Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 330
“This is the premise of faith: Spiritual events are real. Ultimately, all creative events are caused by spiritual acts.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 65)
On this day celebrating Rev. Martin Luther King, a dear friend of Rabbi Heschel’s, what could be a better topic than “the premise of faith”? Dr. King was considered a radical by the white (supremacist) establishment and a moderate by some Black people (Black Panthers, etc). Even those white people who did not consider themselves KKK members held a prejudice against Black people, people of color, Jews, etc in the 1950’s, 1960’s some 100 years after the Emancipation Declaration, 160+ years after the Bill of Rights was ratified! What Dr. King had going for him, for the cause of freedom, of equality, of knowing that every human being was equally worthy and dignified, was FAITH! He, like Rabbi Heschel, and so many other Christian, Jewish, Muslim Clergy lived their faith, lived the principles and the ethics, morals, of their respective Bibles, could not perceive of sitting on the sidelines and doing nothing. There were then, as there are today, Christian, Jewish, Muslim Clergy who promote the lies of the bigots, the prejudices of the white christian nationalists, the radical muslims, the xenophobic jews and even support one another more than they live into the precepts of their respective Bibles-using the names of Moses, Jesus, Mohammed to validate cruelty, hatred, theft, etc. Hence, the problems we face today are caused by a lack of “faith”, a mistrust of “faith”, a disbelief that “spiritual events are real”!
The first spiritual event in the Bible is the creation of “heaven and earth” which was “unformed and chaotic”, with “darkness” and “the Spirit of God” hovering over the “darkness”. God spoke and the world lit up, so too it is with the history of the world, someone speaks and the world is either lit up or darkened, when it is a “spiritual event”, it is usually the former, when it is a rational event, it is far too often the latter. This is our conundrum, honoring the spiritual and making the rational subservient to it, using our rational minds to follow through on, bring to fruition the creativity that comes from our “spiritual events”. This was the genius of Dr. King, of so many of the great luminaries of history; their ability to use their rational minds as servants to God, to their spiritual events, to their creative thoughts and bring their creations to life, to help another(s), to change the ways of the world.
This is what We the People are missing today: the follow through on the creativity that our “spiritual events” present to us; the blocking out of the deafening lies and bastardizations of the modern day lackeys of wanna be slave owners, ie clergy of all colors and faiths who preach any type of blanket hatred. What we are lacking is the hearing aids needed to truly SHEMA, Hear, Listen, Understand, the words of Dr. King, of Rabbi Heschel, of The Baal Shem Tov and the originators of Hasidism, the Catholics like the current Pope, the Christians faithful to Christ’s words and deeds like John Pavlovitz, Jim Palmer, etc. We the People are being called by the words above, by the times we live in, by the commentaries on the Torah, the Bible, the teachings of Rabbi Harold Shulweis to DISOBEY IMMORAL LAWS, IMMORAL REQUESTS, IMMORAL/CRUEL ACTIONS-no matter where they are to be found. After all, would not DISOBEYING have been an early-on solution to Hitler’s hateful rhetoric before he destroyed Germany, Europe, 6Million Jews, estimates of 20-39 million people died in Europe alone! There were people who had “spiritual events”, who knew how to end this madman’s rule with creativity and truth and they were killed, silenced, put in prison, etc because We the People did not SHEMA!
In a world where technology, science, “measurable objectives”, “evidence-based practices” are considered the ‘holy grail’, the ONLY way to bring something to fruition, to the market place, the words of Rabbi Heschel often seem trite, often seem naive, airy-fairy, woo-woo. Yet, I would submit that all technology came from a “spiritual event” the inventor had, Einstein’s theory of relativity came from a “spiritual event”, what is EUREKA, if not the proclamation of a “spiritual event”? What is recognizing the infinite worth, the commonality of spirit we all share if not a “spiritual event”? What is love if not a “spiritual event”, what is intercourse if not a “spiritual event”, think of the words we use to describe “climax, coming, OMG, etc” even when believing it is just fucking! Birth, childrearing, caring for parents, joining the group that believes in the dictates of the Bible to “Love Your Neighbor”, and the most often dictate: “Welcome, love, care for the STRANGER because YOU WERE STRANGERS IN THE LAND OF EGYPT”!!
I know that when We the People welcome the stranger, love the stranger, care for the stranger, we are acknowledging our commonality, our belonging to the same Creator, belonging to the same kind-human kind. I know without doing this, we separate, berate, blame, shame and screw over the stranger, who then becomes defined as “anyone not like me/us”! Trump’s grandfather came here from Germany and was a pimp, Miller’s grandparents are survivors of the Shoah, Lutnick is a Jew who knows history, Vance is a made-up empty shell, Vought is a true-believer in power, glory, cruelty for the sake of some doctrine that is Anti-Christ. I know the “spiritual events” of me and you can overcome these haters, this moment and turn it into the best of what Dr. King preached-we will judge each other on the content of our character, not on the color of our skin, not of the country we came from. Dr. King, Rabbi Heschel, Rabbi Prinz, John Lewis, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Steve Jobs, et al had a “spiritual event” and the “creative event” that followed has changed the world. Let’s all of us create a society of love and change the world today. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark