Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 266

“Few of our contemporaries have ever absorbed the challenge of the prophets or the grandeur of the Book of Genesis, though they have attended Sunday school and were thrilled with the confirmation ceremonies. What prevails in the field of religion is intellectual as well as spiritual illiteracy, ignorance as well as idolatry of false values. We are a generation devoid of learning as well as sensitivity.” (Insecurity of Freedom pg. 52)

In the last two sentences above, I hear Rabbi Heschel crying out to us to end our “intellectual as well as spiritual illiteracy”! In these past 60+ years since he spoke and wrote these words, made this appeal to us, taught a generation of Rabbis how to rise above their “intellectual as well as spiritual illiteracy”, it has gotten worse. Clergy no longer have the respect they used to have, their voices have diminished unless they follow the ‘party line’ of dogma and deception, unless their followers are fundamentalists who are afraid of uncertainty. For the majority of people who identify in one way or another, either as members or lapsed members of a faith tradition, Clergy have no relevance to their living because Clergy have been too afraid of losing their jobs to stand up to boards of directors, elders, etc. They have lost their prophetic voices and being a Clergy-person has gone from a calling to a career, Seminaries have gone from an absorption of “the challenge of the prophets” to a technical training school. We have fallen deeper and deeper into the abyss of “illiteracy” and our “ignorance” is so great we don’t even realize it! Rabbi Heschel’s words above are prophetic, not as if he were a seer rather that he embraces what is and speaks truth to power. He is speaking to the very people he is accusing of “intellectual as well as spiritual illiteracy, ignorance as well as idolatry of false values”, his contemporaries, the Rabbis of the Conservative Movement of Judaism in America.

When we are more afraid of losing our jobs than of speaking truth, we are living in the “idolatry of false values”. When we see what is and call it wonderful and holy, we are living in “ignorance”. When we hate our neighbors, when we treat the stranger as an enemy, when we fail to see the equal worth and dignity of another human being because they are a different color, different faith, different gender, different sexual orientation than we are, we have fallen down the abyss of spiritual illiteracy. When our Clergy promote “ignorance, idolatry of false values, spiritual illiteracy” we desperately need to call on the prophetic voice we each have. We have to fire the Board of Directors, the Elders who hire and keep such an abomination as the ‘spiritual leader’ of our congregation because their need to control him/her is greater than their need to serve the congregation by installing a woman/man who is spiritually literate, who shuns the “idolatry of false values”, who continues to learn so she/he will not fall into “ignorance”. It is time for We, the People, to stand up for ourselves, to stand with the true values of faith, to stand up for the spiritual principles that are the foundation of faith and stop going along like lambs to the slaughter, stop falling deeper and deeper into the abyss of “spiritual illiteracy” that will bring us back to Egypt, will make us slaves to the newest Pharaoh. I am calling out to Clergy to end their fear of losing a paycheck and be more afraid of losing their souls. Now is the time for all Clergy to come to the aid of their fellow human beings and I pray they will!

We have to return to learning- not studying for a grade or a job training, true learning. We are in desperate need of learning so we, the people who care about the prophets, who want to absorb and meet “the challenge of the prophets” can stand up to those ‘who claim to know god’s will’ with their hatred, with their prejudices, with their whitewashing sins because the sins and the sinners help them attain their goals. We have to take back religious education from the hands of those who love and live in “the idolatry of false values”, those who keep promoting these “false values” as real, who claim Jesus hated the poor and the needy, who teach that caring for the stranger, the poor, the needy, etc doesn’t apply to ‘those people’, et al. We, the people have to reclaim our spiritual heritage, our spiritual literacy so we can promote God’s vision of “make wholeness and peace” in heaven and on earth. We, the people, have to reclaim the truth that our spiritual legacy and life is not far away from us, it is in our hearts, in our mouths, and we have to access it. We, the people, have to realize we are all “standing here” this day and every day, on the precipice of moving into the “promised land” and or going back to the narrow places of “spiritual illiteracy” and “idolatry of false values”. We have to “Choose Life”!

The only way to do this is by being sensitive to the needs of another, learning more about our own spiritual needs and maladies and healing our maladies so we can promote our spiritual nature more. We have to learn how to be “sensitive” to the needs of another as well. We have to be “sensitive” to what is actually happening rather than buy the lies of ‘those in charge’. We have to be sensitive to the hearing God’s call, the call of our higher consciousness and respond to these calls rather than the calls of our lower selves, the calls of mendacity and deception. Just as the Haggadah says: if we hadn’t left Egypt then we would still be in there, the freedom of the next generation depends on it. We can do this, we must do this.

I engaged in the “idolatry of false values” for a long time. I am embarrassed and ashamed of the actions I took in those years, especially because my father and grandfathers taught us not to! Dad, Grandpas, I am sorry. In my recovery, I have engaged in spiritual literacy, beginning with Rabbi Mel Silverman, my prison Rabbi. I have been pigeoned-holed as only good for ‘those people’ who are in recovery and people would tell me how ‘undignified’ I was for extolling “the challenge of the prophets” for the masses and I should remember who I work for. I told these people I work for God, I work for the people I am serving and this made me both popular and unpopular with the different incarnations of the Board of Directors. I didn’t change when the culture changed, I have not “stood idly by” while people bastardized faith, recovery, life. I have not stayed silent when people could not, would not see themselves in the Bible and thought they were ‘above the law’. I have made many mistakes and learned much from them, I have fought for what I believe is true and right. I am not embarrassed anymore, I can go to the graves of my ancestors with pride and a sense of continuing their ways. I am still promoting spiritual literacy in the face of those who want to keep us illiterate and I ask you to join me. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark