Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 302

National Month of Repentance and Change

“…Enforced Jewishness still sits so uneasily in many of us that a new wave of desertions could occur at any moment. The apostasy of the past is matched by the superficiality of today. Is this disappointment surprising?” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

Remembering that these words were written in Berlin, Germany in 1936 published on the eve of Yom Kippur and as we head into a new year, 5785 in the Jewish Calendar, with antisemitism on the rise, Israel under attack from the inside and outside, America’s elections in November between an autocrat who hangs out with anti-semites, holocaust deniers, a guy who wants to follow a plan that makes us a ‘christian nation’ and rounds up immigrants, puts serial numbers on them, and, of course, proclaims the hierarchy of white people over everyone else. Oh yeah, he loves dictators and other autocrats who hate Jews, and everyone else not white and, on the other side, a woman of color married to a Jew, a woman who has made service her north star, fought for the rights of those marginalized and harmed by perpetrators of all stripes and types, who has a plan that builds up America and helps us let go of the racism America has held onto for so long. The “enforced Jewishness” that antisemitism brings has, in some cases, caused many Jews to desert our cultural heritage, the legacy of the Bible and the prophets in favor of the autocrat and his gang of thugs, in favor of Bibi who is responsible for Oct. 7th, has prosecuted a terrible war in Gaza, is doing the right thing-so far- in Lebanon, and is trying to make Israel a state without the rule of law and still convince people it is a democracy!

Leading up the destruction of both Temples “apostasy” was rampant among the priestly class, the ruling class, the wealthy class. The abandonment of “Jewishness” by abandoning basic foundational standards such as: caring for the poor, the stranger, the widow, the orphan; “love your neighbor as you love yourself”; “one law for the citizen and the stranger alike”; we are all created in the image of the divine with infinite, equal and unique dignity and worth; “choose life”; no lies, no stealing, no whoring oneself; in a place where there is no humanity, be human and so many others. Why are we repeating the same apostasy’s? What is the hubris that Jews who support an authoritarian believe they will not be rounded up? Do they believe like some Jews in Germany believed that ‘this too shall pass’, ‘he doesn’t really mean it’, that making up stories, as JD Vance has admitted to, like Hatians are eating animals in Springfield, Ohio is good for themselves, democacy, America? That following the talking points of far-right/alt-right to “get over your dictator-phobia” whom JD Vance claims to believe, listen to and quote is a good thing for being Jewish? These Jews are most responsible for the desertions of our young people-they see the hypocrisy of these ‘real Jews’ as they call themselves and want nothing to do with this bullshit! I don’t blame them. They also desert because the rest of us have not given them a compelling reason to be Jewish-not shown them how “Jewishness” gives us a life worth living and helps us navigate the ups and downs of life. We have given them superficiality and wonder why they ‘abandon’ their “Jewishness”.

We each have to look inside and see how we are living Jewishly at a superficial level. We are being called to account on Thursday (actually Wednesday evening) for the ways we have engaged in superficiality as well as the apostasies we have committed-wittingly  and unwittingly. We each have to look inside of ourselves and take note of the lies we have told ourselves, the deceptions we have bought into that has allowed us to be so devoid of meaning and purpose for something greater than ourselves. On these Holy Days we can go to God and seek forgiveness for these desertions and apostasies, we believe so many don’t even do their inventories well. Yet, nothing we have done to another is forgiven until we try to go to them, if they refuse our sincerity-then the universe forgives us. However, if we are not taking note, doing our accounting of our soul to find these apostasies and desertions we have committed, then we are submitting ourselves to the powers that be, to the authoritarians, to the leaders of deceptions, to the people who agree with, support, and encourage our lies and self-deceptions. We are at a turning point again-history has shown us that these points come to us often and we have the opportunity to do differently than the leaders, the wealthy, the priests and the people did in 586BCE, in 70AD, and throughout Jewish history when we deserted and practiced apostasy.

We do this by owning our shit, by standing up and saying: Hineni, here I am in all my guilt, clothed in errors and today I am bathing myself in repentance! We no longer hide our guilt with bluster and blame of another(s), we no longer go along with the lies and deceptions of autocrats, want to be autocrats. We not longer make alliances with people who hate another group, who scapegoat another group of people because we have been, are and will always be scapegoated by groups in power or seeking power. We end our desertions and our apostasies by turning back to our spiritual home, our soul’s calling. We return again to the place where we can breathe freely and where the wind brings the words: “Proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”(Lev.25:10) because we have been freed from our lies, from our deceptions, from our hatreds and from the fears that have distorted our vision. We will also return to these places for sure and the good news is that we will leave them so much quicker than we ever have because our repentance will propel us forward.

I am sorry for the ways I have deserted people, from deserting my father’s morals and teachings, to deserting my family, my daughter, people who trusted me, all of this prior to recovery. I am sorry to the people who have experienced me deserting them in these past 36 years, I am reaching out to the people I remember and I hope the rest can accept my amend here. I am sorry for abandoning my “Jewishness” prior to recovery and am committed to continue to speak out, loudly of course, to the crimes of apostasy that I see and experience. I know this doesn’t make me popular, as my friend Rabbi Ed Feinstein says, and I also know that not doing this is the worst desertion I can commit, the absolute height of apostasy for me. I beg of everyone to accept my amends and understand that my rejection of desertion and apostasy may make you uncomfortable and I have to live my soul’s calling. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark