Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 2 Day 157
“What is a mitsvah? A prayer in the form of a deed. And to pray is to sense His presence. “In “all thy ways thou shalt know Him.” Prayer should be part of all our ways. It does not have to be always on our lips; it must always be on our minds, in our hearts.”(God in Search of Man pg. 375)
In Rabbi Heschel’s interview with Carl Stern that is included in Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity, edited by Dr. Susannah Heschel, he speaks about prayer: “The primary purpose of prayer is not to make requests. The primary purpose is to praise, to sing, to chant. Because the essence of prayer is a song, and man cannot live without a song.” Using this ‘definition’, this understanding of prayer, I am hearing Rabbi Heschel remind us that our deeds are either praising God, praising the good, singing with our whole being our joy and gratitude for being alive, the chant of our soul are reflected in our deeds or our deeds are praising evil, living for self-satisfaction, glory, narcissistic ends, denying the chant/music in our soul and bastardizing God’s name. Sensing God’s presence in the ways Rabbi Heschel teaches, preaches, and lived is much different than what we hear from the fundamentalist clergy, the prosperity clergy, the Orthodox in Israel and in America, the Evangelicals in America, Israel, throughout the world, the Fundamentalist Muslims in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Israel, America, etc. It is different from the practitioners of Eastern Spirituality who have nothing to learn nor accept from people of another Spiritual Discipline.
We are in such a time right now where “to sense His presence” is being used as a weapon for evil rather than a tool, a guide, a motivation for good! We see this in America where so many ‘god-fearing christians and jews’ stand with the authoritarianism of Trump, DeSantis, Pence, McCarthy, Taylor-Greene, Jordan, et al. We are witnessing the promotion of people who participated in an Insurrection on Jan.6th as patriots and political prisoners. This from the same people who believed holding people indefinitely in Guantanamo was the right thing to do because these people participated in attacking our country! They are invested in hating the stranger, jailing the poor and forgetting the needy-these ‘religious’ charlatans. In Israel, the right-wing Orthodox, who feed off the state because they only want to study-not go to the army, not work, just study so they have no ‘skin in the game’ of making the country safe, want to kill the democracy, want to kill the Arabs, want to kill justice for all, so they can rule! I wonder what all their studying has done for them when they are practicing what the Rabbis of old taught was the cause of the destruction of the Temple, Sinat Hinam-senseless hatred. In both of these places, authoritarian leadership is leading the masses to their own destruction, they are leading “their flock” to ruination-especially if the authoritarians win! Remember Nazi Germany, look at Russia under communism and now-the people didn’t thrive, only the authoritarians and their cronies.
Yet, we refuse to learn from history. The ‘religious, god-fearing christians, muslims, jews’ refuse to hear the prophets. They and we are not sensing God’s presence in our deeds otherwise we would not give in to the lies we tell ourselves, the deception of another(s), the call of hatred, the anti-democratic actions that are being done in our name across the world. As we are in the period of time prior to celebrating the Exodus from Egypt and Easter, isn’t it time to look at the ways we are still enslaved to a way of living that denies God’s presence in our actions? Isn’t it time for us to allow our self to be “brought out from the Land of Egypt”? Isn’t it time for us to stop having our deeds praise evil; praise selfishness, praise harming the stranger, the poor, the needy; seek control over women’s bodies, minds and free-will? Isn’t it time for us to stop engaging in the “eye disease”, the “cancer of the soul” of prejudice in all of its forms?
In recovery we say a resounding YES-IT IS TIME TO STOP! We practice the principles of God’s will in all our affairs, we are constantly “seeking knowledge of God’s will and the power to carry it out”, we are consistently aware of when we hit the mark and when we miss the mark and we are more afraid of hiding from our evil actions and our good actions than admitting them out loud!
As Rabbi Heschel says in his speech at the Conference on Race and Religion in 1963, the first conference on race and religion had Moses and Pharaoh as it’s participants and “the outcome of that summit has not come to an end”. I worked and continue to work hard to ensure that my deeds are my prayers, that my kindness overwhelms my selfishness, my generosity of spirit overtakes my FOMO, that truth wins out over mendacity and justice for all is a reality. Seeing the divine in each person I meet prevents the senseless hatred I witness each day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark