The 17th day of the Counting of the Omer begins on Thursday night. Tonight we count two weeks and three days of the Omer. It falls in a week when we read in the Torah about sharing the produce of the earth with others.
This is the day of Tiferet within Tiferet, balance within balance. On this day, I am thinking about how keeping my life in balance is directly related to working to create balance in the world around me. Paradoxically, I find that when I focus on making the world better, it is my own inner life that is healed.
In the early 1980s, I remember seeing a documentary film called Koyaanisqatsi with a beautiful soundtrack by Philip Glass. The strange name of the movie comes from a Hopi word meaning, "Life out of balance." The film contained no narrative or dialogue, no words at all, just images of American life, from the beauty and grandeur of mountains, deserts and valleys, juxtaposed against the hectic, fast-paced, and frenetic life of cities and suburbs.
To me, the film was a beautiful metaphor for a Jewish teaching about balance within balance that comes from this day of the Omer and from this week's Torah portion (Emor). We have an obligation and a need to live in balance within ourselves and with the world around us. If we take everything around us just for ourselves, we will exhaust the earth, wreak havoc upon our society, and corrupt our own souls. The Torah commands:
This is the day of Tiferet within Tiferet, balance within balance. On this day, I am thinking about how keeping my life in balance is directly related to working to create balance in the world around me. Paradoxically, I find that when I focus on making the world better, it is my own inner life that is healed.
In the early 1980s, I remember seeing a documentary film called Koyaanisqatsi with a beautiful soundtrack by Philip Glass. The strange name of the movie comes from a Hopi word meaning, "Life out of balance." The film contained no narrative or dialogue, no words at all, just images of American life, from the beauty and grandeur of mountains, deserts and valleys, juxtaposed against the hectic, fast-paced, and frenetic life of cities and suburbs.
To me, the film was a beautiful metaphor for a Jewish teaching about balance within balance that comes from this day of the Omer and from this week's Torah portion (Emor). We have an obligation and a need to live in balance within ourselves and with the world around us. If we take everything around us just for ourselves, we will exhaust the earth, wreak havoc upon our society, and corrupt our own souls. The Torah commands:
"When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and the stranger: I Adonai am your God." |  |
This teaching is complemented by the teaching in next week's Torah portion about the Sabbatical year, in which the fields must be left fallow every seven years. Just as we have to share the earth with others to live our lives in balance, we also have to allow the earth itself to be rested and restored for the world to be in balance.
On this 17th day of the Counting of the Omer, I make a commitment to act to keep myself in balance, to keep my relationships with others equitable, just and balanced, and to respect the natural world around me. May this be a day in which you bring balance to your life by balancing your sacred relationships with others and with the world.
For the introduction to the Counting of the Omer, click on this link:
The First Day of the Counting of the Omer
On this 17th day of the Counting of the Omer, I make a commitment to act to keep myself in balance, to keep my relationships with others equitable, just and balanced, and to respect the natural world around me. May this be a day in which you bring balance to your life by balancing your sacred relationships with others and with the world.
For the introduction to the Counting of the Omer, click on this link:
The First Day of the Counting of the Omer
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