Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 189
“Indebtedness is given with our very being. It is not derived from conceptions; it lives in us as an awareness before it is conceptualized or clarified in content. It means having a task, being called.” (Who Is Man pg. 108)
The awareness Rabbi Heschel is speaking of is, for many, the most disturbing aspect of living and, for many, the most exhilarating aspect of living; a true both/and. We are aware of a debt, we are aware of something that we have to do and, when we are young, we can’t explain it, we can’t clarify it precisely because it is not conceptualized. Every human being is born with the awareness Rabbi Heschel is validating for us. This is the disturbing part of living: “I know there is something I am supposed to be doing, I know there is something more than just serving myself and taking from my surroundings, yet I can’t seem to put my finger on it” is an experience many people have. I believe this to be the awareness Rabbi Heschel is teaching us about.
Another disturbing aspect of the truth Rabbi Heschel is reminding/teaching us about is that as we are maturing intellectually, spiritually and emotionally enough to begin to conceptualize and clarify our debt, society comes along and reminds us of the ME way of living. Rather than cooperation and consideration, we are worshiping those who compete and compare, we celebrate and make celebrities out of people who can annihilate another on the battlefield of commerce, academia, science, all aspects of life. We are taught from a young age to disregard the foundation of our spiritual being, pay no attention to “Love thy Neighbor”, you are an individual first, last and always and people are around to help you gain your proper status, not to be helped themselves. We have servants and treat them like help instead of as human beings who serve us to make our lives better and we have to do all we can to make their lives better.
While many people may go to Church, Temple, the Mosque, the Ashram, etc for daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly sustenance, they are not going to deepen their spiritual connection nor mature their spiritual core/essence. They are going either out obligation to family, tradition-we have always gone on the Jewish High Holidays, or fear/as a hedge-just in case God exists I have some points with Her/Him. Many children go to school at their religious institutions as an adjunct to their secular schooling because their parents went and they want them confirmed, bar/bat mitzvah’d, etc. Yet, we allow our children to see the hypocrites we are when we send them to learn and we don’t engage in the learning with them. We give them a reason to kill the dawning conceptualizations and clarity that spiritual learning, maturing bring by not following the very lessons, truths, ways of being that our children are learning. In fact, in some cases, even the religious schools have changed to give the children less meaning and more reasons to eschew the life-giving, life-affirming tenets and paths to awareness, conceptualization and clarity that are nudging, niggling, bothering, disturbing us at any given moment.
We are in desperate need of change. We are in desperate need of spiritual wisdom learning. The teachers are here, the tenets and paths are right in front of our eyes, read anything by Rabbi Heschel, Martin Buber, John Pavlovitz, Martin Luther King Jr., Adin Steinsaltz, et al. Listen to and study with Rev Najuma Smith, Rev Mark Whitlock Jr., Rabbi Ed Feinstein, Rabbi Roly Matalon, Imam Jihad Turk and so many others in every city, state, country. We need to return to a life of meaning and purpose, we need to acknowledge our debt, we need to repay the gift of life with action.
In recovery, we begin to relearn the tenets we threw away in favor of ‘the good life’. We are realizing the good life is available only when we are in the process of awareness and repayment of our indebtedness. We seek to serve and we seek to join with another(s) as well as engaging in paths that lead us to spiritual maturity, spiritual growth and spiritual wholeness. In recovery we “practice these principles in all our affairs” so we can “trudge the road of happy destiny”.
I am embarrassed at my dismissal of my indebtedness when I was younger. I am saddened by the awareness and joy I threw away because I was angry, scared, felt misunderstood and so totally alone in the world after my father died when I was 14. I loved the teachings of Torah, the joy of prayer and the discussions with my father about these principles and, then, suddenly he was gone and the light of my life, the leader of the path to me was gone. I remember trying to keep it alive, I remember the war within me, that still rages at times, between my soul and my ‘well-being’, rationalization and knowing, entitled and indebted that had no mediator, no guide, no one to help me navigate it because I thought, who else would ever understand me. So, I tried to kill the conceptions, the awareness and the clarity because they were too painful and didn’t fit in with what I erroneously thought was my obligation. I am with that 14, 15 year old boy right now and letting him know his awareness has grown, his spirit has matured and he was correct and on the right path till he understandably gave into the mendacity of society and his own self-deceptions. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark