Living in Truth and Awareness - Living in Mendacity and Obliviousness- Year 4 Day 206

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 206

“There is great merit in knowing our subtle hypocrisies, in our having no absolute faith in our faith, in our sense of shame and contrition. The sting of shame is the only pain the ego cannot bear and the only blow that may causes its forces to shrink and to retort, and contrition is the saving heart of our soul. Remorse stands higher than sacrifice.” (God in Search of Man pg.400)

The first sentence above is crucial if we are to find our authentic self and not continue on in the societal norm of hiding from one’s “acorn” as James Hillman writes. When we are engaged in the societal norms and cliches, in the “winning” that society “rewards”, we are living false scripts and not engaged in becoming “aware of our inner enslavements” nor are we willing to look at, much less, acknowledge “our subtle hypocrisies”. Listening to Trump and his cronies, Bibi and his gang of thugs, Putin and his sycophants, it would seem as if We the People have given up on “the great merit in knowing our subtle hypocrisies” and joined in the self-deception and mendacity that seems so prevalent in this moment. This way of being is anathema to all three Western Faiths as well as to the Eastern Spiritual disciplines as well. Yet, those ‘good christian, jewish, muslim folk’ who spout hatred and blame upon everyone else, never being responsible for their actions, seem to not have learned this truth and this practice in their churches, mosques, temples, synagogues!

They seem to be practitioners of the most “subtle of hypocrisies”; the inability to practice what one preaches, the bastardization of the basic spiritual principles, a denial of what Godliness/Holiness entails, and a deliberate decision to march to the beat of their Yetzer HaRa, their evil inclination. While Rabbi Heschel uses the word ego, he is speaking in the vernacular of his times and in a way most people can understand. The word “ego” is, I believe, meant to convey the parts of us that are more interested in self promotion than in promoting Godliness/Holiness; the parts of us that run to deceive another, that roll around in mendacity like pigs in shit, etc. When this is the determining factor of our living, one is blind to the “subtle hypocrisies” and defames anyone who points them out. Like the prophets, We the People who are standing up to the tyranny of Trump, the deceptions of Bibi, the lies of Putin, we are lambasted by their sycophantic followers, their cult guardians and it is not an easy way to live. Trump sues anyone and everyone who doesn’t ‘kiss the ring’, ‘bend the knee’ and suck his … These lawsuits, if the Courts are true to justice, are frivolous and still expensive to defend. Plus, Trump has convinced some Law Firms, including the one Doug Emhoff works at, to deny representation to ‘those people’ who seek to defy the autocrat, ‘der Fuhrer’, the Capo d’ Capo. That these cult followers, leaders, guardians include Jews, Muslims, Christians, Catholics, is an abomination!

While it is true to speak out and point out the lies and deceptions of the people in power, it is, after all, a very Jewish way of living when one reads the Prophets in the Bible, it is more important that We the People seek to know “our subtle hypocrisies” as well. Without seeing the ones we practice each and every day, without seeing how we can have solidarity with the Palestinian plight and not Condemn October 7, and Hamas’ terrorism is a “subtle hypocrisy”. When we are more interested in the rights of one group, ie, identity politics, than we are with another, “one law for the citizen and stranger alike” no longer applies. When we can call one group of people “not human” we deny the commandment: “love your neighbor like you love yourself”. When we seek to “rid the country of the vermin who are infecting the blood of our people” as Trump copied from Hitler, we are denying: “love the stranger because you were strangers in the land of Egypt”. When we seek to enrich the rich at the expense of the poor, when we seek to criminalize the plight of people who are homeless, we are denying: “the infinite dignity and worth of every human being because we all come from Adam”(Rabbi Yitz Greenberg).  For those of We the People who are followers of ‘der Fuhrer’, I would ask you to look at your “subtle hypocrisies and those of your fellow people as well as the ones that Trump, Vought, Miller, Lutnick, Vance, et all have as well. For those of us who are in the “opposition”, I would ask us to look at “our subtle hypocrisies” as well and stop having the ‘holier than thou’ attitude of those “progressives” like AOC, Bernie, etc.

When the left and the right are in agreement as to their purity, when neither one can admit their flaws, their failures and seek to learn and grow, then we are witnessing “absolute faith in our faith” which is another fatal flaw! When neither the left nor the right can see the “shame”-which is defined as: “a feeling of distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior”-in their actions, they will never engage in “knowing the subtle hypocrisies” they engage in. When We the People deny our need for contrition-“the state of being remorseful” for the wrongs and foolish behaviors we have engaged in-we deny the truth of our actions, we are so deep in self-deception, we are so addicted to our mendacity, we are risking our future, the future of our children and the freedom so many of our ancestors died for. Isn’t it time for us to do our inventories, isn’t it time for us to let go of our armor and realize we are not so fragile that we are unable to admit our errors and repair them?

I have been in this process for the past 38 years, I was saved by being locked up and I spread the GOSPEL of “subtle hypocrisies” not being the answer and “contrition” being good for the soul, returning us to our natural state of grace and covenantal love between one another and God. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Awareness of the "taints in our virtues" and the "tinge of idolatry in our worship" Year 4 Day 205

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 205

This is how we must begin in our effort to purify the self; to become aware of our inner enslavements to the ego, to detect the taints in our virtues, the tinge of idolatry in our worship of God.” (God in Search of Man pg. 401)

One of the great teachings of Judaism, of the Rabbis-whom I have many arguments with:)- is the teaching of T’Shuvah. Most of us think about this or hear about this only on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Yet, Rabbi Eliezer teaches in the Talmud, tractate Shabbat 153a, that we should do T’Shuvah one day before we die and since no one knows the day of their death, we should do it every day. Without this practice, the period of Elul, which we will enter in 8 days, this month of preparation for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is meaningless and these “Days of Awe” lose their importance and the strength they imbue us with to have the courage to do the next right thing.

In Proverbs 1:7 we are taught: “The awe of God is the beginning of knowledge and fools despise wisdom and knowledge” and the words in bold above remind me of this truth and the folly we are living in today. Rather than “detect the taints in our virtues”, people today point out the “taints” in another person so they do not ‘have’ to look at themselves. In this culture of ‘perfection is the standard’ not the goal, the standard, any “taint” is viewed as a defect which then leads to being vulnerable to attacks by “them”. The old adage “the best defense is a good offense” is alive and well, used and abused by the idolators who pose as ‘religious’, the PAGANS who proclaim their allegiance to Christ, to Adonai, to Allah.

We the People are suffering through a Pandemic that is a greater threat than Covid-19, in my opinion. This pandemic is called “christian nationalism” and is led by people like Doug Wilson, who is Pete Hegseth’s pastor and thought leader. This brand of “christian nationalism” believes women should not have the right to vote, that only ‘christians’ should hold office, that the United States should jettison the Constitution in favor of a Christian Theocracy that he devises, probably alongside of people like Paula White-Cain, Joel Osteen, John Hagee, etc. We the People have to stop listening to and giving any credence to these charlatans who constantly and consistently bastardize the words of Christ, the words of Moses, and refuse to “detect the taints in” their “virtues”, only accuse the rest of us, Jews, Blacks, Hispanics, LGBTQ+ non-people of having “taints”. These assholes along with the ‘real jew’ Rabbis and their followers are infecting this country, Israel, and the world with a way of being that has to lead to destruction because it always has. These “fools despise wisdom and knowledge” and We the People who are following them, who are nodding our heads to their vile speech, their idolatrous ways, to their desecration of God’s name, are responsible for “the taints in our virtues” that we are unwilling to detect. We the People have to engage in the practice of T’Shuvah that Rabbi Eliezer teaches right here, right now, because we are circling the drain of what it means to be human, we are not so slowly losing our humanity, our commitment “to do justly, love mercy and walk in the ways of God”(Micah 6:8). We the People are being reminded of this way of being by the words above, by Rabbi Heschel’s teachings.

While I am not so concerned with how we got to this point, usually, I do realize that many people need to know the path that led us here so we don’t go down it again and there is great “virtue” in this. It is simple, really, just as the people in Ancient Israel and Judea reached the pinnacle of inhumanity to humanity, We the People are closing in on it quickly and, very possibly, surpassing it because of “the tinge of idolatry in our worship of God”. The prophets kept telling the people, the priests, the wealthy and ruling class that God was not interested in their rituals, in their sacrifices as long as their hearts were uncircumcised, as long as their actions towards one another showed disdain for another human being, as long as they continued to believe their own bullshit that they were ‘better’ than those who were ‘lower’ than them, that they were the ‘entitled ones’ who could lie with impunity and, like the “men of renown” found in Genesis, they could fuck anyone and everyone without any consequences.

These people that we read about in the books of the Prophets are alive and well today! They are living next door to us, they are elected to office and are governing us, they are sitting around laughing at the idiocy of We the People who bought their lies, who are so into our own self-deception that we could not perceive their deception of us, and how they are getting rich off the backs of the poor, the stranger, the needy and then calling themselves “Good Christians”, “the Real Jews”, “True Muslims”!!! WHAT THE FUCK!! We the People have to do  our own work to “purify the self”, to remove the “tinge of idolatry in our worship of God”, to “detect the taints in our virtues” and, most of all, end our self-deception, stand up for Godliness, live into our innate Holiness, act as a reminder of God, as a divine need, and see the Image of God in everyone else, honoring it, and speaking to it so there is a change someone else will do their T’Shvuah and then We the People can change the world.

I have fought against the Doug Wilson’s of the world forever, I have been a grifter and hated myself for it. I have refused to “detect the taint in my virtues” and suffered for it in my soul. These 38+years of living in the light bring me to this moment with joy and fear, with hope and worry, with “awe of God”, “wisdom and knowledge”. I can’t abide by the Doug Wilsons, the Hegseths, the PAGANS and Idolators, the grifters and fascists of today so I continue to clean my side of the street and mourn for those who are unable to clean theirs. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Inner Enslavements, Purify the Self, do these mean anything anymore? Year 4 Day 204

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 204

This is how we must begin in our effort to purify the self; to become aware of our inner enslavements to the ego, to detect the taints in our virtues, the tinge of idolatry in our worship of God.” (God in Search of Man pg. 401)

The first phrase above assumes a way of being that does not seem to be in vogue these days with Clergy nor with We the People! Who is truly putting forth an “effort to purify the self” in our world? Certainly not the President of the U.S nor of Russia, absolutely not the President of Hungary nor his ‘good friend’ the Prime Minister of Israel. Nor is most of the Clergy we hear about interested in engaging in the “effort to purify the self” because they are gaining so much power, prestige, money from staying in their “inner enslavements to the ego”! This is the war we are in and, unfortunately, it seems as if we are losing one battle after another. While it looks bleak, we have to remember the Union Army wasn’t always doing so good in the Civil War and they made a comeback. The descendants of Jacob were in a wee bit of tsuris(trouble) before they were redeemed, Christ was crucified and on and on. Because of these ‘victories’, We the People of authentic faith in God, in the Ineffable One, in the God of Moses, of Jesus, of Mohammed, cannot fall into despair and debilitating depression.

Today’s ‘leaders’ in social media, in government, in business, in our courts, in law firms, in universities all give us a wide-open look at what happens when “our inner enslavements to the ego” take over our lives. We the People become whores, prostitutes, we kiss the big fat ass of Trump, et al and then we go home and brag about how smart we are because we ‘got a deal’ from Trump that he will never honor just as he has never honored any deal he makes when it doesn’t suit him anymore. We the People are living under the terror of Roy Cohn, Trump’s mentor. The man who electrocuted Ethel Rosenberg while knowing she was completely innocent, the man who helped Joe McCarthy in his reign of terror and intimidation, the man who denied being a homosexual and publicly shamed gay people while privately being gay, this is who taught the Grifter In Chief, the Liar in the White House, the scared asshole who hides behind the National Guard and the Army to show how strong he is, everything he knows! And, We the People voted an insurrectionist into office, We the People gave him and his cronies who never think about making an “effort to purify the self”, who never think about their “inner enslavements” because their egos are so false and so large all they care about is feeding them!

We the People have to stop being led around by the nose by these PAGANS, be it the clergy who support these assholes or the assholes themselves, be it the elected officials who pledged loyalty to the Constitution and are only loyal to Trump and getting re-elected or to John Roberts and his court of ‘constitutionalists’ who are giving away the country, democracy, and freedom to an autocratic wannabe dictator! We the People have “to become aware of our inner enslavements to the ego”, to money, to power, to the lies we tell ourselves, to our self-deceptions and to the deceptions of another(s). We the People are being called upon to stand up and redeem ourselves and our neighbors from the horrors that Trump and his partners are putting us through; be it what is going on in Gaza, in Ukraine, in Los Angeles and Washington DC with sending the National Guard and Army to be police?! WTF!!

We the People have to demand of ourselves an authentic accounting of the Soul, a “fearless and searching inventory” of “inner enslavements” so we can do our T’Shuvah, make a new plan, renew our covenant with God, with our higher consciousness, and have new responses to these Domestic and Foreign Terrorists running various governments. YES, Trump, Miller, Vought, Vance, Lutnick, Netanyahu, Ben G’Vir, Orban, Putin, and their cronies are TERRORISTS! We the People, because of our obliviousness to our “inner enslavements to the ego” are supporting Terrorists, Law firms who kiss the ring, Universities who kiss the Ass, and Bimbos who are running the very institutions meant to preserve our democracy which they are trying to annihilate! Bondi, Patel, McMahon, etc don’t believe in the agencies they are running, RFK Jr., a disgrace to his father’s name and memory, wants to deny the science that has saved 100’s of millions of lives over the years and this is who We the People put in charge!! They are in charge because We the People have been unwilling to do the work to “become aware of our inner enslavements to the ego”!

I have spent the past 38+ years peeling away the layers of “inner enslavements” which caused me to live in terrorizing ways. As a drunk and a criminal, I was a terrorist, just as all people who are not in recovery are. Rabbi Heschel’s words hit home with me in very personal ways and they hit home for everyone who is willing to “become aware of our inner enslavements to the ego”, to everyone who is willing to search out the Chametz, the bread that has leavening in it, the puffed up parts of our egos which we do every year at Passover. With Yom Kippur only 48 days away, the beginning of Elul only 7 days away, it is time for us to begin to look at the actions which impede our “effort to purify the self” and take these next 48 days to do exactly this-“purify the self”. This is the work I do every year at this time and every day as well. I am enraged at the state of the world and the loss of democracy-while I am not directly effected yet, as I said to someone yesterday; I am a person of faith, when you are being targeted, I am effected, when you are in fear, I am here to stand with you and help you. This is what being a person of faith means, this is what the Bible directs us to do. This is the gift of being human. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Are you engaging in Redemption or are you retarding your redemption and the world's? Year 4 Day 203

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 203

“The world is in need of redemption, but the redemption must not be expected to happen as an act of sheer grace. Man’s task is to make the world worthy of redemption. His faith and his works are preparations for ultimate redemption. (God in Search of Man pg. 380)

“Redemption” is an overarching theme in the Bible. It comes from the Latin meaning “to buy back”. We call God the “redeemer of Israel” in our prayers and in immersing ourselves in the Bible, we experience the “redemption” of so many, beginning with Cain. Cain ‘kills’ his brother Abel (Abel in Hebrew means mist) and then complains to God about his consequences and God guarantees he will not be killed, even though it is supposed to be “a life for a life”. Cain is redeemed by God. Cain’s soul, his very life force is “bought back” by God. We see this often in the Bible, someone screws up, cries out to God and God “buys back” their soul and restores them to life, a life, hopefully, of mitzvahs, of doing the next right thing. As is said above, however, this act of redemption is not done out of “sheer grace”, rather it only happens when the person(s) needing redemption participate in their own redeeming either by crying out like Cain did, admitting their errors as Judah does, and/or doing both and bringing their offerings to the priests in the Bible and now, doing T’Shuvah so we can return and be nearer to God who redeems.

What is most striking is the time in which these words were written, early 1950’s. After the defeat of Nazi Germany, after bringing an end to the pinnacle of man’s inhumanity to man, Rabbi Heschel is reminding us that our redemption is not complete, it is not an entitlement. Redemption, having our souls “bought back” is a partner ship between God and us, that begins with us. This is the crux of our issue, Rabbi Heschel knew that human beings are loath to admit their errors, We the People are more like Jacob than Judah, We the People are more like Korach than King David; admitting our errors is like drinking poison because doing this acknowledges our imperfections and We the People so desperately believe we should be and must be perfect. What a lie we are telling ourselves and what a lie being perpetrated by societal norms and cliches. This lie is killing the freedom that leaving Egypt and accepting the Torah at Sinai promises, this lie is killing the spirit of the individual, it is a denial of “all men are created equal”, that no one soul is inherently worth more than another, We the People all have “certain unalienable rights” no matter the color of our skin, the religion we adhere to, the political party we affiliate with. This is the only way “redemption” can even begin.

Alas, what we have going on now is none of these prerequisites for “redemption”. These ‘good christian folk’, these ‘saviors of Judaism’, these ‘real muslims’ have done more to bastardize “redemption” than any non-believer. These PAGANS keep supporting the worst of the worst for political offices so they can manipulate them, ‘own’ them, get their agendas through and crush the spirit of freedom, bastardize the 10 Sayings we received at Mount Sinai, crush the spirit of Christ. Instead of hastening “redemption”, these charlatans are retarding “redemption”. Instead of “being a light unto the nations” as Isaiah tells us to be, these assholes are darkening the world, shutting out the Or HaGanuz, the hidden light of God/the first days of creation, so we walk around in darkness and, instead of raising one another up, instead of doing what will “make the world worthy of redemption”, these so-called ‘people of god’, are crushing goodness, truth, justice, mercy, and love.

We the People are being called upon each and every day to “make the world worthy of redemption”. We the People are asked to do one act of T’Shuvah each day, one act of redemption for ourselves and one act to redeem another. The Bible teaches us to “love the stranger”, “love your neighbor”, “righteousness, righteousness you shall pursue”, “do justly”, “redeem your kinsman”, “don’t stand idly by the blood of your neighbor”, etc. The Bible is not asking for perfection! On the contrary, it is asking us to be one grain of sand better each day, to do our amends, to repair the damage to another and to our soul, to learn from our errors and the errors of another, to not repeat our same mistakes over and over again. We the People are able to bring about “redemption”! We the People are capable of repairing our corners of the world so the Messiah doesn’t have any work to do when she/he arrives and the Messiah will only congratulate We the People on the wonderfully imperfect job we have done to bring about “redemption”. When We the People commit and follow through on our covenant with God, when We the People take the next right action, when We the People practice our authentic faith(s) out loud, when the Bible (or whatever spiritual text you engage with) becomes our road map to living well, We the People have done our part to bring about “ultimate redemption”!

I have been living in the world of T’Shuvah for 38 years, it is a hard world to live in and it is the most freeing world to live in. Not needing to be right, knowing when I am and when I am wrong, gives me a freedom that I sought for the first 36 years of life. My life’s work is dedicated to “redemption” of both my self/soul and the souls of those I encounter. I am not soft-spoken, I am loud, I am abrasive, because I know what is at stake: the life of the individual, the family, and the community that becomes infected with the lies that “a leopard doesn’t change its spots”, and the writing off of people who make mistakes as ‘lost souls’. I believe in the possibility of “redemption”, I work hard to help people redeem themselves with the help of God and the people around them. I am GRATEFUL for my mission and love my purpose. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

The Problems of Evil -breaking the law and the "radical problem of "the evil drive" - Year 4 Day 202

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 202

There are two problems: the particular sins, the examples of breaking the law, and the general and radical problem of “the evil drive” in man. The law deals with the first problem; obedience to the law prevents evil deeds. Yet, the problem of the evil drive is not solved by observance. The prophets’ answer was eschatological. “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel…not like the covenant I made with their fathers…I will put my law within them and I will write it upon their hearts.”(Jeremiah 31:31-34)

I keep wondering at Rabbi Heschel’s insight and prescience in awe and amazement. In the early 50’s, when it seemed like life was good, baby boomers were being born, WWII had ended in our victory, the UN was functioning, Israel was a new country, and here he is railing on and on about “the evil drive” and “the particular sins”. I say it seemed like ‘good times’ because he writes “the law deals with the first problem; obedience to the law prevents evil deeds”. We the People know that even then-if one was black or Jewish the law was different for ‘our kind’. We the People know that the law has been overtaken by Trump, his lies, his liars that stand with him, and now, the military is being used in cities across the nation because he wants to be dictator. Instead of the Courts standing up to this autocrat, John Roberts and his pussy-whipped friends on the Supreme Court are acting like slaves to Trump saying “yes massa, yes massa, whatever you want massa” instead of standing up for the Constitution, instead of standing up for truth, instead of being truly Good Christians and caring for the poor, the needy, the stranger as Christ did!

We the People are fucked! Rather than having any solution to “the first problem” or “the problem of the evil drive”, in today’s world, in Israel, in Russia, in America, there is no “problem of the evil drive” because it is celebrated, it is on full display and people are bowing down to Trump, Bibi, Vlad because they have given them permission to no longer sublimate their “evil drive”, instead they are being urged to “let it all hang out” and be as cruel as possible. Rather than live in the covenant made at Mount Sinai, Jew and non-Jew alike are worshiping at the altar of the modern day version of Baal. Rather than follow One God, the Ineffable One, the clergy of today and their flocks, their patrons are following the gods of money, power, cruelty, evil, hatred, injustice, etc. This is what ‘religious observance’ has become, this is the reason people young and old have rejected ‘religion’ and, along with this rejection, they are rejecting morality, humanity and holiness. People are not ‘happier’ living this way, they are just no longer struggling to do the next right thing because doing the next right thing leaves one open to ridicule and the cruelty of “the evil drive” that is running rampant in the world. We the People are being called to serve a higher calling than the “evil drive”, a higher standard of living than “the examples of breaking the law” which we and so many others are engaging in.

The question that the words above pose: Are We the People willing to act on the “new covenant”, to live the morality that has been written “upon our hearts”, to live up to and into “my law within them”? All of this has happened, the “new covenant” is no different than the old one, really, it is what Moses says in “The word is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart that you will do it”(Deut. 30:14)! The issue is not if “the new covenant” has happened, the issue is not ‘it will come to pass when the Messiah arrives’, the issue is not ‘how will I know what to do’. The issue for We the People is are we willing to take the next right action based on what we know in our hearts, in our souls, in our bones to be true, right and moral? Are We the People going to act as if the Messiah has already arrived and is just awaiting some human kindness to reveal itself? Are We the People going to stop wring our hands, talking out of both sides of our mouths, stop worrying about optics, end our nauseating need to ‘look good’, ‘be right’, ‘follow the party line of the extremes on both ends of the spectrum’? Are We the People going to stand up, rise up and live into the words that God “writes on our hearts”, “puts in our mouth”, honor and cherish “the law within them”? This is what We the People are being called to do, this is how We the People avoid walking into a slaves existence as we did in Egypt, as they did in Russia, as they are doing in Hungary, as Netanyahu wants to happen in Israel, as happened in Nazi Germany? We the People have to use our prophetic voices, insight and wisdom to call out these “evil drive” experts who are using ‘the law’ like Hitler used the Nuremberg Laws. We the People have been given the Bible, have been gifted with “the new covenant” and now is the time to use them to live better and to make our world better.

I keep thinking about the Liberty Bell and Leviticus telling us to “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”(Lev.25”10). I keep wondering what has happened to “the land that I love”, what happened to “stand beside her and guide her”? What happened to being “the home of the brave”? I know the power of “the evil drive”, I know how to “break the law” and get away with it, I did this for over 20 years, I did it when it didn’t serve me because the urge was so strong. Once I let the “evil drive” dominate me, it was tough putting that Genie back in the bottle. Yet I did and I have-through living into “the new covenant”, through living the what is “written upon my heart” and speaking, doing “the law within me”. It ain’t easy, it doesn’t make me popular, the phone ringing much at all anymore and I will not change, I will not whore myself for any reason, not fame, fortune or being liked-I did this before and it almost cost me my soul. I pray that We the People will stop giving into the lies of today and ground themselves in the TRUTH of the Bible! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Are your Daily actions based on what you 'can do' or what you are commanded to do? Year 4 Day 201

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 201

“Judaism would reject the Kantian axiom, “I ought, therefore I can”; it would claim instead, “Thou art commanded, therefore thou canst.” Judaism, as we have said, claims that man has the resources to fulfill what God commands, at least to some degree. On the other hand, we are continually warned lest we rely on man’s own power and the belief that man, by his power alone, is capable of redeeming the world. Good deeds alone will not redeem history; it is the obedience to God that will make us worthy of being redeemed by God.”

“God helps those who help themselves” is an old saying and in light of the teaching above, I believe has some relevance to how we live. While Kant’s theory is wonderful and better than Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am”, Judaism’s claim as said above by Rabbi Heschel, is better for society. “I ought” is too easily bastardized into narcissistic desires and inauthentic needs, I believe. Being “commanded” is more difficult to bastardize and there are too many ways to point out the lies and subterfuge of those who twist being “commanded”. It is an unbelievable idea, in many ways, that We the People have “the resources to fulfill what God commands”! It is even more unbelievable how often and with how much might we twist these commandments into our own pretzels so we can do what we want, when we want, how we want, and to whom we want.

When the Clergy, when the ‘religious’ do everything in their power to cover up their evil, their cruelty by saying ‘this is what the Bible tells me’ we are in danger of using “the resources to fulfill what God commands” to satisfy only our false ego, our surge for power, and our desire to sublimate many groups and aspects of We the People so it no longer is God whom we are serving, rather it is only our false selves, our inauthentic egos, our puffed up Pharaoh within. This is the reason “we are continually warned lest we rely on man’s own power and the belief that man, by his power alone, is capable of redeeming the world.” We see this over and over again, our desire ‘to be saved’ has stretched from baptism and Mikvah, from circumcision and the Eucharist, to believing the lies of ‘der Fuhrer, of the autocrat, of the despot, of the Pharaoh. When history and the Bible, the New Testament and the Korah warn us all of the pitfalls of following the leader blindly, when we read the prophet Nathan telling King David how he has sinned, when we immerse ourselves in the words of the prophets who are constantly telling the people and the leadership TRUTH, how is it possible for We the People to continue to buy this same old bullshit that has led to ruin for thousands of years?

It is possible because we are suffering from an epidemic called: Spiritual Bankruptcy. Worse than the Great Depression, worse than the financial collapse of 2008, the Spiritual Bankruptcy that has overtaken We the People threatens our very freedoms, our way of life, the seat of democracy. And too many of us, like Nero, seem to be fiddling while the Republic burns! We are so spiritually sick that at least one-third of We the People still believe the lies of Trump and welcome Project 2025, cheer at ICE raids and believe they have the ‘right’ to own, shoot, and, if they want to, kill people with AK-47’s! We the People are so spiritually bankrupt that 1/3rd of us still cheer at the cruelty, applaud the Grifter in Chief and his cronies who are raping and robbing all of us! We the People are so spiritually off-kilter that 1/3rd of us believe that Trump, Miller, Lutnick, Vought, Vance, et al, are the messengers of Christ, with Trump being the Messiah! While I don’t think many Jews think he is the Messiah, there are many Jews who believe his lies, his arrogance, his lust for power is ‘good for the Jews’ while he surrounds himself with anti-semites who love Israel and hate Jews! We the People are so spiritually bankrupt that we have replaced the will of God with the will of self. We the People buy the lies and deceive ourselves daily that what we are doing is good, even if the poor, the needy, the stranger, the widow, the orphan suffer-they are doing this for the greater good! Christ did not believe this, Moses did not believe this, God doesn’t believe this, the Bible tells us to do the opposite and too many of We the People are buying the lies and deceiving ourselves because, of course, it is only happening to ‘those people’ and ‘they deserve it’!

Our Spiritual Bankruptcy, our Spiritual illness’ can only be healed by us with the help of God, with the help of spiritual healers, not shrinks. This is not a ‘thinking’ problem, it is not an ‘emotional’ problem, it is not because of some ‘trauma’ that has happened to us. This spiritual bankruptcy, our spiritual illness’ are the result of not being in TRUTH with ourselves and one another. They are the result of our unwillingness to “fulfill what God commands” and instead fulfill what our false self commands. We the People have become addicted to our own power, our own lies and we give power to our Pharaoh within. Rather than find ways to reach one another, we decide what is and we do the best we can to ram it down the throats of those around us so we have the power instead of joining with God, doing the next right thing, replenishing our spiritual bank accounts and using God’s power to redeem ourselves and another(s). Rather than give rise and power to the Moses within us, we have bought the lies and notions of societal norms, which has, in turn, bankrupted us so completely that we cheer Netanyahu’s and Trump’s cruelty, we abandon the Ukrainians who fight for their freedom against a more powerful enemy, which, as Jews dishonors the memory of the Warsaw Ghetto fighters. It is way past time for We the People to repent, to return, to have new responses to these PAGANS-to respond with the Redeeming Power of God.

I have made many deposits and, with all my withdrawals I still have a positive balance in my spiritual bank account. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Learning to be One Grain of Sand better each day, not denying our frailty and weakness’ - Year 4 Day 200

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 200

“It is true that the commandment to be holy is exorbitant, and that our constant failures and transgressions fill us with contrition and grief. Yet we are never lost. We are sons of Abraham. Despite all faults, failures, and sins, we remain parts of the Covenant. His compassion is greater than His justice. He will accept us in all our frailty and weakness.” (God in Search of Man pg. 378)

These words above lay out the challenge and the hope, the reason that “despair is alien to the Jewish faith”, and the learning of what unconditional love is. Unconditional love, as I hear Rabbi Heschel this morning is not allowing us to do what ever we want and say ‘I’m sorry’ only to do the same things over and over again. It is not, as I am processing this concept today, whitewashing the errors of self nor of another. It is holding ourselves responsible “to be holy”, exorbitant as it may seem. It is to acknowledge our “constant failures and transgressions” so our “contrition and grief” bring us to a new understanding of how to be human and improve our actions. Unconditional love, as practiced by God is to be found in the last two sentences above; when our “compassion” for ourselves and another(s) “is greater than our justice” and when we can accept “our frailty and weakness” and those of the people around us, we are living unconditional love.

This is the challenge for all of humanity since the beginning of time, of our evolution/creation. Yet we seemed to have stopped evolving, we seem to enjoy returning over and over again to our animal instincts, to relish in the fact that “our thoughts are evil from our youth”. Rather than take on “the commandment to be holy”, knowing we will not be perfect and we are on a continuum, We the People seem to have jettisoned any feeble attempts and keep rolling around in the mud of autocracy, the quicksand of cruelty, and we dive headfirst into the deceptions of people telling us good is evil, evil is good, truth is fake and fake is truth, etc. REALLY?! Seeing the world through the eyes of the autocrat, the grifter, it is easy to pick the pockets of We the People because we would rather be deceived, we would rather have someone else to blame than be responsible for our “constant failures and transgressions”. So when Trump blames “the democrats”, when Bibi calls us to hate the Palestinians because they all want us dead, people of little sophistication, people who give lip service to “the commandment to be holy” rather than engage in the depth of what it takes to be in the holiness arena, believe and follow. This is the part of We the People that spurns the unconditional love of God, that is not filled with “contrition and grief” over what they have done, what they have wrought. Au contraire, they rejoice in their cruelty, they throw a party for their transgressions of “the commandments” and their actions totally deny: “we are never lost” because their actions deny the Abrahamic creed, their actions deny Jesus’ teachings, Moses’ exhortations to “CHOOSE LIFE”.

Humanity has learned nothing, it seems, from our experiences up until now. We do not “love the stranger because we were strangers in the land of Egypt”. We do not “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”. We have failed to “have one law for the stranger and citizen alike”. We continue to proclaim “America the Beautiful” and “The People Israel Live”, while our actions deny both statements. The People Israel cannot live when the People Israel go against the teachings, the lessons, the paths of holiness and goodness, the ways of “contrition and grief”, the commandments to be holy and to do T’Shuvah. America is not beautiful when it practices cruelty-be it towards the Native Americans, the Chinese, the Irish, the Italians, the Blacks, the Jews, the Hispanics-cruelty is never beautiful and Trump and the part of We the People that follow him like lap dogs are telling us that cruelty is beautiful and holy!  We have so-called religious leaders praising cruelty as commanded by God both here in America and in Israel-is it any wonder why some of We the People believe destruction is once again upon us because of our own actions. It is the “enemy within” that is destroying us-both the internal evil inclination gone riot of the individual and the external evil being lauded by our elected officials.

The greatest cruelty and the height of denial of God comes from our unwillingness to be in “contrition and grief” over our failures to “be holy”, over our insistence on denying our “sins and transgressions” by justifying them, by proclaiming that ‘our justice’ is greater than our compassion and that we have ‘a new covenant’ that enshrines white people to be the top of the food chain. Rather than engage in T’Shuvah, in repentance, in amends, in seeing the truth, these PAGANS are reveling in their evil by saying “Jesus told me to do this”, “This is the will of God” otherwise it would not be happening, and other such bullshit. We have lost the moral high-ground of our ancestors, we are pointing our internal moral compass in the wrong direction, and the rest of We the People have to get off our asses and not “fiddle while Rome is burning”. We the People are being called, hell we are being commanded to stand up, to speak up, to shut down the evil that is running rampant in our streets, to tell ICE to end these Gestapo tactics, to tell Miller that he has to go to Alligator Alcatraz because his ancestors were not born here, tell Vought he has to face a Religious Court for his Sins against Christ, tell Lutnick that he has to face a Rabbinic Court for his sins against Adonai, tell the rest of We the People that we are not going to take their lies and bullshit anymore. We the People have to demand “contrition and grief” from Bibi, Donny, and the rest of their thugs, We the People have to teach our children unconditional love, how to do T’Shuvah, how to strive towards holiness, how to fail and get back up(resilience), and how to have “compassion be greater than justice” and “accept our frailty and weakness”.

This is the daily task I engage in and I continue to work to “be holy”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Life is precious because of what we can do, not because what we can get. Year 4 Day 199

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 199

The idea with which Judaism starts is not the realness of evil or the sinfulness of man but rather the wonder of creation and the ability of man to do the will of God. There is always an opportunity to do a mitsvah, and precious is life because at all times and in all places we are able to do His will. This is why despair is alien to Jewish faith. (God in Search of Man pg. 378)

The first sentence in bold above is unquestionably true, everyone knows “there is always an opportunity to do a mitsvah”, yet everyone is not always willing to do the one needed for this moment and this is the problem that has faced humanity since the times of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel. Most of us are unaware that “precious is life because at all times and in all places we are able to do His will” and this leads us to seek out the preciousness of life through artificial means, through deceptions, through power-seeking, through enslaving another group/individual, through misogyny, through privilege, through autocracy, etc. Isn’t it sad that the only thing that makes life “precious” to so many is how much money they have, how much power they have, how much they can amass and control? Isn’t it tragic that democracy, the very instrument through which Trump, Vought, Vance, Wytkoff, Bibi, et al gained power is the very thing they are seeking to destroy, the very institution they are seeking to dismantle so they can be in absolute power and crush anyone who says anything negative to them or about them?

How did this come to be? There are a myriad of reasons and a few stand out to me. 1) Since the beginning, humanity has rejected the necessity of looking for “an opportunity to do a mitsvah”, and embraced the false ego-driven lie of ‘look for an opportunity to get mine”, Cain and Abel is the first example, the King of Sodom is another after Abraham returned his wealth and his people to him because Abraham’s nephew Lot had been taken captive. There are many more throughout the Bible and they are there not to point out God’s impotency, they show us directly and unequivocally the results of embracing the false-ego lie of “where’s mine”. Abraham begins with the mitsvah of “making souls”, helping people find their spiritual home, ensuring they live the lives they were meant to and, along with Sarah build community where people belong. Isaac shows us what it means to love someone completely, even if they betray you and lie to you, your love is unwavering as his was for Rebecca. Jacob and Esau represent the two inclinations within us. While Jacob is the ancestor of the People Israel, Esau is the one who shows us what passion, what kindness, what forgiveness is all about. While Jacob needs God to guide him, to show him the way, Esau is the part of us that just knows in his bones what the kind, loving, truthful, next right action to take is. Of course he is passionate and some would say ‘dumb’, I would suggest that he takes every opportunity to do a mitsvah, just as Abraham and Isaac do, just as Moses does, just as Judah does after his encounter with Tamar. The Bible is replete with times and places to do a mitsvah and there are so many people and examples of people seeking to “do His will” and experiencing “precious is life” because they “run to do a mitsvah”.

2) We have been taught what to think, not how to think, as my wife, Harriet Rossetto said to me the other day. We are not being taught to seek our “acorn” as James Hillman writes in “The Soul’s Code”, we are not being given the keys to the kingdom because the Rabbis, the Priests, the Ministers, the Kings, the rulers, the elected officials refuse to trust We the People with power to overrule them, with the power to take charge of our lives and the power to say NO. They are afraid of us, just like Pharaoh was afraid to accept and face God for an accounting of his deeds. Most people are afraid to do a “fearless and thorough inventory” as the 12-Steps call for because they would have to face themselves in truth and “Hell NO, I am not seeking truth, I am seeking validation for my lies and my grift”! We are not taught the how of the Bible’s message, we are taught ritual and dogma, not how to discern which commandments to obey and which to disobey, which verses are inserted and which are divinely inspired. We are not being taught how to discern truth from lies, fact from fiction because then We the People will be able to flex our muscles, argue with the Idolators and the PAGANS, call out the leadership for their Bullshit, and stand for the Ineffable One because so many of the people that said they would, our Clergy, have abdicated their calling so they can gain favor with ‘der Fuhrer’-Trump, Bibi, et al.

There is plenty of shit happening today that can lead anyone to despair and I refuse to go there. Because I know that there is a “mitsvah” to be done, because I know through experience and in my gut that “precious is life” and I seek to find the “mitsvah” that this time and this place is affording me. Because I can always find an “opportunity to do a mitsvah”, because I know the myriad of times the Psalmist felt like giving in to his despair and, instead, he reached up to God and down into his soul to find a path out, to find the pony in the horseshit, to see the beauty and the gift of the moment we are in. I, like you, am the Psalmist, I, like you am the writer of Proverbs, I, like you, am given the Torah and hear the Voice that has never stopped speaking from the top of Mount Sinai to know how to trust what we know to be true and right, take the action that the situation in front of us is calling for without letting fear of ‘what will they think of me’ get in the way. I have spent the past 38 years to do “His will” and because I have been seeking, I am always finding the ways and being found as well. The “opportunity to do a mitsvah” is the path of finding ourselves, finding the truth of another human being and the openness we are afraid of so we can also be found and known. This is the why despair is alien and “precious is life”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Focusing our attention and actions of "the wonder of creation and doing the will of God - Year 4 Day 198

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 198

The idea with which Judaism starts is not the realness of evil or the sinfulness of man but rather the wonder of creation and the ability of man to do the will of God. There is always an opportunity to do a mitsvah, and precious is life because at all times and in all places we are able to do His will. This is why despair is alien to Jewish faith. (God in Search of Man pg. 378)

The first sentence above is true and most of us do not learn this truth about what Judaism is at its core, This is the terrible state of religious education in the Jewish world, the entire Jewish world. While the Orthodox claim “to do the will of God”, it is, when they are actually fulfilling it, a item to check off a list for most, just go to an Orthodox early morning minyan where the men are talking business instead of listening to God, or a Shabbat morning service where the men are more concerned about their ‘kiddish club’ where they drink instead of being in the service. For the other denominations, they teach pap, they go with ‘social justice/tikkun olam, with Am Yisrael Chai/the Jewish People live denoting a togetherness that never was and is not now, and they are not even convinced that God exists so “the will of God” doesn’t always have a strong hold on them.

The fact that Jewish education doesn’t teach the beauty of wonder, the power of radical amazement, the resilience of living a life compatible with being a partner of God’s is criminal. It is, I believe, the real reason that the current younger generation sees no real value in being Jewish, unless there is anti-semitism to make them remember. They want to be ‘citizens of the world’ because there is no compelling reason for them to carry on this beautiful and important way of living. In fact, relegating Judaism to being a “religion” waters down its beauty, its power and its mission!

As we speak “to do the will of God”, we also have to take a critical look at the “will of God” we are choosing. In the Bible, it is evident that Ezra or someone of his time and persuasion inserted xenophobic and racist statements into the text because, as I am learning from my friend and teacher, Rabbi Hazan Danny Maseng, they are in direct conflict with statements that we know come from a source much higher than human rational, self-centered thinking. 36 times we are told to be kind, to love, to embrace the stranger and then, when good for Ezra, et al, we are being told to kill them? WTF! Yet, Netanyahu, Smotrich, Ben G’Vir, et al are using the few ‘kill them all’ texts to validate their greed, their need to kill, their need to show their power and strength! When we are told  about seeing our enemy’s ass wandering we have to take it back to him/her, when we are told one law for the citizen and the stranger alike, when treat the stranger well because your were strangers in the land of Egypt, when “love your neighbor” is the watchword, it is proof that this is “the will of God” and not of some asshole who wants to be God, these statements, the stories of both our rising above our narcissism and failing to rise above it, are proof that the Bible is divinely inspired that the people writing these passages had an experience of higher consciousness that can only be ‘explained’ as an experience of God/higher power.

So, what are We the People to do since we don’t live in Biblical times, since we are so ignorant of the spiritual life we need to live, so deficient in knowing and experiencing “wonder” and radical amazement, so jaded regarding mitzvot and the need to engage in them? We the People are being given an opportunity to “teach ourselves” as the Talmud suggests we do when our parents, when the previous generations fail in their duty to live the V’Ahavta prayer to “teach your children” or as Neil Young sings: “teach your children well”. We the People have to take it upon ourselves to immerse ourselves in the Bible, decide which “will of God” we are going to follow, and find the path of “wonder of creation and the ability of man to do God’s will”. We the People have to take Judaism back from the lazy, power-hungry, sometimes corrupt clergy and lay people including parents, who have reduced this great path for living well to a memorization of one’s Torah Portion and an okay to leave your spiritual education at age 13 when you need it most! We the People are being called to stand on the street corner, to go into the Temples and Synagogues, the Jewish Federations and Community Centers and PREACH THE GOSPEL OF “the wonder of creation and the ability of man to fulfill God’s will”! We the People are being given the permission and the power to help people find “the will of God” that is truthful and not tainted with a human agenda, to lead people to their rightful place as partners with God, to achieve the pinnacle of success; doing the next right thing no matter what or how I feel. In other words, We the People are being called to serve God, to serve truth, to serve with and in love, kindness and pathos.

In my recovery, I have always said: “Fuck your feelings and take the next right action”. I say this because my feelings are not facts and they have, at times before and since my recovery, taken me down a very wrong path. I am pissed off, as you can see, at the ways I was ‘taught’ Judaism and I stayed in Jewish education through my high school years! I did not opt out at 13 and I still did not learn “the wonder of creation and the ability of man to do God’s will”! I did learn the beauty of davening and the fallacy of ‘let us pray’. My rabbinate is all about teaching “wonder”, “the will of God”, radical amazement and truth. It isn’t popular with “mainstream Judaism”, I am not a sought-after speaker, and I do what I am called to do because this is my path of fulfilling God’s will for me. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Having "the ability to fulfill what God demands", it is not too hard for you, "it is in your mouth and in your heart" Year 4 Day 197

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 197

“In stressing the fundamental importance of the mitsvah, Judaism assumes that man is endowed with the ability to fulfill what God demands, at least to some degree. This may, indeed, be an article of prophetic faith: the belief in our ability to do His will. “For this commandment (mitzvah) which I command thee this day, it is not too hard for thee, neither is it far off… But the word is nigh unto thee, in thy mouth and in thy heart, that thous mayest do it” (Deut. 30:11-14).” (God in Search of Man pg. 378)

These words above are at the core of Jewish survival throughout the millennia, no matter what we have been subjected to as a people, no matter the hatred, the slavery, the being regulated to certain work, to certain ghettos, to certain annihilation, we have prevailed because Jews, religious or not, have accepted this “article of prophetic faith” and, to the best of our ability, when the chips were down, returned to our core vale of seeking “to fulfill what God demands”. Without this “article of prophetic faith” why else would we not have succumbed to the call to join Christianity? Why else would we have not ‘gone along to get along’? Why else would we have, to this day, believed in our ability to fulfill our unique task of “being a light unto the nations” (Isaiah 49:6)? Without this fundamental “belief in our ability to do His will” and hearing the call from Sinai, Judaism would have ceased to be. And we are still here! At least for this moment. Reading this, hearing Bibi and Donny cry like little babies over their lack of popularity among the populace they are leading because of their lack of wanting “to fulfill the what God demands” and instead want to make God to fit their image, ie Idolatry, should make us all take a beat and ask ourselves this question: “is what is happening really “what God demands”? Is taking over Gaza, is quashing democracy, really showing “our ability to do His will”? OF COURSE NOT!! So how did We the People get here?

We the People arrived at this moment because we have not taken seriously what it means to be “endowed with the ability to fulfill what God demands”. We the People have sought out shrinks, pills, protests, higher education in order to avoid the questions that are within our inner life. We the People have engaged in the promulgation of ‘rational thinking’ to the utter death of spiritual knowing, We the People have not headed Einstein’s teachings about the intuitive mind and only applaud those who use their intuitive mind to create big things, big business, make a lot of money, etc. We the People have not nor are we today seeking “to do His will”, no matter how much we wrap ourselves in the false narratives of the Bible we are spewing, no matter how much lipstick we put on the PIG of our Idolatry! That Israel, a nation of people who have been subjected to the worst of societal hatred, would say that Arabs are not human, would believe they have the right to destroy an entire area and take over people’s homes, deny a homeland to another people is INSANE and Disgusting.

The Rabbis and those ‘good jews’ who study all day and are on the dole while the People of Israel go to war for them, pay taxes for their benefit, can send these same people to be killed in Gaza, to be maimed in the West Bank, to suffer moral injuries beyond repair in some cases, is a CRIME! These criminals have to be put on trial and sentenced to prison so they can no longer infect the State of Israel and the Jewish people. Why, you may ask? The reason is these “people who should know better” have not circumcised their hearts so “the word” is no longer “nigh unto thee”. The reason is they have used their “mouth” to spew lies and have, like the priests in the Temple in Ancient Israel and Judea, turned to idolatry, doing rituals and hurting people, God doesn’t want their “checklist of mitzvahs”, God wants their hearts and their minds, God wants us to fulfill God’s demands, not the ones people make up and proclaim our ‘in the name of god’.

We the People are the last hope of Jewish thought, living in “the Jewish way”. “It is not too hard for thee, neither is it far off”, rather it is within us at all times. This is the greatest inner war we wage, knowing what is right, knowing what “God demands”, having a desire to fulfill it and being talked out of it by societal pressure, by the lies and hatred of Trump, et al in the USA and Bibi, Smotrich, et al in Israel. We the People have to “girdle up our loins” and, like David, go out an battle Goliath, the giant in front of us that is demanding we surrender/give up to the negativity in the world, hence denying the power of God, the existence of Adonai. We the People are being called to do what we are created to do, make Justice, Mercy, Love, Kindness, Holiness, TRUTH, the foundation of our living. We the People are being asked to repay the debt of being freed from Egypt by ensuring that no one else has to suffer at the hands of modern day Pharaohs like Trump and Bibi. We the People are the last bastion of hope that human beings will always know they have “certain unalienable rights, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness” and We the People are being called to ensure these rights never “perish from this earth”!

It took being arrested AGAIN, in December 1986 for me to “circumcise my heart” and learn that “the word is nigh unto thee”. Since I began this journey with Rabbi Mel Silverman in early 1987, since I began to immerse myself in the Bible and prayer book my brother sent me while in prison, I have made it a point to hear what is being said to me each day a little better, a little clearer, a little stronger. Each day I do the best I can to “fulfill what God demands” and my life is so much better for it. Love, Justice, Truth, Kindness, Mercy, Holiness are the bedrock of my living and I have more joy than I could ever have imagined. This is why I continue to rail against injustice and idolatry and will never stop! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Loving Life because one can do charity and be holy! Year 4 Day 196

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 196

“Jewish tradition, though conscious of the perils and pitfalls of existence, is a constant reminder of the grand and everlasting opportunities to do the good. We are taught to love life in this world because of the possibilities of charity and sanctity, because of many ways open to us in which to serve the Lord.” (God in Search of Man pg. 377/8)

Immersing myself in these words and thoughts, I realize that the exodus from Egypt was so much more than slavery will end, so much more than surrender to God takes a strong heart and will, so much more than just receiving the 10 Sayings, it was the gift of “grand and everlasting opportunities to do the good”. Hence, we are taught to “love the stranger because you were strangers in the land of Egypt”, to “not hate the Egyptians”(because they took us in when we were desperate), to help our enemies, to “be holy”, etc. Yet, we are witnessing, once again, the destruction of “the good”. We are witnessing the deconstruction of what is good, charitable, sanctified and what is evil, miserly and unholy while our freedom burns up and our country is quickly becoming a fascist nation. Isn't it time for every person of true faith, of good faith, to rise up and say NO to these PAGANS? Isn’t it time for every person who believes in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, to stand up and shout NO to these Idolators, these Fascists, these Autocrats? In the words of Rabbi Hillel, “if not now, when?”

We the People have sat on our asses for far too long. We the People want to bemoan what is happening and we did nothing to stop it, when we could have. Mitch McConnell you are a despicable human being-I know there is a soul in your, I know you have Ruach Elohim, the spirit of God within you and you continue to act like Pharaoh did in Egypt, with a false ego and arrogance. To the Republican Senate, your inaction is atrocious and your ceding responsibility to Trump and his THUGS is CRIMINAL! While all of this is true, the ultimate responsibility lies with We the People!

Rather than see the myriad of reminders “of the grand and everlasting opportunities to do the good”, We the People have allowed liars, cheats, grifters, fascists, to take over our land. We the People have been deceived by the lies we have been telling ourselves and the mendacity spewing out of the mouths of Trump/MAGA world. We the People became so ‘woke’ that we stopped seeing another human being, just ‘ideals’, only ‘cause of the month’, strictly, ‘what are the optics’. In our institutions, in our governing, in our families, “what’s in it for me” became the way of world a long time ago and We the People stopped seeing “the possibilities of charity and sanctity…of the many ways to serve the Lord.” Instead, as we see with the Charlatan Prosperity Gospel liars, many of We the People have decided it is time for ‘the lord’ to serve us! The Orthodox Jews who take verses from the Bible that they know were added at the time of Ezra or later as ‘the holy grail’ which allows them to not be charitable, to not sanctify the tenets of the Bible, to not see the “many ways open to serve the Lord”, rather they, like their good friends the ‘prosperity gospel christians’ are treacherous, unholy, and continue to commit Hillul HaShem- desecration of God’s name.

Damn it! We the People are being called by the thoughts and teachings above to get our shit together, to remember the words of Hosea: “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge”(Hosea 4:6) and Hosea 14;2,5: “Israel, return to the Lord for you have stumbled in your iniquity…I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely”. The “charity” spoken about above is the ways in which God has dealt with our harlotry, our whoring ourselves to the ‘better deal’. We the People are given the opportunity to “return” so we don’t have to wander about anymore, so we don’t have to keep harming our souls and the myriad of souls around us who suffer from the “iniquity” in which we not only stumble, We the People seem to revel in and roll around in like a pig in shit! I use the term “pig in shit” for all the Fundamentalist Idolators because it is not kosher, in keeping with the un-kosher way they live. Kosher means fitting and proper and the ways in which We the People have handed power over to the mendacious ones, the ways in which We the People have once again whored ourselves for a few pieces of silver, Mr. Lutnick, Mr. Zuckerberg, and the rest of the Jews and true Christians in the government and Congress, are examples of Hillul HaShem-desecration of God’s Name. We the People are better than this!

I am thinking about how I also rolled around in shit for so many years and knew better! This is the tragedy of our times, most of us know better and sink into the quicksand of uncharitable behaviors, false piety, and put blinders on so we don’t see the “grand and everlasting opportunities to do the good.” This is the most profound ‘switch’ I had in the jail cell in December of 1986. While ending my drinking did not happen until December of 1988, my recovery began in that jail cell in Van Nuys, Ca. As Amazing Grace says” I once was lost, but now am found, was blind and now I see”. Ever since that fateful day, I have kept following a path to freedom, a way of being that continues to open my eyes to “the grand and everlasting opportunities to do the good”. I live with charity and holiness in my heart and my actions to the best of my ability each and every day-I fall short, I am human, and my passion to see “the many ways open to us in which to serve the Lord” has never wavered, in fact, it has grown stronger and I have less patience with the Jewish Institutional world that wants to keep dampening the passion and truth of the Bible by their harlotry, their refusal to admit their stumbling. This is the only way I can move forward-knowing my stumbles, correcting them and moving on. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

The power of evil and the reality of good coexist in our lives- Year 4 Day 195

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 195

“The power of evil does not vitiate the reality of good. Significantly, Jewish tradition, while conscious of the possibilities of evil in the good, stresses the possibilities of further good in the good.” (God in Search of Man pg. 377)

“Why bother, what’s the use, nothing will ever change, the cheaters always win, etc” are common refrains of people who experience powerlessness and believe they have no voice. “What does my vote count for” is another one of these cliches people spout and, as we can see, from the millions of people who voted in 2020 and did not in 2024! When one believes that “the power of evil does” “vitiate the reality of good”, these common self-deceptions have great power and lasting influence on everything they do. What is also interesting are the ‘institutionalist’ who believes their own bullshit that they are serving the greater good while allowing “the power of evil” “vitiate the reality of good”. Both groups of people continue to live in their own lies, the lies and deceptions of another and society as a whole. Hence the importance of the thoughts above.

“The reality of good” is the 6th creation in the Bible. We learn that heaven, earth, water, darkness, light are created and with light comes “good”. The rest of the Bible are stories and lessons, paths and commandments on how to ‘come into the light’ and do “the good”. Sometimes we get there and sometimes we don’t, which is what makes the Bible so riveting for me, looking at the pitfalls that our ancestors(being people who came before us-real or imagined) dealt with them. Learning how to find the good and engage in it, seeing how the “power of evil” easily worms its way into the good and we are blindsided by it some time. The Bible, in my opinion, is not looking for purity, it is not looking for perfection, it is a book, a gift that helps us deal with the reality that “darkness was over the face of the deep”, “there was chaos and emptiness” and “the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters”. All three of these descriptions are still at play in our lives, all three are necessary for creation to happen, all creation involves the evil inclination as well as the good inclination, it is our mission, our ‘job’, to not let “the power of evil” “vitiate the reality of good” in our personal, professional, political areas of living.

Rabbi Heschel is not speaking from some lofty place, he is not giving us theories and platitudes, he is giving us the wherewithal to battle “the power of evil” “in the good”. He is reminding us of a tradition that doesn’t claim perfection, doesn’t focus on our being sinners from birth, rather it is a tradition that teaches we learn how to allow “the power of evil” “vitiate the reality of good” through laziness, through greed, through self-deception, through a myriad of lies, deceptions being perpetrated upon We the People by PAGANS and fascists, by autocrats and ‘good people on both sides’, by white supremacists and fanatical ‘religious’ people masquerading as ‘servants of god’ all the while being servants of self. We the People are witnessing “the power of evil” throughout the globe, here in the USA, in Israel, China, Russia, Hungary, North Korea, etc and it is UGLY! “The power of evil”, however gains its foothold because We the People have forgotten that “the spirit of God hovers” over us, and this spirit, this power is our only weapon against “the power of evil”. It is the only path to finding and living “further good in the good”. We do not learn this in religious school, we do not learn this in regular school, we are beating our children into submission so they can ‘get ahead’, ‘doing it for their own good’, ‘it hurts me more than it hurts you’ and other bullshit we tell our children and ourselves.

It is way past time for We the People to return to our primordial way of being-seeking the good, using the knowledge gained from eating the “fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil”, and not repeating the same errors as the people described in the Bible, as the people in our history books, as the elders in our families, as the people around us who are more interested in power than good, more concerned with optics than truth. The challenge that Rabbi Heschel’s teaching above gives We the People is mighty and powerful, it is daring and bold: stop buying the lies of societal norms, live in radical amazement; the maladjustment to cliches and notions, “go for yourself/to yourself to a land I will show you” which is the land of our souls, of our inner lives so we can cope with “the power of evil” and enhance the “good in the good”. We the People have the opportunity each day to make a decision to serve the “good” or succumb to the “evil’, it is an hourly, moment by moment challenge and We the People have to be more clear-eyed as to the differences between the good and “the evil” that disguises itself as “good”. Case in point, anytime We the People allow the travesty of injustice, of inhumane treatment of another human being, racism, anti-semitism, hatred, hardening of the heart to prevail in ourselves, in our families, in our governments to happen and continue. When We the People celebrate the lack of mercy and empathy, when we invite and applaud tyranny, we deny that “good” can prevail, and we deny “the power of evil does not vitiate the reality of good”.

I have railed against “the power of evil” for all my days and I succumbed to it because I was overwhelmed with grief, anger, and loneliness. My soul was bereft when my father died because I knew I was all alone, no one got me. Hence, I did the best I could to let my daughter know I saw her and got her. I have done the same with the people I have encountered since my recovery began in a jail cell. I have continued to speak truth to power, to validate the reality of people and to call bullshit when I see it. I am engaged in battle with “the power of evil” within me and outside of me, it is never-ending and invigorating, and brings me closer to people, to God, to the universe. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Exempt or not exempt from "dealing with evils" -which side are you on? Year 4 Day 194

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 194

“The mitsvah, the humble single act of serving God, of helping man, of cleansing the self, is our way of dealing with the problem. We do not know how to solve the problem of evil, but we are not exempt from dealing with evils. (God in Search of Man pg.377)

Today is Tisha B’Av-the ninth day of Av when we commemorate all of the “evils” that have befallen the Jewish people. Many say this day is the day of remembrance of the “evils” within us as individuals and as a people that we did not deal with and, instead, allowed to percolate and become a way of interacting with the world> Hence going directly against everything we are told in the Bible not to do! The sentence in bold above is so vitally important to the mental and spiritual health of both each of us as individuals and citizens and strangers in the various countries and as global citizens. What many of us call “evil” are nothing more than personal bias’ and prejudices, what we perpetrate unto families, loved ones, people around us and the world from these bias’ and prejudices are the “evils” that Rabbi Heschel is speaking about, as I am hearing him today and in the context of both the time he wrote these words and in the context of today. One of the wonders and awesomeness of prophets, sages, shamans, spiritual giants is their words are eternal because they are speaking of the human condition-be it Ticht Nacht Han, the Dalai Lama, Jesus, Moses, the Psalms, Proverbs, Martin Buber, the Baal Shem Tov, etc- and they all teach us how to deal “with evils”.

“Evils” are, to me, any actions that go against the dignity of a human being, anything that seeks to lessen one group over another, any action that goes against the dictate to “choose life”, the command to “be holy”, the seeing of even our enemies as human beings who need us to remind them of their inherent holiness and connection to something greater than themselves. “Evils” are what are perpetrated upon humanity by soul-suckers seeking power and fame, wealth and spewing hatred. It is not enough, however, to blame the Hitler, the autocrat, the head of the snake, We the People have to see our culpability in putting these “evil” people in power, We the People have to look at our own complicity in perpetrating the “evils” that are happening before our eyes. When we look to the Bible, we can see that it was not just the priests, the royalty, the wealthy who were being pagans, it was We the People as well-read the words of the prophets. One of the “evils” that many people are not speaking of is going along with the insertions that Ezra and his gang of returning exiles put into the Bible so they could engage in their xenophobic and racist behaviors, as my friend and teacher, Rabbi Hazan Danny Maseng is teaching me. It was  another missed opportunity to deal “with evils”. Throughout the millennia the times We the People decided believe we are “exempt from dealing with evils” and this has brought us to the edge of destruction, to the brink of being locked in Egypt forever, and it has taken a war to free us from the prison of “evils” that we seem to constantly want to visit!

We the People, today, have to end our wishing and hoping, our ignoring and hiding from the “evils” that surround us. We the People, right here, right now, have to renew the covenant we made at Sinai, we have to live the gratitude for being alive and having the strength to resist these “evils” that Trump, Netanyahu, their thugs, their grifters, their Pagans are perpetrating upon all of us. We the People have to, like the daughters of Zelophehad in the Bible, speak truth to power no matter how fearful we are, no matter how impotent we think we are! Like those brave women, We the People have to deny the misogyny that the Rabbis have perpetrated upon us. We the People have to deal with the “evils” of racism, xenophobia, grifting, treating people like 2nd class human beings, etc. We the People have to stop believing we are “exempt from dealing with evils” and get off our asses and DO SOMETHING! We the People are being called today, by the words above, by the remembrance of all the harms that befell us because we were not “dealing with evils” when we could have and when we should have-at the first sight of them, when they began to raise their beautiful head and it is imperative that We the People stop seeing beauty and see what is behind the ‘beauty’, stop seeing ways to ‘get ahead’ and see what lies ahead on that road. It is time for We the People to live into the words of the third paragraph of the Shema: “don’t scout out after your heart and your eyes because you will whore (yourself) after them”!!(Numbers 15:39). Scouting out “after our heart and our eyes” is the main road to our being part of We the People, who like our ancestors before us, turn a blind eye to corruption and senseless hatred, who see another as ‘a mark’ for us to take advantage of, who curse the deaf and put stumbling blocks before the blind and call it ‘freedom’. As Pete Seeger asks: “When we ever learn?”

As one who has both perpetrated “evils” and had them perpetrated upon me, I know the power of Rabbi Heschel’s words viscerally. I am living my T’Shuvah for the evils I engaged in and will for the rest of my life. I am aware, usually, when I get close to these terrible old behaviors and I am constantly seeking to use the energy from what “my heart and my eyes” are scouting to DO GOOD. It is difficult some moments because the “evil” disguises itself as good so often. I deal with the “evils” within me each day as well. I remember that this day, the present, is a gift and I am responsible to not squander it, to use it to connect, to learn, to be an example, and, on some days, to veg and recharge my own batteries. I know that “dealing with evils” takes a great deal of inner work and being able to say NO to myself and to another human being. I practice this daily and I don’t pay attention to the desires that will allow me to “whore” after them, diminishing my humanity and dignity. This is my daily challenge. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Humble, cleansing, helping-the rewards of doing a Mitsvah - Year 4 Day 193

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 193

“The mitsvah, the humble single act of serving God, of helping man, of cleansing the self, is our way of dealing with the problem. We do not know how to solve the problem of evil, but we are not exempt from dealing with evils. (God in Search of Man pg.377)

WOW! What an amazing description of what a “mitsvah” is and what it does for each of us internally and the world externally. This definition reminds us that “the mitsvah” is not a burden, it is not to be checked off, it is not even a ‘religious’ act, as I am hearing Rabbi Heschel today. Rather, it is a deeply personal gift to oneself, to the people around us, and to the universe bringing healing, repair, goodness, kindness, truth, love, justice, mercy to a society that: is unforgiving, except for themselves-the powerful, the wealthy-, see’s weaponization of the “rule of law” as something that is within their purview, believes anything they do is legal, right, and beyond reproach while everything ‘their enemies’ do is illegal, fraudulent, and deserves scorn. They all believe in their sovereignty, their being above the law, above morals and ethics, and, ultimately, above God as God’s will is written in the Bible, in the Gospels, etc. Would they learn to do a “mitsvah” and have the experience delineated above!!

Rabbi Heschel’s first phrase above says so much: “the humble single act of serving God” reminds us and teaches us that we are not called to follow a systematic way of life, that the dogmatic path is just not what God wants. The prophets tell us this, it is apparent in the words of Moses in Deuteronomy most of the time, and the Rabbis themselves argued about what different sentences meant, how they could ignore dogma when it didn’t fit their moral sense of right and wrong. “Single” comes to remind us that what we have is this moment, this opportunity and there will never be another moment like this nor a time wherein this particular “mitsvah” is needed like it is right now. It takes great humbleness to perform a “single act of serving God” which one can only obtain and maintain when We the People stay “grounded” in what we are doing and in the service of something greater than ourselves(for those who just can’t believe in the word “God”). “Ground” is the Latin root of “humble” and it could change how we can be humble and not portray ourselves as “lowly, modest”, etc. Rather, I hear the demand from Sinai, the call from Rabbi Heschel, to stay “grounded” in our lives, in this moment, to act with dignity and grace, staying “grounded” in the love of doing the next right action, the love of God and our being able to “get to” fulfill the covenant with one another and God.

The ideas in the first sentence above are so simple, such ‘duh’ moments that they seem to elude We the People. When We the People allow Trump and his grifters, Netanyahu and his PAGANS, Putin and his thugs, etc to rule us, how can any of us say we are living into a “mitsvah”? When Smotrich and Ben G’Vir call for the extinction of the people of Gaza, for the exile of the Palestinians in the West Bank, how can they claim it is for the ‘love of god’ that they are acting? How can one believe that ‘Donald Trump is the anointed one of the lord jesus’ when he continually acts in direct opposition to Jesus’ words in the Gospels, when he is the one who is doing the crucifying rather than being the one crucified-no matter how much he whines and blames. Rather than “helping man”, these PAGANS and charlatans are helping only themselves, they are continually lying and deceiving We the People and we are allowing it-so We the People also are abandoning “serving God”! It is time for We the People to get our act together and stop buying the bullshit of liars, the mendacity of power-hungry white supremacists, the tearing down of democratic values, the annihilation of the rule of law, both secular and Biblical by the fascists in charge!

All of which brings us to the last path of the first sentence above: “cleansing the self”. We can only make right the lies and deceptions, the mendacity and harm we have wrought or stood idly by while it is happening by first “cleaning our side of the street”, as we say in AA. “The mitsvah” is the path to engaging in our own house cleansing, it is not something we can hire someone to do for us, oh you rich and powerful people, it is not something we can deny we have done without greater damage to one’s inner life which leads to drastic horrors in our outer life-just ask the Pharaoh and the people of Egypt. Ask Hitler’s accomplices and enablers, ask the people who have stood up and taken the blows and did it “God’s” way. When we engage in “the mitsvah” and allow it to cleanse our inner life, we get a new lease on being, we get to repair old damages internally and to those we have harmed. We the People get to return to our “acorn” as James Hillman writes; return to “the self we were created to be” as Thomas Merton teaches, turn/return to living in “radical amazement” as Rabbi Heschel lives for us to emulate. All of which is to say that only through “cleansing the self” can we return to being grounded in our purpose, in our passion, grounded in authenticity, responsibility, and love.

I know these ways of being as I have been on both sides of the coin, I know the terrible toll mendacity causes on the people around me and on me. I know the healing power of “cleansing the soul” through the “humble single act of serving God”, and the joy and uplift that comes to my soul, to my being when I am “helping man”. Even though the pay may be a lot less living in God’s world, the rewards are off the charts!. I know living into “a mitsvah” brings a healing and light that, to me is the “hidden light” of the first day of creation. This is the payoff from doing a “mitsvah”, even T’Shuvah cleanses us so every one impacts our being able to serve God and humanity. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Are you aware of "the tragic predicament of the world" right now? Year 4 Day 192

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 192

“Evil is not only a threat, it is also a challenge. Neither the recognition of the peril nor faith in the redemptive power of God is sufficient to solve the tragic predicament of the world. We cannot stem the tide of evil by taking refuge in temples, by fervently imploring the restrained omnipotence of God.” (God in Search of Man pg. 377)

At first blush, the words above could be seen as a source of despair, how can We the People challenge “evil” to a duel? How can we be so arrogant as to believe we can meet and overcome the “threat…challenge” of evil? Yet, this is precisely what Rabbi Heschel is saying/hinting at in the words above. In fact, he is going so far as to say, and I am paraphrasing,: stop calling out to God and do something yourself! He is also, at a time in history that many people call ‘the good old days’-when white supremacy was flourishing, when making ‘those people’ the enemy (thank you Roy Cohn and Joe McCarthy), when women ‘knew their place’ and so on! The MAGA movement is nothing more than returning to those days, to the hatred of Gingrich, the fascism of Lindbergh, Coughlin, et al, and the belief that “white makes right” and ‘vengeance is mine sayeth the Drumpf’.

That “the tragic predicament of the world” was not known, not spoken about during the early 1950’s is criminal, the “tragic predicament of the world” right now is spoken about, just not doing anything about it. The Congress has failed in their sworn duty, the Supreme Court has failed in it’s sworn duty, many in the media are surrendering and paying tribute to ‘the don’, Universities are bending the knee as our law firms and business’. It is a total collapse of checks, balances, freedom, obligations, belief in the democratic way of life. And, We the People sit around either cheering this debacle not realizing we are going to get fucked by ‘our people’ or wringing our hands and muttering to ourselves, sending money to candidates who, even if they win, will be bought and paid for by some ideology or lobbyist. Public Service is almost non-existent because our ‘public servants’ are serving their own agenda of getting re-elected, rising up in the hierarchy, serving the agenda of the people who send them money, clothe them so nicely, etc. AOC is no more trustworthy than Mitch McConnell as she has proved many times over-her ‘progressive’ agenda is anti-semitic and she is proud of her and her ‘squad’’s hatred of Israel and Jews! Yet, we are not allowed to say this because she is ‘on the right side’ of the continuum, holding these leftist values that are so near and dear to the far left and those of us in the middle, those of us who know that life is not black and white, are left standing out in the cold from both extremes.

Rabbi Heschel, of course, had deep “faith in the redemptive power of God”, so what I hear him saying to us today is stop sitting on your hands, stop standing on the sidelines, meet the “challenge”, stop the “threat” of “evil” because only we can. I also hear him in today’s context, telling not to take “refuge in temples” because, like the prophets before him, he saw the corruption, the desecration of God’s name in temples, churches, mosques just as we see it today. Our Church leaders like Paula Cain-White, other ‘prosperity gospel liars’, the ultra-orthodox, the rabbis and clergy who are preaching that Palestinians are ‘not human’, the Imams who exhort their followers to blow up buildings, bus stops, etc ARE THE EVIL we are facing in the world and We the People have to call them out.

We the People have to “cry out to God” as our ancestors did in Egypt. We the People have to immerse ourselves in the Bible until it becomes part of us, until we see ourselves in every chapter, finding the question that this text is the answer for in this moment. Rather than pick it all apart, be in the text, see yourself as all of the Biblical characters, redeem the captive that is being held inside of you. We the People have to meet the ‘evil inclination” we are born with and transform the energy to do good. We the People have to continue to do our T’Shuvah and see where we hit the mark and where we miss it-not to beat ourselves up, rather to improve. We the People have stop our misguided hope/belief that ‘someone will save us’, that “God will save us”. We the People have to return to our evil and good inclinations, putting them together with the evil serving the good, so we can meet the outside “threat”, through ‘winning’ the inner “challenge”. It ain’t easy! It is not linear! It is doable, it is guaranteed to work by the prophets of old and throughout history. Rather than ask “where is God, where was God”, we are being told to ask: “where are you”, where am I”? Only when We the People stand for our authentic self, only upon rising to the “challenge” of Torah, truth, kindness, justice, mercy, love will we be able to hold “evil” at bay and transform it.

I know this to be true as it is my story. I know the “threat of evil” because I lived in it. I am going to Florida next week and I will be officiating at the 50th Wedding Anniversary of my best friend from childhood. I introduced him to his wife and I am thinking of how much of their lives I missed because I succumbed to the “challenge” of evil instead of meeting it. I know how much I gave away by becoming the very thing I always knew was a “threat”, “evil”. I can’t dwell in the sadness, in the muck, I have to move forward and be in this moment. Today, as I have for the past 38+ years I meet the “challenge” of evil and, while not always overcoming the “evil”, it no longer is the address I live at and my T’Shuvah is ongoing. I am joyous each morning to meet the “threat” and the “challenge” of today, knowing I will encounter “evil” and have a new response that is one grain of sand better than yesterdays! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Goodness needs the will of God and the freedom of man-how are you living in both realms? Year 4 Day 191

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 191

“Values are not eternal ideas, existing independently of God and man. If not for the will of God, there would be no goodness; if not for the freedom of man, goodness would be out of place in history. Greek philosophy is concerned with values; Jewish thought dwells on mitzvot. (God in Search of Man pg. 377)

Rabbi Heschel is reminding us of a crucial life lesson: “values are not eternal ideas”, they come from God and are executed by human beings. It takes “the will of God” and “the freedom of man” to bring them into this world. I hear him reminding us that they are not subjective as well. Values, such as “goodness” are not open to question, as the Greek philosophers and other philosophers like to do, thereby rendering the action called for by a value impotent. There is, or should be, no debate, no discussion of how to fulfill the value: “Love the stranger”. This is not a subjective value that only applies to ‘certain’ people-it applies to all of us because, while not eternal, the “values” God has given us are universal.

While each and every one of us has a different experience of “God”, there is only ONE GOD, as we recite each day in the Shema which also tells us that we are part of the oneness of God, hence our need to “nullify our will before God’s will so God’s will becomes our will” as Pirke Avot teaches us. We the People have to surrender our need to be right, our need to define the undefinable, to explain the Ineffable, and accept that our experience of the Ineffable One is as valid as the next persons and, as we learned at the Red Sea crossing and at Mount Sinai, each being has a different experience of both God and the experience of ‘meeting’ God “face to face”. Again, the Oneness of God is not in question for the Jew, the message of God is not in question for the Jew, what the Jew questions, or should be questioning, is: how do I fulfill the message, how do I live the values, what do I do with my free will, etc.

The difference between “Greek philosophy” and “Jewish thought” as Rabbi Heschel delineates is the difference between witnessing trauma and evil and, as Martin Niemoller says so eloquently, saying “I was not a …” and I am my brother’s keeper, I cannot “stand idly by the blood of” any human being. The fulfilling of a mitzvah, however, is not a scorecard, it is not a check list, it is an engagement in the moment we are living in and seeing what the next right action is, even if that action is to sit on one’s hands. While not every fight is everyone’s the fight in front of me is mine to discern and either join or stop, it is not to be indifferent. “The will of God” is “for the freedom of man” to be used appropriately and at all times. It is not to be robots, it is not to be automatons, it is not to be animals and it is not to be angels, the “freedom of man” is to learn how to make the next right choice, to do the next right thing, the emphasis being on next. We are not capable of perfection and this Greek myth, along with their endless discussion of values, are just bullshit and ways to avoid the hard work of the “mitzvot” that “Jewish thought” calls for. We the People will never be perfect, We the People are not supposed to be perfect, We the People are not God. We the People are able to achieve wholeness, We the People are Godlike, made in the Image of God, partners with God in completing the creation, growing into “the soul we are created to be”, finding passion and purpose. We the People need the “mitzvot” to help us in all our endeavors remembering we have no fucking idea if we are ‘doing it right’ and there is no ‘there there’, we are on a journey and the destination is, as Abraham is told: “to a land(place) I will show you”.

We the People have been engaged in the Greek way of living for far too long, I believe. We the People have lost the ability to discern truth from lies, fact from fiction because we have freely chosen to listen to the mendacious ones, to go along with the grifters, to let go of our “intuitive minds” so we can be a servant to the worst, so we can twist ourselves into pretzels in order to “Be in the “IN Crowd” and ‘get ours’. Netanyahu, Smotrich, Vought, Miller, Trump, Vance are no more interested in what God has to say about “goodness” than the man in the moon. It is way past time for We the People to heed “the will of God” and use “the freedom of man” to serve God’s will instead of the will of the autocrat, the fascist. It is time for We the People to demand of our elected officials they fulfill their duty to “protect and defend the Constitution” rather than protect and defend their asses, their unjust, inhumane, enslaving actions because “the president wants it” as they are wont to whine. The Republicans in Congress have gone along with the fascists in the White House like good German Soldiers-bravo John Thune, Mike Johnson. The Supreme Court has gone along with the fascists as well rendering their oath to “follow the law” mute and their vow to “protect and defend the Constitution” toothless and meaningless. It is up to We the People to turn to the Bible and “proclaim freedom throughout the land”, to remove “the stumbling block before the blind” to end the cursing of the deaf that is happening, to “rebuke our neighbor and not bear guilt because of them”. We the People have to demand better from these PAGANS in Washington than Emil Bovee as a Federal Judge-a Jew who twists values rather than fulfill Mitzvot, like Lutnick, Miller and the rest of those ‘good jews’ who work with the fascists in power.

I have been obsessed with the difference between the “Greeks” and the Jews for a long time. I have written about it, I have preached about it, and I say again-Judaism is not concerned with my feelings, I don’t need to take a leap of faith to be a Jew, I do have to “take a leap of action” as Rabbi Heschel says in order to fulfill the myriad of “mitzvot” in front of me each day. This is my quest and my dream-to see them, to do them, to grow from them. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

"Life is human as well as divine" Human beings are more than just "a value to society". Year 4 Day 190

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 190

“Life is human as well as divine. Man is a child of God, not only a value to society. We may explore things without God; we cannot decide about values without Him.” (God in Search of Man pg. 377)

The more I re-read this chapter, the more I immerse myself in these thoughts and teachings, the more I understand the depth of Rabbi Heschel’s compassion, care, kindness, and faith. Along with this understanding comes a ‘hearing’ of his demands, prophetic vision and speech, and his unyielding belief in the potential of human beings to be human. This is not some ‘airy-fairy’ thought Rabbi Heschel had, rather it is based in his loyalty, his commitment to the ideas and ideals found in the Bible.

Realizing that we are both “human as well as divine” is an important first step in our returning to the ways of the Bible, to the victories of humanity found there as well as the numerous times we ‘missed the mark’ which are also found there. Rather than give into the societal norms, which don’t deal with the “divine” nature of every human being, Rabbi Heschel is calling us to face the truth about We the People, that we are both. This is a difficult proposition for many of us, we don’t want to acknowledge the “divine” we have within us, we are loath to grow deeper into our authentic self through realizing the “acorn”, the raison d’être of our creation and living into it. We the People know we don’t get ‘points’ from society for living into goodness, justice, kindness, truth, love if we don’t make a ‘killing’ from it, if it doesn’t give us power over the people what good is it, most people in power are asking today. Public Service is looked upon as either a great grift or, if you are not grifting, you are just stupid and an ‘idealist’. We have left the days of the Peace Corps being a national treasure and entered the time of being looked upon by our elected officials as scum and with scorn.

In our society today, truthfully forever, many more people see life as “human” and do not regard the “divine” nature of human beings. Hence without attention, without nurturing, without nourishment, our “divine” nature begins to shrivel and wither, becomes almost undetectable and no longer a factor in our decision-making because all that is important is our “value to society”. Our entire ego system is dependent upon being ‘liked’ on Facebook and other Social Media sites, our egos are in constant need of outside attribution with Trump being the best example of this need and far from the only one! Rather than live into the teachings of Christ, those ‘good christian nationalist, prosperity gospel folk’ keep fleecing the pockets, the minds, and the souls of their flock for their greed and to serve ‘der fuhrer’, Donald Trump and this is what is passing as religion!! OY, VA VOY!! Judaism is not doing much better when Chabad and other Ultra-Orthodox groups claim that Oct 7th was God’s punishment to the Jews for not taking Gaza and the West Bank from the Palestinians and throwing them out of their land, again! When these same people along with the far-right Likud members led by that paragon of virtue, Benjamin Netanyahu, believe that Arabs are ‘not really human’ we see the same rejection of our “divine” nature as with ‘those good christian folk’ above.

We the People are being called from Mount Sinai to stand up for God, to stand with God, to deny the lies and mendacity of society that all that is important for someone to be human is their worth, their “value to society”. We the People have a unique opportunity to set things right again, maybe for the first time, and recognize one another as “divine” reminders, as Images of God hence reflections of our divinity and we a reflection of theirs. We the People have to fight like Hell to institute: “Freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein” as a norm not just a slogan. We the People are being asked to rise above the bullshit we have been fed since infancy by ‘societal norms’ and live into the “radical amazement” of being led by God, live into the core of our authenticity, our souls. Taking this journey down, rather than trying to ‘reach the heavens’ is crucial if We the People are to regain control of our destinies, recapture the hallowed halls of government, and clean the Temples, Churches, Mosques of the “money-changers, the idolators, the PAGANS that are currently defiling some of our most sacred spaces. When these assholes defile our sacred houses of worship, our hallowed halls of freedom and democracy, the defilement of the human soul is beginning and most of us don’t even notice it. Listening to the people who are most at risk from the PAGANS in charge and their blind loyalty is scary, is unbelievable, is dangerous, and is the real walking to our deaths because these people have lost their connection to their “divine” nature, to God and only believe what they are told, not what they see, hear, smell, touch. We the People have to do something and do it NOW otherwise we are guilty of “standing idly by the blood of our brothers and sisters”. Isn’t it time for We the People to stop wringing our hands and Get Into ACTION?

My action today is to support the people who support We the People and to stand up to those who support “the 1%” only. Is it any wonder, given society’s obsession with success that the “1%” want to stay on top? They worked hard to get where they are, they unwittingly buried their “divine” nature so deep they can’t even hear its call. I know this experience, I had it without being in the “1%”, I had it because I thought that is what would make me okay. Only through shoveling through the shit I placed upon my soul, only by going deeper into my inner being could I find my authentic self and this is what I am writing about, this is what I speak about and this is the way I work to negate the Trump/Bibi/Orban/Putin way of being. Standing up for and with We the People is what God wants and what we need. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Are we living as entitled human beings or as people who "Owe" a debt for life? Year 4 Day 189

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 189

“We do not wage war with evil in the name of an abstract concept of duty. We do the good not because it is a value or because of expediency, but because we owe it to God. God created man and what is good “in His eyes” is good for man.” (God in Search of Man pg. 376/7)

In the world in which we live, the ideas above seem absurd. They are laughed at by the MAGA, the Trump Circle, the Prosperity Gospel people, they are abused by the Ultra Religious parties in Israel and Bibi uses these ideas to wage war with “good” in every part of his Prime Ministership now and before. Yet, what is a person of faith to do? We cannot let the PAGANS determine our fate, we cannot allow the idolators set the parameters of observance, we cannot lay down in front of the moving train and allow what “we owe to God” to be ignored and plundered. It was never and is not now ‘okay’ to let the bastards win! We the People have to return our world to some sense of stability, some way of being that is constantly wrestling with “evil”, that is willing to stay on the battlefield of war between “the good” and “the evil”. It is imperative for We the People to remember this is not personal goal, it is not a personal win/lose situation, this is war for the soul of humankind, it is a war for the superiority of God, it is the war between Moses and Pharaoh and this war is both macro and micro.

“An abstract concept of duty”, “a value, because of expediency” are not long term solutions. The idea of “abstract” is that it can be changed, mis-interpreted, bastardized and turned into the exact opposite of what our duty is. “Values” seem to change on a dime and “expediency” only lasts a second. What we are left with, if we choose to acknowledge it, is what “we owe to God”. Herein lies the challenge, the rub, the ‘out’, the fertile soil of idolatry and mendacity. This is what we are facing today, as we have throughout the generations of humankind being on earth. We are witnessing a “duty” to get revenge, to ‘get even’, to humiliate another group of people based on their skin color, based on our fear of them gaining power and acting towards us as some of us have acted towards them. Expediency is what is being used to decimate the principle of justice that has been integral to the growth of this country and Israel. Rather than give people due process, both countries are putting people in jail and prison, with the U.S deporting them to other countries without the benefit of a judge, jury, checking on their status as legal or illegal, citizen or green card holder. It is more expedient for an autocrat, a fascist leader to make a scapegoat out of a group, in this case once again it is racial, as this group are Hispanics. In Israel the Ultra Orthodox and Likud far right-wing, led by the fascist opportunist Netanyahu, who are claiming that Palestinians (and by extension all Arabs) in the West Bank and Gaza are less than human! The idea that a Jew would scapegoat another people after millennia of being scapegoated is so disgusting, I want to throw up! Yet, we see it happening because they are not “waging war with evil” no matter what these Fascists in Israel and the United States say, they are waging war with Good, with the Holy, and, ultimately with God! Rather than acknowledge what “we owe to God”, the current trend in both Evangelical clergy and elected officials is to lead their flocks in the path of hatred and believe they are owed, that god is giving them their due and it is because of ‘those’ people that ‘our kind’ has suffered. This old saw is the same tone as what is used against Jews and it is tiresome, deadly and, unfortunately, effective.

WE THE PEOPLE  are being reminded that we are debtors, not creditors, that we owe and we are not entitled, that there is an objective “good” and we learn what this is when we study, immerse ourselves in the Bible. When we accept the truth and wisdom of the Bible as eternal without worrying about the ‘factual basis’ of the stories. When we accept the teachings of how to live well and how we failed to live well with the consequences of both being on display. When we accept that we are like the prophets and the priests who the prophets railed against, when we live into the destruction that we wrought because of senseless hatred and mistreating the stranger, the widow, the orphan and the poor. When we realize we were liberated from Egypt and at Sinai we accepted the Covenant as our repayment for being liberated, that we accepted the yoke of freedom and learned to be free is hard work, then we rejoice in repaying our debt, we are ecstatic to learn and lean into “the good”. We have a new found serenity/clarity because we know what God wants from us, we let go of the false idols we have worshiped in the past, we realize the more we have, the more we get to give to help another, and we appreciate the talents and purpose of each person we meet rather than be in competition with them. This is the Jewish battle plan against “evil” and, one day, when we all live into it, “evil” will be defeated once and for all, until then, we have to battle it one day at a time with the resolve of the prophets, the hope of the Israelite slaves freed from Egypt and the strength of King David.

I know that I owe, I know how large my debt is and I know I can never repay all of it! I keep up with the interest most days and on really good ones, I lessen the principle a little. I keep my doing of “evil” to a minimum and continue to do my inventory daily. I keep working to be one grain of sand better each day and I have filled more than a few sandboxes over the years. I have made errors, I have caused pain and suffering and I have made my amends. I work hard to forgive those who have harmed me and are unable to make amends to me. Those who do, I am eager to re-establish connection. I pray for all the people who are stuck in their shit. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

“Seductiveness of Vice” or “the joys of the mitsvah” we get to choose each day where we want to live- Year 4 Day 188

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 188

“The seductiveness of vice is excelled by the joys of the mitsvah. “Ye shall be men of holiness unto Me” (Exodus 22:30). How do we receive that quality, that power? “With every new mitsvah which God issues to Israel, He adds holiness to them.(Mehilta)”(God in Search of Man pg. 376)

The first sentence above is true and it is not believed by many people! The Biblical person knew this to be true and, as we witness in the stories of the Bible and throughout history, found it difficult to always know and live this truth. This truth has eluded humankind throughout the millennia as it does for many of us in this time. Society has, instead, practiced the opposite, believing “the seductiveness of vice” is so overpowering, so rewarding and the mitsvah is a burden, a yoke, an obligation that only ties us down and enslaves us. Because dogma has become so important in every faith, in every nation, it seems as if “vice” is the only way to break free. It has been called “teen-age rebellion”, getting ahead, Caveat Emptor, etc as ways to cloak giving into “the seductiveness of vice” into something ‘normal’ and, in many cases, ‘good’. This is how far we have sunk into the quicksand of mendacity, into the grips of deception, into being enslaved by our ‘rational minds’ and forgetting “to not scout out after the desires of our hearts and our eyes because we whore after them”(Numbers 15:39.

Instead of heeding this call, instead of immersing ourselves in the last paragraph of the Shema, many Jews ignore it and this is a tragedy that has been with us for the millennia as well. The Temples were destroyed because we did not heed this command, this truth and, instead, believed “the seductiveness of vice” was actually the next right thing to do! We see it happening today as well, both in Israel and in the U.S. with Jews in power spouting words and doing deeds that are reminiscent of the Pharaoh, of other despots and calling it holy!! This is the tragedy of our time, this is the denial of the truth of Rabbi Heschel’s first sentence above, it is a denial of all that is Holy in the Bible and a denial of the word of God to all of us from Sinai. Yet, these PAGANS keep saying how ‘this is fulfilling the word of god’! Have you ever noticed how people of God never need to ‘prove’ the truth of their words or deeds, they only quote the Bible and speak about how to care for the poor, how to live free, how to be a mensch?

Of course, this type of behavior is not limited to Jews, the ‘good old boy christian nationalist’ like Mike Johnson continually engages in “the seductiveness of vice” and calls it holy. The ‘fine prosperity gospel preachers’ like Paula White-Cain preach hate, preach how fine grifters are, how holy it is to take advantage of the poor, etc and say ‘I heard it from the lord jesus’! We are not witnessing a revolution of faith, we are witnessing a revolution of idolatry, of paganism, of the worship of power and money. This is antithetical to what the Bible teaches, preaches and to what Jesus said and did. Any society that doesn’t welcome and love the stranger, forgetting they were strangers in the land of America, as Jews “were strangers in the land of Egypt”, doesn’t care for the poor, the needy, the widow and orphan, cannot claim any kinship to God-full stop! Yet, we keep hearing how ‘holy’ these liars are, how ‘godly’ it is to kill people in the West Bank and Gaza, how ‘those people’ are poisoning the blood of our people, how we have to throw out the constitution that our elected officials swore to “serve and defend from enemies foreign and domestic”. It is ironic that, like in all dictatorships, the people who swear to “defend and protect” are the very ones to shit all over the very ideals and ways that made it possible for them to be free to screw the rest of us over!

We the People are being called by the words above and the times we are in to “return to God” who “will heal our backsliding” and “take us back in love”! We the People need to return to the ways of our ancestors who fought to make Israel a nation in ancient times, who fought to bring into being the Magna Carta, who fought in the Revolutionary War, who fought against slavery in the Civil War, who fought for the freedom of people in World War II, who fought for the Civil Rights of all people in the 50’s, 60’s up till today. We the People are necessary to be part of the fight against “the seductiveness of vice”. We the People have to fight “vice” with the only thing more powerful, “the mitsvah”. At every juncture, We the People have to ask the question: “what is the next right action to take here?” It will differ in each experience and we have to continue to fight for what is right and good, we have to engage in going against what our neighbors are saying, we have to discern truth from lies, fact from fiction and live into the dictate: “You shall be Holy” with each and every action we take, knowing we will stumble, knowing we will fall short of perfection, setting our sights on being 51% decent in every interaction so “the mitsvah” overtakes “the seductiveness of vice”.

I am well aware of “the seductiveness of vice” and I know that it begins with the lies I tell myself. I know the power of these lies, I know the power of the deception by another(s) that leads to whoring after my heart and my eyes. I know the power of being led by a pied piper of “vice” who makes so much ‘sense’ that I became overwhelmed with the lies I told myself and the lies I was being told and “vice” became “holy”. This is “the seductiveness of vice” that overtook my life for 20 years and being at my family reunion has brought up how much time, joy, and love I missed out on and took from my family! We are all good now and this is due to the “joys of the mitsvah” that I have engaged in with them and they have lived for so long. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Raising ourselves to “a higher level of existence” or not - Year 4 Day 187

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 187

“The Biblical answer to evil is not the good but the holy. It is an attempt to raise man to a higher level of existence, where man is not alone when confronted with evil. Living in “the light of the face of God” bestows upon man a power of love that enables him to overcome the powers of evil.” (God in Search of Man pg. 376)

“Holy” in Jewish thought and practice, as I understand it, means “elevated, separated and connected”. This is a crucial foundational idea, principle in living Jewishly, I believe. In order to “raise man to a higher level of existence”, We the People need to elevate ourselves and one another. We the People are being called to do more than we think we can, we are being called to raise ourselves up from our baser, animal instincts and live into the “intuitive mind” that Einstein speaks of and use our “evil inclination” to do good, to be holy. Since we are created in the image of God, since we have within us the spirit of God as Genesis chapters 1 and 2 teach us, we are more than capable of elevating ourselves to the level of being human. This is the challenge we face each and every day, in each and every interaction-will we rise above our false egos, our rational minds which are self-centered and narcissistic or not.

While “the good” is crucial to our actions and as a way of being that “departs from evil”, as I am understanding Rabbi Heschel this morning, they are not enough to truly change our level of living. It is living up “to a higher level of existence” that will enable us to have a daily practice of doing “the good”. Living at the level of “the holy” separates us from the powerful urges and desires to get even, to be cruel, to hate your enemy, to ‘win at any costs’, to separate ourselves from “the good” instead of from “the evil” through our rationalizations such as “everyone else does it”, “it’s just business” and other such lies we tell ourselves. “To raise ourselves to a higher level of existence” we have to separate ourselves from the rationalizations we use, from the lies we tell ourselves and the various deceptions that have become ‘normal’ in our society. Rather than obfuscate the truth, we have to shout what is true and real from the rooftops. Rather than ‘go along to get along’, we have stand up and speak truth to power. Rather than hate our enemies, we have to find ways to love them while fighting “the evil” they are perpetrating. Separating ourselves from our lower and baser instincts is not to say they are without merit because, of course, it is a both/and. We use these baser instincts to build buildings to house and shelter ourselves and another(s), to make medical breakthroughs, to love, to marry, to have and raise children in their own image, etc. AND, we can only really do this when we separate ourselves from “the evil” within.

Connection is the path to doing this. “Living in “the light of the face of God” bestows upon man a power of love that enables him to overcome the powers of evil” and only through connection with “the light” can we be infused and consumed by “a power of love”. This connection begins at birth and, if we nurture and feed our hunger for connection with God through living into the Covenant, we continue to grow this connection and increase our “power of love” in order “to overcome the powers of evil”. It is not easy, it is not a one and done, it is a slow slog through the muck and mire of societal norms, it is a constant “maladjustment to notions and ideas” so we never see the same moment in the same way. Connection is “we will do and then understand”, it is following the Biblical dictates of the “holiness code” to feed the poor, welcome the stranger, pay people a living wage and on time, to not take advantage of another because of their vulnerabilities, to show faith in another by rebuking them when they are on the wrong path thereby showing our belief that they can be “holy”. It means we will not impugn the dignity and value of another, to not hate another, even our enemies, in our hearts, to find a higher level of love for ourselves so we can love another.

We the People are being called every day to “be holy” by the voice of the Ineffable One and we have to hear this call that is deep in our soul. For far too long we have been trying to ‘reach the heavens’ rather than growing deeper, as James Hillman writes, growing deeper into our true and authentic selves, growing deeper in our spiritual life. As I am understanding today’s quote, it is imperative for We the People to end our fascination with the lower self, end our constant need for a ‘bad guy’ to blame for our natural inadequacies, end our need for absolute power. It is way past time for We the People to bask in “the light of the face of God” which is our primordial and natural state of being. It is time for We the People to once again tell the Pharaoh inside, the Pharaoh of societal norms to LET MY PEOPLE GO and leave the Egypt of “the evil”.

I know the power of evil, I also know that only by “living in the light of the face of God” was I able to leave it, to unshackle myself from its tight grasp and subtle ways of holding me captive. I had to come face to face with myself, with my actions, with my tears, with my dreams and my evil in order to return to the basic goodness of being that is deep within me. Only by doing this excruciating work of “the dark night of the soul” as St. John of the Cross coined and describes Jacob’s encounter with “an ish” prior to meeting Esau. I had to wrestle with both the Jacob and Esau in me so I could use Esau’s strength to overcome Jacob’s deviousness. It is a hard journey that, truly, never ends and I continue to wrestle with these two archetypes. Living at the level of “the holy” allows “the good” to win out most of the time. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.