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If God Loves You, Why Are You Complaining?

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The angels glare in envy as the breath of G‑d descends below to become a human soul. Ripped out of the Infinite Light, it squeezes itself within meat and bones to experience that passion which belongs uniquely to earth below—and channel it towards its Beloved above. A new sort of love is born, a novelty to the cosmos and to its Creator: a fire within the human heart upon which the animal roasts, transformed to the divine.

“And G‑d saw all that He had made, and it was very good.” The sages tell us that “good” refers to the urge to do good, “very good” to the passion to do no good. The evil is not good, but the passion—if only it will find its true purpose—is very good.

For all that He made, He made for His glory.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Human Passion and the Envy of Angels”
From the “Freeman Files” series
Chabad.org

I sometimes wonder what we complain about. No, I don’t mean “complain” in terms of being afraid, being sick, or some other such human problem. I mean “complain” like what happens in the blogosphere and in social networking venues. I mean “complain” like always needing to be “right” and being upset when someone else thinks we’re “wrong” and won’t just agree with us that we have all the answers. I mean complain like “I’m the good guy” and everyone who doesn’t agree with me are “the bad guys.”

That kind of complaining.

As we see from Rabbi Freeman’s midrash and metaphor, even the angels envy our special relationship with God. Not the Jewish relationship with God, and not the Christian relationship with God. The human relationship with God.

Even if you temporarily put aside any distinctions between Jews and Christians, between the various other religious groups, and between the many other differing bodies of humanity, we all have one thing in common that is very important.

We were all created in the image of God.

Even the angels can’t say that. No other living being that exists today or that has ever existed can say that. Just we poor, pathetic, mortal human beings can say that.

I’m tempted to quote the mostly over-quoted John 3:16 since it emphasizes God so loving the world and not some subsection of its population. I want to sometimes scream at some people to please get over themselves because things are the way things are, not the way you want them to be.

Tomorrow’s “morning meditation” and my commentary on this week’s Torah Portion talks again about the “choseness” of the Jewish people and why that’s not a threat to the rest of us (though you’d suspect otherwise by reading other religious blogs). Once you let yourself get past the unique relationship God has with the Jewish people through the giving of the Torah at Sinai, you can understand that none of that means God loves you or me any less or that somehow Jewish distinctiveness makes Christians second-class citizens in the Kingdom of God.

And yet, this week in the “Messianic blogosphere” I’ve noticed some authors sparing no effort in maligning individuals and reputations, even to the point of calling some Jewish Messianics “racist” in order to justify their positions and jockey for a superior spot in the race to significance.

But wait a minute.

Take one giant step backward and look at Creation and then picture yourself in the midst of it. That’s where you are. That’s where I am. That’s where we all are. God so loved you and me and all of us, that he sent His only begotten son so that if anyone, anyone at all, believes in him, he/she/they will have eternal life in covenant relationship with our Creator, with God.

Anyone at all.

Isn’t that good enough for you?

You have a life given to you by God. So do I. What are we supposed to do with it? B*tch about other religious people all the time because they don’t support our own special viewpoint about how we’re supposed to be more special than they are? Really?

Our Sages gathered these sections in an order … according to the requisite steps (Introduction to Path of the Just).

While character refinement is an important and desirable goal, we must be careful to stride toward it in a reasonable and orderly manner. Overreaching ourselves may be counterproductive.

Physical growth is a gradual process. In fact, it is not even uniform; the first two decades are a sequence of growth spurts and latency periods. Generally, the body does not adjust well to sudden changes, even when they are favorable. For instance, obese people who lose weight too rapidly may experience a variety of unpleasant symptoms. Although the weight loss is certainly in the interest of health, the body needs time to adjust to the change.

If we are convinced, as we should be, that spirituality is desirable, we might be tempted to make radical changes in our lives. We may drop everything and set out on a crash course that we think will lead to rapid attainment of the goal. This plan is most unwise, because psychologically as well as physically, our systems need time to consume new information, digest it, and prepare ourselves for the next level.

Luzzato’s monumental work on ethics, The Path of the Just, is based on a Talmudic passage which lists ten consecutive steps toward spirituality. Luzzato cautions: “A person should not desire to leap to the opposite extreme in one moment, because this will simply not succeed, but should continue bit by bit” (Chapter 15).

Today I shall …
… resolve to work on my spirituality gradually and be patient in its attainment.

-Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski
“Growing Each Day, Av 21”
Aish.com

Imagine if we all blogged the way Rabbi Twerski does. Imagine instead of sowing contention and discord between our own little religious factions, we resolved each day to be just a little bit better as a person than we were yesterday. There’s nothing in that sort of lesson that has any room for tearing other people down. Even if someone were to tear down Rabbi Twerski, I doubt if he’d spend any time (I don’t know this of course, I’m just supposing) using his space at “Growing Each Day” to post a rebuttal and complain about opposing opinions and oppositional people.

(I know I’m complaining right now too, but hopefully I’ll end on an up-note).

What is your purpose in life? Why did God put you here? Why are you still breathing, walking around, talking, and (possibly) blogging?

We were put here to love God and to love other people. Easier said than done to be sure, but hardly impossible. If you can do that through blogging, that’s terrific. Rabbi Twerski’s “Growing Each Day” series proves (to me, anyway) that you can do good through blogging. If writing isn’t your thing or you can’t do it without having to always comment that someone is wrong on the Internet, then close your web browser, log off your computer, step away from the keyboard, and find something to do that actually does serve the purposes of God. You don’t have to slay dragons or tilt at windmills.

Just do something that in some small way, is helpful to another person in the world, preferably without making a big deal about it or about you.

Ben Zoma says:
Who is wise?
The one who learns from every person…
Who is brave?
The one who subdues his negative inclination…
Who is rich?
The one who is appreciates what he has…
Who is honored?
The one who gives honor to others…

–Talmud – Avot 4:1

Tomorrow, I’ll probably continue to complain, though it’s not why God put me here. Today, I just want to thank God I’m living and breathing and that I have a tomorrow in which I will wake up alive.

 

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What Doesn’t Kill You

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:‫אחד המרבה ואחד הממעיט ובלבד שיכוין לבו לשמים. — ה‬

Whether one does a lot or a little, it is equal, as long as his intention is for the sake of Heaven – 5b

In his commentary to Hilchos Krias Sh’ma, the Or Zarua writes: “One who toils in Torah to the best of his ability might nevertheless feel that he has accomplished very little. He should know, however, that as long as he has done his best, he has earned the same reward as another who has toiled in Torah and who has accomplished much. The reward is commensurate with the effort. (Avos 5:23). The Yerushalmi even says that if one person toiled in Torah day and night for one hundred years, while another studied Torah to the utmost of his abilities for a shortened lifespan of twenty years, God rewards them equally.”

The Or Zarua concludes and rules that the same measure is used in terms of giving tzedaka and for all meritorious acts. When a person honestly does whatever he can and works to the fullest extent of his abilities, God judges it as if he has accomplished what is expected from him, and God will reward him accordingly.

Daf Yomi Digest
Gemara Gem
“To focus one’s heart for the sake of Heaven”
Berachos 5

I suppose this could be condensed down to something like, “do your best” or some similar statement. The “Gemara Gem,” from a Christian point of view, is probably thought of at best as a learned opinion or an encouraging statement, though as I’ve mentioned before that Christianity doesn’t look at Bible study as an act of loving God or something done for its own sake. In religious Judaism however, Torah study brings a Jew close to God in a way that most non-Jews will never understand. I certainly can’t claim any special insights myself.

But think of the implications here. For an observant Jew, failure to strive in Torah study or approaching Torah study with a rather casual attitude must be looked at by God in a less than complementary fashion. If Torah study is that important, whether you’re an accomplished scholar or someone who can hardly grasp the basics, it is your effort and devotion that results in God’s favor. Imagine how you’d feel if you didn’t try your best, but you still cared about merits from God. Or even imagine if you tried your best and still accomplished very little. You might still feel, regardless of what was quoted above, that you are a failure. You might even have friends or family who are more than willing to re-enforce that opinion of yourself, whether due to poor Torah study or any number of other disappointments.

Yesterday, I tried to explain that each of us, having been made in the image of God, are holy and sacred people. We should treat each other and ourselves with dignity and respect befitting someone who contains a precious spark of the Divine. However, I ended yesterday’s missive with a cautionary note:

Oh, one more thing. All this is far easier said than done, especially finding that “holy” guy in the mirror while I’m shaving in the morning.

Knowledge and insight are wonderful things but they don’t automatically result in wisdom and change, especially when your so-called “holiness” collides into the reality of day-to-day life.

Consider this.

Someone spends most of their life, for whatever reasons, believing that they have little to offer others and that whenever they try to do their best, failure is the result. They have hurt others without meaning to, hurt themselves, and generally made a mess of things. Finally, they come to the conclusion that everyone who they love and want to be close to, resents them and even sometimes hates them because of all the trouble they’ve caused.

At some point, this person, on a cognitive level, realizes that at least some of what they’re experiencing is self-constructed and self-maintained. They learn that “you are what you think” and after reading more self-help and inspirational material than they thought they could stand, they come to the realization that they have the power to change how they think and therefore, how they feel and behave.

So they give it a shot. Maybe they just practice some set of rules or habits that they’ve been told effective people use. Maybe they even go to a counselor of some sort to help get a direction and supportive feedback.

But it doesn’t work.

Here’s why.

Each day for twenty, thirty, forty years or more, this person has added ten pounds of weight on their back. I know ten pounds doesn’t sound like much, but if you added ten more pounds each day, day in and day out, 365 days a year for decade upon decade upon decade, it would eventually become tons…tons of weight on the person’s back. Tons of weight holding the person down.

Each time they employ some sort of method to change their thinking, their feeling, and their behavior, they are taking a small hammer and a wee chisel and chipping off a fleck here and a fragment there of fifty or sixty or seventy tons of concrete and steel, trying to lighten the load. After a few days or a few weeks or a few months, the person tries to stand up under the load. It doesn’t seem any lighter. They still can’t stand. They still can’t move.

On top of all this (no pun intended) the original mechanism of thoughts and perceptions that cause this person to process all outside input as negative and punitive is continuing to add more and more weight on. So as this person attempts to make their burden lighter at an extremely miniscule rate, the weight is being replaced faster than it can be removed, so in fact, change is not occurring at all or worse…the weight is getting even heavier.

Do you think when the Or Zarua says the following, that it applies to our much burdened individual?

When a person honestly does whatever he can and works to the fullest extent of his abilities, God judges it as if he has accomplished what is expected from him, and God will reward him accordingly.

I’m not sure it does. Here’s why.

Only when a person has peace of mind can he really feel love for humanity. Lack of peace of mind leads to animosity towards others. Peace of mind leads to love.

Only if a person has peace of mind will he be able to pass the test of dealing properly with other people. He will be able to [be] kindhearted to everyone. His peace of mind will enable him to tolerate others and be patient with them.

see Daas Chochmah Umussar, vol.2, p.203;
Mussar Hatorah, p.10;
Gateway to Happiness, p.73
quoted from Aish.com

If we are supposed to love God by loving other people and performing acts of kindness and charity, and thus achieve an understanding that we can love ourselves and that indeed, God loves us too, how is this achieved if you cannot perform the first step? I suppose I’m looking at this in too much of a linear fashion. I’ve said before that feelings are not necessary in order to do good. Just do good. And yet, thoughts and feelings of self-loathing, self-deprecation, and the insurmountable weight of depression, like 88,000 pounds of lead crushing you into the dirt and mud, makes it difficult or even (seemingly) impossible to budge an inch. In real life, it takes some sort of motivation to do just about anything, especially something that is out of character and that requires an extraordinary effort.

As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing. –2 Timothy 4:5-8 (ESV)

But the encouragements of Paul in the New Testament might seem to backfire in the face of someone pinned to the ground by their faults like an insect trapped in amber.

I know some people read blogs like mine for a sense of encouragement, support, and inspiration, but mine is a very strange “inspirational” blog. Candy-coating life is usually ineffective, and it’s practically insane to deny that some people find emotional survival to be the best they can accomplish on any given day, or at the very least, it’s rather cruel. In the background of life for a person like the one I’ve been describing, it isn’t just the fear that the people they love will get fed up with them and leave, but that God will get fed up as well.

Worry can always provide reason. Maybe G‑d is out to punish you. Maybe you don’t deserve to be saved from the mess you’ve gotten into. Maybe an ugly mess is the only way He has to provide for you.

That’s not called trust. Trust means you have not a shade of doubt that He will deliver. No matter what.

The heavens above mirror the earth below. Trust in Him and He will fulfill your trust.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Forget Punishment”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

Telling someone like this that they don’t trust God may seem to be rather “oh duh” at this point. They know that. It’s just another nail in their emotional coffin, just another ten or a hundred pounds added to what they’re already ladened with (though I should say at this point that if you can’t trust God, trusting or even liking most other people is probably out of the question, but here’s the kicker…do you not trust God because people have proven to be untrustworthy or do you not trust people because you believe God is untrustworthy?).

You must treat yourself with respect. To do otherwise is to desecrate something that is holy.

That which doesn’t kill you will usually try again.

Supposedly, you can only go down so far before you start to rise up again. There is a principle in some areas of Judaism that says, “Every descent is for the sake of a future ascent.” Of course, that “ascent” might not occur until the world to come, which means you’re already dead and your life on earth hasn’t worked out at all. Besides, it’s just a saying. You can’t find it in the Bible.

And yet the Jewish people have survived every conceivable defeat, degradation, and humiliation, and still managed to survive and even to thrive due to such teachings added to the promises of God.

Why doesn’t this work for anyone else?

There is an increasingly mythical sacred person buried under endless tons of rock, dirt, and pain. They keep trying to dig their way out of their cave-in using only splintered, bloody stumps of what’s left of their fingers. The light is dimming and the air is running out. When the Divine spark is extinguished, what will be left of the person who was supposed to be holy? When the abyss finally claims its victim, will God still be there to watch?

 

 

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And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart

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Hear, O Israel: Hashem is our God, Hashem is the One and Only. You shall love Hashem, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your resources. And these matters that I command you today shall be upon your heart.

–Deuteronomy 6:4-6 (Stone Edition Chumash)

And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” And the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher. You have truly said that he is one, and there is no other besides him. And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions.

–Mark 12:28-34 (ESV)

While many Christians firmly believe that the teachings of Jesus replaced the teachings of Moses, we see here a clear and compelling illustration that not only did Jesus draw what he taught from the Torah, he created the rock-solid foundation of everything he taught from the Torah and specifically the Shema, the most holy of all the Jewish prayers.

I’ve written about this before. I’ve written that loving God cannot be divorced from loving other people and if we say that we do love God with all of our hearts, then we must love other people in tangible ways, providing for the needy, feeding the hungry, showing compassion for the grieving.

But is behavior all that God commands?

This week’s reading contains “Shema Yisrael” — “Hear, oh Israel, the L-rd our G-d, the L-rd is One.” [Deut. 6:4] And what is the next verse? “And you will love HaShem your G-d with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.” The commentaries explain that this commands every Jewish person to be so consumed by love of G-d that he or she is prepared to give up his or her last penny, or, in fact, his or her life…

But how can the Torah demand that a person love? How do you require emotion?

Rabbi Yaakov Menken
“For the Love of G-d”
Commentary on Torah Portion Va’ethanan
ProjectGenesis.org

How can God command us to experience an emotion for Him? How can God actually command us to love Him? I can see how He can command us to exhibit various behaviors or refrain from other behaviors. Feed the hungry. Don’t carry a grudge. But love? We know when we love someone, but it’s not as if my wife or children can actually order me to love them. I just do.

One answer is to consider “love as a verb.” That is, instead of focusing on that warm and fuzzy feeling that is sometimes associated with romantic love for example, we can focus on what we do that results from that feeling. Now take it a step further. Don’t wait for the feeling. Just start behaving in a loving manner by doing all of the things that indicate love.

Rabbi Menken continues:

There are two ways to develop an emotion like love. The first is to appreciate everything that has been given to you. Gratitude towards a person, such as a parent or spouse, makes you love them more, and so to with G-d.

The other goes still deeper — and, at its root, offers one reason why Judaism involves so many Commandments. When you do something for someone, that in and of itself instills love for that person in your own heart. Parents, especially, see every day that love in the heart is enhanced by love in action, by investing energy and effort into a child.

Whether between man and man or man and G-d, each and every day we are offered countless opportunities to choose to follow G-d’s Will. And when we follow His Will with a deep understanding of His love for us, and motivated by our love for Him, then that causes us to love Him more.

How do we love God? As it turns out, the feeling may not always come before the action. Yes, we may experience a sense of gratitude when we realize all that God has done for us and in turn, respond by experiencing the feeling of “love” for Him. More often though, our response to God is not a feeling but an action. In this case, since there’s nothing we can really do for God since He has no needs and for God, nothing is missing, we show love for God by showing love for people.

This is how God can command us to love Him and this is why Jesus fused the two commandments of loving God and loving others together in such a way that they are always joined.

The more we obey the commandments, the more we show love for other people, and thus, the more we show love for God, using our emotions, our spirit, and our tangible resources.

A few days ago, I mentioned that for a Jew, studying Torah was an act of loving God and as Rabbi Menken says:

The Sages tell us that “the study of Torah is equal to them all.” When we study G-d’s Torah, we observe His Commandment to do so, we perceive His incredible wisdom, and by doing so with love, we increase our love of G-d and His Torah at the same time.

While Christians do study the Bible as a way to learn more about our faith and to draw closer to God, we don’t typically conceptualize the act of study, either alone or with a group, as an act of love.

Maybe that’s a good idea since if we did, we might be less motivated to actually get away from our books and our computers, and actually do something for somebody else. And after all, there are enough pundits, religious and otherwise, spouting off in the blogosphere or in social networking venues such as twitter and Facebook (and gosh, did I just describe myself?).

On the other hand, studying is by far, the safer option. Here’s why.

At times there is so much suffering in the world that a sensitive person finds it difficult to tolerate. The Brisker Rav, Rabbi Yitzhak Zev Soloveitchik, applied the following Talmudic statement as his advice for such people in such times: “He who wants to live should act as if he were dead.”

There are times when human suffering is so great that a person who feels the suffering of others will simply not be able to continue living. While we have an obligation to feel the suffering of others, we should protect ourselves from overdoing it and destroying ourselves.

At times, said the Brisker Rav, we should adopt an attitude as if we were no longer alive and only then will we be able to exist.

-Moadim U’zmanim
Rabbi Pliskin’s Gateway to Happiness, p.257
Aish.com

HomelessIt isn’t easy to suffer. It’s also not easy to watch someone else suffer. Yes, there are things that we can and must do to alleviate the suffering of others, but let’s face it, we can’t always help. If someone is suffering from terrible cancer and the sometimes worse effects of chemotherapy treatment, what can we do? We can clean their house, cook food for them, do their yardwork, drive them to medical appointments, but we can’t miraculously cure their cancer or make the hideous side effects of chemo go away. We can pray and pray with all of our heart and soul that God will provide a complete physical and spiritual healing from Heaven for this person, but often, we don’t see that healing arriving anytime soon or at all, at least not in the matter that we desire.

So we should stop feeling? We should stop caring? Even if we could do that, and even if that would protect our own emotions, it would also stop us from expressing our concern for the living and the dying. How can we do that, just go through the motions of helping as if we were a machine?

Should we then stop helping because it is too painful or, Heaven forbid, because we might feel that our help isn’t appreciated enough?

Don’t regret good deeds when you end up suffering. In every business there are negative aspects. When you do acts of kindness, realize in advance there are likely to be some unpleasant aspects and accept them.

Realize that when you help others you are helping yourself. You will find it easier to tolerate difficulties.

-Rabbi Eliyahu Meir Bloch
Shiurey Da’as, p.116
Rabbi Pliskin’s Gateway to Happiness, p.254
Aish.com

How ironic that this all comes full circle. We desire to love God, so we love others by helping them. Now we learn that by helping another person, even when providing that help causes us to suffer as well, we are also helping ourselves. So to love God is to love others…and to love ourselves. Maybe that’s why the commandment for loving others says, “and you should love your neighbor as yourself.”

I sometimes regret that saying the Shema twice daily is only for the Jews. At one time, I also recited the Shema, but that was another lifetime, so to speak. That was when I believed that God opened the doorway to the Sinai covenant so wide, that everyone was supposed to walk through. Now I realize that my doorway to God is provided exclusively by Jesus Christ and it is through Him and what I think of as the “Messianic covenant” that I am alive in the Lord.

But that doesn’t make me a Jew.

However, it does make me a disciple of the Master and as I continue learning how to love God, I realize that He loves me too, and far, far more than I could ever be able to love Him.

As a father is merciful towards his children, so has Hashem shown mercy to those who fear Him. For He knew our nature; He is mindful that we are dust. Frail man, his days are like grass; like a sprout of the field, so he sprouts. When a wind passes over it, it is gone, and its place recognizes it no more. But the kindness of Hashem is forever and ever upon those who fear Him, and His righteousness is upon children’s children, to those who keep His covenant, and to those who remember His commands to fulfill them. –Psalm 103:13-18 (Stone Edition Tanakh)

PrayingOf course, the Psalmist was writing about the ancient Israelites and the commandments of the Torah, so perhaps I’m taking liberties in applying his words to we Christians and particularly to myself. But the teachings of Jesus are replete with words of love for his disciples and indeed for humanity, as the famously quoted John 3:16 attests. I have no fear that by God loving the Jewish people, He loves everybody else any less, for God’s love is as infinite as His Being.

And so as He loves, we should also love, or at least we should love to the limits of our human abilities. We are commanded to love Him and we are commanded to love each other. By this we realize that God loves us and that we are more than just grass and dust, though our lives are just as fragile.

If you are Jewish and you are observant, you already have a siddur and pray the Shema twice a day in accordance with the commandment. If you are Christian, you probably have never even seen a siddur; a Jewish prayer book, and up until today, you may not have even heard of the Shema. If you have the opportunity, just once, find a siddur, open to the portion that contains the Shema, and read it to yourself and perhaps just once, even read it to God. Although we are not Israel, we are citizens of the Kingdom of God by the merit of our Master and King and by His merit, we are commanded to…

…love Hashem, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your resources. Let these matters that I command you today be upon your heart. Teach them thoroughly to your children and speak of them while you sit in your home, while you walk on the way, when you retire and when you arise.

from the Shema

Torah Portion

Va’etchanan: Love, Live, Pray

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I pleaded with the Lord at that time, saying, “O Lord God, You who let Your servant see the first works of Your greatness and Your mighty hand, You whose powerful deeds no god in heaven or on earth can equal! Let me, I pray, cross over and see the good land on the other side of the Jordan, that good hill country, and the Lebanon.”

–Deuteronomy 3:23-25 (JPS Tanakh)

The Midrash (Devarim Rabbah 2:1.) explains that when God fulfills a person’s prayer, it can be either by virtue of their merits or, if they have no merits, He does so gratuitously. Even though Moses was certainly righteous and could have supplicated God by virtue of his good deeds and Torah study, he chose not to. Instead he pleaded that God not judge him as He judges the righteous (indeed, Moses did not consider himself to be worthy at all), but rather, that he fulfill his wish of entering the Holy Land only as a gratis gift.

-Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh
“The gift of prayer”
Wonders From Your Torah

How religiously observant Jews view prayer can seem very different from the Christian perspective. We Christians don’t have the concept of having “merits” or praying by the “merit” of our ancestors or our historic holy men and saints (except perhaps in Catholicism, but I’m hardly an expert). Generally, we are taught that when we pray, we all pray for God not to judge us but to be merciful and gracious to us out of His kindness and compassion, just as Rabbi Ginsburgh says Moses prayed.

However, without realizing it, we in fact do pray in the merit of just one holy man, our great tzaddik, and we were taught to do so.

Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. –John 14:13-14 (ESV)

A too literal interpretation of this verse has sometimes resulted in some Christians engaging in the so-called “name it and claim it” theology and then wondering why praying in the name of Jesus Christ didn’t give them everything they named on their wish list.

But then, they weren’t thinking about how Jews conceptualize prayer and praying as disciples in the merit of their…of our Master.

And as we know from the situation of Moses, not all prayers are answered, at least in the way we want them to be answered.

Moses went up from the steppes of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the summit of Pisgah, opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan; all Naphtali; the land of Ephraim and Manasseh; the whole land of Judah as far as the Western Sea; the Negeb; and the Plain — the Valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees — as far as Zoar. And the Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, ‘I will assign it to your offspring.’ I have let you see it with your own eyes, but you shall not cross there.”

So Moses the servant of the Lord died there, in the land of Moab, at the command of the Lord. He buried him in the valley in the land of Moab, near Beth-peor; and no one knows his burial place to this day. Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died; his eyes were undimmed and his vigor unabated. And the Israelites bewailed Moses in the steppes of Moab for thirty days. –Deuteronomy 34:1-8 (JPS Tanakh)

It is said that when God ended the life of Moses, He did it very gently, as one might kiss a friend, and so God was with Moses all his life and to the end of his life, and beyond.

I’m going to stick my neck out and say that, at that place and time where Moses was praying to God to be allowed to enter into the Land of Israel at the head of the tribes, that it didn’t occur to him that he could have “supplicated God by virtue of his good deeds and Torah study.” I believe (and this is just my humble opinion) that Moses pleaded to God for His grace and mercy, asking for a gift and realizing that, in the face of an Almighty, Infinite, and Ultimately Creative God, that Moses had no merits at all to offer. He was as humble (Numbers 12:3) as all human beings are in the presence of the Throne of God.

And God answers us as He answered Moses, not only by His mercy and grace but by His justice and His will, for God is God and we are but His servants.

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong. –Job 1:21-22 (ESV)

How many of us could have everything taken away from us; everyone we have ever loved, and still “not sin or charge God with wrong?”

It’s a crazy world and sometimes I let it get to me. I pray for a saner world and one in which, if it doesn’t understand a life of faith, will at least tolerate it. It seems like the prayers of Moses, that my prayers are in vain.

But that’s unfair since, like Moses, I can’t see the really big, big picture. I have no control of what happens outside of my one, small life and certainly will have no control over anything that happens once my life ends.

But it is important for me to stay on course, if for no other reason than for the sake of my sanity. That’s part of why we pray…so we don’t lose our way amid the seemingly endless distractions that are constantly screaming at us.

But from a Jewish point of view, that’s also why we should study.

The Vayechi Yosef of Pupa, zt”l, would rouse people in his own special way to focus on making set times to learn and keeping to them. “Just like the body needs to eat regularly and cannot maintain a healthy existence without food, so too the soul must have regular learning which is what gives it nourishment and vitality. This can be compared to a city where a rampant disease begins to spread. The medical establishment quickly vaccinates everyone in the city from the disease. In this manner the problem is neutralized. Similarly, Torah is a spiritual elixir of life. One who learns Torah every day vaccinates himself from being dragged down by all the negative influences of his day. Both the impurity he must deal with at work and what is in our streets can be overcome only through dedicated Torah learning. There is no other way to overcome the yetzer hara.

“This explains the statement in Niddah 73 that one should not read ‘halichos,’ goings, but rather ‘halachos,’ laws. As is well known, whenever the Talmud tells us not to read in a particular manner, this means that for some reason the verse cannot be read that way. The Gemara is telling us that one cannot read ‘halichos,’ that is he cannot manage in his daily comings and goings—his mundane business and interactions—without ‘halachos.’ It is only one who learns Torah and especially halachah every day that can get along in everyday life without being dragged down.”

Daf Yomi Digest
Stories Off the Daf
“Comings and Goings”
Niddah 73

Rabbi Ginsburgh connects, through means that are highly esoteric, praying for a gift from God to entering the Holy Land to the Mashiach finally being “able to pass over the Jordan and enter the Holy Land to complete his mission of redeeming the Jewish people.” Although as Christians, we cannot arrive at the same set of conclusions based on the scriptures, it’s not a bad connection and perhaps there is some hidden merit in his words (I base this on the meditations Redeeming the Heart of Israel, Part 1 and Part 2).

What we can see is that the end of our prayers and even the end of our lives isn’t the end of God’s interaction with the world and His plan for the redemption of Israel and the nations. I don’t know that I’ll be around to see it all happen, but I do know that I have some small part of the plan (though I can’t imagine what it is right now). If I can borrow my direction from both Christianity and Judaism, in order to keep my focus, my compass must point to some very simple things. To study, to love, and to pray.

It’s not about what God does and doesn’t give us or how the world seems to be developing in the short run, it’s about God being with us as a companion on a journey. It’s about taking the time to enjoy the scenery, to breathe, to let ourselves feel His presence and indulge in His providence.

For just like Moses from the viewpoint of Rabbi Ginsburgh, someday we’ll cross the Jordan and enter our land of promise; our land of love, life, and peace.

Good Shabbos.

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Walking In Footsteps

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The Midrash offers the following parable to illustrate the advantages of being holy. This can be compared to a simple businessman who was going along when he met a kohen gadol. Obviously, it would be a great honor for the businessman to travel with the kohen gadol. Not surprisingly, when he found out that they were both going in the same direction, he asked the kohen gadol permission to accompany him. “My son, I am a kohen. Therefore I am only permitted to travel on a pure path. To avoid impurity, I must make sure that my steps do not go over any graves. If you wish to be careful to only go in a path which is appropriate for me, I will gladly allow you to join me. But if not, in the end I will leave you and go on my own pathway.”

Similarly, when Moshe broached the subject of purity with Yisrael, he said, “Because God your Lord goes with you in your camp to save you.”

Reishis Chochmah explains this Midrash. “God is absolutely holy and separate from the material world. How are we to emulate Him and become holy even regarding material matters in which we must indulge? The answer is that we must sanctify our thoughts. Holy thoughts are the root of all sanctification. The more we think about holy things the easier it will be for us to sanctify the material. And the more sanctify the material the more we will be able to sanctify our thoughts!”

Daf Yomi Digest
Stories Off the Daf
“The Path of Purity”
Niddah 71

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me — practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.

–Philippians 4:8-9 (ESV)

It isn’t easy. Walking a path of holiness, I mean. It isn’t easy to be human; to be mortal and try to walk in God’s footsteps. I suppose the task seems a little more approachable for Christians when we imagine we’re walking in the footsteps of Jesus. God is just so…so vast, so infinite, so…God. Jesus, at least, we can picture as a human being, as a mortal (though not really) as one whose path we can attempt to walk with some reasonable expectation of success.

And in fact, as disciples of the Master, walking the Master’s path is exactly what we’re supposed to be doing.

Oh really?

You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. –Matthew 5:48 (ESV)

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. –John 5:19 (ESV)

Oh well. Guess that didn’t work. Trying to follow Christ’s footsteps is, for all intents and purposes, trying to follow God’s footsteps. But can this be done? After all, most of us aren’t holy men or tzaddikim or saints, or “super-Christians.” Most of us are just…us, people, human.

Seek not to follow in the footsteps of the wise; rather seek what they sought.

–Matsuo Bashō

Although Matsuo Bashō did not follow a Jewish or Christian religious tradition, I find his words to be most illuminating under the circumstances. As I continue to follow my own path, not only in life, but the “path” of writing this meditation, I can see there is only one goal: to seek God.

As the businessman who walked with the kohen gadol had to choose to walk a path of purity if he were to be with his holy companion, if we choose to follow God as disciples of the Master, we too must choose a path of purity. How can this be done when the world we live in is anything but sanctified and pure? As the midrash has already been explained to us, we must carry our purity with us by conforming our thoughts, emotions, and actions to those things we know are from God. We learn this path by reading the Bible, from studying the teachings it contains, by associating with others who also walk their own path as disciples of Jesus who are seeking God.

Like I said, it isn’t easy.

One of the reasons I write these meditations each day is to focus my day on following the path. I’m not always successful and both my internal states and my external environment often conspire to pull me off the trail or to stall me in one spot, sometimes for a rather lengthy sojourn. When I get distracted or even feel lost, I try to retreat to a point on the path I am sure of and one that I know contains a marker to point me in the right direction.

The Alter Rebbe repeated what the Mezritcher Maggid said quoting the Baal Shem Tov: “Love your fellow like yourself” is an interpretation of and commentary on “Love Hashem your G-d.” He who loves his fellow-Jew loves G-d, because the Jew has with in himself a “part of G-d Above.” Therefore, when one loves the Jew – i.e. his inner essence – one loves G-d.

“Today’s Day”
Friday, Menachem Av 12, 5703
Compiled by the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan
Chabad.org

For the past few days, I’ve written a meditation or two on the topic of love, and particularly Christian and Jewish love. We see from the quote above that for many religious Jews, loving each other and even their “inner essence,” is deeply connected to loving God. This is also true for Christians:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” –John 13:34-35 (ESV)

But in expending our love to our family, our friends, to the fellowship of believers, and to the struggling and conflicted world around us, we must never forget that to give means we must also receive. It’s not selfish to want and even need to be loved. Certainly, we can’t expect the whole world to love us and being Christians, we can in fact, expect much of the world around us to show us anything else besides love.

It’s very draining.

But we do have our families, our friends, our companions in the faith to help sustain us as we walk a path in the footsteps of God, which seems like an impossible task. Our goal is equally impossible; to seek and find God, to be perfect as He is perfect. To focus only on the light and not be distracted by the encroaching shadows. But God so loved the world and that includes us, not just as a group, but as individuals. Each of us is precious to God.

“So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. –Matthew 10:26-31 (ESV)

This isn’t to say that our path will always be secure with no challenges or stress. Far from it. But it does mean that whatever we face and even when we feel that we can no longer see the next step on which to place our foot, God is there, too.

Not long ago, I wrote about fear and insecurity as a challenge to faith and urged all “secure” believers to be compassionate toward their weaker brothers and sisters. Today, while I can’t promise the easy path to anyone who is a disciple, I can promise a path, a definite direction, a concrete goal. The things of holiness and faith seem sometimes confusing and indistinct was we negotiate our way through a world built out of moral relativity and public opinion, but God is One and He is perfect and He is present and He will not abandon us…even in those times when we feel utterly alone.

You can choose to believe in a G‑d aloof from all things, a distant G‑d that leaves you in the hands of so many worldly troubles.

Or you can put your trust in a G‑d that carries you as a nursing mother carries her suckling infant by her bosom; as a father carries his child high upon his shoulders; as an eagle carries its fledgling young upon its wings.

Make room for Him and He will enter. As large as you allow your trust to be, so will be the space that He will fill.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Open Wide”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

The signs may not look the same on my path as they do on yours. The mile markers may appear completely different. Even the terrain, the scenery, the sky and the ground of my path may be totally dissimilar to your own. After all, we’re different people, at different points on the path, and with different paths to walk. And yet we have the same companion, we are following the same footprints, and we have the same goal.

We don’t follow the wise men or the sages because they are not the goal, but we take our cues from them. We seek what they sought. We seek to follow the path that leads to God. May He always walk with you and with me.

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Love, God, the World, and Everything

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“Just as the bride circles around the groom as an expression of yearning and love, so do we circle Jerusalem’s gates as we express our yearning to see it rebuilt, our yearning for the days when we will all be able to go up to the Temple Mount and to the [rebuilt] Temple, and not just walk on the perimeter road that surrounds the walls”, said Nadia Matar.

The18th Annual Walk Around The Walls – Jerusalem
By Yehudit Katsover and Nadia Matar
As quoted from Magic City Morning Star

The Jerusalem Talmud makes an astounding statement: “The generation in which the Beit Hamikdash, the Temple, is not rebuilt is to be regarded as though the Beit Hamikdash was destroyed in that generation.” The explanation is simple. When we mourn for the Beit Hamikdash, we are not mourning for a building that was destroyed 2,000 years ago. Our mourning must be directed to the realization that each generation is obligated to rebuild the Beit Hamikdash and that our failure to do so has little to do with politics, the debate over who has control over the Temple Mount, or the threat of the Arab nations to go to war if we disturb the mosques that sit atop the Temple Mount. The Beit Hamikdash will be rebuilt when a sufficient number of Jews make a commitment to change their lives. When will the Messiah come? As the Torah says, “Today, if you hearken to My voice.”

-Rabbi Pinchas Stolper
“Why Do We Still Mourn”
Excerpted from Living Beyond Time: The Mystery and Meaning of the Jewish Festivals
quoted from Aish.com

I really thought I was done blogging about Tisha B’Av and the Temple and was planning on continuing to write about how we in the community of faith can love, but Rabbi Stolper’s article was recommended to me by a friend on Facebook (one who I’ve met in real life…thanks, Michele), so I thought I should read it.

And I couldn’t stop reading it, and thinking, and then writing.

When writing about Tisha B’Av, I naturally tend to focus on grief and loss. It never occurred to me to see the annual event of marching around Jerusalem as an act of love. In retrospect, it should have been obvious to me. Now it always will be.

But as I mentioned yesterday, how we love and even why we love can be terribly misunderstood. When a Christian says that he or she loves all people made in the image of God, including gay people, the LGBT community and the atheist world tends to doubt that Christian’s sincerity, at least unless the Christian follows up by saying they wholeheartedly support “marriage equality.” I mean, how can you love gay people if you don’t support their desire to marry? But then, how can you love God, love the teachings of Christ, believe his definition that marriage occurs exclusively between a man and a woman (see Matthew 19:4-6 as it references Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24) and still be expected to love a gay person only by supporting “marriage equality?”

The answer is that Christians will express their love in many and varied forms as God defines love, but not as absolute agreement and approval of all progressive social and political expectations.

But when you love Jerusalem:

If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
let my right hand forget its skill!
Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth,
if I do not remember you,
if I do not set Jerusalem
above my highest joy! –Psalm 137:5-6 (ESV)

But there’s a problem here:

Palestinians accused U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Monday of undermining peace prospects by calling Jerusalem “the capital of Israel”, ignoring their own claims to the city and most world opinion.

Romney used the term on Sunday to sustained applause from his Israeli audience in the Holy City, during a trip to present himself as Israel’s closest ally ahead of the November 6 election contest with President Barack Obama.

“We condemn his statements. Those who speak about the two-state solution should know that there can be no Palestinian state without East Jerusalem,” chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat told Reuters on Monday.

by Jihan Abdalla
for Reuters
as quoted from news.yahoo.com

The Jewish people and Israel aren’t the only ones to have an interest in Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. Does loving Jerusalem, desiring that the Temple be rebuilt, and longing for the coming of the Messiah mean that the Jews fail at loving the Arab people? Do they even have an obligation to love and respect them? For that matter, since we Christians have a vested interest in seeing the Temple rebuilt (since prophecy states the Messiah; Jesus will be the one to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem), do we have an obligation to love the Arab people who oppose this prophecy?

I can’t speak for the Jewish people, but as I said yesterday, as Christians we are obligated to love, even our “enemy.” Remember though, this isn’t “enemy” as in an enemy in war, but someone we encounter, someone in our environment, someone who needs God’s love as we can express it though acts of compassion and charity. Who’s to say who is our “enemy” or a “neighbor?”

Which doesn’t mean we have to agree with their politics or even their religion.

I can’t answer the question of how the Temple will be rebuilt and what happens to El Aqsa mosque, which is currently located on the Temple Mount. I leave that up to God. However, some Jewish people have a more definite solution as we see in Katsover’s and Matar’s news story:

Later in his (MK Prof. Aryeh Eldad, co-leader of the Erets Israel Knesset Lobby) speech he referred to the future of the El Aqsa mosque, located on the Temple Mount, as he sees it, and said that we can learn one thing from Beit El’s Ulpana Hill deal, and that is the idea of sawing. “There is one thing we can all learn from one of the most questionable deals we have made lately, and that is what happened at the Ulpana Hill, where they decided to dismantle and relocate the houses, rather than destroy them. At least, when the time comes to reconstruct the Temple, and that time is coming, we will dismantle and relocate the “house” that is currently there. We will cut it up and they can relocate it wherever they want, because that’s where the Third Temple belongs”, called out Eldad over the applause of the crowd.

I can’t imagine many Palestinian Arabs “feeling the love” for Prof. Eldad as he compares disassembling and moving the El Aqsa mosque to the way Jewish homes have been taken apart and removed from so-called “occupied” land, and reassembled in those parts of Israel the Palestinians formally recognize as Israel (at least for the time being). I can imagine that they’d experience Prof. Eldad’s words as about as loving as those of Mr. Romney when he declared that all of Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.

In other words, Palestinian Arabs would not hear any love at all.

It seems as if, at least from a Christian point of view, we have a conflict between our religious and theological priorities and the command to love other human beings. If we, for example, insist that “marriage equality” is in direct opposition to the definition of marriage that Jesus gave us, then we are perceived as not loving gay people. Or if we, using another example, believe that Jesus will return and construct a third, physical temple on the Temple Mount in Holy Jerusalem and re-establish Israel as not only a Jewish nation, but the head of all the nations of the earth, the Arab world will certainly not experience us as loving them, either.

So is this an either/or situation? Do we either stick to our theological guns, or toss the Bible, God, and faith out the window in order to blend in and disappear into the progressive social and political masses?

Or is it an either/or situation?

We are often told by atheists, progressives, and politically liberal religious people that Jesus loved unconditionally. But did he?

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” – Matthew 25:34-46 (ESV)

I have to believe that Jesus loves unconditionally as God the Father loves humanity unconditionally, but that doesn’t mean we are all free to do as we please with no consequences, just because of that love. Apparently, Jesus has standards and expectations. Not everyone will be acceptable to him in the final judgment. There will be distinctions between people depending on how or if they expressed love in terms of feeding and clothing the needy and visiting the hospitalized and imprisoned, to take the examples presented in the verses above.

Jesus didn’t say that we had to love other people by agreeing with everyone’s social, political, religious, and national priorities. Loving others, as we see here, doesn’t obligate us to adopt everyone else’s behavioral and social desires, just as God’s unconditional love for us doesn’t absolve us from the consequences of our disobedience to Him.

I was recently reminded that the New Testament uses 1 Corinthians 13 as the “crystalization” of Christian love. Love is considered the greatest expression of faith and indeed, is greater than both faith and hope.

But love is not blind and it is not ignorant, nor should it be swayed by whatever issue is considered important or critical in this week’s mainstream news stories. But love is patient and love is kind and love perseveres, so when we struggle with the world around us, when we are condemned and called names because our love does not precisely match up with another person’s wants and desires, our response is not to attack those who are attacking us. To do so, makes our words nothing more than a “noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”

We must remember that God has been infinitely patient with us. It’s not that he has approved of all of our foolishness, our mistakes, our willful disobedience. But we know that He is slow to anger and abundant in mercy and kindness. If we’ve learned anything at all as disciples of the Master, it’s that we need to be patient, too. We must have patience with our critics and patience with ourselves when we want to respond with anything less than grace.

And we must remember that the source of our love doesn’t flow from today’s headline story on MSNBC, or what happens to be trending on twitter or Facebook. The source of our love surges like waves directly from the heart of God.

Trust is the child of love, for where love showers down, trust will grow.

And since it is a child, the reciprocal is also true: As the child’s call awakens a parent from deep sleep, so trust awakens the love that gave birth to it.

Provide love, trust will be born from it.
Demonstrate your trust, and it will awaken love.

So it is with a child and a parent. So it is with two good friends. So it is with any marriage. Your love may hibernate in deep sleep, but you have trust that the other holds love inside, and in that trust, love awakens once more.

So it is with the love affair between your soul and her Beloved above. Trust that He is in love with you, and your love will awaken.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Love and Trust”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org