Widening Our Circle of Compassion

Rabbi Naomi Levy’s Commentary

“The mission of Einstein’s true religion is to strive to free us from the optical delusion of our consciousness that we are separate, when in truth we are one, and never before in human history do we need this message more. To believe it, to know that we belong to each other. Einstein is saying that we’re all part of a great wholeness, all things, the living and yes, even the dead. And it’s our delusion of separateness that causes us so much pain when in reality all is connected and intertwined—and to take it a tiny bit deeper—Einstein wrote a letter of condolence to his lifelong best friend’s family. His lifelong best friend was a physicist named, Michele Besso. When Michele Besso died, Einstein wrote this note to his family: “People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.” Einstein wrote these words less than a month before his own death. If that’s the mission of true religion I would love to be a rabbi in that religion.”

—Rabbi Naomi Levy [From the video in Resources below: Einstein and the Rabbi: Searching for the Soul, Jan 30, 2018].

Rabbi Naomi Levy and Einstein both tell us that feeling separate from each other is an illusion we need to break free from. They urge us to be more compassionate, not just to people but to all living things. Einstein’s note to the family of his late friend Michele Besso adds another layer by pointing out that even our sense of time is an illusion. In essence, both Levy and Einstein are guiding us toward the same truth: as Einstein put it, “Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”