Aaargh!

I thought I'd write another entry, and I'd written a number of paragraphs, but then I wanted to put in the word "pinata" (with a ~ above the n), and I tried to use a number code to see if it would work. Unfortunately, it sent the web browser back a page, and I lost it all.

Why was I going to put "pinata", you ask? I've lost the desire to try to write it again.

From my Jewish Law seminar professor:
"Jewish law is a duty driven legal system
American law is a rights driven legal system"

He acknowledged that duties and rights are often found together, so that practically, it makes no difference. If a husband has a duty to support his wife, another way of saying the same thing is to say that a wife has a right to be supported by her husband.

But while American courts will only decide whose rights win (in a civil case, does defendent have to pay, or not?), in the Jewish legal tradition, rabbis have a tradition of being able to say to a defendant: no, the law doesn't require you to pay the plaintiff, but it would be a good thing (a mitzvah) for you to help them.

From another class, Law and Mental Health. One of the professors is a JD/MD psychiatrist, who said yesterday that one of the most fascinating and difficult issues in psychiatry for her is religion. If someone holds crazy beliefs, maybe they're crazy. But if that same person holds these beliefs along with a group of other people as part of an established tradition, then he/she is religious. The stories of the foundings of most religions sound crazy to a nonreligious person. An angel named Moroni came, some tablets buried, special lenses?

It reminded me of an incident when I was a lot younger, and I first learned of the Muslim belief that Mohammed physically ascended into heaven, saw many things, talked with prophets, and then descended back to earth. I asked my brother: do they really believe all that? And my brother said that when Muslims learn that Christians believe Jesus was crucified, was dead for three days, then came back, and ascended into heaven, it sounds just as crazy to them.

So is it not the craziness of the thoughts themselves, but rather the means by which one acquired them? Is this the position in psychiatry: that if you got your crazy beliefs by chemical imbalances (or brain tumors or whatever), then you have a mental illness, but if you got your crazy beliefs from a religious group, then you're religious?

Unrelated to the above: I'm flying to Washington D.C. at the end of this month, for a job fair that'll be held there. I'm flying out Thursday morning and returning Monday night. Most of my classmates are doing on campus interviews, and getting callbacks and such. I, on the other hand, have not been very proactive as of yet. Hopefully, the job fair will turn out well.

Much prayer needed for me! Not just about jobs, but about my own character flaws (some new ones I've just learned about, along with the old ones), workload, my witness in school. Lots more.