GHOSTING GOD, GHOSTING SELF- Day 5

Ghosting God, Ghosting Self

Day 5

I was talking with Harriet about my new blog-which she likes, Thank God, and I said that the entire Bible is the story of Ghosting God, Ghosting Self, finding and connecting to God, finding and connecting to self, and then the cycle begins again! Immersing ourselves in the Bible gives us the insight to see how easy it is to Ghost God, Ghost self, and how difficult it can be to return. Hence, the Rabbis teach that T’Shuvah was put into the world before the world was created and I add: Because God knew we would fuck up and need a way back! Unfortunately, most of us do not avail ourselves of the path back to God, back to authentic self, choosing to Ghost God and our self - just read the prophets, listen to news, watch what they do, not what they say!

Continuing with the Biblical story of Noah, his son Ham saw his nakedness, whatever one understands this to mean, and is cursed for it. Noah’s other two sons, Shem and Japheth, cover their father up and are praised for it. Maybe the Rabbis got it wrong! Maybe Ham is the hero here for not “covering up” his father’s errors, not “covering up” his father’s alcoholism, not hiding from the truth of what is! Maybe Noah, Japheth, and Shem were Ghosting God, Ghosting their self when they cursed Ham, maybe they had to curse their ‘enemy’ for their own bad behavior! Sound familiar?! The hypocrisy of Noah, the incongruence of the Rabbis, the ridiculous need to make the people in the Bible ‘perfect’ is antithetical to the truth, the real lesson of the Bible: Human beings will err, we will fuck up AND God heals our backsliding, God takes us back in love-as soon as we turn back and stop Ghosting God, Ghosting our authentic self- read Jeremiah and Hosea.

The hypocrisy of the Republicans in elected office in this moment is as monumental, as ridiculous as the Rabbis cleaning up the messiness of our Biblical characters. The Trump sons are making money hand over fist selling shit to our Government, making side deals with our allies and our enemies, using their father’s name and influence to land lucrative contracts, become part of companies they know NOTHING about. Anyone remember Hunter Biden and the Republicans? Anyone remember Hillary Clinton and the Republicans? There is no shame to their game, they are brazen in their hypocrisy, in their incongruence, and we are the ones to suffer from their actions-while Donny, Don Jr., Eric, Jared, Ivanka all get richer! THESE ARE THE PEOPLE some ‘fine christian nationalist clergy’ declare our Christ’s messenger? WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE??

Where are the Jews condemning Howard Lutnick? Where are the Jews condemning Bibi Netanyahu, where are the Jews condemning Stephen Miller, where are the Jews railing about the theft of our money-paying off Jan.6 rioters-, the insider trading going on Kashi, etc? Where are the Jews condemning the indiscriminate killing of Lebanese, Iranian, and Gaza’s civilian populations? WHERE ARE THE JEWS?? This hypocrisy is, to me, the worst of all! We Jews are the people who first brought to light the “narrow place” of Egypt, first brought to light the “narrow place” of inner slavery, the “narrow place” of idol worship, of bowing down to a mere mortal, the “narrow place” of ignoring the infinite dignity of ALL human beings, the uniqueness of ALL human beings and now, We are the people who are going along to get along, we are the people that are “covering up” the wrongs of the State of Israel, the wrongs of Trump and his ‘mafia family’?? WHAT THE FUCK FELLOW JEWS?

I know these narrow places, I lived in them prior to my recovery some 39 years ago. As I grew up in prison, as I learned and learned anew the lessons of Noah and the flood, I realized prison was my flood time, it was the time for me to begin to “get clean” of my lies, of my unrealistic fears, and begin to re-learn how to live as a decent human being. It also was the moment when I knew I could not hide if I was to be a father to Heather, a sibling, a son, etc. I have stayed true to this awareness-not always doing the next right thing, sometimes coming up with excuses, and never hiding who I am and/or what I am thinking. It is not always popular, I am usually very messy and I WILL NOT COVER UP what is, I WILL NOT COVER UP the TRUTH. I WILL NOT STAND IDLY BY while the lies, the destruction of freedom is happening.

ACTION STEPS:

1. Ask yourself: What am I covering up and what is the reason I am doing this

2. Look around you, at home, at work and SEE how people are hiding from you and you from them

3. What about TRUTH scares you so much that you rather hide/be a slave than be free?

4. What is your fear of doing T’Shuvah each day

GOD BLESS and STOP GHOSTING GOD and SELF, Rabbi Mark

Ghosting God, Ghosting Self

Ghosting God, Ghosting Self

Day 4

Watching the “news”, listening to the pundits, reading the in-depth reporting in newspapers, magazines like The New Yorker, the Atlantic, the Guardian, it seems as if many human beings are DRUNK! Having survived Covid, it seems as if the reaction of so many of we the people is to get drunk, ala Noah! While the majority of we the people may not have a substance abuse problem, a drinking problem, it is CRYSTAL CLEAR that a substantial majority of we the people have the “ism”, the “stinking thinking”, the belief that we are entitled to be bulllies, be cruel, be invasive, seek power, and be like we the people were before the FLOOD! While shit happens in the Bible, there is also an underlying and, at times, obvious correlation between the choices of we the people and the resulting consequences, both good and not-so-good. Most of the not-so-good consequences are the result of not-so-good choices made in our drunken stupor of believing we are God, we can control God, we have the “‘right’ to do whatever we fucking want to do-who is going to stop me?” This is not a new phenomena, look at Jacob, his sons, Korach, Kings Saul and David, King Solomon, etc. It is precisely what the prophets scream at We the People about and, like our ancestors, we the people are too drunk with our own deceptions, self and the ones we buy into, to hear them, to follow them, to learn from them! This is one of the greatest tragedies of humankind-our inablity to hear, learn, follow the gift of the prophets: how to live a life compatible with being a partner of God’s in perfecting creation!

The name Noah means comfort and it is a “polar opposite” verb because the Bible uses the same word to express God’s regret at creating human beings once God witnesses the cruelty, the entitlement, the savagery we the people perpetrate upon one another. Noah’s story is both an uplifting one and a warning; Noah is a righteous human being in a generation of degenerates! It is hard to be decent when all around you is indecency, is cruelty, is thievery, is power grabs, is enslavement by ‘the man’. Yet, he was and this is what God “found comfort in” and the lesson for We the People is simple and profound: Stand for what is good and right no matter what is happening around you. This is the message of Noah, I believe, and it is the message that keeps emanating from Mount Sinai, keeps reverberating in the spiritual and moral universe We the People can attune our ears to. We the People are not doomed to be cruel, to be ruled by the multitude of Pharaohs that present themselves to us, by the dictates of our “hearts and eyes”. We the People do not have to “drunk” on our power, on our entitlement, on our sense of importance, on our being a victim, on our victimizing another(s), on…. There is a program of Recovery for all of humanity: it is called Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Eastern Philosophy, etc. I am not speaking of the rituals, the bullshit of ‘looking good’, the lies of the prosperity gospel, the bullshit that killing innocents gets you 70 Virgins in heaven, the desecration of God’s Name done by the far-right Jews who claim it is “G’Shriben”, written in the Torah to kill Palestinans, that they are less than human! Talk about BEING DRUNK, these liars, these false prophets, these bastardizers, are KILLING the TRUTH, trying to upend the democratic underpinnings that the Exodus began that the experience at Sinai gave us the blueprint of, and We the People, like multitudes of families have done with the drunk in their midst: SAY NO!

One of my favorite phrases to people is: I will support your recovery and I will not help you kill yourself or anyone else. My own drunkeness caused so much damage to people I genuinely cared about, it sullied my family name that my father and grandfather were so dilligent about building, it caused my daughter to not be able to trust while desperately wanting to trust, it made people much more cautious about helping someone else after I took advantage of their vulnerabilities, I was a fucking HORROR SHOW! Hence: listening to Hegseth, Trump, et al, Bibi, Smotrich, et al, Putin, MBS, et al, Kushner, Wytkoff et al, I keep wondering: WHEN IS CONGRESS GOING TO DO THE INTERVENTION that the Constitution calls for? WHEN ARE WE THE PEOPLE going to demand that our governing bodies SOBER UP, DO THEIR JOBS, RECOVER FROM THEIR ENTITLEMENT, THEIR LIES, THEIR DRUNKENNESS? When are they going to do their T’Shuvah, their Amends, have a plan to do things differently? When are the democrats going to have a PLAN of RECOVERY from their mealy-mouthed, attack-dog ways and give We the People a choice?

ACTION STEPS:
1) Do an Inventory of your personal Drunkenness-being rigorously truthful with your self

2) Do an inventory of self-deceptive ways you hide from God, from another(s), from your authentic self

3) Choose a path of recovery from the paths of indecency, inhumanity, drunkenness you are engaging in

4) Make a Plan of recovery, find a friend, group of people, a spiritual guide to help you along the way-to “sponsor” your becoming more human

GOD BLESS and STOP GHOSTING GOD and SELF, Rabbi Mark

How do you learn- from another, from history, or only from your own experience? Day 3

Ghosting God, Ghosting Self

Day 3

Iran, Israel, Tariffs, Affordability, Gasoline Prices, College debt, Lying, are not new issues for America nor the world. Throughout history, there have been countries who want to conquer another country, who want to take the fruits of another’s work and make it their own. Since the beginning we have had floods of nature, floods of cruelty, floods of entitlement, floods of violence, floods of kindness, floods of love, floods of betrayals, floods of faithfulness. Yet, We the People refuse to learn from our ancestors, we have adopted some idiotic societal norm of “having to learn it myself” because at our core, we the people have not accepted that truth is to trusted, not denied!

When Adam and Eve learned to ‘see’ after eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, their innocence died and their deceptions began. Rather than learn from the negative consequences of their actions, we the people have continued to hide, continued to disobey when disobediance goes against our best interests, and continue to blame another for our woes, ‘she made me do it, the devil made me do it’! Isn’t it WAY PAST TIME to learn the lesson of the Garden of Eden? Isn’t it WAY PAST TIME to answer “Hineni”(here I am) to the call from God, from a stranger, from a friend? According to some, Jared, Donny, JD, Pete the drunk, Todd, Marco, et al NO! The despot, the authoritarian is banking (literally and figuratively) on we the people not learning from our history, not disobeying their dictates, not coming out of hiding. They do this with good reason because we the people, historically, have given the dictator a wide berth before finally rebelling-since the days of being in Egypt till today!

We the People are created in the Image of God, we have infinite dignity and value, we are equal in dignity and value to every human being, we all have unique gifts and talents that no one else can replicate-hence we are all needed for the world to function correctly. At issue today is the same issue that was prevailing in the prophet’s time: CORRUPTION in the Name of God, War for the sake of God, Economic Injustice, Legal Injustice, the pursuit of pleasure, power, money rather than the pursuit of truth, justice, mercy, etc. We the People failed to hear and change then and we the people are failing ONCE AGAIN- WHAT THE FUCK, PEOPLE!?!?!??! The spiritual and moral health of a human being and a nation is to be measured by the treatment of the “waterbearer”, the person who is the ‘lowest’ on the economic scale. Since the beginning of this experiment called the United States, we the people have failed to protect the most vulnerable, we have failed to “love the stranger”, we have failed to care for the needy, the poor, the sick, all while proclaiming We are a God Fearing People! The parallels to Ancient Israel, to Ancient Judea are astounding and the current crop of Clergy-Jewish, Christian, Muslim- don’t seem to be able to call this bullshit out! Instead, the people who claim to have been called to serve God, human beings, are more interested in serving the Rich, the Powerful, the LIE!

Bibi is as big a liar as the Pharaoh in Egypt! Trump is as interested in violence as we the people who were destroyed in the flood! Putin is as interrested in absolute power and wealth as King Solomon! We the People are being called to STAND UP and FIGHT FOR WHAT IS TRUE AND RIGHT. We the People are inheritors of the spiritual essence of the prophets, their words, their power, their strength, their knowing that their destiny is to serve! We the People have within us the history of our ancestors standing up to Hitler and the Nazis, think about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising that is now Yom HaShoah. We the People have the knowing that England was defeated by the 13 Colonies against all odds. It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to use our inherited knowing, our inherited strength, our inherited spiritual power to say NO to the Lies, NO to the Cruelty, NO to the mistreatment of the poor, the stranger, the needy, NO to the graft and thievery of ‘der Fuhrers’, NO to the part of us that tells us to shush, don’t make waves. It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to say YES to the call of Ayecha, YES to the call to Pursue Justice, Righteousness, YES to the call to Love our Neighbor, YES to the call to BE HOLY, YES to the Truth, YES to GOD! Anything else is Ghosting God and Ghosting our Self

ACTION STEPS:

1. Read/Re-read the Bible, the words of Jesus and find the wisdom you are lacking

2. Write down a Plan of Action to fulfill the divine needs expressed in the above wisdom books

3. At every meal go over the Plan of Action, making sure you are on course and making whatever course corrections needed

4. Honor the wisdom that you have inherited, the courage of our ancestors who took great risks so we, their descendants, could live free

GOD BLESS and STOP GHOSTING GOD AND SELF, Rabbi Mark

How are you forming "a more perfect union" with good, how are you forming a more perfect union with not good?

Ghosting God, Ghosting Self

Day 2

“We the People in order to form a more perfect union establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America” is not only the beginning of the U.S. Constitution, it is the theme of the entire Bible. The “more perfect union” is the one we are forming with God, with higher consciousness, with our intuitive mind, with our inner life. When we the people abandon this “more perfect union” for our selfish, self-centered, self-deceptions we the people suffer. And it is, of course, not only the individual, it is the people around them and depending on one’s position, it could be an entire country, world-as we are witnessing right now.

My particular target this morning is not just Donald Trump and his minions, it is the clergy that buy the bullshit, that placate people in power for their own needs. There is a Bible Reading Marathon happening where Trump is reading from II Chronicles 7:14 “If my people who are called by My name, shall humble themselves, and pray, seek my face, turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sin and heal their land.” CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS?? TALK ABOUT GHOSTING GOD, GHOSTING SELF! These ‘fine christian fellows’ are using a verse from the Bible to intuit the divinity of the United States, they are using a known idolator to deliver the message and NONE OF THEM are the least bit interested in:

1. “humble themselves” they would rather brag about themselves, their ‘big beautiful bill that has cost Americans a fortune while perserving the money for the richest 1%! Trump goes on and on about “my ballroom”, ignoring the disastor happening in the Middle East, ignoring that Russia and China are helping Iran and watching the rot and decay of this braggard tear down 85 years of alliance building, strengthening of democracy across the globe. WTF- PEOPLE??!!

2. “pray”, in Hebrew is a reflexive verb, it means to look at oneself from the inside out, to judge one’s actions and do the necessary repairs for our errors, relearn what the next right thnk to do is and make the amends we need to in order to restore the dignity and balance of another human being. It is not a PETITIONARY experience, it is a reflexive one-Pete Hegseth!

3. “turn from their evil ways” doesn’t seem to be a major concern for Trump, for his ‘spiritual advisors’, for his ‘good church going, synagogue going’ cult followers. Instead, as we see with his sons, with Jared Kushner, using the pretext of negotiating a ceasefire with Iran to meet with Arab leaders and get money for their business’ is more important that “the common defense”! “Domestic tranquility, general welfare, blessings of liberty” are to be reserved for themselves, their thugs, and fuck the rest of us, who cares if Americans are dying in this Iranian War Trump started, certainly not Trump, not Kushner, not Vance-they are more concerned with teaching the Pope Christian Theology!! REALLY PEOPLE?!

While it is easy and convenient to blame the assholes in charge, it is more correct to hold the assholes who elected these self-centered, egotistical, deceptive, wannabe Mafia Dons to office, giving them the power to promote their lying, cheating ways for their benefit and not to “establish justice”. It is we the people who, when God calls have been hiding. It is we the people who reject “a more perfect union” that the U.S. Constitution calls for and the Bible demands. From the beginning, Adam hides once his eyes are opened, he uses “the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil” to do more evil, to hide, to deceive and we the people have never learned the lesson to BE TRANSPARENT, to BE AUTHENTIC and there is no authentically evil human being. Of course We the People commit evil acts and We are created “in the image of God” with “the spirit of God” breathed into us; ergo-We the People cannot be born evil, the evilness we the people purpetrate is “learned from our youth” and We the People do not have to learn these lessons and/or can do T’Shuvah and unlearn them! This is the challenge We the People are being given: AYECHA, WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?

ACTION STEPS:

1. Learn from your spiritual counselor/guide what truth is and wrestle with your spiritual friend to find the truth in your daily actions

2. At every meal, ask your SELF, how am I answering God’s call of Ayecha; when am I saying Hineni-here I am and when am I, like Adam, hiding?

3. Each evening, write down the ways I participated in forming “a more perfect union” with God, with myself, with my community

4. Each night write down the ways I participated in selfish, self-centered ways of deception, greed, graft, and what I am going to do to repair and change.

GOD BLESS and STOP GHOSTING GOD and SELF, Rabbi Mark

NEW BLOG: Ghosting God, Ghosting Self- an exploration of hiding and coming out

Ghosting God, Ghosting Selt

Good morning! This is the first day of my newest Blog: Ghosting God, Ghosting Self. I am going to be putting this blog along with my other writing together, with the amazing aid of my writing coach, Gay Walley, in a book later this year. The themes will vary from day to day, the throughline is: recovering our prophetic voice and taking the actions this voice nags at us to do.

The term “ghosting” is used when there seems to have been a relationship and then all of sudden one of the parties to the relationship goes ‘dark’ and is incommunicato, unable to be reached. I believe this is what is happening in our world right now and, while this is not a new phenomena, it seems to be on steroids, destroying faith in everything, especially in TRUTH. When there is no TRUTH, God cannot be present because, as we Jews say: “God is Truth”, “God is Everything” and when the glory of God is used to validate greed, avarice, capriciousness, mendacity, warmongering, etc then God is being ghosted!

Human beings are “just below the angels” and as such, We the People, in order to “form a more perfect union” with the world, with one another, with one’s self and with God have to come out of hiding, we have to tear down the curtain and stop trying to be the Wizard of Oz, stop following “the great and grand wizard”, stop defrauding ourselves and those around us. When we the people don’t engage to “form a more perfect union” we are ghosting ourselves.

I am overwhelmed with righteous indignation, which many people classify as personal anger, ego-driven because I don’t have a bully pulpit anymore. The difference is my indignation is directed at the people who are purporting to be ‘religious’, ‘holy’, and are, in fact, liars, charlatans, idolators, practitioners of mendacity. This is not personal!

OOPS, that may not be true. As a person of faith, as a Jew who wrestles with God, who ‘corrects’ God when immorality creeps into the Biblical dictates, who follows Rabbi Harold Shulweis’ dictate that we have a duty to obey as well as a duty to disobey, when ASSHOLES, like JD Vance, Paula Cain-White, Ben-G’Vir, Smotrich, Netanyahu bastardize the Bible, take the name of God in vain, make false idols of themselves, Trump, money, power, I do take it personally. I realize in this moment, the reason why!! Becase I have been redeemed by God, because the prophets words and actions ring so loudly in my ears, in my soul, because the Jewish world seems to have become mute vis a vis Israel’s foibles, because the Jewish world has lost the essence of what “Am Yisrael” means and is in the spiritual realm, I take this assault on God, on Faith, on Truth, on Holiness, on the Pope, very personally. An assault on any faith, on truth, on the holiness of the human being, is an assault on ALL OF US!

Not only are there False Images of God being purpertrated upon the masses by those ‘good christian LIARS’, these bastards continue to use the Name of God in vain. When Trump, Vance, et al lecture the Pope on Christian Doctrine and the entire Republican Party does not stand up and say ENOUGH, the conspiracy to use the Name of God in vain is vast and wide. When the prosperity gospels are promoted as ‘coming from Christ’ and Christ spoke about the “money-changers” in the Temple, about loving the stranger, caring for the poor and needy, everything coming from the Bible, we the people have to RISE UP from our Self-Deception, we have to WAKE UP from our desire to be in “the in crowd”, we have to LET GO of our need for certainty, power, greed and STAND WITH GOD, not with the False Images, not with taking the Name of God in Vain, etc.

I have been fighting this fight all my life, for about 20 years, I lost more often than ‘won’, this is my period of alcoholism, of criminality, of rebellion against “the societal norms”. It was not the proper rebellion, it was the wrong way to rebel, it was how I ghosted both God and my authentic self, my family and my friends. There were times when I was present, I did the next right thing, I fought the ‘good fight’, I just wasn’t consistent, I allowed my own greed, grief, anger to override what I knew to be right. These past 39+ years have been spent becoming more and more consistent in doing the next right action, in not hiding, in not Ghosting God nor my Self. This is the goal of this blog, to help you do the same-come out, come out wherever you are!

ACTION STEPS:

1. Make a list of the ways you decieved your self today

2. Make a list of the ways you bought into the deception of another

3. Go over both lists and discern the reasons you went against what you know in your guts, in your soul to allow these deceptions to run you

4. Begin/continue a spiritual practice of T’Shuvah: inventory, repair the damages you have wrought, enhance the goodness you have brought

GOD BLESS and STOP GHOSTING GOD & SELF, Rabbi Mark

Selfish motives vis a vis the DEED and GOD this is the choice we face each day - Year 5 Day 40

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 40

“Man may be replete with selfish motives but a deed and God are stronger than selfish motives. The redemptive power discharged in carrying out the good purifies the mind. The deed is wiser than the heart.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 94)

While I firmly and deeply believe in “the redemptive power”, having been a recipient of it, I also know that the “selfish motives” are very powerful and without God, without “hitting bottom”, our self-deception can and does lead many good people to miss their own “selfish motives” while condemning those of another. “Don’t scout after your heart and your eyes”(Numbers 15:39) because “the deed is wiser than the heart” and We the People seem to be unable to grasp this truth no matter how many times we experience the negative consequences of “following our heart”, of believing in another who “knows what is best”, etc! How ridiculous that we the people continue to “looked like grasshoppers in our eyes and so we must have looked in their eyes”(Numbers 14:23) This projection is insane and we the people contnue to do this, we continue to not SEE whom we really are: partners with God, divine reminders, here to fulfill a divine need that no one else can. Yet, between our terrible eyesight, our self-deceptions, our need for power, prestige, wealth, control, and our greedy selfish inclination-we the people fall backwards over and over again. Rather than “fail forward”, learning from our own mistakes and those of our ancestors, we the people fall back into our selfish, bad habits that have gone on for the millennia! WTF, PEOPLE?!?!?

This the 1500th day of my writing on Rabbi Heschel’s teachings. It is the last I am going to do for a while. Tomorrow, I will begin a new Blog: Ghosting God, Ghosting our Self. It is also the title of my next book to come out some time this year. It is precisely what I hear Rabbi Heschel’s teachings call to us to end! God in Search of Man, Man is Not Alone, The Insecurity of Freedom, Who is Man, etc all give us life lessons on how to answer HINENI to the call of AYECHA and, since the time of Adam and Eve, we the people continue to miss the truth of our existence and ‘see’ ourselves as “grasshoppers”, as ‘gods’, bouncing back and forth between “my shit don’t stink” and “if you ony knew”, between “I am trapped in this narrow place(Egypt)” and “I am the Captain of my destiny”, living in the either/or of societal norms, denying the truth that is in our souls, that is in our intuitive mind, in our guts. The refusal to engage in “a deed and God”, ignoring the truth of “the redemptive power” and denying that “the good purifies the mind” has gotten We the People, once again, to a spiritual crisis. When the President of the United States speaks so disgustingly about the Pope who is pushing back against the bastardization of Christ’s words, when the Vice-President of the United States declares the “Pope should be more careful when talking about theology, when the Republicans do NOTHING about this, we the people are in a SPIRITUAL CRISIS!

I am ENGRAGED that there are not more Jewish Voices joining Pope Leo, I am BEYOND the BEYOND that Rabbis, Cantors, etc are afraid to speak to their congregants about the WRONGS of ISRAEL, the WRONGS of the Jews who supported Epstein, the WRONGS of the Jews helping Trump wage war on the stranger, forgetting that “We were strangers in the Land of Egypt”! I am a Zionist, I am NOT a BIBI’ist! I do not believe in the JDL and I am appalled that equating calling out the wrongs of Israel is tantamount to being a “self-loathing Jew”. In the Holiness Code we are COMMANDED to “rebuke your neighbor and don’t bear guilt because of them”(Lev. 19:17) so, my fellow Rabbis: WHERE ARE YOU?? AYECHA is being called out each day from Sinai and it seems the Jewish response has become: “I’m HIDING” just like Adam and Eve, learning NOTHING from the Torah, believing in the hubris and the hatred Ezra put into the Torah, forgetting that  we were brought out of Egypt to “be a light unto the Nations” (Isaiah 42:6). This is the job, this is the privilege, this is the Call from Sinai and the JEWISH PEOPLE are not ANSWERING the CALL with light, with hope. It is WAY PAST TIME for We the People to stand up, be counted, and respond to what is happening with justice, mercy, love, truth, kindness and not with ‘where’s mine, what’s safe, I’m afraid I will offend someone, I may lose my job, etc.’

I have never believed in going along to get along, even though I am guilty of doing it. I have fought for the truth, I have listened to my intuitive voice, I have heard the call from Sinai and I continue to speak out through my writing, regardless of no responses. I am a pariah, it seems, I am deemed too crass because I refuse to put up with the “Ghosting of God”, the “Ghosting of self” that continues to be de rigeueur in our world. Rabbi Heschel has been a constant companion on my journey and these 1500 days, my book 365 Life Lessons of Rabbi Heschel are my repaying the debt, knowing I can never fully repay the gift of living well he gives me.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Do your deeds purify your evil inclinations or your good ones? Year 5 Day 39

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 39

“Left alone, the soul is subject to caprice. Yet there is power in the deed that purifies desires. It is the act, life itself, that educates the will. The good motive comes into being while doing the good.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 94)

“Caprice”, an unaccountable sudden change of mind based on a whim, a feeling, is the condition that We the People are suffering from in this very moment. While everyone knew who Donald J. Trump was/is, it did not seem to matter to the majority of Americans who voted in 2024-granted Kamala was not a great candidate and Tim was an even worse pick- yet a majority of Americans decided to put a person who’s middle name and way of being screams “capriciousness” in charge and saving democracy has become the #1 goal for many of we the people even ones who voted for Trump. Rather than allow “the deed that purifies desires” to impact him, his buddies, the Republican party, all of these entities stay away from any “deed that purifies” and, instead, engage in all of the actions possible which support their avarice, their greed, their hunger for absolute power, up to and including going along with a ridiculous ‘war’ with Pope Leo, accusing the Pope-a boy from Chicago- of not understanding Christ’s words and “deeds”!! WTF PEOPLE?!!

Immersing myself in the words above, I realize the absolute truth of the 2nd sentence: “the power in the deed that purifies desires” applies to the “good deed” and to the “evil deed”. When evil is pursued through deeds, like Bibi and Donny (and their band of thieves, cronies, ass-kissers, cult followers) are doing-they derive more and more power and their motives, desires become stronger, purer, and this is the reason they sound so convincing-because they have put themselves through the purification process that says evil is actually good, denying the Truth is the way of Jesus, Moses, Christianity and Judaism throughout the millennia! I ask again: WTF People?!?@*%$

We the People are being called to account by the words above, by the moment we are living in. The question that I hear coming from the words above and from the Voice on Sinai is: Od Matai-until when will we the people refuse to do God’s wll, to do justly, love mercy, love the stranger, help the poor and the needy, proclam freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein, to love our neighbor as ourselves, to be Holy…? We the People have to seek out the spiritual counselor that can speak directly to the soul within us. We the People have to do an accounting of our soul and list the capricious moments we engage in and heal the wounds that make it okay to violate our covenant with God, betray our neighbors, friends, family. We the People have to make a list of the “deed that purifies desires” and have caused us to do the next right thing and how to enhance these “deeds”.

It is not an easy transition from avarice and capriciousness to doing the next right thing, I know. It took a jail cell to wake me up, it took my 6 year-old daughter’s letter of hate and love to solidify what I knew all along was the right way to live. Ever since, for the past 39 years, I have been on this journey of doing and then understanding, of taking an education and learning the beauty and the ugliness of the actions I engage in, and my life has been a classroom wherein I keep learning more and more how to live, what being a partner with the ineffable one means, how to be the husband Harriet needs, the father Heather needs, the grandfather Miles needs, the brother my siblings need, the uncle my nieces and nephews need, the Rabbi, person my communities need. IT AIN’T EASY AND it is so much more rewarding that the WTF People?!?!! activities I used to engage in! As the Bible teaches us: King David could admit his errors and be repentant and forgiven, the people who left Egypt could bitch and moan AND they never turned back towards Egypt, Moses reminds us that: t”he word is in your mouth, in your heart”. We the People are never to far away to turn back, never so lost we can’t read the map, never too evil to do T’Shuvah and return! The key is: allow the “good” to adjust our motives, to allow the “good” to “educate our will” so God’s will becomes our will.

ACTION STEPS:

1. Make a list of the triggers for your capriciousness

2. Make a list of solutions to these triggers because they are not going away

3. Make a daily inventory of ways your “deeds” purify your evil desires and help you hide from the Truth

4. Make a daily inventory of  your “deeds” that purify you good desires and help you live into Truth

5. Find and engage with a spiritual counselor, a spiritual friend in learning and educating your soul and your will to be in line with the divine.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Living into "ideal goals", "sacred deeds", "sacred goals" - Year 5 day 38

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 38

“Deeds set upon ideal goals, deeds performed not with careless ease and routine but in exertion and submission to their ends are stronger than the surprise and attack of caprice. Serving sacred goals may change mean motives.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 93)

We the People have come to misunderstand what “sacred deeds” are, I believe. When the word “sacred” is used, the dictionary and society automatically identify “sacred” as religious, having to do with God, etc. While a “sacred deed” is given to us by God, it is not a “religious” action as society defines “religious actions”. The use of “sacred” by Rabbi Heschel is, I believe, having to do with any and all actions that fall within the purview of the 248 “thou shall” and the 365 “don’t do” sayings, commandments, directives by God in the Bible. “Love the stranger” is a “sacred deed/goal”, as is “don’t make false idols”, “don’t go back to the narrow straits of Egypt”, “do justly”, “love mercy”, etc. I hear Rabbi Heschel calling out to us to let go of our adjustments to societal norms and continue to be maladjusted so we can “see”, “hear”, “understand” the freshness and newness of each and every action we take, not be bystanders in our lives. Rather, I hear the call of God to live life on and with purpose and not by accident!

The highest  of “ideal goals” is, of course, serve God, serve humanity, live the unique gift we have in the world and in the open for the purpose of serving not for self-serving. Hence, we the people who are living with careless ease and routine, with ‘what’s in it for me’, ‘how do I keep the power I have’, etc live in capriciousness. They live in and revel in “being guided by sudden, impulsive, or unpredictable changes in mood, behavior, or decisions, rather than reason or consistency”. Sound like anyone in power today?!? This way of being is not confined to Trump alone, Bibi does it, Vlad is guilty of doing this, as are many other leaders. This way of being is anathema to freedom, it is the opposite of the “deeds” in the Bible, the preachings of Christ, the actions of Christ, the ways of the prophets. Yet, we keep hearing from so-called ‘religious’ leaders that these are “good men”, who are ‘saving the Jews’, ‘loving Israel’, ‘keeping America first’, and other such bullshit! WTF PEOPLE???

The choice facing all of We the People is simple: accept the “yoke of heaven”, the call to engage in “sacred goals” and have a daily routine of “deeds” that re-enforces these goals or not. Yet, even in this simple choice, there are nuances. When we are engaged in a routine, it is imperative to NEVER DO IT ROUTINELY! As is stated above, we have to exert ourselves and submit ourselves to the ends that we are attempting to serve. Just as there is no ‘one and done’ in the spiritual life of service, there is no ‘easy way’ to perform the mitzvot, to fulfill a “sacred deed”, to serve a “sacred goal”. We the People are being called to be fully present and immersed in the experience we are in, to focus our attention, our actions in service of the “sacred deed” that presents itself in this moment. It AIN’T EASY! Hence, the need for “exertion and submission”. Every time we submit to the will of God, to the call to perform a “sacred deed”, we are strengthening our ability to surrender to a higher call, we are strengthening our staying power when many of we the people would quit.

Being engaged in “sacred deeds” is the pathway out of the morass we the people find ourselves in. Believing a liar, thief, racist, rapist, felon who has never told the truth in his life and making him President? Supporting the myriad of men who, like Swallwell and Gonzales, use their positions of power to sexually assault women without any awareness of their incongruency because they also ‘believe the victims of Epstein, et al’! Living an either/or life when it comes to Israel and Bibi-being ostracized if one believes that Oct. 7th was horrific, Hamas is dangerous and what happened in Gaza has changed Hamas’ stranglehold nor is what the settlers/government doing in the West Bank kosher. Living into “sacred goals” is what my recovery is based on, what most peoples’ recovery is based on and what is desperately needed today!

ACTION STEPS:

1. Write down your routine of spiritual growing and practice-formalizing your pathway to growing into your authenticity

2. Make a gratitude list and a list of “sacred actions” you are going to take this day.

3. Mid-day take your spiritual and emotional temperature, are you present in your living, are you aware of the “sacred deeds” that are calling for your actions?

4. Each evening go over your routine and make note of the ones you did routinely and the ones you were present for.

5. Each evening write down how your “sacred actions” of today changed you.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Power of the Good Deed versus the Power of the EGO - Year 5 Day 37

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 37

“The good is carried out in acts, and there is an intense fascination that comes from a good deed couteracting the pressure and ardor of the ego. The ego is redeemed by the absorbing power and the inexorable provocativeness of a just task which we face.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 93)

70+ years ago, Rabbi Heschel is reminding we the people that all of our intentions, all of our ‘inner goodness’ means absolutely NOTHING if We the People are not STANDING UP and DOING GOOD! Oh, that we the people would have heeded these words and similar words of so many other people then! Since we didn’t then, in the words of Hillel the Elder, I ask IF NOT NOW, WHEN?

While it is true for every moment, this moment is especially in need of “the good”, we the people are in the throes of a society that is giving honor to the thieves, worshiping the golden calf, bowing down to power and greed, surrendering to “the pressure and ardor of the ego”. Every society throughout history has fallen for these exact reasons. From the Children of Israel splitting up into two nations because of Solomon’s greed to the Hasmoneans becoming more Greek-like than the Jews they fought against to gain power, we have watched this movie end with the destruction of the Temples, the destruction of the country, and we, Jews, think Bibi is Moses-like, think Bibi is the modern-day King David??? WTF, people? When we allow past victories to lull us into the false belief that we are invincible, that ‘we have a just cause’, that “never again” gives us the right to keep people in camps, treat another human being as if they are less than human… We the People are FUCKED!

Posting as if you are Jesus Christ or a ‘doctor’ and you heal people with your touch-PLEASE DONALD J TRUMP! Starting a war of words with the Pope, having your VP, that lackey JD Vance stand up for you against the leader of his faith, humiliating him at each and every turn, showing disdain for the Iranians by sending Vance and not Rubio, Kushner and not experienced diplomats, and then using your fuck-ups as an excuse to ‘flex your muscles’, which puts American heroic military people at risk just to prove “the pressure and ardor of your ego” can counteract any good deed that another human being does?! Where is the 25th Amendment? Where are the balls of the Republican White Men in Congress to bring Impeachment and get this lunatic away from the controls. Vance is not a great back-up and he is better than this lunatic! MAGA must RISE UP and SAY NO because as it is, We the People are FUCKED!

Making a habit of doing the next right thing, taking the next right action is not trying to be perfect, in fact it recognizes our fallibility by telling us that whatever we are doing now, may not be right and we have CHOICE! This is the greatest power of “the good”. In doing a “good act”, we become aware of our power over our choices, we find a new freedom, a liberation from “same shit different day” attitude. When We the People embrace how “a good deed (is) counteracting the pressure and ardor of the ego” there is an overwhelming sense of hope, of joy, of love, of connection with our spirituality, with a power greater than ourselves, with our community.

I have been engaged in “doing the next right thing” for the past 38+ years. It is not always easy nor does it always “feel good” in the moment. There are moments of “why do I have to do it when no one else is”, there are moments of “doing this loses me money”, there are moments of intense anger being directed towards me, there are moments of profound misunderstandings, there are moments of intense betrayal. All these experiences, while hurtful, while negative DO NOT come close to the joy, the wonder, the awe, the spiritual fulfillment that “a good deed counteracting the pressure and ardor of the ego” brings! Each and every “good deed” is a repayment to God for the gift of life, for the gifts life brings me, for the love I experience and for the joy I live in. This is what We the People need to do to counter-act the evil that is at the core of our current Government, the greed and avarice that runs throughout the government and people.

ACTION STEPS:

1. Write down the actions you take today that show your goodness

2. Write down the actions you take today that show your not goodness

3. Write down the reasons and the outcomes of the actions you take today, both the good ones and the not so good ones

4. See what you were oblivious to this day, look at the lies you told yourself this day

5. Do an ego check a few times a day to see if the pressure and ardor are rising to dangerous levels

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Living into being "descendants of the prophets" - Year 5 Day 36

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 36

“The prophets are forgotten. No one reades the prophets. They have not touched the mind of America. And this is why such statements come out. What is the greatest concern in the Bible? Injustice to one’s fellow man. What is the greatest dream of the prophets and of the Bible? Peace.” (Continuation of Rabbi Heschel’s intervew with Carl Stern for Eternal Light)

Given the defeat of Viktor Orban, the end of authoritarianism in Hungary, at least for the moment, one can hope that America, Israel will come to their senses and back to their roots. Of course, Hungary is a nascent democracy, remember the Shoe Memorial by the Danube where Hungarians were so eager to kill Jews they didn’t even want to wait for the transports at the end of the war, they shot them in the back of the head and kept their shoes! Israel is also a nascent democracy and both of these countries show us the danger of democracy: it can be used as a weapon by the authoritarian, by the fascist, by the people who have “forgotten” “the prophets”! In America, where we have more experience with democracy, the same is happening; Trump and his minions and handlers are destroying the basic tenets upon which our country was founded: Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Assembly, Freedom to vote, Freedom of Religion, Checks and balances of the SEPARATE branches of Government, etc.

While Trump and his ‘good christian nationalist folks’ continue to invoke the name of Jesus in all they do, We the People of faith like Pope Leo continue to speak out against the lies and the idolatry of these charlatans. We the People like Bishop William Barber continue to support and stand with the poor, the needy, the stranger. The resistance is here, the question is if we are going to have to wait years until Trump and his Gang of Thieves are gone? Or, are We the People going to stand up and throw the bums out right now? I ask the same question of the Israeli people who know that Bibi is killing the principles Israel was founded on, who know that he is a thief and a liar, who know…

Teaching the prophets is imperative for the health of a democracy, without this knowledge, without understanding We the People are the descendants of the prophets, the inheritors of the prophetic spirit, without opening our beings to hear the call from Sinai, the call from the burning bush, the call to wake up, to speak up, to save we the people from our small minds, our ego-driven desires, our hateful, spiteful actions, We the People are doomed to continue to repeat this cycle of freedom, authoritarianism, liberation, freedom, authoritarianism…

NOW is the moment for We the People to be like Hosea and see how we have WHORED ourselves for a pot of gold that is actually coal, how our naked desires and rampant rationalizations have spun a web of deceit that seems impossibel to break free of. NOW is the moment for We the People to be like Jerimiah and call out to one another the power of spirit, the desire of God to “heal our backsliding”, to “take us back in love”. NOW is the moment to hear the call of Isaiah to end our incessant subterfuge of rituals and bastardizations of God’s will and surrender to the spirit within each of us, to appreciate and use the Gift of our intuitve minds rather than worship the mendacity of our rational minds. NOW is the moment for We the People to say NO to the injustices that surround us. NO to the senseless hatred being sprewed and promoted by those ‘fearless leaders’, the wannabe ‘fuhrers’, the whores we the people elected to screw us over! The injustices being practiced in the name of we the people are disgusting, dismantling the fabric of our society, disfiguring the Image of God that is in each of us and deflecting the TRUTH of who We the People can be.

What better day to think, speak, write about this subject than today, Yom HaShoah, the day of remembering the uprising of the Warsaw Ghetto and it is a day of mourning. I remember when it was called Warsaw Ghetto day-honoring the uprising of the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto which lasted almost a month! When We the People arm ourselves with the words of the prophets, when We the People uncover the spirit of the prophets that is within each of us, when We the People believe in, fight for, and engage in paths of “peace”, miracles happen! This is the call of today, it is the call of the prophets.

ACTION STEPS:
1) Write down how you answer the call of the prophets each day for a week

2) Make notes of how you still want to believe the lies of your rational mind, 3) Make a list of the ways you whored yourself each day, asking yourself for forgiveness and changing your ways, your eyesight

4) Make a list of the ways you honored your prophetic spirit, doing justly, loving your neighbor and the stranger

5) Make a plan for this day to strengthen the prophetic voice within and follow it a little better.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Spiritual needs and politics, God and Social Issues-do they belong together? Year 5 Day 35

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 35

Question from Carl Stern: “Prospective jurors, one after another, were questioned…said they thought it was wrong for clergymen to be involved in politics, that their job is to administer to spiritual needs.” Response from Rabbi Heschel: “It is such a good statement that if the prophets were alive, they would already be sent to jail by these jurors. Because the prophets mixed into social-political issues. And, frankly, I would say that God seems to be a non-religious person, because, if you read the words of God in the Bible, He always mixes in politics and social issues.”

Sitting here at my computer, reading the news, was drawn to these words and this interview once again. The entire interview is powerful, uplifting, deeply disturbing, and motivating with the passage above speaking directly to our moment in time. Reading the words of Trump about Pope Leo is infuriating, enraging, head-shaking, and tragic. That this despicable human being-he is, after all, a human being without any humanity, without any empathy, compassion, truthfulness, love, spiritual maturity- can take credit for the assension of Pope Leo is IDIOTIC, LUNACY! Yet, he does. Calling Pope Leo “WEAK on crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy” is such an affront to the spiritual, moral teachings and lessons the Pope is trying to pass on to Catholics, Christians, as well as Jews and Muslims. All of us owe our allegiance to God, Allah, Adonai, the ineffable One. And where are the Catholics in Congress, in the Republican Party, where are the Jews in Congress, in the Republican Party? SILENT as usual!! That this IDOLATOR, this FORNICATOR, can post a picture of himself as “having saint-like powers akin to those of Jesus Christ. Wearing a bilbical-style robe, Trump is seen laying hands on a bedridden man as light emanates from his fingers.”(Apple News 4/13) is an ABOMINATION! Where are the Jews, the Christians, the Catholics who support this ASSHOLE? SILENT! Maybe it is time for We the People to heed Rabbi Heschel’s words above, maybe it is time to go back to the Bible and READ, STUDY, HEAR, UNDERSTAND the words and actions of the prophets, of Jesus, of Adonai!! YA THINK?

In Israel, a land I have great kinship with, an idea that stems from the Biblical accounts of what should be, what could be if and when We the People become a “light unto the nations” (Isaiah 49:6), watching the destruction of the Declaration of Independence, the destruction of the rule of law, the destruction of humanity, the destruction of the ideals and morals the ‘rabbis’ are supposed to be teaching is beyond sad, it is tragic. The verse in Isaiah says that God is “Giving you to be a Light to the nations”, we are the gift, not the destroyer, we are the examples of humanity, of freedom, of liberation from slavery-NOT THE PHARAOH!! When there is condemnation of the policies of Bibi and friends, We the People who are following in the footsteps of the prophets, are labled as traitors by Rabbis who KNOW BETTER? When We the People are living in the both/and of the cruelty of Hamas, the constant pressure from the Arab countries around us to destroy us AND the cruelty of what has happened in Gaza, the ‘collateral damage’ of the strikes in Lebanon, in Iran(an unprovoked war by the way) and labeled as Anti-Semitic, Anti-Zionist by the very CROOKS WHO VIOLATE THE DEMANDS OF THE PROPHETS AND GOD?! This is the moment when We the People must rise up and live the deeds and words of the prophets, when We the People must “give ourselves to be a light to the peoples of the world through protest, through action!

I know I have gone on, I know my views are not always popular, I know that my soul is unable to keep silent, to be ‘political’, and I know that my colleagues are divided. What I don’t know is how anyone can be divided: holding two opposing thoughts, two opposing truths in one moment, in every moment is what it means to BE HUMAN! The Rabbis fear of the prophets is because the prophets would not be nice to them, anymore than they were nice to the Kings, to the priests, to the wealthy, to the people Israel, to the Judean people. FUCK NICE, FUCK going along to get along, FUCK whitewashing evil because it is being done by ‘our side’. FUCK Bibi, FUCK Donny, FUCK EVIL!

ACTION STEPS:

1. Do a self-examination of the incongruence between what you say are your principles, morals and the actions, the silence you practice

2. Take a self-examination of when your principles, morals are congruent with the actions you take

3. Study the Prophets, finding the words and actions that resonate most within you and find ways to incorporate them into your daily living

4. Find places and people with whom you can engage with to effect change in the cruelty, to effect bringing the “law” of Jesus, of Moses, of Adonai more into the town square!
   

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Faith without works is DEAD! Are you one of the walking dead? Year 5 Day 34

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 34

“Indeed, the awareness of the weakness of the heart, the unreliability of human inwardness, may perhaps have been on the reasons that compleled Judaism to take recourse to actions instead of relying upon inward devotion. Perhaps this is the deeper meaning of the Rabbis’ counsel: one should always do the good, even though it is not done for its own sake, It is the act that teaches us the meaning of the act.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 92-93)

Having crossed the Red Sea and on this Day 10 of our counting of the Omer, the slaves who were liberated forgot their words, their commitments and were overcome with fear of ‘no water’. Rather than keep “their hearts in the right place”, we the people witness over and over again the “weakness of the heart” even though We the People had this amazing spiritual experience of God’s liberation! From the time of Adam and Eve, the human heart has proved over and over again to have “weakness”, that our “inwardness” is unreliable and everytime we pick ourselves up, we the people “scout after our heart and eyes to WHORE after them” even though the 3rd Prayer of the Shema tells us NOT to go after them! In Deuteronomy we find Moses telling the people to “love God with all your heart, your soul, your everything and walk in God’s ways, follow the commandments, Choose Life”. While loving God is a good thing, this alone will not lead to doing the next right action. In John 14:15 Jesus says: “If you love Me, keep my commandments” in 14:21: “He who has my commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me”, and in 14:24: “He who does not love Me does not keep My words: and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent me.” Once again we learn the TRUTH: Love is NOT A FEELING, it is AN ACTION! Hence, “one should always do the good, even though it is not done for its own sake”!

We the People are in another moment in time where Truth is being pummeled by deceivers and these grifters and liars, where even the White House had to issue a directive for its staffers to NOT bet on the Iran War in the polymarkets! This assualt is coming from Trump which is not new because Donald Trump never told the truth-in business, in personal, in political realms. He learned to lie at his father’s feet, he learned to hate from his father’s actions, he learned to be cruel as his father’s right-hand man. TRUMP IS NOT THE PROBLEM! The problem is the myriad of clergy, beginning with Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, et al who have defied Christ’s words as related by John in the Gospel! The problem is all the Christian Nationalist Clergy who support the lies of Hegseth, the grift and graft of Rubio, the cruelty of Vought loudly and proudly while calling themselves followers of Christ! Can you imagine what Jesus is saying? Can you imagine how, Jesus the immigrant is experiencing the Detention Centers these ‘fine christian folk’ are setting up, running and supporting? Lest you think that Jews are so much better: Kushner, Lutnick, Bessent, Miller all proclaim loyalty to Judaism and love Israel, while going against the very commandments that Moses gave to us. Rather than believe that God is God, they and the right-wing in Israel believe they know what the Bible is ‘really saying’ and the rest of We the People ‘just don’t understand’. While they peddle these lies, the text says: LOVE THE STRANGER- NOT BE CRUEL TO THE STRANGER, the text says: ONE LAW FOR THE CITIZEN AND STRANGER ALIKE-NOT ONE LAW FOR THE RICH AND ANOTHER FOR THE REST OF WE THE PEOPLE! So, to these ‘good jews’ I say BULLSHIT- READ THE BIBLE, HEAR, LISTEN UNDERSTAND AND DO the words of Moses, the words of the Prophets-not the bastardizations of people throughout the millennia.

At Mount Sinai, We the People committed to DO and THEN UNDERSTAND! No mention is made of our motivation, no mention is made of how we ‘feel’ about it- the only two emotions that are prevelant in the Bible are loving God, the strangter, our neighbor, ourselves, and hating evil, cruelty, lying, greed, murder, coveting! Ergo: It is imperative for We the People to TAKE THE NEXT RIGHT ACTION, to “always do the good”, no matter how we think or feel. More on this tomorrow

ACTION STEPS:

1. Make a list of the good you could have done in the past and didn’t because you didn’t “feel like it”

2. Read Numbers 15:38-40 each morning and evening; in the am make a list of the traps of your heart and your eyes and in the evening-which ones did you fall into, which ones you did not and what new ones did you fall into

3. List the Loving Actions you took today and the non-loving ones as well

4. Write down your plan to repair the non-loving ones and enhance the loving one

5. Live life congruent with the principles you hold dear and in concert with the Biblical mandates

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Going beyond the mind, going beyond the mystery.... Year 5 Day 33

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 33

“Israel was taught how to accost Him who is beyond the mystery. Beyond the mind is the mystery, but beyond the mystery is mercy. Out of the darkness comes a voice disclosing that the ultimate mystery is not an enigma but the God of mercy; that the Creator of all is teh “Father in Heaven.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 92)

We the People have lost our ability “to accost Him who is beyond mystery” because we have to solve any and every mystery. In our hubris, we the people have decided that we are god, no matter how much we pray to Jesus, Allah, Adonai-our actions disprove our words, we the people, or at least a plurality of us cannot conceive that anything is “beyond the mind”, if we only apply ourselves enough! Not only is this hubris, it is STUPID! I have yet to meet a human being who can make the sky turn its myriad of colors, I have yet to meet a human being who can make mountains grow, who can create ex nihlo fruit bearing trees, etc. While one of the new ‘frontiers’ is creating life by cloning, making Robots have human emotions, no one that I have heard of has created a human being ex-nihlo. Sure, it may happen, and it will not be the same!

“but beyond the mystery is mercy” is the issue. No matter how often we the people create something wonderful, meaningful, helpful, there are always those who seek to exploit these creations for their power and wealth, who seek to destroy these creations for the sake of cruelty. We are in the throes of these power-hungry, never enough money grubbing, cruelty-loving assholes right now and they have the unmitigating GALL to proclaim they are doing all of this in the NAME OF JESUS, because it is what ADONAI WANTS! And do not refute them with the facts of what Jesus says nor with the 36 times the Torah demands we love the stranger, etc; because they will tell their sycophantic followers, their cult members and we who confront them that ‘you don’t understand what it is REALLY saying’. HOW INFURIATING!!

That Good Christian Men and Women, Good Jewish Men and Women in the Republican Party do not STAND THE FUCK UP and say NO, that they do not DEFEND the TRUTH, DEFEND these wanton attacks on ADONAI, on JESUS is beyond me! That We the People have not thrown these idolators, these despots, these lying BASTARDS out of office is also beyond me. It is beyond me to understand how any of the people who have the power to go “beyond the mind” and “beyond the mystery” and be “mercy”.

I do understand living in the darkness, as anyone and everyone who has had a “dark night of the soul”, a spiritual awakening, a crisis of conscience, an experience with one’s own higher consciousness can also understand. This, however, is the key. All of these sycophants KNOW better, they have done the next right action before, they know of Goldwater telling Nixon to leave, they know of booting Gingrich out of power, they know what happened on Jan. 6, 2021, and they ignore the TRUTH! When one ignores the truth, the darkness completely enwraps one. Truth is the light at the end of the tunnel and the refusal to engage in it is the downfall of every society. It is Biblical; both Temples were destroyed, the kingdom of Israel was scattered about by the Assyrians, because we the people in our hubris, in our stupidity, in our ignorance, in our self-importance believed we were ‘safe’, ‘it couldn’t happen here’, etc. WRONG!!

And We the People who are sounding the Alarm, We the People who continue to speak out, We the People who keep protesting and voting against these liars, who are cheering Pope Leo, who are resisting the societal pull to “go along to get along”, who are risking being ostracized because we won’t say ‘Israel is right’, ‘America is right’ no matter what are living the certainty that “out of the darkeness comes a voice disclosing that the ultimate mystery is not an enigma, but the God of mercy”. My constant and consistent ranting and raving about Truth, about the need to STOP THE CRUELTY is because I experience the “God of mercy” every day and I need to spread the truth that this is the “ultimate mystery”!

ACTION STEPS:
1) Write about your experiences when you “accost Him who is beyond the mystery”.

2) Do an inventory of how you stopped yourself from going “beyond your mind” because of the lie that there is nothing you can’t figure out

3) Do an inventory of how you went “beyond the mind” and experienced “the mystery”

4) What have you learned from your “dark night of the soul”, from your spirirtual awakening

5) How has the “God of mercy” changed you and how have you been more merciful in your living

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Living in the Both/And or living in Either/Or - what do your actions testify to? Year 5 Day 32

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 32

“Human life is a point where mind and mystery meet. This is why man cannot live by his reason alone, nor can he thrive on mystery alone. To surrender to the mystery is fatalism to withdraw into reason is solipsism. Man is driven to commune with that which is beyond the mystery.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 92)

“Fatalism”, selfishness, why bother, what’s in it for me; all common modes of living for some of we the people in our smallness, in our pettiness, and so abhorrent to those of We the People who live with faith, with courage, with a sense of what is the next right action to take. The “mystic” who cannot live in the real world is not doing “God’s work” no matter what lies they tell themselves, the rationalist who says “prove it” all the time lives in such a tiny, narrow box, neither one are capable of BEING HUMAN! This is the great conundrum that We the People face: are we going to BE HUMAN or exist as homo-sapiens?

As I hear Rabbi Heschel this morning, after a day at the ER for my Afib, I know he is speaking to the necessity to live in BOTH mind and mystery, he is reaching out to us and reminding us that to “meet” God, to commune with the ineffable, We the People have to use both our capacity for rational thinking and our ability to go into and through the mystery. In reading about the mind in his writings, I understand him to be saying here and there; our reason will take us to the horizon of the mystery, it is our ability to go beyond the horizon that will bring us to wholeness, to understanding, to meeting the highest self we can be.

Yet, we the people continue to confound and disappoint the ineffable, confound and disappoint one another, confound and disappoint our self. We continue to put  supreme importance on our rationalizations, on our selfishness, at the cost of seeking the mystery. Some of we the people continue to put supreme importance on the mystery at the cost of what is reasonable and rational. Once again, Rabbi Heschel is telling us what the Bible, what Jesus, what every spiritual discipline tells us: THERE IS NO ONE WAY TO BE! We the People are being called, once again, to live in the both/and. This passage comes from Rabbi Heschel’s book, God in Search of Man, which I infer to mean that without the both/and, God will never find us nor will we find God!

While every generation can point to a man-made catastrophe which it believes is the end of the world, there are some moments where humanity could be on the brink of bringing its own destruction. This feels like such a moment; the unnecessary war with Iran, the insanity of the oil crisis(was this war begun so Russia, Iran, Oil billionaires, Saudi Arabia could make more money?), the disdain for the poor and the stranger, the bastardization of Christ’s words and deeds, the disrespecting/threatening of Pope Leo, the drunkness of Hegseth, the power-hunger of Trump, the “get rich schemes” of Kushner, Wytkoff, Lutnick, the hatred of Miller, the Christian nationalism of Vought; all coming together in ways that I am not sure we the people have seen before. Todd Blanche saying the ‘duty’ of the Justice Department is to go after the enemies of Trump, the lies of the Republicans in Congress, the sycophantic behaviors of the Cabinet, the kissing of Russia’s ass, the support of Orban, the con job of Bibi Netanyahu, etc are all ingredients in a soup of disaster, if not for humanity, certainly for the freedoms We the People have cherished, for which our ancestors fought and died for. WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE!!

We the People are being called upon to STAND UP, to FIGHT ON, to SAY NO to the lies and deceptions we are being fed daily. We the People have to attune our “mystery” to the call from Sinai and our “mind” to the ways of the Bible to carry out this call. What is the call? Well, there are many-granted-yet the ones that stand out are: Be Holy, Proclaim Freedom to all, Love the Stranger, Love your neighbor, Don’t stand idly by the blood of your neighbor, CHOOSE LIFE! This is the call I heard over 39 years ago and I continue to live into this call, I continue to grow my mind and mystery and reach beyond the mystery to ‘meet’ the ineffable. It doesn’t always work and I am a better human being each day for the effort. This is the challenge for all of We the People and I pray you will take it up, do better than you did yesterday and, together, make this corner of the world a little better!

ACTION STEPS:

1. Indulge your “mystery” seeing where you can go, what you can see

2. Write down what you mind says is possible and how to reach the mystery you are seeing

3. Each day, write down how you lived in the both/and of life

4. Each day, make a note of the experiences with the ineffable that you had this day

5. Each day, write down how you stood for the Holy, for Freedom, for Love, for Life this day.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Repaying God for the gifts you receive or repaying the idol you have made into God? Year 5 Day 31

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 31

““How can I repay unto the Lord all His bountiful dealings with me?”(Ps. 116.12) How to answer the mystery that surrounds us, the ineffable that calls on our souls? This is, indeed, the universal theme of religion.” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 91)

I am a loud, outspoken brash, audacious human being. I say what is in my soul, on my heart and, usually, completely unfiltered. This has gotten me to live well, to reach people thought unreachable and caused great angst, anger, and retribution on the part of many people. I am called ‘not a real rabbi’, a ‘niche rabbi’, a ‘rabbi for those people’ and it is ALL GOOD! While I have regrets for some of my outbursts, reading the words above, I know that the outbursts that have been hurtful to my family, my friends, my colleagues, my community are NOT GOOD, I also know stifling them is part of what led me to my addictions to crime, to booze, to mendacity, to self-deception. In answering “the ineffable that calls on our souls”, I and We the People have to learn to monitor and discern time, way and place to be loud, to be silent, to be persuasive, and to be prophetic.

“Repay unto the Lord” being “the universal theme of religion” is exactly what is NOT HAPPENING right now in the circles of power in America nor in Israel! What IS HAPPENING is people calling themselves ‘religious’ are bastardizing the very tenets, ways, morals, deeds that Christ called upon us to do, that the Bible exhorts us to live, and calling it Judaism, Christianity! IT IS INFURIATING, thank God for Pope Leo! He is speaking the truth to power, he is following in the footsteps of Christ, of the prophets and We the People have to listen to him, follow his lead and TAKE BACK WHAT RELIGION STANDS FOR!!  I know I am yelling, I know how indignant I am being, I know that it is not always easy to hear me, to experience this type of anger, AND I know that this is the way of the prophets, this is my inheritance from them, my inheritance from my father, z”l.

The ways Donny boy and Bibi man believe “to answer the mystery that surrounds us” is to exploit the fears, the inner need to ‘beat the bastards’, the spiritual void that allows us to hate our neighbors in our hearts rather than love them, that allows us to have one law for the citizen and another for the stranger, that gives us permission to practice racism, anti-semitism, islamaphobia, with reckless abandon and call it “white pride”, call it discrimination against white men, etc. Backed by their gangs of THUG FALSE PROPHETS, these two men have caused chaos, taken no responsibility for their failures, their fuck-ups, their lies and their cruelty and there are still parts of we the people who clap for them like trained seals! WTF???

We the People are being called upon during this season of the counting of the Omer, on this 6th day of Passover when the liberated slaves were at the edge of the Red Sea, trying to choose certain death by the advancing Egyptians or repaying “Lord for His bountiful dealings” by liberating us from the physical slavery of Egypt. It is a moment, a “dark night of the soul”, as St. John of the Cross wrote about; it is a moment We the People all experience and the question is: will we face it, will we go through it, will we realize the message and the deed that “the ineffable” is calling upon us to perform? In this “Season of Freedom” as We the People count the days until the Holy Day of Shavuot, when We the People remember and engage in once again, receiving the Torah, the Bible, the “universal theme of religion” our response to the “the mystery that surrounds us, the ineffable that callus on our souls” has to be TRUTH! We the People are being called upon to RISE UP, to exercise our PROPHETIC VOICES, to go through our fears and trepidations and VOTE the assholes, the IDOLATORS, the MENDACIOUS IDIOTS OUT OF OFFICE and IMPEACH TRUMP, VANCE, and the rest of their ilk, their sycophants, their enablers. In Israel, it is time to try Bibi for the HIGH CRIMES he as committed as a THIEF, as ASLEEP at the WHEEL on OCTOBER 7, and as a LIAR IN CHIEF! This moment is calling upon We the People to take these

ACTION STEPS:

1. Each morning make a list of “all His bountiful dealings toward me” acknowledging the truth, kindness, goodness, charity extended to us by another(s)

2. Each evening make a list of all the kindness, truth, goodness, charity, we extended to another(s) during the day

3. Each day stand for the principles that present themselves and do not waver, do not allow the deceivers to convince you that you do not know what you know

4. Each evening review your day, making note of when you “repay unto the Lord” and when you STEAL from God.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Sacred Moments, Sacred Deeds, Sacrificial Deeds are all around us! Year 5 Day 30

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 30

“God is One, and His glory is One. And oneness means wholeness, indivisibility. His glory is not partly here and partly there; it is all here and all there But here and now, in this world, the glory is concealed. It becomes revealed in a sacred deed, in a sacred moment, in a sacrificial deed.” ( Thunder in the Soul pg. 91)

Continuing from yesterday, given this is the 5th day of Passover, the slaves leaving Egypt are at the edge of the Red Sea, according to some, or just about there as tomorrow night, the crossing of the Red Sea begins. This is the first “sacred deed” the people who left Egypt partake in. While many were afraid, while many complained, while Moses promised God would do for them and all they had to do is watch, the “sacred deed” in this “sacred moment” was “go forward” as God told Moses and the people. There is a midrash/parable that speaks of Nachshon Ben Amidav, who jumped into the Red Sea(or the Sea of Reeds depending on who is telling the story) and kept going until it covered his nose and then the Sea split so the former slaves could pass on dry land. This is an example of a “sacrificial deed” and, God knows, we the people need to create more of these. We the People have to notice and engage in the “sacred deed” which is always present and available much more often. We the People are being called upon to “lift up our eyes” and see this moment as “a sacred moment”, accepting the truth that each and every moment presents We the People for opportunities to “declare God’s glory” through our “deeds”!

Yet, we the people continually miss the moment, pass on the opportunity, are more interested in serving our selfish desires that we have lied to ourselves about, telling ourselves and everyone else that these narcissistic desires are actually NEEDS, authentic needs, which then we foolishly believe, absolve us of any responsibility to follow in the footsteps of our ancestors. It is especially present for those of We the People who are commemorating the Exodus from Egypt, acknowledging the resurrection of Jesus, to take off our blinders, to uncover our eyes, to open our ears, to smell the Red Sea and know the crossing of it is a “sacred moment” and it is a gift that we have to cherish and We the People are obliged to honor this “sacred moment” with a “sacrificial deed”. In Hebrew the word for “sacrificial” has the same root as “to draw near”, ergo: “a sacrificial deed” is a gift that allows We the People to “draw near” to our authentic self, to the neighbor next door, to the enemy across town. In the “drawing near”, in this and every “sacred moment”, We the People GET the opportunity to engage with our higher consciousness, with our souls and wrestle with our inclinations so that the Good Inclination transforms the energy of the “evil” one to do more “sacred deeds”, reveal more “sacred moments” and rejoice in our “sacrificial deeds”.

This is the goal, this is the message I am hearing this morning from Rabbi Heschel, and it is the goal, message and marching orders from God for this moment of chaos, of potential slavery, the killing of innocent people who’s only crime is they live in a certain area, they are part of an ethnic group which is being targeted, just like we Jews have been for centuries. When Hegseth prays to Jesus for victory, when Hegseth declares the Iran war is a “holy war” that Christ will deliver our enemies to us, We the People  have to stand the fuck up and join with Pope Leo and say NO to this charlatan, NO to this liar. We the People are being called upon to say NO to Trump and his lies, his need for dominance, his desire to be King/Pharaoh. We the People are being given a “sacred moment” to “draw near” to God, to one another by rejecting the lies, the subterfuge, the hatred, the cruelty that is running rampant in both Israel and the United States! Whereas Trump had dinner with Kanye West, the Prime Minister of England has rejected a concert’s desire to feature him for 3 days and Pepsi, the major sponsor of the event has pulled out. This is a prime example of “a sacred deed”. While politics right now is in the forefront, We the People cannot forget about the personal, the local. I have been engaging in “sacred moments” with intention since 1987, I have been engaging in “sacrificial deeds” since then as well-not perfectly and “declare God’s glory” in this moment, in this deed; making them both sacred is my goal and hitting this mark is pure JOY

ACTION STEPS:

1. Ask yourself if you have left this year’s slavery behind or are still carrying it

2. What are you willing to do to cross the Red Sea and get “cleansed” of the shit that is sticking to you from your being a slave, spiritually, mentally

3. “Lift up your eyes and SEE” this moment as an opportunity to perform a “sacred deed”

4. Accept that each moment is precious and different, an opportunity to “draw near” to your self, another human being, the Ineffable One through “sacrificial deeds”.

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Concealing or revealing God's Glory: what is the story you ACTIONS tell? Year 5 Day 29

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 29

“God is One, and His glory is One. And oneness means wholeness, indivisibility. His glory is not partly here and partly there; it is all here and all there But here and now, in this world, the glory is concealed. It becomes revealed in a sacred deed, in a sacred moment, in a sacrificial deed.” ( Thunder in the Soul pg. 91)

This is the 4th day of Passover, it is Easter Sunday and we the people are still unable to notice, recognize, reveal “God’s glory” because of our misguided belief that “God is on our Side” as Bob Dylan sings about, because in our hubris, we the people believe that there is “my god” and “your god” and “your god” is not as good, strong, real, etc as mine, ergo: I have to kill you and “your god” to prove it! Hegseth not allowing Catholic Mass at the Pentagon and JD Vance, that “good Catholic convert”-just ask him and his new book- saying NOTHING!! Jews like Kushner who think they and their Rabbis know it all and there is no other interpretation than theirs which could be correct because “only I know what god wants”. I am putting God in small letters because, as we can see from the quote above, anyone who bifurcates God, anyone who claims “only I know” cannot be correct because God is “all here and all there”, God is “unknowable” and therefore any claim to pigeonhole God, any lie that says “Christ/God wants us to kill”, any claim of “those people deserve death” has to be A LIE! Being a person of faith, being connected to something greater than oneself and listening to the rhetoric, the bullshit, the deception of these ‘good religious folk’ like Kushner, Vance, Hegseth, Ben G’Vir, et al makes We the People of faith, We the People who are searching for Truth, We the People who want God to find us and continue to, in our imperfect ways, try to reveal “God’s Glory”, WANT TO PUKE!

When cruelty is celebrated, when war is waged for the particular good of Oil Companies, of politicians, to deflect from the truth, to conceal the rot at the top, how far has our society progressed from the time of Jesus, from the times of the Prophets, from the destruction of the 2 Temples??!! NOT MUCH! Yet, we the people in our idiocy, in our willful blindness, in our desire to be fit in, to ‘get ours’, go along with this cruelty; “stand idly by the blood of our neighbor; make “one law for the citizen” and another for the stranger; “hate our brother, our enemy in our heart”, “scout after our heart and eyes whoring after them”. All of this in direct opposition to the commandments of the Bible, to the words and deeds of Christ and we the people then try and proclaim our allegiance to a god that is not in the Bible, the New Testament, the Koran. So, we the people who is Full of Shit? Not We the People that are calling out this bullshit like Pope Leo, not those of We the People that are proclaiming NO KINGS, not those of We the People who can hold that Iran is a bad actor and Trump, Hegseth, Rubio went to war to get Epstein files off the front page, Bibi went to war to get away from being held responsible for Oct. 7th and the aftermath. Yet, these are the people who declare they are doing this for “the Glory of God” when in reality, they are doing what they do for the Glory of SELF! This is the worst idolatry of all: making oneself synonymous with God, selling the LIE that, with their ‘spiritual advisors like Paula Cain White, compares Trump’s trials and tribulations to Jesus’!! WHAT THE FUCK?!?!

How can God’s glory be revealed when only god, the idol, is being revealed and God stays concealed, irrelevant, and wholly bastardized? It can’t until We the People stand up and engage in teaching our children that God is everywhere, “all here and all there”, the immanence and transcendence of God is as real as the nose on one’s face. Teaching our children so We the People re-learn the truth of God’s “glory” that is revealed every time We engage in a sacred action-like welcoming and loving the stranger, because as Passover teaches, “we were strangers in a strange land” and Egypt-at least at first-took us in. The “all here” of God is revealed every time we “love our neighbor as we love our self”, every time we “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”! The call for Freedom was known so long ago by Moses, by the prophets, by Jesus, and we the people still buy the LIES of the autocrat, the dictator,’ like the people of prejudice have done throughout the millennia to Jews, to Christians, to Muslims, to anyone they thought they could overpower and be lord and master to? WHEN WILL WE THE PEOPLE stop this way of being?

ACTION STEPS:
1) During your morning meditation, make a plan of the “sacred deeds” you will carry out this day

2) Seek out ways to draw near to another human being and God through an act of service(aka sacrificial deed)

3) Make a list of the ways you desecrate God’s Name by separating ‘your god’ from God

4) Make a list of the ways you brought Oneness into your life and the life of another(s)

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

Living nobly in an animal environment or living like an animal in a noble environment? Year 5 Day 28

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 28

“The problem of the soul is how to live nobly in an animal environment; how to persuade and train the tongue and the sense to behave in agreement with the insights of the soul.” (Thunder of the Soul pg. 89)

Happy First Day of the Omer, the first day of the countdown to Shavuot, where according to Jewish lore, the 10 Sayings were delivered to the People and the Tablets of Torah were delivered to Moses. I pray we all engage in our own personal liberation from the slavery we are in, the Egypt/narrow place we find ourselves stuck in -either a new one or an old one that keeps revisiting, trapping us anew.

Passover is the action step We the People are blessed to participate in as the solution to the “problem” stated above. Leaving the narrow place of EGO, of SELF-DECEPTION, of GREED, of … allows us to realize that We the People are more than our animal environment, our animal instinct, our animal urges. This is not a judgement on the part of us that is ‘earthly, animal’, it is a statement of fact. We the People need our “animal instinct” to get along in the world, to be safe from the dangers of nature, of another animal, from the dangers another human being can present to we the people. The proper use of our “animal instinct” is what can and will allow us “to live nobly in an animal environment” and, please God, teach another person, another group of people how to do the same. This is, after all, what the journey to and the experience of Sinai is all about. The Bible from the crossing of the Red Sea/Sea of Reeds till now is about this very topic-“how to live nobly in an animal environment”.

Today is Good Friday and I wish peace and love to the Christian Communities who celebrate it, who are readying themselves for Easter Sunday. I also know the words above are in line with the thoughts and actions of Christ. It is very important, in my opinion, for Christians, Jews, Catholics, Muslims to find the common ground of the finding the solution to “the problem of the soul is how to live nobly in an animal environment”. While the different spiritual traditions including the Eastern Ones, have different paths, different languages, all of them are in search for the solution to this ‘sticky wicket’. All spiritual disciplines are engaged in living “nobly in an animal environment” and it is time for us to join together, to acknowledge our common goal, respect our different pathways, and bring about the renaissance, the promises of God, of Jesus, of Islam, etc: living “nobly in an animal environment” and, going beyond this to change the “animal environment” to an “elevated environment”, from ‘dog eat dog’ to feed the hungry, help the poor, love the stranger, have one law for citizen and stranger alike, proclaim FREEDOM throughout the land and to ALL its inhabitants therein, love our self so we can truly love our neighbor, etc.

IT AIN’T EASY!! And it is possible and doable to “live nobly in an animal environment” as millions of recovering people attest to each and every day through our actions. It is possible and doable as tens of millions of unsung heroes attest to each day by the kindness’ they show, the truth they speak, and their reaching out to those less fortunate. It takes a willingness to learn, a leaving of the EGYPT we find ourselves in by taking one small wrong turn and not self-correcting quick enough. Redemption is, unfortunately, not a one and done, it is something we have to be hyper-aware of and avoid the traps that our “animal instinct” and “animal environment” lay out for us. Their disguise, their being “societal norms” only help to fill us and lull we the people into a false sense of security. Hence the need to review where we are  and what we are doing at Passover and 6 months later at Yom Kippur. This is a time for elation at being liberated and acceptance of the hard work to stay out “going back to Egypt” and/or finding a new Egypt. I know the difficulty, I fall back, get out, fall back, and get out again-which is the ‘victory’-never staying in the Egypt of our choosing, our being trapped in and continuing to find ways to “live nobly in an animal environment”.

ACTION STEPS:

1. Identify the Egypt you are going to leave this year, not the ones you would like to, the ONE you will, the ONE you are capable of leaving

2. Make a plan to “get out”, taking with you your bare essentials, your authentic self, which includes your “animal instincts”.

3. Make a path to follow that helps you use your “animal instinct” in the most positive of ways, helping you navigate the insanity of the world, the cruelty of another(s) and redeeming the souls you can.

4. Tell the story of your ‘slavery’ and your ‘liberation’ to another(s) and ask for their help in staying out of your Egypt, their help in seeing the traps that you are still blind to.

5. Count the days of the Omer and see how you ready for the surrender of Sinai, the acceptance of the authority of God, you have become!

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark

"Perfect Purity" is a LIE and paves the way to cruelty - Year 5 Day 27

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 27

“Perfect purity is something we rarely know how to obtain or how to retain. No one can claim to have purged all the dross even from his finest desire. The self is finite, but selfishness is infinite.”

These words, this teaching stirs up my entire being. It is so infuriating to listen to the myriad of people who claim to have “purity” of thought, of heart, of faith, ad nauseam! The truth is those who proclaim their “purity” are usually the MOST impure, they do have “infinite” “selfishness” and their claims of purity are the proof of this. No one who has attained “perfect purity” in anything has to brag about it, they are in awe of those moments and continue to seek out ways to have more of them. Those who brag about it, like Hegseth, usually have ONLY “selfishness” and Pope Leo is a hero for smacking his lies down and speaking the Truth of Christ’s teachings, actions, and beliefs.

All of We the People have “dross” that is never going to be “purged” completely and acceptance of this truth is one of the keys to making progress, to making a change in our ways of living, to lessening the “selfishness” that is “couching at our door, it desires us much”, as God speaks to Cain in the Bible. Immersing ourselves in the words above can help us to appreciate, to apprehend God’s next words: “You can control/rule over it”.

When We the People apprehend, comprehend, and appreciate the truth of the words above; there is no “perfect purity” nor can we the people as human beings expect to be perfect; We the People can begin to see one another as the flawed human beings we are, seeking some kindness, some support, some love in order to know that we are accepted as we are, not for some facade we put up, that our flaws do not make us unloveable, that our “dross” is not a reason to be rejected. Rather, when we live into the words above, the teachings of the Bible, We the People accept our limitations as growth opportunities, become aware of the talents and gifts of another human being that wants to and does help us with the task they are gifted and talented to perform, asking them to be of service which is also, according to some in the Jewish Faith, a mitzvah, a good deed, in and of itself.

The current situation we find ourselves in, the war in Iran, the insanity of Trump, the degrading by Hegseth, the cruelty by Miller, the lies of Wytkoff, the greed of Kushner, the arrogance of Lutnick, the ass-kissing of Graham and the cowardice of the Republicans in Congress are prime examples of “selfishness is infinite” and their claims for “perfect purity” and proclamations of same want most of We the People to VOMIT! This is whom we the people, in a moment that we thought ‘he is selfish like me and he will take care of me’ elected and put into office to FUCK US, to TAKE FREEDOMS guaranteed by the Constitution, defended by the military often, and agreed by the majority are important, away from all of us dumb schmucks whom they despise! The same, however, is true for the far left, they demand a “perfect purity” and their insistence on “identity politics” helped to get Trumpism to have the plurality to get elected!! The far left also wanted to TAKE FREEDOMS away from people who didn’t think they way they did; who didn’t want to serve people whose lifestyles they disagreed with-SO WHAT! It is a free country, supposedly, and to not want to do business with someone is NOT A CRIME! To accuse one of racism, etc because they don’t want to make a wedding cake for a gay couple because their Christian faith has told them same-sex marriage is an abomination, is also ridiculous. They have a belief based on their faith-as misguided as it may seem to some of us, is our “purity” so “perfect” that we should deny their right to their beliefs?

What is so infuriating is watching people pontificate and preach the ‘gospel according to Trump’ and call it CHRISTIANITY! To listen to the spokespeople for my country, who are supposed to represent ALL the PEOPLE, speak lies, talk about ballrooms, brag about their deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize for starting a war in Iran, abducting the head of state of Venezuela, abandoning Ukraine, screwing over the allies we have depended on for 80+years is FUCKING NUTS!! We the People have to get our selfishness under control, it will always be with us, and STOP THE STEAL OF the values and principles of freedom, of the Bible, of the USA!

ACTION STEPS:

1. Make a list of the selfish actions you took today

2. Make a list of the acts of kindness you took today

3) Examine both and discern the kindness in the selfish and the selfish in the kindness, making a plan for lessening the selfishness that is harmful to another and increase the selfishness and kindness that helps another.

4) Let go of your need for purity of anything, in anything and BE HUMAN

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE

Fooling oneself into self-righteousness by giving God your 'heart' and not your actions? Year 5 Day 26

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 5 Day 26

“Man’s power of action is less vague than his power of intention. And an action has intrinsic meaning; its value to the world is independent of what it means to the person performing it. The act of giving food to a helpless child is meaningful regardless of whether or not the moral intention is present. God asks for the heart, and we must spell our answer in terms of deeds” (Thunder in the Soul pg. 88)

These sentences lay out a great conundrum humanity has wrestled with forever. What one does says much more than what one intends, what one says, what one believes. Yet, society continues to want to listen to what they say and be surprised by their actions. Case in point: Trump was a liar, a cheat, a thief, a grifter his ENTIRE LIFE, yet, a majority of we the people believed his words, his bullshit, over what they saw with their own eyes; CRUELTY, HATRED, PREJUDICE, GREED, LUST, etc. Hence, we are in a war of Trump’s choice, a war that is dangerous for the American Soldiers, a war that is costing We the People over a billion dollars a day, a war depleting our weaponry, a war that 62% of America DOES NOT WANT, a war that is costing all of us our savings, our affordability,… Yet, Trump keeps saying his lies, his cabinet keeps Kissing His Ass, and many of the people who voted for him are suffering and/or going to suffer the most! WTF People??

I begin with this diatribe because while Rabbi Heschel gives an example of something good, feeding “a helpless child”, I believe We the People have to see, hear, understand what our negative actions do as well. When people with disabilities are mocked and derided, the cruelty shown affects the person being made fun of, it also affects the people witnessing this spiritual crime, it affects the family members of the person with the disability, it affects all the families of people with challenges, as well as the people themselves. YET, good old boy, Lindsey Graham don’t care, that paragon of virtue, Tom Holman don’t care, Kristi Noem don’t care, Howard Lutnick don’t care, their motto, like Trump’s, is FUCK EVERYONE YOU CAN as often as you can.

The intrinsic meaning of the actions taken by Gingrich, the Tea Party, Trump and his MAGA crowd is to deny the foundation of what America was created to be: a democratic state where people argued, people fought, and, with the exception of the Civil War, it was, is, and, please God, will be: We the People, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.!

THIS HAS TO BE STOPPED BY WE THE PEOPLE! We did it with King George, with England when they were so powerful and We the People can certainly do it with Trump and his buffoons-as powerful as they are, We the People Shall Overcome!

“God asks for the heart, and we must spell our answer in terms of deeds” is crucial for change, for T’Shuvah which is what We the People of America and Israel must engage in RIGHT FUCKING NOW. Bibi and Donny do not represent what God asks for nor what God wants, Iranian leadership and Hamas do not represent what God asks for nor what God wants, Putin and Orban, et al do not represent what God asks for nor what God wants! We the People have to rise above our pettiness, pride, fear and self-deception to BE LIBERATED this Passover. We the People are being called to account for what our “deeds” say, for the ramifications of our negative, indifferent actions and the ledger is NOT in the BLACK!! We the People can change the accounting right now, using this Passover to, like the Rabbis in B’nei Brak, plot our liberation from the negativity that has poisoned our souls, overtaken our minds and closed our hearts. We the People are in need of circumcising our hearts once again and continue to monitor the openness and welcoming of the stranger, of God into our hearts. This is the path I have been on for the past 39+ years and while it gets narrower, it also gets bigger, more rewarding and joyous.

ACTION STEPS:

1. Separate your intentions from your actions

2. End your incessant need to explain your bad actions away because of intentions, thinking, etc

3. Stand up and fight for the hard-fought liberation our ancestors provided us with

4. DO NOT SURRENDER to the self-deception and the lies of another.

5. Be part of a group that plots ACTION STEPS for liberation from indifference, etc

GOD BLESS and STAY SAFE, Rabbi Mark