Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 273
“We think of God in the past tense and refuse to realize that God is always present and never, never past; that God may be more intimately present in slums than in mansions, with those who are smarting under the abuse of the callous.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 54)
The first phrase above moves one to think of how We the People, as individuals and as a society relate to God, “think of God”, and what that means vis a vis the ways in which we conduct ourselves. When one uses the phrase “God of the Bible”, is this a way of thinking of God in the past? When one asks “where was God in the Holocaust”, is this a way of thinking of God in the past? When one asks “where is God when I need him”, is this thinking of God in the present? I am intrigued by this thought.
Whenever we glorify the past, use it as a club or a weapon, as a reason to not believe, to not hear the Voice from Sinai, we are guilty of thinking of God in the past tense. Whenever we are confounded by life’s many crossroads and we refuse to seek divine guidance, help from another, we are guilty of thinking of God in the past. And, what is the point to “think of God in the past tense”? As I was writing this question, it dawned on me: to “think of God in the past tense”, in all the different nuanced ways of doing this, means one doesn’t have to be responsible to God in the present, one doesn’t have to ask oneself ‘what is the next right action’, one no longer is burdened with being a divine reminder and a sheliach, a messenger carrying their unique word of God and bringing their word, their passion, their “acorn” as James Hillman says, into the world. Whenever “we think of God in the past tense”, we are absolving ourselves of the responsibilities of the world, we are seeking to enjoy what we can, we are making all the wrong things right, all the right things ‘for suckers’, etc. Whenever cruelty prevails, whenever autocracy is the goal, whenever mendacity and indecency are the ‘winning strategies’, and God’s name is used to validate these horrific ways, it is because “we think of God in the past tense.” Our refusal “to realize that God is always present” comes from our spiritual immaturity, from our adherence to societal norms and ways, from our adaptation of Greek thinking/philosophy. It is society’s path to holding onto to its power, holding onto its control, holding its knee to the neck of freedom, of holiness, of truth!
Hence, the second half of the sentence above. I know that God is intimately “present in the slums…, with those smarting under the abuse of the callous” because I witness this phenomenon daily. While God is “present in mansions” also, just not as often, not in as many, and, not necessarily heard nor listened to when the self-interest of the owner of the mansion is at stake:)! While we hear the preaching and the praying of those ‘fine christian, jewish, muslim folk’ who call for God to reign down ‘fire and brimstone’ on those “terrible democrats”, those unholy Jews calling for We the People to “love the stranger”, to “care for the poor and the needy”, We the People have to stand up and say WE WILL NOT GO BACK TO EGYPT!! Remembering that without God there is no freedom, without God being present in this moment, in this day, the road to Egypt is a slippery one and a lightning fast one. Living into the truth that “God is always present” keeps us out of slavery, prevents We the People from living once again under the thumb of the taskmaster, from being beaten for resisting, from falling for the lies of the ruling class because we are so exhausted and fatigued from doing their bidding, from being conned and grifted, from the pain of realizing the beliefs and trust we put into those charlatans was unwarranted. Finding out that the people “in mansions” don’t believe in adhering to the word of God emanating from Mount Sinai, speaking to us from the pages of the Bible today as God spoke to the people in Biblical times, devastates many of We the People who earnestly and desperately believed the people “in mansions” would make life better, not worse.
It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to stand up and bring God into this moment, to re-read, re-learn, re-encounter the prophets, Moses, King David, Judah and Joseph, Jacob and Esau, Samuel and Saul, Psalms, Proverbs, etc. Not as a ‘historical retelling’ of events rather our new encounter is a spiritual awakening, a spiritual healing, a spiritual counseling session that buoys our spirit and our resolve to NEVER GO BACK TO EGYPT! This is one of the commands of the Bible which Solomon violated and the kingdom was split in two, again. It is the reason the Pilgrims came to America, to escape the Egypt that was England because of their religious beliefs and Trump, the Evangelicals, the Fundamentalists of all faiths are violating this basic tenet of the United States’ founding documents. This is the challenge for We the People in this moment, it is the tikkun, the repair, of the choice of the Israelites to stay asleep while the Pharaoh lulled them into slavery in the Bible. We the People, by knowing that “God is present and never, never past”, can stop these wannabe Pharaoh’s in their tracks, can call BULLSHIT on Russel Vought’s ‘good christianity’, stand up for God against the onslaught of lies from Orthodoxy/fundamentalists of all faiths, block the cruelty of Stephen Miller, of Kristi Noem, of Donald Trump and hold the billionaires who support this way of being, who refuse to stand up to these Pharaohs, accountable.
It is hard, I know from my experience, to do this. It is dangerous to ‘buck the system’, yet, the far right and the far left both use fascist techniques, no free speech, adherence to dogma, and bastardizing of God. I found God in a jail cell and have never let go of that experience so I can find God in the here and now. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark