Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 301

“We do not know with what we must serve until we arrive there (Exodus 10:26). “All our service, all the good deeds we are doing in this world, we do not know whether they are of any value, whether they are really pure, honest or done for the sake of heaven, - until we arrive there-in the world to come, only there shall we learn what our service was here”(Rabbi Isaac Meir of Ger). (God in Search of Man pg. 394)

The quote from Exodus is part of the discourse/argument between Moses and Pharaoh and it is as true today as it was then. In our need for certainty, in our search for surety, in our misguided belief we can know everything, we are continually making proclamations about what is true, the ‘one right way’ to live is when, as the quote from Exodus above is teaching us that we are never sure, we are never 100% right. I hear Rabbi Heschel calling to us to be in this moment, to understand and realize what is needed to serve something greater than ourselves in this moment can’t truly be planned beforehand. We can prepare for the next moment, we can prepare for Rosh Hashanah, for Yom Kippur, and “we do not know with what we must serve until we arrive there”.

We spend so much time planning and trying to make today, tomorrow, the next moment into what we want it to be rather than accepting and living into the wisdom of Exodus, the teaching of Torah and Moses. We continue to give more power to the call of the Pharaoh inside of us instead of the Moses inside of us, we continue to listen to the Roman Emperor inside of us instead of the Jesus inside of us, we continue to understand the idol worshiper inside of us rather than the Divinity inside of us. As human beings we have all of these different voices inside of us-which pair depends on the particular spiritual discipline we follow- and we do not always take the time to discern which voice we are listening to, we get too caught up in seeking power, fame, wealth, ‘rightness’, and are unable/unwilling to ask ourselves the necessary questions to determine whether or not we are serving with the appropriate skills, tools, intentions, thoughts for this moment. Humanity’s history is one of looking forward and missing what is in front of us, seeking ‘the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow’ and not seeing what is needed to serve in this moment, serving God, serving one another, serving oneself.

Because of this way of being, we have been susceptible to the call of the Pharaoh’s, the Romans, the idolators outside of us. We have come to believe that someone will save us, that all we have to do is follow lockstep in the words and orders of whomever we have decided to serve, whomever calls the loudest, whomever appeals to the desires of our hearts and eyes the best. In every era, in every civilization, this path has led to ruin, to destruction, to being enslaved by “a new Pharaoh”. We see this happening in America right now; Trump, DeSantis, the 2025 project, the Heritage foundation, the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, the White Supremacist movement, the Christian Nationalism movement, etc, all are appealing to a segment of our population that wants to throw out the Constitution, that wants to have power over anyone who is not a White Christian male, a segment of people afraid to be in this moment and seek what we need to serve God, to move the words of the Declaration of Independence forward: “All men (people) are created equal”, to embody the words of the Talmud: “whomever saves one soul it is as if they have saved an entire world”.

It is time for us to do our inner inventories, it is time for us to recover the essence of the Bible, the New Testament, the Koran, the Eastern Philosophies, the Big Book of AA. Our future depends on our ability to live into this moment, to discern “with what we must serve” in this moment we have arrived at. We have the tools, we have the teachings, we have to use them in service of something greater than ourselves and stop lying to ourselves, we have to stop making excuses, we have to redeem the shame and blame of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. I have erred in looking too far ahead at times, I have erred in believing my vision was the only one and being unaware of how I was screwing up the moment I was in because I was looking at where I wanted to be rather than where I was. I am sorry to those I harmed, while my intentions were ‘good’, I was oblivious at times to how my actions in the moment actually set us all on a path of destruction, a path of harm, a path away from what God wanted. I also am aware of how often I was in the moment, how often I was aware of what was needed to serve in the moment and, even though people thought I was crazy and wrong, I was able to serve and help people save their own souls. I am grateful to God and to the people who saw me and heard me for this ability to discern. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 300

“The mind is never immune to “alien thoughts,” and there is no easy way of weeding them out. A hasidic rabbi, asked by his disciples in the last hours of his life whom they should choose as their master after his passing away, said:”If someone should give you advice on how to eradicate alien intentions, know he is not your master.””(God in Search of Man pg. 393/4)

Today is 9/11, 22 years after the Twin Towers went down, the Pentagon was attacked, and a plane of heroes died in Pennsylvania. Our country was challenged, attacked and we responded with unity of purpose, defending our democratic way of life. We didn’t do everything right, we discriminated against Muslims and lumped them all as terrorists, we went into Iraq with bad intelligence, we stayed too long in both places AND we brought together a coalition of nations to fight against the threat of “religious law”, we came together as a country to fight the “alien intentions” of false prophets of a Holy Tradition, we weeded out the “alien thoughts” of blame and shame to respond as a nation, as a world against terrorism. There is a generation growing up who doesn’t remember just being able to board a plane, doesn’t remember being certain of our safety, doesn’t remember not ‘being afraid of the stranger’, etc. It is sad that we have lost the ability to feel free and it is important for us to understand that certainty, safety were never real. Surety, power, safety, have always been a conventional notion and a mental cliche which has hindered growing in knowledge as Rabbi Heschel teaches. These are “alien thoughts” as the only safety is in our inner knowing, in our spiritual growth and this safety is the surety that whatever comes our way, we will be able to deal with, even if dealing with it is exile, as the Jews have done for over 2000 years.

Yet, we see over and over again how we fall back into willful blindness, into taking things for granted, into blaming someone else for our situations, rather than be responsible for our actions, be accepting of whatever comes our way, and having responses that come from our soul rather than the reactions of “alien thoughts”. Coco Gauff, the 19 year-old tennis sensation who just won the U.S. Open, is an example of one who finds a “way of weeding them out”. She talked herself out of the “alien thoughts” of negativity during her matches to reach the finals and then again in the finals. She focused her thoughts, her mind and spirit on the goal of winning, of doing the best she could and knowing that her best is good enough. In an interview I heard, this 19 year old sage expressed the spiritual truth that win or lose; life goes on, the people who love her are not leaving and all she can do is the best she can in the moment. We can all learn/relearn this lesson from her.

We also have to be aware of the “alien intentions” of the terrorists that attacked us on 9/11. We have to wake up and stop turning a blind eye to the “alien intentions” of those around us as well. The “alien intentions” of people, in power and who feel powerless, to make the majority subjugated to “christian nationalism”, to less freedom, to being indoctrinated into some form of being that resembles The Holy Roman Empire, a government that is authoritarian rather than democratic, a path of bastardizing the Bible, the New Testament, the Koran, etc, is growing because too many good people are remaining silent, being afraid to stand up and be counted, and we are allowing evil to flourish. This is true on a global level, in our own country, in our states, in our community and in our personal lives. The month of Elul is the opportunity, given to us by God, to examine our intentions, examine our thoughts, examine our actions and weed out the “alien intentions” and the “alien thoughts”.

This is the challenge I have accepted for the past 36 years, beginning in prison. I have not been totally successful, I have acted on my “alien thoughts” at times, less and less each year. I have not, however, allowed “alien intentions” to rule me, I have listened to guides and sponsors, loved ones and even those who haven’t loved me so much, in order to weed out “alien intentions”. I have studied Torah, I have prayed, I have immersed myself in Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom and brilliance to bring me back to proper intentions-aka serving God and another human being. I have not always been sweet and nice, I have tried and succeeded most of the time to be kind. I have been weeding out my “alien thoughts” that come about as of being hurt by people I have tried to help. I have never wanted to admit that I am hurt and this is an “alien thought” that has hurt me and many others. Being hurt is part of being human, just as being disappointed and disappointing another is, yet I didn’t want to show weakness because of the “alien thought” that showing hurt, weakness leaves me too vulnerable. I no longer believe this and I am sorry to the people I hurt by not being more vulnerable. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

1 Comment

Living rabbi heschel’s wisdom - A daily path to living well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 299

“The mind is never immune to “alien thoughts,” and there is no easy way of weeding them out. A hasidic rabbi, asked by his disciples in the last hours of his life whom they should choose as their master after his passing away, said:”If someone should give you advice on how to eradicate alien intentions, know he is not your master.””(God in Search of Man pg. 393/4)

The challenge facing us today, as it has in every generation, is whether we are going to follow some “new Pharaoh” and become slaves to them because of our “alien thoughts” like our fears of not ‘fitting in’, our fear of being left out, our fears of being exiled, killed. History has shown us that our “alien thoughts” which bring about the response to ‘go along to get along’ do not protect us, remember the Pharaoh in Egypt, Herod being King of Judea, the Marrano’s in Spain, all of the ways we tried to please the kings and governments in Europe by doing the ‘work’ they didn’t want to and being blamed by the poor and the wealthy, oh yeah, and there was Hitler Germany where we believed because we fought for ‘our country’ the anti-semitism would ‘blow over’! Yet, we continue to engage in this way of being, in Israel, in America. We are continuing to allow the “new Pharaoh” to reinforce our “alien thoughts” with their own mendacities so we follow them to our ruin and the ruination of people around us and those we don’t even know.

When Donald Trump, who is a proven liar and assaulter of women, both in court and by his own words, remember the tape, can be leading the Republican Party race for the Presidential nomination, when he can be neck and neck in the polls for the general election against Joe Biden who is the exact opposite, our “alien thoughts” have invaded our being so badly that we seem to be unable to discern the lies we tell ourselves and the lies of another(s) that we buy into! When we continue to believe the fears and hatred of women that are being spewed by the right-wing zealots, when we go along with the reasoning that women should just ‘be pregnant and barefoot’, when we aver that women should be controlled by men, etc, we are allowing our “alien thoughts” to override what our soul is telling us, we are hearing the word of God through a filter of mendacity and lies. When we believe the power-hungry ideas of Netanyahu and his right-wing Orthodox cronies, when we lean into the autocratic words of Kevin McCarthy, the Heritage Foundation and so many other ‘conservative’ groups who want to take over the Government with their “2025 project”, we have lost our ability to see and hear truth, we have allowed our “alien thoughts” to overpower our spiritual truths, to override God’s call for the “strange god in thee” telling us to follow the deceptions of another and our own self-deceptions. We are watching people go against the wisdom of the Hasidic Master, we are suffering the consequences of these ‘leaders’ who’s “alien intentions” are alive and well, on full display and we refuse to see them and hold them accountable, instead we go along with them because they accuse everyone else of following “alien thoughts” and “alien intentions”, following the playbook of Josef Goebbels: “accuse someone else of that which you are guilty of”.

We are in the last 15 days prior to Yom Kippur, last night there were Sleichot Services across the Jewish World, the beginning of the “High Holy Day Season”, where speak of forgiving, where we continue, or begin, our personal accounting of the soul, and…my concern, my fear, is that most people’s “alien thoughts” are so strong, they cannot admit to themselves “the exact nature of their wrongs” as AA says, much less admit their errors to the people they have harmed. Many of our errors, our “missing the mark” actions are the result of these “alien thoughts” and T’Shuvah is the Jewish response to “weed them out”. While not easy, it is effective, while not pretty, it is the solution to finding the beauty within. We all need to be engaged in a program of recovery rather than mendacity, we all need to “become willing to make amends” and make “direct amends to such people wherever possible”. This is the command of this season, this is the reason for Yom Kippur, for T’Shuvah, to give us all a way back, to give us all the opportunity to “clean the slate”, to give us the opportunity to reconnect with people we have harmed, to be transparent and authentic with the people around us, to let go of the lies we tell ourselves, to weed out “alien thoughts” and redirect our “alien intentions” to intentions of service, kindness, truth and love.

In the past, as I have said, these “alien thoughts” got the better of me and I am sorry to those I could not hear and tried to help me, speak to me and I rejected/got angry at. I also have witnessed the speed with which these “alien thoughts” get weeded out now, I am elated at how study, truth, prayer, guidance, deepening a practice of spiritual growth, helps me recognize them even when they are coming at me by another who I trust and love! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

1 Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 298

“The mind is never immune to “alien thoughts,” and there is no easy way of weeding them out. A hasidic rabbi, asked by his disciples in the last hours of his life whom they should choose as their master after his passing away, said:”If someone should give you advice on how to eradicate alien intentions, know he is not your master.””(God in Search of Man pg. 393/4)

Rabbi Heschel’s teaching above is so crucial to our well-being and so important to our freedom. Accepting the truth of the first sentence above is the beginning of our journey towards freedom from being ruled by our minds, being ruled by our emotions. Yet, too many of us believe we can think our way into and out of all situations, as Einstein says: “we have come to worship the servant”. It is a daily task to recognize the “alien thoughts” and not succumb to them out of force of habit and our own self-deception.

Living in today’s world, as in every era, we are confronted with “alien thoughts” by people who have “alien intentions” and they are intentional about their mendacity, they deceive both on and with purpose. This is their way and while condemning them is good, rebuking them is holy, we have to stop just pointing the finger at everyone/anyone else and look inside of ourselves. We have to delve into our own “alien thoughts”, we have to ask for help to release ourselves from the prison of self-deception and the prison of needing to be deceived so we can once again be free. This is the freedom we experienced at the Red Sea, this is the freedom we experienced at Sinai, this is the freedom that caused us to have a spontaneous declaration of “we will do and then we will understand/hear” (Exodus 24:7) when we were called upon to accept the Torah. And as the Bible teaches us, human beings immediately and continually broke this promise, forgot this covenant with God, with one another and with themselves.

We need to re-covenant with God, not a new covenant, not a new testament, rather reviving the original dynamic covenant, remembering we are to interpret it anew each year, in each generation. Just as nature is constantly changing and growing/contracting, so too do we humans change, grow, contract. Staying stuck in an old interpretation, staying stuck in old understanding of eternal ‘laws’, is a by-product of “alien thoughts” just as bastardizing the meaning, the purpose of eternal ‘laws’ is a product of our “alien intentions.”

We are in the month of Elul, we are in the time of the year when it is suggested/told that we should do a deep dive into our actions, our intentions, our thoughts and see which were actually “alien” and how we deceived ourselves into believing they were actually holy. Judging someone else’s “alien thoughts” and “alien intentions” is the path most of us take while wrapping ourselves in the cloak of righteousness, and this could be the most dangerous of our “alien thoughts”! While someone else is ‘fair game’ and an ‘easy target’, Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom above speaks to us, individually, and is calling to us to give up our own “big lie” of righteousness, our own “big lie” of how we have taken “the easy way of weeding them out”. I hear a demand to remove the mental make-up and the various masks we have been wearing, take off the outer clothes that protect us/shield us/fool everyone else and look truth in the face, see ourselves without the self-deceptions and lies we have used to feel okay and see the truth of our soul, admire and be guided by the light of our soul. September is “recovery month” and September usually coincides with the Jewish High Holy Days. I don’t think it is a coincidence, I believe the recovery movement along with the Jewish tradition knows this is the month the spiritual forces of compassion, mercy, kindness, justice, truth are at their zenith, and God knows we need all the help we can get to begin to recognize and weed out our “alien thoughts”!

I have not always done a good job of weeding out my “alien thoughts”. I have given in to them at times and each time, some damage has been caused either by me or the person/situation that these “alien thoughts” brought up/were caused by. I am sorry for not recognizing them earlier in the process, I am sorry for the damage I have caused to people for engaging in them. I am sorry for being deceived by my “alien thoughts”, by another’s “alien thoughts” and not weeding them out sooner. Each year, as I look back, I know that I was better and, I also know that I made many errors over the years because of these “alien thoughts”. The one that stands out to me is the “alien thought”; ‘these are my friends and they will have my back’ and deciding what “having my back” meant. What I learned is some of the people were/are my friends and others not so much. I also learned that “having my back” comes in many different forms and sometimes God and another(s) know better than I! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living rabbi heschel’s wisdom - a daily path to living well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 297

“Disguised polytheism is also the religion of him who combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain, as it is said There shall be no strange god in thee(Psalms 81:10), on which our teachers remarked that it meant the strange god in the very self of man(Bahya Duties of the Heart Chapter 10)(God in Search of Man pg.392)

How is it possible, after history has shown us the fallacy of believing in and worshiping “the strange god in the very self of man”, we continue to believe in and follow the “strange god” in ourselves and/or the “strange god” in another(s)? Reading ‘the polls’ and seeing how a proven liar, a grifter, a man who tried to destroy our democracy is leading the pack in the Republican Party presidential nomination race, how he is neck and neck with the current President, how he is indicted in 4 separate jurisdictions, it is amazing to many people that we are so unwilling to acknowledge the “strange god” within us so we fail to see and reject the “strange god” in another.

I have been pondering this phenomenon of “strange god in thee” and realize the Psalmist was cautioning us to not follow our rationalizations, to let go of our need for certainty, to seek truth rather than falsehood, to wrestle with God, with humans and with our own inner chaos in order to serve God and not “the strange god in thee”. It is a difficult journey, it entails our need to know what is unknowable, it means we have to worship God and not need the results to be ‘our way’, it calls to us to engage in being in the solution and understanding the results are out of our control, it means being human. Yet, time immemorial, we reject our humanness and try to be god, hence the “strange god in the very self of man”.

Our inability to admit our powerlessness, our lack of control of people, places and things, our fear of being uncertain, of not knowing all the answers, etc gives rise to our false fears, our feelings of shame, and these lead us to seek “strange god” in another and/or ourselves. This is how, smart people, people of faith, can be ‘led to the slaughter’ of their goodness, their humanness by the charlatans who preach hate and call it love, preach separation and call it Godly, preach separation and call it community, who call themselves ‘servants of God’ while truly seeking to serve themselves.

We are in the month of Elul with only 17 days left till Kol Nidre, isn’t it time to get busy with our own inventories, with seeing how and when we missed the mark and how and when we hit the mark, rather than continuing to blame anyone else, rather than continuing to look outside of ourselves for “bad guys” who are the source of our troubles? This month in the Jewish Calendar is for all of us to use the forces of compassion, mercy, truth that are so prevalent at this time of year and look inside of ourselves, find the “strange god” within us, repair the inner damages that lead us to follow this “strange god” and regain God’s vision for us, attach ourselves to our authentic self more, immerse ourselves in a spiritual discipline that includes prayer, T’Shuvah, pursuing justice and right actions, caring for the stranger, the poor, the needy instead of hating them and jailing them, releasing ourselves from our self-deceptions and following the deceptions of another(s).

Last night our film, “The Jewish Jail Lady and the Holy Thief” was shown at Congregation Beth-El of Montgomery County where my daughter, Heather, is the executive director. Watching it again brought the painful reality of the wreckage my combining my worship with my own gains, it brought the power of the “strange god in” me and how I used it to harm so many people who loved/love me. I have done T’Shuvah with Heather, with family and friends, and I still am haunted by myriad of ways this “strange god in” me can rear it’s ugliness and destruction. I am aware that even while serving people, even while being part of the holy work of Beit T’Shuvah, I still gave into the “strange god in” me and the “strange god in” another(s). I am so remorseful for those times, I see how those actions led to harming people and harming me. I have made my amends where and when I could, I have accepted the rejection of these amends by the few who have rejected them, I also have forgiven everyone who followed the “strange god in” themselves and harmed me, themselves and everyone else around them. It is not my job to be judgmental, it is not my place to be “holier than thou”, it is my place to understand, to have compassion and to repair myself and the errors I have made. I can only be a help/guide for the people who have sought me out in past years, who seek me out today. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living rabbi heschel’s wisdom - A daily path to living well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 296

“Disguised polytheism is also the religion of him who combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain, as it is said There shall be no strange god in thee(Psalms 81:10), on which our teachers remarked that it meant the strange god in the very self of man(Bahya Duties of the Heart Chapter 10)(God in Search of Man pg.392)

“In the beginning…the earth was empty and chaotic, darkness was over the deep and the spirit of God hovered over the waters. God said: “Let there be light and there was light”(Genesis: 1:1-3). These opening words of the Bible do not just describe the earth at it’s inception, they describe the human condition as well. Many of us have felt empty and chaotic inside, we have been overwhelmed with darkness in our minds and our inner lives, and God is always hovering within us and around us. God is calling to us to see the light, God is calling to us to connect to the source of the universe, the source of life and many of us are unable to hear the call. We stay stuck in the darkness, we continue to feel empty and chaotic and we project all three onto the people in our lives.

Emptiness, chaos, darkness are part of our internal make-up, we have a divine inclination and an earthly inclination. They are not something to ‘get rid of’, not something to ignore nor despise, these parts of our being are for us to transform to serve God, to serve one another, and in doing so, we grow in our humanity, we grow in our purpose, we tend our own particular corner of the world. When we engage in “disguised polytheism”, we are negating the call of God to the light, the call of God to connect, the agreement to be in a covenantal relationship with God and with human beings. Herein lies the great dilemma for us, how do we let go of our rational logic of ‘what’s best for me’ and lean into ‘how do I serve God and human beings in my unique way’. One of the ways we engage in “disguised polytheism”, I believe, is our insistence on following a dogma rather than worshiping God. Dogma, while it gives us certainty, leads us to staying stuck in either/or thinking, my way is the best/only true way, change is my enemy, mendacity is truth, up is down, and allows us to live in ‘blissful’ self-deception.

Immersing myself in the teaching above, the “strange god in thee” is our attachment to our rational thinking/our dogmas in the face of our spiritual logic and God’s call to us. We have become so rooted in our self-deceptions, in our “strange god in thee” as to be deaf to the call of one another, to be blind to what God is showing us, to use our deeds to serve ourselves while worshiping not God, but the idols we have created to be our god. Rather than being in competition with one another, rather than continuing to see the world as we always have, rather than pining for ‘the good old days’, I hear Rabbi Heschel, the Psalmist, Bahya, disturbing our blissful self-deceptions, our engagements in mendacity, our practice of worshiping “the strange god in thee”, by reminding us of the destruction these practices bring. We are destroying our democracy, we are destroying the spirit of our exodus from Egypt by continuing to engage in our “disguised polytheism”.

It is ironic that we speak about our exodus from Egypt twice each day in our prayers and we remind ourselves to not “scout out after our hearts and eyes because we will whore/prostitute ourselves after them” and then go into the world and do exactly that. Rather than continue the journey from slavery to freedom, we keep turning back to the inner slaveries of mendacity, self-deception, deception of another(s), believing “the strange god in thee” is what we need to worship and seeking our own gain rather than serving God in truth, rather than caring for one another as we are taught in the Bible. We are told there are 70 faces of Torah, 70 ways to understand each verse, chapter and yet, we stay stuck in our old interpretations because they suit our idol worship. We stay stuck in the judgmental beliefs of earlier selves, we fail to recognize that the Bible, that faith, that worship has to be dynamic, it is ever-changing within us if we are to be people of faith, if we are to worship God and not “the strange god in thee”.

I am guilty of worshiping “the strange god in thee” at times even in my recovery. I have turned a deaf ear and a blind eye to my own rationalizations and called them Godly when they were actually godly. I have erred on the side of my ‘rightness’ and not heard nor seen truth when it was calling to me and in my face. I apologize to those who have been frustrated by calling to me in those moments and my ignoring their call, which I know was also God’s call. I have learned to hear the people around me more, I have learned to discern those who are calling to me from their God-Image and those who call from their own. I hear better, I see better and I am better each day, at least one grain of sand. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Comment

Comment

Living rabbi heschel’s wisdom - A daily path to living well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 295

“Disguised polytheism is also the religion of him who combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain, as it is said There shall be no strange god in thee(Psalms 81:10), on which our teachers remarked that it meant the strange god in the very self of man(Bahya Duties of the Heart Chapter 10)(God in Search of Man pg.392)

Rabbi Heschel’s use of the phrase “disguised polytheism” gives us the opportunity to look inside of ourselves and see what we are hiding both in our worship as well as in our religious/spiritual/secular lives. We change our clothes often, we hide our fat, our thinness, we hide the blemishes on our skin, we hide our motives, we hide our intentions, we hide our thoughts, we hide our souls’ purpose, we hide our false gods, we hide, we hide, we hide! Yet, no matter how many years we live the month of Elul, no matter how many days we live with the opportunity/demand to do T’Shuvah, to do a Chesbon HaNefesh, we seem incapable of escaping the myriad of hiding places we have come to call home.

As I read the words above, I am in awe of the brilliance of the Psalmist, the prophets, Bahya, Rabbi Heschel, et al, who know the human condition so well they can point out to us where the exit from our hiding is, they are the light that shows us the tunnel, they illuminate the exit doors that will save our souls, save our integrity, save our lives. And, we have been consistently deaf to them, we have consistently been blind to the paths out of hiding they provide to us, we have continued to ignore, deride, quote without any meaning/context their words to hide in plain sight our evils, our errors, our unwillingness to change.

We are so eager to follow “him who combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain” in our politics, in our business, even in our personal relationships, we don’t even notice our incongruences, our deceptions, our self-deceptions, our mendacities. This way of being is a “conventional norm” in our society, it is an accepted way of being, so we are oblivious to the truth of our ways of living and defend these disguises to our death. In our political life, people are following a man who only worships his own gain, who only worships God in order to gain for himself. We are witnessing an entire political party go down the rabbit hole of disguise, sink to the depths of mendacity by denying truth that they acknowledged before. Instead of “Morning in America” as Ronald Reagan said, these people of Reagan’s party are promoting Mourning in America! In our business world, companies and individuals agree to pay fines without ever taking responsibility, insurance companies turn down requests by Doctors for medication, procedures that will save lives, help people with serious illness, routinely by people who have no medical expertise-their only job is to say NO, and to make more money for the company. Workers are demanding living wages, they are demanding to be treated as worthwhile and contributing partners to the company executives, board members, and shareholders that are profiting so much from their labor and the ‘powers that be’ cry poor, cry wolf and hide their money so they don’t have to provide workers, actors, writers,their fair share.

We can only change the status quo, the broken political system, the rigged business system one person at a time. While regulations, laws, enforcements will and have gotten the ball rolling, the gains of the 60’s and what happened to them are important lessons. We allowed the gains made in Civil Rights, in Voting Rights to wither away, we took for granted that we won the war and we could move on; yet the people who engage in and practice “disguised polytheism”, that “combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain” never stop seeking ways to overturn any societal gains that call for them to come out of hiding, that demand they put down their disguises. Hence, our political, economic/labor and personal situations that we face seem so daunting.

Immersing myself in these words today remind me the difference between role to role relationships and soul to soul relationships. I have never hidden my soul’s purpose and passion, while I have, at times, bought my own press, I have always allowed, welcomed (eventually) people reminding me of who I am and to cut the crap. I am a loud, abrasive fighter for the soul of another, I am an advocate for the souls of human beings. I realize how ingrained “disguised polytheism” is in all of us and my Chesbon HaNefesh is designed to uncover the disguises I have been unaware of. I have been one who has “devotion to his own gain” and when it has been only about my gain at times in my recovery, I have suffered as have those around me. For this, I am very sorry and remorseful. I also know these times have been few and farther between the more I have grown and continue to grow in my spiritual life, in my recovery and in my coming out of hiding! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 294

“Such a person is worse than an idol-worshiper … . The latter, paying homage to the stars, worships an object that does not rebel against God, whereas the former worships beings some of whom rebel against God. The former only worships one object, but there is no limit to the number of human beings whom the perverse in religion may worship. Finally the inner attitude of the idolator is apparent to everybody; people can guard themselves from him—his denial of God is public knowledge. The hypocrite’s denial, however, is unnoticed … . This makes him the worst of the universal evils(Bahya, Duties of the Heart, Chapter 4). (God in Search of Man pg. 392)

Our insatiable desire to fool ourselves and everyone else, our incessant need to be ‘perfect’, has caused us to become the very people Bahya is speaking about. We are so accustomed to hiding, to wearing masks that we have put on so much mental make-up that we have almost forfeited our faces. We hide our hypocrisies, our incongruences from everyone and tell ourselves a story so we can live with our self-deceptions and our mendacities towards everyone else.

This is the greatest spiritual, mental crisis we are facing today, as it has been throughout history: being authentic, being transparent, being real, living into our imperfections instead of hiding them, denying them and blaming others for them. We see this in politics all the time, Kevin McCarthy wants to move attention from Trump’s crimes and misdemeanors by impeaching Joe Biden for nothing other than he can and his power is dependent upon worshiping “beings some of whom rebel against God.” We hear of Hunter Biden’s crimes, which are serious and not “that” serious while Jared Kushner parlayed his father-in-law’s presidency into a cozy $2 Billion dollar gift from the Saudis and Kevin is mum on this! We watch as the ‘religious right’ do everything they can to demean, disgrace and disregard anyone that is “not with them” and doesn’t think like them, etc. Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, both Supreme Court Justices, believe they are beyond reproach, beyond questioning, behaving as Richard Nixon did, believing that if they do something, it must be ethical, it must be just, etc. The hubris of our politicians is enormous and deadly for us and our democracy because of the worship of humans instead of worshiping God.

In our living rooms, families hide from one another, we teach our children to “not air our dirty laundry”, “what would the neighbors think”, and other such lessons teaching our children to hide and to lie, to worship human beings out of fear of them finding out who ‘we really are’ and rejecting us and/or worshiping them so we can reap some benefits. These ways of being are learned in our home while also saying the ‘right’ things about “Love God with all of your heart, your soul, your everything”. We learn hypocrisy from an early age and it is so ingrained into our society, most people are totally unaware of their incongruences and point their fingers at everyone without looking inside themselves. This is the tragedy of our time, of all times.

Yet, the prophet Jeremiah reminds us: “Return you backsliding children, I will heal your backsliding(Jeremiah 3:22), the prophet Hosea calls out to us to:”Take with you words and return to God, Accept that which is good”. We can be true to ourselves and accepted back by God, we can be true to ourselves and accept our whole selves for maybe the first time since infancy. We need to live into Elul and the compassionate, considerate, loving forces that are so prevalent in the Cosmos at this time of year. God cries for us, our children cry out for us, our parents cry out for us, all of them echoing  the first call to the first couple: “Ayecha, where are you?”

This call rings in my ears, in my mind, in my soul each day for the entirety of my life up till now. For many years, I hid from it, for the past 36, I have been responding with Hineni, no matter where I have been-even in hiding, even in denial, even in obliviousness. I am guilty of falling into the different traps that I mentioned above. I have falsely thought I was serving God when actually serving another human being out of fear/gain. I hid from people my insecurities, my fears that they would leave me if I didn’t do what they wanted rather than what God wanted at moments even in my recovery. I also was true to God and to myself during these times, a nuanced both/and. My fear of being abandoned, not ‘in the club’ drove these false moments, were the gasoline that fueled my incongruences, my hypocritical actions. I apologize to everyone harmed by these false moments and I apologize to God for my betrayal. These have lessened over the years and the fear of abandonment no longer drives me, as it has happened in some cases and I am sad, just not devastated. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom- A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 293

“Such a person is worse than an idol-worshiper … . The latter, paying homage to the stars, worships an object that does not rebel against God, whereas the former worships beings some of whom rebel against God. The former only worships one object, but there is no limit to the number of human beings whom the perverse in religion may worship. Finally the inner attitude of the idolator is apparent to everybody; people can guard themselves from him—his denial of God is public knowledge. The hypocrite’s denial, however, is unnoticed … . This makes him the worst of the universal evils(Bahya, Duties of the Heart, Chapter 4). (God in Search of Man pg. 392)

Immersing ourselves in Bahya’s writing above, I hear Rabbi Heschel’s demanding us to look inside of ourselves and come to terms with our own incongruences, our own actions that serve ourselves paths of hypocrisy. The last two sentences above cut right to the heart of the issues facing us today as they have from time immemorial. The issue is not our incongruences as much as it is our denial of them, of our refusal to be embarrassed by them, of our inability to acknowledge and change them. Rather than follow a path of T’Shuvah, we instead practice our denials, our hiding from ourselves and everyone else, our wearing of masks of piety, of righteousness, and this leads people to believe in us to their ruin, to the ruin of decency, the ruin of truth, the ruin of freedom. Coming to grips with the truth that all of us are incongruent at times, all of us say one thing and do another at times is crucial for our growth, imperative to our ending the practice of evil that we perpetrate upon one another by our incongruent behaviors. Yet, we continue to run away from facing ourselves, from calling out the hypocrite, from even discerning the perverseness of the people Rabbi Heschel and Bahya are speaking about.

These are the people the prophets railed against, the priests who would offer sacrifices while engaging in ways that served the rich and the powerful. Their words and warnings fell on deaf ears, just as the words of people who speak truth to power today and have throughout the millennia fall on deaf ears. As I ponder the words above, I realize more and more that we, the people, buy into the words of these ‘false prophets’ because they say what we want to hear, we ignore their actions and buy into the lies they tell us because we are afraid to see the truth of ourselves, we are afraid to admit our own hypocritical ways, we are unwilling to look at the times when we don’t ‘walk our talk’. So, we go along with the ‘strongmen’, the authoritarians, the populists believing they will save us from having to look at ourselves, make our amends and change our ways; which leads to our loss of freedom, to what makes us human as Rabbi Abraham Twerski teaches: our ability to make “free-will moral choices”.

There is a solution, we are not stuck in the evil that the false pietists spread, and that is engaging in a path of recovery, one of the paths of Torah, of the Bible. We are in the middle of Elul, we are 22 days from Yom Kippur and, as we learn in the Talmud (Tractate Yoma 86b), “Reb Meir would say: Great is repentance because the entire world is forgiven on account of one individual who repents as it is stated: “I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for My anger has turned away from him”(Hosea 14:5). Since we do not know which “him” the prophet is speaking of, we all need to repent! We all need to see the difference between living as a hypocrite and actions of hypocrisy that we are all susceptible to and engage in from time to time. This is the basis of the recovery movement, this is the basis of Torah, our imperfections, our incongruences, and our return. We have to let go of our need to hide, our need to ‘save our face’ and, instead, save our beingness, save our tuchus’, save our humanity and the humanity of everyone else.

The first time I was taught the words of Reb Meir, I was overwhelmed with anxiety, fear and relief. I had to make a decision, would I trust our ancient wisdom, would I truly ‘turn my will and my life over to the care of God…” and engage in the ways of living as a Baal T’Shuvah, a repentant? It was at this moment I realized what living Hineni, here I am, meant. I made a decision 36+ years ago to continue to ‘come clean’ upon realizing my own hypocritical actions, my own incongruent ways of being. I missed the mark over these past 36 years by giving into my fears, my seeking personal benefits, and going along to get along. I also missed the mark through living into the caricature of me that I painted and others put on me. I am so remorseful for these harms, for these ‘evil’ ways and I improve upon them each time I realize the myriad of disguises they take. I have not always walked my talk and I know I will never be perfect in doing this. I do, however, also know I get a little better at it each day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 292

“Such a person is worse than an idol-worshiper … . The latter, paying homage to the stars, worships an object that does not rebel against God, whereas the former worships beings some of whom rebel against God. The former only worships one object, but there is no limit to the number of human beings whom the perverse in religion may worship. Finally the inner attitude of the idolator is apparent to everybody; people can guard themselves from him—his denial of God is public knowledge. The hypocrite’s denial, however, is unnoticed … . This makes him the worst of the universal evils(Bahya, Duties of the Heart, Chapter 4). (God in Search of Man pg. 392)

Continuing Rabbi Heschel’s writing on “disguised polytheism”, this quote from Bahya Ben Joseph Ibn Pekudah, a 10th Century Spanish Jewish scholar and mystic, illuminates the issues we face daily, are our ‘religious’ acts that are out of fear of another human being, that are to benefit from another human being or are they truly religious acts that are serving God. Bahya’s differentiation between an idolator and a person who does things to serve another out of fear and/or to benefit themselves is crucial for us to look inside of ourselves during this month of Elul and see the damage we bring to ourselves and to another(s) when we practice “disguised polytheism”. While we rail against the “idol-worshiper” and, in many circumstances, call anyone who doesn’t worship the way we do an idolator, a pagan, Rabbi Heschel’s use of Bahya’s words here demand we look at ourselves, demand we see the ways we have acted in hypocritical ways and the evils we have perpetrated this evil upon another(s) and upon the world. It is very difficult for most of us to admit the hypocritical acts we have committed, the ways in which we have “sold out” our friends in order to ‘go up the ladder’, the ways we have ‘gone along to get along’, the actions we have taken ‘because it was just business’, ‘everyone does it’, all the while extolling ourselves for our charity and, as I read the quote above, false piety. Bahya’s words describe how we ‘hide in plain sight’. It is a universal challenge for us to look at ourselves, see how we do this in daily activities, do our T’Shuvah, and change our ways.

We are quick to point out the ways another(s) act in hypocritical ways and seem to be unwilling to see the 3 fingers pointing back at ourselves. We are all guilty of being hypocritical, none of us are perfect, and we are being called out for these actions by the words above. We worship the ‘leader’, we seek to ‘be on the right side’ of things/life, we speak out against injustices in the public square and engage in injustice in our private affairs. Business’ have decided providing more money to their shareholders is more important than taking care of customers, they have hidden facts, provided false narratives/reports, engaged in misleading advertising, etc, knowing full well that what they are doing is just for the sake of their jobs, their longevity, ie from fear of losing something and to benefit themselves and another who holds some power over them. We see this in our political realm, how Jim Jordan, et al, are weaponizing Government while accusing the Democrats of doing this ala Josef Goebbels’ “accuse another of that which you are guilty of” and how many people are deceived by these tactics. We also see this in our personal lives, people trying to hide their hypocritical acts by defending them, by accusing another of the same action, by forcing their will upon their children, their parents, their neighbors, their schools, religious institutions, their local social-service institutions and lying to ourselves that this is ‘in the best interests of all concerned’.

Recovering people no longer hide, we still act in hypocritical ways at times and we do our daily, yearly inventory to uncover these blind spots, make our amends and change our ways. We also learn how to spot the path of our own hypocrisy quicker and get back on the path of truth rather than continue on the path of  “disguised polytheism”. My own inventories over the days and years have shown me that I still engage in hypocrisy and I don’t live there anymore. I have, in the past, said I welcome everyone and, at the same time, been judgmental. I have spoken of living an examined life and, at times, been willfully blind to my own shortcomings. I have said I love all while not liking some and my bluster, my aggressive ways have pushed people away. I have spoken truth to power and, at times, lied to myself. The difference between being in recovery and being in denial is my hypocrisies are actions, not the way I am living. I live out loud, so it is easy for another to spot my hypocrisies and help me get back on the path, rather than hiding in plain sight as so many people do. I also know I am not a hypocrite nor an idolator, I am human and T’Shuvah, Step 10 in AA, gives me the ability to see my hypocrisy sooner, hear people when they call me out, and change. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 291

“One may observe all the laws and still be practicing a disguised polytheism. For if in performing a religious act one’s intention is to please a human being who he fears or from whom he hopes to receive benefits, then it is not God whom he worships but a human being.”(God in Search of Man pg. 392)

Looking at the “blue moon” of last night/this morning reminds us that we are in the middle of the month of Elul, we are beginning the ‘home stretch’ to Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur. Immersing ourselves in Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom above gives us the opportunity to look at our intentions, our motives, our actions and ask ourselves: whom are we serving? The challenge Rabbi Heschel’s teaching is giving us is to review our actions truthfully and determine if they were actually “religious” or self-serving, were they serving God or another human being for our gain, safety, etc.

Throughout the millennia we can see how we have come to “bow down or bend over” in accordance of the original meaning of worship. In Hebrew, the root of the word is “to serve” and “thanksgiving”. Using these definitions, we can begin to see when and where we have confused worshiping God with worshiping people, when and where we bow down and serve human beings from a place of fear and benefit, reward and punishment. It is crucial for us to discern the difference between giving thanks to God for everything in our lives, letting go of our erroneous rewarding and punishing God images, and review our actions this past year(s) through the lens of how we “bow down” to God in reverence and joy, how we “bend over” to fulfill God’s will instead of our own, how we seek “to serve” something greater than ourselves, and how we participate in “thanksgiving” offerings, no matter the results of our efforts/actions.

Rabbi Heschel’s call to us is to end our confusion between serving God and serving human beings for our gain. Religious acts bring us closer to our authentic selves when we take them in the name of God, not in the names of fear and/or personal benefit. We are taught by Antigonos of Socho: “Be not like servants who wait upon their master in the expectation of receiving a reward, but be like servants who wait upon their master in no expectation of reward”(Pirke Avot 1:5). Our serving human beings and/or God “with the expectation of a reward”, relieving our fears and/or receiving a benefit is the same as the first half of this teaching. These, as I am hearing Rabbi Heschel today, are not religious acts and we have come to call them such, unfortunately. As we approach the last half of Elul, as we make a “searching and fearless inventory” of the past year(s), it is crucial for us to discern the actions we have taken and will take that are actually done “in the expectation of receiving a reward”. These actions are not in service, they are not taken to bow down, bend over, nor be thankful to God, they are actions in service of ourselves, bowing down to our fears, being thankful for some personal gain, bending over to be rewarded by another human being.

It is time for us to be truthful with ourselves, with another human being and with God, as the 5th Step of Alcoholics Anonymous guides us to be. It is time for us to see how our self-interest has gotten in the way of serving God, of doing the next right thing, of living into God’s will, the teachings of the Bible, the New Testament, the Koran, etc. It is time for us to discern the ways we have betrayed our souls, betrayed our family, our friends, our democracy, by being a person who serves God and/or human beings “in expectation of receiving a reward”. It is imperative, if we are to save democracy, if we are to save religion, if we are to save community, if we are to save ourselves for us to engage in this inventory, to make our amends to ourselves for acting out of fear, whether it is fear of being punished or fear of missing out (FOMO). It is imperative to make our amends to human beings for giving them the false idea that we worship them, for feeding their egos to the point they believe their own BS, for betraying them by staying silent when they needed a spokesperson, an aide, a word.

I have been guilty of these behaviors in the past and I realize this more and more as I write these daily blogs. While I told myself that I stayed in truth, I see where, at times, my actions were in furtherance of my personal gain-keeping a job, making a living, etc., both before and in my recovery. I am deeply remorseful for these times and I see where they harmed me and another human being as my not serving them out of fear/benefit led to separations and anger. I also know my anger at times was not ‘passion’ as I tried to pass it off as, it wasn’t “righteous anger”, it was personal and I am sorry for the anger and the denial. I betrayed God, self and everyone else when I was acting from fear/benefit and I deeply regret these moments and I know I am not living from fear/benefit today. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 290

“One may observe all the laws and still be practicing a disguised polytheism. For if in performing a religious act one’s intention is to please a human being who he fears or from whom he hopes to receive benefits, then it is not God whom he worships but a human being.”(God in Search of Man pg. 392)

Re-reading this teaching of Rabbi Heschel makes me weep. Because “the heart is deceitful above all things, it is exceedingly weak, who can know it”(Jeremiah 17:9), I hear Rabbi Heschel reminding us to not be so sure of our motives, not be so sure we are serving God, remember how difficult it is to be wholehearted in our worship. This level of uncertainty and questioning of ourselves is what most people run from, what most of us are unwilling to examine and do T’Shuvah for. Yet, we continue to lie to ourselves, we continue to ‘wear’ the mask of piety, we continue to falsify our motives in order to wrap ourselves in the cloak of religiosity/spirituality!

As I re-read these words, I hear Rabbi Heschel calling all of us to task to examine our lives, to go through the pain of an examined life, to make our amends to God for trying to “please a human being” who we either “fear or from whom” we hope “to receive benefits.” Humankind has fallen into this trap over and over, we have served Kings out of fear, in order to be granted some kindness/benevolence, we have served bosses/employers in order to ‘get ahead’, to get a paycheck. We have served ‘our people’ in order to ‘be in the group’, we have served people out of fear of them leaving us. We have heard and been told that doing this will bring us a reward in the world to come, we have heard that ‘going along to get along’ will keep us safe, we have been told that “only I/he can save us” and return us to ‘the good old days’. Our desire to be deceived and the disease of self-deception are so powerful, we believe the lies that our weak heart tells us and we forfeit our souls, our strength, our connection to God, just as Samson did.

Our political crises’ here, in Israel, across the globe are proof of the teaching of Rabbi Heschel above. When the religious parties in Israel proclaim they are above the Arab population and ‘better than’ ‘those’ people, we are witnessing proof of Rabbi Heschel’s warning and teaching. When the religious people in America extol Donald Trump because he put enough judges on the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v Wade, when they call him the ‘anointed one’ of Jesus, we are witnessing “a disguised polytheism” as Rabbi Heschel is calling this idolatrous way of being. When business do things to please their shareholders at the expense and harm to everyone else and claiming it is their ‘god-given’ right, we see Rabbi Heschel’s warning being ignored. When we are members of a club so we don’t say or do anything that would go against another member of our club, we are ignoring Rabbi Heschel’s words. When we worry more about “advice of counsel” than human decency, human connection, we are perpetuating the polytheism Rabbi Heschel is decrying. When we are willing to go to any lengths to not ‘rock the boat’ we are surrendering our spiritual values for our rationalizations, to our fears, we are guilty as charged by Rabbi Heschel’s teaching above. When we are admonished for speaking truth about Israel’s current government and policies, when we are called traitors for calling out that “the emperor has no clothes” in regards to the Republican Party of today, we experience how strong the “disguised polytheism” of our world is. And, it all begins and ends with us, the individuals who make up governments, who are the electors, who are the people going along with the deceptions, the mendacities being perpetrated by the few. It is up to us, the individual, who are afraid to stand up to the ‘strongmen’ like Putin, Orban, MBS, Netanyahu, Trump, Jordan, et al. We ‘liberals’ deceive ourselves by being ‘on the right side’ of causes, by declaring our love of God, our adherence to ‘all the laws”, etc. all the while being unwilling to look at our own deceitful hearts, our own subtle ways of seeking benefits from our observances of whatever particular ‘code’ our ‘side’ calls for.

I am weeping because of my blindness, willful and unintentional, to the ways I have done ‘good’ actions out of both fear and wanting to reap benefits. In my recovery I have been more aware and I cannot claim anywhere near perfection. In looking back, I also see that every time I acted from fear and/or benefit, things never worked out so well, sometimes in the short term, sometimes in the long term. I am sorry to the people I harmed by serving people out of fear and/or benefit. I am sorry for the example I set when I did this. I am grateful that these times were fewer and farther in-between and I am grateful I have taken off my own blinders and don’t let fear nor benefit blur my vision nor feed my self-deception. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 289

“The prophet complained, “They never put their heart into their prayers, but howl away for corn and wine beside their altars” (Hosea 7:14). According to the Book of Proverbs (11:20), “they that are perverse in the heart are an abomination to the Lord.” Yet the prophet seems to have realized how hard it is not to be perverse, not to be an abomination.The heart is deceitful above all things, It is exceedingly weak—who can know it?”(Jeremiah 17:9) (God in Search of Man pg 391)

Last week I heard John Kasich say that what we need in our country is a “spiritual revolution”. He was speaking about our current political climate, our current climate of violence, hatred, racism, anti-semitism, and the fact that the Republican Party’s first debate was about hatred, violence, etc. Yesterday I heard Clarence Jones, Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.’s attorney and the person that helped write the “I have a Dream” speech say: “I am telling you that there's a level of violence, and there's a deep level of antisemitism in this country. I'm not trying to cry wolf. I'm not trying to scare you. I'm just telling you what I see.” We are experiencing what the prophets saw and called out-the deceitful heart of human beings being acted out in real time, in our time, in all times.

The spiritual revolution that Mr. Kasich and Mr. Jones are speaking about is being ignored, is being co-opted by the “religious right”. We, the people, no matter what faith or non-faith we are a part of, need to stop being “they that are perverse in the heart”. Rabbi Joachim Prinz, who spoke just prior to Dr. King at the March on Washington, said: “When I was the rabbi of the Jewish community in Berlin under the Hitler regime, I learned many things. The most important thing that I learned under those tragic circumstances was that bigotry and hatred are not '.the most urgent problem. The most urgent, the most disgraceful, the most shameful and the most tragic problem is silence.” Silence, unfortunately, is what is happening today as it did in the 1960’s, as it did at the times of the destructions of both Temples in Jerusalem, as it is in Israel. Not that people are not speaking out, not that legislation is not being proposed, it is the silence of some of the people in power, it is the silence that allows us to “go along to get along”, it is the silence of ‘thank God the anger isn’t directed towards me. This is how deep the deceitfulness and perverseness of our hearts runs. Where are the spiritual leaders, where are our elected officials who can deliver on “the promissory note” of the spirit of our Declaration of Independence, who can deliver on the “promissory note” of the spirit of our Constitution? They seem to be in short supply and this is the tragedy of our time as it has been the tragedy of all the times in history when men decided to stay silent while witnessing the destruction of freedom, witnessing and participating with the charlatans claiming to speak in God’s name. Is it any wonder people are leaving our Houses of Worship when they “speak in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion”, as Rabbi Heschel begins God in Search of Man with?

It is time for all of us to rise up, to speak up, to listen to the call of our souls, to listen to the calls of our neighbors crying out for justice, for freedom, for truth. The way to cure our diseases of perverseness, of deceitfulness, of heartlessness, is to speak truth to ourselves, listen to the truth of our souls, allow truth to defeat our petty and dangerous rationalizations. The way to cure our “exceedingly weak” heart is to surround ourselves with truth seekers, with “spiritual friends” who will help us “circumcise the foreskin of our heart”(Deut.10:16). The cure has to come from within, it has to begin with a willingness to seek out people of truth rather than surround ourselves with “People of the Lie” as M.Scott Peck speaks about in his book of the same name. Each time we give in to the perverseness and deceitfulness of our hearts and of the hearts of those around us, we become “people of the lie”! Judaism and recovery have a solution: T’Shuvah and Inventory. In both spiritual paths we are told to take inventory/do T’Shuvah each day, seeing where we are hitting the mark and where we are missing the mark. Our obligation is to enhance the good, repair the not so good, learn from both and “grow along spiritual lines”.

In this month of Elul, I realize my own surrender to the deceitfulness of my heart  at times. In my recovery, these times were much less and yet, they were more covert as well and no less harmful. I allowed myself to be deceived out of financial fears, aka keeping my job. I allowed my deceitful heart to be in charge because of a deep desire to be accepted and loved. Each time, I and many people suffered the consequences of my choices. I wasn’t aware of my deceitful heart until after the consequences fell. I also know thy myriad of times I did not give into the deception of my heart, I stood up for truth as I still do today. I am not silent, I will not be silenced. I will not stand by the anti-semitism, violence, racism, hatred being spewed by ‘good people’, by ‘spiritual leaders’, etc. Rabbi Heschel, Judaism, recovery will not let me buy into deception any more nor will they allow me to be silent. I pray they do the same for you. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 288

“The prophet complained, “They never put their heart into their prayers, but howl away for corn and wine beside their altars” (Hosea 7:14). According to the Book of Proverbs (11:20), “they that are perverse in the heart are an abomination to the Lord.” Yet the prophet seems to have realized how hard it is not to be perverse, not to be an abomination.The heart is deceitful above all things, It is exceedingly weak—who can know it?”(Jeremiah 17:9) (God in Search of Man pg 391)

Today, August 28, 2023, is the 60th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech. Rev. King, Rabbi Heschel, and so many others “put their heart into their prayers” and while we remember their words, it is more important, I believe, to remember their deeds. They stood up against those who “howl away for corn and wine beside their altars” and we have to today as well. Rabbi Heschel’s quoting of the prophets above is validation for the war within, it is an acknowledgment of how we have struggled to be “wholehearted” in our living with and our loving of God, human beings, and ourselves. It is a struggle that is, as I understand Rabbi Heschel and the prophets today, a daily one and the teachings above are a call to action, not a call to despair.

Immersing ourselves in the wisdom above, we can realize the words and deeds of Rabbi Heschel, Rev. King and so many others who ‘fought’ for civil rights, who fought against prejudice and hatred, who sought to lead us to live the call of our “better angels” are our north star. We are descendants of the prophets, we are the inheritors of their wisdom, their actions, their love, their struggle. Just as Rev. King spoke about America: “When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men — yes, Black men as well as white men — would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” so too does the Bible remind us of the “promissory note” to which every person falls heir to; the 10 Commandments, the Holiness Code, T’Shuvah, Amends, etc. It is time for us to live up to and honor our inheritance and to do so means we have to struggle to overcome being “perverse in the heart”.

Rev. King went on to say: “In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred…Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.” Rabbi Heschel’s writing above and Rev. King’s words are reminders that while it is difficult to “not be guilty of wrongful deeds” it is possible and it takes struggling against our inner perverseness, our inner deceits, our inner desires to win, our inner desires for power, our inner desire for self-deception.

We are witnessing a myriad of people who “howl away for corn and wine beside their altars” and call this wholeheartedly serving God. We watch people leave our places of worship because of the mendacity, the duplicity, the “abomination to the Lord” our preachers, our ‘spiritual leaders’ our houses of worship have become. We are witnessing, as we have throughout the history of humanity, the “pious ones” bastardize God’s words, bastardize the words of the prophets, continue to play ‘three-card monte’ with us, try to deceive us, for their own good, for their own power, to please the ones with the gold, so many have “thrown the baby out with the bathwater” and left themselves adrift in a sea that seems to be ‘spiritual’ and often is as deceitful, perverse, as the institutions they left. In every area of living and working, from the pulpit to government, from the supermarket to the stock market, we have to say NO to the perverseness, the deceitfulness, the mendacity we worship today. We have to leave “bitterness and hatred” and meet “physical force with spiritual force” and we have to engage in this work today!

After living in deceit for many years, after being perverse, an abomination to family, to God, to friends, I had a “spiritual awakening” and changed course. I am not free of deceit and I am much freer than I was. I know that there are days when my bank of justice is overdrawn, I know there are moments when I do not cash the “promissory note” our ancestors wrote for us at Mt. Sinai, and I am saddened by these moments and days. And, they are only moments, days now not a lifetime nor a lifestyle for me anymore. I have cashed most of the “promissory notes” people have presented while working these past 34+ years and I engage each day in my inner struggle. I am sad when people decide to not struggle with me and I am in acceptance, I am in awe of those who struggle so well against the “perverse” and refuse to be “abominations”. I am grateful to Rabbi Heschel, Dr. King, my ancestors for showing me the way! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 287

“Time and again the Bible calls upon us to worship Him “with all thy heart.” “Walk before me, and be wholehearted” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be wholehearted with the Lord Thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). And yet it seems that the Biblical man was disturbed by the problem of whether man is at all capable of serving God wholeheartedly.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

The last sentence above is, I believe, at the heart of our issues today, as is true throughout our the human experience. Being “disturbed at the problem of whether man is at all capable of serving God wholeheartedly” gives us the opportunity to examine our actions, gives the challenge of maturing our inner life, and gives us a basis upon which to do our T’Shuvah/inventory on a daily/yearly spiritual exercise. Being disturbed is not a negative as I am hearing Rabbi Heschel, it is a chance to ask ourselves both difficult and appropriate questions as well as seek solutions to the challenge of the Bible. Understanding the call of the Bible, as Rabbi Heschel helps us hear it, means we are in the process of “serving God wholeheartedly” and the fact that “Biblical man was disturbed” means we are to ask ourselves the hard question: what does it mean to serve God wholeheartedly in this moment, in this situation. Asking ourselves this question leads us to serve God with everything we have in the moment, or not. It demands we make a choice as to whether to serve falseness, mendacity, be self-serving or to serve truth, authenticity, God.

In this month of Elul, this question helps us determine how our actions in the past year served God and served self-seeking. It also provides the opportunity for us to chart our course for the year to come. We need to be “disturbed by the problem” so we can “interfere” with our normal ways of living, so we can, as the Latin root teaches us, be”utterly disturbed” with our actions of half-heartedness, with our actions that were/are self-seeking and self-centered. Today and everyday we are being called upon by Rabbi Heschel, by Torah, by the prophets, by the Bible to live into the challenges that this day presents us with. We are called upon to leave the comfort of our everydayness, the comfort of our facades, the comfort of our self-deceptions and journey through the wilderness of truth, the inner work of service to God, the joy of wholeheartedly serving something greater than our own selfishness. Being disturbed helps us question ourselves to grow spiritually, to grow in our ability to further our journey to wholeheartedness, in relation to God,  in relationship with ourselves. We have become so used to the lies and deceptions of ourselves and everyone else that we have lost the ability to be disturbed by our “phoning in” our wholeheartedness towards God and towards caring for the needy, the poor and the stranger inside of us and in another(s).

Rabbi Heschel disturbs me always! He gives me new and different ways to understand how to live well, how to live into the greatness of being human. As he describes the words of the prophets for himself, he too gives all of us “a bad conscience”. The wonder and awe of his teachings, above and throughout his books and writing, is he demands we constantly seek to improve our humanity, we constantly grow in our connection to God, we consistently live the gratitude for life out loud and in our actions. We are so used to giving lip service to gratitude, to the principles of the Bible, we buy into the deceptions of people in power, in friendship, the deceptions of our religious leaders and the deceptions of self.

In recovery, we are constantly disturbed by our self-seeking, self-centered actions both prior to our recovery and those we still engage in. Just ‘not using’ (in whatever form ‘using’ takes) is just not enough. It is a start and an important first step, yet, we know that we have to “continue to grow along spiritual lines” and “we seek spiritual progress, not spiritual perfection”.

I am embarrassed by the times when I wasn’t disturbed, when I believed I was right, believed myself 100%! While I knew how imperfect I was/am, looking back through the lens Rabbi Heschel is giving us, I am acutely aware of my hubris, my lack of humility, my need to be right, etc. I am sorry to all who had to suffer my arrogance. While my wholeheartedness continues to grow as I grow along “spiritual lines”, I am proud of the myriad of times I sought counsel, I asked for opinions, I collaborated with people to find the best way to serve God and to serve people with my whole heart. Looking ahead, I am committed to be more wholehearted in my serving God and people through growing my inner life more each day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 286

“Time and again the Bible calls upon us to worship Him “with all thy heart.” “Walk before me, and be wholehearted” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be wholehearted with the Lord Thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). And yet it seems that the Biblical man was disturbed by the problem of whether man is at all capable of serving God wholeheartedly.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

“And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might” is the first sentence of the V’Ahavta Prayer following the Shema and, again, it is in the imperfect (future) tense, meaning something that has begun and is not yet completed. It is a seemingly impossible command! Loving God with everything we have calls for an abdication of false self, a complete surrender of shame, an acceptance of our infinite worth and dignity. It also calls for us to respect, honor and embrace every human being, immersing ourselves in  “love your neighbor as you love yourself”. While we will never achieve the totality of this command, we can move towards it more and more each day; which is the goal of every command, I believe.

The path to leaning into and living these words of The Torah is to honor the Divine Image we are created in, letting go of the facades and masks we wear to ‘protect’ ourselves from life’s sadness’ and tragedies, from our own inadequacies and imperfections. We have to end our seemingly incessant need to compare, compete with one and another, the conventional notion that putting someone else down makes us better, let go of the self-deceptions and mendacity that we engage in every day. Immersing ourselves in teachings of the Talmud that remind us we are all equal in ‘God’s eyes’, we are all in need of one another, we all bring unique gifts and talents to the world opens our eyes and reveals a path to living together in camaraderie, in service and in love.

Religion is becoming more and more obsolete for many people because our institutions do not live the words they preach. Religion speaks in the name of authority and perfection, harshness and obliviousness rather than guidance, compassion, love, imperfection and T’Shuvah/return. In Genesis Rabbah, we are taught that God makes new laws every day in the Heavenly Court while we seem to be stuck in laws and paths from over 2000 years ago. Religion needs to speak in the ways of the prophets, not in the ways of human power. Politics is turning people off and away because many politicians and states speak in the name of power for themselves rather than improving “government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from this earth”.

It is impossible to speak of religion, of politics, of democracy, of freedom when we love ourselves, our images, our power, our status, more than we love God. Without “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” as the guiding principle, as Rabbi Akiva taught, we cannot say we love God! Yet, we keep up the facade in our institutions of higher learning, of religion, of government that we are ‘serving God’, ‘following what Jesus wants’ when we deny voting rights, when we deny the dignity of choice to and for women, when we seek to rule rather than govern, when we ego along to get along, when we ostracize people we disagree with rather than learn from one another, when “winning is everything” and we do anything and everything to ‘win’. Rather than live into the words of the prophets, rather than celebrate each day that we “were brought out of Egypt”, we ignore the words and seek to become the new Pharaoh who “did not know Joseph” and who does not know Moses, Jesus, Mohammed, Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Lincoln, etc.

In recovery, we are aware of our incomplete beingness and we “seek to improve our conscious contact with God” every day. We “practice these principles in all our affairs” knowing practice is not perfection. In my Elul inventory, I realize the myriad of ways I deceived myself over the years prior to recovery and I broke the hearts and spirits as well as the trust of those who cared for me and loved me. I have made my amends and I continue to live these amends by healing my self and helping people heal themselves. I am aware of the times in recovery when I thought I was loving God with everything and, as it turns out, I was loving me more-I thought I was taking actions in the name of God and they were for my own sake more than God’s or another’s. I am sorry for these harms. I realize that I also deceived myself through my need to be accepted, loved and bought into the mendacities of another”s which, again, did not serve God. I also know I did serve God by loving my neighbor as myself and this helped so many people. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 285

“Time and again the Bible calls upon us to worship Him “with all thy heart.” “Walk before me, and be wholehearted” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be wholehearted with the Lord Thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). And yet it seems that the Biblical man was disturbed by the problem of whether man is at all capable of serving God wholeheartedly.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

Being wholehearted with God has proven, over the millennia, to be difficult! The story of Jacob teaches us that our intentions, while important do not necessarily lead us to this state of being. Jacob’s promise, Jacob’s intentions to be wholehearted with God begins with him making a deal, after he has acknowledged that “God was in this place and I, I did not know it”. He gives us insight and a teaching as to our relationship with God; rather than it being covenantal, it is conditional/transactional. We keep ‘making deals’ with God, we keep wanting to be shown/given something before we commit and even then, we are constantly asking/demanding a quid pro quo from God. We ‘pray’ to God for x and if we get it, we give thanks and are committed to serving and being “wholehearted with the Lord Thy God” for the moment, until we want/need something else. We have forgotten the teaching of the Kotzker Rebbe: “Where do you find God? Wherever/whenever you let God in.” While we give lip service to this command, we seem to not be able to sustain it. Instead, we engage in so many actions and say it is ‘what God wants’, we lie to ourselves and everyone else in order to feel good about the evils we perpetrate, the negativity we promulgate, the power we seek and wield for our own sake, not for God’s.

We witness this in the ways people in power have, throughout history, said they are doing “God’s Will”, from the Pharaohs in Egypt to the Kings of Israel/Judea to the Holy Roman Emperors, to the politicians in our country today. Listening to them speak of their deep devotion to God, to their wholeheartedness in serving God while they do everything they can to keep out the stranger, to harass the poor and the needy, to deny people their God-given equality, their God-given infinite value and dignity is infuriating to many of us and for many of us we ‘drink the kool-aid” and believe our prejudices, our ‘getting ours’, going against our self-interests and God’s interests is holy. We seem to be wholehearted in our worship of idols, rather than being “wholehearted with the Lord thy God”.

The difficulty of living into this command is apparent with the Rabbis of old; they found ‘clean-ups’ for Jacob’s behaviors in their commentaries and they teach us in the Talmud to “nullify your will before God’s will so God’s will becomes your will.” The Rabbis knew that senseless hatred is/was the destroyer of community and the antithesis of “love your neighbor as you love yourself”, yet they engaged in it under the guise of power, needing to be right, and through the self-deceptive belief that they were serving God and their opponents were not. This is not to denigrate the Rabbis of old, this is to point out to us how difficult it is to live into being “wholehearted with the Lord Thy God”. We are called upon to take some action, in olden times it was bringing an offering, to draw near to God (sacrifice) and today, we do T’Shuvah, Prayer, and Tzedakah to draw near to God, as ways to engage in the introspection necessary to let go of our deceit, our mendacity, our false egos so we can “be wholehearted with they Lord Thy God.”

In recovery, we call this surrender; turning our will and our lives over to the care of a power greater than ourselves, admitting our powerlessness over people, places, things, praying for the clarity to “accept the things we cannot change” and the clarity to see we have “the courage to change this things we can”. We engage in looking at ourselves daily-seeing how and when we served God wholeheartedly and how and when we were actually serving ourselves wholeheartedly and lying to ourselves by calling this service to God.

Each day, not just during Elul, I ask myself: “Whom am I serving, God or my inauthentic self?” I do this so I can catch myself quicker when I am serving inauthenticity, falseness, mendacity. I have used loudness, crassness, at times to get a point across to help another and, at times, to indulge myself and my caricature of myself. Looking backwards I see that many times when I said my actions were for the sake of heaven, they were for my sake 51% and God’s only 49%-I am sorry for these times. Looking back I also see how often my actions were at least 51%+ for God and <49% for me and I am filled with gratitude to God. I wrestle each and every day to “be wholehearted with God”, knowing the language is in the imperfect tense, so it and I am works in progress. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 284

“Time and again the Bible calls upon us to worship Him “with all thy heart.” “Walk before me, and be wholehearted” (Genesis 17:1). “Thou shalt be wholehearted with the Lord Thy God” (Deuteronomy 18:13). “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). And yet it seems that the Biblical man was disturbed by the problem of whether man is at all capable of serving God wholeheartedly.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

Rabbi Heschel’s words above gives everyone pause, hopefully. The Bible’s call “to worship Him “with all thy heart” and to “walk before Me, and be wholehearted” in all our affairs seems to have eluded humankind since the beginning of time. Taking a deep dive into these words and the meanings they convey during this month of Elul gives us the opportunity to review when we have been “capable of serving God wholeheartedly” and when we haven’t. Separating our self-centeredness from our service is a difficult exercise for most of us. While we wrap ourselves in our ‘piety’ often, we quote Scriptures, we quote spiritual texts, we quote Rabbi Heschel often, leaning into the words, living the meanings behind the words has proven much more difficult.

“Walk before me, and be wholehearted” are words ‘spoken’ to Abraham and they give us a glimpse into God’s belief in humanity. We are capable of doing this, we are capable of walking before God, doing the next right thing on our own, we are capable of being wholehearted in all of our affairs. Yet, it seems we have fallen short of, as we say in recovery, “practice these principles in all our affairs”. When we use this command as a yardstick and a question into our behaviors, our actions of this past year, we give ourselves the opportunity to do T’Shuvah, to return to our true self, to repent for our inauthentic ways of being, to repent for our hiding our whole heart, to have a new response to “situations that used to baffle us”, to return to honoring our “intuitive mind” and returning our rational mind in its proper place, as a servant to God, to our intuitive mind. We are, as we have always, engaged in an inner war between walking before God and being wholehearted and thinking we are God and being hidden, having our own agendas, spreading mendacity and deception in our wake.

Herein lies our challenge: are we willing to let go of our false egos and serve our God-Image, serve the divine need we are created for, be a reminder of God in order to make our corner of the world a little better than we found it? In order to do this, we have to let go of our false selves, we have to stop wearing the myriad of masks we keep in our closets and put on each day, we have to stop living in silos, being different depending on the ‘role’ we are playing in any given hour, day, week, etc. We are being called by God to “be wholehearted” to “walk before me” and yet, we seem to be substituting our needs as God’s needs, we seem to be walking before the idols we have made rather than worshiping God, we seem to be more interested in being wholehearted in our duplicity in order to “get ahead” than serving God. We are witnesses and good at seeing the duplicity of another, we are good at witnessing the idolatry of another(s), and we seem to “go along to get along”, we scream LIAR when confronted by people who are being “wholehearted”, by people who seek “righteous justice” as we were told to practice in last week’s Torah Portion.

There is a solution, however. Let’s all go back to basics, let’s all go back to immersing ourselves in our own truths, let’s all go back to using this month of Elul to begin again to fulfill God’s call. We can do this when we make a decision to “turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understand God” as the third step of AA suggests.

I have bastardized “walk before me” by thinking I was the “me” at times in my life and I realize my “stinking thinking” at those moments. I live and lived wholeheartedly in all my affairs, I have never be a spectator in my life, and while this is a good trait, again I have used being wholehearted to ignore God’s call and substitute my false ego and my rational mind for God’s voice and I am sorry for these moments as well. I also know how these bastardizations have happened, I was scared of being me, I was scared of being rejected, I was scared of being left out, etc. I know I was scarred by the death of my father and didn’t not want to go through that pain again, so, at times, I put up my armor and my shield to save me from this pain. Today, I am able to withstand the rejections, I stop and ask “which me is seeing, talking acting”; the false one, the masked one or the authentic me that is walking before God? Using Rabbi Heschel’s words to review life is difficult and exhilarating, painful and freeing. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 283

“Self-examination was not inaugurated by analytical psychology. Austere soul-searching is an essential feature of piety, and the pious man is prone to suspect that his reverence and devotion may be furtive attachments to selfish purposes.” (God in Search of Man pg. 390)

On this 5th day of Elul, these words of Rabbi Heschel seem very appropriate. Given the times we are living in, the ways in which some wrap themselves in the Flag, in the Bible, in the New Testament, in the Koran, in Eastern Philosophical texts, these words are crucial for us to realize the importance of “austere soul-searching”. The Rabbis knew we needed this, not just to be ‘pious religious people’, rather to be able to be servants of God, to fulfill the unique purpose we were given as a birthright, to be an authentic human being who’s dutifulness is never rote, is never for the sake of optics, etc.

Immersing myself in the teaching above, I am struck with Rabbi Heschel’s message of never taking one’s “piety” for granted. I hear him reminding us to stop thinking too much of ourselves, to not believe our own press, to never be ‘holier than thou’ when dealing with ourselves, another, and/or God. Rather than be like Moses who denied doing anything wrong throughout the Bible, Rabbi Heschel is calling out to us to not be so sure of our actions/motives, to not be too self-aggrandizing and self-congratulatory regarding our accomplishments, to not puff up our chests and try to get medals for our “reverence and devotion” because we may be more reverent and devoted to our egos than we are to God, to decency, to ‘doing the next right thing’.

We, here in America and in Israel, as well as across the Globe, are facing choices that call for us to return to the examples of our ancestors, to the guidance of our ancestors and end our need to be so “pious” and to stop our outward declarations of our “piety”. As soon as people tell you what God wants, they are “furtive attachments to selfish purposes”! Each of us is created unique and in the Divine Image, each of us has a word of God to bring to fruition in our own quirky manner, ergo: no one of us knows exactly what God wants from all of us except to “welcome the stranger, care for the needy, the poor, etc”. When ‘religious men’ state that some people are 2nd Class citizens, they go against the Divine command to “have one law for the stranger and the citizen alike”. When these same ‘religious men’ proclaim the value of slavery, white supremacy, anti-semitism, anti-muslim, etc, they are engaged in spreading the cancer that is eating up their soul to the rest of us. When they proclaim their allegiance to God, to the Flag, to the State, and they exclude groups of people, when they seek to have authoritarian rule rather than abide by democratic norms, they are failing to follow God’s command to: “Proclaim Liberty throughout the land and to all the inhabitants thereof”(Lev.25:10). Yet, we are watching the ”pious” proclaim the “piety” in their actions that go against the ways of God in favor of “selfish purposes”.

People such as these and their followers, their adherents give lip-service to “austere soul-searching” rather than do their own Chesbon HaNefesh, their own accounting of their soul. While this has always been the case, reading the Bible, the prophets, gives us the long history of this type of person, it is time for us to stop doing it ourselves, we have to banish these “false prophets”, we have to “circumcise the foreskins of our hearts” so we can hear the words of God we were born with, so we can live our unique purpose and make the world a little better than we found it, or at least do everything we can to make this happen..In recovery as in Judaism, we set aside time each day for inventory, for “austere soul-searching” and for making our amends as well as being grateful for the good we have done, and expressing gratitude for the help we have received during the day. We remind ourselves of a few truths while doing this daily “soul-searching”: we are not in this for ourselves, we can’t do it alone, we will never achieve the perfection we mistakenly believe we should attain, and we have to live an authentic, transparent life.

In looking back over the years, I know my achievements/actions have had a tinge of “selfish purpose” at times, I cannot say that my ego wasn’t involved in my daily living. I do know my ego most times served God, a greater good than “furtive selfish needs”. In my recovery, I wasn’t furtive, I am pretty ‘out there’. I am deeply devoted to service, to serving God, to being open and I have indulged myself by being a caricature of my self at times. I am sorry for the times when my ego overrode being of service and I am sorry for the times when I allowed callousness and harshness to blunt the message God gave me to deliver at birth. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment

Comment

Living Rabbi Heschel's Wisdom - A Daily Path to Living Well

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 2 Day 282

“Self-suspicion looms as a more serious threat to faith than doubt, and “anthropodicy”, the justification of man is today as difficult a problem as theodicy, the justification of God. Is there anything pure and untinged with selfishness in the soul of man? Is integrity at all possible? Can we trust our own faith? Is piety ever detached from expediency.?” (God in search of Man pg. 390)

Suspicion comes from the Latin meaning “mistrust”, and Rabbi Heschel’s use of this word regarding ourselves, asks us to look inside and see how much we actually trust ourselves and how our trust in our inner life/in our soul impacts how we are living. The questions he is asking are to help us see how aware we are/are willing to be about our actions, our motives, the integration of our inner and outer lives. While it seems a negative viewpoint from Rabbi Heschel to some-as I was discussing with a couple of people last night- I find his words to be uplifting in helping us be more introspective and aware of the areas we are living with integrity and the areas of life in which we are not.

The last sentence above, hopefully, stops us in our tracks! Piety is associated with reverence, “a belief or point of view that is accepted with unthinking conventional reverence", and comes from the Latin meaning “dutifulness”. Expediency comes from the Latin meaning “putting in order” and is defined as “the quality of being convenient and practical despite possibly being improper or immoral". Given Rabbi Heschel’s belief in the words and ways of the Prophets, his deep religious fervor for God, for Truth, I hear him calling to us to examine our selves, especially during this month of Elul, and as ourselves how we can claim to be Hasids(pious) when we twist the words of Torah, the words of God, the examples of the prophets, the actions our ancestors took that were wrong and taught to us to show us what happens when we choose expediency, when we live in ways that are “unthinking, conventional” and we show “reverence” and deference to mendacity, self-deception, deception of another(s), etc.

On Yom Kippur Day, we read from the Book of Jonah, an interesting choice by the Rabbis. The people of Nineveh, the King of Nineveh, the most power-hungry city in its time, all hear the words of the prophet and they engage in T’Shuvah, they engage in self-examination, they engage in purposeful actions and change their thinking and future actions. We today seem incapable of following their lead. We hear of the perfections of Biblical Characters, we read in commentaries ‘clean-ups’ of their bad behaviors, we suspect their motives and we are told we are wrong, we just are spiritually elevated enough. We listen to the exhortations of religious/spiritual leaders that promote “conventional, unthinking” and demand “reverence” to what is “convenient and practical” and we either go along with them blindly, walk away because we don’t want anything to do with God, higher power,  and/or walk away because we know they are charlatans.

In recovery, we know that pointing the finger at someone is a sign to us, to look at the 3 fingers pointing back to us. While it is not wrong to point out to someone their veering off the path of their recovery, it is also important to look at the ways we are drifting off the path as well. We are aware that “piety” can never be “unthinking, conventional”, not as a spiritual discipline/practice. We know that we can no longer do things because they are “convenient and practical” they have to be deliberate and purposeful. Our recovery inventories continue to help us live into the maladjusted, impractical, deep thinking, and inconvenient ways of wonder and radical amazement!

Continuing my own examples of Elul, I am painfully aware of when expediency and piety were so attached I didn’t see them as separate. I am aware of the times, I went along with people and actions that we “improper and immoral” because it was “convenient” and self-serving. While this was more prevalent prior to my own recovery in 1988, it has happened in my recovery. While fighting the ways of the world, when I was confronted by people in these past 34+ years, at times I was unable to see their point of view, I was willfully blind and deaf to their calls and I am deeply remorseful for these times. Looking back, each time was a result of my own suspicions that needed to be an inner journey and inventory which I made an outer finger-pointing; always getting me in more spiritual distress and angst. I am also aware of the many times, I have chosen to be “maladjusted to notions and cliches” in order to “have an authentic awareness of that which is” and experienced the consequences of these actions as well. I am proud of being a Hasid, especially a Hasid of Rabbi Heschel’s and I pray I do his words, teachings, God’s words, teachings, justice each day. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Comment