Day 1, March 29: The Hesed In Hesed
29/03/21 13:55 Filed in: Omer
Omer Day 1: The Hesed In Hesed - April 16 - Cultivating pure, expansive loving kindness.
Hesed means “the way that you act toward someone you love.” So for March 29, 2021, the first day of the counting of the Omer, we're looking at the purest conceivable love that we can muster within ourselves and manifest in the behaviors in our own lives.
In the midrash, the sages tell us that behaving with kindness is one of the most important ways of emulating God, or, if you will, of striving toward godliness. (This is why providing a proper burial is such a pure form of lovingkindness, because the person can never thank us for it.) God “clothes the naked” in helping Adam and Eve make clothing for themselves. God “buried the dead” in burying Moses at the end of the Torah. Perhaps most profoundly, the entire creation of the cosmos is seen as being an act of love on the part of the Creator. Rabbi Jacob Haber writes that “Hesed is the desire for life, the life force of the universe, which is the ultimate purpose of creation. Hesed makes no distinction between species. Hesed is simply life, without differentiation.”
Hesed is also a kind of love that goes beyond what the object of the love “deserves.” In this respect, the patriarch Abraham is seen as exemplary of Hesed, because he constantly manifests love and concern for others, even the three “strangers” who come to visit him, even the people of Sodom and Gomorrah who are deemed to be so deeply wicked.
The kind of Hesed we are thinking about on this first day of the counting of the Omer is so pure that it expects no reward.
Over the next 24 hours, try exploring your own capacity for kindness. Can you make a list of the most selflessly loving acts you have performed in your life? How did doing these things make you feel? What was the result of these actions?
You might also try to recognize your connection through the Hesed that animates all creation to those who are suffering. Certainly, the current pandemic reminds us that there truly is no such thing as "us" and "them." We are all one human family, and what we do affects the whole of which we are a part. What is it like to remember that? How, through tzedakah, might you currently express love and concern, Hesed, for someone suffering on the other side of the globe, or in our own community at this moment?
And in the spirit of Passover, specifically, how might consciously and deliberately cultivating a more openhearted, loving nature help you to find liberation from things that hold you captive in your own life?
I look forward to your reflections!
Rabbi Steve Folberg
In the midrash, the sages tell us that behaving with kindness is one of the most important ways of emulating God, or, if you will, of striving toward godliness. (This is why providing a proper burial is such a pure form of lovingkindness, because the person can never thank us for it.) God “clothes the naked” in helping Adam and Eve make clothing for themselves. God “buried the dead” in burying Moses at the end of the Torah. Perhaps most profoundly, the entire creation of the cosmos is seen as being an act of love on the part of the Creator. Rabbi Jacob Haber writes that “Hesed is the desire for life, the life force of the universe, which is the ultimate purpose of creation. Hesed makes no distinction between species. Hesed is simply life, without differentiation.”
Hesed is also a kind of love that goes beyond what the object of the love “deserves.” In this respect, the patriarch Abraham is seen as exemplary of Hesed, because he constantly manifests love and concern for others, even the three “strangers” who come to visit him, even the people of Sodom and Gomorrah who are deemed to be so deeply wicked.
The kind of Hesed we are thinking about on this first day of the counting of the Omer is so pure that it expects no reward.
Over the next 24 hours, try exploring your own capacity for kindness. Can you make a list of the most selflessly loving acts you have performed in your life? How did doing these things make you feel? What was the result of these actions?
You might also try to recognize your connection through the Hesed that animates all creation to those who are suffering. Certainly, the current pandemic reminds us that there truly is no such thing as "us" and "them." We are all one human family, and what we do affects the whole of which we are a part. What is it like to remember that? How, through tzedakah, might you currently express love and concern, Hesed, for someone suffering on the other side of the globe, or in our own community at this moment?
And in the spirit of Passover, specifically, how might consciously and deliberately cultivating a more openhearted, loving nature help you to find liberation from things that hold you captive in your own life?
I look forward to your reflections!
Rabbi Steve Folberg
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