Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 4 Day 71
“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)
These descriptions of and defining terms about “freedom” are so poignant in our times and I believe “freedom” has become so bastardized and ignored that we have become oblivious to what it is, how to keep it, how to grow it and how easy it is to lose it. It is so interesting that the people who hate immigrants are descendants of immigrants and/or immigrants who came here to pursue ‘the American dream’ because Musk couldn’t do it in his native South Africa because of his prejudice and hatred of anyone not white like him. Earlier in this chapter Rabbi Heschel reminds us of the “true essence” of “freedom”: to sacrifice prejudice even if it hurts, to give up superstition even when it claims to be a doctrine. We are witnessing the exact opposite of both sacrificing “prejudice” and “to give up superstition”. “Prejudice comes from the Latin meaning “in advance of knowledge” and superstition comes from the Latin meaning “to stand over”. In both cases, truth and knowledge are being “sacrificed” not “prejudice” nor “superstition” and we see both running rampant in the world today. We are so “prejudiced” that we are willing to let go of the “freedom” that our Constitution and the Amendments guarantee! We are so superstitious that we are willing to have Trump, Musk, Putin, Bibi stand over us as Pharaohs and their minions like the taskmasters in Egypt so we do their bidding and, like Joseph did in Egypt, there are Jews who are willing to gouge the populaces so the wannabe oligarchs, these Pharaohs and their courtiers can get richer!
It seems like a dream, like an unrealistic way of being reading the words in bold above. What was Rabbi Heschel thinking? How could he have such a utopian view of human beings after witnessing Nazi Germany firsthand, after losing so much of his family and a way of life in the Shoah? I would say that is exactly how and why he is calling out to us and demanding we not fall asleep again, that we “lift up our eyes and see” what truly is, not what the Pharaohs, the wannabe oligarchs, the liars and the deceivers are trying to show us. He is demanding we stop playing the shell game with these cheaters and recommit to the covenant of freedom that was made by the founding fathers of this great nation. It is a great nation and only people who want to deceive and enrich themselves want to ‘make it great again’-as we can see with the chaos and disruption the Musk/Trump administration is doing and the effects on the economy, the market and everyday items that ‘only they can bring down’!
The only sacrifices that are being made in this moment are the ones by people who believe in “freedom”, who know the “tyranny of the self-centered ego”, not by the people elected to maintain and grow our freedoms. These people are seeking the approval of Putin and his minions, Trump and Musk, Bannon and Miller, Bibi and Smotrich, etc. They have abdicated their duties for fear of not being re-elected, for fear of Trump’s private militia, the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, coming after them and/or their family. They are afraid of Pam Bondi filing charges against them, etc. Rather than seeking “moments of transcending the self”, rather than having an experience of “spiritual ecstasy”, these ‘good christians’ who do not follow what Christ preaches, instead stay within “the confining framework of routine reflexive concern. And We the People elected them!!
This is our moment, this is our calling, this is the meaning of Lent, of Easter, of Ramadan, of Passover, of all holy days in every faith and spiritual discipline. We the People need to reclaim our “freedom”. We do this by reclaiming our personal “freedom”, by going back to the basic principles of faith and “freedom”-transcending our lower selves and serving our higher consciousness, our “intuitive minds”. To do this we have to first acknowledge the lower self for what it is, a servant to our higher consciousness, a servant to our intuitive mind. We the People have to know that both ‘selves’ are necessary and needed in order to be human and to be free. We can “transcend the self” when we are aware of and in service to our higher consciousness, to our intuitive minds, to our spirits, to our “gut instincts”. We have the moments of spiritual ecstasy Rabbi Heschel is speaking of more and more often, and, we live into the words of the V’Ahavta prayer: “You will speak of them when you lie down..teach them to your children..” In other words, the more we serve our higher consciousness, our intuitive minds, the more we live the principles and values found in the Holy texts of every spiritual discipline and the better off we are to ward off, fight back against the autocrats, the wannabe dictators, the mendacious and despicable useful idiots of these ‘leaders’. Living to serve our higher ‘self’, “stepping out of the framework of routine reflexive concern” means we are in “sacrifice” of saving our face, we “sacrifice” our false selves, our masks and our mental make-up for truth, for goodness, for “freedom” and then we can and will “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”!
I am enraged, bereft and bewildered at the loss of “freedom” so many of us are experiencing right now. I watch as Musk, an unelected IMMIGRANT, who has been on the DOLE OF THE GOVERNMENT his entire business career, is slashing every freedom and safety net for people ‘not like him’. He and Trump and the rest of them are hurting white people, people of color, Jews, Christians, Muslims alike without a care in the world for another human being. I know this way of being, every addict, everyone knows this way of being and anyone who says they don’t understand and/or they are good people living ‘good christian values’, ‘living what is written in the torah’ are LIARS and stuck in self-deception! I lived as a narcissist and a bully, a deceiver and a grifter; I hurt a lot of people and I have lived these past 36 years doing TShuvah. I know the signs of the lie and it drives me crazy, I hear Rabbi Heschel’s words in my head and know I have to do something, so I write to you each day, I post on social media, and I support people who stand up against these “People of the Lie” as M. Scott Peck describes in his book of the same name. Rabbi Heschel is calling me to do more, to not settle, to not give into despair and to fight for the Good, for the Holy, for the Principles and Values of the Bible. I hear him remind me that the Prophets stood up knowing the people would not listen, Moses gave us a prophecy of what would happen when, not if, we succumbed to a Trump, a Putin, a Musk and I fear, once again it will take great suffering to regain “freedom”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark