"Living With Open Eyes", Atonement Day, 5763, Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn, Temple Sinai, New Orleans.

"READING THE WRITINGS"
Part 4

"LIVING WITH OPEN EYES"

A Sermon for Atonement Day 5763
September 16, 2002

Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn
Temple Sinai
New Orleans, Louisiana

Troubles, consequences--many of them merited owing to our own stupidity, but many of them entirely undeserved, perhaps due to quirks of fate or natural law, or losing a toss of the genetic dice, or just plain old bad luck-troubles in our lives come this way, don't they? And living our lives in a knowing way pretty much demands that we analyze how and why bad things happen (to be quite candid) to the good and to the not so good among us.

Let's return to our theme for these High Holy Days: "READING THE WRITINGS," k'tuvin, the third portion of Hebrew scripture. In previous years we discussed Torah, last year Prophets, and this year K'tuvin, the writings. On this Yom Kippur Day, I want to take a look at the Book of Job, which is included in The Writings, truly one of the masterpieces of biblical literature.

Do you know that scholars suggest as many as ten different time periods for the authorship of the Book of Job?

One of our sages teaches that Job actually lived during Moses' life. In one place, the Talmud says that Moses even wrote the Book of Job! Another sage insists that Job was never meant to be read as an historical character, but as a parable. If you must have a date, figure post 530 BCE when, under Persian influences, the idea of Satan was introduced. My advice, however, is forget the scholars and focus on the story! What can be learned from it toward the living of our lives?

Do you remember Philip Simmons? We spoke of this 30something author of Learning to Fall on Rosh HaShanah Evening. Here's that guy with Lou Gehrig's disease who describes life with such keen insight. And he addresses the Book of Job, describing Job as a "cosmic schlimazel" who had the misfortune of being around when God, on a dare from Satan, decided to test a good person's faith, and Job was the subject of that test.

Job's children were all killed in a freak accident, his stock portfolio turned into trash, and his real estate went down the tubes. Job proceeds to tear his clothes, sit in ashes, and affirm his faith with those unforgettable words:

Naked came I from my mother's womb and naked shall I return; the Lord gave, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

Well, Satan was still not satisfied, and he dared God to test Job even further with all manner of physical torment just short of his death. Job's wife, wishing to end her husband's anguish, urged him-

Honey, you just curse God and die!

But again, Job responded with these well-known words of uncommon grace and determined insight, asking

Shall we receive good at the hand of God and not receive the bad? Yet though He slay me, still will I believe.

This fellow Job reminds us how little reason avails on those terrible occasions when we struggle to understand all that befalls us. And remember how Job is visited by three "good old boys," his best friends, who certainly don't help him out much when they insist that he must have done something, committed some secret sin, to deserve all of this horrendous punishment!

So how does it end? Job is busy asking piercing and penetrating questions of God, demanding to know why. And finally God speaks up, out of the whirlwind, typically answering Job's question with another question:

Where were you (little man) when I laid the foundations of the earth? I set it all up, everything that defines nature, and now, I'm not responsible when things get rough. I'm in the order, but not the disorder of life. I'm God, and you're not!

God states His case for the next four chapters! And then Job acquiesces, admitting:

I have uttered that which I understood not . . . . L'Shamah Ozen Sh'ma'tee-chah, V'atah Aye-nye Rah-ee-tee. I had heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear. But now, my eye seeth Thee.

In short, Job's eyes were finally open to the realities of life! And in "that wordless place," as Philip Simmons puts it in his book, Learning to Fall,

beyond all niggling over right and wrong, Job's surrender moves us toward a wholeness and connectedness in which all things, good and evil, are divine, all part of the sacred dance of creation.

Now I want us to think about this. We need to continue to ponder how much our world has changed since 9/11. We, too, like Job, have come to see things in a much bigger picture. Notwithstanding the fact that tons and tons and tons of that smoking mountain from the Twin Towers are now gone, they are keenly felt within us.

For me, it seems as if the tragedies in our beloved country, and the cataclysmic terrorism of the suicide bombers destroying the innocents in Israel, and the everyday variety of tragedy-the tumors discovered, the AIDS affliction, car crashes, starvation, natural disasters-for me, they all now seem to be an integral part of everyday life and not an anomalous divergence from it. I'm trying my best to speak with you in the most candid and honest fashion. No sugar coating here.

The Book of Job makes the point, but let me call upon the philosopher Rousseau to second it. Rousseau says:

Human beings are by nature neither kings nor nobles nor courtiers nor rich. All are born naked and poor, all are subject to misfortunes of life, to difficulties, ills, needs, pains of all sorts. . . Each may be tomorrow what those we help are today. Do not, therefore, accustom yourselves to regard the sufferings of the unfortunate and the labor of the poor from the height of your own glory. . . . Understand that the fate of these unhappy people can be yours, that all their ills are there in the ground beneath your feet.

So, you ask me, "Rabbi, what do you make of our lives and destinies on this Yom Kippur Day?" And my answer to you is-Hey, let's do our best to live our lives with eyes open and with hearts alert. "For ours is a fragile happiness," as Rousseau put it. And as Harvard Chaplain Peter Gomes notes in his new book,

We do not do virtuous things in order to be happy; rather, we are happy because we are doing what we are meant to do and being what are meant to be.

Now that is a statement for Yom Kippur Day.

Michael J. Fox. Have you read his best-selling autobiography, Lucky Man? In it Fox describes the earliest symptom of what was finally diagnosed as multiple sclerosis. He remembers:

That's when I noticed my pinkie. It was trembling, twitching, auto-animated. How long this had been going on I wasn't exactly sure. But now that I noticed it, I was surprised to discover that I couldn't' stop it.

Ten years after discovering that involuntarily moving finger, Michael J. Fox, truly a wiser man now, draws this conclusion:

Nobody would ever choose to have this visited upon them. Still, this unexpected crisis forced a fundamental decision: adopt a siege mentality-or embark upon a journey. Whatever it was-courage? acceptance? wisdom? That finally allowed me to go down the second road. . . was unquestionably a gift. . . . I would never have opened it, or been so profoundly enriched. That's why I consider myself a lucky man.

Michael J. Fox, and let's add everyone else with a brain, sooner or later, must come to understand that Rousseau's "Fragile Happiness" is the only kind that there is! Happiness is either fragile or it is self-delusional. And, do you know what the key to enjoyment of that happiness is? One word: gratitude.

You want to talk about avoiding sin, which is a completely appropriate subject for this day? Gratitude is our best protection from the curse of sin-sickness. Grateful people avoid so very many of the pitfalls which lead others to sin.

Look at that list of sins elaborated in our prayer book. I'm telling you, it could choke a horse. From the old Union Prayerbook to the new Gates of Repentance, my rabbinic colleagues seem to have discovered more sins than ever! And the antidote, as I see it, is a sense of gratitude for what we have, and even more importantly, whom we have in our lives, and whom once we had in our lives.

Author and lecturer Lewis Smedes, surviving a close encounter with death during a recent illness, writes this from his hospital bed:

It was then I learned that gratitude is the best feeling I would ever have, the ultimate joy of living. It was better than sex, better than winning a lottery, better than watching your daughter graduate from college, better and deeper than any other feeling. It is perhaps the genesis of all other really good feelings in the human repertoire.

Just this week I ran across these thoughtful words of Garrison Keillor, my good friend from Lake Wobegone. He says:

Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have it, you may be smart enough to see, is what you would have wanted had you known.

Gratitude is the key to sin-free living and to profoundly meaningful living in a world of fragile happiness.

Remember Charles Schultz, the father of Snoopy, Peanuts cartoonist? Here was his philosophy of life. He challenged us to-

Name the five wealthiest people in the world.

Name the last five Heismann trophy winners

Name the last five winners of the Miss America contest.

Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.

Name the last decade's worth of World Series winners.

How'd you do?

Said Schultz, the point is none of us remember the headliners of yesterday. No second-raters, they are the best in their fields but, alas, awards tarnish and celebrity is forgotten.

So, says Schultz, let's try this quiz instead:

List a teacher who transformed your journey through school.

Name three friends who were there for you, you know, the ones who came in when the rest of the world walked out.

Name three precious souls who taught you unforgettable and irreplaceable lessons about life.

Name those people who have been your heroes, your caring mentors, and your lasting inspiration.

Do you see the difference? Life cannot bring to you or to me any more intense joy or more genuine treasure. But are we mindful of our blessings? Will we embrace one another and share our love and tell our appreciation before it's too late? Too often we're like that Norwegian farmer described by Garrison Keillor, the one who loved his wife and appreciated her so much that one day he almost told her so!

Gratitude is the lubricant which anoints the gears of civilization and makes a life of fragile happiness possible. Let's close with this.

A well-known New York minister, Dr. William Stidger, was suffering a severe depression. Nothing relieved it. But then someone suggested to him-something which contributed greatly toward his recovery:

Think of someone who has made a difference for the better in your life, someone you've never really thanked.

Well, he thought of a former school teacher, Miss Wendt, who had awakened within him a lifelong passion for Tennyson's verse. So he found out her address and sat down to write her a letter of thanks. And a while later, Stidger received this reply in shaky handwriting.

My dear Wille: When I read your letter I was blinded with tears for I remember you as a boy and as I think of you now I see you as a little fellow in my class.

I taught school for fifty years. Yours is the first letter of thanks I ever received. It came on a blue, cold morning, and it cheered me as nothing has in years.

Oh dear friends-you have a hopelessly square Rabbi! But I don't think I've ever told you a word from this pulpit I didn't believe. So here it is, in a world of often unfair troubles. You want to live a life of joy? Want to avoid the pitfalls of sin? Well then, here's your homework! Be happy with what you have, and like Job --- we, too, will grow to understand that, even in the storms of life we cannot go where God is not, and where God is --- all will be ultimately well.

Amen.