Free The Long Shadow of Small Ghosts by Laura Tillman Page B

from is debatable, butJohn said he believed at the time that it was divinely sent. Regardless of whether the culpable influence was psychosis or a spiritual force, there was no contradicting intervention at the final moment. No angel of God was present to stop John’s actions. If any of us today were to kill his or her own child and attribute the imperative to do so to God, we would be labeled monsters of the most repulsive nature. The excuse of being commanded by God rings hollow, deceptive, or insane in a modern context.
    I was stuck in my own thoughts on John and Angela when the rabbi’s voice, rumbling with conviction, broke through.
    â€œYou say, ‘I would not do that.’ And you would be saying that you would not do what the source of all, the Creator of the world, God Almighty, told you to do,” Rabbi Robert Levy said.
    It can be difficult to conceptualize God’s direct intervention in our lives, where “what God says, as we’ve learned, is what happens,” as the woman at Good Neighbor told the group. We follow our own instincts, believing them to be our own. And we abide by the rules of society. These laws may be based on the codes of the Old Testament, forbidding us from killing or stealing, but if we break them, we will be punished concretely by a group of people who represent the modern rule of law.
    Levy explained that, in the story of Abraham and Isaac, components of the Torah that usually work in union—righteousness and compassion—are separated from one another, acting independently. Abraham is the righteous one, behaving like a good disciple by doing as he is told. God eschews righteousness by issuing a despicable directive, one that seems seeded in the most jealous and manipulative impulse (prove to me how much you love me by sacrificing what is most precious to you), but then sweeps in at the final moment, offering compassion. Levy told the congregation that it is up to us to look for the points where righteousness and compassion intersect, and that we must find balance in our lives between what is merely right and what is compassionate; we must be neither the bighearted rube acting on pure emotion, nor the coldhearted realist who uses the rule book as his only guide.
    When we dole out punishment to criminals, we usually begin with righteousness, as we apply the rule of law, and then, later, we might consider compassion. In capital cases, this plays out when defense attorneys present mitigating factors, reasons that the person on trial might be deserving of compassion and therefore be spared the harshest punishment—death—and instead serve life in prison. The guilt or innocence of the person is not addressed at this stage, but rather how much of our compassion he or she deserves.
    The binding of Isaac has been interpreted for centuries as a story with a lesson that we’re meant to learn, while the crime on East Tyler Street seems worthless as any sort of guide. Rather, it’s what crops up in the wake of the crime that summons tricky questions. How do we, as bystanders, react to an atrocity? Here, Levy’s sermon is germane. How do we become the best versions of ourselves when confronted with another person who exhibits the worst behavior within humanity? Letting righteousness or compassion guide us would be simple. We could let either impulse take us by the hand, leading us willingly toward uncomplicated forgiveness or vicious revenge. Putting the pair together simultaneously, while also weighing the rest of the ingredients of the event, is a vast and consuming task.
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    I walked to the building, a few blocks down East Tyler Street. It stood, menacing and comforting as ever, indifferent to my attentions. Here was Mount Moriah, the site of the slaughter. I walked a few doors down, toward the house where I’d met Miguel Angel. No car pulled up this time. No glamorous girl was walking toward the house, bringing her