Contemplation of the Divine crowns all of life, without distinguishing between lofty and lowly. As it embraces rational thought and purifies it, so does it exalt and enrich the imagination; it refines the will, just as it empowers abilities.
   The need to think about God, however, is a drastic descent and necessary to man only as a therapy. Atheism is an unfavorable preparation to the greatest level, when there will no longer be a need to think about Divinity, for life itself will be the Light of God.

                                         --Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Kook



And, similarly...

Love means never having to say you're sorry.
  
                                          --Erich Segal, Love Story


For one never apologizes to one's self.

And a healthy person need not talk and express his feelings to himself either...



Rabbi Moshe Leib of Sassov used to tell his followers that he learned what it means to love from two Russian peasants. Once he came to an inn, where two thoroughly drunk Russian peasants were sitting at a table, draining the last drops from a bottle of strong Ukrainian vodka.

One of them, in a slurred drunken drawl yelled to his friend, “Igor! Do you love me?” Igor, somewhat surprised by the question answered, “Of course Ivan, of course I love you!”

“No no”, insisted Ivan, “Do you really love me, really?!”

Igor, now feeling a bit cornered, assured him, “What do you think? I don’t love you? Of course I love you. You’re my best friend Ivan!”

“Oh yes, yes?” countered Ivan. “if you really loved me … then why don’t you know what hurts me and the pain I have in my heart?”








You came to me, to open my eyes.
To me your body was a view,
A window and a mirror.
You came as night comes to the owl
To show him, in the darkness, all things.

And I learned: There's a name
For each eyelash and fingernail,
And for every hair on the exposed flesh.
And the scent of childhood,
The scent of paste and pine,
Is the night aroma of the body.

If there were torments -
They've sailed towards you.
My white sail into your darkness.
Allow me to go, oh allow me to go
And kneel on the shore of forgiveness.    

                                                   --Leah Goldberg





            

I was asleep, but my heart awake: It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled; For my head is filled with dew, My locks with the drops of the night.


I have put off my garment; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
                                           --Song of Songs 5:2,3




When I was a child
I caught a fleeting glimpse
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone
I cannot put my finger on it now
The child is grown,
The dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb.
                                               --Pink Floyd

Looking at God in the Eyes--Part 3

[Continued from here and here]

Lift up your eyes to the sky: Who created all these?
                                                             --Isaiah 40:26



Must I really be turning my head upwards to look at Him in the eyes? The world has such beauty and is teeming with ineffable grandeur...must I really escape from it to behold His Presence?



It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.

                                                      --Henry David Thoreau



[Contemplate in the mind as follows:] "The light of the blessed En Sof (Infinite), which pervades all the worlds...including also this place where I stand...was the only existence before the world was created, [so is It now] without any change, as is written, 'For I, the Lord, have not changed,'...Everything [is] in His presence, and is truly nothing at all other than Him."


Allow the soul to enlighten her eyes with the truth of the unity of the light of the En Sof, with a perceptive vision and not merely by cognition alone...this is the core of the whole [Divine] Service.
                                                         
                        --Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, Tanya, Chapter 29




The sky is not a place; it is a way of perceiving reality. Lifting one's eyes up to Him means focusing on His Light pulsating through the details right in front of you, within you, around you. It means utilizing every wonderful experience of being as a window through which you see Him smiling at you. 


This is the secret of the redemption of our world. Making Heaven a place on Earth...




How many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?...
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.
                                                           --Bob Dylan


The wind of our nostrils, the Messiah of the LORD...

                                                            Lamentations 4:20

Resting in God--PART 2

There's no place like home

There's no place like home!

                               --Dorothy (L. Frank Baum), The Wizard of Oz

How lovely is your dwelling place,

Lord Almighty!

My soul yearns, even faints,

for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and my flesh cry out

for the living God.

Even the sparrow has found a home,

and the swallow a nest for herself,

where she may have her young—

a place near your altar,

Lord Almighty, my King and my God.

Blessed are those who dwell in your house;

they are ever praising you.

                                Psalm 84

But how can one's yearning soul find a home with God, in His courts, in Him? Where must we go?

"Thou art higher than my highest and more inward than my innermost self..."

                          

                                                                    --Augustine of Hippo



"Thou art close, O God..."         
                                                                --Psalms, 119:151

"Closer than anything that is close..."
                                                               --Ibn Ezra

Resting in God

And may we take refuge and rest in the shade of Your wings, as on the day when "The LORD came down in a cloud"  (Exodus 34:5)
                                                      --Siddur, Daily Prayer Book

How can we possibly rest in God here, now, today, just as on the day He descended upon Sinai? But that, indeed, was what was revealed on that day. The truth of what we are.

The ultimate purpose [of creation] is...that the Divine light of the blessed En Sof (Infinite) shall shine forth...throughout this world...The Divine light will be revealed...without any cloak, as it is written, "No longer shall thy Teacher hide Himself...but thine eyes shall see thy Teacher..." The Messianic Era...is the fulfillment and culmination of the creation of the world, for which purpose it was originally created...Something of this revelation has already been experienced on earth, at the time of the Giving of the Torah, as is written, "Unto thee it was showed, that thou mightest know that the Lord He is G-d; there is naught else beside Him"... And the Rabbis, of blessed memory, explained, "They looked eastwards and heard the speech issuing forth: 'I am the Lord your God,' etc., and so [turning] towards the four points of the compass, and upwards and downwards...there was no place from which He did not speak unto them...."

                                                             --Tanya, chapter 36

                                                                             

Allowing yourself to rest in God is like a wave resting in its essential nature, the water. Imagine a wave rising and falling on the surface of the ocean. Observing the wave, we can see it has a beginning and an ending; it comes up and it goes down. The notions of beginning, ending, going up, and going down may scare the wave and she may think, "Before rising up as this wave, I didn't exist, and soon I will become nothing again." It seems as if before the wave comes up it's not there, and after it goes down it no longer exists. How could a wave be a happy wave if she's caught in these notions of birth and death, beginning and ending, going up and going down? But there's a way out, an opportunity for her to be saved. When she bends down and examines herself, she discovers that she is water. She's a wave, but she's also water. As a wave she may be described in terms of being and nonbeing, coming and going,. But water cannot be described in these terms. The moment the wave realizes she's water, she's free- free from such notions as birth and death, coming up and going down. The wave is water right in the here and the now.

Just as the wave doesn't need to go looking for water, we don't need to go around seeking God. Just as the wave can rest in water, we can rest in God. In the here and the now. With mindfulness and concentration we are able to touch our true nature of no birth and no death. .

                                                                  --Thich Nhat Hanh

I lie on the seashore, the sparkling flood blue-shimmering in my dreamy eyes; light breezes flutter in the distance; the thud of the waves, charging and breaking over in foam, beats thrillingly and drowsily upon the shore---or upon the ear? I cannot tell. The far and the near become blurred into one; outside and inside merge into one another. Nearer and nearer, friendlier, like a homecoming, sounds the thud of the waves; now, like a thundering pulse, they beat in my head, now they beat over my soul, wrapping it round, consuming it, while at the same time my soul floats out of me as a blue waste of waters. Outside and inside are one. The whole symphony of sensations fades away into one tone, all senses become one sense, which is one with feeling; the world expires in the soul and the soul dissolves in the world....



Perception is a breaking apart, a forming, a separating, and then again a joining together. The unity of the spiritual and the sensual, of the subject and the object, is experienced in feeling. The divisiveness of perception is broken by the welling up, even the overflowing, of feeling. Whoever eats of the tree of perception divorces himself from the paradise of feeling.



                                                                                      --Karl Joel

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye.
                              
                                                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince




My heart has seen much wisdom...

                                                 --Ecclesiastes 1:16




With the eye of the intellect, which is in the heart, one can see everything....
                                             
                                                 --Zohar, 116b



But we need to change this...



Our Sages describe the Messiah as waiting anxiously to come.  In previous generations, his coming was prevented by the fact that the Jews had not completed the tasks expected of them. At present, those tasks have been accomplished; there is nothing lacking.  All we have to do is accept the Messiah, and to create an environment that will allow his mission to be fulfilled...

In the Talmud (Pesachim 119b), our Sages described the Redemption as a feast.  The table has already been set...everything has been served...and we are sitting at the table together with the Messiah.  


All we need to do is open our eyes.


                                          ---The Lubavitcher Rebbe

To Heal the World

Matzah is the Bread of Healing.


                                                 --Zohar II:183B

What is it that needs to be healed?

Like lovers’ quarrels are the dissonances of the world. Reconciliation is there even in the midst of strife and all things that are parted find one another again. 

                                                            --Holderlin, Hyperion


But with the world so terribly chaotic, so utterly permeated with all the vicissitudes of life, how, indeed, can there be assurance that a congruous harmony will eventually emerge?

And what is it about the matza that hastens that promise of recovery?





The Shechinah (the indwelling, immanent Presence of God in the world) is suffering in the exile.                                                        --Zohar

     
Metaphorically speaking, (the Zohar is saying that the Shechinah's state) is like a bodily ailment. The cause of illness or health lies in the extension and flow of the life-force vested in the blood of life which flows from the heart to all the limbs; and turning round and around, goes the spirit of life and the blood into all the limbs, through the veins that are absorbed in them, and returns to the heart. Now, when the circulation and flow of this spirit of life is always as it should be, in its proper order arranged for it by the blessed Fountainhead of life, man is perfectly healthy. For all the limbs are bound together and receive their proper vitality from the heart through this circulation. But if there is any disorder in any place, restraining, hindering or reducing the circulation of the blood with the spirit of life vested in it, then this bond [which binds all the limbs to the heart through this circulation] is broken or diminished, man will fall ill and sick, may the Lord have mercy.

Precisely so, metaphorically speaking...the Shechinah is called the "heart," as it is written: "The Rock of my heart;" (Psalm 73:26) and as it is written: "And I will dwell amongst them." (Exodus 25:8) That is, the term Shechinah denotes the light of the Lord that dwells in the worlds....in order to vivify them....and the souls are referred to as "limbs." When all the souls are attached and bound together, the circulation and flow of the vivification and of the effluence "turns around and around," and "their culmination is wedged in their beginning" to bind and join them all to "the Lord (who) is One," to be attached unto Him, blessed be He... 

And hereby will be understood the saying of our sages, of blessed memory, that the destruction of the Second Temple and the fall into exile, and the withdrawal of the Shechinah and its descent into a state of exile, as it were; all this was because of the sin of groundless hate and a division of hearts, the Merciful save us. And that is why (the Shechinah) is referred to as ailing, metaphorically speaking...

                                        --Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, Tanya 




The fundamental concepts with which Spinoza sets forth a vision of Being, illuminated by his awareness of God...may seem strange at first sight. To the question "What is?" he replies: "Substance, its attributes, and modes".

                                                               --Karl Jaspers

When you pray, have in mind to arouse the letters with which were created heaven and earth, all creatures above and below, and all universes. If you do this, then all the universes and all creation will join you in your worship.
When you do this, you arouse these letters, which are the life-force of all creation, and they join your prayers. Thus your thoughts can elevate all creation, and earth alike...
The Baal Shem Tov once told his disciples, “You must even pray for a bird that might be flying by and singing.”

                                                   --Rabbi Zechariah of Jaroslaw, Darkei Tzedek




Bread is the sustenance, the life-force of man. Matza, whose dough is thrown into the fiery oven before given a chance to rise, is the Bread of Healing: it is internalizing the realization that all reality is forever within "the Lord your God, an all-consuming fire" (Deuteronomy 4) and therefore not "rising" to an illusory feeling of independence from His Infinite Light.

That is why on Passover we read the Song of Songs. 

"Like lovers’ quarrels are the dissonances of the world. Reconciliation is there even in the midst of strife and all things that are parted find one another again." 

We fall in love with Him all over again. And get healed.

I Saw Eternity...

The ocean receives different names on the several shores which it washes...
                                                       --Ralph Waldo Emerson




The foundation of all foundations and the pillar of wisdom is to know that there is a Primary Being who brought into being all existence. All the beings of the heavens, the earth, and what is between them came into existence only from the truth of His being....This entity is the God of the world and the Lord of the entire earth. He controls the sphere with infinite and unbounded power. This power [continues] without interruption, because the sphere is constantly revolving, and it is impossible for it to revolve without someone causing it to revolve. [That one is] He, blessed be He, who causes it to revolve without a hand or any [other] corporeal dimension.The knowledge of this concept is a positive commandment, as [implied by Exodus 20:2]: "I am God, your Lord...."
           
                                       --Maimonides, Laws of the Fundamentals of Torah, Chapter 1






"He who has been instructed thus far in the things of love, and who has learned to see the beautiful in due order and succession, when he comes toward the end will suddenly perceive a nature of wondrous beauty (and this, Socrates, is the final cause of all our former toils)-a nature which in the first place is everlasting, not growing and decaying, or waxing and waning; secondly, not fair in one point of view and foul in another, or at one time or in one relation or at one place fair, at another time or in another relation or at another place foul, as if fair to some and-foul to others, or in the likeness of a face or hands or any other part of the bodily frame, or in any form of speech or knowledge, or existing in any other being, as for example, in an animal, or in heaven or in earth, or in any other place; but beauty absolute, separate, simple, and everlasting, which without diminution and without increase, or any change, is imparted to the ever-growing and perishing beauties of all other things. He who from these ascending under the influence of true love, begins to perceive that beauty, is not far from the end. And the true order of going, or being led by another, to the things of love, is to begin from the beauties of earth and mount upwards for the sake of that other beauty, using these as steps only, and from one going on to two, and from two to all fair forms, and from fair forms to fair practices, and from fair practices to fair notions, until from fair notions he arrives at the notion of absolute beauty, and at last knows what the essence of beauty is. 

"This, my dear Socrates," said the stranger of Mantineia, "is that life above all others which man should live, in the contemplation of beauty absolute; a beauty which if you once beheld, you would see not to be after the measure of gold, and garments....

"But what if man had eyes to see the true beauty-the divine beauty, I mean, pure and dear and unalloyed, not clogged with the pollutions of mortality and all the colours and vanities of human life-thither looking, and holding converse with the true beauty simple and divine? Remember how in that communion only, beholding beauty with the eye of the mind, he will be enabled to bring forth, not images of beauty, but realities (for he has hold not of an image but of a reality), and bringing forth and nourishing true virtue to become the friend of God and be immortal, if mortal man may. Would that be an ignoble life?" 


                                                                     --Plato, Symposium





I saw Eternity the other night,
Like a great ring of pure and endless light,
All calm, as it was bright;
And round beneath it, Time in hours, days, years,
Driv'n by the spheres
Like a vast shadow mov'd; in which the world
And all her train were hurl'd.

                                                                      --Henry Vaughan




There is, apart from mere intellect, in the makeup of every superior human identity, (in its moral completeness, considered as ensemble, not for the moral alone, but for the whole being, including physique,) a wondrous something that realizes without argument, frequently without what is called education, (though I think it the goal and apex of all education deserving the name) --- an intuition of the absolute balance, in time and space, of the whole of this multifarious, mad chaos of fraud, frivolity, hoggishness --- this revel of fools, and incredible make-believe and general unsettledness, we call the world; a soul-sight of that divine clue and unseen thread which holds the whole congeries of things, all history and time, and all events, however trivial, however momentous, like a leashed dog in the hand of the hunter. 

                                                              --Walt Whitman





                                         THE SUPREME FACT OF THE UNIVERSE

The great central fact of the universe is that Spirit of Infinite Life and Power that is back of all, that animates all, that manifests itself in and through all; that self-existent principle of life from which all has come, and not only from which all has come, but from which all is continually coming. If there is an individual life, there must of necessity be an infinite source of life from which it comes. If there is a quality or a force of love, there must of necessity be an infinite source of love whence it comes. If there is wisdom, there must be the all-wise source back of it from which it springs. The same is true in regard to peace, the same in regard to power, the same in regard to what we call material things.

There is, then, this Spirit of Infinite Life and Power back of all which is the source of all. This Infinite Power is creating, working, ruling through the agency of great immutable laws and forces that run through all the universe, that surround us on every side. Every act of our every-day lives is governed by these same great laws and forces. Every flower that blooms by the wayside, springs up, grows, blooms, fades, according to certain great immutable laws. Every snowflake that plays between earth and heaven, forms, falls, melts, according to certain great unchangeable laws....

God, then, is this Infinite Spirit which fills all the universe with Himself alone, so that all is from Him and in Him, and there is nothing that is outside. Indeed and in truth, then, in Him we live and move and have our being. He is the life of our life, our very life itself. We have received, we are continually receiving our life from Him. We are partakers of the life of God; and though we differ from Him in that we are individualized spirits, while He is the Infinite
Spirit including us as well as all else beside, yet in essence the life of God and the life of man are identically the same, and so are one. They differ not in essence, in quality; they differ in degree...


                                      THE SUPREME FACT OF HUMAN LIFE

From the great central fact of the universe in regard to which we have agreed, namely, this Spirit of Infinite Life that is back of all and from which all comes, we are led to inquire as to what is the great central fact in human life. From what has gone before, the question almost answers itself.

The great central fact in human life, in your life and in mine, is the coming into a conscious, vital realization of our oneness with this Infinite Life, and the opening of ourselves fully to this divine inflow. This is the great central fact in human life, for in this all else is included, all else follows in its train. In just the degree that we come into a conscious realization of our oneness with the Infinite Life, and open ourselves to this divine inflow, do we actualize in ourselves the qualities and powers of the Infinite Life.

And what does this mean? It means simply this: that we are recognizing our true identity, that we are bringing our lives into harmony with the same great laws and forces, and so opening ourselves to the same great inspirations, as have all the prophets, seers, sages, and saviours in the world's history, all men of truly great and mighty power. For in the degree that we come into this realization and connect ourselves with this Infinite Source, do we make it possible for the higher powers to play, to work, to manifest through us.

We can keep closed to this divine inflow, to these higher forces and powers, through ignorance, as most of us do, and thus hinder or even prevent their manifesting through us. Or we can intentionally close ourselves to their operations and thus deprive ourselves of the powers to which, by the very nature of our being, we are rightful heirs. On the other hand, we can come into so vital a realization of the oneness of our real selves with this Infinite Life, and can open ourselves so fully to the incoming of this divine inflow, and so to the operation of these higher forces, inspirations, and powers, that we can indeed and in truth become what we may well term, God-men.

And what is a God-man? One in whom the powers of God are manifesting, though yet a man. No one can set limitations to a man or a woman of this type; for the only limitations he or she can have are those set by the self. Ignorance is the most potent factor in setting limitations to the majority of mankind; and so the great majority of people continue to live their little, dwarfed, and stunted lives simply by virtue of the fact that they do not realize the larger life to which they are heirs. They have never as yet come into a knowledge of the real identity of their true selves.


Mankind has not yet realized that the real self is one with the life of God. Through its ignorance it has never yet opened itself to the divine inflow, and so has never made itself a. channel through which the infinite powers and forces can manifest. When we know ourselves merely as men, we live accordingly, and have merely the powers of men. When we come into the realization of the fact that we are God-men, then again we live accordingly, and have the powers of God-men. In the degree that we open ourselves to this divine inflow are we changed from mere men into God-men.



                                                              ---Ralph Waldo Trine, In Tune With the Infinite

We're All Mad Here

Things are not always what they seem; the first appearance deceives many; the intelligence of a few perceives what has been carefully hidden.                      --Phaedrus Some say it is intelligence that can discern what is Truth...Others know the opposite to be the case... Fair is foul, and foul is fair...                                             --Shakespeare, Macbeth A person is obligated to get drunk on Purim until he does not know the difference between "cursed be Haman" and "blessed be Mordechai."                      --Talmud, Megillah But how does one Truly get drunk? The body is the bodhi tree, The mind is like a clear mirror standing. Take care to wipe it all the time, Allow no grain of dust to cling to it.                       --Shen Hsiu The Bodhi is not like a tree, The clear mirror is nowhere standing. Fundamentally not one thing exists: Where then is a grain of dust to cling?                       --Hui Neng There is a well-known story about the students of the Baal Shem Tov who knew of their teacher’s love for light and its increase, but couldn’t find any candles.  The Baal Shem Tov came in and noticed that there was a lack of candles on a particular black, cold, and frozen night.  He said, "Ohr (light) has the same gematria (numerical value) as raz (secret). One who knows the secret of G-d's Unity has the light that can illuminate everything…" and he scolded the students for not bringing more candles.  The students apologized and said that they weren’t able to find any candles. The Baal Shem Tov commanded them to bring down the icicles from the roof and to light them. Thus, they lit the candles of ice which shone with a brilliant light.  "But I don’t want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. "Oh, you can’t help that," said the Cat: "we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad." "How do you know I’m mad?" said Alice. "You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn’t have come here".                --Lewis Carrol, Alice in Wonderland On that day King Ahasuerus gave to Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews.               --Esther 8:1

(Previous post continued...)

This poem was sent to me by my dear friend, one who lives always with the sense of the Ineffable, Sadiq M. Alam.




This being human is a guest house

This being human is a guest house
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,

still treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

~Rumi

"I was once traveling on a ship," recounted Rabban Gamliel, "when I saw another ship that had been wrecked. My heart grieved especially for one of its passengers, the great sage Rabbi Akiva. When I reached land and resumed my studies I suddenly saw him sitting before me and discussing spiritual matters with me.

"I said to him, “My son, who pulled you up?”  


Rabbi Akiva replied: "A plank from the ship came my way and I clung to it. When each wave came surging towards me I bowed my head and let it pass over me."

                                                  --Talmud, Yevamos 121





My Soul, my Soul, all disturbed by sorrows inconsolable,

Bear up, hold out, meet front-on the many foes that rush on you

Now from this side and now that, enduring all such strife up close,

Never wavering; and should you win, don't openly exult,

Nor, defeated, throw yourself lamenting in a heap at home,

But delight in things that are delightful and, in hard times, grieve

Not too much—appreciate the rhythm that controls men's lives.


                                                 --Archilochus





           

An Endless Pilgrimage of the Heart

“Faith is not the clinging to a shrine but an endless pilgrimage of the heart.”

                                        ―Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

One may challenge this statement. Seemingly, the former rendition of faith indeed fits for faith in a Being, the latter only to things that are able to be transformed, changed, cultivated: life, humanity, relationships, etc. 

Yet, obviously, Heschel is referring in both cases to faith in the Supreme Being. And yet both scenarios are possibilities, for one may remain stagnant and become stale by grasping on to an outgrown, comfortable mode of connection, not willing to constantly enhance, enrich and morph the bond because it is taken for granted as being a business like partnership with specific pragmatic goals to be achieved; or one is willing to make the endless pilgrimage and dedicate the large amount, quantitative and qualitative, of effort needed to continuously develop the connection by removing old forms and finding deeper and more intense ways of making the relationship not just a facilitator of life, but indeed life itself. The only thing, however, that motivates the latter scenario to be picked is the security that comes from knowing that this Being encourages reaching Him, His very Essence, and sets no limits to how totally passionate a fusion He longs for, so that although the outer layers and garments through which the relationship manifests might change and even at times seem unbearable, the objective, eternal truth and exclusivity of the relationship guarantees it's ultimate success and bliss that makes all the effort worthwhile.

The Hedgehog and the Fox...and Tu Bi'Shvat

"There is a line among the fragments of the Greek poet Archilochus which says: 'The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing'. Scholars have differed about the correct interpretation of these dark words, which may mean no more than that the fox, for all his cunning, is defeated by the hedgehog's one defense. But, taken figuratively, the words can be made to yield a sense in which they mark one of the deepest differences which divide writers and thinkers, and, it may be, human beings in general. For there exists a great chasm between those, on one side, who relate everything to a single central vision, one system less or more coherent or articulate, in terms of which they understand, think and feel-a single, universal, organizing principle in terms of which alone all that they are and say has significance-and, on the other side, those who pursue many ends, often unrelated and even contradictory, connected, if at all, only in some de facto way, for some psychological or physiological cause, related by no moral or aesthetic principle; these last lead lives, perform acts, and entertain ideas that are centrifugal rather than centripetal, their thought is scattered or diffused, moving on many levels, seizing upon the essence of a vast variety of experiences and objects for what they are in themselves, without consciously or unconsciously, seeking to fit them into, or exclude them from, any one unchanging, all-embracing, sometimes self-contradictory and incomplete, at times fanatical, unitary inner vision. The first kind of intellectual and artistic personality belongs to the hedgehogs, the second to the foxes...."

                                                                       --Sir Isaiah Berlin

Is there such a distinction in one's connection with God? And how does this connect to Tu Bi'Shvat? Listen here.

"The kindness and special quality in G-d's making man upright, to walk erectly, is that though he walks on the earth he sees the Heavens; not so with beasts that go on all fours; they see only the earth."

                                          --Tzemach Tzedek





"Whenever he could, he sought out a new road to travel....The world was huge and inexhaustible; he had only to allow his sheep to set the route for a while, and he would discover other interesting things. The problem is that they don't even realize that they're walking a new road every day. They don't see that the fields are new and the seasons change. All they think about is food and water.

Maybe we're all that way, the boy mused."


                                   --Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist



Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these?

                                     --Isaiah 40:26

The Greatest Love of All--PART 6

"We know much more about the universe than the ancient world knew, but the more we know about it the harder it becomes for our spirits to accept the visible universe as the ultimate and final reality. The cold and pitiless forces of nature are not less cold and pitiless when we succeed in discovering their laws and habits. One comes back from his study of the march of suns, and planets, and the spiral movements of world making nebulae with very little to comfort the longings of the heart. He sees that these curves are all irrevocable and inevitable and that each event unfolds out of the one which preceded. It is a wonderful and amazing system, but it offers no tenderness, no love, no balm for the wounds of the spirit. It rolls mercilessly on, and he may be thankful if its wheels do not ride over him — the midget of an hour, riding on one of the flying globes of this mechanical system.

"It is useless to expect tenderness and love and balm in a system of mechanical forces. That kind of world can reveal gravitation and electricity, attraction and repulsion; it can show us matter moving under law; it can exhibit the transformation of one form of energy into some other form; but from the nature of the case it cannot manifest a heart of tenderness or a spirit of love. Those traits belong only to a person, and a mechanical system can never reveal a person.


-----------------


"If religion is, as I profoundly believe, the essential way to the full realization of life, we, who claim to know about it, ought to interpret it so that its meaning stands out plain and clear to those who most need it to live by. I have always believed and maintained that the apparent lack of popular interest in it is largely due to the awkward and blundering way in which it has been presented to the mind and heart of those who all the time carry deep within themselves inner hungers and thirsts which nothing but God can satisfy. I do not want to write or print a line which does not at least bear the mark and seal of reality — and which will not make some genuine fact of life more plain and sure.

"The struggle for a conquering inner faith has in these strenuous days been laid upon us all. The easy, inherited, second-hand faith will not do for any of us now. We cannot stand the stern issues of life and death with any feeble, formal creed. We demand something real enough and deep enough to answer the human cry of our soul today. We need to be assured that we do not in the last resort fall back on the play of molecules but that underneath us are everlasting Arms. We want to know not only that there is law and order but that a genuine Heart of Love touches our heart and brings us calm and confidence.

"Robert Louis Stevenson has somewhere told of an experience that happened once to his grandfather. He was on a vessel that was caught by a terrific storm and was carried irresistibly toward a rocky shore where complete destruction was imminent. When the storm and danger were at the height he crept up on deck to look around and face the worst. He saw the pilot lashed to the wheel, with all his might and nerve holding the vessel off the rocks and steering it inch by inch into safer water. While he stood watching, the pilot looked up at him and smiled. It was little enough but it completely reassured him. He went back to his room below with new confidence, saying to himself, "We shall come through; I saw the pilot smile! " If we could only in some way catch sight of a smile on the face of the great Pilot in this strange rough sea in which we are sailing, we, too, could do our work and carry our burdens with confidence, perhaps with joy.


                                                                    --Rufus Jones, The World Within