Blessings & Curses

I've been on a journey the past few months that has included reading the weekly portion of the Torah for the first time. As it turns out and as far as I am concerned, the Torah is the jewel in the crown of the self-help genre. But please don't tell Madonna! Last week's portion talked about receiving both a "blessing and a curse." I never knew where that expression came from. Anyway, last night I checked into my next dwelling, now in Neve Tzdek, Tel Aviv. It is very clean, and nicely designed BUT having booked this space earlier in my travels, it lacks a couple personal requirements that have come to top my "must have" list after clean. For example, outdoor space, nature, view. I found myself regretting my choice, fantasizing over the "one I let get away," looking at the pictures with longing, until I said STOP. Accept this and move on, I demanded. Then, as is my nature, I tried to find the blessing in it. And there are a couple significant blessings in having a lack of outer distractions as I continue my inner journey which involves, writing, learning, prayer and meditation. 

But here is the rub. The blessing is only a blessing if I actually turn the "curse" into the blessing by allowing for the fruits of the blessing to manifest. It's one thing to see lemons and know I can make them into lemonade. It's another thing to actually make the lemonade.

My intention is to make the lemonade during this week in my nicely appointed subterranean bomb-shelter-like dwelling.  Today is day one. 

I recognize what I'm contending with is ridiculously minor considering the challenges of today's world such as living in a war zone, or the birth of a child with severe difficulties. And certainly the death of a child can hardly be seen as a blessing though so much good has come from parents channeling their grief into positive action - not to say that all can or should. 

Two and a half years ago I faced the beginning of the worse time of my life, with the death of my mother, my younger sister, and many painful collateral loses - all within a period of a few weeks. This became a slide downward for the next six months. I will leave it to say now two years later I have reached the happiest time in my life. It was without a doubt an "inside job."

With all that said, as I allow myself to be led down a slowing deepening path, I have come to accept I have no idea what God's plan is for me (the God of my understanding). My work is to be willing. To be willing. And then to be willing some more. A curse can be turned into a blessing with the right attitude. 

Which brings me back to you, dear reader. What "curse" have you turned into a blessing? How can you apply this lesson to your life's journey?

My back hurt this morning. Between a comfortable but non supportive mattress and being hunched over my iPad while tossing Theo's blue ball for him, when I tried to get up I was kind of hunched so, my lower back aching. So I went into a modified cobra for a few minutes.

While in that pose my mind started calibrating my years "out" and then added my years "in" the first time - all the way up until now. 1992-2014. I went out sometime in late 2003 - sometime during my move to Miami that October. I started counting on my fingers while in the pose. One, two, three.... Nine years out. Add to that almost 11 "in". Twenty years - not counting being "in" again for almost two now. Add those two and we are talking about 22 years!

I started getting pretty down while holding the pose - sensing the loss of time. And then! Just like that... a new thought came in to replace all that. All that time, all that time of my life is what it took to find Torah. I mean to really find Torah. How can I bemoan any millisecond of my life that has led to the morning I've had today.

What I also got is he's been trying to get my attention ALL MY LIFE.  Two years ago, in a fit of anger, I scream at him to take me - take all of me. Clearly, I yelled, you want me all for yourself.

What I understand now, is he wants me for himself, first of all. Just first of all...

Here I am.

I feel alive and awake.

Blissed-out over Torah.

It is all coming together.

I love that this blog has an Israeli address: http://called2torah.blogspot.co.il

Below I am reminding about the two paths in life I felt I had to choose from.  One was colorful and sparkly, dynamic; the other grey and quiet, kind. Over the years I've interpreted this to mean several different options. Finally I had decided on an integration of them. Now, I begin to see it through yet another lens. The first is spiritual; the second, material. The " "grey" depiction is deceiving. Grey can also mean humble, lacking intensity. This is how I want to "be" yet the colors I am drawn to lately are vibrant: hot pinks, purples, red, orange. 

As the days progress I need no more convincing that path needs to be the one of Torah - first. One of right action, word, thought. Implicit in that is loving God. If he gave us the Torah, how can I not feel deep gratitude and love? There will be some degree of acting "as if" because I'm not devotional by nature but I have not know how to live. Torah is the way.

The Love of Kindness

"Grant truth to Jacob, kindness to Abraham, as you swore to our forefathers from ancient times."(Micha 7:20)

In the first, second, fourth, and fifth years of the seven-year Shmitah cycle, Jews living in Israel were commanded to separate a tenth of their crops and bring them to Jerusalem to eat (ma'aser sheni). In the third and six years of the cycle, that tenth was given to the poor as ma'aser ani.

At first glance, it would seem that the order of ma'aser sheni and ma'aser ani should have been reversed. Why were the landowners not required to first share with the poor and only subsequently to enjoy their produce in Jerusalem. In other words, why was ma'aser ani not given at the beginning of the three-year cycle, and only then ma'aser sheni?

Maimonides (Gifts to the Poor 10:2) writes that one must give tzedakah with a joyous countenance, and that giving with a disgruntled mien negates the mitzvah. Thus we see that the attitude with which one gives tzedakah is intrinsic to the mitzvah itself.

The prophet Michah (5:17) defines that which God wants from us as "to do justice, love chesed (kindness), and walk modestly with God." And in the concluding blessing of the Amidah we thank God for giving us, "through the light of His countenance a Torah of life and a love of chesed." It is not enough to do chesed. One must love chesed.

More than any other positive mitzvah, writes Maimonides, tzedakah is a sign of the essence of a Jew. It is the very fiber of Jewish existence and the source of our future redemption. Similarly, a good heart, which is the basis of all good character traits (Avot 2:13), refers to an attitude which fosters chesed.

GOD'S FOOTSTEPS

The goal of our striving in this world is the perfection of our souls. The mitzvot are the means to achieving this goal. There are two mitzvot which enable us to emulate God as He relates to us. One is Torah study. Through the study of Torah we attach ourselves to God's mind, as it were, as He created the world.

The second is chesed. The basis of all existence is God's desire to do chesed to His creation. Hence, when we do acts of chesed with a strong desire, we follow in God's footsteps.

Abraham discovered God through the characteristic of chesed of recognizing the chesed inherent in the creation. He so longed to perform acts of chesed, that even when he sat in great agony after his own brit milah, he suffered when no guests appeared. Our mother Rivka, too, was distinguished by her love of chesed. It was for that quality alone that Eliezer tested her.

We are now prepared to understand the order of ma'aser sheni and ma'aser ani. By commanding us to bring one-tenth of our crops to Jerusalem to rejoice there, God taught us two vital lessons. The first is that our material possessions are a present from God and He can dictate how we use that material bounty.

The second is that using material wealth in the way prescribed by God generates feelings of joy and sanctity.

Once we have internalized these lessons in the first two years of the cycle, we can offer that bounty to the poor in the third year - not perfunctorily, but with a true love of chesed.

The letters of Elul hint to the verse, "I am to my Beloved and my Beloved is to me," signifying our intensified relationship with God leading up to the High Holidays. To achieve this we must condition ourselves not only to do chesed, but to love it.

Choices

God gives man choices; these are described as blessings and curses, or life and death. Remarkably, mankind has always needed to be encouraged to choose life. This seemingly automatic, rational choice has never been the "no-brainer" it should be. Why would any sane person choose a cursed path that leads to certain death over the blessed path of life? Apparently, the choice is somewhat more complicated, and our judgment curiously clouded. From time immemorial, the Tree of Death and its luscious fruit looked like the gleaming and attractive choice - more delicious, more desirable. In addition, a seductive, serpentine salesman hissed in our ears about how the fruit of this tree could solve all our problems, enlighten and empower us.

Those of you who rushed to consult your Bibles because you do not recall reading about a "tree of death" are partially correct: there was, indeed, a tree of death, presented by God Himself as the antithesis of the Tree of Life. Clearly, in order to allow man to make a choice between these two options, this tree needed a more palatable image, and so it was marketed and promoted as a "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil". While many of us often think of this tree and its fruit as a viable option to the other choice, and conveniently refer to it in shorthand as a tree of knowledge, it was, in fact, the tree that represented a confusion of good and evil, a tree whose fruit distanced us from the source of life itself - clarity and understanding, proximity to God and holiness. This tree and its fruit are the physical representation of the choices that lead to death - of experience without understanding, of knowledge without wisdom, of information devoid of values.

This choice, this path in life, has not changed much since the days of Adam and Eve: Even today, in the information age, the toxic cloud of confusion created by the amalgamation of good and evil casts a massive shadow that obscures our sightline to true knowledge and real life. Contemporary examples abound: In our generation, computer technology and the internet give us access to information in staggering quantity, but good and evil are often combined and confused. Is all the information we access reliable? Do we want our children to take in everything the internet has to offer? Can we ourselves, as intelligent and discerning adults, accurately evaluate or adequately assimilate all of the words and images we are fed? 

Is it any wonder that one of the most successful computer companies in the world (the creator and manufacturer of the machine on which I am writing these words) represents itself by a fruit with a bite missing - perhaps depicting the forbidden fruit?

What the Torah teaches us is not that the internet, or any technology, is evil or forbidden. The image of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil represents the confusion that is to be found in many different aspects of human life. We are warned that the source of truth - absolute truth - is accessible to us, but the fruits of the tree of death continue to entice and attract our attention and imagination. Why are we attracted to this fruit? Are we hard-wired to self-destruct? Were we created with a death wish? Is the urge to experience the fruit of the 'tree of death' an attempt to anesthetize ourselves, to punish ourselves, or do we simply desire what we cannot have? Do we fancy ourselves to be gods? Perhaps all of these motives combine; perhaps the confusion of motives is one more result of having ingested, of continuing to ingest, the fruit of the tree that confuses and clouds truth and reality, and leads us astray from our life-source, to death.

As man becomes more and more sophisticated, as we obtain and attempt to synthesize more and more information, our need for clarity becomes more and more acute. All of our sophistication has not made us immune to confusion; in fact, we may say that the opposite is true. Now more than ever, we need a healthy dose of the fruit of the Tree of Life - of clear morals and values that can equip us to make sense of the glut of information that is the defining trait of modern life. Our choices often seem so much less cut-and-dried than they were in the Garden of Eden; our lives seem to be composed of so many shades of grey. Moshe's message is that complex moral dilemmas can be distilled into one question: Which choice will lead me closer to my spiritual source of life? The Tree of Life, Torah and its immutable moral guidelines, provides this clarity. From the dawn of creation, evil has been dressing up, making promises. To choose life, we must focus on the word of God and not the slick salesman selling snake oil; his promises are empty, and the potion never works.

The choice that confronts the People of Israel as they prepare to enter the Promised Land is the choice that confronts us, individually and collectively, to this very day. Once again, two paths diverge from the junction at which we are poised. Will we repeat the mistakes of the past? Will we, once again, choose death? Moshe reminds them, and us, of the choices, and of our capabilities. He calls upon them, as he calls upon us, to rise to the occasion, to raise our heads above the cloud of confusion and not to lose sight of the Tree of Life, the moral compass with which we have been armed. Above all, Moshe reminds us that we are capable of making the right choice - but it is a choice. God, for His part, is rooting for us: "Choose life."

Shabbat morning. This is my third Shabbat here in Israel. I've been b'aretz a two full weeks now and after five blissful days in Ein Kerem, I've settled into myself. Ein Kerem, the loveliest of settings, peaceful, calm, rustic, rich in fruit growing on vines, dangling from trees, stone houses respecting the curves of rolling hillsides.

Yesterday I had a phone conversation with a director of one of the learning programs I'm interested in checking out for September. And this is what I came away with....

At this point, my lesson plan lays before me. What there is for me to do is sit. And study. And sit. And then sit some more. That's basically it. If I can do it amongst like-minded seekers that would be yummy.  In the meantime I will enroll in Melton Core curriculum for when I return to the states. Community of learners is a joy. And I have my personal journey. That one, with the help of God, is my self-study. I think I can do this at home or in Jerusalem. It's my curriculum. But as it says in the Matot passage, I will aided deeply being in Jerusalem. Well, time will tell...

As the high holidays approach, and I review my past year, I see it has been one of picking seeds, planting, and some pruning. And I continue...

I've had this faint gnawing feeling, a low-grade, fear that if I've lived my life with such delusion, fear and detachment how can I know what else I'm unaware of or of ways I am living that keep me from a full life, full expression, love, generosity, living God's will.

And this is the answer I got.

"Keep doing what you are doing. Study Torah. Pray. Seek. Make an effort. The truth will be revealed. The right path is the one you are on. Stay the course."

Right thought, right word, right deed. That is what struck me in the Zend Avesta. Those are the same words that Chakrapani urged me towards in my reading.

On page 86 in the Big Book it says: "In thinking about our day we may face indecision. We may not be able to determine which course to take. Here we ask God for inspiration, an intuitive thought or a decision. We relax and take it easy. We don't struggle. We are often surprised how the right answers come after we have tried this for a while."

This is what there is to do.

Earlier today while looking for Theo's lost blue ball below the Ein Kerem house, I came across ripe tomatoes growing on the vine. Small round ones, the kind you pop in your mouth as I did and also larger deep red orange globes ready to be plucked. And so I did. I gathered what I could carry, climbed the steps with Theo trailing behind, rinsed them off and left them to air dry.

Was I stealing, I wonder? Nah, I replied. Yet that old familiar feeling, wondering if I'm "getting away with something" crept in. As well as the old fear of "not getting what I want" or "losing what I've got." Really, just picked a few tomatoes. But the thought lingered until I realized that thought wasn't going away. And so I sent an email to my host, told her what I did, and asked if she wanted them. I immediately felt better having done that, regardless of the result.

As I suspected, she said she had plenty. "Keep them," with a smiley face.

And moments later, finally getting to today's reading, I read this commentary on a parsha in Deuteronomy (my highlights in pink) :

So too, we are expected to become impartial judges over ourselves, being הבו לכם, honest and impartial about what we have to work on and improve. Hence in the singular, i.e. each –שופטים ושוטרים תתן לך :prepare yourselves; And – א )יג ( of you should place a judge – borders and parameters, בכל שעריך – around his personality.  Moshe introduces this issue by using the word איכה - alas, woe - that terrible word used by Yirmiyahu to talk about the destruction.         He warns that the beginning of destruction will lie in the small breakdowns in law and order,         in the unpunished theft of pennies and the overlooked little acts of cheating. 

It is for this reason that the judges are ordered to consider a case involving one cent with the same care, and with the same priority as a multi-billion dollar suit, hearing it first if it came first. Our job is to take care of whatever part of the truth comes our way. To ensure truth emerges from that little prutah is just as important, in terms of human spirituality as ensuring truth in a case that rocks the nation. 

I am here. That is all there is to say. A message I got today what to disconnect from emails and Facebook until tonight. It took until almost until 2pm to do so. And so the moratorium, just like the ceasefires - has been extended to tomorrow morning - except I'm not going to terrorize myself by breaking the moratorium. I was also going to include Safari. I have all that I need to read and study elsewhere but with rockets blaring once again from Gaza, I’m going to at least for now delay checking things out but I will keep in touch with the news...

... a little while later...

It is really shocking! I just reread my prior blog posts from 2006 and I am in EXACTLY the same place of discovery I was then - save one huge difference: I gave up alcohol (again) almost 2 years ago. My last drink was October 22, 2012 - what would have been my sister's birthday. It wasn't intentional. I had no idea that day, even while at the restaurant bar having wine with dinner, that would be my last drink. It was the night of Obama's second debate. I say Obama like it was only his - that points to my allegiance at the time. I got home from the restaurant in a grey out. I remember siting on my bed, put on the tv and that was it. I woke up in the middle of the night in despair and fear. Calling out to God. I had only two good size glasses of wine. Maybe that was four glasses. Missed the debate. Scared myself. Even texted Allan earlier that night. Up until then for the past seven months I was busy drinking and texting Allan. Thankfully that night was my last text to him. Well... that's all there is to say about all that just now.

As I was writing the top passage in Y7 something moved me to pull out this blog. I felt like writing publicly although I realize no one is really going to see this. But i feel like it should be out there somehow. I made add back former posts I don't know. What is really really interesting to me is that the first post dated July 2006 (not yet visible here) is called "In the beginning." That is the exact title of my Y7 almost 8 years later. Except I've written as such: B’rei Sheit. It's a stunning realization. 

So where is the exact place I'm at? I've been called to study Torah except this time I am actually doing it. Previous posts in Y7 spell all that out so I'm not going into it here anew - except to say, in both media I came to the same conclusion: I don't know how to live."  Eight years apart. And what has occurred to me this time is that I really don't. I've lived a completely superficial existence. The values that were instilled in me were fear and guilt, accompanied by shame.

Now that I'm in Israel there is the added piece which is moving here to become fully entrenched. Here is the passage that leads me to this.

(This pertinent reading from Matat aish.com - Mayanot - by Rabbi Noson Weiss pdf on desktop - also in Y7)

The purpose of living in the Holy Land is to be able to connect to God more easily and with greater strength than we could attain living on the unhallowed soil of the rest of the world. The Mishna in Kelim (1:6) states: "There are ten levels of holiness on earth; the land of Israel is holier than all other countries."

For someone who is living at the maximum level of daat, living in Israel could produce no possible improvement. The children of Gad and Reuben were making no mistake. Moses and the elders who saw everything clearly in the bright light of prophetic vision approved their decision. They were maximizing their potential for daat by receiving their inheritance in Trans-Jordan.

In the world of today, the decision to remain in other countries rather than move to the land of Israel is a voluntary one. Whoever chooses to remain in the lands of exile because he feels that he can do a better job of collecting his holy sparks there is committing no fault.

But whoever chooses to voluntarily remain there because his standard of living is a high priority is going against the daat of the Torah and can be held liable for his sin.

Many Jewish people are in the position of being able to make it in Israel but on a much lower standard of living, and therefore refrain from taking the step of aliyah. If a correct system of priorities would place a person in Israel, where it is easier to form a more powerful connection with God even in the periods of exile such as we are currently experiencing, then that person is clearly losing out by staying put. His assigned holy sparks are in Israel. He will look for them in vain in the lands of exile where he chooses to remain.

There is really nothing more for me to say right now.