Soundscape #11: "I'm A Non-Practising Jew"

Michael Hinkle, B.F.F. (Best Friends Forever), 2005.

"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death." (Albert Einstein, "Religion and Science," New York Times Magazine, 1930).

I can imagine how worked up some people may get when they come across Nietzsche and his "god is dead" in Thus Spake Zarathustra, but I think he is more against organised religion than religion per se when he likens worshippers to herds of mindless sheep. I have nothing against religion, mind, even though I'm an agnostic. But I think that to be religious, one has to open both mind and heart; i.e. one has to be spiritual first. It doesn't necessarily work the other way though.

Agnosticism is often confused with atheism, but if you really think about it, agnostics do not not believe that there is no god; only that one cannot know if a god exists or not; there is no such knowledge made available to us (or we are not equipped to process this knowledge, should it exist). Literally, agnostic means without (from the greek a) knowledge (greek gnosis). Most people think that agnosticism is a weak cousin of atheism (since atheism rejects or denies the existence of god outright) but as I've once pointed out to a (Christian) friend, it will be much harder to convince an agnostic of god's existence precisely because his/her basic premise is already the fact that there cannot be perceivable evidence (that god exists) or that man is not equipped with the right instruments to process this evidence, should it really exist.

Spirituality is different. Even if you don't believe in god, there is no reason to think that there isn't something magical happening around us everyday. The miracle of life, of animals, of plants, of your friends and family and everything else in between, points to something beyond and outside of ourselves.

Track Listing:
1. (0:00) DeVotchKa - Do You Think There's A Heaven (Buy Little Miss Sunshine OST)
2. (1:23) Wilco - Jesus, Etc (Buy Yankee Hotel Foxtrot)
3. (4:75) Iron And Wine - Naked As We Came (Buy Our Endless Numbered Days)
4. (7:07) David Bazan - Fewer Broken Pieces (Buy Fewer Moving Parts)
5. (10:32) Iron And Wine/Calexico - He Lays In The Reins (Buy In The Reins)
6. (13:75) Jenny Lewis With The Watson Twins - Born Secular (Buy Rabbit Fur Coat)
7. (18:82) Sufjan Stevens - For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fatherless In Ypsilanti (Buy Greetings From Michigan)
8. (22:39) The New Pornographers - The Laws Have Changed (Buy Electric Version)
9. (25:65) Yo La Tengo - Demons (Buy Genius + Love = Yo La Tengo)
10. (28:83) Rilo Kiley - The Absence of God (Buy More Adventurous)
11. (32.38) Morrissey - I Have Forgiven Jesus (Buy You Are The Quarry)
12. (35:79) Beulah - Me And Jesus Don't Talk Anymore (Buy Yoko)
13. (40:30) Interpol - Evil (Buy Antics)
14. (43:65) Portishead - Wandering Star (Buy Dummy)
15. (48:21) Radiohead - Where I End And You Begin (The Sky Is Falling In) (Buy Hail To The Thief)