Old Interviews With Leonard Nimoy About Judaism

Trek Clippings has a wealth of old articles about Star Trek--if you're a fan, you'll want to read them all! But these two gems about Nimoy and his relationship with Judaism caught my eye:

In 1967's Banned in Boston Nimoy talks about the prejudices he faced growing up as one of the few Jewish kids in his Boston neighborhood.

And in another article from 1967, Nimoy talks about his Orthodox parents, plus his own thoughts about observance, prayer and raising kids in Judaism. I especially liked the way Nimoy described his mom's relationship with God--she would even ask God to make sure her kids remembered to brush their teeth!

My Mom's like that: she calls for divine aid in any and all situations. And she's a nice Catholic girl, not a Jew, so apparently this trait crosses religious boundaries. She passed that trait onto me, for which I'm grateful. It allows me to bitch, moan and plead with God about everything...

Enjoy the articles!

It's Candlelighting Already?

It's time to light the candles? But I'm still worn out from Yom Kippur. Heck, I think even God's still worn out from Yom Kippur. All those prayers--over and over again. (Why say something once when you can say it twenty times?)

Don't mistake me; Yom Kippur was powerful. Sort of the way a punch in the gut is powerful...it can shock you out of your own skin and force you to open up your eyes. It really is worthwhile to be in shul the whole day. Still, by the time we reached that last silent Amidah I was done. I just closed my eyes and said, "HaShem, you know the words..."

And now we're back to Shabbat...so there are even more prayers to come!

Of course, it'll be a partially observant Shabbat for me, as usual. I'll light the candles and have a Shabbat dinner and make it to shul tomorrow--but I doubt I'll lay off the computer or the phone tonight. But right now I'm ok with that. Sometimes observance is a matter of baby steps.

Shabbat Shalom!