Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 131

“There are no proofs for the existence of the God of Abraham. There are only witnesses. The greatness of the prophet lies not only in the ideas he expressed, but also in the moments he experienced. The prophet is a witness, and his words a testimony to His power and judgement, to His justice and mercy.”(Essential Writings pg. 64)

Humanity seems to ignore the teaching and wisdom of Rabbi Heschel above, and truth be told throughout his writings, in favor of following the false witnesses of the false gods power and judgment, the idols false promises of justice and mercy. When the Israelites and the other slaves who left Egypt crossed the Red Sea, they proclaimed: “This is my God, there is no God like Adonai”  yet throughout our history we seem to run to believe the isolators, the deceivers, the people who tell us what we think we want to hear rather than hear, take in, and believe the testimony of the the prophet.

It is so ridiculous to ignore the prophet’s “words a testimony to His power and judgement”. Yet we do at our own peril and at the cost to everyone around us, we continue to deny what “the prophet is a witness” to with our refusal to hear his testimony as truth and follow through on “his words”. Rather, we find a myriad of ways to make what some in Jewish learning call “a midrashic move”, taking the words of the prophet slightly or broadly out of context to make the point they want to make rather than see what the prophet saw, respond to the inequities of human behaviors and justice as the prophet does and also testify to “His power and His judgement”.

And we continue to fall short of their testimony, we continue to bastardize their words so much, people have come to believe that Donald Trump is sent by god, because they are idol worshipers and being led by clergy who are false witnesses. We are so far from hearing “a testimony to His power and His judgement” when we can believe that Nikki Haley is woman who cares about people while knowing she is being backed by the same people who have come up with the 2025 project, the same White Christian Nationalists that support Trump, there is no difference in how either one of these administrations would treat the widow, the stranger, the poor, the orphan, the needy, etc while accusing all illegal immigrants of bringing Fentynal across the border while winking at the wealthy donors who have exploited the crisis through their price gouging of medications, their making recovery a business rather than a mission, lying, cheating and denying responsibility for their crimes while paying massive fines.

These fine ‘good-Christian’ folk like Mike Johnson who denies the testimony of the very prophets that Jesus quotes and learned from, Lindsey Graham, Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, et al all claim to ‘love the Bible’, ‘I listen to a higher authority’ speech’s while denying the power and judgement of God that the prophet testifies to; the power of forgiveness, the judgement to “heal their backsliding”, the power to impact the soul of an individual, to fill one’s heart with remorse and regret in order to return to His covenant, in order to forgive oneself for our errors rather than blame another for our mistakes. Rather than falsely proclaim what the Bible says, maybe these ‘leaders’, these charlatans, these power-hungry lackeys should actually read the Bible, immerse themselves in the “testimony” of the prophet, witness the world through the eyes of the prophet and approach the sacred task of leadership with a little more humility.

We are witnessing the same bastardization and false testimony by the right wing in Israel. Ben-G’Vir, Smoetrich, Netanyahu and their allies, the settlers, the Ultra Orthodox Rabbis and their students who, since the day of the Oslo Accords, have denigrated the vision and testimony of the prophet, who have called for the death of Yitzhak Rabin because he sought a path to peace, who continue to make these ‘midrashic moves’ so they can advance an agenda that does not adhere to a testimony where “his words a testimony to His power and His judgement”. Rather, as the prophet says: “On that day God will be One and God’s name One”, should be what we strive for-but authoritarians never want harmony, they never want democracy, they call for an end to messiness, they call for an end to freedom for the masses and only for themselves.

The prophet calls to us with his testimony to recover our ability to seek forgiveness, to accept God’s power to forgive, to recover our ability to see clearly enough to judge ourselves truthfully-not harshly nor softly. When we recover the words and power of the prophet, we in recovery experience life as he did; with wonder, awe, consternation, sadness, joy and truthfulness. We are recovering our humanity which is what God’s power is all about, I believe, tapping into the divine power and dignity we are created with so we can be more human each and every day-our recovery is from our inability to be human for a time and now we are repeating and living into the testimony of the prophet because we know “no human power could have saved us”.

I think about the power and judgement of God with wonder and awe. I am a recipient of this power to change and the judgement to see truth and be accepted back into the fold because of my T’Shuvah and be a witness to the T’Shuvah of tens of thousands people over the years. The prophet, while abrasive and single-minded, comes to testify that change is possible, forgiveness is attainable and we can recover our dignity, our humanity and our connection. I have experienced these ‘promises’ and continue to be a witness to the truth of his testimony. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark