Sunday, April 20, 2014

Why I'm a Humanitarian:' Finish your food there are kids starving in Europe.'

Why I'm a Humanitarian:' Finish your food there are kids starving in Europe.'

When I was growing up my grandmothers and my mother would always say ,'Finish your food there are kids starving in Europe.'  The irony was that when they told me that in 1957-8 there probably were not that many kids starving in Europe, but maybe somewhere. However this was an important lesson for me that has stuck my entire life and has changed me.  The lesson I took away from that simple, though wrong, statement was that even small acts that we do can help others.  It has caused me to dedicating my life to doing as many small acts that like the butterfly effect can have ripples that spread out and make the world a better place.  I also had a Hebrew school teacher (the principal) Rabbi Elliot Ness who took a group of us out of Hebrew class with  everyone else to teach us Jewish Philosophy and Talmud.   We were taken out of class because they gave up on ever teaching us Hebrew and therefor we were Elliot Ness and the Unteachables (Groan) .  We learnt much more then the students in the regular Hebrew School and it has stuck. Two of the fundermentals of Jewish and Talmudic philosophy are Tikun Olum, Repair the World, and the Golden Rule 'Do onto others as you would have them do onto you.'  Itr was these three concepts drilled into me in my most formative years that have made my the person I am today.