening and morning and between Israel and the nations, "the one whom He chooses He will draw near to Him!" (Numbers 16:5)
Rebels' Delusion
"Let all of you take fire pans,
Korach and all of his congregation,
put fire in them and incense on top of the fire,
before the Eternal tomorrow…"
Why did Moses propose this?
He said to them: Other nations have a plethora of practices and priests while for us there is one God and one Torah, one Altar and only one High Priest. You are 250, all of whom seek the High Priesthood" (cf. Numbers 16:10)! I can go along with that: "Therefore let you and your congregation" (ibid. 11) "take fire pans…and put in them fire and place upon them incense…" (ibid. 6-7)! The incense is the most select of offerings but it contains within it a fatal ingredient, from which Nadab and Abihu were burned to death (cf. Leviticus 10:1 ff.). So I warn you now that only the one of you whom the Eternal shall choose as holy will emerge alive from this experience, and the rest of you will perish (cf. Numbers 16:7). "That should be sufficient warning for you, O sons of Levi" (Numbers 16:7)! Foolishly, notwithstanding his warning, they went ahead with the offering of incense, thereby sinning at the cost of their lives, as was said, "the fire pans of those who sinned at the cost of their lives" (ibid. 17:3).
But what drove Korach, who was clever, to pursue this nonsense? He was obsessed with a vision of his line into the future (cf. I Chronicles 6:16-23) including the prophet Samuel (I Samuel 1:1), who was reckoned the equal of both Moses and Aaron, as was said, "Moses and Aaron among His priests and Samuel among those who speak in His name" (Psalms 99:6), twenty-four Levitical generations of his descendants prophesying by the Holy Spirit (cf. I Chronicles 25:1). "With such greatness to come from me," he thought, "how can I keep silent?"
But the grandeur as it applied to Korach was his delusion. The line into the future was not to the credit of Korach, even though they were his descendants, but to the credit of his sons, who repented of their association with their father's sin (cf. Numbers 26:10-11). Moses saw this in his response to the rebellion, but Korach misapplied his warning that only one would survive and the rest would perish, misapprehending that "the man that the Eternal would choose as the holy one" (Numbers 16:7a) would be him!
SHABBAT SHALOM!
Copyright © 2020 Eric H. Hoffman
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Memes, Good, and Home: When your boss asks why you need to leave early Bro, I'm straight-up not having a good time. Need to go home and Juul, brah.
Need to go home and Juul, brah.
Home, Go Home, and I Want to Go Home: GO HOME GiO HOME I WANT To GO HOME twilter -caplag I want to go home!
Funny, Party, and Chat: @fentynipple i will never forget the time i was at a party we were playing truth or dare and someone dared me to go home Press F in the chat @larnite • ➫➫➫ Follow @Staggering for more funny posts daily!
Press F in the chat @larnite • ➫➫➫ Follow @Staggering for more funny posts daily!
Funny, Tumblr, and Home: clare @clur19 When l was 14, a boy told me I had the body shape/type of a gingerbread man, and last night he tried to get me to go home with him as if I do not remember what he said to me 7 years ago.


text:
The Lost Fleet: Fearless by Jack Campbell
I reviewed Dauntless, the first of Jack Campbell's Lost Fleet series, in May this year, and thought well of it: "The result is highly impressive: a gripping page-turner of a tale in which Campbell puts to very good use his experience as a US naval officer, bringing the ring of authenticity to his hero's command problems and meticulous accuracy to his description of the complexities of fighting a space battle in which the distances involved are so great that enemy actions can only be observed some (constantly varying) time after they have happened."
Fearless continues the story of the revived hero, John Geary, controversially put in charge of the Alliance fleet deep in enemy territory with the task of getting as much of it home as he can. Cue lots more of the same: detailed considerations of strategic and tactical options and gripping space battles. There really aren't any new elements included in the story, just a continuation of Geary's complex and developing relationship with Co-President Rione, and the dissatisfaction of some of his starship captains boiling over into mutiny with the arrival of a new catalyst.
My previous reservations about the author's writing weaknesses remain: "The total focus on Captain Geary's viewpoint and command problems is unrelieved by any other elements; it's a bit like a meal which is all meat and no veg. Furthermore, although Geary's personality is clearly drawn, there are no physical descriptions of him or anyone else in the book, other to say whether they are male or female, and look young or old. This gives no guidance to the reader's imagination in conjuring up mental pictures of the scenes".
Furthermore, I am already becoming a little weary of Geary; the way he never puts a foot wrong, always finds exactly the right words, and invariably wins every battle, usually by annihilating the enemy while suffering minimal losses. Despite this, Fearless is addictively exciting and I read it quickly. I already have the next volume on my reading pile but I'm not sure how many more I'll want to read unless the author injects some variety into the stories.
Posted by Anthony G Williams at 06:43 No comments:
Film: Gravity (2013)
When Gravity hit the cinemas I was very keen to follow the advice of the critics and see it not just in 3D but also on the IMAX screen. Even people who generally disliked 3D acknowledged that this was one film which was made for it, and that the visual spectacle should best be appreciated on the giant screen. For one reason or another I was unable to get to the cinema for three weeks, and when I eventually sat down to book my seats I was very disappointed to discover that the run at my local IMAX had just ended. I still can't understand the thinking behind this; the IMAX schedule wasn't exactly overcrowded (just one showing per day) and the film remained available on the ordinary screen in the same cinema for several more weeks, showing several times a day. However, I couldn't be bothered to travel to the cinema for a second-rate experience, so I didn't see it. Now that it's on DVD, I decided to watch it at home to see what all the fuss was about.
The plot of the film is of course very straightforward and with only two characters of significance it must be one of the simplest screenplays ever written. That enabled the director to focus on what the film was really all about – the experience of being in space. I did think that the plot was rather far-fetched – would the Hubble telescope, and the International Space Station, and a fictional Chinese space station, really all be so conveniently close together in matching orbits? And the debris storm was supposed to have taken out the communication satellites as well – but many of those are in geocentric orbits some 36,000 km up and would hardly have been affected by the same incident that hit the various stations at around 600 km. However, had the plot been realistic the film would have been very short with an unhappy ending.
It isn't the plot that's realistic but the depiction of being in space; the silence, the awkwardness in a bulky space suit, the disorientation of having no "up" or "down", the sharp clarity of the stations in the airless sunlight, the jaw-dropping views. Even on the small screen in 2D this came through very strongly. Clooney isn't exactly stretched in giving a wisecracking hero performance so the attention is very much on Sandra Bullock, who does a good job as a "space virgin" who has to overcome her panic when disaster strikes and demonstrate the Right Stuff to stand any chance of getting home.
I found the film to be edge-of-the-seat gripping, especially in the early part before the improbabilities started to pile up, and well worth watching. However, I agree with the critics: if it looks good on a small screen, it must have been truly spectacular at the IMAX.
Beyond the Barrier by Damon Knight
Damon Knight was an American SFF writer who was at the heart of the genre throughout its golden period. The first of his four dozen or so short stories was published in 1940, and seventeen novels followed in the period 1955 to 1996, the last appearing six years before his death. As his Wiki entry says, as well as winning the Hugo Award, he was "founder of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), cofounder of the National Fantasy Fan Federation, cofounder of the Milford Writer's Workshop, and cofounder of the Clarion Writers Workshop." His most famous work is probably the short story To Serve Man, which I read long ago and still remember vividly for its shock ending.
I have to say that in general his writing didn't strongly appeal to me, except for the one novel I have kept: Beyond the Barrier, originally published in 1964 as The Tree of Time. I hadn't read it for more than thirty years so decided to refresh my memory.
Gordon Naismith is a professor of science at a Californian university, a former air force crewman who had lost his memory in a plane crash four years earlier. His life is routine to the point of boredom when he is asked a question by one of his students: "What is a Zug?" He finds this a strangely disturbing question and is thrown further off-balance by a series of events which suggest that his forgotten past holds a secret – one that is known by some people of dubious origin who are determined to manipulate him for their own ends. He is forced to question who – and what – he really is. As a result, he finds himself travelling into a far future in which humanity is about to implement a drastic measure to rid itself of its most deadly enemy, and he plays a crucial role in determining the outcome.
In the fashion of the time, the book is short at 150 pages. There is no padding, no leisurely scene-setting or background character development, the story hits the ground running and doesn't slow down at any point before Knight's characteristic terminal twist. I found it an irresistible page-turner and read it at one sitting. Recommended to all fans of SF of this period.
The second season of Under the Dome has started on UK TV. I reviewed the first series in September and November last year and pointed out numerous unrealistic plot elements, concluding that: "It isn't great SF but has been just about worth watching so far for the performance of the major characters". The first episode begins at the exact moment that the first season ended and the story continues unchanged. As do its strengths and weaknesses. After a couple of weeks of being cut off from the rest of the world there is still no apparent difficulty in finding food to eat, whereas any modern town so isolated, used to "just in time" deliveries of frozen and chilled produce, would begin to run out of supplies in a few days. I'll keep watching for the time being and see how it goes.
TV – Dollhouse (2009)
In my hunt for decent TV SF series I came across some favourable mentions of Dollhouse, so I put it on my view list.
The MacGuffin for this series can be summed up as "mind wipe and personality transfer". Criminals faced with a long jail term are given the option of volunteering to spend five years working for a secret corporation that removes and stores their personalities and substitutes those recorded from other people with specialist skills. The criminals (known as "Actives" or "Dolls") are then sent out on missions which range (in the first few episodes) between acting as a good-time girl for a rich man, a bodyguard in the guise of a pop singer, a master safe-cracker and a hostage negotiator. At the end of the mission their borrowed personalities are wiped and they are left as robotic blank slates until they are prepared for their next mission.
The principal Doll on which the series focuses, played by Eliza Dushku, is given the code name Echo. This part is a gift to an actor since she is on screen much of the time, playing dramatically varying roles (rather like Orphan Black in that respect), and Dushku is a convincing heroine. There are strong supporting roles, especially Olivia Williams as the person in charge of the Dollhouse, Harry Lennix as Echo's "minder", and Tamoh Penikett as FBI agent Paul Ballard who is certain that the Dollhouse exists, although his colleagues disagree.
It soon becomes clear that the mind wipes are not entirely effective: Echo appears to be slowly recovering some of her memories and personality, while one of the Dolls (Alpha) accidentally recovered the skills of all of the people he played and went rogue, threatening the Dollhouse. As the series continues, the plot switches away from the Actives' missions and becomes more complex. It focuses on the Dollhouse organisation itself, tensions within the management, and its real purpose, along with Agent Ballard's attempts to discover what is going on.
Compared with other series, Dollhouse is a slick production with a typically American glossiness about it. In contrast, the Canadian Orphan Black is grittier and darker but also much funnier, with the humour balancing what would otherwise be a rather grim tale. Dollhouse may lack much humour but the premise is intriguing and well-enough executed to hold the attention, and the script is intelligent. One long scene sticks in the mind in which Ballard confronts a rich man who hires Echo once a year to play "house"; Ballard is contemptuous but the rich man explains his motives and challenges Ballard's, and the viewer is left feeling rather sympathetic. I do like drama which goes beyond the usual Manichean good/evil contrast to show that the bad guys are not always evil and the motives of the good guys are not always pure.
The final episode of Season 1 – Epitaph One – is entirely different. It jumps forward to 2019 when the world is in chaos due to the uncontrolled spread of the mind-wiping technology. I understand from the Wiki summary that Season 2 then reverts to the present-day timeline to reveal how this catastrophe occurred, before the finale of Epitaph Two which jumps again to 2020. However, at the time of writing, Season 2 has not been released on DVD in the UK.


text:
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Corporate Idealism from the Inside Out: A Conversation with Christine Bader
Eva Dienel, Expert Contributor
Christine Bader, Former Human Rights Advisor, BSR
#Energy and Extractives, #Human Rights,
On Christine Bader's first helicopter ride, she flew high above West Papua's Bintuni Bay, craning her neck to watch flocks of birds rise from the trees. A newly-minted MBA with BP, Bader was in Indonesia to help resettle Tanah Merah, a community of 127 households, so that BP could build a liquefied natural gas plant, an operation that would involve clearing swaths of forest and erecting a series of shining steel plants to access 14.4 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves. Trying to envision the change in landscape, Bader started to feel uneasy. "For the first time, I was seeing what BP was in the business of doing, and it was literally making me sick," she writes in her new book, The Evolution of a Corporate Idealist: Girl Meets Oil (Bibliomotion), available today.
Such is the position of a corporate idealist: accepting the sometimes hard realities of global business in order to make it better. Bader's book provides an on-the-scenes look at the practice of CSR through her own experiences and interviews with dozens of other corporate idealists.
In a conversation with BSR, at which she serves as a senior advisor on human rights, Bader said she hopes her book will reach both corporate idealists and the general public. "Whenever there's a corporate disaster in the news, we tend to look at these companies as evil monoliths," she said. "Instead, we need to understand what's going on inside these companies, many of which have people working full time to prevent the very disasters that occurred. We need to understand why these people failed, and what we all need to do to help them succeed."
Here, she takes us on a tour of corporate idealism, from the progress the community has made, to the challenges it still faces, to a modest proposal that we ditch (some) spreadsheets in favor of storytelling to get more people on board with sustainability.
Tell us about that first helicopter flight over West Papua. You describe your experience of feeling conflicted about your work as a common one for "first time" corporate idealists.
That first trip to West Papua was when I saw for the first time what my company was doing to people and communities and the environment, and it surprised me. But I realized I was there in order to make those impacts better. A lot of the people I interviewed had similar experiences—walking into a factory for the first time and seeing horrible working conditions. It's part of the realization that the world is a messy, difficult place. If you're really going to have an impact, you need to see firsthand what the problems are and how complex they are.
One thing that is so powerful about your book is this collection of stories from other corporate idealists. Why is this focus on storytelling so important?
It is totally essential. That's why we see ads of one child who is starving in a developing country as opposed to just seeing statistics of how many hundreds of millions of children are hungry: People are moved to act by stories. In this field, we can spend lots of time on the business case, but what really moves people is when there's an individual person, when there's a story, when there's a community being affected by what they do. Spreadsheets are important, but they don't motivate people.
What does this mean for those who are struggling to make the "business case" for sustainability?
The biggest problem with the "business case" is that we are so hung up on making the business case! It is important, and every responsible person and company needs to think about costs and benefits. But the problem is that we lose sight of what we're talking about. So, if I need to spend $6 million next year on community investment projects and making sure that my security arrangements are consistent with international human rights principles so we aren't complicit in genocide, the response shouldn't be, "If we spend $3 million on that, does that mean there's a 50 percent chance we're going to be complicit in genocide?"
Part of being effective in making the business case is realizing that the business case is not the be-all and end-all—which is why we need to share stories and see the faces of the people we are impacting.
That said, often, the role of the corporate idealist is to translate the needs and expectations and desires of stakeholders into language and accountabilities that a companies can understand. I do think some rigor around costs is really important, but we can't lose sight of morality.
Criticism of CSR ranges from the work is just greenwashing to the focus on "doing good" distracts companies from their core obligation to shareholders. What's your take? Is CSR making a difference?
Of course it's having an impact: It's changing the way people talk about business and the way people do business. The UN Global Compact, for all the criticism it attracts—for not having enough teeth, for not being strict enough with its membership requirements—now has thousands of companies that are doing some reporting and thinking and talking about corporate social responsibility.
Getting so many CEOs and companies to be talking about corporate social responsibility is a big deal, and yes, those companies aren't doing enough, there aren't enough of those companies at the table, they're not acting fast enough, and some of them are talking about things that are superficial, but again, having people at the table is a really important start. As BSR President and CEO Aron Cramer has said, the trick is to get them to the table—and then move the table.
I also think we have made a lot of progress on how companies are thinking about their supply chains. Rana Plaza was an unthinkably tragic disaster, but there could have been 10 or 20 or 100 more Rana Plazas if we hadn't been doing the work we have been doing.
Companies are doing things that they have never done before: looking more deeply into their supply chains, engaging with NGOs rather than dismissing them as silly or irrelevant, and responding to enquiries that force these conversations internally. CSR people are an entry point to external people who want to raise issues, and they create and hold the space internally to have the conversation about the company's role in society.
In your epilogue, you publish what you call a "Manifesto for the Corporate Idealist," and No. 9 on that list is: "Transformational change is needed. Incremental change is good, too." How can incremental change really solve sustainability problems when the underlying financial incentives still encourage widespread unethical behavior (cost-cutting that leads to lower worker pay or shortcuts on safety, or the sale of new products that we don't need)?
If the argument is that CSR can't fix these big, systemic problems, are people really arguing that we shouldn't even do incremental work on them? We need people working on every angle of these problems. We need people working on a systemic level, and we need people who are tweaking on the edges because those tweaks might save some lives today. They might save some fingers and toes today. And would anybody really say that's not important?
Your book describes your time at BP as a sort of love affair: You fell for Big Oil, and the news of the Deepwater Horizon explosion broke your heart. How did you reconcile that experience with your belief that business can be a force for good?
I didn't recognize the BP that emerged in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. At first, I thought, That couldn't be my BP, that could not be the company that I spent nine years with. It simply didn't resemble the company that, in my experience, went above and beyond any law anywhere to protect the people, to protect the environment. And then I started to think, Is it my BP after all, and did I actually not learn anything in the nine years that I was there? Was I more marginalized than I thought? Were the CSR projects that I worked on more the anomalies than the norm?
I still don't have good answers to those questions, but I have realized that in a company with 100,000 people that's operating in 100 countries, there are a lot of different subcultures, and that's clearly part of the story. In a lot of these disasters, the company might have been doing great things in some places, but that doesn't mean that they don't have deep, serious problems in other parts of the business.
Deepwater Horizon happened under the tenure of Tony Hayward, after John Browne stepped down as CEO. Browne tried to do transformational things, and many of them did not come to fruition. With the benefit of hindsight, could his goals have been pursued differently to have more long-lasting impact?
John Browne did have a transformational vision about the role of business in society, and of course that would be hard to achieve; otherwise it wouldn't have been transformational! He set some very bold targets for reducing the company's greenhouse gas emissions, and the company met those ahead of schedule. He had a vision of the project I worked on in Indonesia—essentially refuting the resource curse, to see if a greenfield project could be a good thing for the communities, the region, and the country—and, so far, it looks pretty good.
He achieved some amazing things by stating some big, bold targets. I now know his BP was not perfect, and part of the exercise of writing this book was to reflect on this. Bad things happened while I was with the company. What do I think can and should have happened? The honest answer is, I don't entirely know. On the specific projects that I worked on, the innovative and transformative work that we did was pretty much at Lord Browne's direct command; that was my experience of his leadership. If I speculate about what should have or could have been done elsewhere in the company, I'm part of the problem of people who are Monday-morning quarterbacking from the outside.
You mentioned that part of your intent in writing this book is to reach beyond the CSR community—and, indeed, your book is already making strides, with a nice review in the New York Times Sunday business section. What's your sense of the current state of CSR: Is it enough? Do we have the right people working together in the right ways to make the progress we need to make?
No, it's not enough. The community is not big enough, and it's not strong enough. But it's moving in the right direction. The CSR movement needs to not just be the CSR movement. In BSR's Human Rights Working Group, which I facilitate, we've talked about having a session where everybody brings their lawyer or someone in finance or someone in procurement. For people in companies, we need to engage more people so the CSR function is not siloed. And for "the movement" more broadly, we need to make sure that we're not just talking to each other—that CEOs and CFOs are part of these conversations, that Wall Street is part of these conversations. We need people working on all aspects of the system.
Your book maps the trajectory of your career—from big business to the UN to academia and nonprofits. Any advice for corporate idealists based on your career path?
I left BP to work on the UN mandate on business and human rights, and for a while, being at the epicenter of international policymaking was fascinating. But I found myself gravitating back toward the company folks because, while I understood the importance of the language and of international instruments, I found myself empathizing with the people who were asking, "What do I need to do differently on Monday, because my business is still barreling ahead?"
For all of us who want to make an impact in the world, the decision about which angle to do that from is a deeply personal one. I get a lot of people asking me, "If I want to have a positive impact on society, should I go work at Amnesty International, or should I go work at a company?" And I don't think there's only one answer. We all thrive in different environments, and we all need to pick where we will be the most effective, and that can change over time.
One final question that I have to ask, since I am also a mother of twins and a runner, and I can't believe you were able to do all this: How did you give birth to twins, run a marathon, and a write a great book in the space of one year?
I was very deliberate about creating space for myself to take a break to reflect on what I had done for the previous 15 years. I saved a lot of money while I was working at BP, and I have a fabulously supportive husband and a great caregiver for our kids for 40 hours a week.
Writing the book was something I had promised myself that I would do, and I had to be proactive in making sure I was able to do it. Running the marathon turned out to be an amazing parallel activity. With both very big tasks, I had to do all of the things that project managers say you have to do with very big projects, which is to break it into very small pieces and understand what the plan is. With both of those tasks, I realized no one else was going to get them done for me. And because I had put so much work and thinking and planning into my efforts, I knew the question was not, Can I do it, but Will I?
#Energy and Extractives, #Human Rights
Davos 2020: Progress in a Time of Turmoil?
Aron Cramer, President and CEO, BSR
Entering Davos Week 2020, there is clearly a new climate for business.
Business Leadership in Defending Inclusive Societies and LGBTI Rights at Davos 2020
Salah Husseini, Associate Director, Human Rights, BSR
The Partnership for Global LGBTI Equality (PGLE) is pleased that the economic inclusion discussion in Davos will shine a light on the discrimination faced by millions of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people worldwide every day.
Our Top Sustainability Insights of 2019
Maria Bennici, Communications Coordinator, BSR; Aimee Louise Bataclan, Manager, Communications and Marketing, BSR
As 2019 comes to an end, we are taking a moment to look back at the news and initiatives that shaped the year. Our six most popular blog posts and reports exemplify the diversity of topics BSR works on, from gender equality to stakeholder engagement.
A Human Rights Review of the Facebook Oversight Board
Dunstan Allison-Hope, Managing Director, BSR; Michaela Lee, Manager, BSR; Joanna Lovatt, Associate, BSR
Today, BSR is releasing a human rights review to inform the governance and operations of the Facebook Oversight Board so that it is consistent with human rights-based approaches, principles, standards, and methodologies.
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The Afterimage of Patriarchy
No matter the tradition, religious oppression always seems to weigh heaviest on women. The burdens of male guardianship, clothing regulations, and modesty culture cast a shadow over the lives of countless women in Muslim-majority countries—and even in Muslim communities in the West. Ex-Muslim men and women do not experience their departures from Islam in the same ways, nor are their experiences with the faith identical. Gleanings from our survey make this reality evident.
The clearest example is the concept of "awrah," or private body parts. The Islamic obsession with reining in women's sexuality is evident in the term itself: in Pakistan, in fact, women are referred to by the closely-related Urdu term aurat, which literally means "defect" or "genitalia."
To put it mildly, dressing immodestly is one of the worst taboos a Muslim woman can breach. What happens, then, when a woman in a repressive environment frees herself from these shackles, newly aware that she can, in fact, wear shorts without risking eternal damnation?
Unsurprisingly, the answer is that, almost always—86% of the time for our female respondents—she has a difficult time adjusting. Men, who are unburdened by the shackles of modesty culture, can look forward to a much easier time: 74% of our male respondents had no trouble with the transition at all.
It is not shocking in this light that more women had trouble adjusting to premarital sex once they left Islam. This difference is modest—4%—but the wide gap in former behavior is undeniable. Far more women than men abstained altogether, 50% to 38%.
This dynamic was present in dating behavior, too. More women than men—10% to 6%—said they did not or could not date before marriage while they were practicing. Women were also less likely to say that their practice of Islam had not factored into their decisions on who to date or marry (19%) than men (29%). A majority of women (51%) had dated and planned to marry within the faith while only a plurality of men (46%) said the same, reflecting another patriarchal standard: if a man takes a non-Muslim wife, it may not be as serious a transgression as it would be if the roles were reversed. Men take brides of other faiths; women marry into other faiths.
Indeed, in all things, it seems women bore the burden of Islam's restrictions more heavily than men. They felt it concerning alcohol consumption, which a majority of men participated in and a majority of women abstained from before apostatizing. They felt it even after they broke ties with Islam, when 62% felt pressure from their families to "keep quiet" about their apostasy, as opposed to 50% of men. Women were also significantly more likely to experience difficulty adjusting to alcohol consumption (68%) than men (60%).
Our female respondents also said they thought of themselves as less devout than their male counterparts, and they did not pray as often. But this is no isolated result: Islam holds a unique distinction as one of the only world religions whose women are not generally more devout than its men.
Our respondents took this tendency further: men reported greater levels of devoutness while they were religious. They were slightly more likely to report praying "as often as possible" or "all the time" (47%) than women (43%). Conversely, women were significantly more likely to say that while they were practicing, they considered themselves less devout than the rest of their family (42% to men's 31%).
In case after case, women are born on the wrong side of God's affection and then find it difficult to dispel that burden, even as they come to recognize God does not exist. Is it any surprise that they find themselves less engaged with Islam?
The sexism revealed here likely has real implications on who stays in Islam, who leaves it, and why. Among the women who told their stories in the survey, a recurrent theme emerged: the realization that they did not need to feel guilt for their sex, that they could live as freely as men without being treated like children. But the feelings of inferiority, the inhibitions so often inculcated in women but spared to men, the psychological struggle merely to exist as an autonomous human being—these can and do linger even after women leave their religious lives behind.
What it's Like to be an Ex-Muslim Immigrant
Conventional wisdom goes that the children of immigrants will become more naturally integrated into their societies than their parents. Exposed to their country's culture from …
The Ideas "Poisoning" Young Muslim Minds
"Our youth are being corrupted by moral decay." So goes the refrain of traditionalists and moral crusaders the world over. The supposed culprits are many, …
The Politics of Apostasy
When 16-year-old French teenager Mila Orriols faced death threats and harasment after publicly calling Islam a "shitty religion," it ignited an argument across France. Mila, …


text:
Why You Shouldn't Buy an Electric Riding Lawn Mower
Josh Hendrickson
Josh Hendrickson is the Editor in Chief of Review Geek and is responsible for the site's content direction. He has worked in IT for nearly a decade, including four years spent repairing and servicing computers for Microsoft. He's also a smart home enthusiast who built his own smart mirror with just a frame, some electronics, a Raspberry Pi, and open-source code. Read more...
@canterrain
Aug 19, 2022, 9:00 am EST | 7 min read
Josh Hendrickson / Review Geek
Riding lawn mowers are great for making quick work of lawn care. But they're loud, jerky, and chug through oil and gas. An electric riding lawn mower promises to solve all of that. But after two years of owning one, I'm here to say don't make the mistake of buying one. At least not yet.
I've owned a variety of lawn mowers, both of the push and riding variety, and have tried both gas and electric options. I switched over to electric mowers years ago, first with my push mowers and then my rider. And while I absolutely loved my electric riding lawn mower in the beginning, now I'm sorry I bought it. The purchase feels like a mistake, and it's all down to using old technology.
The Benefits of an Electric Mower
The Problem With Most Electric Riding Lawn Mowers
The Future of Electric Riding Lawn Mowers
RELATEDIs an Electric Lawn Mower Right for You?
Although it's easy to think an electric mower sounds like a dumb idea, that's not true. Range really isn't as much of an issue as you might assume. While corded electric mowers were once a thing, battery tech has come a long way. If you have an electric push mower, chances are a single battery can get through the average 1/4th acre yard found in the U.S., and if not, you can swap it out with another battery on the fly.
It helps that companies selling electric push mowers also typically sell other yard tools, like weed whips, that use the same batteries. It's a lot like power tools at this point—stick with a brand, buy more batteries, and you'll have plenty of juice for the job. And you get other benefits along the way.
For one, whether we're talking push or riding, electric mowers are much quieter thanks to skipping the traditional engine. Depending on your machine, the loudest part will be the blades themselves; you may not even need hearing protection as you do with conventional mowers. In the case of my riding lawn mower, I once helped out a neighbor who ran out of gas partway through a mowing job. When I started mowing, she grabbed my attention as though something was wrong. It turned out she thought I hadn't started the blades on the machine because it was so quiet.
An electric mower is easier to use, too. No seriously. Think about all the times you've pulled the chain of a gas mower only to have to pull it again and then a third time. If you're lucky, that's all it took. Even with a riding lawn mower, you've probably dealt with getting everything set just right, so it starts when you turn the key. Electric mowers are nothing that. You push a button, and it just goes. Every single time, assuming you remembered to charge the battery.
On top of all that, while an electric mower is typically more expensive to purchase than a gas mower, it's also less costly to use. Electricity is cheaper than gas, especially right now, and you won't have to deal with oil. Depending on where you live, it'll cost you pennies to mow your lawn with an electric mower.
When I first purchased my electric riding lawn mower, I loved it for all these reasons. It starts quickly, it's quiet, it doesn't cost much to run, and it felt like I finished mowing the lawn faster than with my old gas-riding lawn mower.
But two years later, I'm not so in love with it anymore.
The first year and a half I owned my riding lawn mower, I loved the thing. But starting this summer, I changed my mind. In fact, I can't in good conscience advise anyone to buy an electric riding mower right now. You should not buy one at all. You're better off with a gas mower, at least for the next few years.
Why did I change my mind so much? The batteries. When you buy an electric push mower, you get a nice set of easy-to-change long-lasting lithium-ion batteries. But that's not the case with an electric riding mower. Instead, most currently use a Sealed Lead Acid (SLA) battery. You're probably already familiar with SLA batteries—there's one in your car. Yes, it's the same kind of battery your car uses. And chances are, if you have a gas riding mower, it also uses one as well!
But there's a big difference between how your gas riding mower, your car, and an electric riding mower use that battery. In very basic terms with the former two, the battery starts the engine before the gas components take over to keep things going. After that, the battery powers other electrical functions, like those useless headlights on your mower.
Electric riding mowers are entirely reliant on SLA batteries. In the case of my machine, it houses four SLA batteries under the seat, and they all work together to provide 48 volts or about an "hour of run time." My mower promises to get through an acre before needing a recharge, but I can tell you from my experience that's inaccurate. It's probably something closer to 3/4ths of an acre.
So what's bad about that? Well, SLA batteries are, frankly, terrible. They don't last long at all and are easy to damage. They work well enough in a car (though some people might disagree) because most people drive their vehicles daily. But you probably don't mow your lawn every day, and you definitely don't during the winter.
And therein lies the problem. Buy any electric mower with an SLA battery, and you'll find heavy warnings:
Always connect the mower to the charger when the unit is not in use. If it is not possible to leave the mower charger connected, make sure to charge the batteries fully at least once a month.
Unlike other battery tech, SLA batteries need to remain charged, and letting them drop below 50% can damage them. They don't do well with cold either. Ignore those warnings, and you can kill batteries. Or the batteries may not hold a charge anymore. We tried our best to keep to those rules, but our batteries aren't working correctly two years later.
I think range issues ended up killing the batteries. Our mower is rated for a full acre before needing a recharge, but it's realistically closer to 3/4ths an acre. We have a half acre of land, so just mowing the lawn regularly drained the battery below 50%. Again, going below 50% can deplete an SLA battery's recharge life.
From the information I'm now getting from the battery indicator display, I can tell two of the four batteries are dead. That tracks, as when I get the mower to start (it now takes several tries), I only get half the range I had when I first bought the mower. Two years in, and my electric mower needs two new SLA batteries—that'll cost around $480 to swap out. And doing so requires a tricky procedure that entails taking apart the mower, dragging a heavy tray back, avoiding toppling the mower over in the process, then avoiding shorting out the system since the four batteries are tied together. It's not pretty.
I spent over $2,000 on a mower that's now half as useful as it once was, and I'll spend hundreds more getting it back into shape. Only to have to repeat the process two years from now. That same mower now costs even more than when I first purchased it. A gas mower would be better. You might be wondering if better electric riding mowers are on the way, and the answer is yes. But it's not all good news.
Obviously, the biggest complaint and downfall of most current electric riding lawnmowers is the reliance on SLA batteries. And if that's the case, the solution is, in theory, pretty easy—switch to Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries. You probably own devices that already use Li-ion batteries. Do you have a smartphone, cordless drill, true wireless earbuds, or an electric vehicle? All of those use Li-ion batteries.
It's not surprising that so many gadgets made that choice either because Li-ion solves many of the problems plaguing SLA batteries. It doesn't damage them to drain the battery to zero (at least not as much), you can keep them charged all the time (modern tech prevents "overcharging"), it doesn't suffer from "memory issues," and as much it's generally longer lasting. With a Li-ion battery-powered electric mower, you won't have to worry about maintaining charge as much or plugging in over the winter.
So what's the catch? Price. Electric riding mowers are already expensive. You'll pay over $2,000 for a model that promises to mow just one acre on a charge, more if you need something that can handle a bigger yard. Compared to other similar riding mowers, that's a 20% premium. But if you want to buy a Li-ion electric riding mower, the price goes way up.
Ryobi only recently started selling its first Li-ion options, and the starting price is a wallet-busting $6,000. That giant price gets you a mower that only promises to mow around an acre of land on a single charge. And remember, companies tend to overpromise and underdeliver on charge claims. When it comes time to recharge, you'll need to wait an hour and a half to get back to a full charge. You can buy a model with more range, but each step up adds another $1,000 to the price.
Other mowers either go for a similar price or come from lesser-known manufacturers. The most affordable entry I can find is a Craftsman, tipping the scales at $3,000. But scroll through the reviews, and any comments not tagged as a promotion are pretty negative.
For that kind of money, you can buy professional-grade gear that'll cut your lawn in a fraction of the time.
The bottom line is until prices come down and enough time has passed to prove reliability; you probably shouldn't drop a ton of cash on a Li-ion electric riding mower. Push mowers, on the other hand, are a solid bet. Those work well and won't break the bank. For now, electric riding mowers just aren't worth the money, despite their benefits. They'll either cost way too much up front, or cost too much down the road as you replace batteries again and again.
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Josh Hendrickson is the Editor in Chief of Review Geek and is responsible for the site's content direction. He has worked in IT for nearly a decade, including four years spent repairing and servicing computers for Microsoft. He's also a smart home enthusiast who built his own smart mirror with just a frame, some electronics, a Raspberry Pi, and open-source code. Read Full Bio »


text:
FBS to FCS: Montana State's Kaegun Williams ready to prove himself
By: Ashley Washburn
BOZEMAN — Since its introduction four years ago, the NCAA Transfer Portal has forever changed the scope of how college football teams not only build their rosters but more importantly, it's given players the chance to manage their own careers.
Sometimes that can come at considerable risk, but for others, it can present a second chance.
For instance, there has been a growing trend in college football with players transferring from the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) to the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS). According to HERO Sports, more than 500 players made the jump this offseason.
Montana State welcomed five of those transfers this fall, one of them being San Diego State graduate transfer Kaegun Williams.
"I just wanted one more chance because I felt like at San Diego State I didn't really have a chance to show my true potential, so I think that I'll be able to do that here," the running back explained.
Williams spent four seasons at San Diego State primarily serving in a backup role rushing for 268 yards and two touchdowns in 2021.
While the Aztecs did graduate their top back in Greg Bell, after an official visit this spring, Williams couldn't help but be drawn to Bobcat Football.
"Seeing the success that they had last year in the season I kind of knew that was what I wanted to go for when I was looking for a team and just the core base that they have laid for the foundation is something that we kind of had at San Diego State," Williams said.
With All-American Isaiah Ifanse still month-to-month in his recovery, it's presented an opportunity for Williams to make an early impact – one already filled with high expectations.
"We wouldn't have brought him in here if we didn't think he could make his mark," Bobcats head football coach Brent Vigen stated. "How that's going to look volume I can't say right now, but I think to this point going back to the spring of what we hoped we would be able to get in Kaegun, I think we feel really good that that's on track."
However, there are still other backs to consider like Elijah Elliot who held a significant workload last fall, as well as incoming freshman Jared White.
"We have a lot of competition right now between the five guys that are out there and we have 'X' number of carries to be doled out come September third," Vigen explained. "It still remains seen of how that's going to work."


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text:
Q: Use (remember picture, overlay) TikZ picture to design parts, chapters, ToC, Bibliography, Index What I have
I am designing the format of the parts and chapters in my document using TikZ picture, with remember picture, overlay option, like this:

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{positioning}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{color,xcolor}
\usepackage{graphicx}
\definecolor{bggray}{RGB}{215,215,215}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}[remember picture, overlay]
    \node[below right=4.8cm and 0cm of current page.north east] (a) {};
    \fill[bggray] (current page.north west) rectangle (a);
    \node[below right=1cm and 2cm of current page.north west,color=blue!90] {\huge\bfseries Part I};
    \node[below right=2.5cm and 2cm of current page.north west,color=blue]{\fontsize{30pt}{30pt}\selectfont\scshape Foundations};
    \node[below left=1cm and 3cm of current page.north east] (pic1) {\includegraphics[width=3cm]{0.png}};
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}

What I want
Now I have some problems:

*

*Overall customization I want to use this design for all parts and chapters (actually in chapters I will change a bit in colors and sizes). This should satisfy

*

*The commands to use the design, like \part{} and \chapter{} in normal design, should be used simply. I prefer something like
\mypart{Foundations}{abc.jpg}
\mychapter{Foundations}{abc.jpg}

*The parts and chapters should be numbered as usual.

*There should be contents referring to the parts/chapter in the Table of Contents, and if I use hyperref package, the ToC contents should be clickable.

*The Table of Contents, Bibliography, Index, etc. should be of the same design. In other word, I want
\tableofcontents

to be as
\mychapter*{Table of Contents}{} % There will be no pictures included

and to output the result

by using \tableofcontents only.

Some remarks
I have read this question: Problem using a tikzpicture in \titleformat, but that is not what I mean, because the question is about normal TikZ picture in title design, but not about remember picture, overlay TikZ picture in title design.
You can either help me to solve my problem, or edit the accepted answer in the attached question so that it suits the requirements well.
All your helps will be highly appreciated!
Thank you in advance!

Edit 2
Following @marmot's answer, and the answer actually almost help me solve the issue. However, the ToC became
Chapter 0
CONTENTS

How to delete Chapter 0?

A: Here is an attempt. As for instance explained in this answer, by loading the titlesec package with the explicit key, you can make the title part of a tikzpicture, which can of course be an overlay.
\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{positioning}
\usepackage[explicit]{titlesec}
\usepackage{tikz}

\titleformat{\part}
{}
{}
{0em}
{\begin{tikzpicture}[remember picture, overlay]
    \node[below right=4.8cm and 0cm of current page.north east] (a) {};
    \fill[bggray] (current page.north west) rectangle (a);
    \node[below right=1cm and 2cm of current page.north west,color=blue!90]
    {\huge\bfseries Part \thepart};
    \node[below right=2.5cm and 2cm of current page.north
    west,color=blue]{\fontsize{30pt}{30pt}\selectfont\scshape #1};
    \node[below left=1cm and 3cm of current page.north east] (pic1)
    {\includegraphics[width=3cm]{example-image-duck}};
\end{tikzpicture}}

\definecolor{bggray}{RGB}{215,215,215}
\begin{document}
\part{Introduction}

Some text

\part{More stuff}
\end{document}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Eastenders star Jacqueline Jossa breaks silence after reports emerge of split from husband Dan Osborne
She's weeks away from giving birth
(Image: Instagram/Jacqueline Jossa)
Jacquline Jossa has broken her silence since reports emerged that she has supposedly split from husband Dan Osborne.
The pair have a three-year-old daughter together and Jacqueline is currently eight months pregnant.
The couple have been together since 2014 and tied the knot just last summer.
EastEnders actress Jacqueline Jossa and TOWIE star Dan Osborne split just weeks before birth of second child
Taking to Instagram, the actress has spoken out after rumours swirled of the couple's supposed split after she had a day of pampering.
Wearing a set of new, fluffy eyelashes, she urged fans to focus on something "positive."
She said: "Guys, let's talk about something positive. Can you all vote for me please and everything EastEnders but mainly me... thanks."
In the video, she appeared to wipe away a tear from her eye.
A source told the Sun: "Dan and Jacqueline are on a break right now. He's living at a friend's house.
"He went away to the bootcamp in Marbella. She's 31 weeks, almost 32 weeks pregnant. She wants him around.
"They still want things to work out, but they're living apart right now."
Jacqueline recently admitted her pregnancy has been very difficult.
"The first 16 weeks were horrendous," she told Closer. "I was being sick almost every morning."
"With Ella – apart from not having periods – I wouldn't have known I was pregnant until I was about six months along.
Jacqueline Jossa
Dan Osborne admits to mistakes
Jac speaks out about Dan's cheat claims
No more kids for Jacqueline Jossa
Dan and Jacqueline from the beginning


text:
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Call 978.265.6526 today for an appointment to view available spaces in this creative and dynamic property.
— Amesbury, Massachusetts' most innovative commercial space offered to small business owners and creative arts entrepreneurs.
14 Cedar Street Studios has office, art studio, and light industrial units available from 200-3,500 sq. ft., at affordable rates. Work within a creative community of architects, designers, engineers, artist and entrepreneurs in an historic mill building that was renovated using sustainable building practices.
see floor plans and directory
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Congratulations to our partners at AVEBE who have won the Most Novel Protein Award from Bridge2Food for Perfectasol D520 in Pizza Cheese.
With the product Perfectasol D520 Avebe is the winner of the Most Novel Protein Ingredient Award!
The award was presented during the Bridge2Food Protein Summit 2018, world's largest protein platform, on 25 October in Lille (France).
Perfectasol D520 is a unique combination of potato starch and potato protein and makes it possible to make a 100% plant-based pizza cheese. This 'topping' has the same properties as dairy-based cheese; well shreddable and sliceable with excellent melting properties and the 'stretch' of mozzarella. Perfectasol D520 has a neutral taste and colour and is 'clean label' (no e-numbers)….
Daymer are currently working on a Gluten Free & Egg Free cake concept.
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