{"id":51886,"date":"2019-11-22T16:18:40","date_gmt":"2019-11-22T22:18:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=51886"},"modified":"2019-11-22T16:18:40","modified_gmt":"2019-11-22T22:18:40","slug":"off-the-pulpit-inner-directed-truth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/off-the-pulpit-inner-directed-truth\/","title":{"rendered":"Off the Pulpit: Inner-directed Truth"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By RABBI DAVID WOLPE<\/p>\n<p><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>Much of our kindness comes from fear \u2014 if I do not act this way another person or group of people will think less of me or be angry at me. This is not necessarily a bad motivation; we are social creatures and a \u2018decent respect for the opinions of mankind\u2019 is written into our founding document. But it is not the highest motivation either.<\/p>\n<p>Kindness that arises from a sense of sympathy or of justice is stronger and surer. Abraham does not greet the strangers because he fears they will disdain this inhospitable nomad if he stays in his tent. Jeremiah does not berate the people because he thinks they will kick him out of the prophetic circles if he keeps quiet. Such figures are \u2018inner directed\u2019 \u2014 their heroism arising from a deep sense of right and wrong, of goodness unrelated to the judgment of others.<\/p>\n<p>In an age when we are seen and rated and judged every minute of the day, when social media scores our souls and calibrates our characters, the Torah is a powerful corrective. How you stand before your own deep values and before God is higher than the passing opinion of your neighbor.<\/p>\n<p><em>(Rabbi David Wolpe is the senior rabbi of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/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%20Inner-directed%20Truth\";<\/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\/51886"}],"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=51886"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51887,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51886\/revisions\/51887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}