9.09.2009

There's a story...

about a rabbi.
(Forgive me if I don't get it just right.)

This rabbi was walking along the shores of Israel one evening, heading towards his home. And like any good rabbi, he was quoting Scripture to himself. Over and over, repeating a phrase. As he goes along, it begins to get darker, and he takes a wrong turn towards a Roman fort. The guard at the top of the wall calls out to the rabbi and startles the man who is just realizing he is not where he expected to be.

"Who are you?
What are you doing here?"

The rabbi stands in stunned silence for a moment, then responds, "How much do you get paid to ask me these questions?"
The soldier, taken a little bit off guard answers him.
"I'll pay you double!" the rabbi declared loudly, "But you must stand outside my house and ask me those two same questions every morning when I leave and every evening I return."

So I have a question for you:

Who are you?
What are you doing here?


In this world of constant motion, have you ever stopped to consider? You are here for a purpose. Do you know what it is? Are you fulfilling it? There's a lot of hype in this world. We get caught up in worries and menial tasks, ideologies and philosophies, complacency and disinterest... But can you answer these two simple questions?
Can I?
Or have we not even attempted to answer them. Are we afraid of the answer? Or the lack of one? I think that's what all these distractions are about. Perhaps all this incessant noise, all this preoccupied busy-ness, all of these time consuming schedules where you can scarcely get a breath of fresh air (much less enjoy one)... perhaps it is all a desperate attempt to avoid the silence. Perhaps it is a manic fervor to steer clear of those two taboo questions:

Who are you?
What are you doing here?

To answer them could turn your world upside-down.
Go ahead. Try it.

2 comments:

a girl with a smile said...

I'm supposed to keep working on my psych hw, but i took the time to stop by your blog and see what have i missed. This little story is still enveloping in my head, so i can't really comment much on it. Yet, those two questions are always present in the back of my head

Kaleigh said...

I love this! All three of your most recent blogs are great. I just read them all for the first time. I so enjoy reading what you write, Britt. We have so much catching up to do. I love you!

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