Rabbi Heschel & Jesus: All People as Prophets & Spiritual Warriors

Yesterday, MLK Jr.’s feast day and holy day, we remembered him as the spiritual warrior he was, and we pray we all develop our call to the same vocation. 

Yesterday the nation also swore in a new president who, strangely and for the first time in 250 years, has proven himself to be above the law and, thanks to a thoroughly corrupt SCOTUS, has been declared above the law while acting as president.

It is going to take all the resilience and spiritual strength we can muster—thus spiritual warriorhood–to become a wise and worthy opposition whenever the policies of Project 2025 come forward.  

Policies whose very intention is to displace democracy with a government of the few and monied and therefore powerful—i.e. owning the media and social media, the courts and now unsupreme court, the largest corporations and lawmakers who guarantee that those who teach climate change is not real and the primary task of government is to cut taxes for billionaires and corporations and let everyday Americans pay for it. 

And also slash social security for the oldest among us, and education, and Medicaid, and Medicare, and other safety nets for the many.  And to erase the rights of women and minorities and immigrants.

In recent DMs, we have held up the importance and universality of the spiritual warrior archetype taught in indigenous traditions, Judaism,  Islam including Sufism, and Christianity as exemplified by MLK, Jr, Sister Dorothy Stang, and others. 

Jesus shares the Jewish lineage of the prophets and the poor were especially on his mind as it was theirs.  Rabbi Heschel says that what was uppermost in the prophets’ minds was injustice—the presence of oppression and corruption.  The urgency of justice was an urgency of aiding and saving the victims of oppression.  So says Rabbi Heschel, author of the iconic volume on The Prophets.

The prophet Isaiah speaks:

The Lord enters into judgment
with the elders and princes of his people:
‘It is you who have devoured the vineyard,
the spoil of the poor is in your houses.
What do you mean by crushing the people,
by grinding the face of the poor?’
So says the Lord of hosts.

Jesus invokes Isaiah in his first teachings recorded in Luke’s gospel. 

The spirit of the Lord has been given to me,
for he has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor,
to proclaim liberty to captives
and to the blind new sight
to set the downtrodden free,
to proclaim the Lord’s year of favor.  
Is 8.23-9.1.  Lk 4. 16-18.

Rabbi Heschel reminds us that all people are to be prophets: To do justice is what God demands of every person: It is the supreme commandment, and one that cannot be fulfilled vicariously.

Adapted from Matthew Fox, “Spiritual Warriorhood,” in Fox, One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Faith Traditions, pp. 411f.

See also Fox, Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.

And Fox, A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice.

And Fox, Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality, pp. 257-306.

And Fox, “Spiritual Warriors” in Fox, The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine, pp. 77-104.

And Fox, Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election.

Banner Image: “We Fight Back! Rally against Donald Trump at San Francisco’s Civic Center, January 19, 2025.” Photo by BuddyL on Flickr.

Queries for Contemplation

Do you accept the reality that you are called to be a prophet and spiritual warrior to stand up for justice in your own way and that this is a supreme commandment that cannot be fulfilled vicariously?

Recommended Reading

One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Global Faiths

Matthew Fox calls on all the world traditions for their wisdom and their inspiration in a work that is far more than a list of theological position papers but a new way to pray—to meditate in a global spiritual context on the wisdom all our traditions share. Fox chooses 18 themes that are foundational to any spirituality and demonstrates how all the world spiritual traditions offer wisdom about each.“Reading One River, Many Wells is like entering the rich silence of a masterfully directed retreat. As you read this text, you reflect, you pray, you embrace Divinity. Truly no words can fully express my respect and awe for this magnificent contribution to contemporary spirituality.” –Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit

Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth

Fox’s spirituality weds the healing and liberation found in North American Creation Spirituality and in South American Liberation Theology. Creation Spirituality challenges readers of every religious and political persuasion to unite in a new vision through which we learn to honor the earth and the people who inhabit it as the gift of a good and just Creator.
“A watershed theological work that offers a common ground for religious seekers and activists of all stripes.” — Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice.
“I am reading Liberating Gifts for the People of the Earth by Matt Fox.  He is one that fills my heart and mind for new life in spite of so much that is violent in our world.” ~ Sister Dorothy Stang.

A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice

In A Spirituality Named Compassion, Matthew Fox delivers a profound exploration of the meaning and practice of compassion. Establishing a spirituality for the future that promises personal, social, and global healing, Fox marries mysticism with social justice, leading the way toward a gentler and more ecological spirituality and an acceptance of our interdependence which is the substratum of all compassionate activity.
“Well worth our deepest consideration…Puts compassion into its proper focus after centuries of neglect.” –The Catholic Register

Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality

Matthew Fox lays out a whole new direction for Christianity—a direction that is in fact very ancient and very grounded in Jewish thinking (the fact that Jesus was a Jew is often neglected by Christian theology): the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality, the Vias Positiva, Negativa, Creativa and Transformativa in an extended and deeply developed way.
“Original Blessing makes available to the Christian world and to the human community a radical cure for all dark and derogatory views of the natural world wherever these may have originated.” –Thomas Berry, author, The Dream of the Earth; The Great Work; co-author, The Universe Story

The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine

To awaken what Fox calls “the sacred masculine,” he unearths ten metaphors, or archetypes, ranging from the Green Man, an ancient pagan symbol of our fundamental relationship with nature,  to the Spiritual Warrior….These timeless archetypes can inspire men to pursue their higher calling to connect to their deepest selves and to reinvent the world.
“Every man on this planet should read this book — not to mention every woman who wants to understand the struggles, often unconscious, that shape the men they know.” — Rabbi Michael Lerner, author of The Left Hand of God

Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election

Matthew Fox tells us that he had always shied away from using the term “Anti-Christ” because it was so often used to spread control and fear. However, given today’s rise of authoritarianism and forces of democracide, ecocide, and christofascism, he turns the tables in this book employing the archetype for the cause of justice, democracy, and a renewed Earth and humanity.
From the Foreword: If there was ever a time, a moment, for examining the archetype of the Antichrist, it is now…Read this book with an open mind. Good and evil are real forces in our world. ~~ Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Conversations with the Divine.
For immediate access to Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election, order the e-book with 10 full-color prints from Amazon HERE. 
To get a print-on-demand paperback copy with black & white images, order from Amazon HERE or IUniverse HERE. 
To receive a limited-edition, full-color paperback copy, order from MatthewFox.org HERE.
Order the audiobook HERE for immediate download.