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Bo- Act as if- ACTION!

 




In this week's Torah Portion, Pharaoh calls for Moses and Aaron, as the plagues are starting to affect him personally!!   He told them, “plan your exodus, take your wives, take your children, your children’s children, and your herds and flocks of animals, and your belongings, and I shall, “Let YOUR people go!”  They packed, and grabbed their belongings, and started their journey!  A long journey at that.....as we know how the story goes.

To this very day, we remember!  WE REMEMBER!  Each and every year, we commemorate in reverence to our survival, our not being under The Pharaoh's rule as slaves!  We have survived, day in and day out.  It is our tribute and remembrance to times of slavery, to times of unjust persecution, to times of severe undue punishment, to times of plague. 

We all have experienced persecution some time in our histories/life!  We all must comprehend that labeling facilitates this behavior as does social media to a rather big extent and absolutley has an impact of some of our actions.  It might have been ages ago or maybe even just yesterday, but we, as so called modern day people must stop and honestly think, “Am I, or we repeating the past acts?  Am I treating my fellow human as I wish to be treated?” Am I being treated like a loved human being AND am I treating others, ALL others with a loving hand too?!  One of my favorite words in the English language is “Reciprocity”;  The Golden Rule, “Do on to others as you would wish to have done onto you!”  The 1st step is to make the honest effort of action thereof.......This is ORTHOPRAXY!  The correct conduct, both ethically & liturgically, as opposed to just correct belief.

Do we live in hypocrisy?  Or are we expressing our own personal freedoms?  Has social media become Pharaoh, or the brave authoritarian Wizard behind the curtain, or our Cult leader; do we go to our “smart phones” by default, as the social media apps may be an outlet?  I am not arguing that social media is the root of all evil or ‘wrong’ , but our actions are so glued to Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, Tik Tok, etc. for us to share and express ourselves, Do you wake up in the middle of the night and just happen to check email?   Are we so glued to our a social media outlets? 

Social Media, and our apps, “smart phones” can be so very valuable, but also our own worst enemies!  We have recently seen social media absolutely being abused, and NOW is the time to “ LET MY PEOPLE GO”, or something similar please. Express yourself with care and compassion, as if your young child was reading or your Mom or Dad!  Act as if......

Remember, Our Actions speak LOUDER than our words, or our postings. We can apologize over and over again for a statement, but if our actions don’t change, our words become meaningless. We can teach, we can learn, and YES, some people chose to turn away and maliciously deviate, which is horrid, but just speaking and focusing on YOU, YOU can_____________!

Starting or continuing this Shabbat (Sabbath), Let’s make our proactive, positive impact NOW, and not wait for the next sign of a modern plague (we're in the midst of one), before it is too late!

We need Tikkun Olam

(Tikkun Olam (Hebrew: תיקון עולם ‎, lit. 'repair of the world')


 


The decision is Ours!

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