It Speaks Of A Life That Passes Like Dew (John Barlow & Bob Weir - "Black Throated Wind")

           With a daughter spending a gap year learning in Israel, we get phone calls at rather odd times. One of the odd times she decides to call is at the conclusion of Shabbat in Israel. Knowing that she can only leave a message, our daughter will call, inform us of her Shabbat experience. If she was spending Shabbat away from her Seminary, she will call to let us know that she is safely home. If there was important news that occurred late Friday night or on Saturday eastern standard time, she will tell us what we might have missed. Last Shabbat was no different than any other Shabbat since she has been in Israel. While we were eating Shabbat lunch here in Toronto, our daughter called and told us that Joe Biden was now the President-Elect. In our home, we were thankful and hopeful that there might be a new beginning,  as these troubling and chaotic four years draw to an inevitable conclusion. Ten minutes later, that hope, that sense of a new beginning, and new opportunity burst as our daughter called again. This time she called to tell us that Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, the former Chief Rabbi of England, passed away. The Jewish people and indeed the world lost a brilliant intellect, and an empathetic soul,  teacher of Jewish texts, and perhaps the greatest ambassador of Modern Orthodox Judaism,  western morality, ethics, and philosophy. Within ten minutes of our Shabbat lunch, there was life and death, joy and grief, light, and darkness. 

         This Shabbat is Parsha Chayei Sarah. In Chayei Sarah, life and death appear almost simultaneously.  We read of Sarah’s death in terms of life: “Sarah’s lifetime was…” (Gen23:1). Then Avraham prepares for his wife’s burial. Next, Avraham concentrates his focus upon the perpetuation of life. He sends his servant, Eliezer, to find a wife for his son. He sends his servant, Eliezer, to find a matriarch that can fill the void left by Sarah’s death. Rivkah embodied this notion of life and legacy. These qualities are inherent to her character. Rivkah offered water, a symbol of both life and Torah, to Eliezer. Then she offered water to Eliezer’s camels thereby demonstrating her menschlekite. Rivkah also possessed the ability to sustain life. She sustained Eliezer’s life by allowing him to accomplish his mission and return to Avraham with a wife for Yitzchak. She sustained her own life by having the wherewithal and the strength to leave her family, a family which our sages suggest were cutthroats and cheats (Genesis Rabbah 63:4), and join a family that made a covenant with God. Ultimately she brought sustenance and comfort to Yitzchak when they both entered his mother’s tent. 

          After Eliezer received water from this girl, we are told her name, Rivkah. Her name is indicative of her character. Her name also suggests an inherent ability to join seemingly disparate events or ideas such as life and death and make meaning from it. The Hebrew root of her name (RVK) means “join”, or “yoked together”, e.g. two oxen are joined together to pull a plow. The team must be of equal strength or the plow won’t go straight. Therefore Rivkah must be equally as strong as and independent as Yitzchak. Rivkah must be strong enough to take the memory and legacy of Sarah and make it her own. This requires a very strong sense of self.              

Rivkah fills the spiritual vacuum created by Sarah’s death. Rivka will also become  Avraham in the sense that just like God shared with Avraham the prophecy; God will share the prophecy of  Rivkah’s two sons with Rivkah (Parsha Toldot). Like Avraham, Rivka is the bridge between this family’s current state of affairs and future spiritual holiness. “And Yitzchak brought her into the tent of his mother; he married Rivkah, she became his wife, and he loved her; and thus was Yitzchak consoled after his mother.” (Gen 24:67)  The Rabbis explain that while Sarah lived a cloud of glory hung over her tent, her tent was known for hospitality, and a lamp remained alit from Shabbat to Shabbat. When Sarah died all these qualities died with her. However, when Rivkah was brought into the tent of his mother, all these qualities returned (Genesis Rabbah 60:16). Besides perpetuating life, she perpetuated the spiritual holiness necessary for joining Yitzchak in God’s covenant. Only Rivkah was able to fill the powerful memory of Sarah and still prevent herself from being overwhelmed by such a memory, joining the legacy of Sarah to her own being and her marriage to Yitzchak.  Only Rivkah was able to join the generation of Avraham and Sarah with the next generation. Fittingly, the Parshah ends as it began, with death. However, now read of Avraham’s death.  

          Rivkah took the legacy, the Middot, the qualities of the deceased, of Sarah, and (RVK)  joined those qualities, aspects, and Middot to her life. She accomplished this monumental task when she and her husband Yitzchak entered his mother’s tent and she brought him comfort. At that moment Rivkah managed to demonstrate life and death can converge, that joy and sorrow can be linked, that past and present can intersect resulting in something spiritually powerful as opposed to spiritually debilitating.

Peace,

Rav Yitz

Think This Through With Me, Let Me Know Your Mind, What I Want To Know Is, Are You Kind? (Robert Hunter & Jerry Garcia - "Uncle John's Band")

          An elderly gentleman told his friend about a magnificent restaurant. “The food is great, the prices are reasonable, and the ambiance is really elegant.” His friend asked for the name of the restaurant, and the elderly man struggled to remember the name of the restaurant. Finally, he asked his friend, “There is a flower with beautiful petals… it has a long stem with thorns on it- what do you call it?” The friend replied, “A rose?” “Yeah, that’s it!” said the gentleman. So he turned toward the kitchen and yelled, “Hey, Rose! What was the name of that restaurant we ate in last night?” Sometimes we all need a reminder. We even need a reminder for those things that we really know.

          Besides Shabbat, it is also Shavuot. This is essentially the yearly reminder of two important concepts of Judaism: Mitzvot and Chesed (Commandments and Kindness). Shavout has numerous alternative names, but perhaps the most well known is Chag Matan Torah, the Holiday of the Giving of the Torah. On Friday, the first day of Shavuot, we read about B’nai Yisroel’s revelation at Sinai (Ex. 19:1-20:23). We read of their three days of preparation, Moshe’s ascending and descending from the mountain, and finally, we read the Aseret Dibrot (The Ten Commandments). Needless to say, the Torah reading for the first day of Shavuot is replete with laws. Explicitly, we read the Ten Commandments, ten universal rules that were all punishable by death. We also read and understand that our ancestors purified themselves in preparation for meeting God. They washed their clothes, they bathed, and they refrained from conjugal relations. We are reminded that Torah possesses a ritual/legal aspect that enriches the relationship between the individual and God, and the community and God. Both of these relationships require that we approach the sanctity of these relationships in a state of purity.

          The second day of Shavuot coincides with this Shabbat, therefore instead of the weekly Parsha, we read the passage in Deuteronomy 14:22-16:17. If the first day Torah reading for Shavuot focused upon the Commandments, the receiving of Torah at Sinai, The second day Torah reading focuses upon Chesed, Kindness. On three different occasions, the Torah reading either implicitly or explicitly reminds us and challenges us to engage in Gemilut Chasidim and Act of Kindness. First, we read about laws concerning tithing. Explicitly, we are again discussing law, however, this is not ritual law or law concerning Man’s relationship to God. Implicitly, we are reading about those laws that govern our behavior towards our fellow man, ethical law. We are commanded to care for those who are less fortunate. “At the end of the three years you shall take out every tithe of your crop…then the Levite can come-for he has no portion or inheritance with you – and the proselyte, the orphan and the widow who are in your cities so they may be satisfied….(Deut. 14:28-29). The second topic discusses the laws concerning Shmittah, the seventh year when debts are canceled, fields lie fallow, slaves are set free, and any firstborn male born during this year is considered Hekdesh (sanctified and therefore belonging to God.) Even here, the Torah’s focus is upon what we consider to be ethical concerns. “For destitute people will not cease to exist within the land; therefore I command you, saying, ‘you shall surely open your hand to your brother, to your poor, and to your destitute in your Land’” (Deut.15:11). We are commanded, and obligated to always take care of those who are less fortunate. The third topic discusses the Mitzvot related to each of the three Pilgrimage Festivals (Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot). On Pesach, we are commanded to eat only unleavened bread and the Pesach offering. On Sukkot, we are commanded to dwell in the Sukkah. On Shavuot, having already counted seven weeks since Pesach, we are now commanded to bring an offering commensurate to total production. Everyone is commanded to rejoice before God, “You, your son, your daughter, your slave, your maidservant, the Levite in your city, the proselyte, the orphan, the widow who are among you” (Deut.16:11). Again, implicit in the Torah reading is the notion of caring for those less fortunate. The ethical concerning, mankind’s relationship to mankind is the second concept of Torah.

          Unique to the holiday of Shavuot is the reading of the book of Ruth. The book of Ruth contains no laws regarding impurity and purity, nor laws of what is prohibited and what is permitted. It is however a beautiful story of a young woman willing to remain with her mother-in-law, return to the mother-in-law’s (Naomi’s) homeland of Eretz Canaan, and convert to Judaism. Implicit in the Book of Ruth is Gemilut Hasidim, Acts of Loving Kindness. Boaz, a wealthy landowner and distant relative of Naomi’s late husband, leaves the prescribed part of his field to be harvested by those who are less fortunate. He cares for the destitute, the proselyte, the widowed, and the orphan. He doesn’t abandon his communal nor familial responsibilities. Ruth, under no obligation, did not abandon her mother-in-law. As a non-Jew, she chose to accept those obligations and converted. The two are married. They embody Torah, the symbiotic relationship between the ethical and the ritual. As a result, they have the z’chut (the merit) to be King David’s great grandparents.

         Like the old man who needed to be reminded of his wife’s name as well as the restaurant’s name, every once in a while we need to be reminded that Torah and Judaism have as much to do with God and ritual as with Mankind and ethics. The Ethical and Ritual are inseparable. Our attempt to separate the two diminishes Torah, Judaism, our community, ourselves, and our relationship to God.

Peace,

Rav Yitz 

Think This Through With Me, Let Me Know Your Mind; What I Want To Know Is, Are You Kind? (Robert Hunter & Jerry Garcia - "Uncle John's Band")

We had a very interesting New Years Day. With our children visiting their grandparents, we were in a very quiet house. After having brunch, my wife received a troubling WhatsApp from a friend of ours in San Diego. Her husband was scheduled to return to San Diego from Israel. However, the plane had to stop in Toronto because someone had become seriously ill. That person also happened to be from San Diego and we knew that person, his wife, and their family. The person was rushed to the hospital and his wife went with him leaving their children with our other friend and another San Diegocouple (whom we do not know).  My wife’s friend tells us the whole story and we learn that her husband and the sick man’s children are in a hotel by the airport with no kosher food. We get her husband’s phone number, make contact and within 90 minutes we have brought several pizzas, salad, and sandwiches. we meet up with our friend. He appeared exhausted, and worried, We hugged, listened to his story and gave him the food. He thanked us over and over and was so appreciative of this act of kindness.  We headed home, attended a bris and afterward my wife began to cook. With New Years Day almost finished;  there was a San Diego couple in the Emergency Room of a hospital near Toronto’s Pearson airport. So with tins of pasta, soup, salad, some fruit, instant coffee packets, and a USB cord for the wife’s cell phone; we drive to the hospital. We find the sick man’s wife, and she too looks even more tired with physical exhaustion and anxiety than our friend at the hotel. She sees us, we hug and my wife explains the bag's contents. The wife is so relieved, expresses so much gratitude and over and over again expresses amazement at the kindness that she has experienced on what must have been one of the most exhausting and emotionally frightening days of her life.

This week we read from Parsha Va’Eira. This Shabbat we read Parsha Va’Eira. In this Parshah, God reassures Moshe after Pharaoh and mocked and dismissed both he and Aharon. God explains the plan to Moshe that Pharaoh’s heart will be hardened after each plague but eventually, Pharaoh will capitulate. God explains the various stages of redemption. The plagues begin. We are supposed to understand that each of these first seven plagues is more severe than the previous plague: Blood, Frogs, Lice, Wild Beasts, Animal plague, Boils, Hail. Moshe requests that Pharaoh allows B’nai Yisroel to worship God for three days, Pharaoh sometimes acquiesces sometimes he doesn’t. Sometimes he asks Moshe to pray on his behalf and sometimes he doesn’t. One thing is clear, that whenever Pharaoh gets his way (a plague ceases), something that would clearly indicate the power of God, Pharaoh acts almost like a child. He returns to his arrogant self-centered nature. Finally at the very end of the Parsha, after the plague of Hail has devastated the land and killed anything that was outside, Pharaoh expresses the evolution of his belief system.

Two men, Moshe and Pharaoh experience a type of revelation. Each man’s revelation is shaped by who they are, their life experiences and their outlook upon the world. Each leader will experience something very different than what fits their current theological system. Moshe is told by God, “Ani Adoshem VaEira el Avraham El Yitzchak v’ El Yaakov B’Eil Shaddai U’Shmi Adoshem Lo Nodati LaHem – I am Hashem, I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as El Shaddai, but with My Name Hashem, I did not make Myself known to them (Ex. 6:2) For Moshe, his revelation assumes questions.  Why did you, Hashem, reveal yourself one way to Abraham Isaac and Jacob, and another way to me?  God will reveal himself to Moshe through “Signs and Wonders”.  V’Yadu Mitzrayim Ki Ani Adoshem, BinToti et Yadi Al Mitzrayim V’Hotzeiti et Bnai Yisroel MiTocham – And Egypt Shall know that I am Hashem, when I stretch out My hand over Egypt; and I shall take the Children of Israel out from among them (Ex. 7:5). With each ensuing plague, Pharaoh and Egypt will experience God. For Pharaoh, the embodiment of a system that did not permit questions, the revelation was much more absolute and stark. That revelation would manifest itself in a series of plagues.

Pharaoh’s world is harsh, he felt threatened by a minority culture and he believed that Egypt was threatened by that same minority culture. As a result, the blood, the frogs, the lice, swarms of wild beasts, livestock disease, boil, hail, locusts, and the death of the first born were perceived as plagues and God was perceived as a harsh judge with little mercy. Moshe had experienced kindness. His mother hid him in the basket, Pharoah’s daughter drew him out of the basket and raised him as her own. After he demonstrated kindness to the slaves by attempting to protect them, he leaves Egypt and demonstrates kindness to Yitro’s daughters. Yitro takes in this stranger as his own son, and eventually, Moses marries Yitro’s daughter Zipporah.  Zipporah demonstrates kindness to Moshe when she perceives that his life is endangered because he didn’t circumcise their son in a timely fashion (Ex. 4:24-26). Because Moshe experienced kindness through his life and he demonstrated kindness to others; it only makes sense that God is not so much a harsh judge as God is merciful and kind.  Needless to say, when we arrived with food for our stranded friends, their faith was re-affirmed. Despite the difficulties and inconveniences, they were experiencing in a Toronto hospital, they could only see the kindness that people had extended. As for me, I was reminded that we always have opportunities to demonstrate kindness. Some are big and some are small. Some opportunities are obvious and explicit, some are less so. However those opportunities exist, and as much as our friends’ faith was reaffirmed by an act of kindness, being presented an opportunity to spend a day engaging in random acts of kindness re-affirmed my faith as well. Besides, it seemed like a pretty good way to start 2019.

Peace,

Rav Yitz

What I Want To Know Is, Are You Kind (Robert Hunter & Jerry Garcia - "Uncle John's Band")

There are some life lessons that recur so frequently that it seems almost impossible to learn from them. Yet, for some, it is impossible to learn. As a husband, a parent, a child, as a friend, as an educator, as a Rabbi or a community leader one of the most vital and recurring lessons of Presence. Sometimes, the Lesson of Presence is a phone call, a tweet, or an email. Sometimes the Lesson of Presence is a formal statement. Sometimes it is physically showing up. The fires out west have been horrific, lives lost. My wife’s family lives in both northern and southern California. We call them because we are concerned, but we also call them to let them know that we are thinking of them, that we are present. With a daughter in learning in Jerusalem and friends throughout Israel, when we say “stay safe”, it reminds them that we care and that we are sensitive what has been happening in Israel with hundreds of rockets being fired from Gaza.  With a daughter who has finished an election cycle and was driving alone from Florida to Washington DC; I spoke to her several times so she shouldn’t feel so alone (it probably drove her a bit crazy but she should know that she wasn’t alone).  As Jews, we pay a Shiva visit to a mourner, we do Bikur Cholim- we visit the sick. On a Yartzeit, (the anniversary of a person’s death), the loved one might visit the grave.  To be “Present” is among the most basic and simplest acts that one person can demonstrate to another. Sometimes it may require words or a hug. Sometimes it can be done in silence. For a leader of a Nation, the Power of Presence is about the easiest thing to do.  On one hand, it is incredibly symbolic, it creates a sense of good will, and it goes a long way in reminding the person or the group that feels alone and abandoned that they are not.  

This week we read from Parsha VaYeitze. This week we read from Parshat VaYeitze. The focus of the narrative is upon Yaakov. For the first time, Yaakov will find out what it means to be alone in the world.  He has left his mother, Rivkah, and his father Yitzchak, for the first time. In fleeing his brother Esav, Yaakov now embarks on a new phase of his life. For the first time, but certainly not the last time, he will have to face being alone. Yes, Yaakov will meet his future wives, his cousins Leah and Rachel. He will work for his father in- law, Lavan, and he will have children. The narrative will focus upon Yaakov life from young adulthood to becoming a responsible father, earning a living and all the trials, tribulation, and tensions of career and family. As Yaakov makes his way in life, hopefully, he will learn more about himself. With each event, with each adventure, Yaakov has an opportunity to become better connected, better connected to himself, and better connected to a covenant that his father bequeathed to him. Yet throughout the narrative he will come to understand the Lesson of Presence.  At the beginning of the narrative, he feels alone but will quickly sense God’s presence. He will learn the importance of Presence when his wife begs for a child, when a son helps his mother, and when a family prepares to finally leave an untenable situation.

Yaakov acknowledges his loneliness at the beginning of the Parsha. He doesn’t even feel connected to God. First God speaks to Yaakov in the dream: Ani Adoshem Elohei Avraham Avicha, V’Elohei Yitzchak HaAretz Asher Atah Shocheiv Aleha Lecha Etnenah U’LeZarecha – I am Hashem, God of Abraham your father and God of Isaac; the ground upon which you are lying, to you will I give it and to your descendants (28:13). In the dream, God offers Yaakov protection wherever Yaakov goes. In a sense, God volunteers to be Yaakov’s God as well.  When Yaakov wakes up from the dream he still does not feel reassured: Im Yiheyeh Elohim Imadi Ushmarani Baderech Hazeh Asher Anochi Holech v’Natan Li Lechem L’echol Uveged Lilbosh, vShavti b’Shalom el Bet Avi v’Hayah Hashem Li Le’lohim.  If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and clothes to wear, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God.  Im Yiheyeh Elohim Imadi Ushmarani Baderech Hazeh Asher Anochi Holech v’Natan Li Lechem L’echol Uveged Lilbosh, vShavti b’Shalom el Bet Avi v’Hayah Hashem Li Le’lohim.  If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and clothes to wear, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God.   Yaakov equates the feeling of abandonment or a lack of presence with a lack of demonstrable kindness.  It will take nearly two decades, but as Yaakov is able to act selflessly, demonstrate kindness, he will feel less alone, and less of a sense of abandonment. As Yaakov is more present in others’ lives, he will sense God’s presence in his life.

In the first chapter of Genesis, we learned that humankind was created in God’s image. That is to say, human beings have the capacity to emulate Godly qualities. The Talmudic Tractate Sota 14 a explains that clothing the needy is a Godly quality because God clothed Adam and Chava; visiting the sick is a Godly quality because God visited Avraham while Avaraham was healing from circumcision (the beginning of Parsha VaYeirah); comforting the mourner is a Godly quality because God comforted Isaac (end of Parsha Chayei Sarah) and burying the dead because God buried Moses (end of Deuteronomy 34:6). Emulating God requires us to act selflessly, to remove the self from the equation and to do for the other. Fundamental to each of these Godly actions, these acts of kindness is the notion of being present. Every act of kindness is an expression of God’s Presence. Perhaps it is the simplest activity for a person to do – be present, empathize, and in doing so, God’s presence is self-evident.

Peace,

Rav Yitz