Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 302
“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)
The conclusion of this piece of wisdom from Rabbi Heschel is, for many, more outrageous and difficult to live into than the idea and obligation of “human life is holy, holier even than the scrolls of Torah”. While human beings are the only ‘creature’ said to be a partner with God, created in the “likeness, image” of God, to say we should “be treated with the honor due to a likeness representing the King of kings” is, for most people a bridge too far. Yet, here again, maybe because it is so outrageous a statement, maybe because it is so difficult to perceive, receive, and do, the emboldened sentence above is undeniably TRUE.
Which, of course, leads to the lunacy we are witnessing, participating in, protesting against, or standing on the sidelines like a ‘good MAGA’, waiting to be told what to do by the winner. Because of guilt, shame, need to be right, need for certainty, and so many more inauthentic needs, human beings have treated one another terribly, horribly, with disdain, with recklessness, with senseless hatred, with greed, with slavery, etc. Rather than showing one another “the honor due to a likeness representing the King of kings”, we show one another dishonor, we show one another oneupmanship, we show one another shame and blame. Rather than treating one another as divine reminders, divine needs, as “a likeness representing the King of kings”, we treat one another as competitors, as usurpers, as thieves coming to steal what we have, take it away from us, we see enemies and allies, we believe “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”, we continue to scapegoat whomever we can, always adding the Jews in, so we can feel good about ourselves.
Our clergy is not helping too much either! They have reduced the Bible, the words of Moses and the prophets, Samuel and the Psalms, to sound bites that serve their xenophobic purposes, they have taken the words and deeds of Jesus and made them into a proof for their ill-treating the stranger and the poor! Rather than seeing and living into their responsibility to acknowledge “man must, therefore, be treated with the honor due to a likeness representing the King of kings”, these mendacious, cruel, desecrating idolators preach the ‘prosperity gospels’, the ‘christian’ nationalist bible, the hating of the stranger even though we were strangers in the land of Egypt, the refusal to help our enemy as the Torah teaches, Proverbs teaches.
We the People who believe in the human being, who understand that human beings have a higher consciousness and rise above their reptilian brain, can rise up to “be holy”, have to RISE UP and REVOLT against this degradation of God, degradation of a human being, to paraphrase Martin Luther King Jr.-degradation of a human being anywhere is degradation of human beings everywhere! We the People are being called by the events in our daily lives, by the events in our country, in our world to “DO JUSTLY, LOVE MERCY, WALK HUMBLY WITH GOD(IN GOD”S WAYS). Says simple and does difficult, I know AND We the People are capable because we are “a likeness representing the King of kings”! Since we have this “gift”, since holiness is part of our make-up, it is not such a leap to live into the mandate given to the first human couple-take care of the earth and all the creatures in it. It is not too big a leap to “care for the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow,” it is not an impossible step to “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”!
What it takes is for We the People to leave the world of binary thinking, of good guys and bad guys, of either/or and run to join God, the teachings of the Bible, in the solution to dealing with the opposing forces within us. Rather than pathologies these normal opposing forces, We the People need to learn how to deal with them, use them wisely and in proper measure to improve our lives and the lives of all those around us. Rather than seeking a scapegoat, We the People are being called to remember: “in a free society, some are guilty all are responsible”. Rather than going along to get along, rather than be part of a fascist cabal who want to have all the money, all the power, etc We the People are being called to reject societal pressures and norms so we can live into “wonder or radical amazement, the maladjustment” to norms and cliches, so we can have “an authentic awareness of that which is”. This is not a call to make it all happen today, it is a call to begin the process, to continue Neil Armstrong’s achievement: One small step for man, a giant leap for mankind”! Are We the People willing to make this step, this leap?
It is so hard to live this way all the time! I sit here at the computer with my head in my hands because I know what I am writing is so true and so hard to live completely and always-hence my fighting against the societal norm that it must be always, completely; hence my welcoming of people seeing and possibly using my vulnerabilities against me rather than hiding them, rather than denying them; hence my belief in and action of doing TShuvah out loud, not needing a community to validate me AND needing a community to belong to. It is hard to treat every human being as “a likeness representing the King of kings” and it is exhilarating when I say hello to people, when I can reach out to help another, to say Hineni, I am here, to treat myself as “a likeness representing the King of kings”, which maybe the hardest task of all and leads to the rest. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark