In the verses of the Shema prayer, it is written: “and you will not be carried away after your heart and after your eyes ..”.
This injunction, taken from the Torah, clearly indicates to us that the gaze can affect and influence the heart, if we do not remain constantly and daily alert.
When the heart categorizes the other with the excuse given by the look alone, it is wrong.
The testimony of truth lies in listening. This is why the idea of Chema, which means listening, takes precedence over the gaze, which can only perceive the superficial surface of things.
The voice expresses the life that animates what we see.
The path of truth is the one that goes from the ears to the heart, not the one that goes from the eyes to the heart.
The eyes must learn to read, in order to match the subtle nuances of listening to the visual dimension.
Listening ranges from silence to whisper and recognition and the distinction between question and call.
The ascending order of the meaning for the Masters of the Torah evolves towards the Taamim, the sung notes which are not written but learned by heart, ie absorbed by pure listening.
However, the enhancement and the return to dignity in the space of human interaction, also occurs when the priority is given to listening, and that this takes precedence over appearances.
A society demonstrates its values, depending on whether or not visual appearances prevail over listening to the needs of its members.
It is not a battle between the different modes of perception.
The Chema prayer calls us to focus on our true ability to generate our own happiness, and that of others, by first strengthening our sense of inner hearing, which allows us to distinguish the right voice from the noise of thoughts. .
The risk of being fooled by the gaze exists at all times.
Defining beauty through exclusively optical plastic and visual referents cultivates both an absence and a distance, which quickly become cold.
The look is easily deceived by makeup, photographic rigging, or conjuring.
Listening is already being able to hear what speaks within ourselves.
It’s not just reacting, like a spring bounces off every stimulus and provocation to reaction.
We must first have our ears attentive to the needs around us, so as not to fall prey to the temptation of the judging gaze, which invites us to categorize the other and dehumanize him.
According to the verse from Chema Israel is a heart which has gigantic ears.
These ears must be able to sense all the nuances that the eyes cannot see.
According to the listening capacity of the heart, it takes more depth, and ends up including all the other voices: to be able to hear them, that is to say to understand them, and to value the unique place of each of them.
In the Torah verse the word Shema is written Shem Ayin, and the letter Ayin is written in upper case.
Ehad is written Ah Dalet and the letter Dalet is also written in upper case.
These two capital letters Ayin and Dalet together make up the word
Ed which means to testify.
This testimony goes beyond the selection of what we choose to hear, or what we close our ears to and prefer to play deaf.
The voices that we ignore, our hearts know them.
The alibi of the gaze is invalid as soon as the soul of the other manifests itself.
For the soul is a mirror, and by its revelation it is our own voice that we hear.
The eyes, the ears and the heart in Judaism
