A Soulful Journey

“You  cannot worship God, and then look  at a human being, created by God in God’s own image, as if he or she were an animal.” -Abraham Joshua Heschel

"Dad, how do they do gene splicing?" Shrugging, the father said, "I don't know." "Dad, why do we believe in God?" "I do not know." "Who do you think would make the best president?" "I do not know." "Dad, I hope you don't mind me asking you all these questions." "Of course not son, how else will you learn anything?" -Rabbi Shammai Kanter Pay attention to what comes out of your mouth.

"To ask larger questions is to risk getting things wrong. Not to ask them at all is to constrain the life of understanding."  - Alvin Toffler , The Third Wave

Dr. Gershon Rosenstein, prominent Russian scientist, a specialist in the chemistry of the brain, discovered religion as an adult and prevailed on the Soviet government to let him to go to Israel, where he could practice his newly claimed faith.   Shortly after his arrival there, he was interviewed about how a scientist could suddenly accept religion.   H e said among other things, “I remember the first time I tried to pray, to probe the depths of my heart and reach God.   M y scientific mind said to me, ‘You fool, what are you doing?   T o whom are you speaking?’   To this day, I have a great fear about what would have happened to me if I had not overcome my intellectual hesitations at that moment.” What would have happened to him?   H e would have spent the rest of his life stuck in the illusion of self-sufficiency, believing that his own strength and intelligence were all he had, and all he would need, to make it through life.    I n a Hasidic story, the disciple comes to the ra

“Your cravings as a human animal do not become pagan just because it is God whom you ask to attend to them.”  -Dag Hammarskjold

There are, as William Blake called them, "the idiot questioners” who ask seductive questions “to scuttle meaningful discussions” and steer them on to irrelevant agendas.   – Jonathan Omer-Man

A minister teaching a class of seven year olds asked the Sunday School kids, “What is small, gray, and runs around Central Park collecting nuts for the winter?” Silence. Then one girl raised her hand and said, “Reverend, I know the answer must be God but it sure sounds like a squirrel to me.”

It is told of the sage called the Chofetz Chaim that he once had to go to a Czarist official and plead for relief from a particularly harsh decree against the Jewish people. Since the Chofetz Chaim spoke no Russian and the aristocratic official spoke no Yiddish, an interpreter stood waiting. Once permitted to speak, the Chofetz Chaim delivered his message with all the feeling and sincerity that emanated from a heart as pure as his. When he finished, a pregnant silence filled the room. Then the interpreter started to speak: “Your honor, the Jew claims…” Whereupon the Russian official raised his hand and said: “No translation will be necessary. I understood.” As a result of this meeting, the decree was revoked.   - Rabbi Baruch Cohon

The Berditcher [Rabbi Levi Yitschak] began his discourse, “A world turned topsy-turvy I see before my eyes.   In years gone by, the Jews spoke the truth in the streets and the marketplaces, but in the House of Prayer they told a lie.   It is the other way around now.   On the streets and in the marketplaces they all speak falsehood, but h in the house of Prayer they tell the truth. “A riddle?” “The explanation: honesty and good faith were the torches lighting their paths in the olden days.   And so they made good the Scriptural world of a righteous aye and nay, and all their trading was done in good faith.   But when they came into the House of Prayer, they would beat their breasts and say” ‘We have defrauded, we have robbed.’   That was then a lie, for they had been true to God and their fellow man.   Today it is the reverse: in the trading place, they lie and defraud, and in their confessional prayer, they speak the truth.” – Newman, Hasidic Anthology