Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 2 Day 115
“Good and evil are not values among other values. Good is life, and evil is death. “See I have set before thee this day life and good, death and evil…choose life”(Deuteronomy 30:15-19) (God in Search of Man pg 373)
Rabbi Heschel’s first sentence above seems obvious, yet he has to state it. In fact, he states it again later in this paragraph. I wondered why at first and then, DUH, he has to state it because we had/have become guilty of confusing good and evil as just another value like honesty/dishonesty, being overcome with a desire/controlling our desires, etc. In the shadow of the Shoah, in the shadow of the Concentration Camps, in the shadow of people’s inhumanity towards people, in the real time of nuclear bombs build-up, in the shadow of the McCarthy Hearings/witch hunt, in the shadow of the killing of Ethel Rosenberg even though the government knew she was innocent, Rabbi Heschel saw truth, saw the way good and evil were tossed around.
I imagine he was abhorred at the idea that the words, good and evil, were just thrown around to justify inhumane actions, to justify life-taking, freedom-denying actions that ‘the people in power’ were taking. Dropping the Atomic Bomb on Japan, while it saved so many lives as opposed to invading Japan, it was not good, it was not life-giving nor life-saving to those who died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki! McCarthy and his ‘commie witch hunt’ was not to save our country, it was not to unearth actual treason, it was to make a name for himself and to punish people who’s politics he did not like. Killing Ethel, and for that matter Julius, Rosenberg did not serve any purpose except to show the anti-semitism that was still abounding in the US at that time (and now). Knowingly putting an innocent woman to death for not telling something she did not know, knowingly suborning perjury from her brother to save his life is not a good thing.
Yet, we continue to confuse good and evil as just another utilitarian value. How do I use them to my advantage people think, then and now-possibly it has been this way forever. When the Congress is going to call Illhan Omar an Anti-Semite because of her comments of years ago and extol Paul Gosar and Marjorie Taylor-Greene who participated in rallies with White Supremacists who spewed out hatred of Jews and they seem unable to pass a bill that ensures equal and fair access to the process of voting while claiming stolen elections and the Republicans call this good, call this living good American values; Rabbi Heschel’s concern and need to re-iterate this seemingly obvious statement that “good and evil are not values among other values” is warranted and necessary.
We must stop using ‘spin’, ‘half-truths’, cover-ups, ‘alternative facts’, etc to define what is good and what is evil! This has gone on too long and look where we are at. We have almost 50% of our country who believes the 2020 election was stolen, that the Jan. 6 insurrection and storming of the Capital was a peaceful demonstration by people who wanted truth restored by overturning a free and fair election. We have elected representatives who supported the insurrection in words and deeds before and after it happened while cowering while it was happening for fear of their lives! We listen to Tucker Carlson, et al spew out so many lies, so much evil that Russia hails him as a hero! We have people who believe it is okay for Putin to invade Ukraine because he is ‘the savior of the white race’! We are watching, finally in some horror, as Police beat Black men to death just because they are black and make up lies to validate their behaviors and call them good. We are watching, some of us in horror, as these same evil Police (not all Police are evil) get away with these actions as they have forever. There is no personal accountability and, in the overwhelming amount of cases that are brought against them, they are acquitted. We use the words good and evil without truly ascribing the the life and death values they embody. We have come to make them like most values-in the eye of the beholder and to be used for personal validation rather than to save life, to serve another and to serve God.
In recovery, most of us realize we were both at death’s door many times and we were the bringer of almost death, certainly spiritual death, certainly emotional suffering to the people closest to us, to the people who loved us and to the stranger. Instead of caring for people, we used them; instead of bringing good, we perpetrated evil. Our recovery is based on making our amends not just for past actions, it is based on living amends by “practicing these principles in all our affairs”. We know, firsthand, that evil is death, because we were close to spiritual death. We are learning that good is life.
I know how much death evil brings. I saw it in the eyes of the people closest to me, I saw it in people who came for help. I see it in people on the street who are suffering because of the evil that is being perpetrated. It is not okay for me to just not do evil anymore, that was okay for a while. Immersing myself in Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom reminds me that I have to seek to do good, I have to find good to bring to each and every day-otherwise evil wins! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark