Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 321
“If the world is only power to us and we are all absorbed in a gold rush, then the only god we may come upon is the golden calf.” (Thunder in the Soul pg.61)
OMG! Here we are again!! These words written/spoken some 50-70 years ago are as true if not truer today than when Rabbi Heschel wrote/spoke them. We are witnessing, once again the belief that all that matters in this world is “power” and the way to “power” is through money, because of “gold” one possesses. The “Golden Rule” for these ‘good christian nationalist folk’ is “the one with the gold rules”. Because money is “power” and “power” is all that matters, how one gets one’s money is immaterial, how one screws people over to ‘get to the top’ is of no consequence, and holding a Trump, Trump-like, Trump loyalist to account is ridiculous!
And, this is so much bigger than Trump and his accolades, it is a way of being that has its roots in Ancient Egypt and a through-line from Alexander’s Greece to Trump’s America. That the Jan 6 rioters, those ‘fine patriots’ who attacked and tried to kill Capital Police and DC Metro Police were pardoned is a disgrace, that Trump arrests Maduro on Narco trafficking charges and pardons Juan Orlando Hernández Alvarado, the ex-President of Honduras who was responsible for 500 MILLION POUNDS OF COCAINE entering the United Sates is BEYOND THE BEYOND! Yes, I am screaming, yes, I am enraged, yes, I am bereft and so should everyone else. We the People need some anger and disgust for the ways God’s Name is being desecrated by the people running the country. We the People need to hear the SHEMA being blasted from Mount Sinai as you read this and I write these words. We the People are being called to respond differently than we have been to what we see happening before our very eyes.
For far too long, we the people have gone along with the societal norms and mental cliches that money is power and power is what life is all about. Facing the truth of our powerlessness is too much for most people, knowing that uncertainty is one of the main facets of living, that we are dependent on another(s) from birth through death is an undeniable truth; all of these are too much for the Greeks to bear and Trump’s America is in strong denial of these basic truths from the Bible. “Until when” will We the People not bow down to the Truth of life? “Until when” will We the People not realize that democracy is hanging by a thread and the thread is being cut as we speak? “Until when” will We the People continue to put the cotton in our ears so we don’t hear the Call from Sinai? “Until when” will we the People not be like the Egyptians and not bow down to greed and grift, graft and bribery, Lutnick and Kushner, Trump and Miller, et al? “Until when” is the question Moses asked Pharaoh, and his courtiers asked him with no response. And we all know how that story ends!!
While it is easy to ‘blame’ Trump-the truth is much harder for most of us to bear. “In a free society some are guilty, all are responsible” is a major teaching of Rabbi Heschel and I say to We the People before you point your fingers, ms liberal, mr. Progressive, mrs conservative, pastor christian nationalist, rabbi xenophobic, imam radicalism, LOOK AT YOURSELF! How did the overstepping of ‘freedom’ lead to the backlash that brought Trump to office in the first place and returned him after his CRIMINAL ACTIONS? How have the “progressives”, the “good people on the right side of an issue” stifled any and all opposition to ‘their ways’ because ‘right is on their side’? If this is not worshiping “the golden calf” what is? These same progressives feel the same way about their money as the conservatives they rail against. From King Solomon till now the ruling class’ obsession with wealth and equating wealth with power has only grown! “The one with the most toys wins” is not just a vapid cliche, it is doctrine for many people, on both sides of the aisle. That the conservatives, far right promote the “prosperity gospels” is a wonderful example of worshipping at “the golden calf”, bastardizing Jesus’ words and deeds, not learning from the Israelites who were newly freed, and all together a horrific attitude towards their brothers and sisters, all of us “children of God”.
As I have stated many times, the only path forward, the only way to honor the truth of where we are going, the only road that takes us from where we are, slaves to the almighty dollar, servants of the quest for power, is the inner journey to our core, to our soul’s mission, to the connection and covenant with something greater than ourselves. Addiction is a Spiritual Malady! Extremism is a Spiritual Malady! Obsession with Money is a Spiritual Malady! Mendacity about whom/what we are worshipping is a Spiritual Malady! LETS GET OFF THE COUCHES and INTO THE PEWS! LETS GET THE CLERGY TO GET OUT OF THEIR DOGMAS AND PREJUDICES AND TEACH, PREACH the PROPHETS, JESUS, AND LOVE THE STRANGER, LOVE ADONAI, LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR! This will only happen when the Clergy and We the People come together to seek relief from the lies we tell ourselves, when we become “maladjusted to notions and cliches” so we wake up every day grateful and dedicated to living in “radical amazement” as Rabbi Heschel did and teaches us to.
This is the journey I have been on for the past 39+years, no longer worshipping the Golden Calf and serving God. No longer denying the lies I tell myself, being aware of them so I don’t fall down the rabbit hole AGAIN, and speak truth to power-no matter the consequences. Sometimes I live in exile because of I won’t bow down to the Golden Calfs’ and that is okay because to bow down would mean I am in exile from myself. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark