So I’m driving along Commercial Drive, and I’ve stopped at a pedestrian-controlled crosswalk. A young man starts to cross the street, and stops halfway. He looks at the walk sign and reads it out loud. “Five, four, three, two, one, zero!” Then he dashes across the street. He cheers for himself. Then he pushes the button so he can do it again.

Now that is a dimension of reality I have not seen before: the crosswalk sign as a sprint-training machine.

There’s a Rosh Hashanah message in here.

We talk about the Torah as an endless source of meaning. You can read the same stories year after year, and each year you learn something different. Life is like Torah. You can live the same life year after year, and each year you learn something different.

Welcome to a New Year.

So, I’m waiting at the bus stop on Main Street, with six other random people. We are standing around in no particular pattern.

The bus arrives and suddenly there is a pattern.

Everyone waits while an elderly woman boards with her shopping basket. A boy tries to leap onto the bus but, without saying a word, his grandmother puts her hand on his shoulder and he steps back. Two elderly gentlemen board. Then the grandmother and her grandson. A young man in sunglasses nods imperceptibly to me. I get on and he  follows.

This was a profound moment for me. I felt as though heaven had opened and revealed a hidden structure of reality. A hidden moral structure. A structure of respect. So obvious no one had to say a word. It was clear and precise and known to all.

There’s a Rosh Hashanah message here, too.

Maybe during a mystical experience, I see the moral structure of reality clearly. But in everyday consciousness, I am pretty confused.

And yet, on Rosh Hashanah, I’m supposed to judge myself.

Because: Rosh Hashanah is the Day of Judgment.

Actually, it’s the first of nine days of judgment. By the tenth day, Yom Kippur, I should have completed the evaluation and be ready to make my confession.

But this year, after the bus stop revelation, something is different. I realize that I do not know the criteria I should use to judge myself. Or, more accurately, the criteria I normally use don’t make sense anymore.

Normally, I judge myself based on how I feel.

If I feel fine, I did not do anything wrong.

If I feel bad, I did do something wrong.

If I feel very bad, I did something very wrong.

This is a terrible method.

It places me, and my perspective, at the centre of the universe. It assumes my feelings are a perfectly adjusted moral compass. It ignores the fact that I may feel the most confusion and guilt when I have been wronged. And that blaming myself sometimes increases the pain.

I just want the heavens to open up and give me a simple criterion.

Like the one our sage Hillel articulates when he is asked, “Teach me the Torah while standing on one foot.” Hillel says, “Do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you. That is the whole Torah – all the rest is commentary.”

Over the next nine days I might do an experiment. I might use Hillel’s teaching as my criterion for self-judgment. Just for this year.

When I review the year, and a painful memory arises, I might look it square in the face and ask, “In this situation, did I avoid doing unto others as I would not have them do unto me?”

If I did, I will let go of the guilt.

If I did not, I will confess and atone.

It’s not a perfect criterion. We apply it subjectively, based on our own personal sensitivities. We don’t all want the same things done unto us.

But it is a simple criterion.

And sometimes, simplicity has its benefits.

Like in the famous story by the nineteenth-century Hassidic teacher Reb Nachman of Breslov, HaChacham v’HaTam, the Clever Man and the Simple Man.

Two Jewish boys are born in a small European village. One is sharp-witted; the other is plain, not subtle. Their differences are so pronounced that their names aren’t even written into the local birth register – it just says “clever” and “simple” were born that day. The two friends grow up together, as close as brothers.

The simple young man settles in their hometown, learns a trade but not well, enters into a loving marriage, and practices gratitude.

The clever young man goes off to seek his fortune in the big city. Quickly, he learns dozens of academic subjects and several trades. But nothing he or anyone does is ever good enough for him. He returns home and moves in with the simple man.

The King hears about his famous cleverness and invites him to the capital city to serve as a minister. The clever man sets out, thinking deeply. Along the way, he realizes he has never seen the king, and isn’t sure the king even exists. Maybe, he thinks, this is a scam. Instead of going to the capital city, he becomes a drifter.

The King decides it’s better to hire an honest man than a clever man, so he invites the simple man to serve as a minister. The simple man accepts, and gradually gains the academic and practical knowledge he needs to succeed.

One day, the clever man drops by, in need of help again. The simple man greets him with joy, calling him, “My dear brother!”

But there is a disturbance at the door. A messenger says to the clever man, “The devil is looking for you!” The skeptical clever man says, “There is no devil. It must be my biological brother.” He goes to investigate, and ends up trapped in the devil’s mud.

After three years, the simple man finds him and frees him, with the help of the local Ba’al Shem, the mystical healer. The simple man asks his clever friend, “Now have you learned something?”

This is a story about a simple man, but it’s not a simple story.

Do you know these characters?

Notice that the characters don’t have names. They are just called “clever” and “simple.” Maybe we aren’t supposed to think of them as people. Maybe they are parts of ourselves: the clever part and the simple part. Both characters speak inside us, and they take turns speaking the loudest.

One character is sharp-witted. His mind cuts things up into pieces. He uses ideas as barbs. He feels sharp edges cutting into him everywhere. He judges himself and others harshly. He piles up so many judgments, he can’t see through them to reality. He bedevils himself. He is stuck in mud.

The other character is simple. He loves easily. He is filled with gratitude. He learns well, if learning furthers a relationship. He has a generous lifelong friendship with the judgmental character, and is not affected by that character’s angst. He becomes close to the King – who, let’s face it, usually represents God in Jewish stories. He works in partnership with a healer.

Who will be your inner judge over these next nine days?

A clever, sharp-witted and negative character?

Or a simple, loving and healing character?

Every Rosh Hashanah until now, I’ve believed that the clever, sharp-witted character is supposed to be the judge. Isn’t that what judgment means? That I’m supposed to look critically at every behavior, every feeling, every angle until I get clarity? No wonder I get stuck in the metaphorical mud so often. No wonder I feel confused.

But when the heavens opened up at the #3 bus stop I saw that morality doesn’t have to be so complicated. A simple structure of love and respect might run through everything.

What will happen if I judge myself with love and gratitude, asking simply where I have fallen short in these departments?

Maybe this year, I will find out.

Dvar Torah presented at Rosh Hashanah 5774 (2013) at Or Shalom, Image: buboblog.blogspot.com