Comment

Are you so stuck in the lies you tell yourself that only Severity can tame you? Year 4 Day 295

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 295

“Severity must tame those whom love cannot win.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 39)

I have taken this sentence from yesterday because it both bothers me and I know the truth of it. I want to cry and scream, I want to be the instrument of “severity” towards the assholes who are actively enjoying their role in perpetrating the cruelty we see happening. I am shuddering inside because I know that the “severity” necessary to “tame those whom love cannot win” is so severe, so dangerous, so cruel in and of itself that it cannot be delivered by another human being, it has to be a divine command, a divine intervention.

I am so saddened by the truth of the statement above; there are people in power who are in love with their power, who worship their power, who believe their power gives them “certain unalienable rights” to upend the “unalienable rights” of whomever they deem as their ‘enemy’, whomever they want to use as a scapegoat, to use as a deflection from their grift, their lies, their indecency, their continuous grab for more: more power, more money, more land, more business, more sex, more, more, more. It is so disgusting that We the People have ourselves to be back in this dilemma, that we have returned to the love of autocracy and fascism, that we are gleefully returning to a state of being that reveres a Hitler and reviles a Moses. How have we fallen so far, how have we forgotten what it was like?

The sentence above is proven in the Bible by the story of the exodus from Egypt. The fact that the Pharaoh could not learn, could not surrender, could not hear of God’s love for the descendants of Jacob, is an indictment of inherited power, an accusation against the immature souls that seek, grab, maintain power when they have not a clue of what it means to BE HUMAN! Pharaoh did not care what it took for a person to feed their family, what it took to build the pyramids, what it took to be a person of faith, what it took to be a ruler/leader who actually cares about the people who have been entrusted to her/him! When we are in such a state, when we the people have sunk so low that we come to love the dictator who doesn’t give a shit, who doesn’t care about the sufferings of the people, what else but plagues will wake us up? Kindness is taken as weakness, love is used to make us co-dependent, truth is manipulated and denied so the lies of the Pharaoh, the Fuhrer, the Autocrat, are accepted by the useful idiots who lap up his/her every word, and spiritual growth is called treason, living justly is grounds for imprisonment, loving mercy is laughed at and called stupid. All of the tools of love, all of the actions of decency, all the mitzvot of the Bible, are jettisoned out of the consciousness of ‘der fuhrer’ and her/his acolytes, and We the People are left to call it out or succumb to the insanity. When we succumb, we experience/suffer the same consequences of severity, when we call it out, we experience the consequences of the crazy person in charge, the cruelty of the Pharaoh, the meanness of Attila, the vileness of Hitler. And today, We the People are experiencing the craziness of Trump, the cruelty of Miller, the meanness of Vance, the vileness of Bondi, the greed of Lutnick, the desecration of God’s Name by Kushner. One can throw Bibi Netanyahu along with Ben-G’Vir and Smotrich in the mix here as well. Don’t forget the cruelty of MBS, the vileness of Hamas also.

The question that is rising within me: “Are We the People willing to seek, hear, listen and understand the Moses for today? Are We the People ready to do battle against the evils of the current leadership here and in Israel? Are We the People willing to be part of the revolution that was begun in Egypt some 3500+ years ago, be a soldier in the cause of goodness and truth that Moses gave us the path to? Are We the People ready to experience the severity needed to WAKE US UP, to TAME THE PHARAOH? Are We the People prepared to leave the burdens of the slavery of addiction to power, addiction to fear? Are We the People willing to surrender to a power greater than ourselves that is also a part of ourselves, i.e. God? This is what it will take to teach ourselves to love again, to train ourselves to to care for the stranger, the widow, the poor, the needy. Are We the People soldiers or slaves?

These are the questions that I never asked myself prior to recovery, Pharaoh and Egypt had no relevance for me except the wonderful times at the Passover Seders with my Grandfather. Looking back on it now, I realize that my Grandfather, Abe Borovitz, was trying to teach his grandchildren what it meant to be free, what it meant to be part of a revolution begun so long ago and to never forget how tenuous freedom is, how the Cossacks are not annihilated, they are still in the shadows. He didn’t do this to make us paranoid, he was passing on his wisdom, his experiences, and he wanted us to understand the exodus from Egypt is still happening, Pharaoh is still chasing us and he did it so sweetly that I missed this message until right this minute. Oh Grandpa, I am so sorry I didn’t’ realize what you were saying and the trouble I caused because my ignorance, the ways I lived and acted that were so antithetical to you, to your life. In recovery, I am compelled to ask and respond to the questions above with a loud, a strong YES. I am called to action by the very Voice from Sinai that I denied for 20 years, that I ignored for 20 years and I refuse to ignore nor deny the Voice again. I realize that the severity of prison, the severity of being shunned was to “tame” me because “love” couldn’t. It is what makes co-dependency so dangerous and life-taking. I pray for all of us to learn from the “severity” so we can, going forward, be “tamed by love”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Time to be accountable for the cruelty We The People continue to inflict on one another - Year 4 Day 294

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 294

“To our mind, the terrible threats of castigation bespeak a lack of moderation. Is it not because we are only dimly aware of the full gravity of human failure, of the sufferings inflicted by those who revile God’s demand for justice? There is a cruelty which pardons, just as there is a pity that punishes. Severity must tame those whom love cannot win.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 39)

What is it about human beings that, with all of our ‘higher intellect’, we seem to be unable to learn from the past, to do T’Shuvah for “the full gravity of human failure”, for “the sufferings inflicted by those who revile God’s demand for justice”? I am filled with trembling at reading these words, while people don’t like to compare what is happening now with the 1930’s, is Putin any different than Hitler, is the Ukraine any different than Poland, is Trump any different than Chamberlain?? Is this moment that different than the time of the prophets calling to both Israel and Judea to “return to God”, are we still so deaf and dumb that we cannot believe, understand, hear that “God will heal our backsliding and return us in love”? It seems to be so, hence the words of the prophets, the predictions of the prophets are based in the truth that human failure is so grave, We the People are so stuck, so overwhelmed by our own self-deception and the deception by another(s), so fearful of FOMO, so needy for certainty, We the People seem incapable of doing T’Shuvah, of learning from our past, of changing the ways in which we live and act so we serve God instead of being part of those who revel in “the sufferings inflicted by those (of us) who revile God’s demand for justice”!

Rather than call out the BULLSHIT so-called christianity of Trump, Vought, and the myriad of ‘christian’ nationalists like the KKK was, rather than call BULLSHIT on the false ‘catholicism’ of Vance, et al, rather than call LIAR to Kushner, Lutnick, Wytkoff, et al, their followers among We the People revere them, worship them, defend them because those of We the People who are doing this are JEALOUS that they can’t be this cruel, they can’t stick it to ‘those’ people, they can’t be as mean, as powerful, as protected as the assholes running the country, the courts, the business’ today.

The inability of We the People to see the parallels between today and 100 years ago, between today and the times of the prophets, between today and the Bible’s account of what happened in Egypt, is astounding! Get your heads out of your ASS PEOPLE!! Stop making excuses for the cruelty, stop absolving these desecrations of God’s name, these “sufferings” as ‘just what the other side did/does’. Even if this is true-IS THIS THE WAY OF JESUS?? NO, NO, NO, a thousand times NO! Yet, listening to Hegseth, Bondi, Vought, Vance, Jesus loved cruelty, loved hating the stranger, loved killing “those people” because there is not proof that the boats being attacked are bringing drugs to the U.S. IS THIS THE WAY OF THE HEBREW BIBLE? NO, NO, NO, a thousand times NO! Yet, if you watch Jared Kushner, the guy who had to get permission to ride on Shabbat so he could attend the Inaugural Balls( of course his Rabbi believed this was more important than the ‘laws of Shabbat) one might believe that the prophets, that Moses, that God wants to repudiate what is said 36 times in the Torah-Love the stranger because you were strangers in the land of Egypt. One might think that autocracy and fascism is what Judaism is all about if you believe and watch Kushner, Lutnick, Bessent, Wytkoff while the Bible says: “Proclaim FREEDOM throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”!!

The cruelty that is coming, the experiences that We the People are going through right now are, hopefully, the precursors of a new day, a new way of being, a new recognition of the sanctity of human life, a renewed interest in and adherence to the words and deeds of the prophets, a renewed interest and explanation of what the Bible teaches us about how to live, a new understanding of how Judaism is not a ‘religion’, an ‘ethnicity’, Judaism is a way of being in this world that is compatible with our being a partner with God in its completion. The same is true of Christ’s teachings, of Mohammed’s wisdom, Buddha’s higher consciousness, the name, the path is immaterial because, as the Dalai Lama says: they all lead to justice, truth, kindness, love, mercy.

Unfortunately, the people in charge right now and their idiotic lapdogs will only understand “a power greater than themselves” in order to change, to surrender. Much like the Pharaoh in Egypt, We the People have yet to understand that “Israel is lost”, that “America is lost”, because We the People refuse, ignore, abstain from asking ourselves and the leaders “Until When (Ad Matai) will you refuse to humble yourself before God?, the words that Moses spoke to Pharaoh, the words that Pharaoh’s courtiers spoke to him and the words that fell on Pharaoh’s deaf ears, just as the words of the prophets, the words of Moses, Jesus, et al are falling on deaf ears today. WAKE THE FUCK UP PEOPLE!

Thinking of how stuck I was, how deaf I was, is excruciatingly painful to me. Not hearing my daughter, my sister, my family, my father’s words is something that I continue to regret-not morosely, rather the regret that keeps the memory close enough that I don’t repeat it again as badly. I know in my recovery, I have been deaf to the call of another, I have been deaf to the call of God, I know that it took catastrophic events to get my attention at times and I have resolved and followed through on being more aware, more attuned to what is happening around me, more aware of the “cards being played at the bridge table” literally and the ‘bridge table’ of life. I am grateful for the “severity” which “tames” me when “love” eludes me. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living into the Spiritual Grandeur of the moment or seeking spiritual comfort? Year 4 Day 293

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 293

“Our embarrassment in reading the harsh expressions of divine wrath is also due to the general disposition of modern man. We have no sense for spiritual grandeur. Spiritual to us means ethereal, calm, moderate, slight, imperceptible. We respond to beauty; grandeur is unbearable. We are moved by a soft religiosity, and would like to think that God is lovely, tender, and familiar, as if faith were a source of comfort, but not readiness for martyrdom.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 38-39)

The issue that begins today’s quote is one I hear often, regarding the prophets, the Bible, people have told me I am too loud, too brash, too sensitive, all of which are true. The prophets, the Bible, and I are very sensitive to evil, to the beginnings of evil, to the lies we tell ourselves and the ones another(s) tries to sell to us, to ‘the masses’. While people keep wanting to have religion be “a source of comfort”, the Bible’s only comfort comes when We the People find our connection to something greater than ourselves, when We the People make the decision to seek to do the next right thing, when We the People engage with one another and see the similarities, celebrate the differences and join together to move our corner of the world a little closer to being complete.

Rabbi Heschel’s use of the word “grandeur” here, I believe, is to describe a way of being that is so beyond whatever we think, an experience with our higher self, with the Ineffable One, with the divine, that lifts in holiness, in consciousness, in vision to places we never even dreamed of. It is not to a ‘grand’ place-I believe-it is to a place and sense of Oneness of the universe, a knowing of our being part of the Oneness of the Universe (as the Shema says), and a call to action that we are unable to not hear. While one may choose to ignore the call to action that being in grandeur sends out, it is impossible to not hear the call, if and when one is living in spiritual grandeur. Granted, for most of We the People spiritual grandeur is a place we may visit or be visited upon us and We the People may or may not be aware of the spiritual grandeur that is to be experienced in this moment, yet it is undeniably true that spiritual grandeur exists and is the ‘place’ when human beings and the divine meet, where higher consciousness explodes and changes us with or without our desire, approval, maybe even against our will.

“Grandeur is unbearable” because of the light that is shone upon us, because of the yoke of action that is placed on us, and because we are obligated to fulfill the mitzvot-not do as we please. “Grandeur is unbearable” because it forces us to give up the lies we have been telling ourselves and/or buying from another(s): “God doesn’t care”; “My God is loving and approving of me”; “My God is not like yours”, “Praying to My God comforts me and rocks me to sleep”;  and other such ridiculous statements. “Grandeur is unbearable” because the awe, the beauty, the radical amazement is so powerful, we have to look away after a few seconds otherwise it feels like we will burn up. AND, We the People are being called to visit spiritual grandeur more often. The words above, the words of the prophets demand that We the People end our love affair with the idolatry of a calm, moderate, ethereal way of living and get into the mud, wrestle with the lies and the evil being perpetrated against God, against another(s) human being(s), against the very nature of our souls. We the People are desperately needed in this moment to stand with God, to stand in the Grandeur that is being provided for us and to us each day, each hour by the prophets, by the Bible, by the universe.

We the People have, throughout history, found ways to reach the “grandeur” that gives us the courage, the strength, the will to fight off the evil of that time period. Whether it was the Buddha, Moses, Mohammed, Jesus, King David, the Maccabees, Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, Oliver Cromwell, Ben Franklin, Patrick Henry, Lincoln, Churchill, Niebuhr, King, RFK, Rabin, Pelosi, up until now We the People have had a leader to bring us into the light and power of “spiritual grandeur”. Who is our leader today? We the People have to stop depending on someone else to save us. It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to save ourselves and save one another. Each of us has a Moses and a Pharaoh within us, each of us has fear and awe within us. We the People are being called to let go of our hiding our heads in the sand, release ourselves from the cult of autocracy and the need for certainty-as Harriet Rossetto told me yesterday. We the People, following the direction of the prophets, can turn back to a way of life that utilizes our fears to stop us from buying the lies and bullshit of ‘der fuhrer’, of Trampy Trump, of barbarous Bibi. We the People have within us the ability to come out from under and help another(s) come out from under the inner burdens   of our self-deceptions, the knowing of freedom, the knowing of the path to Sinai and the ability to rise up to the higher consciousness this moment calls for. WILL YOU??

This is the question that has dogged me forever. I have risen up and fallen back, “spiritual grandeur is unbearable” because I can’t stay there, something brings me back down-the call of my false ego, the need to care for another person, the co-dependency I have for my family, my wife-not bad things, just daily living so I relish the moments of “spiritual grandeur” because they give me new insights, new ways to serve, and new ideas to write about. The moments of “spiritual grandeur” make me more accountable, bring me comfort in that I am able to see where I missed the mark and where I hit the mark, what I need to do today and never ‘rest on my laurels’ or ‘believe my own press’. “Spiritual grandeur” makes writing each day a call and a joy. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Being a Perpetual Concern of God, OH SHIT! Year 4 Day 292

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 292

“Man is not only an image of God; he is a perpetual concern of God. The idea of pathos adds a new dimension to human existence. Whatever man does affects not only his own life, but also the life of God insofar as it is directed to man. The import of man raises him beyond the level of mere creature. He is a consort, a partner, a factor in the life of God.” (Thunder in the Soul pg 38)

Once again, I am trembling at the insights I get from these words. It isn’t as if I haven’t read this sentiment before, it isn’t as if I am just realizing the place that I and every other human being is being called to report to, The trembling awe comes from the re-awareness of God’s concern for me, for you. It is an awareness that too many of We the People seem to ignore, that too many of the ‘prosperity gospel’ preachers, the ‘I have to study all day so I am not responsible’ ultra-orthodox rabbis, the ‘don’t you know who I think I am’ liars and cheats that are running the US Government, the Israeli government, WILLFULLY and GLEEFULLY IGNORE! I am outraged and cannot understand why more of We the People are not outraged! WTF, PEOPLE!!

I am aghast at the ways We the People are either acting or allowing our governments to act in our name! How in the HELL can any of us celebrate the wanton killing without proof going on in the Caribbean Ocean right now? What the FUCK is wrong with some of We the People who want to believe Pete Hegseth, a drunk, womanizing, thieving liar?? How can these ‘good religious folks’ continue to disrespect the “god” they claim to love and are serving? They serve this ‘god’ by having no concern for another human being while God in the Bible is concerned with all of humanity??!! They serve this ‘god’ by hating the stranger, scapegoating the stranger while God in the Bible tells us 36 times to love, welcome, care for the stranger??!! The ‘god’ of Trump, Vance, Kushner, Lutnick, Vought, Bondi, et al, is the ‘god’ that humans make up when they “scout after their hearts and their eyes and WHORE after them”(Numbers 15:39). God as experienced in the Bible, in our daily lives, is concerned with human beings, with our actions, with our decisions, with every aspect of our living. What a gift, what a responsibility, what an enormous burden and what an amazing gift of freedom!

God’s concern is a call to action for We the People and each day, when we awake, when we see the sunrise, when we see a rainbow, when we breathe the air, when we go to the bathroom, we experience God’s concern, we experience the “import of man” because all of these experiences, these gifts and necessities, are God-given, they are not because of anything we did, nothing that we merit, they are experiences of love, of concern, of hope, all gifts from God for We the People AND We the People keep squandering the gifts, keep “worshipping the servant” as Einstein says, and are willing to go along with the liars who tell us that “only I can fix this” “only I and my small group have been anointed by god to be a partner with him”, and other such BULLSHIT! I AM ENRAGED THAT THESE LIES ARE BEING PERPETRATED BY RABBIS AND PRIESTS, MINISTERS AND IMAMS-ALL PEOPLE WHO KNOW BETTER AND ARE THE FALSE PROPHETS THE BIBLE WARNS US ABOUT!.

I know I am yelling, I know that I am preaching to the choir, I know that maybe my voice is no longer heard anywhere in the ways it was 5+ years ago, AND it doesn’t matter, because I have to continue to speak truth, I have to continue to be “a consort” “in the life of God”. It is imperative for We the People to find our unique niche, the purpose we are created for, the passion that our souls are crying out to us to engage in because this is the antidote to the LIARS, this is the only way that, like the Maccabees, We the People can proclaim: “All who are for ADONAI, FOLLOW US”. Only when we accept the responsibility of being “a partner” with God, can we find the clarity, the serenity, the turning down of the volume of K-FUCK radio that is constantly telling us lies, constantly wanting us to be less than, better than, and all the other shit. “Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today” says Dr. Paul in the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. Living in the acceptance of the words above, changes everything about the way We the People will live today, tomorrow, forever. Not change it permanently, not a one and done change, rather it is a transformation of our understanding of our place in this world, a transformation of our understanding of the place each and every other human being has in this world, a transformation of how we treat one another, a transformation of our experience of God, Godliness, Mitzvot, etc. This can only happen when We the People take our rightful place as “a factor in the life of God”!

This is not easy!! And it is exhilarating, exciting, filling me with trembling awe, with deep remorse when I fuck it up, making the stakes of life so much more knowing that God is concerned with me, that God’s concern is for me to do the next right thing-NO MATTER WHAT I feel or think. The “yoke” of free will that is calling me to serve God instead of my “heart and eyes” is so fragile at times and I know I have to keep it on, because slipping out of it, breaking it will lead me back to the days when I would use “god’s concern” to get me out of trouble, lead me to more and more irresponsibility, like Trump, Jared, Bibi, et al. Living as a “consort, a partner, a factor in the life of God” is more than just trembling awe, it is the purest and most complete experience of FREEDOM I have ever had. I truly have experienced a “new freedom”, I do proclaim FREEDOM from the rooftops to everyone who will hear me and, alas, most people can’t, won’t and this is sad. I do believe in continuing to do my part, however, and continue to show some ways to FREEDOM. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Are you aware of "God's stake in the human situation", do you honor it or not? Year 4 Day 291

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 291

The prophet does not see the human situation in and of itself. The predicament of man is the predicament of God, who has a stake in the human situation. Sin, guilt, suffering cannot be separated from the divine situation.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 37)

What is Rabbi Heschel saying here, what meaning do these words have? I am having an experience of “trembling awe” “Yirat HaShem” immersing myself in these sentences (truthfully, in most sentences re: the prophets and so much more of Rabbi Heschel’s). “The prophet does not see the human situation in and of itself” because it is IMPOSSIBLE to separate the prophet from God, and it is RIDICULOUS to separate human beings from God-YET WE CONTINUE TO DO IT! Hence, my “trembling awe”.

Since we are created in the Image of God, of course God “has a stake in the human situation” and we human beings keep ignoring this truth, keep being willfully ignorant and blind to this truth and keep living as if God has no “stake in the human situation”, We the People even go so far as to use the Holocaust, the illness of babies, the shootings that occur on a regular basis here in America as ‘proof’ that God doesn’t care, that God is not involved in the world. BULLSHIT!

Isn’t it time, isn’t it WAY PAST TIME, for We the People to acknowledge the truth of our existence, the truth of the Bible, the wisdom of the Bible without having to say everything in it happened? Isn’t it WAY PAST TIME that We the People end our incessant need to bow down to the latest and shiniest idol in front of us? Isn’t it WAY PAST TIME to stop kissing the assholes of the rich and famous, of the liars and cheats, grifters and deceivers, fascists and autocrats grabbing power throughout the world today?? OF COURSE IT IS!

Yet, who will be our Moses today? We killed JFK 62 years ago, we killed MLK Jr. and RFK 57 years ago, we have bought into the lies of Trump and Vought, project 2025 and Peter Thiel, JD Vance, Stephen Miller, Jared Kushner, Howard Lutnick et al and some of us, still believe they ‘will delivers us from evil’ while they perpetrate EVIL, LIES, GRIFT, SLAVERY, HATRED with every word that comes out of their mouths and every action they take-believing they will be able to con and out scheme all the rest of the liars, dictators, grifters they are dealing with. WTF People??

Our Moses is within each of us, we have a Pharaoh and a Moses inside as they are archetypes, and it is up to each and every human being to decide which one they are going to feed, which one they are going to promote, which one they are going to tame. We the People are being called by the words above, by the words and actions of the prophets to stop waiting for ‘daddy to save us’ and take the “bull by the horns” and join together to throw off the yoke of idolatry, break the yoke of slavery to bullshit and certainty, get out from under the yoke of mendacity and self-deception. It is not easy to do this, society has a plan to keep us “under the thumb” of the fascist, of the scam artist and it has worked off and on for the millennia!


TODAY, knowing and finally acknowledging that God CARES, that God is involved and if we are willing to access the divine power and strength of our souls, we can bring about a new day, we can once again be on the journey to the “Promised Land” knowing we will never “get there” and we can move closer to the world of goodness, community, covenant, etc. Using the power that is within us to be Moses, using the connection within us to another divine image, another human being, all human beings, we can truly “Proclaim Freedom throughout the Land and to ALL its Inhabitants therein” regardless of status, race, religion, color, ethnicity! Do you hear this your ‘fine christian fellow’ Russell Vought, Donald Trump, J D Vance? Do your hear this you ‘fine jewish fellow Bibi Netanyahu, Howard Lutnick, Jared Kushner, Steve Wytkoff?


These assholes are disgraces to the Biblical traditions they claim to follow. They are the exact people who go against Adonai and cause the suffering , the pain, the sin of humankind and relish it. They role around in sin and guilt like pigs in the mud because they believe they are exempt from God’s judgement, because they do not believe in ADONAI- they worship BAAL instead. It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to leave the warmth and comfort of our self-deceptions, of our need/desire to be deceived and stand for what is true and right, what is holy and needed, what is good and Godly.

I lived for almost 35 years in deception, denial, anger, self-pity, and kept asking God-WTF. Even as a kid, I knew I was different and my father knew it as well. He was torn, as I look back now, between supporting my uniqueness and wanting me not to suffer the same indignities he had. It was a real dilemma for him and, after he knew that he was going to die young because of his heart condition, he fully supported by uniqueness, kept giving me advice that I just did not comprehend at that age and he was desperate to impart it, hoping I would remember his support, his wisdom when I was older and he wasn’t around to go to. I think this is why I was and am comfortable going to the Cemetery to ‘visit’ him-telling him of his wisdom since my recovery rather than crying that he was dead, before my recovery. I am the prophet I need, I have joined with teachers, fellow learners, to create a community that saved lives from the scourge of addiction, I keep writing to sound the Shofar of alarm and the Shofar of solution. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Are you engaged in the Battle that is raging with the forces of good and not good within you and outside of you? Year 4 Day 290

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 290

“A battle is raging: man in his presumption undertakes to fashion history in disregard and defiance of God. The prophets witness the misery that man endures as well as man’s wickedness that God endures, and even tolerates. But God is wrestling with man.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 36-27)

I am sitting here at my computer, reading the words above and want to jump out of my skin! The first phrase: “a battle is raging” when combined with the last sentence above: “God is wrestling with man” says it all. I cannot contain myself in the beauty, the light of this truth. We have called descendants of Jacob: “God-wrestlers” and reading this maybe We the People have had it wrong. Jacob did not win the battle against the angel, the angel did not come to attack Jacob for Esau’s sake, it was God wrestling with Jacob to see the error of his ways towards his brother, his twin Esau. Maybe it was God wrestling with Jacob to make him understand that he needs the help and support of his brother, his twin, his Yetzer HaTov (good inclination) because his Yetzer HaRa (evil/earthly) inclination was so strong. As we see with Jacob, however, he never fully surrendered to God, he never allowed God to win the wrestling match completely, as Abraham did, as Moses did, as Judah did.

We are in such a horrific state right now that too many of We the People do not even realize their “presumption”  to “fashion history in disregard and defiance of God”!! Too many of We the People still laud Trump and Lutnick for selling out the United States, too many of We the People are clapping for Wytkoff and Kushner as they sell out to Vladimir Putin and fuck over Ukraine! Too many of We the People are still believing the lies of Blondie Bondi, Nasty Noem, and Meany Miller. The worst, however is that too many of We the People adhere to the words of Hateful Hegseth and not to the truth in front of their eyes! WTF!!??!!??

When I use the phrase “too many” I am not suggesting a majority of We the People believe, go along with, clap, adhere to any of these presumptive mendacious human beings, I am saying that any amount of We the People who give them the benefit of the doubt, who give them aid and comfort, is too many! We the People are in desperate need of hearing the call of the prophets to end our “disregard and defiance” of God’s direction. We the People are being welcomed into the embrace of God, the wrestling with the divine, the wrestling with our own inner conflicting voices and desires, so that we can bring to an end, or at least a beginning of the end of “man’s wickedness that God endures”. SO WHY DOES GOD ENDURE WICKEDNESS, one might ask and while the question is, in many ways, the wrong question to ask, the response is FREE WILL! Do We the People really want to be puppets? God has angels to do God’s bidding, humans are supposed to be partners, not marionettes. The response: “if God didn’t want me to do this, God would stop me” is another ridiculous excuse made by humans to cover up our “defiance”, our selfishness, our “disregard” for the words and deeds of the prophets, of the Biblical directions. In fact, we can see “God is wrestling with man” in the ways the editors of the Bible put contradictory statements into the Bible to satisfy their xenophobic, narcissistic ends. 36 times we are told to care for the powerless, the voiceless, the stranger, the widow, the poor, the needy, the orphan, the blind, the deaf, in the physical and spiritual realms. Nothing else is mentioned this many times so what do we see throughout history and on steroids right now from ‘these fine christian gentlemen’ like Vought, Vance, Trump, et al ‘these keepers of the flame of the Temple orthodox jews’ like Kushner, Wytkoff, et al? THE EXACT OPPOSITE! The “wickedness” of our leaders, of their followers among We the People is sickening, disgusting, and just plain wrong! It is time, way past time, for the majority of We the People who believe in “proclaim Freedom throughout the land to all its inhabitants therein”, who adhere to the biblical and revolutionary claim of “all people are created with certain unalienable rights”, who are the descendants of immigrants to this land at any time since America was discovered in 1492 and honor that gift of “a new birth of freedom” that our ancestors gave us, to STAND UP, SAY NO TO THE FASCISTS, SAY YES TO GOD. IT IS WAY PAST TIME TO ALLOW GOD TO WIN THE WRESTLING MATCH AND SURRENDER TO LIVING WELL, LIVING IN AND WITH LOVE, LIVING IN TRUTH!

Sitting here this morning, understanding Jacob’s wrestling from God’s point of view, from the prophets’ teachings, fills me with remorse. Not the remorse that is self-flagellation, rather the remorse that teaches me how not to be in this moment, how not to keep fighting the wrestling matches that I have with people, with God, with myself. I am constantly ‘at unease’ with what is happening in the world, whenever I see injustice, especially whenever I commit injustice! I have been told that I should take a ‘chill pill’,  it’s not that big of a deal, I have told people the same lie and, my experience with the words above are shaking me to my core. I see the wickedness that God has endured from me and I am sorry, I am remorseful, I know I will do it again and I resolve to do it less often and less severely. I see the misery I have endured from another human being and the bile makes me throw up, yet I have to have compassion while condemning evil. I watch in horror at the “disregard and defiance” of God that I perpetrate and know that I do it much less each day. Watching the “disregard and defiance” that people around me perpetrate fills me with righteous anger that I have to dispense in ways that another can hear me, instead of raging like the prophets. Most of all, I am grateful that God still wrestles with me, that God still helps my inner life grow and my connections to the divine reminders around me makes me more and more aware of my need and calling to be a divine reminder myself. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Perpetuating Freedom or Slavery, Truth or Lies, the Prophets or the Idolators? Year 4 Day 289

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 289

“PROPHETIC REFLECTION BEGINS, we might say, with the abuse and consequent failure of freedom, with the irrationality of human conduct, and it points to God who stands above history.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 36)

WOW!! What a statement, what a bold, outrageous, truthful description of the emergence of “prophetic reflection” that has been with us forever, since the time of Abraham. Between the ‘conversations’ between God and Abram/Abraham, the declaration of Malki Tzedek, King of Shalem, (i.e. wholeness), the way of being declared by Moses in the name of God, up till today-there has always been “prophetic reflection” and We the People have bought the lies of the Rabbis and Priests, Popes and Muftis that the age of prophecy is over as if they are saying,  ‘the study of the prophets is okay, just don’t put too much energy in them, we will tell you the important things they say and how/what to understand their words’. BULLSHIT, as I am understanding Rabbi Heschel’s words today-while he believed in the teachings of the Rabbis, he believed the lack of understanding, knowing, studying of the prophets led to the horrible ways Blacks were being treated in America, the inane and senseless killing of “innocent Vietnamese” and American soldiers. When called a prophet, he wanted only to be known as a “descendant of the prophets”.

We the People, as I have said often, are descendants of the prophets. We the People are in the midst of “the abuse” of freedom by the wannabe autocrats, the FASCISTS in our midst, the ‘good religious folk’ of all faiths who deny every principle of freedom, dignity, decency found in the Bible, who, in their fervor to serve their own image and idols, bastardize the “prophetic reflection” found in the Bible, revere and utilize the rhetoric of Josef Goebbels, and deny truth, goodness, kindness, and caring to all except the few they deem their ‘allies’. We the People are in the midst of a “failure of freedom” by our courts, our ‘so-called free’ press, and by We the People who seem to have lost our ability to discern truth from fiction, good from evil, right from wrong, faith in God from worshipping idols.

While many of us compare today to 100 years ago in Germany, We the People could also compare today to 2500 years ago in Jerusalem, to 2700 years ago in Samaria(Northern Kingdom of Israel), to 2000 years ago, again in Jerusalem. What today cannot be compared to is 250 years ago, when “Let Freedom Ring” became true in America, what today cannot be compared to is 3500 years ago when Moses led the slaves out of Egypt and the Torah was ‘given’ and accepted. There is no ‘golden age’ of freedom happening now, there is no spiritual revolution, no caring for the widow and orphan, no welcoming the stranger because We the People “were strangers in the land of Egypt” and in the land of America!! There is no love of one’s neighbor unless the neighbor agrees with der fuhrer, Donald Trump or his henchmen, Stephen Miller, Howard Lutnick, Steve Wytkoff, Jared Kushner, Russell Vought, J D Vance, Pam Bondi, et al. The fact that so many people who call themselves Jews, and in some cases claim to be ‘orthodox’ is appalling to me, it is an affront to the prophets, to “prophetic reflection”, an bastardization of most everything the Bible teaches. Yet, here we are.

Netanyahu asking for a pardon while admitting no guilt nor responsibility, Trump pardoning Drug Lords while wantonly killing people in boats he and his prop Hegseth claim to be bringing drugs into the U.S., Miller decrying immigrants and locking them up in ‘camps’ while being the descendant of Holocaust survivors, Vought claiming to be a ‘devoted follower of our lord and savior Jesus Christ’ while doing everything that JESUS RAILED AGAINST, while BEING THE MONEY-CHANGER IN THE TEMPLE that Jesus preached against, while being the Pontius Pilate of our days!!  We the People desperately need to re-evaluate ourselves, look in the mirror, do our T’Shuvah and return from “the irrationality of human conduct”. We the People have to call BULLSHIT and MENDACITY on the lies that are being spoken, spread on the internet, over the airwaves of Fox News and the ‘right-wing nut’ media. We the People are being called to recall the “prophetic reflections” of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Hosea, Amos, etc and act our ways back into right thinking, exit our addiction to lies, our addiction to bastardizing goodness, our addiction to hatred, power, money, blame and shame! Only then will We the People be able to mitigate the “irrationality of human conduct”, only then will We the People be able to hear, listen, understand (Shema) the essence of the 10 Sayings from Mount Sinai, the laws of decent living found in the Bible right after receiving the 10 Sayings, the wisdom and plans the prophets give to us and how to carry them out.

It is not too tall an order! Those of us in recovery are living into the ways of the prophets each day, many believe Dr. Bob Smith and Bill Wilson were prophets of a sort, just like many believe Martin Luther King Jr. was a prophet, Rabbi Heschel was a prophet. At issue is our willingness to hear the “prophetic reflection” that is within us, that is being spoken to us and stand up for this rather than the lies and power-grab, the money seeking mendacity of people. I know both sides of this coin, I was an asshole who screwed anyone and everyone over to ‘get mine’. In recovery, I have done the opposite, I read and study  the prophets, I read and study the Bible, I am committed to doing the next right thing and make my amends when I don’t. I am far from perfect and one grain of sand better each day. I do not tolerate the lies and bullshit of clergy, the powerful, the stranger, the poor and the needy. I seek to live in truth and demand people help me and themselves to do the same. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Suggestions or Commandments, concern or going along to get along- what is your basic mode of living? Year 4 Day 288

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 288

“The divine commandments are not mere recommendations for man, but express divine concern, which, realized or repudiated, is of personal importance to Him. The reaction of the divine self, (Amos 6:8; Jer. 5:9; 51:14), its manifestations in the form of love, mercy, disappointment, or anger convey the profound intensity of the divine inwardness.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 36)

Continuing on the theme of GOD CARES, the words above are giving us another(s) example of “divine concern”. What I am hearing, however, is much more personal, much more inner driven. “The divine commandments” reminds us that the ways of treating the stranger, the ways of dealing with one another in truth and full transparency, the call to live authentically, the demand to “be holy”, and so many more of the ways to build free societies, to live into a democratic way of being, to have a separation of church and state because when there isn’t both become corrupted, all are not man-made! They are, instead, decreed from God, from higher consciousness, whatever word one uses to denote something greater than themselves. Living into this “divine concern” is an inside job and We the People are being called to account, called to engage in this word, not by God, not by an idol, rather we are being called to respond to them by our own inner voice, our own inner soul, our own inner desire to liberate our beingness from the petty and inane, from the blame and shame, from the either/or, from society’s bullshit and ‘rules’. This inner response is the proof-text for me that “the divine commandments are not mere recommendations for man”, they express not only God’s concern, they express our inner concerns, our inner need to connect and live in community, to see the worth and dignity of another in order to show the world our own dignity and worth.

We the People have allowed the P.T. Barnum’s of our time to tell us our inner voices are not good, they are just confused because Trump, Kushner, Wytkoff, dealing with the Russians, fucking over Ukraine, making a sham of NATO and screwing over our allies in Europe, is actually a good thing- they will make billions and, after all, when der fuhrer is happy, everyone should be happy. FUCK THIS SHIT!! Once again, the need for spiritual growth, the urgency for Spiritual Emergency Services is being shown to We the People and, it seems, we keep ignoring it. This is not a ‘socio-political’ issue, this is an issue of the soul, it is an issue of whether we are going to realize or repudiate “the divine commandments”, whether we are going to give air to our inner life and a megaphone to our inner dialogue. The great challenge as presented throughout the Bible is to listen to the voice that spoke after crossing the Red Sea-“this is my God” with everyone having a different and authentic experience of God; to listen to the voice that spoke after receiving the first “10 Sayings”, “Na’Aseh V’Nishmah” “We will DO and then Understand”.

Yet, We the People seem too afraid of being judged, being left out, being ‘out of the car’ to STAND UP and do the next right thing. We the People allow social media, our financial goals, etc to silence our inner voice, to block out the experiences of divine love, divine mercy because we are blocking out, walling off, trying to kill the divine voice, the divine call, the divine soul within us. We the People cannot live the life of a grifter, live the life of a hanger-on, live the life of a slave and hear the divine voice inside of us-we have to try and kill it in order to continue a life of crime-emotional, physical, spiritual-, to continue to do the next wrong things, to refuse to do TShuvah, to deny what is staring back at us in the mirror. We the People continue to invoke disappointment and anger within us because we refuse to hear our inner voice to do good, listen to the call of our souls to care for one another, understand the gift of living is to be able to serve, to help, to connect.

We the People have and know the solution-grow our inner lives, mature our souls, end our disdain and denial of what truly is, what is truly important, what is truly our proper place. When We the People live into the solution, then Putin is put in his place, Trump is put in jail for his grift along with his groupies like Kushner, decency, order, kindness, truth, love, compassion, become important again. Living into the solution gives every person “their fig leaf”, each person their “proper place”. Living into the solution is the path to leaving “the harsh labor of Egypt (the narrow places we have been living in), we are relieved of the heavy burdens of our inner slavery, we come to once again ‘know’ Godliness, and we no longer need to compare and compete because, as Ben Zoma says: we are rich because we rejoice in what we have instead of complaining about ‘those people’ or ‘what I want’.

This is very personal to me. I have been working to mature and grow my soul for the past 38+ years and I keep getting better-not perfect, not a linear progression- and I am closer to the goal this year than last. I know the anger and disappointment of my inner life, my soul when I fail, when I see someone else acting differently than we had agreed upon, when I see the mistreatment of the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow, the orphan. This still makes me CRAZY and my reactions are still not appropriate in force. I am too afraid of breaking a deal because I can’t engage in the next wrong thing without dire consequences to my soul-and my overreaction also have dire consequences to my soul. It is a conundrum that I have yet to solve:)! I know that We have the awesome opportunity of beginning anew today and I am going to use today to live better, to live into the “divine commandments” a little more and better. I pray you will also so we can defeat the enslavers, the grifters. God Bless and stay safe Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Spiritual maturity and growth or staying stuck in being a spiritual infant ? Year 4 Day 287

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 287

“The style of legal, objective utterance is alien to the prophet. He dwells upon God’s inner motives, not only upon His historical decisions. He discloses a divine pathos, not just a divine judgement. The pages of the prophets are filled with echos of divine love and disappointment, mercy and indignation. The God of Israel is never impersonal.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 35)

I have decided to spend another day on this writing of Rabbi Heschel. The words in bold above tell a story that many of We the People never learned, never heard of, never thought relevant to/for our daily lives. The prophets are quoted in snippets, the book of Ecclesiastes is read in full on Sukkot-a book that my friend and teacher, Rabbi Hazan Danny Maseng and I are having a difficult time with because it is Greek writing style and denies the words of the prophets, gives a wink and a nod to the ways that the prophets railed against, much like what is happening now in Churches, Mosques and Synagogues throughout the land and in Israel. What the prophets’ words and actions tell us is that GOD CARES! God is deeply involved in the doings of humanity because, We the People are created in the Image of God, We the People are divine reminders, divine messengers, divine representatives, partners in completing the creation begun oh so many billions of years ago. Yet, we continue to cease and desist from reading and immersing ourselves in “the pages of the prophets”. A lot of this has to do with the power-hungry misogynistic Rabbinic tradition that included Ecclesiastes and did not include The Wisdom of Ben Sira, the book of Judith, the Maccabees, all for their own political benefit, while having the Chutzpah to quote the prophets, often times out of context, to further their goals-not God’s goals, not the goals of the prophets, rather to further their stature, their power, their authority. We have been dealing with the bullshit of people like the “prosperity gospel” clergy for a long, long time and now is the time for We the People to revolt!

The “divine love and disappointment, mercy and indignation” that are found in “the pages of the prophets” are meant to move We the People to have the same experience! Of course God loves humanity! This is not a parochial love, it is a love for all of humanity which is found throughout the Bible except where Ezra or whomever edited the Bible decided to become xenophobic and ‘wipe them all out’ bullshit which is antithetical to “love the stranger”, “feed your enemy”, care for the powerless and voiceless, slavery must end, etc. Because We the People are so spiritually immature, because no one goes to the “physician of the soul”, as Maimonidies describes the role of a Rabbi, teacher, We the People continue to live a stunted life, a life of “not substantial” as Kohelet describes. Rather than provide the necessary education to grow and mature the soul of an individual, a community, Clergy have forever wanted to use their ‘superior spirituality’ as a weapon, to keep power and control over the masses, for fear of losing their place, being found out to be full of shit when it comes to: the control they want to exercise, their false/narcissistic readings of the text, their need to make the people in power happy and go along to get along, all of which was happening in the times of the prophets and, eventually, led to the complete destruction of the Northern Kingdom, Israel, and the exile of Judea-twice-the last one spanning some 1900 years!

Do We the People care about “divine love and disappointment, mercy and indignation”? Only when we can proclaim ‘our god’ always loves me and is disappointed in you (the other) and always shows me mercy and grace while is so indignant towards you (anyone who disagrees with me). “Divine love and disappointment, mercy and indignation” is all encompassing not only in “the pages of the prophets” they are all encompassing in the Bible, in prayers, in the soul of each and every one of us. This is, in my opinion, the goal of spirituality; to experience, like the prophets, these 4 aspects of the universe, plus so many more, to live as mature spiritual beings instead of being infantilized by the Clergy we hear, the ‘god’ we worship. While it is wonderful and necessary to have a “personal relationship” with God-this doesn’t mean that God becomes proprietary, there is no ‘my god’ in “the pages of the prophets”, there is no ‘my god’ in the words of the prophets, there is only GOD-hence the Shema prayer, which Jews are to say 3 times a day declares our commitment to being a witness, testifying to the truth that God is ONE, and we are all part of the Oneness since we are created in the Image of God.

This moment, in America, in Israel, in the world calls for a REVOLUTION. The revolutionary document, the principles and ways of being we are REVOLTING TO, are to be found in “the pages of the prophets”. We the People have the duty, the obligation, the authentic need to return to the pages of the Bible, to the words and deeds of Moses and the Israelites, the prophets and King David, the Psalmist and grow the fuck up, mature our souls and BE THE PARTNER WITH GOD WE ARE CREATED TO BE! Yes, it is hard, it is daunting and, like the creation of the world, it this revolution begins with a big bang, a lot of chaos and darkness, and We the People joining with the Spirit of the universe to bring light, order, form to the chaos and find the light in the dark, know the dark that is in the light. IT IS POSSIBLE- Ask anyone in recovery, ask anyone who has had a spiritual awakening, ask yourself. These are the ways I helped people find their souls, grow their spiritual maturity and health, and live lives they are proud of, lives that give back and receive, lives that echo “the pages of the prophets. Will you join us? God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Allowing the need for power and control to override the words and ways of the Prophets. Year 4 Day 286

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 286

“The style of legal, objective utterance is alien to the prophet. He dwells upon God’s inner motives, not only upon His historical decisions. He discloses a divine pathos, not just a divine judgement. The pages of the prophets are filled with echos of divine love and disappointment, mercy and indignation. The God of Israel is never impersonal.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 35)

The first sentence above gives us a possible insight as to why the prophets are not taught more by the Rabbis, rather the words of the prophets are quoted in pieces so as to prove a Rabbinical point, not to be immersed in their thoughts, their ideas, their understanding of “God’s inner motives”. In the Talmud, we have an argument between Rabbi Eliezer and the rest of the Rabbis-with Rabbi Yehoshua being the antagonist. Rather than hear the law as it was meant, the Rabbis were more interested in asserting their dominion over this world. They told God to butt out by saying: “the Torah is not in heaven”, meaning the Torah was given at Sinai, we don’t pay attention to a heavenly voice”(Baba Metzia 59b)!

Immersing ourselves in these words and the Rabbis responses to the prophets can illuminate how we find ourselves in the predicaments we are in today. While many of We the People are off to shop the black Friday deals, many of We the People don’t have the income to shop, are afraid of losing their jobs to AI, to governmental whims of Vought, Noem, Trump, et al, and many of We the People are just trying to survive the tsunami of hatred, greed, grift that emanates from Washington DC and spreads from “California to the New York Islands” as the song goes. The ‘good christian nationalist preachers’, the wonderful ‘good christian evangelical prosperity gospel promoting clergy’, the ‘amazing orthodox and ultra-orthodox jews promoting hatred of Palestinians, welfare promoting for themselves and no one else Rabbis’ all claim to know “God’s inner motives” while going against everything the prophets tell us to do. Rather than realize, promote and experience “a divine pathos” these idolators, these grifters, these LIARS IN CHIEF really, promote and experience ways to raise their stature up and lower the stature of God in the eyes, thoughts and spirits of too many of We the People.

What is passing as religion today is a sham, it is bullshit in so many Temples, Churches, Mosques. Pope Leo is trying to recapture the essence of Christ’s teachings and ways, Rabbi Heschel is promoting the ways of the prophets, MLK promotes the equality and freedom that “divine love” brings to us all. Today, we have Bishop William Barber, John Pavlovitz, Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz, Rabbi Sharon Brous, and many others who are STANDING FOR AND WITH GOD. These are the people, We the People have to hear, listen to, and understand-not the bullshit ‘good cross-wearing blondes’ who worship Trump and not God, or the lying ‘good christian nationalist males’ who believe all the power is with the White Man. Thinking about what Thanksgiving is about, the myth of co-existence between the white man and the native Americans, what is happening today is an extension of the belief that “white is right”, the “peckerwood” mentality that is prevalent in our prison system. This is not the message of the prophets, this is not the path of “divine pathos”!

Yet, We the People, seem unable to read and understand the prophets, We the People have relinquished our spiritual and religious power to the clergy rather than remember that We the People are a HOLY PEOPLE, as it says in Exodus 22:30. We the People are all priestly, we are all able to hear, discern the “divine love” shown to us each day as the sun rises, as we wake up from our near-death experience of sleep. Yet, We the People have taken so much for granted we don’t even realize the “divine love” we receive in the moment. We the People have become so blind and deaf to the ways and words of the prophets that we are oblivious to the “divine pathos” we are given freely. Rather than receive the “mercy” that is prevalent at all times, too many of We the People would rather live in the “indignation” and “disappointment” of not getting their own way.

It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to return to the prophetic way of living. We the People are constantly being called to leave the confines of our thinking, our reasoning and, like the prophets of old and of today, join with the divine to ‘see’ what could be, to ‘see’ what is and the path to go from where we are to where we should be. It is an arduous journey, one that is fraught with landmines installed by the Rabbis, by St. Paul, etc and have been hidden and spread throughout the millennia. The journey from where we are to our proper place as partners with God has an army of people who want nothing more than to defeat We the People so these white supremacists men can continue to rule, to have the wealth and the control to enslave the rest of us. This is the fight that MLK and Rabbi Heschel engaged in, this is the fight that Bishop Barber, Rabbi Yanklowitz, Pope Leo are engaged in now and We the People are being called to support and be part of the Army that believes and lives the ways of the prophets.

I have been a yeller and a screamer for what is right and good, for the ways of the prophets for my entire recovery and before it as well. I gave up too soon as a teen-ager, hence my dissent into hell and I will not give up as an Adult! I am asking you to join the group in your area that is dedicated to “divine pathos”, divine love, divine mercy and fight like hell against the Trump/MAGA/white supremacy that is running rampant right now. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Happy Thanksgiving- Gratitude, Appreciation, Reciprocity are the key ingredients in Being Human- Year 4 Day 285

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 285

“The truth of being human is gratitude, the secret of existence is appreciation, its significance revealed in reciprocity. Mankind will not die for lack of information; it may perish for lack of appreciation.” (Insecurity of Freedom pg. 26)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

The words above reveal to us the ‘secret of a great life’-“gratitude, appreciation, reciprocity”. These three words hold the key to living well, to loving completely, to living authentically, to living in and with truth, to accepting all of life, the good, the not so good, the beautiful, the ugly. AND, these the authentic meaning and experience of these three words have been so bastardized by political and societal extremism, we have lost our ability to appreciate, reciprocate, and be grateful for what we have and for what we don’t have. Listening to the right wing nuts and the left wing crazies, not having what we want is a crime, it is a moral injury, it is a wrong that has to be righted by retribution and extremism. Look where it has gotten us, Trump, Netanyahu, and their opposites on the ‘left’. Neither ‘side’ is grateful for what they have, neither ‘side’ is seeking to exhibit and practice reciprocity, neither ‘side’ is overflowing with “appreciation” for being alive, for being able to serve, for being given the mantle of protecting freedom, the mantle of being an AM KADOSH, a Holy People. This is not just for Jews, it is for all people to “see ourselves as if holiness abides in our guts”. Yet, We the People are so busy looking to be slighted, seeking out the slightest hint of negativity, projecting onto another what we are thinking, We have lost our ability to see clearly, to love freely, to welcome the stranger within ourselves, to be grateful for what we have, to give back to another some of what we have been blessed with. THIS IS THE CRIME OF OUR CENTURY!

Today, as we celebrate this uniquely American Holy Day of Thanksgiving, with the false narrative of the pilgrims and the Indians, I believe we need to take the words above, written in 1958 to heart and into our souls. The false narrative about the pilgrims and the Indians is a narrative of hope, it is a narrative of what We the People want to see-a joining of peoples from all walks of life, from all religious backgrounds, from all ethnic heritages, devoted to the freedom and well-being of one another. While this has never happened in history, it doesn’t mean We the People should not strive to make this a reality-of course We will fall short-that is not the point! The point is to appreciate and be grateful for our efforts to move humanity forward by being MORE HUMAN each day. When We the People realize that “the truth of being human is gratitude”, We will be able to live into “being human”, We will lead our community, our family into the streets and give freely of time and effort to make those who have less a little more comfortable, a little more aware of people caring for them, about them, and being more and more aware of knowing the grace we experience for being who we are and having what we have-no matter how much nor how little.

“The secret of existence is appreciation”, reminds me of the Ben Zoma quote from Pirke Avot 4:1-“who is rich? One who is happy with his protion”, In other words, being rich is equated with wanting what one has, even our Tsuris, our troubles. This is such a rare experience in our time, and, truthfully, throughout time! Yet, We the People can STAND UP and implement this way of being into our culture, We the People can SPEAK UP and demand of our elected officials they DO THEIR JOB instead of grandstanding, taking so much vacation time, passing legislation that favors the rich and denigrates the poor, taking actions that revile the stranger rather than loving the stranger-forgetting they(their ancestors) were strangers in America at one time! WTF???

The fact that any lawmaker sits down at a Thanksgiving Table, goes to  Homeless Shelters and serves a meal and wants to be recognized for this act is Despicable and Ugly. That Trump is celebrating Thanksgiving as a free person, not in jail, and instead is persecuting anyone and everyone who he has a resentment against is UN-AMERICAN, A DESECRATION OF GOD’S NAME! Yet, these fine ‘good christian nationalists, good orthodox jews’ salute him, going against everything important to Christ, to Moses, to the prophets to God.

Hence, “mankind will not die for lack of information; it may perish for lack of appreciation” I have lived the past 38+ years in appreciation and gratitude. I became grateful early on in my last incarceration which began in Dec 1986. It was around February, after meeting with Rabbi Mel Silverman, z”l, that the seeds of gratitude and appreciation took hold and I have been cultivating them ever since. I don’t like everything that I have experienced in these past 38+ years, I have been an asshole at times, AND I have and am grateful for every moment, every experience of being alive and engaged, every meeting of people who agree with me and who do not, every connection to people from all walks of life and every corner of the world. Each day I have a newfound appreciation for the love I am able to give out and, more importantly, the love I receive from people. Each day I am in awe of the beauty of the world, physically and spiritually, I receive from the Ineffable One a new sense of uplift, a new pair of glasses with which to see, a deeper dive into “being human”. I don’t know everything and I do appreciate what I have, what I don’t have, what I suffer with, and what I am blessed with - I am grateful to all of you who read my blogs, buy my books, buy Harriet Rossetto’s books, and engage with us. GOD BLESS and be safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Involving God and the Prophets in your daily decisions and actions - Year 4 Day 284

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 284

“God’s role is not spectatorship but involvement. He and man meet mysteriously in the human deed. The prophet cannot say Man without thinking God.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 35)

“So, where was God in the Holocaust” people continually ask as a way of denying the Presence. While it is, in my opinion, an inane question, a response can be found in the words above; God was in the “human deed”, the deed of kindness of the people who risked everything to save a Jew, a homosexual, a Gypsy, etc; God was in the “human deed” of the prisoners who could continue to show kindness and mercy to their fellow prisoners and, in many cases, even their tormentors. God was in “the human deed”, the deed of the Allies who went to stop the dictatorial reign of Hitler and his friends, God was in “the human deed” of the American(and other) servicemen who risked everything to fight against evil, many of them giving their last full measure to save democracy and fight autocracy. God is engaged whenever human beings choose to rise above themselves, whenever a human being can see beyond his/her own selfish desires and take the next right action, God is engaged in the Bible because the authors and editors knew that to have a free society, a fair society, the poorest and the people with the smallest voices and the least power had to be cared for, had to be respected, had to have their inherent dignity respected, otherwise chaos will reign. This truth is to be found in the Magna Carta, in the Declaration of Independence of both the USA and Israel, in the Constitution as well. Which is what makes what is happening in both countries so sad, so antithetical to the foundational underpinnings of both countries and provokes such frustration, sadness that is mistaken for anger when in reality we are arguing for the sake of Heaven.

The prophet is calling to us, not in anger, rather in the same frustration that the Black people in America felt and still feel because they are still being judged by the color of their skin and not the content of their character. The prophet is calling to us to wake up, drink the coffee, smell the roses and realize the STINK we have put on everything because many of We the People have deserted the foundational underpinnings of democracy, of freedom; because so many of We the People have abandoned God’s word, God’s call, God’s gift of how to live well that is found in the Bible; because so many of We the People have chosen to “follow our heart and eyes and WHORE after them, because of the prostitution of our elected officials at the feet (and other parts) of Donald Trump, Russell Vought, Stephen Miller, Howard Lutnick, et al. I hear the prophet asking Lutnick, Wytkoff, Kushner, Miller: “Du bist a Yid, You are a Jew”? Because to a person who knows the prophets, who reveres the prophets, who learns from the prophets, who lives into the inheritance left to her/him by the prophets, to be a whore to these assholes, these Pharaoh wannabes, these hateful, power-loving, freedom taking humans is anathema to being Jewish, cannot be validated when seen through the lens of history, the lens of the Bible. These ‘good christian nationalists’ do not want anything to do with the actual teachings of Christ nor the Hebrew Bible, these ‘good jewish folk’ don’t want to be confronted by the teachings of Torah nor the prophets because in both cases to do so would mean having to admit their mendacity, admit their crimes, do T’Shuvah and experience the logical consequences of their behaviors. These assholes can’t do this because they are afraid to experience any consequences of their behaviors unless it means they get richer, they get away with their lies, etc. AND We the People have allowed them to achieve their goals!

It is imperative for We the People to find our way back to the prophets’, accept the spiritual awakenings that are all around us, each morning realizing and acknowledging the miracle of waking up, the beauty of the sunrise, the joy of connecting with nature, with our animals, with our significant people. Upon acceptance of our spiritual awakening, we then GET to make a plan to capitalize on it, to grow our spiritual awareness, to find our purpose and passion, to live into being the person our souls want us to be. This journey changes our focus, it allows us, GIVES us the gift of connection, the joy of wholeness, the power of the original light of Genesis Chapter 1. Being on this journey gives us “a new pair of glasses” as Chuck C teaches and we are able to see God when speaking to one another.

This is the quest I have been on forever. I sought a spiritual awakening through booze for a while because of my issues with the people at my Temple. Looking back, I realize I allowed society and individual people to separate me from God, to separate me from me. I went to ‘liquid courage’ to make myself impervious to the onslaught of the assholes and in the process, lost my spirit, using my intuitive mind to find ways to screw over other people, when in reality I was screwing over myself as well. My recovery has been a return to living into the spiritual awakenings of my youth, the knowing and the doing I was raised to find. It is a return to honoring the trust my father had in me, the dreams of my youth, the connections that died when I was so young. Writing this today calls me to realize that the loss of connection to so many people of my youth was because of my shame at being a criminal, a con, and disappointing myself so I could not face the people I knew and knew me. While it is sad, I also realize that my life today is filled with people who care for me and for whom I care, I also know that I am still an acquired taste because the prophet in me continues to yell, to argue, to demand I do better and that you do as well. This is the quest, the challenge, to see God in you, to see God in me, and to live together with respect and arguing for the sake of heaven, not ourselves. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Awareness of "what happens to God" in all of our actions is crucial to Spiritual Growth Year 4 Day 283

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 283

“Prophecy proclaims what happened to God as well as what will happen to the people. In judging human affairs, it unfolds a divine situation. Sin is not only the violation of a law, it is as if sin were as much a loss to God as to man. God’s role is not spectatorship but involvement.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 35)

STOP THE PRESSES!! NEWS FLASH!! GOD CARES! This is something that seems to be missing from most people’s realm of understanding. Many of We the People believe if God cares, where was God in the Holocaust, in the suffering we see everyday as excuses for their own bad behaviors, as reasons not to hear the cry of God each evening, the call of the Voice from Sinai each day. “What happened to God” is a minute by minute experience and, We the People determine both the joys and sorrows that God experiences. This is, after all, God who proclaims 36 times that We the People should love the stranger, take care of the poor, help the needy and protect the widow and orphan!

We the People seem to be unwilling to accept our larger role in both our lives and the life of God. We want to deny our responsibility, we want to bastardize the words of the Bible, the thoughts and prophecies of the various prophets, cleaning up the behavior of the Rabbis, of Ezra, of Joshua, inserting ridiculous commentaries to passages that are very clear and caring, truthful and just. We the People, or at least some of us throughout the ages, have taken the words of Jesus, Moses, Mohammed, the Buddha and twisted them into pretzels to validate our wrong and ignorant behaviors. It is so interesting that We the People demand free will, fight for our own right to do whatever we want to, deny the same to another(s) who is ‘different’ than us, then demand that God should intervene when we are in trouble. Rather than realize every affair we are involved in is “ a divine situation”, that God is present within us and around us, that God is also present in the people around us and cares all of us, We the People want to make God into our ‘savior’ at the expense of “those people” who we want to annihilate. How sick and sad, how ridiculous and ignorant, how narcissistic and antithetical to everything the prophets teach us. Yet, We the People persist in our willful blindness, going so far as to call Trump, ‘the anointed one of Christ’!! WTF!?!?!?

I am struck by the use of the word “law” in the teaching above. In Judaism, “love your neighbor as yourself” is a “law”, “proclaim liberty throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein” is a “law”, “teach your children” is a “law”, “don’t scout out after your heart and eyes because you will whore yourselves after them” is a “law”. To disabuse any of We the People who want to pervert the word “law” above, I am offering this bit of wisdom and truth, justice and kindness, mercy and compassion. Just as God believes in T’Shuvah, just as God keeps sending prophets to remind us of our duty to do T’Shuvah every day, ie a 10th step in Alcoholics Anonymous, just as the Bible gives us the direction and pathway we need to live a richer and more meaningful life, We the People are being told that these “LAWS” are as important, if not more important, than what the priests are supposed to do, than what the correct interpretation of what is kosher food consists of, than hating Amalek, than the senseless hatred that has plagued humanity forever!

Yet, if one listens to many of those ‘good christian nationalist clergy’ these “laws” mean nothing. If one listens to that ‘defender of the Bible’, Donald J Trump, these “laws” mean less than nothing. If one listens to any of the Fox News, Right-wing NUTS on podcasts, these “laws” mean nothing. If one watches and listens to Kash Patel, Pam Bondi, We the People are well-aware of the lack of meaning God’s “laws” have. The irony is, of course, that while these ‘good christian, cross wearing, prosperity gospel’ charlatans are promoting how they live by the Bible, the “laws” of the Bible hold no real sway over Mike Johnson and his band of idolators in Congress. Lindsey Graham, that betrayer of everything his friend John McCain stood for, has no regard for the “laws” of the Bible-no matter how much he proclaims his allegiance to Jesus, he is the Anti-Christ in action. What is worse, however, is not these people in power who are like this, what is worse is that so many of We the People have disregarded the words of the prophets, disregarded the “laws” of God found in the Bible, so much that these people who are enslaving us, promoting “sin” in the marketplace, in our streets, in hating the stranger, in scapegoating the resident alien,  were put into power by WE THE PEOPLE!!

I am well-acquainted with the ‘prayer’ of people who have bastardized every “law” for their own benefit and then ‘prayed’ to God to save them. For example: when I was on my way to Prison for the first time, I prayed that God would tell the guards that they made a mistake and let me go! I hadn’t prayed to God for any guidance, for any direction, yet I wanted God to ‘save me’!! REALLY?!  I know how often people have questioned my faith because of terrible events that happen in personal lives and in the world in general. I hear the prophets and the words above reminding me that not only does God have a stake in what is happening, more importantly I have a stake in what is going on. I have to keep cleaning my internal house of shmutz so I can stand up for the poor, the needy, the stranger around me. I have to continue to see what I do well and where I miss the mark so I can call out the bullshit of another without being like a Donald Trump, et al. I have to continue to do TShuvah each day so I can face myself in the mirror each morning, I can see more clearly each day the love I have to give and the love I receive from so many, especially my wife. I am blessed to know that my “sin” is also a loss to God and my job is to minimize God’s losses! I pray you will join me in this quest! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

The Legacy of the Prophets, our Inheritance from the Prophets - Year 4 Day 282

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 282

“Indeed the main task of prophetic thinking is to bring the world into divine focus…The prophet is endowed with the insight that enables him to say, not I love or I condemn, but God loves or God condemns.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 34-35)

Yesterday I wrote on the first sentence above and today I want to engage with the second one. Rabbi Heschel’s description of “the prophet” confirms for me, at least, that we are truly descendants of the prophets, that we truly have available to us the inheritance from the prophets of “insight”. As human beings, we always have the choice between being selfish and egotistical, narcissistic and sociopathic and being able to see what is the next right thing to do, being generous with spirit and finances, seeing another human being as having equal and unique dignity and worth, knowing that seeing another human being is, as Jacob said to Esau: “seeing your face is like seeing the face of God” (Gen. 33:10) While Jacob was never fully capable of connecting to Esau, of accepting Esau’s forgiveness, of dealing with his own guilt, he is telling us, early on in the Bible what it is to look into the face of another, to truly SEE that another human being is, as Rabbi Heschel says often: a divine reminder.

At issue for We the People is not that the prophets existed, not even that the prophets had “the insight that enables him to say, not I love or I condemn, but God loves or God condemns”, at issue for us, is whether we are willing to leave the narcissism, exit the selfishness and connect to something greater than ourselves-call it the universe, God, Higher Power, Love, Truth, Higher Consciousness, whatever one wants to call it? We the People have been called to leave the loneliness of being egotistical and sociopathic and join with another human being to BE HUMAN! This is counter-intuitive to the ‘way of the world’, I know, it is counter-intuitive to the ways of AI, the ways of tech, the ways of Power, the ways of the wealthy and those who seek wealth. Yet, it is the inheritance we receive from the prophets, it is the key to sustaining our humanity as well as sustaining our planet. Every resource is limited except our Spirit, every road has an ending except the road to the Ineffable One, every creation is limited except those that come from our souls. This is the truth that the Clergy of today and yesterday, the power brokers, the ruling class never want We the People to know! And it is the TRUTH we have received from the prophets, it is the inheritance that has been passed down, both wittingly and unwittingly by the generation since the prophets ruled, it s the inheritance that has been lived by many heroes silent and loud throughout our history-Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Lincoln, Roosevelt, JFK, RFK, Liz Cheney all are examples of people of spirit and soul that lived the truth of their time and spoke out. The history of clergy is replete with people like St. Francis, Thomas Merton, MLK, the Baal Shem Tov, Reb Nachman, Rabbi Heschel, who also lived into their inheritance from the prophets. It is time for We the People to take up the mantle given to us by the prophets, wear it and live into their teachings.

This can only be done through study and wrestling with the texts. It is not a top-down education process because the words of the prophets, like much of the Bible, need to be digested, discussed, argued over and then put into action. It is not a top-down education process no matter what the ‘teachers’, the ‘rabbis’ say; it is take the action the words say to take and then understand their meaning, the exact opposite of what I just said because BOTH WAYS ARE TRUE and GOOD! Whatever way you engage with the prophets is good-just ENGAGE with them.


This is the issue of our time, when the so-called religious right is telling us that the words of the prophets mean the opposite of what the prophets are saying, when the so-called religious right is telling us that Jesus loved the rich and famous, the powerful and the mighty, that God loves the rich and the poor are being punished, that God wants the Arabs to be driven from their land and killed, that calling ‘those people’ vermin, not human, blood poisoners, WE THE PEOPLE have to, like the prophets in their time, STAND UP AND SAY NO! We are living in a precarious time because we have not stood up to the Tea Party hatred, the war-mongering of Gingrich, the hatefulness of Nixon, the lies of the KKK, the need for ‘the south to rise again’, the toying with fascism like in the 1930’s here in America, the desire of some to return to being like Egypt and having slaves do the bidding of the rich white folk. This is what We the People have wrought by our inattention to the words and the ways of the prophets, by our unwillingness to say “God loves or God condemns”.

I know the trap my immature ego set for me, both when it told me I was the Shit and when it told me I was a piece of shit. I knew of my inheritance as a young man and I squandered it, I used it for all the wrong reasons and in all the wrong ways. I still regret this, I am still acutely aware of these errors so that I don’t repeat them. I also know that in my recovery, I have lived into the inheritance I receive from the prophets, I live into the call for: justice and truth; for caring and concern of another human being; for speaking to people in the way they can hear; for spreading love and kindness. Most of all I live into the inheritance of calling out the whoring of self and the rest of us, the rebuking of myself and my neighbor, the no-holds barred battle/war with the mendacity and self-deception by someone else as well as my own, because T’Shuvah is the response God wants and the response that will save myself and humanity. “For one person’s TShuvah, the whole world endures” says Reb Meir in Yoma 86b. Will you join me in being that person? God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Have you had your "divine focus" eyesight checked recently? Year 4 Day 281

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 281

“Indeed the main task of prophetic thinking is to bring the world into divine focus…The prophet is endowed with the insight that enables him to say, not I love or I condemn, but God loves or God condemns.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 34-35)

According to my understanding of the first sentence above, seeing the world through God’s ‘eyes’ is the gift bestowed upon the prophets and, if we are willing to ‘see’ beyond our desires and self-sabotaging lies, we have inherited. In fact, I would argue that this was the gift given Adam and Eve, the knowledge of good and evil gives us the ‘eyesight’ of the divine and we have abused it, used it for our own selfishness instead of being a prophet in our own time.


This strikes me as a very radical thought, We the People are endowed not only with “certain unalienable rights”, we are also endowed with certain immutable responsibilities which begin with seeing the world through the lens of the divine! The blaming of God for the tragedies of the world, the questioning of “where was God when…” is all an excuse for We the People to soothe our knowing that we have the ability to ‘see’ what God ‘sees’, to take the action necessary so justice, love, mercy, kindness, truth prevail and We the People make this road the “Road Less Traveled” and indulge in the blame game instead.

Extrapolating Rabbi Heschel’s words and thoughts, knowing we are descendants of the prophets, realizing the prophets were everyday people, they were not of the priestly class, not the rich and famous, just ‘average joes’ makes us either seek to improve our eyesight or run away from the divine focus that is available to us. These two ways of encountering the world are on the continuum and most people live in both realities-the choice that I hear from Rabbi Heschel’s first sentence above is: where do you/I stand on this continuum, which direction are we headed towards? This is the question being put before us each day; upon waking up and saying the prayer of gratitude that we are alive do We the People ‘see’ the divine focus needed for this day, ‘see’ the responsibility we get to fulfill this day? If not, are we aware of the choice we are making to stay willfully blind to what truly is, to be ignorant of the ways we are degrading another human being(s)?

Of course, We the People have all the ready-made excuses for not living in “divine focus”, ‘we have to make a living’, ‘there are no more prophets’ , ‘the Rabbi/Priest/Minister is supposed to do this for me’, and other such bullshit. “Life is hard and then you die”, the fatalistic viewpoint gives us another excuse, the denial of God because of the ways religion has bastardized God’s teachings, because of all the wars fought ‘in God’s Name’, and other reasons people have left their religion is another reason/excuse for people not living in divine focus-although they will tell you they are moral people, they are good people and, while this may be true, they forget where the scales of morality and goodness come from: The Bible! So, even the people who proclaim God is dead, who say God is a man-made invention, and act in accordance with justice, love, truth, kindness and mercy are exercising their “divine focus”!

That the ‘un-christian christian nationalists’, the ‘un-orthodox orthodox jews’, the anti-islam muslims’ all proclaim their allegiance and descent from the prophets is, to me, the greatest bastardization of “divine focus” the world has seen for at least 100 years! What is happening now in America, in Israel is not democracy, is not justice, is not truth, is not moral, is not goodness, is not kind, is not merciful, is not loving-it is the opposite of these ‘divine principles’. We the People are being called by the words above to stand up and reclaim our “divine focus”! We the People need to get “a new pair of glasses” as Chuck C writes about people in recovery, and ‘see’ what God is ‘thinking’, ‘see’ what God is ‘calling us to do’, ‘see’ the divine truth in front of our faces and take the next right action to fulfill God’s ‘desire’ for the betterment of humanity and of ourselves.

Every time We the People live in and act from our “divine focus”, We experience a joy that is beyond the beyond. We have the experience of connection to the divine, to something greater than ourselves and to the soul of another human being, to the souls of all human beings. It is an exhilarating experience that feeds upon itself and is so overwhelming, such a ‘high’ that We become ‘addicted’ to seeking more of these experiences. I know this to be true because this is the story of my recovery, it is the story of how joyful my life is and has been. There was/is a person who would fight with me because when asked how I was/am I said/say GREAT! “How can you be great all the time”, she asked and I responded that living in recovery, living in line with “divine focus”, living the best I can each day is so overwhelmingly exquisite, how can I be anything other than GREAT?

Living in “divine focus” does not bring about happiness all the time and it does help me live in joy. That I can feel sad, that I can experience the ups and downs of living in the world, that I no longer deny what is true and real, that I stand up and speak out for the sake of God, for the sake of the stranger, the poor, etc doesn’t make me happy-it gives me the knowing I am living my purpose and this is the purest form of joy I experience. That another(s) put me down, want to silence me, use my foibles against me is of no matter because I get to live into the “divine focus” I have been gifted with. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Taking the Prophets Seriously and living into their words - Year 4 Day 280

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 280

“The words the prophet utters are not offered as souvenirs. His speech to the people is not a reminiscence, a report, heresy. The prophet not only conveys; he reveals.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 33)

In 1972, in his conversation with Carl Stern, Rabbi Heschel gives me the impression that one of the great tragedies of our time is that no one studies the prophets, takes in their words and their essence, etc. Look what has happened in the ensuing 53 years! The stranger is hated and used as a scapegoat, the poor are exploited even more than they have been, racism is off the charts, white supremacy is ‘in vogue’, young white men want to identify with Nazi-loving autocrats, white women vote for a misogynist, rapist, Black and Latino men vote for a bully rather than a woman, and the country is in shambles. Exactly the opposite of the message of the prophets who the so-called clergy of these white self proclaimed “christian” nationalists are delivering and the exact opposite of Mike Johnson and Russell Vought’s claim to “love their Bible”!

Reading the words of the prophets’ today is not a luxury, it is not a moment to engage in critical analysis of whether they existed, it is not to debate their ideas. Immersing ourselves in the life, the times, the words of the prophet is to immerse ourselves in this very moment, to be aware of the times we are living in, and to hear the call of the divine, to wake up to the spirit of the laws given to us at Sinai, to understand that “do not steal” has so many meanings and nuances to it, that the words at Sinai, like the experience of Sinai, was/is experienced by each person differently and uniquely. We need everyone’s authentic experience of the Voice that comes from Sinai today as well as the authentic experience of We the People when reading the Biblical recounting of this experience.


The words of the prophets are also experiences of the Voice from Sinai speaking to a new generation-OURS- calling out to us to “return” to the ways given to us, to “return” to our covenant with the ineffable One and with one another. The prophet is giving us the gift of revelation and We the People continue to ignore it! How utterly ridiculous, egotistical, and ignorant of We the People, hence we find ourselves in a world where lying is celebrated, graft and grift are deemed good, smart qualities, where reneging on the promise of America is glorified, where Israel has become a blight unto the nations instead of a light. This is the result of years and years of ignoring the speech of the prophets, of shunting them to the side by the Rabbis and Sages, of fearing them by Clergy of all stripes.

Hearing and understanding, listening and guarding the words of the prophet is the closest We the People can come to the experience at Sinai! Their words and thoughts, actions and truth are, for We the People an authentic experience of what is rattling around in our souls, the essence of our inner life that we keep ignoring, clouding up with our rational minds (which is supposed to be a servant to our soul), and using criticism rather than critical thinking to hide from the truth of who we are, what our mission is, and living into it.

Why have We the People ignored the call of the prophets, the Word from Sinai? Because we are more interested in our place in society than we are in our place in our lives, in the world. We have become obsessed to the extremes of narcissism, of egotism, of cruelty, of unkindness, of mendacity, so that we can exert our power absolutely- the words of Samuel come to mind and ring so true. Looking into the mirror, seeing the reflection of our souls, experiencing the words of the prophets, allowing their revelations to open our eyes and our spirits to the truth that lies within each one of We the People is the solution to the situation we face today.

80 years ago, Dwight D. Eisenhower told his people to film what they were seeing at the Concentration Camps they were liberating because “years from now people will deny this happened”. The prophets called out the wealthy, the priests, the kings, so that We the People would be brought out of the slavery of autocracy, the cruelty of Solomon, the hatred between the sons of Jacob and their words, their stories, like all of the words and stories in the Bible are the “film”  for We the People to prevent the denial of goodness, to prevent the spread and worship of evil as good, to stop the horrific treatment of the stranger, the poor, the needy from happening again. We the People have failed in our mission to be “a light unto the nations”, we have failed in hearing the call of the prophets ie the call from the divine. AND, We the People are given the solution from the prophets: TSHUVAH! When We return, we are welcomed back, when we return we are healed, when we return, we get another opportunity to hear, listen, understand that freedom, justice, kindness, truth, love are our God-given rights!

In my almost 39 years of studying the prophets, I can attest to their veracity, to their understanding of return, to their words and deeds helping to keep me free, not totally as my ego, my traits that are still out of proper measure, still win the day at times, just a lot less of the time! I am in line with the prophets words and direction about 90% of my days now and it is an experience of supreme JOY and devastating ANGUISH. Seeing how the world is, watching in horror the cruelty that abounds from Jew and Gentile alike causes me grief, sorrow and anguish. Experiencing the goodness of people, the simple acts of kindnesses, participating in same gifts me with JOY, LOVE, and BELONGING! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

P.S. I am taking next week off from writing-visiting my grandson and daughter for his Birthday week! See you next Sunday!

Comment

Comment

Reclaiming our Inheritance left to us by the Prophets - Year 4 Day 279

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 279

“THE PROPHET IS A WATCHMAN (Hos. 9:8), a servant (Amos 3”37. Jer. 25:4. 26:5), a messenger of God (Hag. 1:13), an assayer and tester of the people’s ways (Jer. 6:27)…The prophet’s eye is directed to the contemporary scene; the society and its conduct are the main theme of his speeches.” (Thunder in the Soul pg.31-32)

I admit that I am a little (?) obsessed with the prophets! The words above, this description of their ways, their vision, their courage, their insights, their ability to converse(?) with God in such intimate ways is the goal that We the People strive for, whether we believe in God or not! One of the beautiful things about the prophets is their words, their calls, their demands are for the benefit of society, for the benefit of the individual, for all of We the People being able to live with ourselves and with one another in a healthier, more productive, kinder fashion.

The challenge/demand of the prophets for us, their inheritors, is for all of We the People be watchers; all of us look at the world we live in and see if it is living up to the standards of kindness, justice, truth, love, compassion. We the People are being called to account for the ways in which we “treat the stranger”, “care for the poor, the needy”, do business and live life in a “kosher” manner, ie in a way that is fitting and proper, “do justly, love mercy” and walk in the ways of the Ineffable One, in the ways our souls tell us is the right path.

What we are seeing right now is that We the People have FAILED in our jobs as watch people. We have allowed the fox in the hen house and we are at a loss as to how to stop the killing, the abusing, the stealing, the cruelty, be it here in America or in Israel, or anywhere in the world where the autocrats, conservative and/or progressive, are in charge. YET, IT IS NOT TOO LATE! We the People, like the prophets before us, both in Biblical times and throughout history, can stand up and say NO to tyranny, NO to cruelty, NO to xenophobia, NO to the bastardization of Moses’ teachings, of Christ’s teachings and ways, to the Voice on Sinai that keeps broadcasting truth and love which has been turned into hate and falsehoods by the Idolators at our gates, just like the priests did for the ruling class in the times of the prophets. We the People, can and, I would add, must do differently than our ancestor; heed the words of the prophets of the Bible and their descendants here (aka all of us) and take the actions they provide for us, follow Justice, Love, Truth, Kindness and Mercy all the days of our lives and demand the same from our communities, from our elected officials and never give up our freedoms again, like we did in Egypt!

When We the People truly come to grips with the Spiritual Malady that has infected society, our daily living, and our treatment of both one another AND the ways we treat ourselves, our inner lives, then We will seek out the “physicians of the soul” as Maimonidies calls spiritual counselors. It is imperative for the Clergy of today to do their own TShuvah, their own Chesbon HaNefesh so they can quality for the task ahead-heal the spiritual bankruptcy of We the People. It is a big job, a huge task and the only one that truly matters to any and all clergy who know, like the prophets, that being a member of the Clergy is a privilege, a calling, a purpose and a passion. It is knowing that our employer is not the Board of Directors, not the Bishop, not the Pope, our employer is God, our job is to care for the souls and the conduct of God’s ‘children’-it is not to advance the political agenda of MAGA, it is not to promote a political agenda of hate, prejudice, etc. This is another of the challenges of this moment.

Thank God we have the “servants” who want to fulfill this role for the rest of We the People! Reading and listening to the amount of people who are declaring the  current practices to be UnAmerican, to be autocratic, to be enslaving, to be unjust is heartening, it keeps growing. The issue facing We the People is how to grow our souls so that when these assholes are out of office/power, how do We the People not repeat the ways of autocracy that have been unique to the left? SPIRITUAL HEALING is the only response. For us to immerse ourselves in the inheritance the prophets gifted us, We the People have to heal our inner lives, We get to develop our hearing so our souls’ voice is louder, or at least overrides, the noise in our rational minds. We the People are being called by this moment to develop faith in what we “know in our guts/kishkas” and live into this knowing rather than the rationalizations of our mind, the whims of our false egos. Without this education, without this healing, then, how long will it be until We the People realize we have willingly walked into hell?

I have been engaged in spiritual counseling for myself and being a spiritual counselor for another for the past 38 years. I also was blessed to have my father speak to my soul as a youth. I know the importance of this work, I am angry that my colleagues are not doing more of this work, I am outraged that the Seminaries are not promoting this work as a basic function of the ‘job’. I am also in disbelief that Boards of Directors think they know what constitutes a ‘Jewish’ institution. Especially when they are all about the money and ‘the optics’. I truly believe in Spiritual Counseling, I truly believe we have more to learn from the prophets than is being taught precisely because their disgust at the ways We the People were/are acting is too much for the people in power to deal with-the reflection back from the mirror of the prophets is not one they want to see! YET, I still minister to people, I write each day hoping someone hears and a spark is lit. I am powerless over the results and powerful to do my part. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Do you "suffer with" those who experience injustice, are you a perpetrator of injustice for you own gain? Year 4 Day 278

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 278

“The prophet disdains those for whom God’s presence is comfort and security; to him it is a challenge, an incessant demand. God is compassion, not compromise; justice, though not inclemency. The prophet’s predictions can always be proved wrong by a change in man’s conduct, but never the certainty that God is full of compassion.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 31)

I have continued with this passage because I concentrated on only the first sentence yesterday. The difference between compassion and compromise is great and important. To have compassion, as I am understanding Rabbi Heschel this morning, is to “suffer with”, to feel the burden that another person is carrying, since the root of the word for compassion in Hebrew also means womb. To compromise, one needs to give up on a principle, on a belief, to make concessions that may not be holy, good, or right. While compromise is important and good and holy and right at times, it is not a substitute for compassion and it is certainly not what God’s compassion in all about. Divine Pathos, divine compassion is the goal for We the People to strive for, it is embedded in each and every mitzvah, it is the centerpiece of T’Shuvah, it is the acknowledgement of our human imperfections and frailties.

The prophets are prime examples of divine compassion! This just occurred to me as what is more compassionate than telling all of us that We the People are better than our worst mistakes, that We the People do not have to be defined by our past errors, no matter what society says. What can be more compassionate that calling from the rooftops that God wants us back, that God will heal our shortcomings, that God loves us with all of our flaws and errors, that God keeps the gates of T’Shuvah open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year! What can be more compassionate than taking up the cause of the stranger, the widow, the orphan, the poor and the needy? What can be more compassionate than speaking truth to power? What can be more compassionate than NOT standing idly by the blood of our neighbors? What can be more compassionate than rebuking us so we can change, rebuking us because of the faith that We the People can do better and are better than cruelty, grifting, murdering the soul of another(s), putting stumbling blocks before the blind and cursing the deaf! While the prophets’ language is considered harsh at times, isn’t it compassionate to speak to people in the ways they can hear? Isn’t it compassionate to love humankind so much that one is willing to take the wrath of We the People when speaking truth to them? Isn’t it divine pathos and compassion to love God so much that one is willing to go to jail for spreading the Word? I am aware that this is a radical thought.

“Justice, though not inclemency” is another wonderful phrase. It describes perfectly one of the main themes of the Bible. God believes in and practices “justice”, teaches human beings what justice is and how to administer it AND, it is not to be harsh, it is not to be inclement. Hence, arguing with Abraham about Sodom and Gomorrah, Jethro telling Moses to find “God-fearing men, men of truth” to be judges over the people, “Do not pervert justice, don’t take a bribe, don’t favor someone you know, add righteousness/charity in to make a righteous judgement”. Justice is not to be harsh nor cruel, in fact, even though the Rabbis want to use the Bible as a weapon at times, thanks to Ezra and some of the editors who put the Bible together(as my friend and teacher Rabbi Danny Maseng has taught me)! Justice is not to be pursued to hurt another human being, it is not to be perverted as it is now, and probably always has been. Justice is not to be used as “retribution” as Trump is proclaiming and Bondi-Patel are carrying out. Justice can never be achieved behind a mask and by manhandling people, it can never be lauded for targeted prosecution because of the color of a person’s skin, the license plates on their cars(as has happened to a few Canadians here), or for any other reason.

We the People are descendants of the prophets, we are their heirs and it is WAY past time for us to live into their teachings, their ways, and find our own unique modus operandi to spread the word. It is not their words we need to spread, it is not our own words we need to spread, rather it is the WORDS that are continually coming from Sinai, the words and deeds in the Bible that teach us how to live together in harmony, in respect, with dignity for self and for every human being. We the People are being called to “tear down the wall” between callousness and compassion, between inclemency and justice, between compromise and divine pathos. We the People have to demand of ourselves, the elected officials, the people whitewashing Hamas and the Arabs like Linda Sarsour, TRUTH, JUSTICE, COMPASSION not the bullshit lies and grifts being promoted by both extremes. We the People are being called to hear the prophets words, heed them and live into them so America will continue to be a democracy and Israel will live the promise of their Declaration of Independence.

I look at myself and see when I was not compassionate, not just, not kind and it hurts me. My spiritual awakening did not cure me of never doing these ugly actions. It has made me think more before I am about to do something, it helps me realize when I am compassionate, just and kind, when I am in truth and when I am not. Divine Pathos is a path I follow, compassion, justice, truth, kindness has allowed me to not have any resentments, to do my T’Shuvah without any expectations and be sad when I see people who are still stuck in their shit. I continue to live into the prophets words and ways and my gratitude for being alive shows in my compassion, my engagement/fight for justice and living in truth. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Comfort, security or Challenge, incessant demand: how do you experience God's Presence? Year 4 Day 277

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 277

“The prophet disdains those for whom God’s presence is comfort and security; to him it is a challenge, an incessant demand. God is compassion, not compromise; justice, though not inclemency. The prophet’s predictions can always be proved wrong by a change in man’s conduct, but never the certainty that God is full of compassion.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 31)

In a world filled with so many versions and conflicting visions of God, these words above can come to remind all of us that God is NOT HUMAN! God is the wind, the spirit, the Ineffable and to define God is humanity’s way of trying to control people. God’s spirit, presence is throughout the Bible and in our lives today-the difference between King David and today’s oligarchs and MAGA’s, Bibi and Putin is King David knew God’s presence, knew God’s compassion, knew God’s “incessant demand” for justice, kindness, compassion, truth, and love. The aforementioned people seemingly do not! Listening to the Fire and Brimstone Preachers, the Prosperity Gospel Preachers, the “it is written” Rabbis, and every other fundamentalist can bring We the People to an erroneous conclusion, image of God. Their vision of God is one of either ‘just have faith and your actions don’t matter as much cause you are going to heaven’ or ‘you are born in sin and you live in sin and you will die in sin and go to hell’ or ‘it is written in the Torah and we have to do everything that is written, so I have to do nothing but study and you have to pay my expenses so I can study and tell you how to live’! In other words- We the People have been fed so much bullshit by ‘those righteous people’ that we have come to rely on someone else to tell us what God is saying, what we are to do, think, feel about God and about how to live-BULLSHIT!

“God’s presence” is both “a challenge, an incessant demand” and “comfort and security” to those of us who seek to respond to the “challenge, the demand”. Without experiencing “God’s presence”, those of us who ‘know’, would be lost and wandering, ready to assimilate and give up, become like the “lost tribes of Israel”, roaming the earth looking for the place where we belong. The prophet’s “disdain” is because the Bible is replete with stories of arguing with God, wrestling with God, with the growth of our relationship with God and God’s relationship with human beings. Living with “God’s presence” is never easy, nor comforting in the ‘it’s okay baby’ way. The comfort comes from knowing one belongs in one’s skin, one is capable of living a life compatible with being a partner with God, with experiencing one’s purpose and passion, meaning and unique talent/gift. And, this “comfort” is the cause of great consternation, great distress when we shirk our responsibility to live our authentic life rather than the one that is expedient. It is distressing when a human being witnesses another so lost that they believe the lie is the truth, the evil is the good, cruelty is kindness, slavery is freedom, etc. When Ron DiSantis claims slavery was good for Black people and this should be taught in Florida’s schools and claims to be a ‘good christian’ who ‘reads his bible daily’, we know how far down the rabbit hole he has fallen and, so have all the people who support him, who agree with him and who give him power. The same is true of good old Mike Johnson who makes false claims about the Bible daily and has no compunction about lying, cheating, stealing, treating the stranger, the poor, the needy with disdain, hatred, cruelty-which is the EXACT OPPOSITE of what the Bible teaches.

The prophets spoke truth to power in their day and it is high time for We the People to do the same in our time. We the People, are being challenged, not by God, by the idolators, the autocrats, the Pharaohs of our moment to stand up for what is true and good or to sit down, take the shit they are throwing at us and hope for some scraps, some hand-me-downs from their grift, their theft. We the People have to say NO to this bullshit, We the People have to clean out our clogged ears, clear out our noisy mind that is listening to the bullshit and believing it, do angioplasty on our spiritual arteries so our soul’s voice comes through and SHEMA, listen, hear, and understand the “incessant demand” of the Voice from Sinai. The Rabbis were afraid of the prophets, even though they quoted them, sort of taught them, they were afraid if the prophets were taken seriously, the people would revolt against them, would reject the dogma they were pushing and have their own experiences of “God’s presence” and follow their calling rather than the calling of the Rabbis, rather than the calling of the people who wanted power. The same is true of Christianity and Islam-it is the people who fucked up the beauty, the truth, the knowing of the Bible and their faiths, not religion itself. We the People have to take back the spirit of the Bible, the visions of the prophets and the Word of God in our own unique fashion, like the Israelites did after crossing the Red Sea and at Mount Sinai. If we are to survive this crisis of idolatry being perpetrated in the US, in Israel, across the globe, We the People have to live into our inheritance from the prophets.

I ran from the “challenge”, the “incessant demand” and had to drink myself into oblivion to be able to ‘rationalize’ my evil ways, my turning my back on truth, justice, etc. I know how incessant the Voice from Sinai is and it took me 20 years to finally surrender to it, to allow “God’s presence” to envelop me, to change me, to point me in the direction I was meant to go in. Since that moment in Dec. 1986, I have lived with an “incessant demand” within me to seek truth, to speak truth to power and to do so without fear nor favor. I have not always been right and I have waded into areas blindly because injustice, mendacity, bullshit drive me nuts. I no longer need to seek solace in booze, I find joy, meaning, love, connection and belonging in the presence of God and those whom I share life with, friends, family, fellow learners, community. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Indifferent to the "monstrosity of inequality" is the downfall of freedom - Year 4 Day 276

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 4 Day 276

“That equality is a good thing, a fine goal, may be generally accepted. What is lacking is a sense of the monstrosity of inequality. Seen from the perspective of prophetic faith, the predicament of justice is the predicament of God.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 54)

8 Democratic Senators caved into the whims of Donald Trump and proved his message; “the Democrats are weak” to be true. While it is also true that playing “chicken” with a group who want to crash the car, the system is a losing game, these 8 Senators got nothing in return except some bullshit promise they could get a vote on renewing the ACA subsidies sometime and maybe the House of Representatives will take it up. These 8 Senators are the proof-text of what is written above: they lack “a sense of the monstrosity of inequality”! The current administration revels in “the monstrosity of inequality” and We the People voted them in!!! WTF???

What is it in our upbringing, in our faith traditions, in our schooling that gives rise to this seemingly robust love affair with “inequality”? I believe it begins at home and at our synagogues, churches, mosques, temples. When young people hear about the ways we have been victimized because of our skin color, our religion, our socio-economic status, etc they usually decide either: “why bother” or “I am gonna get mine”. What is missing is the dinner table discussions about the rule of law, the mitzvot that teach us how to be more human each day, the 365 actions we are taught not to take and the 248 actions we are taught to take. Rather than speak about the need for Justice, the need for Righteousness, the need for seeking to live the Holy, dinner table discussions are about how someone screwed me over, or how I ‘jewed’ them down, or  they will get theirs, and other such thoughts. Rather than seek out Truth, we are fed ‘alternative facts’, rather than believe what we are seeing, we believe the words of the “leader”, “der fuhrer”. Rather than accept that we are all responsible and, in this case, guilty of accepting “the monstrosity of inequality” as normal and okay.

The fact that more of We the People are not outraged at “the monstrosity of inequality” being perpetrated upon all of us, bewilders me, upsets me, and I wonder where the Clergy who have pulpits, who have congregants, who have followers are  and what they are doing to call this situation out, to stand up and say NO to this evil, to stop being indifferent to “the monstrosity of inequality” that we are seeing every single day of this current administration, and, in full disclosure, that has been present since the founding of our Country. This moment, this administration is making “the monstrosity of inequality” their goal, their modus operandi and reveling in it. This is the difference and some 30+% of We the People are applauding and going along with it, not realizing we are the ones who will experience “the monstrosity of inequality” next and, maybe, harder than those whom this part of We the People call our enemies.

Plaques commemorating African American soldiers fighting against Nazi Germany in Europe have been removed from a U.S. military cemetery in the Netherlands is the latest headline to validate the war on equality being waged by Trump et al. Worse is that these are “good god-fearing christians” just like the Klan were and they bastardize Christ, Moses, the entire Biblical narrative and teachings to carry out their “monstrosity of inequality”, not accepting that the righteous justice is a command from God, that justice denied to one is justice denied to all, to paraphrase Martin Luther King Jr. We the People can no longer claim our commitment to freedom, our belief in God, our faithfulness to a higher power, our following our higher consciousness and allow for “the monstrosity of inequality” to continue to grow and flourish. We the People are being called not just by the words above, rather we are being called to STAND THE FUCK UP for Godliness, for Holiness, for Decency, for Freedom, for the Souls of ourselves and another(s). Isn’t it time for We the People to finally STAND WITH GOD rather than with the autocrat, STAND WITH JUSTICE rather than reveling in injustice, STAND with TRUTH rather than continue to live in mendacity?!?

I believe this is the moment for “all good people to come to the aid of their country”, otherwise we will not have a country that is a little better to leave to our children. We will be leaving them a country and a way of living that they will have to rebel against, that they will have to break the yoke of slavery and hatred, inequality and mendacity, they will have to do TShuvah for our wanton display of whoring ourselves after the newest, shiniest, god. This is not the legacy my father’s generation left to me, they left me with a lot of shit and they left me with the legacy of fighting injustice in Germany and Poland, in Mississippi and in Cleveland, Ohio. While my father saw “the monstrosity of inequality” first hand when he was in the Army and growing up a proud Jew, he fought against it when he made sure the pay of the Black men of the business he had just bought was equal to the pay of the white men-which when he took over it wasn’t! The white men quit and no white man would work for the N——-lover! My father stood up against “the monstrosity of inequality” and raised his boys to see the content of character that a person possessed, not their skin color. This was the way he treated not only people of color, this is the way he did business, always in a ‘kosher way’. This is the legacy he left for us, his sons and his daughter. My siblings have continue to live this way, and, while I was late to this party, I live fighting against “the monstrosity of inequality” each and every day. I stand in solidarity with the “predicament of God”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment