A Planet of Self-Sabotage or Self-Love? A Tish’ah Be’Av Commentary
By Rabbi Jonah Rank, Hebrew Seminary President & Rosh Yeshivah
Before he became an unlikely household name in the 1960s, when he removed the high brow of Amilcare Ponchielli’s ballet Dance of the Hours by borrowing the composer’s tune for “Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter From Camp),” Allan Sherman had been a struggling writer. The product of a disrupted childhood—traveling with multiple divorced parents from New York to Los Angeles, plus many places in between and back again—Sherman had few comforts in life. Despite having recently gotten married (in the rabbi’s office in Chicago’s Anshe Emet) to his girlfriend from the college that had had him removed from campus a few too many times—Sherman’s satisfaction in the world came not from the stability of any relationship in his life but from the vices that occupied him. When his wife, Dee, saw that Sherman’s smoking habit was obstructing him from completing his work assignments—she, in the words of Sherman’s biographer Mark Cohen,
urged him to stop smoking and told him about a class that helped people quit. He asked the cost. The answer was fifty dollars. For Sherman, that was a straight line
“Think of how many cigarettes you could buy for that money!”[1]
Sherman’s joking aside, it is all too true that human nature includes this tragic tendency for us to commit acts of self-destruction. Dr. Ethan Kross, a psychologist in Ann Arbor, explains that the moments when we make the choice to harm ourselves can all be traced to the dialogues we all hold with our inner voice. This inescapable ‘inner voice,’ notes Dr. Kross, interrupted the silent contemplation of early Christian mystics and has misled the meditation of Chinese Buddhists centuries to “deluded thought.”[2] Kross delineates the phenomenon:
As naturally as we breathe, we “decouple” from the here and now, our brains
transporting us to past events, imagined scenarios, and other internal musings. This
tendency is… our “default state.” It is the activity our brain automatically reverts to when not
otherwise engaged, and often even when we are otherwise engaged. You’ve no doubt
noticed your own mind wander, as if of its own volition, when you were supposed
to be focusing on a task… So, what often happens when we slip away?
We talk to ourselves.
And we listen to what we say.[3]
The neural basis of this inner voice is so strong that it transcends our own vocal capabilities and is not limited to only to those who can hear or have heard. “Some people who stutter,” Kross writes, “report talking more fluently in their minds than they do out loud. Deaf people who use sign language talk to themselves too, [with] their own form of inner language[,] involv[ing]… signing to themselves.”[4]
Public domain image of shaded shape of person’s head within which the outline of one person is waving to another.
This inner voice helps guide us through the day, and it turns into high gear when our stress levels rise. Kross explains how this voice adapts under pressure:
Sometimes this chatter takes the form of… a compulsive rehashing of
past events (rumination); sometimes it’s an angst-ridden imagining of
future events (worry). Sometimes it’s a free-associative pinballing between
negative feelings and ideas. Sometimes it’s a fixation on one specific unpleasant
feeling or notion. However it manifests itself, when the inner voice
runs amok andchatter takes the mental microphone, our mind not
only tormentsbut paralyzes us. It can also lead us to
do things that sabotage us.[5]
Kross demonstrates, however, that through (at least twelve!) different techniques he identifies to give ourselves the language to help us redirect both our inner voice and how we respond to it—that impulse to make choices we will regret later is something we can control.[6] Our tradition has known this secret for nearly thousands of years. When the Jewish sage Ben Zoma near the end of the 1st century C.E. asked the rhetorical question of אֵיזֶהוּ גִּבּוֹר (eyzehu gibbor, “What constitutes a hero?”), he answered his riddle: הַכּוֹבֵשׁ אֶת־יִצְרוֹ (hakkovesh et yitzro, “The one who conquers their inclination [to do evil]”).[7]
Although the destructions of the first and second Temples in Jerusalem can be attributed to militant actions from the Babylonian Empire circa 587 B.C.E.[8] and the Roman Empire in 70 C.E.[9]—the folktales of our people suggest the problems were internal. Rather than blaming political enemies who were too mighty for the Jews to withstand, the Babylonian Talmud would rather point an accusatory finger at the mirror, pathologizing that the Jewish people were responsible for the demise of their own sanctuaries. In one of the Talmud’s reimaginings of history, the Temple reached its end when one Roman Caesar became enraged after being falsely informed that his sacrifice would be rejected in the Jewish Temple. Without confirming the veracity of this rumor begun by one Bar Kamtza—a man wronged when Jewish leaders did not intervene when Bar Kamtza had been publicly humiliated—this Caesar exacted revenge on the Jewish people.[10] In another oral tradition, the first Temple was dismantled for having housed idolatry, sexual immorality, and bloodshed; and the second Temple met the same fate for having hosted שִֹנְאַת חִנָּם (sin’at chinnam, “baseless hatred”).[11]
Although the Mishnah, edited circa 225 C.E., recognized Tish’ah Be’Av—the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av—as the date when the Temple cult ceased to be,[12] the observance of Tish’ah Be’Av has often attracted more universalistic themes. When we fail to recognize the dignity of our fellow human beings, we deface the Divine image implanted in our planet; when we cannot justify feelings of animosity or suspicion towards others, our emotional bonds prove no longer tenable for keeping our society tight-knit and together. Human degradation spurs the breakdown of whatever on Earth has been intended to house whatever may be sacred.
It is for this reason that many Jewish communities in this time of year mourn not the particularistic end of ancient Jewish Jerusalem’s sacrificial system but something much broader. Over a decade ago, I was introduced by Rabbi Bradley Solmsen to the notion of mourning Earth itself as a Temple. This sentiment and so many like it are exactly what the “Eicha for the Earth” liturgy arranged by Rabbis Tamara Cohen and Dr. Arthur Waskow intends to inspire us to confront.[13]
In fewer than 48 hours from the time I write these words, the official observance of Tish’ah Be’Av will have begun on the same coast where the United States Senate is scheduled to debate the Inflation Reduction Act. This proposed legislation, if passed, promises to lower carbon emissions in the United States by 40% by 2030.[14] Ambitious as this goal may be, it still falls short of the aim of reducing carbon emissions by upwards of 55% by 2030, as once advised by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.[15] Our inability to meet this ideal is likely to lead to more days of increasingly extreme heat, an uptick in weather-related disasters, rising sea levels from melted icebergs, and far more planetary instability.[16]
Why Americans will soon debate whether or not to meet this lowered bar for climate responsibility is made clear when we understand what finances are at stake. It is true that clean energy and renewable energy are relatively expensive at this time, but all that could change when enough money is reinvested into a more sustainable future. Senator Joseph Manchin III, the key negotiator along with Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer behind the Inflation Reduction Act, earned some $500,000 in 2021 alone through investing in Enersystems, Inc., Manchin’s own coal brokerage business.[17] Senator Manchin is far from alone though in being a politician with opinions influenced by money earned through high loads of carbon emissions. Since 2021, coal industry corporations have contributed more than $3 million to help finance political campaigns, almost exclusively to politicians who have argued against climate change or adapting to other aspects of sustainable living.[18]
The love of money may help motivate someone to earn more money. But loving money is no plan for ecological sustainability. Money—like any item that can fuel greed or gluttony—can entice our inner voice toward some ill-advised choices. “When money talks, I hate to listen,” sings Ben Folds. “But lately it’s been screaming in my ear.”[19]
As we experience heat waves across the globe like never witnessed during our lifetimes, and whenever we encounter reports of tragic flooding in Kentucky, we know with greater certainty than ever that the way our species has been treating our planet must change. Earth cannot handle much more abuse and remain a safe place for humans to live.
We are blessed to live in a time when numerous guides to the dozens of practices we can adopt to protect our environment are so close to our fingertips.[20] The major work that we have to do to protect Earth is to convince our inner voice that no tradeoff is a greater deal than giving what we can so we no longer need to mourn losing the Temple Earth year after year. Just as many of us have felt the blessing of the modern State of Israel rebuilding Jerusalem and therefore seen Tish’ah Be’Av practices evolve in our time[21]—we can aspire for a Tish’ah Be’Av when we can rest assured that we have secured a healthy future for our planet.
Think of how many dreams we can achieve with our willpower.
[1] Mark Cohen, Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2013), p. 65. See also pp. xii–xiii.
[2] Ethan Kross, Chatter: The Voice in Our Head, Why It Matters, and How to Harness It (New York, NY: Crown, 2021), p. 13 of 198 (electronic edition).
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid, p. 14; cf. p. 154.
[5] Ibid, pp. 14–15; italics are Kross’.
[6] Ibid, esp. pp. 139–146.
[7] Mishnah, Avot 4:1.
[8] Cf. Hayim Tadmor, “Judah from the Fall of Samaria to the Fall of Jerusalem,” in Hayim Hillel Ben-Sasson (ed.), A History of the Jewish People (translation from Hebrew into English by George Weidenfeld and Nicolson Ltd) (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976), pp. 139–158, esp. p. 157.
[9] Cf. Menahem Stern, “The Great Revolt,” in Ben-Sasson, pp. 296–303, esp. p. 303.
[10] Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 55b.
[11] Ibid, Yoma 9b.
[12] Mishah, Ta’anit 4:6.
[13] Liturgy available at https://www.ritualwell.org/ritual/eicha-earth as of August 4, 2022.
[14] Cf. “Inflation Act One Page Summary” as accessed at https://www.democrats.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/inflation_reduction_act_one_page_summary.pdf as accessed on August 4, 2022.
[15] Cf. Emma Foehringer Merchant, “PCC: Renewables to Supply 70%-85% of Electricity by 2050 to Avoid Worst Impacts of Climate Change” (October 8, 2018) as accessed at https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ipcc-renewables-85-electricity-worst-impacts-climate-change#gs.3globl on August 4, 2022.
[16] Cf. NASA, “The Effects of Climate Change,” as accessed at https://climate.nasa.gov/effects/ on August 4, 2022.
[17] Cf. Scott Waldman, “How Manchin used politics to protect his family coal company,” (February 8, 2022) as accessed at https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/08/manchin-family-coal-company-00003218 on August 4, 2022.
[18] Cf. “Coal Mining” as accessed at https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=E1210 on August 4, 2022.
[19] Ben Folds Five, “Emaline” (composed by Ben Folds), appearing on Naked Baby Photos (produced by John Alagia; Caroline Records, 1998).
[20] See, e.g., “100+ Ways to Heal the Planet,” as accessed at https://healtheplanet.com/100-ways-to-heal-the-planet/ on August 4, 2022.
[21] Cf. Rabbi David Golinkin, “Nahem on Tisha B’av: Is it permissible to change the wording?” as accessed at https://schechter.edu/nahem-on-tisha-bav-is-it-permissible-to-change-the-wording/ on August 5, 2022; and Rabbis Tuvia Friedman and David Golinkin, “Fasting Until After Minha on Tish’a B’av,” as accessed at https://responsafortoday.com/en/fasting-until-after-minha-on-tisha-bav/ on August 5, 2022.