Parashat Beshalah--The Long Way Around

The Talmud teaches, “There is a long way which is short and a short way which is long” (Babylonian Talmud, Eruvin 53b).  Yes, I think, it’s true; although, when setting off on one’s journey it’s often hard to know the difference.  I can think of times when I’ve set off on a course of action, confident that I am traveling down a short road of slim resistance, only to find myself mired in the thick of things and wondering how I got myself there in the first place.  And then there are those times, when a long view and careful planning, a tough trek anticipated ahead, is filled with sweetness and ease.  Knowing which roads we’re embarking upon, it seems to me, is the stuff of life and measurements of growth.

This week’s Torah Portion, Parashat Beshalah, begins, “Now when Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines, although it was nearer; for God said, ‘The people may have a change of heart when they see war, and return to Egypt.  So, God led the people roundabout, by way of the wilderness at the Sea of Reeds” (Exodus 13:17-18).

The Israelites had one short road ahead, which God feared would be too difficult and would cause the Israelites to complain and beg to return to Egypt.  So, God sent them the long way.  The irony of our people’s journey is that the long way was not actually any easier.  While traveling the long way, they spent years crying out to God and begging to be returned Egypt with just as much force as they did to be freed from it in the first place (Numbers 14:1-5, for example). 

So, I will be a little chutzpadik and suggest an addendum to the Talmud’s wisdom: There is a long way which is long and there is a short way which is long.  Sometimes, we’re blessed to find a long way which is short and, every once in a great blessed while, a short way which is actually short

What might we learn from this week’s Torah Portion?  A few thoughts:

1. Rachel Lewin, Head of School of the TIOH Day School, wrote a few months back about the importance of parents letting children experience the very natural process of learning something new, which can include feelings of frustration and challenge.  Rachel explained that learning how to cope with these feelings and moving through them are important life lessons.  For parents, it can seem easy enough to make a child’s long road shorter, but sometimes we find on the other end, that the short road missed the journey all together.
2. Sometimes, it is not until we have reached the end of a journey that we realize we have traveled the long way around.  It is often this realization and the lessons we have learned along the way that help us to take the shorter roads ahead.  
3. Most of all, this week’s Torah portion reminds us that our life’s pursuit should not be a search for short roads.  Long roads and 40 year journeys are a part of our historical memory.  Even the long roads that are long hold blessings and lessons along the way.  Torah’s promise to us is that God travels with us no matter which road we take or that the sacred is within us no matter how long the journey.

This is a Shabbat for choosing new journeys and reflecting on the ones we have chosen.  This is a time for reorientation.  What journeys are you on?  Were they expected or no?  Have they proven long or short?  What are the blessings to be gleaned from them?

*A huge thank you to Darcy Veber for pointing out this gem of a Talmud verse to me.

Parashat Bo--Myers-Briggs

In the opening verse of this week’s Torah Portion, Parashat Bo, we learn again of the phenomenon of Pharaoh’s “hardened heart” when it comes to the Israelites and their situation (Exodus 10:1). This idea of a “hardened heart” is repeated no less than 20 times in Exodus: half of the references referring to Pharaoh having a hardened heart and half of the references referring to God hardening Pharaoh’s heart (Etz Hayim 335). This repeated phrase begs a couple questions:

• In the context of Torah, what is the role of the heart and what does it mean for a heart to be hardened?
• How can we learn from this lesson of a hardened heart today?

The role of the heart
As far as the Torah is concerned, the heart functions “as the seat of the intellectual, moral, and spiritual life of the individual” (Etz Hayim 335). Said differently, the biblical heart is understood in much the same way as our mind functions today (the role of today’s heart, the emotional center, is found in the biblical kishkes or gut).

Hardening of the heart
We come to see then that what happens to Pharaoh is not an emotional hardening, but rather an intellectual and spiritual hardening. When the Torah says that Pharaoh’s heart is hardened, it signals to us that Pharaoh has become increasingly entrenched in his own thoughts, beliefs, and assumptions. Pharaoh becomes so convinced he is right, so convinced in the unjust social order of his day, and so sure in his own reasoned justifications that he becomes unable to hear the voices of others, to see their suffering, or recognize injustice.

Lessons of today 
In studying these verses this past week, I was reminded of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (or personality test), which I first completed as a professional development tool while studying at the Hebrew Union College. One of the preference pairs on the test helps the test-taker to understand how s/he likes to make decisions: by Feeling or by Thinking. People who make decisions by Feeling “believe [they] can make the best decisions by weighing what people care about and the points-of-view of persons involved in a situation.” People who make decisions by Thinking “like to find the basic truth or principle to be applied, regardless of the specific situation involved.” As my professor explained it to me, for a Feeling decision-maker the feelings of the other person are more important than being rational and right, and for a Thinking decision-maker being right and rational is more important than sparing the feelings of others or his/her own self.

This Test comes to mind today because I see in its carefully laid-out boundaries the lessons of Pharaoh’s heart. When we harden our hearts, we allow ourselves to exist in the extremes of decision making. For the Feelers amongst us, we allow ourselves to ignore the moral universe in service to the individual in front of us. For the Thinkers amongst us, we allow ourselves to ignore the realities of the individual in service to what we have labeled as moral certitude.

The lesson of Pharaoh is this: We are responsible, always, for justice and compassion; for morality and empathy; for being right and for being kind. This dual-responsibility is what Torah, mitzvot, and Jewish ethical living are all about.  Our tradition asks us to rise above are most basic instincts.

Tests like Myers Briggs are helpful for understanding ourselves, the ways in which we make decisions, and our own tendencies toward action and reaction in this world. They are not, however, excuses to live in extremes and harden our hearts. We are reminded this week not to decide in the image of Pharaoh (who sees neither justice nor compassion), but in the image of God (who seeks always to embody both).

Parashat Sh'mot--Spiritual Exile

This week, we begin a new book of Torah.  Exodus.  Sh’mot in Hebrew.  We often speak of the famous exodus memorialized in this book.  The Exodus from Egypt, in which Moses leads the Israelites out of bondage, out of slavery, out of the Narrow Place.

But, as this book of Torah opens, there is no hint of bondage, no hint of slavery, no fear of the Narrow Land.  Rather, this week’s Torah portion begins with an exodus into Egypt, as Joseph’s brothers and their families follow his footsteps southward from Canaan.

They had no idea what they were walking into. 

And, doesn’t this story of our ancestors ring true?  That which enslaves us often creeps up unannounced…out of places of plenty, experiences of goodness, lives of fullness.  And then slowly, and without warning, we find ourselves not on some exotic adventure or frivolous vacation, but in exile.  Distanced from freedom, separated from wholeness.

To be in exile is a spiritual condition.  We are in exile when we find ourselves somehow separated from God, separated from the sacred.  We are in exile when we feel an absence of the divine in our lives. 


When we are in exile, we are spiritually marooned.  Spiritually lost.  Disconnected.

This week’s Torah portion is about experiencing exile and longing for redemption.

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The Torah tells us how the Israelites went from freedom to slavery.  It reads: “A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, "Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us. Let us deal shrewdly with them, so that they may not increase” (Exodus 1:8-10).

Exile happens to us.  Without our intending it.  Without our wishing it.  Suddenly, something around us changes.  And what started as a journey to a land of plenty (good living), becomes enslavement.  A simple story.

But, Torah teaches us that exile is not a permanent condition.  Every exile holds the promise of redemption.

The Sefat Emet teaches us that Torah speaks of three different types of exile. 
1.    Imprisonment
2.    Humility
3.    Poverty

And with each of these types of exile, we are promised three different acts of redemption, for Torah teaches us that God:
1.    Brings forth the prisoners
2.    Delivers the humble
3.    Helps the needy

And we ask:  What is the meaning behind each of these types of exile?  What does it mean to be a prisoner?  What does it mean to be humbled?  What does it mean to be needy?

First—The prisoner.

The Sefat Emet teaches us that we are prisoners when we are “unable to broaden out that point of divine life that is within [us].”  We are imprisoned when we fail to recognize that there is an essential spark inside each of us.  We are imprisoned when we are unable to tap into that source of life and goodness.  We are imprisoned when we are unable to tap into its strength.

But, God brings us prisoners forth.

Second—The humble.

The humble person is a righteous person, one who need not be in exile, but who remains there selflessly.  Working to redeem others.  Moses, the Sefat Emet teaches, was one of the humble.  He himself could have been redeemed, but remained in Egypt in order to lead his people out.  And there are those of us who spend our days redeeming others.  We work tirelessly to rescue those amongst us who are lost or fallen or faltering.  We are reminded this week that this work comes at a toll.  We who exile ourselves by choice need special care.  We too must claim moments of rest, moments of freedom, moments of peace.

And, God, we are taught, delivers the humble.

And finally, the third type of exile—The needy.

“The needy,” we are taught, refers to “those lowly ones who do not yet even feel their exile.”  Yes, says the Sefat Emet, “they are in need of the greatest salvation.”  Our ancestors suffered under the cruel king’s tyranny for years without realizing they were enslaved.  It was not until that king died that the Israelites first cried out.  They moaned and called out for help.  And God heard them.  And remembered.  And saw them.

God, we are taught, helps the needy

Redemption is impossible until we recognize that we are in exile.  Until we cry out.  Until we sigh under the burden.  This is the great act of strength.  Falling into exile is passive.  Readying for redemption is active.

We are taught there is a final act of redemption, one that is due to us all.  God tells us:  “I will take you as My people” (Exodus 6:7).  No longer lost.  No longer separated.  Claimed.  Whole.  Connected.

The Sefat Emet finishes, “Something like this is true of every exile.  But more than that, all these rungs seem to exist in every person as well.  Every [person] has some inner place in which he is a free person.”

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And now I invite you look inward.  Imagine that first cry our ancestors made.  The original sigh, which grew to a moan, and cascaded into a call, one heard by God.  Imagine the relief they felt, finally naming that which oppressed them.

And now I invite you to consider your own life.  Imagine the divine spark deep within you, your source of freedom.  Breathe into it.  Breathe out of it.

This is the first act of redemption.  This a Shabbat for claiming freedom.  All the rest is still yet to follow.  Only potentials.  Only possibilities.

Parashat Vayehi--Making Sprials

There are many elements converging together this Shabbat.  I believe these elements, which are seemingly disconnected, might actually suggest to us something new (or at least something to reflect upon) during the day of rest ahead.

A few elements worth noting:

We are coming to the end of the first day of a new calendar year.

We are one night past a fairly rare blue moon on a New Year’s Eve.

We are reading the last Torah portion in the book of Genesis.

And, with Joseph’s death at the end of the parashah, we are standing on the border between freedom and slavery in Egypt.

Remember these disconnected elements as we dive for a moment into the particulars of the Torah portion itself.

This week’s parashah begins with Jacob on his deathbed.  Jacob’s son Joseph brings his two sons Manasheh and Ephraim to their grandfather’s bedside, asking Jacob to offer a blessing over them.

As is the custom, Joseph leads the older son Manasheh to Jacob’s his right side and the younger son Ephraim to his left.  Jacob is blind by this time and Joseph helpfully arranges the boys perfectly so that Jacob would be able to easily use his right hand to bestow due honor on Manasheh, Joseph’s firstborn son.

A word about firstborn sons...

In the Tanakah, the Hebrew Bible, we are taught that the firstborn son is due quite a lot in life—his father’s blessing, a double portion of his family’s inheritance (Deut. 21:15-17), and the authority to rule over the rest of his family after his father’s death.

What a privilege...

And yet, in this week’s Torah portion, we are reminded that so-called divinely ordained privileges are often not all that they seem to be.

In this week’s parashah, Jacob intentionally crosses over his arms, laying his right hand on the younger Ephraim’s head and his left hand on the older Manasheh’s.  When Joseph seeks to correct the mistake, Jacob says, “I know, my son, I know. He too shall become a people, and he too shall be great. Yet his younger brother shall be greater than he” (Genesis 48:19).  And Jacob blesses the younger Ephraim.


Jacob is clearly sensitive to birth order, having tricked his older brother Esau out of birthright and blessing.

And at that, Jacob’s father Isaac knew a bit about superseding the so-called “natural order of things,” as he, the younger son, was granted his father’s birthright and blessing in place of his older brother Ishmael.

And why is it that Jacob is blessing the sons of Joseph at all?  Let us remember that Joseph is the eleventh of Jacob’s twelve sons.  Why is not the oldest son, Reuben, at his father’s bedside?  Jacob himself explains that it is because of Reuben’s immorality that the sons of Joseph receive Jacob’s birthright (1 Chr. 5:1).

The list continues.  King David passes over his firstborn son Adonijah in favor of  the younger Solomon. (2 Chr. 21:3).  Chosah chooses Shimri.

In the end, even God chooses to turn aside custom, claiming the Levites as priests, in place of the Israelites’ firstborn sons (Number 8:6-18).

And so, we are left with a dilemma.  What sort of a lesson are we meant to take away from this systemic undoing of what is presented as a preordained “donesss”?  That is to say, why does the Torah teach of a firstborn’s birthright, if, more times than not, this birthright is given not to the privileged older son, but to the younger son?

We are reminded of this intentional rebalancing on a weekly basis.  In the Shabbat blessing of the children, parents are called upon to say, “May you be like Ephraim and Manasheh.”  Our words flip the natural birth order, Manasheh and Ephraim, and we continually reinforce the reconstituted hierarchy of life.

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I mentioned earlier that there are a series of elements converging upon us tonight.  We are moving beyond beginnings (full moons and new years) and into the possibilities that lie ahead, at the same time we come to the end of a book of Torah.  This Shabbat is one of endings and beginnings.

Our patriarchs begin and end as well.  Ephraim begins his new life as favored son.  Manasheh ends his.  Jacob dies.  Joseph dies.  And the Israelites are poised to begin a new, not necessarily better, tenure in Egypt.

Beginnings and Endings.  Torah tells us:  At these moments, things are ever hardly what we expect them to be.  What we are told they should be.  What we want to order them to be.

Margaret Atwood writes, “Beginnings are sudden, but also insidious.  They creep up on you sideways, they keep to the shadows, they lurk unrecognized.  Then, later, they spring (The Blind Assassin 232). 

Rabbi Zoë Klein told me once that a circle is a dangerous shape.  Circles continue revolving on and on, without stopping and without ever advancing.  A spiral is much healthier.  Spirals have the roundness of circles, but are ever pushing forward, ever advancing.

Maybe this is the lesson we are to learn this week.  Not just that Torah favors younger sons or that hierarchical establishments are made to be broken...but, that we have the power to change the seemingly preordained and inevitable circles of our lives.  Endings and beginnings are perfect times for making spirals.

Joseph set two sons before Jacob.  The future all lined up.  Neat and ordered.  All Jacob did was flip his hands.  Circle made spiral. 

And here we are, the moon pregnant with possibility, waxing yet again.  The 0s and 1s of 01-01-10 lined up neatly on our calendars.  All we have to do is flip our hands.  Set the spiral in motion.  Start a new book of Torah once again.

Chazak, chazak, v’nitchazek.  Be strong, be strong, and may you be strengthened.

Chanukah and Shabbat 5770

A prayer for tonight, which is Shabbat and the first night of Chanukah:

May the lights we light tonight not be limited to four small flames. 
Rather, may each of these flames expand—expand into a soft light that illuminates the shadows within each of us.
May tonight’s flames serve as some sort of gentle inner glow—a glow that radiates from the outside in and from the inside out.
A light of awareness.

May the lights we light tonight not be limited to four small flames. 
Rather, may each of  these flames blaze like torches—torches that throw light onto the injustices around us.
May tonight’s flames serve as urgent, alarm-like reminders that our world is not yet perfect and that we have a pressing responsibility to act for change.
A light of awareness.

May the lights we light tonight not be limited to four small flames. 
Rather, may each of these flames serve as markers—markers of the Sacred Presence in our hearts and homes.
May tonight’s flames serve as the purest of symbols—symbols of a Sheltering Peace that envelops us even in these longest, darkest days of our year.
A light of awareness.

Parashat Vayishlach--thoughts on Thanksgiving cont.

In this week’s Torah portion, Vayishlach, Jacob gives something of himself to his brother Esau.  In this parashah, Jacob sees Esau for the first time in twenty years.  You may remember that the last time these two brothers saw one another was when Jacob was fleeing his family’s home in fear of his life, for Esau had just discovered that Jacob had stolen his birthright. 

In the beginning of this week’s portion, Jacob spends a night of restless wrestling, he is filled with the deepest fears imaginable.  Jacob is terrified that Esau, in violent retribution for his earlier thievery, would attack him and his entire family.  We can imagine how relieved and shocked Jacob must have been when Esau, instead of attacking him, received him.  We can imagine what Jacob must have felt when he realized that his worst nightmares would not become reality.  We can imagine that Jacob, by the end of this encounter, was unbelievably grateful to his brother and to God. 

I believe that we can all identify with Jacob:  We know the feelings associated with being given a gift that we feel we might not have deserved.  We can empathize with the deep gratitude that Jacob must have felt when he knew that his life would be spared.

But, what is remarkable about Jacob’s behavior in this story is what Jacob does with his gratitude.  For, when Jacob realizes that Esau is granting him the gift of peace, Jacob says to him: “‘…I pray; if you would do me this favor, accept from me this brachah (blessing), for to see your face is like seeing the face of God, and you have received me favorably. Please accept my blessing which has been brought to you, for God has favored me and I have plenty’” (33:10).

Jacob responds to his heartfelt gratitude by giving something essential of himself to his brother.  The blessing that Jacob gives to Esau is more than just a simple offering.  This gift is Jacob’s attempt to make right the wrong he had committed against Esau twenty years ago.  The Hebrew word for birthright is “b'racha” or “blessing.”  And so, when Jacob offers Esau a “b'racha,” a blessing as a gift of gratitude, I believe that Jacob is trying to set right what he had done wrong.  For, Jacob, in his gratitude, gives Esau a “b'racha,” something that is profoundly essential to who he is, and something which Esau lacks.  

The truth is, it would have been easy for Jacob to have simply walked away from his brother.  Jacob could have fallen to his knees, in perfect biblical style.  He could have thanked and praised God, his Provider and Protector, his Rock and his Shield for delivering him from his brother.  But, Jacob does not just do that.  Jacob knows that prayer, in this case, is not enough.  His gratitude warrants action.  We can learn a lot from Jacob. 

This is thanksgiving.

Questions for further reflection (perfect for family-sharing during Shabbat meals):

• What is a gift that have you received for which you did not feel worthy?
• How did you feel when you received it?  How did you react?
• What life-lesson(s) did you learn from the experience?

Parashat Toldot--Thanksgiving

The word “Thanksgiving” is an assertion. From it, we learn that the appropriate response to gratitude is giving. Thanksgiving. Because we feel deeply grateful for what we have in our lives, we give something of ourselves to someone or something else.

In this week’s Torah Portion, Parashat Toldot, we encounter the opposite of thanksgiving. Said simply, this is a parashah that focuses on ingratitude and taking. Jacob pushes his (slightly) older brother Esau into selling him his birthright for a cup of soup, and then Jacob steals Esau’s blessing through outward trickery. They boys’ parents, Isaac and Rebekah, each choose their favorite son and support his efforts.

If this were the end of the Torah’s story about thanksgiving, we would be in a sorry state. In fact, it’s just the beginning. The real story of Jacob and Esau is not the taking or the trickery, but the gratitude and giving that come later. For me, the real story of Jacob and Esau is one of reconciliation and redemption. But, that is still yet to come...

The joy of studying Torah each week is the spiritual reflection that is possible when we know the end of the story, but willfully ignore it. This week we learn of taking and losing. This week we are left to consider the isolation and unhappiness that selfishness breeds. We are left longing for giving and gratitude. (and we know they are still yet to come)

As we move toward Shabbat, and then toward the holiday of Thanksgiving, I invite you to reflect again on the word “thanksgiving.” This word implicitly asserts that living a life filled with gratitude is insufficient. Unlike gratitude, thanksgiving is renewable. It spreads from person to person, life to life, soul to soul. Gratitude is a feeling. Thanksgiving is an action. In fact, this week, we hear a call to action: Seek out gratitude. Embrace opportunities for giving.

Questions for further reflection (perfect for family-sharing during Shabbat meals):

• What are you grateful for in your life? 
• How might your gratitude inspire you to give? 
• What gifts do you still have yet to share with the world, and how might they be used to help others?