A spiritual God placed us in a physical world and gave us the possibility to live lives of the soul. This week's Torah portion begins, "You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy." How do we achieve holiness?
Jews create and live in sacred dramas. We have just been through one: the seder, in which we enact our exodus from Egypt, the root experience of the Jewish people, until we fulfill th...e commandment, "In each generation each person is obligated to see him/herself as though s/he came out of Egypt."
Each time we remove the Torah from the ark, we participate in a sacred drama reenacting the revelation on Sinai, in which the lectern is Mt. Sinai, the reader is Moshe Rabbeinu, and the Torah is revelation.
Why these sacred dramas? In order to structure our lives to fulfill this week's portion: being holy, the ultimate purpose of human life. If we simply indulge in the physical world, we will lead purely physical lives. But if we set aside time, called Shabbat, to dedicate to sacred living; if we dedicate a portion of our work for the altruistic act of selfless giving, tzedakah; if we behave morally with others even to our physical detriment (e.g. - do not put a stumbling block before the blind, love your neighbor as yourself) then we transform the physical earth into a spiritual abode and transcend time. Sacred drama enables us to transform our beings by sculpting our actions to fit God's design.
Shabbat shalom.
Jews create and live in sacred dramas. We have just been through one: the seder, in which we enact our exodus from Egypt, the root experience of the Jewish people, until we fulfill th...e commandment, "In each generation each person is obligated to see him/herself as though s/he came out of Egypt."
Each time we remove the Torah from the ark, we participate in a sacred drama reenacting the revelation on Sinai, in which the lectern is Mt. Sinai, the reader is Moshe Rabbeinu, and the Torah is revelation.
Why these sacred dramas? In order to structure our lives to fulfill this week's portion: being holy, the ultimate purpose of human life. If we simply indulge in the physical world, we will lead purely physical lives. But if we set aside time, called Shabbat, to dedicate to sacred living; if we dedicate a portion of our work for the altruistic act of selfless giving, tzedakah; if we behave morally with others even to our physical detriment (e.g. - do not put a stumbling block before the blind, love your neighbor as yourself) then we transform the physical earth into a spiritual abode and transcend time. Sacred drama enables us to transform our beings by sculpting our actions to fit God's design.
Shabbat shalom.
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