How does Repentance help you prove to yourself that you can and are going to change your negative ways? Year 3 Day 295

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 295

National Month of Repentance and Change

“The season of Rosh Hashanah is the “Day of Memory”, the “Day of Judgement”. Before the judgement and memory of God we stand. How can we prove ourselves? How can we persist How can we be steadfast? Through repentance.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg 69)

Remembering that we are not so much ‘standing in front” of a man in a beard with a staff, in front of some mythical figure, rather we are standing in front of ourselves, we are facing our self and our actions as well as our inactions. We are asking ourselves for proof that we are worthy, proof that we can change, proof that we can be forgiven. We are asking ourselves for proof that we can forgive ourselves, that we can end our incessant need to be self-abusive, as Noah BenShea speaks about in his documentary, “Jacob the Baker” on Amazon Prime-which I highly recommend.

We wonder, at this time of year, in this reflexive and reflective time, how can we go on, how can we continue to try and fail, how can we keep trying to keep up appearances, worry about the “optics” while our inner world is burning, while we are falling apart inside and we continue to ignore our spiritual health while maintaining the appearance of propriety, high moral standards, wonder and awe?

We question our ability to stay true to ourselves since we have betrayed ourselves so often in the past. We begin and/or continue to doubt our ability to hold fast to the Torah, to principles of morality and ethical ways when the lure and the pull of ‘get rich quick’, ‘make the money and you will be safe’, “if your rich they think you really know”, “winning at all costs and the one with the most toys wins” are so strong from both society and within us. How can we believe we have the “staying power” when we say both the long and the short confessionals on Yom Kippur?

We have shunned this questions for so long as individuals and as a society. We have shied away from these questions of Rabbi Heschel for millennia and, it is interesting to me that there is not more discussion among my colleagues about these questions and response from Rabbi Heschel. It is as if we don’t want to face the truth about our own selves as Clergy, as human beings so we continue to preach out, preach about what is good (Jews and Israel) and what is not good (antisemitism and anyone who is critical of Israel). When the Rabbis and Cantors who have supported Trump, the Republican Jewish Coalition who says they believe in “Republican Values”, don’t walk away when he speaks of “blame the Jews for my loss of the election”-we see people who are unable to be steadfast in their devotion to Biblical Values. Listening in horror to the evangelicals who proclaim Trump and Vance as ‘god’s anointed’ and they clap and say ‘amen’ to this should make all of us want to throw up! Yet, we continue to see how people are more interested in being “steadfast” in their mendacity and their self-deception. than in the principles of the Bible, of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, of Easter and Christmas.

It is time for all of us to engage in the solution Rabbi Heschel is reminding us of: Repentance. In the Talmud Yoma 86b it states: Reb Meir says: “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)”. This is, of course on its face an outlandish statement. Yet, it also speaks to the importance of each and every individual. It also reminds us of Malcolm Gladwell’s “tipping point” theory. It is defined as: “the critical point in a situation, process, or system beyond which a significant and often unstoppable effect or change takes place”. When one person repents to another, that person then is moved to do the same and on and on until the whole world is rising to repent and have “their backsliding” healed and be in a state where they and another “love them freely”. We have the path, it is in the Bible, it is, according to our mystics a way of being that was put into the world even before the world was created and, I would add, it is so often bastardized and not used.

Saying “I’m sorry” is not the same as repentance! Repeating the formula the Rabbis gave: “if I have done anything to harm you, please forgive me” is inadequate. Asking people what you have done to them is abdicating one’s responsibility to be self-reflective and self-reflexive. Yet, we allow these types of false humility and piety to be ‘good enough’ for us and can’t understand why someone would not forgive these half-assed ways of seeking forgiveness. We find it incomprehensible that someone would expect us to actually face our selves, to do the work to prove to them and to ourselves that we want to change our ways, that we are willing to make restitution for the harms we have wrought, that we are committed to finding new responses to these old triggers and experiences which will be with us throughout our lifetime. How dare anyone expect this, how dare my own soul, my inner life cause me such turmoil because it expects me to change and grow. Yet, repentance is the solution.

As a younger human being-denial was the default. If someone accused me, I denied and, for a while, I was good enough to make them question their reality. I was steadfast and persistent in my lies and my denials. I was unwilling to repent even when my errors were so apparent all I could do is say “sorry”. Never once meaning it enough to change, to grow, to face myself. It took being arrested again in Dec.1986 for me to want to change, to actually face myself, face what I had done. In realizing everything and everyone I was losing, I had to begin with the realization that I had lost myself so long ago, I had succumbed to the lies I told myself, the lies of society, even the lies of my family. I had to begin by proving to me that I was capable of living from my soul, that my inner life would have the final and deciding vote and veto power over my mind and my emotions. I had to be steadfast and strong in this decision because the power of my evil inclination to run away again, the power of society to laugh at me for being a sucker, was so strong and, to this day, still rears its ugly head at time. I have, however, been persistent, I have proved to myself and I have stayed true to the call I heard from the universe to change. All of this has happened because of my repentance, many lives have changed because of my repentance and the repentance of so many at Beit T’Shuvah, in AA, etc. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

How does "know before whom I stand" help me in this "season of Rosh Hashanah"? Year 3 Day 294

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 294

National Month of Repentance and Change

“The season of Rosh Hashanah is the “Day of Memory”, the “Day of Judgement”. Before the judgement and memory of God we stand. How can we prove ourselves? How can we persist How can we be steadfast? Through repentance.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg 69)

The first two sentences, which I have bolded, are overwhelming in the power they have to penetrate the “foreskin of our heart”, the stubbornness of our minds and the urges of our desires. This is the season of Rosh Hashanah-the month of Elul until Yom Kippur (and some say till the 8th day of Sukkot)- and today is the 19th day of Elul, we have 20 days till Yom Kippur, the half-way mark. What does it mean to us that we are in the season of “Memory”, the season of “Judgement”? Most of us pay no attention to these descriptions of the spiritual calendar because we either don’t believe in God, believe that God is absent, and/or don’t believe that God cares about us as individuals. WRONG, in my humble opinion. If one believes that God is ‘the man in the sky’, if one has made a false/craven image of the source of energy that is in the universe, I can understand these falsehoods one tells oneself. Rather, understanding the one engaging in “memory”, in “judgment is us, many of us see this time as the cosmos giving us the compassion and vision to look at the tape of our actions from the past year and fix the ones we screwed up and enhance the ones we did well.

“Know before whom you stand”(Talmud, Berakhot 28b) comes to mind for me today as I dive into the words above. This phrase is before many Holy Arks in Temples and Synagogues across the world and, Reb Eliezer says it in the context of prayer, I think it is a piece of wisdom we should use in all of our affairs. Here again, we have a call for this moment and, we should not think that this call cannot apply in our ‘everyday living’ as well. To “know before whom you stand” we have to look in the mirror and, remembering the poem “The man in the glass” by Peter Dale Wimbrow Sr., during this time of year, the “man in the glass”, ie our reflection, that stares back at us does so with compassion and consternation, forgiveness and accountability, the power to wipe the slate clean/pardon us and the power to hold us to our commitment to change.

Many fundamentalists like to say “God is watching you”, “God will punish you”, some even are calling Oct.7th “God’s wake-up call”!! They do this so they can hold onto to power over their constituents, they do not want to lose their grip. They put so much weight on Torah Study that in the Talmud, Rabbi Nehunya Ben HaKana demeans the people who work for a living-of course these are the people that support the Orthodox students in Israel. Rather than living the Torah principles and precepts, rather than “love your neighbor as you love yourself”, rather than use this season as the month of repentance and change, the fundamentalists use it to give lip service to “know before whom you stand”, they seem unable to change and repent for the errors they have made, for the hatred between Jews, the hatred of non-Jews that they have sown during the past year. It is time for the rest of us to “do for them what they could not do for themselves”, it is time for us to be God’s messengers and hold them accountable-not for punishment, rather for them to see the error of their ways, to repent and to change. It is imperative to use this “season of Rosh Hashanah” to help another who is stuck because the forces of kindness and forgiveness, vision and truth are so powerful right now.

When the “judgement and memory” we stand before is ours, when we look at the “man in the glass”, knowing that we cannot “cheated the man in the glass” and have any inner peace, we can use this season to right our wrongs, repair our traits that have been out of proper measure, we can change the course of our lives by doing the next right thing instead of the next wrong thing. When we “know before whom we stand”, we live into a life of joy and the ability to no longer hide from “the man in the glass” nor anyone else. We know we are standing in front of our family and reconnecting, we are standing with our community and finding our proper place, we are standing as a partner in the fight for righteousness and justice, caring for the strange and the poor, choosing life!

These words above are so important for us, especially right now. When a candidate for President knowingly supports someone for Governor who calls himself “a Black Nazi”, when this same candidate for President, at a gathering about antisemitism, tells everyone that if he loses it will be the Jews’ fault and Jews, Christians still support him and praise his words, we are witnessing a group that has no sense of the meaning of Rabbi Heschel’s teaching, the teachings of the Talmud, of Jewish history. When this same candidate and his running mate admit to making up a story about Hatian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio and say they will not stop spreading lies and falsehoods and people (especially men) of color, people of a faith based in everyone being created in the Image of the divine, and people who claim to be citizens of this country who evidently don’t believe that everyone “has certain unalienable rights” support these liars and deceivers-they seem unable to “know before whom they stand” and must not “go to the mirror and look at yourself and see what that man has to say.” How sad for them and how tragic for the rest of us.

While I have gone through this season all my life, it is only in the past 37 years that I have been serious about it. I always knew what “the man in the glass” had to say, which is probably the reason my “reward” was “heartache and tears” because I constantly tried  to “cheat the man in the glass”. I couldn’t live with myself and I was powerless, in my mind, to change. In prison I learned a different way and since then, I no longer cheat “the man in the glass”, I no longer cheat my neighbor or anyone else. I am not perfect, I spend this “season of Rosh Hashanah” doing my inventory, crying over my errors, rejoicing in what I do well and saddened by lost connections, whether my doing or the other persons’. I miss the people whom have left-those who have died and those who have “moved on”. I practice a loyalty to God that has be standing in memory and judgement of myself all the time and I use this loyalty to stand with the people who have helped me and whom I have helped. I use this loyalty to be open to admit my errors and/or acknowledge them when they are pointed out to me. I use this loyalty to be open to forgive anyone and everyone who asks. I use this loyalty to let go of resentments and just be sad rather than mad which was my old way. This season, each year, helps me grow so I look forward to “the man in the glass”. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

How have I abandoned and forgotten the powerless and voiceless in my midst? Year 3 Day 293

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 293

National Month of Repentance and Change

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

What am I doing Today to "establish God as king within" me? Year 3 Day 292

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 292

National Month of Repentance and Change

“In all that happens in the world, in thought, conversation, actions, the kingdom of God is at stake…These days are dedicated to establishing God as king within us.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pgs. 68-69)

In 2 weeks we will be in Temple for Rosh Hashanah, we will be singing praises, hearing sermons, hearing the sounds of the shofar, prostrating ourselves during the additional service when praying the Aleinu prayer, standing and reciting the Avinu Malkeynu prayer, all in service of our recognition that God is king for these ten days. Not the king that is malicious and who wants us to fail, wants us to be among those “who shall die” as one of the prayers states. Rather the king who is missing his children who have left the palace, stretched the connection between parent and child so far and so taut that it seems as if it will break and this sovereign is crying to his kids to come back, to return again, to come home. Rabbi Heschel’s words above stir this thought in me, they call me back home to taking my place as a child of the sovereign, a prince who is being called upon to spread the kindness, the joy, the obligation, the pain of being so connected to the sovereign that everything I do reflects on the sovereignty of God, the understanding of God’s love, the continued life of the world we live in.

I am trembling as I write these words. Can the religious zealots really believe that Trump, Bibi are protecting and promoting the sovereignty of God? Can anyone truthfully say that they are good for Israel or the US or the world when they believe that they should be the sovereigns? Who among us can say I have established “God as king” within me and then bow down at the altar of liars, narcissists, thieves, bullies, and men hellbent on destroying the freedoms, the divine images of anyone that doesn’t bow down to them? How can the so-called ‘rabbis’ in Israel and the US proclaim the righteousness of these charlatans? How can the so-called christian clergy proclaim that Trump is the “anointed one”? In the Bible we read about King Saul being anointed and then Samuel seeing the error of his ways and anointing King David. Saul’s mental anguish, which made him suspicious of David even though he knew David was loyal and he loved him, went out to battle the Philistines and died in battle-he did not send everyone else while he sat at home, Bibi-he brought his sons into battle with him-he didn’t send him to Florida, Bibi! Both Saul and David were so much more suited for the job of King than Trump or Bibi-both have had the power and they squandered it on enriching themselves and cozying up to Vlad, Victor, Kim, etc! They are certainly not interested in taking action for the sake of the kingdom of God, for them all that is at stake in their everyday living is enriching and protecting themselves from the consequences of their actions because they believe they are entitled to be above the law! This is what these so-called rabbis and so-called christian clergy are calling servants of the king? PLEASE!!!

To establish “God as king within us” we have to surrender our belief that we are king, that we are the judge and jury of our own lives. We get to, during this month of repentance and change, let go of our false egos, leave the confines of our mind and no longer live according to ‘don’t you know who I think I am” and return to living our passion and purpose fulfilling the divine need we are created to fix. We get to engage with God as our ancestors did in the desert, as the prophets did in Israel and Judea, as the Rabbis did in Babylonia and Yavneh. We establish “God as king within us” by immersing ourselves in the moments of life instead of continuing to manage them to what we believe is our benefit. Rather than ‘get ours’, ‘get as much as we can’, we return to knowing that the kingdom of God is at stake in every action we take, every conversation we have and, that the life of our soul, our inner life is at stake as well.

During this month of repentance and change, we choose to return and allow God to “heal our backsliding”, knowing that God “takes us back in love” as the prophets remind us. We read in the Torah of how to be human even in war, how to be grateful upon arriving in our proper place, that we always have the power of choice-choosing good/life and/or wrong/death. We, each of us individually as well as all of us collectively, have to make choices in this month that, fortunately and/or unfortunately, will guide our next 6 months until we participate in our exodus from slavery at Passover time. We have the opportunity to change our glasses and regain our 20/20 vision in our souls, in our ‘third eye’. We have the opportunity to let go of our narcissistic ways that block the kingdom of God from entering into our consciousness and “circumcise the foreskins of our hearts”. There is an urgent demand as we approach these last two weeks of Elul, COME HOME TO THE PALACE where God as king resides, COME HOME TO THE PALACE where you belong and can flourish spiritually and help spread the word, heal the sick, care for the stranger, choose life! During this month of repentance and change, we come to respect, relish, admit: WE MATTER

I know what it means to not establish “God as king within us” as I did this for over 20 years and the harm I brought, the plague I spread was horrific-I have spent the past 37 years undoing the evil and creating new and good. Knowing the kingdom of God is at stake in everything I do is overwhelming and exhilarating! It is, for me, the ultimate experience of Yirah, the trembling awe of knowing that I matter! Rabbi Heschel’s words are not new ideas, I/we know them from the liturgy we recite and they are concise and piercing through the veils I have hidden behind, causing me to face the truth-I did what I thought was best in the moments of my life and, unfortunately, many times my thinking was stunted, biased, based on erroneous input, ergo; not good, not right and I sacrificed the kingdom of God for my own self-satisfaction, my own blindness both willful and unwitting. I am remorseful for these moments where ego, error, bias’ got in the way of fully serving both the “kingdom of God” and “establishing God as king within” me! To those who were harmed, I am deeply sorry, I am getting better at pausing, I am getting better at engaging my spirit before my mouth. I am also still a descendant of the prophets, I take seriously what they said and they guide me at this time and every time of the year. Each morning, I face Moses, Jeremiah and Hosea, Isaiah and Micah, as well as Amos and the rest and hear their wisdom on how to be in this day so God is within me a little more today than yesterday. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Living into the "kingly dignity of God" that is within all of us - Year 3 Day 291

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 291

National Month of Repentance and Change

“Does this demand - the essence of Jewish law - signify an esoteric symbol, a mystical act? It signifies a close, this-worldly and everyday act. The establishment of the kingly dignity of God occurs now and in the present, through and in us.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg.68)

The “demand” Rabbi Heschel is speaking of is “to take the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves”, which I wrote about yesterday. This quote above reflects both the grandeur and audacity of the Hassidic Movement which Rabbi Heschel was brought up in, his audacity and grandeur,  and the grandeur with which Jewish law is being described. He calls upon us to see taking this “yoke” is not some “mystical act” which will transform us into a new sphere/level of spiritual life, it is not some “esoteric symbol”that we can discuss and meditate on, rather it is a way of living in the here and now, in the present and without hiding, without blaming another, without complaining, etc. He is calling upon all of us for “the establishment of the kingly dignity of God” right here, right now.

Isn’t it sad at how badly we fail to follow through on this demand, on the call of Torah, of Jewish living to establish ‘the kingly dignity of God” “now and in the present”? We are witnessing instead, led by mendacious clergy people the denigration desecration of the dignity of God by some Rabbis here in America and in Israel, the bastardization of the teachings of Jesus by the “prosperity gospel” deceivers and the so-called “christian” nationalists, the power grabbing of the Imams and Ayatollahs rather than surrendering to Allah and seeking peace. We are being led to the slaughter by the very people who are supposed to be leading us to “the Promised Land”!

As Rabbi Heschel said to President Kennedy; “We forfeit the right to worship God…Churches, synagogues have failed. They must repent.”(June 1963). We still have not repented, in fact, we have grown our failure exponentially through so-called ‘religious actions’, which are nothing more than a power grab, a way of establishing autocracy, theocracy, etc-not even attempting to “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”(Lev 25:10), which I quote a lot because it is part of the essence of being a priest, a clergy person! Yet, we continue to fail, we continue to blame, explain rather than repent. We claim to “take the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves” and we are really just giving the “kingly dignity of God” lip service and worshiping at the altar of Boards of Directors, Church elders, and other intermediaries that proclaim ‘I know God’s will’ while they let women die because of abortion bans which are not talked about in the Bible at all!! Yet, these ‘holy rollers, these men and women who claim to be messengers of God and are really just idolators who proclaim Trump is the anointed one of their god and they are dragging the world to a bloody battle.

The Rabbis in Israel who are calling for the death of the Palestinians, who support the terrible settlers raids and killings, who want Gaza to be part of Israel, are just as bad as the christian idolators! They read the same Bible as I do, as many of us do and they fail to see what happens when they promote senseless hatred, when they are so close to power and want so much power that they bastardize themselves and prostrate themselves at the false altar of idolatry. When they constantly and consistently denigrate the “kingly dignity of God” by their actions against fellow human beings, other people who are also created in the image of the divine, who also have infinite worth and dignity. Their hunger for power, their lying about what the Bible says, their ignoring of the words and warnings of the prophets will bring about the ruination of Israel as a democratic state if they are not stopped = of course BIbl doesn’t want to stop them for his own personal gain and neither Bibi nor these Rabbis and their followers give a damn about the Hostages.

And, of course, one is not allowed to say these truths in Synagogue or Church or the Mosque because it would “upset the donors” so Rabbis, Priests, Ministers, Imams are being controlled by their Boards instead of looking out for and promoting the “kingly dignity of God” in the here and now. Rather than screaming about the idolatry and blasphemy being done in the name God, clergy are too busy worrying about what someone is going to think of them. They are too worried about which identity group is going to be offended. Rather than lead the people out of slavery as Moses did, rather than live among the whores, the thieves, the homeless like Jesus did, many of the clergy of today are more interested in living among the rich, of staying enslaved and putting down any revolts by masses so the rich stay in power, they keep their money and give their leftover ‘change’ to the Temple, Church, Mosque. When clergy forget that God is their employer, when they forget that the “kingly dignity of God occurs now and in the present, through and in us“ they have lost their way, lost their ability to hear the call of God and the universe and the cries of the poor, the stranger, the needy, the widow and the orphan. They NEED TO REPENT! RIGHT NOW!

I am guilty of not always honoring the “kingly dignity of God” and I also have never lost sight of my obligation to do so. My failures, my ‘sins’, all begin with losing sight of the “kingly dignity of God” in every experience of daily living. I also know I will never not fail at times and this is important for all of us to recognize so we don’t just say “fuck it-I can never be perfect, I can never get it right”. I said this and used this way of thinking to validate the criminal life I lived prior to my recovery. In my study yesterday with Rabbi Danny Maseng, we looked at the last chapter of Samuel I which describes the death of King Saul, Jonathan and the his other sons.  I realized that the actions that defy “the kingly dignity of God” cause a plague not only on the person, King Saul, but on everyone around him-in this case, Israel. Because of his jealousy, David had to flee and he didn’t have his best fighter, commander to go into battle with. Because of the actions I took, my whole family was infected. Because of the fear of my fellow Clergy, our world is suffering from a plague of indifference and mendacity. I didn’t let the Board tell me what to say, I was audacious, too much so at times, and bold, sometimes offensively, and I spoke the truth that my soul, my spirit put into my mouth without fear or favor. I became a liability because of my inappropriate way of expressing my intolerance of mendacity. A true both/and-I was wrong and I was correct. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Living in " a kingdom of everyday life" and accepting our responsibility to make it "one grain of sand better" each day- Year 3 Day 290

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 290

National Month of Repentance

“At issue is not an eschatological vision, a utopia at the end of time, or a kingdom in the beyond. Rather, we are talking about the present, the world that has been bequeathed to us, a kingdom of everyday life. We have to choose God as king, we have to ‘take the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves.””

Continuing to immerse ourselves in Rabbi Heschel’s writing from 1936 in Berlin, Germany-the hotbed of anti-semitism, Jew hatred at the time, on the eve of Yom Kippur, we experience his deep belief that we all need to be in the here and now. Thinking about the place and the time he is writing about, I am hearing him call out to people who want to live in the future and/or the past, that we have to be right here, right now. T’Shuvah, Yom Kippur is not about anytime but the present, God has no sense of time-everything in God’s world is in the moment and we have to wake up, open our eyes to this truth.

He is also telling us to end our euphoric recall, like the Israelites in the Bible had of the flesh pots they used to sit around and eat out of in slavery-cut the crap people! We are in the world that was created a long time ago and has evolved into what it is today both because of our presence and God’s presence. Rabbi Heschel is calling upon us to be here now as Richard Alpert, aka Ram Dass teaches. We are being reminded to see and deal with “a kingdom of everyday life”-what a wonderful phrase. While many of us see life as mundane, waiting for Shabbat, waiting for the Sabbath, waiting for ‘our ship to come in’, Rabbi Heschel is calling out to us to see our everyday living as “a kingdom” a realm where we have rule and dominion and we get to “choose God” as sovereign, we willingly choose to “take the yoke of God upon ourselves”.

Rather than “make America great again”, rather than “destroy Hamas” or call them “Amalek”, rather than choose Putin over Zelensky/Ukraine so Russia can get the territory it conquered in another time back again, or ‘the South will rise again”-making slavery a way of life again in the United States; the teaching above reminds us going back in time is ridiculous, trying to recapture some grand false vision of the past is antithetical to living in the world we have, the world that God has given to us. Instead of thinking about ‘how can I cause the “end of days”’, we are to be considering how do we act in accordance with the best interests of the universe, humanity, the animal kingdom, and ourselves!

Each day, when we say the Shema, when we express gratitude, when we study and Holy Text, when we say a rosary, go to the Mosque, we are taking “the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves”. This “yoke” is a surrender, an acknowledgement that we are not the end all/be all of the world. It is a surrender in that we say we are not always right, we don’t know everything and there is a force more powerful, more intelligent, a power greater than ourselves to whom we are responsible, to whom we have to be in service to. While for many this idea is anathema, it is the truth I hear Rabbi Heschel reminding us of. Being in the present, serving something greater than ourselves, seeing the spark of the light, the divinity in each and every person-whether they show it or not, is the call I am hearing this morning. In a place like Nazi Germany, in a place where the ‘good christian folk’ are loving their Jew-hating, Jew-blaming selves, where these ‘good christian folk’ are proclaiming their allegiance to Christ while subjugating and killing his family(he was a Jew after all), while going against all of his teachings, Rabbi Heschel is saying live here now!

What a great way to look around and see how we “take the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves” today. When we want to go back, we are not doing this. When we want to live in the future, we are not doing this. When we scapegoat another group of people, another person, we are not doing this. When we blame another for our errors-ie ‘you made me do this’, we are not doing this. When we traffic in lies and deceptions, we are not taking this “yoke” on. When we pray with no awareness that prayer is to change us, when it is a rote action, we are not doing this. When we proclaim our need to study all day in Yeshiva and watch the death of our citizens for a war that the Rabid Rabbis and Right-wingers want so they can have power and control, we are not taking “the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves”. When we perpetrate the lies of the internet so that schoolchildren have to be subjected to daily bomb threats and Haitian Immigrants have to fear for their safety, we are not taking this “yoke” “upon ourselves”!

We, the people, living in the present, taking “the yoke of the kingdom of God upon ourselves” have to look back upon this past year to see our responses to these same situations that have been going on for a long time and take responsibility for our part. “But we didn’t do anything” is the refrain of most people and this is the problem! Living in “a kingdom of everyday life” and choosing the “yoke of the kingdom of God” makes it imperative to DO SOMETHING to stop the lies of the people in power or seeking power who want to take us backwards, to stop the deceptions of the people who are following them like lambs to the slaughter, to stop the senseless hatred of one another and the promotion of this hatred so one person/group can have power. We, the people, have to take a close look at ourselves, at our own actions and inactions which have, wittingly and unwittingly promoted these lies, this violence, this desecration of God’s Name and of our Image.

It is hard to be present, it is also the only way to live well. There is no ‘big score’ that will save me, no house, car, vacation, job, person who will make my life ‘easy’. The only way I have been able to live well is by choosing and accepting the “yoke of the kingdom of God”, knowing that there are times when I take it off, there are times when I decide which way to turn even though the ‘driver’ of the wagon wants to go straight. Yet, I return to giving up the reins, to hearing the call of the universe and cleaning up the schmutz  I have put into my inner life. It is excruciating to see the errors I make, the subtle ways I lie to myself and how I try hard to make my wishes my reality rather than living in “a kingdom of everyday life” and responding in my unique way and adding my gifts to the solution for whatever presents itself today. This is the power of T’Shuvah-returning to adding good to the world. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Recognizing the Principles that make us Human and recommitting to living them more - Year 3 Day 289

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 289

National Repentance and Change Month

“The world has fallen away from God…Through our obstinacy we, too, are antagonists. But still, sometimes we ache when we see God betrayed and abandoned.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg.68)

These words, written almost 90 years ago in Berlin Germany to a Jewish world that was on the brink of total destruction, the Nuremberg Laws having been passed the year before, it was coming apart at its core, people were trying to leave, others believed ‘this too shall pass’, ‘what’s another pogrom-we have survived them all’. Rabbi Heschel is reminding us that these ‘good christian’ Nazis have “fallen away from God.” He is reminding us that the leaders of the countries that are appeasing Hitler, allying themselves with him have “fallen away from God.” And he is calling out the Jewish people for being obstinate, for being antagonists. What have we, people living in America and beyond, learned in these almost 90 years since these words were written?

Today, we see how “the world has fallen away from God” in a myriad of ways. We listen to the hatred spewed towards the immigrants, ie stranger, the ways some Republicans describe them as “vermin”, “spoiling the blood of Americans”, etc-propaganda that was used against the Jews of Germany. While these Republicans are not Hitler, they are also using the ways of Josef Goebbels in their political rhetoric, they are cozying up to Holocaust deniers, haters of immigrants, white supremacists, chaos actors, etc. Watching clergy of all religions spew hatred and go along with the racist rhetoric supporting Jew Hatred, Stranger Hatred, Muslim Hatred, is more than disgusting, it is another proof of Rabbi Heschel’s first sentence above!

We have “fallen away from God” by not wrestling with the Holy Texts we have been given. We have “fallen away from God” by the ways we treat one another-we certainly are not following “love your neighbor as you love yourself” very often in our business, political, nor personal lives. We have “fallen away from God” by making spiritual principles optional for our children, by not growing their souls while we feed their minds and bodies with trief - unkosher thinking and actions. We have “fallen away from God” with the laws of Caveat Emptor-let the buyer beware instead of the laws of spirituality-let the seller disclose. We have “fallen away from God” by using deception, mendacity, lying as our default way of communicating and ‘winning’, abusing people with these ways so we can have power, prestige and wealth.

We, Jews and non-Jews, have all “fallen away from God” and we need to end our antagonistic attitude towards God, towards the force in the Universe, towards one another. NOW IS THE TIME! THIS IS THE MONTH! We have the luxury of being able to look back upon the past year and, unlike Jan 1, repair the harms we have wrought. We have the luxury and obligation to see where we have “fallen away from God” in the past, where we have betrayed and abandoned the spiritual principles we know to be true and right, the treatment of another we know has been self-serving. We have the opportunity to see how we have failed to respond to the call and the cries of people in need. We are able to recognize the myriad of ways we betrayed our core principles in order to ‘get ahead’, to ‘get ours’, to use people for our own gain rather than connect with them soul to soul. We have the moment to review the times we acted from our ‘roles’ rather than from our souls. We have the time to “ache when we see” how we have abandoned our friends and family, when we have let go of doing the next right thing in order to do the next expedient thing. We have an opportunity to “ache” because we have sold our soul to the highest bidder rather than dedicate our soul to serving something greater than money, property, prestige, fame, etc.

This is the month of Elul, the month of Repentance and Return, Repair and Change! It is built into the cosmos, the air is filled with compassion, forgiveness, it is charged with awareness and aching, with truth and reconciliation. The climate is changing, we are moving from summer to fall, are we willing to change our inner climate? Are we willing to do the inner work necessary to rejoice in a new year, a year in which we commit and do the work of growing in kindness, forgiveness, compassion and goodness? A year where truth uber alles is our motto, a year in which we let go of more of our selfishness and self-serving actions? Is this the year we achieve a solid 51% foundation in doing the next right thing, in growing one grain of sand better each day? We have to make this decision, we have had many false starts, we have voted our ‘pocket book’, ‘voted for Israel’ which has gotten us to where we are today-spiritually bankrupt politicians dedicating themselves to a false christianity, a Christian Nationalism which has always been terrible for the Jews and everyone else who isn’t ‘one of them’. It has gotten us Bibi allowing Hamas the money to build their tunnels, buy their weapons and plan Oct. 7th. We, Jews, from secular to Orthodox, have a lot to repent and change because of our abandonment of principles found in the Bible! King David repented, but Bibi and Ben G’vir can’t, Johnson, Trump, Vance can’t??

In December of 1986, I had my first soul awareness of how I had abandoned and betrayed God, betrayed the principles I had been brought up with. I knew these truths in my mind and I could rationalize them, blame someone else for ‘making me do it’, etc. Yet, in a Jail Cell in Van Nuys, Ca. I faced my abandonments and betrayals within myself and my soul cried out for God. “Out of the Depths I cry to You” became a reality not just a verse in Psalm 130. I have not stopped crying from the depths of my inner life. I have made the same errors more than once-I just do a little better each time, meaning the errors are not exactly the same, they are less harmful and I recognize them sooner. I am less sensitive to being hurt by people, I feel betrayed in my core by some and I realize that my way of being is the way I have to be in order to live with myself. I also have stopped expecting another to do things the same way I do, in fact I am grateful for the myriad of ways we all fulfill spiritual principles and the ways we don’t-because I can keep learning. I have not “fallen away from God” since December of 1986 as I know I am free-fall into the abyss and the 9th circle of hell if I do! I am more forgiving and more bewildered when people don’t respond-life is too short to hold onto grudges. I stay grateful and connected to the people who helped me. I am engaged in staying connected and never abandoning people as my best way to never abandon God. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Fulfilling the "Mystery of Prayer" during Elul and beyond- Daily exercises from Rabbi Heschel - Year 3 Day 288

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 288

National Days of Repentance and Change

“THE MYSTERY OF PRAYER on the days of Rosh Hashanah presents itself with characteristic familiarity: it reveals itself to those who want to fulfill it, and eludes those who want only to know it.” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity pg. 68)

The words above are the opening of an article that Rabbi Heschel wrote in September of 1936 in Berlin, Germany, entitled: “The Meaning of Repentance”. I will be quoting from this article for the next days. Rabbi Heschel’s first words of this article present us with a way of seeing prayer and Rosh Hashanah in a new/old light-what is “THE MYSTERY OF PRAYER” we experience? How do we experience it, are we seeking to fulfill it or just know it so we can bathe in it? During this month of Elul, today is the 12th day, we get to clean up our errors; change our ways of thinking, acting and seeing; recognize our goodness; enhance what we do well and be more charitable to ourselves and to another(s). We are given the time, the space and the cosmic power to forgive, to repent, to, as Chuck Chamberlain writes, “get a new pair of glasses”. And, while all of this is available, we have to “want to fulfill it” rather than “want only to know it”.

This month, the experience of prayer on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the work of the 10 days of repentance, are experiential, there is no way to vicariously experience them. There is no way to just go to Temple, Synagogue, and remember the prayers from last year, go to sleep during the sermon again, stand up and sit down like robots and believe one has fulfilled one’s obligation. The reason most people are not moved by the “mystery of prayer on the days of Rosh Hashanah” is because most people are not engaged in prayer, they are engaged in seeing who is at services, what people are wearing, what business they can set up for the next day, how much booze the ‘kiddish club’ has and when can they steal away to have a drink. Rather than seeking to fulfill the ideas and engage in the paths of prayer on these Holy Days and, truth be told, during the rest of the year as well, most people-even the most observant-are only interested in ‘getting through the service’ so they can go home and eat, sleep, whatever. This happens because of our culture, because of our insistence on saying every prayer exactly word for word and going on to the next one as fast as we can, because of our need to appease the donors and the people who only come 3 times a year, and, mostly, because we are unwilling to do the work to prepare for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

It is very interesting to me that we are willing to plan a party a year in advance if necessary to get the right venue, the right caterer, the right music, and we are not willing to take a month to get right with the universe, with our souls, with those we ‘love’, with the ones we have hurt, etc. We are unwilling to take this time to look inside ourselves, to play the video tape of this past year(s) and see what we have done well and where we have missed the mark. We are unwilling to fulfill the “mystery of prayer” in these days prior to Rosh Hashanah much less “fulfill it” “on the days of Rosh Hashanah”. It is TIME TO WAKE UP! Yes, I am shouting this to myself and to everyone who is reading this. No matter how aware we think we are, no matter how much we know we have grown in the past year, we have to take the time and make the effort “to fulfill” the “mystery” of this month prior to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. We have to “lift up our eyes and see” as God tells Abraham a few times in Genesis, especially to see the ram in the thicket instead of killing Isaac.

What stops us? What is the cause of our lack of preparation for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur? Laziness, a need to know and understand before doing, a disbelief in the mystical and the mystery of these 40 days from the first of Elul through Yom Kippur, the disbelief that people can change! Another reason, I believe, is fear of seeing ourselves completely and facing our authentic self, warts and all, which leads to not being able to hide so well anymore and, ‘what will people think if they know the real me?’. We are, at our core, afraid to walk into the unknown with only our souls leading us, with only the voice of the Ineffable One to guide us, we are denying the experience that God provides for Abraham; “Lech L’Cha- go for/to yourself… to a land I will show you”.

This month of Elul provides us with the opportunity to have the experience of Abraham, to go forward for our self and to our true self; to go to our proper place where we can be of service to another person(s), to our self, and to the Universe. The forces of the Cosmos are in sync with this way of being, just as they were with Abraham. We, the people, have to engage in the work that this entails, we get to see how we have created souls in our midst-by helping people in need of material and spiritual sustenance, how we have destroyed souls in our midst-by ignoring the material and spiritual needs of people around us. We are able to engage in the work of repairing the damage we have wrought, we get the gift of seeing our narcissistic tendencies which lead to doing harm to another human being. We are better able to discern different ways to respond to the challenges of greed, of fear, of daily living so we do not just react in the same old ways.  Yet, without fulfilling the call of T’Shuvah, the inner pull of doing our own inventory, we have no chance to change, no path to a new freedom, no “stairway to heaven”.

I have been engaging in the gift of Elul for the past 37 years and it is the most exhilarating and frightening experience! I am so elated to see where I have missed the mark, where people tell me what I have screwed up because I know I can grow and change. I am frightened when I see where I have succeeded because I know I need to keep my ego in check and not believe that I can go on auto-pilot because I have done ___(this) right before. I am engaging my whole self in the “mystery of prayer” of these days of Elul, “the days of Rosh Hashanah” because I need to fulfill the thoughts, the ideas, the demands of the prayers. I look forward to the music, to the interpretations of the prayers and to my own new experiences of prayer and service, inventory and repairs, asking for forgiveness, being forgiven, and forgiving another. I am acutely aware of my errors, I see them everyday in the writing I do, in the prayers I say, in the inventory I take daily. I am aware of the inner fight I wrestle with in each moment and I am grateful for the people in my life who help me and stand with me even when I screw up because they know my soul, they know my goodness and they know my foibles. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Remorse for the ways we have failed to be audacious and rejoicing in the ways we have! - Year 3 Day 287

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 287

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

“Audacity” comes from the Latin meaning “bold”, in the Oxford Dictionary it gives two definitions, one being “willingness to take bold risks” and “rude or disrespectful behavior; impudence”. The Hebrew given is Chutzpah, which can be a word of praise and/or have a derogatory connotation. Rabbi Heschel, of course, is calling for the 1st definition, asking President Kennedy to “take bold risks” because seeing a human being as a human being no matter the color of their skin, the faith (or no faith) they practice and live into the words of the Declaration of Independence: “all men (and women) are created equal endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…” was, at the time, a bold risk! It is still a bold risk today, unfortunately.

While it is easy to hold our leaders to blame and be frustrated with the inhumane ways some elected officials behave and try to, and sometimes succeed, in governing only for ‘their’ people; it is also true we have to blame, be frustrated, and hold ourselves accountable for electing these people, for not seeing the humanity of another person even when they are covering it up, not being able to nor trying to reach the soul of another person because we are too busy seeing them as less than, ignorant, seeing them through our own bias’ and prejudices, rather than seeing them for who they are, lost sheep like us and, as a Hassidic story teaches us, together we can find the ways not to go anymore.

We, the people, during this month of Elul, are in desperate need to see how we have used our spirituality to be audacious, to be bold and, of course, to be disrespectful and rude. We have to do an inner investigation into the myriad of ways we have failed to respond to “the hour calls for high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity”. We have failed in the ways we talk to one another, the ways we complain about homelessness and believe putting the homeless in jail is a good idea. We have failed in the lack of humanity shown at our borders to people of color, mostly, who are seeking a better life, as every immigrant wave has, as the ‘founding fathers’” did! We have failed to to respond to this hour of crisis in the world with “spiritual audacity”, we have failed to hold our leaders like Johnson, McConnell, Schumer, et al to being spiritually audacious in the ways they govern and help the people who are the most vulnerable, the people that Jesus speaks about, the people the Bible reminds us that God hears the cry of the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow and the orphan. We have failed to demand boldness in responding to the Climate Crisis, the threat of autocracy here and abroad, the rude and disrespectful behavior of Bibi and his right-wing coalition towards both the Palestinians in the West Bank, the Hostage Families, the Israelis who are fighting and losing their business’ while the ‘religious’ idolators ‘study in their Yeshivas so as to save Israel’.

We, the people, have failed because we have been too afraid to live in “spiritual audacity”! We have been content to complain and blame and not courageous enough to take Rabbi Heschel’s words to heart. Yet, they are not really his words, they are the words of the prophets, the words of the Bible, they are the words that describe King David’s way of admitting he was wrong and doing his own form of T’Shuvah. We are in the month of Elul, now is “the hour calls for high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity.” We have throughout the Bible moments where our imperfect heroes rise above their flaws and respond with audacity, with boldness, with greatness which I believe is what makes them heroes-their ability to rise above their flaws in moments of need, hours that call for “spiritual audacity”. The world is in need of our “spiritual audacity”, we are facing a myriad of challenges to the dictum: “Proclaim Freedom throughout the Land and to All Its Inhabitants therein”(Lev.25:10). We, the people, have to demand through our actions that our leaders engage in “high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity” instead of the mendacity and deceptions that are so prevalent in both politics, business and organized religion. We have to live our spiritual audacity so everyone will take responsibility for the good and not good each one of us does daily, repent and change. NOW IS THE TIME!

I have “a willingness to take bold risks” and some people believe I am “impudent” and both are true!! I live in “high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity” and I do not always achieve either. This is my truth of my humanity, my knowing of my limitations and flaws. AND this doesn’t stop me from continuing to grow in both “moral grandeur and spiritual audacity”, the fact that I am “not like the other Rabbis” is true and I am grateful that people see me, good and bad, liking me and not liking me, frustrating me and supporting me, frustrated by me and supported by me for who I am-not some cookie cutter of a Rabbi nor an opaque human being. I am remorseful for the myriad of times I have hurt someone because of my boldness, I am remorseful for the misunderstandings my audacity has caused. I continue to improve my ways of communicating without ever changing my core values, without giving in so I can “go along to get along” or ‘shh-don’t let them hear what you are thinking cause they will fire you’ ways of being. I, like the song says, “took the blows and did it my way” because authenticity is at the core of “spiritual audacity”. I continue to sing the song of my soul because without doing this, I am like the walking dead. I commit to continue to be bold and take risks because this is the path of my soul, the response to this hour. I am grateful to everyone for helping me see truth and be bold, be audacious. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi MarkDaily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 287

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

“Audacity” comes from the Latin meaning “bold”, in the Oxford Dictionary it gives two definitions, one being “willingness to take bold risks” and “rude or disrespectful behavior; impudence”. The Hebrew given is Chutzpah, which can be a word of praise and/or have a derogatory connotation. Rabbi Heschel, of course, is calling for the 1st definition, asking President Kennedy to “take bold risks” because seeing a human being as a human being no matter the color of their skin, the faith (or no faith) they practice and live into the words of the Declaration of Independence: “all men (and women) are created equal endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…” was, at the time, a bold risk! It is still a bold risk today, unfortunately.

While it is easy to hold our leaders to blame and be frustrated with the inhumane ways some elected officials behave and try to, and sometimes succeed, in governing only for ‘their’ people; it is also true we have to blame, be frustrated, and hold ourselves accountable for electing these people, for not seeing the humanity of another person even when they are covering it up, not being able to nor trying to reach the soul of another person because we are too busy seeing them as less than, ignorant, seeing them through our own bias’ and prejudices, rather than seeing them for who they are, lost sheep like us and, as a Hassidic story teaches us, together we can find the ways not to go anymore.

We, the people, during this month of Elul, are in desperate need to see how we have used our spirituality to be audacious, to be bold and, of course, to be disrespectful and rude. We have to do an inner investigation into the myriad of ways we have failed to respond to “the hour calls for high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity”. We have failed in the ways we talk to one another, the ways we complain about homelessness and believe putting the homeless in jail is a good idea. We have failed in the lack of humanity shown at our borders to people of color, mostly, who are seeking a better life, as every immigrant wave has, as the ‘founding fathers’” did! We have failed to to respond to this hour of crisis in the world with “spiritual audacity”, we have failed to hold our leaders like Johnson, McConnell, Schumer, et al to being spiritually audacious in the ways they govern and help the people who are the most vulnerable, the people that Jesus speaks about, the people the Bible reminds us that God hears the cry of the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow and the orphan. We have failed to demand boldness in responding to the Climate Crisis, the threat of autocracy here and abroad, the rude and disrespectful behavior of Bibi and his right-wing coalition towards both the Palestinians in the West Bank, the Hostage Families, the Israelis who are fighting and losing their business’ while the ‘religious’ idolators ‘study in their Yeshivas so as to save Israel’.

We, the people, have failed because we have been too afraid to live in “spiritual audacity”! We have been content to complain and blame and not courageous enough to take Rabbi Heschel’s words to heart. Yet, they are not really his words, they are the words of the prophets, the words of the Bible, they are the words that describe King David’s way of admitting he was wrong and doing his own form of T’Shuvah. We are in the month of Elul, now is “the hour calls for high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity.” We have throughout the Bible moments where our imperfect heroes rise above their flaws and respond with audacity, with boldness, with greatness which I believe is what makes them heroes-their ability to rise above their flaws in moments of need, hours that call for “spiritual audacity”. The world is in need of our “spiritual audacity”, we are facing a myriad of challenges to the dictum: “Proclaim Freedom throughout the Land and to All Its Inhabitants therein”(Lev.25:10). We, the people, have to demand through our actions that our leaders engage in “high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity” instead of the mendacity and deceptions that are so prevalent in both politics, business and organized religion. We have to live our spiritual audacity so everyone will take responsibility for the good and not good each one of us does daily, repent and change. NOW IS THE TIME!

I have “a willingness to take bold risks” and some people believe I am “impudent” and both are true!! I live in “high moral grandeur and spiritual audacity” and I do not always achieve either. This is my truth of my humanity, my knowing of my limitations and flaws. AND this doesn’t stop me from continuing to grow in both “moral grandeur and spiritual audacity”, the fact that I am “not like the other Rabbis” is true and I am grateful that people see me, good and bad, liking me and not liking me, frustrating me and supporting me, frustrated by me and supported by me for who I am-not some cookie cutter of a Rabbi nor an opaque human being. I am remorseful for the myriad of times I have hurt someone because of my boldness, I am remorseful for the misunderstandings my audacity has caused. I continue to improve my ways of communicating without ever changing my core values, without giving in so I can “go along to get along” or ‘shh-don’t let them hear what you are thinking cause they will fire you’ ways of being. I, like the song says, “took the blows and did it my way” because authenticity is at the core of “spiritual audacity”. I continue to sing the song of my soul because without doing this, I am like the walking dead. I commit to continue to be bold and take risks because this is the path of my soul, the response to this hour. I am grateful to everyone for helping me see truth and be bold, be audacious. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Inventorying the ways we have missed living in "High Moral Grandeur" and the ways we have - Year 3 Day 286

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 286

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

“The hour calls for high moral grandeur…” strikes me as a phrase that can and does apply to every hour in every day. The idea that an immigrant, in America only 23 years would dare talk to the President of the United States in this manner strikes me as an example of the demand Rabbi Heschel makes upon President Kennedy. It is a call/demand that all of us need to take seriously, it is a call that could get someone jailed under some of our political leaders and certainly ignored by many of our elected officials. Yet, Rabbi Heschel was still in attendance at the “meeting” the next day, he was still heard and, at times, listened to-certainly not silenced because of the “high moral grandeur” of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. Would many of our current politicians use them as examples in their behaviors instead of prejudice, racism, antisemitism, islamaphobia, etc.

“Grandeur” comes from the Latin meaning “grand/great”. On the Internet “high moral”  standards are defined as: “doing the right thing for the greatest number of people, a matter of personal and professional character. Character includes morality, ethics, honesty and humane values”. Hence, every hour calls for “high moral grandeur” otherwise we keep falling short of our goal, our potential, the call of the universe and the people around us who need us to live morally, ethically, honestly and humanely. Today, these values are talked about by many ‘religious’ leaders who practice the exact opposite of them. We are being inundated with lies, with false prophets, with false prophecies, with false images of God/Christ, with bastardizations of our Holy Texts by people seeking power, prestige, wealth and it is up to the rest of us to reject their lies, their deceptions.

The call for “High Moral Grandeur” while sent to President Kennedy is something all of us are responsible for, all of us can call for within our selves, our families, our communities, our government, our religions, our faith gatherings. Yet, we seem not to-we go to rallies of the liars, we watch TV to be deceived, we wring our hands over what is happening in Ukraine, in the Middle East and we refuse to rise up to the call of the universe for Grand Moral behaviors, for ethical wars (an oxymoron, I know), for being humane even in the worst of times, and to live into the truth of the moment rather than the lies and deceptions of the idolatrous and the people who bastardize our foundational truths, ideals and morals. It is a call for all of us to reject the people who practice Idol worship, like the Far-Right Rabbis in the West Bank who urge their ‘people’ to kill Palestinians, like the Far-Right MAGA people who attacked and killed Police on Jan. 6th, like J.D. Vance who is promoting racism with ridiculous lies about Hatians, like Tucker Carlson who promotes Holocaust Deniers in his support of the Trump/Vance ticket. We have to call upon the Harris/Waltz ticket to pledge to live the “High Moral Grandeur” that President Biden has shown and that Rabbi Heschel is calling for today, not just reading this as a footnote to history.

We, the people, during this month of Elul, on the 9th day of our deep dive (hopefully) into National Repentance and Change days, have to see where, when, and how we have fallen short of living at the standard of “high moral grandeur”, how we have allowed personal gain and profit, the need to be liked and fit in, the self-deception we accept as truth, the inhumane ways of treating both ourselves and another(s) we have adopted as ‘that’s the way we always have’, the “adjustment to conventional notions and mental cliches” that are hindrances to knowledge and keep us forever in ignorance. We, the people, have the opportunity, once again, to take the time to look within ourselves and see where we have missed the mark by settling for a life that does not aspire to “high moral grandeur”, a way of life that “goes along to get along”, a way of being that doesn’t ‘rock the boat’. We, the people, have to demand of our clergy, of our Rabbis and Priests, Ministers and Imams, leadership that allows us to do our inventory and they do theirs, that shows us the way to ask for forgiveness and leave the ruts of familiar patterns that don’t serve us anymore, to accept the forgiveness and see, contrary to popular belief, that humans can change their spots, even if leopards can’t!

I have allowed myself to live at a lower standard than the one Rabbi Heschel is calling for. I have allowed hurts and being adrift to shrink me and I have shirked my obligation to people and to the universe by keeping quiet and fearful for this past year(s). I did not act with moral grandeur when I went off at services in Feb. of 2020. I was wrong and I have admitted this, I have made restitution, I have made my amends and I have been ostracized. This is all part of the T’Shuvah process, there is no guarantee of being accepted back into the fold. I have allowed this ‘rejection’ to defeat any efforts to teach, preach, counsel, etc before I even begin and this is the real ‘sin’, the truth of how I have missed the mark. I am no longer staying stuck, I am no longer accepting the words of another who tell me ‘it’s really hard to start something new, especially at your age in a new place’. I am clear-eyed and open-hearted, I hear the call of my soul loudly and I commit to do more, to speak more, to teach and preach more, to learn more and to be a better human being in this next year than I have been this year. I am going to publish a book, seek opportunities to speak, I am going to continue to serve people who call and always stay true and available to the people I have a relationship with. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Repenting for our Inhumanity towards another(s) and rejoicing in our acts of kindness to another(s)- Year 3 Day 285

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 285

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

Today is September 11, a day of tragedy and a day of mourning for every American. It is a day that shattered the myth of our safety and imperviousness to attack. It is a day when people died senselessly and for no reason other than a ‘religious’ leader believed it was right and good to “kill the Americans” because we support freedom and democracy across the globe. The 9/11 Victims Fund was set up to help people impacted by this attack and the aftermath from being in the vicinity and “working on the pile”. Yet, even this became a political football, Guiliani didn’t want to release the health problems reports of his administration, Trump withheld payments, etc. Even though we set up a type of “Marshall Plan” for the largest tragedy to happen on the Mainland of the United States, we became cowards when called upon to fulfill it. A Trump Judge, in 2023 denied the transfer of funds from the Taliban to the 9/11 fund!

Whether a “Marshall Plan” is for Black people, for the victims of 9/11, for the poor and the needy, all of the above, this idea is about our own humanity. I am thinking of the inhumanity of making it more difficult for the actual victims and survivors of 9/11 to get the funds necessary to help them, to receive the medical help they need to survive and thrive after this tragedy. I am thinking of the inhumanity of seeing Black people as slaves who, in the words of Ron DiSantis, “learned important skills while enslaved” and denying them the help they need to have a level playing field. I am thinking of the inhumanity of treating the poor and the needy as criminals, locking up the homeless and mentally ill in jails and prisons rather than helping them solve their problems with dignity and grace. I sit here this morning of 9/11 and I am horrified by our lack of humanity, by our believing it is good to use the tactics of Goebbels, accusing your enemy of that which you are guilty of, by one political party, Presidential candidate, while taking no responsibility for the chaos, destruction, inhumanity of his prior administration, like the Treasury Department withholding portions of reimbursement payments to the FDNY World Trade Center Health Program or the OMB under Trump and Mulvaney’s budget proposal in 2018 that would hav seriously harmed the program!

After World War II, as Secretary of State, General George Marshall, under the Presidency of Harry S. Truman, developed a plan for the resurgence of the European Economy and prevent the Soviet Union and Stalin from taking over the democratic governments of 17 European Countries. West Germany was included in this group, we helped to rebuild Japan as well so we assisted both allies and enemies to return to a way of living that was as good and even better than prior to the war. We helped them regain their dignity and a sense of worth and value-whether they were our friends before the war or our enemies! Yet, we can’t do the same for our own citizens, we can’t help the “tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free”? How sad, how inhumane, how antithetical to the spirit of the Bible, the Koran, the New Testament!

Now is the time to look inside of ourselves as individuals, as communities, as a country and re-evaluate both the humanity and inhumanity we have brought about in the past year and years. Now is the time for us to rejuvenate our “better angels” and rise above our nature of selfishness and greed and repay the victims of 9/11 with our own service to democracy, our own exercise in repentance and change, our own voting to ensure that our democratic way of life continue. Now is the time to take a page from Liz Cheney who said it was inhumane to not vote for impeachment of Donald Trump no matter the personal cost, to take a page from her father who is supporting Kamala Harris because she will keep democracy alive and thriving even though the policy differences are great. We have to take a page from George Marshall and Harry S. Truman as they are both doing-build a coalition that will help rebuild the destruction of humanity that we engaged in willingly and unwillingly. We had to repel the Axis in WWII and so many innocents died. We have to repel Hamas in 2024 and too many innocents are dying. We have to find ways to end the hatred and the inhumanity, just as we stopped the “Final Solution” of the Nazis, which some people associated with Vance and Trump are denying, we have to find ways to stop the senseless killing, the inhumanity of school shootings, mass shootings, wars in the Middle East and the invasion of Ukraine.

I participated in a “Marshall Plan” type of facility for over 30 years, Beit T’Shuvah. Harriet Rossetto taught us all how to help people rebuild their lives by letting go of the either/or thinking and adopting a way of seeing the both/and, the ‘bigger picture’ of our lives and the lives of another. We helped people repent for the ways they “missed the mark” and perpetrated inhumanity upon another(s). We practiced seeing everyone as a  creation of the divine and worthy of respect and dignity. I led study groups and Torah Studies to help all of us recognize the beauty of T’Shuvah and Beit T’Shuvah helped people regain a sense of themselves that is beautiful, meaningful so they could live with passion and purpose. We helped them find work that was meaningful and we hired some to work in recovery. We trained people and paid them to learn skills and business’ for themselves. We did this without regard to skin color, religious affiliation, ethnicity, etc. Our goal was to help people rebuild their lives, much like the original “Marshall Plan” was for Europe. We believe in the dignity and worth of every individual, we believe in the humanity of everyone and we believe in honoring and supporting the Repentance and Change that brings about kindness, truth, love, mercy and justice. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Being Part of the Solution of Today's "State of Moral Emergency" - Year 3 Day 284

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 284

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

I am continuing the theme from yesterday because I know in my soul that to “DECLARE A STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY is crucial to our survival as a nation, as a Jew, as a person of faith, and for our ability to “be human”.

Our crisis of today is the crisis of history on steroids. While it is easy to list the litany of rights being violated, the identities being ostracized and marginalized, I believe the “state of moral emergency” begins with our inability to discern fact from fiction, truth from lies, deception from reality. We have been bombarded with lies from politicians and leaders forever, just not as much, as foundational, and as powerful as we are receiving them now with the Internet and the ‘bad actors’ trying to interfere in another country’s elections, ways of governing, foreign policies, etc. When dictators and autocrats are being extolled by one of the major political parties and their ‘fearful’ leader, the balance of democracy, as fragile as “a fiddler on the roof” is in grave danger. And, the same people causing the current “moral emergency” are trying to declare it and blame it on ‘the other side’, which is why ‘taking sides’ on a political issue is useless and living in an echo chamber.

I hear Rabbi Heschel calling out to President Kennedy to remind the faith leaders at this meeting on June 17, 1963 of our responsibility to grow the moral behavior of our flock through the teachings of the Bible, the Koran, the New Testament, etc. These Holy Texts are revolutionary in their message both when they were ‘written’ and now. Rather than denigrate the human spirit and make a caste system, a hierarchy of humanity, these Holy Texts come to remind us of our responsibility to and for one another, they call out to us to care for one another, even our enemies! The “Moral Emergency” of today is rooted in the LIES and MENDACITY of those seeking to have power over their fellow human beings, those who will let go of basic moral, spiritual principles for the ‘almighty dollar’, just ask Jared Kushner who’s father-in-law denigrates Jews and gives voice to the Holocaust deniers of today!

The “Moral Emergency” however, cannot be blamed on Trump and his minions, it is the fault of all of us for believing what we know in our bones is a lie, for buying into the bullshit that Trump is Christ’s messenger, that a ‘christian nation’ is what is needed rather than a democracy that my father and many fathers fought in World War II to defend and help flourish. The blame is with us who have become so dependent on the “dopamine rush” of lies and internet, of conspiracies and enemies, that we no longer have the ability to discern truth from fiction, deception from reality. The “Moral Emergency” is because our Faith Leaders are more interested in keeping their jobs than in promoting the Truth that is at the core of every faith. When the ‘religious’ can claim they are ‘following god’s will’, while desecrating God’s Name, we are in a grave “Moral Emergency”. When one takes the 10 Sayings/Commandments and bastardizes them to the extent that they no longer are about morality and connection, rather they are about power and  control, the Faith Leaders, the autocrats, the politicians have created a “moral emergency” for all of us and we must call it out. We need to repent for our part in fueling this “Moral Emergency”!

We, the people, have to be the ones to declare the “Moral Emergency” just as Rabbi Heschel did some 61 years ago. We, the people, have to demand of our Faith Leaders “personal involvement” in finding the solutions to today’s “Moral “Emergency”. We, the people, have to overrule the power structure of our Faith Institutions so Truth rather than ‘correctness’ is at the core of our institutions, so that wresting with the souls of the individuals and the entity is the work of our faith institutions, so that we welcome the stranger that is within us and the one who presents to us from outside of us. We, the people, have the opportunity to heed the call of Rabbi Heschel, to do the work that was started by some 276 attendees at this White House Meeting, attendees of all faiths, coming together to engage in solutions of a common problem: How to solve our moral emergency that took shape in the ways Black People were still being treated some 100 years after the Emancipation Proclamation. While it was about Black People then and now, it is about so much more-it is about how we treat one another, how we live the words of on the Statue of Liberty, how we live the words of the Declaration of Independence in our everyday lives!

I have been railing against the immorality in our world forever-for 20+years I succumbed to it and gave in, for the past 37 years I have returned to railing against the immorality we see around us and I have been so focused on it, continually seeking to sound the alarm of the “Moral Emergency” of the moment we are/were in, I often didn’t see how I also was undermining myself by making alliances that I believed were good and real with people that actually I made uncomfortable because I didn’t follow ‘the party line’, I got involved in things that ‘were not Rabbinic’, and I became outraged at the mendacity and deception I saw around me and I blew up-inappropriately and I have made amends for this more than once. I am bereft with what I am seeing, I am saddened by the deaf ears I am writing to and speaking with. I am enraged at what passes for Spiritual Leadership in so many communities! I commit to keep writing, I commit to creating a space for NON-BINARY THINKING and a space for personal Spiritual Growth online and in person. This is part of my Repentance and Change for 5785! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Responding to the "State of Moral Emergency we are in through Rabbi Heschel's Teachings - Year 3 Day 283

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 282

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

Immersing ourselves in the words in bold above, remembering what the 1960’s were like, the images of people being tortured with high power water hoses, beaten with night sticks, burning crosses, hangings and killings of innocent people just because of the color of their skin, the faith they practice, the voting rights of all they were protecting, and looking at today we experience a type of Deja Vu that is neither euphoric nor a time for indifference. We are in a desperate need because we are in, in my humble opinion, a greater “moral emergency” than we were then! No matter which “side” one may be on, both “sides” are declaring the other one ‘immoral’ and herein lies our greatest challenge.

Stop choosing sides! Once we decide ‘who’s team we are on’ we immediately make the “other” team wrong and bad, evil and despicable. We begin to spread lies and get our ‘supporters’, aka cult fans, to believe them so there is no dialogue possible. In the entire telegram up till now, Rabbi Heschel has been laying out the issues that Clergy have to face within themselves as well as within their congregations and now he is calling on President John F Kennedy to “declare a state of moral emergency”, a call to action to change the moral state of our country, to truly take actions that prove we are “one nation UNDER GOD” rather than a nation of charlatans, idolators, and bastardizers of the words of God, of the prophets, of Jesus, Moses, Mohammed. We are unable to do this when we choose sides that have anything other than morality, spirituality, kindness, truth, love, justice, compassion as the core.

We have become so used to the binary choices of ‘right/wrong’, ‘win/lose’, ‘us/them’, etc we have forgotten that “all people are created equal with certain unalienable rights…”, we are ignoring that “all people are created in the Image of the Divine”, all people-regardless of color, race, ethnicity, faith-have infinite equal unique worth. We are taking the idea of have dominion and rule as an entitlement rather than as a responsibility, killing animals at will/for sport rather than for food, killing people because we don’t like them, giving children AR-15’s so they can shoot up their schools, pressuring teachers to give their children good grades because of threats, winning at any and all costs, rather than “caring for our corner of the world” we are exploiting it for all we can get from it for ourselves. Rather than being stewards for the generations to come, we are destroyers of climate, of resources, of the dignity of those with whom we disagree.

Living in a Non-Binary Thinking world has nothing to do with gender, with sexual preferences, with labels, it has to do with responding to the “moral emergency” that has always been in our midst. Living in it means that religions and Clergy no longer fight for control rather we seek to help the people we serve find their path to a higher consciousness, to serving something greater than themselves, finding a way to care for the stranger, the needy, the poor, etc; being able to discern the myriad of voices within them and determine which voice in the moment is their soul’s voice and which are the ones who want to convince them there rationalizations are ‘good’. Living in a Non-Binary Thinking world means I have to hear the words of people I may not agree with in this moment and know they also are in need of being shown dignity and, if I truly believe they are mistaken, to help them see the errors of their ways; “rebuke your neighbor and not bear guilt because of him”(Lev.19:17). Living in a Non-Binary Thinking world means the only standard you have, the only loyalty one has is to Truth, is to The Next Right Action, is to Justice for all, is to “Proclaim Freedom throughout the Land and to all its inhabitants therein”(Lev.25:10), is to grow one grain of sand better, one grain of sand more into one’s own authenticity, one grain of sand more connected to one’s soul, to one’s loved ones, to one’s community. There are many ideas I have about Living in a Non-Binary Thinking world to come:)

In the years prior to my T’Shuvah, my repentance and change, I was part of the reason for the state of moral emergency! I lived life as “a winner takes all” game, even though I grew up with a sense of loyalty to doing what is right, I lost my way, I moved into the “either/or”, Binary-Thinking world I have been railing against. I marched in the 60’s for civil rights, I marched against the war, I protested the Kent State Killings, which were just up the road from The Ohio State University I briefly attended. I also was getting drunk, running card games, hustling hot merchandise, etc and making both things okay- my Binary-Thinking allowed me to have 2 separate lives which eventually collided. In December of 1986, the crash happened and I was blessed to have an ecstatic experience of knowing the Universe (God) was trying to give me a message and I had to learn it once and for all. Rabbi Mel Silverman taught me about the “state of moral emergency” I was in along with so many others, he turned me on to Rabbi Heschel and he taught me how to see myself in the texts I was reading and to get out of the old ideas I held onto to so tightly, that a human changes their spots, that T’Shuvah is the proof that change is not only possible it is mandatory, He taught me how to stop living in either/or and move into ‘both/and’. My years at Beit T’Shuvah were my payback to Rabbi Mel, to Rabbi Heschel, to my father and grandfathers, to all my teachers by showing so many others the “state of moral emergency” they were in and how to rise above it and bring order to their lives and resuscitate their morality and their kindness, find their truth and their love, do justly and walk in the path of their soul. Each day I work hard to stay out of Binary Thinking and do more good than not good. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark.

Day 5 of Repentance and Change Month- leaning into Rabbi Heschel's thoughts - Year 3 Day 282

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 282

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

One of the reasons I have chosen to begin Elul and restart my Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel with this passage is: “they must repent”. In the spiritual realm, the most prominent powers at this time of year are: truth, forgiveness, compassion and acceptance. In order to repent, our Clergy must be in truth with themselves, with their Higher Power, with their Higher Consciousness, with their congregants. The role of clergy is very difficult and, because or the erroneous misconception that clergy are supposed to be perfect, rather than human, Clergy have to be in truth with their own families as well. It says in the Bible that the High Priest has to make “expiation”, for his “missing the marks”, those of his household and then for the People Israel. If our Clergy are not being truthful with themselves, if they are still excusing the “missing the marks” they have committed, what right do we have to demand of our flock, our family, our world to engage in confession, in repentance, in change? This is the issue we all have to face.

We need Faith Leaders who are willing to engage in “National Repentance and Personal Sacrifice”, we need Faith Leaders who are willing to “repent” in public as well as private, who are willing to go to the people they have harmed and make their amends, make restitution and speak about how they are changing their ways, how they have grown from this process of being in truth with themselves and with another(s). We are desperately in need of leaders who are willing to live their faith out loud and very loudly. Not the bullshit that we are hearing from the charlatans and the idolators who want to make the US a ‘christian nation’, not the crap about “sharia law” that makes everyone else second-class citizens, not the lies of the so-called ‘orthodox’ Jews who want to live under ‘torah law’, because all of these groups constantly violate the principles of the ‘laws’ they claim to revere. They all desecrate the name of Moses, Mohammed, Jesus, and the very ‘laws’ the Bible proclaims! We need Faith Leaders who are willing to confess their errors so they can be heard above the noise and mendacity of these idolators. We need “Religious Leaders to call for National Repentance” and begin with their own to show all of the rest of us how to do it.

Because the forces of the Cosmos are inclined towards repentance, compassion and forgiveness, I call the 40 days from the beginning of Elul through Yom Kippur as the time of “getting right with self, with another(s), and with God. On Yom Kippur we are forgiven, on Kol Nidre we are told: “I forgive as you have spoken” and the rest of the day is for us to forgive ourselves, to see our pure soul, to recommit to the covenant we have with God and to embrace the community around us. We need to engage in “Personal Sacrifice” during this time- the “personal sacrifice” of our false egos, the “personal sacrifice” of the lies that have fueled us for so long, the “personal sacrifice” of our self-deceptions which have blinded us to truth and to authentic connection with another human being and with a higher power. We have the energy of the universe calling to us and pulling us in the direction of forgiveness and, most of all in the direction of compassion and acceptance.

Doing the work of repentance allows us to be embraced by people we love and who love us even though we didn’t always appreciate them. We are embraced by their forgiveness and acceptance of who we are, we are embraced by their compassion for our flaws and their knowing we will never be perfect. We now have the “job” of accepting our true and authentic self. We can use the acceptance and compassion of those whom we have harmed, knowingly and/or unknowingly, to become more rooted in knowing ourselves, in having compassion for ourselves, and accept ourselves with our imperfections and never need to hide again. Compassion and acceptance, forgiveness and truth uncover all the ways of being that we have tried to hide-both the ugly and beautiful ways of being. These forces so prevalent right now help us to see clearer, to hear sharper, to taste the bitterness of b.s and the sweetness of truth more fully, and to sense the touching of real and authentic in ways that send goosebumps through us. We have the paths to accomplish this, we have the roadmaps to Repentance and Change, I pray we have the Religious Leadership this year that leads us to accomplish this Holy Task.

I have repented for the past 37 years and each year I see more of my authentic self and live more authentically in the following year(s). This year, I repent for my withdrawal, for opting out and feeling afraid to be ‘pushy’. I have allowed my fears of rejection to stop me from putting myself out there more. Yes, I have written almost each day and yes, I am doing some things-being in truth with myself, I know I have made excuses for my lack of active participation, I have tried to put out “the fire in the belly” that is my voice, the voice that makes me worthy of being a descendant of the prophets (as we all are) and worthy of being a descendant of the family generations before me. I have been coming to see this truth and I am changing my ways-not sure how I am going to accomplish this and I am committed to doing it. I am repenting for the errors I have made this year, I am sorry to the people whom I have disappointed, I am sad about the connections that have been lost or are lying dormant, I am committing to reconnection, to repentance, to change, and to redemption. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Happy 3rd day of Elul-Changing our Synagogues and Churches per Rabbi Heschel's words - Year 3 Day 281

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 281

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

I am wondering how the “Church Synagogues” responded to Rabbi Heschel’s truthful denunciation of their work! How audacious and powerful the statements that are bolded above are. Yet, today we can say that Church Synagogue have failed us to a greater extent rather than a lessor one, we can say with surety that these entities learned nothing from Rabbi Heschel’s words and deeds, Rev. King’s words and deeds, the words and deeds of other Religious leaders like the Berrigan Brothers. It is safe to say this because so many people answer NONE when asked what religious order they belong to, because around 27% of Jews did not consider being Jewish to have anything to do with religion. We have witnessed a deep divide in the way Judaism as a religion is being practiced and the political power that some Orthodox Jews in America and in Israel are trying to use to attain their goals which go against so many of the principles found in the Bible. We have witnessed the failure of the Church to rein in their own priest/pedophiles and the cover up that caused so much addiction, mental illness and death. We witness the radical Imams and Mosques who preach “death to the Jews”, “death to America” and the support that terrorists get from young people especially as we saw on college campuses this past year. In the face of Oct. &, 2023 and the latest round of executions, we watch Hamas and the Orthodox Jews of the settler movement, those who follow Ben G’vir, Smotrich, Deri, all Kahane-like haters.

“Church Synagogues” have failed in educating our young and inspiring the parents of today to live the spiritual values of Islam, Christianity, and/or Judaism. We are turning out robots who blindly follow the extremists and/or anarchists who believe it is all bullshit and all that is of importance is what I can get for me. When I was a criminal, I believed if I could take it from you than it was really mine in the first place-how is that for convoluted thinking! Today’s “Church Synagogues” are, in both subtle and not-so-subtle ways teaching the same ways. They have bastardized the words of Christ to make it okay to take advantage of the poor, to allow graft and money to show how “God loves me because I am rich” and other such bullshit-like control over a woman’s body, misreading of biblical texts to suite then proclivities, accusing another of the very things they are guilty of and supporting dictators and authoritarians, the exact opposite of what Christ was put on the cross for-he was killed for speaking truth to power whereas many of today’s clergy-especially in the MegaChurches- worship power over truth!

In the Synagogues, we hear “the People Israel Lives” without defining what the “People Israel” is! We are not all the same, we are not supposed to be, according to the Ancient Sages, no one has more value and dignity than another in the Jewish tradition, yet Bibi and his gang of thugs believe they do and only they are the “real Jews”-much like many of the Orthodox here in the US. We are watching Chabad and other Chassidic Sects go so far from their revolutionary roots and work hard to sit in seats of power or at least next to those in power. We are witnessing Jews here and in Israel care nothing for the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow, and/or the orphan which we are commanded to do 36 times in the Torah. We are watching, some of us in horror, as these “real Jews” take the words of the prophets and do everything they warned us not to with reckless abandon believing they will not suffer nor cause the same fate as we experienced in 586BCE or 70AD! What Chutzpah!!

Not to be outdone, a majority of the rest of the Synagogues have been so boring and trite, worried about raising money rather than souls, the people join for the B’Nai Mitzvot of their children and the party/money afterwards. They reject the spiritual message of our faith and our Holy Texts as irrelevant because it won’t help my kid nor me make money, get a job, have a career, etc. The Synagogues have failed to make Judaism vibrant, necessary and alive in the souls of people and, except for High HolyDays, they remain less than full on days of worship. Our Jewish Federations are not much better, they have also lost the vibrancy of Judaism, the passion and fire in the belly of the prophets, they also are catering to the rich and powerful ostensibly so they can help the poor and the needy,  believing the ends justify the means.

I am a product of a failed Synagogue-not the Clergy in my case, the religious directors who wanted to drill the recitation of prayers into us, the learning of how to read and say the words of prayer and Torah in Hebrew without the meaning and the vibrancy of what it means to pray. Even though I knew instinctively that prayer was important, I did not let it penetrate me because it was not deemed important in my shul at that time. I have, especially on Yom Kippur, made amends for the Synagogues and the Churches that have failed us, I have done T’Shuvah for them as the High Priest did for himself and his household and then the People Israel. I believe we have to live the saying we find over the Holy Ark in many Synagogues: “Know before whom you stand” which seems to be ignored by both Synagogue Boards and congregations. I am grateful that I, along with so many people, created a Spiritual Community, a Jewish Congregation that was vibrant, spiritual, loud, raucous, with the spirit of the prophets and the boldness of the Baal Shem Tov to bring meaning, purpose, introspection, community, caring, and love into the Synagogue so people, after their first time at services could say: “this feels like home”. Judaism is a rebellion, it rebelled against the norm at the time and, if we stay true to our roots, we have to continue to rebel against being stuck in old ways, we have to continue to see the text anew and allow it to embolden us to move forward. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Seeing the Good in ourselves through the words of Rabbi Heschel - Year 3 Day 280

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 280

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

During the Month of Elul and every day of every month, Rabbi Eliezer says we should do T’Shuvah. Maimonidies defines T’Shuvah as a complete inventory of our actions that day, in previous days as well. Given this “atza tova”, good advice, I think it is crucial to look at how we have “done” something about the “Negro Problem” and all of the other problems that racism, xenophobia, fear and hatred bring about. I think it is important to balance our view of ourselves and our leaders, mostly however, ourselves. Many religious leaders have called for more tolerance, more understanding and more welcoming of the stranger into our communities and into our congregations. There has been more and more inviting of faith leaders of other religions to speak in Temples, Mosques, Churches, there is more interfaith work being done now than at any time in our past. We see the melding of faiths to march for civil rights again, we see the meeting of the spirits to call for lifting people out of poverty, of no longer criminalizing being poor and a tremendous outcry for reform of our criminal justice system that is both racist and anti-poor people. We all need to look at our own actions which have “done” something about racism, about injustice, about ensuring the rights of everyone because as Rev. King said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” in his Letter from the Birmingham Jail. Seeing wherever and whenever we have stood for justice, stood against racism, welcomed the stranger, lifted a person up, done Tzedakah, is important for us to see the whole picture of our year, not get bogged down in what we didn’t do and see more of the whole picture of our ways of living well and not-so-well. Remember, seeing the good is important so we can continue to enhance the good as we lessen the not-so-good in our daily living.

“Demand of… Personal Involvement” is not just for “Religious Leaders”, it is for all of us. Looking at the past year(s), we need to see how we have personally stood up for the weak and the poor, the needy and the stranger in all of the subtle and not-so-subtle ways they have been ‘picked upon’, ‘bullied’, ‘blamed for society’s ills’, etc. When we challenge the ‘conventional thinking’ of people who blame all of the problems on ‘those people’, on “those immigrants who are poisoning the blood of our people, our country” we are getting personally involved in standing up for turner, standing up for one of the most, if not the most mentioned principle in the first 5 books of the Bible, “Care for the stranger, the poor, the needy, the orphan and the widow”. It is vital that we see how we have been personally involved in helping raise people up from being put down, how we have refrained from joining the crown that bullies, that blames and we stand firm next to, we support the stranger, etc from beside and we lead them to the same ‘promised land’ that our ancestors have led us to. The reason this is so vital is we tend to ignore the good we do as if it is no big deal and it is a big deal!! We have to be responsible for the good we do as well as the errors we make.

In our inventory we also have to see how we have honored the people around us and people we don’t even know. When we use an invention that was created by another human being for good and for the purpose it was meant for, this is a way of honoring the inventor. When we say hello to another human being, whether we know them or not, we are honoring the divine in them and in ourselves. When we help another person, open a door, let someone in while driving(even if we don’t want to:)), when we support the people around us in following their passions and purpose, when we donate to a charity that helps people realize their dreams, helps people recover their authenticity, we are honoring humanity. When we learn from our teachers, from our ancestors, when we study ancient wisdom without the commentaries so we can imbue what the words and the context mean to us without fear nor favor, we are honoring the gifts of those who have come before us. When we argue with the different interpretations and commentaries on history, on art, on spiritual matters for the sake of learning and growing, we are honoring our own spirits and minds. These are some of the ways we are not humiliating another! Our challenge is to find ways to enhance these positive ways of being and do more of them during each and every day.

I know the ways I have done both, I am proud that I have been able to take the next right action sooner rather than later in most of my recovery years. I am not proud of the times I have not. I am grateful for my ability to be personally involved in my life, in my family’s life, in the lives of those who sought my aid and comfort. I am humbled by the immense amount of teaching and learning I have gathered from so many other people-be they Rabbis, Priests, Drug Addicts, Alcoholics, Businesspeople, Artists, young and old. I am blessed to be able to learn from the Holy Texts I am privileged to read in their originals and to seek new experiences with these texts each time I engage with them. I am beyond joy because of being able to honor people for what they bring and not just see their flaws. I see my flaws daily and I am grateful to see the good I do each day as well. Enhancing the good is the goal today and every day! I have been listening to binary dialogue, either/or thinking and spewing for a long time and I know when I did my Chesbon, I realize the grey and the both/and of living. I know that there are no easy solutions and simplicity is found in our goodness and our ability to seek the higher plane of goodness for another and for me. No more binary-seek the whole picture is the path to Truth and wholeness for me. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Joyous 1st Day of Elul-Repentance and Change through the teachings of Rabbi Heschel - Year 3 Day 279

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 278

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

Today is the first day of Elul, the month of preparation for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. On Rosh Hashanah, we rejoice in meeting God for the celebration of the New Year and the anniversary of the day humankind was created. We recognize we are entering an Awe-Filled time, not that every day isn’t, it is during the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur that we go over our Elul introspection, make as sure as possible that we are up-to-date on our amends and our gratitudes, the changes we need to make and the goodness we bring. The sentence that is bolded above causes me to tremble with “terrible awe” as I think about the subtle and not-so subtle ways we “continue to humiliate Negroes” and so many people that are considered “other”. There is no “other” for a person of faith, for a Jew, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, etc-we know we are all created in the Image of the Ineffable One, we are all created with Higher Consciousness, we all have to ability and the obligation to rise up rather than sink down. Ergo=we are all equal in worth, dignity, and different in uniqueness and energy, which are not comparative categories. Yet, “we continue to humiliate” Black people as we are witnessing in our Presidential Campaign by Trump, “we continue to humiliate” Jews as proven by the great rise in anti-semitism that began at Charlottesville in 2017, “we continue to humiliate” Latinos and Muslims, Asians and Indians from India as well as Native Americans, in Israel “we continue to humiliate” Palestinians and Israeli Arabs, “we continue to humiliate” anyone who is different than us and who has different spiritual, moral, and political values that we do! And this is being done by Clergy, by the “faithful” ‘religious’ people in our midst! And this is who Rabbi Heschel is begging President Kennedy to rebuke! What Chutzpah, what faith, what morality and what courage. An immigrant calling upon the President of the United States to do what is right and good, holy and moral, a Rabbi castigating his fellow Clergy of all faiths including his own.

We Clergy, who will be leading the services on Shabbat, during the week, on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, etc need to look inside of ourselves and see how “we continue to humiliate” ourselves and people with our fearfulness to speak truth to power. We have to look inside of ourselves and do a deep dive into the ways we“forfeit the right to worship” by  humiliating ourselves at the altar of making a living, humiliating ourselves for fear of not working, forfeiting our truth and our souls for the sake of being liked. We have to come to grips with the truths of how we have neglected to stand for what is good and right, moral and holy for fear of being scolded by ‘our board’. We have to do a Chesbon HaNefesh, accounting of the soul, of the myriad of ways we have sent people who come seeking wisdom and guidance away to the ‘therapists’ rather than seeing and hearing the call of their souls; “Rabbi why is my life important” questions that no therapist can help them find. We, Clergy, have to look at the ways “we continue to humiliate” those who have different religious views, different moral views, how “we continue to humiliate” ourselves by failing to “rebuke, rebuke your neighbor and bear no guilt because of them”, by staying silent in the face of evil, in the face of imorality, in the face of lies and mendacity. We, Clergy, all clergy of all faiths and spiritual disciplines, are in need of heeding the words of Moses to Joshua: “be strong and courageous”. We, Clergy, need to take the moral and spiritual strength of Rabbi Heschel, of The Baal Shem Tov, of so many of our ancestors and end our tendency to “continue to humiliate”!

We, who are going to go to Temple on Shabbat, on Rosh Hashanah, on Yom Kippur need to look inside of ourselves to see how “we continue to humiliate” our children, our parents, our siblings, our friends, our neighbors, our enemies, our employees, our employers, the homeless on the street and the people who walk by us and we never acknowledge. It is imperative that we take note of how “we continue to humiliate” the clerk in a store, the barista are a coffee shop, the bak teller, the gardener, etc by failing to even say hello, by ignoring their plight and continue to try and “squeeze the last dime out of them”. We, the ‘faithful’ have to examine our grasping onto the deceptions of another and our own self-deceptions, admitting to the lies we tell ourselves and letting go of these lies and being responsible for the harms they have wrought. The spiritual energy of these next 40 days is compassion, forgiveness, reunification-will you join in?

I have engaged in humiliation of another and I have made amends for it, I have been misinterpreted as engaging in humiliation and I am sorry people have taken offense when they misinterpreted me and I am remorseful that I was not clearer in my words/deeds. I refuse “continue to humiliate Negroes” since I was a child as my family employed Blacks and we treated them as we would one another. Our family housekeeper called my Grandfather, Uncle and took care of all of us in one way or another for years. My father, being humiliated in the Army and when he looked for jobs as a Jew, was told to change his last name and he would not nor would he humiliate anyone else nor allow us to. I am loud and can blow up at the worst possible moments with no ‘apparent’ reason and I know that the fire in my belly at what is not right, what is not holy, what is not moral, what is not good, when lies and deceptions are being agreed to makes me crazy. I have never been able to tolerate it, even when I was perpetrating these ways in my actions prior to my recovery! I work hard to not “humiliate” anyone else and I also work hard to rebuke my neighbor so I don’t bear guilt and because I have faith we all can do better. More on that during the month. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

National Days of Repentance- through Rabbi Heschel’s teachings- Year 3 Day 278

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 278

National Days of Repentance and Change

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

Rabbi Heschel’s next words are a clarion call needed in this moment at least as much when he wrote them if not more! “PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION”. We have all heard the pronouncements of our Religious Leaders, we have all heard the numerous calls to action, the “solemn declarations”, very few of them go to the marches, very few of them lead the protests, very few of them have the courage of Joachim Prinz, the former Rabbi of Berlin who spoke before Rev King at the March on Washington, very few have the tenacity of Rabbi Heschel who would cancel a class on ethics in order to attend a march, a gathering to protest racism, hatred, the Vietnam War, because what good is teaching ethics, teaching Torah, teaching the Bible, if one is not going to live them? We hear the “solemn declaration” of hatred and envy, fear of losing power, and, most of all in my opinion, fear of being found to be fraudulent phonies. Many of us fellow clergy watch in horror as our colleagues serve the masters of greed, money, prestige, fame instead of serving God, Jesus, Allah, serving the people we are called to serve and call on us for direction and guidance. When our “religious leaders” continue to care more about their pocketbooks, their renown, we are dangerously close to the conditions that caused God to regret creating humanity in Chapter 6 of Genesis! We, clergy, are called for the mission to reverse the trend of evil that humans learn from their youth and help people turn back to the basic goodness of being that we are all created in and with-yet some of my sisters and brothers in the clergy are more concerned with keeping their boards of directors happy, keeping their standing and their stature than responding to the call of service that demands rigorous honesty, seeking of truth and constantly rooting out of our errors and engaging with our congregants and the world in true humility-the humility born from our acknowledging our imperfections and working to be one grain of sand better each day.

Personal involvement means living our lives out loud rather than keeping the darkness we feel, we do secreted away so no one truly sees us. Personal involvement means getting out of our offices and pulpits and, like Rabbi Heschel, Rev. King, Pastor Niebuhr, taking to the streets to march, to speak, to go to Congress and lobby lawmakers, to publicize our errors, our repentance, and the ways we will change and challenge everyone we know and don’t know to do the same. Personal involvement means no longer preaching a good sermon, it means living the words we preach. It is to stand with our fellow clergy who are vilified and demeaned because they stand up for the poor, the stranger, the needy, who are victims of “cancel culture” whether we agree with their interpretations or not, if they are engaged in T’Shuvah, in living life out loud, in seeking to be a little better each day, if they are practicing the principles of truth, love, kindness, justice, compassion in all of their affairs, if they are unwilling to take the bribes of job security, reputation so they will compromise their principles, every clergy person should be standing with them-this is personal involvement in a cause that is so much greater than us-it is the cause Micah the prophet tells us-“Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God”(Micah 6:8). Justice, mercy, walking with God doesn’t mean we all agree on what the text means, we just agree that each of us has a word of the Bible within us and we all have different ways to “Do and Understand” God’s will and we all have a unique path to fulfilling the divine need we were created to fill. Yet, if we are not willing to stand with our colleagues, if we are not willing to stand against the laypeople who want to control the spiritual life, the spiritual well-being of the congregation, a subject they know very little about, then how are we “walking humbly with God”. Unfortunately, too many Clergy have the mis-impression that they are God, they ‘know’ God’s will rather than continue to search for it, rather than realizing each event in our lives calls for different “midot”, measurements of attributes, because no two events are the same, no two moments are the same, no two people are the same, we are not the same as we were yesterday. Everything grows or retards depending on our personal involvement in our lives and the lives of another(s). As Clergy isn’t it time we realize this, isn’t it time we act upon this, isn’t it time we stop relying on the interpretations of 2 millennia and see how the Bible applies to us today? Personal involvement means to be present, live in the here and now, use the principles of the Bible to inform our actions in these new situations not live like we did in the 1st Century BCE or CE, or the 16th Century in Poland or S’fat.

It is time for all Clergy, all people to get up off their asses, off their couches, off their pulpits and become involved in the matters that concern God most: the poor, the needy, the stranger, the widow, the orphan-all of the people who have no power, who have no voice-we Clergy are here to give voice to, to raise them up and to call out the Truth to Power, to call out the Lies of the ruling class, to make it uncomfortable for the comfortable and make it comfortable for the uncomfortable. My life has been about this and even when I was a criminal, my rebellion was against the lies and b.s. that I saw in front of me. I have been railing about this situation for my entire rabbinate, I am a ‘niche’ Rabbi because I have to be involved personally with each person and there is only so much of me. I have to be leading and walking with the people who are not treated well, who have been forgotten and those who have forgotten their own worth and importance! We, Clergy have to lead the way by “loving our neighbor as we love ourselves”-this is the first step in “personal involvement” in repentance and change! God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Living Into Rabbi Heschel’s Teachings - A Daily Path of Spiritual Growth

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 277

During these turbulent times in our world and as we begin the Hebrew month of Elul, the month prior to Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur-the month of our introspection and T’Shuvah I am drawn to a telegraph that Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel sent to President John F. Kennedy. I am drawn to it because I believe we in America, in Israel, Jews as well as non-Jews across the globe need to take responsibility for the conditions in this world, own our parts, do our T’Shuvahs, our repairs and have new responses to events in our lives. I believe we are in need, during the month of Elul/September to have a:                                            

                                         National Days of Repentance and Change

A Yom Kippur for All of Us

A Month of Elul that is real and Life-Changing

Rabbi Heschel’s telegram:

TO PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY, THE WHITE HOUSE, JUNE 16, 1963

I LOOK FORWARD TO PRIVILEGE OF BEING PRESENT AT MEETING TOMORROW AT 4 P. M. LIKELIHOOD EXISTS THAT NEGRO PROBLEM WILL BE LIKE THE WEATHER. EVERYBODY TALKS ABOUT IT BUT NOBODY DOES ANYTHING ABOUT IT. PLEASE DEMAND OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT NOT JUST SOLEMN DECLARATION. WE FORFEIT THE RIGHT TO WORSHIP GOD AS LONG AS WE CONTINUE TO HUMILIATE NEGROES. CHURCH SYNAGOGUES HAVE FAILED. THEY MUST REPENT. ASK OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS TO CALL FOR NATIONAL REPENTANCE AND PERSONAL SACRIFICE. LET RELIGIOUS LEADERS DONATE ONE MONTH’S SALARY “TOWARD FUND FOR NEGRO HOUSING AND EDUCATION. I PROPOSE THAT YOU MR. PRESIDENT DECLARE STATE OF MORAL EMERGENCY. A MARSHALL PLAN FOR AID TO NEGROES IS BECOMING A NECESSITY. THE HOUR CALLS FOR HIGH MORAL GRANDEUR AND SPIRITUAL AUDACITY. ABRAHAM JOSHUA HESCHEL” (Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity)

Rabbi Heschel’s words above “everyone talks about it and nobody does anything about it” describes how we deal (or not deal) with issues that have vexed us forever-issues that go to the very heart of the Biblical Commands of “Love thy Neighbor as thyself”, “Care for the stranger, the poor, the needy, the widow and the orphan”, “pursue justice and righteousness”, the entirety of the 10 sayings, the response of “we will do and we will understand”. We acknowledge problems, we see the inequities in our world, we discuss ways to change them and then we seem to do nothing to make them come to fruition. We pass laws like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 only to have future Congress’ water them down, the Supreme Court declare them unnecessary, and the states disenfranchise voters who they think will not support their party! We are watching, some of us in horror, as a woman of color is being denigrated by her political opponents as she runs to be the next President of the United States, we are “standing idly by the blood of our brothers/sisters” as both Palestinians who want peace and harmony as well as Jews who want the same are being marginalized by the extremes in their midst. We have allowed the “inmates to run the asylum” and refuse to take our responsibility for what is happening-choosing to blame another rather than see the 3 fingers pointing back to us. In the Bible, after the “Mishkan”, the Ark, the Altar etc are erected at the end of Exodus, the first “new laws” we learn about are the laws/need to look within ourselves and be grateful for what we have, see where we have erred, see where we have denied, and make an offering, a rapprochement with God, with the people we have harmed, and with our selves. T’Shuvah, return, repentance, new response is what we learn about in Leviticus and, while it seems boring, dry and dull, it is the glue that holds families together, holds communities together, holds peoples together with a power greater than ourselves. It is the essential ingredient for being able to live with oneself and with one another-when we engage in blame only, when we deny our responsibility to make the necessary changes, we will continue to “talk about it and nobody does anything about it.” Thinking about the prophet Amos, who contrary to what everyone else saw, proclaimed the ruination of Israel because of the lack of people being responsible, I think, the lack of humility and bravery that T’Shuvah entails. We all know what happened to the Kingdom of Israel-Amos was correct, unfortunately, and the ones who declared their own righteousness in denigrating all of the principles of the Bible were destroyed. Bibi, Ben G’Vir, Smotrich, study your Bible a little better, stop ignoring the prophets. Preachers and Evangelicals, Baptists and Jews, immerse yourselves in the Holy Texts you hold so ‘dear’ and turn away from your blaming and do nothing ways and join the prophetic way of being, of hearing, of doing.

We are witnesses to this behavior happening all the time be it in families, schools, government, workplaces. Remember how long it took for labor laws to come into effect that some states are trying to change! Clergy are standing idly by and/or leading the charge while the questions of the 60’s regarding freedom to vote, freedom to live, civil rights, a women’s right to make her own choices regarding her body, even freedom of religion are under attack once again. Clergy are staying silent in the face of anti-Semitic and Islamophobia, they are once again afraid to anger their patrons, their donors, the hierarchy of the Church, the powers that be, etc. We are witnessing the very leaders who should be leading us to freedom, leading us out of Egypt, getting the “money changers” out of the halls of power instead invite the charlatans in, welcome the people who engage in idol worship, be it through their bastardizations of our Holy Texts or the ignoring of them.

I have written and spoken about the ‘do-nothing’ but talk about it nature of human beings often in the past. I am watching in horror as we face another test of our spiritual commitment to one another, to God’s will, to freedom, to truth, to justice, to compassion. It is time for all Clergy to look inside of themselves and admit their dependence on the ‘donor’ class for their livelihood and how they give up parts of their soul in order to keep their jobs. It is difficult, I know and I also know that getting fired is worth the price of saving our own souls and dignity. While I am loud and bombastic and I know how hard it is for Clergy to go against the grain and keep their jobs, I also know it is imperative in order to not be culpable in another era of “senseless hatred”. It is hard for us to do what is right and this is the call we have been given-we are descendants of the prophets, Moses, Jesus, Mohammed.  God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark

Living into Rabbi Heschel's Teachings - A Daily Path for Spiritual Growth

Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel

Year 3 Day 276

Last writing for 3 weeks-restart on Sept. 2/3

“Our premise is the certainty of being able to educate the inner man; to form as well as to inform the personality; to develop not only memory but also the capacity for insight; not only information but also appreciation; not only proficiency but also reverence; not only learning but also faith; not only skills but also inner attitudes.” (Insecurity of Freedom pg.56)

Today is Tisha B’Av, the 9th day of Av, the day the Rabbis proclaimed as a national one day of mourning for the destruction of both Temples and, have since, added every other cruelty, destruction of community that has happened to the Jews ever since-except for the Shoah, the Holocaust. Orthodoxy was defeated when they wanted to add the Shoah to the list of “bad things that happened to good people” by the rest of Jewry because Tisha B’Av represents the calamities we brought about because of our bad behavior and the Shoah was pure hatred of Jews just for being Jewish. The destruction of the 1st Temple was because of the ways the people in power, including the Priests, treated the widows, the orphans, the poor, the needy and the stranger, according to Rabbinic lore and the 2nd Temple was destroyed because of senseless hatred between people that caused embarrassment and harm with the lies and mendacity that was the way of the world in Judea at the time. Isn’t it wonderful that we commemorate these terrible ways of being that caused destruction and ruin on Tisha B’Av, that we mourn the destructions all the while we continue to engage in the same behaviors that caused them!!!

The last phrases that are bolded above, along with our current situations in the world,  point out the danger in “only learning” and “only skills” being our reason d’être. What good is learning if we are not also going to have faith-isn’t the reason to learn to deepen one’s faith in, and trust in what we are learning and to use the lessons of our past to have “sincerity” and “be genuine” in our dealings with one another and be in truth with oneself? We have learned how to pray, how to beg, how to bluster, how to beat our chests, how to be victims, how to be superior and we have failed to have trust that being genuine human will suffice and move us forward as individuals and as humanity. We have failed to grasp sincerity and faith the lessons from Tisha B’Av, from the Bible impart upon us because we are too busy being ‘victims’ and living in ‘identity politics’ and/or worried about ‘optics’. We watch the same people who are causing or trying to cause the destruction of another person/people wailing on the floor this morning in Temple Services or this Friday at the Mosque or Sunday in Church- mourning some fantasy glory rather than putting their learning to good use, using their “learning” to make life better for all-they are being led by mealy-mouthed people for whom being political is more important than being faithful! Rabbis and Clergy who are more worried about their jobs and status than about truth and leadership. These ‘learned people’ like Mike Johnson and Ben-G’vir care only about their power and Sinwar cares only about getting his and getting even-not using their “learning” to be more human, more genuine, more in line with the divine. The great question is how they and their ancestors for the millennia have gotten other learned people to go along with them and allow them to cause more and more reasons to mourn on Tisha B’Av! How sad for them and for us, how irresponsible of the rest of us for allowing them so much oxygen in the room.

We have the skills to pray, we have the skills to read texts in the original, we have the skills to learn and to gather information, to be proficient, to remember, etc and what we have done with the teaching and learning of these skills is forget to use them to influence “the inner attitudes” of human beings. We have forgotten that just teaching our children to read prayers and to learn a Torah Portion for their Bat/Bar Mitzvah means nothing if we haven’t influenced and helped them learn how to change their inner life, grow their spiritual selves, and live life as decent human beings. It is not enough, my dear Rabbinic Colleagues to go along with the status quo and throw up our hands, it is not enough to read the words of the prophets each Shabbat Morning and not fulfill them, not be moved by them. It is not enough to extol the ‘sages of old’ in their mendacity and their move away from what our Holy Bible teaches us in the prophets, from King David, Moses, etc. It is not enough to teach the adults that they only have to drop their kids off and make their lack of participation palpable to them and to yourself. It is not enough to hide behind ‘your contract’, ‘your livelihood’ as the reasons for short-changing the very people you have been “Called to Serve”!

It is time for all of us to re-assess ourselves in relation to Rabbi Heschel’s teachings above. It is time for all of us to end our self-deceptions and denials, our deceptions of another(s) and our lies. We have to start with ourselves and then broaden our approach. I have been using “learning” to be more “genuine” and “sincere” since my recovery. As a friend of mine told me yesterday, “Mark, you are not political, you do not play the game” and he is right. What you see is what you get because I was a thief and a con, a drunk and a liar, a hider and it almost destroyed me and harmed so many people who loved/love me in those times. I refuse to “go along to get along”, my current situation of retirement is a direct result of my lack of political correctness, my lack of worry about optics, and, I was wrong in the way I acted-full stop! I was not wrong in my assessment and my concerns all along nor was I heard. While the prophets of old were not heeded, they kept talking from Amos to Micah, even Jesus was heard and not heeded to this very day. It is time for us to end our “ritual mourning” for the “good old days”, stop our “make America Great again” and “from the River to the Sea” as well as all the other stupid slogans.

It is time for us to cut the cord of lies and mendacity, it is time for us to be genuine and sincere in “love your neighbor as yourself”, its time to embody “proclaim freedom throughout the land and to all its inhabitants therein”. It is time for us to use the “learning” of Tisha B’Av, the “skills” of mourning to deepen our “faith” and grow our “inner attitudes”, raise up our souls and the souls of those around us. My new way of doing this is through this blog and the way I greet people, the reaching out of my hand over and over again-whether someone takes it or not. I am engaged in living the lessons from my errors as well as from my ‘victories’ each day. I pray you will use today to be more “genuine” with yourself and engage in daily spiritual growing. God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark