Psalms 11:7: “The Lord is righteous, He loveth righteousness: The upright behold His face.”

What is righteousness?  It sounds important, God loves the righteous and they are able to behold His face.  That is everything in a nutshell.  To be something the Lord loves and to behold His face or be in His presence. Righteousness is the word tsadiq, which means doing what is lawful and correct. The Lord does what is right or lawful, He keeps His laws and we live by a set of spiritual laws that we try to keep. Although as non-Jews we are not held to the dietary laws or the ritual laws as established by Peter in the Book of Acts,  the Apostle Paul makes it clear we are still held by the moral laws as listed in the Ten Commandments and those that God has written in our hearts.  If we follow this God will love it.

Most people try to do what is right and follow the moral laws as well as that which is written in their hearts.  The brothers here at the Monastery live a disciplined life in silence. They follow the moral law and their hearts which tell them to live a contemplative life style.  Not all of us are called to a contemplative live style, we must examine our hearts to determine what lifestyle we are called to.   The brothers at the Abbey take on vows of celibacy and rarely venture outside the compound.  They go to mass every day, recite prayers six times a day, is this what God loves, do they feel the presence of God? Who am I to say, only God knows their hearts.

Two different words are used here for righteousness.  You have tsadiq which is rendered as righteous and yashar which is rendered as upright which seems to be the same thing and in fact is at times rendered in English as righteous.  However, the Talmud teaches there are no synonyms in Hebrew, the two words must somehow be distinguished.

Yashar in its Semitic root means to be straight, level. It is what is right and pleasing to God. It is spelled Yod, Shin and Resh.  The Talmud teaches that God used the letter Hei to create the world and the Yod to create the world to come.  The Yod is often placed in front of a word to indicate that verb to be in a future tense.   The Yod is the only letter that is suspended in mid-air.  The Yod is the smallest letter in the Alphabet. It is viewed as a seed the smallest grain which will grow into a big stalk or a mighty tree.  The Yod represents potential and hence it is the first letter in the word yashar or upright.  We may not be totally righteous now but we have that seed of righteousness in us planted by Jesus Christ when he died on the cross to make us righteous. The Yod is the smallest yet is the first letter in the sacred name of God YHWH.   Although small it does not impede greatness.  The Yod speaks of the future.

The next letter is the Shin and is the letter of esh or fire.  It even resembles a flame with its three uplifted arms.  Fire is a picture of passion and the passionate love of God. It is also a picture of the sun and sun related words such as sh’viv spark, shalhaevet, flame, and sharav, heat.  The upright has the seed of righteousness planted in him and the passionate love of God in us will, like the sun shine cause that seed to sprout and grow.  The passionate love of God will grow as we do what is right.

The last letter is the Resh.  The Resh is a straight line bent over like it is bowing.  It is bent over in humility and like it is making a turn.  The Resh represents repentance, turning away from sin.  The upright are those who turn away from sin.  So the upright or the yashar are those who will experience the presence of God, those who have the seed of righteousness implanted in them by the blood of Jesus and that seed of righteousness will grow through the passionate love of God and as it grows it will turn you away from sin.  In a word uprightness is a process, not a state of being.

After spending a week in silence I feel so discouraged as I am still aware of my sinful self.  I am still aware of the many flaws in my life that keep me from being a truly Godly man.  I am thinking about this as I sit in front of the great white tree.  It is still growing. Still producing new leaves every year, it has not yet reached its full potential. Just as I am still growing, still producing leaves and I have not yet reached my full potential.

As I look upon this mighty tree, I have decided it must be an oak tree for it so mighty and powerful and has endured so many storms, endured the loss of its bark, and the ravishes of time. Yet it still flourishes.  I speak to the mighty tree with my heart and I ask it: “Oh, great and mighty tree, tree of such awesome strength, just what is it that my God is trying to tell me through you?”   The great white tree answers to my heart:  “I speak only this and that is – I was once just a nut like you.”