God Can Wait

I believe this is what God wants. 

How many times have we heard some variation on that claim in support of a particular action? How often do we hear individuals, communities and nations invoke Divine support for something they’ve done or intend to do? 

This may sound strange coming from a rabbi, but I think we would often do well to back away from that claim, at least until we have carefully weighed the ethical implications of our actions or action plans.

Better that we carefully consider, before we invoke God, whether or not our intentions are ethical.  Though there are many criteria that one can use to determine that, I’m hard-pressed to think of a more compelling litmus test than the one-liner that Hillel the Elder delivered to a heathen who asked the sage to teach him the entire Torah while he stood on one foot:  “What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor.” 

Imagine if we used that measure to help us consider a variety of questions, including:  Whether or not to wage a particular war.  Whether to allow full rights to people regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation.  Whether to advocate for a livable minimum wage and accessible health care for everyone.  How to respond to environmental disasters wherever they might occur.

Rabbi Donniel Hartman, director of the Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, has taught and written extensively about the need to consider ethical issues apart from belief in God.  His upcoming book is entitled Put God Second:  Saving Religion from Itself.  As a participant in the Institute’s Rabbinic Leadership Initiative, I’ve had the opportunity to learn directly from Rabbi Hartman in this area as well as others.

Hartman believes that we can all too easily use God to justify all sorts of things, some of which are problematic and even downright malicious.  The dangers of what he calls “God-manipulation” are all too common.

I propose an analogy.  Whoever has done weight training knows the value of proper form.  In order to help achieve that, experts often recommend that the individual first practice lifting the bar without added weight.  Once proper form has been achieved, you gradually add an appropriate amount of weight.

Perhaps as we consider an ethical dilemma or possible course of action, we should first ask Hillel’s question.  If it passes that test, then we can carefully, humbly “add weight” by framing the matter in theological terms.

It’s not full-proof, but it strikes me as a decent method to consider.  First ask if we ourselves could live with whatever outcome we’re proposing for others.  Then consider what, if anything, God has to do with it.

At his second inaugural address, Abraham Lincoln urged the nation to finish the work of tending to soldiers and their families with the following charge:  “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right.”

Notably, his sentence begins with a humanistic ethical imperative and concludes with a humble acknowledgment of our limited sense of God’s will.  The sequence and proportion strike me as spot on and worthy of our emulation.