A Soulful Journey

 There, where one burns books, one in the end burns men.   -Heinrich Heine Book burnings no longer take place, for the most part.  Our corollary in modernity is the obfuscation of knowledge.  Facts are few, opinions many.  When opinions are viewed as facts and differing “facts” are reduced to ridicule we face the modern version of book burning.  As Heinrich Heine opined, what follows is extremely dangerous.

Stevie Morris was asked by his teacher to find the elusive mouse hiding in her  classroom.  No one else could find the little creature but this child was special and the teacher knew it.  His keen sense of hearing compensated for his blindness.  She appreciated his gift and let him know that he was special. Years later, after he changed his name to Steve Wonder, he never forgot how this one teacher in urban Detroit was the start of his new life of creating music. -Paul Harvey How wonderful this life would be if everyone was told how special they are.

  Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said that " the Bible is meant to be our critic, not we its critic." 

The Seer of Lublin learned from R' Elimelech, who sent him to Reb Zusha. Reb Zusha asked him, "How would you make a person repent?" The Lubliner answered, "I'd show you in the Shulhan Aruch where he did wrong." Reb Zusha answered, "I don't think that would work." Do you think that would make the person feel good?" On the contrary, it would make them feel bad. And if they feel bad, they would run away from you. People do wrong because they don't have the strength to do right." The Lubliner asked Reb Zusha, "How do you do it?" To which Reb Zusha replied, "I shine the light into them, into their hearts, a great light of the love from God.." -From Tzaddikim - May 1931 Two Gun Crowley a serial killer was  apprehended by the police after a shootout.  "He said, "Under my coat is a weary heart, but kind one - one that would do nobody harm." - Al Capone, the most notorious gangster considered himself a he...

There is an old story about a seeker who has traveled high into the Himalayas to find a great teacher whom he believes has the secret of life. After much hardship, the traveler finally comes face to face with the wise one in a cave high in the mountains. The seer has been a recluse for many years, half naked, dressed in only a few dirty rags. His face and head are a tangled mass of snowy hair. His eyes are red and glassy from lack of sleep. The traveler sits nervously at the teacher’s side. “Tell me,” he pleads, “What is the secret of life?” “The secret of life is simple,” responds the teacher. “Life is just a bowl of cherries.” The traveler is startled by the teacher’s response. “A bowl of cherries!” he exclaims. The teacher ponders this for a moment and then questions, “You mean it isn’t?” -Leo Buscaglia The secret of life is in living. The key to living is being awake and aware of the world; knowing that there is an eye which never closes and the ear which hears all.

  A  story related by Rabbi Hugo Gryn  from his native Czechoslovakia about a swan.   A river flooded and swelled and the only way the still-weak cygnets  could be saved would be if the father swan carried them on his back  to a distant and safer bank. Halfway across he asked the first one,  ‘How will you treat me when you grow up?’ ‘Oh, I’ll be the best son  in the world to you! I’ll obey you, care for you, love you . . . ’ ‘You  little hypocrite,’ said the father, and dropped him. He asked the same  question of the second fledgling. ‘What’s the difference?’ he replied.  ‘You just get me to the other side.’ ‘You are no good,’ said the father  and dropped him. The third cygnet thought a while and said: ‘I’m not  sure how I will act, but I can tell you this: I shall treat my young the  way you treat me.’ And in the story that one got saved. It is a story of both honesty and direction.  We are products of our origi...