Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 70
“Freedom is the liberation from the tyranny of the self-centered ego. It comes about in moments of transcending the self as an act of spiritual ecstasy, of stepping out of the confining framework of routine reflexive concern. Freedom presupposes the capacity for sacrifice.”(Insecurity of Freedom pg.15)
Sitting at my computer, reading these words leaves me understanding Rabbi Heschel’s teaching in God in Search of Man that “freedom” is an event. For most people, “liberation from the tyranny of the self-centered ego” never occurs or if it does, they are not aware of it. In AA there is a saying; “I may not be much but I am all I think about”. Psychologists/therapists ask:”how does this make you feel”, making the feelings and thoughts of the individual uber alles. While it is important to think of oneself and know how experiences make us ‘feel’, the ridiculous emphasis on the individual, on ‘success’, on wealth and power for the sake of the individual’s mental health has led us to live in “the tyranny of the self-centered ego”.
In government, we no longer have “public servants”, we have people whose ego is so self-centered and they are so consumed with being re-elected, they no longer care about what is good and right, they are hellbent on lying and deceiving their constituents about their votes, their lack of progress and forcing the country, the state, the city, to suffer under the “tyranny of their self-centered ego”. Rather than be the “public servants” envisioned by the founding fathers, politics is a full-time job. Rather than serving the greater good ala Daniel Webster, they serve their agendas, their party leader’s whims and desires and they too become trapped in the “tyranny of the ‘leader’s’ self-centered ego”. Isn’t it horrifying to realize how UNFREE our elected officials are, how UNFREE we are and how difficult it is to become liberated?
Individuals are totally susceptible to falling into the “tyranny of the self-centered ego” and not realizing it because our societal norms are to fight to be right, never surrender, and, especially in this modern era, deny, deny, lie, lie, never take responsibility for anything ‘bad’, always take credit for anything good, use deception and mendacity to ‘fool’ the public, our neighbor, our family, etc. We are so stuck in this “tyranny” that we are unaware of how tightly our “self-centered ego” has us by the throat and is chocking the spirit out of us. We are oblivious to the death and destruction of our creativity, our ability to see and hear truth, to participating in the covenant made with God by our ancestors and re-made by each of us with our birth. The “self-centered ego” is a tyrant! It is a despot that leads us to engage in autocracy, in absolutism, and it uses oppressive power, cruelty for the sake of cruelty, chaos, deception, fear, blame and scapegoats to feed itself and imprison the individual and the people around it. The “self-centered ego” begins with Cain and has continued through this moment. it is the root cause of entitlement, of enslavement, of not welcoming the stranger, of making poor people into criminals just for being poor, of using jails and prisons to deal with people who have mental health challenges, etc. The “tyranny of the self-centered ego” is so devious that we are unaware of how it kills the kindness within us, how it stops us from being, as Thomas Merton says,: “the self we were created to be”.
Of course the same is true in the religious realm. We have people put into positions of power and they say they are serving God when really they are serving themselves, their egos, their agendas. Leaders of Churches, Temples, Mosques routinely make decisions and invent rituals that exclude people, the lay leaders have their agendas and if the Priest, Minister, Imam, Rabbi doesn’t follow it, if they speak truth to power, they are fired. Most clergy, however, succumb to the whims and wishes of “the board”, most clergy live in the “tyranny of the self-centered ego” because they believe their interpretation of scripture is correct, most are unwilling to truly entertain arguments questioning their rulings, questioning their actions, questioning them. Rather than being a forum and a place for divergent ideas, most religious institutions have their own dogma, their own ‘flavor’ and work hard to promote their own agendas. This is, of course, OUTRAGEOUS!
Easter is April 20th and Passover begins on April 12th; the period of Lent is to prepare for Easter and the period between the first of Nissan, March 30, and Passover is to prepare to be liberated. This confluence of Holy Days is not accidental, after all Christ’s Last Supper was a Passover Seder. They both are the root stories of Christianity and Judaism. Yet, we seem to see them only as times to get together, ask when do we eat, be bored by the reading of the Haggadah, unless there are antics and theatrics, go to Church to show off our “Easter Bonnets”, etc. Both Easter and Passover are about “the liberation from the tyranny of the self-centered ego”, i.e. “freedom”. We the People have to engage in these Holy Days if we want any chance of having an experience of “freedom”, if we yearn to unshackle ourselves from the “tyranny of the self-centered ego”, our own and/or the ones that are controlling us like Presidents, Senators, Congresspeople, Clergy, Parents, Siblings, bosses… We, the People are being called upon to STAND UP for our true selves, to REBEL against the tyrannical madness of governing bodies in every realm of our life, to ENGAGE in truth and goodness, to UNDERSTAND that the stories of Passover and Easter are not one and done, rather we have to engage in UNSHACKLING ourselves from our “self-centered egos” every day.
I know the “tyranny of the self-centered ego”, I lived it for over 20 years and knew I was enslaved to it, without any hope of being free of it. I was ruled by it and Passover never meant much to me since my Grandfather died and stopped leading the Seder. This year, as in the past 35 years, Passover is the time for me to do an inventory since Yom Kippur. On Yom Kippur, I was clean and caught a glimpse of the purity of my soul, the cleanliness of my being-I schmutzed it up quickly and for me to be liberated on Passover, I have to rid myself of Chometz, all the leavening, all the fat that has accumulated around my soul, my mind, my inner life. I learned this from Rabbi Mel Silverman in prison and have engaged in letting go of one of the “tyranny’s” that prevents me from “liberation from … my self-centered ego” and also allows me to have more compassion for those who are still stuck in their own. I am grateful for the “freedoms” I enjoy and look forward to expanding them. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.