Think and Act Your Wisest and Best
The quality of your choices will depend greatly on your mental state at the decision-making moment. Your choices will be different if you are at your wisest and best.
When you are at your wisest, you think more clearly. You weigh your options more skillfully. You give greater thought to the possible outcomes of a specific course of action. You realize when something is not a good idea. Since your quality of thinking is at its highest, your decision will be the best choice that you can make at that moment.
When you are at your best, your talents and skills represent your best efforts. Remember your best moments and utilize this to create your wisest and best ways of thinking and acting.
Love Yehuda Lave
The beautiful Caucasian shul in Acco, Israel, Yesterday I sent a whole piece explaining about Acco and its history..If you didn't see it, it is on my blog for yesterday. (YEHUDALAVE.COM)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5woPhoeS1A
True, Jewish tradition never emphasized or even went into great detail about the specifics of the World to Come. It was simply a given, a fact rooted, as biblical commentators explained, in the notion that we are created “in the image of God.” Since God is eternal, there is something within every one of us – the Divine essence that represents our identity and that we refer to as our souls – that must of necessity be equally eternal and immortal.
Judaism did not dwell on the obvious. Sure there is life after death; without it life would be rendered a transient flash in the pan, perhaps fun while it lasted but ultimately devoid of meaning. The Torah recorded the past as history; it chose to leave the future as mystery. Its purpose was primarily to be a “tree of life” concerned with teaching us how to improve ourselves and our world while we inhabit it. The details of our post-terrestrial existence were in the main left unrecorded. There will be time enough for us to discover the Divine master plan for the World to Come – once we get there.
But if we are to lead our lives with the proper sense of responsibility and purpose, there are some things that the Sages realized we have to know about. So they did give us a peek into the future after our deaths.
At the moment of death, we catch a glimpse of God. The Torah teaches us that God decreed, “No man can see me and live” (Exodus 33:20). The implication is clear: with the end of life we are granted the gift of a minute vision of the Almighty. That is the reason, many commentators suggest, that we are obligated to close the eyes of the deceased. The eyes that have now beheld God Himself must be shut off from any further contact with the profane.
And it is this momentary meeting that serves to give meaning to all of our lives. We suddenly grasp that everything we have ever done or said was in the presence of a Higher Power. Everything we accomplished or failed to do was judged by the One Who created us. “Know before whom you are destined to give a final accounting” is the language of the Talmud. Can there be a greater incentive to do good and not evil than the knowledge that in the end it is God Who will pass judgment on whether we were a success or a failure?
In Kabbalah, the mystics add a small piece to the story. It is not only God who judges us. As we bid farewell to the world, we are shown a film that contains scenes of our entire lives. We are witnesses to every moment of our days on Earth as they pass before us with incredible rapidity. And as we watch our own story unfold, there are times when we cringe with embarrassment; others when we smile with glee. Our past moral lapses cause us to shudder in pain; our victories over our evil inclinations provide us with a keen sense of spiritual triumph. It is then that we realize in retrospect that we alone are the greatest judges of our own lives. What happens after death is that we gain the wisdom to evaluate our own life by the standards of Heaven – because we have finally glimpsed an eternal perspective.
The quality of your choices will depend greatly on your mental state at the decision-making moment. Your choices will be different if you are at your wisest and best.
When you are at your wisest, you think more clearly. You weigh your options more skillfully. You give greater thought to the possible outcomes of a specific course of action. You realize when something is not a good idea. Since your quality of thinking is at its highest, your decision will be the best choice that you can make at that moment.
When you are at your best, your talents and skills represent your best efforts. Remember your best moments and utilize this to create your wisest and best ways of thinking and acting.
Love Yehuda Lave
The beautiful Caucasian shul in Acco, Israel, Yesterday I sent a whole piece explaining about Acco and its history..If you didn't see it, it is on my blog for yesterday. (YEHUDALAVE.COM)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5woPhoeS1A
Life after Death
What matters most is maximizing our life before death.
by Rabbi Benjamin Blech
Recently there's been a spate of new books presenting what the authors consider an unshakable case for the survival of consciousness beyond death, drawn from quantum mechanics, neuroscience and moral philosophy.
But I have to confess that having the inside information Judaism gave me – long before the publication of these new findings that claim to know what happens after our “full life of 120” – is far more satisfying than the most compelling and supposedly scientific validity for belief in an afterlife.True, Jewish tradition never emphasized or even went into great detail about the specifics of the World to Come. It was simply a given, a fact rooted, as biblical commentators explained, in the notion that we are created “in the image of God.” Since God is eternal, there is something within every one of us – the Divine essence that represents our identity and that we refer to as our souls – that must of necessity be equally eternal and immortal.
The soul accompanies our journey through life, and does not forsake us with the end of our physical being.Our bodies, as material creations, came from the dust of the earth and have to return to their source; they disintegrate when they are buried. But our souls are the gift of “Himself” that the Almighty breathed into us. They accompany us in our journey through life and do not forsake us with the end of our physical beings.
Judaism did not dwell on the obvious. Sure there is life after death; without it life would be rendered a transient flash in the pan, perhaps fun while it lasted but ultimately devoid of meaning. The Torah recorded the past as history; it chose to leave the future as mystery. Its purpose was primarily to be a “tree of life” concerned with teaching us how to improve ourselves and our world while we inhabit it. The details of our post-terrestrial existence were in the main left unrecorded. There will be time enough for us to discover the Divine master plan for the World to Come – once we get there.
But if we are to lead our lives with the proper sense of responsibility and purpose, there are some things that the Sages realized we have to know about. So they did give us a peek into the future after our deaths.
At the moment of death, we catch a glimpse of God. The Torah teaches us that God decreed, “No man can see me and live” (Exodus 33:20). The implication is clear: with the end of life we are granted the gift of a minute vision of the Almighty. That is the reason, many commentators suggest, that we are obligated to close the eyes of the deceased. The eyes that have now beheld God Himself must be shut off from any further contact with the profane.
And it is this momentary meeting that serves to give meaning to all of our lives. We suddenly grasp that everything we have ever done or said was in the presence of a Higher Power. Everything we accomplished or failed to do was judged by the One Who created us. “Know before whom you are destined to give a final accounting” is the language of the Talmud. Can there be a greater incentive to do good and not evil than the knowledge that in the end it is God Who will pass judgment on whether we were a success or a failure?
In Kabbalah, the mystics add a small piece to the story. It is not only God who judges us. As we bid farewell to the world, we are shown a film that contains scenes of our entire lives. We are witnesses to every moment of our days on Earth as they pass before us with incredible rapidity. And as we watch our own story unfold, there are times when we cringe with embarrassment; others when we smile with glee. Our past moral lapses cause us to shudder in pain; our victories over our evil inclinations provide us with a keen sense of spiritual triumph. It is then that we realize in retrospect that we alone are the greatest judges of our own lives. What happens after death is that we gain the wisdom to evaluate our own life by the standards of Heaven – because we have finally glimpsed an eternal perspective.
If you haven't seen these before, they are fun!!....Certainly inspired by car designers with visions of the future!!!!...Besides the ones I've seen before (in another email),I just wonder how many of the "old" cars are still around----to be appreciated....I gather some are one-of-a-kind, and mostly foreign built.......They are remarkable car designs.....Enjoy!
Begin forwarded message:
Some of these are more futuristic looking than today’s designs.
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