Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 230
“The eternal command, like a saw, is trying to cut the callousness of hearts. In spite of all efforts, the callousness remains uncut. What, then, is the meaning of all endeavor? Rabbi Tarfon said: “You are not called upon to complete the task, yet you are not free to evade it.” Whatever we do is only partial fulfillment the rest is completed by God.” (God in Search of Man pg. 406)
The first sentence above kinda says it all! We are told to “circumcise the foreskin of our hearts” and “the eternal command” is the only way for this to happen. Instead, we are witnesses to “the callousness” being held out as the standard of morality, the standard of a ‘free society’, the goal for all to reach so we can be rich, famous, powerful like Trump, Netanyahu, Putin, and their criminal allies. It is especially galling to read these words above, to know “the eternal command”, when done in truth, in kindness, with justice, mercy, and love is the antidote to “the callousness of hearts” and watch in horror as the liars in chief, the idolators who have the megaphones, preach a message of hatred, callousness and celebrate the cruelest of actions. Charlie Kirk, who is being canonized by the far right and demonized by the far left is a prime example. He claimed to be ‘a good christian’ while preaching a Christian Nationalism that is about as far away from Christ’s life work as possible, he is having praise heaped upon him by Jews, especially Netanyahu, and a traffic circle named for him in an Israeli town while he promoted blatant antisemitism, hatred of people of color, LGBTQ, he opposed the separation of Church and State, seemingly embracing that the United States should be a ‘christian nation’ which has always been good for the Jews-NOT! Yet, because “the callousness of the hearts” “remains uncut”, we see Charlie Kirk-who was killed in the most horrific of ways, who did not deserve to die for his right to free speech-being lionized, having a statue in the Rotunda to him, a bill to allow him to lie in State as if he was a hero, and wonder what good is “the eternal command” if, after all these years, over 3000, the callousness not only remains, it seems to get stronger and stronger, immune to the “saw” of “the eternal command”.
“Why bother”, “fuck it, I don’t matter nor make a difference”, “they(society) are too powerful and have the game rigged” are all thoughts and expressions that We the People use to deny the words of Rabbi Tarfon, the wisdom and truth of what he is saying above. These ways of opting out of “the task” have permeated society for the millennia and we are reaping what We the People have sown through our inaction, our inattentiveness to “the eternal command”. Rabbi Tarfon’s wisdom above is one of my brother’s, Rabbi Neal Borovitz, favorite pieces of wisdom. He has preached it for 50+ years, he has lived it for more than 50 years as well. Yet, We the People, continue to allow “the callousness” to grow, rather than put some “saw” marks in it, rather than use “the eternal command” to weaken the “callousness” a little each and every day. This is the reason that Rabbi Tarfon’s wisdom is so crucial for We the People to stop the cruelty of a Charlie Kirk from becoming the policy of the United States Government which it has become, to stop the mendacity and the injustice of Netanyahu and his gang of thugs from ruining what the State of Israel is meant to be-a light unto the nations, not a pariah among the states of the world! Yet, We the People are adamant in our refusal to live “the eternal command” in all our affairs because we are afraid of being ‘a loser’, afraid of ‘not getting ours’, etc. POOR WE THE PEOPLE.
Please spare us the whining, spare us the response that ‘religion is bullshit’, ‘look at how those religious folks are cruel and mean, hateful and suspicious towards anyone not like them’, etc. “The eternal command” has nothing to do with the ways religions are practiced, unfortunately! This is the problem that We the People have created and only We the People can solve. The first step in recovering the solution is to ask: “what is “the eternal command”? It is simple, it is spoken throughout the Torah, it is in the first of the 10 sayings, “Walk humbly with God”, “do justly”, “love mercy”, because for God to bring us out of the land of Egypt, to remove the binds of slavery, to save us from our inner slavery, we have to participate, we take on the obligation to live into “the eternal command”. “What does it really mean”, people ask. To “walk humbly with God” means to “love the stranger, take care of the poor and needy, to love your neighbor, to rebuke your neighbor”, it means to be careful to not “be a scoundrel within the bounds of Torah” as the Ramban warns in his commentary on Lev. 19:2. “Do justly” means ensuring that people’s dignity and value is upheld, it means due process under the law, it means the rule of law is of utmost importance and dispensing justice means we have to live into the spirit as well as the letter of the law; “righteousness, righteousness you shall pursue”. We the People will never complete this job, this “task” AND we have to stop our giving up because we will not see it through to completion! We the People, in this month of Elul, have to recommit to doing the best we can in this moment, doing our T’Shuvah each day, improving/learning one grain of sand more every day and stop lionizing HATRED, CRUELTY, RACISM, ANTISEMITISM, and all other forms of autocracy!
This “task” is one I have been on for my entire recovery and, like my foray into bridge, I take two steps forward and one step back. Remembering the wisdom of Rabbi Tarfon is crucial to my truly moving ahead so I stop beating myself up for the errors and seek to ‘finally get it right’. Once again, in my quest for growth and knowing, Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom turns on a light bulb! I am committed to hone my competitive edge without being competitive, to continue to grow and learn, one grain of sand, in every area of my life, on each and every day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark