From Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg On to today:
It goes without saying that this time is horrific, agonizing², and today we are going to remember that we must keep the fires of the liberatory imagination burning.
Especially in the face of so much death and despair. We must remember what’s possible. We must try to envision new ways. We cannot find our way out of this moment if we cannot even begin to imagine what else could possibly be.
We cannot ever do anything differently if we cannot even begin to grasp how we might begin to get there.
And given the dehumanization I see on social media—the othering, the determination to justify death—the validating the destruction of innocents as long as it’s the innocents on the other team—honestly, we need some new paradigms…
Some mystically-minded folks, in the Kabbalistic tradition and elsewhere, argue that everything is interconnected as part of one great underlying spiritual unity—that even if we all seem to be separate, we're actually akin to the seemingly differentiated waves in the sea, or like ice in a glass—appearing separate, but, really, just water.
https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/i/137943616/may-this-be-the-last-moment-of-horror-before-the-creation-of-a-new-whole-tomorrow-for-everyone
Long ago - and yesterday in cosmic time, Julia ward how wrote her Mother’s Day Proclamation:
MOTHER’S DAY PROCLAMATION
Boston, 1870
“Arise, then… women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts,
whether our baptism be that of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies.
Our husbands shall not come to us, reeking with carnage,
for caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country
to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.
From the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own.
It says: Disarm, Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
nor violence vindicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
at the summons of war,
let women now leave all that may be left of home
for a great and earnest day of council.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them then solemnly take council with each other as to the means
whereby the great human family can live in peace,
each bearing after his own kind the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
but of God.
In the name of womanhood and of humanity, I earnestly ask
that a general congress of women, without limit of nationality,
may be appointed and held at some place deemed most convenient,
and at the earliest period consistent with its objects,
to promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
the amicable settlement of international questions,
the great and general interests of peace.“
~ Julia Ward Howe
The rest of Rabbi Danya is awesome. I highly recommend reading it! That said, I had an interesting experience on her page on a post that I was uncomfortable with due its partisan way of addressing issues in the United States that I felt lacked the nuance that her treatment of the middle east so beautifully portrays in this piece. I got silence when I, in the most loving way I could asked if there was space in her community for those who come in good faith wanting good things for all, yet who may not agree ideologically, or may see some things as having a broader or more nuanced context that needs addressing before we click “YES” and call politicians to support certain legislation. I got silence. Perhaps Rabbi Danya felt what I said in her heart but recognized that she could jeopardize her ability to be a bridge with the people with whom she has clout if she came right out and said it at that time. Or perhaps the area of US politics is more charged and binary in her being at this time. But I hope, hope, hope that we can have more open conversations instead of silence. Because war comes when an oppressed people is unheard in both actual listening and appropriate action for too long. Peace can be found by listening with compassion and finding common ground, yet also holding space for difference. We can like each other. Love each other. Want the best for one another and for one another’s families, even if we disagree passionately, if we can come to the place beyond words were we recognize the sacred in. one another and are committed to finding, as my son once put his prayer for change, “Grassroots all-way win solutions.”
Grassroots All Way Win Solutions
Shalom Salaam
