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Rabbinic Insights: Talking To God
San Diego Jewish Times,
March 10, 2006
By Rabbi Wayne Dosick
You
journey through the magical pathways of the Spiral Tree of Life, drinking in the
energies of each of the sefirot,
savoring the unique encounter with God at each emanating step. You go from where
God meets you on Earth where you dwell spirit in matter to where you
meet God where God dwells matter in spirit. You are with God in Keter,
the place of ultimate union, of complete Oneness.
You
are in God's holy presence. It is awesome and glorious. And it can be daunting,
and even intimidating, for you are as the philosopher tells it in
"fear and trembling." You are acutely aware that "there is an Eye
that sees, and an Ear that listens."
And
it is, at the same time, warm, and welcoming, and very, very comfortable. You
are Home. The transcendent God the God of the entire cosmos is now the
immanent God, with you and within you. Ein
Sof, the Infinite God who fills the whole universe, envelops you you,
alone in the most loving embrace. You speak, and the Ineffable Almighty
who is lonely without you joins you in intimate conversation. God speaks,
and the Divine utterance is your very own lovesong.
In
the language of the Kabbalah, here in the Keter place of union, you seek
to merge with God; you seek devekut,
to cleave to, to blend, to meld with God.
You
do this through hitbodedut,
"self-isolation," or, better, "isolation from Self." You go
to your deepest place, the place of the "inside of your insides," the
place beyond ego and identity. You are in yichud,
your deep, intimate alone time with God.
When
you are with God, you connect the Divine that is within you with its Divine
Source. The "holy sparks" of God that are within you meet their
Origin, and God's Light of creation from where they were kindled is, in turn,
re-enflamed.
When
you are with God, you remember what you already know. You are fully aware that
the totality of eternal knowledge is within you; you know the entirety of All
That Is. In your Heavenly remembering, some of the mysteries and the wonders of
your Earth-life come into better focus and greater understanding. Then, when you
return from being with God, another speck of your Earth-knowing is illuminated,
your God-ness is expanded. When you are with God, you are in the magnificence of
total, absolute, Love. God is Love. You are Love. Together, you and God are the
greatest of all Love.
You
talk and God listens. What do you say?
Sometimes,
it takes only one word, for in the intimacy of the embrace of love, even in one
word, whole worlds are spoken and received. Or, you can begin by saying: I come
to You, O God to acknowledge You, to bless You, to praise You, and to thank You;
to talk to You, and to listen as You talk to me in the sweet and holy Voice of
Your Word and Your Will.
Then,
say anything and everything. Pour out your heart and cry out your soul to the
Creator of your heart and soul. Sing your joy. Shout. Whisper. Argue. Wrestle.
Be guided. Be challenged. Be comforted. Be enlightened.
In
the form of traditional prayer, you may want to: Praise. In your own words, and
through your own experiences, you may want to say, "How great are Your
works, O God. The whole Earth is filled with your glory." I am in awe.
Thank.
In your own words, and through your own experiences, you may want to say,
"It is good to give thanks to God ... to declare Your lovingkindness ...
and Your faithfulness. Thank You, O God, for all Your many blessings of life
and sustenance. I am in gratitude.
Does God need your praise and thanks? Probably not. But, even God likes to hear
a good word now and then; God likes to know that God's Godness and God-ing are
appreciated. But, even more, you need to praise and thank God for you. You need
to remind yourself that it is not your might or your power that moves and
controls the universe. It is God's spirit. You need to be in humility, awe, and
gratitude, so that you can say, with glad conviction, "God is God."
Ask.
In your own words, and through your own experiences, you may want to ask God for
what you want and desire for you, for the ones you love, for your world. I
am in need.
Here
comes the big, big learning:
It
is perfectly proper to ask God to fulfill the desires of your heart. Yet, there
are some "ground rules," some boundaries.
God does not provide red bicycles for good little children; parents do. God does
not provide As on tests: good studying students earn them. God does not
provide victories for sports teams; good athletes prevail. And God does not
provide what God has already given us the ability to achieve by ourselves. As
Rabbi Jack Riemer puts it, "We cannot merely pray to You, O God, to end war
... to end starvation ... to root out prejudice ... to end despair ... to end
disease. For You have made the world in such as way that we must find our own
path ... to peace ... You have given us the resources to feed all people ... to
clear away the slums and give hope ... to search out cures and healings ...
Therefore, we pray 'to do' instead of only 'to pray.'"
Perhaps
your prayer, then, should be for the extending of your capacities and our
abilities to see, and explore, and envision; for a greater measure of wisdom,
and insight, and fortitude, and compassion; for constant good counsel and
guidance. "May God's goodness be upon us, and establish the work of our
hands.
There
is more to the big, big teaching. And, this is the more difficult part, because
it requires the stripping away of all ego, the stripping of all pretense, the
utterly honest confrontation with all the archetypes real and imagined;
illuminated and shadow that are within you, the full surrender to God.
Often,
in your prayers, you may try to convince God that your will the things you
want and desire should be God's will. But, the world does not work that way.
God's
values are supreme. They supersede your feelings, and your desires and your
cravings, and your choices no matter how worthy and worthwhile your
inclinations might be. God's will is God's will.
Your
view of the world is bounded by what you can see and experience at a given
moment, and what you are able to possibly envision for future time. And, your
world-view is greatly influenced by your very human needs and desires, and yow:
very human feelings and emotions.
God's
view of the world is unlimited. God "was, is, and always will be."
God
sees the past, the present, and the future of the entire cosmos, and determines
how it will unfold. God, who created the universe and everything in it
including you has a design, a blueprint, for its and your continuing
existence.
God decides what is right or wrong; what is in the highest and best interest of
our world, including what is in your highest good.
So,
sometimes, God does not answer you prayer the way you would hope and expect. God
determines that your request even though you may think so may not be in
your highest and best interest. Or, God determines that your request may be good
for you, but may not fit into the plan and blueprint, the ultimate design, for
the whole world. It may not be in the collective highest good.
If
you had God's perspective, you would be able to see how your life and your
requests fit into the Divine Design. You could know that your heartfelt
prayers even when it seems to you as if they are not heard are, indeed,
heard and honored, even if they cannot be fulfilled in the way you would like.
You would know that when you experience very real human emotions of pain, and
anguish, and suffering, God weeps with you in your pain, and whether or not
it seems so to you at the moment comforts you, and lifts you up out of the
depths.
In
the same way, when it seems to you as if your prayers are answered in the way
you would like, when you experience great moments of joy, happiness, and
contentment, then, too, those emotions are not sourced your own will, but in
God's will.
So,
as our revered teacher Rabbi Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel ztl
put it (in an era before egalitarian language), "Prayer is not man imposing
his will on God. It is God imposing His will and mercy on man." Or
as President Abraham Lincoln put it, "I want to humbly pray that we are on
God's side." As it is put most succinctly, "Thy will be done."
God
will listen and respond to your prayers only when your requests, your pleas, are
in alignment with the Divine plan. God will listen and respond only when you ask
to do God's will, and only when you ask God to do God's will.
Rabbi Wayne Dosick, Ph.D., the spiritual guide of the Elijah
Minyan, an adjunct professor at the University of San Diego and the Director of
the 17: Spiritually Healing Children's Emotional Wounds. He is the
award-winning author of six critically acclaimed books, including Golden
Rules; Living Judaism; and Soul Judaism: Dancing with God into a New Era.