Posted by The Husband

If anyone is reading this blog then let me warn you that the following post will be heretical, heathenly, and hopefully, hilarious.

This weekend on shabbat, I was pondering the parashat hashavua and I decided that God has a lot in common with Tony Soprano. This (past) week's parasha was parashat Ki Tisa. In that portion of the Torah, there are a few passages that relate how God will punish the Nation of Israel if they do not follow His Law. Concurrently, though not on shabbat, I was reviewing the last season of The Sopranos in preparation for The Last season of The Sopranos which will return to television (and my computer) around the middle of April. For anyone unfamiliar with The Sopranos, the show is about a mob boss named Tony Soprano and his relationship with his family, therapist, and crew.

In the last episode that I watched, there was a side story about how one of Tony's front companies, Barone Sanitation, was being sold by the son of the owner. The owner had killed himself thereby passing on the business to his son. The son was never informed of his father's connection with organized crime and only wanted to sell the business for his mother. The part of the story that is germaine to this particular discussion is that the son gets involved in the shady business side of his father's business and ends up getting threatened, beaten, and then shaken down by one of Tony's own captains. Of course, at the same time, Tony is assuring the kid's mother that "nothing is going to happen to him, I swear."

So how is God like Tony Soprano? I'm glad you asked.

Go back a few thousand years. God does a favor for the Nation of Israel. They are slaves in Egypt and pretty miserable and God offers them a way out. "I'll take care of the Egyptians," says God, "and I will make a nation of you." Pretty good offer. "All you have to do," God says, putting His (figurative) arm around the pathetic slaves, "is promise to worship me and obey my laws."

Now the slaves, who probably were ready to do anything about that time, say, sure, what the hell, we'll obey, we'll listen, just get us the hell out of here. So God does. He sends a couple of His goons to break a few kneecaps, smash a few windows, and smite some firstborn sons. Israel rejoices and runs like hell to get out of Dodge. God sends one of his captains, Moses, to lead the newly freed slaves to the mountain of Sinai where God explains his business plan. Along the way, God gives the nation some seed money, in the form of manna, and helps them with some pesky legal troubles by splitting the Red Sea and drowning the opposing council.

God business plan is simple. "Here's My rules. 10 basic rules and 603 more to come. Follow the rules, do what I ask, and I'll protect you and make you prosperous. If you have a problem, don't take it to any other god. Don't go outside the family. Take it to me. I will take care of it. At some point in the future, I might ask you to do Me a favor. There's this nasty other family called the Amalekites who are trying to bust in on My action and I may need you to clean up that mess. Don't go to the cops, they won't help you. Other nations won't listen to you and will turn their hearts and hand against you. But I am your God. I will help you. I will make it alright. Of course, if you should happen to go against my wishes, I will smite you and your children and your children's children until you come back to Me and beg My forgiveness. But don't worry, I'm sure you are smart enough to do the Right thing."

So here we are, the children of the Nation of Israel who made a deal with God to protect and deliver them. God doesn't really talk to us anymore, but we're still obligated to Him. He hasn't done much in the protection racket lately, although occasionally He steps in and stops us from being totally annihilated. But we're still paying our dues and paying for the deal that our forebears made with God. And, according to the terms of the deal, if we don't kick up to the Big Boss, we are gonna wish we were never born.

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