Be careful making choices
WHAT a wonderful feeling it is to know that the Covid numbers are going down, more and more people are vaccinated daily and spring is almost here!
We are not at the end of the pandemic yet but we can already see light at the end of the tunnel! We’ve almost made it through one of the worst winters of our time. Now is a great time to start reflecting on our experiences and see what we can learn from them.
One reflection is that the pandemic has brought out the best and worst in people. I always find it fascinating to observe what choices people make in a crisis. Why is that some people make moral choices and do good in times of social challenge yet some follow their evil inclinations?
I have always been fascinated by the history of the Holocaust and the process of the Evil Leaders making ordinary people follow their will to the point that killing others, just for who they are, would seem either normal or that they would be too scared to speak out.
How does it happen all over the world that dictators take over countries and do as they please? How does it happen that in some countries with strong democracies the rule of the mob prevails at times?
The conclusion I came to: it is complicated! And very different circumstances lead to certain outcomes in history.
Yet there is definitely one fundamental process which unites this shift in human conscience from good to evil: the choices – good or bad – we make on a daily basis. Often one choice leads to another without us even noticing it.
It takes some people many choices, including the people they follow on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Youtube, to be radicalised or to become racists.
We all have some prejudices or unconscious bias. It is our choice whether we stamp them out or start feeding them.
Rabbi Hillel Silverman said: “Every time we disobey the voice of conscience, it becomes fainter and feebler, and the human heart becomes harder to reach and move. Judaism affirms the principle of free will. We are each the master of our own spirit. ‘One evil deed leads to another’ is said in the Teachings Of The Fathers. And conversely ‘One good deed leads to another’”.
Life sometimes presents difficult scenarios, where it is not easy to make a choice, never mind the right one. However, when you are about to make that choice, try to think about the consequences of your decision because “one good deed leads to another and one sin might lead to another”.
Tanya Sakhnovich is rabbi at Nottingham Liberal Synagogue.