Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 5 Day 23
“Judaism is averse to generalities, averse to looking for meaning in life detached from doing, as if the meaning were a separate entity. Its tendency is to make ideas convertible into deeds, to interpret metaphysical insights as patterns for action, to endow the most sublime principles with bearing upon everyday conduct.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 87)
The first thought I have upon reading these words is of the Kotzker Rebbe who asked his disciples: “Where do you find God” and he answered his own question with: “Wherever/whenever you let God in”. I am hearing Rabbi Heschel call out to us, once again, to “let God in”! That the essence of Judaism, the way of Yiddishkeit is to “let God in”. And, as it says in Parasha Nitzavim, “it is not far off from you, it is in your mouth, in your heart”. Immersing ourselves in this idea to “let God in” brings up the brilliance of the title of the book this comes from: God in Search of Man. God keeps searching for we the people and knocks on the doors of our souls, our intuitive minds and, in our hubris, we the people keep rejecting the call, keep shutting the doors of our hearts, of our souls, of our minds. What a Desecration of God’s Name being perpetrated by Jews in all sects denominations, from the secular to the ultra-religious. WAKE UP PEOPLE- LET GOD IN!!
Kushner, Wytkoff, Lutnick, Netanyahu, et al keep listening and giving homage to the lying Trump and call themselves “the keepers of Jewish living”. They believe the lies they have been telling themselves and care nothing for how they debase themselves, desecrate God’s name, make a mockery of what Judaism truly is! They are making their “ideas convertible into deeds” that are self-centered, egotistical, power-grabbing-not the ideas that Rabbi Heschel is speaking about above. No matter what anyone wants to say-the Prophets come to teach us what God desires, what God wants and it is not to kill the Palestinians in the West Bank, it is not to decimate Gaza so it is uninhabitable, it is not to send ICE and HATE THE STRANGER, it is not to Falsely accuse your neighbor, your enemy, it is not to kill citizens for exercising their right to assembly and our right to protest!! So, as all of these ‘good jews’ extol the cruelty, the breaking of another country’s sovereignty, while decrying the consequences they face for their actions as ‘cruel and unusual punishment’, it is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to STAND THE FUCK UP AND DEMAND JUSTICE, DEMAND KINDNESS, DEMAND TRUTH!
As we enter the final few days prior to Passover, I believe We the People have to rise above our pettiness and pride, envy and enmity, to leave the prisons these ways of being have put us into, to remove the shackles of resentments, willful blindness, greed, and fear that continue to silence we the people and to “see” this Passover as a “metaphysical insights as patterns for action”. At the Seder tables, rather than wonder ‘when do we eat’, rather than go on and on with all of the flourishes of what this Rabbi says about that and that Rabbi says about this; let us “add to the story” by talking about the “sublime principles” that we commit to have “bearing upon everyday actions”?
Each Passover I take the idea of liberation from slavery and make a vow to help myself out of the slavery I am currently in AND to help another human being out of the slavery they are in. Each year, each day, I work very diligently and deliberately to convert the ideas of Judaism into deeds, making sure to “BE HOLY”, to “CHOOSE LIFE”, to “Proclaim Freedom throughout the land and to ALL its inhabitants therein”! This year, it is all about the inner life and the outer life being more congruent, holding myself and people in general to account for the deeds we all do, for the good and for the lies, for the not good and for the truths we speak and KNOW. This is the challenge of Passover, this is the challenge of the words above-“Shvr Tzu Tzin a Yid”- it is hard to be a Jew because of the obligation to turn “ideas into deeds”, “metaphysical insights into patterns of living”, and “sublime principles bear upon our everyday conduct”! And, it is doable, it is joyous, it is FREEDOM!
ACTION STEPS:
The ideas you “convert into deeds” are they helping you be a better human being or just more ”successful”?
The “metaphysical insights" you receive: are you using them to better your corner of the world or just your pocketbook and status?
How are you using the “sublime principles” in your daily living to enhance the goodness, the holiness of your life?
How are you making sure to “let God in” and allow God to find you?
GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark