“Let the first act of every morning be to make the following resolve for the day:

I shall not fear anyone on Earth.

I shall fear only God.

I shall not bear ill will toward anyone.

I shall not submit to injustice from anyone.

I shall conquer untruth by truth. And in resisting untruth, I shall put up with all suffering.”

Mahatma Gandhi, assassinated on this day in 1948

“Our greatest enemies, the ones we must fight most often, are within.”

Thomas Paine, born on this day in 1737

Thomas Paine caricature, by his enemies

“You must not pity me because my sixtieth year finds me still astonished. To be astonished is one of the surest ways of not growing old too quickly.”

Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, born on this day in 1873

Holocaust Memorial Day

“For the survivor who chooses to testify, it is clear: his duty is to bear witness for the dead and for the living. He has no right to deprive future generations of a past that belongs to our collective memory. To forget would be not only dangerous but offensive; to forget the dead would be akin to killing them a second time.”

Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor

“We live under the power of Modern Consciousness, which means that we are obsessed with progress. Wherever you are is not good enough. We always want to achieve something, rather than experience something. The opposite of this is Spiritual Consciousness. By that I mean you find enchantment in every action you do, rather in just the results of your action. Spiritual Consciousness is not a particular religion but a way of being.”

Satish Kumar

To A Mouse by Robert Burns, born on this day in 1759,

“Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim’rous beastie,
O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi’ bickerin brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an’ chase thee
Wi’ murd’ring pattle!

I’m truly sorry Man’s dominion
Has broken Nature’s social union,
An’ justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle,
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,
An’ fellow-mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen-icker in a thrave
’S a sma’ request:
I’ll get a blessin wi’ the lave,
An’ never miss ’t!

Thy wee-bit housie, too, in ruin!
It’s silly wa’s the win’s are strewin!
An’ naething, now, to big a new ane,
O’ foggage green!
An’ bleak December’s winds ensuin,
Baith snell an’ keen!

Thou saw the fields laid bare an’ waste,
An’ weary Winter comin fast,
An’ cozie here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter past
Out thro’ thy cell.

That wee-bit heap o’ leaves an’ stibble
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
Now thou’s turn’d out, for a’ thy trouble,
But house or hald,
To thole the Winter’s sleety dribble,
An’ cranreuch cauld!

But Mousie, thou art no thy-lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!

Still, thou art blest, compar’d wi’ me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But Och! I backward cast my e’e,
On prospects drear!
An’ forward tho’ I canna see,
I guess an’ fear!”

UN International Day of Education

“It is nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom; without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail. It is a grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching can be promoted by means of coercion and a sense of duty…

It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.”

Albert Einstein

“Holy Spirit, you are the mighty way in which everything that is in the heavens, on the earth, and under the earth, is penetrated with connectedness, is penetrated with relatedness.” Hildegard of Bingen

“Interdependence and interrelationship are deep ways of seeing the world that our premodern ancestors celebrated. The modern age thought in terms of subjects and objects. But today, and in Hildegard’s day, the key to understanding self and others is connectedness… Ask yourself: Am I attuned to my connection with everything that is in the heavens, on the earth, and under the earth? With all my relations?” Matthew Fox

“There are four questions of value in life.. What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for and what is worth dying for? The answer to each is the same. Only love.”

Lord George Gordon Byron, born on this day in 1788

“It is a mystery. How does light become darkness, and how does darkness become light?
What is the purpose of this transformation?
We see this every day, yet our eyes do not see it, nor do our minds perceive it true.
Do you not know that life on earth is school?
Every day is class.
Every day there is what to learn.
And do not forget, once life teaches us its lessons, tests always follow.
Why would we think that nature would follow any other course?
Turn to your teacher, and learn!
Listen to the voice of instruction speaking to you from every corner of the Earth.
Listen to your interpreter, the voice within your mind, that translates for you
the messages of nature into the language of your understanding.
Underneath your skin is your full body.
Underneath the sights of your eyes is where the real truth resides.
Do you see it?
Do you even care to seek it out?
You will be tested!
After all, you are nature’s student.
You are attending the school which G-d has made.
You can’t drop out.
You must advance.
And you will, one way or another.
In the end, however long that may take, we will all graduate and advance to another world in another place to continue our education, and to rise higher and higher to a place that today, we cannot see.
We will get there.
We will learn.
But we can help the process by cooperating with it.
Be open to learn from life.
Look for the lessons that life is teaching you daily.
Reach out with your senses, and with your mind.
Ask the great question, and never, ever stop asking it.
W-H-Y-?
That is the great question.
W-H-Y-?
Continue asking, never stop.
Discover nature’s secrets all around us, and inside us.
G-d gave us curiosity in order to motivate us to ask, so “ask” we must.
When we ask, we will be answered.
Only then will we understand.
And when we understand, the tests will come to prove that which we know.
Embrace the path – seek graduation.”

Rabbi Ariel Bar Tzadok