{"id":33023,"date":"2021-11-21T12:35:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-21T12:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mathewingram.blog\/?p=33023"},"modified":"2021-11-21T12:35:00","modified_gmt":"2021-11-21T12:35:00","slug":"the-true-story-behind-tvs-strangest-space-jew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/2021\/11\/21\/the-true-story-behind-tvs-strangest-space-jew\/","title":{"rendered":"The true story behind TV\u2019s strangest space Jew"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Eight years ago, <em>Atlantic<\/em> writer Yair Rosenberg started trying to figure out why <a href=\"https:\/\/newsletters.theatlantic.com\/deep-shtetl\/618dedd1d581bf0020f7b07a\/firefly-space-jew-al-pugliese\/\">an obviously Jewish character suddenly showed up in a minor role<\/a> in the science-fiction show <em>Firefly<\/em>, but no one in the show ever mentioned the fact that he was Jewish. He wound up interviewing the actor who played the character, who said the role triggered a desire to learn more about Judaism, and finally tracked down the producer to find out why the show chose to make the character Jewish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\" src=\"https:\/\/mathewingramblog.files.wordpress.com\/2022\/01\/fireflyspacejewa-27848020627510823910.png?w=1000\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-33098\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/fireflyspacejewa-27848020627510823910.png 1000w, https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/fireflyspacejewa-27848020627510823910-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/fireflyspacejewa-27848020627510823910-768x432.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I also learned from this piece that the term &#8220;Kwisatz Haderach,&#8221; which author Frank Herbert used in <em>Dune<\/em> to refer to Paul Atreides and the myth of a messiah, is a transliteration of a Jewish term, term&nbsp;<em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Kefitzat_Haderech\">kefitzat haderech<\/a>&nbsp;<\/em>(\u05e7\u05e4\u05d9\u05e6\u05ea \u05d4\u05d3\u05e8\u05da), which means the \u201cshortening of the way\u201d or \u201cleaping of the path.\u201d As Rosenberg describes it, &#8220;the messiah, in other words, is the one who propels humanity forward to its ultimate destination.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eight years ago, Atlantic writer Yair Rosenberg started trying to figure out why an obviously Jewish character suddenly showed up in a minor role in the science-fiction show Firefly, but no one in the show ever mentioned the fact that he was Jewish. He wound up interviewing the actor who played the character, who said &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/2021\/11\/21\/the-true-story-behind-tvs-strangest-space-jew\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;The true story behind TV\u2019s strangest space Jew&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33023\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathewingram.com\/work\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}