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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 154

“To the shepherds: thus said the Lord, God: you shepherds who have been tending yourselves, is it not the flock that the shepherds ought to tend? You partake of the fat, clothe yourselves with the wool…but you do not tend the flock. You have not sustained the weak, healed the sick, bandaged the injured, have not brought back the strayed, or looked for the lost…I will rescue them form all the places to which they were scattered…I will tend them justly”(Ezekiel 34:2-4,12,16)


God is so deeply disappointed in the leaders of Israel and of Judah. They were given the charge to care for the people, protect them, feed them, heal them, etc. The priests were charged with the spiritual care of each individual, this is what the priesthood is all about. It is not about the empty rituals that the priests were performing at the time (as many clergy do now), it was using the rituals to bring the people more in touch with their own soul and more connected to God. 


Yet, what did the leaders do then? They continued to get fat off of the people, they continued to use and abuse anyone and everyone for their own personal gain. They came across like they are these wonderful caring people, all the while only doing what was good for their own sake, only good for their bottom line and the bottom line of their investors(other wealthy people). God is calling them out in a most public and powerful manner. God is not giving them any leeway to talk about their good works, progressive thinking, conservative values, etc. God is telling them that whatever ‘good’ they did was a byproduct of their greed, their callousness and their attempt to look good and holy. They were engaged in mendacity and deception to the max and God is telling these charlatans that their subterfuge isn’t working. How refreshing to hear God call out these lying leaders, these disgusting antics of trying to hide behind God’s words and ways when really you are only trying to look good yourself. 


What they did wrong, of course, is the same thing that is happening today: letting the sick suffer, watching the weak slowly disappear, laughing at the injured, shooing the homeless from their street corners, laughing at those wandering and stopping the places set up to help people from doing their work with mindless paperwork that is more important than healing the sick, sustaining the weak, bandaging the injured, rescuing the strayed and finding the lost. 


No, according to the current day shepherds, it is more important to spend precious time on ridiculous paperwork than to do God’s work, God’s charge and God’s call. Listening to  all the politically correct shepherds makes God want to puke, much less those of us dedicated to fulfilling God’s call to us to be shepherds. And, they are good liars and deceivers because most people believe them and keep bowing down to them and following their directions without challenging them. Today, as then, the suits are in charge and the people suffer because the suits only care about their next million/billion. 


Rabbi Heschel teaches: “The prophets consistently singled out the leaders, the kings, the princes, the false prophets and the priests as the ones responsible for the sins of the community.”(The Prophets pg. 203). Of course they did because they were not interested in being ‘soft, quiet, meditative’ nor were they concerned with political correctness. The prophets were so identified with God that they could not stay silent. We see this today with some leaders, some people, the ones who constantly call out the bullshit and the lies of the people in power at every level of government, organizations and families.  When I had power, I was responsible for the entire community and, when I screwed it up, I admitted it, learned from it and ‘failed forward’- today I am saddened to see leaders of communities seek to grow themselves, their egos and leave these communities in the lurch for a better job or, “on the advice of counsel” turn out the very people who made the organization, company, house of worship relevant and meaningful-all in the name of progress. Taking the dignity and spirit of an individual, org, company, country is what the prophets held against the leaders, I believe after reading Rabbi Heschel’s teaching. 


In recovery, we have taken our proper place as the shepherds of people who reach out to us, we sponsor people, we guide people and we care for the poor, the stranger, the weak, the lost and seek out those who have strayed from the path of God and the  path of recovery. It is our honor to do this because someone did this for us and we are grateful to pay it forward. We hear God’s call to tend God’s flock and are imbued with God’s love, strength and power when we engage in this work.

Like the last verses speak of, I have been privileged to follow God’s guidance to seek out the ones who strayed and those who are lost because I was rescued, healed and brought back to path by Rabbis, family and people who cared for me. I know the pain of being a leader who falters, I have been that person. I also know the pain of feeling: lied about, dealt with falsely, exiled, pushed out, and being told that I have “founder’s syndrome” and “politically incorrect” because I say what I mean, sometimes harshly, and I want to see the power of spirit that can heal people preserved and promoted. Like Sinatra says: “I took the blows and did it my way”, which is the way God has shown me. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 153

“Now, human, I have appointed you watchman for the House of Israel; whenever you hear a message from My mouth, you must transmit My warning to them. Now, say to the House of Israel; this is what you have been saying: Our transgressions and our sins weigh heavily upon us; we are sick at heart about them. How can we survive? Say to them: As I live, declares God, it is not My desire that the wicked shall die, but that the wicked turn back from his evil ways and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways that you may not die, House of Israel!” (Ezekiel 33.7-11). 


Ezekiel is once again explaining where the words he says are coming from, God. He is trying to get the House of Israel to understand that he is not just another false prophet, he is not being oppositional to the other prophets and the ruling class - he is part of the ruling class as a priest- and he is coming with God’s message to the people in order to remind them that they are still savable. 


This is an important passage for everyone to hear, consider and engage in. So many people believe the lies that Israel believed, “our transgressions and our sins weigh heavily upon us”. This story has been the reason that so many people will not look at themselves and do T’Shuvah. The weight of their errors seems too much to bear and the idea of admitting our errors, making the proper amends, accepting responsibility for our part in the error/interaction and turning back from the path the ‘transgressions’ have laid out for us, is just too much for many people. They regard doing T’Shuvah, making amends as being weak and vulnerable and they do not have the soul strength to overcome these obvious self-deceptions. 


Their survival is based on their denial and the blaming of another(s), they believe. These are the people who caused the destruction of the Temple (first and second in my opinion) and continue to cause the grief, mischief, terror, war, destruction up until today. They cause destruction for their fear of facing what is really true and certain. God’s gift of T’Shuvah is true and certain, humanity’s need to deny and believe their myth of perfection is false and dangerous. People who need to be right always, who are afraid to acknowledge their errors,are people who have little soul strength and maturity and much false pride and false ego. These supposedly “God-fearing” don’t truly fear God because they cannot/do not hear God’s call as Ezekiel gives voice to it. 


People continually to misread the Bible and deny the importance of God’s words, God’s desire’s and God’s instructions because they call God “of the old testament and angry God” which is as far from the truth as evidenced above. God does not want the death of ‘sinners and transgressors’; God wants us back, God wants our return, God cries out for us to repent, return, and have new responses to life’s challenges.

Yet, the people I spoke of above still can’t hear this message. They are so full of themselves, and they sound so logical and rational, they continue to deceive themselves and everyone around them that evil is good, they are the smartest people in the room and they destroy the spirit of everything good that another(s) has created, nurtured, and grown under the guise of progress. It is not progress, it is a power grab, it is an envy towards the creative spirit that drives a prophet, a creator, a helper, etc. God wants us to live and these people want to live at the cost of another(s) life. They would rather deny to their certain spiritual death and physical death their errors than live in repentance and what they believe would be shame. “Turn back from your evil ways” God is calling to all of us-will we listen.

In recovery, we heard this call from God. While we have been scared to be this vulnerable, while we have had our errors used against us by another(s), answering this call of God has given us a new freedom, a new relationship with ourselves, our families, our loved ones, our friends, our world and God. This freedom begins with not hiding anymore, it continues to being responsible for our part only and being forgiven, going on to learning more about how to live life well and growing us up to be better partners with God in making our corner of the world a little better. We also know this is not a one and done proposition; it is a constant dive into our actions and making every effort to live more congruent and with more integrity each day. 


I have lived this call for the past 32+ years, as imperfectly as I have lived my almost 70 years. I have been on the receiving end of the people I wrote about above, on a personal as well as being part of humanity who suffers because of the deception of another(s) that is always rooted in their own self-deception. I work hard to stay in truth and, when I fall into self-deception to recognize it quicker and have people around me help me stay true to God. My return to God and decency has allowed me to thrive, not just survive, these past 32+ years and will help me move forward. My failures have propelled me to learn more and my learning has been difficult and painful for me, for the people close to me and for another(s) as well. I am sorry and have made my amends. Reading Ezekiel reminds me that God has cleansed my guilt and I have to allow it to wash away and begin again clean, bright and hopeful. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark.


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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 152

“Every one of the princes of Israel used his strength to shed blood. Fathers and mothers have been humiliated within you; strangers have been cheated in your midst orphans and widows have been wronged within you. You have despised My holy things and profaned My sabbaths. And the people of the land have done fraud and robbery; they have wronged the poor and the needy, have defrauded the stranger. And I sought a man among them…to stand in the breach…that I might not destroy it; but I found none.”(Ezekiel 22:6-8,29-30).


Ezekiel is so angry here again. He is using all the metaphors that other prophets used, yet in reading his words, I find his personal anger overflowing. Of course, why should we all not be angry for and with God. The princes of Israel were perpetrators in evil, in killing physically, emotionally and spiritually of the very people they were responsible for. The kingship in Israel was not a position of privilege, it was a position of responsibility, of caring for the people, protecting them against enemies, “foreign and domestic”. Yet, the prophet is railing, in God’s name, against these charlatans, these perpetrators of evil-using the vulnerability of the people against them. 


Look who the people that God and the prophet are looking to protect; strangers, widows, poor, needy, parents; all vulnerable people who need and have put their faith and dreams in these very princes and their king. Yet, as the prophet relates, time and time again, they disappoint us through their selfish and wanton acts: their mendacity, their humiliating someone because they can, fraud, robbery, despising of God and God’s ways, all the while purporting to be God’s servant. 


This type of behavior has continued throughout the millennia, we are still victims and perpetrators of these behaviors today. While I would like to find a hero, I also see, like Ezekiel relates, seeking someone “to stand in the breach” is becoming more and more difficult. What these words of Ezekiel point out is the difficulty people have to stand up for what is right and against the bully in power. We see this on both ends of the political, religious, moral, and educational continuums. People at the extremes, ‘right and left’/progressive and conservative, are no longer standing up for what God sees as right, only what they have decreed is right-while both can make very compelling religious cases for their positions and I have heard them all-no one on these ends are looking to learn from and with each other. They are not caring about the ways they cheat another of their voice from fear of humiliation and retribution.


Yet, we do not have to continue to be victimized by these current day “princes and princess’”. We do have the power to stand up and say no-it is not just the rich and famous who have power in America, it is not just the Rabbis of 2000 years ago who have power in Judaism, it is us, the people. As Ezekiel hints to above, we are the people being called upon to stand it the breach, to hold and rebuild the walls that these charlatans, speaking in God’s name yet actually despising God and worshiping idols, are breaking down. We are the people being called upon to heal the wounds of the needy, care for the poor, restore the dignity to the stranger, care for the widows and the orphans, and, of course, respect our fathers and mothers. We, all of us, have been called by Ezekiel, by God and by the current times to be this person(s) and, God knows it will take all of us to restore the sovereignty of God, to return to God’s ways, and to love each other. 


In recovery, we are dedicated to standing in the breach! “Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.” This is the gift of being in recovery, we are on call 24/7 to answer God’s call “to stand in the breach” without concern or regard to race, color, creed, religion, etc. We know that standing in the breach is the gift of recovery and, while we will be scorned for it by many, it is the surest and best way for us to repay God for all the kindness’ God shows us daily. In recovery, we no longer defy God’s call for righteousness, kindness, truth, love and justice. We are able to and live to respond to the call of the widow, the stranger, the parent, the orphan, the poor and the needy with a loud and resounding Hineni, Here I am. We stand for God, for the people who still suffer and for what is right, holy and honoring of and to God. 


I have also done many of the wrong actions listed above. I did not steal or defraud, I did not always stand for the voiceless and, at times, drown out the voices of reason in front of me. I did it when I was ‘in power’ and when I had no power. Every time I did not see the person in front of me, only what I wanted, I was/am guilty of these crimes above. I also know that I have carried God’s message to many both in word and deed. I realize that we want to judge people by their worst action and I also know that God doesn’t do that. I am aware of the perfection standard that we have for ourselves and another(s) and I know that God put T’Shuvah into the world so we could realize the folly of ‘perfection’. I am sorry for those times when I did not defer to wiser people around me. I am grateful for the gift of standing in the breach and being a partner with Harriet Rossetto, and so many partners, in brining the light of God that has led so many to freedom and joy. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark



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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 151

“And I said,”God, they say about me that I speak in allegories only.” Thus said God, for causing your guilt to be remembered and your sins revealed-all of your misdeeds-because you have brought your guilt to be remembered, you will be held responsible. This shall not remain as it is; exalt the low and abase the high.”(Ezekiel 21:5,29,31).


We have to remember that Ezekiel is giving the people a history lesson-Jerusalem has fallen and the Temple is destroyed. I believe this to be an example of both survivors guilt and Ezekiel’s distress regarding the way his fellow priests went along with the mendacity of the kings and the wealthy as well as his own guilt in being part of the power structure that helped to lead people away from God instead of bringing them closer.

He begins by saying the people don’t listen to him, they think he speaks in allegory and/or riddles. He is giving both an excuse for his lack of effectiveness and a lament for what this brings about within the people and the land. Ezekiel is very aware of his role as a priest, I believe, and he knows and is guilty for himself and his fellow priests for their disregard for God and their participation in ‘looking good while doing not good’. 


We see this today in our clergy and in our leaders. While no one is perfect, the role of the Clergy, in my opinion, is to speak truth to the people, to power and to lead/provide a path to a higher state of living and being. Every clergy person gets the honor of helping another human being live a little better by bringing them into and helping them grow in their connection to God/Higher Power/Higher Consciousness-whatever one wants to call the Creative Force of the Universe. When we fail to do this, the failure reverberates throughout the world, when we are part of the solution, the solution becomes the new basis for living lives compatible with being a partner with God. Unfortunately, we seem to be falling back to the days prior to the destruction of Jerusalem with the mendacity of so many clergy members. Rather than preach the word of God as God speaks, they want to preach their words and say it is God. They are the false prophets of today. 


It is not just clergy, however. Leaders of many kinds and stripes do this. As God says above, in the second verse, our continued actions in opposition to what God truly wants brings about the remembrance of past deeds and the things we have been hiding. We promote the idea that because we are ‘right’, we alone speak the words of God, we are the righteous ones, etc, that we can do whatever we want and it is okay. Ezekiel and God are telling us we are engaging in erroneous thinking and terrible actions. We all know people who, whatever their political/social position, believe they can do whatever they want because they are proponents of a ‘righteous cause’. Be it progressives who have disdain for people they see as ignorant-anyone who doesn’t agree with them or conservatives who have disdain for anyone who wants to have/share power-or believes in all people having the same privileges. 


We cause them to be revealed. We are the people who, in our self-deception, believe whatever we do is good and whatever ‘they’ do isn’t. Our actions grow in mendacity, cruelty and they cause us to debase ourselves further and further. Which, in turn, causes our destruction and, unfortunately, the destruction of innocents as well as us guilty ones! So, we have to begin to see how the crown may need to come off of the people we have allowed to lead us to ruin and destruction. We need to take action and remove the crowns we have put on people who are engaging in saying one thing and doing another, people who are unwilling to leave their self-deception and spreading of mendacity, and place them on the people who, everyday, work to improve their authentic connection with God and make themselves one grain of sand better each day. 


In recovery, we know that we can no longer be nor follow false prophets and false people. We are engaging in a process which I call “Spiritual Sobriety” every day. In recovery, we know the destruction we have caused by our being chameleons and leading others to ruin as well. We are constantly listening with our souls to the words that come from God/Higher Power so we don’t stray from the path of decency, truth and justice. We are aware of receiving God’s mercy because we turned after God allowed us to experience the consequences of our mendacity and we are grateful to experience the mercy of God’s forgiveness and yours. 


I know the pain of Ezekiel and I know the mendacity he speaks of. I have caused destruction through my own self-deceptions and I have been ruined by the mendacity and lies of people. The ruin I have caused, I continually realize and make amends-the people who have worked to destroy me, they are still defending themselves. I work hard to be clear and concise, I know at times I take leaps in thinking and speaking because I can’t keep up with the thoughts and words of God as they come to me. I also get angry for and with God and I am sorry to people who don’t understand my anger. I pray for the people who still need to live in their mendacious ways and I pray for the people who are harmed by them. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 150

“Now say to the House of Israel: Thus says the Lord God: If you defile yourselves as your fathers did and go astray after their detestable things…I will not respond to you. With a strong hand and an outstretched arm I will bring you out of the peoples and gather you… I will bring you into the bond of the covenant… you will remember your ways and actions which defiled you and your will loathe for the evils you committed. When I do not deal with you in accordance to your evil ways and corrupt acts, you will know I am God.”(Ezekiel 20: 30,31,34,37,43,44).


This chapter of Ezekiel portrays his speaking to certain elders of Israel who came to him to ask what God wanted/was saying. This is, of course, a recognition of Ezekiel’s status as a prophet. We have another recounting of our history of forgetting God, breaking the covenant, and following the ways of our heart/mind and not staying loyal to God, who brought us out of Egypt, etc. 


God is telling Ezekiel in the first verse above to let the elders know that the false sacrifices and offerings that were happening at the Temple prior to its destruction were never accepted. Rather, the priests, the royals, the people in power fooled themselves into believing that God would be placated with empty rituals. In this verse, God is putting this self-deceptive way of being to rest, hopefully. Yet, how often are we still guilty of believing we can do the detestable actions of our ancestors as well as new ones we think up and believe we can assuage God and another(s)? We are so deeply committed to the lies we tell ourselves and mendacity as the way to be in the world that these words of the prophet and God seem like hyperbole and unnecessary! 


God’s response to our willful blindness is to, once again, save us from ourselves as well as from Babylon, with an “outstretched arm and strong hand”. Yet, even this is not enough, as God has learned. People forget the miracle of salvation pretty quickly. My wife, Harriet Rossetto, says: “gratitude lasts 72 hours”. This is how long it took the Israelites to begin complaining after being taken out of Egypt. God also is going to bring us into the bond of the covenant. We will undergo a bonding experience with God and, hopefully, this bonding experience will imprint the covenant on our hearts, in our minds and unlock the power of our spirit. Without this imprinting, without this bonding, we will repeat our detestable actions, as I am reading Ezekiel. While this was written 2500 years ago, by some accounts, it is as real and continues to happen over and over again. Because so many refuse to become bonded with God, because we reject the imprint of our moments with God, we continue to contribute to our own demise, as nations, as a world and as individuals.

After the bonding experience, after acceptance of the covenant with God, we have to do T’Shuvah for our past actions, as the last verses above teach us. We have to do our inventory and regret our past errors. We also get to be grateful that, for most of us, God does not keep score nor go ‘tit for tat’ with us. Rather, God’s mercy is overflowing and God’s mercy is shown through the same strong hand and outstretched arm that was spoken about earlier. What I am understanding, again, is that mercy, forgiveness are attributes of God’s strength, and ours as well, even though we deceive ourselves to think of these attributes as weakness. Isn’t it time for us to let the fog lift, the self-deception leave and be part of the Oneness of God, the oneness of humanity?

In recovery, we have experienced the bonding with the covenant with God and we carry the imprint of this experience with us daily. We acknowledge God’s ability to “restore us to sanity” and turning “our will and our lives over the care of God…” are two actions we take daily, sometimes many times a day. When we acknowledge the gifts God and life has given us, when we are able to see obligations as “get to” rather than ‘have to’, we are living from this imprint. In recovery, we are constantly searching our inner life to root out the small things that lead us to doing the detestable things that separate us from God, our soul and our authenticity. In recovery, we continue to respond to God’s call, be of service to another(s) and help them to be bonded with the covenant and with God. 


I have also experienced this bonding and I have done detestable things. While many of us want to live in either/or; if you do one bad thing, you are bad; Ezekiel is letting us know that we live in a both/and world. While I have been characterized by some for my less than stellar behaviors, by my traits that are most out of proper measure, this chapter reminds me that T’Shuvah is what God wants and accepts. I also am reminded that while God accepts everyone’s T’Shuvah-people often don’t. I realize they are afraid to do as God and the prophet are suggesting; look at their own detestable actions and repent. Doing this means we have to see our imperfections, correct our actions and allow the imprint of this bonding experience to heal and grow our imperfections to serve us, God and another(s). I also accept and embrace the teaching of mercy and forgiveness that Ezekiel is imparting to us. I no longer resent nor am angry at the people who want to define me by my last ‘bad’ action. I no longer feel hurt by these actions, God’s message of mercy and forgiveness allow me to do both with these people because I ‘get to’ as a member of this new covenant with God. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets- wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 149

“If the wicked one repents of all his errors and keeps My laws and does what is just and right,,, None of the transgressions shall be remembered against him. Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, asks Adonai, our God. It is rather he should turn back from his ways and live. Cast away all the transgressions by which you transgressed and get a new heart and a new spirit for yourselves…”(Ezekiel 18:21,22,31).


Ezekiel is pronouncing a way of being that is so important to our survival and to the survival of the Jewish people till this day and beyond: T’Shuvah. In the first verse above, God is calling out to all of us, because all of us have done, do and will do wicked/erroneous actions. We know this and we already know that T’Shuvah is a necessary part of living.


So, why is this in need of restatement? I believe so the people can truly look inside themselves and see their own imperfections, their own “wickedness”, their own blame/shame behaviors, their own lack of taking personal responsibility for their part in the wickedness of the world. It is so easy to wrap ourselves in the flag of self-righteousness, in the cloth of “being on the right side of an issue”, being ‘woke’, seeing ourselves as the front line of offense and the last line of defense for the “right” way of doing things and whitewash our errors and the errors of our family members, our cohorts, our ‘side’. We see this all the time, on both the left and the right ends of the political/moral spectrum. Yet, God is calling to all of us to see our errors, ask for forgiveness, so we can release our errors from our inner lives, let them leave our way of being, and allow God to cleanse us. 


God, unlike humans, does not want us sinners to die. Each Kol Nidre we ask and give permission to pray with sinners because we are all sinners! Yet, there are those among us who believe their PooP does not smell and have no need to do T’Shuvah, rather they blame another for making them harm them! God wants us to return from our subtle and not so subtle evil ways and live! What a rebellious thought and way of being, don’t kill the evil, transform it, use it for good and for holy actions. This is what God and Ezekiel are exhorting us to do, even in today’s world, or especially in today’s world.

Yet to do this, we have to cast out the transgressions that are in us. We have to surrender and let go of these beliefs that our PooP doesn’t smell, that we are so ‘right’ in our causes that we can do anything we want in the name of our ‘wokeness’ and our ‘righteousness’. We have to truly allow God to do open heart surgery on us, we have to allow God to cut away the foreskin of our hearts and open them up to repentance and acceptance of our total self, not just the parts we want to show off. Doing this rejuvenates our soul and a new spirit of love, truth, justice, mercy, compassion, connection and forgiveness of self and another(s). Then we can truly live a life that is compatible with being a partner, representative, image of God.

Rabbi Heschel teaches: “The words of the prophet are stern, sour, stinging. But behind his austerity is love and compassion for mankind. Ezekiel sets forth what all other prophets imply: “Have I any pleasure in the death…”(The Prophets pg. 12)  and he goes on to remind us: “Indeed the central message of the prophets was the call to return.”(ibid, pg. 238).  We have forgotten that rebuke is a form of holiness and love. Chesbon HaNefesh, an accounting of our soul, is for our benefit to improve and mature our beingness. T’Shuvah is God’s gift to us so we know we are never doomed to be wicked, we are not “bad seeds” that have to grow into “bad trees, etc”, rather we are human beings who, with our surrender and God’s help, can transform our errors into merits, as Reish LaKiesh teaches in the Talmud. 


In recovery, we are living proof of the verses above. We are the wicked ones who repented and returned to a way of living that is compatible with God. We are the ones who “made a decision to turn our will and life over to the care of God” as the Big Book of AA suggests. We have turned from our own negativity to allow God to enter our hearts and renew our spirits daily, so we can continue to grow our knowledge of God’s will for us. In recovery, we are grateful for someone pointing out a character trait out of proper measure, that we did not see so we can bring it back into proper measure and use it wisely and successfully. In recovery, we are grateful each and every day for the gift of return and renewal.

I am the recipient of God’s forgiveness many times over. I am constantly searching myself and asking for God’s help and the help of another(s) to find the traits that I still use out of proper measure. I know that my passion is often confused with anger and I also know that my ways, while at times stinging, stern, and sour, are filled with love and compassion for another human being. I also realize that people use it against me as I can be loud, powerful, etc. While there have been times where this has been my ego speaking, God and I know that the vast majority of these instances in my recovery years, are for the good of another, the belief that another can change and my way of helping him/her see this truth. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 148

“The king of Babylon came to Jerusalem…he took one of the royal seed and made a covenant with him…but that prince rebelled against him…Shall he break a covenant and escape? He broke a covenant…he shall not escape. So too, said God, I will pay him back for flouting My pact and breaking My covenant…I will pluck a tender twig from the tip of its crown…I will plant it in Israel’s lofty highlands…(Ezekiel 17:12,13,15,18,19,22,23)


The king of Babylon, as Ezekiel is recounting, did not want to destroy the city of Jerusalem nor the kingdom of Judah. There was a deal, a covenant as Ezekiel calls it, and it was the prince that was put in charge that caused the destruction that followed. Evidently, the prince made a political deal to save his life and did so with the full intention of breaking it as soon as possible. The question posed by God through Ezekiel is ringing in my ears:”Shall he break a covenant and escape?”. How often do any of us make a deal and break it? How often do we make a deal and know we are going to use a loophole, find a way out after we get what we want? How often do we break a deal and then blame the other party for “making us do it”?

In today’s world, our word is no longer our bond, the relationships we make are mostly transactional and God, through Ezekiel, is telling us that we cannot escape the consequences of transactional living. The hubris of humankind is that we believe we can make and break covenants with impunity. We believe we can make a promise to our constituents and not fulfill them and still get re-elected (which does happen often). We believe that we can use people for our needs and then throw them away when it becomes too bothersome to stand up for what is right, after this person stood up for us.

Ezekiel is telling us that the king of Babylon did not let the prince escape and the city and kingdom were destroyed. He is also telling us that God is not letting us escape unscathed either. “I will pay him back for flouting my pact and breaking my covenant” is the wish of every oppressed person, every person who has been devastated by this transactional way of being. We want to see God ‘punish’ the evildoer and dance when it happens. Yet, this is us at a very ugly level of living. This is us being part of the “rebellious breed” as well. While the momentary satisfaction of seeing karma happen is exhilarating, it also is doing what is hateful to us to another. It is not what God is trying to teach us.

God’s “payback” is to teach us to keep our covenants and our pacts with each other and with God. It is a purifying and teaching experience rather than a ‘get back’ experience. God cries when God has to teach us in this manner, I believe, because God keeps begging us to return through God’s prophets, God keeps calling to us each and every day to return, and God gave us T’Shuvah so we can have a way back. Yet, as the prince did with both the king of Babylon and God, we continue to “make deals” with each other and with God and break them with alarming speed and contempt. This is true in business relationships, in personal relationships, and it is tearing at the fabric of society.

Yet, God’s promise is that from the people who return, the people who were sent into exile through no fault of their own, a new nation will arise, a new Israel/Judah will be born from this twig of people who keep their pacts and have kept their covenants with God. This remnant will produce a people, who one day, will again be the light unto the nations that reminds us of our first loyalty and our first covenant is with God and we are responsible for keeping our covenants and our pacts.


Recovering people are these returning people. We return to a way of being that is compatible with God, compatible with our soul’s calling and our most joyous moments are when we are in I/Thou relationships with people. In recovery, we keep our pacts and our covenants, we continue to grow our relationships and our word is our bond, again. We no longer do things with bad intentions, we enter into relationships with open hearts and connecting souls. In recovery, God is dear to us and we relish the opportunity to be of service to another(s) and to God. 


I have, of course, broken pacts and covenants in my past. I  do now, however, enter into relationships with people with an open heart and committed to honor the pact and covenant. I am sad at the latest covenant and pact that I made was broken by the other parties to it and no mention is made of their treachery, only my inappropriate response to the breaking of the pact and covenant. While it seems that they will  not ‘pay not price’; I realize that it is not mine to exact, I have to learn and move forward from the experience. This is the learning from God through Ezekiel for me. I pray that my “friends” will also learn and enter into relationships that are not just transactional, as I am committed to doing. While relationships may not be forever, the covenantal ones need to be honored, nurtured and grown. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark


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The Prophets- wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 147

“You have played the harlot with the Egyptians…You have played the harlot with the Assyrians. You have carried your lewdness and your abominations, says God. God says, I will deal with you as you have done for you have despised the oath in breaking the covenant. Nevertheless, I will remember My covenant with you. Then you shall remember your ways and be remorseful. And I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall know I am God.(Ezekiel 16: 26,28,59,60,61,62)


This chapter is one of Ezekiel’s angriest so far, and that is saying something. I keep returning to my belief that Ezekiel is reliving his anger and frustration from the time he was a priest in Jerusalem and unable/unwilling to confront the people and/or get them to change.


The accusation against Jerusalem in this chapter is reminiscent of Hosea, comparing Jerusalem to a harlot, to an unfaithful wife. This is another reoccurring theme. We speak of monogamy and worshiping God with love and reverence, yet people continue to flirt with another(s), break the covenant of decency, leave the path of God, hate mercy and do unrighteous acts. Ezekiel the priest, witnessed and, possibly, engaged in these types actions and sees the error of the ways of the people and his own shortcomings. It enrages him, saddens him and causes him to seek ways to return. 


The theme of lewdness, harlotry, and adultery all seem to be pointing to uncovering our nakedness “in private” and God is pulling down our masks and our facades to force us to look into the mirror. ‘You cannot continue to lie to yourself, you cannot continue to act as if you are the victim, you cannot continue to bemoan My abandoning you’ is what I am experiencing in reading this chapter over and over. Ezekiel is forcing us to look at the reality of our past behaviors through God’s experience, not our mendacity and self-deception. God is telling us that we can no longer play the harlot, the adulterer, the victim, the orphan; rather we have to be responsible for our past actions and be transparent and authentic in order to learn, return and recover from our past.


In the 3rd verse above, the prophet is reminding us that God will give us what we ask for, to be dealt with as we have done to God, to the poor, the needy, to each other. Breaking the covenant is an act of despising God, despising each other and, I would add, an act of despising oneself. We see this type of behavior over and over again throughout history, there are people who believe that they are above the law of their land and above the law go God. These people are so sure of their invincibility that they flaunt their lies,‘abominations’, prejudices and false pride. Then they wrap themselves in a cloak of being God’s true messengers while playing the harlot to the powerful and the adulterer towards the people they say they are helping. They sell their souls and their neighbors for a moment of ‘power’ that is as fleeting as a second. Yet, they deceive themselves and another(s) into believing they are serving God. This is the cause of the destruction of Jerusalem, this is the cause of the destruction of all the ‘great’ societies of antiquity up to today, I believe. 


Yet, God will always honor God’s covenant. God will always take us back. God will remember us and will give us the opportunity to be remorseful, return and renew our covenant. God, in the last verse above, will establish the covenant with us again and again because God desires our return as our prayers call to us to return. Return comes from a sense of embarrassment for our past behaviors. It comes from a realization of the myriad of ways we have lied to ourselves, harmed another(s), left the paths of God and treated people as objects for our use and discard. AND, our return will allow us to be forgiven, re-invigorated and clean of our past errors and move forward with God, with community, and with a whole self to make this world a little better each day. 


In recovery, we recount the ways we played the harlot and the adulterer. We are so aware and embarrassed by these behaviors that we once believed were good and right. We do this recounting so we know what to and how to avoid these ugly paths that separate us from God, from our authentic beings and our commitments to another(s). In recovery, we are blessed to be able to have established a new relationship with God, a new covenant with God and we have a new knowledge of God’s will and ways. Armed with this new path and strength, we get to live a life that is compatible with God. 


I have played the harlot and adulterer prior to my recovery. In my recovery and in retrospect, I see how I played the harlot at times in my recovery, all the while excusing my harlotry as something I was doing for the greater good of the organization I was raising money for and running. I was so deep in my self-deception and mask that I did not realize what this was doing to my soul. I know now that being a “hooker for a greater cause” doesn’t work. I know now that depending upon people to “have your back” in the face of their friends, etc doesn’t work-especially if the people are concerned with optics. I have made a new covenant with God, my wife and myself-no more whoring, no more masks, no more self-deception-my covenant is a covenant of transparency, authenticity and walking in God’s path and let the chips fall where they may. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets- wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets 

Day 146

“Human, these men have set up idols in their heart, and put the stumbling block of their iniquity before their faces; should I let Myself be ask by all of them? …Thus says the Lord God; everyone of the house of Israel who sets up his idols in his heart… and comes to the prophet; I the Lord will respond to…That I may catch the house of Israel in their own heart because they are all estranged from me through their idols…Thus says the Lord God; Repent and turn yourselves away from your idols and turn your faces from all your abominations.”(Ezekiel 14:3,4,5,6)


The power of this prophecy is the message it gives to the people/remnant of Jews in Babylon and in Israel; to return, to let go of their idolatry, etc. 


The problem with idolatry, as God reminds us in the first verse above, is that it begins in our hearts! As Moses said to us in Numbers 15:39, “Do not follow your heart and your eyes in your lustful urge”. We desire something, anything so badly that our hearts/minds find ways to justify the behaviors necessary to obtain/satiate our “lustful urges”. These urges can be comprised of anything; power, prestige, fame, etc; and they all lead us astray and are stumbling blocks we put in front of our faces/feet.

We all are guilty of doing this, at one time or another, in a greater or lessor degree. God is speaking to those of us who make it a habit to worship their idols and set themselves up to serve themselves only. While they may “look good” and be on the “right side” of causes and mitzvoth; these are people who do things for their own sake, not the sake of God. These are people who are so arrogant as to think they fool God and humans alike. Yet, as stated above, God knows and because God knows, another(s) human being will know and then another, etc. Idolators are found out and, while not always dealt with in our time and in our desired manner-they suffer for their iniquity and idolatry.

God’s wish, as I understand the second and third verses above, is that the idolators, the people who keep stumbling over their iniquity come to God and connect with God. God wants the people to end their estrangement from God. As I am writing this, I realize this is the call of every parent who feels estranged from their children because of the missing the mark of both parties, I realize this is the call of every sibling, lover, friend when someone is missing the mark with them. I realize this call to be the call of love, care, compassion, kindness and truth. Yet, this call so often falls on deaf ears. It is hard to hear the call to end our estrangement from another(s), including God, when we are unable to hear the call of our inner life/soul to end our estrangement from ourselves.

How do we end this estrangement? Repent, return and have new responses, ie T’Shuvah. This is the path God reminds us of in this chapter, again. It is a constant call of God to people, COME BACK, the door is always open; yet we seem to like the iniquity and idols we set up better than to answer God’s call once and for all time. We keep going back and forth because of our desire to live in our own mendacity, our own lies, our own masks and our own false selves. To live who we really are, to contribute what we really can to make God’s world a little better each day, this takes dedication, ability to accept disappointment, letting go of the idols in our hearts, no longer hiding our errors/our miss the marks, accepting our place as God’s partner, servant and caretaker of God’s world. Remembering the world was created for our sake and we are not the creators of it, using our creative nature-implanted in us by God-to grow and change our corner of the world for the sake of God, not our egos and not our fortunes. 


In recovery, we are well aware of the way idolatry takes root in our hearts and we see the world through false eyes and with suspicion and scarcity. We know the harm on our souls and the harm we then perpetrate onto another(s) because we are devoted worshipers of our idols. We also know the stumbling block of our iniquity before our faces is the way our vision sees only what we want it to see, not what is. AND, in recovery, we are well attuned to the warning signs of this insidious way of being creeping into our daily lives os we constantly and consistently do T’Shuvah, we consistently do our inventory, we are constantly improving the ways we live and the ways we serve God each and every day, one grain of sand at a time. We are able to rejoice in our portion, love our neighbors better and not need to give into our false egos, our false selves and our inauthentic natures. 


I know a little about the idols of my heart and the stumbling block of my iniquities before my face. I live with the aftermath of them each and every day. I know that my flirtations with idolatry in recovery (mainly thinking I am right) have been fewer and fewer over the years and I am engaged in rooting them out each and every day. I also know that I have bought the faces of people living their iniquity on their face and not realizing it. Every time I buy into the lies of another(s), I am engaging in idolatry. Our idolatry begins when we buy the lies of another(s). Truth sets me free and I have to see Truth as well as speak truth a little more each day. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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THE PROPHETS - WISDOM TO ENHANCE OUR DAILY LIVING

Daily Prophets

    Day 145

“Thus said the Lord God; Woe to the foolish prophets, who follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing! They have spoken falsehood and divined a lie, they say, Says God when God has not sent them.  Because they have led my people astray…Because with lies you have cowed the heart of the righteous, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, by promising him life;”(Ezekiel 13:3,6,10,22)


Ezekiel is railing against false prophets and false prophecy in this chapter. He begins with the statement “woe to” in order to get the people’s attention as well as call out the pretenders. He makes the distinction between false prophets and himself and the other prophets in that true prophets don’t ask for the job, are overcome with an experience of God and speak only what God tells them-their own spirit does not enter into the words God has them speak. 


False prophets, according to the verses above, are dangerous because they are so believable. They speak falsehood and divine a lie, yet the people follow them and believe them. Why? I think it goes back to the Kotzker Rebbe and Rabbi Heschel’s teachings about mendacity and the desire we all have for self-deception as well as our wanting to hear “good news” rather than truth. It is very hard for people to look at their part and their responsibility in life. It is much easier to blame, proclaim innocence and deny responsibility, as well as sell false hope rather than effect change in ourselves and in another(s). 


Yet, what happens is the false prophets lead all of us astray, even the ones wrestling to speak truth. Truth seekers and speakers are led astray because they are scorned, they speak louder, get frustrated and, eventually are drowned out and their spirits are so sad and heavy, many of them just give up under the weight of it all. For the ones who suffer from the disease of self-deception, they are led to and want to believe lies and no change has to be made. They cannot return to God, as the prophets demand, because in their mind they haven’t left God. How these false prophets still rule today. So many people would rather buy the lies of these false prophets who lead every nation they gain control of away from God and towards ruin and destruction.

The deeds are to “cow the heart of the righteous…and strengthen the hands of the wicked”. Herein lies the issue with false prophets, they convince people that the message of their souls, the decent behavior that God has ordained, are not true-decency is wrong and indecency is right in this topsy-turvy world. They help the cons, the thieves, the powerful and the rich keep doing the things that God is calling evil, that the prophets are damning and demanding return from! They do this for their own power, for their own prestige and for their own pocketbooks. False prophets then as well as now, don’t believe the lies they spew, they spew them for their own personal gain. Ezekiel is telling us that a true prophet doesn’t gain anything material, they only gain spiritually. They sing the song that is in their soul, they speak the words of God they were created to speak and they live to serve. 


In recovery, one of our deeds is to spread the message to others who still suffer from ills stemming from pride, prestige, mendacity, etc. It is an honor to speak to a group and a privilege to carry the message that God gives us to spread. In recovery, we search out our beings every single day for the lies we are telling ourselves so we can let them go in order to serve God and another(s). Each day we surrender our false pride and false ego to God because we know how insidious both of these negative attributes can be. Each day, we open our eyes a little more and see more clearly the things we can change and those that we are powerless over, spending our time and energy in the former and letting go of the need to control the latter. In recovery, we get to show up for God in truth, kindness and love-life doesn’t get any better than this. 


I have experienced Ezekiels rage and anger at the mendacity of myself as well as another(s). I have been known to ‘fly off the handle’ when I witness the mendacity that will “cow the heart of the righteous” and “lead the people astray”. While I am not condoning inappropriate anger, I also know righteous anger is needed at times, as Ezekiel demonstrates in this chapter towards the false prophets. Having dealt with falseness in myself and in another(s) for years, I realize that my righteous anger towards the liars and the false prophets has been used against me-while I am seething with anger from God, toward the liars who are trying to destroy people and organizations for their own enjoyment- the liars are calm and collected. Hence they are believed by the people who engage in and relish in their own self-deceptions! I am not always correct nor appropriate in my righteous anger and neither am I always wrong. We are afraid of righteous anger because we are afraid that we have been found out and God is calling us back when we want to stay in power and control. Let’s all stop our wicked ways and return to God’s ways so we don’t have to have as much stress and strife and be responsible for our part, rather than blaming another(s) for our errors. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark


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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our Daily Living

                                                             Daily Prophets

    Day 144

“​And the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Son of man, you dwell in

​the midst of a rebellious house, who have eyes to see, and see not; they have ears to hear, and hear not; for they are a rebellious house. For there shall be no more any vain vision nor flattering divination...(Ezekiel 12:1,2,24)


Again, Ezekiel is speaking as if Jerusalem still stands and we know his prophecy is in Babylon. I am realizing he is recounting the events in a new light to the exiles so they learn the lessons that God and the earlier prophets were teaching them, yet they refused to heed and heel to. 


The opening message from God is one that Jeremiah spoke about, the other prophets alluded to and Moses warned us about. All throughout the millennia, this has been a constant refrain. “Can’t you see what is right in front of you” is a common question asked by parents, kids, bosses, employees, by all of us to another. Yet, we don’t always ask this question of ourselves. Ezekiel is being instructed by God to ask this question to the exiles in Babylon so they can affirm their faithfulness rather than their rebellion. 


Rebellion against God, against decency, against kindness, etc happens, as I am understanding Ezekiel this morning, because of our own willful blindness and willful deafness. In rebellion, even good ones, we often fall prey to our zealousness and are so focused on rebelling/our goal that we don’t hear the whole story nor do we see the pain, fears and pitfalls in front of us. I am thinking of the Maccabees and how Hanukkah became the beginning of the end with the later generations reverting to Greek names and ways, while selling out to the Romans who eventually destroyed them. 


We are unable to see what is in front of us because we are not willing to confront truth. Willful blindness is a state of being unwilling/afraid to confront reality head on. Rather, we see what we want to see, we see people for whom we want them to be, we see strengths as weaknesses, and weaknesses as strength. We are, as the Rambam writes in Shemoneh Prakim, we are suffering a spiritual sickness where bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter, everything is reversed. In this state, God sends Ezekiel to remind us of what the cost of this willful blindness is, death, destruction, exile, etc. 



Learning from our errors, from the errors of our ancestors allows us to let go of our vanity and our need to flatter ourselves and another(s) to get what we want/think we deserve. It is the bane of our existence. As we can see from our own personal history as well as the history of our country, if we are willing to let go of our willful blindness, our vanity and flattery has caused great suffering, world wars, racism, anti-Semitism, hatred of everyone different that me, etc. We are experiencing the vanity of our former president and the need by so many, seeming aware people, to flatter him and buy into his lies and deception. 


Vanity and flattery lead to mendacity, self-deception and the deception of another(s), as Rabbi Heschel teaches. We see this in the prophecies of Ezekiel and the other prophets. We see this in the opening two verses above: when we are engaged in vanity and flattery, we cannot see nor can we hear truth-we only see the lies, the deception and spread this mendacity till it ruins us internally and destroys all around us. We are faced with this curse over and over again in our lives and the life of the world. 


In recovery, vanity, flattery, not hearing and not seeing are what we are recovering from! We spent much time in “having eyes and not seeing, having ears and not hearing” and it led to our ruin and destroyed so many relationships and possibilities that we had. We are acutely aware of our desire to see what we want and hear what we want so in recovery, we are doing inventory each day to check ourselves, we are checking in with another(s) to make sure our eyesight and hearing are good. We meet with people in humanship and to help them as well as ourselves. In recovery, we work hard to not buy into the flattery of another(s) and keep our vanity in check-otherwise we know we will return to spaces and places of destruction and rebellion. 


I have always been a rebel, for many years I rebelled against God and everyone else. I have given into vanity and flattery, I have not heard and seen what is in front of me even in my recovery. Last week, I realized what the issue is/was: Indifference, my inability to defer to the wisdom of another(s) at times and to defer to the message God was sending me. This led me to give in to my vanity and buy the bullshit others were slinging. I understand it fed my lower self and I was willfully blind because of my lack of deference and reverence. It is a hard pill to swallow, yet it is necessary if I am going to grow and be more in concert with and act in partnership with God and another(s). I am also grateful for being the rebel I am so I can join the rebellion that Judaism has always been, that spirituality calls for, the rebellion towards God, towards community and aware from willful blindness and vanity. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets- wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets 

    Day 143

“Thus says God…I will gather you from the people… and I will give you the land of Israel.I will put a new spirit inside you; and I will take the stony heart from their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh; That they may walk in my statutes, and keep my ordinances, and do them; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.”(Ezekiel 11:17,19,20)


Ezekiel has another of his visions of the Chariot, the Cherubim, the fire and above it all is God-not in form of any kind, rather in spirit and voice and he is beginning to hear God’s mercy and compassion as well as God’s need for humanity to do right. 


In the first verse above, Ezekiel is reiterating the promise given to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as well as to Moses and the Israelites in Egypt. God will gather us from the scattered places and bring us all to Israel, again! While this is a physical reference, I am struck by how scattered we are as individuals and as a people as well as how scattered are the people of the USA (and other countries) from each other. We have forgotten that we all made it to freedom together. Thinking about Moses scolding the tribes of Reuben, Manasseh, and Gad for wanting to stand on the sidelines while the rest of their cousins were going to fight for Canaan, I realize how scattered we can be. 


The wars we fight with each other and call it business as usual, the polarization, obstruction and hatred/racism/anti-semitism, etc that we experience here-these are all because we have scattered inner lives and we have come to see each other as enemies, the other instead of another human being seeking God’s light and bringing a word of God to all of us. 


God knows this will happen and the cure is the same as the cure stated in the second verse above; a new spirit is inside of us, if only we would allow it to prevail. While Ezekiel is a little over the top about his visions, I think he is exhibiting for use, a new spirit from the one he had as a priest. We all are infused with a new spirit each and every day- when we say gratitude for God returning our soul to us, we acknowledge a new spirit-yet most of us don’t allow it to overwhelm our emotions and minds enough to change our behaviors. 


Instead, we hold on to our “stony heart’. We see this when people do not forgive another who seeks forgiveness and reconnection for errors made. We see this when people “stand idly by the blood of their neighbor”, we see this when people “bear false witness” and engage in “murder of the soul of another”. So, Ezekiel reminds us that in freedom, we have a heart of flesh, not stone and God gives us this heart of flesh so we can enhance and grow our freedom as well as share it with another(s). 


We do this by living the last verse, walking in God’s ways first and foremost. The ordinances are the social ordinances, how to live as one people together with all of our differing viewpoints. Walking in God’s ways is to be fully immersed in truth, justice, kindness, compassion and love. It means to, as Rabbi Heschel teaches, have the interests of another(s) be our concerns. It means to, in the words of Rabbi Heschel, “ask what life got out of us today”, instead of being preoccupied with what we are getting out of life. Freedom is accepting God’s authority, it is receiving the gift of being God’s people with joy, reverence, and commitment and it is never being indifferent to life’s beauty and challenges. God is always God to and for us, when we live the verses above, we are aware of this, act accordingly and connect to each other and to God in a deeper, more meaningful and joyous manner. 


In recovery we are aware of the stony heart we had and each day we are grateful for the heart of flesh God has placed in us. We are desperate, in positive way, to walk with God and in God’s ways. We constantly work to “improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out” as the 11th step of AA guides us. We are so aware of our need to constantly clean out the lies and BS that keeps us scattered internally and look for connection and communion with God and another(s). In recovery, we use our past history of being scattered to ensure our togetherness today. We are aware that we have to see life anew each and every day-“same shit, different day” doesn’t work for our recovery. Instead, we adopt/adapt Rabbi Heschel’s teaching of not taking anything for granted and being surprised each and every day. We notice miracles today that used to be unnoticed and boring. In recovery, we celebrate the gift of being a person of God and being able to live with God as our Guide. 


I find myself still getting scattered at times. I know I am when I can’t see or hear those closest to me. I know I am when I find myself distant from God. I am blessed by God’s kind and loving action of bringing me back from the edge, I have not gone back to the drunk and criminal I was. I acknowledge and live through my new heart and my new spirit to the best of my ability. I am grateful that I am transparent, even when it isn’t so pretty.  I am saddened by the fauxthenticity of others around me and I am grateful for the authentic connections I have to family, friends, and community as well as to God. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets- Wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

    Day 142

“And the Lord said to him, Go through the city, through Jerusalem, and put a mark upon the foreheads of the men who sigh and who cry for all the abominations that are done in its midst. Slay utterly old men and young men, young girls, and little children, and women; but do not come near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary.(Ezekiel 9:4,6)


Ezekiel is again angry and recounting an experience that could not have happened in Babylon, only in Jerusalem. This prophecy is either a recapping of what has happened in a different light or a vision that came to Ezekiel in Babylon as a reminder, explanation for the exile. He is certainly making the destruction and exile a punishment from God, not a political grab/gain for the Babylonian Empire. 


While the descriptions seem far fetched to many people today, I believe he is so over the top because of his inability to effect any of the changes/returns that the earlier prophets had demanded/requested. Ezekiel, I believe, suffers from survivors’ guilt and the guilt of one who could not make a difference in the outcome. He is suffering from his own need to fix that he could not control. Ezekiel is having a confrontation with himself, a dark night of the soul, and has to learn that he can only do the best he can and is powerless over the actions of other people. 


The first verse above tells us of God’s mercy and grace. God is sending someone to mark the foreheads of the people who recognize their errors and the errors of the people around them. Because they can “sigh and cry for all the abominations that are done in their midst” it shows God of their desire to return and, rather than allow Babylon to destroy everyone, God wants to save these people. It is interesting that the mark on the forehead has a similar significance to the mark of Cain-that this person is protected by God. 


I believe that we have forgotten to “sigh and cry” for the errors we make and the errors those around us make. We have become so used to defending our actions, refusing to admit our responsibility for our “missing the marks”, mistakes, failures-however you want to put it-and this makes us unable to “sigh and cry”. God and Ezekiel are reminding us that acknowledging our wrongs, seeing the wrongs of our friends, family, society is a holy action and one deserving of salvation. Actually, as I write this I am realizing without the “sigh and cry” we are not worthy of being saved. Hence, Rabbi Heschel’s teaching that “prayer will not save us, it may make us worthy of being saved”. 


Ezekiel has the people begin at the Sanctuary, I believe, because that was his place of work and service. It is the place and people who should have been helping the people return to God before the destruction began. It is the place where Ezekiel was ineffective and the place of his greatest shame. Instead of realizing his responsibility, he is in fact blaming the other priests and wanting revenge on them, I believe. How human is this! The more shame Ezekiel feels, the more he is unable to accept his responsibility for this outcome, the more blame he puts on another(s). Remember, Rabbi Heschel teaches “in a free society, some are guilty all are responsible”. 


He is interested in killing those fellow priests because he will then get revenge and call it God’s will. Revenge is never God’s Will, it is humankind’s will. We think that we can “get even” and exact our pound of flesh for the harms another(s) has inflicted upon us. It never truly works out that well, however. We cannot exact revenge and live a life compatible with God. God doesn’t seek revenge, only connection, purification. Whenever humans seek revenge, we become less than human, distant from God and never fully satisfied from our revenge. Yes there are schadenfreude moments and they don’t last long as well as realizing that what we hated done to us, we have done to another. Beginning at the Sanctuary does allow everyone else to see that no one is above God’s ways of living and everyone has to face themselves and God at sometime in their lives. 


In recovery, we have the mark on our foreheads. Before, it was a mark that everyone could see and know to stay away from us because we were not able to be reliable, not able to be truthful, not able to be honest, not able to live a life compatible with God, decency, kindness, justice and love. In recovery, we have turned our lives over to God’s will and God’s teachings, we “sigh and cry” for the errors of our past and the ones we make now-no longer hiding from you, me, and God. In recovery, we also rejoice in our transformation to being an instrument of God’s love, mercy, kindness, justice and truth. We rejoice in our return to God, society, community, family and our authentic self. 


I have the mark on my forehead and I “sigh and cry” at my errors and mistakes. I also “sigh and cry” at the errors and mistakes on another(s). I no longer have to “get even”, I no longer have to blame, I no longer feel less than, I no longer accept the shame another(s) want to put on me. God’s grace and mercy have truly saved me and I am so grateful. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 141

“And God said to me, human, do you see what they do? The great abominations that the house of Israel commits here, to drive Me far away from My sanctuary? And I went in and saw;…all the idols of the house of Israel portrayed on the surrounding wall. …have you seen what the elders of Israel do in the dark, every man in his rooms of pictures? For they say, the Lord does not see us; the Lord has forsaken the land.(Ezekiel 8:6,10,12).


The first verse above is a haunting question that is still ringing in my ears and God is still asking, I believe. It is the question that begs God’s call to Abraham and all of us since to:”Lift up your eyes and see!”. We have become more adept than our ancestors, possibly, at not seeing what we see because we see what we want to. They were masters of this behavior as we can see from the verses quoted above and the words of all the prophets. 


Do you see what you do, is the question that is calling out to me. I am humbled by looking at the ways we have driven God out of God’s house, not just the Churches, Mosques, Temples and Synagogues, how we have driven God out of our world and consciousness through the idols we have made of God. How often have we looked at our abominations and seen them as holy acts instead? We have become more and more entrenched in our own ideas, political correctness, self-deceptions, idolatry, etc. We are so entrenched that we are unable to “lift up our eyes and see!”. We need cataract surgery in order to lift the film that blinds us to our abominable actions. We need to “circumcise the foreskin of our hearts” as Moses commands us in Torah.

Yet, we don’t. We engage in different forms of idolatry, some more sophisticated and some so vulgar that it is impossible for us to believe it is idolatry. We are do engaged in our self-deception and deceiving another(s) we have come to buy our own lies! This is the greatest abomination of all to me; because just as the study of Torah leads to the living/doing of Torah, the engagement in self-deception and deceiving another(s) leads to living an idolatrous life and doing idolatrous actions.

We hide behind God’s words, proclaiming the ONE WAY to salvation and God. Yet, we are the idolators seeking everyone to follow us for our gain, not for God’s glory nor gain, according to Ezekiel here. Today, we don’t even hide the idols in the darkness of our rooms, rather we proudly display them with the buildings we name for someone who has enough money to pay for them. We worship names like Trump, Bezos, etc. not because they have done anything Holy, rather because they are loud, rich and lie with impunity. The charlatans who proclaim “on advice of counsel” in criminal or civil matters are hiding behind the bill of rights to hide their own guilt. The idol worshipers who twist God’s words and commandments from their pulpits, who say one thing to everyone and hold themselves to lower standards, who accuse another(s) of what they themselves are doing, the ‘dark money’ people who are pulling our strings of government so we are no longer a government of the people, by the people and for the people, we are a government of the rich and powerful.


The people are told that God has forsaken us because of homosexuality, the immigrants we take in, the Jews, the Blacks, the Asians, etc by these charlatans. We are told that _____ has caused all of this trouble(fill in the blank) and that is why we have to do such and such. God has forsaken us because of YOUR idolatry is the pitch that this Shysters, Con people, Snake Oil Salespeople are using and it is working. These are the people who have abandoned God, these are the people who Ezekiel is saying caused the destruction of the Temple, Jerusalem and the defeat of Judah.

In recovery, we are constantly aware of the abominations we did in our life prior to recovery and, while we are nowhere near perfect today, we have left the paths that lead us to those abominations. We are constantly in conversation with our “higher consciousness” and with another(s) to keep ourselves in check and out of the paths that led to destroying our lives and the lives of another(s)! We no longer worship at the feet of idols, we know what is truly important, connection. We are aware that no amount of fame, fortune, etc will bring us authentic connection and we are not willing to engage in faux connection. In recovery, we have left the darkness of our rooms and celebrate our connection to God/Higher Power by walking in the Light of God and being grateful for God’s show of Grace to us. 


I also have done abominable actions. I also “lift up my eyes and see” every day. I realize that I also deceived myself to see what I wanted and not what was. I bought into people who were actually just deceiving me and, once again, I am on the outside looking in at idol worshipers, lawyers who lie, people for whom I am an easy scapegoat and ‘friends’ who deserted me. I have a part in this experience and my actions were wrong/stupid and I am portrayed as evil by the people I counted on. It is sad and I can relate to God’s sadness here. I also am committed to not be “indifferent to the sublime wonder of living” anymore and to celebrate connection to real friends and to people who walk their talk. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 140

“The survivors shall escape to the mountains, like doves together, each person shall moan their iniquities. …horror shall cover them, every face shall betray shame… I will treat them in accordance with their own ways and judge them according to their judgements.”(Ezekiel 7:16,18,27).


The last verse above is an interesting one for me. It is God being God’s least merciful version of God. While we keep insisting on FAIR and everyone treated the same, here, the prophet is saying we will be treated as we acted and judged as we judged! Oh no, we will be treated as we treated others, so if we were racist and slave masters, we will be treated with racism and become a slave. If we were greedy and stole from our employees by underpaying them so the “shareholders could profit”, then we will be underpaid and stolen from, etc. While the lawyers tell us ‘if you do it for one, you have to do it for everyone’, do the lawyers want to be treated like they treat another(s)? I think not! Do government officials want to be treated the way they treat us citizens? Again, I think not. God is promising to treat us according to the ways we treat others and all of us should tremble. Are we ready to stand before God and be judged in the manner we judge another? Most of us count on God’s mercy and grace so the last verse above is terrifying to most of us.

It is important for us to hold onto this verse as it will cause us to be more Godlike in our ways of being and in the judgements we make. It will allow us to be less judgmental and more open to mercy and grace. It will give us the opportunity to constantly change our ways of being so we are more in concert with our Godly nature. Holding onto this verse eliminates the need for “it’s not fair” and sameness in acting and judging. Since all of us are created unique, what is fair for one, cannot be fair for another and what is just for one, can’t be just for another-rather we have to act in accordance with God’s Will for us individually and judge each person as individuals, not go by some metric.

This is how the survivors in the first verse above will relieve themselves of the shame and horror of their actions. Moaning over our iniquities is the first step on our journey back to a decent way of living and reconnection with God and another human being and humanity in general. We need to see the horror of our actions, we need to experience the shame of being created in the image of God and not recognizing nor honoring this truth. Instead, we go about our business thinking of ourselves and what is “best” for us and ours. Not being responsible for what is right and good in God’s world, not caring for the stranger and the needy and the poor in body, mind, finances, and spirit. We, the ones going about our business as usual, are the ones who are poorest in spirit and don’t realize it. We are spiritually bankrupt and claim to be flush with cash.

What is needed is a little horror and shame on the part of our leaders and on our part as well. False accusations are the same as murder in Jewish Law because they murder the integrity and dignity of another(s). Promoting lies, rewriting of history, cover-ups, blaming another(s) for ones flaws and failures, etc are all things that should bring us to horror and shame, yet many people extol these ways of being as Godly and people support them because self-deception is a major disease, as Rabbi Heschel teaches. In his book Who is Man, Rabbi Heschel in 1963, teaches: “There are slums, disease, and starvation all over the world and we are building more luxurious hotels in Las Vegas”. Some 60 years later, we are no better, maybe worse. 


In recovery, we experience the horror and shame of our actions that are in direct violation of God’s Will and Ways. We gather together to help each other face our flaws and failures, own up to God and to another(s) the direct nature of our errors and find ways to make amends to the people we have harmed. These principles are cornerstones of our recovery as we need to constantly “keep our side of the street clean”. Once we have come face to face with the horror we have caused and our faces betray the shame we experience from these actions, we are on the road back to decency, God as well as family, friends, community and, most importantly, our authentic self and a way of being in the world that honors our uniqueness and is compatible with being a partner of God’s.

I have faced with horror the negative ways I have acted and the paths that I have taken that led me away from God. I have experienced the shame of separating myself from God, believing the lie that I was doing God’s Will. I also faced with horror and shame the foolish belief in people I trusted to be true to their word and stay connected and helpful at all times. I am grateful that these times have been fewer and fewer in my 32+ years of recovery. I know that I am unafraid of God’s judgement as I have made amends and T’shuvah with those I harmed and with God. I also know that I have learned whom to trust and whom not to. I have taken off the blinders and stay open to the T’shuvah of another(s) as I pray people are open to mine. Even when it is not accepted nor acknowledged, I have learned that T’Shuvah takes the horror and shame away from me. Thank you God for the gift of horror, shame and T’Shuvah. God Bless and Stay Safe, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 139

“The word of God came to me.Yet I will leave a remnant, in that some of you will escape the sword and be scattered through the lands. And those of you who that escape will remember Me among the nations…how heartbroken I was through their faithless hearts which turned away from Me and through their faithless eyes which lusted after their fetishes. And they shall loathe themselves for all the evil they committed…”(Ezekiel 6:1,8-9).


Since Ezekiel is in Babylon when we first encountered him, I believe this is a retrospective view of what happened and a cautionary tale for the people to begin/continue the process of returning to God and letting go of their lusts and fetishes. God’s desire to connect with humans is so powerful in that God does not destroy completely. God keeps the covenant God made with Noah to never destroy the entire world again because humans act ungodly.

Being scattered among the nations is, I believe, a key to our return. Without going to another nation, being under their authoritarian and arbitrary rule, we will not be able to appreciate being a nation that worships God, not royalty, has a set of standards that enhances the dignity of every person, and can start to promote this way of being in the land they are living in order to be stronger in their resolve to not make the same mistakes they did before and learn from the mistakes of their ancestors. 


It is a revolutionary idea that Judaism in general and Ezekiel above is promoting: GOD CARES! God is so deeply involved with us that God is heartbroken by our faithlessness, by our turning away from God, by our lustful eyes and our running after the latest fad and fetish. We have to be in exile to see this? All of our Holy Books remind us that God is deeply involved in the plight of humanity. The Temple worship service is proof of God’s involvement, yet it became and empty ritual. Our prayer services are proof of God’s involvement and desire to connect, yet it can easily become boring, archaic and void of any power, going through the motions. Our study of Torah, Talmud, etc. is proof God cares and wants to improve our beingness. Yet, we make it about the arguments rather than immersing ourselves in the text to connect with God. 


Once we realize how heartbroken God is, we loathe ourselves for the evil we committed as the beginning of our T’Shuvah, our return to God. We need to have this deep disgust for our behaviors so we can taste the bitterness of our actions, like we taste the bitterness of slavery through the Maror at Passover. Tasting the bitterness will stop us, hopefully, from going down this same road again, from breaking God’s heart with our unfaithful heart and eyes. When this realization occurs, when we turn back to God with a clean heart and clear eyesight, we are then able, like Ezekiel, to hear the word of God that comes to all of us. Prophecy may have ended with Micah, however, the word of God still comes into our beings.


In The Prophets on page 226, Rabbi Heschel teaches: “Never in history has man been take

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 138

“But she rebelled against My social ordinances and My statutes…she rejected my social ordinances and did not walk in my statutes. ..Because you defiled My Sanctuary with all your detestable things and your abominations, I will withdraw from you showing you no pity nor compassion. …I will scatter one-third in every direction…”(Ezekiel 5:6,11,12).


What I am hearing from him, today, is not anger, though the text is clear that God is angry. Rather, I am hearing God’s deep disappointment and sadness, God’s pathos and desire to connect, God’s bewilderedness at the ignorance, stupidity and callousness of humankind.

In the first verse above, God is lamenting more than railing against the Jews for rejecting a way of living together in peace and harmony. The Social Ordinances are the glue that keep the people together, keep them working together and able to settle differences without losing connection. It sounds angry to most of us because we cannot hear the difference between anger and pain-it is a subtle nuanced difference in many cases. Yet here, Ezekiel is portraying the deep pain of God and himself at not being able to bring the Jews of Jerusalem together to follow the path of God that will help them live well. 


I hear the call of Ezekiel and the Call of God to return to the path, stop rejecting and rebelling and begin again to embrace and follow God’s path, God’s teachings and God’s design. The blueprint for living well is given to us through God’s Torah, God’s teachings, and each of us has to discern the teachings through our soul’s lens, not through our minds-trying to rationalize God’s teachings only led and leads us to rejection and rebellion. My path is different from yours by design, religious behaviorism and spiritual plagiarism is anathema to God’s Will and God’s Teaching. We get to immerse ourselves in text, find the way to live it in our unique way and join with our community to lift up our collective life to serve God, not the idols we make.

Rebellion and rejection lead to defiling God’s Sanctuary, we are taught. When we take stock of our ways, we can realize the ways we have defiled God’s Sanctuary, the Earth, till now. Yet, we have “religious people” denying Climate Change and Pandemic and the solutions to these grave threats! Why? Because they are still rejecting God’s social ordinances and statutes. They are still rejecting “E Pluribus Unum”, out of many-One. They reject the Shema Prayer, that we are all part of the Oneness of God when we hear, listen, understand and wrestle with our selfish desires and the lies we tell ourselves. 


The people of Judah engaged in these practices 2600 years ago, and we are still doing these detestable things today. We are still calling another human being an abomination in order to not face the abominable things we ourselves do. We work so hard to hate another human being, we work so hard to dominate another human being, we work so hard to obstruct goodness and kindness, not because we disagree with it rather just to exert our power. Yet, we call ourselves “religious people” who are doing God’s Will. I call it Bullshit and it is time for all of us to stand up against this defiling of God’s Name and God’s social ordinances and statutes.

I hear Ezekiel warning us that destruction is coming, God’s enabling is over, God will show no mercy nor pity. Yet, in the next breath we are told that one-third of the people will survive, so God’s mercy doesn’t end ever. We are the descendants of that one-third, we are the inheritors of God’s teachings and God’s Will, we are the recipients of the gift of freedom because our ancestors made a choice to come to America to give us what they lacked in their home country. Yet we are continuing to act like the people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the kingdom of Judah. We, the survivors have to live in the shadow of the remnant that survived and the light of the God’s mercy and compassion. 


In recovery, this is the theme of our lives, living in gratitude and honoring the saving power and grace of God. We continually make living amends for our past abominations, rebellions and rejections. We are dedicated to following God’s Will, living together with another(s) in harmony and peace, not needing to control and/or exert power and be the welcoming light for the people behind us that are seeking what we have found. We share our joy, our path gratefully and joyously. In recovery, we honor the path of those who went before us by living happy joyous and free. 


I also know how I have followed the ways of the people of Judah and defiled, etc my world and the world of people around me. I also am proud of the path I took 32+ years ago and see how I fall back into rebellion and how I rebel against those who seek power and reject God’s Path, through their “talking the talk and not walking the walk”. While not perfect, I am grateful that I have honored my inheritance of surviving and thriving by staying with God and not giving into mendacity and self-deception. How are you honoring the inheritance of God’s Teachings and God’s Path?  Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 137

“And God said to me, human, I am going to break the staff of bread in Jerusalem and they shall eat bread by the weight, in anxiety, and drink water by measure, in horror. So, lacking bread and water, they shall stare at each other, heartsick over their iniquity.”(Ezekiel 4:16-17).


In this Chapter, Ezekiel is speaking in a much more punishing voice for God. He is not able to see any good nor is he able to give any hope to the people. Jeremiah, while angry, also found compassion and Ezekiel, so far has not been able to. Ezekiel began as a priest, so he witnessed the other priests and the people engage in empty rituals that had no influence on the people’s actions. They might bring a sin offering and then go out and do the same thing right away. Ezekiel’s punishing rhetoric may be from his own frustrations and anger with the mendacity of the people while in Judah and Jerusalem.


In the first verse above, Ezekiel is describing the need to break the people through famine. These people who live in a land flowing with milk and honey, are now left to ration their meals and even their water. The implication, to me, is that they have so defiled the land, defiled their covenant with God and each other, the land cannot/will not produce enough food for the people. This is what happens, I believe, when we take what we have for granted, when we don’t see the correlation of our actions today with outcomes later and we are so arrogant to assume that God will always be on “our side”. The horror and anxiety that is present when we are afraid of where our next meal will come from and/or how we will feed our children is palpable in his words. 


This defeatism has been present throughout the millennia, and it is present in our world today. In America, as well as across the globe, families go to sleep hungry and fearful, which leads to more separation, crime, and exile. Some religious leaders say this is happening because God is punishing these people, overlooking the way the leaders, religious and secular have used people’s horror and anxiety to gain and wield power over them. Mendacity, denial of responsibility, and perversion of Justice were what God was so angry about and needed to purify the people of Judah from. Yet, it seems as if we have not learned and are arrogant as the nations of antiquity that are no longer around and, we can learn from this verse to stop thinking: “it won’t happen to me!”


The last verse above is probably the saddest to me. Ezekiel is saying that we are unable to be heartsick over our iniquity unless we experience dire consequences for our behaviors. It is only when the Jews are lacking bread and water, do they “stare at each other, heartsick over their iniquity”. As I said above, Ezekiel was a priest and his frustrations and anger/punishing may come from both the people’s inability to be changed by the rituals and his own inability to effect a change in the people. 


In this last verse, Ezekiel is telling us that the people and the priests failed in this pursuit, we could not/would not allow the Holy rituals to change our behaviors, we couldn’t/wouldn’t act our way into right thinking and feeling, we broke the promise/covenant of “we will do and then we will understand” that was made at Mt. Sinai. Only when famine strikes, only when we are too weak to resist will we be able to understand the errors of our ways and begin to be able to begin the process of T’shuvah, repentance, return and new response. Does the punishment fit the crime? Maybe, because without the punishment, the people would never admit to the crime. This was true then as it is true now, we have not learned much from Ezekiel, the other prophets and the experience of Judah. Well, we have learned to cover our mendacity more, engage in more self-deception and denial more and better, I guess.

In recovery, we know the moment of horror and anxiety was the beginning of our recovery. It was in this moment that we could surrender our will to the Will of God and begin to change our ways/paths/thinking. We were suffering from a famine of the spirit if not our bodies, we were in horror over our emptiness inside and could no longer lie to ourselves and others that we were “fine” and the self-deceptive/self-destructive  behaviors we were in engaging in were actually helping us. In recovery, we have made it a point to stop living in mendacity, we have learned we are not perfect and making mistakes doesn’t mean we are a mistake and we can repair our past and present each day. In recovery, we feed our spirits and our inner life with healthy, holy actions and these fuel our purpose and passion each day. 


I stare at the horror and have felt the anxiety that my “fight or flight” brain chemistry has created and I have done T’shuvah for it each time. It has lessened over the years and, I understand it more and better each day. I know the heartsickness of being exiled and, in my case, not being allowed back. I know the sadness of seeing the destruction of family, friendships, etc. I also know the value of reconnection, of friendships that never wavered and the love of people, both old and new.  Being heartsick helped me clear out the poison of my actions and the actions of ‘the powers that be’ so I face today clean and excited for the next chapter. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily prophets 

Day 136

“Go to your people, the exile community and speak to them. Say to them: Thus says the Lord, your God-whether they listen or not. Then a spirit carried me away…”Blessed is the Presence of God in God’s place”. Human being, I appoint you watchman for the House of Israel; and when you hear a word from My mouth, you must warn them.”(Ezekiel 3:11,12,17). 


We are still learning of Ezekiel’s call from God and his experience of this call. Imagine being able to experience the Presence of God and know that this experience is beyond words while still using  words and descriptions to point to the magnificent, breath-taking, spiritually infusing meeting with God. To know that we are in God’s presence is so awesomely terrifying and Ezekiel is letting us know that we don’t have to hide from God’s call and God’s Presence. “Blessed is the Presence of God in God’s place” is a prayer all of us need to recite each day. Without God’s Presence in God’s place, we could not live our presence in our place and then the world falls apart again and exile happens again! 


God is telling him, in the first verse above to do the work God is calling on him to do without worrying about the results. Amazingly, God is concerned with the solution to Israel’s problem of being in exile which is Israel letting go of its stubborn, rebellious, brazen ways and returning to God. A simple solution that, it seems, is very hard for the Israelites to follow. We are faced with the same dilemma today-return to God, or continue in our rebellious, stubborn and brazen ways. One leads to redemption while the other leads to exile, death and possible extinction. We complicate our lives by seeking convoluted solutions while God and Ezekiel are telling us be in the simple solution, stop running away from God and your authentic self. 


Ezekiel is told by God to be the watchman for Israel, an apt description for all the prophets. Ezekiel is also told to sound the alarm when God tells him to so that people have the opportunity to change their individual ways and, hopefully, create a community of people who change from their pathway of destruction to a pathway of creation, joy, love and return to God. In fact, later in this chapter, Ezekiel is told if he doesn’t warn the people that God tells him to warn-he will be responsible for their deaths and liable for their deaths as well. God is sending a messenger to promote life, to promote return and show love, mercy, kindness and concern. I find this description of God’s love moving and powerful. 


Rabbi Heschel teaches: The prophet’s duty is to speak to the people, “whether they hear or refuse to hear.” A grave responsibility rests on the prophet:…The main vocation of a prophet is …to let the people know “that it is evil and bitter…to forsake…God”(Jer.2:19), and to call upon them to return.”(The Prophets pg. 19). I believe that this is the duty of all of us, since we are all descendants of the Prophets. While we think of prophecy as being a seer, a diviner of the future, Rabbi Heschel’s words remind us that our duty, as descendants of the prophets is to speak to people in our lives and in the life of the world and let them know the evil, bitter ways they are forsaking God and show them a path of return. God is calling us each and every day to return as individuals and as communities. We have to be louder, stronger, more compassionate, more transparent, more authentic, more truthful, and more loving to ourselves and others: holding hands and “walking humbly with God” and each other. 


In recovery, being in the solution is the only thing we can control and we know this. We keep it simple because every time we complicate life and experiences, we fall back into old habits and pathways. We know how blessed we are and we make gratitude lists as well as say prayers of gratitude for everything we have. In recovery, we want what we have and we speak truth to all people we encounter during a day, week, month, year. We no longer look for the loophole, we look for how to best serve God and another human being. In recovery, we carry the message to others who suffer from a spiritual malaise and bring hope, solution and love to those we encounter-no matter how they respond to us.

I know the blessing of God’s Presence being in God’s place and that place is within me. I understand Ezekiel’s ecstatic experience not only from the text and immersing myself in it, also from my own ecstatic experiences with God’s Presence overwhelming me, my body, my thoughts and my soul. It is impossible for me to describe the experience, yet Rabbi Heschel’s words above, and all of them, speak to me of his experiences with God’s Presence. Being a watchman for years has brought me joy and sadness, scorn and accolades, death and life. A watchman is not well-liked when the crisis of the moment is over and the watchman is still calling because we have to-it is in our bones to call out God’s warning. This is not usually a welcome call by people, yet we guards have to sound the alarm. The ridicule and the hatred that is heaped on the guardians for God still doesn’t stop us, although I needed to rest for some time after my last experience with scorn, sadness and people trying to kill my spirit. We get to be the guardians for God and to our people, let’s rejoice in the gift of the experience of God’s Presence being revealed to us and carry the simple solution of returning to God to people across the globe. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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The Prophets - wisdom to enhance our daily living

Daily Prophets

Day 135

“A spirit entered me when He spoke to me and I was set upon my feet as well…He said to me, “Mortal I am sending you to the people of Israel, that nation of rebels…for the sons are brazen of face and stubborn of heart. I send them to you and you shall say: Thus says Adonai, your God. Whether they listen or not, for they are a rebellious breed, that them may know there was a prophet among them.”(Ezekiel 2:2,3,4,5).


What Ezekiel is describing in the first verse above is similar to what the Midrash describes as the Israelites reaction to both the parting of the Red Sea and the receiving of the 10 Sayings. A spirit entered them and each Israelite had their own unique experience with God and were uplifted and moved. Ezekiel’s experience, while sounding like he was smoking some really good dope, is actually not that uncommon. 


Love is a spirit that enters us, stands us up and allows us to hear differently and more attentively. Hatred, unfortunately is also a spirit that does the same. Ezekiel is telling us the importance of keep hatred out of our beingness, as I am understanding the verses above. Rebellion towards God, brazenness and stubbornness are all actions that lead to and comprise hatred. God knows the people may or may not listen to Ezekiel and God is sending him anyway. God sends us prophets from love, not for punishment, not for scolding, not from wanting to exile us.

Yet, we continue to act like the people of Judah who were exiled to Babylonia and, still, stayed rebellious and brazen, both in captivity and in Judah. Rebelliousness, brazenness is not just an action, it’s an attitude that eats away at our soul from the inside out. Living in this brazenness of face does not allow us to appreciate, rejoice and take advantage of God’s grace, love and loyalty. We continue to reject the words of the Prophets, from the Bible up to today’s prophets. We quote them, we “revere” them, yet we don’t heed their words. 


We see this in the way our democracy is unfolding. Our founding fathers (and mothers) wanted us to grow our democratic ways, not shrink them. They wanted to ensure that we would never go back to a King George way of being-where power was so centrally located that we would again be under the tyrannical rule of a lunatic despot. We see how their words are not being heeded in the ways racism, anti-semitism, anti-anyone who is White Anglo Saxon Protestant/Evangelical is growing each day. We see the ways the words of the prophets past and present are not being heeded by belief in and promotion of the BIG LIES. 

The last verse above is so beautiful and so telling. Rabbi Tarfon, in Pirke Avot, says “it is not our job to finish the work and we are not free to annul it.” The prophet’s job is not fulfilled if the people listen, it is fulfilled by his delivering the message. Rabbi Heschel teaches: “The life of a prophet is not futile. People may remain deaf to a prophet’s admonitions, they cannot email callous to a prophet’s existence…Ezekiel was told to not entertain any illusions about the effectiveness of his mission:”  (The Prophets pg.18).  We judge ourselves and others on results that we have no control over, while God, as Rabbi Heschel so beautifully explains, judges us on our efforts. Ezekiel’s effectiveness is proven by our still reading him and, I hope, learning more and more from him. 


These verses give hope and strength to those of us in recovery. We have had Spirit enter us and stand us up-in fact this is the only way we stopped engaging in our own brazenness and rebelliousness. We have done inventory many times on how we defied God, what we knew was the next right thing to do, the harm we brought and how to repair the damage. In recovery, we know and appreciate our imperfections rather than try and hide them and deny them as we did before. We were deaf to the voice and words of the prophet until Spirit entered us, in many different forms-even the form of a judge and jail. We now carry the message of Spirit to another(s) and we are not investing in the results, only in the solution. In recovery, we know we are blessed and we continue to study the words of the prophets of old and our modern day ones to mine them for new, different and deeper ways to connect to Spirit and let Spirit lead us. 


I have been blessed to have Spirit enter me. I also heard the voice of God calling me and, finally answered with Hineni, here I am. I was one of the people the prophet is speaking about, the brazen rebel, who kept up the rebellion long after I had been defeated, captured and exiled. I realize that the rebellion I was in and the brazenness I practiced were smokescreens for the inner emptiness I experienced and the loneliness I felt. Not being known and seen for who I am, a terrible experience that led to years of drunkenness and crime. So many people harmed by me and I pray that my t’shuvah has been accepted by most. As someone who has delivered a message for 32+ years, I know the feeling of futility that comes when it goes unheard, ridiculed, made irrelevant. I also know the experience of being exiled for continuing to be me and being rejected by the very people one has reached out to help. And, Ezekiel’s words brings me back to what is important, doing the work and staying out of the results. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark

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