The advent of Passover and Easter, which always fall around the
same time, beckons a deeper discussion about one of the principle
differences between Judaism and Christianity. In essence it is the
difference between a values system based on struggle and a values system
based on perfection.

The reason there are no perfect people in
the Torah is that we don’t believe in perfect people and we do not
respect perfection. Do you know what the perfect person lacks that the
imperfect person has? An imperfect person fights to do what is right. He
struggles with his conscience. When you fight for something, you
demonstrate its worth.

Look at the contrast with every other belief system. Christianity is
predicated on perfection, on the idea that Jesus was tempted but never
fell. The same is true for Muslims and Mohammed. In Buddhism, the Buddha
is perfect. In Hindu, Krishna is perfect. Even in the pantheon of great
American heroes, our founding fathers were once portrayed as saints. I
remember being taught as a young boy that George Washington never told a
lie and that Abraham Lincoln walked miles to return a single penny.
Both these stories were pure invention, but the idea was: How could you
respect the founder of your nation if he was flawed?

Here in America we live under the tyranny of perfection. We are
constantly being sold glossy images of people with perfect bodies,
perfect résumés, and perfect lifestyles. Convincing people of their
inadequacy in relation to these paragons of physical, intellectual,
moral, and aesthetic perfection has always been a good racket, but never
more so than today.

It even seeps into our religious debates. The insinuation that Jesus was
lonely and required the love of a woman, as Dan Brown suggested in The
Da Vinci Code, deeply offended many of our Christian brothers and
sisters. When I debated Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, D.C.,
about the subsequent movie, he said that the film’s protestors should
remain calm but he could understand why people were upset. I said I
understood how the departure from New Testament orthodoxy was
provocative, but why was it deemed so hurtful? Dan Brown and the
moviemakers didn’t say anything bad about Jesus–they said only that he
got married! So what? If he were a young Jewish man growing up in the
Galilee region in ancient Israel, not only would he have been expected
to marry but it would have been sinful for him not to.

Why were Christians offended at the thought that Jesus married?
Because the idea suggests he felt something was missing in his life. In
short, he wasn’t perfect. As a perfect being, he required the love and
validation of no one. You and I? We get cold and need comfort and want
to be held. We feel dispirited, and we need someone to inspire us.

I am always impressed at the deep spirituality of my Christian brothers.
I am a rabbi with a deep love and awe for the incredible commitment to
goodness and faith that is so characteristic of my Christian colleagues.
But ultimately Christianity loses me when it dismisses the humanity of
Jesus in favor of his divinity. Jesus is so much more interesting when
we read of his struggles in the New Testament to fulfill the will of
G-d, like when he says, while dying on the cross, “My G-d, my G-d, why
have you forsaken me?” And I am always puzzled why my Christian brothers
and sisters seem disheartened to discover Jesus’s vulnerabilities.

Personally, I have no patience for perfect people. I find them
boring, predictable, and judgmental. It is human beings whose goodness
is real, yet purchased amid Herculean effort and struggle, whom I find
so endlessly fascinating.

Judaism doesn’t value perfection. I believe that perfect people are
sweet and nice but I have no relationship with them, nor would I seek
one. If they’re perfect, they don’t need me. It has been estimated that
in many marriages, the criticism-to-compliment ratio is three to one.
The argument troubled couples make is always essentially, “but my spouse
is so imperfect!” I counsel them to remember that if their spouse were
perfect, he or she would never have married in the first place. So why
not be thankful for our loved ones’ imperfections (as long as they take
responsibility for their actions and apologize sincerely when they’ve
done wrong)?

I am not a Christian not because I was born Jewish, because if
Christianity were true I would be obligated to convert. Rather,
perfection has no appeal for me. Perfect people do the right thing every
single time. How could they understand someone like me, for whom every
day is a struggle?

Being with perfect people is like watching a movie when you already
know the ending. You can’t thrill to perfect people’s victories because
they don’t involve real courage. Real courage means to be victorious
over fear. If you were never afraid, were your actions courageous? No.

People used to think Martin Luther King Jr. was a saint. He started
the civil rights movement when he was only twenty-four years old. He was
killed before his fortieth birthday. Of course, one thought, saint that
King was, he was able to lead those marches in Birmingham and in Selma
and inspire a whole generation. No wonder he was so incredibly eloquent
and courageous. He was perfect. But then we discovered that in fact he
was deeply human and did things that betrayed big character flaws.
Suddenly we saw him differently. In fact, his true greatness was thereby
manifest: He was flawed and frail and still he accomplished so much.
You mean he was scared in front of those attack dogs and Bull Connor? He
had to struggle to do those things? My G-d, that truly is a great man.

To me, that is so much more inspiring. King wrestled with his
conscience. Now he speaks to me, because I’m just like him. He was not
an angel, not a saint, just a person who struggled to live righteously
and courageously. And in so doing he changed America, dealt a fatal blow
to racial injustice, and restored the country to its founding creed of
all men being created equally by G-d. And he did all this not
intuitively or instinctively, but amid great effort and struggle. It was
never easy. But if he could do it and he was human like me, then I have
no excuse not to try to rise to similar acts of courage.

The truly righteous man is not he who never sins but rather he who,
amid a predilection to narcissism and selfishness, battles his nature to
live a virtuous life. The truly great man is not he who slays dragons,
but he who battles his inner demons, who struggles with himself to
improve and ennoble his character.

The truth is that perfection fosters dependency. It is an engine that
actually retards human progress, because it continually tosses humans
back on a sense of their own inadequacy. Rather than lift them up, it
keeps them down. That’s why kings used to claim they were perfect
beings, kissed by G-d and standing high above their lowly
subjects–because if you can convince people that they’ll never be as
good as you, they won’t even try. They will worship you and hate
themselves.
 
Those for whom life has been so sweet and smooth, those who refuse to
struggle, will never know the true taste of courage. They will never
develop the ability to overcome obstacles to do what is right. They will
never firmly establish that their convictions are not just feelings.
Struggle is where the infinite value of goodness is established.

The Zohar says that every single time you choose to subdue and
subjugate evil, G-d’s glory rises higher and higher. Every time you
exert the effort to choose righteousness over selfishness, you are
showing that righteousness is precious to you, that G-d is a living
presence, and that you are prepared to fight. Even when it’s
inconvenient. Even when it entails sacrifice. Struggle is what
establishes the infinite preciousness of righteousness.

Israel literally means “he who wrestles with G-d.” It was the name
given to Jacob, who wrestled with a brother who sought to kill him and a
father-in-law who sought to enslave him. Most of all, he wrestled with
an angel. Israel is he who wrestles with the G-dly portion of his
existence.

Most of what we cherish in life involves a struggle. I was a child of
divorce, so I was extremely excited to be married. I anticipated
perfection. Shortly after our wedding in Australia, I went out, a newly
married man, to buy a camera. And in the camera store I couldn’t help
but notice that the woman behind the counter was pretty. I was
mortified. This is ridiculous! I thought. What kind of husband am I? I
came home and confessed to my wife that I had noticed that another woman
was attractive. She laughed at my naïveté. But it still bothered me, so
I thought deeply into this. Why did G-d make love so imperfect? How do
we even notice the opposite sex when we are in love with our spouse? Why
is it that even in the best marriages we still recognize that other
people are special?

Now I understand why G-d made love imperfect. Relationships are
special when you choose each other anew every single day. Some think
marriage is when you choose your spouse under the chuppah–the canopy
used in Jewish weddings–and you’re done. Married! You never make that
choice again, and your choice becomes a thing of the past. The marriage
becomes stale and ossified, and the commitment is never renewed. But
because we all struggle to keep the passion and intimacy in our
marriages alive, because we struggle to compliment and love each other,
because we wrestle with our nature to always focus on each other, love
each other, and put each other first, we choose each other over and over
again, and that’s why love is imperfect. The man who chooses his bride
and never has to choose her again is one who takes her for granted, who
doesn’t seek to bring novelty to his relationship, who allows it to
stagnate. But if you forever renew your commitment and investment, your
goodness and your relationship never go stale.
 

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, a renowned TV and Radio host, is the
international best-selling author of 23 books. He is about to publish
Renewal: Living the Values-Filled Life (Basic Books). He is the founder
of This World: The Values Network. http://www.shmuley.com