Daily Prophets
Day 76
“God, be gracious to us; we wait for You. Be our arm every morning, be our savior in times of trouble. Sinners in Zion are frightened…Who of us can dwell with the never-dying blaze? One who walks in righteousness, speaks uprightly, spurns profit from fraudulent dealings, waves away a bribe, stops ears from hearing bloodshed, shuts eyes against seeing evil.”(Isaiah 33:2,14,15).
In this chapter, Isaiah begins with a plea of mercy for the people. As angry as he can get at the people for their betrayals and treacheries, he also is able to have compassion and plead with God for them, hence Rabbi Heschel’s description of the prophet as a man who holds God and humans in one moment, in all moments. Isaiah’s plea is, I believe, a plea to the people to remember God for Who God is. God has been gracious, God has been waiting (and still is), and God has been and is our savior. Isaiah is the mediator, here who is reminding both sides of the commitments they made at the beginning of the relationship.
Fear is a good thing for Isaiah, he wants the people to know that their actions have consequences. While many people say this is a mean and vengeful God in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, I disagree. There are logical consequences for our behaviors, Isaiah is saying STOP the sinning, it will bring destruction. Return to God who saved you before, who has never stopped loving you, return the love through action. Yet, then as now, few people believe they will have to experience the consequences of their behaviors.
I know that God is not vengeful and mean because Isaiah delivers to us the formula for returning and for safety. Walk righteously, no more treachery, speak truth, no more lies, deal in good faith, no more fraud, stay true to the principles, no more bribes, hear truth and kindness, no more listening to LaShon HaRa(evil/negative speech), and see what is good, no more seeing/following negativity. While this seems simple, it has been the most difficult path for people to follow for the past millennia. While we have these teachings of Isaiah, we just haven’t studied them nor followed them. How sad!
Rabbi Heschel teaches us:”Israel has forsaken the Lord, but the Lord will not forsake Israel; He will not discard them.”(The Prophets pg 88) in reference to the first verse above. The teaching here is for us to not discard even those who forsake us, a theme he reiterates in reference to the second verse above:”However the destructiveness of God’s power is not due to God’s hostility to man, but to His concern for righteousness, to His intolerance to injustice.”(ibid. pg 80). God keeps caring, God is relentless in God’s quest for righteousness and justice, which is the reason that the one who survives will be people who “walk in righteousness”. We are being called by Isaiah and Rabbi Heschel to be these people.
Our political leaders have forsaken God, country and constituents with their lack of righteousness and their practice of injustice. Rather than looking for how to help another(s), they are looking to help themselves. There are not arguments about principles that they hold dear, only about how to either win or obstruct. Rather than be realistic about what can get done and find ways to bring We, the People, together, our politicians are concerned with getting it all done now and/or spreading the Big Lie. They are the sinners that Isaiah is speaking to, they are the ones who keep spreading evil/negative speech, they are the ones who continue to practice injustice, fraud, bribery, evil. We, the People must say NO to these actions because we will suffer the consequences before and along side of these politicians.
In Recovery, righteousness and justice are cornerstones of our living. The new home/relation with God we build in recovery has these attributes and paths as part of the foundation. We know that we have sinned, we have experienced the “never-dying blaze” of our actions. We know the pain that bribes, fraud, negative speech, seeing and following evil brings. We know what it means to both deliver and suffer injustice. Our recovery is based in our following a path of righteousness. We continue to renew our covenant with God each day through prayer, meditation and actions. We know, through experience, that God has never forsaken us and we know we have to cleave to God as our savior and help.
I have prayed Isaiah’s prayer often, both for community and for self. I have sought the Grace of God for the past 34+years so I could/can return to God, family, community, world. I know what the “never-dying blaze” feels like, the heat, the intensity, the fear-I have lived it more than once. Even today, when I miss the mark, the blaze returns. I now use the heat to change instead of trying to find shelter from it. I cry out to God to save me from myself at times, my indignation at injustice that gets out of proper measure. I also cry out to God to save me from people who mean to do me harm just because I am being who I am. I know that I am on the path of righteousness and have a lot of work to do! I know that cleaving to God, guides, family and friends is the path for my growth. I know that I am not a fraud, I am me. Righteousness or Betrayal-which path do you walk in? Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark