In seeking spiritual highs, people often turn to moments of overwhelming emotion, or to exotic locations. Our culture perceives spirituality as a jolting transformation -- an overwhelming sense of God's presence that is different than ordinary experience. Such moments certainly occur in biblical and rabbinic Judaism as well.
Abraham in the Covenant of the Pieces, or the Jewish people at Sinai, are but two examples of transforming moments in time. But such moments remain the exceptions. The incessant need to experience spiritual peaks can represent a hedonism no less compulsive and damaging than the hedonism sought in more physical sources of pleasure. Periodic peaks are useful to reinvigorate, to reorient, or to rededicate. In context, they are an essential part of Jewish life. But we do not live on the peaks -- the air is too thin, the winds too brisk to sustain human life, family and community. So we need a religious orientation that sustains us on the plains -- amid concerns for security, education and relationship. After the revelatory moment passes, after the high is over, then life begins. And there, too, Judaism must dwell.
Parshat Mishpatim is precisely that kind of spirituality, teaching us to look for God, not with closed eyes, but with hands engaged; not with a mantra, but with involvement.
We find God in the world by making the world more Godly -- through labor, compassion and justice. Parshat Mishpatim is a collection of laws pertaining to living every day -- laws of marriage, employment, lost property, integrity and financial practices.
Why the focus on mundane detail? Judaism has always insisted on translating philosophy into action. Ideology without action quickly becomes anemic and self-serving. Action without conviction becomes mechanistic and insincere. The balance between deed and creed is the realm of 'mitzvah' -- where God's will and human integrity meet in practice.
The balance of today's Torah portion is the insistence that our deepest convictions find articulation not just in words but in deeds, not just in strong feeling, but in cooperative behavior. By training ourselves to perform 'mitzvot,' we school ourselves anew in the values and perspectives of Judaism. We transfer an aspect of the original peak experience into the remotest aspects of our daily lives -- a spark from the original flame. With the light of those sparks, we warm ourselves and our fellow human beings. We illumine our lifelong journey, invigorating ourselves, our traditions and our God.
Amen. Shabbat Shalom.