February 21 • 2019 33
jn

T

wo Jews, three opinions.
” 
Our people are no strangers 
to controversy, 
which is fine as long as our 
perspectives are grounded in 
understanding, a commitment 
to the greater good (our sages 
spoke of machlochet b’
shem 
shamayim — controversy for 
the sake of heaven), and clear 
seeing of what is there and 
what is not. We are neither 
deceived by “fake news” nor 
blind to what is as plain as the 
noses on our faces.
Unfortunately, this level of 
wise, idealistic and clear seeing 
does not drive our public 
discourse. As neurolinguist 
George Lakoff has pointed out, people 
generally do not make decisions based 
upon facts, but rather upon cognitive 
frames that shape our values and 
reinforce our perspective on reality. 
Skilled politicians and marketers are 
adept at appealing to these cognitive 
frames and fixations to get us to buy 
what we don’
t need, to vote for those 
who don’
t represent our best interests 
and to behave in destructive and even 
violent ways. 
The Torah repeatedly teaches us not 
to be deceived by such emotionally fed 
illusions, but rather to attend to what 
is really there. This week’
s portion 
contains what is perhaps the extreme 
example of forgetting how to see. 
The Israelites, who just months 
earlier had experienced the presence 
of God at Mount Sinai, who received 
God’
s Torah and pledged to obey, 
collectively suffered what psychologist 
Daniel Goleman called “an amygdala 
hijack.
” Overcome with fear that 
their leader Moses would not return 
from the mountaintop, their higher 
intellectual and sensory functions were 
suppressed by the kneejerk responses 

of the reptilian brain. The more subtle 
brainwaves that could and recently did 
perceive a spiritual realm, in 
which Divine reveals a higher 
truth, were shoved aside as if 
the great revelation never took 
place. In desperation, the people 
sought a protector they could 
see with their own eyes. In their 
panic and delusion, they sought 
safety in a shiny gold animal 
totem, a calf that couldn’
t even 
moo to its (nonexistent) mother, 
much less protect the people 
from the terrors of the desert.
Three times God refers to 
our ancestors as “a stiff-necked 
people.
” The description is apt. 
When we feel threatened, the 
reptilian brain takes over; our necks 
stiffen as part of a mechanism putting 
the entire body on high alert. In this 
posture we see only what we need to 
escape or attack. It’
s a terrible posture 
for prayer, devotion or thoughtful 
decision-making. Better to take some 
deep breaths; massage the back of your 
neck; do some full but gentle stretches 
and ease into a fuller kind of seeing, 
what Rabbi Heschel called “radical 
amazement.
”
God is atop Mount Sinai … and all 
around us. As Psalm 121 says: “I lift 
my eyes to the mountains; from where 
will my help come? My help comes 
from the Eternal One, maker of heaven 
and earth … The Eternal One will 
guard you from all harm … now and 
forever.
”
Can the metal figurine of a calf do 
anything like that? ■

Rabbi Michael Zimmerman is the rabbi of the 
Reconstructionist Congregation Kehillat 
Israel in Lansing. He is also the founder and 
organizer of the Greater Lansing Network of 
Spiritual Progressives and serves on the Tikkun 
Magazine Editorial Board. 

Remembering How to See

Rabbi Michael 
Zimmerman

Parshat

Ki Tisa:

Exodus 

30:11-34:35; 

I Kings 

18:1-339.

spirit

torah portion

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