On The Good Place, Michael reveals the whole system to the humans, as well as the Jeremy Bearimy, nonlinear reality of time in the afterlife. On the podcast, Marc Israel (new rabbi on the team!) helps Jon make room for the idea that teshuvah might require something different than a Maimonidean awareness of past experiences in sequence of which we are consciously aware. (Jon’s working title for the episode, before talking to Marc, had been: “Jeremy Is Jewish, Bearimy Not So Much?”)
Texts and Concepts We talk a lot in this episode about the idea of “there is no earlier and there is no later in the Torah.” We discuss it in the context of a narrative sequence in the Torah’s book of Exodus, broadly from chapter 19 (the revelation at Mt. Sinai) through the end of Exodus. Specifically, we address the interesting fact that after the Ten Commandments are spoken, Moshe climbs the mountain to get instructions for building a Sanctuary. His return coincides with a rebellion, centered around the request for the creation of an idol, the Golden Calf. After the episode, the Torah continues by implementing the building of the Sanctuary. Were the instructions actually given later but for some reason recorded earlier in the Torah, and if so what is that reason? The whole sequence is in Exodus 31-35.
In a more Kabbalistic/mystical, spiritual, or chasidic reading, the whole Torah is a series of metaphors (even dreams) about states of the soul, any of which could be real at any moment.
Deuteronomy 11:26-28 (click here for source and wider context) See, I give before you today blessing and curse. The blessing: That you listen to the mitzvot/charges of Adonai your God which I am charging/commanding you today. And the curse: If you do not listen to the mitzvot of Adonai your God, and turn away from the path that I am charging/commanding you today, to walk after other gods whom you have not known.
“Jeremy Bearimy” Song, By Clem
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