Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 291
“Yet what I mean is not outward ceremony and public demonstration, but rather inward appreciation, lending spiritual form to everyday acts. Its essence is to call attention to the sublime or solemn aspects of living, to rise above the confines of consumption.”(Who is Man pg. 117)
“Lending spiritual form to everyday acts” is, has been, and always will be a profoundly difficult and enriching endeavor. As we have learned in prior writings, spiritual comes from the root spirit, which in Latin means breathe, the Hebrew word is Ruach, wind. We can understand Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom above to infer, at least for me, that whatever we breathe life into, whatever we take a breath before doing, we are able to approach true celebration, provided that the actions we are taking are for good, for God, for the sake of higher self. As with everything in life, we can use the same energy to promote principles of God, principles of holiness, principles of decency, justice, love, compassion and their opposites. Unfortunately, people who want to demean God, demean human beings, who believe they are to be served and power is theirs use the power of breath, the power of spirit to deny freedom to another(s), enrich themselves, obstruct justice, and are spiritually ill, as Maimonides teaches in his book The Eight Chapters.
For the majority of people, we seek to use our breath for good, we seek to breathe life into decency, kindness, love, compassion and are, unfortunately, easily misguided, deceived and lied to. It is a trait of humanity to want to believe so we can connect to one another, living in suspicion of our neighbor doesn’t promote “love thy neighbor” as we are commanded to do. Yet, many of us have come to suspect our neighbor because hatred and mistrust has been breathed into us from childhood, protecting ourselves from another human being has been fed us along with mother’s milk. Fear, mistrust, comparison, competition, power, all are the antonyms of what Rabbi Heschel is teaching us, in my opinion.
We need to return to the roots of religious and moral actions, not the interpretations of people with self-promoted agendas, rather the essence of the words of the Bible, the words and actions of the Prophets, of the Kings, of the writings, of the Psalmist, of Moses, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, etc. We are not going to be able to breathe life into God’s teachings, we are not going to be able to use the wind of spirit to move our corner of the world to being a little better today than yesterday without the foundation of truth, love, compassion, justice, kindness, connection. Yet, many people, especially as we head into the midterm elections, are going to breathe hatred, lies, anger, promote connection through negativity, as well as extol injustice and non-freedom. They are doing this under the banner of religion, under the banner of god-all the while practicing the worst of idolatry, denying the truth of the first 3 Commandments!
We need to return, especially as we approach the Hebrew month of Elul when we are supposed to look back on the year past, make T’Shuvah (amends) for the wrongs we have not made yet and celebrate through inward appreciation the goodness we have breathed life into. We need to be thorough and fearless in seeing how we have lent spiritual form to our everyday actions, how we have breathed life into those nearest and dearest to us through love and kindness, how we have shared breath with people who needed a kind word, a word of encouragement, a word of rebuke in order to return to their rightful place. We get to revel in these actions and, I believe based on today’s reading of Rabbi Heschel’s brilliance, we need to gain more inward appreciation so we can gain strength from our prior good acts to do more of them today. We have to gain more appreciation for our self, for our ability to breath goodness, love, truth, justice, compassion into our daily actions so this way of being becomes more “normal” and, like physical exercise, we build our spiritual muscles and clear away the plaque that may be in our spiritual arteries.
In recovery, many of us awake with a gratitude for being alive. We take our first breath upon awakening and immediately realize we have this day to breathe more life into our newfound way of living, the opportunity to build up our spiritual muscles and clear out the junk that has blocked us from hearing our souls, for living from our spirit and from “doing the next right thing”. In recovery, we quickly learn to use the power of our decency to lift up and breathe life into the pitiful form we had become. In recovery, our inner appreciation meter grows each day and, like a Geiger counter, we are drawn to more and more ways to serve God, to serve another human being, to serve humanity, to serve all of God’s creations and, in doing so, are of maximum service to our self.
As I begin my inventory and review of the past year, I am struck with how much people have breathed life into me, have breathed life into the principles I hold dear and how much and often people have reached out to connect. Of course, I am painfully aware of the ones whom have cut off breath from our relationship and these relationships have died. Without blame, shame or fault finding, it is just the way it is and I have to see my part, accept it, try to repair it and allow for the ones who want to not reconnect and send love and blessings to them. It is sad to look back at the errors I have made based on putting too much breath into some places and not enough breath/spirit into other places. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark