Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 293

National Month of Repentance and Change

“The deepest human longing is to be a thought in God’s mind, to be the object of His attention…let Him not forget me, not abandon me.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 69)

After “establishing God as king within us” Rabbi Heschel’s words make perfect sense. The problem for most human beings is our disbelief that our “deepest longing” coming to fruition is even possible so most of us have shuttered this “longing” away and believe the contrary; “God doesn’t give a damn”, “Where was God in the Holocaust”, “Why didn’t God protect me” and more so this “longing” is just fantasy and the stuff fairy tales are made of.

Because so many of us have locked our “deepest human longing” away within us, because we still have it and won’t admit it, we seek to be thoughts in society’s mind, to be the “object of” society’s “attention”, believing that doing what it takes to be known is all that matters, ie, winning an election (from Student Council on), beating our opponent in a game, killing everyone who is ‘our enemy’, lying and cheating to become rich, etc. Look at our fascination with Serial Killers, with Immigrants, with Cult Leaders; all we want is to either be the one doing the noticing, in charge, or being noticed by people in charge. Look at the way Mark Robinson of North Carolina wanted to be noticed by Donald Trump and the mutual admiration and love between them, providing Robinson with being ‘knighted’ by the white supremacist and Trump proving how much Black people love him. Be it the Kardashians, Paris Hilton, or any number of the “social media influencers” of today; people want to be noticed, people want to be thought of, people want to make money off of being noticed, being the “object of …attention”. And it works. This cheap substitute for the true “longing” in us is being sold as the cure for an ailment, a desire that is impossible to achieve. Too many people believe that God has forgot human beings, God has abandoned me. For those people who are still seeking to be noticed, to be remembered, they have found a salve in the false claims of the ‘anointed one’ being Trump by the false priests and prophets of the far right, they have found a salve in believing that Israel must ‘destroy Amalek’, that we have to “kill evil” as Robinson says. All of this to hide from the truth of our inner life, the truth of God’s attention and demands, God’s reaching and pulling us closer, begging us to do the next right thing.

The entire Bible is how important a thought human beings are in God’s mind! We have been “the object of His attention” forever! God speaks to us through the words in the Bible, God calls to us through our souls, by giving us “a bad conscience” as Rabbi Heschel says elsewhere. When we have anxiety, it is probably from ignoring God’s call and/or hanging up the phone when we are given directions to something we don’t want to do. We are so important to God that we are commanded to “Ransom the Captives” at any and all costs-even going so far as to sell a Sefer Torah to raise the money needed to buy back someone’s freedom! Yet, Ben G’Vir, Smotrich, Netanyahu have decided they know better than God, they are above the Holy One, the Judge of all the Earth in the middle of Elul! How ridiculous, how sad, how scary. Our tradition says God is constantly calling out to us, constantly crying out the Shema from Mount Sinai every morning and evening and we, the people who have this “deepest longing” are tone deaf to the Call.

Rather than being forgotten, rather than being abandoned, during this month of repentance and change, we have to look at ourselves and see how we have forgotten to honor our longing, forgotten to hear the call of God, the call of our Higher Consciousness, the call of the Universe, the call of the captive. We have to inventory the myriad of times we have left the captive to their own fate rather than stand up to the bullies, the cult leaders, the governments that use these captives for their own power, for they own political and financial gain. We have to engage in the difficult work of looking deeply inside of ourselves and make amends to the people we have harmed by forgetting our place, our importance, our being commanded. We have to change the ways we encounter the stranger-instead of abusing them for our gain we have to welcome them and care for them. We have to change the ways we see people-instead of being here for our gain, we have to see the needs they have, the souls they are and honor their dignity and worth, appreciate their uniqueness instead of using it against them.

We have to look back and see how we have abandoned people who cared for us, who helped us, who needed us. We have to look and see how our leaders have abandoned the hostages throughout the world, we have to hold them and ourselves accountable, change our ways of dealing with hostage takers, ensure that there is “righteous justice” being pursued, and there is equal justice rather than one Justice System for Trump and Bibi, Putin and Orban and another for the rest of us-this is an abandonment of God’s words in Deuteronomy, very ‘christian imposter, unrighteousness christian John Roberts, Sam Alito, Clarence Thomas!  We have to admit our errors and change our ways, we have to stop blaming God for abandoning us and list the ways we have abandoned God-everything that is happening is told in the Bible when we abandon and forget God, when we blame our loneliness and inner misery on God’s abandonment of us instead of changing our ways. This hour/this month calls for us to engage in Spiritual Audacity!

I am truly sorry for the people who experienced me abandoning them-I am also sorry about the people who abandoned me. The relationships that have been stretched and/or severed hurt me greatly and I accept the results and consequences of my actions. I forgive the people who have abandoned me and I ask for forgiveness from those whom I have abandoned or who feel I have. I realize in my pain and sadness over my actions and the subsequent aftermath from Feb. 2020, I have been afraid to reach out-not knowing who wants to hear from me and who doesn’t and this is my ego and fear being out of proper measure. I also know I have reached out to people and not heard back and this is painful especially because I don’t know what I did to them, how I harmed them and know I helped them when they needed. It is just sad to be abandoned and makes me more determined to not abandon people when they are in need. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark