This week’s Torah portion is Toldot, which means offspring or generations. It tells of Isaac and Rebecca’s family and the birth of Rebecca’s twins, Jacob and Esau; there is Esau’s selling his birthright to Jacob, Isaac digging wells of water, God renewing the promises of many descendants and the land to Isaac, and Jacob’s stealing the blessing of his father, meant for Esau. Esau was born first, covered in red hair. The name Esau comes from the verb ASA, to do or to make, and Esau was also a do-er: a man of action. Rashi said everyone called him Esau because he was fully made, completed. He was done.
Jacob was born second, grasping Esau’s heel, and he was named Yaakov, heel, or that which follows. The Torah gives a brief description of the two boys: Esau became one who knows trapping, a man of the field; and Jacob was a quiet man, abiding in tents. Not all translations say quiet. Rashi says wholesome. Another translation is mild. But the Hebrew says, Tam. Tam literally means finished, perfect, complete whole, innocent, or simple. It is the same word used for the Simple Son in the section of the Passover Hagaddah that tells of the four children, or historically, the four sons. We can see that Jacob and Esau were very different, but that each was complete in his own way. In a sense, they make up complete person when their attributes are combined: the outer qualities of Esau and the inner qualities of Jacob.
This is what makes Jacob so much more interesting than Esau. Jacob is far from perfect: he schemes, he cheats, he lies, he tricks, he steals. There are depths to Jacob. Esau may be finished, but Jacob, like us, is perfectable. Jacob had all the inner resources he needed to become a holy person. And that he actually gets there should give us great hope for ourselves. What sets Jacob so far above Esau is that he is willing to grow. The S’fat Emet comments on a later verse in this portion: “And Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found living waters (Gen. 26:19).” He says that “the Torah is called water because it’s found everywhere; and as is true with seeking water, it depends on how deep one wishes to dig, and how sincerely one wants to have Torah.”
Jacob was always trying to catch up with his slightly older brother. He shows his desire to overcome his younger brother status, but also his deep desire to be a leader, when he impersonates Esau to receive the blessing of the firstborn; his desire to be a person of goodness when he dreams of the ladder reaching to heaven and vows to give to charity and establish a house of God, and finally a desire to be a blessing when he wrestles with the angel and leaves behind the deceptive nature he no longer needs. Jacob’s striving to best Esau never stopped. His inner growth allows Jacob finally to surpass his brother.
We are all meant to be a work in progress. We are never finished. Our desire to grow and to rise toward holiness and our willing-ness to do the inner work we need to do will determine how far we can travel along the road that leads to the Divine. As Jacob found out, we are not alone on this journey. We receive help and support along God’s path. May we know that we have been given great spiritual potential for goodness and for Godliness, and may we strive like Jacob, to use these gifts, by being willing to learn and willing to grow.
Friday, December 28, 2012
Friday, December 21, 2012
Lessons of Hurricane Sandy
At this time of great difficulty for so many in NY, NJ, and CT, we look at the Torah with different eyes, trying to find light in the darkness, whether your darkness is physical or metaphoric, hoping to find warmth in the cold, and praying for heat and hot water in all your apartments. One lesson in this week’s portion comes from the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. An obvious thing to take from it is that there was a reason for the destruction. People were choosing the wrong things, from a moral standpoint.
For us, we know that our choices, environmentally speaking, haven’t always been great, but they haven’t been terrible either. Humans began by burning wood for warmth. Then we moved on to coal, then oil and gas. Possibly our worst choice is bio-fuels, in which not only oil and gas, in the form of farm machinery & pesticides, but also good farmland is used to produce grain, which, by using even more oil and gas, is turned into ethanol, which is then burned. Hurricane Sandy sent a message to the seat of financial power. The climate is changing because we have changed it. Our choices weren’t bad. Perhaps we have been a little self-indulgent, energy-wise. Our choices weren’t necessarily wrong: we had to heat our homes and, for those who live outside a large city, drive to a place of employment. Admittedly, we have taken the lazy way out. Some have become used to making the easy money. We have not planned for the future or supported research and development leading to new forms of energy. We can now see that the old choices are no longer good ones. They don’t work anymore. God, or if you like, the Universe, is asking us to move on. This happens to us in every aspect of life. We are asked to choose a new way. The new way we must choose is very simple to state, but will be challenging to implement. We have to let the sun power our world. We can’t burn things anymore. The sun’s energy powers the wind and the waves. We can use wind and wave power, solar power, and renewable hydroelectric power if we decide to put our minds to it. We’ll figure out the storage issues. We may even figure out nuclear fusion (fission is too dangerous and too radioactively polluting). We could even use the millions of feet walking along New York City’s sidewalks for part of our power needs.
There is one more lesson from Vayera that I’d like to address. It’s about caring. The Torah says, referring to Abraham, And he lifted his eyes and looked, and three men stood by him; and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed to the ground, And said, My Lord, if now I have found favor in your sight, pass not away, from your servant; Let a little water, be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree; And I will fetch a morsel of bread, to comfort your hearts; after that you shall pass on; seeing that you have come to your servant. And they said, do so, as you have said. And Abraham hurried to the tent to Sarah, and said, Hurry, three measures of fine meal, knead, and make cakes. And Abraham ran to the herd, and fetched a calf tender and good, and gave it to a young man; who hurried to prepare it. And he took cream and milk, and the calf which he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood over them by the tree, and they ate.(18:2-8)
Abraham truly cared about the three travelers who appeared at his door. He hurried to help them, to feed them, to show them courtesy and respect, and to give them his very best. He didn’t know they were angels until later. The phrase, “He stood over them,” is interesting and quite telling. Angels receive their orders from God. One understanding of angels is that they are simply energies, in any form, sent to accomplish certain acts. When a caring, generous impulse comes from us, and when we act upon it, we stand above the angels. That’s the gift that dwells within free will. Abraham honored the Godliness in the angels before he knew them to be Divine. He tried to help them and care for them simply because he thought they were human. May all the love and generosity we show to each other during these trying times be noticed and blessed. May we be even more sincerely caring than we have been before. The Chassidic masters taught: the path to God leads through men. May we help each other in our time of need, acting as angels for each other, and being even higher than that: people who care, standing heads and shoulders above the angels.
For us, we know that our choices, environmentally speaking, haven’t always been great, but they haven’t been terrible either. Humans began by burning wood for warmth. Then we moved on to coal, then oil and gas. Possibly our worst choice is bio-fuels, in which not only oil and gas, in the form of farm machinery & pesticides, but also good farmland is used to produce grain, which, by using even more oil and gas, is turned into ethanol, which is then burned. Hurricane Sandy sent a message to the seat of financial power. The climate is changing because we have changed it. Our choices weren’t bad. Perhaps we have been a little self-indulgent, energy-wise. Our choices weren’t necessarily wrong: we had to heat our homes and, for those who live outside a large city, drive to a place of employment. Admittedly, we have taken the lazy way out. Some have become used to making the easy money. We have not planned for the future or supported research and development leading to new forms of energy. We can now see that the old choices are no longer good ones. They don’t work anymore. God, or if you like, the Universe, is asking us to move on. This happens to us in every aspect of life. We are asked to choose a new way. The new way we must choose is very simple to state, but will be challenging to implement. We have to let the sun power our world. We can’t burn things anymore. The sun’s energy powers the wind and the waves. We can use wind and wave power, solar power, and renewable hydroelectric power if we decide to put our minds to it. We’ll figure out the storage issues. We may even figure out nuclear fusion (fission is too dangerous and too radioactively polluting). We could even use the millions of feet walking along New York City’s sidewalks for part of our power needs.
There is one more lesson from Vayera that I’d like to address. It’s about caring. The Torah says, referring to Abraham, And he lifted his eyes and looked, and three men stood by him; and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed to the ground, And said, My Lord, if now I have found favor in your sight, pass not away, from your servant; Let a little water, be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree; And I will fetch a morsel of bread, to comfort your hearts; after that you shall pass on; seeing that you have come to your servant. And they said, do so, as you have said. And Abraham hurried to the tent to Sarah, and said, Hurry, three measures of fine meal, knead, and make cakes. And Abraham ran to the herd, and fetched a calf tender and good, and gave it to a young man; who hurried to prepare it. And he took cream and milk, and the calf which he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood over them by the tree, and they ate.(18:2-8)
Abraham truly cared about the three travelers who appeared at his door. He hurried to help them, to feed them, to show them courtesy and respect, and to give them his very best. He didn’t know they were angels until later. The phrase, “He stood over them,” is interesting and quite telling. Angels receive their orders from God. One understanding of angels is that they are simply energies, in any form, sent to accomplish certain acts. When a caring, generous impulse comes from us, and when we act upon it, we stand above the angels. That’s the gift that dwells within free will. Abraham honored the Godliness in the angels before he knew them to be Divine. He tried to help them and care for them simply because he thought they were human. May all the love and generosity we show to each other during these trying times be noticed and blessed. May we be even more sincerely caring than we have been before. The Chassidic masters taught: the path to God leads through men. May we help each other in our time of need, acting as angels for each other, and being even higher than that: people who care, standing heads and shoulders above the angels.
Sunday, December 2, 2012
Take the First Step
This week’s Torah portion is Lech Lecha, which means, go for yourself. God speaks to Abraham for the very first time, with the offer of great blessing, if Abraham will follow God, leaving his native land to journey to Canaan in order to establish a new nation there. Abraham does so and God promises him the land four separate times in this portion. At the end of Lech lecha, God makes a covenant with Abraham: every male will be circumcised at the age of 8 days. Abraham, 13 year old Ishmael, who is Abraham’s son with Hagar, the maidservant, and all the men in Abraham’s employ become circumcised.
Just what is this covenant all about? We hear so much about the covenant, but what exactly is it? A covenant is usually an agreement between two people. Each party has an obligation. Abraham has two obligations: to accept God for himself, his household, and for all the generations that will follow, and to circumcise himself and all the males in his household, as a sign of that acceptance. God takes on three obligations: to give Abraham offspring, who will become great nations, to give him the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession, and to be a God to Abraham and his offspring forever. God had great faith in Abraham, knowing that Abraham would not only agree to the terms of the treaty, but that he would complete all the circumcisions on that very same day, acting with that admirable quality that Moshe Chaim Luzzato called alacrity, in his famous work, Path of the Just. Rashi, our famous Torah Commentator, taught us similarly, do not delay a mitzvah (Bo).
Abraham had such a difficult thing to do. There is a haftarah that we read in the spring in conjunction with the book of Leviticus, about doing something difficult. Naaman, Captain of the army of the king of Aram, was a leper. The Prophet Elisha, told him how to cure his leprosy: requiring him to bathe 7X in the Jordan. Naaman became enraged at the ridiculousness of the suggestion; and his servants came near, and spoke to him, and said, “My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much rather then, when he said to you, Wash, and be clean (2 kings Chapter 5)? It is so much easier for most of us, to accept the covenant and to circumcise, not usually ourselves, but our children than to do what Abraham did.
But what does the Torah mean in the beginning of this section, when God said to Abraham, “Walk before me and be perfect”? We have to remember that Sara did not conceive Isaac until after the circumcision. Walk before me then means that God is saying to Abraham, I will follow you. I will be watching you and I will come after you. Please take the first action, otherwise, I can’t do anything. Your action will be completed by me. I follow your lead. Are we then leading God? Of course not. The Eternal One is our Divine teacher: showing us which way to go. God points the way. We must decide whether to go there. The covenant has been accepted for us because it simply is an enduring truth that all existence is One. And yet, it is up to us to act, taking upon ourselves the obligations of the covenant in every choice we make. May we know that our Divine Guide is both in front of us as well as following us, and may we, like Abraham, find great blessings by walking forward on the path that leads to kindness, generosity, compassion and love.
Just what is this covenant all about? We hear so much about the covenant, but what exactly is it? A covenant is usually an agreement between two people. Each party has an obligation. Abraham has two obligations: to accept God for himself, his household, and for all the generations that will follow, and to circumcise himself and all the males in his household, as a sign of that acceptance. God takes on three obligations: to give Abraham offspring, who will become great nations, to give him the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession, and to be a God to Abraham and his offspring forever. God had great faith in Abraham, knowing that Abraham would not only agree to the terms of the treaty, but that he would complete all the circumcisions on that very same day, acting with that admirable quality that Moshe Chaim Luzzato called alacrity, in his famous work, Path of the Just. Rashi, our famous Torah Commentator, taught us similarly, do not delay a mitzvah (Bo).
Abraham had such a difficult thing to do. There is a haftarah that we read in the spring in conjunction with the book of Leviticus, about doing something difficult. Naaman, Captain of the army of the king of Aram, was a leper. The Prophet Elisha, told him how to cure his leprosy: requiring him to bathe 7X in the Jordan. Naaman became enraged at the ridiculousness of the suggestion; and his servants came near, and spoke to him, and said, “My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much rather then, when he said to you, Wash, and be clean (2 kings Chapter 5)? It is so much easier for most of us, to accept the covenant and to circumcise, not usually ourselves, but our children than to do what Abraham did.
But what does the Torah mean in the beginning of this section, when God said to Abraham, “Walk before me and be perfect”? We have to remember that Sara did not conceive Isaac until after the circumcision. Walk before me then means that God is saying to Abraham, I will follow you. I will be watching you and I will come after you. Please take the first action, otherwise, I can’t do anything. Your action will be completed by me. I follow your lead. Are we then leading God? Of course not. The Eternal One is our Divine teacher: showing us which way to go. God points the way. We must decide whether to go there. The covenant has been accepted for us because it simply is an enduring truth that all existence is One. And yet, it is up to us to act, taking upon ourselves the obligations of the covenant in every choice we make. May we know that our Divine Guide is both in front of us as well as following us, and may we, like Abraham, find great blessings by walking forward on the path that leads to kindness, generosity, compassion and love.
Monday, October 22, 2012
In the Wake of the Flood from The Jewish Week
Or: Noah Explains it All
This week’s Torah Portion relates the story of Noah and the Flood. Because of the corruption of humankind, God brings a flood to destroy all life except Noah, the righteous man, his family, and the animals in the ark. Later, God promises Noah never again to “smite every living being as I have done. Continuously, all the days of the earth, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease. (Gen. 8:21-22),” This parable teaches us about how our world works and answers some of our most heart wrenching questions: why is the world so imperfect? Why are there disasters, disease, tragedies? Why do we have good days and bad days? Why will God never do this again? We may not like the answers, but this portion at least seeks to give us some insight into these questions.
Originally there was no disease and few natural disasters. We lived to unimaginably advanced ages: Methuseleh to 969 years and Noah to 950 years. There were no checks on human corruption. Sin piled up. The world became worse and worse. The system, which is all of a unity, could not sustain that amount of greed, untruth, rapaciousness, and crime. So God decided to sweep away the old system and put an entirely new, self-regulating system in place. In this new system the maximum life span would be 120 years. Human imperfection that led to selfish or sinful acts would be worked out and expiated little by little, constantly, in small and large ways. No person would be allowed to accumulate too much sin. Less worthy acts would be taken care of in the course of a life. God would constantly communicate with us through the positive and negative circumstances in our lives, letting us know the results of our actions. We would be able to take an honest look at our lives and know how we are doing because of the circle of choice and result that connects us to God: we do something good and experience blessing, or at the very least, good feelings from performing mitzvot. We miss the mark, do something less worthy, and are sent a correction.
But it’s not always so clear why negative things occur, or why terrible things happen to people who are virtuous. Rashi comments on the first verse (Gen 6:9) of the portion “The offspring of the righteous are good deeds.” Our sages agreed that the more righteous deeds a person does, the clearer is the correspondence between what happens to that person and their deeds. However, as part of society, we bear responsibility for the acts of our community. We may ask: why in the story of the flood did so many have to perish? Why the animals and plants? The story teaches us that what we do affects everything else. A modern example is that the people who cut down trees are seldom those who contract Lyme disease. We are connected to all existence, all being, and to God. When we choose only for ourselves, God is hurt, and the world cannot continue in that way.
The sober and very adult message of Noah is that if the world were not the way it is: if there were not built-in corrections to human sin, life would be even worse. There would be no progress and we would experience hopelessness. Sin would pile up. Life would go in a negative direction. However there is good news in this tale: the Noah story teaches us not only how our world is constituted but also about our great power to create blessing. When we strive to do what is good, like Noah, we need not be overwhelmed by destructive forces. We participate in our own salvation by choosing that which helps the world to be a better place. As the sage S’fat Emet taught, it is up to us to broaden the good impulse within us for our own benefit and the benefit of the world. Our task is to pour the balm of love upon that which is wounded and to be of those who repair what is rent. God knows our intentions, sends us blessings, and allows us to live even when we fall down, judging us in mercy and helping us to improve. May we be worthy of the great power for good given to us, and the faith, dignity, and respect for us that has been accorded to us by the Source of Life. Our world is beautiful; and we have an enormous effect on our lives and also on the world. The system works in our favor: God wants to bless us. May we broaden the goodness and Godliness within us, and experience how much blessing we may create.
This week’s Torah Portion relates the story of Noah and the Flood. Because of the corruption of humankind, God brings a flood to destroy all life except Noah, the righteous man, his family, and the animals in the ark. Later, God promises Noah never again to “smite every living being as I have done. Continuously, all the days of the earth, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease. (Gen. 8:21-22),” This parable teaches us about how our world works and answers some of our most heart wrenching questions: why is the world so imperfect? Why are there disasters, disease, tragedies? Why do we have good days and bad days? Why will God never do this again? We may not like the answers, but this portion at least seeks to give us some insight into these questions.
Originally there was no disease and few natural disasters. We lived to unimaginably advanced ages: Methuseleh to 969 years and Noah to 950 years. There were no checks on human corruption. Sin piled up. The world became worse and worse. The system, which is all of a unity, could not sustain that amount of greed, untruth, rapaciousness, and crime. So God decided to sweep away the old system and put an entirely new, self-regulating system in place. In this new system the maximum life span would be 120 years. Human imperfection that led to selfish or sinful acts would be worked out and expiated little by little, constantly, in small and large ways. No person would be allowed to accumulate too much sin. Less worthy acts would be taken care of in the course of a life. God would constantly communicate with us through the positive and negative circumstances in our lives, letting us know the results of our actions. We would be able to take an honest look at our lives and know how we are doing because of the circle of choice and result that connects us to God: we do something good and experience blessing, or at the very least, good feelings from performing mitzvot. We miss the mark, do something less worthy, and are sent a correction.
But it’s not always so clear why negative things occur, or why terrible things happen to people who are virtuous. Rashi comments on the first verse (Gen 6:9) of the portion “The offspring of the righteous are good deeds.” Our sages agreed that the more righteous deeds a person does, the clearer is the correspondence between what happens to that person and their deeds. However, as part of society, we bear responsibility for the acts of our community. We may ask: why in the story of the flood did so many have to perish? Why the animals and plants? The story teaches us that what we do affects everything else. A modern example is that the people who cut down trees are seldom those who contract Lyme disease. We are connected to all existence, all being, and to God. When we choose only for ourselves, God is hurt, and the world cannot continue in that way.
The sober and very adult message of Noah is that if the world were not the way it is: if there were not built-in corrections to human sin, life would be even worse. There would be no progress and we would experience hopelessness. Sin would pile up. Life would go in a negative direction. However there is good news in this tale: the Noah story teaches us not only how our world is constituted but also about our great power to create blessing. When we strive to do what is good, like Noah, we need not be overwhelmed by destructive forces. We participate in our own salvation by choosing that which helps the world to be a better place. As the sage S’fat Emet taught, it is up to us to broaden the good impulse within us for our own benefit and the benefit of the world. Our task is to pour the balm of love upon that which is wounded and to be of those who repair what is rent. God knows our intentions, sends us blessings, and allows us to live even when we fall down, judging us in mercy and helping us to improve. May we be worthy of the great power for good given to us, and the faith, dignity, and respect for us that has been accorded to us by the Source of Life. Our world is beautiful; and we have an enormous effect on our lives and also on the world. The system works in our favor: God wants to bless us. May we broaden the goodness and Godliness within us, and experience how much blessing we may create.
Friday, October 5, 2012
Bringing God and Judsiam into the 21st Century
On this Yom Kippur, we come here for a very special and mystical process, what the philosopher Martin Buber calls, the mysterious meeting of human repentance and Divine mercy. There is a dance – a partnership, and if so, there must be a partner. Who, exactly, is our partner and how do we regard that partner we call God? For us, two generations after the Holocaust, this is a large and difficult question. Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach thought that perhaps the fascination with eastern religions in this country had to do with our anger at God over the Holocaust. He suggested that the Eastern religions were not similarly tainted.
The beginning of an answer to who our partner is must necessarily start from the information we have been given in the Torah. In the story of Cain and Abel, Cain kills his brother. If God were the vengeful, angry God some ascribe to the Bible, we would expect God to kill Cain. But that’s not what happens. God protects him and sends Cain off to learn. Then in the story of Noah, when corruption grew unbearable on the earth, we would expect that a vengeful, angry God’s reaction to human greed and rapaciousness would be anger. But the Torah says, “God had heartfelt sadness.”
To bring our conception of God into the 21st Century, we have to go beyond the anthropo-morphism and personification of the early Torah, the book of Genesis, and jump to the next book, Exodus, in which God says to Moses, by my name, the four letter name of God, yud, hei, vav, hei, the patriarchs did not know me. This name is a conjugation of the verb To Be, and it includes the letters for I was, I am, I will be: past, present, and future. God’s name means being. It means existence; and when God answers Moses’ question, what is your name, God says, I shall be is my name, accentuating the future. This means that God is the unfolding of life, the continuing creativity of each day. This is a way of understanding Divinity that is more modern. Rabbi David Cooper wrote a book titled, God is a Verb, and Rabbi Zalman Schacter Shalomi has written about God-ing, using God as a verb, not a noun; and this is in fact the way we first encounter God in the Torah: in the process of creating.
Some have asked, is God inside of us or outside? The answer necessarily is: both, or even: however you choose to regard the question. We all live within life; within being and existence. It is both within and without. How we contact the Divine Presence determines the way we regard it; and Judaism has always seen God as being paradoxically, within everything and above everything: immanent and transcendent. The prophet Jeremiah wrote, “I will put my law in their inward parts and in their heart I will write it, and I will be their God.” The book of Deuteronomy also puts it very tenderly: “for it is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart to do it.” What these quotations tell us is that Law, teaching: Torah, is in us and God is in us, and also outside of us. We live in the matrix of it all, which is how this great Creating Oneness operates. Judaism gives us vital information about what works: why and how it works, how our actions affect the outcomes we observe in our lives and in the greater society: why not taking care of others causes us not to be taken care of. Why killing others causes our own dying and suffering. It is important for us if this vital information is to be operative in our lives, that we re-interpret God and Torah in our generation and for our modern understandings so that it can speak to us.
The concepts of reward and punishment are also ripe for re-interpretation. The God of punishment is an older world view. The Talmud repeatedly says, “The Torah speaks in the language of men.” (Avodah Zarah 27a). It speaks in the language of people at the time it was written, for their understanding, in that society. The Torah explains reward and punishment by saying, toward the end of Leviticus, “the same shall be done to you.” The stories in the book of Genesis impart this information over and over again. Abraham, the one who is a blessing, is blessed. Isaac, the one who makes peace, experiences tranquility. Jacob, the one who tricks, is tricked. The ones who separate, Rebecca and later Judah, are separated from those they love. Is there someone throwing lighting bolds at us, from the sky? Is life random? The Torah tells us that life is not random. There is not an angry, vengeful God in the sky waiting to punish us. Quite the opposite. We dig a hole and walk forward, into it. And there is Divine heartfelt sadness.
Did the Divine have to instruct us or make a covenant with us? Of course not. Why did the Source of Life do this: to give us this precious knowledge of what works and what does not work in our lives? Perhaps, as the sages tell us, because we are loved. Perhaps so that existence can flow in a positive direction, so things can become continually better. Perhaps, because we, as part of God, influence the contentment of the whole. Buber says that the covenantal relationship is based on destiny. As God said, it is all about the future. It is all about human knowledge and human choice. Since we are made of the Divine energy-matter continuum, we can bring our modern growing Universalism to the understanding of God and Judaism. It is difficult to be attracted to a Divinity we fear: one that is always disapproving of us or punishing us. But life, creativity, being: these ways of regarding Divinity that expand us and give us hope. Why does it matter what our conception of God is? Because we are asked to love God. This helps us make better choices. We can’t love a God we fear. But we can love life. We can love goodness; and in order to identify with that goodness, we have to conceive of a God we can love, who is not angry at us, who is on our side, rooting for us to make loving, caring choices: a Divine Parent, Source of all goodness in the Universe who we want to please. How do we act in consonance with life, how do we promote life?
These are skills we can acquire; skills that attract us, so that we want to acquire them. This information is actually in the Torah. This is a modern way to interact with Judaism. Life is good. The elevation of the spirit is good. Embracing the universality of the totality of Life is good. Judaism is an authentic spiritual path that shows us how to extend our innate goodness and expand our acceptance of all life. In this final day of turning, may we be open to the great goodness and love that we experience within and without: the love we express and the love we receive. May we turn to that goodness, as Jeremiah said, in our inward parts, in our hearts. May it guide us all year long, allowing us to use our powers of loving and choosing to promote life, promote goodness, and create blessing and happiness in the world.
The beginning of an answer to who our partner is must necessarily start from the information we have been given in the Torah. In the story of Cain and Abel, Cain kills his brother. If God were the vengeful, angry God some ascribe to the Bible, we would expect God to kill Cain. But that’s not what happens. God protects him and sends Cain off to learn. Then in the story of Noah, when corruption grew unbearable on the earth, we would expect that a vengeful, angry God’s reaction to human greed and rapaciousness would be anger. But the Torah says, “God had heartfelt sadness.”
To bring our conception of God into the 21st Century, we have to go beyond the anthropo-morphism and personification of the early Torah, the book of Genesis, and jump to the next book, Exodus, in which God says to Moses, by my name, the four letter name of God, yud, hei, vav, hei, the patriarchs did not know me. This name is a conjugation of the verb To Be, and it includes the letters for I was, I am, I will be: past, present, and future. God’s name means being. It means existence; and when God answers Moses’ question, what is your name, God says, I shall be is my name, accentuating the future. This means that God is the unfolding of life, the continuing creativity of each day. This is a way of understanding Divinity that is more modern. Rabbi David Cooper wrote a book titled, God is a Verb, and Rabbi Zalman Schacter Shalomi has written about God-ing, using God as a verb, not a noun; and this is in fact the way we first encounter God in the Torah: in the process of creating.
Some have asked, is God inside of us or outside? The answer necessarily is: both, or even: however you choose to regard the question. We all live within life; within being and existence. It is both within and without. How we contact the Divine Presence determines the way we regard it; and Judaism has always seen God as being paradoxically, within everything and above everything: immanent and transcendent. The prophet Jeremiah wrote, “I will put my law in their inward parts and in their heart I will write it, and I will be their God.” The book of Deuteronomy also puts it very tenderly: “for it is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart to do it.” What these quotations tell us is that Law, teaching: Torah, is in us and God is in us, and also outside of us. We live in the matrix of it all, which is how this great Creating Oneness operates. Judaism gives us vital information about what works: why and how it works, how our actions affect the outcomes we observe in our lives and in the greater society: why not taking care of others causes us not to be taken care of. Why killing others causes our own dying and suffering. It is important for us if this vital information is to be operative in our lives, that we re-interpret God and Torah in our generation and for our modern understandings so that it can speak to us.
The concepts of reward and punishment are also ripe for re-interpretation. The God of punishment is an older world view. The Talmud repeatedly says, “The Torah speaks in the language of men.” (Avodah Zarah 27a). It speaks in the language of people at the time it was written, for their understanding, in that society. The Torah explains reward and punishment by saying, toward the end of Leviticus, “the same shall be done to you.” The stories in the book of Genesis impart this information over and over again. Abraham, the one who is a blessing, is blessed. Isaac, the one who makes peace, experiences tranquility. Jacob, the one who tricks, is tricked. The ones who separate, Rebecca and later Judah, are separated from those they love. Is there someone throwing lighting bolds at us, from the sky? Is life random? The Torah tells us that life is not random. There is not an angry, vengeful God in the sky waiting to punish us. Quite the opposite. We dig a hole and walk forward, into it. And there is Divine heartfelt sadness.
Did the Divine have to instruct us or make a covenant with us? Of course not. Why did the Source of Life do this: to give us this precious knowledge of what works and what does not work in our lives? Perhaps, as the sages tell us, because we are loved. Perhaps so that existence can flow in a positive direction, so things can become continually better. Perhaps, because we, as part of God, influence the contentment of the whole. Buber says that the covenantal relationship is based on destiny. As God said, it is all about the future. It is all about human knowledge and human choice. Since we are made of the Divine energy-matter continuum, we can bring our modern growing Universalism to the understanding of God and Judaism. It is difficult to be attracted to a Divinity we fear: one that is always disapproving of us or punishing us. But life, creativity, being: these ways of regarding Divinity that expand us and give us hope. Why does it matter what our conception of God is? Because we are asked to love God. This helps us make better choices. We can’t love a God we fear. But we can love life. We can love goodness; and in order to identify with that goodness, we have to conceive of a God we can love, who is not angry at us, who is on our side, rooting for us to make loving, caring choices: a Divine Parent, Source of all goodness in the Universe who we want to please. How do we act in consonance with life, how do we promote life?
These are skills we can acquire; skills that attract us, so that we want to acquire them. This information is actually in the Torah. This is a modern way to interact with Judaism. Life is good. The elevation of the spirit is good. Embracing the universality of the totality of Life is good. Judaism is an authentic spiritual path that shows us how to extend our innate goodness and expand our acceptance of all life. In this final day of turning, may we be open to the great goodness and love that we experience within and without: the love we express and the love we receive. May we turn to that goodness, as Jeremiah said, in our inward parts, in our hearts. May it guide us all year long, allowing us to use our powers of loving and choosing to promote life, promote goodness, and create blessing and happiness in the world.
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Rosh Hashanah 2012
Today we will read in the Torah about the birth of Isaac to Abraham at 100 years old and Sarah at 90: a joyous and miraculous event. Then tomorrow we read the test of Abraham, the Akeda or Binding of Isaac, God’s asking of Abraham to bring his beloved Isaac up as a sacrifice, which Abraham does. An angel of God saves Isaac; and Abraham is blessed through his willingness to follow God whole-heartedly. There are many ways to understand this, and I’ve spoken previously about how much prior reassurance God had given to Abraham, the deep personal bond of trust between them, and the promise that Isaac would have many descendants. But this year I’ve come to also see another aspect of this story.
One way to understand it might be to see it through the prism of our life’s goals. As we gaze ahead into a busy fall and beyond we may have immediate to do lists for the week or month. We may also have things we’d really like to do: travel to a country we’ve never seen, study a new subject, or even just get through the next year without any major health crises for us and our families, being as decent a human being as we can be. You’ve all heard the line, Man plans and God laughs. Why is that? Why should it be that life is so shockingly unpredictable? I would like to suggest that it is because our goals, wants, and needs are so different from God’s goals for us. Speaking about wants is easy. We need food and shelter; and we need money to buy those things, so we need to work or to have worked so that the Divine Presence can help us provide and so that we can contribute to providing for others. We also need love, human interaction and connections, intellectual stimulation, and spiritual nourishment. My teacher of blessed memory, Rabbi Gelberman, once gave a talk about wants and needs. In it he quoted Martin Buber who said, “The difference between the Holy and the Unholy is that the Holy are waiting to be sanctified.” Buber wrote; “We are called to the world in order to hallow it, to redeem it. The world needs us for its hallowing. It is waiting to be hallowed by us// and in hallowed contact with the world, with the things and people we meet on the way, we find our way to God.” So it is not that we should not have material wants, as long as we make the distinction between what we need and what we would like. And we can sanctify what we receive and what we achieve.
Goals are more elusive to speak about. It’s easy to identify short term goals. But how many of us can articulate long term goals? You all know the famous joke: A man goes into the hospital for surgery. The operation is successful. The nurse comes in and says, Mr. Shapiro, "Are you comfortable?" he says, "I make a good living." That’s the middle or upper middle class ideal: a comfortable, peaceful life, earning enough to enjoy our existence here on earth and not having to worry. This is probably the opposite of what God wants for us. Being what I call a spiritual naturalist, someone like Charles Darwin who observes events and draws conclusions from observations, it appears to me that God is interested in our spiritual growth. We are not allowed to stay on one level or in one place for very long. It is obvious that the world is in need of great improvement. How is this going to happen? It can only happen if we are forced to grow, through a series of tests, challenges, opportunities, and acts of Divine Grace: both the carrot and the stick. Every day of our lives we are in Life University: a school from which we will never graduate until we leave this plane of existence. And what are we tested on in this school of life? Compassion, Kindness, generosity, selflessness, caring, humility, and love. This is our life’s course work. This is why life has so many tests and challenges. There is a clash between what we want and what God wants. The world can only improve if we improve. We want a peaceful, easy life. God wants growth. God wants action.
The S’fat Emet, Rabbi Yehuda Leib Alter of Ger, has written “We have already been on a very high rung [of spiritual attainment] on Mt. Sinai. Because of that we can raise ourselves back up to Heaven….From now on [there will be] a way to find everything by means of struggle, as it is said, your deeds will draw you near.” A life of spiritual struggle is therefore our lot, in order to be raised up, in order for the world to keep improving. This is why each person is precious to God: each human being has been given challenges in their personalities and life circumstances to struggle with. We are all one soul, there is only one life between us. Each person is precious because they are purifying their small bit of the soul matter for all of us. Our sages taught, angels can’t rise in holiness. Only human beings can become greater than they are. Similarly, in the Talmud, R. Abbahu, said: The place occupied by repentant sinners cannot be attained even by the completely righteous (Sanhedrin 99a). It is improvement that God notices and requires. That’s why we must not ever be completely satisfied with our level of goodness. Life will not allow us to stand still. Norman Mailer famously wrote: “There was that law of life so cruel and so just which demanded that one must grow or else pay more for remaining the same.”
In the book, Duties of the Heart, by Rabbi Bachya ben Paquda it says that Abraham understood the Torah before it was given. He was already a kind, gracious, generous, compassionate, loving person. Yet God still gave him a further test: the ultimate test: was his faith and trust in God’s goodness so great that he would offer up his own will, his own son, in love, knowing that there must be an explanation and a blessing beyond his comprehension? He did, and he was greatly blessed. There were no other tests for him that we know of. There could not possibly be any other major tests Abraham could be given. He had passed them all. Luckily, none of us are or ever will be at his spiritual level. Our tests are such that we can pass them. Our sages taught, no one is given a test he cannot pass.
In this New Year, we will have many tests, challenges, and opportunities for growth. How will we respond? Most probably, this is what will be asked of us: We will be asked to care about each other more; to be of help and service to each other; to be generous: to keep our hearts open and loving, to let go of any anger, hurt, or hatred and to teach by example. By being willing to grow in goodness and by participating in the goals God has for us, we can not only deepen our understanding of the events in our lives, but also experience all the goodness and joy of God’s great gifts to us. By doing good, we increase goodness in the world and experience that goodness. Buber teaches: “… rejoicing in the world, if we hallow it with our whole being, leads to rejoicing in God.” We are on a magnificent journey on the road that leads to holiness. Angels can only stand still but humankind can rise to unimagined heights, and God is leading us there. May all of us grow in goodness in this New Year, passing our tests, hallowing life, expressing our love and kindness, living joyously, and striving to be grateful and thankful for our continual unfolding.
One way to understand it might be to see it through the prism of our life’s goals. As we gaze ahead into a busy fall and beyond we may have immediate to do lists for the week or month. We may also have things we’d really like to do: travel to a country we’ve never seen, study a new subject, or even just get through the next year without any major health crises for us and our families, being as decent a human being as we can be. You’ve all heard the line, Man plans and God laughs. Why is that? Why should it be that life is so shockingly unpredictable? I would like to suggest that it is because our goals, wants, and needs are so different from God’s goals for us. Speaking about wants is easy. We need food and shelter; and we need money to buy those things, so we need to work or to have worked so that the Divine Presence can help us provide and so that we can contribute to providing for others. We also need love, human interaction and connections, intellectual stimulation, and spiritual nourishment. My teacher of blessed memory, Rabbi Gelberman, once gave a talk about wants and needs. In it he quoted Martin Buber who said, “The difference between the Holy and the Unholy is that the Holy are waiting to be sanctified.” Buber wrote; “We are called to the world in order to hallow it, to redeem it. The world needs us for its hallowing. It is waiting to be hallowed by us// and in hallowed contact with the world, with the things and people we meet on the way, we find our way to God.” So it is not that we should not have material wants, as long as we make the distinction between what we need and what we would like. And we can sanctify what we receive and what we achieve.
Goals are more elusive to speak about. It’s easy to identify short term goals. But how many of us can articulate long term goals? You all know the famous joke: A man goes into the hospital for surgery. The operation is successful. The nurse comes in and says, Mr. Shapiro, "Are you comfortable?" he says, "I make a good living." That’s the middle or upper middle class ideal: a comfortable, peaceful life, earning enough to enjoy our existence here on earth and not having to worry. This is probably the opposite of what God wants for us. Being what I call a spiritual naturalist, someone like Charles Darwin who observes events and draws conclusions from observations, it appears to me that God is interested in our spiritual growth. We are not allowed to stay on one level or in one place for very long. It is obvious that the world is in need of great improvement. How is this going to happen? It can only happen if we are forced to grow, through a series of tests, challenges, opportunities, and acts of Divine Grace: both the carrot and the stick. Every day of our lives we are in Life University: a school from which we will never graduate until we leave this plane of existence. And what are we tested on in this school of life? Compassion, Kindness, generosity, selflessness, caring, humility, and love. This is our life’s course work. This is why life has so many tests and challenges. There is a clash between what we want and what God wants. The world can only improve if we improve. We want a peaceful, easy life. God wants growth. God wants action.
The S’fat Emet, Rabbi Yehuda Leib Alter of Ger, has written “We have already been on a very high rung [of spiritual attainment] on Mt. Sinai. Because of that we can raise ourselves back up to Heaven….From now on [there will be] a way to find everything by means of struggle, as it is said, your deeds will draw you near.” A life of spiritual struggle is therefore our lot, in order to be raised up, in order for the world to keep improving. This is why each person is precious to God: each human being has been given challenges in their personalities and life circumstances to struggle with. We are all one soul, there is only one life between us. Each person is precious because they are purifying their small bit of the soul matter for all of us. Our sages taught, angels can’t rise in holiness. Only human beings can become greater than they are. Similarly, in the Talmud, R. Abbahu, said: The place occupied by repentant sinners cannot be attained even by the completely righteous (Sanhedrin 99a). It is improvement that God notices and requires. That’s why we must not ever be completely satisfied with our level of goodness. Life will not allow us to stand still. Norman Mailer famously wrote: “There was that law of life so cruel and so just which demanded that one must grow or else pay more for remaining the same.”
In the book, Duties of the Heart, by Rabbi Bachya ben Paquda it says that Abraham understood the Torah before it was given. He was already a kind, gracious, generous, compassionate, loving person. Yet God still gave him a further test: the ultimate test: was his faith and trust in God’s goodness so great that he would offer up his own will, his own son, in love, knowing that there must be an explanation and a blessing beyond his comprehension? He did, and he was greatly blessed. There were no other tests for him that we know of. There could not possibly be any other major tests Abraham could be given. He had passed them all. Luckily, none of us are or ever will be at his spiritual level. Our tests are such that we can pass them. Our sages taught, no one is given a test he cannot pass.
In this New Year, we will have many tests, challenges, and opportunities for growth. How will we respond? Most probably, this is what will be asked of us: We will be asked to care about each other more; to be of help and service to each other; to be generous: to keep our hearts open and loving, to let go of any anger, hurt, or hatred and to teach by example. By being willing to grow in goodness and by participating in the goals God has for us, we can not only deepen our understanding of the events in our lives, but also experience all the goodness and joy of God’s great gifts to us. By doing good, we increase goodness in the world and experience that goodness. Buber teaches: “… rejoicing in the world, if we hallow it with our whole being, leads to rejoicing in God.” We are on a magnificent journey on the road that leads to holiness. Angels can only stand still but humankind can rise to unimagined heights, and God is leading us there. May all of us grow in goodness in this New Year, passing our tests, hallowing life, expressing our love and kindness, living joyously, and striving to be grateful and thankful for our continual unfolding.
Thursday, September 13, 2012
The Power of the Gift
This week’s Torah portion is Nasso, which means take. Moses continues to take a census of the Levites; and the Levites are assigned tasks for dismantling and carrying the Tabernacle. Instructions for purifying the camp are given, there is a process to atone for sins, and laws that have been abandoned, such as the trial by ordeal, when a husband is suspicious of a wife; and the rules for temporary nuns and monks, the Nazarites, are outlined. This portion famously includes the Priestly Benediction; and concludes with the description of identical offerings of the tribal families for the dedication of the altar.
Sometimes when I read the Torah, something catches my attention. I make a note of it, and it’s only later that I realize that most of the portion actually addresses this one concept. Here are some verses to consider: “God spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the Children of Israel: a man or woman who commits any human sins, by committing treachery toward God and that person shall become guilty – they shall confess their sin that they committed; he shall make restitution for his guilt in its principal amount and add it’s fifth to it, and give it to the one to whom he is indebted. If the man has not kinsman to whom the debt can be returned, the returned debt is for God, for the Kohen, aside from the ram of atonement with which he shall provide him atonement.” (Num. 5:5-8)
This verse speaks about atonement, but also about giving. The entire sacrificial system is predicated on giving. Giving, in the Torah, is the mechanism for drawing closer to God, for atonement, and for celebrating. Also, in this Torah portion specifically, the Levites give their labor to God, the Tabernacle, and to the community of the Israelites. The Nazarites give their time and good intentions. The priests give their blessings, as well as their time, labor, and attention. The Tribal families give gifts. Giving, then, is very important for a number of reasons. We might ask, why is it that giving effects atonement and why is giving so important? We might think that confession effects atonement, or perhaps confession and personal change, and that certainly is true. But personal transformation is also a form of giving, one in which we dedicate ourselves and give ourselves over to acting in consonance with what we know is right, which is almost always what the Source of Life has asked us to do.
The verses from Nasso also teach us that in order to repair whatever we have done or have taken, we need to give more than we might expect; just the way one who has stolen something must return the stolen goods and also pay a fine. It’s the giving that reestablishes our harmonious relationships with each other and with the Divine Presence; and it doesn’t matter what we give, as long as our intentions in giving are good and pure. In a sense, all we have to give is ourselves. All of life, including giving, works the way love works. By giving love we set in motion the conditions for receiving it. By giving to each other, we set in motion the forces that allow us to receive and to grow, to feel good about ourselves and be able to share with each other.
The converse is also true. In the Talmud: R. Yochanan said, If someone keeps for himself the gifts he is required to turn over to the priests, God will punish him by depriving him of his prosperity and leaving him with nothing more than the small amount that he should have given away to God’s servants. R. Nachman b. Yitzchak affirms that giving causes us to receive: “Whoever has priestly gifts and gives them to the Kohen will be come wealthy, as it says, figuratively, whatever a person gives to the Kohen will belong to the giver.” (The Torah Revealed, R. A.Y. Finkel). As always, in spiritual life, our participation is required, and we are the impetus for our own growth, well-being, and prosperity. Not that we have total control, but that without our giving of ourselves, we make no progress. We can give time, Money, kindness, and teaching. We can give love, we can give help. The more we give the happier we become, as long as we are giving with open hearts and balanced judgment.
In the Midrash it says, (Midrash Rabba Numb. 8:7): “ by virtue of his own merit he will enjoy the fruit of his actions both in this world and in the next. Hence it is written, When thou eat the labor of your hands, meaning, the good deeds which he has painstakingly performed in this world; as you read, And there the weary are at rest (Job III, 17), and also, Whatsoever your hand attains to do by your strength, that do… (Eccl. IX, 10). What is his reward? Happy shall you be, and it shall be well with you.” Giving is the way the world works. One metaphor is seeing the world as a giant pocketwatch, whose many gears and springs work harmoniously together, each part contributing to the whole. In human interactions, withholding causes relationships to break down, but giving builds them up, gives us joy, and allows us to feel connected to God and each other. When we are sad, when we need to atone, when we want to reconnect, giving is the mechanism by which we can make a change. The Source of Life provides us with countless opportunities to give. All we have to do is to open ourselves to the awareness that opportunities are constantly being sent to us, and then seize them by giving generously to ourselves and the universe. May we be givers to each other, of whatever we are, and whatever we have to give, and by so doing, be among those who enrich life and live in great joy.
Sometimes when I read the Torah, something catches my attention. I make a note of it, and it’s only later that I realize that most of the portion actually addresses this one concept. Here are some verses to consider: “God spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the Children of Israel: a man or woman who commits any human sins, by committing treachery toward God and that person shall become guilty – they shall confess their sin that they committed; he shall make restitution for his guilt in its principal amount and add it’s fifth to it, and give it to the one to whom he is indebted. If the man has not kinsman to whom the debt can be returned, the returned debt is for God, for the Kohen, aside from the ram of atonement with which he shall provide him atonement.” (Num. 5:5-8)
This verse speaks about atonement, but also about giving. The entire sacrificial system is predicated on giving. Giving, in the Torah, is the mechanism for drawing closer to God, for atonement, and for celebrating. Also, in this Torah portion specifically, the Levites give their labor to God, the Tabernacle, and to the community of the Israelites. The Nazarites give their time and good intentions. The priests give their blessings, as well as their time, labor, and attention. The Tribal families give gifts. Giving, then, is very important for a number of reasons. We might ask, why is it that giving effects atonement and why is giving so important? We might think that confession effects atonement, or perhaps confession and personal change, and that certainly is true. But personal transformation is also a form of giving, one in which we dedicate ourselves and give ourselves over to acting in consonance with what we know is right, which is almost always what the Source of Life has asked us to do.
The verses from Nasso also teach us that in order to repair whatever we have done or have taken, we need to give more than we might expect; just the way one who has stolen something must return the stolen goods and also pay a fine. It’s the giving that reestablishes our harmonious relationships with each other and with the Divine Presence; and it doesn’t matter what we give, as long as our intentions in giving are good and pure. In a sense, all we have to give is ourselves. All of life, including giving, works the way love works. By giving love we set in motion the conditions for receiving it. By giving to each other, we set in motion the forces that allow us to receive and to grow, to feel good about ourselves and be able to share with each other.
The converse is also true. In the Talmud: R. Yochanan said, If someone keeps for himself the gifts he is required to turn over to the priests, God will punish him by depriving him of his prosperity and leaving him with nothing more than the small amount that he should have given away to God’s servants. R. Nachman b. Yitzchak affirms that giving causes us to receive: “Whoever has priestly gifts and gives them to the Kohen will be come wealthy, as it says, figuratively, whatever a person gives to the Kohen will belong to the giver.” (The Torah Revealed, R. A.Y. Finkel). As always, in spiritual life, our participation is required, and we are the impetus for our own growth, well-being, and prosperity. Not that we have total control, but that without our giving of ourselves, we make no progress. We can give time, Money, kindness, and teaching. We can give love, we can give help. The more we give the happier we become, as long as we are giving with open hearts and balanced judgment.
In the Midrash it says, (Midrash Rabba Numb. 8:7): “ by virtue of his own merit he will enjoy the fruit of his actions both in this world and in the next. Hence it is written, When thou eat the labor of your hands, meaning, the good deeds which he has painstakingly performed in this world; as you read, And there the weary are at rest (Job III, 17), and also, Whatsoever your hand attains to do by your strength, that do… (Eccl. IX, 10). What is his reward? Happy shall you be, and it shall be well with you.” Giving is the way the world works. One metaphor is seeing the world as a giant pocketwatch, whose many gears and springs work harmoniously together, each part contributing to the whole. In human interactions, withholding causes relationships to break down, but giving builds them up, gives us joy, and allows us to feel connected to God and each other. When we are sad, when we need to atone, when we want to reconnect, giving is the mechanism by which we can make a change. The Source of Life provides us with countless opportunities to give. All we have to do is to open ourselves to the awareness that opportunities are constantly being sent to us, and then seize them by giving generously to ourselves and the universe. May we be givers to each other, of whatever we are, and whatever we have to give, and by so doing, be among those who enrich life and live in great joy.
Friday, August 31, 2012
Guest Blogger Barbara Bova, PhD: Review of Show: Siren's Heart
Siren's Heart {about Marilyn Monroe} is a wonderful musical originally shown at Theater For The New City -- it is currently at The Actors' Temple Theatre. The play runs for 90 minutes with 8 original songs.
Louisa Bradshaw captures the sensitivity and kindness of the real Marilyn/Norma Jean from her room in Purgatory. Marilyn talks/explains/contemplates/sings about her life and death with us and we relive it with her. She remembers with fondness her appearance before 17,000 troops in Korea--there she sensed complete love and acceptance. with absolutely no lack of self-confidence with them, her live audience, (and also with us her live audience) and thinks that perhaps she would have gone on to become a stage actress. It also shows the downturns in Marilyn's confidence as her GI appearance was downplayed by someone close to her. But in yet another example of Marilyn's kindness she forgives everyone. I highly recommend this one-woman show.
Friday, July 13, 2012
How To Be A Priest
This week’s Torah portion is Bemidbar, the very first portion in the book of Numbers. Bemidbar means, “in the wilderness.” It’s always read just at the time of Shavuot, when we commemorate the receiving of the Ten Commandments and celebrate the great gift of Torah. This portion begins with a charge to take a census, hence the name of the Book, Numbers. The plan of how the tribes will encamp around the Tabernacle is laid out, with banners and insignias for each tribe. The Levites replace the first born and are appointed to dismantle, carry, and re-erect the tabernacle on their journeys.
All the drama the Israelites have witnessed: the plagues, the parting of the Sea of Reeds, the giving of the Ten Commandments; all the building of the tabernacle, the crises of not enough food and water have stopped. We are all alone in the desert – but not alone. We are with God. Now we have to begin to just live. How do we do that?
The Torah has very practical advice for the Levites, that for us, can take on deeper meaning. But before we can take this advice into ourselves, we must go back to something God said to us right before the giving of the Ten Commandments. God said, “ V’atah t’hiyu li, ma-m’lechet Cohanim v’goi kadosh. You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.”(Ex. 19:6) Of course, this is both an offer and a prophecy: a commandment and the beginning of a brand new religious system. In idol worship, the priest spoke through the idol to the God, who spoke back to the priest, who then reported to the people. Judaism was to begin the democratization of religion. Each of us was to be our own priest. We, then, are the Levites: the priests. We are to interact directly with God and to become holy individually, so that we can be a holy nation.
Here is God’s advice. “…you shall appoint the Levites over the Tabernacle of the Testimony, over everything that belongs to it. They shall carry the tabernacle and all its utensils and they shall tend, (guard, and watch) over it; and they shall encamp around the Tabernacle. When the tabernacle journeys, the Levites shall take it down and when the tabernacle encamps, the Levites shall erect it….and the Levites shall protect the guarding of the tabernacle of the testimony.”
We have to remember what was in the center of the Tabernacle: words. We also have to imagine how weird that must have seemed: no idol, rather laws that were available to all. The sages interpreted the commandment to safeguard the charge of the Tabernacle literally. In ancient times, Levites were stationed around the Tabernacle, and later the Temple at 21 different stations, according to Nachmanides, as an Honor Guard. Our task is to go deeper into the symbolic meaning of the text. Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach said a beautiful thing: “Imagine if I knew the Torah was given only to me, all its holiness was made just for me – how I would throw myself at every word! How I would cry over every word to understand it! When I receive a letter from someone I love I can’t stop reading. This is how we have to learn Torah, as a love-letter from God to us.”
Rabbi Carlebach captures the spirit of the verses from Bemibar. We are to carry the Torah: to carry it with us, because it truly is within us, as it says in Deuteronomy (30:14), “in your heart and in your mouth.” It is part of us and we are part of it. We are to tend, guard, and watch over it, by developing within ourselves that sense of awe and gratitude which we must have once felt, when we received it, and by putting it into practice in our lives so that we can become Torah; not just know it, but live it and be it. We can encamp around it by making it central to the way we live our lives; not something that is part of our cultural and religious heritage only, but by taking it seriously enough to believe that its wisdom is greater than our own. We can take it down when we have searched our hearts in total honesty, and know with all our being that there is something in the text which we, as a society, cannot agree with any longer: such as the practice of slavery or the exclusion of people on the basis of sexual preference. And we can erect it when we look to it for guidance, when we have a difficult choice and don’t know which way to go. Finally, we can protect it by nurturing its truth within our hearts and by refusing to abandon its teachings; by proudly standing up as Jews, and refusing to abandon our unique destiny as guardians of this precious teaching. By protecting Torah, it protects us. By loving it, it will send loving blessings to us.
In the Zohar it says, “How beloved… is the Torah before the Holy One, blessed be God, …. wherever words of the Torah are heard the Holy One, blessed be God, listens together with all the hosts. Indeed, the Divine Presence comes to lodge with the one that gives utterance to those words, (III:118a)... In all one’s deeds it behooves a person to imitate the celestial model, and to realize that according to the nature of a deed below there is a responsive stirring on high ….When one … turns one’s eyes to the heavenly light, that person will be illumined by the light that God will cause to shine upon him. (III: 118b-119a). At this time of Shavuot, when we ready ourselves to receive the Torah once again, may we all be bathed in the heavenly light of understanding, that we may honor and love the Torah. May we carry it with us, tend it within us, strive to understand the spirit of what it is saying to us, and live by its light.
All the drama the Israelites have witnessed: the plagues, the parting of the Sea of Reeds, the giving of the Ten Commandments; all the building of the tabernacle, the crises of not enough food and water have stopped. We are all alone in the desert – but not alone. We are with God. Now we have to begin to just live. How do we do that?
The Torah has very practical advice for the Levites, that for us, can take on deeper meaning. But before we can take this advice into ourselves, we must go back to something God said to us right before the giving of the Ten Commandments. God said, “ V’atah t’hiyu li, ma-m’lechet Cohanim v’goi kadosh. You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.”(Ex. 19:6) Of course, this is both an offer and a prophecy: a commandment and the beginning of a brand new religious system. In idol worship, the priest spoke through the idol to the God, who spoke back to the priest, who then reported to the people. Judaism was to begin the democratization of religion. Each of us was to be our own priest. We, then, are the Levites: the priests. We are to interact directly with God and to become holy individually, so that we can be a holy nation.
Here is God’s advice. “…you shall appoint the Levites over the Tabernacle of the Testimony, over everything that belongs to it. They shall carry the tabernacle and all its utensils and they shall tend, (guard, and watch) over it; and they shall encamp around the Tabernacle. When the tabernacle journeys, the Levites shall take it down and when the tabernacle encamps, the Levites shall erect it….and the Levites shall protect the guarding of the tabernacle of the testimony.”
We have to remember what was in the center of the Tabernacle: words. We also have to imagine how weird that must have seemed: no idol, rather laws that were available to all. The sages interpreted the commandment to safeguard the charge of the Tabernacle literally. In ancient times, Levites were stationed around the Tabernacle, and later the Temple at 21 different stations, according to Nachmanides, as an Honor Guard. Our task is to go deeper into the symbolic meaning of the text. Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach said a beautiful thing: “Imagine if I knew the Torah was given only to me, all its holiness was made just for me – how I would throw myself at every word! How I would cry over every word to understand it! When I receive a letter from someone I love I can’t stop reading. This is how we have to learn Torah, as a love-letter from God to us.”
Rabbi Carlebach captures the spirit of the verses from Bemibar. We are to carry the Torah: to carry it with us, because it truly is within us, as it says in Deuteronomy (30:14), “in your heart and in your mouth.” It is part of us and we are part of it. We are to tend, guard, and watch over it, by developing within ourselves that sense of awe and gratitude which we must have once felt, when we received it, and by putting it into practice in our lives so that we can become Torah; not just know it, but live it and be it. We can encamp around it by making it central to the way we live our lives; not something that is part of our cultural and religious heritage only, but by taking it seriously enough to believe that its wisdom is greater than our own. We can take it down when we have searched our hearts in total honesty, and know with all our being that there is something in the text which we, as a society, cannot agree with any longer: such as the practice of slavery or the exclusion of people on the basis of sexual preference. And we can erect it when we look to it for guidance, when we have a difficult choice and don’t know which way to go. Finally, we can protect it by nurturing its truth within our hearts and by refusing to abandon its teachings; by proudly standing up as Jews, and refusing to abandon our unique destiny as guardians of this precious teaching. By protecting Torah, it protects us. By loving it, it will send loving blessings to us.
In the Zohar it says, “How beloved… is the Torah before the Holy One, blessed be God, …. wherever words of the Torah are heard the Holy One, blessed be God, listens together with all the hosts. Indeed, the Divine Presence comes to lodge with the one that gives utterance to those words, (III:118a)... In all one’s deeds it behooves a person to imitate the celestial model, and to realize that according to the nature of a deed below there is a responsive stirring on high ….When one … turns one’s eyes to the heavenly light, that person will be illumined by the light that God will cause to shine upon him. (III: 118b-119a). At this time of Shavuot, when we ready ourselves to receive the Torah once again, may we all be bathed in the heavenly light of understanding, that we may honor and love the Torah. May we carry it with us, tend it within us, strive to understand the spirit of what it is saying to us, and live by its light.
Friday, July 6, 2012
We Were There
This week’s Torah portion is Ki Tissa, which means.” when you take.” It begins with the taking of a census, goes on to appoint two people to oversee the work of the Tabernacle and holy vestments, and reiterates that Shabbat observance supersedes work on the tabernacle for God. Later in the portion, while Moses is gone, the people make and worship a golden calf. Moses wins forgiveness for them and has an intimate encounter with God, in which he hears a description of God’s attributes: that God is compassionate and gracious; slow to anger, forgiving, and great in kindness and truth.
I’d like to tell you about something I saw while in Peru. My husband and I traveled to Cuzco, which used to be the capital of the Inca Empire. It is over 11,000 feel above sea level, where the oxygen is pretty thin. It has been called the bellybutton of the world. On one of the hills, overlooking the city of Cuzco, there is a major archeological site, whose name is Sacsayhuamán. This site dates from the middle ages, and in Inca times, probably during the 1400’s & 1500’s it was a religious site associated with the worship of the Condor. The Incas had many gods who represented what they called the 3 worlds: the sky, the earth, and the underworld, the world of death. So this site was part of the worship of the forces of the sky. It is a vast site, a very grand plateau probably the size of several football fields, capable of holding thousands of people, with three levels of undulating walls on one side. The guide for our group told us that in 1536, Francisco Pizzaro and his troops began the siege of Cuzco. It took almost a year.
At the end of the siege, the Spanish came up to Sacsayhuamán. There was a religious ritual being enacted there, in which the Inca placed grain on the ground for the condors to descend and eat. The Spanish soldiers massacred every person there: many, many people, and managed to capture a number of condors. They brought the condors down into the city and massacred them too. Thus the Spanish destroyed the religious site, the people, and the Inca religion all in one day. Later they removed stones from the walls there to build churches and cathedrals in Cuzco.
Standing there, I could feel that I was standing on holy ground. It was sanctified by the blood: the deaths of the hundreds and perhaps thousands who were killed there. And I realized that we were the ones who died and we were also the ones doing the killing. God and life are all one. We are one soul, past present, and future. Our Jewish sages have said that to God, there is no past, present, and future. This is also what Einstein believed. Einstein wrote a letter to the family of his friend, Besso, after Besso passed away. He indicated that although Besso had died before him, it was of no consequence, since "...for us physicists believe the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one."
In Ki Tissa we read about the making and worship of the Golden Calf. We may fault the Israelites for their abandonment of the sole worship of one God, but we were there too: not always being able to live up to the level of our knowledge and experience; not always able to live up to our own values and ideals. We are they, but we are also Moses, who knew with a deep, natural knowing, that he must plead for the people, since they were a part of him and he of them. When Moses asked God to give him more information and let him know why Moses found favor “in God’s eyes,” God gave him what we call the 13 attributes: a description of God’s personality: They are: Being, Existence, God; compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in kindness and truth, forgiving willful sins and errors, and who cleanses, but who does not cleanse completely, allowing us to take responsibility for our decisions (the last especially, being an interpretation).
We have made progress since the worship of the Golden Calf. We have made progress since the massacre of the Inca and their sacred birds. But in our world, killing still goes on: in Sudan, in Syria, in the Congo, and elsewhere. Part of us has come so far, but not all of us. The closer we come to being gracious and kind and forgiving to each other; the closer we come to compassion, and truth; to being slower to anger, more patient and more accepting, the closer we will come to what God said to Moses: my Presence shall provide you rest. God’s Presence, that Divine Rest is what we will experience eventually; but also what we can experience occasionally, right now, out of our choosing to live from our knowledge of what we should be striving for. We have been given the goal and the answers. They are right here in Ki Tissa. We can sanctify life not only through death, but through goodness and holy action. May we choose the path of life, of beauty, and of God’s Presence, experiencing the flashes of inner peace and holiness that are truly ours to possess.
I’d like to tell you about something I saw while in Peru. My husband and I traveled to Cuzco, which used to be the capital of the Inca Empire. It is over 11,000 feel above sea level, where the oxygen is pretty thin. It has been called the bellybutton of the world. On one of the hills, overlooking the city of Cuzco, there is a major archeological site, whose name is Sacsayhuamán. This site dates from the middle ages, and in Inca times, probably during the 1400’s & 1500’s it was a religious site associated with the worship of the Condor. The Incas had many gods who represented what they called the 3 worlds: the sky, the earth, and the underworld, the world of death. So this site was part of the worship of the forces of the sky. It is a vast site, a very grand plateau probably the size of several football fields, capable of holding thousands of people, with three levels of undulating walls on one side. The guide for our group told us that in 1536, Francisco Pizzaro and his troops began the siege of Cuzco. It took almost a year.
At the end of the siege, the Spanish came up to Sacsayhuamán. There was a religious ritual being enacted there, in which the Inca placed grain on the ground for the condors to descend and eat. The Spanish soldiers massacred every person there: many, many people, and managed to capture a number of condors. They brought the condors down into the city and massacred them too. Thus the Spanish destroyed the religious site, the people, and the Inca religion all in one day. Later they removed stones from the walls there to build churches and cathedrals in Cuzco.
Standing there, I could feel that I was standing on holy ground. It was sanctified by the blood: the deaths of the hundreds and perhaps thousands who were killed there. And I realized that we were the ones who died and we were also the ones doing the killing. God and life are all one. We are one soul, past present, and future. Our Jewish sages have said that to God, there is no past, present, and future. This is also what Einstein believed. Einstein wrote a letter to the family of his friend, Besso, after Besso passed away. He indicated that although Besso had died before him, it was of no consequence, since "...for us physicists believe the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one."
In Ki Tissa we read about the making and worship of the Golden Calf. We may fault the Israelites for their abandonment of the sole worship of one God, but we were there too: not always being able to live up to the level of our knowledge and experience; not always able to live up to our own values and ideals. We are they, but we are also Moses, who knew with a deep, natural knowing, that he must plead for the people, since they were a part of him and he of them. When Moses asked God to give him more information and let him know why Moses found favor “in God’s eyes,” God gave him what we call the 13 attributes: a description of God’s personality: They are: Being, Existence, God; compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in kindness and truth, forgiving willful sins and errors, and who cleanses, but who does not cleanse completely, allowing us to take responsibility for our decisions (the last especially, being an interpretation).
We have made progress since the worship of the Golden Calf. We have made progress since the massacre of the Inca and their sacred birds. But in our world, killing still goes on: in Sudan, in Syria, in the Congo, and elsewhere. Part of us has come so far, but not all of us. The closer we come to being gracious and kind and forgiving to each other; the closer we come to compassion, and truth; to being slower to anger, more patient and more accepting, the closer we will come to what God said to Moses: my Presence shall provide you rest. God’s Presence, that Divine Rest is what we will experience eventually; but also what we can experience occasionally, right now, out of our choosing to live from our knowledge of what we should be striving for. We have been given the goal and the answers. They are right here in Ki Tissa. We can sanctify life not only through death, but through goodness and holy action. May we choose the path of life, of beauty, and of God’s Presence, experiencing the flashes of inner peace and holiness that are truly ours to possess.
Friday, June 8, 2012
What is Fair and What is True
This week’s Torah portion is Mishpatim, which means ordinances or laws or judgments. It contains a code of civil law that directly follows the Ten Commandments and includes wonderful laws: like the ones that encourage people who have indentured servants to treat them as human being and not as property, that prohibit harm to others through negligence or theft, that provide for interest- free loans to the poor, that prohibit maltreatment of strangers, widows, and orphans, and that encourage people to come to the aid of their enemies, among many other laws. Also, in a spirit of full disclosure, it contains laws that we don’t understand and others that most people don’t agree with.
Twice in this portion it says that God listens to those in pain or in need. The first one says, “You shall not taunt or oppress a stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not persecute any widow or orphan. If you will persecute him! For if he will cry out to me I shall surely hear his cry (Ex. 22:20-22)” And the second one, referring to loans to the poor: …”if you will take your fellow’s garment as security until the sun sets shall you return it to him for it alone is his clothing. It is his garment for his skin. In what should he lie down? So it will be that if he cries out to me, I shall listen for I am compassionate.”
These two quotations give us a window into what it being asked of us. The Torah tells us that there is an ultimate standard of justice that is inherent in the way our world is constructed. The laws in Mishpatim also give us a window into God’s thinking, in a sense. There is a delicate balance in these laws, between what is fair to everyone and what is true. For example, it was true that slavery existed at the time the Torah was given. It is also true that, since there was no consumer credit, that people who found themselves unable to support themselves and pay their bills could sell themselves for a period of six years into indentured servitude. This acted somewhat like our military does today. People can enlist in the army and serve for a period of time while receiving room, board, a salary, and educational opportunities. Of course, this is preferable to indentured slavery, but we can see that both institutions were or are helpful to people, which partially explains why they exist. So God balances what needs to be with the ultimate ideals of justice, and right, and fairness. With our Universal and Divine Parent: no one is favored over anyone else. This is because we are all part of God and live within God. Do we love one of our teeth or one of our fingers more than the others? They are all part of us and we love them (even if we may not like them) equally.
When we don’t understand some of the laws in Mishpatim, it’s important to remember what they are trying to accomplish: instilling respect in us; teaching us to treat each other fairly, enlightening us as to what is cosmically and fundamentally true; helping us to live more peaceful, happy lives; and making allowances for social institutions that existed at that time for the good of society. We know that although there may be good laws and there may be courts; well meaning people and honest judges, that justice is not always served. God and the Torah recognizes this too, which perhaps is why there are the quotations I referred to earlier: If you cry out to me I will hear. If there is a wrong, there is a higher authority to appeal to. God says, in another quotation from Mishpatim, “for I shall not exonerate the wicked (23:7),” meaning that ultimate justice rests with God. This is why the Apter Rebbe said, “If one wishes to judge flawlessly, one must put one’s mind and heart in order and realize that the judgment is in the Presence of God who sits among the Judges (p. 65 The Heschel Tradition).”
This is true for us too: we should put our minds and hearts in order, realizing that God sees what is happening, knows how we feel and what we think about it, cares about us, about others, and about justice, balances all our claims, loves us all equally, and is the court of highest appeal for those who are injured and in need: the One who insures that goodness overcomes our errors and selfishness. May we do our best to help God in these matters: to make the ideals of Torah manifest in the world – to promote fairness and equity; and may we be grateful for the laws, guidance, and understanding God has allowed us to have and to know.
Twice in this portion it says that God listens to those in pain or in need. The first one says, “You shall not taunt or oppress a stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not persecute any widow or orphan. If you will persecute him! For if he will cry out to me I shall surely hear his cry (Ex. 22:20-22)” And the second one, referring to loans to the poor: …”if you will take your fellow’s garment as security until the sun sets shall you return it to him for it alone is his clothing. It is his garment for his skin. In what should he lie down? So it will be that if he cries out to me, I shall listen for I am compassionate.”
These two quotations give us a window into what it being asked of us. The Torah tells us that there is an ultimate standard of justice that is inherent in the way our world is constructed. The laws in Mishpatim also give us a window into God’s thinking, in a sense. There is a delicate balance in these laws, between what is fair to everyone and what is true. For example, it was true that slavery existed at the time the Torah was given. It is also true that, since there was no consumer credit, that people who found themselves unable to support themselves and pay their bills could sell themselves for a period of six years into indentured servitude. This acted somewhat like our military does today. People can enlist in the army and serve for a period of time while receiving room, board, a salary, and educational opportunities. Of course, this is preferable to indentured slavery, but we can see that both institutions were or are helpful to people, which partially explains why they exist. So God balances what needs to be with the ultimate ideals of justice, and right, and fairness. With our Universal and Divine Parent: no one is favored over anyone else. This is because we are all part of God and live within God. Do we love one of our teeth or one of our fingers more than the others? They are all part of us and we love them (even if we may not like them) equally.
When we don’t understand some of the laws in Mishpatim, it’s important to remember what they are trying to accomplish: instilling respect in us; teaching us to treat each other fairly, enlightening us as to what is cosmically and fundamentally true; helping us to live more peaceful, happy lives; and making allowances for social institutions that existed at that time for the good of society. We know that although there may be good laws and there may be courts; well meaning people and honest judges, that justice is not always served. God and the Torah recognizes this too, which perhaps is why there are the quotations I referred to earlier: If you cry out to me I will hear. If there is a wrong, there is a higher authority to appeal to. God says, in another quotation from Mishpatim, “for I shall not exonerate the wicked (23:7),” meaning that ultimate justice rests with God. This is why the Apter Rebbe said, “If one wishes to judge flawlessly, one must put one’s mind and heart in order and realize that the judgment is in the Presence of God who sits among the Judges (p. 65 The Heschel Tradition).”
This is true for us too: we should put our minds and hearts in order, realizing that God sees what is happening, knows how we feel and what we think about it, cares about us, about others, and about justice, balances all our claims, loves us all equally, and is the court of highest appeal for those who are injured and in need: the One who insures that goodness overcomes our errors and selfishness. May we do our best to help God in these matters: to make the ideals of Torah manifest in the world – to promote fairness and equity; and may we be grateful for the laws, guidance, and understanding God has allowed us to have and to know.
Friday, June 1, 2012
Bringing Ourselves to Sinai
This week’s Torah portion is Yitro – named after Jethro, Moses’ Father in Law. Jethro, Moses’ wife, and two sons meet Moses and the Israelites at Mt. Sinai. Jethro advises Moses to establish a system of judges and courts. Moses takes his advice and Jethro departs. The people prepare themselves for the great and terrifying day on which God will speak to them, what we call The Revelation – the only time in human history that God’s words were heard simultaneously by a whole group of people. God speaks the Ten Commandments and subsequently the people become afraid, asking Moses to speak with God and let them know what God requires of them.
The Ten Commandments, which are: I am God, Do not worship idols, Do not take God’s name in vain, Remember the Sabbath, to make it holy, Honor your parents, Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not lie about a legal case, and Do not covet are clearly Divine. They are the only code of law that has never been amended, modernized, or superseded in all of human history. They are the minimum that God asks of us, they fit us humans perfectly, and they work: in that they are the recipe for a successful, happy, productive life. But why do they work and how do they work?
The sages of the Zohar used to say that it was by means of the Torah that the Holy One created the world (I 5a).It was said that, like an engineer, God had a kind of blueprint, the Torah, by which the world was created. But this can be inverted too: that as part of creation, part of God, the Torah reflects the fundamental structure of reality. The Torah’s moral laws, not just the Ten Commandments, but also such precepts as do not gossip, do not hate; love your fellow as yourself, are not only an accurate portrayal of realty, but that they are in fact embedded in reality, an integral part of the way our world is structured and made of the same stuff. They are inseparable from our reality and they are testable.
I like to think of myself as a Religious Naturalist: in the way Darwin was a naturalist – an observer of nature in order to form theories of cause and effect. I, too, am an observer of cause and effect, but my special interest is not natural law but moral law: the spiritual laws of nature. So if you want to test these 10 commandments, it’s easy. You can keep them and see how things go, or you can choose one and break it, and see how the dysfunction in life occurs. Now I’m not really suggesting that anyone break one of the Ten Commandments, but in looking back on our lives, most of us can see how things we’ve done in the past which have transgressed the Torah’s moral precepts have not worked out well. They created hardship or a breakdown in our lives; an interruption in the flow of blessings. This means that these commandments are not just laws of society but are truths: a part of Divinity itself – a part of God and nature: not matter, not energy, but an explanation of the interaction of matter and energy: a key to us, and life, and God. If this is so, then all the Torah’s moral laws have the power to unlock love and goodness in our lives. This is the essential Jewish spiritual path.
In this week’s portion it says: “You have seen what I did to Egypt and that I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to me. (Ex. 19:4)” The Ten Commandments are the bringing. God brought us to Mt. Sinai and set us down gently and lovingly, giving us actual Divinity to grapple with in the guise of the Ten Commandments. We bring ourselves to God by living in accordance with these life giving laws: life giving because being made of Divinity by our Creator, they actually create more life and goodness. The Zohar says: (II:83a-b) Then the Divine word descended from heaven, being on its way engraved upon the four winds of the universe; and then rose once more and again descended. When it rose up it drew from the mountains pure balsam and was watered with the heavenly dew, and when it reached this earth it encompassed the Israelites and brought them back their souls.
This mutual bringing: of us to God by God and of we ourselves approaching God is for the purpose of bringing unification of our souls with God and each other; and of bringing blessings not just to ourselves but to the entire world by exposing ultimate truth and allowing it to come into human understanding. Our task is to realize that we can bring ourselves to a holy place and be a bridge between earth and heaven. We are of the same stuff as the Torah and God. As the Chassidic sages said, “God, the Torah and Israel are all one.” Holiness is God’s gift to us through our being alive. The Torah is the blueprint for our growth into that holiness. May we recognize the holiness we have been blessed with, and may we bring ourselves forward to encounter our own Divine souls on our unique Jewish spiritual path.
The Ten Commandments, which are: I am God, Do not worship idols, Do not take God’s name in vain, Remember the Sabbath, to make it holy, Honor your parents, Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not lie about a legal case, and Do not covet are clearly Divine. They are the only code of law that has never been amended, modernized, or superseded in all of human history. They are the minimum that God asks of us, they fit us humans perfectly, and they work: in that they are the recipe for a successful, happy, productive life. But why do they work and how do they work?
The sages of the Zohar used to say that it was by means of the Torah that the Holy One created the world (I 5a).It was said that, like an engineer, God had a kind of blueprint, the Torah, by which the world was created. But this can be inverted too: that as part of creation, part of God, the Torah reflects the fundamental structure of reality. The Torah’s moral laws, not just the Ten Commandments, but also such precepts as do not gossip, do not hate; love your fellow as yourself, are not only an accurate portrayal of realty, but that they are in fact embedded in reality, an integral part of the way our world is structured and made of the same stuff. They are inseparable from our reality and they are testable.
I like to think of myself as a Religious Naturalist: in the way Darwin was a naturalist – an observer of nature in order to form theories of cause and effect. I, too, am an observer of cause and effect, but my special interest is not natural law but moral law: the spiritual laws of nature. So if you want to test these 10 commandments, it’s easy. You can keep them and see how things go, or you can choose one and break it, and see how the dysfunction in life occurs. Now I’m not really suggesting that anyone break one of the Ten Commandments, but in looking back on our lives, most of us can see how things we’ve done in the past which have transgressed the Torah’s moral precepts have not worked out well. They created hardship or a breakdown in our lives; an interruption in the flow of blessings. This means that these commandments are not just laws of society but are truths: a part of Divinity itself – a part of God and nature: not matter, not energy, but an explanation of the interaction of matter and energy: a key to us, and life, and God. If this is so, then all the Torah’s moral laws have the power to unlock love and goodness in our lives. This is the essential Jewish spiritual path.
In this week’s portion it says: “You have seen what I did to Egypt and that I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to me. (Ex. 19:4)” The Ten Commandments are the bringing. God brought us to Mt. Sinai and set us down gently and lovingly, giving us actual Divinity to grapple with in the guise of the Ten Commandments. We bring ourselves to God by living in accordance with these life giving laws: life giving because being made of Divinity by our Creator, they actually create more life and goodness. The Zohar says: (II:83a-b) Then the Divine word descended from heaven, being on its way engraved upon the four winds of the universe; and then rose once more and again descended. When it rose up it drew from the mountains pure balsam and was watered with the heavenly dew, and when it reached this earth it encompassed the Israelites and brought them back their souls.
This mutual bringing: of us to God by God and of we ourselves approaching God is for the purpose of bringing unification of our souls with God and each other; and of bringing blessings not just to ourselves but to the entire world by exposing ultimate truth and allowing it to come into human understanding. Our task is to realize that we can bring ourselves to a holy place and be a bridge between earth and heaven. We are of the same stuff as the Torah and God. As the Chassidic sages said, “God, the Torah and Israel are all one.” Holiness is God’s gift to us through our being alive. The Torah is the blueprint for our growth into that holiness. May we recognize the holiness we have been blessed with, and may we bring ourselves forward to encounter our own Divine souls on our unique Jewish spiritual path.
Friday, May 25, 2012
Resisting Our Own Freedom
This week’s Torah portion is Bo, which means, Come. God commands Moses to go to Pharaoh to warn him of the last three plagues. Later in the portion, the Israelites are given instructions about the Pesach offering to God, in preparation for departure; and the protection of marking the doors with the blood from the pesach offering; and also staying inside, away from danger. We are given our own calendar and the commandments concerning Passover, to celebrate it with matzah and bitter herbs as an eternal decree; the first borns are consecrated to God. Then Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt.
In the previous portion there had been seven plagues. Toward the beginning of this portion, Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh. Now they warn him of the 8th plague, the swarm of locusts, yet Pharaoh still refuses to send the people out. Then Pharaoh’s servants say to him, “Send out the men that they may serve God, their God. Do you not yet know that Egypt is lost?” (Ex. 10:7). There is a hidden reality that Pharaoh needs to know. This verse seems to extend the theme of knowing that I spoke about last week. Pharaoh thinks he is resisting Moses. In fact, just before the 10th Plague, Pharaoh says to Moses: “Go from me, Beware! Do not see my face anymore for on the day you see my fact you shall die!” (10:28). Pharaoh actually thinks that by getting rid of Moses, he is eliminating his problems. Pharaoh holds the mistaken notion that he is resisting Moses and also the Jewish people. He doesn’t realize that he is resisting truth itself. Whatever shows up in one’s life repeatedly is an attempt by God to manifest a higher truth. God tries to attune Pharaoh’s consciousness to this by showing him that everything Moses or Aaron did or predicted was true or came true. But Pharaoh is just like us. We want to hold onto the present conditions and our present reality, our assumptions and frames of reference. We resist learning the lessons that God and life is trying to teach us.
A large part of gracefully making the transition from youth to maturity, to advanced age is to learn the correct lessons from our experiences. And we resist this, because we do not yet understand that cosmic truths are trying to become manifest in our lives. My favorite sage, the S’fat Emet said, “Always one must first set right the physical and the natural and only afterwards can we come to new insights.” In other words, we have to do certain work: the work of purification: of setting things right emotionally, intellectually, morally, and also physically. And then we will be able to apprehend the truth that is manifesting before us. There are those of us who have been hurt or disappointed by those we cared about. The wounds we suffered caused us to make decisions, which may or may not serve us later on in life. When we shut down certain parts of ourselves, we shut ourselves off from seeing certain truths. We only allow ourselves a kind of partial sight. We have chosen, like Pharaoh, to limit ourselves. In Pharaoh’s case, he transgressed the reality that the Moses and the Hebrews were connected to him and to the Egyptians. He couldn’t have fathomed this, but God was attempting to teach him. And because he kept resisting truth, resisting reality, the results that manifested in his life got worse and worse. When we make decisions that go against the truth of our connection to others, we not only learn the wrong lessons from our life experiences, but we lose opportunity for love, and friendship, and happiness. Things that happen to us occur in order to uncover a deeper truth. Isaiah said: For since the beginning of the world we have not heard, nor have we perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen a God besides you, who should do such a thing for him who waits for him. In the Talmud (Berachot 34b), R. Joshua b. Levi commented: This is the wine which has been preserved in its grapes from the six days of Creation. R. Samuel b. Nahmani said: This is Eden, which has never been seen by the eye of any creature. ( Isa. 64, 3.)
These quotations attest to the hiddeness of truth that gradually makes itself known. The S’fat Emet expresses it differently: “All choice, all human actions and undertakings, come about in accord with God’s will.” In effect, this seems to be about negating choice. If there is only one right decision, then perhaps we may conclude that we are not really free. But it is through a full understanding of truth and hidden reality that we can become fully free. We are most free when we understand that we have only one choice: to choose happiness or to choose suffering. Pharaoh chose suffering. Thank God, we know better or perhaps we are constantly coming to know better. May we each choose openness to each other: connection, giving up the me for the us, and forming friendships that nourish us and bring us joy. May we understand how much truth has been given to us, is being sent to us, and may we learn all that which the God of love and goodness is teaching us.
In the previous portion there had been seven plagues. Toward the beginning of this portion, Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh. Now they warn him of the 8th plague, the swarm of locusts, yet Pharaoh still refuses to send the people out. Then Pharaoh’s servants say to him, “Send out the men that they may serve God, their God. Do you not yet know that Egypt is lost?” (Ex. 10:7). There is a hidden reality that Pharaoh needs to know. This verse seems to extend the theme of knowing that I spoke about last week. Pharaoh thinks he is resisting Moses. In fact, just before the 10th Plague, Pharaoh says to Moses: “Go from me, Beware! Do not see my face anymore for on the day you see my fact you shall die!” (10:28). Pharaoh actually thinks that by getting rid of Moses, he is eliminating his problems. Pharaoh holds the mistaken notion that he is resisting Moses and also the Jewish people. He doesn’t realize that he is resisting truth itself. Whatever shows up in one’s life repeatedly is an attempt by God to manifest a higher truth. God tries to attune Pharaoh’s consciousness to this by showing him that everything Moses or Aaron did or predicted was true or came true. But Pharaoh is just like us. We want to hold onto the present conditions and our present reality, our assumptions and frames of reference. We resist learning the lessons that God and life is trying to teach us.
A large part of gracefully making the transition from youth to maturity, to advanced age is to learn the correct lessons from our experiences. And we resist this, because we do not yet understand that cosmic truths are trying to become manifest in our lives. My favorite sage, the S’fat Emet said, “Always one must first set right the physical and the natural and only afterwards can we come to new insights.” In other words, we have to do certain work: the work of purification: of setting things right emotionally, intellectually, morally, and also physically. And then we will be able to apprehend the truth that is manifesting before us. There are those of us who have been hurt or disappointed by those we cared about. The wounds we suffered caused us to make decisions, which may or may not serve us later on in life. When we shut down certain parts of ourselves, we shut ourselves off from seeing certain truths. We only allow ourselves a kind of partial sight. We have chosen, like Pharaoh, to limit ourselves. In Pharaoh’s case, he transgressed the reality that the Moses and the Hebrews were connected to him and to the Egyptians. He couldn’t have fathomed this, but God was attempting to teach him. And because he kept resisting truth, resisting reality, the results that manifested in his life got worse and worse. When we make decisions that go against the truth of our connection to others, we not only learn the wrong lessons from our life experiences, but we lose opportunity for love, and friendship, and happiness. Things that happen to us occur in order to uncover a deeper truth. Isaiah said: For since the beginning of the world we have not heard, nor have we perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen a God besides you, who should do such a thing for him who waits for him. In the Talmud (Berachot 34b), R. Joshua b. Levi commented: This is the wine which has been preserved in its grapes from the six days of Creation. R. Samuel b. Nahmani said: This is Eden, which has never been seen by the eye of any creature. ( Isa. 64, 3.)
These quotations attest to the hiddeness of truth that gradually makes itself known. The S’fat Emet expresses it differently: “All choice, all human actions and undertakings, come about in accord with God’s will.” In effect, this seems to be about negating choice. If there is only one right decision, then perhaps we may conclude that we are not really free. But it is through a full understanding of truth and hidden reality that we can become fully free. We are most free when we understand that we have only one choice: to choose happiness or to choose suffering. Pharaoh chose suffering. Thank God, we know better or perhaps we are constantly coming to know better. May we each choose openness to each other: connection, giving up the me for the us, and forming friendships that nourish us and bring us joy. May we understand how much truth has been given to us, is being sent to us, and may we learn all that which the God of love and goodness is teaching us.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Noticing God
This week’s Torah portion is Va’eira, which means, and He appeared. God speaks to Moses about the Divine Name and promises to redeem the Israelites and take them out of Egypt, leading them to the Land. Moses has doubts about the success of his mission and voices his frustration to God, who instructs Moses and Aaron to go to Pharaoh and demand that the people be freed. Pharaoh repeatedly refuses, bringing upon himself and his people the plagues of blood, frogs, lice, swarms of beasts, and fiery hail. Each plague brings Pharaoh to consider freeing the people, only to go back on his word and reconsider, once the plagues have been removed.
In this Torah portion, the theme of knowing is introduced in the very beginning, the 3rd verse, which reads: “through my name God I did not become known to them.” Then, as the portion proceeds, this theme is restated eight more times. The Torah says, “so that you will know that I am God.” It’s repeated a few different ways to include Moses, the Israelites, Pharaoh, and the Egyptians. Anything repeated in the Torah has significance and something that appears eight times bears further investigation. So we might ask, what does God want us to know and why does God want us to know it?
The “what” is fairly easy: there was no monotheism at that time, except among us, the Hebrews. God wanted a universal truth to come into the stream of human knowledge, that there is one God and that all other “gods” are not real. This God did through what we now call plagues. The Women’s Torah Commentary points out that the phrase, 10 Plagues, eser makkot, does not appear anywhere in the Torah. God calls these events signs, otot, or wonders, moftim, and not plagues. One would think that the seven years of plenty and seven years of famine in Joseph’s time would have ushered in a period of monotheism. It’s possible that it did, but 200-400 years later, Egypt was again a polytheistic society. The Ten Wonders were designed then, to get our attention, get Pharaoh’s attention, and get the Egyptians’ attention, which they certainly did. We should remember that the first few wonders were merely annoying and not life threatening: the Nile turning to blood so that the Egyptians had to dig to find fresh water, frogs, lice, and insects; later boils, hail, and darkness. Only cattle disease, and the final plague, killing of the firstborn destroyed animal and then also human life.
When God first appeared to Moses, the Torah says: “God saw that Moses turned aside to see and God called out to him from amid the bush.” Moses’ capacity to notice something unusual, to be aware of the inconsistencies of life, was what recommended him for a special spiritual relationship with God. The painter Eugene Delacroix once said, “The eyes of many people are dull or false; they see objects literally; of the exquisite, they see nothing.” And a writer, the Reverend Erie Chapman, who contributed to an online site for caregivers commented: “The decision to see with "dull eyes" or to open to "the exquisite" is very personal. It takes work to learn the appreciation of the sacred.” This is what God wants us to do: to be able to notice and see beyond the obvious. Everything that we encounter has the potential, like the wonders, to educate us: to allow us to see and understand more of the underlying truth of God’s existence and our place within it. The Apter Rebbe, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt once asked, “Why do we need such a strong reminder from God?” I might also ask, Why isn’t truth evident to us and why can’t we automatically notice God’s presence in the everyday occurrences of out lives? If everyone could realize truth innately, there might be no need for a Torah to tell us what is real and what is only an illusion. But also, there would be no progress for us: no learning, no spiritual attainment. We would already be living in the messianic era, called the end of days.
That we have the capability, like Moses to notice and learn from the marvels of our everyday lives is a great gift that we are asked to develop and use: to become aware of more than just the physical and receive the knowledge that is being sent to us. This was said ever so much more elegantly in the Reform movement’s siddur, Gates of Prayer: “Days pass and the years vanish, and we walk sightless among miracles. Eternal One, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing; let there be moments when Your Presence, like lightning, illumines the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness, and exclaim in wonder: How filled with awe is this place, and we did not know it! Blessed is the Eternal One, the holy God!” May we become more and more aware of the Divine Presence, who now as then, wants to be known and to bless us with knowledge and wisdom.
In this Torah portion, the theme of knowing is introduced in the very beginning, the 3rd verse, which reads: “through my name God I did not become known to them.” Then, as the portion proceeds, this theme is restated eight more times. The Torah says, “so that you will know that I am God.” It’s repeated a few different ways to include Moses, the Israelites, Pharaoh, and the Egyptians. Anything repeated in the Torah has significance and something that appears eight times bears further investigation. So we might ask, what does God want us to know and why does God want us to know it?
The “what” is fairly easy: there was no monotheism at that time, except among us, the Hebrews. God wanted a universal truth to come into the stream of human knowledge, that there is one God and that all other “gods” are not real. This God did through what we now call plagues. The Women’s Torah Commentary points out that the phrase, 10 Plagues, eser makkot, does not appear anywhere in the Torah. God calls these events signs, otot, or wonders, moftim, and not plagues. One would think that the seven years of plenty and seven years of famine in Joseph’s time would have ushered in a period of monotheism. It’s possible that it did, but 200-400 years later, Egypt was again a polytheistic society. The Ten Wonders were designed then, to get our attention, get Pharaoh’s attention, and get the Egyptians’ attention, which they certainly did. We should remember that the first few wonders were merely annoying and not life threatening: the Nile turning to blood so that the Egyptians had to dig to find fresh water, frogs, lice, and insects; later boils, hail, and darkness. Only cattle disease, and the final plague, killing of the firstborn destroyed animal and then also human life.
When God first appeared to Moses, the Torah says: “God saw that Moses turned aside to see and God called out to him from amid the bush.” Moses’ capacity to notice something unusual, to be aware of the inconsistencies of life, was what recommended him for a special spiritual relationship with God. The painter Eugene Delacroix once said, “The eyes of many people are dull or false; they see objects literally; of the exquisite, they see nothing.” And a writer, the Reverend Erie Chapman, who contributed to an online site for caregivers commented: “The decision to see with "dull eyes" or to open to "the exquisite" is very personal. It takes work to learn the appreciation of the sacred.” This is what God wants us to do: to be able to notice and see beyond the obvious. Everything that we encounter has the potential, like the wonders, to educate us: to allow us to see and understand more of the underlying truth of God’s existence and our place within it. The Apter Rebbe, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt once asked, “Why do we need such a strong reminder from God?” I might also ask, Why isn’t truth evident to us and why can’t we automatically notice God’s presence in the everyday occurrences of out lives? If everyone could realize truth innately, there might be no need for a Torah to tell us what is real and what is only an illusion. But also, there would be no progress for us: no learning, no spiritual attainment. We would already be living in the messianic era, called the end of days.
That we have the capability, like Moses to notice and learn from the marvels of our everyday lives is a great gift that we are asked to develop and use: to become aware of more than just the physical and receive the knowledge that is being sent to us. This was said ever so much more elegantly in the Reform movement’s siddur, Gates of Prayer: “Days pass and the years vanish, and we walk sightless among miracles. Eternal One, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing; let there be moments when Your Presence, like lightning, illumines the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness, and exclaim in wonder: How filled with awe is this place, and we did not know it! Blessed is the Eternal One, the holy God!” May we become more and more aware of the Divine Presence, who now as then, wants to be known and to bless us with knowledge and wisdom.
Friday, May 4, 2012
We Were There
This week’s Torah portion is Ki Tissa, which means.” when you take.” It begins with the taking of a census, goes on to appoint two people to oversee the work of the Tabernacle and holy vestments, and reiterates that Shabbat observance supersedes work on the tabernacle for God. Later in the portion, while Moses is gone, the people make and worship a golden calf. Moses wins forgiveness for them and has an intimate encounter with God, in which he hears a description of God’s attributes: that God is compassionate and gracious; slow to anger, forgiving, and great in kindness and truth.
I’d like to tell you about something I saw while in Peru. My husband and I traveled to Cuzco, which used to be the capital of the Inca Empire. It is over 11,000 feel above sea level, where the oxygen is pretty thin. It has been called the bellybutton of the world. On one of the hills, overlooking the city of Cuzco, there is a major archeological site, whose name is Sacsayhuamán. This site dates from the middle ages, and in Inca times, probably during the 1400’s & 1500’s it was a religious site associated with the worship of the Condor. The Incas had many gods who represented what they called the 3 worlds: the sky, the earth, and the underworld, the world of death. So this site was part of the worship of the forces of the sky. It is a vast site, a very grand plateau probably the size of several football fields, capable of holding thousands of people, with three levels of undulating walls on one side. The guide for our group told us that in 1536, Francisco Pizzaro and his troops began the siege of Cuzco. It took almost a year. At the end of the siege, the Spanish came up to Sacsayhuamán. There was a religious ritual being enacted there, in which the Inca placed grain on the ground for the condors to descend and eat. The Spanish soldiers massacred every person there: many, many people, and managed to capture a number of condors. They brought the condors down into the city and massacred them too. Thus the Spanish destroyed the religious site, the people, and the Inca religion all in one day. Later they removed stones from the walls there to build churches and cathedrals in Cuzco.
Standing there, I could feel that I was standing on holy ground. It was sanctified by the blood: the deaths of the hundreds and perhaps thousands who were killed there. And I realized that we were the ones who died and we were also the ones doing the killing. God and life are all one. We are one soul, past present, and future. Our Jewish sages have said that to God, there is no past, present, and future. This is also what Einstein believed. Einstein wrote a letter to the family of his friend, Besso, after Besso passed away. He indicated that although Besso had died before him, it was of no consequence, since "...for us physicists believe the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one."
In Ki Tissa we read about the making and worship of the Golden Calf. We may fault the Israelites for their abandonment of the sole worship of one God, but we were there too: not always being able to live up to the level of our knowledge and experience; not always able to live up to our own values and ideals. We are they, but we are also Moses, who knew with a deep, natural knowing, that he must plead for the people, since they were a part of him and he of them. When Moses asked God to give him more information and let him know why Moses found favor “in God’s eyes,” God gave him what we call the 13 attributes: a description of God’s personality: They are: Being, Existence, God; compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in kindness and truth, forgiving willful sins and errors, and who cleanses, but who does not cleanse completely, allowing us to take responsibility for our decisions (the last especially, being an interpretation).
We have made progress since the worship of the Golden Calf. We have made progress since the massacre of the Inca and their sacred birds. But in our world, killing still goes on: in Sudan, in Syria, in the Congo, and elsewhere. Part of us has come so far, but not all of us. The closer we come to being gracious and kind and forgiving to each other; the closer we come to compassion, and truth; to being slower to anger, more patient and more accepting, the closer we will come to what God said to Moses: my Presence shall provide you rest. God’s Presence, that Divine Rest is what we will experience eventually; but also what we can experience occasionally, right now, out of our choosing to live from our knowledge of what we should be striving for. We have been given the goal and the answers. They are right here in Ki Tissa. We can sanctify life not only through death, but through goodness and holy action. May we choose the path of life, of beauty, and of God’s Presence, experiencing the flashes of inner peace and holiness that are truly ours to possess.
I’d like to tell you about something I saw while in Peru. My husband and I traveled to Cuzco, which used to be the capital of the Inca Empire. It is over 11,000 feel above sea level, where the oxygen is pretty thin. It has been called the bellybutton of the world. On one of the hills, overlooking the city of Cuzco, there is a major archeological site, whose name is Sacsayhuamán. This site dates from the middle ages, and in Inca times, probably during the 1400’s & 1500’s it was a religious site associated with the worship of the Condor. The Incas had many gods who represented what they called the 3 worlds: the sky, the earth, and the underworld, the world of death. So this site was part of the worship of the forces of the sky. It is a vast site, a very grand plateau probably the size of several football fields, capable of holding thousands of people, with three levels of undulating walls on one side. The guide for our group told us that in 1536, Francisco Pizzaro and his troops began the siege of Cuzco. It took almost a year. At the end of the siege, the Spanish came up to Sacsayhuamán. There was a religious ritual being enacted there, in which the Inca placed grain on the ground for the condors to descend and eat. The Spanish soldiers massacred every person there: many, many people, and managed to capture a number of condors. They brought the condors down into the city and massacred them too. Thus the Spanish destroyed the religious site, the people, and the Inca religion all in one day. Later they removed stones from the walls there to build churches and cathedrals in Cuzco.
Standing there, I could feel that I was standing on holy ground. It was sanctified by the blood: the deaths of the hundreds and perhaps thousands who were killed there. And I realized that we were the ones who died and we were also the ones doing the killing. God and life are all one. We are one soul, past present, and future. Our Jewish sages have said that to God, there is no past, present, and future. This is also what Einstein believed. Einstein wrote a letter to the family of his friend, Besso, after Besso passed away. He indicated that although Besso had died before him, it was of no consequence, since "...for us physicists believe the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one."
In Ki Tissa we read about the making and worship of the Golden Calf. We may fault the Israelites for their abandonment of the sole worship of one God, but we were there too: not always being able to live up to the level of our knowledge and experience; not always able to live up to our own values and ideals. We are they, but we are also Moses, who knew with a deep, natural knowing, that he must plead for the people, since they were a part of him and he of them. When Moses asked God to give him more information and let him know why Moses found favor “in God’s eyes,” God gave him what we call the 13 attributes: a description of God’s personality: They are: Being, Existence, God; compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in kindness and truth, forgiving willful sins and errors, and who cleanses, but who does not cleanse completely, allowing us to take responsibility for our decisions (the last especially, being an interpretation).
We have made progress since the worship of the Golden Calf. We have made progress since the massacre of the Inca and their sacred birds. But in our world, killing still goes on: in Sudan, in Syria, in the Congo, and elsewhere. Part of us has come so far, but not all of us. The closer we come to being gracious and kind and forgiving to each other; the closer we come to compassion, and truth; to being slower to anger, more patient and more accepting, the closer we will come to what God said to Moses: my Presence shall provide you rest. God’s Presence, that Divine Rest is what we will experience eventually; but also what we can experience occasionally, right now, out of our choosing to live from our knowledge of what we should be striving for. We have been given the goal and the answers. They are right here in Ki Tissa. We can sanctify life not only through death, but through goodness and holy action. May we choose the path of life, of beauty, and of God’s Presence, experiencing the flashes of inner peace and holiness that are truly ours to possess.
Monday, April 16, 2012
The Royalty of Oneness
This week’s Torah portion is Tetzavah, which means, “you will command.” It gives the commandment for the Ner Tamid, the continual light, shining forth from the golden Menorah that the priests were to light within the Tabernacle. This commandment is the reason every synagogue has a light above the ark. Most of the rest of this portion describes the clothing the priests were to wear. Briefly: a robe and a sash, a breastplate, and a turban that looked like a crown, with a golden plate at the forehead, very similar to the way our Torahs are dressed today. The breastplate of the High Priest had twelve jewels arranged in four rows, to symbolize each of the twelve tribes of Israel, and it was attached by golden chains to a kind of apron. The breastplate and apron were made out of a special woven material containing red, blue, and purple wool, white linen, and real gold thread. An outfit of royalty – fit for a king! In the Torah (Levit. 19) there is a prohibition against wearing mixed fibers, such as wool and linen, yet the Priest was commanded to do so: to be elevated above all others. But it was not to aggrandize the Priest himself, the man who served as Kohen Gadol or High Priest. For the High Priest represented the people. He expressed the royalty and elevation of the people, joined together in holiness, who came before him to elevate themselves: to worship God, express their gratitude, and become finer human beings by atoning for their sins. Tonight, Jewish people across the United States and Canada – Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstructionist, Reform, and others – have come together to celebrate Shabbat for the same purpose: to pray; to thank God, and to ascend in goodness. By joining together we are greater than the sum of our parts, our individual selves. Abraham Joshua Heschel’s book, The Sabbath, speaks of Shabbat as holiness in time. Tonight, Tetzaveh also shows us that this Shabbat is royalty in time: an expansion of who we are, through our solidarity and participation. Both the gold in the High Priest’s vestments and also the eternal light reflect our holy souls, given to us by God, which shine forth on Shabbat like the brightness of the ancient Menorah. When we transcend our differences and join together for a holy purpose we express a royal unity, where the Oneness of God’s Presence can dwell. The Psalmist said, “Hineh matov umanayim shevet achim gam yachad: How good and pleasant if is when brothers and sisters dwell together.” May our souls shine forth on this Shabbat, allowing us to experience how good and pleasant Oneness is; and may this feeling allow us to elevate ourselves and express our royalty, our innate goodness, and our beaming inner light.
Monday, April 9, 2012
Guest Bloggers: Passover Package Deliveries with Dorot
I want to thank you all for taking time from your busy lives to bring smiles
to those people who are further along in their lives and who are now coping
with the problems "staying alive" brings. The person I visited was very
grateful that we came.
Iris Berger, Aron Bederson and Florence Cohen went to visit a terrific woman
on West 73rd Street. She was so happy to see us and share memories of her
very full life which started in Germany and brought her to America with her
parents and sister, fortunately before WWII. She must be in her 90's and
although physically somewhat incapacitated her mind and memory are very
active. She edited books and wrote beautiful poetry which we were able to
read. Her determination and good spirits keeps her going and she is able
to participate in activities at the senior citizens center. Aron sang an
aria from Tannhauser in German which thrilled our lady along with Iris, the
aide and myself. By Florence Cohen
Ruth Sandberg and I visited a woman who imigrated from India many years ago. She received most of her education in India and England then came to the US for her doctorate in Economics. She was only able to get part time jobs then was not able to complete her PhD. She was most hospitable to Ruth and I. Ruth and Jharma shared some experiences they had at the various Jewish Community Centers in the neighborhood--Jharma lives on West 77th Street in the luxury Hotel on the Avenue. However she and some others are rent stabilized tenants and the landlords are always looking for reasons to evict. The hotel cleans her apartment--a room and a kitchen--and makes her bed weekly. She also has keys to a kitchen on her floor but only for her. She is very interesting and likes to have discussions and company. I am happy to have visited her as is Ruth as well. By Barbara Bova
Barbara Nathan and I visited a wonderful Brooklyn native named Herbert. He's 97 and all smiles. He regaled us with sweet stories of his days as a hair dresser and shared some of the challenges, such as having an absent father, he's faced in his long life. He was so appreciative of our visit and it was touching to see how much he likes his assistant, Sal, from the Philippines. I happened to wear a yarmulke that day and when Herbert asked me about it, Sal promptly brought Herbert his yarmulke, which he put on the man's head. It had his Hebrew name, Tzvi, embroidered on it. 97th birthday decorations were on the wall behind him and in the kitchen. They spelled out his nickname "Hoopert" because his grandkids couldn't say Herbert when they were very young. Herbert says the decorations remind him of his age when he forgets. It was such a warm and fulfilling experience. Thank you, Michael, for making these happen and getting the Actor's Temple involved in such mitzvahs. By Philip Rosenbaum
We would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to you and all the Actors' Temple volunteers who participated in DOROT's Passover Package Delivery on Sunday, March 25, 2012.
Your delivery of Passover treats and welcome company helped brighten the holiday for nearly 525 isolated elders, and helped forge yet another loving link between the generations. From Dorot, the Agency under whose auspices the deliver was accomplished.
to those people who are further along in their lives and who are now coping
with the problems "staying alive" brings. The person I visited was very
grateful that we came.
Iris Berger, Aron Bederson and Florence Cohen went to visit a terrific woman
on West 73rd Street. She was so happy to see us and share memories of her
very full life which started in Germany and brought her to America with her
parents and sister, fortunately before WWII. She must be in her 90's and
although physically somewhat incapacitated her mind and memory are very
active. She edited books and wrote beautiful poetry which we were able to
read. Her determination and good spirits keeps her going and she is able
to participate in activities at the senior citizens center. Aron sang an
aria from Tannhauser in German which thrilled our lady along with Iris, the
aide and myself. By Florence Cohen
Ruth Sandberg and I visited a woman who imigrated from India many years ago. She received most of her education in India and England then came to the US for her doctorate in Economics. She was only able to get part time jobs then was not able to complete her PhD. She was most hospitable to Ruth and I. Ruth and Jharma shared some experiences they had at the various Jewish Community Centers in the neighborhood--Jharma lives on West 77th Street in the luxury Hotel on the Avenue. However she and some others are rent stabilized tenants and the landlords are always looking for reasons to evict. The hotel cleans her apartment--a room and a kitchen--and makes her bed weekly. She also has keys to a kitchen on her floor but only for her. She is very interesting and likes to have discussions and company. I am happy to have visited her as is Ruth as well. By Barbara Bova
Barbara Nathan and I visited a wonderful Brooklyn native named Herbert. He's 97 and all smiles. He regaled us with sweet stories of his days as a hair dresser and shared some of the challenges, such as having an absent father, he's faced in his long life. He was so appreciative of our visit and it was touching to see how much he likes his assistant, Sal, from the Philippines. I happened to wear a yarmulke that day and when Herbert asked me about it, Sal promptly brought Herbert his yarmulke, which he put on the man's head. It had his Hebrew name, Tzvi, embroidered on it. 97th birthday decorations were on the wall behind him and in the kitchen. They spelled out his nickname "Hoopert" because his grandkids couldn't say Herbert when they were very young. Herbert says the decorations remind him of his age when he forgets. It was such a warm and fulfilling experience. Thank you, Michael, for making these happen and getting the Actor's Temple involved in such mitzvahs. By Philip Rosenbaum
We would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to you and all the Actors' Temple volunteers who participated in DOROT's Passover Package Delivery on Sunday, March 25, 2012.
Your delivery of Passover treats and welcome company helped brighten the holiday for nearly 525 isolated elders, and helped forge yet another loving link between the generations. From Dorot, the Agency under whose auspices the deliver was accomplished.
Guest Bloggers: Passover Package Deliveries with Dorot
I want to thank you all for taking time from your busy lives to bring smiles
to those people who are further along in their lives and who are now coping
with the problems "staying alive" brings. The person I visited was very
grateful that we came.
Iris Berger, Aron Bederson and Florence Cohen went to visit a terrific woman
on West 73rd Street. She was so happy to see us and share memories of her
very full life which started in Germany and brought her to America with her
parents and sister, fortunately before WWII. She must be in her 90's and
although physically somewhat incapacitated her mind and memory are very
active. She edited books and wrote beautiful poetry which we were able to
read. Her determination and good spirits keeps her going and she is able
to participate in activities at the senior citizens center. Aron sang an
aria from Tannhauser in German which thrilled our lady along with Iris, the
aide and myself. By Florence Cohen
Ruth Sandberg and I visited a woman who imigrated from India many years ago. She received most of her education in India and England then came to the US for her doctorate in Economics. She was only able to get part time jobs then was not able to complete her PhD. She was most hospitable to Ruth and I. Ruth and Jharma shared some experiences they had at the various Jewish Community Centers in the neighborhood--Jharma lives on West 77th Street in the luxury Hotel on the Avenue. However she and some others are rent stabilized tenants and the landlords are always looking for reasons to evict. The hotel cleans her apartment--a room and a kitchen--and makes her bed weekly. She also has keys to a kitchen on her floor but only for her. She is very interesting and likes to have discussions and company. I am happy to have visited her as is Ruth as well. By Barbara Bova
Barbara Nathan and I visited a wonderful Brooklyn native named Herbert. He's 97 and all smiles. He regaled us with sweet stories of his days as a hair dresser and shared some of the challenges, such as having an absent father, he's faced in his long life. He was so appreciative of our visit and it was touching to see how much he likes his assistant, Sal, from the Philippines. I happened to wear a yarmulke that day and when Herbert asked me about it, Sal promptly brought Herbert his yarmulke, which he put on the man's head. It had his Hebrew name, Tzvi, embroidered on it. 97th birthday decorations were on the wall behind him and in the kitchen. They spelled out his nickname "Hoopert" because his grandkids couldn't say Herbert when they were very young. Herbert says the decorations remind him of his age when he forgets. It was such a warm and fulfilling experience. Thank you, Michael, for making these happen and getting the Actor's Temple involved in such mitzvahs. By Philip Rosenbaum
We would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to you and all the Actors' Temple volunteers who participated in DOROT's Passover Package Delivery on Sunday, March 25, 2012.
Your delivery of Passover treats and welcome company helped brighten the holiday for nearly 525 isolated elders, and helped forge yet another loving link between the generations. From Dorot, the Agency under whose auspices the deliver was accomplished.
to those people who are further along in their lives and who are now coping
with the problems "staying alive" brings. The person I visited was very
grateful that we came.
Iris Berger, Aron Bederson and Florence Cohen went to visit a terrific woman
on West 73rd Street. She was so happy to see us and share memories of her
very full life which started in Germany and brought her to America with her
parents and sister, fortunately before WWII. She must be in her 90's and
although physically somewhat incapacitated her mind and memory are very
active. She edited books and wrote beautiful poetry which we were able to
read. Her determination and good spirits keeps her going and she is able
to participate in activities at the senior citizens center. Aron sang an
aria from Tannhauser in German which thrilled our lady along with Iris, the
aide and myself. By Florence Cohen
Ruth Sandberg and I visited a woman who imigrated from India many years ago. She received most of her education in India and England then came to the US for her doctorate in Economics. She was only able to get part time jobs then was not able to complete her PhD. She was most hospitable to Ruth and I. Ruth and Jharma shared some experiences they had at the various Jewish Community Centers in the neighborhood--Jharma lives on West 77th Street in the luxury Hotel on the Avenue. However she and some others are rent stabilized tenants and the landlords are always looking for reasons to evict. The hotel cleans her apartment--a room and a kitchen--and makes her bed weekly. She also has keys to a kitchen on her floor but only for her. She is very interesting and likes to have discussions and company. I am happy to have visited her as is Ruth as well. By Barbara Bova
Barbara Nathan and I visited a wonderful Brooklyn native named Herbert. He's 97 and all smiles. He regaled us with sweet stories of his days as a hair dresser and shared some of the challenges, such as having an absent father, he's faced in his long life. He was so appreciative of our visit and it was touching to see how much he likes his assistant, Sal, from the Philippines. I happened to wear a yarmulke that day and when Herbert asked me about it, Sal promptly brought Herbert his yarmulke, which he put on the man's head. It had his Hebrew name, Tzvi, embroidered on it. 97th birthday decorations were on the wall behind him and in the kitchen. They spelled out his nickname "Hoopert" because his grandkids couldn't say Herbert when they were very young. Herbert says the decorations remind him of his age when he forgets. It was such a warm and fulfilling experience. Thank you, Michael, for making these happen and getting the Actor's Temple involved in such mitzvahs. By Philip Rosenbaum
We would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to you and all the Actors' Temple volunteers who participated in DOROT's Passover Package Delivery on Sunday, March 25, 2012.
Your delivery of Passover treats and welcome company helped brighten the holiday for nearly 525 isolated elders, and helped forge yet another loving link between the generations. From Dorot, the Agency under whose auspices the deliver was accomplished.
Friday, March 23, 2012
What is Fair and What is True
This week’s Torah portion is Mishpatim, which means ordinances or laws or judgments. It contains a code of civil law that directly follows the Ten Commandments and includes wonderful laws: like the ones that encourage people who have indentured servants to treat them as human being and not as property, that prohibit harm to others through negligence or theft, that provide for interest- free loans to the poor, that prohibit maltreatment of strangers, widows, and orphans, and that encourage people to come to the aid of their enemies, among many other laws. Also, in a spirit of full disclosure, it contains laws that we don’t understand and others that most people don’t agree with.
Twice in this portion it says that God listens to those in pain or in need. The first one says, “You shall not taunt or oppress a stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not persecute any widow or orphan. If you will persecute him! For if he will cry out to me I shall surely hear his cry (Ex. 22:20-22)” And the second one, referring to loans to the poor: …”if you will take your fellow’s garment as security until the sun sets shall you return it to him for it alone is his clothing. It is his garment for his skin. In what should he lie down? So it will be that if he cries out to me, I shall listen for I am compassionate.”
These two quotations give us a window into what it being asked of us. The Torah tells us that there is an ultimate standard of justice that is inherent in the way our world is constructed. The laws in Mishpatim also give us a window into God’s thinking, in a sense. There is a delicate balance in these laws, between what is fair to everyone and what is true. For example, it was true that slavery existed at the time the Torah was given. It is also true that, since there was no consumer credit, that people who found themselves unable to support themselves and pay their bills could sell themselves for a period of six years into indentured servitude. This acted somewhat like our military does today. People can enlist in the army and serve for a period of time while receiving room, board, a salary, and educational opportunities. Of course, this is preferable to indentured slavery, but we can see that both institutions were or are helpful to people, which partially explains why they exist. So God balances what needs to be with the ultimate ideals of justice, and right, and fairness. With our Universal and Divine Parent: no one is favored over anyone else. This is because we are all part of God and live within God. Do we love one of our teeth or one of our fingers more than the others? They are all part of us and we love them (even if we may not like them) equally. When we don’t understand some of the laws in Mishpatim, it’s important to remember what they are trying to accomplish: instilling respect in us; teaching us to treat each other fairly, enlightening us as to what is cosmically and fundamentally true; helping us to live more peaceful, happy lives; and making allowances for social institutions that existed at that time for the good of society. We know that although there may be good laws and there may be courts; well meaning people and honest judges, that justice is not always served. God and the Torah recognizes this too, which perhaps is why there are the quotations I referred to earlier: If you cry out to me I will hear. If there is a wrong, there is a higher authority to appeal to. God says, in another quotation from Mishpatim, “for I shall not exonerate the wicked (23:7),” meaning that ultimate justice rests with God. This is why the Apter Rebbe said, “If one wishes to judge flawlessly, one must put one’s mind and heart in order and realize that the judgment is in the Presence of God who sits among the Judges (p. 65 The Heschel Tradition).” This is true for us too: we should put our minds and hearts in order, realizing that God sees what is happening, knows how we feel and what we think about it, cares about us, about others, and about justice, balances all our claims, loves us all equally, and is the court of highest appeal for those who are injured and in need: the One who insures that goodness overcomes our errors and selfishness. May we do our best to help God in these matters: to make the ideals of Torah manifest in the world – to promote fairness and equity; and may we be grateful for the laws, guidance, and understanding God has allowed us to have and to know.
Twice in this portion it says that God listens to those in pain or in need. The first one says, “You shall not taunt or oppress a stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not persecute any widow or orphan. If you will persecute him! For if he will cry out to me I shall surely hear his cry (Ex. 22:20-22)” And the second one, referring to loans to the poor: …”if you will take your fellow’s garment as security until the sun sets shall you return it to him for it alone is his clothing. It is his garment for his skin. In what should he lie down? So it will be that if he cries out to me, I shall listen for I am compassionate.”
These two quotations give us a window into what it being asked of us. The Torah tells us that there is an ultimate standard of justice that is inherent in the way our world is constructed. The laws in Mishpatim also give us a window into God’s thinking, in a sense. There is a delicate balance in these laws, between what is fair to everyone and what is true. For example, it was true that slavery existed at the time the Torah was given. It is also true that, since there was no consumer credit, that people who found themselves unable to support themselves and pay their bills could sell themselves for a period of six years into indentured servitude. This acted somewhat like our military does today. People can enlist in the army and serve for a period of time while receiving room, board, a salary, and educational opportunities. Of course, this is preferable to indentured slavery, but we can see that both institutions were or are helpful to people, which partially explains why they exist. So God balances what needs to be with the ultimate ideals of justice, and right, and fairness. With our Universal and Divine Parent: no one is favored over anyone else. This is because we are all part of God and live within God. Do we love one of our teeth or one of our fingers more than the others? They are all part of us and we love them (even if we may not like them) equally. When we don’t understand some of the laws in Mishpatim, it’s important to remember what they are trying to accomplish: instilling respect in us; teaching us to treat each other fairly, enlightening us as to what is cosmically and fundamentally true; helping us to live more peaceful, happy lives; and making allowances for social institutions that existed at that time for the good of society. We know that although there may be good laws and there may be courts; well meaning people and honest judges, that justice is not always served. God and the Torah recognizes this too, which perhaps is why there are the quotations I referred to earlier: If you cry out to me I will hear. If there is a wrong, there is a higher authority to appeal to. God says, in another quotation from Mishpatim, “for I shall not exonerate the wicked (23:7),” meaning that ultimate justice rests with God. This is why the Apter Rebbe said, “If one wishes to judge flawlessly, one must put one’s mind and heart in order and realize that the judgment is in the Presence of God who sits among the Judges (p. 65 The Heschel Tradition).” This is true for us too: we should put our minds and hearts in order, realizing that God sees what is happening, knows how we feel and what we think about it, cares about us, about others, and about justice, balances all our claims, loves us all equally, and is the court of highest appeal for those who are injured and in need: the One who insures that goodness overcomes our errors and selfishness. May we do our best to help God in these matters: to make the ideals of Torah manifest in the world – to promote fairness and equity; and may we be grateful for the laws, guidance, and understanding God has allowed us to have and to know.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Bringing Ourselves to the Mountain
This week’s Torah portion is Yitro – named after Jethro, Moses’ Father in Law. Jethro, Moses’ wife, and two sons meet Moses and the Israelites at Mt. Sinai. Jethro advises Moses to establish a system of judges and courts. Moses takes his advice and Jethro departs. The people prepare themselves for the great and terrifying day on which God will speak to them, what we call The Revelation – the only time in human history that God’s words were heard simultaneously by a whole group of people. God speaks the Ten Commandments and subsequently the people become afraid, asking Moses to speak with God and let them know what God requires of them.
The Ten Commandments, which are: I am God, Do not worship idols, Do not take God’s name in vain, Remember the Sabbath, to make it holy, Honor your parents, Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not lie about a legal case, and Do not covet are clearly Divine. They are the only code of law that has never been amended, modernized, or superseded in all of human history. They are the minimum that God asks of us, they fit us humans perfectly, and they work: in that they are the recipe for a successful, happy, productive life. But why do they work and how do they work? The sages of the Zohar used to say that it was by means of the Torah that the Holy One created the world (I 5a).It was said that, like an engineer, God had a kind of blueprint, the Torah, by which the world was created. But this can be inverted too: that as part of creation, part of God, the Torah reflects the fundamental structure of reality. The Torah’s moral laws, not just the Ten Commandments, but also such precepts as do not gossip, do not hate; love your fellow as yourself, are not only an accurate portrayal of realty, but that they are in fact embedded in reality, an integral part of the way our world is structured and made of the same stuff. They are inseparable from our reality and they are testable.
I like to think of myself as a Religious Naturalist: in the way Darwin was a naturalist – an observer of nature in order to form theories of cause and effect. I, too, am an observer of cause and effect, but my special interest is not natural law but moral law: the spiritual laws of nature. So if you want to test these 10 commandments, it’s easy. You can keep them and see how things go, or you can choose one and break it, and see how the dysfunction in life occurs. Now I’m not really suggesting that anyone break one of the Ten Commandments, but in looking back on our lives, most of us can see how things we’ve done in the past which have transgressed the Torah’s moral precepts have not worked out well. They created hardship or a breakdown in our lives; an interruption in the flow of blessings. This means that these commandments are not just laws of society but are truths: a part of Divinity itself – a part of God and nature: not matter, not energy, but an explanation of the interaction of matter and energy: a key to us, and life, and God. If this is so, then all the Torah’s moral laws have the power to unlock love and goodness in our lives. This is the essential Jewish spiritual path.
In this week’s portion it says: “You have seen what I did to Egypt and that I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to me. (Ex. 19:4)” The Ten Commandments are the bringing. God brought us to Mt. Sinai and set us down gently and lovingly, giving us actual Divinity to grapple with in the guise of the Ten Commandments. We bring ourselves to God by living in accordance with these life giving laws: life giving because being made of Divinity by our Creator, they actually create more life and goodness. The Zohar says: (II:83a-b) Then the Divine word descended from heaven, being on its way engraved upon the four winds of the universe; and then rose once more and again descended. When it rose up it drew from the mountains pure balsam and was watered with the heavenly dew, and when it reached this earth it encompassed the Israelites and brought them back their souls. This mutual bringing: of us to God by God and of we ourselves approaching God is for the purpose of bringing unification of our souls with God and each other; and of bringing blessings not just to ourselves but to the entire world by exposing ultimate truth and allowing it to come into human understanding. Our task is to realize that we can bring ourselves to a holy place and be a bridge between earth and heaven. We are of the same stuff as the Torah and God. As the Chassidic sages said, “God, the Torah and Israel are all one.” Holiness is God’s gift to us through our being alive. The Torah is the blueprint for our growth into that holiness. May we recognize the holiness we have been blessed with, and may we bring ourselves forward to encounter our own Divine souls on our unique Jewish spiritual path.
The Ten Commandments, which are: I am God, Do not worship idols, Do not take God’s name in vain, Remember the Sabbath, to make it holy, Honor your parents, Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not lie about a legal case, and Do not covet are clearly Divine. They are the only code of law that has never been amended, modernized, or superseded in all of human history. They are the minimum that God asks of us, they fit us humans perfectly, and they work: in that they are the recipe for a successful, happy, productive life. But why do they work and how do they work? The sages of the Zohar used to say that it was by means of the Torah that the Holy One created the world (I 5a).It was said that, like an engineer, God had a kind of blueprint, the Torah, by which the world was created. But this can be inverted too: that as part of creation, part of God, the Torah reflects the fundamental structure of reality. The Torah’s moral laws, not just the Ten Commandments, but also such precepts as do not gossip, do not hate; love your fellow as yourself, are not only an accurate portrayal of realty, but that they are in fact embedded in reality, an integral part of the way our world is structured and made of the same stuff. They are inseparable from our reality and they are testable.
I like to think of myself as a Religious Naturalist: in the way Darwin was a naturalist – an observer of nature in order to form theories of cause and effect. I, too, am an observer of cause and effect, but my special interest is not natural law but moral law: the spiritual laws of nature. So if you want to test these 10 commandments, it’s easy. You can keep them and see how things go, or you can choose one and break it, and see how the dysfunction in life occurs. Now I’m not really suggesting that anyone break one of the Ten Commandments, but in looking back on our lives, most of us can see how things we’ve done in the past which have transgressed the Torah’s moral precepts have not worked out well. They created hardship or a breakdown in our lives; an interruption in the flow of blessings. This means that these commandments are not just laws of society but are truths: a part of Divinity itself – a part of God and nature: not matter, not energy, but an explanation of the interaction of matter and energy: a key to us, and life, and God. If this is so, then all the Torah’s moral laws have the power to unlock love and goodness in our lives. This is the essential Jewish spiritual path.
In this week’s portion it says: “You have seen what I did to Egypt and that I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to me. (Ex. 19:4)” The Ten Commandments are the bringing. God brought us to Mt. Sinai and set us down gently and lovingly, giving us actual Divinity to grapple with in the guise of the Ten Commandments. We bring ourselves to God by living in accordance with these life giving laws: life giving because being made of Divinity by our Creator, they actually create more life and goodness. The Zohar says: (II:83a-b) Then the Divine word descended from heaven, being on its way engraved upon the four winds of the universe; and then rose once more and again descended. When it rose up it drew from the mountains pure balsam and was watered with the heavenly dew, and when it reached this earth it encompassed the Israelites and brought them back their souls. This mutual bringing: of us to God by God and of we ourselves approaching God is for the purpose of bringing unification of our souls with God and each other; and of bringing blessings not just to ourselves but to the entire world by exposing ultimate truth and allowing it to come into human understanding. Our task is to realize that we can bring ourselves to a holy place and be a bridge between earth and heaven. We are of the same stuff as the Torah and God. As the Chassidic sages said, “God, the Torah and Israel are all one.” Holiness is God’s gift to us through our being alive. The Torah is the blueprint for our growth into that holiness. May we recognize the holiness we have been blessed with, and may we bring ourselves forward to encounter our own Divine souls on our unique Jewish spiritual path.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Choosing Suffering or Choosing Blessing
This week’s Torah portion is Bo, which means, Come. God commands Moses to go to Pharaoh to warn him of the last three plagues. Later in the portion, the Israelites are given instructions about the Pesach offering to God, in preparation for departure; and the protection of marking the doors with the blood from the pesach offering; and also staying inside, away from danger. We are given our own calendar and the commandments concerning Passover, to celebrate it with matzah and bitter herbs as an eternal decree; the first borns are consecrated to God. Then Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt.
In the previous portion there had been seven plagues. Toward the beginning of this portion, Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh. Now they warn him of the 8th plague, the swarm of locusts, yet Pharaoh still refuses to send the people out. Then Pharaoh’s servants say to him, “Send out the men that they may serve God, their God. Do you not yet know that Egypt is lost?” (Ex. 10:7). There is a hidden reality that Pharaoh needs to know. This verse seems to extend the theme of knowing that I spoke about last week. Pharaoh thinks he is resisting Moses. In fact, just before the 10th Plague, Pharaoh says to Moses: “Go from me, Beware! Do not see my face anymore for on the day you see my fact you shall die!” (10:28). Pharaoh actually thinks that by getting rid of Moses, he is eliminating his problems. Pharaoh holds the mistaken notion that he is resisting Moses and also the Jewish people. He doesn’t realize that he is resisting truth itself.
Whatever shows up in one’s life repeatedly is an attempt by God to manifest a higher truth. God tries to attune Pharaoh’s consciousness to this by showing him that everything Moses or Aaron did or predicted was true or came true. But Pharaoh is just like us. We want to hold onto the present conditions and our present reality, our assumptions and frames of reference. We resist learning the lessons that God and life is trying to teach us. A large part of gracefully making the transition from youth to maturity, to advanced age is to learn the correct lessons from our experiences. And we resist this, because we do not yet understand that cosmic truths are trying to become manifest in our lives. My favorite sage, the S’fat Emet said, “Always one must first set right the physical and the natural and only afterwards can we come to new insights.” In other words, we have to do certain work: the work of purification: of setting things right emotionally, intellectually, morally, and also physically. And then we will be able to apprehend the truth that is manifesting before us. There are those of us who have been hurt or disappointed by those we cared about. The wounds we suffered caused us to make decisions, which may or may not serve us later on in life. When we shut down certain parts of ourselves, we shut ourselves off from seeing certain truths. We only allow ourselves a kind of partial sight. We have chosen, like Pharaoh, to limit ourselves. In Pharaoh’s case, he transgressed the reality that the Moses and the Hebrews were connected to him and to the Egyptians. He couldn’t have fathomed this, but God was attempting to teach him. And because he kept resisting truth, resisting reality, the results that manifested in his life got worse and worse. When we make decisions that go against the truth of our connection to others, we not only learn the wrong lessons from our life experiences, but we lose opportunity for love, and friendship, and happiness. Things that happen to us occur in order to uncover a deeper truth. Isaiah said: For since the beginning of the world we have not heard, nor have we perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen a God besides you, who should do such a thing for him who waits for him. In the Talmud (Berachot 34b), R. Joshua b. Levi commented: This is the wine which has been preserved in its grapes from the six days of Creation. R. Samuel b. Nahmani said: This is Eden, which has never been seen by the eye of any creature. ( Isa. 64, 3.)
These quotations attest to the hiddeness of truth that gradually makes itself known. The S’fat Emet expresses it differently: “All choice, all human actions and undertakings, come about in accord with God’s will.” In effect, this seems to be about negating choice. If there is only one right decision, then perhaps we may conclude that we are not really free. But it is through a full understanding of truth and hidden reality that we can become fully free. We are most free when we understand that we have only one choice: to choose happiness or to choose suffering. Pharaoh chose suffering. Thank God, we know better or perhaps we are constantly coming to know better. May we each choose openness to each other: connection, giving up the me for the us, and forming friendships that nourish us and bring us joy. May we understand how much truth has been given to us, is being sent to us, and may we learn all that which the God of love and goodness is teaching us.
In the previous portion there had been seven plagues. Toward the beginning of this portion, Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh. Now they warn him of the 8th plague, the swarm of locusts, yet Pharaoh still refuses to send the people out. Then Pharaoh’s servants say to him, “Send out the men that they may serve God, their God. Do you not yet know that Egypt is lost?” (Ex. 10:7). There is a hidden reality that Pharaoh needs to know. This verse seems to extend the theme of knowing that I spoke about last week. Pharaoh thinks he is resisting Moses. In fact, just before the 10th Plague, Pharaoh says to Moses: “Go from me, Beware! Do not see my face anymore for on the day you see my fact you shall die!” (10:28). Pharaoh actually thinks that by getting rid of Moses, he is eliminating his problems. Pharaoh holds the mistaken notion that he is resisting Moses and also the Jewish people. He doesn’t realize that he is resisting truth itself.
Whatever shows up in one’s life repeatedly is an attempt by God to manifest a higher truth. God tries to attune Pharaoh’s consciousness to this by showing him that everything Moses or Aaron did or predicted was true or came true. But Pharaoh is just like us. We want to hold onto the present conditions and our present reality, our assumptions and frames of reference. We resist learning the lessons that God and life is trying to teach us. A large part of gracefully making the transition from youth to maturity, to advanced age is to learn the correct lessons from our experiences. And we resist this, because we do not yet understand that cosmic truths are trying to become manifest in our lives. My favorite sage, the S’fat Emet said, “Always one must first set right the physical and the natural and only afterwards can we come to new insights.” In other words, we have to do certain work: the work of purification: of setting things right emotionally, intellectually, morally, and also physically. And then we will be able to apprehend the truth that is manifesting before us. There are those of us who have been hurt or disappointed by those we cared about. The wounds we suffered caused us to make decisions, which may or may not serve us later on in life. When we shut down certain parts of ourselves, we shut ourselves off from seeing certain truths. We only allow ourselves a kind of partial sight. We have chosen, like Pharaoh, to limit ourselves. In Pharaoh’s case, he transgressed the reality that the Moses and the Hebrews were connected to him and to the Egyptians. He couldn’t have fathomed this, but God was attempting to teach him. And because he kept resisting truth, resisting reality, the results that manifested in his life got worse and worse. When we make decisions that go against the truth of our connection to others, we not only learn the wrong lessons from our life experiences, but we lose opportunity for love, and friendship, and happiness. Things that happen to us occur in order to uncover a deeper truth. Isaiah said: For since the beginning of the world we have not heard, nor have we perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen a God besides you, who should do such a thing for him who waits for him. In the Talmud (Berachot 34b), R. Joshua b. Levi commented: This is the wine which has been preserved in its grapes from the six days of Creation. R. Samuel b. Nahmani said: This is Eden, which has never been seen by the eye of any creature. ( Isa. 64, 3.)
These quotations attest to the hiddeness of truth that gradually makes itself known. The S’fat Emet expresses it differently: “All choice, all human actions and undertakings, come about in accord with God’s will.” In effect, this seems to be about negating choice. If there is only one right decision, then perhaps we may conclude that we are not really free. But it is through a full understanding of truth and hidden reality that we can become fully free. We are most free when we understand that we have only one choice: to choose happiness or to choose suffering. Pharaoh chose suffering. Thank God, we know better or perhaps we are constantly coming to know better. May we each choose openness to each other: connection, giving up the me for the us, and forming friendships that nourish us and bring us joy. May we understand how much truth has been given to us, is being sent to us, and may we learn all that which the God of love and goodness is teaching us.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Cultivating Awareness
This week’s Torah portion is Va’eira, which means, and He appeared. God speaks to Moses about the Divine Name and promises to redeem the Israelites and take them out of Egypt, leading them to the Land. Moses has doubts about the success of his mission and voices his frustration to God, who instructs Moses and Aaron to go to Pharaoh and demand that the people be freed. Pharaoh repeatedly refuses, bringing upon himself and his people the plagues of blood, frogs, lice, swarms of beasts, and fiery hail. Each plague brings Pharaoh to consider freeing the people, only to go back on his word and reconsider, once the plagues have been removed.
In this Torah portion, the theme of knowing is introduced in the very beginning, the 3rd verse, which reads: “through my name God I did not become known to them.” Then, as the portion proceeds, this theme is restated eight more times. The Torah says, “so that you will know that I am God.” It’s repeated a few different ways to include Moses, the Israelites, Pharaoh, and the Egyptians. Anything repeated in the Torah has significance and something that appears eight times bears further investigation. So we might ask, what does God want us to know and why does God want us to know it?
The “what” is fairly easy: there was no monotheism at that time, except among us, the Hebrews. God wanted a universal truth to come into the stream of human knowledge, that there is one God and that all other gods are not real. This God did through what we now call plagues. The Women’s Torah Commentary points out that the phrase, 10 Plagues, eser makkot, does not appear anywhere in the Torah. God calls these events signs, otot or wonders, moftim, and not plagues. One would think that the seven years of plenty and seven years of famine in Joseph’s time would have ushered in a period of monotheism. It’s possible that it did, but 200-400 years later, Egypt was again a polytheistic society. The Ten Wonders were designed then, to get our attention, get Pharaoh’s attention, and get the Egyptians’ attention, which they certainly did. We should remember that the first few wonders were merely annoying and not life threatening: the Nile turning to blood so that the Egyptians had to dig to find fresh water, frogs, lice, and insects; later boils, hail, and darkness. Only cattle disease, and the final plague, killing of the firstborn destroyed animal and then also human life.
When God first appeared to Moses, the Torah says: “God saw that Moses turned aside to see and God called out to him from amid the bush.” Moses’ capacity to notice something unusual, to be aware of the inconsistencies of life, was what recommended him for a special spiritual relationship with God. The painter Eugene Delacroix once said, “The eyes of many people are dull or false; they see objects literally; of the exquisite, they see nothing.” And a writer, the Reverend Erie Chapman, who contributed to an online site for caregivers commented: “The decision to see with "dull eyes" or to open to "the exquisite" is very personal. It takes work to learn the appreciation of the sacred.” This is what God wants us to do: to be able to notice and see beyond the obvious. Everything that we encounter has the potential, like the wonders, to educate us: to allow us to see and understand more of the underlying truth of God’s existence and our place within it. The Apter Rebbe, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt once asked, “Why do we need such a strong reminder from God?” I might also ask, Why isn’t truth evident to us and why can’t we automatically notice God’s presence in the everyday occurrences of out lives? If everyone could realize truth innately, there might be no need for a Torah to tell us what is real and what is only an illusion. But also, there would be no progress for us: no learning, no spiritual attainment. We would already be living in the messianic era, called the end of days. That we have the capability, like Moses to notice and learn from the marvels of our everyday lives is a great gift that we are asked to develop and use: to become aware of more than just the physical and receive the knowledge that is being sent to us. This was said ever so much more elegantly in the Reform movement’s siddur, Gates of Prayer: “Days pass and the years vanish, and we walk sightless among miracles. Eternal One, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing; let there be moments when Your Presence, like lightning, illumines the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness, and exclaim in wonder: How filled with awe is this place, and we did not know it! Blessed is the Eternal One, the holy God!” May we become more and more aware of the Divine Presence, who now as then, wants to be known and to bless us with knowledge and wisdom.
In this Torah portion, the theme of knowing is introduced in the very beginning, the 3rd verse, which reads: “through my name God I did not become known to them.” Then, as the portion proceeds, this theme is restated eight more times. The Torah says, “so that you will know that I am God.” It’s repeated a few different ways to include Moses, the Israelites, Pharaoh, and the Egyptians. Anything repeated in the Torah has significance and something that appears eight times bears further investigation. So we might ask, what does God want us to know and why does God want us to know it?
The “what” is fairly easy: there was no monotheism at that time, except among us, the Hebrews. God wanted a universal truth to come into the stream of human knowledge, that there is one God and that all other gods are not real. This God did through what we now call plagues. The Women’s Torah Commentary points out that the phrase, 10 Plagues, eser makkot, does not appear anywhere in the Torah. God calls these events signs, otot or wonders, moftim, and not plagues. One would think that the seven years of plenty and seven years of famine in Joseph’s time would have ushered in a period of monotheism. It’s possible that it did, but 200-400 years later, Egypt was again a polytheistic society. The Ten Wonders were designed then, to get our attention, get Pharaoh’s attention, and get the Egyptians’ attention, which they certainly did. We should remember that the first few wonders were merely annoying and not life threatening: the Nile turning to blood so that the Egyptians had to dig to find fresh water, frogs, lice, and insects; later boils, hail, and darkness. Only cattle disease, and the final plague, killing of the firstborn destroyed animal and then also human life.
When God first appeared to Moses, the Torah says: “God saw that Moses turned aside to see and God called out to him from amid the bush.” Moses’ capacity to notice something unusual, to be aware of the inconsistencies of life, was what recommended him for a special spiritual relationship with God. The painter Eugene Delacroix once said, “The eyes of many people are dull or false; they see objects literally; of the exquisite, they see nothing.” And a writer, the Reverend Erie Chapman, who contributed to an online site for caregivers commented: “The decision to see with "dull eyes" or to open to "the exquisite" is very personal. It takes work to learn the appreciation of the sacred.” This is what God wants us to do: to be able to notice and see beyond the obvious. Everything that we encounter has the potential, like the wonders, to educate us: to allow us to see and understand more of the underlying truth of God’s existence and our place within it. The Apter Rebbe, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt once asked, “Why do we need such a strong reminder from God?” I might also ask, Why isn’t truth evident to us and why can’t we automatically notice God’s presence in the everyday occurrences of out lives? If everyone could realize truth innately, there might be no need for a Torah to tell us what is real and what is only an illusion. But also, there would be no progress for us: no learning, no spiritual attainment. We would already be living in the messianic era, called the end of days. That we have the capability, like Moses to notice and learn from the marvels of our everyday lives is a great gift that we are asked to develop and use: to become aware of more than just the physical and receive the knowledge that is being sent to us. This was said ever so much more elegantly in the Reform movement’s siddur, Gates of Prayer: “Days pass and the years vanish, and we walk sightless among miracles. Eternal One, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing; let there be moments when Your Presence, like lightning, illumines the darkness in which we walk. Help us to see, wherever we gaze, that the bush burns unconsumed. And we, clay touched by God, will reach out for holiness, and exclaim in wonder: How filled with awe is this place, and we did not know it! Blessed is the Eternal One, the holy God!” May we become more and more aware of the Divine Presence, who now as then, wants to be known and to bless us with knowledge and wisdom.
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