Hello, I'm really glad that you decided to check on the second
video in the series were we're going to look at the first of thirteen levels
of forgiveness as described in the
phenomenal book Tomer Devorah (Date Palm of Devorah)
by the 16th century Kabbalist Rabbi Moshe Cordovero.
So, the 13 levels
are based on a verse in Micah that goes through
the 13 attributes of God
Which are couched in highly arcane language
but he teases them out to discuss these thirteen different levels.
The first level of the 13 is called "Mi Kel Kamocha" or
"who is God like you?" and Rabbi Cordovero
evokes a very powerful image called
the "Melech Ne'elav" or "the Insulted King".
So what is talking about? Basically,
we have this idea which is common to most western monotheistic faiths
as far as I'm aware
that not only did God create the universe,
but God continues to maintain the existence of the universe.
That God continues to send the flow of energy to the universe to allow it to
maintain its existence. Were God to
at a moment, God forbid, remove that continuous flow of energy
the universe would simply disappear in an instant. So the idea is that God did not
just
like in Deist position sort of create the world and then step back like creating a
clock, winding it up, and then walking away -- God continues to provide this
flow of energy the universe at all times.
If we accept that as a basic idea
of Judaism, then that would mean that all the energy that is directed to
this universe
at every moment is not only on a macro level but also on a micro level.
As the Midrash likes to say "there's not a blade of grass that grows without
an angel striking it and saying grow" meaning that
every single aspect of our existence is
supervised, observed, and given
energy by the King of Kings. This is a concept
in Judaism known as "Hashgacha Pratis"
or "Divine providence" in traditional theological language.
So given those two ideas, that God
is constantly providing energy for the maintenance the universe,
and that God is completely aware of everything of that happens
in the universe, then it follows that whenever
we use our own will and our own
energy to sin we are actually subverting
the very energy that God gives us to perform God's will
and we're using it against His will. It's as if
an employer gives his servant a walking stick and gives him a mission to
go off on a journey
and the walking stick is for the servant's benefit
but then the servant picks up the stick and begins to beat the boss
with it. Meaning we're using God's energy
against Him. That's what's discussed in this first level
of the 13 levels of Mercy.
The concept is really quite powerful
if you think about it also in the Midrashic context (by the way Midrash
are a series are ancient and medieval discussions of biblical text, really
ancient discussions
often recorded in medieval documents that
provide sometimes poetic, philosophical
interpretations of the text. These texts of Midrash are considered very holy
by traditional Jewish readers.) So one of the Midrashim,
for example, discusses the the splitting of the sea
which of course has entered into the wider
culture the Western world: the Jews leaving
Egypt flee to the sea, God splits the sea, (or you know Charlton Heston with the
sticks and things like that) the Jews travel through
the sea which miraculously maintains its place
with the walls of the sea up like this, and the ground becomes hard, allowing them
to walk..
and so as the Jews see that their escape is no longer barred and that they can
actually flee from the Egyptian safely, what do they do? According to Midrash,
they have some false idols, some statues, and they decide they should take them
along with them
through the waters of the sea. Now think about how mindboggling
that is: that here it is, God has transformed nature, God has
altered the behavior of water and gravity and all kinds of things
in order to demonstrate His will and His concern for the slaves who were fleeing Eygpt,
and at that very moment not only are the Jews not
recognizing that but they're actually taking advantage
of that salvation in order to rescue
their idolatry. That's an amazing thing. Similarly the Midrash there goes on
to say that God is providing the Jews with manna in the desert
for forty years and they're receiving all this manna
and some of them say wow this is great we're getting food from the sky every night,
let's set some aside so we can offer some
offerings to our false idols. Here it is the very gift of God itself
and the Jews are using it contrary to His will.
So this is why God is called the "Melech Aluv" or the "Melech Ne'elav" meaning
"The insulted King" because here, God forbid, we are actually
kind of slapping Him in the face when He is benefiting us directly.
It's an amazing, astounding level of forgiveness
that's very difficult for us to comprehend.
Nevertheless, in Tomer Devorah (The Date Palm of Devorah)
which I've discussed in this commentary, The Kabbalah of Forgiveness,
Rabbi Moshe Cordovero does discuss it at some length
and I think that one of the ways that we can understand this best
is in the sort of behavior paradigm set up by parents and children,
especially adolescent children.
I'm a father of 6 myself, thank God, so I certainly know
a little bit about adolescent behavior and it can be
trying every now and then. The idea is that here you're giving so much energy
to these kids, providing for their education, and their housing, and their
shelter, and their food, and you know all this positive energy all the time,
and when they do things that are contrary to your will it can be very frustrating.
Similarly if an employer is upset with an ungrateful employee,
or if a spouse is long-suffering, the
foibles of his or her marriage partner..
..there's all kinds of times where we are required to keep giving
even when the other person is not only rejecting,
but throwing it back in our face in a very spiteful manner.
In that case we,
that is the giver, are to a certain degree like
God in terms of giving to humanity.
We are required, we are called upon to be generous with ourselves,
to give ourselves, and totally ignore the insult that comes back. So to go back for
example to the adolescent children
you know rebellion is part of developing their identity
rebellion is part of them trying to figure out exactly who they are
as independent individuals and so
on the one hand yes it would be nice if they could go straight from being
beautiful ten year olds to being beautiful twenty or thirty year olds without
and any of that crazy stuff in the middle, but it's a natural part of growing up that they should
learn to rebel against authority in order to understand
what independence means. So our task as the givers as it were
is to forgive those kinds of returns. (That's interesting, I just thought about that:
The word give and forgive are closely related.
I'm sure someone already talked about that though...anyways.)
So, anyways,
in my commentary
I go through the translation of the text and (please have a look on the website,
you'll see some the original text there in hebrew and in English)
and I go through several kind of discussions of the references there
and the scholarly material
but the part that I kind of like the most and I hope you'll enjoy too-
is I try to take this book which is really very much
a pragmatic book despite all of the Kabbalistic information
and the Talmudic information, never the less, it's a book about
practice. It's a book about
how can we change our lives by implementing these thirteen levels
of forgiveness. So what I do at the end of each of these 13 sections is I try to
provide the reader with a few
practical examples. So where we might actually use some of these ideas and if we
rehearse them then hopefully
when real life presents us with an opportunity we'll actually remember what we read
and do the right thing. So here's an example: let's say your
in line at the checkout line
at this grocery store you happen to be in the Express line because
you only want to grab a few things before you rush home
and your checking your smartphone
and a person behind you says "listen do you mind I'm really in a big rush
and I have got to get home. Could I just get ahead of you?" And you know you're feeling
kind of relaxed and you've been reading
The Kabbalah of Forgiveness, and you think "yeah, sure" so you let that person go in
front.
As that person goes in front,
(let's say it was a woman), she starts putting her items on the conveyor belt,
and you notice that the sign says
maximum 10 items. And you're looking--
and she's got 18 items on that conveyor belt.
You're thinking "whoa, what a Chutzpah"
to use the Yiddish expression.
What nerve! Okay, now really in the grand scheme of things
18 items is not hugely more than 10 but here she
asked you to you know give her something let her take your place in line
and that with that you know forgiveness she's gone and turned it back on you.
Oh my gosh, okay, so that's that's a fairly small example
you know if you read the Kabbalah of Forgiveness you'll be able to say all right,
you know the Insulted King, God takes a lot worse punishment than I do
and I am also responsible for a lot of that punishment for God, I'm not speaking theoretically I'm
speaking, you know, actually -- so if God can tolerate
my transgressions then certainly I can tolerate 8 extra items on a conveyor belt.
It's much harder though when you get to the serious family dynamics of
parents and adolescents and spouses and siblings and you know
you just have to use your imagination a little bit about
those situations where you're required to give
and they are not necessarily respecting the fact that you're giving
and you never less have to give and give again.
That's this concept out the "Melech Ne'elav" "the Insulted King".
And if we can master this
first concept of forgiveness, that giving
is really something that is incumbent upon us, something that we never less have
to give
and we should not necessarily anticipate an appropriate
level of gratitude in return -- then we've made the first step towards the 13
distinct levels of forgiveness. If you thought this one was hard, which I did,
(which I do consider it hard) you know, sit tight because the next
12 levels: each one gets harder and harder.
By the time we get to 13, which is kinda like the nuclear option - if you can't
find any other way
to forgive a person the thirteenth level is the absolute last ditch effort -
you know you'll see that there's a tremendous amount of spiritual work that
goes on here.
Now one last thing before we close:
in my commentary as I work through this, really I'm working through it for
myself too, I really want to become the kind of person that Rabbi Cordovero
writes about in Tomer Devorah, I thought a little bit about what I could do to
exercise this forgiveness muscle. What could I do to myself, how could I work on
myself
to try it and you know produce the kind of person
that I want to be? So I thought
of an exercise that you might want to try as well.
The first level forgiveness is all about giving and not expecting anything in
return.
Giving and even if what comes back is a slap in the face
just saying well, you know, my task here is to give
and I give without reservation.
Think about this exercise: Go through your contact list
and see if you can find a few people that you haven't talked to in a long time
and write them a letter. Write them an actual
paper letter. Like, so 20th century kind of technology.
A postcard, a small thing, and then just
stick those letters in the mail and forget about them.
Do this maybe once a month. Try and
write these letters, my gosh I'm reminding myself, I really should do this more often, but
try and write these letters and just send them off (this is what my mother does, my mother's
really an amazing person, and she writes letters like these constantly on those little slips of paper
that are individual, not like full pages like this and
not typed but, she'll find little notepads...you don't care about this, I should get back to the material.)
So just write those letters,
send them off, and don't expect any response.
If you get a response than that's wonderful and I'm sure it will make you feel really good.
And if you don't, well, that's okay you have put yourself into that kind of modality
of giving unconditionally and that's really at the root
of this concept of the "Melech Ne'elav" "the Insulted King",
that God knows he is going to be insulted, God knows that
giving us this kind of energy, we're bound to do
the wrong thing with it from time to time and
we'll be using the energy He gives us contrary to His will,
even when He's completely aware of that and nevertheless He does not stop that
flow of energy
He keeps giving and giving and giving. So that's the first level
of the 13 levels.
Please click on the playlist and try the second level: it gets a little bit harder
and actually a little bit more Kabbalistic.
Thanks for watching.