Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 2 Day 307
“The most unnoticed of all miracles is the miracle of repentance. It is not the same thing as rebirth; it is transformation, creation. In the dimension of time there is no going back. But the power of repentance causes time to be created backward and allows re-creation of the past to take place. Through the forgiving hand of God, harm and blemish which we have committed against the world and against ourselves will be extinguished, transformed into salvation.”(Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)
The last sentence above is one that is debated, argued, and which many people disagree with. It is also one that I believe is misunderstood.God’s always seeking to forgive, God is always seeking for us to return, in the Talmud we learn that God cries because “My children are in Exile”, at the drowning of the Egyptians in the Red Sea while the Angels were cheering, our sages teach that God says: “My children are dying”. Rather than accepting the “punishing God of the Old Testament”, God redeems the Israelites from Egypt, God continually accepts the T’Shuvah of the Israelites in the desert, God sends the Prophets to the kingdoms of Israel and Judea to call the people back to being the souls they were created to be. Jeremiah calls to us: “Return, you backsliding children, I will heal your backsliding”(Jeremiah 3:22), Hosea reminds us to “return Israel to the Lord your God, for you have stumbled in your iniquity”(Hosea 14:2). Our tradition reminds us that the Gates of T’Shuvah, the gates of return/forgiveness are open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year! Yet, we continue to use God as punisher, as authoritarian because we are afraid to believe Rabbi Heschel’s words above and the words of the Bible. I think our fear is rooted in our lack of forgiving ourselves and another, our fear is rooted in our inability to accept our imperfections, our fear is rooted in the responsibility forgiveness/T’Shuvah brings to us.
In Numbers 14:20 God says: “I forgive as you have spoken” in response to Moses’ pleading for the people when they disbelieved God again in regards to entering the Promised Land early on in their journey from Egypt to Canaan. Each Erev Yom Kippur, aka Kol Nidre, after the Kol Nidre prayer, we recite these words to remind us of “the forgiving hand of God”, to remind us we are worthy of forgiveness, to call on us to forgive as easily as God does even though God knows we will need forgiveness again and again. Each time we screw up, we do it a little differently and we learn from our mistakes, each time we screw up we go to God and we are forgiven, we experience, as Hosea 14:5 teaches: “I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely.” These are not the words of a punishing God, these are the words and actions of a loving God. God has kept the Jews alive and Judaism has stayed dynamic throughout antiquity up until now because of God’s love, God’s forgiveness, God’s healing. Rather than stay stuck in the past, rather than live under a strictness, a perfection seeking path that is impossible to hold to, God calls for us to return, God sends us forgiveness, God is willing to begin anew, wiping away the memories of our iniquities, cleaning the slate of our errors and missteps.
Yet, the problem, as always, is with us. Many of us are not willing to accept God’s forgiveness for what it is, a responsibility, a clean slate, a new beginning, a re-covenanting. Rather, we find ways to bastardize the teachings of the Bible, the wisdom and brilliance of Rabbi Heschel’s teaching above(and all of his others) so we can ‘get over’ on God, on another human being, on ourselves. We seem to be afraid to accept God’s forgiveness, we seem to be reluctant to allow our “backsliding” to be healed, we seem to disbelieve that we “I will love them freely” is the way of God. The problem, as always, begins and ends with us! We stay in our own denial and self-deception, we continue to be adjusted to the societal norms and cliches that once a ‘bad boy’, always a ‘bad boy’. We are shamed and blame from an early age and we shame and blame everyone else from an early age and this pattern disallows our belief in God’s “forgiving hand” and instead gives aid and comfort to the lie of “punishing God”, something invented by pagans and other faiths as a marketing tool for converts because Judaism had and has, at its core: “welcoming the stranger, caring for the poor, feeding the hungry, redeeming the captive and the one who had to sell themselves into slavery” and the responsibilities and inner work it takes to fulfill.
I have experienced the “forgiving hand of God” numerous times in my life, as I look back on my past. In recovery, I have been aware of these times and I am so grateful for “the forgiving hand of God”. I know I could not have achieved the spiritual clarity/serenity, the acceptance of “the things I cannot change” and “the courage to change the things I should” without “the forgiving hand of God”. The Serenity Prayer quoted here and T’Shuvah remind me daily of God’s love and forgiveness. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark