Right-sizing your ideals

“But what about your hope?” a sincere fellow-learner asked me recently. We were sharing coffee. Discussing the prospects for a conflict-solution in Israel’s neighborhood. 

I’d shared my position with him, that it required a massive identity-overhaul for Palestinians that would take generations. This would depend on their determination to renounce their 100-year war on Zionism and embrace a new identity that was only about building their home alongside ours. I’d also shared my discomfort with solutions thinking. 

“I’m actually very hopeful,” I replied. “I hope for my People’s safety. For security for Israelis and for neighbors of good faith. I’m hopeful for continued day-to-day coexistence between Israeli Jews and Muslims that happens hundreds and thousands of times daily without incident.” I had more to say. I imagine you do too. The point? I tried to bring his question about hope from his solution-frame to my home field which hosts an abundance of applied-hope. 

Right-sizing ideals happens to be one of your people’s specialties. 

For example, this week’s portion of Torah brims with ideals like repentance and forgiveness. It’s where we’re first taught how to pray for them (Ex. 34:6-7). You don’t have to take the portion’s word for it. When you have a look inside our daily prayer book, you meet all kinds of ideals like healing, ingathering, and upbuilding.

Turns out that right-sizing ideals involves lots of trial and error. Why? Because collisions between ideals and reality can be very damaging. But a steady commitment to rightsizing your ideals prevents them from being abandoned in roadside wreckage. 

Sinai isn’t only home to the Ten Commandments. It’s also where the Tablets get smashed and then remade. That is, it’s home to the ongoing need to workshop ideals, to adapt them. Indeed, it’s the home field for their blessed resilience.