Faith In Community
"Interfaith Dialogue" by George Thompson as delivered at Abrahamic Dinner October 27, 2005
First I would like to thank the Istanbul Center for Culture and Dialogue for inviting me to speak this evening. It is an honor and a pleasure to stand before so many good friends.
I come to you this evening as a fellow traveler on the road of life at this time in history and in this community; a road, we hope, toward peace, toward freedom, and to the brotherhood and sisterhood of all humanity. As we gather to share insights and stories about interfaith work, I want to begin by sharing some words from the Jewish liturgy at this time of year…a glorious time of year when nature turns from the vitality of the summer toward the rest of winter. It is a time for turning. The leaves are beginning to turn from green to orange to red. Birds begin to turn south; animals turn to the task of storing food for the winter. For leaves, birds and other animals turning comes instinctively. But for us turning does not come so easily. It takes an act of will for us to turn. It means breaking old habits…it means admitting that we have been wrong. This is never easy. It means losing face; it means starting over again. This is always painful. It means saying: I am sorry. Turning is terribly hard to do, but unless we turn, we will be trapped for ever in yesterday’s ways.
The theme of turning – or Teshuvah in Hebrew – begins with the lunar month of Elul prior to Rosh Hashanah and concludes with Simchat Torah which ended this week. It is a time of introspection, questioning our actions over the past year, committing ourselves to righteousness in the year ahead. All through teshuvah – turning.
Simchat Torah is the final turning when we conclude the reading cycle of the torah scroll finishing Deuteronomy and beginning anew with Genesis, a story of creation, a story of finding ones place in the world, a story of how we reawaken our senses to perceive the world anew. For the creation story is not the story of THE beginning, but of every beginning. As a child may become cognizant of the world by first recognizing the difference between light and darkness, so do we all create our own worlds by noticing differences and making a conscious decision to divide. The act of creation continues as we perceive differences between land and water, between the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. We name each and every thing. When we see difference we separate and give each part a separate name. Difference divides. But then comes the great divide; the distinction between seeing difference and knowing difference. When we take the act of seeing difference, an act so vital in creation, and use it to think we know difference, then we do something dangerous. Maybe this is the fruit of the tree of knowledge? Maybe this is what we were commanded not to consume? We can divide in order to see, or we can divide in order to think we know. The former keeps us in the garden, the later keeps us out.
Let me tell you a brief story from my tradition.
Isaac once asked the Eternal: Creator, when You made the light, the Torah says You said it was good; when You made the expanse of heaven and earth, the Torah says You said they were good; and of every herb You made, and every beast, You said that they were good; but when you made us in your image, You did not say of us that humanity was good. Why, Lord?
And God answered him: Because you I have not yet perfected, because through acts of righteousness you are to perfect yourselves and perfect the world. All other things are complete, but humankind is not complete; you have yet to grow. Then I will call you good.
Dialogue also requires a certain amount of introspection bordering on self doubt. To allow oneself to understand the logic of another, one must be willing to let go of ones own reality enough to allow the others view of reality to make sense. This act does not require one to loose ones reality, but it does require one to allow that reality to be shaken and resettle into new perceptions and visions…a new creation.
Dialogue is also very similar to a journey. All journeys require movement, the letting go of the familiar to travel along a path which may or may not be familiar.
When we travel, we pack. We pack suitcases of things we think we need, the necessities and often much much more. But if we pack too much, the journey is more about the hassle of moving our luggage from place to place and less about being in the place and time of the trip. So too with dialogue. If we hold on too tightly to our own thoughts, logic, and stories, we may spend so much energy trying to lug our baggage around that we never see the sights, hear the stories or learn the lessons freely given in every moment and in every place and in every heart. We must push our own comfort zone and travel with minimal necessities through life. We must travel with our simple humanity, never allowing others to take it away and making sure we protect the humanity of others.
Lord, help us to turn – from callousness to purpose, from envy to contentment, from carelessness to discipline, from fear to faith. Turn us around, O Lord, and bring us back toward You. Revive our lives, as at the beginning. Through our many faiths may we see the world as one world. Lead us from knowledge to wisdom so that we may turn toward each other and see You there. Lord, help us learn that in isolation there is no life for only by sharing, trusting and caring do we find life filled with Your blessings.
