Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 3 Day 40
“The conscience of the world was destroyed by those who were wont to blame others rather than themselves. Let us remember. We revered the instincts but distrusted the prophets. We labored to perfect engines and let our inner life go to wreck. We ridiculed superstition until we lost our ability to believe. We have helped to extinguish the light our fathers had winded. We have bartered holiness for convenience, loyalty for success, love for power, wisdom for information, tradition for fashion.” (Man’s Quest for God pg. 150)
Having immersed ourselves for days in this paragraph, we come to the last phrases and delving into how we have “bartered… loyalty for success, love for power, wisdom for information, tradition for fashion” can help us see a future way of living that is more authentic to the call of our souls, to becoming “the self we were created to be”, and living in harmony with all people.
Rabbi Heschel is calling to us to stop deceiving ourselves as to what we are doing, bastardizing our basic goodness of being, our foundational principles and paths for momentary gain. He is lifting the veil of mendacity under which we all seem to be viewing our ways of living, our principles, the principles of the Bible, etc. We all have been party to and witness’ of what happens when we deceive ourselves that our success is being loyal no matter how we achieve this success. We all have been party to and witness’ of bartering our principles in one area of living in order to gain support, monetary success, in another area. We all know how our government works today where everyone in their respective party is supposed to go along with the party line, toe the party line no matter what their constituents need, no matter what is true and right, no matter the stakes. Liz Cheney is a perfect example of what happens when an elected official goes against the party line-she was ostracized, defeated in her re-election bid by the Republican Party. Democrats supported Rashida Tliab’s right to promote extermination of Jews and destruction of Israel as a way of being loyal to ‘the party’. We have come to deceive ourselves/barter away our loyalty to the Founding Fathers who never believed the Constitution they wrote was written in stone, who set up amendments for the purpose of changing, who knew the ways would have to be constantly re-defined and understood in each proceeding era, by being “strict constitutionalists” which is another term for achieving their own selfish goals rather than what is best for all.
In the Bible, Numbers 15:39, we are taught: “do not scout out after your heart and your eyes which you will whore after”. As individuals, we have transgressed this commandment, this principle so often. This is a very personal instance of trading our loyalty to principles for our momentary and monetary success. Think of the myriad of people any of us have betrayed so we can “get ahead”. Apple did it with Steve Jobs, Synagogues have done it with their spiritual leaders, institutions do this with their leaders and the employees backstab one another in order to “get ahead”. Business engage in spying on one another, “killing the competition”, lying about their achievements, not mentioning the risks, not taking responsibility for their actions which harm, all in the name of success, all to serve their ‘higher’ goal of winning. We do this in so many areas of life and it begins with how we decide to live personally, how we choose to either “scout out after our hearts and eyes”, give in to our baser desires whether they are good for us or not, or we choose to stay loyal to our authentic selves, stay loyal to higher consciousness, stay loyal to God’s call. We have become oblivious to the need to constantly making this choice, to being aware of the myriad of disguises selfishness, success wear so as to confuse us as to what is good and right, what is bartering “loyalty for success” and harming our inner lives, harming our world.
There is a solution, of course. It calls for us to strip away the false exterior, the deceptive armor we have put on, to let go of our facade of strength and ‘rightness’, to engage in an authentic Chesbon HaNefesh, an accounting of our souls personally, communally, country-wide. We need to “go back to the drawing board” and look at the foundational principles of our way of living. What do we value? Do we value life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Do we value that all people are created equal, all people are created in the image of the Divine? Do we value the call to welcome the stranger, care for the needy and the poor, the widow and the orphan? Do we value the health and well-being of everyone? Or do we just pay lip service to these values and do what we want so we can ‘get ours’? With Russia’s attempt to grab Ukraine, Iran’s attempt to destroy Israel and exterminate Jews through its proxies, the polarization here in our country, the Anti-Semitism and hatred spewed throughout the world right now, it feels like we are at a tipping point, again. We need a revolution- we need to revolt against our pursuit of “success” at the cost of being loyal to decency, kindness, and the other values listed above.
Recovery is just such a revolution. In recovery, we welcome everyone, we love people without any reciprocity until they can love themselves and pay it forward. In recovery, we take responsibility for our actions, good and not good, improving the good and making amends for the not good ones. We continue to take this inventory every day so we don’t drift off our path, off the path of goodness, kindness, etc. We stay loyal to the principles even when it means calling someone out on their behavior and their self-deceptions. In recovery, this makes us popular, it makes us feel whole and connected. I have stayed loyal to people and principles in my recovery, sometimes that loyalty has not been reciprocated and I stay loyal to the principles. I continue to be responsible for my side of the street and work to keep it as clean as possible. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark