CLAL Special Features

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Jewish Public Forum Seminar: “What Is Religion For?”
November 19, 2001 

Pre-Seminar Response to the Question:

“What Is Religion For?”

By Shari Cohen 

I have been preoccupied, since September 11, with how we, both individually and collectively, think about the future imaginatively in a period when crisis and fear are the prevailing sentiments.  It has a lot to do with individual efficacy in the face of daunting uncertainties.   People respond to uncertainty in so many ways—they buy large amounts of Cipro; they shift their world views; they get religion; they commit suicide; they change their careers.  But I want to know how we can stimulate and motivate a response that says: “We have not been asking hard or big enough questions; we have not been transcending our individual professional concerns to add up our incredible knowledge and expertise. At the same time we have not been as intellectually humbled as we might be.”  Maybe this really means embracing psychic uncertainty in a way that we find very uncomfortable.  This might require that we think about how we use our time differently; we might have to think very differently about the networks we are or are not part of; we might need to explore other modes of understanding the world (and some of these might be religious).  

So the question I would ask is: How do we maintain a focus on imagination and the longer view at a time when most of us are preoccupied with survival?

 


    

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