Elul Thoughts, Elul 29 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

Look to the Lord, be strong and of good courage, look to the Lord (Ps. 27:14)

Today is the last day of Elul, at sundown it will be Tishri 1 when we go to Synagogue and bring in the new year together.  “Look to Adonai, be strong and of good courage,” what does that mean?  For the last month, each and everyday at the blowing of the Shofar, we are asked to evaluate self, assess our behaviors, question our short comings, weed out our wrongs, be honest about our sins … you get the picture.  It is possible to become down on yourself  and wonder if it is all worth it, not everyone will act that way, but some might.  It takes courage to engage the season of Elul and the Holidays that are coming. Too often it seems like Jews go to synagogue during this time out of a sense of obligation for a variety of motivations, and while that is a good thing, there is also a reason for the season you can say.   Going back to Egypt our people have always been on the outside looking in, in fact each section of our Bible (Torah, Prophets and Writings) ends just that way, Israel outside of the land looking in.  For the last month we have been on the outside of the days of forgiveness looking in and now that time has come and we can enter them.  When the Book of life is open we stop, reflect, repent, and seek the higher ways of God as we enter a new year.  I am not sure if the of Book of Life being opened only from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kipper is enough motivation for people, but does it matter?  We know we are not perfect and we know we fall short, so we have been given this time by our tradition to cleanse and correct the traits we wish to fix and/or better ourselves.  Consider the words of the Prophet Isaiah; Seek the LORD while He may be found, Call upon Him while He is near.

At the end of the Year, we find a new beginning

     

Elul Thoughts, Elul 28 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

Generations come and generations go, but the world stands (Ecc. 1:4)

There is nothing new under the sun, people come and go, but the world and its ways stay the same.  What also stays the same is that people need tikkun, or repair.  During the holidays, particularly on Yom Kippur, we will say many prayers that have to do with t’shuva, prayers that speak to the act and/or its potential. When we say the Al Chayt, we seek forgiveness for acts of slander, bribery, extortion, perverting justice, lies, baseless hatred, but also gossip and greed.  In fact gossip, along with idolatry and murder it is considered one of the worst sins in Judaism. The point is that like others, yesterday and tomorrow,  human error will continue to exist. This is not like a Christian understanding that all people are depraved, which is not the Jewish way, a way that says we are perfectly and wonderfully formed but also no one is above making errors. With all our human advancements human nature never really changes yet our tradition gives us the tools to fix it. 

Because the world is a different place each moment, I am alive, there is unlimited
potential for change

Elul Thoughts, Elul 27 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

If I had not believed to look upon the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living!

The Prophet Isaiah writes, “the dead cannot praise you; they cannot raise their voices in praise. Those who go down to the grave can no longer hope in your faithfulness. Only the living can praise you as I do today. Each generation tells of your faithfulness to the next. Think of it—the Lord is ready to heal me! I will sing his praises with instruments every day of my life in the Temple of the Lord.”  To put is succinctly, if you are dead you cannot enjoy what it means to be alive, but if you are alive you need to be healed.  As we have been saying all along, we are people in process, we need to grow and become, we need to heal and overcome to reach our best.  Torah helps that part of the human journey by acting as a fence, something we also we spoke about once before (Avot 1:1).  A fence serves two purposes; to protect and to separate.  The fence that sets boundaries for how we conduct ourselves also allows our inner spirit to corral the benefits gained.  How we behave has a great deal to do with how we heal.  How we heal begins by knowing that we need to heal in the first place.  We are a just a few days away from our celebration of Rosh Hashanah, have we found the tikkun (repair) we need?

Healing begins when acknowledge that we are broken

Elul Thoughts, Elul 26 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and behold the angels of God were ascending and descending on it (Gen. 28:12)

This dream of Jacob’s happened as he journeyed upon the road and had an encounter with God that helped to fulfill his own sense of purpose.  Elul is about an encounter upon the road leading up to Rosh Hashanah and the rest of the Holidays that follow.  The ladders that ascend and descend can also be a metaphor for people who encounter a sense of “other” on their own path and the wisdom that perhaps will come from that very same encounter.  We learn that physically the ladders are community, prayer, S’lichot and hearing the shofar daily.  We also learn, that for Jacob his dream was his dream, it came as he journeyed and sought direction along his path.   There were no bells and whistles, just his spirit engaging with God along the way.  Each one of us is in charge of our own paths and the ladders upon it.  The Torah is like a ladder, we seek higher ways through its teachings and we receive in return the benefit of its wisdom.  Perhaps we should pay more attention to our dreams, even our daydreaming when we are fully awake, because who knows what they may want to teach us.

Through Torah, God will help us to ourselves

Elul Thoughts, Elul 25 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

Deliver me not over until the will of my enemies, for false witnesses have risen up against me and this who breath violence (Ps. 27:12)

There are many ways we can go with the above in terms of enemies.  Sure, it can be a foe, but it can be a temptation, sickness or even self.   But it can also be society.  In other words, just because others may step over people to get ahead, or sue a neighbor who has a tree with its branches hanging over a fence so leaves fall into the yard, right or wrong, the behavior of "payback" is just not right.  Our tradition looks poorly upon the abuse of others who are weaker like widows and strangers, but also the more powerful over another in terms money and resources.   This is why Pirkei Avot asks, who is wise; who is rich, who is powerful and who is honorable? (Avot 4:1ff).  The one who is wise is humble and learns from all people; the one who whose rich is content with what they have; the one who is strong has self-control over how they act and the one is honorable gives others honor before or equal to self.  We need to define an enemy as one, or what, impacts the inward battle of growth and pursuits for out desired higher norms of behavior.  Fighting an enemy you can see is one thing, fighting the enemy you cannot, that is a very different kind of battle. 

How does the weapon of forgiveness operate in your own battles?

Elul Thoughts, Elul 24 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

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רפואה מן התורה

Love Your Neighbor As Yourself (Lev. 19:8)

Given the spoken words of our current day it seems difficult to do, but Jewish tradition is always interacting with the words of Torah and asks us rise above normal levels of existence for a better way. In Parasha Ki Teitzei we find what appears odd in Deuteronomy 22:6-7.  It says that if you are on a path and come upon a nest that has either young birds or eggs in it as well as the mother, you can only take them if you sent the mother away first.  In Targum Yonatan the reward of doing so is not only good in this world but has merit for the world to come, which is why for Rashi it is about the mitzvot.  But then Ramban (Nachmonides) takes that one step further and says that the act of removing the mothers eggs from beneath her is an act of cruelty.  By therefore sending the mother bird away first it was an act of kindness so the bird did not have to watch her eggs being taken from before her eyes.  We learn from this what it means to love another, maybe not in the same way as with the mother bird and her eggs, but about going out of the way to make sure any type of harm does not come to another. Surely we want that for ourselves but we must make that a foundation of how we conduct our own actions.  This is a “me” world particularly right now, yet how we love others needs to be a bigger part of the norm.

Love of others is only possible through love of self.

Elul Thoughts, Elul 23 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

Show me your path, O Lord, and lead me on a path because of my ever watchful foes (Ps. 27:11)

In Leviticus Rabbah 8:1 Rabbi Yose ben Halafta teaches “Making ladders for people to descend and ascend;” how might we understand that?  We can process that teaching to be about reaching beyond what a person may think they are capable of to embrace a better way.  We talked about the path in another Elul Thought as a choice, a choice that calls for us to consider right from wrong, a choice that a person must make in order to raise themselves above their base nature for a higher level of spirituality.  The above quote form Psalm 27 suggests that a foe, or an enemy, is what stops us from reaching our desired highs.  I think we need to understand an enemy as what constrains us; a person, a temptation, need for power, greed, a substance, selfishness, lies -  perhaps you can think of other enemies that you may have?  The path represents the ways of “over-coming,” which is the foundation of our victories.  We have a ladder to ascend to greater heights. One of my favorite modern day prophets, Bob Dylan, writes, “may you build a ladder to the stars and climb on every rug …,”  if we have been given a path to rise above I think we should take it.

Whenever we get lost in the desert, God helps us to find our way

Elul Thoughts, Elul 22 (Short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

Among the ways to repent for the one turning is … to change his name, as of to say, I am a different person and not the one who sinned (Maimonides Laws for Repentance)

Every day we pray and remember that it was God who lead “Abram” out of his home of idolatry into a new land that included the name of change to “Abraham.”  “Abram” means exalted father and “Abraham” means father of many.  Each name says something about the man who would be the father of the Jewish people, in fact the father for all monotheistic religions.  He was not just the exalted father of his own family, but he became the chosen servant for all of people, hence the father of many.  I wonder what that did to his own mindset, how did he see himself after that name change?  The Kohelet writes, “A good name is better than precious oil; and the day of death is better than the day of one’s birth” (Ecc. 7:1).  A good name is earned no matter what.  The fact is having a good name does not demand perfection, but integrity and honesty.  Mystically, the Sovereign of the Universe gives us all the opportunity, as with Abraham, to change our name so to speak.  Repenting is like changing our name, it is a change of purpose and choice, a change of repentance that is also birthed from integrity and honesty.  It takes a great deal of courage to admit when we are wrong that then on different levels requires needed changes.  That is what a good name looks like.

To go to the light we have to find out way through some darkness

Elul Thoughts, Elul 21 (Short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

For although my mother and father have forsaken me, Adonai will lift me up (Ps. 27:10)

The Kohelet writes, “every time and season under heaven are known my all” (my translation of Ecc. 3:1).  Our mothers and fathers will pass from this earth and leave us as orphans.  In fact the mourners Kaddish is called the “kaddish yatom,” literally the Orphans Kaddish.  This might sound strange to many folks who certainly know the following, but we always need to remind ourselves that with our parents gone we are responsible for our own choices.  But that is the case in general as we grow from a young person right up till adulthood even when mom and dad are still alive.  Now we can turn to God as a parent figure, and many people in every theistic religion do, but it is more than that. Elul is asking us to take stock, be responsible, rise up and embrace the meaning of this time in our calendar cycle.  Per the words of Talmud, this time is to reflect since our “impulse renews itself every day, it grows in strength each day and seeks to slay you” (BT Sukkah 52b).  God does not forsake us even if sometimes it feels that way (I know, this is another conversation). The ethics of God reflected in Torah set a bar for living that is right and pure.  That is the energy which is birthed from our self-responsibility and with the help of God we can gain (or regain) the control needed to reach where we aim. 

As we become adults, we encounter our parents with new understandings

Elul Thoughts, Elul 20 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

What is repentance? The sinner shall cease sinning, and remove sin from his thoughts, and wholeheartedly conclude not to revert back to it, even as it is said: "Let the wicked forsake his way" (Maimonides Mishnah Torah, Laws of Repentance 2:2)

Once there was a man who uncovered a woman’s head in a public square. Rabbi Akivah levied a large fine on this man who then pleaded his case.  The man’s argument was that the woman at another time uncovered her own head so why should he be held accountable for what she did to herself already?   Rabbi Akivah said that what a person does to themselves and what another person does to them are separate matters and the man was still required to pay the fine (Avot D’Rabbi Nathan, chapter 3).  Not sure if this man got it right away or if at all.  In fact when it comes to human growth it is a process and while some thing’s come quickly others take time to better grasp and develop.  Confession of short comings unfortunately seems to work that way; looking in the mirror we see where we fell short and other times we just look right past it.  All of us have to take stock, remember Chesbone HaNefesh – taking an account of self, yet it further helps to know that the time component is permeable, and that is okay.  This year we have new things to bring before God as we better ourselves and next year there will be something else to address, you can bet on that.

Lasting change comes in stages

Elul Thoughts, Elul 18 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

רפואה מן התורה

Chose this day life and good, death and evil (Dt. 30:15)

I do not think any of us do anything unless we find value in it.  Benjamin the Righteous, when confronted by a widow with four sons, had compassion and helped them in their time of need.  Then when he lay on his sick bed dying we read the famous verse, “one who preserves a single life ... it is as if the whole world was preserved” (Avot D’Rabbai Natan, chapter 4).  In our story God remembers Benjamin the Righteous because of his act of compassion; at the beseeching of the angels, for God’s mercy, 22 years were added to life of Benjamin the Righteous.  It is doubtful that Benjamin the Righteous did what he did for self-gain more so than it was just the right thing to.  Doing the right thing is about making the choice to do so with no other qualifications than it is just right.  As we approach the Holidays we self-reflect and make the needed corrections and/or adjustments between God, others and self - also because it is the right thing to do.  Our challenge; look deep inside and make changes that will impact the future.  No one makes us do that, it is always about choice, but choice with a purpose.

Repentance is an act of belief in the future          

Elul Thoughts, Elul 17 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

רפואה מן התורה

Seek my face, my heart repents, your face, O God, do I seek (Ps. 27:8)

One of the better well known passages of Torah comes from parasha Shoftim in Deuteronomy that says; צדק צדק תרדף, “Justice, justice you shall pursue.”   The fact that justice appears twice should not be missed.  On one hand we must be “just” in how we conduct ourselves with others, while on the other hand, we must be “just” in how we self-evaluate ourselves.  Torah in general asks both of us; proper behavior and proper internal conviction/awareness.  The inter-conscience is a vehicle for spiritual justice, it works to guide our internal moral compass, our sense of ethics and the basic sense of right and wrong.  Aristotle held that the inter-conscience is a natural part of how the mind works, but I also think we need to grasp that in a slightly different way, hence the inter-conscience of the mind is a part of human spiritually.  In that sense when we respond “justly” our spirit is responding to God who fashioned us in that very way.  Likewise, when we seek God, particularly at certain times of life (such as the holidays), we have the ability to embrace things like repentance, because what is a natural part of our neshoma is awakened and becomes operational.  Listen to that voice during this season, and while that connection is always there, maybe right now we tend to seek it a little more.

The gates of repentance are always open 

Elul Thoughts, Elul 16 (short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

רפואה מן התורה

There are sin’s that can be atoned for immediately and other sins can only be atoned for over the course of time (Maimonides, Laws for Repentance, Mishnah Torah)

When Israel was about to cross the Jordan and enter the land that God promised their ancestors, 2 1/2 tribes elected to remain east of Canaan and create their homesteads. While Moses and the Elders permitted their desire, the men of those tribes first had to cross the Jordan and enter the land in support of the rest of Israel who sought to settle is the land of their inheritance.  What does that have to do with the forgiveness of sin that also seems to the work on many different levels all at once?  Forgiveness does not mean the eradication of consequences, and the forgiveness of sin does not always mean that you always wake up and “feel” forgiven.  Forgiveness is a journey in many ways and you might not be able to “settle” until other business is dealt with first, just like Israel and the land above.  The fact is that if we rest on the morals of forgiveness we might miss a very important truth; we continue to fall short.  Please do not read that as an indictment of some kind, that would be the wrong way to take it.  What it is saying is that repentance and forgiveness are a process, it can take time. Sometimes we have to fix something first, like asking forgiveness from another person on Yom Kippur, or sometimes we have to forgive ourselves before we can feel forgiven by God.  As the Kohelet wrote in Ecclesiastes 7:2, “it is better to go into the house of mourning than go to a house of feasting.”  Well, perhaps that is because in our case we have to be someplace that allows us to better hear that needed inner voice of correction. 

It takes a lifetime to complete the process of t’shuva.            

Elul Thoughts, Elul 15 (Short read)

Below is teaching of Chaplain (Rabbi to be) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing for the High Holidays

רפואה מן התורה

Listen Lord when I cry aloud, Have mercy on me, answer me (Ps. 27:7)

Was the Psalmist making a declarative statement about Adonai or is he/her making a statement about hope?  In fact, is there a way to know, I mean not for us, but did the psalmist know the difference?  In the Kabbalistic tradition it says that creation is made up of two spheres, the spiritual and the physical realms.  The spiritual realm is called the “99% realm” and the physical realm is called the 1% realm.” Humanity, although primarily spiritual, spends almost all its time on the 1% by being caught up in the feelings and emotions of fear, doubt, disappointment and anger. Likewise, the pursuit of truth and self-growth becomes intellectual and bodily, even to the point of denying the inter voice of the human spirit.  Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel says that creation spoke to the inner mystery of the human quest, he called it radical amazement, thus the heavens declare the glory of God (Ps. 19:1).  The Psalmist made a statement about God and self, and perhaps the line from Psalm 27 above was about the conclusion of a journey, a journey to know God birthed from the yearning of the soul.  That is what Elul is for - searching out your sense of other, your sense of God.

Prayer is part of an ongoing dialogue with God

Elul Thoughts, Elul 14 (Short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

What is the straight path a person shall chose for themselves? (Avot 2:1)

When the temple stood the sacrifices served as a hands-on way for the members of Israel to interact between God and themselves.  When Israel was dispersed after the destruction of the temple they needed to rebuild that connection, hence the famous words of Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakkai, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.”  Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakkai spoke those words to Rabbi Joshua after the cessation of the sacrifices at the destruction of the Temple, teaching his disciple that there were now new ways to connect to God, through prayer, charity and loving kindness. Israel had to choose to move on after the destruction of the temple and the early Rabbis reformed the Jewish faith for that reason.  Today sacrifice is the intent of each Jew and for that matter person that lives; sacrifice of prayer, holiness, choice of right and wrong or commitments to name just a few.  Sacrifice is about choice; how are we going to live and behave, believe and practice, love and hate, work and play.  Sacrifice is no longer an animal on the alter but the direction of our free will in what we do.  But sacrifice also may include a loss, but a loss for a bigger reward. Judaism does provide a road map, it’s not a random bunch of choices that lack meaning and/or purpose. Putting order to our lives creates the path of righteous sacrifice.

When we offer up sacrifices we let of our inner selves

Elul Thoughts, Elul 13 (Short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

And now I will lift up my hands … and I will offer sacrifices in your tabernacle with sounds of trumpets … I will sing praises to the Lord (Ps. 27:6)

Holiness is something that we have more control over than spirituality. How?  Spirituality is a belief or a feeling, things that are more intangible than anything else.  In other words, how we feel about our sense of spirituality can change daily.  Holiness is about how we behave and conduct ourselves in all aspects of life, personal and/or professional.  Doing the right thing or acting in the right way is like muscle-memory, it is behaviors that are not based on how we feel but what we know are right.  But spirituality, our faith and convictions, through the mundane nature of our daily behaviors, will rise to the top and reveal itself to us, seeing God in the backdrop of our actions and their rewards. When that happens we see God, we experience that sense of “other,” which in turn has the power to allow us raise our hearts in the sacrifice of thanksgiving to the Lord.  Sacred moments in life are personal alters we erect along the journey.

Spiritual moments contain eternity

Elul Thoughts, Elul 12 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

The sin offering atones for all the transgressions in the Torah, those violated intentionally and those violated inadvertently (Maimonides, Mishnah Torah, Laws for Repentance)

Perkei Avot says to be careful regarding the small and be careful regarding the senior mitzvot.  A mitzvah is just not a good need, like opening your spouse’s door when you get in the car, but it is an act of character.  Now, why we cannot please every person who we encounter, the fact is that how we conduct ourselves is about our own character.  If we neglect what we consider a small thing; a smile, a hello, being present in listening, lending a helping hand not based on value of the need, or what have you - although we may not consider it as such - that is a direct reflection of our character. Conversely, if a large thing is giving a helping hand to people who we consider more important, involve ourselves in a project only for self-gain, gravitate towards others because of money or religion in terms of inequality with different groups, well that is also an issue of character.  The fact is that when we do things like that I think it is safe to say that most people do not set out to hurt others, but that is the result too often.  We cannot control how others perceive us but we can control holding the small and the senior mitzvot as equals.  How we act has more power than we may think, and our characters offer lots of light even if we cannot see another person’s darkness.

Once we can clean up the environment of souls we offer cleaner air to breathe freely

Elul Thoughts, Elul 11 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

You conceal me in the pavilion on the day of evil, you hide me in the covert of your tent, you lift me up on a rock (Ps. 27:5)

William Worden, a leading grief therapist, writes that when there was ambivalence or discord between the deceased and the living the later will deem the former as an unworthy partner relationally to fix what was broken.   In other words, the result of that relationship can only be corrected on one side since the other party is no longer a part of that connection physically, yet emotionally the relationship certainly carries on.  The mourner now must address and fix what was broken on their own, that is without the departed, and that very much reflects the above Psalm. How?  Giving and receiving, offering or embracing forgiveness boils down to a belief that it can happen and it is available no matter how bad the act or even the crime. The words of the above psalmist says that God would “protect” the doubts and fears that claims forgiveness is not possible, even if it is only one sided toward self because the other person(s) are not in the picture any longer.  Forgiveness is a powerful thing and people may feel they are unworthy of it.  Ah, but that is why God hides us spiritually in the tent of his covenant, lifting us up on the rock to reach for what may seem too far away, even if that means years have gone by. God’s forgiveness does not have a statute of limitations.

The present contains the potential to change the past

Elul Thoughts, Elul 10 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

Have you forgotten the wickedness of your fathers, the wickedness of the kings of Judah, and the wickedness of their wives, your own wickedness, and the wickedness of your wives, which they committed in the land of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? … (Jer. 44:9)

Yep, that is a heavy indictment to say the least, and it’s really to bad we find it in the Tanakh.  But there is value to be gained by looking behind the words themselves. Maimonides in his Mishnah Torah (Laws of Repentance -Hilchot T’shuva) says, that when a person is faced with the potential once again to to fall short from the same situation, will they act upon that sin again?  The “wickedness” that Jeremiah speaks of above was on going, the people and nation continued to embrace unhealthy and non-Torah based ways of living, embracing practices that were against the ethics of God and like-values.  The result; they were attacked and lost their land to a foreign king, exiled to a land that was not their own as strangers, having no sense of security or hope of return in the future.  Now while that may be that story, our own stories tell us that we each are victims of our own choices.  The natural evolution of growth in Torah asks us not to forget the past and make better choices for the sake of the future.  Engaging in better self-awareness sets the stage for self-betterment in general.

Complete acts of T’shuva help complete the self

Elul Thoughts, Elul 9 (short Read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

One thing I ask of the Lord, only this do I seek to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the Lord’s beauty and to frequent his temple … (Ps. 27:4)

This really does seem impractical; I mean living in the house of God every day and every moment let alone seeking God all the time.  David (assuming that he wrote the above Psalm) was a man who loved his life with the Lord, that much is clear when you read about him, and the Torah was a lamp to his feet and a light to his path as he walked with God (Ps. 119:105).  Today, the challenge in having that type of devotion (no matter the extent) is compromised given the business of our world.  But that problem also existed when Israel lost their land and temple and was exiled to Babylon and beyond after the destruction of the 2^nd Temple.  As such, we read in Perkei Avot, “I have found nothing better for my body than to sit in silence” (Avot 1:17).  Likewise, Avot also teaches that “The fence of wisdom is silence” (Avot 3:17).  God can be found in the silence and our job is to create that in the ever ending ruckus of our lives.  Elijah when seeking God did not hear the voice of the Divine in the thunder, lighting or the shaking of the earth, but in the silence of the wind.  While not easy, it is possible.

The voice of Sinai is heard in the silence

Elul Thoughts, Elul 8 (short read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

They heard the sound of God manifesting itself in the garden toward evening, and the man and woman hid from God … (Gen. 3:8)

After Adam and Eve partook of the apple, the story tells us that they saw the world differently than before, going from being naked and unafraid to afraid and full of shame.  We are going to make mistakes, and we are going to have to try again.  We are going to fall and sometimes it will be easier than other times to get back up.  Why did Adam and Eve feel shame?  What good can come of shame and guilt?  Shame and guilt or regret and blame seem to be a part of the emotional ecosystem of reaction that belongs to us as people.  In fact, King Solomon says in Qohelet (Ecclesiastes) that all of his wisdom caused much grief and knowing increases pain (Ecc. 1:18).  The human consciousness gives birth to the wisdom to know wrong from right (both learned and intuited behavior) and in turn it helps us to frame our responses to both right and wrong reactions.  The above passage teaches us to learn how to better embrace our convictions of wrong in order to aim for the higher values of right. Sometimes hiding appears easier than the pain of self-revelation. It is indeed a challenge to take our negative feelings and let them be the very means to achieve a better path. 

Embarrassment and regret pave the road to change.

Elel Thoughts, Elul 7 (less than a 1 min read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

If an army shall encamp around me, my heart shall not fear. Though war should wage up against me even then I shall be confident … (Ps. 27:3)

In the Torah we read a story about Moses who needed to keep his arms raised toward the sun to ensure Israel’s victory, whereas if they fell, Israel would be defeated.  Fear of losing was why the text says that Moss was “constant” in his determination to keep his arms extended upwards.  I am sure he was afraid not only of the battle but of his inability to succeed in his task.  In the story Moses fulfilled his destiny although he would require the help of his brother and nephew for what he could not accomplish alone.  When war rose up against Israel Moses might have looked to the heavens to be rescued from the hands of their enemies, but it came from an unexpected source. In other words, Moses’ battle was not his own, it was a collective effort.  Often times when we enter life battles we take them on alone, which does not always turn out the way we may want.  Fear is a human emotion; isolation is another matter.  Seeking isolation when things get tough seems to be the human way, but fear should be an emotion that reaches out for help.  War is apart of life, battling it ourselves in another matter completely.  God’s miracle of deliverance comes in the package of relationships, and sure we have all be disappointed, but in those connections we can be confident.

Miracles can be found only when we are ready to look for them

Elul Thoughts, Elul 6 (less than 1 min read)

Below is the teaching of Chaplain (soon to be Rabbi) Adam Ruditsky in conjunction with the book Preparing yourself for the High Holidays.

רפואה מן התורה

There is not a righteous person on this earth who only does good and does not sin … (Ecc. 7:20)

Adam sinned in the garden.  Did he (and his wife, Eve) have to leave the garden because they sinned or when confronted by God they both refused to accept responsibility for their actions?  While the answers are many, here, the above is asking us to not only recognize our imperfectness but also to consider how we respond.  The reasons why people do not like to reflect on wrongs are many.  Perhaps a person just has a hard time saying they are wrong or saying sorry, or maybe the guilt and shame of that wrong turns into a  state of self-loathing that at all costs must be avoided.  Sure there is the fear of rejection; who has not been afraid to approach a person who we have wronged not knowing quite sure how they might respond?  Honestly, I also think there are people out there who just don’t know or even won’t count the cost of the power of wrong.  And yes, self-wrong and self-forgiveness, that is a real big issue that has led to terrible results.  It’s not easy, but being “free” of  whatever wrong constrains us is a big part of how we contend with our faults, just as we also do with others.  Righting wronged relationships has the power to help restore the world we live in, but the first step begins with ourselves.

By doing t’shuva, you participate in the act of recreation.