Leon's No News Bulletin 104 Sat 9th May 09

Shalom everyone,

A few weeks ago I learnt that there’s more power in asking for forgiveness than receiving it.

I made this amazing discovery a few Saturdays ago when I felt that I had disappointed Tamar; she had expected Ettie and I to take her to a movie but I had to work and Ettie had gone off with her friend Carmela.

I was eating my heart our about it but everyone “phoo phooed” my attitude and said that Tamar didn’t bear any grudge and probably had forgotten about the whole incident.

Their words of comfort didn’t help me and I continued to suffer in my guilt.

I think that this is how Adam must have suffered after he had disobeyed God. Only Adam didn’t ask God for forgiveness while I did ask Tamar for forgiveness.

In a desperate attempt to ameliorate my agony I burst out with a plea to Tamar to forgive me. Immediately I felt better so I repeated my plea for forgiveness. I’m sure Adam would have felt better also had he asked God for forgiveness.

I felt still better when Tamar came and sat next to me and said “grandpa I forgive you”.

God didn’t forgive Adam because Adam didn’t ask God for forgiveness. God punished him and mankind has felt guilty every since..

My feeling of joy, having her next to me and saying those words, knew no bounds and is beyond the ability of words to describe.

My joy was contagious and Tamar laughed with happiness and ran to tell her mother that she had forgiven grandpa. She was proud of what she’d done and everyone else was proud of her also.

She was thrilled at being a person who forgives and I was thrilled that she had forgiven me.

It’s obvious that asking for forgiveness made my feeling of guilt disappear, whereas by not asking for forgiveness Adam caused guilt to exist.

One could say that guilt is created by Adam not asking God for forgiveness. Conscience is man’s contribution to creation.

It is part of human nature just as sure as our limbs and every other part of our body is part of us.

Conscience, man’s first creation is the basic cause for all other creations of man..

The important thing in life is to have a conscience and to always ask for forgiveness. That’s what makes us happy.

Naturally if we give forgiveness we’ll be happier but that can’t happen without someone asking for forgiveness.

The act of asking forgiveness brings happiness irrespective of whether one receives forgiveness or not.

Naturally one will only ask forgiveness if one feels guilty about something. If we didn’t have original sin we’d have to create it.

It’s amazing to think that all of these wonderful benefits, joy, comfort, relief, a new closeness between Tamar and I, all came from my one small question “please forgive me”.

I’m grateful to have someone I love, like Tamar, from whom I can ask forgiveness and I think about people who don’t have someone from whom to ask forgiveness

The most difficult person, however to ask forgiveness from is ourselves. Here’s an example:

We had all come to visit Dror, Shai, Tamar’s uncle’s friend, a wonderful artist in pottery to help Ettie choose a gift to take with to her brother, Ezer, in Toronto, where she and Ittamar would be visiting in the coming week.

She finally chose a beautiful, delicate pottery sculpture, which Dror considered his best piece. Then he wrapped it carefully in bubble plastic and threw it up in the air to demonstrate that it was unbreakable in that package, of course it fell to the floor breaking into little pieces.

Dror’s sadness knew no bounds; he cried and bemoaned his stupidity in dropping his most valuable creation.

We all tried to comfort him but to no avail. He couldn’t forgive himself for breaking his own wonderful creation.

Of course the only way he could be comforted would be to forgive himself; he had to ask himself to forgive himself.

In a flash I realized that asking forgiveness is really the thing that brings happiness. It starts a reaction within oneself or between people that can only lead to happiness.

Whether or not we receive forgiveness from the person whom we feel we have harmed is not as important as the act of asking forgiveness.

Obviously one can also obtain happiness from giving forgiveness, but there are very few people who are capable of giving forgiveness without being asked for it.

Most people need to be asked for forgiveness in order to give it. Some people who are asked for forgiveness may not give it, but the asker of forgiveness had done his best to get forgiveness and that act alone brings him comfort and happiness.

But much more important than this was the realization of the power of the simple act of asking for forgiveness;

Wishing you a great no news day

Yours truly

Leon Gork

Come for a Jerusalem Walk with Leon Gork

Jerusalemwalks.com

legork@netvision.net.il

Tel: 052 3801867