May 30, 2008

Parashat Bamidbar 5768

This week, we begin reading a new book of Torah. Like most of us, the book hosts not one, but at least two identities. These identities are reflected in its names.

In Hebrew, the book is called Bamidbar, meaning “in the wilderness.” Bamidbar is a book about being in the wilderness. It outlines the effect that journeying has on the people. In Bamidbar, we hear a counter-narrative of wandering; the Israelites grumble, complain, and rebel. They grow mistrustful of God, of Moses, and of Aaron. Bamidbar shows us that wandering comes at a price, as does freedom from slavery.

Bamidbar reminds us that every seemingly ordered experience in life is counter-balanced by chaos and made more interesting by disruption.


In English, the book is called Numbers. Numbers is a book about numbers and certainty. This week’s parashah, for example, details a census, listing both the number of Israelite men who are of fighting age and the number of Levite males who will serve as the priests of the people. In Numbers, we learn of order and detail, including both the preparations to leave Mount Sinai and the groundwork for life in the Promised Land. Numbers is a book about marching forward from slavery to freedom and from the Narrow-Places of Egypt to the Promised Land.


Numbers reminds us that there is a rhythm to life, a current by which we flow, and a path for us to follow.
Rachel Havrelock writes in The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, “The contrast between these two titles reflects a tension between order and chaos, culture and nature, obedience and rebellion that characterizes the book and drives its plot.” This book of Torah deals in reality, reminding us that life is often more than what meets the eye.


As we enter into Shabbat this week, let us reflect on the significance of the names we possess. Many of us are known by different names, depending on the context in which we find ourselves: There are the names by which we are known at home, at work, and in the community. Strangers address us in one fashion, loved ones in another. Our names have power. They shape both the ways in which we see ourselves and the ways in which others see us. They can guide the way we act and the way react.

Like our book of Torah, Bamidbar – Numbers, our multiple names often represent multiple identities. These names give texture to our lives. On this Shabbat, let us delight in our full selves, reflecting on our many names and giving voice to disparate parts of ourselves.

May 23, 2008

Parashat Bechukotai 5768

With this week’s Torah portion Parashat Bechukotai, we come to the end of the book of Leviticus. The parashah ends with a familiar biblical assertion. God says: If you obey my laws, I will shower you with blessings and, if you do not obey my laws, I will bring curses upon you. For me, this simple statement of theodicy—this simple explanation for why good and bad happens in our lives—is troubling and rings untrue.

I do not believe in a God that blesses people who do good and curses people who do bad. This neat sense of balance in the world may give us humans a sense of control or power in the universe (i.e. if we just do good, then good things will come to us), but the problem is that it is simply untrue. Sorrow and pain sadly touch all of our lives, whether we are good people or not. To suggest otherwise is to deny many of our fundamental human experiences.

The Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, itself expresses many different contradictory theologies (beliefs in God) and theodicies (explanations of good and bad in our world). So, while this theology of blessings and curses is often read as the dominant theology of the Hebrew Bible, it is certainly not the only way our foundational text looks at God’s relationship with us. The ancient Jewish rabbis, as well as the rabbis of the Middle Ages and Modern eras, wrestle with Bechukotai’s concept of God in their own writings. We, today, stand in a long line of tradition when we engage in this wrestling, as well.

This past week, I had the honor of hearing my teacher, Dr. Tamara Eskenazi, speak briefly on this week’s parashah. She explained that while she does not believe that God blesses us, she does believe we have the choice as to whether or not we want to be blessings in the world.

What does it mean to be a blessing?

We become blessings when we recognize that we are created in the image of God and act in ways that bring a sense of the Divine into our world. In this week’s parashah, God promises us peace, abundant food, respite from wild beasts, and military victories. And I think, what if we, ourselves, become agents of peace, providers for the needy, champions for the poor, and advocates for the disenfranchised.

If we look beyond the belief that God gives us blessings and curses, then we look toward a world in which we recognize our own power to become blessings in our families, in our work, in our homes, in our communities, and in our world. May each of us recognize the Divine spark within us and from that spark learn to be a blessing. Through us, may shefa brachot, abundant blessings, flow into our world.

May 16, 2008

Parashat Behar 5768

In this week's Torah Portion, Parashat Behar, we hear a new commandment, "When you come to the land that I give to you, there will be a Shabbat-ceasing of the land-a Shabbat for God." That's right, you read it correctly: Leviticus is commanding the land to rest, just as God commands us to rest.

This week's parashah teaches us that every seven years the land of Israel must lie fallow so that it can be rejuvenated. Just as we are commanded to rest every seven days, the land is commanded to rest every seven years.

Torah teaches us: Neither we nor the land can be worked and worked and worked endlessly and tirelessly. Notice, though, that in today's society, neither we nor the land often have many opportunities to rest-even if it is for God's sake. Society often sends us messages that tell us to push and push forward, to always look ahead. In the work world, as well as in school, we may feel that we need to keep moving in order to get ahead. We skip vacations because "there is just too much to do; we just can't get away."

This mentality, our Jewish value system tells us, is flawed. Am Yisrael, our people, are commanded to live by a different calendar. We are commanded to rest every seven days, to cycle back. We are told to rest and to be refreshed. We are told to take a day of menucha, a day of rest, for time at home, for prayer, for study, for reading, for family, and for personal reflection. On Shabbat, we are meant to stop.

This week, our understanding of what Shabbat means is deepened. This week, we are taught that our Earth, as well, is a complex, strong and fragile living, breathing being who must rest. Many of the conversations we are having about our environment and our responsibility to it stem from this basic belief. In spiritual terms: Our earth is no longer being left to observe her natural rhythm and is no longer being given the chance to lie fallow-even for a second. Just as our perfectly created bodies, if pushed too hard for too long, will take revenge on us, so too will our ever-caring, perfectly created and balanced earth rebel if she is not given her proper Shabbat.

Shabbat is a counter-cultural concept.

On this Shabbat, let us reflect on the connection between our bodies and our land. From this reflection, may we discover a relevant ordering of the world-a guide that we can use to inform our 21st century concepts of both Western Culture and time-management, as well as environmental and personal well-being.

May 9, 2008

Parashat Emor 5768

When I was seventeen years old, I stepped off a plane and onto Israel's soil for the first time. This simple contact between foot and ground took my breath away. When I arrived at the dorm of Alexander Muss High School in Israel, our counselor jokingly asked me, "Did you kiss the ground when you landed?" My soul would have none of the joke. "I should have," I felt myself cry inside.

This week's Torah portion, Parashat Emor, exclaims, "Adonai spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the Israelite people and say to them: These are My fixed times, the fixed times of Adonai, which you shall proclaim as sacred occasions" (Leviticus 23:1-2). Parashat Emor describes the sacred festivals outlined by our Torah. I believe it is wonderfully fitting that it is during this very week in which Torah describes our fixed calendrical celebrations that we celebrate two holy-days of modern creation: Yom HaZikaron and Yom Ha'azmaut, Israeli Remembrance Day and Israeli Independence Day. For Jews in Israel, these holidays set a national scene: A day of communal mourning followed by a day of communal celebration, days which are marked by the sounding of sirens, by somber ceremonies, by private memories, and by family gatherings.

When I was a junior in college, I studied abroad in Israel. On Yom Ha'azmaut, I took a bus from Hebrew University into the center of Jerusalem. As the bus wound its way into the city, I was excited. The curious college student thought: I wonder what Independence Day in Israel looks like? I stepped off the bus and was immediately covered in silly string, which seemed to be pouring out of the cans of Israeli teens running everywhere. The streets, the crowds, the sidewalks, the storefronts-everyone, everything-was covered in silly string. The streets were alive. This was no time for passive observation. I bought two cans of silly string from a passing merchant. I began spraying the strangers around me, laughing in disbelief. This day had become my Independence Day.

My partner Tali, who is Israeli, tells me stories of her own experiences of Yom Ha'azmaut growing up. She explains that on Yom Ha'azmaut, every patch of Israel's available grass, from public parks to roadway medians, is claimed by an Israeli family engaging in the Israeli national pastime, mangel or barbeque. Families roast meats, eat hummus, play soccer; radios play and children nap on spread out blankets.

Yes, Parashat Emor carefully outlines the rhythm of Shabbatot and festivals, of holy days and agricultural cycles, but our modern day Jewish calendar reminds us that Torah is a living document, one which is made richer by our own ongoing Jewish experiences. May this Shabbat be one in which your heart is turned eastward and your prayers offered toward Jerusalem. Who knows, maybe this is the excuse you've been looking for to have a family picnic!

May 2, 2008

Parashat Kedoshim 5768

In this week's Torah portion, Parashat Kedoshim, we are given the key to unlock the mystery of Leviticus, and maybe even the whole of Torah. Leviticus 19:2 reads, "You shall be holy, for I, Adonai your God, am holy." As I explained to our TBS teenagers earlier this week while we stood in remembrance of the six million Jews murdered at the hands of Nazis: Holiness is what being Jewish is about. We are commanded to be holy, as God is holy, and it is our most sacred task to bring holiness to ourselves, to our community, and to our world.

The Jewish philosopher Martin Buber suggests that holiness is found in our relationships with one another. This week's parasha provides a textual backdrop for Buber's philosophy. Leviticus 19:9-10 reads, "When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not pick your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen fruit of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger: I Adonai am your God." Torah teaches us to protect the powerless in our society.

Bringing holiness to our world means asking ourselves: What is today's field? What is today's vineyard? As I have listened to our local officials and community representatives in past weeks, the answer to this question has become clear to me: Our field is the California state budget.

This past week, our local representative from CLUE (Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice), Wendy Tarr, asked local faith leaders to consider this question: How will Governor Schwarzenegger's proposal of 10% budget cuts hurt the poor and needy in Orange County? CLUE explains that among other areas, these cuts will affect healthcare for poor children, employment and temporary financial assistance to low-income families, financial and in home assistance for seniors and disabled persons, and increase class sizes and decrease preschool enrollment.

Our state budget is our field. It is our vineyard. And, we must ask ourselves: Will we leave the corners of our field for the needy or will we strip our vineyard bare? This week's parasha teaches us that our obligation to be holy means protecting the poor and powerless in our community. CLUE has begun to initiate conversations about how California faith groups can and should respond to these proposed cuts. I, along with other concerned people of faith, will be engaging in this dialogue. Do you wish to join in? Do you have beliefs that you would like us or members of the broader community to hear? If so, please write me.

K'doshim tihiyu, You shall be holy. Let it be so!