One of my favorite parts of Judaism is that it encourages us to question, to doubt, to grapple, to seek, and to find the deeper meaning.
This doesn’t give us permission to not follow the rules, yet it gives us permission to question them. Judaism challenges us to not just be a lame duck, yet to educate ourselves, and to find out what the meaning is.
The doing is collective; if we don’t have law and if we don’t have rules, we have pandemonium and we have chaos.
However, if we don’t have individual thinking, then we are just robots. This thinking leads to learning, which leads to even deep thinking, which help us have a better understanding of ourselves and our thought processes.
This thinking also leads to listening; in fact, the word for thinking in Hebrew is Nishma, which means both to think and to listen. If I’m not willing to listen, I will stay stuck in my personal beliefs, where I unfortunately can’t find out the truth or other truths, since I’m caught in my fear that I will be wrong, and my belief that if I’m wrong, something is inherently wrong with me.
This week, let’s question dialogue, constructively argue, and find ways to see each other’s perspectives, in the hopes of understanding the deeper meaning we are all a part of.
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