According to Maimonides, a greatly revered Jewish thinker, philosopher, and sage, in his 800 page book, Guide to the Perplexed, the highest purpose of life is to understand life, knowledge, wisdom, to understand the world and other humans, because, says he, if you understand all of that, you will understand G!d.
Towards the end of his massive tome, Maimonides points to one proof text for all of this in the Bible: Jeremiah 9:22-23--
Verses 22-23: "This is what the Lord says:
“Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or the strong boast of their strength or the rich boast of their riches, but let the one who boasts boast about this: that they have the understanding to know me, that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight,” declares the Lord."
In short, according to Maimonides' understanding of Torah, our truest purpose and highest perfection is to inject kindness, justice, and righteousness into our every action and interaction.
His conclusions from Jeremiah remind me of the words of another prophet, Micah: "What does the LORD require of you, but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your G!d?" (Micah 6:8).
While I disagree with much that Maimonides writes about the details of how, I can say that there is a consistency in the Bible about needing to live a G!dly life. For me, the bottom line is less about the HOW and more about the THAT we act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly; it is THAT we inject those G!dly qualities of kindness, justice, and righteousness into our every action and interaction.
Sometimes, we overcomplicate things, as this reminds us:
And there is no better time to re-assess where we are on that continuum than now, at the end of one year and beginning of the next. All of our reflections and questions have been leading us to this point.
Maimonides wrote another massive tome, the Mishneh Torah, a very important Jewish book through the centuries. In particular, he writes about this time of year, in his section on the Torah laws of repentance, "It is necessary that everyone throughout the year should regard [oneself] as if [one] were half innocent and half guilty, and also [see] the whole world - half innocent and half guilty. If he sins one sin - he has tilted herself and the whole world to the side of guilt and caused its destruction. If he does one mitzvah - he has tilted herself and the whole world to the side of innocence and caused redemption and rescue... And for this reason the whole House of Israel has a custom to increase charity and good deeds, and to engage in mitzvot from Rosh HaShanah until Yom Kippur, more than the rest of the year...." (Mishneh Torah, Repentance 3:4)
From Maimonides' point of view, each of our very next actions could determine the fate of the whole world.
Now, of course I don't see the world quite like that, nor spirituality, but there is something important here for us to consider.
Why should we look at ourselves and the world as being half innocent and half guilty?
If we think we are inherently sinful, we might not try to do good, because it just doesn't matter. And if we think we are righteous, we might not see the bad that we do.
So, we have to be morally balanced so we are motivated to look at our next act as something which can change the world.
Anyone heard of the Butterfly effect? It is true that one tiny act can make a huge and significant difference, and often we don't even know how much so.
I have a lengthy story I could tell about that, but, it's long, so we'll save that for another time.
Suffice it to say that Maimonides sees that we are to view ourselves and the world at this time of year as being half innocent and half guilty.
I am here to challenge that notion just a bit. Is 50-50 right? What if we were 49% good and 51% not so good? And how would that tiny shift make any kind of difference?
Well, one thing we know for a fact is that almost no one changes by 180 degrees. It is nearly humanly impossible.
Why, at the beginning of the secular/civil calendar year are 95% of resolutions broken by the end of the first week, sometimes even the end of the first day? Why do we go on and off diets like changing clothes? Buy gym memberships and special watch trackers only to have the initial enthusiasm quickly wear off, leaving us not much different than before? Yes, sometimes we do make permanent changes and sometimes we do improve, but more often than not, we don't improve much, if at all.
It is human nature that we can't just chuck all the bad habits at once and become completely different people overnight because we want to and can think our way into it. Rarely does that happen.
What science tells us is that the most permanent changes are those which we effect in small ways, changing habits that seem impossibly tiny and insignificant, starting from where we are. But when we are consistent, and we string together several of these teensy changes in our thinking or habits, over time, it can make a big difference.
Few can change by 180 degrees (that would be 100%). But all of us can change by 2%. And 3 months or 6 months from now, we can change by an additional 2%.
The most significant and permanent changes are made incrementally, by tweaking what we are already doing just a tiny bit, NOT by chucking everything and all at once. The effort required for 180 degree changes is simply too overwhelming. Our brains and bodies aren't wired for that, and our schedules and families need time to adjust.
Even science tells us that we can't fool a frog by dropping it into boiling water, as it will quickly jump out. But if we put it in a container and very very gradually heat the water, it has an amazing ability to keep adjusting to the gradual temperature changes until it essentially dies. Sorry for that rather macabre example, but that's how we need to approach making changes in our own lives.
So as we look at the new year, perhaps we ought to look at how we can change by 2% for the better. Just 2%.
Can I be 2% kinder? Can I give 2% more to charity? Can I put 2% more time into nurturing my soul this year? Can I study Torah or other spiritual materials just 2% more this year?
Think 2% is too much? Think 2% is not enough to accomplish anything? Let's put it this way: 2% of your week is just TEN MINUTES. Ten minutes a week. Can you spend just ten minutes a week doing something to make yourself a kinder, smarter, or more healthful person this coming year?
Just 2%. It's not about the big things, just the tiny 2%.
Because if you can do 2% more good this year, then you change the balance from 49% good and 51% not so good, to 51% good and 49% not so good. And you change the balance.
And then next week/month/quarter/year, you aim for another 2%.
Just 2%.
That's only ten minutes of every week. Two pennies of every dollar.
Two percent could change the course of the world. Are you willing to take the challenge and give it a try?
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