Torah Thoughts Vayera

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Vayera Genesis 17:27 – 22:24
November 15, 2008       18 Heshvan 5769

This week’s Torah portion, Vayera, begins with Abraham having just circumcised himself at age 99. Talk about an incredible amount of faith! I can’t even begin to project how this experience worked for Abraham. But I’d be sure that anyone who had done such a thing to himself would be at home, in bed, trying to recuperate, at least physically. How one recovers emotionally or psychologically is difficult for me to determine, but one thing is clear – Abraham is not in need of any kind off spiritual healing. His self-inflicted wound, a marking Jewish men continue to carry on our bodies, is a sign of a covenant, brit, with that which can lead to healing.

Instead of lying in bed to recover, Abraham is sitting at the entrance of his tent. Some of us can understand that need – to get right out of bed after we have been ill or have had surgery. Sometimes, the sooner we return to some sense of normalcy, the faster the pace of our recovery seems to be. So there is Abraham, getting back out there, ready, willing, even if not quite able, to start doing some mitzvot, bringing his life back to normal.

The text then tells us something amazing: G!d appears before Abraham as he’s sitting at the entrance of his tent. The rabbis point out that this means that G!d visits the sick. G!d is engaged in bikkur holim, and this is one of the bases for our practice of visiting the sick. The text just says G!d appeared. And then, all of a sudden, Abraham looks up and sees three men standing in front of him.   Abraham ran to greet them and said, ‘Please come in! I’ll bring some water, and you can wash up and rest…’ Abraham hurried to Sarah’s tent and said, ‘Quickly make three cakes.’ Abraham ran to his cattle, selected a choice one, and gave it to his son who rushed to prepare it…” (Genesis 18:1-8)

Abraham treats the guests royally and serves the finest foods, he involves his family in the mitzvah, and he’s zealous in making it all happen. He seems to have completely forgotten the ordeal he has put his own body through, and he’s back in charge, giving orders, making the guests comfortable. We usually tell people to rest after surgery. Take some time to heal.  But that’s not what Abraham is doing.

Something about the whole sequence of events is very strange: at the beginning of the story, G!d appears to Abraham, and the next thing you know, Abraham leaves to attend to three strangers. What happened to his conversation with G!d? Imagine you’re in the middle of speaking to the new President of the United States. Would you ever say, “Hold on a second, there are some strangers walking by. (Not even at the door, just walking down the street!)  I’ll get back to you later”? So what made Abraham think putting G!d on hold was the right thing to do?

The answer is that there is an experience even greater than talking to G!d. And that is to be like G!d. Our primary goal, in all that we do, is to be like G!d. According to Rabbi Harold Schulweis, (sermon for Yom Kippur 2002) “The purpose of prayer is not the adulation of G!d, but the imitation of G!d, not the admiration of G!d, but the emulation of G!d’s ways. G!d is the ideal, the model to be emulated by me in my life horizontally, between me and you, and my family and friends, brother, sister, son, and daughter.”

The rabbis spelled out the moral correlation, “As G!d is merciful, you should be merciful.  As G!d is compassionate, you should be compassionate. As G!d forgives, you should forgive. As G!d visits the sick, you should visit the sick.”

How do you experience G!d? You experience G!d’s love when you love. You experience G!d’s forgiveness when you forgive. When we act like G!d, do that which we want G!d to do, we experience G!d. Human beings are created in the image of G!d which means we are supposed to see ourselves emulating G!d’s work in all that we do, bringing G!d into the experiences we have, and the ways we touch others’ lives, to do the things G!d would want, and to know that people come first, no matter what.

So that was what Abraham was doing: he broke off his conversation with G!d in order to be more like G!d, to do what G!d would want for other people, who come first. What a radical notion!  Taking care of people was even more important to Abraham than chatting with G!d! And G!d blessed him for getting his priorities straight.

Abraham set a good example for all of us:  not to just talk to or with G!d, but to do G!d’s work, with our own hands. Abraham goes out of his way to demonstrate that what G!d desires most is for us to be more like G!d. When he was still recovering from surgery, Abraham managed to find healing in being G!d’s active partner, emulating G!d, representing G!d’s Presence.

May we all be blessed with the wisdom and courage to see clearly what is most important, like our ancestor Abraham, fulfilling the words of our prophet Micah: to do justice, love mercy and to walk humbly with G!d.

Noah: Theology, Not History or Science

Torah Thoughts
Noah    Genesis 6:9 – 11:32
Theology, not history or science
November 1, 2008   3 Heshvan, 5769

Every year we begin the cycle of reading the Torah again, as though it were for the first time. We all know the stories at the beginning of the Bible. Most people would be able to summarize at least part of the stories, with some confusion of them mixed in. Many people incorrectly figure that Adam and Eve were the people created in the first story of creation, with the seven days of creation. Lots of people try to figure out if there was one man and one woman created in the second story, and they had two sons, how were they able to populate the world without incest? Many people see the Noah story as subsequent to the creation stories historically, since the Bible gives us some really interesting genealogies between the two, but includes life-records that are hundreds of years long. “Who calls that livin’ when no gal will give in to no man what’s 900 years.” (Porgy and Bess: It Ain’t Necessarily So)

When we take the stories literally, they make very little sense. People try to rationalize the first story of creation, saying that “days” could mean centuries (now we’re not literal anymore) and try to make the obvious contradictions between the stories appear to be resolvable. And I always equate all of these allegories to the Wizard of Oz, another great allegory. An allegory teaches lessons through a story, but most allegories are not meant to be taken as literal “truth”. The truth is in the meaning of the story to the reader, not the literal words.

But, in our society, we have presidents and Boards of Education, and leaders of faiths, people who are supposed to be “smart” trying to force these stories into molds that make no sense. The same way as we can never find the Gales’ house in the Wizard of Oz, we can’t find Noah’s Ark. They are both stories, allegories, not history or science. And unfortunately, we hear a lot of the nonsense about “creationism” and do not engage in discussions of what these stories are really about. We dismiss the nonsense, but don’t put out there often enough what the stories actually teach.  People who know these stories can’t be literally true end up feeling like they have to reject the entire Bible because these stories are not believable.

Look at it this way: when these stories were written, everyone knew that the world was flat. If we want to credit Columbus or Galileo or Copernicus with figuring out the shape of the world, or the place of the Earth in the Universe, they lived at least 2,000 years after these stories were written. The stories are about theology, not science, not history. They introduce us to G!d, establish our relationship as humans with G!d. They are theologically “true”, and there is no conflict for Jews between our value for science, knowledge, research, and these stories. A cartographer would never try to locate Oz in the Midwest, and no one should be looking for an Ark on any mountain.

The first creation story, with the seven days of creation, which has been the most misunderstood by the creation self-proclaimed “scientists”, is actually the most Jewish of the creation stories. Its purpose is to lead us to see that Shabbat is the culmination of creation, that humanity was created as a partner with Shabbat. Every other living thing was created in a way that could be self-reproduced. The seed-bearing fruits, the creepy crawlers, the sea monsters, all had ways to re-create. The only way for Shabbat to recreate is as a partner with humanity. The story has lots of other theological implications, but it is not about how the world was created – it’s about how Shabbat was created, and why Shabbat is so important to the Jewish people.

The second story of creation, the Adam and Eve story, is a creation story in and of itself, not built upon the first story in any way, and it teaches that humanity has free will. It also teaches that G!d learns, grows with us, and can be surprised by humanity. After all, when G!d is trying to come up with a help-mate for the man G!d created, G!d parades animals past the man, asking if they are the right help-mates for him. Animals, in the second story, were created as trial and error for G!d in finding a match for the man. Free will, implies that everything may not happen for a reason, that G!d doesn’t know what we are going to do before we actually do, that it’s ok for us to make mistakes and learn consequences for our choices.

The third story of creation, Noah, teaches the value of life. There was no appreciation for life, or the order of the world of living things in the Noah story. That was the sin of his generation. In the first creation story, the one with the seven days of creation, G!d creates order out of chaos. In this story, G!d creates order out of chaos (of Noah’s generation), and again, G!d is surprised by the behaviors of humanity.

The major purpose of the Noah story is to assure humanity of G!d’s Presence, to assure us of the natural ways of the world, and that G!d is a loving and caring G!d, despite the way it seems in the beginning of the story. G!d changes from angry to benevolent. The story assures us that G!d is involved and committed to benevolence. The Noah story ends with an affirmation of hope – G!d promises never to destroy the world again. G!d sets the rainbow to be a sign of the covenant that we can trust in G!d, and in the natural order of the world. The rainbow is the symbol that good can come from disaster.

The allegories are “true” as theology. not as science or history. When other people, with other agendas interpret them for their own purposes, we don’t have to agree with them, or lose track of their meanings for us. We need to constantly undo the miseducation that says that either one “believes” in these stories or one “believes” in science. For us, as Jews, science and religion can go hand in hand. There is no contradiction, and no need for people to dismiss religion based on not being able to “believe” in these stories. Once the stories are explained in their truest context, that of theology, understanding our relationship with G!d and the Universe, there is neither conflict nor contradiction, only opportunities to understand them deeper each time we read them.

May we continue to attempt to see the words of Bible in an ever-changing light, seeing that the truths we understand in one reading only lead us to find new truths the next time around. May we be blessed with the wisdom and understanding that these words are here to assure us that G!d is present in our lives, committed to benevolence. May we all create a world that reflects order and the value of life, as we are blessed beneath the rainbow of the radiant light of G!d’s Presence.

Sukkot and the Boogeyman

Torah Thoughts
Monday, October 13, 2008    14 Tishrei, 5769

Sukkot and the Boogeyman

During just these past few weeks we have experienced the worst global economic meltdown in history, accompanied by the media’s endless fear-mongering thereon. Now we fear recession, depression, pennilessness. When I was a kid, the boogeyman was the scariest guy out there. The ultimate in scary, the boogeyman was invented so we would have something to be really afraid of. How times have changed!

We’re approaching the “scary” time of the secular year, Halloween, when kids try to make people so afraid that they will give them candy to get them away from their doors. And we begin the festival of American Consumerism, which is sort of morphed into Hallothanksmas, a really scary blend of the three autumn/winter holidays. Just go to Disneyland to see what happens when all three morph into one holiday in The Haunted House. Skeletons with Santa Claus hats, ghouls circling presents under a tree, ghosts eating turkey at a Hallothanksmas table. (Scary because of the loss of their original meanings, and scary because the merging of these holidays only makes sense from the sales perspective.)

On the one hand, we celebrate and trivialize fear, and for us as adults, there are much more terrifying things than the boogeyman. We live at a time when fear abounds. During the last 7 years, we had the worst terrorist attacks on our nation, started a war in Iraq based exclusively on fears of weapons of mass destruction. Air travel has become an experience of reminding us that we “need” the Federal government to “protect” us from things we fear. Unlike Franklin Roosevelt, we hear from the government that we have everything to fear, not just fear itself.

I’m not doing a political commentary, but wonder about the impact of all the fear. We are celebrating the festival of Sukkot, the ultimate holiday of thumbing our noses at fear. Most of us try to live in places that are safe and secure, places where we can feel at home. We build sukkot to remind us of the fragility of our homes and our lives, the temporary nature of everything we have. Sukkot is a holiday of appreciation of what we have, even as life is so precarious. We build walls that are not really walls, a roof open to moon and stars, knowing that our sukkah could be blown down by a stiff wind, we could get soaked in the rain, as a reminder of the real source of shelter for us – the Holy Presence of G!d. The sukkah is a promise of the moon and stars in our lives, the spirit of the Holy One dwelling among us.

Sukkot reminds us that we were all wanderers in the desert and that we longed for a “permanent” home. Just like our people, a sukkah is constantly threatened, constantly in jeopardy. But we, and the sukkah, are still here. We do this incredibly silly thing of making a sukkah to remind us that we need not be so afraid. Individually, we do it to remind ourselves that we have managed to get through whatever challenges could have blown us away, and we’re still here.

We create a sukkah out of thin air. One minute it’s just some raw material – wood, fruit. Assembled, it’s a holy reminder place. The sukkah calls us to pay attention not just to our fears, but to the presence of G!d in our shakiest of times and places. The sukkah reminds us that no matter what we build, no matter how strong or how tall or how well reinforced, the healing and the hope come not from the building, but from what we put into it.

These can be frightening times for us as Americans. But there have always been uncertainties in the world, and always will be. We build sukkot, not bunkers. We are guaranteed insecurity, not security. We are assured by the shakiness of our sukkot that despite whatever else happens, we know we can find G!d and a place for G!d in our lives. We have always had boogeymen in the world, always had things that scare us, make us worry endlessly. But we get to decide how we’ll live today, how we’ll find meaning, how we’ll grow even in sickness, worry or adversity. We get to recognize that we can only do the best we can, and that that is actually enough. We get to take away all of the power of the boogeyman by telling him, in the words of Glenda, the Good Witch of the North: “Be gone. You have no power here.”

May it be Your will, Holy One, that we remember that nothing is more permanent or more unshakable than Your Presence with us. May we learn to seek Your Presence when we feel that the most shelter we have is a flimsy booth. May we see how our lives are filled with blessings as numerous as the stars we see when we sit in a sukkah, and may our world be illumined by a new light which comes from You.

Have a joyous holiday!!

Torah Thoughts – Ha’azinu

Torah Thoughts:  Ha’azinu
Deuteronomy 32:1-52
October 11, 2008   12 Tishrei, 5769

One of my favorite TV shows is My Name is Earl. Earl was a petty thief, a low-life scumbag. He “buys” a lottery ticket, wins, runs dancing into the street and is hit by a car. In the hospital in a body cast, he learns from a TV show about karma, and in every subsequent episode, he makes amends for one of the hundreds of things terrible things that he has done to others that are now on his “karma list” for him to undo. Each episode usually focuses on one of the people he has done something terrible to, and the implications and outcomes of his behavior. So Earl doesn’t just apologize, or seek forgiveness, he has to undo the damage that happened as a result of his behavior. He has to talk with each of the people he hurt so he can figure out what happened as a result of what he did.

If you haven’t seen the Sex and the City movie yet, it’s about people in relationships who do terrible things to one another, mostly through carelessness, passions, or fears.  Then they ask for, and ultimately receive, forgiveness. Each of the people who were hurt finds a way to forgive, and most of the movie revolves around their route to forgiveness. You may have thought the movie was about fashion or women who are friends, but it was clear to me that the authors wanted us to look at how to ask for forgiveness, and how to forgive others.

Both Earl and all of the characters in the Sex and the City movie do what our High Holiday season tells us to do. In the Talmud, Yoma 86b, Reish Lakish says “Great is repentance, for because of it, sins are turned into merits.” By redefining our attitudes, our values, our place in the universe, repentance redefines and recreates time, undoing our past sins. The essential nature of Yom Kippur is to freeze time, and within the frozen time, to rearrange our lives, redefine our existence, and rewrite our past. Moments from our past influence our future – we are who we are, and do what we do, because of where we have been, what we have experienced.

But none of the power to change can be there if we’re not willing to listen, to incorporate what we are hearing, to transform by paying careful attention, even to the details. The little things we do have the power to change everything. Earl listens to the people on his list; the characters in the movie listen, when they can, and ultimately hear the pleas for forgiveness. One has to listen; we hope G!d listens.

So I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the first word of this week’s Torah portion is “ha’azinu”, literally “give ear”, or in less poetic form, “listen”. I didn’t get past the first word before I started asking questions about that word itself. Why is it “ha’azinu” and not the much more familiar word for listen, “shema”?  The first verse continues by using the word “shema” – let the earth “hear”.  So, in the first four words of the Torah portion, there is a reference to hearing twice. Later on in the Torah portion, Moses says to the people “Pay attention/take to heart these words which I have warned you this day”.

This Torah portion is a poem, almost at the end of the Torah. Moses is making his farewell speech to the people (in this Torah portion, he ascends Mount Nebo to go to his final resting place), in the form of a poem. Maybe it’s because we’re at the end, and people need to start paying attention already, really listening to what they have heard!

I was sitting in the last row in synagogue on Rosh Hashannah, my first time in 20 years as a congregant and not as someone on the bimah (I was a High Holiday cantor before I went to rabbinical school) and I couldn’t help but notice how many people were sitting and chatting, not paying attention at all to what was happening up front. While the cantor and choir were singing beautifully, and while the rabbi was providing insights into the worship and the Torah portion, so many people were not paying any attention at all! Perhaps the Biblical author knew our people’s proclivity for expressing our opinions, and not necessarily for being the best listeners!

In thinking about it, as a society, I’m not sure how good we are collectively as listeners. When I started teaching people how to volunteer to do bikkur holim (visit the sick), we spent substantial time training people to “actively listen”, to enable the people they were visiting to say what’s on their minds, and to know someone was listening. Even on TV, Dr. Frasier Craine’s welcoming line on his radio program was “I’m listening”. We pay people to listen to us when we have to be heard!

We read this Torah portion immediately after Yom Kippur. Is it asking, “Are you listening”? Have you paid enough attention? Have you really taken to heart the meanings of the holidays? Have you forgiven, and have you sought forgiveness? Are you listening and hearing, or are you just talking and missing what is being said to/at you?

Moses says “May my discourse come down as the rain; My speech distill as the dew… like droplets on the grass.” Let the gifts of G!d fall upon us, nurturing us like the droplets nurture the grass. Tiny, almost unnoticeable dew or mist. To notice the small droplets, you have to pay attention. G!d is constantly there trying to nurture us, but we can’t seem to find the nourishment. We’re not listening – we’re not paying enough attention to the droplets, to that which we miss when we go so fast, when we shut out by talking over. Maybe if we looked a little less for the big things, we could find G!d where G!d is, in the showers of blessings we tend to ignore each and every day, in the TV shows or movies that seem frivolous but actually may have deeper meanings. If we were paying more attention… The messages are out there; we just need to tune in, literally and metaphorically.

This holiday week, and throughout this New Year, may we all find G!d around each and every one of us like the droplets of dew on the grass, and may we all find healing and hope. May we pay attention, listen, to that which needs to be heard from our inner selves, from others, and may we truly become active listeners to the world around us.

Shanna tovah, and g’mar hatimah tovah. May we all be blessed with awareness of the dewdrops of G!d in our lives, so we may experience a truly good New Year.

Torah Thoughts – Nitzavim

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Nitzavim Deuteronomy 29:9 – 30:20
September 27, 2008   27 Elul, 5768

“You stand this day, all of you before The Holy One your G!d…” Nitzavim has such a dramatic beginning, and leads so well into not just the historic narrative of the text but also into the Holy Days, when we once again all stand together before G!d. It is a statement of anticipation and of anxiety. We are all standing on a precipice – all looking into what we hope is the promised land of our future, trying to figure out the ways in which our pasts will lead us into our futures. The covenant which was established with Children Israel, as they stood there in the presence of G!d, was designed precisely so we would feel this angst when we read these words at this time of the year – we are about to stand before our G!d. Are we ready?

According to Abraham Joshua Heschel, “Judaism is a religion of time, aiming at the sanctification of time… the Bible senses the diversified character of time. There are no two hours alike. Every hour is unique and the only one given at the moment, exclusive and endlessly precious. Judaism teaches us to be attached to the holiness in time, to be attached to sacred events.” (The Sabbath) Most of what we do as Jews is based not on things but on time, time of the day, time of the week, month, year. We mark days for remembrance. Look at the mahzor (the prayerbook for the Holy Days) or a siddur (prayerbook) and you’ll find the word “Yom” (day) more often than you might originally think. “hayom harat olam“, today is the birthday of the world from the Rosh Hashannah liturgy, and also the day when we stand before our G!d.

I like to tell this story a lot. Maybe you’ve heard it. I was on the subway once when I saw a man who looked totally exhausted sitting across from me. I watched him struggle to stay awake, watched him as he anxiously peered out the window at a stop to see if he had missed his. It took me a while, but I figured out why he was so tired. His shirt had the name of his company on it: “Time Movers”. No wonder he was exhausted! He had spent his day moving time!

Time movers. I wonder what they do, and how they do it. Think about it: if you could move time, how would you do it? Would you move time in a way which is different from the way we currently experience it? Would you make time move faster or slower? (After all, doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun?)  Would you move your time to a different age altogether, like the 17th century or the 25th century?

I wanted to wake the Time Mover, to ask him how he does what he does, and to seek his advice on how I could learn his technique. Unfortunately, such things just are not done in New York. With the exception of the Time Movers, the rest of us live in time which can’t be moved. Life has really just two tenses: past and future. We are in the constant flow between the two, every moment is either about to happen or has slipped by.   We experience time each moment as it comes, each day as we live it, each week, etc.

Rosh Hashannah takes the concept of holiness in time one step further. It marks the passage of a complete Jewish year. Rosh Hashannah begs the question: If you can’t move time, what have you done with the time since last Rosh Hashannah?  What have you done with the 550,080 minutes, the 9168 hours, the 382 days, the 54 1/2 weeks since last Rosh Hashannah? (These are the actual numbers since last Rosh Hashannah. (5768 was one of those leap years with an extra month in the calendar.) Have you lived these times to your fullest? Rosh Hashannah asks us to begin a process of examining how we lived our time, and how will we use our own time in the future.

Rosh Hashannah is the Jewish time to reflect on how we have used our time as a nation, as a people, as human beings. Think back and list all of the things that have happened this year in human history. And what has happened this year in your own life? What really made you proud? Where did you find your nachas – your sources of joy? What were the challenges you faced? How did you do with those challenges? What remains undone, unexamined, unapproached? Who was sick, who is sick, who has recovered? What were your major life-changes of this year, and what became more comfortable for you in its ongoing reliability? Think of two moments in the last year which made your heart sing, and two moments which made your soul ache.

Rosh Hashannah is the moment of transition between what was and what will be. We begin today to look at our lives over the past year, and start considering for the year to come. How do you want it to be? In what ways do you have to change in order for the desires of your heart to happen? What needs to be done to undo the things you have done that were wrong? How can you prevent them  from happening next year? During the next weeks will be in limbo between how we lived our lives in 5768, and how we will live our lives in 5769.

The rabbis teach us that we should live each day of our lives as though it were our last day, because, in reality, we never can know. Live each day fully, one day at a time, live time fully, for each moment could be our last.

This Rosh Hashannah, may we all be blessed beneath the wings of shehinah, G!d’s Holy Presence, with the strength and courage to face our failures, to own our weaknesses, and may we find the help, the security, the compassion we all seek. May we look at our time, forgive ourselves and commit to the changes that we must make to move peacefully through time, rather than to move time. May we be blessed with that which is truly precious and therefore most holy – time.

Torah Thoughts Ki Tavo

Torah Thoughts
Ki Tavo      Deuteronomy 26:1 – 29: 8
September 20, 2008     20 Elul 5768

Some of the recurring themes of the High Holy Days are t’filah, t’shuvah and tzedakah – prayer, repentance and acts of lovingkindness – themes that are reflected in the u’netanah tokef prayer.  When it comes to prayer, it is difficult to quantify whether we have prayed enough, prayed with adequate feeling and commitment, or even prayed according to Jewish tradition. Only G!d knows whether prayers are acceptable. Did I spend enough of my time meditating on life, thinking about what I was doing, where I was going? I can wonder whether I have engaged in conversation with G!d, listened enough to what G!d wants me to hear, but I probably could have done more, been in the process more. Is there ever enough?

When it comes to repentance, once again, “Have I done enough?”  “Did I miss opportunities?” “Should I have done more?” While I may think that I have reasonably repented, G!d’s view may be totally different. Did I ask for enough forgiveness? G!d knows, and I know, that I should ask for forgiveness, but I may not even know all the people I have offended, or be able to count that high! Did I forgive myself for being such a failure in the things I expected to get done, that I have yet to start? Did I come up with ways to be more gentle with myself and less judgmental about my life? To be honest, I probably could have done more, been in the process more. Is there ever enough?

But, when it comes to acts of lovingkindness, the Torah is clear on one aspect of this theme, we need to give a minimum of 10% of our gross income to help others in need.  Every year when we speak to our accountants before tax time, it’s right there in black and white. Either I made the mark or I didn’t.  Either I gave at least 10% or I didn’t!  Therefore, as I see it, of the 3 fundamental principles of the High Holidays, the only one that is quantifiable in human terms is tzedakah, charity/acts of lovingkindness. There are other acts of lovingkindness we can do, but this one we can measure.

So how are you doing with this concept of 10%? Look at your books. Take an inventory, now, before the Holidays. If your last gift was last year, if you’re not giving nearly 10%, are you even attempting the number?  Everyone, even a beggar on the street, is obligated to give to help others. I would venture to guess that no one reading this Torah Reflection is a beggar. Think about 10% for a moment. No matter what you’re earning per year when you divide the 10% of your earnings by 365 days, it comes out to a very small amount of money to give away daily.

Okay, some of our readers are now saying  “No way, the rabbi is nuts! I have too little already!” So don’t start out giving at 10% if you feel you can’t afford it. Go for 5%. Can you do that? Get started somewhere and build your giving. The paradox of giving: the more you give away, the richer you’ll feel. The more good you do by helping others, the better off you’ll be. If you light one candle with the flame of another candle, that does not diminish the light – it actually makes it stronger. And while working for an organization is good, meaningful, and helpful, it does not excuse you from the responsibility of giving money, too.

Do your math. If the answer to your personal question is yes, I could have done more, get going!

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Tavo, contains all kinds of blessings and curses for when the people will come into the land of Israel at the end of their long journey in the desert. But the curses come with an interesting chorus: “And all the people will respond ‘amen’”. I wondered about that “amen” line. Why is it there? “Amen” is a word of affirmation: do I really want to affirm the curses?

Change is sort of a dialog, both internal and external. We go from who we were, to who we are, to who we will be. Each step of these curses is a step in our personal journeys. By saying amen, we affirm that we are on the road, making our journey with G!d at our side. With each step we are essentially different from who we were before we took that last step, and we will be different from who we are now when we take the next. Each step is a step in the direction that is right for us. In saying “amen” we affirm that we’re on that road with G!d.

So this “holiday preparedness season” is asking you to say “amen”, not to the curses, but to the actions which lead you away from the curses. It asks you to look at your life, your prayer and meditation, your relationships with G!d and others, and your checkbooks, to see exactly where you stand as you approach a time to say “amen”, a time when you say “I did the best I could”.  Assess where you are, now, just a few days before Rosh Hashannah, and note that praying or repenting endlessly from now till Rosh Hashannah will probably not do it for you. But you can certainly take a step in the right direction by examining your giving patterns and saying amen – to walk this journey of life with G!d at your side by doing the things we’re supposed to do. Say amen not to the curses to but to the journey away from the curses. And let us say, amen.

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

Torah Thoughts – Ki Tetze

Torah Thoughts
Ki Tetze   Deuteronomy 21:10 – 25:19
September 13, 2007   13 Elul, 5768

This week, we read in our Torah portion that  “If, along the road, you chance upon a bird’s nest, in any tree or on the ground, with fledglings or eggs and the mother sitting over the fledglings or on the eggs, do not take the mother together with her young. Let the mother go, and take only the young, in order that you may fare well and have a long life.” My question: Why? Why not take the mother with her young? What’s the big deal here? Perhaps the reason is tsa’ar ba’alei hayim – protection for the feelings of the animals. A mother hen should not have to watch her chicks slaughtered, same as we have with boiling a kid in its mother’s milk.

Maybe that’s really what this is about, but it seems lame to me. If you don’t take them together, which should you take? If you take the mother, the chicks will die. So they are wasted. If you take the chicks (or the eggs) what good are they? Assuming that the eggs are fertilized, which is why the hen is sitting on them, you can’t use them for food – they aren’t cookable eggs. If they are fledgling birds, they also are useless for food, there’s no meat on their bones. You couldn’t put them in an incubator and raise them. They needed their mother to survive. Either way the chicks are wasted.

If we look at the law as having a deeper meaning, what would it be? It seems to me that we should treat each other with the same care and concern. If we’re supposed to care for animals, show them mercy and concern, how much the more so are we supposed to show our concern for human beings. Remember the end of the book of Jonah, which we read every year on Yom Kippur? G!d shelters Jonah from intense heat of the  sun by growing a gourd. The gourd then dies. Jonah kvetches about the loss of the gourd. G!d chastises him saying, “you care so much about a gourd, and not about the city of Nineveh with 120,000 people in it?”

So this Torah portion is really about how we are supposed to behave as people toward other people. It’s put in terms everyone should understand, about chickens and eggs. Especially now, in the weeks before Rosh Hashannah, it’s the time for us to consider our relationships with people, and see if they fit the “chicken and egg”  caring test. I want to suggest three personal activities which can be helpful in focusing on how we are doing in caring for other people; all are things which we can and should be able to make changes in the upcoming weeks.

a. lashon ha-ra. Bad mouthing people.  It has to stop. All of us do it, and all of us need to consider ways to lessen the negative impacts of our mouths. Just as we need to worry about the emotional impact our behavior may have on an animal, we have to consider the impact gossip, bad mouthing people, can have on the people whose reputations we are harming, the people listening to our nonsense, and ultimately on ourselves. By participating in lashon ha-ra, we destroy lives as surely as we destroy the lives of the birds in the Torah portion. And in so doing, we also lower ourselves.

lashon ha-ra also applies to the nasty things we read on the Internet, often about candidates we don’t like. Passing on the vile lies about political candidates we read daily is lashon ha-ra. How do you know if it’s true? Look it up yourself; verify it. If you did not hear the candidate say what s/he is alleged to have said, look up the texts for yourself. If you can’t find the evidence, why are you passing it around? There are plenty of valid grounds for all of us to pick apart the people who are running for office. We don’t need to make stuff up, and certainly don’t need to accept, on face value, someone else’s lies.

Ask 3 questions before you engage in any talk about another person: (1) Is it true? (2) Is it nice? (3) Is it necessary? If you can’t say yes to all questions, it’s lashon ha-ra.

b. hah-nasat or-him. Making people feel welcome in our homes. I have noticed that few people invite me to dinner, ever. Maybe it’s me. But it’s not the way I remember. I remember going to people’s houses, sitting at their tables, enjoying a meal together. Now, if I do food with someone, we go to a restaurant. When you open your home to others, though, it’s not about the food. It’s about being and sharing lives together.   Reaching out to others, inviting them to a meal, dessert or something in your home is a hallmark of how we are doing in caring for others in our community.  It’s not about the guests, and how they benefit at our tables, it’s about us, and how we benefit from their presence. As we look at Holidays and start our personal planning, are we sure that everyone, including older singles and new families with little kids, have welcoming homes to go to for Holiday meals? If you can, invite some guests into your home to help make the High Holy Days holy at home.

c. tzedakah: plan to give. Yizkor, the prayer of memory for people whom we loved and who are now dead, used to include a line about making a donation to keep their memory alive. It’s missing from many modern prayerbooks, because people thought it was tacky to talk about money in remembering the dead. But it’s not only an act of righteousness, of doing justice for your own good, but a way of keeping the loved-one’s name associated with doing good. What more would we want than to have our names associated with good deeds even after our lifetimes?

As you manage not to kill off little chicks, or harm the hen’s feelings, think abut how you are also supposed to make the world a better place for all of us by giving and doing acts of justice. There are lots of organizations that would welcome your participation, and your check, but’s not about the organizations that will benefit – it’s about your own need to do that which is right.

We need to stop talking about people behind their backs; welcome people into our homes, and consider how we can make the world a better place. The compassion we are supposed to show for a mother bird with her chicks is an example of the compassion we are supposed to show for other people and for ourselves. May we all be blessed, as we focus on the upcoming year, with the ability to seek ways to improve our lives, ways to improve and respect the lives of others, and ways to bring our dreams to reality. May our New Year be filled with the same compassion that we would show to mother birds in our midst – compassion for our families, our community, and for ourselves.

Torah Thoughts – Shoftim

Torah Thoughts
Parshat Shoftim    Deuteronomy  16:18 – 21:9
September 6, 2008     4 Elul 5768

We have just  began the month of Elul, the month preceding the High Holidays, a month  traditionally set aside for thinking about getting ready for the High Holy  Days. It says in this week’s Torah portion “tamim tehiyeh im adonai  elohecha” You will be simple (wholehearted) with the Holy One, your G!d.”  In other words, you will trust in G!d, surrendering unto G!d that which is  G!d’s domain. G!d is commanding us to take responsibility for that which we  can control, to fulfill our obligations, to do that which is right and just.  The Torah portion then goes on to forbid sorcery, which is an effort to  control those things over which we have no domain.

According to  Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, “Judaism is a religion of time, aiming at the  sanctification of time… the Bible senses the diversified character of time.  There are no two hours alike. Every hour is unique and the only one given at  the moment, exclusive and endlessly precious. Judaism teaches us to be  attached to the holiness in time, to be attached to sacred events.” (The  Sabbath) Most of what we do is based not on things but on time, time of  the day, time of the week, month, year. We mark days for remembrance.

Our Torah portion speaks about cities of refuge for people who have  committed manslaughter, for them to go to for safe-keeping until the death of  the High Priest, who, if he were doing his job right, would have prayed well  enough to prevent the disasters of accidental deaths. The month of Elul is a  refuge in time, for all of us, who have done terrible things, some  purposefully, some unintentionally.  Elul is when we look inside to see  how we are using our time, which we get to control. Elul is the beginning of  our process of transition between what was and what will be. We begin to get  ready for the Holidays by looking at our lives over the past year, and start  considering for the year to come. How do we want it to be? In what ways do we  have to change in order for the desires of our hearts to happen? What needs to  be done to undo the things we did that were wrong? How can we prevent them  from happening next year?

The month of Elul gets us thinking about the  High Holidays, and whenever I start thinking about the Holy Days, I am  reminded of the scariest poem in our liturgy, and feel an obligation to help  people to understand it better. The scary poem is included in every Rosh  Hashannah and Yom Kippur service in almost every synagogue. The part most of  us are most familiar with says that On Rosh Hashannah it is inscribed, and  on Yom Kippur it is sealed, who shall live and who shall die.  The  poem then goes on to list some of the possible ways in which people  might die – by fire, water, plague, starvation, etc. It’s a specific, but not  exclusive, list.

Written by Rabbi Amnon of Mainz, one of the greatest  men of his generation, the circumstances that led him to write this poem were  unfortunately not all that unique for Jews of his time – he had been tortured  in an effort to force him to convert. According to the legend, he either wrote  u’netanah tokef on his deathbed or dictated it after his death in a  dream to Rabbi Kolanymous. I’m not sure what to make of the legend, and  similarly, most Jews are really not sure of what to make of the poem.
When I was a kid I puzzled over whether or not it was okay for  G!d to write on Rosh Hashannah. After all, we were told it was  forbidden to write on yom tov – a holy day. Certainly, on Yom  Kippur, I couldn’t figure out why it was ok for G!d to seal anything since we  are forbidden to do such work on Yom Kippur. Beyond my own confusion, I  learned much later that a lot of people find this poetry very disturbing.  There’s a book out there, somewhere, in which our fates are written, closed,  sealed. What’s the point of having such a book, and, if it’s written down  during these ten days, how does what we do the rest of the time effect that  fate? Isn’t it rather cruel for decisions made in September or October about  the fates of people who will die next June? What if they are really good  between now and then? Does G!d include in this book the deaths of babies who  are born after the Holidays and die before next year’s holidays? What kind of  G!d would intentionally make this kind of decision in  advance?

Okay, it’s all a metaphor, but, for most of us, we miss  the entire point. We focus so much on the list of the ways in which people can  die that we miss the words that follow the list, that make it all make more  sense. Those 7 words are “u’teshuvah, u’tefillah, u’tzedakah, ma’vaerin et  roah hagezerah”. Repentance, prayer, and acts of lovingkindness can shift  (or remove) the bitterness of the decree. Repentance, prayer, and acts of  lovingkindness do not remove the decree, they remove the bitterness thereof.   They can make the decree tolerable.

Repentance, prayer and  acts of loving-kindness. Some of the most positive ways in which we can live  our lives: recognizing what we have done wrong, correcting the mistakes,  seeking forgiveness from those we have harmed; seeking G!d in our lives,  relating to and relying upon G!d for the strength to improve our lives; and  acts of loving-kindness, helping other people, making life better for others,  not just for ourselves. So Rabbi Amnon’s paragraph focusing on death is really  focusing on surrender. People die in all kinds of ways over which we  have no control. Some deaths are tragic or make absolutely no sense. Some seem  downright cruel. They are all out of our control. Whether we live or  die in the upcoming year, according to our poet, we really don’t get to  control. We just have a list of some of the core issues over which we have no  choice but to recognize our powerlessness.

But we do get to  control the ways in which we live.  If we live our lives with a focus on  teshuvah, tefillah and tzedakah, repentance, prayer, and acts of  loving-kindness, we might come to feel very differently about the ultimate  decree. It may not be so bitter after all. We may come to a place of  shalom, of inner peace, through the focus not on that which we can’t  control, but rather on that with which we can. We can rail against G!d for not  consulting us in these things or we enrich our lives living with G!d, taking  control over how we live.

In other words, Rabbi Amnon’s poem is  reflected in the very familiar quotation based on a statement by Reinhold  Niebuhr: G!d, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,  the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the  difference, The Serenity Prayer.  We cannot change the ways we are  going to die; we can change how we live in the meantime.

The rabbis  teach us that we should live each day of our lives as though it were our last,  because we never can know. Live each day fully, one day at a time. Live  time fully, because each moment could be our last. As we enter Elul,  our city of refuge in time, may we all be blessed beneath the wings of  shehinah, G!d’s Holy Presence, with the strength and courage to  face our failures, to own our weaknesses, and may we find the help, security,  and compassion we all seek. May we recognize the things over which we have no  control, and surrender them to G!d, have the strength and courage to work on  the things that we can control, and may we find the wisdom to understand the  difference fully. May we be blessed with that which is truly precious and  therefore most holy – time.

Torah Thoughts Re’eh

Torah Thoughts
See…Listen
Re’eh  Deuteronomy 11:26 – 16:17
August 30, 2008      29 Av, 5768

If you had a choice between being blind or being deaf, which would you choose? Why?

Both are essential senses, but I have no doubt of my choice. I would hate it, but I could live without seeing. But deafness? Not hearing, never hearing the sound of another person’s voice, not engaging in conversation directly, without signs, for me, would not be my choice. Hearing is the essence of communicating. Most people in our century are afraid of the dark, including the real darkness of blindness.  For me the fear is more personal. To not be able to communicate, to connect with other people and beings – that to me would be the major challenge.

All this talk about hearing and seeing and blessing and curses is, of course, directly related to this week’s Torah portion, Re’eh. Here’s how it starts: re’eh, ano-hi noten lifney-hem hayom b’raha u-k’la-la. See, I place before you today blessing and curse.  Blessing, if you listen to the commandments of the Holy One your G!d which I enjoin upon you this day. The first word, re’eh, “see”, is followed in the next sentence by the word tishm’u “listen”. See, listen.

What’s the difference? Why the different wording?  Seeing is immediate. You look, you see. To get a picture, you just push the button, you get instantly what you see. All the information is right there, whether or not you absorb all the details. But listening requires involvement – it requires waiting and focus, and time. Imagine me saying this next line out loud: “You – can’t – know – what – I – am – about – to – express – until – or – unless – it – happens”. Listening is long term.

I was listening to the radio in my car and heard an interview with a composer for film scores. He said something very interesting. In movies 10 to 20 years ago, the scores were much more simple, much more evocative of emotions, suspense and beauty because the films they accompanied were less action-packed, less special-effect oriented, and more “acted”. Film scores now have to wrap around sound and special effects on screen, which in the case of a Jurassic Park or Star Wars movie are the movie. The visual experience is dictating the audio experience. The visual demands an immediate response, the audio is a cumulative response over the course of the film.

This week’s Torah portion begins with the immediate statement, “Hey you, look!” Blessing is right here before you in front of your face. But even as it’s there, don’t get lost in the special effects. Listen to what I (G!d) am telling you. In listening to what you see, maybe there will be a way for it to sink in.

Seeing the blessings may require us to listen to the blessings in our lives, to take them in and see more than we see with just our eyes. Seeing is not believing. Seeing is taking a picture. You don’t need belief if you can see it! Belief is in the hearing – in the depth of the experience. But we live in a society which is so completely fixated on the visual that’s it’s no surprise that we don’t have time to listen.

In the three sentences which begin our Torah portion, the word hayom, today, appears three times – “today” I put before you blessing and curse; listen to these commandments “today”. “Today” appears again in the next sentence, about the curse. I find that repetition of the word hayom, “today”, to be very meaningful. Each and every day we have choices, we have opportunities, we have chances to make the blessings happen and to be there in our own lives. Each day we can start again, try anew. Each day we can change our habits, and move from a perception of curse to blessing. Each day we can move from seeing to hearing.

The other remarkable thing about the Hebrew in the first two sentences is that there is a transition between singular and plural which you miss completely in English, since the word “you” in English is for both singular and plural. But in Hebrew, there’s a singular “you’ and a plural “you”. Here are the sentences again:

The first sentence says “See, I place before you (singular you – each individual) today blessing and curse. The second sentence says  “Blessing, if you (plural you, like the entire people) listen to the commandments of the Holy One your G!d which I enjoin upon you this day”.

The text moves from you – individuals, to you – community. Choices we make, in experiencing blessings or curses, have an impact on the community at large, on our people and the people with whom we live. Each of our acts touches others, whether we see it or not, and has a ripple effect in our world. We are tied to other people, even when we are hermits, in that our absence also has meaning. Every decision, every act, every touch, every move, requires others to respond or experience in some way. When G!d puts before the individual blessings and curses, we as a community are connected to one another’s responses.

The singular “you” is connected with seeing. Seeing is personal and immediate. We can be in the same room and see the same thing and experience it in the same way. The plural “you” is connected with hearing. We all know how we hear experiences differently, process information differently, less from seeing and more from hearing. Hearing, in this case, is an outgrowth of our singular visions. We find direction in our own lives, and in so doing, communicate with others in hearing G!d in our lives.

May it be Your will, Holy One, that we see and hear the blessings in our lives, even those which seem to be hidden in curses, today, each day, differently from the days before, and that we, as a community,  hear – support one another, and create opportunities for us all to see what we hear.


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

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