Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 5 Day 10
“The deed is the test, the trial, the risk. What we perform may seem slight, but the aftermath is immense. An individual’s misdeed can be the beginning of a nation’s disaster. The sun goes down, but the deeds go on. Darkness is over all we have done.” (Thunder in the Soul pg.82)
We the People are witnessing the quintessential example of “an individual’s misdeed can be the beginning of a nation’s disaster” in living color, in our living rooms, at the gas pumps, the grocery stores, etc. Between the bullshit tariffs that no one knows where the money is and when it will be returned, the Iran war, the stealing of the sovereignty of Venezuela, the ass-kissing of Putin and Russia, the betrayal of the Ukraine, the ICE raids, the United States under the “Family” led by Donald Trump is at the precipice of “disaster” and it is time for We the People to stand up, rise up, and say NO to this betrayal of the oaths these liars took, NO to the grift they are taking, NO to the rape of our cities, our elections, our Constitution, our ideals, our morals, our foundational principles that we have not always lived up to and still kept!
The assault on TRUTH is the first battle to wage. What has happened to the TRUTH beginning with the Tea Party, the Birther bullshit, and then the ‘golden stairway walk’ by Trump is horrendous. That there are so many so-called ‘people of god’ willing to ‘lay hands’ on this prick, this anti-Christ, is one of the prime examples of this assault! That the wealthiest in our nation are willing to kiss the ass of Trump and Lutnick, Miller and Vance, Hegseth and Rubio, knowing their tactics can come back to bite them is another example of the assault on Truth as these rich bastards take over the media and the law firms capitulate to join with MAGA to “Make America GO AWAY”! As is said above, “the sun goes down, but the deeds go on” this assault is a 24/367 endeavor by these assholes, these TRAITORS, these mendacious pricks wrapping themselves in Christ, in Moses, in the Bible?!? WTF, PEOPLE?!? It is WAY PAST TIME to put an end to this assault, this war on TRUTH, on FREEDOM, on God, on Spiritual Principles! We the People are being called upon to end our addiction to the LIE, our obsession with the material, our indifference to evil, our willful blindness to the rape of children and adults, physically, materially, emotionally, and spiritually!
As you might be able to see, I am PISSED OFF with what is happening. I know this playbook, I lived this playbook-not even close to the perfection and extent Trump et al are doing- as a criminal and an alcoholic mendacity was all I knew to do because the TRUTH was too scary, it was too harsh, it was facing me all the time and I drank to blur it, to be willfully blind to it. It got so bad, I was having such a hard time hiding from the TRUTH, that, at the end of my drinking I was pouring a glass of Vodka before I went into the shower because I couldn’t even face myself under the water! What I did to my family, my friends, the stranger, was horrific, it was the worst crime next to physical murder. I stole their trust, used their vulnerabilities against them and made them question what they knew to be TRUE and go along with my lies. This spiritual rape of people around me is something I have continued to do T’Shuvah for, it is my way of stopping “the deeds go on”! This is the power of T’Shuvah, it puts the past where it belongs, in the past; I restore the dignity to the people I hurt so badly, so they don’t have to continue to live with trauma because they knew me. My T’Shuvah is the return the prophets speak about and I am bearing TESTIMONY to the TRUTH that God took me back in LOVE and HEALED my backsliding. While nowhere near perfect, I have never returned to the Mark Borovitz who committed these crimes.
This is the PATH to breaking up the “darkness is over all we have done”. T’Shuvah smashes the darkness because, like at the beginning of Creation, the Spirit of God hovers over the deep and when we RETURN, we engage with this power to fulfill the command of God: LET THERE BE LIGHT. This is the great fear of Trump, Netanyahu, Putin, et al: LIGHT! LIGHT brings TRUTH back to the forefront and TRUTH restores DIGNITY, WORTH, UNIQUENESS back to WE THE PEOPLE and the END to the disaster, the end to the complete and utter darkness we are living under today.
ACTION STEPS:
Put on a “new pair of glasses” so you SEE the darkness that surrounds you as an individual and we as a nation
Smash the idols, “as Abraham did” of indifference, wealth, blindness
Do you T’Shuvah and restore the dignity you have robbed from another with your greed, your mendacity
Make a list of those who have harmed you in the same ways and find ways to let go of the resentment, heal the trauma without needing them to do their T’Shuvah-not forgiveness, just letting go of resentment
GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark