The Tzaddik
As we enter the “season” of Holy Week, it is hard sometimes to get past the trauma of Yeshua’s martyrdom and the subsequent theology of the atonement as it has been taught in the West to the heart of the matter understood in a different way.
Rabbi David Cooper in his Ecstatic Kabbalah makes the case that the defining principle of a Tzaddik (that is a Righteous One because he or she is inwardly aligned to the Divine and therefore in right-relationship) is
Although we honor martyrdom, the acts of a tzaddik, must be seen to occupy a higher level of conscious compassion because he or she is, as Cooper says, “the living representative of the heart of compassion. This state of being can only be accomplished when one has vanished into Presence and there is no longer a separation of oneself from all of humanity” (63), nor, perhaps it should also be said, from God.
Yeshua’s consciousness was clearly that of a tzaddik in its full meaning within this understanding of Judaism. And (as also understood within Judaism), his work must be seen to be one of restoration (tikkun) as a primary acts of conscious self-sacrifice for the good of all. As in the Buddhist tradition of the bodhisattva, the work of the tzaddik is to mend and restore the human self, the world, and ultimately the manifest “face of God” to the harmonic levels of completion and balance (78). This fundamental state of consciousness and its ultimate outcome, in solidarity with all who have brought compassionate self-service to the world, is what we remember as we enter Holy Week.
Rabbi David Cooper in his Ecstatic Kabbalah makes the case that the defining principle of a Tzaddik (that is a Righteous One because he or she is inwardly aligned to the Divine and therefore in right-relationship) is
the choice and willingness to take on suffering in a way that will relieve others. Whenever anyone is able to bring clear awareness to one’s own pain in a situation and is able to say, “May my pain be such that it helps at leas one other person to be free of such pain,” we have achieved a level of consciousness that is identified with a tzaddik (63).
Although we honor martyrdom, the acts of a tzaddik, must be seen to occupy a higher level of conscious compassion because he or she is, as Cooper says, “the living representative of the heart of compassion. This state of being can only be accomplished when one has vanished into Presence and there is no longer a separation of oneself from all of humanity” (63), nor, perhaps it should also be said, from God.
Yeshua’s consciousness was clearly that of a tzaddik in its full meaning within this understanding of Judaism. And (as also understood within Judaism), his work must be seen to be one of restoration (tikkun) as a primary acts of conscious self-sacrifice for the good of all. As in the Buddhist tradition of the bodhisattva, the work of the tzaddik is to mend and restore the human self, the world, and ultimately the manifest “face of God” to the harmonic levels of completion and balance (78). This fundamental state of consciousness and its ultimate outcome, in solidarity with all who have brought compassionate self-service to the world, is what we remember as we enter Holy Week.
posted by Lynn Bauman at 7:24 AM
2 Comments:
Beautiful story of reconciliation between the faith traditions. Truly Yeshua is the ultimate reconciler, unifier, redemptor.
Thank you my brother for this contribution.
Such a relief...I have been struggling with the Holy Week story all Lenten season. Trying to make sense of it....how could Yeshua who understood the implications of getting on a colt..do so? As always, Lynn's insight makes sense out of the muddled theology that has become traditional Christianity. Like the process of breathing in pain and breathing out Love, the Teacher's life models what we are called to become.
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