{"id":39569,"date":"2017-11-23T23:41:52","date_gmt":"2017-11-24T05:41:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=39569"},"modified":"2017-11-23T23:41:52","modified_gmt":"2017-11-24T05:41:52","slug":"off-the-pulpit-methuselah-and-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/off-the-pulpit-methuselah-and-me\/","title":{"rendered":"Off the Pulpit: Methuselah and Me"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By RABBI DAVID WOLPE<\/p>\n<p>Yes, I also read the health studies that advise eating this and avoiding that.&nbsp;I don\u2019t always adhere to the recommendations but I follow them as if, well, as if my life depended on it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-35320 size-thumbnail lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-350x350.jpg 350w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 150px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 150\/150;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-35320 size-thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Wolpe_edt-350x350.jpg 350w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a>At the same time, I know that you cannot savor life if I worry constantly about extending it. Living is not a contest for duration but a pageant of meaning.&nbsp;Grateful as I am for the drugs that put my cancer in remission, and the studies that made my eating healthier (sometimes), and the devotion of experts in all fields, I am also aware that everyone\u2019s days are numbered and measured more in meaning than in minutes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">My father once told me he thought Methuselah was the saddest man in the Bible. Imagine, he said, living 969 years, bearing children, and not having a single accomplishment worth recording &#8212; not even that he was a good father to those same children. Not one single action that changed his world for the better. We who live for brief spans can do that each day. None of us is granted immortality but all of us can live in a way that touches eternity.<\/p>\n<p><em>(Rabbi David Wolpe is the spiritual leader of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles.)<\/em><\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Off%20the%20Pulpit%3A%20Methuselah%20and%20Me\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[8790,8795,8788,608],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39569"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39569"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39570,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39569\/revisions\/39570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}