Sublime

arguments for the superiority of some over others fail both because we are descended from the same father (Adam) and because we were created by the same Father (God).

Like judging people favorably and cultivating a “generous eye” toward them, caring for and about people is obviously noble and virtuous. But what would it mean to truly treat caring and loving as “the great principle of the Torah”?

The Jewish philosopher Will Herberg once spoke of “cut-flower ethics.” He argued that Jewish ethical norms will last for a brief while, even apart from Jewish teachings, just as flowers uprooted from the soil stay in bloom for a short time after cutting. But soon the flowers fade. Behaviors, too, disintegrate if cut from the soil in which they were

If a reflective life is meant to be more than just affirming our existing beliefs, then Torah provides the opportunity to engage with life more fully.

Love and generous perception are mutually reinforcing. Adopting a posture of love toward others leads us to see them positively;

To live a spiritual life is to seek to grow in love and kindness—and to persevere even when love as a perfect integration of emotion and action seems daunting or out of reach.

A medieval sage, Rabbi Asher ben Yehiel (Rosh, 1250?–1327), insists that this mitzvah of receiving people warmly applies not just to one-on-one encounters but also to the way we carry ourselves in public. “Let not your face be angry toward passersby,” he says, “but receive them with a friendly countenance.”48 How we comport ourselves in the world m

we live in a world that is fundamentally ambiguous, and that we can have no absolute certainty about how the world ultimately is.

Jews who are deeply engaged in traditional language and practice, knowledgeable in their textual heritage, and open to the wider world have the power to alter the course of contemporary Jewish life. They may never be the majority in the Jewish community, but they have the potential to engage the majority of Jews in a deep way.