“Guard My Eyes, I See Divine”. Also: “Lost My Mind, See Divine,” oil paint on linen, 30 x 30 inches. 2024
Friday: Mitzvah Outreach
Ben helping Frank do a mitzvah
Friday, February 9th. For the entirety of the late-morning my friend Ben and I wrote a song called “Be Yourself.” Upon wrapping up the session he invited me to come along with him to do something called Chabad mitzvah campaigns. You’ll soon understand what that means in practice.
Out in north Park Slope, it truly felt like Spring, myself and Ben were energized. We walked the streets asking passerbyers, “Are you jewish?” We then handed out candles to women to light before the Sabbath, and helped men to perform a mitzvah (religious act) called wrapping tefillin.
My friend, Ben spotted a man in front of a café. He seemed to be passing a little time before getting on his bike to leave. Ben nodded his head to me, as if you say, “You go for this one.”
“Are you jewish?” I asked the man at the café.
He said “yes,” and added that, “Usually you guys pass by me, so I really appreciate you stopping to ask.” He explained that, “My mother is jewish and my father is black, so I don’t always appear obviously jewish.”
That man, who turned out to be a prominent film director, wrapped tefillin (a mitzvah) that day for the first time, which is a significant event in jewish belief. We spoke further about creativity. We exchanged information.
Up the street, a while later, my friend spoke to an older jewish lady and gave her Sabbath candles. I spoke to her assistant who was from Ghana. She wanted to know about the fringes on shirt. I explained the commandments in the Torah as connections to spiritual realities. She told me that she grew up Christian and that her mother had traveled to Israel. I explained to her that according to jewish belief, there is no man that could be God, but rather that all people can connect to the One God that is the Source of all.
Saturday Night
I profess a belief in synchronicity. As Jung said, “Synchronicity is everywhere for those who have the eyes to see it.” Or the jewish mystical belief that behind all of nature is the transcendent oneness. In this view, all of lifes events are actually organized into a great meaning.
“Sheba in an Ocean Bath,” oil paint on linen, 72 x 48 inches. 2024.
After Shabbat, I traveled to Connecticut for my father’s 70th Birthday. So much went wrong! I decided to take the subway from Crown Heights to Grand Central. I left with plenty of time to make an 8:03 train. The 3-train was under construction, so the express train I got on stopped locally. It took a very long time to get there. I still reached the train platform just in time. But the conductor looked at me and closed the door. I put my hands up in the air and laughed! What could be the synchronicity here!?
I waited another 20 minutes, and got on the next train. Just prior to leaving, a young woman who was apparently Jamaican to me, sat down just next to me. She had her hair dyed red. This reminded me instantly of my commitment to a large canvas: Sheba in an Ocean Bath. It is based off the concept of a Jamaican woman, imagined as the biblical queen Sheba, consort of Salomon. Next to her is a shark diving to reach a heart that is on fire.
“Untitled (Reddish Fate),”Ink on paper, 9 x 6 inches. (Torn in half)
On the young woman’s shirt: she had hand-drawn a heart. Oh, how odd and poetic is life. Synchronicity, I suppose. I made a drawing.
I didn’t speak to her.
Just before my stop the train came to a halt. A voice was heard on the intercom: “If you’re a doctor or nurse, please come to the second to last car.”
After 15 minutes, I began to pray out loud. I was late; exhaustion was sitting in; I was trusting some greater synchronicity; but this was getting to be too much! God let this train move soon!
The Jamaican woman turned to me; she asked, “Are you praying to God?”
“Yes, I am.” I laughed.
“I am too.”
I asked if she was religious. She said that she grew up Catholic. I joked, “That’s too bad!” She agreed that it had been a struggle.
We began to speak further, and I mentioned that according to Jewish belief there are seven universal laws that were given to all people of the world to follow. I asked if she would be interested.
“I’m interested in any spiritual knowledge!”
So we looked through the list. To know that there is One God and to connect to that Source. We discussed the law of not eating flesh from a living animal. “It seems obvious,” I said, “But in many places they still do it!”
She asked, “Is that like the verse that says an animal with split hooves that chews its cud?”
“No, actually,” I explained, “That verse describes animals that can be made kosher as meat. Like a cow, sheep or lamb, counts. But not the pig, or horse. It might be a good idea to only eat kosher animals, but it isn’t a part of the prophetic laws that the jews received to be relevant for all people.”
“Why would there be some laws for some people and not others?” She keenly asked.
“Well, each group of people plays a distinct and unique role. Think of a great circle. And within this circle are many diamonds and gems of many shapes and colors. We are all one within that circle, but each with their unique gifts.”
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Comment from Johannes: Could you bring it home somehow? What’s the plot here.
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I finally did make it to my home stop. My father picked me up in the car. Although I was looking forward to his birthday, I had to tell him about the series of events that had just transpired. From the delayed local subway that caused me to miss the eight pm train, to the delay just one stop from home.
“I profess in writing, in songs and to friends,” I said to my father, “about how I see synchronicity and how God’s hashgacha pratis is in everything, and here I was, I was tested! The frustration built up and I prayed out loud, which led to this outreach conversation. The relationship between the identity of this young woman and my painting of Sheba was an obvious synchronicity. However this was just the icing on the cake; Gods way of winking at me, that there was a meaning behind all those inconveniences of my commute. The deeper meaning here is the enforcing that there is always a meaning, a connection to the Greater Being.”
It is this final insight that this essay is about.