High Holiday Series
The Road to Happiness
Rabbi Don Levy
7-8 October, 2011
Yom Kippur Evening
Faith
As you remember, last week during Rosh Hashanah I presented the thesis that would form the basis of my speaking for these High Holy Days. That thesis, borrowed from the sociologist Charles Murray, is that there are four elements, four areas in our lives that together can lead us to happiness. Those areas are: family, community, faith, and vocation. When I heard Murray speak these words some time ago, I had an AHA! Moment. His thesis handily outlined for me a series of sermons for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
As I pointed out last week, I have let this thesis form the overall theme of my sermons with some trepidation. Some of you may be expecting grander themes than achieving happiness, from the visiting rabbi who came all the way from the United States to share these holy days with you. For me to spend so much time when the largest number of people of the year are gathered here in your sanctuary, might be jarring to you. As I said then, I do hope that you’ve listened and will continue to listen with an open mind as I develop my thesis for you. This, because I believe that the quest for happiness is nothing short of the most important quest of our lives. Some would say that the quest for Goodness is more important. You could probably make a decent case for that. But I’ll take happiness, because so much evil in the world is perpetrated by unhappy people. Happiness is an important building block in the enterprise that we, in Jewish circles, often call Tikkun Olam.
We Jews use this term, Tikkun Olam very liberally these days. It means literally, ‘repairing the world.’ The premise is that the world is broken, that we have broken it, and it is therefore our mission to fix it. We cannot rely on G-d to do so. Iff we all do band together and achieve ‘Tikkun Olam,’ then that will usher in the Messianic Age.
Most of us agree on a certain level with this premise I just called, ‘the Messianic Age.’ It is a Jewish way of expressing the Great Premise of all Western Thought: that of Progress. All of the ‘isms’ of Western Life, are based on Progress. It forms the basis of the three Great Western Religious Traditions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – and all their variations and offshoots. It has been at the root of all the great secular movements as well: Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Fascism, and so on.
Now, please don’t think that I’m being complimentary to Socialism, Communism, Fascism and the like by calling them ‘great’; I only mean in the sense that these movements gained millions of adherents and that each had a profound effect – mostly not positive – on human history. And my point in juxtaposing them to the far more positive movements of capitalism as well as Judaism and her daughter religions, is simply that all have, at their heart, a vision of a world perfected. Of course, that vision is not the same vision for all the systems mentioned – not by a long shot! But each is predicated on achieving a specific vision of a utopian world. That notion is at the heart of all Western Thought.
It isn’t at the heart of Eastern Thought. Those who have studied comparative religion or Eastern Philosophy know, that Eastern Thought is predicated not on Progress, but on cycles. Time is cyclical, not linear. The task of each person is to move in the rhythm of the cycle rather than to affect the outcome of the movement of history.
Now, I’m not here to re-open the debate as to which approach – Western or Eastern – is better. That would be a worthy subject for a long-running discussion group; it would probably keep the cross-flow lively for several months at least. Suffice it to say for now, that the concept of Tikkun Olam underlies all Judaism. But Jews differ as to how to achieve it.
Some look outward to great social and political movements to achieve Tikkun Olam. This is why Jews are at the forefront of every great political movement, of every great policy debate. We appear prominently in numbers that would indicate there are far more Jews than there are. In my country, Jews were far ‘over-represented’ among activists in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960’s, for example. When I visited South Africa for High Holy Days in 1995, I was not surprised that that country’s relatively small Jewish community had provided a number of the heroes of the anti-apartheid movement. Although I’m not as familiar with the great social movements of your country, I’m guessing that here, too Jews are in the thick of things despite your modest numbers.
But when it comes to Tikkun Olam, my own focus is more inward. All great historical movements are to some extent flawed, because the people involved have a propensity for Stage One Thinking. Perhaps you’re not familiar with the term, Stage One Thinking, which was coined by the brilliant economist, Thomas Sowell. To Sowell, Stage One Thinking is reaching for a goal because it sounds lovely and the thought of it makes you feel good – without considering its overall effects and consequences. I'll give you an example: the idea of a planet free of the pollutants that make our world less than pristine, is a utopian dream. It sometimes creates a blind hatred for the extraction, processing and burning of fossil fuels, and for all businesses involved in extracting, refining, and delivering them to us. But that hatred causes some to lose sight of the incredible quality of life that fossil fuels have brought us – even to those in the most modest economic circumstances. Stage One Thinking plants the idea of tearing apart our fossil-fuel dependent economy – no matter how much misery that would surely bring.
That’s why I like to focus on Happiness within the individual as the major ingredient necessary for Tikkun Olam. Tikkun Olam is achieved one person at a time, as individuals achieve happiness. Happy people do not commit murder. Happy people do not participate in suicide bombings. Happy people do not abuse others. Happy people are charitable and generous. Happy people want only happiness for their fellow human beings. At the heart of my thesis is that personal happiness, multiplied by as many as can achieve it, is the way to a better world. Great movements that attempt to achieve it by restructuring our society only fail time and again by causing unintended suffering and unhappiness.
Which brings me to the third item in the quartet that enables us to achieve happiness, and that is – Faith.
Faith is not a word that we Jews use very often. We have largely ceded the language of faith to our neighbors. Whether we think about it or not, we have bought big time into the post-modernist’s notion that religious faith is a quaint holdover of an earlier time. We have to a large degree, turned our congregations into places that celebrate Jewish history and Jewish ethnicity, far more than Jewish faith.
When I was in my first year of rabbinical school, studying at the Jerusalem campus of Hebrew Union College, every student made at least one stop per day in the mail room, because that was where we would receive letters from abroad. This was before e-mail became the medium of choice for long-distance communication. I had a telephone in my apartment, but calls to and from the US were very expensive. So every student would eagerly check his mailbox daily to see if there were any letters or care packages from home. The school also used the mail room as the distribution point for publications they wanted every student to read.
One day, I entered the mail room to find it abuzz about the latest edition of Reform Judaism magazine, a stack of which had been left for the students. I picked up a copy and glanced at the cover story: Focus on G-d. As I was scanning, one of my classmates, a young man named Leon Morris, walked in and picked up a copy.
“G-d??!” Morris exclaimed. “What’s Reform Judaism got to do with G-d??!”
Now I know that the form of Judaism known as ‘Reform’ in North America is more properly called, ‘Progressive Judaism’ here in Australia. But the name aside, it seems that the regional differences are more differences of degree than anything else. I’m therefore guessing that there are many in this room tonight who would ask the same question. At least some of you would agree that Progressive Judaism doesn’t, or perhaps shouldn’t have very much to do with G-d.
There was a time, before and during my rabbinical studies, when I would have agreed with such sentiments. And my relative lack of specific faith in G-d survived rabbinical school and carried over into the early years of my rabbinate. I remember explaining to a Christian colleague, Shelia Wilson that, to most Jews, faith equals a kind of reverent skepticism. A Baptist minister, Reverend Wilson found my statement jarring. “But what about the Torah?” she asked me. “Doesn’t it say, ‘Abraham believed, and therefore was considered righteous?’”
“Well, but Hebrew verbs are not so specific,” I replied fuzzily. “That’s a simple translation, but chances are the text means that he ‘was faithful,’ which implies belief less than a certain steadfastness.”
I may have truly believed what I told Shelia Wilson that day. But I changed over the years. I like to think that as learned to I quiet my own ego I was better able to hear the Still Small Voice that, if we let it, will reveal to us many of life’s secrets that might otherwise be lost in the clutter. And what that voice has been telling me, and what I came to accept over time, is that there is a dimension of reality that is not apprehensible by the senses and the intellect. There is Something Else out there that can inspire, and comfort, and guide. And over time, I began to accept that that Something Else as G-d.
In all the congregations I’ve served, both military and civilian, many of the Jews I’ve encountered consider themselves to be atheists. An atheist is, by definition, one who rejects the existence of G-d entirely. Following that exact definition, my experience tells me they probably more likely simply reject certain Traditionalist notions about the Deity than reject the very idea of a Deity. If that’s the case, one is more accurately ‘non-traditional’ or perhaps ‘agnostic.’ But it’s not my place to argue the point with you; if your stance is ‘I swear to G-d I’m an atheist,’ then who am I to argue??!
Seriously, I’m not implying that, if you cannot believe, you’re a lesser person. That there are many good and wonderful people who are atheists, and more than enough scoundrels who are firm believers in G-d, is a given. Faith does not necessarily make someone good, and lack of faith does not make someone bad. If that were the case, it would be far easier to make the case for faith. It would be far easier to point to some stark difference between people with faith and people without faith, as a way of convincing you of the importance of making faith a central fact of your Jewish identity. But for better or worse, I don’t have that stark difference, by which to make my case.
What I do have is a stark difference in myself – the me before faith and the me after faith – to make the case. As I allowed myself to believe, as I allowed myself to see and accept the grandeur and glory of G-d, I found myself far more at peace. I felt myself becoming far less combative as an expression of my Jewish self, far more accepting of others as I became far more accepting of myself.
We Jews joke among ourselves about our combativeness. For example, we tell the joke about the Jew shipwrecked on an island who builds himself three synagogues: one for weekdays, one for holy days, and one he wouldn’t set foot in. Or, the one about the Jewish beggar. A rich Jew walks past and, feeling generous, hands him a five dollar bill. So the beggar takes the fiver and walks into the nicest deli in the neighborhood and sits down to enjoy a repast of bagels and lox. While he’s eating, the rich benefactor walks in and sees the beggar. “What??!” he demands. “You took the five dollars I gave you and spent it eating lox??!” The beggar responds: “If I don’t have five dollars, I can’t eat lox! If I do have five dollars, I can’t eat lox! So when can I eat lox??!”
These are jokes, but they resonate with us because they capture so well the Jewish way of thinking. They capture so well the Jewish way of fighting fate, of not accepting the way things are. When I was stationed as a chaplain at the US Air Force Academy, a Jewish woman once called me. She was upset that the Scheduling Committee would not let a certain cadet leave the Academy to travel to attend her daughter’s bat mitzvah in Boston. The cadet in question was not a family member, just a friend of the family. Cadet Wing regulations make it clear that the privilege of time off to leave the Academy for such an event reserved for family members, and the Scheduling Committee had simply upheld that regulation. In trying to console my caller, I told her that you can’t fight City Hall.
“Oh, yes I can!” she retorted. “And I will!”
Now I don’t know if she managed to budge City Hall on the issue. But I’m sure many of you here tonight would react in precisely the same way.
Another example. Once Clara and I went to the movies, in a town called Kiryat Malachi, in Israel. The film malfunctioned, and the theater manager told us to hold on to our ticket stubs as we could use them at any of the chain’s theaters, on any night, for any other show. But I didn’t want that. I was getting ready to leave Israel the very next day and I didn’t know when I would return. I did not want to spend the next year or two carrying around a ticket stub in my wallet. I wanted a refund, and I asked for it. The manager didn’t want to give me the refund; he was paid, after all to uphold the chain’s well-articulated, countrywide policy. After arguing for several minutes, I finally let loose a stream of vituperation in Hebrew, one that I didn’t think I had in me. What happened? The manager shrugged, took the refund money out of the till, and handed it to me with an expression that seemed to say, Why didn’t you tell me you wanted a refund to begin with? In other words, my not being combative from the start gave the man the message that I didn’t really want it.
Some would say that the Serenity Prayer is antithetical to Jews. Remember the Serenity Prayer? G-d grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference. Most of us know it in that form. It was composed by the German theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, probably in the 1930’s. It was adopted as a kind of watchword by William Griffith Wilson and has become an important concept in Alcoholics Anonymous and every other 12-Step program for additions.
Perhaps the Serenity Prayer is antithetical to some Jews. But I have found that, as faith has become a more and more important part of my life, that the prayer rings true. Although not a specifically Jewish prayer, it manages to capture the essence of faith and its purpose in life – whether from a Jewish or other perspective. The extended version of the prayer does it even better:
G-d, grant us the...
Serenity to accept things we cannot change,
Courage to change the things we can, and the
Wisdom to know the difference.
Patience for the things that take time,
Appreciation for all that we have, and
Tolerance for those with different struggles.
Freedom to live beyond the limitations of our past ways, the
Ability to feel your love for us and our love for each other and the
Strength to get up and try again even when we feel it is hopeless.
Sure, one without a faith in G-d can achieve many or all of these things. But I’ve found that G-d is the Tool I needed in my Toolbox for Life, to put me on the road to achieving all these things. Have I arrived? I would not be so arrogant as to suggest that I have. But since I began my faith journey, I am surely much farther down that road than I was before. Faith – belief in a caring yet demanding G-d who wants us to achieve Happiness and Goodness – is what has led me down that road. I don’t have to regret that I can’t change everything I touch – G-d has given me the serenity to accept that which I cannot change. I don’t have to feel reticent about demanding some things around me do change – G-d has granted me courage to stand up when necessary. I don’t have to be frustrated over how long some things take – G-d has granted me the patience to accept that things don’t often happen just because I want them now I don’t have to be consumed by jealousy for what others have – G-d has granted me appreciation for what I have.
So faith is not only for the Christian. It is not only for the Muslim. Yes, it is a Jewish concept and it is the greatest gift that we Jews have given the world. If we learn to hear G-d’s Voice speaking to us, we increase our chances of finding Happiness. We increase the Goodness in the world.
But many of us are fearful of the possible consequences of hearing G-d’s voice. We point to many individuals, past and present, who claimed to be listening to G-d’s voice yet brought tremendous evil upon themselves and those around them. The 9-11 hijackers, to use but one example, all felt they’d heard G-d’s voice calling them to commit their atrocities against innocent people. Does this not call into question the very idea of faith as our guiding inspiration?
As a result, many of us have ceded the very language of faith to our neighbors. In my last congregational job, I attended a meeting concerning how to mount a fund-raising campaign for the temple. The professional fund-raiser with whom we were working, was experienced only with Christian communities. He talked repeatedly about the importance of challenging each member of the congregation over and over, to pray over the congregation’s needs and ask for G-d’s guidance in deciding how much to give. One of the members of our committee rightly responded: In their campaigns, churches ask their members to spend time praying over the congregation’s needs. How is that going to resonate with Jews? Suggest to a group of Jews to pray over something, and the reaction is likely to be, Say what?
I had an answer at the time. It was that we use a different vocabulary of faith. For example, when it’s time for the silent prayer at the end of the Amidah, I seldom say it’s time for a silent prayer. More often I use the term ‘silent reflection’ or ‘silent meditation.’ But my answer to you tonight is different. Are you uncomfortable thinking about praying for something? Then I respectfully recommend you reflect on the Presence of G-d. Once you agree that rejecting certain Traditional notions concerning G-d does not necessitate rejecting G-d altogether, perhaps faith will not seem so impossible.
If that doesn’t set you down the road to faith, please don’t feel in any way inadequate or that the temple is irrelevant for you. At the same time, accept that for those who have crossed the threshold of faith, it seems like an empty exercise to create a Judaism based only on rational thought.
Without G-d the law-giver, all of the great principles of law – including the prohibition on murder – become simply a matter or preference for the declaration of the state. The Torah becomes a lovely fairy tale. What we’re doing here tonight becomes some expression of ethnic solidarity, or perhaps of fealty to ancient customs that have ceased to mean much to us. Without G-d as judge, life becomes a crap shoot. There is no Ultimate Justice. In philosophical terms I’m making here is the argument for G-d’s existence from necessity. G-d must exist because we need Him. Oh, how we need Him!
But the argument from necessity is the beginning of the case, not its end. Does that mean that I’ve only now started to give my sermon tonight? (pregnant pause) Don’t worry. J
I’m not sure there is an end. There’s only a journey – as I’ve already called it, a Faith Journey – on which one moves from fighting to acceptance, from un-belief to acceptance of the possibility of belief, to the beginning of a crystallization of one’s belief…to a beginning of achieving the balance, the serenity, the happiness that belief, that faith can engender.
Please don’t hear that I’m trying to prescribe an imperative to believe. More than that, I’m offering you permission to believe. You may be happy with a supremely rational faith, in which case it is not my purpose to try to take you out of your comfort zone. Rather, I don’t want you to think that, if you are open to the Still Small Voice within you that leads you to have faith, that you are somehow transgressing the nature of Judaism. Although most of us like to see ourselves as skeptics, we have given the world a great heritage of faith, operative faith, demanding faith as a tool in humanity’s quest for Goodness. Let’s feel free to reclaim it! If you feel its tug in your life, rejoice! Celebrate that your faith if nothing less than a gift, a gift to cherish as you let it lead you on a journey toward happiness.
Yom Kippur Morning
Vocation
When speaking to you from this pulpit, I am acutely aware of the need for us to have a common understanding of the words I use. When we use a particular word in conversation, it is important that it means the same thing to all parties of the conversation, or at least that the party using the word explain to other participants exactly what he intends the word to mean. So I use the term ‘vocation’ with some trepidation.
To review, on the evening of Rosh Hashanah I presented a thesis which I heard on a radio program articulated by the sociologist and author Charles Murray. His thesis is that a life of deep meaning and happiness dwells in four elements: family, community, faith, and vocation. Hearing this thesis, I knew immediately that I had a series of High Holy Day sermons outlined for me. Since I’ve been addressing these elements one by one during these Days of Awe, and Yom Kippur morning represents the fourth occasion for a sermon, you already have figured out that I’m about to address the fourth element, that of Vocation.
I hope that I’ve made the case for the importance of putting in order your familial relationships, for building real community with others of like interests or values, and for exploring and developing faith. So now we deal with Vocation. But what exactly do I mean by Vocation? It’s not a word that frequently appears in the Jewish lexicon. Perhaps you have some vague idea that it has to do with the work you do – and if so, then you are correct. But the meaning of vocation is much deeper than that.
In American life, we associate the term ‘vocation’ with those high school students who are not especially academically oriented, whose guidance counselors steer them into the ‘vocational’ or ‘vo-tech’ track. There, at least many years ago when I was in high school, the boys would learn carpentry or auto mechanics while the girls would focus on cosmetology. ‘Vocational’ careers were understood to be blue-collar careers. There was, then, a stigma attached to the word Vocation. Of course, this was unfortunate. Why should blue-collar work be less commendable than white-collar work? It is perhaps in part because of this stigma attached to those who work with their hands, that we in the Western nations have allowed our industrial capability to whither away during the decades since the 1960’s. Factories, their associated pollution and the legions of grimy industrial workers became an embarrassment to many Americans. I’m guessing that you went through a similar process here. If you don’t think this is so, go online to the websites of the convention and visitors’ bureaus of any formerly industrial city in the world. Almost without exception – at least in my experience – such informational websites tout that their city’s formerly industrial districts have given way to entertainment districts and ‘clean’ industry and office parks. I think it’s beyond dispute that the dismantling of our industrial base has displaced workers, led to the demise of the blue-collar middle class, and shifted our countries’ balance of trade since we still need the products of heavy industry, but we’re now paying people in other countries to build them for us.
Later, when I served as a US Air Force chaplain, I became familiar with a different use of the word Vocation. To my Christian colleagues in the ministry, it means a calling – specifically a Divine calling to the ministry or, in the case of a Catholic man, to the priesthood. As I told you Most of my Christian colleagues in ministry, moved toward their careers in ministry after feeling they’d received a very clear summons from G-d. For rabbis, or for Jews who are wrestling with the idea of becoming a rabbi, this idea is instantly foreign. Most rabbis would not profess to have been instructed by G-d to train for and enter the rabbinate. But thanks to my work in the interfaith sphere of the Air Force chaplaincy, I began to understand the word Vocation in a context other than that of blue-collar work.
That however, is not what Murray was talking about in his interview, and it’s not what I’m here to talk about this morning. If I was, it wouldn’t apply to anybody in this room – unless there are Christian clergy present without my knowledge. So what does the word mean in the context of my lesson for today?
It means the occupation that you feel, at the pit of your gut, is the correct and appropriate occupation for you. It may have been a Still, Small Voice that told you it was what you were supposed to be doing. Perhaps it was something different – say, an overall feeling of well-being or joy when you decided on, were preparing for, and now when you perform, that occupation.
Men tend to connect vocation to how we earn a living. This only makes sense: providing for our family is a primary expression – perhaps the primary expression – of one’s masculinity. There are some primeval forces operative in our lives, that we can’t change – that we shouldn’t even think of trying to change. But vocation is not necessarily the work by which we earn a living; it can be something that we do, even though we earn a living doing something else. But for most men, their vocation is their income-producing activity. For women somewhat less; motherhood is the quintessential vocation that does not produce a salary.
That’s not to say that there’s anything wrong with having a disconnect between the work one does to earn a living, and what one’s Vocation is. For example, my older brother is a CPA – what I think you would call here, a Chartered Accountant. My brother likes his work, he’s good at it, and it provides him and his family a very nice living. But if I were to ask him if he thought being a CPA were his Vocation – once I were sure he understood what I meant by Vocation – I doubt that his answer would be in the affirmative. Since I know my brother well, I would guess that his answer would be: “I earn a living as a CPA, but my true vocation is being a husband and father.” This presents a disconnect between what my brother spends much of his time doing and what he really thinks he was put on earth to do. Does it make him less of a man??! G-d, no! I think it means he’s unlocked a secret of life that many of us, I daresay, have not found. For better or worse, most men find that their primary sense of who they are comes from their work. To criticize that, I think, is like someone who lives in the tropics complaining when it rains.
So we work, and at least many of us derive a large portion of our self-definition and self-esteem from the work that we do. But what if we have a hard time thinking about our work as our Vocation, using the definition that I’ve given?
Everybody knows such a person, and most of us have been that person at some time during our lives. We’ve been taught to derive self-esteem from our work in direct relation to how prestigious that work is, or how much we earn from that work. The two often, but don’t always, go hand-in-hand. Almost all of us have held down jobs that did not give us so much satisfaction, while waiting for better work to come along. Perhaps we were students in high school or university, holding down relatively-unskilled jobs to pay the bills while waiting to finish our education and start our ‘careers.’ Think of the jobs that many of us held in supermarkets, fast food, or restaurants while we were studying.
Believe me, I’m not for a minute implying that these kinds of jobs are below respect, or unworthy of our efforts. I believe that all honest work ennobles the worker on a number of different levels. I’m only commenting on the reality that most of us, if and when we did such work, were unlikely to see this work as our Vocation. But some of us – perhaps many of you in this very room who are in their working years – go to jobs daily without a sense of Vocation. If this describes you now, and you think there’s truth in this notion that Vocation is one of the important elements leading to happiness, and you’d like to be happy, then what can you do?
Well, it seems to me that you would have three courses of action open to you: find your Vocation in something other than how you earn a living; decide to make your occupation your Vocation; or strive to change your life’s course so that you can pursue your Vocation as the way you earn a living. So let’s examine all three alternatives.
The first course would be to agree that your work is not your Vocation, and cling to that definition in some other area of your life. Like the example of my older brother, who makes a good living as a CPA but considers his Vocation to be that of husband and father. But other definitions are possible. I have a friend who is an ordained rabbi, but earns his primary living as a CPA. He doesn’t complain about his work as an accountant. But he definitely considers his Vocation to be that of a rabbi. There’s nothing at all wrong with such a disconnect. If one can pull it off then that’s fine and wonderful. I have to say, though that I think it would be difficult to spend something like 35% of one’s waking hours doing something other than one’s Vocation. Especially so, since we tend to order most of the other 65% of our waking hours around our jobs. Nevertheless, it is certainly possible. Some of you are in jobs that you don’t see as the end of the rainbow, which you are unable to see as your Vocation, but which you’re loath to quit because of the economy, or family obligations, or whatever. If this describes you, your best course of action may be to find your Vocation in some other compartment of your life.
The second possible course would be to decide that one’s occupation is one’s Vocation. In other words, to make up your mind that the occupation by which you make is living is your Vocation. Many individuals experience such a transformation in their frame of mind, and I met many of them during my military service, and in fact I am one of them. One meets such people, most often, working for the government or for other large enterprises.
One starts out in an entry-level position where the work is repetitive, or requires relatively little skill, but one stays with the same organization for years and grows into positions of greater skill or responsibility. Suddenly, one day one wakes up and realizes that he identifies closely with the ‘product’ that is the result of the collective efforts of all those toiling in the organization. Whether the specific job one is currently holding is the End of the Rainbow is irrelevant. The sense of vocation comes from being a part of something bigger than oneself, something that matters.
Using this reasoning, the person who finds his work as a clerk in a supermarket unsatisfying, can suddenly change focus and think about all the people who are able to buy healthy, nutritious food at affordable prices because of what all the employees in the supermarket chain do every day. This is the difference, for some people, between having a job and having a career. But one can take it further; it can become a Vocation. In large organizations, these are the workers who usually work their way up into management and leadership positions.
The third possible course for those who find the disconnect I’m talking about, between what they do for a living and their sense of Vocation, is to change the course of their lives – to move into a career or profession what would be their vocation.
This is, for many, the hardest of the three courses. It’s the most risky. But for most of us, if we give ourselves the credit we deserve, we can achieve it. It’s within the capability of most in this room, if we learn to have enough confidence in ourselves and our vision for our lives, to ‘reinvent’ ourselves in this way.
I’ve personally done it more than once. For those in this room who don’t know my personal history, I want to tell you about how I found my vocation and re-invented my life to pursue it. In so doing, my purpose is not to show myself as praiseworthy in any way. I know that I take a risk in talking about myself; I certainly don’t want to appear narcissistic! But because I’ve experienced the changes I’m talking about, I think my life can serve as a good example for you. So allow me to use my own life to illustrate that, when one makes up one’s mind to bring deeper meaning to one’s life through one’s work, one can do it – even an entirely ordinary person like me.
I joined the US Navy after high school, not out of patriotism or calling, but because I wanted to get out on my own, to see some of the world, and perhaps to learn something that would translate into a good job afterward. I ended up as a crypto-linguist after studying Russian language. The job felt like a good fit, and when I decided to make a career of it, I made the transition from having a steady job to having a Vocation. In order to be the best military leader I could be, I also pursued my university degree in my spare time.
At some point, having been serving for a few more years, I had my BA and was beginning to itch for the next big challenge. A humorous conversation with my rabbi opened my heart to the idea of becoming a rabbi myself. So I left the Naval service and entered Hebrew Union College with a true sense of Vocation – I had left a comfortable career and a measure of security to pursue the calling that felt just right at a gut-level if not yet at an intellectual level. Upon ordination I went back on active duty in the military – this time in the US Air Force and as a chaplain – as I’d planned from the start.
When I’d served in total, enough years in uniform to earn a modest retirement, I began thinking about the next change in my life. I found my service as an Air Force chaplain fulfilling in many ways. But I knew that, in order to have a sense of complete fulfillment in my Vocation, I would have to leave my work and move into a congregational rabbinate.
I had to try congregational work, because over my years in the Air Force chaplaincy, I found that the tasks and processes that gave me the most joy, were those that would be my full-time job as a congregational rabbi but which were a secondary emphasis to a rabbi serving as a military chaplain. So I put in my retirement papers, began a job search with a great deal of hope for the future, and ended up in Colorado Springs, at a small Reform congregation.
After two years I felt that the match between me and my congregation in Colorado was not good enough that I would want to spend the rest of my career there. We had accomplished some great things together, but I itched for a congregation more interested in the things I wanted to spend my time and energy doing. I therefore gave them plenty of notice that I was looking elsewhere and began my search for my next pulpit.
Some would say that I picked a bad year to do so; many congregations in the US are being severely taxed by the current economic downturn as it stresses their members’ ability to contribute financially. This has resulted in a contraction in the number of full-time jobs available. At the same time, the number of rabbis in the mix has expanded. This, because a number came out of retirement to build up retirement funds decimated by the stock market crash. As a result, I found myself at the beginning of last summer with no job. But I was in better condition than some others in the same position; I have a modest pension and other benefits from the military. Rather than pursue a job that was not a good fit, I decided to go back to school for a while.
That’s what I’m doing right now. I’m attending graduate school, pursuing a second master’s, in clinical counseling. Whether I complete the two-year program of not, I will see every day I’ve spent in it as contributing to my rabbinate. Everything that I learn, every skill that I hone, will add to my effectiveness in my Vocation. If no permanent, full-time opportunities should come up and I actually complete the program, then I’ll have the possibility of earning a living in a completely different way and in a field that is certainly part and parcel of my self-definition as a rabbi. So it’s a win-win. Again, I recount my own life, and my own struggles to find myself within my Vocation, for one purpose only. And that is, to give you hope if you’ve been struggling to find your Vocation. Every twist and turn in the road we call life, may be a new opportunity to find self-fulfillment. We should never despair. We should never think that Vocation – one of the four essential elements in this four-part system I’ve been busy presenting to you – is out of our reach.
And now I’d like to say a few words to those of you who have already finished your working years and are in retirement. I’m told there are one or two in this congregation. Of course, you who are retired, and who no longer need to work at an occupation to make a living, are in an enviable situation.
If the work that you did for many years was unsatisfying, or if you cannot look back and think of yourself as having pursued your Vocation, you needed not look back with any regret whatsoever. Instead, rejoice in your current situation and the reality that you are now free to find your Vocation without any consideration whatsoever as to whether you’ll be able to make a living doing so! Pursue your interests, do what you find fulfilling, feel free to contribute to society in important ways without any need to ask about the salary you’ll receive! It’s true that you are now free to spend your time playing golf, or sailing, or fishing. But if you believe that you’ve yet to fulfill the purpose for which you were put on earth, you now have the freedom to pursue it with all your heart.
Vocation is the final piece in this four-part puzzle, in this one notion of how to achieve happiness that so resonated with me that I made it the theme of these four sermons for these Days of Awe. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t important. As I said from the start, we begin with the circle closest to us and then we broaden our vision in concentric circles to include and ever larger world that we wish to affect.
If what I’ve said over these days resonates with you, then I invite you to begin your self-examination of the four specific areas. Ask yourself if they’re in order. Ask yourself if they need work. If yes, have the courage and optimism to move forward from strength to strength as you strive for that often-elusive, but attainable goal of happiness.
There’s more I could say right now, but I know that I’ve gone on long enough and that I will see many of you again this afternoon. I will offer some concluding thoughts to this sermon series later, at our closing service. That’s a promise, not a threat! J For now, I believe we have a Torah portion to read…
Yom Kippur Closing
Putting It All Together
These Days of Awe, these Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, are intended to be reflective. Some would say, leave it to the Jews to expect that reading a 600-page book in the course of two full days to lead to reflection. This is not even considering many minutes of listening to the words of a rabbi who could not possibly know what’s on the hearts and minds of those listening to him. After all, rabbinic ordination does not confer clairvoyance upon the ordinee!
It is therefore my prayer that at least some of what I’ve offered in reflections, has resonated for each of you in this congregation. And while I pray this with utmost sincerity, I do not begin to think that it has been the case. Nevertheless, I do hope that he thoughts I’ve presented have given you something upon which to reflect. I hope that the themes of my sermons have engendered some dinner table conversation and thoughtful discussion.
As I promised earlier today that I would, I would like to take just a few minutes to offer some words of closure to the discourse I’ve given you during these all-important days. I do so understanding perfectly that the sunset draws nigh and that there’s a break-the-fast awaiting us. Far be it for me to keep a group of Jews from a well-earned nosh! And believe me: I am also coming to the limits of my endurance. But if I were to forego the opportunity to try to put it all together, I would definitely be remiss.
I started from the premise that happiness is what most of us want in life, more than anything else. That’s what most of us would say, and I believe we say so with nothing but sincerity. Even so, happiness is elusive for many of us. We may not really know what happiness is. Or perhaps, we allow other things that are not as important – yet which are easier to attain than happiness, to clutter our lives and distract us.
That’s why, when I first heard Charles Murray offer his four-part formula for the attainment of happiness, it resonated with me so deeply.
Perhaps by now I have convinced you to accept my premise that happiness is not an emotion, but is more like a rational state. And that it means felicity, blessedness, a deep satisfaction, wholeness. That attainment of happiness is evidenced by a demeanor that can be described as ‘feeling comfortable in one’s skin.’
If my working definition of happiness works for you, then perhaps so does Murray’s formula for the means by which we achieve it. Family. Community. Faith. Vocation. Perhaps you’ve listened to my series of discourses on what these mean and have considered how you would use these four tools to enable you on your own road to happiness.
Perhaps some of what I’ve presented might make perfect sense to you, and you are ready to consider how it may help you in your own quest for happiness. But perhaps you still find the way I’ve made my presentation, somewhat unsettling. Maybe my lack of reference to the Torah text has left you wondering, what is specifically Jewish about what the rabbi has been saying?
After all, I hope that I’ve presented myself as a person for whom the Torah, the sacred text of our Tradition, is important. I hope that I’ve infused everything that I’ve offered you, with a sense that the Torah is a primary influence in my life. I will leave to the theologians an exact explanation as to how the Torah came to be in the form in which we possess it. The way I look at it, there are many possibilities. We’re not fundamentalists, so it isn’t necessary for all us to believe the very same thing in this regard. And guess what? The Torah herself does not tell us how she came into being. So any belief we might form with regard to how it came about, while it may be a convincing answer to us as individuals, is necessarily external to the Torah herself. So to me, the central thing is not how we think the Torah came into being but the central place we grant her as a guiding force in our lives. But if so, why have my discourses lacked references from the Torah’s text?
Here’s where I get to repair that omission. ‘Happiness’ as I’ve been using the word is a noun denoting a state of being. The word exists as a noun in Hebrew but is practically unknown in the text of the Torah. On the other hand, it appears repeatedly as a verb, from the root sin-mem-chet, meaning ‘to be happy’ or ‘to rejoice.’ In this form, it appears many times, but rather than take you on a tour of the Torah in which anybody with a copy of the text and a concordance can guide oneself, let me offer a verse that epitomizes the Torah’s attitude toward being happy.
In the book of Devarim, Deuteronomy, chapter 12 verse 18, we read about bringing tithes and offerings before G-d. The Israelites are instructed to separate the first-fruits of all their increase. They are not to eat of these in the places of their normal habitation, but to bring them to ‘a place chosen by Hashem’ where they may eat freely of them. And when they do, they are instructed: “…thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy G-d in all that to which thou puttest thy hand.” They are told to rejoice – to be happy – before G-d for all that they touch.
This verse brings out a concept, about which I have not yet spoken. And that is, the obligation to be happy. We have taken happiness from an emotion to a deeper state of being, and now it appears that the Torah is obligating us to be happy in return for the blessing that G-d has granted us. I don’t think that this is but an appearance of obligation. I think that there is a divinely-ordained obligation to respond to life with happiness.
Think about it. Happy people make the world a better place. Happy people are rather unlikely to murder. Or to be contentious. Or to abuse others. Or to be unethical. Happy people therefore, make the world a better place. Does G-d have an interest in a better world? I can’t imagine an argument on that point. As I’ve already said, I think that being happy – and spreading happiness – is the true Tikkun Olam.
One more citation. Outside the Written Torah, in the wisdom books that are traditionally attributed to King Solomon, we find the book of Proverbs. It is a book of pithy wisdom, of short saying that can easily be memorized and actualized. In chapter 29 of Proverbs, the sixth verse we are told: “…a righteous man sings and rejoices.” So even wisdom is connected to being happy. Whether the intent of the verse is that one who is already wise will endeavor to be happy, or whether one who is happy has in being so attained wisdom, I cannot say. But surely it doesn’t matter; either could be said to be true.
We can look at these Days of Awe that are now coming rapidly to a close in a number of ways. Surely they are a sort of religious marathon, a time when most of us push aside other needs and concerns to attend shul and do religious things more than we normally do in a ten day period. They’re also a time to rejoin with the members of your congregation – or your community – for a renewing of friendships and family relationships.
But they’re also a time to sit back and consider our lives, and to imagine the kind of life each of us would like to live in the coming year. In our Tradition, this enterprise is called heshbon nefesh, literally an accounting of the soul, or a stock-taking.
Do my words have fallen on fertile soil? Have they resonated with you? Do you hear in them a hint of wisdom to help you to imagine a good, successful and happy year ahead? If so, then I challenge you to consider the paths you have been following in your quest for happiness. Consider the path that I’ve laid out before you. Think about how to cultivate the four areas of life, about which I’ve spoken on these days. Family, Community, Faith, and Vocation. How can you imagine improving the way you respond to these areas? How will you respond? Will you achieve, or deepen you happiness in the coming year? It is my prayer that each one in this room today will do so. If the ‘road map’ I’ve presented helps even one of you in any way in this process, than I will be thankful and will consider this long journey from Colorado to Queensland as having been supremely worthwhile.