Psalms 105-107

Sunday's Bible Reading: Psalms 105-107

The second line of "Shema Yisrael" states: "And you should love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might." The classical commentaries explain that "with all your heart" means with both your good and bad inclinations, "with all your soul" means with your very life, and "with all your might" means with all your money. Since the mitzvah seems to be stated in order of ascending difficulty, the question is asked how loving God with all your money can be more difficult than giving up your life. The answer: "Some people love their money more than their life."

This Talmudic teaching used to make me think of wealthy German Jews in the 1930s, who chose not to leave Germany without their property and paid for that choice with their lives. After my debacle with my opal ring,* however, I realized that none of us is immune to the power of money to distort our values and corrupt our choices. Sad to say, we all have our price.

The cure for this Faustian predicament is to clearly identify the two sides of the choice. If we could strip away the layers of principles, and expose the choice for what it is, we would be shocked to discover how often we are swayed by money. —Sara Yoheved Rigler, "Selling Your Soul," aish.com

*To learn about the opal ring debacle, read the entire article.

After church today, Jay and I went to Meijer Gardens for lunch and then spent some time wandering through the Sculpture Park. I wanted to see The Thinker while it is on loan from the Detroit Institute of Art. Today seemed like the perfect time since the weather was so spectacular, as the pictures indicate.



The Thinker is located across from The Waterfall, a lovely place for contemplation, the perfect spot for "thinking."



Next we came to The Groves, where a Blue Heron was resting on a rock. Assuming it was a sculpture, I said, "Wow, that sure looks real." Just then the wind rustled the bird's feathers and we realized it was real. Silly me, none of the other sculptures were at all realistic, so there was no reason to assume that something that looked real wasn't—except that it looked too perfect to be real. Right after I took this short video, the heron spread his wings and lifted off across the pond.