Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 301
“Human life is holy, holier even than the scrolls of Torah. Its holiness is not man’s achievement; it is a gift of God rather than attained through merit. Man must, therefore, be treated with the honor due to a likeness representing the King of kings.” (Thunder in the Soul pg.41)
OUTRAGEOUS!! That’s is what is coursing through my veins upon reading these words. “Human life is holy, holier even than the scrolls of Torah”? How are these words possibly spoken, written by a man who witnessed, who suffered the indignities of Nazi Germany, who is the son of a woman who died because the Nazi’s came for her, who’s family members died in the Shoah? Because they are TRUTH and, above all else, Rabbi Heschel is dedicated to the TRUTH.
Holy is defined as “sacred, blessed, etc” and in Hebrew it means “set apart, elevated, and implies connection with something greater than ourselves or at least connection with our higher consciousness. In English it comes from the word “whole”. “Human life is” elevated, connected “even more than the scrolls of Torah” because the Torah is useless unless and until we immerse ourselves in it, learn from it and with one another, and approach it in a state of seeking wholeness, seeking connection with our study partner(s), seeking to be elevated, educated, set apart from the dullness, the boredom of ridiculous societal norms and the noise of the idolators who speak in the name of religion, who speak of holiness while practicing defilement, preaching hatred, pandering to the lowest common denominator of human beings-hatred, blame, shame, etc.
These bullshit artists like Vought, Vance, Kushner, Cain-White, all follow the Nazi playbook of Goebbels, all seek to have a “fourth reich” rise up where White Christian Men are in charge in America and everyone else is subservient AND they claim to be “Good Christians” who believe fervently in Christ while doing the exact opposite of what Christ preached, what Christ did! They are so full of shit they believe that their “holiness” is achieved through their own actions, through their own “merit”, just ask Trump, Miller, Noem, Hegseth, et al. The latest post about the tragic death of Rob and Michelle Reiner is an example of their hubris and the bowing down of We the People, especially Congress, to deny our own holiness!
This is the great tragedy of modernity, of history. “Human life is holy…it is a gift of God rather than attained through merit” is unknown to most of We the People. This concept is so foreign to most and this is because we are not spiritually educated well, we are not taught from our toddler stage that We the People are “holy”, that each of us is a holy soul and deserving of honor and respect, dignity and kindness, not to be worshipped, rather to be partnered with to raise up the world instead of following the path of the Priests, the Rabbis, the Ministers, the Imams who have particularized and promoted their ‘religion’ as THE ONLY ONE that is true and right-BULLSHIT on them. Be it a Jew or non-Jew, not recognizing that there are many paths to living into the “holy, holier even than the scrolls of Torah” is ridiculous, xenophobic, and, in my opinion, ignorant. What is happening in the world today, being perpetrated by ‘religious’ people, is an affront to the thoughts above, is an affront to the words of the Bible, to the spiritual teachings of the 10 Sayings, to the Holiness Code itself! Yet, too many of We the People are willing to suspend our spiritual knowing, to suspend our moral standards to support the idolators who proclaim they will make us rich, they will make us safe. How is that working our We the People??
We the People, what a wonderful phrase, just like Am Yisrael, the people Israel, only lasted a short time! We the People have not been on the same page for a long time here in America, not even to fight the Nazis! Charles Lindbergh and Father Coughlin, Henry Ford and the Bund all wanted the United States to join with Germany, wanted to have Fascism be the law of the land here in the USA! Guess what, People, it is here, it is alive, just like the “South will rise again” is happening, and the Ku Klux Klan is reconstituted in a new form-MAGA! People we must stand up and stand together, as Ben Franklin said: “we all hang together or we all hang separately”. Is it really too hard to live into the “holiness” that abides in your guts? It is really too hard to live the teaching of the first chapter of Genesis: humanity is created in the “image and likeness of God”? When will we, People accept the gift of “holiness” that God has bestowed upon us and use it wisely instead of as an entitlement that is ‘mine only’? This is the challenge of the first two sentences above, more on the 3rd tomorrow!
I think about this, immersing myself in these two sentences and am trembling inside for the years I spent not believing in my own holiness, in not taking the actions of one who is “holier even than the scrolls of Torah”. While my T’Shuvah has changed me, the memory of ‘those’ years still, at times, haunts me and keeps me committed to living a more “holy” life. I am grateful each morning for life itself, for the gift of holiness, for the joy of connection, for being able to set myself apart from the baser emotions and impulses I still have. Last Friday evening, Yeshaia Blakeney and I led a Shabbat Service in L.A. with the amazing help of Nicole Goodman and the “holiness” that filled the room was palpable, enveloping everyone who was there. The next day, Shabbat, I spent with my dear friend, teacher, Rabbi, mentor, Ed Feinstein, and we learned together, we taught together, I knew and felt the “holiness” in the rooms, the connection between Ed and I permeated the spaces we were in and continues to permeate my being. How is holiness permeating you and how are you promoting it in the spaces you are in? God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark