Why Not Orthodox or Conservative Judaism?
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2024/07/11
According to some semi-reputable sources gathered in a listing here, Rick G. Rosner may have among America’s, North America’s, and the world’s highest measured IQs at or above 190 (S.D. 15)/196 (S.D. 16) based on several high range test performances created by Christopher Harding, Jason Betts, Paul Cooijmans, and Ronald Hoeflin. He earned 12 years of college credit in less than a year and graduated with the equivalent of 8 majors. He has received 8 Writers Guild Awards and Emmy nominations, and was titled 2013 North American Genius of the Year by The World Genius Directory with the main “Genius” listing here.
He has written for Remote Control, Crank Yankers, The Man Show, The Emmys, The Grammys, and Jimmy Kimmel Live!. He worked as a bouncer, a nude art model, a roller-skating waiter, and a stripper. In a television commercial, Domino’s Pizza named him the “World’s Smartest Man.” The commercial was taken off the air after Subway sandwiches issued a cease-and-desist. He was named “Best Bouncer” in the Denver Area, Colorado, by Westwood Magazine.
Rosner spent much of the late Disco Era as an undercover high school student. In addition, he spent 25 years as a bar bouncer and American fake ID-catcher, and 25+ years as a stripper, and nearly 30 years as a writer for more than 2,500 hours of network television. Errol Morris featured Rosner in the interview series entitled First Person, where some of this history was covered by Morris. He came in second, or lost, on Jeopardy!, sued Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? over a flawed question and lost the lawsuit. He won one game and lost one game on Are You Smarter Than a Drunk Person? (He was drunk). Finally, he spent 37+ years working on a time-invariant variation of the Big Bang Theory.
Currently, Rosner sits tweeting in a bathrobe (winter) or a towel (summer). He lives in Los Angeles, California with his wife, dog, and goldfish. He and his wife have a daughter. You can send him money or questions at LanceVersusRick@Gmail.Com, or a direct message via Twitter, or find him on LinkedIn, or see him on YouTube.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: We talked about Reformed Judaism and Israel Jacobson in Germany. I wanted to ask the obvious question: why aren’t Orthodox Judaism or Conservative Judaism for you?
Rick Rosner: Because I’m not religious, they take much time. They dominate your life. Reformed Judaism, even done right, takes maybe a couple of hours a week, some blessings before meals. But Conservative services are twice as long, and Orthodox, or being an observant Jew, is an all-the-time thing. It’s not something I want to devote my life to.
Jacobsen: What observances would you find least objectionable?
Rosner: Ones that aren’t every week or don’t require you to go to the synagogue every week. For me, growing up, the synagogue was at least half an hour each way, so we went very seldom. My dad didn’t get along with the upstart congregation in our hometown, so we had to go from Boulder to Denver, a 30-mile drive. I was okay with the blessing over wine and bread once a week on Friday nights and undoubtedly okay with the blessings over the Hanukkah candles and the High Holy Day services, but nothing that would take up my whole life. Even my mom, who’d grown up in a reasonably observant household, had become much less so.
Jacobsen: So, I mean, that’s it. What would make these more appealing to you? Also, why do you refer to yourself as a non-religious person when you are Reformed Jewish?
Rosner: We already talked about this, I believe. Whatever spirituality I have, it’s not connected to any established religion, and I’m not ready to believe in a bunch of stuff I’m not going to believe in. Judaism is thousands of years old, Christianity is 2,000 years old, Islam is 1,400 years old, and all of it is based on stuff from, you know, a thousand years before we developed science. And, you know, there are problems with science, but I have fewer problems with science as it is practiced than with religious beliefs. I don’t need to modify some religion that I don’t believe in to make it more palatable to myself.
Jacobsen: What about the whole prayer thing?
Rosner: I mean, I can pray on my own, but I don’t need to do a bunch of prayers connected to — what purpose would it serve besides — okay, it might connect me more to my Jewish brethren, but I can feel Jewish without doing that. These are rituals that would be mainly empty to me.
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