November 2005
Friends,
I write this as our High Holiday services have come to a close and I am still enveloped in the warmth and wisdom of our community. There were many special moments that will stay with me, from the singing of the choir and from some amazing voices one row behind me, to sermons that spoke to the head and heart, and to contributions, large and small, made by so many to make these services successful.
And as I watched and listened and participated, I felt the presence time and again of a special rabbi in our midst – Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. Rabbi Heschel, a descendent of Hasids and Professor of Jewish Ethics and Mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America from 1945 until his death in 1972, spoke and demonstrated by his own life how to lead a spiritual life – by engaging the spiritual both by an inward process and by acting in response to contemporary moral and political issues. I felt the presence of Rabbi Heschel when our own Jim Levinson spoke of what it is to be a “good Jew,” challenging all of us to widen our gates and open our hearts, to reject attempts to divide and exclude. Heschel said in 1957, “Judaism is not a matter of blood or race, but a spiritual dimension of existence, a dimension of holiness. We are messengers; let us not forget our message.”
I felt the presence of Rabbi Heschel too as I listened to the heart of John Ungerleider as he described the path that will bring him to his Bar Mitzvah next month. Heschel taught of the efforts of modern man to confront and relate to what one senses is transcendant, and he teaches us that it is not dogma that brings us close to our spiritual being, but the journey itself. John’s journey, familiar to many of us, touched us deeply.
I felt the presence of Rabbi Heschel most strongly as I listened to words of community – communities large and small; as I listened to acts of generosity and kindness; as I listened to deeds of social action and repair of the world. Social action was crucially important to the spirituality of Heschel. He said, “To perform deeds of holiness is to absorb the holiness of deeds,” and “A mitzvah is a prayer in the form of a deed.” Many will remember that Heschel marched with Martin Luther King from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. As he described, “For many of us the march…was both protest and prayer. Legs are not lips, and walking is not praying. And yet our legs uttered songs. Even without words, our march was worship. I felt my legs were praying.”
BAJC will face difficult challenges in the months and years to come. The teachings and life of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, along with the spirituality, warmth, and wisdom of our high holiday services, can help illuminate our path.
L'shalom,
Paul
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