Torah Thoughts
Ki Tissa: Exodus 30:11 – 34: 35
March 14, 2009  18 Adar 5769

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tissa, is all about the concept of “awe”, wonder. We read this week about two attempts to see G!d, to respond to some of the awesomeness of G!d. The people are in a major crisis. They have left everything they know, and their leader, Moses has disappeared. They have experienced incredible miracles and wonders in the desert, and really can’t figure the whole picture out. In the first attempt to see G!d, the people demand that Aaron fashion a golden calf for them, a physical form of the appearance of G!d, for them. Cows were holy in Egypt. That’s what they knew and were used to. These weren’t incredibly sophisticated people; we weren’t known for our smarts in those days. In the absence of the leader of the people for more time than they could handle, the people demanded a return to their old explanations of the world. They wanted a G!d they could see and an answer to their questions they could touch. They channeled their fears and their amazement at the wonder of the world into a tangible G!d they could relate to. Aaron even said regarding this golden calf: “this is your G!d who brought you out of the land of Egypt”.  Well, obviously, they knew better, since it couldn’t have been the G!d that brought them out of Egypt, yet they were desperate, feeling abandoned, hopeless.

Many of us can identify with acting irrationally because of desperation and abandonment. These former slaves were looking for help to come to them miraculously, in the depth of their abandonment. They find G!d in a fantasy, something that made them feel good for the moment, much the same way we might find ours – in addiction, craving and collecting stuff.

The second time there is a struggle with G!d’s image is when Moses asks G!d to allow him to “behold G!d’s presence”. It’s an odd request from a guy who has been sitting on a mountain for 40 days taking dictation from that very G!d. How can Moses ask such a thing?

What possible motivation could he have had, after spending all that time since the burning bush in G!d’s Presence to ask to “behold G!d’s Presence”? Of all people, Moses?! He saw G!d at the burning bush, worked with G!d through all of the plagues and negotiation with Pharaoh, relied on G!d at the Red Sea, and has just spent 40 days with G!d on Mount Sinai.  And it’s Moses who asks for such a thing? You have to look at this request and go “huh?” I understand completely why the former slaves made the same demand. I even understand them creating an image to fill in for their lack of image – in that Moses must have symbolized for them the Presence of G!d. For Moses to ask roughly the same thing in the same Torah portion is more than coincidence.

G!d’s answer is even stranger: Moses can see G!d’s Presence, but only the back of G!d, whatever that might be. G!d puts Moses into a hollow place on a cliff, covers Moses’ eyes with G!d’s hand, passes before Moses and then lifts G!d’s hand off Moses’ eyes, and Moses sees G!d’s back.

On the one hand, I’m impressed with the incredible intimacy of this experience. G!d in physical contact, somehow, with Moses. Moses seeing, somehow, that which none of us get to see. What does G!d’s back look like? How can a being with no body or corporeal image have a back? Perhaps Moses is shown that even at the amazing moment of having been in contact with the Holy One for so long, he cannot see G!d directly. He can only see G!d’s Presence in the past tense, where G!d has been. At that moment of seeing where G!d had been, he was as close as he ever could be to G!d.

So, too, with us. G!d’s Presence touched us personally and has touched the world. When we are filled with awe and wonder, when we find the places where G!d has been, we are as close as we can be to G!d. We see G!d in the past tense, most of the time.

Elijah the prophet told of how he experienced the Presence of G!d: The Holy One passed by. There was a great and mighty wind, splitting mountains and shattering rock by the power of G!d; but the Holy One was not in the wind. After the wind – an earthquake; but The Holy One was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake, fire; but the Holy One was not in the fire. And after the fire, a thin voice of silence.

G!d is not in the big deals, the high places, the “special effects”, but rather is present in the voices of silence, touching hearts, shaping souls. According to Rabbi David Wolpe, “G!d does not reach down to remove tumors. But G!d grants courage, helps us to hope, strengthens our souls, and stiffens our spine. G!d helps community cohere. In the stillness and isolation of illness, we can hear G!d’s voice of silence speak to us, and through us.”

We do G!d’s work with our own hands. We are the vehicles through which G!d’s Presence is experienced on earth, even if it’s in a still small voice, even if it’s just from the back, just in hindsight. We do that work not only as individuals, but also as a community. Not just one at a time, but together. We came out of Egypt as a community; we struggled through the desert as a community, we built a golden calf as a community, and we learn as a community to stand together to do G!d’s work, with our own hands.

G!d moments abound, but we’re most aware of them in the past tense. May we learn to experience the Holy One’s Presence in our own lives, to see that Presence both in our personal and communal past, but also right here, right now.

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Mishpatim  Exodus 21:1 – 24:18
February 21, 2009   27 Shvat 5769

Last week we read the Ten Commandments. Everything in the Torah led to this incredible moment – our people standing at the foot of Mount Sinai, feeling the ground tremble beneath the Presence of the Holy One. Our people stood and freaked out as they heard the words of G!d not in the thunder, or in the blaring of the shofarot (rams horns) or in the pounding of their own heartbeats. They heard G!d’s voice telling them the Ten Commandments in a whisper, directly into each and every person’s own ears. G!d’s voice was the sound of almost hearing, as personal as a whisper. What an incredible moment!

That personal whisper into each person’s ears is the closest,  the most intimate, extreme, spiritual, and climactic moment of the Torah. How do you follow that most amazing of experiences? Although the words of the Ten Commandments are repeated, the experience was exclusive, once and only once. And it begs the question, “now what?” Where do we go from here? The rabbis didn’t want the Ten Commandments to be holier or more significant than all of our other mitzvot, to be the only rules people might observe. All of the Torah is holy, and all of the mitzvot are important.

We can find the rationale for this approach in this week’s Torah portion, Mishpatim, which seems to be a completely different experience. We have a compendium of about 50 laws. We have the judicial rules for how to handle and free our slaves and our enemies, manslaughter, kidnapping, insults, goring oxen, damage to livestock and to crops, arson, loans. We have rules for sorcery and for idolatry, and proper care for the needy, widowed and orphaned. This list is far from exhaustive. So, this week we go from our most holy moment at Sinai to what seems like a random list of rules.

But it’s more than just a list. It’s the details. This week we see how we can go from the most significant event in our lives to living every day – by taking care of the details. We see that there’s a message here in moving from the BIG issues to the almost mundane ideas of how we are supposed to behave towards one another. We elevate the mundane into something sacred. That’s not foreign to us at all as Jews. We’re used to taking the simplest acts – eating, drinking, seeing beautiful or ugly things, even going to the bathroom – as opportunities for praising, acknowledging or blessing G!d, ways to see the holy in our daily lives. We have blessings to help us see how holy the ordinary can be.

Sometimes we forget the importance and significance of the small stuff, the simple acts that might make real differences to others. Sometimes we miss the holiness in our own lives. We get so caught up in our routines that we forget that our time is holy, our acts can be holy, our lives can be filled with the spirit of G!d. The minutiae of this week’s Torah portion is a reminder that after the miracle of Sinai we have to pick up our stuff in the morning and go back to our daily lives, and what we do now is even more important, after Sinai, even if it doesn’t feel that way at first.

According to Rabbi Shraga Simmons, Maimonides explains this metaphorically as follows: “Imagine you’re lost at night, trudging knee-deep in mud through dark and vicious rainstorm. Suddenly a single flash of lightning appears, illuminating the road ahead. It is the only light you may see for miles. This single flash must guide you on through the night. So too, says Maimonides, one burst of inspiration may have to last for years.”

We fill our minds with Sinai, with the miraculous moment, as a light to guide us through the rest of our experiences. The peak moments are supposed to do that for us, to enable us to go on through the proverbial mud we find ourselves mired in. We can appreciate the light, the guidance, the flashes of insight we might get from the special moment, and we can  turn our minds back to those moments to guide us and to bring us hope and courage when we need them most. All of us have those special moments that we cherish that have the power, in their recalling and retelling, to transform and guide us on our personal journeys.

May it be Your will, Holy One of Blessing, that we take the moments to find holiness in our day-to-day life, and to be aware of our blessings daily. May we find inspiration for today, and dreams for tomorrow, as we recall the most special moments in our lives. May the special moments help us get through our darkest hours.  May the flash of Your light guide us on our journeys through life.

Torah Thoughts
Parshat B’shelah Exodus 13:17 – 17:14
February 7, 2009       13 Shvat, 5769

When we look at history, we often look at it from our current, modern perspective. We think about it in our own terms, so we sometimes misunderstand why things happen the way they did. Our perspective has all kinds of anachronisms; we impose our values and beliefs on an earlier age, assuming that they should have lived by how we see things today.

It’s an interesting problem. When we look at Biblical narratives, we see them through our lenses. I did it a few weeks ago in a Torah Thought. I mentioned that Jacob, on his way home from exile in the Old Country, was worried about the reunion with his family. I said that you would be worried too, if you hadn’t sent an email or called your mother in 21 years, like Jacob had done. I was hoping to be funny with that line, and assumed everyone reading it would smile at the thought of Jacob calling his mother. I also made the assumption that the classic image of a Jewish mother applies to mothers in Biblical times. (A Yiddishe Mama in the Bible would make no sense, since Yiddish itself was not invented until the Middles Ages. Mothers have been around a lot longer.)

In this week’s Torah portion, B’shelah the people of Israel get to the Sea of Reeds, with the Egyptian army hot on their trail. They cross the Sea on dry land and the walls of the Sea come crashing down on the Egyptians, their horses, and chariots. The Israelites throw a big party for their miraculous rescue. Even though they have no idea of where they are headed, they know they have been rescued by miracle.

Whenever we talk about this miracle, or the 10th plague, death of the first-born, there are always feelings of compassion for the Egyptians. When we recite the Ten Plagues at a Passover seder, we remove a drop of wine from our glasses to diminish some of our celebration of the Exodus from Egypt, recognizing that other people suffered in the course of our miracles.

But my compassion for the Egyptians is limited. I’m sorry it took such strong measures to get Pharaoh to throw us out of Egypt. But even after the death of the first-born, Pharaoh goes with his troops to pursue the people he just threw out, only to find a watery death in the Sea of Reeds.  It was his recalcitrance, his repeated changes of heart, which led to the ever-increasing devastation by means of the plagues.

Now here’s the problem: why should the people of Egypt suffer because their leader is stubborn? It’s not like they voted for him, or had any choice about living under his dominion. Why should all Egyptian families have to suffer for the deeds of their imperial ruler?

These things scream at our modern sensibility. We look at the plagues and say that Moses should have negotiated a peaceful end to the dispute with Pharaoh. We repudiate violence of any kind, and prefer peaceful negotiation over all else. We look at the disaster of the death of the first-born and we consider it to be contrary to the Geneva Convention. The Egyptians’ human rights were violated. And we look at the theology of a G!d who would do such atrocities. (Of course, by now we have forgotten the atrocities of Sodom and Gemorrah, and the allegorical generation of the flood.) But what kind of G!d is this that we worship, Who is so cruel to innocent people?

Bill Clinton would have looked at the last sentence and asked what the definition of is “is”.  Is the Biblical G!d the same G!d as we worship today? Or is it possible that as humanity has changed, our perceptions and understandings of G!d have also changed? We see G!d as relating differently with us today – no one is expecting G!d to repeat the miraculous experiences of the Exodus from Egypt. This was a one-time event to be a reminder through all of history of the incredible power of G!d. Can we see G!d as having intervened in ways which are objectionable to our modern point of view and yet also recognize that they were necessary, and appropriate, for their times?

Biblical texts are of their own time and place. My guess is that in Biblical times negotiation of a dispute might happen, but it was more likely that war would settle disputes. After all, there are plenty of battles in the Bible. While negotiations happen, they usually are to create alliances with other people to battle a common enemy together.   It also would seem likely that the person who attempted to negotiate instead of bearing arms would be perceived as a wimp, and could be easily dispatched. The strange part of the story of Pharaoh and Moses is not that they didn’t negotiate a peaceful resolution to the conflict, but rather that Pharaoh didn’t kill Moses and Aaron anywhere in the process, as would have been normal for him to have done.

In Biblical times, there was no democracy, and the suffering of the ruler’s people, in the name of that ruler, was common, even, some might say, “honorable”. It’s contrary to our sensitivities, but we weren’t around in Biblical times. We would never have survived with our current values in Biblical times! The G!d in the Biblical narrative is described in terms understood by the people of those times, and it is our job to understand that G!d differently. Just as we are not as barbaric as our ancestors, our concept of G!d doesn’t have to be as barbaric either. We are different; we can relate to different aspects of G!d.

May it be Your will Holy One of Blessing, that we find the paths to greater understanding. May we remember whence we came, and that our future is influenced by our past, but not a reflection of it. As we value our progress, may we be blessed with the ability to progress theologically a well.

Shabbat Shalom!

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Bo  Exodus 10:1 – 13:16
January 31, 2009          6 Shevat, 5769

I’ll admit it. I am stubborn.  At times, I am very stubborn. Sometimes being stubborn is a problem. Sometimes, it’s a virtue. When we look at it as a problem, stubbornness is about being obstinate, rigid, headstrong, stiff, unyielding. When we see it as a virtue, it’s about being dedicated, sure, unwavering, certain. When a person absolutely sticks to his/her plan and achieves a goal, we call that fortitude, or stick-to-it-iveness, persistence, determination, dedication. When we disagree with that dedicated, determined person, then the determined person often is perceived as stubborn.

A judge who is determined that a law is very clear is considered to be fair and honest, except by the people trying to persuade that judge of different perspectives. A doctor who has perfected a medical procedure, and sticks to it because it works well for his/her patients is considered an expert. Until, of course, new procedures s/he doesn’t use because they are not his/her way. A teacher who knows the facts, has studied and knows answers to the questions his/her curriculum raises is considered to be a master. But when others disagree with this person’s interpretation of reality, s/he is seen as obstinate, unyielding.

In many ways, I really don’t think I’m all that much more stubborn than most other people. It’s just when other people disagree with me, and I know I’m right, I stick to my guns. My guess is most people stick to who they are, what they believe, and are rarely all that ready, willing or able to move their positions and opinions on just about anything. That’s one of the reasons why New Years resolutions often don’t work or why every year we come together on Yom Kippur and confess exactly the same sins as the previous year. We cheated, we gossiped, we were miserly, we hurt other people last year, and my guess is that it doesn’t change all that much after Yom Kippur.  The optimists among us say that people can and do change; their counterparts say “nah, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

Sometimes we get stuck in places that could change if only we would let them. Illness, depression, addictions, enslaving habits can all be expressions of how we hold on to that which maybe we could be better off without. Maybe if we let go of what holds us back, we could change, grow, and experience the world, and our lives, in completely different ways.

If we look at our practice of Judaism, (or if you’re not Jewish, your religion) we can also see how this intractability is reflected. Think about it. Can you define what Judaism is all about, for you? What does it mean to be Jewish? How is your Judaism reflected in your life? How have you changed and developed in your religious practice in the last years?
Have you come to different understandings this year? Have studied a Jewish text this year, or read a Jewish, non-fiction book, or expanded your experience and practice of Judaism in any way in the past months?

In our congregations, sometimes we don’t explore why we do things the same way, year after year, or don’t explore how our traditions change and grow to include new traditions. We get so stubborn that there is a “tradition” that we forget the tradition is supposed to be creative, growing, flowing and moving – that the tradition can be more an act of stubbornness than an act of faith.

For those of you who are now wondering, yes, there is a connection with this theme and this week’s Torah portion, Bo. Remember we left off last week with two very stubborn men – Moses and Pharaoh, both locked in a battle of their own commitments. Seven plagues took place last week, and this week we read about the last three.  Many of us get very concerned by the fact that in these plagues G!d hardens Pharaoh’s heart, G!d makes him refuse to let the people go.

Why would G!d take away Pharaoh’s choice? Because Pharaoh has done it all along – it was his nature – to give up, realize the error of his ways, and to return to his normal behavior, which was to never give up. Pharaoh had lost his ability to change; in hardening his heart G!d was simply keeping Pharaoh doing what was natural for him.

It’s natural for us, as well. Human nature determines that we are going to just be that way.  The challenge, which I think is G!d’s message in the story, is to figure out ways to go against our very nature, to break the habits, to shed our stubbornness, to move beyond that which is usual and normal for each of us, and to be open to the ever-expanding wealth of our own potential.

May it be Your will, Holy One our G!d, that we find ways to defrost our hearts and our minds, our souls and our spirits, so that we can be less stubborn and more open to that which is different. May You lead us to find new ways of experiencing Your presence here with us, and may we continue to strive to attain our potential for change.

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Va-era Exodus 6:2 – 9:35
January 24, 2009 28 Tevet 5769

A few months ago, we studied the three distinct Creation stories in the Bible – the story of the seven days of creation, the story of Adam and Eve, and the Noah story. Jewish tradition has always looked at these stories with the understanding that they are about theology, not science or history, but attempts to understand our relationships with G!d and the universe.

This week, we continue reading about the Exodus from Egypt – the Ten Plagues which G!d used to attain the liberation of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt. But many people have asked recently, do we believe the story of the Ten Plagues or the Crossing of the Red Sea are historically accurate; can they be scientifically proven? Is the Exodus from Egypt an allegory, just like the creation stories? Indeed, there have been assertions recently that because there is a lack of archeological evidence proving the Exodus, it never happened.

The problem for me is one of belief. Do I really need to have proof to believe in something? Quite the contrary: it seems to me that if I have proof, I don’t need to believe. Does belief imply a foolish lack of care with regard to veracity of the belief: is belief blind? Is it naïve to believe in the miraculous experience of the Ten Plagues, and the parting of the Red Sea, and to think that miracles could happen in other ways at other times? What do I really expect the Biblical text to tell me about humanity, G!d, and our relationship with G!d if I can’t rely on it to be historically accurate or archeologically verifiable? Does it make a difference if I believe in G!d, but not that G!d could do, or did, the miracles associated with the Exodus from Egypt?

The Exodus is the # 1 most important event in our history as Jews. We relate just about everything to it. We were slaves in Egypt; we were strangers in a strange land; we know what oppression is; we know what miraculous liberation is. As a result of the Exodus from Egypt, we are unified as a people, and become the people who struggle with G!d and the Book we received, which we could only receive as a result of leaving Egypt. We are reminded that G!d brought us out of the land of Egypt to be our G!d, to give us the mitzvot, (acts of commandment which are to our benefit to do), to make us people who connect with G!d through Jewish tradition. Because G!d brought us out of Egypt, we are supposed to honor our parents, remember and observe the Shabbat, not murder or kidnap, and recognize the validity of all of the other rules by which we are supposed to live. Everything we do as Jews is based on this unique experience of G!d being involved in this one-time, never repeated, event.

What was the purpose of the Ten Plagues? Some people will say they were to convince Pharaoh to let our people go. But that doesn’t make sense. If G!d wanted to get Pharaoh to do something, anything, all G!d would have to do is zap Pharaoh. Pharaoh can’t possibly be the goal. Was it the Egyptians, then? Once again, that’s not likely. The purpose of the plagues was to enable the entire people of Israel to understand and see a connection to a powerful, caring and involved G!d. The plagues were not about Pharaoh or the Egyptians; they are about us and G!d, Revelation of G!d. Our ancestors, living in Goshen had not had any contact with G!d for nearly 400 years, since the time of Joseph – no phone calls, emails, letters, nothing. They didn’t know from G!d. The Ten Plagues were a crash course introducing G!d, our G!d, not the Egyptian Pharaoh, who thought he was god, to our people and to us.
We are supposed to see ourselves as if we personally left Egypt, as if we personally experienced these miracles, so that we can and will see G!d involved in our lives, and caring and about us. That’s really hard to do at the same time as we deny that it happened!

The burning question remains: did it happen? Or did something happen, but not what we have described in the Bible? Or, if something did happen, why is there no proof? I believe the proof is in the question – in the fact that 4,000 or so years later we’re still arguing about it. No matter how I answer this question, there will be other people with lots of other approaches to understanding what it means to consider this unique example of G!d’s intervention in the world. I believe it happened not because there is archeological or historical or scientific evidence of it, but because there is religious evidence: we are here and our religion is derived from this experience of leaving Egypt. This experience is how I know G!d, how G!d was revealed to me, when I left Egyptian bondage. The basis for everything else I do as a Jew is traceable to this introduction of G!d to our people.

There is a connection between the allegories of creation and the Ten Plagues. All are stories of miraculous involvement of G!d in the world. But the Exodus from Egypt goes beyond story, beyond allegory, right to the heart of what we believe we are and what we are supposed to do being who we are.

May it be Your will, Holy One of Blessing, to enable us to see your involvement in our own lives and the lives of all humanity. May we be blessed with the courage to believe that which can’t be proven, and the confidence to live our lives in accordance with our beliefs. May we see ourselves as if we personally struggled with slavery in Egypt, and learn from that experience to trust in Your compassion to lead us from our own personal darkness into the light. As You were there for us in our worst of times as a people, so may You also be there for each of us in our darkest hours.

Torah Thoughts

Genesis 44:18 – 47:27   Parshat Va-yigash

January 3, 2009   7 Tevet 5769

As we near the end of the book of Genesis, b’raysheet, I have been looking at the promises. G!d promises make to Abraham into a great nation, that all other nations will see Abraham and his descendents as blessings. The rest of the Torah is about the fulfillment of this promise. I always saw this end of the Book of Genesis as sort of a stopping point. There’s a kind of break in the story. We go from having a family focus to a focus on the nation. But the family foretells the promise for the nation.

In this week’s Torah portion, Joseph and his brothers reconcile. He reveals his identity, which he had hidden from them when they came to him looking for supplies during a famine in Israel. He tried to figure out what to do with these brothers who attempted to kill him, who sold him into slavery. Despite the hardships of his first years as a prisoner and as a slave, Joseph is now a major big shot in the land of Egypt. In this week’s Torah portion, he is The Man to see if you wanted to survive the famine in Egypt. Joseph sees his dreams fulfilled: his brothers all come to him and bow to him, and his father, Jacob, finally comes to the place where he is in power.

The process is interesting: Joseph’s dreams are fulfilled through major, significant struggle. His life after being sold into slavery was not easy, we can be sure. Yet he lives to see his dearest dreams fulfilled. The process, the journey leading to redemption, seems to be a major theme with his father as well. Jacob is repeatedly dreaming, hearing blessings, yet they seem to go unfulfilled for a long time. When Jacob left his parents’ home after tricking his father and brother, he met up with G!d in a dream (remember the ladder?). At that time, G!d promised, “All the families of the earth will bless themselves by you and your descendents. Remember, I am with you; I will protect you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land.” (It’s similar to the blessing Abraham received, but Abraham didn’t get the blessing in dreams.)

Then after 20 years, when Jacob finally gets out of servitude to Laban with his wives and his kids, he wrestles with an angel, again in a dream, and is blessed again on his journey. In this blessing, Jacob’s offspring will include kings and the land of Canaan for his descendents. Now, in this week’s Torah portion, Jacob leaves the land of Canaan with a blessing from G!d saying, “Fear not to go down to Egypt, for I will make you there into a great nation. I Myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I Myself will bring you back.”

So we have this sequence of blessings in Jacob’s life, from leaving Canaan to coming back and then leaving once again, all with the promise that the descendents will inherit the land, that a great nation would come to occupy it. They are very strong blessings, the kind of blessing that leave little doubt that they will be fulfilled. G!d is very convincing in this series.

Yet, if we look at the process between the blessings, there seems to be a parallel in the experiences of Joseph: it doesn’t come easy. Jacob worked for 20 years to just get out of the clutches of Laban. The promise for Jacob was after wrestling with the angel was for the distant future. And now again, with Joseph, we read of a promise that foretells that there will be tremendous upheaval before its fulfillment. For some reason (and let’s face it, we all know the story) G!d will have to personally intervene to bring the people back from Egypt. Here the parallel with Joseph is even clearer: he goes to Egypt and becomes a slave. Jacob leads the family to Egypt, and they become slaves.

The process of fulfillment of the blessings is not an easy one. Why did Joseph have to suffer on his way to becoming a big shot? Why did Jacob have to go through all the struggles with Laban in order to come back home with his family? Why do his descendents have to go through slavery in order for G!d to bring them out personally? Wouldn’t it have been better for Joseph or Jacob, or our people, to just get what was promised?

Even in the Bible, when G!d is actively intervening, there is a sense of partnership. People have to do their part, and that may involve struggle, challenge, failure, and hardship. In some ways, we become better people for it. Jacob seems to have mellowed, learned to be more fair and reasonable, through his challenges. Joseph was a conceited brat as a kid, and now has clearly grown up and became a real “mensch”,  a good guy, through his struggles. The people of Israel, through their journey from slavery to freedom, seem to learn nationhood in relationship with G!d.

The journey is the journey. It’s the important part; it’s where we grow and become better people. Fulfilling the blessing without personal growth would be easy, but meaningless. Many of us would have preferred a different experience, a different journey than one filled with difficulty, pain or loss, as I’m sure both Jacob and Joseph would have. But we don’t get that. All we seem to get is awareness that G!d is with us. So no matter what the journey, we really have nothing to fear. We are not promised a life without challenges or struggles; we are promised that we may be able to find meaning, healing and hope in our personal journeys.

May it be Your Will, Holy One of Blessing, to help us to find the fulfillment of our own dreams, yet to find comfort on our difficult journeys to that fulfillment. Help us to rid our lives of resentments, hatred, enslaving habits, illness and fear that are the prisons of our own existence. May we see our lives as the fulfillment of Your promise to our ancestors.

Torah Thoughts
Vayishlah  Genesis 37:1 – 40:23
16 Kislev 5769            December 13, 2008

Have you ever been frightened of the repercussions of something you did?  Really, really scared that something you did would lead to total disaster for you; not immediate disaster, but one at a much later time? What was it? What were the potential consequences you were so afraid of?

In this week’s Torah portion, Jacob is scared beyond belief at the prospect of returning home to his parents’ house more than 20 years after he left. He’s scared because last he heard, his father Isaac was dying, his twin Esau was ready to kill him, and just about everyone was angry at him for tricking Isaac into blessing the “wrong” son. He hasn’t written, not a phone call, no e-mail, nothing. If you went back to your mother after all that time not calling, you’d be scared, too!

But Jacob left Canaan and the family with absolutely nothing. He’s coming back in this week’s Torah portion with flocks and herds, money, and most importantly, with family of his own: 2 wives, 2 concubines, 11 sons, Dinah and any other unmentioned daughters.  The consequences of his actions all those years ago could wipe out everything that was important to him now, everyone he loved. If you faced such circumstances, you’d panic too!

So with all this fear, panic and worry on his mind, Jacob sends his family ahead of him, sends all of his possessions ahead of him, and he is left alone, just like when he started. Alone, Jacob wrestles with a man (or a messenger from G!d) until nearly daybreak. Jacob struggles with this stranger, until the stranger wrenches Jacob’s hip almost out of its socket, and Jacob still doesn’t let him go. He holds onto the messenger, who is causing him intense pain, and Jacob demands a blessing from him. Jacob’s name is changed to Israel, because he wrestled with a divine being. (Israel means wrestles/struggles with G!d.)

Who is this stranger? Is it an angel? Is it G!d? Is it a devil? One thing is certain: it can’t survive in the day light. All of us struggle with our own demons, many of us at night. Yet even when we are struggling with demons, many of us are like Jacob, we hold right on to the very things with which we are struggling. We hold on to the anger, the fear, the resentments that we know plague us and give us no rest. We hold on to that which we should probably let go.

Maybe the lesson is to find a way to turn the struggle we’re holding into a blessing for us, to find the blessing within the struggle. We need to know that something good will come out of the struggle, just like the blessing Jacob receives. The key to letting go of our fears, to letting go of the struggles, can be found in the blessings hidden within. Jacob’s blessing is in finally coming to a personal relationship with G!d, finally getting to know, experience and relate to his own G!d.

When Jacob set out on his journey, lo those many years ago, he had a dream on the road in which he saw a ladder with angels or messengers going up and down the ladder. In that dream, G!d spoke as “the G!d of Abraham and the G!d of Isaac.” But the text in that story didn’t mention “the G!d of Jacob.” When Jacob woke up from that dream he said, “G!d was in this place and I, I did not know it.”  What does that mean? It could mean he didn’t know G!d was there, or it could mean he didn’t know G!d, not in any meaningful way.

Now, after all these years, when Jacob finally heads home, realizing he has to reconcile with his brother Esau, Jacob has this second strange experience while he is just as alone as he was before. After holding onto the messenger, and demanding the blessing, Jacob  says “I have seen G!d face to face, and my life is preserved.” As a result of this encounter, he now has a relationship with his own G!d. Later, he meets up with and reconciles with his brother. He builds an altar and calls it “El-Elohay Yisrael,” the G!d of Israel. Finally, G!d is not just the G!d of grandfather and father, but also the G!d of Israel, Jacob. The struggle through which he has gone led him to the blessing of finding his connection to G!d, his personal relationship with G!d. He has overcome his fears, wrenched blessings from them, and in the process, he has found G!d, holiness, redemption, hope. Perhaps that relationship with G!d is what led him to be able to face the thing he feared the most.

May it be Your will, Holy One, that as we struggle with and overcome our own fears and demons, we wrestle the blessings out of the struggle. May we follow in Jacob’s example, finding and receiving the blessings brought by the liberation from our own demons, and may we come to see Your Presence, right here with us, as we struggle through the journeys of our lives.

Torah Thoughts
Hanukkah
December 21, 2008      25 Kislev, 5769

This time of year is one of major conflict for me. I don’t like having to defend Jewish tradition. I don’t like having to say that Hanukkah is not a big deal holiday and that we have to resist the temptation of our society’s to turn it into the Jewish American Christmas.  This has always been my least favorite time of the year. I’m on the defensive no matter what I say. If I say it’s ok to celebrate the secular festival of American consumerism, I am putting down Christmas. If I say that it’s not very Jewish to celebrate the season with all the gifts and decorations of Christmas, I’m taking away all the fun of the party.

But I heard a story a while ago that I find really useful for framing my discomfort and the resolution of it. It took a couple of years to come to terms with the story.   Here’s how it goes:

This old guy is about to die.  He is very uncomfortable about his impending death, worried about what will happen to the Jewish people. He goes to his rabbi. He complains bitterly of his worry and his need to hang on to life until or unless he can see that the future of the Jewish people is secure. In his magical wisdom, the rabbi brings him to the eighth year of the second Christian millennium, to the last month, and here he sees the Jewish people making a huge deal out of Hanukkah, an admittedly minor, insignificant holiday. He sees children getting gifts every day, celebrating with great joy this very minor holiday.  He hears incredibly insipid songs dedicated to spinning tops and potato pancakes, can’t figure out their meaning, but at least he recognizes the happiness and warmth of the songs.

Finally, after taking in this spectacle, he says to the rabbi, “If this is how they celebrate such a little holiday like Hanukkah, I can rest assured. Think how they must be observing the important holidays, like Sukkot and Shavuot, or even Shabbat!”

Many other rabbis who tell this story go on to lament what they see as the irony of this story – that we have lost sight of our authentic Jewish holidays and have focused a lot on a minor holiday. I differ with them here, and I base that difference on the very story of Hanukkah. Hanukkah celebrates a military victory that has little or no spiritual or religious value. The historical accounts of Hanukkah do not include the story with the cruse of oil lasting for 8 days. That story was attached to it much later, in Talmudic times, around 400 years after the battle was won but the war was lost. In other words, our ancestors saw miracles in the story in which G!d was not at all Self-evident, attributing the military victory to G!d. They then further added G!d into the Hanukkah story, making it a spiritual event, with the device of the “miracle” of the oil.

G!d doesn’t appear in burning bushes, in splitting seas or earthquakes, thunder or lightning in the Hanukkah story. In fact, G!d isn’t even mentioned much. The Maccabees are praised for their bravery in winning the battle, and there is a sense of awe attached to the legend of the oil, but I don’t remember anyone saying it was G!d’s direct hand that kept the oil burning for the 8 days, just a very strange experience, a miracle.  That G!d doesn’t appear in the story, doesn’t mean that G!d is not there, just that it’s our job to understand that G!d can be in the little things, in the unbelievable victory of the small over the mighty, in legends of rededication that we tell ourselves in order to sense the closeness of G!d in the less than spectacular.   The rabbis turned to the legend of the oil when memory of the military victory was fading, when they were oppressed, lost, down and out, and needed to find G!d, to find miracles, to find holiness in what they had left.

That’s a Hanukkah lesson I am comfortable with: that G!d is present to us, in the miracles of our daily lives, if we see G!d in the smaller, non-spectacular stories of our own lives and our times. Recognizing when we need to turn to G!d, and finding the Holy One right there with us, as we struggle with our own battles and our own losses. Hanukkah is a way of rededicating ourselves to seeing the light of G!d where G!d’s Presence may be most needed, most welcome, most missed. Hanukkah is a reminder that G!d’s light in our own lives is the miracle, and it lasts way more than 8 days!

So, in thinking about it, I’m not all that disturbed by that which other rabbis might find lamentable – that in our society we have elevated a minor holiday into major proportions. It means we’re still a dynamic religion, still growing, developing and changing. It means that the Judaism we celebrate today continues to have creative energy. May we learn, as our ancestors did, to infuse that creative energy with G!d’s Holy Presence, making more obvious to us the miracles of G!d in our own lives each and every day. May the candles we light this Hanukkah remind us that the light from G!d will never diminish, and may we enjoy the glow way after Hanukkah is over.

Happy Hanukkah.

Torah Thoughts
Genesis 28:10 – 32:3   Parshat Va-yetze
December 6, 2008   9 Kislev, 5769

Remember the V-8 commercials? When the guy in the ad would slap his head and say, “Wow, I cudda had a V-8.” This week’s Torah portion always reminds me of that commercial. Jacob, on his escape route, running away from a tricked father and way-too-angry brother, camps out for a night. He has a weird dream in which he sees angels going up and down a ladder. He hears a blessing from G!d, and when he wakes up from his dream, he slaps his head (well, I see him as doing that, the text doesn’t say so) and he says: “G!d was in this place and I, i didn’t know it.”  (See Rabbi Lawrence Kushner’s book with the same words as the title for an explanation of the double “i”. )

Lots of us have had that kind of experience. We think a place or an experience is going to be just the usual kind of thing, and then all of a sudden we realize after it is over that it was special, awesome, strange, amazing. We most often see the places where G!d has been. We read and talk about our desire to see God, to respond to some of the awesome nature of our existence, thinking that somehow “seeing is believing”. Many of us ask for and await “a sign” of G!d in our lives, some remarkable, unexplainable feat to convince of us beyond any doubt of G!d’s existence.

Even Moses, our most famous teacher and prophet, asks G!d to allow him to “behold G!d’s Presence”. It’s an odd request from a guy who has been sitting on a mountain for 40 days taking dictation from that very God. But G!d’s answer is even stranger: G!d will allow Moses to see G!d’s Presence, but not G!d’s face, only the back of God, whatever that might be.

Moses is shown that he cannot see G!d directly. He can only see G!d’s Presence in the past tense, where G!d has been. So too, with us. We also are allowed to see G!d in the past tense – where G!d’s Presence has touched us personally and has touched the world. When we are filled with awe and wonder at the world, when we find the places where G!d has been, we are as close as we can be to G!d. That’s what Jacob experiences in this week’s Torah portion.

In another Biblical “wow” moment, Elijah the prophet told of how he experienced the Presence of G!d: The Holy One passed by. There was a great and mighty wind, splitting mountains and shattering rock by the power of G!d; but the Holy One was not in the wind. After the wind – an earthquake; but G!d was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake, fire; but the Holy One was not in the fire. And after the fire, a thin voice of silence.”

G!d is not only in the big deals, the high places, the “special effects”, but rather is present in the voices of silence, touching hearts, shaping souls. According to Rabbi David Wolpe, “G!d does not reach down to remove tumors. But G!d grants courage, helps us to hope, strengthens our souls, and stiffens our spine. G!d helps community cohere. In the stillness and isolation of illness, we can hear G!d’s voice of silence speak to us, and through us.”

We can see G!d’s Presence in our own lives most often and clearly when we look back and see acts of loving kindness, which are reflections of G!d. As human beings, as reflections of G!d’s image, we can see G!d in the work of our hands and the ways human beings reflect G!d’s Presence.

We do G!d’s work with our own hands. We are the vehicles through which G!d’s Presence is experienced on earth, even if it’s in a still small voice, even if it’s just from the back, just in hindsight, even if it’s in weird dreams that will be interpreted and reinterpreted forever.

Jacob has this amazing moment when he realizes that the place where he went to sleep was a holy place, not because of the particular rocks there, but because this was a place where he saw God, where he experienced the holy. Think back in your life. Are there places where G!d has been, and you didn’t know it? Are we the guy in the commercial, realizing, after the fact, that we were in the Presence of G!d?

May we all be blessed with awareness of G!d’s Presence in our lives, in the amazing moments, and in the small, incredible insights we have when we hear the thin voice of silence.  May the works of our hands be pleasing to G!d, as they reflect G!d’s Presence.


Rabbi H. Rafael Goldstein, BCC
Spiritual Life Coach
Dynamics of Hope Consultants
www.dynamicsofhope.com
ravrafael@earthlink.net
602-459-1819

Torah Thoughts
Genesis 23:1- 25:18   Ha-yay Sarah
November 22, 2008     25 Heshvan 5769

This week’s Torah portion begins with the sadness of the death of our matriarch Sarah. Following almost immediately the story of the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac, one has to feel for Abraham’s pain in losing his beloved wife, especially after the near-tragedy of sacrificing his son. He was so alone, and so sad. The Torah says he wept and mourned for his wife. Isaac is not around, for reasons that are not all that clear. Abraham focuses on doing what he can, burying his dead. He spends a lot of time negotiating the purchase of the first piece of land associated with the Jewish people and the land of Israel, the Cave of the Mahpelah, which is in Hebron.

Abraham goes from mourning to the purchase of real estate, to making sure that Isaac is married to an appropriate woman from the “old country”. The text digresses from Abraham’s life to that of the arranged marriage of Isaac and Rebecca, a wedding we are not sure Abraham attended. (After the Akedah, Isaac and Abraham never had another conversation recorded in the Bible.) We know Abraham is involved in Isaac’s life, but we don’t get to see their interaction.

Abraham seems so old in this Torah portion. It even says so in Gen 24:1 “Abraham was now old, advanced in years”. When he purchased the Cave of the Mahpelah, surely he expected to be buried rather soon next to the woman whom he loved who has predeceased him, but not by much!  Sarah died at 127 years of age. Abraham was 137 years old when she died. In arranging for his son’s marriage, Abraham seems to have taken care of all the essentials of his own life, getting his house in order, and seems ready to die.

Then there’s an incredible notation in the story. Abraham remarried! He had five additional children with his new wife, Keturah. Abraham lived another 38 years after Sarah’s death. Even though Isaac inherited his entire estate, the sons of Abraham’s “concubines” inherited gifts, and were sent to the east, to be away from Isaac. My question: What concubines? Keturah was a wife, not a concubine, so that means that Abraham was involved with even more women! (It’s plural!) At his age!!!

No one challenges the idea that Sarah was the love of Abraham’s life; that they were “b’shert” (fated) to be together. But after she died, Abraham somehow managed to go on, to rebuild his life, to prosper, to even find happiness after Sarah was no longer alive. The Torah says that when Abraham died, he died at “a good old age, old and satisfied”. And all too often we miss this important message in the Torah: even in loss, we go on, we rebuild, we continue, we grow.

All of us suffer all kinds of loss throughout our lives. Loss is inevitable. We lose people we love, jobs and homes, friends and pets, fortunes and challenges. But we can’t stay frozen in our losses. Life goes on, and we have to adjust to living without the person or people we love, without the homes we grew up in or where our children grew, without the companions with whom we shared our lives. It’s hard for all of us. Loss happens.

It was not easy for Abraham either. But it is the only thing we can do in our loss – to move forward, to remember, to keep the memory alive even as we live beyond the experiences we shared. The Torah demands that we “choose life”. That’s what Abraham does in this Torah portion – he continues to live as fully as he can, as long as he can, experiencing both the sorrows and joys of his life, dying in fullness of years and fullness of life.

We learn from our losses. These are the hardest lessons of life – not a schooling any of us welcomes. But our losses teach us that we can endure, that we really are strong, that there is meaning and even hope in learning to adjust to loss. Loss teaches us to cherish what we have all the more, as long as we have it, and as long as we can remember what we no longer can touch.

As we struggle with our own personal losses, may we also be inspired by the hope and courage affirmed by Abraham in this week’s Torah portion. May the Source of Strength, who helped Abraham through his sadness, also help us to find the better times, the good, the fullness, the blessings, in our own lives.