Who are the advocates, the champions, the interferers, the remonstrators of today? Year 4 Day 246

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 246

“In a sense, the calling of the prophet may be described as that of an advocate or champion, speaking for those who are too weak to plead their own cause. Indeed, the major activity of the prophets was interference, remonstrating about wrongs inflicted on other people, meddling in affairs which were seemingly neither their concern nor responsibility.” (Thunder in the Soul pg.45)

The prophets have captured my attention forever, when I was a youth, I believed we could ‘change the world’ once and for all, because of the words of the prophets, because in the Bible was the path to change, the path of justice, the path of mercy, etc. Yet, it was not to be and the more I was laughed at, the more jaded I became and I joined the wrong revolution, I joined the rebels who were also in it for themselves-what could I get from you and make it mine. This is the difference between a prophet, a person of the Bible, a person of real faith, person who believes being humane is the most important action one can take and everyone else: having “the calling of a prophet”, being “an advocate or champion”.

It is an interesting description: “the major activity of the prophets was interference” because the Rabbis have been afraid of the prophetic strain in our tradition, fearful that they would be the ones being interfered with, fearing the passion and the possible destruction of the Jewish people if the prophetic spirit moved them to stage another revolt like the Bar Kochba one, which was a dismal failure. While the Rabbis quote the prophets in the Talmud, they take the words out of context often, just as they do with the Torah and this leads to a bastardization of the prophets words, a weakening of their message and a lessening of their “interference”.

Here we are today, in 2025, and the questions some people are asking is: Where are the prophets today, who are the prophets of today? For some, they are the MAGA crowd of haters and bible-thumpers(Jewish and Christian) and this belief is bewildering because none of the ‘prophets’ of the MAGA crowd do anything for another human being that is not their concern and they take no responsibility in anything that doesn’t work, they take no responsibility for speaking truth to power, nor do they care about the poor, the widow, the orphan, the stranger. Yet, the clergy who promote a Christianity that has nothing to do with Christ, a Judaism that has nothing to do with Moses and the God of Abraham, fervently believe they are the true ‘prophets’ of today, and are doing what they can to promote the untruths of their ‘biblical’ message-which is really anti-biblical. I call them untruths because anytime something is ‘half-true’, it is all untrue. Truth is, there is no half, no quarter, this is a case of either/or-something is true or it is not true.

For the rest of We the People, we are left asking ourselves-who are the prophets of today as well. While there are some leaders like Bishop William Barber, some activists like Ezra Klein, no one has stepped forward to truly lead the resistance, no one is stepping up to be the “advocate or champion” that speaks to the souls of all of us, that speaks to the actions we must take in our own inner lives. Yes, there are many on the ‘progressive’ end of the spectrum like AOC and Bernie who advocate for the poor by denigrating the people who have money, and they are correct-it is just that their agenda is not favoring the middle of the road people, their agenda is as radical as the MAGA, so, there is no one speaking out for God except for people like Bishop Barber, Rabbi Sharon Brous, and others.

Hence, as We the People immerse ourselves in the words above, we, hopefully, come to realize the prophetic mantle has been given to us, we are all descendants of the prophets, we are all capable and being called to be “an advocate or champion”, we are being called to speak “for those who are too weak to plead their own cause”. We are being reminded that running “interference” against the status quo, “remonstrating about the wrongs inflicted on other people”, “meddling in affairs” which some believe are not our concerns is the only way to live in the world and be a person of faith, a person who lives as decent human beings-no matter what one is a person of faith or not. The words above remind us, cajole us, demand of us to get off our asses, stop worrying about what ‘the neighbors think’, end our incessant need to please everyone and be thought of as ‘a nice person’ and “remonstrate”, “champion”, “advocate” for what is right and true, what is just and loving, what is serving another and being more selfless than selfish. These words call us to stand up for our freedom and the freedom of another(s), knowing that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a prophet for his time and ours, taught. This way of being is one of the highest forms of serving the Ineffable One.

I know the life of the prophet is not easy, it is difficult because no one wants to hear, listen and understand (Shema) their errors, their wrongs, their injustices because most people enjoy the ill-gotten gains these errors, wrongs, injustices have brought them! I did in my days before recovery and I was jealous of those who had what I wanted. Recognizing my prophetic voice, eyesight has brought me to a place of loneliness and joy, truth and scorn, enveloped and exiled. I know that, as my friend and teacher Rabbi Ed Feinstein says, people do not want to hear what I have to say because it makes them uncomfortable, which is what I am trying to do. I am uncomfortable every time I see injustice and I am compelled to do something about it. It is what my Rabbinate was all about, it is what I am all about. God Bless and Stay safe, Happy Sukkot, Rabbi Mark

Truthfulness, remorse, responsibility: the pathway to being a citizen rather than a tourist! Year 4 Day 245

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 245

“Its motivations are remorse for the past and responsibility for the future. Only in this manner is it possible and valid…Repentance is a decision made in truthfulness, remorse and responsibility.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

Since it is almost Sukkot, it begins Monday evening, I wanted to end our time writing about “repentance” with these sentences. While we are called to do TShuvah every day and I believe it is crucial for our spiritual, emotional and physical well-being to do so, I know that most people only think of this process during this time-which is a tragedy in my opinion. Think of the world we could have, think of the the world God imagined when he put TShuvah into the world before it was created because God knew/knows we will screw up and need a way back-even though humanity has adopted perfection as not only the goal but also the only way one can feel okay with oneself-HOW RIDICULOUS!!

Hence my choosing these sentences above. The only “motivations are remorse for the past and responsibility for the future” tell us to embrace our imperfections, cherish our errors as learning lessons and be committed to being one grain of sand better today than we were yesterday. What is Rabbi Heschel saying, what is Judaism saying about the importance of “repentance”? WE NEED IT! We need to experience remorse for our errant actions, otherwise we are a narcissistic sociopath, we have to admit our errors in judgment that lead to our taking actions in error otherwise we are a psychopath, remorse says we are responsible for our past actions and this leads us to being more responsible for the actions we take from then on. In other words, one cannot say everything one does is right and beautiful, one cannot say their lies are the truth, one cannot say they are ‘god-fearing christians’ and hate the stranger, one cannot say they are ‘good jews’ and hate their enemies in their hearts, lie about what they are doing and deny responsibility for their actions. The elected officials and their advisors, cabinet members who take these abhorrent actions are representing We the People because We the People elected them!! It is way past time for We the People to ask ourselves if we feel remorse for the ways the U.S is attacking boats in the Caribbean, raiding businesses, schools, farms, courthouses, etc and arresting, manhandling people who have committed no crimes, who are hating the stranger in our midst-here legally or not, who have declared war on cities and people who don’t agree with their fascist, autocratic ways, who lie constantly and believe cruelty is the goal? We the People have to ask ourselves if we feel remorse for the way Israel has prosecuted the war with Hamas, if killing innocent Arab babies is any different than Hamas killing innocent Jewish babies, if leveling cities and areas with 2000lb bombs is so different from a suicide bomber leveling a bus full of people, whether the payments to Hamas for years was an act of betrayal to the people who live in Israel and to Jews across the globe, whether the denial of the government to conduct an inquiry into what happened on Oct. 7th, 2023 was preventable and who is responsible is another way of avoiding responsibility for their actions-these ‘orthodox’ Jews like Ben G’Vir, et al. Are We the People going to learn from our errors, have remorse for the mistakes and horrific ways we have treated our neighbors, the strangers and our enemies and be responsible going forward?

This is the question that these sentences bring up in me, as an individual, as a citizen of the United State, and as a Jew who has been and is a Zionist and supporter of the State of Israel. I pray they bring up the same question for you. That “repentance is a decision made in truthfulness, remorse, and responsibility” calls all of us to account, asks all of us the question I ask above. I believe it is way past time for all of us to be accountable for our lack of “truthfulness, remorse, and responsibility”. I believe We the People have to face ourselves prior to Sukkot this year, see where we are still hiding and lacking these three ingredients that make us human and repair our inner life, reject the lies of our rational mind, stop whoring ourselves after what our heart and eyes desire and, as it intimates in the 3rd paragraph of the Shema: be a citizen, not a tourist!

I have been living as a citizen these past 38 years precisely because I lived as a tourist for the 20 years prior, because instead of being in truth, I lied to you and to me and when I couldn’t lie to myself-I drank. I have been living as a citizen for these past 38 years because once I read these words of Rabbi Heschel, once I learned what TShuvah means and its centrality in Judaism, I couldn’t live in my skin until I began this process and it is a process that never ends-hence the call to do TShuvah one day before you die, ie-every day. It is hard for me to sleep a full 7-8 hours most days because I am constantly bombarded with the knowing that I am co-responsible for the actions that Stephen Miller, Howard Lutnick, and the rest of the gang of grifters and thieves like Jared Kushner, are taking in the ‘name of freedom, of ridding us of weaponization of government’, etc. It was difficult to not hear a call from the Rabbi to mobilize against the evil of these people, to fight against the extremists on both ends of the spectrum, to stand up for the principles of “truthfulness, remorse, responsibility”  in our daily prayers, actions, etc. It is difficult to look at what is going on, know my limitations and still hear, follow and echo the ways and words of the prophets of old and not ‘take to the streets’ like I did as a child of the 60’s. I live as a citizen because my soul demands it of me, because I have done TShuvah long enough and seriously enough to never take life for granted, to never accept the wrong, to never allow the majority to corrupt me in their drive for evil. This is the challenge I and we face each day-how are you responding to it? God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Knowing when a decision is made from spirit and when it is made from rational mind - Year 4 Day 244

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 244

“Repentance is an absolute, spiritual decision made in truthfulness.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

Well, the BIG DAY is over- now what? We have Sukkot to look forward to, hopefully everyone had a moment like I did during the 25 hours of Kol Nidre/Yom Kippur and got close and personal with your soul, with your essence, with your higher consciousness. I am continuing with some of Rabbi Heschel’s thoughts on repentance because, according to the Rabbis, we have until Hoshana Rabbah, the 7th day of Sukkot, to take care of any lingering shit on our shoes that we may have missed. Another reason is because, according to Rabbi Eliezer in the Talmud, Shabbat 153a, “Do TShuvah one day before you die” and since we don’t know the day of our death, “do TShuvah every day”.

The sentence above is the essence of how to live well, I believe. We are continually called to “return again” as the song/prayer by Shlomo Carlbach, that reminds us to we have to keep returning “to the land of our soul”. Repentance is not something we do just on Yom Kippur, everyday we are reminded of the exodus from Egypt in our prayers and everyday we are reminded to “Return” by the 2nd prayer of the middle prayers of the Amidah. Right after we remind ourselves that we have wisdom, we remind ourselves to do TShuvah, repent, return, have a new response! In fact, we praise God in this pray as the “Desirer of our TShuvah”!

Rabbi Heschel’s statement above moves me so much because any rationale for doing Repentance that we may employ renders it false, makes it seem phony, and, usually, is not accepted! Repentance is an inside job-just as seeing the divine essence, the true, authentic nature of your self/essence yesterday cannot be done rationally, neither can repentance be achieved through rational thought nor expediency. It is not a ‘get out of jail free’ card, it is not an “I’m sorry” bullshit excuse. Repentance is a decision that has to be a spiritual one, it has to come from within us, as individuals and as a community. The confession of the High Priest on Yom Kippur begins with one for himself, then his household, then the Congregation of Israel. While the confessional prayer is in the plural, it is crucial that we know our part, our responsibility to say both the prayers of confession, the TShuvah itself, and our acceptance of forgiveness from “an absolute spiritual” place within us. We cannot phone in our TShuvah, we cannot phone in our repairing damage and harm we have wrought, we cannot phone in being responsible for our part in any and all ruptures of connection between an individual and myself, between a community and myself, between a people and myself. Only through “an absolute spiritual decision” can I make my amends, continue to improve on my path, and be connected once again and more fully, to self, to another(s), to community.

The last word of the sentence above is the killer: “truthfulness”! Without returning from the land of our inner self-deception and outer deception of another(s), there can be no TShuvah made, no repentance achieved, no return happening. Which, of course, leaves us wandering in the desert, not the Sinai desert, not the desert on the way to the ‘promised land’, We the People are wandering in the desert of waste, of ruin, of blame, shame, despair, anger, etc. This desert is the desert of death, of dryness, of hunger. While yesterday, Yom Kippur, was a day some describe as a day like death, which I choose to reject because those of us for whom our TShuvah is/was done in “truthfulness”, we weren’t all that thirsty nor hungry, we were not that tired as Ne’ilah began, we were excited to hear the Shofar not because it meant we could eat but because it meant a New Year with possibilities and opportunities was finally here, the old year is history and not a burden upon us, it is a beginning place from which to grow another grain of sand or two this year! When We the People are in “truthfulness”, “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants there in” is not just a phrase, it becomes reality. When We the People live in “truthfulness”, “choose Life” is not just something written in the Bible, it is the level of existence we function from. When We the People live in “truthfulness”, hatred goes away, idolatry is no longer the major religion(idolatry by both the ‘believers’ and non-believers), loving the stranger, our  neighbor, showing dignity to every soul we encounter and, most of all, ONE, BOTH/AND is the order of the day-we see distinctions, we distinguish one from another, and we do not separate ourselves nor anyone/anything else anymore. This is the power, the joy, the serenity that “repentance is an absolute spiritual decision made in truthfulness” brings to the individual and the communal-the micro and the macro.

I don’t hold myself out as having achieved total truthfulness, nor have I achieved a state of being where I make no errors! I have and continue to grow in my return because I am growing in my awareness of when I do the next right thing and when I do not do the next right thing. I have and continue to grown in truthfulness and this is leading me to realizations that are painful and joyous-a truth both/and. I have been waiting to be asked to do something and this is ridiculous-my path is to do and then figure it out, my path is to reach and then see who reaches back; not wait for the phone to ring! My awareness this High Holy Day season is that I have to be me-in all my messiness, all my warts, all my brilliance and all my fire. I just don’t know another way nor do I think there is one for me! I am not sure the form this takes shape as, I am not sure the method nor much except the promoting of our new books, the reaching out to speak anywhere that will have me, and move it forward. This is what “truthfulness” has revealed to me! God

TONIGHT IS THE NIGHT- Will you celebrate, complain, be miserable, be joyous? Year 4 Day 243

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 243

“Repentance is an absolute, spiritual decision made in truthfulness.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

TONIGHT IS THE NIGHT!! At sundown we will begin the celebration of Kol Nidre leading into the most AWESOME day of the Jewish Calendar-Yom Kippur1 It is the last day(almost) to clean up the shit from last year, to rejoice in the good and figure out how to do more good in this new year-which has technically begun and not really begun. Until we deal with the past year, successes and failures, repairing and improving, we cannot begin anything new with much hope of success. This is the beauty of, and the wisdom of the Torah in telling us to take the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to finish up last year’s business. The Rabbis, in their wisdom, knew it would take more than 10 days for most of us so they declared the month of Elul, the one preceding Rosh Hashanah, to be a month of TShuvah, of introspection, repair and enhancement.

We have done the work, hopefully, and the BIG DAY has arrived. While many Jews see this day as awesome in the sense of fear and dread, some even believe the fate of the individual is decided by ‘the guy in the sky’, looking at the liturgy, having done the work of TShuvah, of introspection, of repairing and enhancing, tonight and tomorrow is a celebration of being clean of last year’s shmutz(aka shit), being clear-eyed as to what is necessary to live well in this year 5786, what we can do to make our corner of the world a little better, whom we have to stay connected to and whom we have to distance ourselves from, how we can “love the stranger” a little more and better, how we can “redeem our kinsmen” a little more, how we can “rebuke our neighbor and not bear guilt because of them”, how “we can NOT run after the majority to do evil”, and so many other ways of being. One of the benefits of doing the work we have been doing for the past 40 days (just like the 40 years in the desert) is we have “circumcised the foreskin of our heart” and we have followed the command: “Choose Life”.

After the chanting of the Kol Nidre Prayer, we are told: “You are forgiven according to your words”! We are forgiven because we have engaged in the work of TShuvah these past 40 days and, hopefully, every day at least from now on. So the rest of the 25 hours we will be in the awesomeness, holiness, and uplifting prayers is a gift to ourselves. It is a time for us to forgive ourselves, it is a time for us to come together as a community and give one another a break, see how we have committed the same, similar actions as the ones we abhor in another(s),  how we go to extremes and have not noticed the person next to us, in front of us, or behind us as anything but an impediment to getting what we want, or as a tool for getting what we want. It is a day to remind ourselves that God doesn’t forsake us, we forsake ourselves. It is a day to remember that We the People, as individuals have to “hear our voices” and the voices of the poor, the needy, the stranger with compassion and grace. We the People, as a community and as an individual have to accept our foibles and those of another(s) We the People as a community and as an individual are called up to receive the stranger, the poor, and the needy within ourselves with compassion and kindness. Recommitting to  “cause ourselves to return”, “not be distant from our souls, our inner life”, is the gift of this day!

How can tonight and tomorrow not be a celebration for us? It is the renewal of our marriage vows with God, with our souls, with community, with our enemies. It is an experience of oneness with everything-for 30 seconds at least. How can we not celebrate the gift of admitting to everyone in the community the “exact nature of our wrongs”? We no longer have to hide in shame nor embarrassment, we no longer have to “worry about what they will think of me” because ‘they’ are admitting to the same errors, the same missing the marks! We are all ‘sinners’ who commit to change, we are all penitents who are repairing our errors, improving our actions and committing to living better in this next year. WE ARE NOT AFRAID OF THE TRUTH COMING OUT!  If this isn’t a reason for celebration, I have no idea what could be.

I have treated Kol Nidre and Yom Kippur as a day like a wedding!  Rabbi Heschel’s idea is on Yom Kippur who would want to eat with so much connection to the universe and to our inner self, our higher consciousness, our spiritual selves? I have found this to be true for myself and a myriad of people who I have served as their spiritual leader. I am rejoicing in the moment, I will celebrate this day sitting next to my wife, imagining my daughter Heather and grandson Miles sitting next to me, seeing my ancestors standing with me during the Yizkor Service, knowing I have done the best I could this year to bring everyone into the gates of TShuvah before they ‘close’ on Ne’ilah. I do miss not leading Services, I do miss not having the joy of seeing the awe and the glory on the faces of people as they awaken to the celebration of freedom. Oh well-maybe next year:) I am so grateful to my friends and family for their love, I am so grateful to all of you for reading this blog over these past 4+ years. I am so grateful to my ancestors and teachers for nurturing the spiritual thirst that has propelled me these past 38 years to a life way beyond my deserving and a life of joy, celebration, love, kindness, meaning and purpose. I am grateful for finishing two books-which are available now: You Matter TOO and Daily Life Lessons of Rabbi Heschel. God Bless, G’Mar Tov, Easy fast, and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

3 days till Yom Kippur! - Do you believe in the power of TShuvah? Year 4 Day 242

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 242

“The most unnoticed of all miracles is the miracle of repentance. It is not the same thing as rebirth, it is transformation, creation…Through the forgiving hand of God, harm and blemish which we have committed against the world and against ourselves will be extinguished, transformed into salvation.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

We have 3 days till Yom Kippur! What is the state of our Repentance? While there was a wonderful press conference yesterday and many of my colleagues will be hailing the “eternal peace” that has been promised by Donald J. Trump, while many Jews around the globe will be celebrating this new era of cooperation and connection with the Arab and Muslim world, none of this must deter us in doing the work of TShuvah/repentance. Israel has not done it’s own TShuvah/Inquiry regarding Oct. 7, 2023, Bibi is loathe to take responsibility for his failures, for his funding of Hamas all these years, his desire to placate the radical messianic factions of his coalition, his desire to stay out of prison! Enough of holding Bibi and Donny to account-We the People must hold ourselves to account, We the People must allow the “transformation, creation” of ourselves to happen, we must do this work in order to shed the skin we have created, the facades we have adopted, the walls we have erected so we don’t face our authentic self, we don’t cry over the missed opportunities to serve our self and another(s) in the ways we are created to do.

It is imperative for We the People to look at our self, take inventory of our actions, ask for forgiveness from those whom we have harmed, and forgive another when they come to make amends, and let go of resentments so we don’t “drink the poison expecting another person to die”, as we say in AA. We the People are being called, cajoled, demanded to engage in repentance. In the Talmud, Reb Meir says: “for one person’s repentance, the entire world is forgiven”! WOW, what an outrageous statement and what a wonderful idea. Not that everything is dependent upon one person, rather the importance of one person, the power of one person, the redeeming aspect of every person! In times such as these, with the crazies on both ends of the spectrum bellowing so loudly that those of us who seek solutions and compromises, those of us who know we don’t know it all and are not always right, repentance and redemption are our saving graces, they are necessary to our spiritual and emotional health every bit as much as prayer, ritual, etc. I would suggest that repentance and redemption are built into every prayer, every ritual and the issue for We the People is most of us are just phoning it in, we hide in the rituals and in saying our prayers, we hide in the different idolatrous interpretations of the Bible, of the New Testament, of the Koran. Isn’t it time for We the People to face up to the truth of our existence, to come to grips with our errors and stop promoting the evil as good, the bitter as sweet? Isn’t it time for We the People to stop our incessant need to be right, our constant being the victim, our ridiculous belief that only we know and do what is right, that only by being progressive/conservative can anyone be politically correct, and other such bullshit? We the People have the power to change! We the People have the gift of forgiveness, of redemption, of salvation!

One of the questions we come face to face with is: Are we willing to change, to be forgiven, to be redeemed, to experience salvation? Are we still acting like the slaves in Egypt who could not believe that God heard their cries? Are we still stuck in our erroneous beliefs about what is right and good while the world burns because we are being perfect is more important than just taking an action, that perfection continues to hold us hostage, that our disbelief in our being forgiven, in our being redeemed, in our being saved, is so great, we are unable to suspend it? Rabbi Heschel’s teaching, delivered in the most dangerous of times and places; 1936 Berlin, Germany, comes to dispel our disbelief, comes to remind us that just as God took us out of Egypt, so too will God forgive us, redeem us and save us.

How can I make this outrageous statement? I have been redeemed, I have been forgiven, I have been saved because of Repentance, because of doing the work of TShuvah-repair, change, hope! I have been the recipient of much forgiveness and those who have been unable to forgive me, I feel bad for-their need to hold onto resentments and angers precludes their ability to experience redemption and salvation, it also precludes their ability to truly take in and revel in the forgiveness of another human being. I know this because I have, in the past, been stuck in the same place. I am living a life that is beyond my wildest dreams and certainly one that is beyond my deserving on my own. The life I live is directly linked to the repentance/TShuvah I have engaged in over these past 38 years. Each Yom Kippur, I have been blessed with being able to spend 30 seconds in the throne room with God. Each Yom Kippur, I am given the gifts of redemption, forgiveness, salvation AND the gift of seeing my pure soul, seeing me in my original shape and form, experiencing the reason I was created and this allows me to commit a little more to being the me I was created to be a little more in this coming year. This is the “unnoticed miracle” of repentance for me and for YOU!! I pray you take advantage of the gift, that you don’t take it for granted, you cherish it as I do! The forces of the Universe are open to TShuvah, to repentance, they are beaming out the light of forgiveness and redemption-will you use these lights to benefit you, to make someone else whole, to leave the Egypt you have lived in for so long? I hope so, freedom is an overwhelming gift and one we have to be responsible for and to-yet it is a helluva lot better than living in the narrow spaces of Egypt!! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Time is Short, are you going to be willing to do the work of Repentance this year? Year 4 Day 241

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 241

“Before the judgment and memory of God we stand. How can we prove ourselves? How can we persist? How can we be steadfast? Through repentance.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

We are truly in the Home Stretch! We have 3 full days to get our shit right, do our inventories, make our amends, have a plan to enhance the good and not repeat the not good and then be in Synagogue on Wednesday evening to hear/recite the Kol Nidre Prayer and be forgiven! OY, do I, do you have enough time, have we spent too much time in resentment and anger, too much time patting ourselves on the back for our brilliance, too much time ignoring the errors of our ways in the past year because we were too engaged in celebrating the cruelties we have inflicted upon another or have witnessed ‘our people’ doing to another? In other words: WTF?!?!

It is disheartening to witness the various so-called spiritual communities which preach belonging, we want you, you matter and other such platitudes disrespect, disregard and displace people based on their pettiness and pride, envy and enmity. It is disheartening to hear the clergy preach so passionately about ‘we are one’ and treat some people as ‘the other’. It is disheartening to have the stewards of these so-called spiritual communities shove people who are threatening, who are not guppies, blind followers out of the way, stabbing them in the back while smiling to their faces. These practices of the various so-called spiritual communities playing to the rich, extolling themselves for helping Israel while crying poor, are what We the People have to repent for. It is not the so-called spiritual communities fault; the errors lie with the people entrusted to steward the congregation, to lead the people out of the Egypts/narrow places we all find ourselves in, and these trusted servants have become the authorities, the know-whats-best, benevolent (or not) dictators. It is all about the people-the leadership and the members, it is all about us, as individuals making up communities and groups-do we stand in repentance/TShuvah or do we stand in being right, in being cruel to ourselves as well as to another(s)? These are some of the questions we have to face if we are to be forgiven, these are some of the introspections we have to engage in if we want to experience forgiveness.

After all, God is not the ‘guy in the sky with a long white robe, beard and staff sitting on a throne’, God is the energy that keeps the world and the planets in their proper place, God is the energy that lives in each of us, the Image we are created in, that connects with the greater spiritual power in the universe. It is, in my opinion, our souls, our knowing that we “stand” before in “judgment and memory”, that we are trying to “prove ourselves” to. It is “The Man in the Glass” to whom we are called to answer and far too many of us reject this command, this GIFT of spiritual housecleaning, the joy of experiencing forgiveness and a clean slate. Without facing ourselves in truth, without getting naked in front of ourselves-seeing our foibles as well as our greatness, We the People, especially the members of so-called spiritual communities, are no different than the current autocrats in charge in the U.S. and in Israel! We the People engage in our own unique cruelty while putting on the airs of being so welcoming and kind, so serious about our commitment to the poor, the needy, the stranger and in practice hold ourselves out as better than, act like the benevolent rich of olden times. I ask again: WTF?!?!??

“How can we prove ourselves? How can we persist? How can we be steadfast? Through repentance.” This is the challenge of this moment and every moment according to the Talmud and the Bible. Are we hearing the calls of the prophets, of Moses, of God, of the Rabbis to continually do TShuvah? Are we going to commit to living life as imperfect human beings striving to repair the harms, knowing our limitations, respecting the infinite value of every human being, honoring the infinite dignity of every human being, rejoicing in the uniqueness of every human being? Are We the People going to jettison our pettiness and pride, our envy and enmity so we can “beat our swords into plowshares…so nation does not lift up sword agains nation and neither shall men learn war anymore”? Are We the People engaging in “repentance” so deeply that, this year, we will truly change our ways, find new pairs of glasses with which to see the world, to see one another, to recognize and speak to the Image of God in everyone? We the People are more than capable of rising up, of being “steadfast”, of proving “ourselves” if and when we make the decision to “persist” in our repentance! As Hillel the Elder asks: “If not now, when?”

I have been doing this introspection for 38 years, I uncover new nuances to things I did years ago. I have been guilty of the ways I outline above and have/am in repentance over these errors. I am outraged at the lack of teaching about TShuvah/repentance in our Jewish Institutions, I am outraged at the two-faced ways of being that so many Jewish leaders, lay and professional, exhibit. I am outraged that, in this moment of chaos, in this moment of cruelty, We the Jewish People are NOT leading the path to wholeness and forgiveness, to repair and new responses by leading the world, leading the country in doing TShuvah, by being in “repentance” daily. We the Jewish People are NOT being the “Light unto the Nations” we are called to be by Isaiah. We the Jewish People includes me and you, as is said: every Jew is responsible for every other Jew-so we are all responsible for the errors of another and the community! OY!! I pray for the souls of the current leadership, I pray for the awareness of We the People that repentance will save us, will heal us. We need repentance this year so badly! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Day 6 of the 10 Days of Repentance - Developing personal motivation and "an internal sense of urgency" - Year 4 Day 240

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 240

“We must recognize that repentance has yet to begin! Each person must examine whether one is part of a movement forced upon us by the environment or whether one is personally motivated, whether one is responding to a pressure from outside or to an internal sense of urgency. At stake is not the sincerity of the motivation but the earnestness and honesty of its expression.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 70)

On Thursday and Friday I wrote about the communal responsibility for T’Shuvah and asked us to ask ourselves if we are holding our community responsible for the good and not good that it has perpetrated. Here is the bridge, I believe, from the communal to the personal. Because whatever the community does, it does in our name as well as the community’s name-so We the People are co-responsible as Rabbi Heschel teaches elsewhere: “In a free society some are guilty, all are responsible.”

The teaching above may sound harsh, it may sound scolding - I can understand this interpretation - yet, I hear it as pleading, as a cry, much like the cries of the prophets of Ancient Israel, much like the cries of the slaves in Egypt, much like the cries of the Negroes in America, much like the cries of decent people everywhere who are being persecuted and prosecuted based on the color of their skin, their country of origin, their religion, their sexual orientation, etc. Whenever we are not able to speak truth to power, whenever we go along with the bastardization of the Bible by idolators posing as priests (like in the times of the prophets) we can not claim on Kol Nidre nor on Yom Kippur: “Salachti Ki’Dvorecha, I have forgiven as you have spoken” because our words and our actions are still misaligned, still incongruent; our actions are cruel and unusual punishment of our supposed enemies, they go against the words of Proverbs: “If your enemy is thirsty, give them drink…”. Before we go to Synagogue on Kol Nidre, the teaching above forces us to look deep inside of ourselves and ask if we are sincere, if we are responding to the call of our souls, if we are so closed off from our inner life, we just are phoning it in with no resolve to actually change.

One of the reasons I never use “I’m Sorry” as a complete sentence is because I used it so much before my recovery, before my return that it had no meaning, nor effect on my future actions. Today, when I say I am sorry, I finish it with what I am sorry for, how I am going to repair the damage, and what changes I am going to make so I don’t repeat the same error. When one is “part of a movement forced upon us by the environment” then actual change rarely takes place, “I’m Sorry” is just a way to get the heat off and neither the offender nor the victim believes there is true repentance nor sorrow for the action. This is the reason “that repentance has yet to begin”, I believe.

We the People are being asked, called to change both ourselves and our community in this bridge from the communal to the personal. After all, who makes up a community if not various individuals? We are all guilty of making society an amorphous entity, not taking the responsibility that comes with acknowledging that We the People make up society hence whatever the societal pressures we feel, whichever societal lies we buy into are of our own making. This is what makes being “personally motivated” and “an internal sense of urgency” so crucial for “repentance to begin”. Without our “an internal sense of urgency” human beings will put off the undesirable action of being in truth with ourselves and another human being forever, we may say “I’m Sorry” without meaning and meaningful change, we just won’t be in truth nor in touch with our inner life.

What our community, especially our Jewish community, needs is the same as what our individual soul needs: TShuvah done in “earnestness and honesty”, TShuvah that is “personally motivated” and we need to do it NOW, we need to experience the “internal sense of urgency” that the Universe is showing us, we need to ‘see’ the spiritual push of the universe towards TShuvah, towards sincere forgiveness, sincere repentance, sincere return and demand this way of being for ourselves and for our neighbors, for our community, for our enemies. When we “love the stranger" because we were strangers in Egypt, in America, we are “personally motivated”. When we speak truth to power, when we say NO to the cruelties being perpetrated in our name by Jews, by Gentiles, we are responding to “an internal sense of urgency”. When we lead our community to TShuvah, to an introspective inventory of how We the People have acted we are moved to being earnest and honest.  This is the challenge of these next 4 days, this is the Great Challenge of Kol Nidre and Yom Kippur: being responsible, being moved to change by “an internal sense of urgency” and holding our Spiritual Leaders to account to “show us the way” to true repentance and then following their lead.

OY, what a challenge! Yet, it is the one I am responding to today with more fervor and gusto than I did 38 years ago. Today, I see the nuances and the hidden/oblivious nature of both my good and not good actions. I am able to discern the negative in my thinking quicker and not act on it as much. I am more able to keep my ego in proper measure, I am more able to know my truth and see more of the Truth that is in the world. It is a long, hard journey to where I am now and I am here because of being “personally motivated” and not ignoring the “internal sense of urgency” that has always nagged me. I pray that we all participate in this “repentance” of both community and our individual selves. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Day 4 of the 10 Days of Repentance- Selfishness, Cleverness, Pretense: the killers of truth - Year 4 Day 239

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 239

“It is also deplorable when a spiritual movement deteriorates into bustling and pretense. It is unclean when a holy desire is misused by the selfishness of the clever.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 70)

On this 4th day of Tishri, this 4th of the 10 days of TShuvah, the 10 days of Awe, I picked these sentences from Rabbi Heschel to follow up on yesterday’s writing. We the People have to be responsible as a community to do the next right action!  We the People are being called to account for ourselves, not to some punishing God, rather we are being called to account for ourselves to ourselves and to community. I am suggesting that in this moment, in this time, as we get ready to go to Synagogue, to shul, on the holiest day of the Jewish Year, this year we go prepared to meet ourselves in the Confessionals, we sit in the pews and, instead of being bored, we ask ourselves during the beautiful Kol Nidre Prayer, “which vows, oaths, promises, did I not fulfill this past year, which ones do I need to make amends for, to whom do I still need to repair damages with?” Then, when we hear “I forgive as you have spoken”, we no longer have to be in fear that someone will find out, that we have to keep a secret, and we can unburden ourselves of the deceptions and lies, the hiding and the fears that keep us stuck in “bustling and pretense”.

We the Jews have fallen into the “deplorable” situation described in the first sentence precisely because we are afraid to confront ourselves, individually and collectively. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the current Matzav, situation, in Gaza, in Jerusalem, in Washington DC, in America in general. When so-called religious people can applaud the killing of people because of the color of their skin, because of the religion they practice, because-like the Israelite people who were stuck in Egypt-they “yearn to breathe free”, we are witnessing and experiencing “the selfishness of the clever”. Bibi, Donny, Howie, Stevie, Stevie, and the rest of their minions and thugs, all are “unclean”, all are practice “selfishness of the clever” and We the Jews go along with these lies and then we go to Kol Nidre and ask some Deity to forgive us? PLEASE!! I am ready to throw up at their gall and their “deplorable” ways of taking a beautiful “spiritual movement” and making it “deteriorate into bustling and pretense.”

What has happened since Rabbi Heschel wrote these words on Kol Nidre in 1936 is horrific! We the Jews have not only not heeded his words, we are in the process of denouncing them, of reviling them and of doing the exact opposite of what Repentance/TShuvah call for. Rather than hear the call of Rabbi Eliezer on Shabbat 153(a) of the Talmud, today’s so-called religious leaders are extolling a part of the Bible that Ezra added, that is not in keeping with Yud Hey Vav Hey that teaches us to “love the stranger, love your neighbor, rebuke your friend and bear no guilt because of them, remember you were strangers in the land of Egypt, if your enemy is thirsty-give them drink, etc” As my friend and teacher, Rabbi Danny Maseng has pointed out to me the additions and subtractions that are in the text and it is a fascinating way to read the Bible. Should you want to validate your cruelty-you can find it in the Bible, if you want to live into the laws of Moses, it is much harder to do this. I believe the Ramban’s commentary on Lev. 19:2-“one can be a scoundrel within the bounds of the Bible” is so appropriate for this moment, for all moments.

I suggest this is our challenge and the question we need to be asking ourselves as we continue to prepare for the great assembly, for the Day of At-One-Ment, where we come face to face with ourselves and one another, with no pretense, with no bullshit, and we cry, we laugh, we see one another in a new light with compassion and kindness, and we embrace the essence of who we are, who we are created to be and the unique talent we possess, making the commitment to live into who we are more, live into who we are created to be more, live into our unique talents more in the coming year, in 5786 so we can make our corner of the world more better!

I suggest this is our calling and the question we need to be asking our community. Isn’t it time for We the Jews to stop extolling the big donors, stop extolling the strong men in charge, stop extolling the “politically correct” and hear the call of the Prophets, hear Isaiah’s words, listen to Amos’ call for justice and righteousness, truly understand Hosea’s likening of us to whores? Isn’t it time for our Clergy to begin the Yom Kippur Services with Atonement for their sins, for their missing of the mark? Isn’t it time for all of us to as a community to participate with the Clergy in admitting our sins as a community such as xenophobia, unreasonable loathing of another human being, generalizing about an entire group based on the actions of a few? We have experienced this type of behavior for the millennia and We the Jews are prohibited to doing what is hateful to us to another human being! Yet, we are and we do-Will you hold your community responsible and call them to account? When the grandeur of forgiveness, the audacity of facing oneself is reduced to how much you give, We the Jews are truly lost.

I know how difficult it is to lead a community of Jews!! I know how hard it is to be accountable to oneself let alone to an entire community. I also know my confessions on Yom Kippur led another(s) to speak theirs and this took on a life of its own and people healed themselves by no longer hiding from themselves and the community grew stronger and stronger so it no longer needs me, it leads itself and I consider this to be among the best of my achievements! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

The Third Day of the 10 Days of Repentance- will you have a G'Mar Tov? Year 4 Day 238

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 238

“For many years we have experienced history as a judgement. What is the state of our repentance, of our “return to Judaism”? (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg.69)

G’Mar Hatima Tova is the usual greeting after Rosh Hashanah’s Shana Tova. The Rabbis, I believe, in an instant of inspirational brilliance (of which they had many and some not so much), are reminding us that to have a “good year”, we have to finish(G’Mar) up our repentance. This is true of individuals as well as communities, countries, etc. Rabbi Heschel in a piece published in Berlin, Germany on Yom Kippur Eve(Kol Nidre) asks the question above: “what is our state of repentance?” While I do not believe that “history as a judgement” is the way to look at our lives, I do believe looking at our history is a way to discern what is good and not good, what is the right way to live and what is not the right way to live, what we have to repent for as individuals, as members of a group, a country, a faith and what we have to be proud of and continue to grow as an individual, etc. One of the most powerful experiences many of us had at Beit T’Shuvah was when a Catholic Priest apologized for the Churches hatred of Jews, their antisemitism, their sexual scandals and for not hearing the women and children who came to them. People were crying along with the Priest.

Which brings me/us to the “state of our repentance, of our “return to Judaism”. This year, the first day of Sukkot falls on October 7th. October 7, 2023 was a horrific day for Jews, for people who believe in the sanctity of life throughout the world and we can never forget what happened. Hamas is a Terrorist Organization, it is EVIL-full stop! And, as I have heard in many sermons and online discussions, the deafness of Rabbis and congregants, of Jews and non-Jews to the destruction in Gaza is also horrific! It is also EVIL! There is no excuse for it and, if we are to have a G’Mar Hatima Tova, we have to be accountable for our excesses, our abuses, our evil actions-otherwise “our “return to Judaism” is false, it is bullshit, and it is an desecration of the Name of God and what the Bible truly stands for. No matter what the Orthodox, the war-mongers say, the overriding concern of the Bible is: LOVE the STRANGER, BE DECENT, CHOOSE LIFE, stop whoring yourself for gold, for power, for …. Yet, here we are-Rabbis are condemning the virulent anti-semitism that is rampant once again throughout the world without calling out the abuses of Netanyahu and his Idolatrous “religious” coalition.

I am a JEW, I am a ZIONIST, I am NOT a Netanyahu follower, I am not a  believer that Israel right or wrong is always right, I believe in Isaiah 49:6, that Israel (Jews) is to be given “for a light unto the nations that salvation may be…” We are not here to serve ourselves, to get rich, to take advantage of the poor, the needy, the stranger! We are not here to be all powerful and dictatorial, we are not here to violate the words of Moses, the promises to Abraham, the ways of King David who could admit his errors when pointed out to him and, at times, on his own. NO, Israel is here to be accountable, we are to show the world how to be accountable and how to do TSHUVAH, how to Repent, Repair, have a New Response to the triggers that caused us to forget our mission, our purpose. I am a Jew, I am a Zionist, I am a Baal T’Shuvah, a master of return precisely because I come back each day, each Elul and do my inventory, make my amends, plan on how to not make the same errors and enhance the good I do. I believe in “Never Again” and believe that the message of the Los Angeles Holocaust Museum: “Never again Can’t Only Mean Never Again for Jews” and continued with “Jews must not let the trauma of our past Silence our conscience…” and they were vilified for this truth, they deleted it 2 days later and issued an apology! APOLOGIZE for TELLING THE TRUTH!?!?!?

This, then, seems to be “the state of our repentance, of our “return to Judaism”-NOT! When we, as a Jewish People, cannot live in the both/and of the trauma of October 7, the horror of the evil of Hamas, AND be accountable for our part in what happened-which Netanyahu has not allowed a review of the days preceding 10/7, he has not allowed anyone to hold him accountable, he has not allowed anyone to criticize his keeping his son in Miami, Florida-safe and sound, not subject to serving as a reservist-, he is not caring about the Hostages-leaving Israelis to die and the ones who are dead, leaving their bodies to rot in Gaza-, and JEWS are APPLAUDING THIS?? “The state of repentance” is NILL, We the Jews have made null and void the words of Isaiah, the words of Hosea, Jeremiah, of all the prophets, of our teachers and spiritual guides of the past, by refusing to do a CHESBON HANEFESH on and for ourselves. We the Jews are called to be “a light unto the nations that salvation may be” and We the Jews are failing, We the Jews need to get our heads out of our asses and be JEWS, BE REPENTANCE, BE HUMAN.

The issue of Gaza, of Hamas, of what to do is complex and I am not trying to be stupid about the necessity of Israel to defend itself nor of the difficulties in living next to people who hate you! I am speaking only of the need for JEWS, like me and you, to take our own inventories, to see where we have been wrong, to not whitewash our inequities because of the EVIL that Hamas perpetrated upon Israel. I am saying that Netanyahu and the Israeli government has to look at the ways it supported Qatar giving BILLIONS to Hamas so the Palestinian Authority could be weakened and how Netanyahu and his gang did not heed warnings given to it about the possibility of Hamas breaking through. It isn’t easy, I don’t have the answers, I do have the solution- TSHUVAH, improve “our return to Judaism” by being human! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

FREEDOM - Rosh Hashanah is the beginning of a newfound path to achieve personal Freedom - Year 4 day 237

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 237

“To believe in freedom is to believe in events, namely to maintain that man is able to escape the bonds of the processes in which he is involved and to act in a way not necessitated by antecedent factors. Freedom is the state of going out of the self, an act of spiritual ecstasy, in the original sense of the term.” (God in Search of Man pg 410)

SHANA TOVA U’METUKAH!! A sweet and joyous year, a year of truth, of learning, of kindness and of compassion. A year where we put down our weapons and we hear, listen, and understand (SHEMA) the words of the Prophet Isaiah 5:20-21: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil; who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and prudent in their own sight.” The times call for action on our part to make this prophecy real and true in our own time!

The way to make this happen, in my opinion, is to live into the last sentence above. I bolded it so you will know what this last blog of 5785 focuses on: FREEDOM and what better time to achieve it, what better place to engage in it than during the 10 days of Awe, the 10 Days of TShuvah? Whether you are going to services or not, whether they bore you or not, you can engage your soul in at least one of the prayers, one of the melodies, one word of the Torah reading, one word of the Haftorah reading. You can allow your heart to be opened by the sound of the Shofar, you can send your negativity away as you cast your bread/sin upon the waters, you can put yourself in “the state of going out of the self”.  We the People who have chosen to opt out of organized religion can take this moment to read something, to meditate, to listen to a different piece of music, any action that stirs your soul, that opens up your inner life to yourself and have the same experience of “going out of the self”.

This is the real goal of this period of time, “going out of the self” to have an authentic, truthful look at “self, another, and the world. To achieve “freedom” We the People have to first be in truth with who we are, with whom we are meant to be, and the incongruence between what we know and what actions we take, the incongruence between “the self” and the false “self” we wear for societal acceptance, gain, power, etc. We the People have shown to be less fearful of living inauthentically, incongruently and more fearful of being real, of not settling for crumbs from society, not standing with the minority to do good! We the People are being called by the Shofar’s blasts to WAKE UP and see what is good and no longer confuse, lie about it being evil, to see what is evil and no longer live into the mendacity of making evil good. We are called to be able to distinguish, L’Havdeel, between dark and light, between bitter and sweet, between what we want to see and say about ourselves and what is the real deal. This moment, for all times, is a moment of reckoning for us, not a punishing reckoning, a gifting of sight and a gifting of the ability to change, repair and have hope for living better, the world being a better place because of us contributing our unique gifts and talents to it and no longer being confined by society’s conventional notions, mental cliches, no longer does the one with the gold rule, etc. Will We the People seize the moment, Carpe Diem?

I write about this sentence today, this idea precisely because I had this experience of “spiritual ecstasy” in the jail cell in 1986, I had this experience when the judge sentenced me to prison, I had this experience when I began to study Torah and pray, I had this experience when I decided to serve another(s) instead of just myself. I had this experience when I realized how far apart my first wife and I were, I had this experience when I realized how much I loved Harriet, I had this experience and didn’t know it when my daughter Heather was born, I had this experience when I began working at Beit T’Shvuah, when I studied with Rabbi Omer-man, when I began what is a 30+ relationship with Rabbi Ed Feinstein. I had this experience when I entered Rabbinical School and, no matter how hard they tried to disabuse me of this way, I fought for my authenticity, my congruency.

I have continued to fight for authenticity, for truth, for kindness, for realness, for congruence, for the “spiritual ecstasy” Rabbi Heschel is speaking about. I am not always there and I continue to grow in “freedom”, I continue to create experiences of learning, creating in ceramics, playing bridge, writing that help me “going out of the self” and into the “self” I was created to be. Each time I have this experience, more and more of the falseness, of the bullshit, of the political me, of the caricature of me that I have lived falls away and this is the gift, the joy, the eye-opening experience that helps me live more and more into the words of Isaiah above. I don’t experience those “woes” so much anymore, I don’t need to be validated nor vindicated by anyone, I don’t have any resentments, nor any harsh feelings for anyone. I am sick at what is happening in the world, I am scared for my grandson and the world he is living in. As my brother, Neal, said: “we were born in a much better world than the ones we are giving to our grandchildren”! I have so much joy and faith, I live the best I can each day and I know 5786 will be a “Shana Tova” a year of good because I will bring more good, more light, more sweetness into it and I pray you will also. This is the ultimate in “spiritual ecstasy”, the greatest “freedom” one can experience and I pray we continue to grow in it and bring it more and more into our everyday living. I will write again on Thursday! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Rosh Hashanah is approaching- are you Freer this year than last? Year 4 Day 236

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 236

“To believe in freedom is to believe in events, namely to maintain that man is able to escape the bonds of the processes in which he is involved and to act in a way not necessitated by antecedent factors. Freedom is the state of going out of the self, an act of spiritual ecstasy, in the original sense of the term.” (God in Search of Man pg 410)

I picked this quote because today is the day before Erev Rosh Hashanah and, in my opinion, Rosh Hashanah is the 6th month mark since Passover-the season of our liberation and is the time to see how fat we have gotten since the lean days of being liberated with only Matzah to eat and then Manna. Now that we have the 10 sayings, now that we have experienced once again the miracle of Mount Sinai, the destruction that Tisha B’Av commemorates, it is time to stand in self-judgement and see where we are in our quest to make our corner of the world a little better. It is time for us to review and discern how we have helped to “bend the arc of the moral universe towards true justice” to paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In order to do any of this, we have to be free, we have to be present “in events” and be “able to escape the bonds of the processes” that tend to make us robots, automatons, blind followers, and, eventually, slaves. Slavery is not just being under a taskmaster or a master, it is also the inability to make free-will moral choices, it is the abandoning of what one knows in one’s bones, in one’s guts and either choosing or feeling coerced/forced to choose to go along with the majority in order to make a living, to keep the money they have, the status, to keep from being isolated and lonely. It is such a time we are in right now, I believe, and these words above give me hope for our future, a future where “the Torah shall come from Zion and the word of God from Jerusalem…and they will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation nor shall men learn war anymore.”(Isaiah 2:3-4). What a wonderful prophetic vision!!

I believe this vision is the guiding light We the People need to face the moment we are in, to “act in a way not necessitated by antecedent factors”, to see what is and not respond as humanity has forever; with fear of rocking the boat because it will get worse, with acceptance that ‘we have lived through this before and it will blow over, with resignation that we are too weak to win this war with the forces arrayed against us, to wait for a redeemer to come from God, for the second coming, or first depending upon one’s beliefs, to save us by destroying everything and other such “antecedent factors”. NO! NOT ANYMORE!!

This Rosh Hashanah, this day of Judgment and Celebration of the creation of the world and of humankind, is the moment to break out of the bonds of societal norms, the moment to end the reliance on the strongman, the worship of the money and class status that gives us closeness to power, the mealy-mouthed compliance of a slave class that believes their money will keep them free, etc. It is precisely this moment of Rosh Hashanah, this moment of judgment and mercy, of fear and awe, this moment where we realize the Judge is internal, it is our soul’s calling to us to SEE, to HEAR, and to UNDERSTAND,(SHEMA) what we have been doing, how it is helping to promote freedom and how it is helping to retard freedom for both ourselves and another(s). This is the experience that this Rosh Hashanah, and every Rosh Hashanah, gifts us with-will We the People avail ourselves of this gift and use it wisely? While we pray in community on Rosh Hashanah, the response to this question is personal and individual, it has to be made by a majority of the community one is in to make it a communal decision to BE FREE. If the majority of the community is not willing to “escape the bonds of processes” We the People need a new Rabbi, Clergy, Board of Directors who want to live into the prophecy of Isaiah, the words and actions the prophets scream, cry, whisper to us in a combination of horror and awe, in consternation and love. The haunting question that hangs over us, especially this year, is: Are We the People willing to do what it takes to be free, to honor the Torah “from Zion” and “God’s word from Jerusalem”?

It will take “the courage to change the things we should” as Reinhold Niebuhr teaches us in the Original Serenity prayer. We the People will gather in our Temples and Synagogues on Erev Rosh Hashanah and on Rosh Hashanah to be together, to begin the 10 days of Awe, the 10 days of TShuvah (repentance, return and response) and allow the prayers to fill us with trembling awe, the words of the Rabbis to fill us with the strength to be free in this moment and in many moments, to not “run after the majority to do evil” and to stand in truth and love to ensure that justice, mercy, kindness ‘win’ the day! This can only happen if and when We the People make a conscious decision to leave the Egypts we are currently in, when We the People be deliberate in our choosing to cross the Red Sea, when We the People believe the words of Isaiah quoted above more than the words of the autocrats, the idolators, the mendacious deceivers who are ‘in charge’ here in America and in Israel. We the People “should” change the ridiculous “anything Israel does is good and right”, the stupidity of “Trump loves the little guy and is our redeemer” and instead, on this day of Judgement and Celebration, look inside of ourselves, see the lies we tell ourselves, seek out truth, wisdom, love, kindness, mercy and justice and rejoice in our ability to rise above our “processes” and connect to the source of all and to our innermost self.

This is my practice each Rosh Hashanah and I find myself being free more and more each day and more days than ever before. Shana Tova U’Metuka, a Good, Sweet Year to all. God bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Forgetting everything including the self in order to find your authentic self- Year 4 Day 235

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 234

“It requires a great effort to realize before Whom we stand, for such realization is more than having a thought in one’s mind. It is a knowledge in which the whole person is involved; the mind, the heart, body, and soul. To know it is to forget everything else, including the self.” (God in Search of Man pg. 407)

I have been thinking about this piece of wisdom for a while and especially since I wrote about it yesterday. The last sentence is the key to living into “know before Whom you stand” and it is not easy to accomplish nor maintain, in fact, we will never be consistent in our maintenance and effort “to realize before Whom we stand.” Given this truth, I recall Rabbi Tarfon’s teaching: “we are not commanded to finish the task and we are not free to not engage”. We are 3 days until Erev Rosh Hashanah and 12 days till Kol Nidre and We the People will not finish the work of TShuvah, utilize the gift of Elul completely-we are not perfect and that is not the goal of this moment, it is not the goal of the TShuvah process.

The goal of this moment, this month, this period of “spiritual audacity” is to engage, to be in the work of looking at oneself, seeing what is true and what isn’t, letting go of the resentments that keep us enslaved to blame and shame, to forget the slights, the traumas, the dashed dreams, the grudges, the unfairness of life, the mental cliches and conventional notions, the societal pressure to measure up to some inane and insane standard of perfection that NO ONE ever measures up to. The goal of this period of time is to look as deeply inside ourselves as we possibly can, and then go a little deeper-one grain of sand- to see the beauty of our living, to realize the purpose we are created for, the divine need we fulfill, to hear the call of the stranger, the poor, the needy, the friend and the foe; responding to each in ways they can hear and “to forget everything else”, especially the lies we have told ourselves for years and the deceptions from another(s) that have chained us to mediocrity either emotionally, physically, and/or spiritually.

“To know it (before Whom we stand) is to forget everything else, including the self” is an outrageous statement, it is an audacious statement, it is a statement of great “moral grandeur” as well. It is almost too much to take in and yet, in the Bible, we see over and over again people doing this and then screwing up big time! These examples, hopefully, give us the strength to strive for the 30 seconds of seeing our own holiness on Yom Kippur. When We the People “forget everything else, including the self”, we rise to meet our authentic self, our vision is better than 20/20 because the universe shows itself to us and we are able to see what the next right action is, we are able to appreciate the path we have taken to get to this moment, and we let go of recriminations for not ‘seeing’ this sooner, for not ‘being better’, and we accept the words that are spoken on Kol Nidre: “I have forgiven as you have spoken”! Once we accept the forgiveness of another, the forgiveness of God, we can, finally, forgive ourselves. Upon reaching this level of forgiveness, we achieve “to forget everything else, including the self” for this moment and we will not stay in this state and we will lose it and keep returning to this place so we can improve our vision, lessen the harms, and live a little more authentically and joyfully.

The only path to achieving this is TShuvah, amends, confession, whatever the path to wholeness is your spiritual tradition. Facing oneself, without blame, without being judgmental, without needing to make excuses is  a terribly difficult journey. It is a journey that society has ignored and the powerful jettison immediately upon taking power-hence “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. We see this with King Saul and with King David-both succumbed to the corruption that power brings; with King David doing his TShuvah so he could once again retake his moral high ground and spiritual place in the world. We are witnessing this with the people in power in the United States who are going against the 1st Amendment-Freedom of Speech! We see this in the abuse of power they are committing and the going along with this bullshit, with this destruction of the Constitution by the Supreme Court! This is an example of people who do not “realize before Whom they stand” no matter how much they brag about their ‘faith’, no matter how much they proclaim their loyalty to Jesus while doing everything that he railed against. We the People in doing our TShuvah, in knowing “before Whom we stand”, in staying loyal to the principles of the Bible, can stop these wannabe Pharaohs, these wannabe dictators, these idolators and liars. WE HAVE THE PATH, THE POWER, and THE WILL to do this once we take the dive into our inner life, into our spiritual powers.

I have been knowing “before Whom I stand” forever, actually. I ignored this knowing from ages 15-35, by ignoring what I knew to be true I sent myself into more and more internal anguish and confusion that took more and more booze to quiet and more crime to have ‘enough’ money to buy me peace. It DIDN’T WORK! It was in a jail cell, in a prison Rabbi’s office, Rabbi Mel Silverman, that I was turned on to the truth about me, the power of TShuvah and the wisdom of Rabbi Heschel among others. It was with my friend and teacher, Rabbi Ed Feinstein that I learned the text, with my teacher Rabbi Jonathan Omer-man that I learned about my inner life through spiritual counseling. It is with great humility that I “realize before Whom I stand” and am able to forget everything else, including my self”, especially myself so I can serve another(s) in ways they need and know it is only through being mostly clean that I can hear another(s), love another(s) and be present with another(s). It ain’t easy and it is doable! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Are you truly aware of "Before Whom you stand" and do your actions reflect this awareness? Year 4 day 234

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 234

“It requires a great effort to realize before Whom we stand, for such realization is more than having a thought in one’s mind. It is a knowledge in which the whole person is involved; the mind, the heart, body, and soul. To know it is to forget everything else, including the self.” (God in Search of Man pg. 407)

On the walls of many sanctuaries in Synagogues, over the Ark and in other places, the phrase: “Know before Whom you stand” is on them. As We the People enter the home stretch of this season of High Holy Day Preparation, this phrase, this way of being, this overwhelming idea of the presence of “before Whom we stand” is most appropriate, I believe. I believe the job of a human being is to look at our experiences, our texts, and ask ourselves: “what is the question that this experience, text, etc is the answer for” as Rabbi Jonathan Omer-man taught me some 35 years ago. I have been seeking to find the right questions ever since!

I am asking myself and you all: what is the question that “realize before Whom we stand” is the answer for. I believe one of the questions is; are we seeing the Divine Image in the people in front of us, next to us, behind us? Are we able to see this divine image no matter their politics, their ways of being? Are we willing to seek out this divine image and speak to it, even though the person in front of us has no idea “before Whom they stand”? It is difficult to do this and this is some of the work of this month of preparation prior to Rosh Hashanah; cleaning out the schmutz that hardens our hearts, having cataract surgery for the blurring vision we have had during parts of this past year and beyond, letting go of what was, our past errors, not worrying about “what will the neighbors think”, societal norms and mental cliches that only hold us captive. To “realize before Whom we stand”, it is important, if not imperative, to let go needing our rational mind to make sense of this phrase, to make sense of the process of TShuvah, to make sense of being right-sized.

Only then is this phrase “more than having a thought in one’s mind”. It becomes  an integrated experience that transforms “our swords into plowshares”, it causes us to “make war no more”, it gives We the People the ability to rise above our desires and our pettiness and envy, our enmity and jealousy, to take our rightful place knowing before Whom we stand” and not feeling inadequate, a fraud, etc. We the People, when we “know before Whom we stand” no longer take a backseat to anyone, we are not expendable, we don’t have to prove we are right, we don’t have to deny our guilt, our culpability, our responsibility and, we don’t have to beat our chests either as Tarzan or as poor supplicant. Living into “know before Whom we stand” gives We the People a new sense of freedom, a new experience of joy, a life without the bounds of another human being, without needing to hold onto the past, no longer needing to have things our way, etc. “Know before Whom we stand” is the gateway to a richer and more meaningful life and the beginning of our recovery from our addiction to perfection, our search for certainty, and our “scouting out after our heart and our eyes to whore after them”.

When We the People “realize before Whom we stand”, with “the mind, the heart, body, and soul”, there is no more maudlin regret, no more mea culpa’s for the errors we have already done TShuvah for, no more puffed up ego and no more mealy-mouthed subservience. When We the People “realize before Whom we stand” our awareness of the gift of serving something greater than ourselves is huge, our joy at being able to see the divine image in another human being fills us with love and rebuke, kindness and truth, compassion and justice, mercy and responsibility. These ‘opposites’ are not opposites at all, they are complimentary to one another, and one without the other is a half-truth, ie a lie.

While I know that many of We the People only give lip-service to “know before Whom you stand”, many of We the People only see it, let it in and out in a nanosecond while we are at services 3 times a year, I also know that there is always hope for a spiritual awakening, there is always more I/we can learn and do from our ability to “realize before Whom we stand”! I have spent the past 38 years engaging in this “knowing” and it is a tug of war between my spiritual knowing and my ego/rational logic. Both are necessary for me to live, for me to be engaged and for me to move forward. What “know before Whom I stand” gives me, however, is the momentary pleasure to “forget everything else, including the self”, because at this moment, I see and relate to the divine image in you, in another human being and their politics, their mendacities, their obliviousness is the beginning of a conversation that informs me and another human being.

Are people like those who spout hatred and vitriol deserving of me/you seeing their divine image? Of course they are: “Come to Pharaoh” is God’s directive to Moses, I ache to be able to “come to” Stephen Miller, Howard Lutnick and search for their divine image and speak to it, not because I believe they will agree with me, rather to let them know their authentic self is seen, their soul is worth saving and help them “realize before Whom we stand”. I ache to do the same with many people and I am doing the best I can to practice this way of being in my everyday interactions with another(s) and with myself. When I “forget everything else” I am free to see truth, to see beauty, to hear the music of my soul, the niggun of your soul, to join together as human beings and work hard to not deny nor damage your dignity, your value and your uniqueness. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Crying out for help, believing the lie of self-sufficiency-which do you choose? Year 4 Day 233

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 233

“Out of the depth we cry for help. We believe that we are able to overcome ulterior motives, since otherwise no good would be done, and no love would be possible.” (God in Search of Man pg. 407)

What is the help We the People need? The first sentence above comes from Psalm 130 which is read every day in the morning service in Synagogues across the globe during the month of Elul. It is a supplication Psalm that also recognizes: “With You God, there is forgiveness and it is awesome”. We the People need to remember that “there is forgiveness” and we are not meant to be perfect, we are not bound by the conventional notions, the mental cliches, the social media mendacities that abound in our society. We the People need the help of one another, we need the help of the Ineffable One, we need the help of our inner life and we need to help another human being, we need to help ourselves, we need to help the Ineffable One. Rabbi Heschel states in his interview with Carl Stern, human beings are divine needs and reminders of God, and Jewish tradition calls us partners with God in completing creation, then we need to take our proper place in making the world a little better each day, just one grain of sand is enough. To do this, we need “help”. “Out of the depth we cry for help” reminds us that the help has to come from within as well. We the People have to let go of our need for being right, We have to let go of our perfection bullshit, we have to embrace our inner strength and live into our inner knowing rather than allowing our ego, our rational minds to overrule what our intuitive minds direct us to.

Of course “we believe that we are able to overcome ulterior motives”. And, belief is not enough! We the People are being called upon to show up and stand up, to speak truth to Trump and his thugs, Netanyahu and his gang, Putin, Xi and their kleptocrats. The moment is calling for the prophetic voice that has reverberated throughout the centuries, that has informed every major push from slavery to freedom, from the inner chains that have bound us to being healed from our inner slaveries. The only motive we have is to be free, and not just for ourselves, for everyone. Just as Martin Luther King Jr. said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” so too is slavery anywhere a threat to freedom everywhere! We the People need to get our heads out of our asses, we have to take the blinders off and stand for the principles that our ancestors fought, suffered, overcame their fears for: Freedom, Truth, Love, Kindness, Compassion.

It is not enough to just “overcome ulterior motives”, in my opinion and as I understand Rabbi Heschel. We the People have to take the actions necessary to “blot out the memory of Amalek” from our minds so when the pendulum swings back our way, we do not do to another what is hateful to us-which is the way things seem to go. When there is repression on one side, the other side responds with “free speech” that is hateful, “tough on crime” that is criminal, etc. Then ‘the good people’ respond with “free speech” is what I tell you is acceptable language, “criminals” need to be coddled and allowed to roam the streets. Unfortunately, We the People seem to jettison the middle path, we are so caught up in ideologies that we miss the forest for the trees. Yet, the middle path is exactly what the Bible portrays, it is the foundation of the mitzvah system, and it has been bastardized as well. In this moment, it is so very important for We the People to stand together and recognize the dignity of every human being, friend and foe alike. It is crucial that We the People find ways to speak to one another from a place of learning, arguing for the sake of heaven, arguing to find the middle path rather than arguing to be right, to be certain, to make money, to have power.

It is a hard shift for most of We the People. Shifting from our need for certainty, our need to be right, our need to have power over another, our need to blame, etc. AND, this month of Elul is the time the Jewish tradition has gifted to us to make this shift. Looking at the connections we have made as well as those we have lost and seeing our part in making and losing them, looking at how our competitive nature has harmed our competitive edge, being responsible for the good and not good we have done, is all part of our growth. It is the fodder upon which We the People can chew and grow from, making a “more perfect union” of our inner and outer lives, our values and our actions, our love of justice, mercy, the stranger, and one another. We the People are more than capable, the world is more than ready, are We the People willing? Please God, these last two weeks till Yom Kippur will bring the readiness and the path to our beings and We the People will light the way for everyone.

My new book: You Matter Too is now available. The book tells the stories of a composite of people, how they had ‘hit bottom’ even though they were not all addicts, and the teachings we learned together to help them live well. Not all the stories have ‘happy endings’ and I hope the teachings help all who read it. This is one of the ways I am doing what I can to make the world a little better, it is how I keep shifting more and more into responsibility, justice, wisdom, love, truth, compassion. This year during this month of Elul, I have found I don’t need to be noticed, I don’t need to be right, I don’t need to blame, I see what is and I am responsible for my part only-be it good or not good. I am finding a new freedom and a sense of purpose and mission that is the same as it has been and in a different arena. I have been able to truly overcome my “ulterior motives” with the help of Harriet, Heather, my siblings and family, and my dear friends. It doesn’t get better than this! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Doing all that is within our power to achieve that which is beyond our power - Year 4 Day 232

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 232

“Alone we have no capacity to liberate our soul from ulterior motives. This, however, is our hope: God will redeem where we fail; He will complete what we are trying to achieve. It is the grace of God that helps those who do everything that lies within their power to achieve that which is beyond their power.” (God in Search of Man pg. 407)

These words in bold capture this moment in time, I believe. As we enter the final week prior to Rosh Hashanah, we are 15 days away from Yom Kippur, I know it is essential for We the People to see the path to redemption, the wilderness we need and are able to go through and achieve a new sense of freedom, a freedom of spirit, a freedom from resentments, a freedom to be who we authentically are and a freedom to welcome the authenticity of another human being. The caveat, of course is: We the People have to “do everything that lies within (our) power to achieve that which is beyond (our) power.”

We are living in a moment in time, that has repeated itself over and over throughout the history of humankind; we keep regressing to autocracy, to seeking someone to take care of us, someone to make it right, to beat up our enemies, etc. We seek hatred and destruction rather than community and creativity, we are ensconced in resentment and blaming the ‘other’ rather than honoring the inherent dignity that the Bible tells us all people have. We the People have to demand from ourselves to “love the stranger” as the Bible tells us 36 times in the first 5 Books, we have to “do justly, love mercy, walk humbly in the ways of God” as the prophet tells us, we have to guard against being “ a scoundrel within the bounds of Torah” as Moses Nachmonidies warns us. The paths that our country is on, in my opinion, is the path deeper into the wilderness, deeper into the loss of freedom, deeper into the path the Israelites took to become slaves to Pharaoh.  It is up to We the People to seek the redemption necessary so we are able to, once again, cross the Red Sea and move towards Sinai, accept the 10 sayings and live as free people, honoring the freedom of another, serving something greater than our self-centered desires, jettisoning the practice of following our hearts and eyes whoring after them. We the People can do this, not completely, not once and for all, and we can move forward step by step, little by little and, on Yom Kippur accept the “grace of God” to be clean and free.

How do we do this? It ain’t easy! Yet, it is simple. We the People are being asked, commanded, pleaded with by the spiritual forces most prevalent in the world right now to tell ourselves the truth about our actions, our desires, our passion and purpose. It is called doing TShuvah, an inventory of what we have done well and what we haven’t. This process begins with giving up our claims that we are innocent, we aren’t in every circumstance, it continues with letting go of the lies of society that we are supposed to be perfect-only the Ineffable One is and my wife, Harriet Rossetto, is not so sure this is true:)! Upon doing these first two actions; knowing they will seek to enter our thinking because, after all, we are not perfect; we begin our review of our ways of being over the past year(s). Looking backwards is difficult because, as we know, hindsight can be 20/20, and we see where we actually harmed ourselves and another human being, where we were oblivious to what was going on within us and around us, and what we need to repair within ourselves and with another human being. This is not to beat ourselves up because we know better now, it is an acknowledgment that we did the best we could in the moment given everything that was happening within us and outside of us at that moment, in that experience; unless we planned to do evil and were excited to get over and be king of the mountain! This is not to whitewash what we have done, it is to put it into it’s proper context, to not get into shaming and blaming ourselves nor another, unless it is warranted as a “rebuke, rebuke your neighbor and don’t bear guilt because of her/him”. We the People are also commanded to see the GOOD we have done, relish in our goodness and be grateful for finding places and people to live in community with. We the People are called to see how we have lived spiritually, covenantally, and freely in the spirit of the universe and from our souls rather than our egos! Doing this list is crucial to our own redemption, crucial to doing “everything that lies within our power to achieve that which is beyond our power”.

This is my 38th year of being on this journey through the wilderness of Sin, to being imbued with the power of the experience at Sinai, and the journey to freedom and my proper place. It is a trip to see how far I have come, to rejoice in the good I have done and, while acknowledging my errors, not focus on the shit anymore. After speaking with a dear friend, my writing may be seen as my beating myself up for old errors, and if this is how it came across, I am sorry. In my desire to be in the both/and I acknowledge my imperfections and I am not sorry for them, I rejoice in them because they make me who I am and I think I am pretty cool, good, passionate, and purposeful. My sharing in this blog is inspired by Rabbi Heschel’s words because he shows me where I am not living up to the call of the Ineffable One and I will never “GET THERE”. Redemption is a forgone conclusion, as I understand living Jewishly. When I am kind, just, loving, truthful, forgiving, non-resentful, merciful, compassionate, friendly, welcoming of the stranger and the friend alike, I am living my redemption and living in these ways is the path out of the wilderness to the edge of the promised land, it is the repayment of the debt I owe to God, to the universe, to the myriad of people who have helped me grow into being authentically me. We are all redeemable, no one is beyond redemption to live into this truth and to do whatever is in our power in this moment , so we can “achieve that which is beyond our power”-redemption, community, belonging. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Ulterior Motives, Selfish Desires, Egocentricity or the Redemptive Power of God - Year 4 Day 231

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 231

“Alone we have no capacity to liberate our soul from ulterior motives. This, however, is our hope: God will redeem where we fail; He will complete what we are trying to achieve. It is the grace of God that helps those who do everything that lies within their power to achieve that which is beyond their power.” (God in Search of Man pg. 407)

Reading this teaching after pondering the last sentence of yesterday’s quote: “Whatever we do is only a partial fulfillment; the rest is completed by God” gives us a lesson in humility, which humanity is in DESPERATE NEED OF right now especially. The “American Way” of self-reliance is in direct opposition to those who are claiming that they want a “Christian Nation”, which everyone knows is code for White Supremacy. Yet, if these PAGANS and LIARS were being loyal to the values of Christ, true to the ways of Christ, we would have very different world. This teaching above, as I hear Rabbi Heschel this morning, in this moment, is not about a “religion”, it is about a spirituality that overpowers our selfish needs to be #1, to be the religion, to be the best, to be the smartest, etc. This is the teaching for all of us to live into on this 22nd day of Elul, on this week prior to Rosh Hashanah.

On the High Holy Days, We the People go to rejoice and remember, to forgive and ask for forgiveness, to clean up our side of the street and to be heard and seen. Yet, how can we do this when We the People are still living in the fantasy world of either/or, the imaginary world of “I am a self-made human being”, “I am self-actualized” and other such bullshit. The same is true for all of the ‘religious people’ who claim to know God’s Will so well they should never be questioned. “It is written in the Bible” means nothing because it is also written in the Bible that human beings are to argue with God as Abraham and Moses did, we have a “duty to disobey” as Rabbi Harold Shulweis writes in his book: Conscience; the duty to obey and the duty to disobey. The idea that we do not need to be redeemed because ‘we have already been redeemed at the Red Sea’ is utter bullshit. Each year in the Haggadah we are told: “every one must see him/herself as if they too have been redeemed from Egypt”; we all need to be redeemed and because of our outlandish, outrageous, out of proper measure EGOS, we need to be redeemed often! Yet in a climate of “I am right”, “you need to heel to me”, etc; Trump’s perfecting of this pattern is the quintessential experience of “no capacity to liberate our soul from ulterior motives”. Miller, Wytkoff, Lutnick, the three Jews who may or may not go to Services on the High Holy Days will not hear a word of the prayers they recite, they will not allow anything to penetrate their shells, and this is what passes for being ‘a good Jew’ today; Judaism was never about choosing a political side, it was and is about choosing God’s side and We the People have failed once again to make the best choice in this moment and in every moment-choosing to follow our “ulterior motives” rather than God’s direction. And these three Jews, along with millions of others, here and in Israel, will beat their chests, will use the formula the Rabbis gave us, and believe in their own self-righteousness, the ‘rightness’ and ‘godliness’ of their service to Trump, to fascism, to autocracy while reading the exact opposite in their High Holy Day Prayer book!

We the People have to be fully engaged in the personal work of Elul, whether we think redemption for ourselves is possible or not, whether we believe that someone else can be redeemed or not. We always can have “hope: that God will redeem where we failed”, that upon reflection, we will understand and ‘see’ through our higher consciousness the proper way to be, the best way to make our amends, and the vision for moving forward. This is the essence of TShuvah, this is the path of partnership with God, this is the truth of being human: WE NEED HELP! None of We the People can do life alone, none of We the People can fix everything that ails us, much less all that is wrong/off with the world.

I have been thinking about what it is that stops human beings from doing TShuvah actively and with joy, I think I have stumbled upon an idea. Humanity does not like to admit their errors, it goes against “conventional norms and mental cliches”, it is an affront to our egos and most of We the People don’t know how to admit our errors, rise above our false selves and be truthfully repentant, truthfully needy, and truthfully ask for help with our internal lives. There is a reciprocity of generosity that comes with being in truth with another human being, with God, and there is a debt that we take on also. The debt is to be available for another person who needs to be in truth, to rebuke those who refuse to let go of their lies and falsehoods. The teaching above reminds me that the great lie is “I did it”! The truth is with God’s help, with the spiritual force of the universe, with the help of so many others, I have been able to achieve some great things, I have been of service to God, to another(s), to myself and I am guilty of many errors in judgment, in action, and in thinking. I continue to realize them, I make my amends and I speak truth to people-whether they want to hear it or not. If you don’t want to hear my truthful response, don’t ask me any questions. As I said, I am guilty and I return to my innocent self each time I clean my shit up, each Yom Kippur I get a new start and a clean slate, each day I engage in living well, in growing into God’s will a little more, each day I ensure that love, kindness, justice, truth, compassion are leading the way, it is a good day, I am allowing “God” to “redeem where I have failed” and experience the immense love the spirit of the universe has for me and everyone. I am unique and not special! As the prayer says: We are all children and God is parent to us all. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Confusing Callousness and Cruelty with the Eternal Command - Year 4 Day 230

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 230

“The eternal command, like a saw, is trying to cut the callousness of hearts. In spite of all efforts, the callousness remains uncut. What, then, is the meaning of all endeavor? Rabbi Tarfon said: “You are not called upon to complete the task, yet you are not free to evade it.” Whatever we do is only partial fulfillment the rest is completed by God.” (God in Search of Man pg. 406)

The first sentence above kinda says it all! We are told to “circumcise the foreskin of our hearts” and “the eternal command” is the only way for this to happen. Instead, we are witnesses to “the callousness” being held out as the standard of morality, the standard of a ‘free society’, the goal for all to reach so we can be rich, famous, powerful like Trump, Netanyahu, Putin, and their criminal allies. It is especially galling to read these words above, to know “the eternal command”, when done in truth, in kindness, with justice, mercy, and love is the antidote to “the callousness of hearts” and watch in horror as the liars in chief, the idolators who have the megaphones, preach a message of hatred, callousness and celebrate the cruelest of actions. Charlie Kirk, who is being canonized by the far right and demonized by the far left is a prime example. He claimed to be ‘a good christian’ while preaching a Christian Nationalism that is about as far away from Christ’s life work as possible, he is having praise heaped upon him by Jews, especially Netanyahu, and a traffic circle named for him in an Israeli town while he promoted blatant antisemitism, hatred of people of color, LGBTQ, he opposed the separation of Church and State, seemingly embracing that the United States should be a ‘christian nation’ which has always been good for the Jews-NOT! Yet, because “the callousness of the hearts” “remains uncut”, we see Charlie Kirk-who was killed in the most horrific of ways, who did not deserve to die for his right to free speech-being lionized, having a statue in the Rotunda to him, a bill to allow him to lie in State as if he was a hero, and wonder what good is “the eternal command” if, after all these years, over 3000, the callousness not only remains, it seems to get stronger and stronger, immune to the “saw” of “the eternal command”.

“Why bother”, “fuck it, I don’t matter nor make a difference”, “they(society) are too powerful and have the game rigged” are all thoughts and expressions that We the People use to deny the words of Rabbi Tarfon, the wisdom and truth of what he is saying above. These ways of opting out of “the task” have permeated society for the millennia and we are reaping what We the People have sown through our inaction, our inattentiveness to “the eternal command”. Rabbi Tarfon’s wisdom above is one of my brother’s, Rabbi Neal Borovitz, favorite pieces of wisdom. He has preached it for 50+ years, he has lived it for more than 50 years as well. Yet, We the People, continue to allow “the callousness” to grow, rather than put some “saw” marks in it, rather than use “the eternal command” to weaken the “callousness” a little each and every day. This is the reason that Rabbi Tarfon’s wisdom is so crucial for We the People to stop the cruelty of a Charlie Kirk from becoming the policy of the United States Government which it has become, to stop the mendacity and the injustice of Netanyahu and his gang of thugs from ruining what the State of Israel is meant to be-a light unto the nations, not a pariah among the states of the world! Yet, We the People are adamant in our refusal to live “the eternal command” in all our affairs because we are afraid of being ‘a loser’, afraid of ‘not getting ours’, etc. POOR WE THE PEOPLE.

Please spare us the whining, spare us the response that ‘religion is bullshit’, ‘look at how those religious folks are cruel and mean, hateful and suspicious towards anyone not like them’, etc. “The eternal command” has nothing to do with the ways religions are practiced, unfortunately! This is the problem that We the People have created and only We the People can solve. The first step in recovering the solution is to ask: “what is “the eternal command”? It is simple, it is spoken throughout the Torah, it is in the first of the 10 sayings, “Walk humbly with God”, “do justly”, “love mercy”, because for God to bring us out of the land of Egypt, to remove the binds of slavery, to save us from our inner slavery, we have to participate, we take on the obligation to live into “the eternal command”. “What does it really mean”, people ask. To “walk humbly with God” means to “love the stranger, take care of the poor and needy, to love your neighbor, to rebuke your neighbor”,  it means to be careful to not “be a scoundrel within the bounds of Torah” as the Ramban warns in his commentary on Lev. 19:2. “Do justly” means ensuring that people’s dignity and value is upheld, it means due process under the law, it means the rule of law is of utmost importance and dispensing justice means we have to live into the spirit as well as the letter of the law; “righteousness, righteousness you shall pursue”. We the People will never complete this job, this “task” AND we have to stop our giving up because we will not see it through to completion! We the People, in this month of Elul, have to recommit to doing the best we can in this moment, doing our T’Shuvah each day, improving/learning one grain of sand more every day and stop lionizing HATRED, CRUELTY, RACISM, ANTISEMITISM, and all other forms of autocracy!

This “task” is one I have been on for my entire recovery and, like my foray into bridge, I take two steps forward and one step back. Remembering the wisdom of Rabbi Tarfon is crucial to my truly moving ahead so I stop beating myself up for the errors and seek to ‘finally get it right’. Once again, in my quest for growth and knowing, Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom turns on a light bulb! I am committed to hone my competitive edge without being competitive, to continue to grow and learn, one grain of sand, in every area of my life, on each and every day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Living as "a hired servant" or as "Israel", one who belongs? Year 4 Day 229

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 229

“Israel feels a certain ease and delight in the fulfillment of the law which to a hired servant is burdensome and perplexing. For “the son who serves his father serves him with joy, saying, Even if I do not entirely succeed [in carrying out His commandments], yet, as a loving father, He will not be angry with me. In contrast, a hired servant is always afraid lest he may commit some fault, and therefore serves God in a condition of anxiety and confusion.” (God in Search of Man pg.406)

What Rabbi Heschel is saying here is crucial to our way of living. While “Israel feels a certain ease and delight in the fulfillment of the law” may seem farfetched to some, the idea is very important to the way We the People are going to choose to live. There is a tremendous difference between a person who is ‘obligated/has to’ do a task, even a good deed and a person who is ‘obligated/gets to do a mitzvah, even something that doesn’t ‘feel’ good, that seems harsh, like rebuking someone because of their behavior. While both people are doing “the next right thing”, the difference between “Israel” and “a hired servant” is that “Israel” is moved to a higher understanding of living, seeing a higher purpose in their lives and an excited for what is to come, what one is going to learn and grow into; while “a hired servant” is going to stay stuck in resentments, looking for how they are ‘put upon’, how ‘they’ are out to get him/her, and never being able to see past their own selfishness, self-centeredness. I want to be clear that I am not talking about a slave-Rabbi Heschel is very specific in his choice of words, “a hired servant”.

On this 19th day of Elul, entering the home stretch prior to Rosh Hashanah, isn’t it time to take a look within ourselves and determine when we are living as “a hired servant”, as a person who lives as a victim, who constantly is telling everyone how they are right and being put upon, who is resentful and serves with anger and a shield so the mitzvah can never penetrate their inner life, who is unwilling to “circumcise the foreskin of their hearts”. These are the people who have a check-list of mitzvahs they do each day/need to do each day and while they are always smiling when doing them, their inner lives are not changed, their belief system of they do it right and everyone else is wrong, their actions towards the stranger are horrendous, they don’t “love their neighbor” nor are they opposed to “putting a stumbling block before the blind, cursing the deaf, having different weights and measures ‘for the goyim’, etc. We the People cannot overlook the times we are acting in the same ways, albeit nuanced, yet, still “put upon”, feeling “not recognized”, thinking “don’t you know who I think I am”, as a member of AA said to me at my first meeting and then he started to laugh. In our inventory, in our replaying of the video of this past year, We the People are being called by the words above to let go of our “anxiety and confusion” and see ourselves for our flaws as well as our greatness, have mercy upon ourselves just as God has mercy upon us and acknowledge the areas of life that are difficult for us to be in acceptance of, the areas where we still need to compete and compare, the areas where “the next right thing” is “burdensome and perplexing”. If we are to grow along spiritual lines, if we are to experience the 30 seconds of being completely clean in our soul, connected and embraced by the Ineffable One, we must do this work, We the People must see the areas where we are uncomfortable and fearful, resentful and feel victimized.

We the People are also being called on this 19th day of Elul to see and acknowledge when we are “Israel”, when we are fulfilling the Divine’s will with “ease and delight”, when we are excited to see how we can serve another(s) and ourselves in this day, in this hour, in this moment. Rather than being afraid, it is important for us to see how we serve with joy and where we can learn and grow. Living as “Israel” as described above, gives us the opportunity to welcome our imperfections, embrace our errors in judgment and action, appreciate the rebukes we get from another(s), and roll away the boulders that are in front of the blind, speak in sign language to the deaf, not have one set of standards for ‘our kind’ and another for ‘those people’, etc. Living as “Israel”, means to welcome the stranger as Abraham did, meditate and pray for the wellbeing of another as Isaac did, wrestle with one’s negative nature as Jacob did, take care of business and be loving to a mother who hated him like Esau did, hold onto the covenantal love even when our partner hurts us. Living as “Israel” is to live above the fray, to embody “radical amazement”, to keep learning by seeing everything new, by not being tied down by ‘societal ways’, ‘optics’, ‘what we did yesterday/this is the way we always do it’.

This High Holy Day Season, I pray that my colleagues find new ways to transmit the joy of the Holy Days, to see Yom Kippur as “a day like a wedding”, to stop ‘beating our chests’ and start massaging our strengths, to admit our errors out loud-beginning with the Clergy, to have people tell the stories of those for whom We the People are saying Kaddish for at the Yizkor Service, for the Clergy to speak to and about “the holiness that abides in our guts”, that “we are all standing at Sinai”, that “the world depends on us”, that “serve in joy and in truth” is paramount to a good life. Stop being “a hired servant” and start being “Israel”, one who belongs, one who is given a task, the true meaning of “being the chosen people”, and is grateful for the opportunity to serve, to grow and to learn. This is the path my Rabbinate took, it is the path my life took and I am IMPERFECT! I serve in and with joy, I am optimistic about today and tomorrow, I believe in the basic goodness of humanity and I see the evil that is abounding, clothed in the robes of the Clergy-like the Kingdoms of Israel and Judea- and I pray WE THE PEOPLE wake the fuck up! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Privilege, Joy, Preciousness of doing the Next Right Action - Year 4 Day 228

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 228

“Though deeply aware of how impure and imperfect all our deeds are, the fact of our doing must be cherished as the highest privilege, as a source of joy, as that which endows life with ultimate preciousness. We believe that moments lived in fellowship with God, acts fulfilled in imitation of God’s will, never perish; the validity of the good remains regardless of all impurity.” ( God in Search of Man pg. 406)

Immersing ourselves in the words above, in the thoughts and actions above, I believe, is the only path to ending the senseless hatred and violence that was once again on display yesterday in Utah. Charlie Kirk was not killed by a “radical left lunatic”, he was murdered by a sick individual who had easy access to guns and who believes violence is the only way to solve problems. This is not what America has stood for, ideally, constitutionally, for most of our 249+ years. Yet, today, in our country, in our world, suicide bombers, over the top retaliation, assassinations, are happening more and more in schools, in the streets, in Israel, in Gaza. At what point do We the People say ENOUGH!!??

In reading and hearing Rabbi Heschel call to us in love, kindness and truth to stop worrying if we are perfect, we are not! Whew, now that perfection is off the table, we can appreciate the “privilege” of being able to fulfill a mitzvah, a divine need, help another(s) human being. What a wonderful way to see the “yoke of heaven”, “as a source of joy,” a “privilege”, as “that which endows life with ultimate preciousness.” Consider how our lives change when seeing ourselves and our deeds through this lens-forgetting about our inner impure thoughts, forgetting about our less than perfect performance, just living into the sheer “joy” of being alive, the “privilege” of being able to do a mitzvah, a “deed”, and the realization of the preciousness of the moment, the “deed”, and our “life” has meaning and purpose. It is the realization by We the People that We MATTER TOO!

In a society steeped in falseness, awash in optics, demanding perfection since Greek civilization, it is absolutely diametrically opposed to the wisdom and truth stated by the Bible, the New Testament, Rabbi Heschel and so many others. If God wanted perfection, humanity would not have been created. Since we are here, appreciating the “preciousness” of the moment we aer in, being in awe of the privilege to serve something greater than our narcissistic selves, the joy of being free to be who we are, to know our actions matter, to rejoice in the “deeds” of another(s) that give aid and comfort to us and to so many others, is essential! Without living into this appreciation, awe, freedom, joy, we are left with anger, with resentment, with “where’s mine”, with shame. In these states, we seek retribution, blame, winning at all costs, our ‘pound of flesh’, control, power, wealth, etc. The stark difference between what society demands, the “conventional notions and cliches” under which society has operated-white people should rule, wealth is reserved for the few, hate the stranger, suspect one’s neighbor, be sycophants to the powerful, corrupt the clergy, etc- and what the Bible demands-love your neighbor, help the poor, loan to the needy, love the stranger, every human being is infinitely worthy and dignified in their soul and the different talents each of us possess is for the benefit of society, not to be ostracized because of them, and, most of all, speak TRUTH TO POWER! All of these ‘good christian folk’ like John Roberts, Mike Johnson, are perpetrating the societal lies of life, not the Spiritual, Christian, Jewish, Muslim way of living well, of honoring the “privilege”, of realizing the “joy” of doing the next right action, of reveling in the “preciousness” of purpose and meaning!

“One ‘oh shit’ wipes our 100 atta boys” the saying goes and the last sentence above denies this bullshit, this “conventional notion and cliche”. Just as the negativity we wrought doesn’t leave the world, the impact is always embedded in the moment we committed it, the good doesn’t leave either, it will “never perish”. While we may forget it, people may forget it, the universe doesn’t and is better because of the “good” we have done! This is an important knowing for all of us who get down on ourselves, who beat ourselves up because of our “missing the mark”. In this month of Elul this year, it is up to We the People to remember the negative, repair it, put it in the past where it belongs for both the one we harmed and ourselves, have a new path and way of responding to the same triggers that will come up again, and see the good we have done, enjoy the actions that have helped another(s) and ourselves, use them as a step ladder to climb more rungs to do more “deeds” that are “lived in fellowship with God”, “acts fulfilled in imitation of God’s will”. If this isn’t a “privilege”, what is? We the People are needed, called and have the wherewithal to rise above the negativity of perfection to the positivity of service.

I realize that my competitive nature, my impatience with my own imperfections is showing up at Bridge and with Harriet! I realized this fact in the writing today and I will change it- not sure how yet and Harriet will give me some advice along with friends and advisors. It is a privilege to serve, it is awesome to be able to take an action that serves my soul and the soul of another(s), to serve God in ways I never would have imagined possible. It is a constant source of joy, doing the next right thing and not allowing my ego to become puffed up by my actions, in fact it is the opposite. Each time I am in the preciousness of purpose, my ego gets more and more right-sized and I am able to live better. I am so grateful for life, for being able to respond rather than react, for the month of Elul taking the time to see what is good and not good-repairing both. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Selfish motives versus a deed and God- are you aware of this choice which confronts us all the time? Year 4 Day 227

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 227

“Man may be replete with selfish motives but a deed and God are stronger than selfish motives. The redemptive power discharged in carrying out the good purifies the mind. The deed is wiser than the heart.” (God in Search of Man pg.405)

As outrageous and outlandish as the first sentence above may seem, given the history of destruction and cruelty of “man”, it is, nevertheless, absolutely true! So, why, Rabbi, is cruelty and evil abounding in this moment as it has so often in the past, you may be asking/thinking? The facts that “man” is not willing to engage in “a deed and God” doesn’t negate the truth that “a deed and God are stronger than selfish motives”. This is the great issue of our time and of all times: What will it take for “man” to engage in “a deed and God” rather than just living capriciously, living according to his/her ‘needs’ which are really desires and selfishness in disguise?

We Jews have a practice of T’Shuvah and, like the 12-Step recovery programs, we are told to engage in “one day before we die and since we don’t know the day of our death, do it every day”(BT Shabbat 153a). In this month of Elul, we are graced with extra compassion, strength, and mercy so we can confront ourselves and our selfish motives as well as making amends and confronting those who have harmed us. We confront those who have harmed us only to re-connect and re-sew the fabric of our relationship, not to harass nor harangue them. We “rebuke our neighbor so we don’t bear guilt because of them” as we learn in Lev. 19:17). Rabbi Heschel speaks about Repentance being an “unnoticed miracle” precisely because “the redemptive power discharged in carrying out the good purifies the mind”.

What ails society, what is making our world more and more cruel and harsh, is not fatal unless We the People continue to give voice and power to our “selfish motives”! We are not doomed, this is not a moment for despair, it is the exact time to look inside our own souls, do our own inventory and and confront our errors of judgement, our selfish actions, and the harms these have brought to self and another(s). We the People cannot be calling out the evil and cruelty of another(s) without first searching and seeing our own, doing TShuvah for them, and having a plan to not repeat these same behaviors, having a plan to deal the cruelty and selfishness that lies within us, sometimes dormant, sometimes very active, so neither way of being rules us anymore, they become subservient to the “deed and God” rather than being the false god they have become for so many of We the People.

Be it Trump or Netanyahu, Bessent or Ben G’Vir, Lutnick or Smotrich, these men are hellbent on serving their selfish motives, they proclaim their ‘religious fervor’ as a cover for their selfishness and cruelty, for their grift and their power grab. These are not people of faith, these are not people of integrity nor are their followers, their cohorts, their families and friends! One cannot be a Haver, a spiritual friend, to someone who relishes their cruelty, who extols their selfishness and wears their evil as a badge of honor and a symbol of god’s love! With the exception of Trump and Bessent, the Jews mentioned above have NO FUCKING IDEA what this month of Elul is about, they could care less about doing TShuvah and they will walk into Synagogue on Kol Nidre and Yom Kippur certain of their holiness and goodness-this is how destructive “selfish motives” are! It is way past time for We the People to demand an accounting by our leaders for their transgressions instead of white-washing them as the Supreme Court seems to be doing!

We the People are being called by the words above to demonstrate to these PAGANS and WHORES, these CRUEL and EVIL people, the “redemptive power discharged in carrying out the good”. It is way past time for We the People to recognize our own goodness, demand goodness of our family and friends, demand TShuvah from our leaders and hold them accountable and responsible for the evil and the cruelty they have, are and will create! We the People know the truth that “the deed is wiser than the heart” and we have to demonstrate this in our daily affairs. Yes, fuck our feelings, do the next right action, follow the mitzvahs dealing with how to be holy, how to be decent, how to transform our selfishness, cruelty and evil inclinations into servants of the good, of the decent, of the holy instead of the other way around. We the People have to live into the power of “a deed and God”, we the People are needed to be soldiers in the war against God, the war against “the deed”. We the People have the opportunity to stand up for GOOD, stand with the STRANGER, stand for FREEDOM, the question that is being asked of We the People is: “will you do the next right thing, take advantage of this opportunity, and move the redemption of the world forward?

I know the “redemptive power discharged in carrying out the good”, I know how it “purifies the mind” and I know this month has, for the past 38 years, moved redemption forward for me and for those around me. I know that I am far from perfect, I know I make some of the same old errors, I know I have improved, the errors are not as bad, as messy, and I know that I have left the past in the past. I pray for the people who harm me, rather than think about revenge. I rejoice with people who let me know the truth, good and not good, about me, my actions. I know the “selfish motives” are very few and far between now and I know that loving the stranger, my brother, my neighbor is the path of JOY for me. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark