Ghosting God, Ghosting Self
Day 75
Continuing with the Book of Jonah, we see that once he is thrown overboard, swallowed by a fish, there in the belly of the fish(unnamed species) for 3 days and nights, he begins to pray to God, prayers of contrition, prayers, as we will see in a minute are bullshit-get the heat off, save me from the trouble I caused prayers! What is remarkable is that this is the Haftorah reading for Yom Kippur! The reason for this continues to engage me.
After God has the fish spit Jonah out, God tells him, again, to go to Nineveh and give them the message that in 40 days Nineveh will be destroyed. Nineveh was a BAD place, on the scale of Sodom, Gomorrah, and was a fierce and feared land. When Jonah got there, he preached the message and, low and behold, “the people believed God and proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the smallest” (Jonah 3:5) Even the King joined in, in his sackcloth and sat in ashes to repent for their evil. He even decreed that the people should turn away from their evil, their repentance may bring about God’s repentance. AND IT DID!
The Book of Jonah is telling us in this chapter the difference between Nineveh and Ancient Israel, Judea, and all of the other nations whose cruelty has caused their downfall. The Book of Jonah is about Jonah and he represents the worst of humankind, the one who wants to see the bad guy get annihilated rather than transformed. The Book of Jonah is about the people of Nineveh, the most evil, hearing the call to change, to do T’Shuvah, to repent, to live differently going forward and THEY RESPONDED POSITIVELY, unlike the Northern Kingdom, unlike Judea, unlike the United States today, Israel today. Both of these countries and many more, Russia, China, Iran and their proxies, are examples of the cruelty that will, at some point, cause their downfalls. What is so sad, is neither the United States nor Israel can hear the call of God to repent, to turn back to Godliness, to turn back to truth, to justice, to kindness, to loving the stranger, to treating each human being as a divine reminder, valuing the dignity and worth of everyone. Yet, the leaders of both of these countries, like Judea and Ancient Israel, will claim fidelity to Christ, to Adonai while doing everything against the Biblical dictates and Christ’s pronouncements. This is Ghosting God on a level that surpasses Jonah!
We read the story of Jonah on Yom Kippur to ask ourselves: who are we like, the people of Nineveh, the people who reached the apogee of distance from God so they could return; or like Jonah, like Judea, like Ancient and present day Israel, like the United States under Trump and his sycophants? While it is not Yom Kippur yet, it is the 2nd day of Av, 7 days before the destruction of the 1st and 2nd Temples, the beginning of the end for Judea as a country and the beginning of the wanderings of the Jews. The Book of Jonah is a counterintuitive saga, one would think that Nineveh would never repent, yet they heard something that Jonah, the messenger, could not grasp: the Gates of Repentance are always open, 24/7/365. Learning from Pharaoh, unlike the Egyptians, the King of Nineveh and the people of Nineveh, knew the truth when they heard it, knew they had gone too far and believed they could return, believed God would “heal their backsliding and take them back in love” and God DID!! What is even more interesting is that Jonah is considered the 2nd of the pre-exilic prophets, before Amos and the rest of the group who preached to Judea and Ancient Israel. This will be explored more tomorrow!
As one who hit his own apogee, as Rabbi Ed Feinstein said in the book The Holy Thief, I know the power of repentance, I know the necessity of returning, I know the joy of being forgiven, I know the strength God gives me/us to do the work of T’Shuvah. Christ was doing the same thing in his time, which is why I consider him to be a prophet, Jesus was asking the people in charge of the Jewish community to REPENT, to FOLLOW THE BIBLE, to LIVE DECENTLY, to…. And just as with Ancient Israel, just as with Israel today, the United States today, Jesus’ words, the Bible’s Call, the anguish of the prophets go unheard and unheeded! The example of Nineveh is immaterial to most of We the People and the result is cruelty upon cruelty. It seems as if we the people either have not hit the apogee or are blowing through it. I have spent the past 39+ years in Repentance and keep learning more and more is revealed to me. I am sorry to the people who believe I harmed them and not made amends, I am sorry for the misunderstandings of me that people have spouted and thought. I ain’t no saint and I ain’t that evil guy! Unlike God, some human beings are incapable of “taking someone back in love”. This is the challenge for this time of year, who do we need to ask forgiveness from and who do we need to forgive who has asked for it.
Action Step:
How do we end the inner and outer destructive forces that surround us
GOD BLESS, STOP GHOSTING GOD, GHOSTING SELF, rabbi mark