[Lawrence Kushner is a writer, teacher, and rabbi of Temple Beth-El in Sudbury, MA.(USA)]<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The story is told of Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev that once on Kol Nidre, the holiest night of the year when all sins are confessed, the tailor, one of the most devout members of the community, was absent. Concerned, the rabbi left the synagogue and went to the tailor\u2019s home. To his surprise he found the tailor looking at a piece of paper before him on the table. \u201cOh, everything\u2019s fine,\u201d replied the tailor. \u201cAs I was getting ready to attend the service I made a list with two columns. At the top of one I wrote my name and at the top of the other I wrote, \u2018God of all the Universe.\u2019 Then, one by one, I began to list my sins. \u2018Cheated Goldman out of a pair of trousers.\u2019 And in God\u2019s column I noted God\u2019s omission: \u2018Little girl died of diphtheria.\u2019 Then the next sin, \u2018Lost my temper with my children,\u2019 and in God\u2019s column, \u2018I heard there was a famine in another country.\u2019\u201d And so it went. The tailor showed the rabbi the completed list. \u201cAnd for every sin I had committed during the past year, God had done one too. So I said to God, \u2018Look, we each have the same number of sins. If you let me off, I\u2019ll let You off!\u2019 \u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n But the story doesn\u2019t end there. When the rabbi looked at the paper his face grew red and he scolded his friend: \u201cYou fool! You had Him and you let Him go!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Here is a kind of relationship with God unique to Jewish tradition. Jews don\u2019t just get angry with God. They call God to account. In Abraham\u2019s words, as he argues the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, \u201cWill You sweep away the innocent along with the guilty?. . . Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?\u201d (Genesis 18:23-35)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The man, in effect, is saying, \u201cJust who the hell do You think You are?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n But there\u2019s another curve ball. If you believe, as I do, that \u201cit\u2019s all God,\u201d then how do we argue with what we\u2019re made of? That destabilizes us, makes us very uncomfortable. It means we have to talk to ourselves. We no longer have the luxury of putting all the nasty decisions and deeds on some distant, omniscient, omnipotent God, and freeing ourselves to bask in moral security. God says, in effect, \u201cAnd whom do you think you\u2019re talking to? Hold up a mirror. When you\u2019re done with that conversation, come back to Me. . . .\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [Lawrence Kushner is a writer, teacher, and rabbi of Temple Beth-El in Sudbury, MA.(USA)] The story is told of Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=696"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":697,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696\/revisions\/697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/berdichev.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d asked Levi Yitzhak.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n