Category Archives: Quote of the Day

On Gratitude

25 Wednesday Nov 2015

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Poetry, Quote of the Day, Uncategorized

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Tennessee Williams put it exactly right: “You know we live in light and shadow. That’s what we live in – a world of light and shadow; and it’s confusing.” (Orpheus Descending)

No life is simple, but along comes Thanksgiving and tradition compels us to emphasize gratitude regardless of our circumstances, how we may feel and conditions in the world.

For some, gratitude comes easily. For others gratefulness is challenging. Nurturing gratitude, however, is one of our most effective means to dispel the “shadow” and lift us towards the “light.”

Here are a number of reflections from Jewish tradition and world literature that offer us perspective, insight, wisdom, and hope.

“Hodu l’Adonai ki tov, ki l’olam chasdo – Give thanks to God, for Adonai is good…God’s steadfast love is eternal.” –  Psalm 136 (9th century, B.C.E.)

“When you arise in the morning give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength. Give thanks for your food and the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies in yourself.” – Native American Prayer, Tecumseh Tribe

“How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned right to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.” – Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972)

“Ingratitude to a human being is ingratitude to God.” – Rabbi Samuel Hanagid (993-1056 CE)

“What have you done for me lately is the ingrate’s question.” – Rabbi Joseph Telushkin

“If you cannot be grateful for what you have received, then be thankful for what you have been spared.” – Yiddish proverb

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” – William Arthur Ward, American scholar, author, pastor and teacher (1921-1997)

“Gratitude, not understanding, is the secret to joy and equanimity.” – Anne Lamott, writer (b. 1954)

“Thank everyone who calls out your faults, your anger, your impatience, your egotism; do this consciously, voluntarily.” – Jean Toomer, poet and novelist (1894-1967)

“We should write an elegy for every day that has slipped through our lives unnoticed and unappreciated. Better still, we should write a song of thanksgiving for all the days that remain.” – Sarah Ban Breathnach, author (b 1948)

“Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.” – Cicero, Roman philosopher (106 BC – 43 BC)

“If the only prayer you say in your life is ‘Thank you,’ that would suffice.” – Meister Eckhart, German theologian, philosopher (1260-1328)

“When I started counting my blessings my whole life turned around.” – Willie Nelson

“The highest tribute to the dead is not grief, but gratitude.” – Thorton Wilder

“I can no other answer make but thanks, and thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks.” – William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Anger Management and Leadership – Ki Tisa

06 Friday Mar 2015

Posted by in Divrei Torah, Ethics, Quote of the Day

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Recently, I found myself sitting in a traffic jam in my supermarket’s parking lot. One driver decided (wrongly) that I was the one holding up movement, and so he rolled down his window and with a vulgar gesture cursed me crudely with such venom that I feared he was going to get out of his car and attack me. I rolled up my windows and didn’t look at him! He went away, thank God.

Of course, his outburst had nothing to do with me. I have no idea why he was so angry. However, I got to thinking about how much rage plagues common discourse today, in our relationships with family, friends and colleagues, with people we don’t know, within the Jewish community, and between peoples and nations.

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tisa, shines a light on Moses’ rage at his people. He had brought the tablets of the law down from Mount Sinai and en route learned from Joshua that the people were celebrating around a golden calf. As he descended the mountain he heard for himself the revelry and became enraged.

After all God had done for the people and after all he had done to facilitate God’s will in their redemption, the people were short-sighted and ungrateful. With righteous indignation Moses smashed the tablets, burned the golden calf, ground it to powder, mixed it with water, and force-fed the substance to the guilty Israelites. (Exodus 32:15-20)

Moses’ indignation went unabated and we read in the next chapter: “Now Moses would take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, at some distance from the camp.” (Exodus 33:7)

Rabbi Menachem Sachs, quoting from the Jerusalem Talmud (B’chorim 3:3), explained why Moses pitched the Tent of Meeting so far away:

“…because he was tired of the people’s constant complaining and criticism. As Moses walked around the camp some would say ‘look at his thick neck, his fat legs – he must eat up all our money.’”

Insulted and exasperated, Moses moved the tent out of the people’s sight so that only those who really wanted to draw near to God would have to deliberately choose to do so and then make the effort to come to the meeting tent.

Watching disapprovingly, God appealed to Moses (Midrash Rabbah 45:2):

“I want you to change your mind, go back to the camp, and deal with the people face to face, as it says, ‘The Eternal would speak to Moses panim el panim – face to face, as one person speaks to another.’” (Exodus 33:11)

We can’t blame Moses for his weariness and impatience with the people. He had suffered their obstinacy since leaving Egypt. He was old and tired, and had had enough.

Tradition, however, reminds us that leading a community while angry is no way to lead. Once leaders lose their temper publicly and become impatient with the people whom they lead, they lose not just whatever argument is immediately before them, but the faith of the people in their leadership.

As a congregational rabbi and leader of a large religious institution, I’ve learned over a period of more than 35 years that the very worst thing a leader can ever do is to respond to individuals, to the community, to staff, and to strangers with impatience, condescension and anger. This is true in religious institutions and education most especially, but in business, non-profits, the arts, politics, diplomacy, and government as well.

Tradition says that Moses lost the right to enter the Promised Land when he hit the rock with his stick out of anger at the people, instead of speaking to it as God had commanded him (Numbers 20:11).

No less an equivalent consequence should be exacted from trusted leadership when they lose control, condescend, humiliate, and sow division amongst those they lead.

The Talmud says, “If a person loses his temper – If he is originally wise, he loses his wisdom, and if he is a prophet, he loses his prophecy.” (Bavli, Pesachim 66b).

Here are a few additional reflections about anger worth noting:

“Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.”
-Mark Twain

“When angry you will make the best speech you ever regret.”
-William Ury, American author, academic, anthropologist, and negotiation expert

“When the spirit of anger asserts itself over a person, the trait of mercy flees and cruelty takes over to shatter and destroy.”
-Orchot Tzaddikim, 15th century Germany

Shabbat shalom!

The Measure of Our Success – D’var Torah Vayigash

26 Friday Dec 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Beauty in Nature, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Life Cycle, Quote of the Day

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As 2014 comes to a blessed close, our world continues to escalate in brutality, is more politically fragile, religiously challenged, and morally confused than ever before. In times such as these it is worthwhile to consider once again who we are and how we might measure our personal, societal and international well-being. In this I am reminded of Churchill’s words that a successful person will “be… able to go from one failure to the next without losing enthusiasm.”

This week’s Parashat Vayigash has something to teach us about the importance of our attitude. In these closing chapters of Genesis we come to the climax of the Joseph narratives. The crown prince meets his brothers after 20 years of exile and reveals himself. As they cower before him, he forgives them and makes peace. Then he settles his father Jacob in the land of Goshen.

Pharaoh meets Jacob and one old man asks another: “Jacob – How many are the years of your life?”

“The years of my sojourn on earth are one hundred and thirty. Few and hard have been the years of my life, nor do they come up to the life-spans of my fathers during their sojourns.” (Genesis 47:8-9)

This seems an odd response given Jacob’s manifold blessings. Recognizing Jacob as a kvetch, the Midrash (B’reishit Rabba 95) brings an incredulous God into the conversation:

“Jacob: ‘I saved you from Esau and Laban; I brought Dinah back to you, as well as Joseph, and you complain that your life has been short and evil?’ [If so] I’ll count the words of Pharaoh’s question to you and your response, add them together and shorten your life [by that number of years – 33] so you’ll not live as long as your father Isaac, who lived to 180.’ Jacob lived 147 years.”

What happened to Jacob that he should be so negative at this point in his life? After all, he had 4 wives, 13 children and many grandchildren. His son Joseph had become the second most powerful man in the world, and he himself had encountered God twice, in a dream and at a river, but Jacob could only complain!

Where was the gratitude? That this conversation with Pharaoh should come just after Jacob had been reunited with Joseph, his favorite son, is disheartening and disturbing.

Truth to tell, we all know people like this who see their lives through a negative prism – parents who fixate on their children’s weaknesses and failings; marriages that dissolve because one partner won’t let go of past slights; people who refuse to see the half-full glass and always negatively spin whatever happens to them; others who refuse to overcome disappointments and predict instead a negative future on the basis of past hardship repeating the familiar cynical refrain regardless of new opportunities that could be very different were they not so stuck in their approach and negative attitude to the world.

In his book “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,” Stephen Covey concludes that the most well-balanced, positive and proactive people, who live happily with others at work and home, are successful because they balance four dimensions of their natures: the physical, spiritual, mental, and social/emotional.

We may need to care more for our bodies, eat better food and less of it, drop excess weight, get sufficient rest, keep stress and negativity at bay, and exercise more.

Perhaps we have closed our hearts and souls to the experience of mystery, awe and wonder.

Maybe we are intellectually stagnant, our curiosity suppressed and our minds inactive.

Possibly, we’ve become jaded and numb to feeling, focused too much on ourselves without bothering to empathize with others.

The Midrash surmises that Jacob’s negativity and propensity to complain, despite his many blessings, shaved years from his life. Writing 1500 years ago, the rabbis anticipated what psychiatrists and scientists know today, that some illnesses and even some early deaths can be avoided if we take better care of ourselves in body, mind and soul, and paid more attention to those relationships of meaning and trust that we have with one another.

Robert Louis Stevenson described a successful life this way:

“A person is a success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much; who has gained the respect of intelligent people and the love of children; who has filled his niche and accomplished his/her task; who leaves the world better than s/he found it, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem or a rescued soul; who never lacked appreciation of earth’s beauty or failed to express it; who looked for the best in others and gave the best s/he had.”

Wiser words have not been uttered.

Shabbat shalom and a happy, healthy, meaningful, balanced, loving, and peaceful New Year!

[Note: This is an edited d’var Torah that I posted here in December 2011 and in re-reading it, I realized that nothing substantially has changed in the world or in the lives of multitudes in that time – hence, its reprise.]

 

Inspiring Words and Blessings for Hanukah this Year

11 Thursday Dec 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Holidays, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Quote of the Day

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I offer these words from a variety of sources for this season of Hanukah and am grateful to the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem for providing them. I  offer my own blessings to be said before the kindling of the Hanukah lights on each night, beginning this next Tuesday evening – the first night of Hanukah.

“The glory and the educational value of the Hasmoneans is that their example revived the nation to be its own redeemer and the determiner of its own future…”
-Yitzhak Ben Zvi, 2nd President of the State of Israel

“The Hanukah lights reflect the fire within the Jewish soul, as it is written, The soul of a human being is the lamp of God.’ (Proverbs 20:27) Each person possesses this light within his body. Hanukah teaches how this light must be ignited, …renewed and increased each day. Projecting light to the world at large is the underlying intent of all the mitzvot, as it is written, ‘A mitzvah is a lamp and the Torah is light.’ (Proverbs 6:23) However, to a greater degree than in other mitzvot, this intent is reflected in the Hanukkah candles, for they produce visible light and they spread that light throughout their surroundings.”
-Rabbi Menachem Schneerson

“When reading the contemporary accounts of the Hasmonean Revolution found in the Books of the Maccabees (c. 165 BCE), the rabbis of later centuries made the observance of the commandment of “pirsum hanes – the public proclamation of this miracle” the centerpiece of the festival thereby emphasizing that the power of the spirit is enduring and not weapons of war, high finance and politics.”
-Professor Shimon Rawidowicz

“Just as the light of a lamp remains undimmed, though myriads of wicks and flames may be lit from it, so the one who gives to a worthy cause does not make a hole in his/her own pocket.”
-Midrash Exodus Rabbah 36:3

The Talmud tells of a great debate about how to light the Hanukiah. Do we start with eight and diminish until the last night. Or do we start with one and build to the eighth night. Beit Hillel says the latter. Beit Shammai says the former. The halacha (Jewish law) follows Beit Hillel. In other words, each day we build on what has taken place.  Each day we add light. Each day we are strengthened in resolve, goodness. Each day we draw closer to God. [The custom is to line up the candles from the right to the left, but to light them from the left to the right – the current day first.]
-Bavli, Shabbat 21b

The Midrash compares a mitzvah to a lamp. The increasing light kindled on Hanukah reminds us that we are not diminished when we give of ourselves to others. The opposite is true. By our kind deeds we increase light and sparks of Divinity into the world.

Suggested Blessings to Say Before Kindling the Lights of Hanukah

FIRST CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF TORAH AND BLESSING

With this candle we reaffirm our people’s commitment to the study of our sacred tradition. May the light of this flame cast its warmth and inspire us to be grateful for the blessings of life and health.

SECOND CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF LIBERATION AND HOPE

On behalf of our people dispersed in the four corners of the world who live in fear, repression and imprisonment, we stand this night in solidarity with them. Our Hanukkah flames are theirs and their hopes are ours. We are one people united by tradition, history and faith in the one God who inspires freedom and liberation.

THIRD CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF PEACE AND MEMORY

With this candle we pray that a just and lasting peace may be established between Israel and the Palestinians, between Israel and all Arab and Muslim peoples. May the memory of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and those who gave their lives for peace be a blessing for our people and all peoples of the Middle East.

FOURTH CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF TOLERANCE

With this light we pray that racism, political enmity, gender bias, homophobia, religious hatred, intolerance, and fundamentalist extremism be dispelled, and may all people recognize divinity within all of God’s children.

FIFTH CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF ECONOMIC JUSTICE

With this light we recommit ourselves to work on behalf of the poor in our communities and throughout the world. May we be inspired not only to feed the hungry and lift the fallen, but to reorder society’s priorities and  educate all children to be able to sustain themselves with dignity and hope.

SIXTH CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF CREATION

With this light may our commitment be renewed to preserve God’s creation, for as the Midrash reminds us, if we destroy it there will come no one after us to make it right.

SEVENTH CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF BLESSING

May the light of this flame cast its warmth upon us and inspire us to be ever grateful for the blessings of life, family, community, and health.

EIGHTH CANDLE: THE LIGHT OF MEMORY AND WITNESSING

May these lights inspire us always to care, love, and perform deeds of loving-kindness to others. Amen!

Kindnesses That Last Forever

08 Monday Dec 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Jewish History, Quote of the Day, Tributes

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When I was in Central Europe last month with thirty of my congregants touring formerly great Jewish centers of life in Budapest, Prague and Berlin, the Holocaust was everywhere we went. Memories of the cruelty and brutality so oppressed members of our group that many of us reflected that, despite how worthwhile our tour was, we had never returned from travel feeling as demoralized, depressed and sad as we did from this trip.

Since our return I recalled an act of kindness once shown to me by one of my rabbinical school professors. It took place forty years ago, but his loving concern for me has never faded from my heart and memory. Juxtaposed to what we experienced in Central Europe, what he did for me is a stark contrast to what we witnessed in the cities of our recent travel.

One of my Talmud teachers at HUC-JIR in Los Angeles was Dr. Abraham Zygelboim (z’l). As a rabbinic student in my mid-20s, I had suffered a painful break-up with my then-girlfriend, and I was emotionally devastated. Between classes one day I needed to take a few minutes for myself, so I walked outside, sat against a wall and wept.

Out of nowhere Dr. Zygelboim approached me quietly and kissed my forehead without ever saying a word. His sweetness stays with me and will all the days of my life.

Dr. Zygelboim was a gentle man, a Polish Holocaust survivor whose brother, Szmul Zygelboim, was a political leader in the Jewish community of Warsaw before the Nazi occupation. Szmul managed to escape Poland and advocated on behalf of the persecuted Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe as powerfully as he could in the United States and Great Britain. Deeply frustrated that the allies were neglecting to stop the slaughter of the Jewish people, and as a public act of protest, Szmul set himself on fire in front of the Parliament in London on May 12, 1943.

Szmul’s brother, my teacher, never spoke to us, his students, of his experience in the Shoah or of his brother’s ultimate and courageous act of protest. But we knew of it.

Dr. Zygelboim knew Talmud, and I was lucky to learn with him. But frankly, I do not remember the specifics of any particular lesson he taught me forty years ago, though I remember the sections of Talmud we learned with him – but I do remember his kiss on my forehead.

We are, each of us, powerful beings, and we often underestimate our capacity to touch others. Indeed, how we treat others and the way we speak to them defines not only our relationships with them, but our nature and the measure of our character.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said towards the end of his life: “When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.”

It is, of course, not always easy to be kind – especially when confronted by obstinate, difficult and offensive individuals. The moralist and essayist Joseph Joubert offered this in such circumstances, “Kindness is loving people more than they deserve.”

Leo Buscaglia offers this certain truth: “Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.”

Gratitude – Gratitude – Gratitude

26 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Jewish Identity, Quote of the Day

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As so much in our country and world is torn and ugly (e.g. Middle East, Congo, Sudan, Ukraine, North Korea, Iran, American politics, fundamentalist religious and nationalist extremism, Ferguson, prejudice, suspicion, hatred, racism, anti-Semitism, mental illness, societal polarization, etc.), Thanksgiving comes to Americans this week and we ask ourselves – ‘For what are we grateful?’

At our synagogue’s Nursery School Thanksgiving celebration earlier this week, I asked two questions of our children, their parents and grandparents: “Do you wake up each morning feeling mostly ‘grumpy’ or mostly happy?” It’s much easier to be grateful if we are happy as opposed to being grumpy.

Two-thirds said they awake happy, refreshed and raring to go, and the other third said ‘grumpy,’ many (I suspect) with the caveat that it takes them a bit longer to wake up and get into the flow of the day – then, maybe, they feel happy – but maybe not!

I am one who awakens happy, especially after I’ve had my double espresso – my little ‘resurrection’ each morning. Though I awake happy most days, I’m not naive. I am particularly conscious of the world’s troubles, and in my role as a rabbi and pastor, every day people seek me out for counsel, comfort, support, and love. I do the best I can in response, and offer whatever support and comfort I am able. Many, of course, continue to suffer (some for good reason) and they are joined by many in our community and around the world who live in difficult circumstances. When feeling this way, it is  difficult to feel gratitude for anything.

Indeed, most of us are confronted with life-challenges large and small. My question of our Nursery School children, parents and grandparents revealed that, at least, in this group gratitude comes naturally to most even when we feel that we’ve been dealt a bad hand. Little children inspire that kind of joy, love and gratitude.

How we approach the world determines not just whether we are grateful for our many gifts, but also whether we exhibit the virtue of humility, and whether we are generous people or tight-fisted including what we give of ourselves and resources to others. In this way, the virtues of gratitude, humility and generosity are inter-related. If these virtues are highly developed, people are more likely to discover deeper meaning and happiness in their lives.

What follows are thoughts on the virtue of gratitude as drawn from Jewish tradition and world literature. You might consider sharing these quotations around the Thanksgiving table this year as you share with each other, as my family does annually, what we feel gratitude for in our lives.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

“How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned right to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.”
-Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, 20th century philosopher, theologian, activist

“I can no other answer make but thanks, and thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks.”
-William Shakespeare

“If the only prayer you say in your life is ‘Thank you,’ that will suffice.”
-Meister Echkart, 13th century German theologian and philosopher

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.”
-William Arthur Ward, 20th century pastor and teacher

“Gratitude, not understanding, is the secret to joy and equanimity.”
-Anne Lamott, writer

“Ingratitude to a human being is ingratitude to God.”
-Rabbi Shmuel Hanagid, 10th century Spanish sage

“When you arise in the morning give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength. Give thanks for your food and the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies in yourself.”
-Native American Prayer – Tecumseh Tribe

“I offer thanks to You, Sovereign Source and Sustainer of life, Who returns to me my soul each morning faithfully and with gracious love.”
-Morning Liturgy

“Thank everyone who calls out your faults, your anger, your impatience, your egotism; do this consciously, voluntarily.”
-Jean Toomer, 20th century American poet and novelist

“Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.”
– Marcus Tillius Cicero, 1st Century BCE Roman Philosopher

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more.”
-Melodie Beattie, contemporary author

“We don’t express gratitude in order to repay debts or balance ledgers but rather to strengthen relationships (learned from Sara Algoe)….feelings of gratitude make us want to praise the other person publicly, to bring him or her honor.”
-Jonathan Haidt, social psychologist and Professor of Ethical Leadership, NYU

“What have you done for me lately is the ingrate’s question.”
-Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, lecturer and author

“If you have done a big kindness for your neighbor, let it be in your eyes a small matter. If your friend did you a small favor, let it be in your eyes a big favor.”
-Avot d’Rabbi Nathan 41:11, 9th century CE, Babylonia

“A person must be grateful to a place [e.g. synagogue, school, college, hospital, etc.] where he derived some benefit.”
-B’reishit Rabbah 79:6, 5th Century CE, Palestine

“If you cannot be grateful for what you have received, then be thankful for what you have been spared.”
-Yiddish proverb

“The highest tribute to the dead is not grief, but gratitude.”
-Thorton Wilder, 20th century playwrite and novelist

When Hearing An Ambulance Siren & Thoughts About Healing

12 Sunday Oct 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Life Cycle, Quote of the Day

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Following Kabbalat Shabbat services this past week a young woman, Hannah, asked me a question that had never been asked of me before. She wanted to know what blessing was appropriate to say when hearing an ambulance siren.

Hannah explained that she worried about the well-being of the individual for whom the ambulance was intended even though she had no idea who it was, and she wanted to be able to call upon whatever powers that be (e.g. physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual) that could possibly help the individual survive and cope with his/her ordeal.

The shortest prayer in the Hebrew Bible immediately came to mind – “El na r’fa na la – Please God heal her!” (Numbers 12:13) Moses had offered this five-word blessing on behalf of his sister Miriam after she had become leprous, and the Torah relates that Moses’ blessing was efficacious in Miriam’s healing.

Judaism understands that the human being is an integrated whole including body, mind, heart, and soul, and that all belong to God. As God’s “partner” in creation, Judaism obligates us to help others heal from injury and illness. (see Healing and the Jewish Imagination: Spiritual and Practice Perspectives on Judaism and Health, edited by Rabbi William Cutter, Jewish Lights, 2007)

I have written a Guide called “On Healing and Recovery” as part of a Transitions & Celebrations series of Jewish Life Cycle Guides that is available on the Temple Israel of Hollywood, Los Angeles website –

http://www.tioh.org/images/Worship/ClergyStudy/on%20healing%20and%20recovery.pdf 

In this guide I respond to many “Frequently Asked Questions” about recovery and healing and what to do and not do when someone becomes ill. I list relevant Jewish laws and traditions concerning the mitzvah (commandment) of bikur cholim (visiting the sick), as well as a glossary of relevant Hebrew terms and concepts and a list of resources for further inquiry.

I offer here a few reflections drawn from Jewish and world literature on the theme of healing:

“Rabbi Chiyya was suffering, and Rabbi Yochanan gave him his hand. Rabbi Chiyya was lifted.” (Babylonian Talmud, B’rachot 5b)

“I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order.” (John Burroughs)

“In the end, medicine will always be about one patient and one physician [or nurse] together in one room, connecting through the most basic of communication systems: touch. In an age of breathless innovation, this system is almost antediluvian. But medicine simply cannot be automated beyond this point.” (Danielle Ofri, MD, PhD – in Jewish Stories From Heaven and Earth: Inspiring Tales to Nourish the Heart and Soul, Edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p. 47)

“Abayei said, when a person comes out of a privy, that person should say: Blessed is God who has formed us in wisdom and created in us many orifices and many cavities. It is obvious and known before Your throne of glory that if one of them were to be ruptured or one of the blocked, it would be impossible for a person to survive and stand before You. Blessed are You that heals all flesh and does wonders.” (Babylonian Talmud, B’rachot 60b – Also in Asher Yatzar, a prayer in the morning liturgy)

“The Torah gives permission to the physician to heal; moreover, this is a mitzvah and it is included in the mitzvah of saving a life; and, the physician withholds such services, that person is considered a shedder of blood.” (Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh Deah 336: 1)

“It is a positive rabbinic commandment to visit the sick, comfort mourners and serve in a funeral escort.” (Maimonides, Mishnah Torah)

“God’s word is the Source of all true life. Know and understand it. The word can heal your soul and unite it with its Source.” (Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav)

“Rabbi Abba son of Rabbi Hanina taught: The one who visits a sick person, takes away 1/60 of that person’s pain.” (Babylonia Talmud, Nedarim 39b)

“A man too busy to take care of his health is like a mechanic too busy to take care of his tools.”
(Spanish proverb)

“When one helps another, both gain in strength.” (Ecuadorian proverb)

“May the One who dwells in this place comfort you.”  (A message inscribed on Kings Gate in Jerusalem)

“The soul is healed by being with children.” (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)

“Be a lamp,
or a lifeboat,
or a ladder.
Help someone’s soul heal.
Walk out of your house like a shepherd.” (Jalaluddin Rumi)

“Sickness is a separation from God – Healing is returning to God.” (Shirley MacLaine, Out on a Leash)

“For with God there is steadfast kindness!” (Psalm 130:7)

10 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Beauty in Nature, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Quote of the Day

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Sukkot so often is associated with ‘doing.’ The first thing observant Jews ‘do’ after Yom Kippur, the most ascetic holyday in the Jewish calendar, is get back to work and build sukkot. Beyond the doing, of course, is much meaning that gives the holyday its character, power and appeal.

The Sukkah

There’s a machloket (controversy) in the Talmud about what a sukkah represents. Rabbi Akiva said that it represents the booths our people lived in during the 40 years of wandering, thereby recalling the years of exile and suffering experienced by the Israelites who, despite God’s beneficence (per Rabbi Akiva), wanted to return to the Godless Egypt and attach themselves to the false physical comforts based in brick and mortar, as if there were any.

Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus disagreed saying the sukkah represents the ananei kavod (Clouds of Glory – i.e. God) that hovered over the people en-wrapping them with God’s self like a tallit, and providing them with food, water, protection, and safe passage in the desert wilds. The Clouds of Glory were a physical reminder of Divine-nearness that enabled the people to develop trust and faith in a redeeming God without fear.

We seduce ourselves into believing (per Rabbi Akiva) that any house, with its thick walls, gates and alarm systems, can guarantee safety. And so, the sukkah becomes our “house” during this season to remind us of our fragility, impermanence and the limits of the material.

Sukkot comes each year to break us of our illusions and to emphasize that real protection lies within God’s arms. This is the spiritual message of the sukkah, and it’s there that we live for seven days under the t’sach, God’s canopy, a sukkat shalom.

Our bodies are like a sukkah as well, a vessel within which the indwelling presence of God (i.e. the soul) abides. We know, especially as we age, that our bodies are not forever. They break down; we get sick and frail; and we die.

Our homes can so easily be knocked down by earthquake, tornado and storm, just as our bodies and the sukkah are subject to time’s vagaries.

Kohelet

The megilah (scroll) we read on the Shabbat of Sukkot is Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) and it emphasizes this theme of human impermanence and fragility. Kohelet says: “Havel havelim amar Kohelet – havel havelim hakol havel!” – ‘Utter futility, said Kohelet, Utter futility, all is futile!’” (Ecclesiastes 1:2)

A better translation of havel is “vapor.” We feel it one moment, and the next it dissipates much like Abel, whose Hebrew name was also “Havel,” for he left no trace when his brother Cain murdered him.

Most often we attach far too much importance to things – our home is important – our job is important – certain possessions are important – we’re important – everything feels important because we’re attached to, identify with and treat our possessions and self-made identities as extensions and reflections of ourselves, but the truth is that over time nothing tangible or created by human beings is ultimately important – “All is vanity,” like vapor dissipating leaving no trace.

That’s the disturbing side of life, and Sukkot reflects ultimate truths about the limits of materiality and the eternal nature of the spirit. The other side of the holyday, thankfully, empowers us because tradition calls us to rejoice in the very things that we know are impermanent which, like us, are the manifestation of divinity too.

The Four Species

The arba minim (the four species), the lulav, etrog, hadas and aravah plants, represent different aspects of the natural world. They symbolize also different kinds of Jews, the Jewish people as a whole, the oneness of humankind, and God’s all-encompassing unity.

And so, in this z’man simchateinu, this “time of our rejoicing,” we leave our homes and return to nature and the earth. We become more aware of what’s around, above and below us, and we become even more aware of who and what we are.

Universalism

Sukkot carries a deeply universal message. It’s not just for Jews – it’s for non-Jews too. We know this because in the Talmud 70 sacrifices were brought to the Temple during Sukkot, representing the 70 known nations of the world at that time (Bavli, Sukkah 55b). This festival is for the entire world, for everyone everywhere on the planet.

Redemption

Pesach, Shavuot and Sukkot is a triad of Biblical festivals celebrating three kinds of p’dut, redemption.

Pesach’s p’dut celebrates our people’s liberation from Egyptian bondage.

Shavuot’s p’dut celebrates our receiving Torah.

And Sukkot’s p’dut celebrates our redemption from ourselves, especially from the finitude and impermanence of our lives.

In Psalms (130:7-8) we read:

Yachel Yisrael el Adonai
Ki im Adonai ha-chesed
V’har’beh i-mo p’dut;
V’hu yif’deh et Yisrael mi kol a-vo-no-tav.

O Israel, hope in God
For with God there is steadfast kindness
And great redemption is with the Eternal;
And God will redeem Israel from all its wrongs.

Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sukkot Sameach.

“”Now that I am old I admire kind people.” Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

18 Thursday Sep 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Jewish Identity, Quote of the Day

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I am a collector of quotations on every conceivable theme. During the month of Elul each year I revisit my ever-expanding collection with particular focus on the midot, the moral and ethical virtues that are Judaism’s foundational values.

The virtue of loving-kindness (Hebrew – chesed) is one such midah, and one I learned early in my life by example from my father (z’l) who taught my brother and me to “always be kind.” When our father died so long ago, this was a lesson I took deeply to heart not only for its own sake, but because by being kind (I like to think) I become worthy to be his son. I try and emulate his kindness in everyone I encounter.

I have in my collection pages and pages of quotations on the theme of kindness. I offer below a few of them:

When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
-Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

Three things in human life are important: The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.
-Henry James

A thoughtful act or a kind word may pass in a moment, but the warmth and care behind it stay in the heart forever.
-Marjolein Bastin

Always be kind!
-Leon Rosove

The best portions of a good person’s life are little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love.
-William Wordsworth

You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson

Be kind because everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.
-Philo Judaeus

It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one’s life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice than to try to be a little kinder.
-Aldous Huxley

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.
-Leo Buscaglia

Today I bent the truth to be kind, and I have no regret, for I am far surer of what is kind than I am of what is true.
-Robert Brault

The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention.
–Oscar Wilde

Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not.
-Samuel Johnson

I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.
-Étienne de Grellet du Mabillier

For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone.
-Audrey Hepburn

Diplomacy – Quotes to Consider in Dangerous Times

05 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Quote of the Day, Uncategorized

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As Secretary of State John Kerry, along with able diplomats such as US Middle East negotiator Martin Indyk, wade into the waters of Middle East diplomacy, I thought the following quotes are enlightening.

“Negotiation in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties are more anxious to agree than to disagree.” -Secretary of State Dean Acheson (1893-1971)

 “You cannot negotiate with people who say what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable.” -President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963)

 “Never hate your enemies. It affects your judgment.” Mario Puzo, The Godfather (1920-1999)

“Hating clouds the mind. It gets in the way of strategy. Leaders cannot afford to hate.” -Bill Keller, Journalist (b. 1949)

“To jaw-jaw is always better than to war–war.” -Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

“Diplomacy: the art of restraining power.”  -Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger (b. 1923)

“Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.” -Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

“All war represents a failure of diplomacy.” -Anthony Neil Wedgwood “Tony” Benn, British MP and Cabinet Minister (b. 1925)

“Diplomacy is, perhaps, one element of the U.S. government that should not be subject to the demands of ‘open government’; whenever it works, it is usually because it is done behind closed doors. But this may be increasingly had to achieve in the age of Twittering bureaucrats.” -Evgeny Morozov, Russian-American writer (b. 1984)

“Force is all conquering, but its victories are short-lived.” -President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)

“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.” -President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963)

“Certainly the international community is putting a lot of pressure on Iran and making clear that its nuclear program must stop. If it stops with the sanctions, the combinations of sanctions, diplomacy, other pressures, I, as the prime minister of Israel, will be the happiest person in the world.” -Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (b. 1949)

Amen!