A Small Thought on Faith & Country

Apologies for taking a break this week

Hey folks —

I’ve been super busy, so sorry I won’t be sharing a mini-lesson on Isaiah based on the Abarbanel. Instead, I wanted to share a short thought that’s somewhat connected, maybe, perhaps, to this national holiday we’re celebrating here in America: Thanksgiving.

One of the big challenges we face — and I think this has been discussed widely across our nation, and really across most Western democracies — is how we create a sense of shared commonality in a society that’s built on deep respect for the individual. Rabbi Sacks, in The Home We Build Together, explores this tension in depth.

I’d like to add to that conversation with a thought from Rav Kook in Musar Avichah, Ethics of the Fathers, in his entry on Emunah, on faith. He writes the following:

“A person who the light of faith is revealed in him in its purity, he loves all of creation entirely, without any measure at all. And his entire focus is on their exaltedness, and on their repair. And the ways of repairing them become full of rebuke, ethics, and uprightness, according to the degree in which faith is revealed in his heart.”

What this means, I think, is that the more a person’s faith in Hashem is revealed and illuminated, the more they begin to see all of civilization — everyone around them — as beings created by the Creator. And once that becomes clear, a person naturally desires goodness, growth, and spiritual elevation for all the people in their family, their city, and their country.

Hopefully this thought can give us a bit of motivation as we try to be active participants in making our little corners of the universe more filled with faith in Hashem.

Shabbat Shalom.

Jeff