Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 127

“The ego is a powerful rival of the good. When coupled with gain, when virtue pays, the good has a chance to prevail. When the good is to be realized at a loss, with no reward, it is easily defeated.” (God in Search of Man pg. 374)

Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom and words from some 68 years ago have been true forever and are true today. I sit here and write with a heavy heart precisely because we are seeing, in real time, in our time, how true and scary this teaching is. Rabbi Heschel is putting a mirror up to all of us, to humankind, and asking us what do we see, what are the self-deceptions we are engaging in so we can confuse good with evil, what are the ways we are using our egos to defeat the good?

We have two examples of this from Presidents’ Day 2023. Joe Biden took an arduous train ride to visit Kyiv, Ukraine and President Zelensky on the eve of the 1 year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He stood with the Ukrainian people, saw firsthand the devastation and the determination of the Ukrainian people to save their country, to save their democracy from an authoritarian dictator. He went there to show solidarity and support, to let the Ukrainian people know they are not alone in their fight for self-determination, to honor their struggle, their heroism and the lives that have been lost due to Putin’s Crimes against Humanity. President Biden, not as a democrat nor republican, not as a publicity stunt nor as a poke in the eye to Putin, did what he thought to be good, overcame his own self-interests to give aid and comfort to an ally, to a people who, like we did in 1812, are fighting for their sovereignty against a foreign aggressor. It was courageous, kind, and the right thing to do. We don’t know how many of his inner circle were against this trip for very valid reasons, we do know Joe Biden said Hineni, here I am, to the Ukrainian people, he said the US has your back. This is good, this is virtue, this is doing the right thing, no matter the cost.

A second example is, actually two examples: Marjorie Taylor Greene criticizing President Biden for supporting an ally, finding something wrong with a heroic show of compassion, comfort and support. For Marjorie Taylor Greene, goodness is a by-product of gain, maybe. If there is no gain for her, she will not do the next right thing. If there is no ego feeding camera around her, if there is no ego satisfying destruction she can bring, then doing good is unnecessary and stupid to her. She also is, like the Confederacy that she and her other unpatriotic allies believe in, calling for the US to be ripped apart, that there should be “a divorce between red and blue states”. A sure sign that she does not serve the Union and the Constitution as she swore an oath to, rather she serves her own underdeveloped and oversized ego, which is a rival to any and all good that there is to be done. 


Kevin McCarthy releasing the Jan. 6th tapes to Tucker Carlson who, by his own texts, we know lies and obfuscates truth for his own ratings, for his stock options, to do with what he wants with them, including giving enemies of the government of the US, a blueprint of the Capital building’s secure areas. Had they had them on Jan. 6th, the insurrectionists could have found VP Pence, the leaders of Congress, including McCarthy and killed them, held them hostage, etc. Yet, McCarthy, to serve his ego to be Speaker of the House, made a deal with the Greenes’ the Gaetz’, the Gosars’, the rest of the ‘freedom caucus’ that wants to restrict freedoms and did not even give it to all medial outlets, just to Carlson and Fox. Since Fox is in a lawsuit for over 1 billion dollars, it seems their veracity may be in serious question and McCarthy, to serve his own ego, his own gain, is giving aid and comfort to people who support the overthrow of our way of governing and living. Again, McCarthy goes against the spirit, if not the letter, of his oath of office because it doesn’t serve him.

We are all in need of recovery, as Harriet Rossetto says often “You don’t have to be an addict to be in recovery” and “You are either in recovery or in denial”. In recovery, we let go of our false ego, we stop serving only our gains, our false needs and desires, and we engage in a way of being that serves the good, that serves another person, another creation of God. In recovery, we learn that “sacrifice”, as in the Bible, means to come near. In our service, in sacrificing gain for doing what is right and good, we are coming nearer to our authentic self as we were created to be, we are coming nearer to people around us, we are seeing the differences and similarities of self and another(s) and celebrating both rather than trying to crush another human being to satisfy our egos, ala Putin, Greene, etc. We put down the sword and reach out a hand to help. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

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