“one thing i ask, that i shall seek“

many of you have been saying/singing/praying this fourth verse of Psalm 27 since the beginning of Elul, as have i. and now that we are mid-month, perhaps we can learn something new from this piece. we’ve said already that t’shuvah is a response, return, reintegration, even restoration in our relationship with haShem, and thereby with all that we know here in the realm of yesh, the realm of stuff, as i like to think of it, or as more commonly translated, the realm of something/somethingness. yet the prayer that is Psalm 27 seems to work somewhere between the horrors of yesh (much talk of being surrounded by thugs and other assorted enemies) and the aspiration for its opposite, the realm of calm and no-thing-ness of ayin (the desire to be ‘at home’ with G’d, a place we assume to be empty of thugs and cares, etc.). Psalm 27 is considered to be deeply involved with the realm of t’shuvah, as are the kabbalistic concepts of yesh and ayin.

perhaps we should take a little time with ayin/yesh so as to understand not only the Psalm we pray, but also because the understanding is foundational to t’shuvah in many views. we will keep it simple.

Creation posits somethingness that came out of nothing. this is yesh. it is the world we all seem to think we know and can touch and can share. on the level of human souls, the yesh can be understood as something like self-consciousness of self as an independent, separate thing. the ego, as we know it, is a fixed self-image…and as all fixed things in Creation, can exist only in the past as it flows up to the present moment. the ego is an experience, but not an experiencer per se. ego is not our innate self, but a construct we use in the Creation.

by contrast, ayin is the no-thing-ness that both preceded somethingness and also underlays it in the present moment. ayin is the consciousness of our integral wholeness, our simple being-ness, and our true self, which is completely compised in the Source. to be entirely in the moment is to be in ayin, for the ego of yesh can only ruminate about the present as a sort of shortened past…making a spur of the moment story of the moment. it writes a present that is a projection of predictable future.

ayin is no story. it is silence. it is hearing, but not speaking. ayin holds when we stop being m’daber, the “speaking one”. our ability to hear the Sh’ma’s message relies on our tapping into ayin. so long as the Sh’ma is heard in yesh consciousness, its message is just a puzzle, for in yesh absolute oneness has no standing. so we come up with metacommentary about “listening” and its importance….we call the Shema the “fundamental faith statement of Judaism” and other such prattle. the point of Shema is to simply hear in ayin. all the rest is, as they say, commentary, but it is not worth the study.

only in no-thing-ness can we get to deep levels of t’shuvah as reintegration, retransformation, and thoroughgoing revolution, for in ayin nothing is determined out of the past and nothing is reified for the future. in ayin, one simply is.

but for our purposes, we must understand that ayin is the state in between an old yesh and a new yesh in t’shuvah. it is the primordial state after we have cleared ourselves out of our old ways (past) and have not yet proven forth our new, improved ways (future). we are in between ways of being in the world outside ourselves.

think of it as something like a self-imposed, and much desired time out…or maybe like a catnap that purges what came before it. you know you were in it in part by the sense of disorientation you have as you come out of it, if you will. realizing that change is possible comes in the ayin of t’shuvah.

there is another transformative state that dwells more in the yesh, and that some of you may know well. it is the transitional place called mikvah, the ritual bath in living waters that separates a state of tumah (blockage) from the state of taharah (flow). the time of actual being in the water, letting go of blockage, but before emergence into free flow is no-thing-ness. and it teaches us paradoxically an important idea about directionality in no-thing-ness. as R’ Pearson points out, mikvah shares its root in the word kaveh, “hope” (you hear the root in “haTikvah”). we come out from the living waters of hope into a new state of possibility. hope emerges from the silence…not from the noise of the Creation all about us.

ayeka

when G’d sought Adam and Chava after they had eaten of the Tree forbidden to them (Genesis 3:9), he called out simply, “where are you”? when we step up to t’shuvah, that is the question we hear from haShem. it is a call to reveal, and a call to ascend, as it is from on high. t’shuvah is our answer

hineni

here i am. here am I, with ayin consciousness, PRESENT, ready, accounting for myself before You, Holy Blessed One, ready to walk the Walk beside You.

let’s go back to Psalm 27 now, and that famous 4th verse with which we began, “one thing i ask, that i shall seek”. we seek in the ask. we do not seek in knowing, but in no-knowing. we do not ask in construct or conception, but rather in no-conception.

“and you shall seek haShem from there, and you shall find Him”

the Kotzker interprets this verse (Devarim 4:29) in light of the ayin state of t’shuvah, “the seeking is the finding”. to be in a perpetual state of no-thing-ness is to be in the seeking, it is to be in the hope always….”all the days of my life…to always seek You in every time and place”……..

let’s go out in an alternative translation of Psalm 27:

Yah! You are my light.
You are my savior.
Whom need I dread?
Yah, with you as my strong protector who can make me panic?
When hateful bullies gang up on me, wanting to harass me, to oppress and terrorize me
They are the ones who stumble and fall.
Even if a gang surrounds me my heart is not weakened.
If a battle is joined around me my trust in You is firm.
Only one thing do I ask of You, Yah:
Just this alone do I seek, I want to be at home with you, Yah,
All the days of my life.
I want to delight in seeing You.
Seeing You when I come to visit You in Your temple.

You hide me in your sukkah on a foul day.
You conceal me unseen in Your tent.
You also raise me beyond anyone’s reach
And now, as You have held my head high despite the presence of my powerful foes
I prepare to celebrate and thrill, singing and making music to You, Yah!
Listen, Yah, to the sound of my cry
And, being kind, answer me!
My heart has said, I turn to seek you.
Your presence is what I beg for
Don’t hide Your face from me.
Don’t just put me down, You who have been my helper.
Don’t abandon me, don’t forsake me, God my support.
Though my father and my mother have left me
You, Yah, will hold me securely.
Please teach me Your way.
Teach me Your way and guide me on the straight path.
Discourage those who defame me
Because false witnesses stood up against me belching out violence.
Don’t let me become the victim of my foes.
I wouldn’t have survived
If I hadn’t hoped that I would see, yet,
Your goodness, God, fully alive on earth.
So I tell you, my friends: you too hope to Yah! Be sturdy!
And make strong your heart. And most of all, keep hoping to Yah.

“i will multiply, multiply your pain in pregnancy; in painstaking-labor shall you bear children”

likewise Adam would get food from the ground only through painstaking-labor (Genesis 3:16). the same hebrew root is used in both cases…what i’ve translated as ‘painstaking-labor’ is also just ‘pain’, ‘suffering’, ‘travail’ (labor/pain as one word!), or ‘anguish’. the point is that endurance and persistent effort will be required….not just physical pain but psychic pain….and only with great effort will the necessary and the good be brought forth. whenever you need sustenance…whenever you seek to reproduce….no gain without pain.

but in each case, there is reward, yes? children and, well, food. for the People, who would know repeated and sustained exile from their Land, the pain of exile, first in slavery, then in persecution, and finally in genocide would have to be endured to attain the ambition of return. child-bearing yields stronger women; slavery, persecution and genocide ultimately yielded a stronger People.

“exile contains redemption within itself, as seed contains the fruit. right work and abiding diligence wil bring forth the hidden reward.”

none other than the Gerer rebbe so taught. netzach in netzach is abiding diligence, enduring effort, with confidence (“bitachon”) that you are able, through your abiding diligence, to effect the ultimate reward, of course with G’d’s help, no matter how hidden. this actually is a great summation of the cosmos in kabbalistic terms, for the work of tikkun olam (‘repair of the world’…’rectification of time and space’), the very reason for human existence, is touched with eternity and unending effort and intensity. but so is the redemption.

it is very important to remember that reward is explicit in the banishment from Eden, painstaking-labor, yes, but IN IT you shall bear children and bring forth your living. it is not endurance, perseverence, abiding for its own sake! consider the words of the insight of r’ Henoch of Alexander:

“the real exile of Israel in Egypt was that they had learned to endure it”

there is no sense of endurance for it’s own sake in netzach. no sense of purgative suffering, rather it is a tool of spiritual ambition, “ratzon” (‘desire’ or ‘will’) directed toward getting at a better end. walking longer each day and more humbly with your G’d requires bitachon and netzach: confidence and abiding diligence. again with the Heschel, who points out that “our task is…to change, not only to accept; to augment, not only to discover the glory of G’d.”

“i believe with complete faith in the coming of Moshiach, and even though (s)he may tarry, i anticipate every day that (s)he will come”

the jude abides, man

which will also bring us to bitachon redux in hod she b’netzach tomorrow….

mussar for netzach she b’netzach

with another….bein adam l’chaveiro are there some people you can barely stand to listen to? some you regularly brush off? resolve today the change that relationship and tolerate, even with painstaking-labor your interactions until such time as you see what it is they bring in G’d’s world. it will be something you never imagined.

with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo bring bitachon (‘confidence’) in the coming of Moshiach to your practice today. bring it to your prayers. bring it to bear in the kavannah you bring to all your doings of good and your avoidance of evils. just bring it.

kabbalah for netzach she b’netzach

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion the traditional ideal is to make your life a continuous kiddush haShem (‘sanctification of G’d’s Name’), not through martyrdom, but through endurance, strength and persistance for you ambition to cleave to G’d. step one, however, is ceasing to do chillul haShem (‘desecration of G’d’s Name’) in your habits…many of which are as hidden to you as is the Presence of G’d, no doubt. contemplate on the many desecrations you do regularly, ferret them out with deep contemplation of your actions, and imagine how you would go about curbing and then abolishing them.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation kabbalah teaches that each of us has a soul ‘root’ that extends back into and through Adam and Chava and up into the realm of G’d. dwell on how this root draws you into the time of Eden….and what can you draw back from the experience into your life today?

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation the rabbis ethan and joel coen didn’t just pull “the dude abides” out of thin air, you know. consider Psalm 102:26ff), which describes how the earth and the heavens are G’d’s handiwork….”even all this will perish, but you will endure”. haDude abides. meditate on what this means for how you divide your intellectual time….are overinvested in that which will perish?

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition soul and body are interincluded and utterly real. each matters, each supports the efforts of the other in growing near to G’d. but spirit abides in “l’olam” (‘forever’), whereas body abides in “ba’olam” (‘the world’), and G’d is G’dself abiding in olam as “helem” (‘hidden’). meditate on how your walk with G’d partakes now of l’olam, now of ba’olam, and even now and then of olam/helem.

kinyan 25 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Samei’ach b’Chelko….Being Happy with One’s Lot. the very well know story goes like this: the Chofetz Chaim (renowned author of Chafetz Chaim on the halachah of evil speech, Mishna Berura commentary on the Shulchan Aruch, and Ahavat Chesed on the commandment of lending mondy to the needy, among many other texts) wanted to change the world when he was a boy. at some point he saw that that ambition might be a bit too bid, so he resolved to change just the people in his town….likewise with limited success. sho he decided instead to change his own family. even that proved elusive, so the Chofetz Chaim finally decided to focus on changing jut himself…and THAT was the ticket to changing the world of traditional jewish practice through his saintly example in living his own life and his voluminous but accessible teaching.

“ben Zoma said: ‘who is rich? those who are happy with their portion’

(Shabbat 32a)

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to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your G'd

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days of repentance: 14 & 15 Elul