Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 3 Day 346
“Satisfying a need is part of the continuum of the psyche, serving an end, doing a mitzvah is a breakthrough…Ultimate ends, as seen by our tradition, are not timeless values, metaphysical entities, frozen absolutes. Ultimate ends are mitzvoth, demands.” (Insecurity of Freedom pg. 63)
As I wrote about before, Rabbi Heschel and Judaism do not vilify physical urges nor needs of the psyche. What he is speaking about here is going beyond serving just our psyche, just our bodies, and ensuring that there is an end that is more than just about us. There are many mitzvot about taking care of one’s body, one’s money, one’s home, one’s family, etc. These “demands” encompass our own needs so we can serve something greater than just ourselves, so we can rise above our self-centered, narcissistic ways of being that impede our living well and impede the forward motion of the world around us.
Rabbi Heschel’s statement: “doing a mitzvah is a breakthrough” is so radical that it could, should stop us in our tracks. What are we breaking through when we do a “mitzvah”? As I experience these words this morning, I know that the “breakthrough” is our ability to finally “circumcise the foreskin of our hearts” as Moses instructs us in Deuteronomy. My experience of these “breakthroughs” is one of awe and trembling, never fear. It is the awe of realizing the goodness that lies within each of us, the goodness that so many have been afraid to show. It is the awe of wonder and, maybe for the first time, seeing another human being as someone to care for as Leviticus teaches us “Love your neighbor as you love yourself”. It is the awe of wonder, again for one of the first times, of seeing our authentic self and realizing that to serve something greater than ourselves is one of the highest callings we have, one that goes beyond the societal norms and our rational minds.
These “ultimate ends” in no way deny the need of serving the psyche, they do not negate our need for physical, emotional satisfaction. I would posit that satisfying our physical and emotional needs is a precursor to serving “ultimate ends”, otherwise we deny a part of us which then negates the “demand” of the “mitzvah” to bring all of ourselves to the table, to “walk humbly with God”, to live into and up to our higher consciousness.
The experience of serving “ultimate ends” by “doing a “mitzvah” breaks through our hardened shell of fear and self-loathing. It cracks open our false belief that we have to ‘do everything on our own’ to be a ‘rugged individual’ that ‘the one with the most toys wins’, that ‘winning is the only thing’ making it okay to win at any and all costs. This way of being is how we lose our spiritual health, how our needs overtake our psyche and prevent us from having a “breakthrough”. Remember, society doesn’t want us to have these “breakthroughs” because it would help us all throw off the yoke of these asinine societal cliches and norms. Serving “ultimate ends” creates within each individual a sense of freedom and joy, service, infusing our lives with an exhilarating feeling of indescribable spirit.
Hence, the reason that the autocrat wants us to serve them, not “ultimate ends”. Hence the reason that so many leaders, clergy, practitioners of different religions what us to serve dogma rather than “ultimate ends”. We have become so proficient at subterfuge and mendacity that many people have turned the Bible into their manifesto to enslave another person whereas the Exodus from Egypt, the five promises God makes to Moses and the Israelite people deny that slavery is forever. The experience at Mount Sinai, whether one believes the story of God holding the mountain over the heads of the tribes to get them to accept or not, is one of the importance of freedom by accepting an authority greater than ourselves. Even if one believes the midrash of God coercing the Israelite people to accept the Torah, the truth is we die inside every time we go against serving an “ultimate end”, we create more cognitive dissonance every time we ‘go along to get along’. We enhance the split between our rational mind and our intuitive mind every time we deny the “breakthrough” that occurs when we are “doing a mitzvah”. This is one of the ways society, people get us to go against our own best interests to serve the ‘man’ rather than serve an “ultimate end”. These elected officials who see mandates and want to destroy the democratic norms established in 1789 and improved upon ever since constantly fill our heads and minds with the lies that serve them-not us, serve them-not our country, serve them-so they can have ‘ultimate rule’ so that their selfish desires become our ‘ultimate ends’.
“We, the people” have to say NO to the bully, NO to the autocrat, NO to the idolator leading a religious community. We have to say YES to serving the “ultimate ends” of humanity, YES to “doing a mitzvah” as a “breakthrough”. Now is the time for all of us to take the next right action and break out of the doldrums and rote behaviors of either rage or acquiescence. We have to break out of the societal norms and mental cliches that have prevented us from serving the best interests of our self, serving the needs of our psyche to go beyond our physical and emotional needs to serve more than just ourselves. Making love, a wonderful and beautiful action is more that just reaching an orgasm for both partners, it is the culmination of and the physical manifestation of the spiritual connection between 2 people. Righteousness is something we have to constantly and continually pursue and temper all justice with it. Rebuking our neighbor is to help them see the error of their ways and to not bear guilt upon ourselves for “standing idly by the blood of our neighbor”. We have the road map and the playbook for how to serve “ultimate ends” and we have the inner strength to “breakthrough” our narcissism to accomplish them.
I have been serving “ultimate ends” for over 36 years and in doing so, also have served my own needs. In fact, serving “ultimate ends” is what has led to the “breakthrough” I experience each day. I write this blog, do my podcast, and beginning a new group called “conscious living” in person and on zoom to serve “ultimate ends” to live my gifts out loud and to serve my need to serve. I also know that I am not ‘owed’ anything from anyone for serving “ultimate ends” even though they may have benefited from my actions. Doing the mitzvah is its own reward. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark