The Paradox of Power

 God didn’t know what to do. He wanted to destroy Sodom because of its wickedness. But ever since that flood he was second-guessing himself. God vowed he would never again curse the ground. But Sodom was really bugging him. He knew he had to do something. Maybe a targeted hit, just one city? “Shall I tell Abraham what I am about to do?”

God told Abraham his plans to blow up Sodom, and Abraham went to work. “What if you should find 40 innocent people there?” Abraham asked. “Wouldn’t it be wrong to punish the innocent and the guilty alike? Should not the judge of all the earth deal justly?” God was swayed by Abraham’s argument. “Fine,” God said, “if I find 40 innocent people, I will spare the whole city.”

But Abraham wasn’t done. “What if there are 30? 20? 10? Will you not spare the whole place for the sake of the ten?”

“Fine,” God relented, “I will spare the whole city for the sake of the ten.”

Look what just happened. In the most remarkable story in the book of Genesis, (and that’s saying something), Abraham models for us one of the core values of Judaism – that justice is a higher truth than power, and that we, as human beings, are morally obligated to intervene when justice is endangered, even if the source of the danger is God himself. It is not blind obedience God longs for – it is our awakening to a sense of moral responsibility. By speaking truth to power Abraham demonstrates that we are made in God’s image and must, therefore, join in the project of the furtherance of justice. Abraham is the first lawyer, arguing a pro bono case for his clients, the hypothetical innocent of Sodom. His willingness to wield the tools of reason, language, and persuasion to change God’s mind shows us how powerful we can be and must become.

In a later story, God asks Abraham to kill his son Isaac. Now, with the stakes so personally high, Abraham is oddly compliant. “Sure,” he says, “no problem.” Abraham sets out to complete the grisly task and is, at the last second, stopped by the angel Gabriel. “That was only a test,” said Gabriel, “we wanted to see if you had it in you.” Apparently Abraham did.

So which is it? Which Abraham should we be? Should we challenge authority in a struggle to co-create justice? Or when given an order, dutifully comply?

The answer lies, as it so often does, somewhere in the middle. In the paradox of Abraham our lives meander like streams around hard boulders and through soft meadows in turn, toward a sea beyond our reckoning. Reason isn’t the only tool in the box. We never have enough information. And we’re not as smart as we think we are. Sometimes we have to trust. Real empowerment has nothing to do with rigidity. It’s about fluidity in the face of obstacles, and the willingness to assert and acquiesce in turns.

In the wisdom of Judaism, we are morally obligated to participate in the healing of the world – tikkun olam. But it is also true that we are not in charge. COVID-19 taught us that. At best we can, and we must, join together to wield every tool – reason, science, and assertion, as well as empathy, sacrifice, and surrender. Only then does the best of all possible worlds begin to rise into view.

[A version of this piece first appeared in my "A to Zen" column in the September/October edition of Unity Magazine, and is reproduced here with permission.]

The Love of Money

         “Money is the root of all evil,” he said, “it’s in the Bible.” I didn’t respond. People don’t like being corrected. Sometimes it’s best just to smile and move on.  
          Actually, I thought to myself, the line is “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil…” (1 Timothy 1:6) It may seem like a small difference, but it matters.  
          Money isn’t the problem – it’s our rapacious craving born from the consciousness of scarcity that causes all of the destruction. “People who want to get rich,” Paul writes, “fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction… Some people, eager for money, have wandered…and pierced themselves with many griefs.”  
          What Paul’s lamenting is not money, but the spiritual poverty that goads us into the mistaken belief that our happiness lies in the meaningless acquisition of things. To fall into the love of money is to be pierced with many griefs. We must instead love the work, without attachment to the results.
           Some voices in traditional Christianity have used these passages to support a dualistic philosophy that denigrates the material world as a treacherous lair of temptation, a trap our godly souls must strive to avoid. This arguably Medieval, life-denying, and otherworldly form of Christianity views the world of embodied forms as a fallen realm to be transcended. But that isn’t the only way to see it.
          Other voices within the Christian family align more closely with their sister faiths Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism in their affirmation of the fundamental goodness of the material world.
          In Hinduism, ultimate reality is known as Brahman, the sacred formless ground of being out of which all forms emerge and to which all forms return. In this non-dualistic view, the world of forms is a sacred reflection of divinity, a realm of infinite value and beauty. Even the creativity and productivity pouring through us is understood as yet another aspect of the one divine unfolding. Our longing to expand, whether spiritually, professionally, or materially, is not a sign of vice or self-obsession – it is simply Brahman giving birth to itself through us. Wanting a more beautiful home isn’t always covetousness – sometimes it’s just growth. Who are we not to create more, have more, and be more – not in the pursuit of self-aggrandizement, but in the spirit of playful enjoyment?
          You’ve also heard it said that money can’t buy happiness. You know who talks like that? People who have money. It’s difficult to be happy if you have no shelter, you don’t feel safe, or you have no access to adequate healthcare. Poverty exerts terrible stress on the poor, akin to the traumatic stress experienced by combat veterans. Not knowing where your next meal is coming from, or worrying about whether or not the thin walls of your section 8 apartment can keep out stray bullets from drive by shootings make happiness a distant dream.
          A raft of recent studies show that money does indeed buy happiness, up to a point. Happiness increases as income increases, up to about $75,000 a year. As income rises above $75,000, the happiness correlation drops off. And by the time you get to $250,000 a year, the correlation disappears. If you’re well into the six figures, money cannot buy more happiness. But below that it can, and it does.
          If all is one, then our participation in the material world is a sacred experience. Doing the work we have been given to do, applying our God-given talents, sensibilities, and initiative to create products, services, and solutions for the needs of the world is everyone’s sacred purpose. When we offer up our best in the consciousness of service, people give us money for it. As we work in our given professions for a world that works for everyone, we honor ourselves, our creator, and each other. Earning money for honest work is a deeply satisfying, honorable pleasure. Using that money to provide for one’s family, enrich one’s experiences, enhance one’s safety, security, and enjoyment, cannot be evil. 

[This piece was originally published in my column "A to Zen" in the July/August 2017 issue of Unity Magazine, and is reproduced here with permission.]

Our Sacred Longing

Sometimes it’s a subtle nudge. Other times it’s an insistent desire. We can’t tell if we’re being pulled toward something or pushed away from something else, or both. All we know is, we can’t stay here.

            Frustrations mount. Powerful emotions like sadness and anger cloud our vision. We know we’re not happy, but we don’t know why. Things feel stale, old, and uninspiring. How do we break out, and when we do, where are we supposed to go, what are we supposed to do, and who are we supposed to be?

            This cosmic restlessness drives us like a lash. It impels us to sail oceans, cross continents, climb mountains, write symphonies, create solutions out of problems, draw healing out of woundedness, and forge justice out of suffering. Everything great every human being ever did came from this one source: our sacred longing.

            If we are a spark from the Divine Mind as the Stoics taught, or if we are a manifestation of Brahman as Vedanta teaches, or if we are a mixture of matter and spirit as the Bible teaches, or if we are all Buddhas waiting to awaken as Buddhism teaches, then the energies that move through us are not entirely our own. We are fountains through which the holy waters flow. Our only duty then is to stay open to what is trying to move through us, as us. Our lives are the way the universe heals itself.

            In his poem Each Note, the Persian Sufi poet Rumi (1207-1273) put it this way:

God picks up the reed-flute world and blows.

Each note is a need coming through one of us,

a passion, a longing-pain.

                                                Remember the lips

where the wind-breath originated,

and let your note be clear.

Don’t try to end it.

Be your note.

I’ll show you how it’s enough.

Go up on the roof at night

In this city of the soul.

Let everyone climb on their roofs

And sing their notes!

Sing loud!

            In Rumi’s image, the world is God’s flute, and each need coming through us is a note from that flute. Therefore, our yearning to grow, to create more, to have more, to be more, is a sacred longing born not from ego or fear, but from the divine flow that pours through everything around us. It’s the budding of the blossoms on the branches, it’s the powerful tail stroke of the humpback whale swimming thousands of miles home to its calving grounds, it’s the discipline of a young medical student pushing through the impossible conditions of residency, it’s the courage of the soldier running toward danger to save a wounded brother-in-arms. In this sense, our passions are not our own – they’re a message from the source. We are called to manifest our potential, keep our divine appointment, and honor our roots by daring to bloom boldly and humbly. Our own happiness is impossible without this alignment. If we fail to give way to what is trying to arise through us we not only dishonor our source, we also rob the world of whatever ripples our loving would have stirred in others. It is not for us to say no. We must always have the holy word upon our lips – yes.

            Another Persian Sufi poet, Hafiz (c. 1320-1389) put it this way:

           

Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time for you to deeply compute the impossibility

that there is anything but Grace.

Now is the season to know that everything you do is sacred.

            If Grace is all there is, if all aspects of realty exist in a single, vast, interconnected web, then we can rest in the knowledge that we are supported. This means that our own best thoughts, intentions, convictions, passions, empathies, and actions are also woven into this same singularity. And if you learn how to be still through meditation, contemplation, yoga, prayer, sacred service, reverie in nature, or aesthetic rapture you soon feel for yourself this interweaving grace. No one has to tell you about it, explain it to you, or prove its existence. Your own unimpeachable experience confirms its existence, even, its primacy.

            And then finally you can dispense with this “I’m not good enough” business. That tired mantra is shown for the lie that it is. We wake up and realize that our imperfections are part of the process. Awkwardness is natural in any evolutionary transformation. The doe can hardly walk when it’s newly born. The wings of a just-hatched bird are good for nothing but wild gestures. So too our efforts often pale in comparison to a conceptual ideal. No matter. There is music and majesty in the simple effort to be good, to reach farther, to be more. The vision of flight comes before the flight, every time. Vision and intention have the power to arrange outer conditions until they align. You are good enough, because there is nothing but grace – and this truth is shown to us over and over again through the lens of our loving.

            In her poem Wild Geese, American poet Mary Oliver puts it this way:

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

           

            It isn’t mysterious. Our love shows us where to turn. When we “follow our bliss,” as Joseph Campbell put it, we feel in our bones that we are finally, fully alive. Our sacred longing, our wordless loving, the unassailable convictions born only in the clarity of direct experience all lead us toward our own best life. We don’t have to wonder anymore. We know what to do. As Rumi put it, “Let the beauty we love be what we do.”