Empathy or Fear – A Country Divided

Who has not seen the image of two bodies face down in the water ruach  of El Salvador) without responding with a tear in their eye, a pang of sadness in their heart, or even rage, knowing the source of this tragedy? Probably some Republicans or Trump followers for sure. Such an image emboldens their message—stay home and don’t bring your children to our country. Hard to believe this country could be so divided between the empathic and the ‘encrusted,’ people who, in their own pain and fear, have developed layers of protective crust, hardening their hearts, not unlike the Pharaoh we read about in Torah. The description in Hebrew of Pharaoh is “Vayichbad Lev,” translated as his heart of hardened. The root of the word is Chaf Vet Dalet, which has multiple meanings; it can mean honor, heavy, impediment, as well as the liver. The liver is an organ that has as many as 500 different functions including producing, converting and regulating various important chemicals and proteins making sure our bodies function appropriately and maintain a healthy, toxic-free system. Only our holy language could possibly make the same Hebrew letters represent a human organ and moral character traits. How is this possible?

As always, I am impressed with the rabbis’ intuitive wisdom about the mind/body connection. Not dissimilar to Chinese medicine that understood that the organs of our body expressed not only the state of our health, but also our emotional life often the root of physical symptoms and illness. The liver in Chinese medicine is aligned with the feelings of impatience, frustration, and anger. It is seen as the foundation of Qi, the energy flow of life, what we would call ‘Ruach,’ which means wind, spirit, and breath. The rabbis understood from Torah’s description of Pharaoh that the stubbornness and rage in his heart was a more encompassing condition. It was about a toxic and imbalanced emotional state connected to an impure organ, drastically in need of cleansing and healing.

So many, who suffer their own sense of mistreatment, lack of place, loss of work, parnassah (income), and dignity, see the other, the ones encroaching on their space, as the enemy. Deep down they fear displacement, and rightfully so, becoming the white minority race in this country. It won’t be long before people of color and foreign cultures will outnumber the ones that founded this country – the white, religious-puritans, running from powerful and elite religious and royal leaders who controlled their lives. These afflicted men and women came to American searching for freedom and equality, generations later, in the end punish and harden their hearts to those who want the same.

For those of us newer to America, exiled from our roots and decimated because of the Holocaust, our hearts are still malleable and empathic to those running from tyranny. Dedicated to Jewish principles we can’t help but cringe when babies are ripped from their mother’s arms or as survivors/children of survivors we tap into the cellular memory so painfully depicted in “Sophie’s Choice.” We have to respond, cry out, yell, and call on our politicians to destroy the evil that this administration has unleashed and show our strength and weight reflected in a ‘liver’ that is not only fully-functioning but maintains a mind/body that is whole, healthy and strong. We must ‘honor’ our basic core values.