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Twilight screenwriter, Melissa Rosenberg, tells the Jewish Journal that "her" vampires are not like any others. "They're kosher vampires," Rosenberg says, laughing.

To call them "kosher" may be a stretch, but the leading figure, Edward Cullen, and his family are all "vegetarians" -- which in this context means they don't drink human blood, though they do eat animals -- and therefore they are not killers, but hunters. Their anomalous way of life, in which diet is not simply a carnal drive but a moral choice, makes them outsiders, not only from the world of mortals but also from the larger vampire culture, who see the Cullens as a threat to the vampire establishment. The story's human protagonist, Bella, idolizes the Cullens, and, you could say, sees them as a light unto the vampire nation.

Well, what do you think? Are these vampires really different? Are all vampires "Jewish", in the sense that they are eternal outsiders, as Rosenberg speculates? I am not sure, but I do know that any time you watch a movie, and ask who is the "Jewish character", you will learn a great deal about what being Jewish means -- not to the character, but to yourself. Now that's always intersting.

This should be a no-brainer, right? Well for a significant number of Orthodox Jews, it's not so obvious and that fact speaks volumes to the thinking of many in that community. Interestingly, it is precisely those who think the answer should be 'no' that are more accurate about the historical origins of the holiday, and I actually have great respect for that even if I totally disagree with the conclusion at which they arrive. But what really makes this question interesting, is that how one answers it, is a kind of Rorschach test which reveals how one thinks about Jews living in a largely non-Jewish culture.

The arguments against observing Thanksgiving are all based on Leviticus 18:3, which reads, "You shall not copy the practices of the land of Egypt where you dwelt, or of the land of Canaan to which I am taking you; nor shall you follow their laws." Some halakhic (Jewish legal) authorities rule that observing Thanksgiving violates this rule while others do not. The issue which divides them is generally whether they see Thanksgiving as religious or not.

Those who embrace Thanksgiving, do so on the basis that it was "always a secular holiday", to which anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of history responds, "are you kidding?!"

Any time the citizens of a state, particularly a democracy, invoke their faith to pray for the demise of those they oppose politically, we should be concerned. When the call for such prayers becomes one of the most popular Google searches in the country, we should shake, especially those of us who believe in God, prayer and the Bible. Psalm 109, verse 8, went viral this morning in just that way.

Among the world's top Google searches today are phrases that contain the words "Psalms 109 8", and "Psalm 109 8 prayer for Obama". For those of you who may not know that particular verse, it reads "May his days be few, may another take over his position." And before anyone excuses this toxic use of scripture as nothing more than the wish that President Obama not be re-elected to a second term of office, the next verse in the psalm reads, "May his children be orphans and his wife a widow".

This short article by Robin Yassin-Kassab, makes an intriguing claim about the wisdom of seeing the Bible, or any sacred literature, as mythology.

Myth doesn't mean untruth any more than a great novel does. Myth is heightened truth. A myth is perhaps more 'true' than reality because reality unfiltered is unstructured and unexplained. The fact that God uses human myths to talk to humans need not perturb the religious.

The idea that a myth is something different from a lie, and possibly more important than a simple factual truth, is not new even if it remains provocative and that is why I share this with you. Is this so different a claim than that made by the Sages of 2,000 years ago, that "the Torah was given in human language"? The idea that the infinite One could reveal in human language the full meaning of God's will is actually pretty arrogant on our part.

The article itself is overly simplistic and far too impressed with the results of a simple comparative of religions approach which notes the similarities of the Gilgamesh epic and the story of creation as found in the Hebrew Bible. But the larger issue of our ability to think bigger about the stories we hold to be sacred endures.

Ultimately, this author asks us to think about how big these stories are, and how the bigger they are, the more elastic their meaning will be. In a world of endless battles between too many who either see literal truth or no truth at all in the Bible, those are important questions to ask and to answer.

What do you think?

The short answer is almost certainly not. But after yesterday's column in the New York Times, many people are asking, and not without some justification. In writing about Goldman Sachs, the famously/infamously successful investment bank, Dowd dredged up ancient and dangerous motifs which have inspired hatred of Jews for two thousand years.

Comparing the employees of Goldman Sachs to "the same self-interested sorts Jesus threw out of the temple", and also linking blood lust and GS bankers' lust for money, Ms. Dowd stepped over a very important line -- one which when crossed in the past cost thousands, if not millions of lives. At the very least she demonstrated how deeply the metaphors of hate are rooted even in the lives of some well meaning people, and that alone is deeply disturbing.

The story of Jesus driving the money changers, all presumed to be Jewish, out of the Temple was used for centuries to justify the pernicious linkage of Jews and money, and helped Christians to kill Jews with precisely the glee Ms. Dowd ascribes to Goldman CEO, Lloyd Blankfein's approach to making money. It was also used to justify driving Jews from their homes since, like the money changers in Jerusalem, they had no place in God's house or, as the interpretation ran, in any decent house.