Day of Judgment: Are we nothing or something?

On Yom Kippur we fervently pray for a favorable judgment, while we affirm that from dust we arise and to dust we return. We are nothing, but what we do in between, within and among ourselves.

In between, we are creatures with free will. Regardless of the ultimately unknowable by man of whether that personal free will serves G-d’s greater plan, it is knowable whether it serves G-d’s greater purpose: To build by our actions a better world by building better personal relations based on mutual respect, providing for the truly unfortunate, transmitting that purpose to our children, and creating and defending the security of self and civil society that makes such purposes possible.

It’s ironic, but perfectly clear, that as we individually move ourselves closer to personal harmony with this purpose, as we rise in nearness to it, in accomplishing worthy goals, our humility grows at the increasing knowledge of how little we’ve attained relative to the magnitude of the purpose, in effect recognizing we are nothing, our mortal remains returning to dust. However, as dust accumulates it forms greater mass, and if our individual specks of life accumulate for greater, lasting good, we’ve accomplished our privilege in living and choosing. What we leave behind defines the worth of our in-between.

Whether it’s platitudes about caring that are devoid of self-sacrifice or effort, or more directly venal and selfish self-serving with no care for the harms, others’ welfare or the furthering of a more civil world, or simply being unconcerned or ignoring threats to our and others’ survival or to elemental human rights, it’s clear to all but the self-blinded whether we’re working earnestly and honestly for the better purpose.

As we ponder, discuss, debate specific programs or policies in the public arena, it seems to me – at the very least -- we should first filter ourselves and what we hear through this overriding judgment.