What is the essence of human nature? Are we really creatures of spirit and mind, capable of forming ourselves at will to correspond to the highest conceptions of humanity possible? Or are we, rather, little different than the animals of the field and forest, driven by instinct and whim, incapable of modifying either our behavior or our aspiration?
The question of whether we are little lower than the angels or simply a standing, naked ape has preoccupied poets, philosophers, and sages from the dawn of time. In every age, cogent defenses of both positions volley forth from vociferous advocates, each deaf to the merits of the other's position or to the flaws of their own.
On the one hand, it is remarkable what marvels humans have accomplished. With only the power of our minds, we have erected buildings that stand across the millennia and stretch up to the very skies. We have turned the desert into farmland and found ways to link people separated by thousands of miles through a vast array of communication and transportation, so that flying from Los Angeles to New York City takes less time than driving from Washington, D.C. to Boston. Having conquered a long list of malignant diseases, our scientists seem on the brink of winning the battle against illness, even as our educators perfect methods of conquering illiteracy. We are truly reflections of the divine, able to create worlds through our will and our words.
And yet...
Even as our accomplishments loom so large, our failures assume an even more terrifying posture. Our scientific advances threaten to poison our air, render our water unusable, and leave our land blighted. Even as medicine advances, we grapple with plagues that reminds us of our continuing frailty and our devastating impotence. Despite our tremendous wealth, the illiterate and unemployed, the outcast and the hopeless loom ever larger, making a mockery of our smug self-satisfaction. Women are still underpaid, and subject to assault. Terrorists and floods catch us ill-prepared. Blacks and Latinos are still underemployed, and subject to assault. Gays and lesbians are still despised, and subject to assault. Maybe we really are animals after all.
Jewish tradition rejects this simple dichotomy, a false attempt to force humanity into the role of either paper saint or preprogrammed bug. Both angel and animal, human beings are unique precisely because we have the potential to develop in either direction, often both at once.
Our Torah portion opens with Moses' stirring words, "Give ear, O heavens, let me speak; Let the earth hear the words I utter." The Talmudic and geonic rabbis asked themselves why it was that Moses felt impelled to mention both heaven and earth. Wouldn't one have sufficed as a witness?
In Midrash Devarim Rabbah, several answers all point in the same direction: Rabbi Tanhuma said "Because God will redeem Israel only through the agency of them both." Another explanation posits that "the Torah was given only through the agency of them both." Or that "manna and the quails were given through the agency of them both." Or finally, that "God compared Israel to the stars of heaven and the dust of the earth."
Each of these answers insists that salvation comes only through the combination of heaven and earth, of the mundane and the spiritual, of the ideal and the concrete. Both lofty goal (often unattainable) and repair of the world (often prosaic) are necessary for the redemption of humanity and the establishment of caring community.
Without a goal of complete social justice, our communities and the family of man cannot attain a better world. But without a willingness to look after the little details--the individual homeless, poor, sick, or hungry--the goal will remain elusive and ethereal.
Without a sense of the mitzvot as a goal--seeking to incorporate God's will and a sense of the sacred into our lives--there is little hope of elevating our souls. Yet holiness can only enter our lives when translated into practical behavior--shaping how we eat, study, pray, rest, and how we celebrate.
Our destiny as a people, as the House of Israel in the modern age, integrates that same stubborn balance: A flesh-and-blood people still wrestling with an angel in the night, still insisting that holiness is possible, that righteousness must flow like a mighty stream.
By holding on to our own physical nature, we can hope to elevate the material world into something higher. By retaining our dreams, our vision, and our faith, we provide a direction for otherwise pointless business and dreary years.
All it takes is heaven and earth, and the ability to listen. It hasn't changed since Moses first sang to us his song of love.
Shabbat shalom.