Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 39

“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)

Religion is not superstition-full stop! Yet, because of our need to live in an “either/or” way of being, we seem incapable of holding two thoughts at one time in our being. Because of the divorce of science and religion, around the time of Galileo, I believe, these two crucial ways of relating to the world have become locked into a contentious battle. Neither of these disciplines are antithetical to one another, yet humans in their need for superiority, have made them so. Some scientists have labeled religion “superstition” and some religious people have labeled science “blasphemy”-neither are true and too many people have bought into these deceptions and we find ourselves locked into a war. This war is also an internal war, we find people who ‘choose’ sides deny the truths of the ‘other side’. This divorce of science and religion has fueled a war of words and actions; to the point where people are unable to discuss, appreciate and find common ground. Rather than seek to learn with and from one another, we are witnesses to and participants in a ‘straw-man’ issue.

We are in desperate need “to believe” in something greater than ourselves. We are in desperate need to “honor our mothers and fathers” by brightening “the light our fathers had winded”. Yet, we seem to be hellbent on “evidence-based” thinking and “blowing out the candles of light”. Herein lies our challenge: how to live into and accept the hypothesis’ and proofs of science and the truths of the Bible and the prophets. They are not antithetical, they both come from a power greater than ourselves, they are both true. Religious/spiritual living has evolved from the very “light our fathers had winded” as has science! While “evidence-based” is called ‘scientific’, it doesn’t take into account the resilience of the human spirit. While our education system, both secular and religious, engages in either “evidence-based” or “biblical” methods, neither takes into account the wisdom of proverbs 22:6: “Teach each child(person) according to his way” or the wisdom of Hillel (paraphrasing here): “speak to each person in a way they can understand”. We are not in need of more dividers, we are in need of more acceptance.

Our need to depend on the “evidence-based” theories of today negates the test of time, the foundational aspects of how we have survived and thrived to last this long on earth. Humanity has fought with one another in a false struggle to prove Darwin’s theory-the survival of the fittest- while denying the truth that the Bible screams at us to “care for  and welcome” the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow, the orphan-the least among us. This is not to decry advances in science, in knowledge, it is to decry throwing “ the baby out with the bathwater” way of modernity. We have a rich tradition of seeking truth, we have a mandate to understand the Bible in all of its “70 faces”, which demands “rigorous honesty”, it demands “radical amazement”, it demands living in “both/and”. As we have seen throughout the past, when one ‘group’, scientific or religious, goes to great lengths to deny the whole picture, when one group stakes their very existence on the denial of any other ways of learning, of seeing the world, we have a very skewed world. When religious people want to deny the scientific advances in medicine, in climate, in a myriad of meeting life’s challenges, we see people die needlessly, we see people suffer immeasurably, for no good reason. Who do these people think gave our scientists the spirit, wisdom and drive to make the wonderful advances we have achieved if not God? When scientists, rationalists, humanists, have to laugh at those of us who have religious and spiritual beliefs, we see people suffer from depression and despair, people rebel against the “conventional notions and mental cliches” that rule this group of people, we are witnesses to the wars, the cruelty, the addictions that have created more divisions between people, we have seen the destruction of “am I my brother’s keeper?”, the destruction of “love your neighbor as you love yourself”.

There is a solution, however. We have to enhance “the light our fathers had winded” through seeking harmony, through turning “our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understand him”(3rd step of AA). Scientists like Einstein believe in a power greater than themselves, scientists have sought the source of energy that keeps the world afloat forever. People of faith have sought God, as they understand God, as a source of energy, a source of spirit, a source of morality. Whether the Bible was written by God and/or divinely inspired is immaterial, whether one can “prove” the veracity of the biblical sites and people is of no consequence, because the validity of the Bible is unquestionable, the “light our fathers had winded” has survived till today, the Jewish people have survived till today, our connection with “a power greater than ourselves” has continued to today. This connection is the beginning and end of recovery-full stop!

I have spent the last 36 years fueling the light my father and grandfathers had winded. I spent many years prior to recovery trying to extinguish this same light. Thank God I was unable to extinguish their light, unable to extinguish the light of my soul. This is the challenge for everyone, to live in the light of the “both/and” our ancestors “had winded”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark