Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 283

“Self-examination was not inaugurated by analytical psychology. Austere soul-searching is an essential feature of piety, and the pious man is prone to suspect that his reverence and devotion may be furtive attachments to selfish purposes.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

On this 5th day of Elul, these words of Rabbi Heschel seem very appropriate. Given the times we are living in, the ways in which some wrap themselves in the Flag, in the Bible, in the New Testament, in the Koran, in Eastern Philosophical texts, these words are crucial for us to realize the importance of “austere soul-searching”. The Rabbis knew we needed this, not just to be ‘pious religious people’, rather to be able to be servants of God, to fulfill the unique purpose we were given as a birthright, to be an authentic human being who’s dutifulness is never rote, is never for the sake of optics, etc.

Immersing myself in the teaching above, I am struck with Rabbi Heschel’s message of never taking one’s “piety” for granted. I hear him reminding us to stop thinking too much of ourselves, to not believe our own press, to never be ‘holier than thou’ when dealing with ourselves, another, and/or God. Rather than be like Moses who denied doing anything wrong throughout the Bible, Rabbi Heschel is calling out to us to not be so sure of our actions/motives, to not be too self-aggrandizing and self-congratulatory regarding our accomplishments, to not puff up our chests and try to get medals for our “reverence and devotion” because we may be more reverent and devoted to our egos than we are to God, to decency, to ‘doing the next right thing’.

We, here in America and in Israel, as well as across the Globe, are facing choices that call for us to return to the examples of our ancestors, to the guidance of our ancestors and end our need to be so “pious” and to stop our outward declarations of our “piety”. As soon as people tell you what God wants, they are “furtive attachments to selfish purposes”! Each of us is created unique and in the Divine Image, each of us has a word of God to bring to fruition in our own quirky manner, ergo: no one of us knows exactly what God wants from all of us except to “welcome the stranger, care for the needy, the poor, etc”. When ‘religious men’ state that some people are 2nd Class citizens, they go against the Divine command to “have one law for the stranger and the citizen alike”. When these same ‘religious men’ proclaim the value of slavery, white supremacy, anti-semitism, anti-muslim, etc, they are engaged in spreading the cancer that is eating up their soul to the rest of us. When they proclaim their allegiance to God, to the Flag, to the State, and they exclude groups of people, when they seek to have authoritarian rule rather than abide by democratic norms, they are failing to follow God’s command to: “Proclaim Liberty throughout the land and to all the inhabitants thereof”(Lev.25:10). Yet, we are watching the ”pious” proclaim the “piety” in their actions that go against the ways of God in favor of “selfish purposes”.

People such as these and their followers, their adherents give lip-service to “austere soul-searching” rather than do their own Chesbon HaNefesh, their own accounting of their soul. While this has always been the case, reading the Bible, the prophets, gives us the long history of this type of person, it is time for us to stop doing it ourselves, we have to banish these “false prophets”, we have to “circumcise the foreskins of our hearts” so we can hear the words of God we were born with, so we can live our unique purpose and make the world a little better than we found it, or at least do everything we can to make this happen..In recovery as in Judaism, we set aside time each day for inventory, for “austere soul-searching” and for making our amends as well as being grateful for the good we have done, and expressing gratitude for the help we have received during the day. We remind ourselves of a few truths while doing this daily “soul-searching”: we are not in this for ourselves, we can’t do it alone, we will never achieve the perfection we mistakenly believe we should attain, and we have to live an authentic, transparent life.

In looking back over the years, I know my achievements/actions have had a tinge of “selfish purpose” at times, I cannot say that my ego wasn’t involved in my daily living. I do know my ego most times served God, a greater good than “furtive selfish needs”. In my recovery, I wasn’t furtive, I am pretty ‘out there’. I am deeply devoted to service, to serving God, to being open and I have indulged myself by being a caricature of my self at times. I am sorry for the times when my ego overrode being of service and I am sorry for the times when I allowed callousness and harshness to blunt the message God gave me to deliver at birth. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark