Daniel Goleman both coined the term “Emotional Intelligence” and wrote a wonderful book by that title. He tells the story of encountering a homeless man in New York City. Hardly an unusual encounter, you may be thinking, and you would be correct. In fact, Goleman was in New York to research and write a piece for The New York Times about homelessness at the time. Here’s his account:
One day… at the
end of the day, I went down—I was going
down to the subway. It was rush hour and thousands of people were streaming
down the stairs. And all of a sudden as I was going down the stairs I noticed
that there was a man slumped to the side, shirtless, not moving, and people
were just stepping over him—hundreds
and hundreds of people. And because my urban trance had been somehow weakened
[by researching the problem of homelessness], I found myself stopping to find
out what was wrong.
Why did people stream past this man
without noticing him lying in plain sight? Why did Goleman stop to check on him?
And what happened as a result? More in a moment.
וְגַם אֲנִי
שָׁמַעְתִּי, אֶת-נַאֲקַת בְּנֵי
יִשְׂרָאֵל, אֲשֶׁר
מִצְרַיִם, מַעֲבִדִים
אֹתָם; וָאֶזְכֹּר,
אֶת-בְּרִיתִי
I have now
heard the moaning of the Israelites because the Egyptians are holding them in
bondage, and I have remembered My covenant. (Exodus 6:5)
Just now, after 400 years, God
hears the Israelites’ moaning? Not exactly. God took notice
earlier. The very first time God took notice of the Israelites’ suffering is recorded in Exodus 2:23:
וַיְהִי בַיָּמִים
הָרַבִּים הָהֵם, וַיָּמָת מֶלֶךְ מִצְרַיִם, וַיֵּאָנְחוּ בְנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל מִן-הָעֲבֹדָה,
וַיִּזְעָקוּ;
וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם
אֶל-הָאֱלֹהִים,
מִן-הָעֲבֹדָה. כד וַיִּשְׁמַע אֱלֹהִים, אֶת-נַאֲקָתָם;
וַיִּזְכֹּר אֱלֹהִים
אֶת-בְּרִיתוֹ,
אֶת-אַבְרָהָם אֶת-יִצְחָק וְאֶת-יַעֲקֹב. כה וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים, אֶת-בְּנֵי
יִשְׂרָאֵל; וַיֵּדַע,
אֱלֹהִים.
A long time
after that the king of Egypt died. The Israelites were groaning under the
bondage and cried out; and their cry for help from the bondage rose up to God.
God heard their moaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham and Isaac
and Jacob. God looked upon the Israelites and God took notice of them. (Exodus 2:23-24)
It would seem that God took no notice
of the Israelites until they cried out to God for help. Their vulnerability and
suffering did not, in and of themselves, reach God’s notice
until the people pleaded for help. But since then, much more time has passed.
Moses has been residing in Midian with his wife, Tzipporah, and father-in-law,
Jethro. He has encountered God on Horeb through the divine manifestation of the
burning bush, where God tells Moses, “I am mindful of
their sufferings” (Exodus 3:7)—this is the second time God takes
note—and on
this occasion commissions Moses to appear before Pharaoh. Moses demurs; God
insists; Moses demurs; God promises to send Aaron with him. And indeed Moses
and Aaron make their first visit to Pharaoh, which results only in Pharaoh
increasing the quota of bricks required of the slaves and forcing them to find
their own straw. Now God speaks again to Moses, and this time says, “I
have now heard the moaning of the Israelites….
(see Exodus 6:5 above). This is the third time
God hears or notices the Israelites’ suffering.
God takes note of the Israelites on
three occasions, but it is only after the third time that God finally sets in
motion a plan to secure their release from bondage.
Sometimes it is most difficult to
notice the people who are right in front of us. It is as if their pain and
suffering erect an enormous wall between them and us. The barrier isn’t visual;
it’s
emotional. How many homeless people have we, as individuals, encountered? How
many times have we all lowered our eyes so we don’t “see” them
or “notice” them? How many times will we, as a
society, need to note their suffering before we—both as individuals and as a society—respond? It seems it took three rounds for God.
Perhaps Torah is inviting us to make
Moses our role model here. The very first time Moses ventures out of the palace
as a young man, what does he see? He might have seen the beauty of the land and
the Nile River. He might have noted the power projected by Pharaoh’s palace,
viewed from without. He might have seen vast building projects erected to honor
his father and strengthen his rule. We don’t know if Moses notices any of these
because Torah doesn’t
record it. Instead, we know that Moses witnesses the slaves at labor and a
taskmaster beating a slave. Immediately he responds. We can certainly debate
his vigilante justice; I’m
not defending it. Rather, I want to point out that despite the many other directions in which Moses could easily focus his eyes and mind, he notices human suffering around him first.
A second example: While shepherding
Jethro’s flocks,
Moses encounters a burning bush. Torah tells us that Moses stops and looks.
He notices. He wonders about the meaning of what he sees. He asks himself how
he should respond. It doesn’t
take Moses three times to notice, or even two. Moses gets it the first time.
It is difficult and painful to see
those who are suffering, those who are homeless, those who are hungry, those
who are ill. That is entirely understandable. As Daniel Goleman describes,
hundreds of people stepped over and around a homeless man slumped against the
wall of a subway station. But it is not impossible to overcome our proclivity
to not notice or respond.
First we need to understand our own inclinations to avoid the needs of
the neediest. If you like watching videos, here’s one to view. It’s
remarkable how willing people are to give money to a man in a business suit,
but not to the same man when he appears homeless—even standing in the same spot
and making the same request.
Next, we need to move past our
prejudices. Take a look what happened when youtube prankster Josh Paler Lin
gave a homeless man $100. Note how he spent the money.
(Some have claimed it was all a set-up,
but note that Lin has raised more than $100,000 to get Thomas back on his
feet.) We’ve all
heard the by-now classic argument against giving homeless people a few bucks
that “they will
probably spend the money on booze or drugs.” Is
that a reason? Or is it an excuse?
Most impressive and important in all
this is to note that Utah is on track to be the first state in the Union to end homelessness. How? By giving
people apartments to live in cleanly, decently, and safely. The result is a
major cost-saver to Utah. Read about it here. Kol
ha-kavod to Utah.
Let’s return to Daniel Goleman and the
homeless man in the New York subway. What happened after he stopped and took
notice of the man:
The moment I stopped, half a
dozen other people immediately ringed the same guy. And we found out that he
was Hispanic, he didn't speak any English, he had no money, he'd been wandering
the streets for days, starving, and he'd fainted from hunger. Immediately
someone went to get orange juice, someone brought a hotdog, someone brought a
subway cop. This guy was back on his feet immediately. But all it took was that
simple act of noticing…
Mindfulness is a holy act. Goldman
saw the humanity of a person suffering and in need. Can we do the same? With
thought, intention, and commitment, I have no doubt we can—as soon as
we open our eyes and take note of the people standing before us.
© Rabbi
Amy Scheinerman
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