Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 84
“When the soul of man is asked: What is God to you? there is only one answer that survives all theories which we carry to the grave: He is full of compassion. The Tetragrammaton, the great Name, we do not know how to pronounce, but we are taught to know what it stands for: “compassion”” (Man is Not Alone pg 148)
This teaching makes us realize all the foolishness we engage in each and every day with our callousness, our ‘knowing God’ controlling of people, places and things, etc. Of course it assumes we are interested in hearing, learning from and engaging with our soul and with the compassion of God, the compassion of the universe as well as being willing to show compassion to another human being as well as to ourselves.
At the bottom of page 148, Rabbi Heschel adds a footnote, quoting Sifre Deuteronomy and Pesikta, explaining the “rabbinic doctrine that the Tetragrammaton(the name of God the priests would use in prayer that has been lost), usually rendered the Lord, expresses the divine attribute of love, while the name of Elohim that of judgement”. We can infer the correlation between love and compassion from this footnote, I believe, which leads us to take a deep dive into our souls and into our ways of thinking and being. I believe Rabbi Heschel is giving us the cause of the angst, despair, mental/psychological issues and spiritual wasteland we humans suffer from. While we try to answer the problem with drugs(legal and non-legal), power and prestige, facades of wealth and smiles, exerting power over another person, etc we are missing the response that we need to be engaged in: listening to the call of our soul, listening to the compassion and love of God, accepting this love and compassion as well as giving this love and compassion to another person.
Compassion comes from the latin “suffer with” not to feel bad for, not to ignore, not to have a false sense of superiority, not to be ‘bountiful’ towards ‘those poor people’, to suffer with each and every person including oneself. Most of us are unwilling to suffer with ourselves, to see where we are need of compassion and love from a source greater than ourselves, be this source our higher consciousness, our higher power, our friends, our significant other, our children, our parents, God is of no consequence. What matters is our acknowledgement of our need for compassion so we allow our soul to fill us with love.
Most people who are in need of compassion reject it because it makes us feel weak and needy which are negative characteristics in a Greek-dominated society. We are unwilling to go to the root cause of our angst, despair, psychological and spiritual maladies because covering them up is a more ‘accepted’ way of dealing with these realities. Yet we get angry with and treat addicts who are doing the same thing that most people do, seek an escape from doing the soul work, silence the call of our soul/inner life, wear masks to hide from everyone else including ourselves.
Our callousness, that Rabbi Heschel teaches about on the previous page of Man is Not Alone, is directly correlated to our lack of compassion for our self and for anyone else. We are not suffering with another person, we are trying to console them (maybe), we are trying to help them (maybe), we are trying to control them (most likely), and we are not seeing the torment of their soul, we are not seeing the need for true, authentic connection, hence we are not being authentically connected nor our we suffering with them. To suffer with entails us to look at our own needs, our own lacks, our own unmet authentic desires and touch another person from our soul to theirs. Then and only then can we truly show someone a path forward that is suitable for them, based on our experience of finding our own way forward through compassion and love for our self. This is the path out of callousness and the path of compassion and love.
In recovery, we are so desperate for a new solution as the old ones have not worked. We are desperate for love and compassion and, since we don’t have it for ourselves, we can only receive it from a “power greater than ourselves”. In recovery, we know we have to ‘suffer with’ our deeds, the deeds of another and we are in need of someone to do this with. Sponsors, guides and/or mentors are gifts bestowed upon us and we learn to take advantage of this gifts and use them wisely.
Being vulnerable and open, authentic and flawed, transparent and brazen, has caused me great pain many times in my life. Prior to my recovery, I soothed myself with crime, alcohol, women, action, etc. Really I was escaping and recovery put a stop to hiding and escaping and has brought me more pain and anguish at times. The difference now is that I know God is compassionate with me, I know that God is loving me and I know that with God’s compassion and love, I can survive and thrive. God’s compassion and love have helped me heal from most of the traumas and wounds of my past, they have helped me do T’Shuvah and restore the dignity of those I have harmed if they are willing to accept them. I know that I have ‘suffered with’ many people and helped them heal their wounds and learn to have self-compassion and self-love. More on this tomorrow, please know that I know I am blessed and pray that you realize the blessings in your life as well as the blessings you are to another(s)! Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark