Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 356

“We are living through one of the great hours of history. The false gods are crumbling, and the hearts are hungry for the voice of God. But the voice has been stifled. To recapture the echo, we must be honest in our willingness to listen, unprejudiced in our readiness to understand.” (Insecurity of Freedom pg. 66)

I have read these words with both hope and sadness over these years. Hearing Rabbi Heschel call out to us to recognize that right now is “one of the great hours of history” is vital to living into the demand the universe puts upon us and the demand that our inner life is calling to us to fulfill. Yet, most people go through life with the “same shit, different day” attitude which does not give us a sense of “reverence for man” as I wrote about yesterday nor does it even give us reverence for ourselves. This is the reason, I believe, we don’t recognize right now is “one of the great hours of history.”

That this was written and spoken in 1962, at a time when the Civil Rights movement was gaining so much strength, when it looked like the promise of the Declaration of Independence for all people having the “unalienable rights” like “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” would come true with the Integration of the Ole Miss, fair housing order, etc so “the false gods are crumbling” was actually happening as many people were seeing segregation, racism in all of its forms-skin color, ethnicity, religious- was evil and it is an inner disease that is a “cancer of the soul” as Rabbi Heschel teaches us. It is the second half of the sentence that seemed to go unrealized, however, which is why we find ourselves, like Isaac in the Bible, having to re-dig the wells of our ancestors!

Our “hearts are hungry for the voice of God. But the voice has been stifled” is as true today as it was then. The deaths and the beatings that were endured and sanctioned between the enrollment of James Meredith in Ole Miss and the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the hatred and defiance of the racists ever since then is unimaginable if we hadn’t witnessed it. Just like people can believe Holocaust deniers because the enormity of the evil is so great, most people don’t want to consider it, don’t want to admit their own anti-semitism, racism, hatred and fear of another person who ‘looks, dresses, prays different’ from them. We are hearing of the ‘anointed one’ being elected because the charlatans are trying to use “the voice of God” that “our hearts are hungry for” to convince us to surrender to hatred, to being controlled and enslaved by the wealthy who want to be the ruling class, just ask Elon Musk. These charlatans have co-opted the Churches, especially the Evangelical ones, to promote ways that are antithetical to everything Christ talks about in his “Sermon on the Mount”, the ways he acted towards all of the people who were thought of as “vermin, poisoning the blood of the nation” in his time and instead of hanging out with them-these representatives of Christ are demonizing them along with their patrons, the new Republican establishment. Just like Bibi and the Far Right in Israel have portrayed all Palestinians as terrorists, as Hamas or Hezbollah so they can demonize them the way Jews have been demonized throughout history, so too is Trump, Musk, Project 2025 doing the same here. This is the worst case scenario of the bastardization of God’s voice! It is using the vulnerabilities of so many people, it is using the trust they have in Clergy and the Church, Mosque, Synagogue, Temple, etc and twisting it to the needs of the rich and powerful instead of using their trust to help them and another. This is the not just that “the voice has been stifled”, it is both “stifled” and, like AI, being used in ways never meant to be used so people can be conned and grifted for the benefit of the few, not for the sake of Heaven!

As I am writing this, I have decided to continue with these first two sentences because I need to delve into the ideas therein. How to recognize the “one of the great hours of history” is right now begins with staying fresh and alive, waking up each morning grateful to be alive, acknowledging our responsibility, individually and collectively, to be compassionate and faithful to ourselves, to our purpose, to bring a sense of meaning into our daily activities, to take actions of compassion and stay faithful to the call of another human being. This is the first thing we acknowledge when we awake, God’s compassion and faithfulness so, since we are “made in the likeness of God”, we have to do the same to another-it is called “pay it forward”. We ‘get’ to see life anew each day, each hour, we are not defined by our last mistake, we are defined by the enormity of goodness we put out each day unless we choose to be defined by the enormity of negativity, evil we put out each day. The greatness of “hours of history” is not known until we are past them and see them in the 20/20 vision of hindsight so we have the opportunity to make each and every hour “one of the great hours of history” if we so choose. It is up to We, the People!

It is past time for us to take back our faiths, to take back our Churches, Mosques, Synagogues and restore them to being “an elevated space where God dwells among us” as the original Tabernacle was described. We have the power, the desire and the pathway to elevate our ways of being to include everyone under our tents, not to convert someone to the faith we believe in nor in the politics we believe in-rather, like Liz Cheney shows us- to be willing to risk our own safety for the ideals, the principles and values we hold dear. When we make a decision that we are not for sale, that we will not sacrifice our principles for momentary gain, when we refuse to bow down to idols and we will not follow idolators because it is “a bridge too far”, because we have “reverence for God and reverence for humanity” we are on the road to hasten “the false gods are crumbling” and ensuring they remain dust rather than allow them to regain the strength that they have since Rabbi Heschel’s words above.

I continue to do angioplasty on my spiritual arteries, each and every day I look for how I can contribute to this hour, this day being know as “one the great hours of history” and I will be known by my family as a responder to the greatness. “What did you do” is a question my daughter has asked and, in the time of the Civil Rights Movement, I can say I stood up for the values and principles of decency and truth. I did the same in 1967 for Israel, in 1973, and I have given Tzedakah since I was a kid. What am I doing now is writing and speaking to those who will read and hear, discussing with the people I disagree with politically and religiously because they are also “made in the likeness of God. A tall order and one I have to fill. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark