Being Godlike In Our Imperfection Or: If God Can Do It, So Can We

Transcription

1 Being Godlike In Our Imperfection Or: If God Can Do It, So Can We This season in the Jewish calendar reminds us that we are broken. Try though we do, all year long, we are imperfect, we have made mistakes, and it is up to us to learn from them and do better. We are given the opportunity to do teshuvah each year, to strip away the missteps that tarnish our souls, and return again to our very best potential. But it s hard! The prospect of facing our weaknesses can be overwhelming, to say the least. The thought of examining our failures threatens to paralyze us with fear. But somehow we do it. Every year we do it, again and again. Because this is exactly what we were made to do. Where do we get the strength to go through this process? As challenging as it might feel, there is something divine in this cycle of teshuvah. We are created in God's image. And being created from such a divine model certainly does not mean we are perfect. We are all living proof of human imperfection, and of divine imperfection. Being created in the image of God means we are imbued with honesty and integrity and good intention. It doesn t mean that we never make mistakes; it means that once we realize we are heading down the wrong path, we tap into our God-given resources of resilience and compassion. We try to connect to the parts of ourselves that are godly, and live up to our fullest potential. We were created to be like God, and it turns out that God is not perfect, either. We repent because God also repents. Our texts are full of examples of God making mistakes, too. If God experiences regret and remorse, and even apologizes and forgives, then surely we can strive to do the same. If God can make mistakes and learn from them, so can we. Let s look at a few of these examples together, and gain inspiration from God s own process of teshuvah. *teaching* 1

2 God Learns from Past Actions And I will establish My covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by floodwaters; neither shall there be any more floods to destroy the earth. (Genesis 9:11) God was completely convinced that the world was more bad than good and needed to be destroyed. And yet, after the flood recedes, God blesses Noah and his family, comforting them, and imbuing them with hope. In the following sentences, God seems to be aware of having a temper, and needs a reminder so as to maintain better behavior in the future. This covenant of the rainbow will be a sign both to us and to God. God Fixes Mistakes The context of this next, more obscure text is a discussion about mamzerim, a halachic category of personal status of someone born from a couple whose relationship is not condoned in Torah. The mamzer faces many challenges in terms of personal status on the Temple. The details are somewhat outdated, and frankly irrelevant to the overall conclusion of this piece, which we are focusing on now. I want us to pay close attention to God s reaction....the text was speaking about mamzerim. Behold the tears of the oppressed Their fathers sinned, but what has it to do with these insulted ones! there is no one to comfort them A mamzer shall not enter into the congregation of the Eternal. (Deuteronomy 23:3) And there is no one to comfort them. Therefore, says the Holy Blessed One: It is upon Me to comfort them. (Leviticus Rabbah 32:8) God realizes when a decree was too harsh; takes responsibility and tries to make amends. It is upon Me to comfort them. It s a radical revision of God s own decision, and God takes full responsibility to fix it. 2

3 God Acknowledges Sin This next text comes from the Talmud story of God creating the celestial bodies. The moon was offended, feeling less-than the sun. By the end, God feels bad for having made the moon feel slighted. And one goat for a sin-offering for the God; it shall be offered beside the continual burnt-offering, and the drink-offering thereof. (Numbers 28:15) It is written And God made the two great lights, and [later] it is also written: the great light and the lesser light. (Genesis 1:16??) The moon said before the Holy One, blessed be He, Master of the world, is it possible for two kings to use one crown? God said to her, Go, and diminish yourself! She said before God, Because I asked a reasonable question, I need to diminish myself? God said, Go, and rule over both day and in night. She said, What is the greatness in that? How does a lamp help in the daytime? God said, Go, and let Israel count their days and years by you. She said, They use the daylight [of the sun] to count the days and seasons Seeing that she [the moon] was not appeased, the Holy One said, Bring a chatat (sacrifice of atonement) for me because I diminished the moon! This is what Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish said: What is different about the sacrificial ram of the new moon that is offered for God? Said the Holy One: This ram shall be an atonement offering for Me because I diminished the moon. (Hullin 60b) This is the only time the chatat, the sin offering, is attributed to God s self! God expresses a desire to atone for mistreating the moon, and God does it in a very human language, in a very human way, that we are meant to understand. God Struggles to Overcome a Temper...the Holy Blessed One says prayers. What does God pray? Rabbi Zutra ben Tobi said in the name of Rav: May it be My will that My mercy may suppress My anger, and that My mercy may prevail over My [other] attributes, so that I may deal with My children through the attribute of mercy and, on their behalf, stop short of the limit of strict justice. (Berachot 7a) 3

4 This text is compelling because we have already seen that God has quite a temper. And now we learn that God s prayer for divine mercy mirrors our own pleading with God! Our fear of our own destructive capacity is something we share with God. God Forgives And the Eternal said, I have pardoned according to your word. (Numbers 14:20) This text comes from the Book of Numbers, when God is furious that the people continue to doubt whether or not they will ever reach the Promised Land, and threatens to kill them. But Moses pleads with God, reminding God of the thirteen divine attributes of mercy. God is placated, and forgives. Likewise, we conclude our confessions on Yom Kippur by reciting these thirteen attributes and reminding God of God s mercy by saying, And God responded: salachti kidvarechah, I forgive, as you have asked. The mystical tradition teaches that our actions in this world, on this plane, in this life, have some cosmic influence over God in the heavenly realms. And here with these texts, we have a converse equation that is perhaps even bolder-- suggesting that God's actions, in all their imperfection, can be a model and inspiration for us. God is the magnifying glass of our human experience. We are imperfect. We hardly need these High Holy Days to tell us that. Like God, we, too, have acted hastily. We, too, have destroyed worlds in a moment of unrestrained temper. We have condemned innocent people in our lives, only to embrace them again once we have been repulsed by our own harsh decree. Like God, too, we can admit our sins. We can confess publicly what we have done, own our actions and their consequences, and witness others doing the same. Like God, we can forgive our penitent friends, family, and ourselves. This is the challenge of the next ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This season reminds us to get out of the weeds of the things that plague us in this moment in time, in this place, and to look instead at the bigger picture. 4

5 This time that calls us to do teshuvah; it reminds us that our relationships with other people are the very fiber that hold everything together, especially in times like these. If we try to be godlike in our best moments, then why shouldn't we also aim for godliness in our worst? This is my challenge to you, to all of us. If God can do it, so can we. ***Creative Exercise (see other side of handout): And if the story of God s mistakes is worth studying year after year, then surely we believe that there is something worth learning from them. So what about our own mistakes? Enter: the Museum of Failure. Opened this summer in Helsingborg, Sweden, the Museum of Failure showcases only products and innovations that failed. As it says on the museum website, The majority of all innovation projects fail and the museum showcases these failures to provide visitors a fascinating learning experience. The collection consists of over seventy failed products and services from around the world. Every item provides unique insight into the risky business of innovation. The museum even hosts evening activities related to failure. All this because the museum s founder is adamant: Learning is the only way to turn failure into success. So if failure truly is our teacher, I invite you all to take a moment and think of something this past year that did not go as planned. We are asked to reflect on our failures at this time of year, but we do not always take the time to consider what they have taught us. Did that experience reveal something new to you about the way you handle challenges? A new insight about a relationship? What would be showcased in your personal Museum of Failure? See if you can observe your failure as you would take in a painting in a museum, without judgment. Be open to what it might teach you. 5

6 Museum of Failure