Closer to Eden – Inch by Inch

I was at dinner with a friend not long ago, and we got around to the topic of “why things happen”. Of course, we weren’t talking in a scientific or an analytical sense, but rather in a philosophical / religious sense. Another way to broach the subject might be to ask whether or not all things happen for a purpose, or whether things just happen, and we make from them what we can. Fate vs Opportunity.

While I’d like very much to believe that G-d is shaping His multiverse around me and around the everyday events that need to happen in my life, I can’t seem to get to that place with either my heart or my mind. There’s just too much world in this solar system, too many solar systems in this galaxy, too many galaxies in this universe, too many universes in…

I guess it boils down to the age-old question: “To what degree does the universe revolve around me as a person?”

That’s really the hurdle that we’ve got to get past, isn’t it? When Galileo challenged the details of the traditional Old Testament creation story, he was jailed by the church until he recanted. The traditional creation story makes it quite plain that man is at the center of the earth, and that earth is at the center of the universe. It’s a very painful process to challenge this notion that I’m at the center of the universe, and everything in turn revolves around me.

In many ways, it’s no different than the maturation process of a human from infancy to adulthood. When we’re born, all we know of the universe is the mother that takes care of us. As we grow, our perception needs to expand and evolve, as we learn that there are many other children, many other mothers, and that we need to fit into this much bigger picture. This expansion process needs to continue in order for us to “grow into” the real world. At whatever point we stop allowing ourselves and our perception to expand, this is the point at which we lock the size of our world.

And of course, G-d’s world is quite large indeed, isn’t it? The question for each of us is this: “How much can I allow my perception of the world to expand toward the complete universe of G-d?”

This is not a new question – wise sages in the Bible (both Old Testament and New Testament) often compared human faith and human maturity, making it very plain that our faith was to mature, evolve, and change as we grew more wise, and more aware of the world that we fit into. Of course, when they were writing, the “known” universe was much smaller than it is today.

Back to my discussion with my friend at dinner – the degree to which G-d makes things happen in our life, vs the degree to which things just happen. As I think about this, it isn’t as simple as connecting the question to the degree to which I believe that G-d is “involved” in my life. It’s simply the degree to which the events of the universe are directed for my “benefit”.

It’s a question of “rights” vs “responsibilities” in many respects. It seems to me that the events of the universe are progressing along – one event or set of events impacting other events. To this point, the question of whether or not “G-d” even exists doesn’t matter – the universe is, and stuff happens – it doesn’t really matter “why”.

But then, I stumble into events, or events trip across me. This is where G-d enters the equation. It’s in how I choose to react to the events that my path takes me through. G-d isn’t hitting me over the head with “the world and the events of the world”, but rather asking me to bring the world a little closer to Her. Along whatever paths I choose to wander, and into whatever events happen to overtake me on that path, I need to work actively to bridge the gaps that I find between the present reality and the Eden that calls us.

G-d happens in whatever each of us does within the events that we stumble through in our lives. We’re responsible to take whatever does happen in our life, and to use those events to help move the world just a tiny little inch further toward Eden.

Of course, if you’ve been born into great privilege or great wealth, or if the “turn of the worm” in life has dropped great fortune in your lap, then it’s really tempting to believe that G-d wants you to have your good fortune and your good luck. We always want to believe that we deserve the good things we have. We always want to believe that G-d wants us to have the good things that we’ve got.

But when things aren’t so fortunate – when you don’t happen to live in the lap of luxury – when you happen to be moving down “Job’s path in life” – it’s then that we begin to question why it is that bad things are happening. It’s then that we have a tough time making this “deserve” concept fit. It’s then that we start blaming G-d rather than thanking Her.

If we drop this notion that we deserve anything at all, and drop this notion that we are at the center of the universe and that G-d is directing the universe for our benefit in some way, then we can more easily accept that life just happens. Nothing more. Nothing less.

We can start to focus on what we can do within each event that we stumble through to move this world just a tiny inch closer to the Eden that G-d calls us to.