Shabbat Shemini: They Must Deserve It

There but for the grace of HaShem

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר מֹשֶׁ֜ה אֶֽל־אַהֲרֹ֗ן הוּא֩ אֲשֶׁר־דִּבֶּ֨ר ה’ ׀ לֵאמֹר֙ בִּקְרֹבַ֣י אֶקָּדֵ֔שׁ וְעַל־פְּנֵ֥י כׇל־הָעָ֖ם אֶכָּבֵ֑ד וַיִּדֹּ֖ם אַהֲרֹֽן׃ 

Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what ‘ה meant by saying: through those near to Me I show Myself holy, and will be respected before all the people.” Aaron was silent. (Lev. 10.3)

On this Shabbat we read of the tragic deaths of Nadav and Abihu, two young men on their first day working in the newly-established priesthood serving HaShem on behalf of the Israelites. We understand very little of the Torah’s account as it is preserved, and what we do have is so troubling that trying to understand it has been the aspiration of many a midrash.

Most of the interpretations given to this passage assume that the punishment fits the crime. Using the tools at their disposal to try to explain, the rabbis note the juxtaposition of a rule that requires priests not to drink alcohol on the job and deduce that Nadav and Abihu must have been drunk, and so were punished. Another midrash interprets through the Torah’s description of their bringing of “strange fire that had not been commanded” that the two of them were disrespectful of the established ways and were impatient to take over and innovate. 

What many interpretations share is the desire to justify their treatment; they must have deserved it. The ways of HaShem, they seem to feel, must not only be just, they must be always justifiable. This way of thinking is ultimately nothing other than self-interest. If I can see the logic in what happened to them, I can avoid it, and thus be safe; and from our natural interest in self-preservation it is only a short step to dehumanization of the other, who is not me. If it is happening to them and I am not them, then I am safe from what happened to them. 

If there is no logic to this thinking, then uncertainty, and anxiety, must ensue. The ultimate impact of the escape from uncertainty is cruelty. And so HaShem is seen as arbitrarily cruel, when it is our own assessment that leads to that conclusion.

This seemingly innocent tool of thinking is not morally neutral. Proceeding from the assumption that events have reasons can and does lead us to a place of moral judgement. It is  only the belief that events may be mysterious that leaves room for kindness. It is only when we can face our anxiety free of the burden to find meaning for it that we can make room, strangely enough within the anxiety and the uncertainty, for empathy and kindness.

In Tomer Devorah the great scholar Moshe Cordovero offers us an ethical practice greater than discerning how another person deserves what has happened to them: when we  remember that we are created in the divine Image, and that we are capable of not only expressing all the divine characteristics of being, we can come to see that what we act out is what exists in the world. 

כְּפִי מַה שֶּׁיִּתְנַהֵג כָּךְ מַשְׁפִּיעַ מִלְמַעְלָה וְגוֹרֵם שֶׁאוֹתָהּ הַמִּדָּה תָּאִיר בָּעוֹלָם

As a person acts below, so [too] will one merit to open for oneself the highest trait above – exactly as one acts, so will there be a flow from above. And one will cause that trait to shine in the world. (Moshe Cordovero, Tomer Devorah, 1.14)

The trait Cordovero names as being the highest expression of the divine in the world? it is not justice, nor certainty, nor even peace – it is mercy. HaShem’s most holy presence in the world is adumbrated by kindness. 

We don’t know why Nadav and Abihu died. We don’t know why the person living in a tent down the street lost everything. And we do not know why suffering comes to us in unequal measures in this world. All we know is that our ancient and well-traveled Jewish tradition asserts that the answer to our sadness and our fear is not to be found in logic, but in love.

Shabbat Pesakh 5785: Uncertainty

What if this Pesakh

We recall precarity

Versus redemption?

– Jen Van Meter

This year Shabbat occurs on the seventh day of Pesakh. The Torah story assigned to this day recalls the most uncertain time of all in the course of our ancestors’ redemption. First, HaShem leads us on a deliberately circuitous route to avoid contact with any other human encampments; second, HaShem then leads us in a reverse course, in order to lure Pharaoh into what will ultimately be a fatal pursuit. Finally, exactly that happens, and we find ourselves trapped between the Sea of Reeds on one side and the approaching Egyptian army on the other – the Jewish version of being caught between Scylla and Charybdis. 

Uncertainty just at the outset of carefully devised plan has a murderous impact on morale. There is something about the first steps of carrying out a plan that is so tentative, as we wonder whether we’ve worked it out correctly, whether our assumptions will prove true, and whether we can trust each other in the process. So when it all seems to go wrong, our ancestors are quick to conclude the worst; their words to Moshe have always seemed to me to be the first demonstrable example of sarcasm in our ancient literature:

וַיֹּאמְרוּ֮ אֶל־מֹשֶׁה֒ הֲֽמִבְּלִ֤י אֵין־קְבָרִים֙ בְּמִצְרַ֔יִם לְקַחְתָּ֖נוּ לָמ֣וּת בַּמִּדְבָּ֑ר מַה־זֹּאת֙ עָשִׂ֣יתָ לָּ֔נוּ לְהוֹצִיאָ֖נוּ מִמִּצְרָֽיִם׃ 

And they said to Moses, “Was it for want of graves in Egypt that you brought us to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, taking us out of Egypt?” (Ex. 14.11)

Human nature hasn’t changed much since then; we are still quick to assume that all is lost when things seem to go wrong, and often act with great alacrity to blame someone else for it. And very few of us are comfortable in moments of uncertainty. A lot of bad theology emerges from the human desire to believe something certain rather than accept mystery at the heart of life.

There is, however, another choice, midway between assuming failure and accepting mystery, and that is to balance them both in an awareness of time. HaShem is an expression of all Place and all Time, and you and I are each one individual nexus within that reality. As long as we live, we move with HaShem, at each moment of our lives occupying exactly one position in which time and space converge in us, and every moment, by the nature of time and space, we are also moving from one position to another. We are not static. Every moment brings the possibility of a new awareness, a change in circumstance, a different perspective. 

It took the Israelites forty years to learn that a spiritual path takes time – indeed, it takes a lifetime. The path we as a kehillah kedoshah, a holy community, follow together will always be part mystery, part uncertainty, and part assumption that will be proved wrong as often as not.

When we face uncertainty, if we have enough willingness to show each other Hesed, grace, we will emerge better than when we started, as we move, each of us and all of us together, in the Eternal circles of our shared and our solitary existence.

Pre Pesakh Primer: All Things Hametz

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אָנוּ אוֹכְלִין חָמֵץ וּמַצָּה, הַלַּיְלָה הַזֶּה כֻלּוֹ מַצָּה.

On all other nights we eat hametz and matzah, tonight only matzah. (Mishnah Pesakhim 10.4) 

Happy new year! The Jewish month of Nissan began on Saturday evening, and with it, the calendar year of our people.

The first of three harvest festivals is only two weeks away. The observance of Pesakh, also called Passover, obliges us to live differently (even as our other new year in the fall is marked by Yom Kippur, a day on which we live differently from the norm). Each year, throughout the Jewish world, the old is discarded or recycled, and the new is celebrated.

Pesakh begins at sundown on 14 Nissan, which is Saturday evening, the close of Shabbat, April 12 2025. 

Here is a review of the most important aspects of our celebration:

Before Saturday evening April 12, all hametz is removed from the possession of any Jewish person. What you are unable to eat or give away should be packaged safely and put away in a designated area. Make a list of all that you have hidden away and sell it for the duration of the festival of matzah. You can do that using a handy on line form provided by our friends at Chabad here: Hametz Sale On Line

This year, the timing is the tricky part. Pesakh begins at the close of Shabbat this year. That means that we have to clean for Pesakh before Shabbat. Therefore: from Friday April at noon until Sunday evening April 20 at sundown, all Jews should have no leavening in their possession, except what you are planning to eat on Shabbat. The cleaning takes place before that, and should be done by Friday before Shabbat begins.

You should do the ritual blessing of bedikat hametz and bi’er hametz (looking for and getting rid of your hametz) on Friday afternoon. You can find the ritual in the first pages of many haggadot, or click HERE.

After you clean, your hallah or whatever other hametz foodstuff which you are having for Shabbat before Pesakh begins should be kept in one designated area of your living area; everything else should be cleaned of any hametz by then.

What is hametz? The Torah is specific:

שִׁבְעַ֤ת יָמִים֙ מַצּ֣וֹת תֹּאכֵ֔לוּ אַ֚ךְ בַּיּ֣וֹם הָרִאשׁ֔וֹן תַּשְׁבִּ֥יתוּ שְּׂאֹ֖ר מִבָּתֵּיכֶ֑ם כִּ֣י ׀ כׇּל־אֹכֵ֣ל חָמֵ֗ץ וְנִכְרְתָ֞ה הַנֶּ֤פֶשׁ הַהִוא֙ מִיִּשְׂרָאֵ֔ל מִיּ֥וֹם הָרִאשֹׁ֖ן עַד־י֥וֹם הַשְּׁבִעִֽי׃ 

Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; on the very first day you shall remove leaven from your houses, for whoever eats leavened bread from the first day to the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel. (Exodus 12.16) 

Please note that outside of Israel Passover is observed for eight days, not seven.

But the Torah is not specific enough: what is leaven? The rabbis of the Talmud spell it out. We are to clear our homes of all the five types of grain that our ancestors used as food, and to make matzah from any of the five from the new harvest (unleavened because it is new, and there is no time for the dough to rise!) for the celebration:

These are the types of grain with which a person fulfills his obligation to eat matzah on the first night of Passover: With wheat, with barley, with spelt, with rye, and with oats. (Mishnah Pesakhim 2.5)

Because of our concern to fully rid ourselves of all products containing these five grains, many more foodstuffs have been added to the list of what is considered hametz. 

what is forbidden and what is permitted:

  1. Whisky, beer, and other alcohols made from grains is forbidden
  2. Soy sauce and other condiments with wheat added are forbidden
  3. Yeast itself, as well as baking power and baking soda (although these are not hametz, they are too much like it) is avoided
  4. Rice, corn, beans and legumes are not consumed by Ashkenazi Jews, for no clear reason other than they 1. Look like flour, 2. Can be used to make bread, and/or 3. Swell when cooked (like when bread rises)
  5. Sefardi Jews eat rice, corn, beans and legumes; many Ashkenazi authorities also recommend that Jews not abstain from these foods, but old traditions are still very strong in many places, and each family should follow their own familiar minhag.
  6. Gluten free matzah is permitted, but it does not fulfill the halakhic obligation during the Seder to consume a single bite of matzah made of one of the five classic grains: wheat, barley, spelt, rye, oats.

Where possible, different plates and cooking utensils are utilized. Items like pots and pans and cookie sheets can be run through a dishwasher or put in an oven set to its highest heat to kasher them. The oven itself should be kashered in the same way; countertops can be cleaned with boiling water, and some people cover them with aluminum foil. A toaster cannot be kashered for Pesakh, but a toaster oven can be if necessary.

You do not have to eat matzah all week; the halakhic obligation is to eat an olive’s worth during the seder (about a bite, not even a mouthful).

If you are so completely gluten intolerant that eating one bite of such matzah would endanger your life or your well-being, you may not do so. 

Spiritually, regardless of your regular dietary restrictions, it is important that this week be treated differently in terms of the way you eat. Matzah is so central to the holy day that it is literally called hag haMatzot, the Festival of Matzot. Since eating is life, and all life depends upon the harvest, this eight day festival of gratitude depends on our mindfulness of all we are taking into our bodies as sustenance.

רַבָּן גַּמְלִיאֵל הָיָה אוֹמֵר, כָּל שֶׁלֹּא אָמַר שְׁלֹשָׁה דְבָרִים אֵלּוּ בְּפֶסַח, לֹא יָצָא יְדֵי חוֹבָתוֹ, וְאֵלּוּ הֵן, פֶּסַח, מַצָּה, וּמָרוֹר

Rabban Gamliel always said: Whoever does not speak of these three things on Pesakh has not fulfilled the obligation: Pesakh, matzah, and maror. (Mishnah Pesakhim 10.5)

Shabbat Pekudey/HaHodesh: once more, with kavvanah!

וַיַּ֨רְא מֹשֶׁ֜ה אֶת־כׇּל־הַמְּלָאכָ֗ה וְהִנֵּה֙ עָשׂ֣וּ אֹתָ֔הּ כַּאֲשֶׁ֛ר צִוָּ֥ה יְהֹוָ֖ה כֵּ֣ן עָשׂ֑וּ וַיְבָ֥רֶךְ אֹתָ֖ם מֹשֶֽׁה

When Moses saw that they had performed all the tasks—as the LORD had commanded, so they had done—Moses blessed them. (Ex. 39.43)

One of the fascinating aspects of Torah study is how archaeological discoveries often offer  adjustments to what we think we know, as they inform and disrupt our learning. Midrash and speculation are endlessly rich and exciting, but there’s nothing like actual concrete (more likely, rock) evidence of ancient religious practice and spiritual belief.

On this Shabbat Pekudei, named for the Torah reading of the week, we reach the last parashah of the book of Exodus as well as the last of the retellings of the building of the mishkan. By dint of the calendar this is also Shabbat HaHodesh, literally “the Shabbat of The Month.” By this is meant the first month of the Jewish year, the month of Nisan; on this Shabbat we announce that the month of Pesakh is beginning.

Our ancestors celebrated Pesakh by traveling to Jerusalem in what is called in English “pilgrimage.” In Hebrew the festival is referred to as a hag, a word related to the ritual of walking around the altar in procession – this procession was apparently a high point of all three of our harvest festivals, Pesakh, Shavuot and Sukkot. (If you’d like to see the closest relative to that ritual extant today, you have to go to the live cameras trained on the ka’aba in Mecca). 

It’s interesting to learn that according to the archaeological evidence, already a long time ago our ancestors were developing a ritual for those who could not make the trip. We can zoom in, or visit a live cam, and their equivalent is possibly that which is pictured in the photo above. 

The Magdala Stone is, as near as we can tell from how it is carved and where it was found, meant to provide a sense of being connected to the Jerusalem Temple when one was forced to remain at a distance. The stone itself is carved with all kinds of references to the central Shrine: the top may be meant to show the bread put out each week, and the Temple pillars are carved on the sides.

Look closer, and one sees something depicted inside the Temple, behind and partially obscured by the pillars: possibly, maybe, it could be the wheels of the merkavah, the chariot described by Ezekiel in the opening vision of his book – a chariot upon which HaShem was conveyed.

Pekudei is about so many myriad details that go into constructing the mishkan; Shabbat HaHodesh is likewise a reminder of the many details of preparing for Pesakh and the Seders we will celebrate together, G!d wiling. One might catch oneself in recoil from even more details that add to the overwhelm of our days. The Magdala Stone can serve us as a tangible reminder: all of life is a myriad of details, and the to-do lists will never be done.  All those details, done well and carried out with kavvanah, intention, become a construction within which we will find the Presence of holiness. More: we will not find it otherwise.

Once more, then, beloveds, with kavvanah: into the details of the mishkan: the moments and the mitzvot of our lives.

Shabbat VaYak’hel/Parah: Every Little Bit

לֹא עָלֶיךָ הַמְּלָאכָה לִגְמֹר, וְלֹא אַתָּה בֶן חוֹרִין לִבָּטֵל מִמֶּנָּה.

It is not up to you to finish the work – yet neither are you free to give up. (Pirke Avot 2.26)

Our parashat hashavua might seem to be a boring, overly detailed account of every little detail that went into the actual construction of the mishkan, the holy space our ancestors set to building this week. But Torah has a way of smacking us in the face with messages we can’t necessarily see at first glance. You have to dig for them.

There’s something off-putting about a plethora of details; it’s overwhelming. And “overwhelming” is precisely the response that so many of us have been experiencing to the flood of evil coming from the Federal government since even before the inauguration of the current occupier of the U.S. presidential office. It’s the kind of flood that causes us to lose our balance and our sense of direction, and we are tempted to withdraw. There’s only so much anxiety over the fate of the world that jangled nerves can take.

In the opening of our reading in this third year of the Triennial Torah Reading Cycle, we see:

וַיַּ֥עַשׂ אֶת־הַקְּרָשִׁ֖ים לַמִּשְׁכָּ֑ן עֲצֵ֥י שִׁטִּ֖ים עֹמְדִֽים׃ 

They made the planks for the Tabernacle of acacia wood, upright. (Ex. 36.20)

We go on to read about these planks for several verses. Exactly how long and tall they were, exactly where they were to be placed, exactly how many. And then comes the description of how they are to be put into place, with

וְאַרְבָּעִים֙ אַדְנֵי־כֶ֔סֶף עָשָׂ֕ה תַּ֖חַת עֶשְׂרִ֣ים הַקְּרָשִׁ֑ים

forty silver sockets under the twenty planks (Ex. 36.24)

There are twenty planks on each long side of the enclosure, measuring out the length of the mishkan, and each is supported by these silver sockets, which in Hebrew are אַדְנֵי־כֶ֔סֶף – adney kesef. “Silver sockets” in English isn’t saying much, but when we stop to consider the Hebrew and its spelling we are confronted with a hint a mile wide and many cubits deep. These sockets are each spelled with the same letters as those that spell out the most holy and awesome and unpronounceable Name of HaShem. Alef, dalet, nun, and yud. 

It’s as if each of these little sockets is, can we say this, like a piece of G!d. As our ancestors regularly said when they were able to utter something impossible, “if it wasn’t written, I could never have said this,” but here is אדני over and over again in this passage. 

Insistently it keeps presenting itself to our eyes: lots of little echoes of the big holy. It’s trying to tell us something. Even as no one Israelite was responsible for building the mishkan, so no one of us is meant to Save the Day in our own day. Human beings are not SuperBeings; we are, however, created in the Image of Holiness; this passage reminds us that every small action, such as being one of many, many small silver sockets, can and must be suffused with holiness. 

Holiness here is very much to be understood in the ancient Israelite sense of wholeness. To be holy is to be fully dedicated to the purpose. It is to act with integrity, with a sense of one’s full devotion, and with groundedness in where we come from – even if we cannot know where we are going.

Shabbat urges us to take seriously the concept of rest in our lives. We are not machines, and we must take time off, and that time must be nurturing. This week, parashat VaYakhel emphasizes that the work is not of a heroic scale – although it is, we can see, a certain kind of heroism to believe in the holiness of the small acts of our lives (otherwise called mitzvot, those acts that make our lives holy).

None of us can do anything alone against what overwhelms us individually; we must see our strength in connecting with each other, and, concomitantly, we must accept that none of us, alone, is enough. The key is not to be perfect; it is to lean to be one’s best, most integrated self, fully – that is, to become holy.

On his deathbed, Rabbi Zusya of Hanipol began to cry uncontrollably and his students and disciples tried hard to comfort him. They asked him, “Rabbi, why do you weep? You are almost as wise as Moses, you are almost as hospitable as Abraham, and surely heaven will judge you favourably.” Zusya answered them: “It is true. When I get to heaven, I won’t worry so much if God asks me, ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Abraham?’ or ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Moses?’  I know I would be able to answer these questions.  After all, I was not given the righteousness of Abraham or the faith of Moses but I tried to be both hospitable and thoughtful.  But what will I say when God asks me, ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Zusya?’ (From Martin Buber’s Tales of the Hasidim, quoted by Rabbi Sylvia Rothschild)

Some days are overwhelming. The only answer is to resist meaninglessness by insisting on the importance of every little thing. Every socket, every plank, every donation, every smile, every hand outstretched, is vitally, foundational important, for each and every moment we are building a holy place.

Shabbat Ki Tisa: Truth requires Mercy

וַיֹּ֕אמֶר לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לִרְאֹ֣ת אֶת־פָּנָ֑י כִּ֛י לֹֽא־יִרְאַ֥נִי הָאָדָ֖ם וָחָֽי׃ 

“you cannot see My face, for a human being may not see Me and live.” (Ex. 33.20)

“You can’t handle the truth.” – Col. Jessup, A Few Good Men, Aaron Sorkin, 1992

This Shabbat we read from parashat Ki Tisa, in close proximity to the story of Purim which we read on this day. 

It could give you mental whiplash: from the fun “children’s holiday” of Purim to the depths of the spiritual chaos that leads to the heresy of the calf. There could be no better way for us to finally internalize the message that Purim is no children’s holiday; it is an ancient tale of political  intrigue, human vulnerability and resourcefulness, and the reality of evil. In short, a tale with no end of current resonance. To juxtapose it to Ki Tisa is to risk opening a new level of learning, down, down, from surface p’shat past imaginative midrash to the level of the disturbing hints of remez.

Purim is ”a holiday made for a postmodern sensibility: a holiday of masks, inversions, comic mockery, concealment of God whose name is never even mentioned in the Megillah.” (Susan Handelman, “Crossing and Recrossing the Void” 2002). What better time to seek out the strange truth hinted at in the old rabbinic play on words observing that Yom Kippur is “yom ki-purim” “a day like Purim”?

On Yom haKippurim, which we generally call by its shorter name of Yom Kippur, we stand before HaShem in a radical awareness of all the ways that we fail to see what is real, and even when we can glimpse it, fail to follow what we do manage to see. Rather than see what is too difficult to accept, we take refuge in the veils of half-truth, partial awareness, and being too busy to think about it.

This Shabbat, the juxtaposition with Ki Tisa forces us to consider a radical concept: we too have replaced HaShem with an idol. We too, having been invited to follow a higher path, have opted for an easier, less complicated life.

For the Israelites, the idol – which should be understood here in a sophisticated way, not easily dismissed, but as that which you believe to be the grounding of your actions and ethics – the idol was made out their presupposed comfort zone. Egyptian imagery of power and precious metal translates for us into belief in power structures and resource accumulation as places of safety. 

The great shock of our days is the revelation (I use the word deliberately) that the Jewish community’s golden calf in our days has become the State of Israel. This inescapable conclusion becomes obvious when we consider the spiritual chaos of Ki Tisa and recognize its resonance in the U.S. Jewish community’s approach to Israel as a Jewish nation-state. The stronger the case is made that a Jewish and Jewish-controlled state is the only way for Jews to be safe and thrive, in the face of the absolutely unJewish behavior of that state, the more the calf holds sway, and the farther we are from HaShem. And the more we condone violence in the name of that safety, the farther still.

The high priest of this idol is the idea of the centrality of the self. When we do what we do because we feel like it, we are serving only the level of comfort and convenience we currently need. We are serving the calf of the veils, and of the self-deception that allows injustice to exist.

On the other hand (the hand of mercy, hesed, of recognizing that we are just weak, scared, and overwhelmed): It’s too hard to look at that remez and know what to do. It’s too difficult: we cannot “see Me and live.” We cannot stand in the face of complete transparency and understanding and survive the shadows of regular, quotidian, day to day life. 

In short, we cannot handle the truth – not for long, anyway. It is too complicated, and too many people will shun not only the remez but anyone who seeks to understand it.

This is the reason we need each other’s compassion, and we need this Place where we come together and, momentarily, find the occasion and the courage to peek behind the veil toward that which pulls us, despite ourselves and our desire for comfort and safety. Like Moshe, we want to see; and like Aaron, we want to live, and we can too clearly see the contradiction between truth and safety.

As we insist in our prayers, HaShem is truth, nothing else. Yet you and I are created in that divine image, and the Psalmist sings that truth springs up from the earth – from us, made of dirt and failure and dreams. (Psalm 85.12)

This is the very adult meaning of the holy day of Purim, this day which urges us to look behind the masks of our regular life and recognize that there is something more toward which we might walk, something truer, which we will never be able to completely see. Yet that vision is what makes our shared journey so beautiful.

חֶסֶד־וֶאֱמֶ֥ת נִפְגָּ֑שׁוּ צֶ֖דֶק וְשָׁל֣וֹם נָשָֽׁקוּ׃ 

Hesed (mercy) and truth meet;

justice and shalom (well-being) kiss. 

(Psalm 85.11)

Shabbat Zakhor: What are we supposed to remember? to forget?

What are we supposed to remember to forget?

Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey, after you left Egypt— how, undeterred by fear of G!d, they surprised you on the march, when you were famished and weary, and cut down all the stragglers in your rear. Therefore…you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget! (Deut. 25:17-19)

On this Shabbat we not only read from the regular parashat hashavua, but also add a short reading specifically chosen for our proximity on this last Shabbat before Purim to our yearly encounter with the Megillat Ester, more often called simply “the Megillah.” The Purim story recalls a terrifying time for a vulnerable Jewish population in Persia, and celebrates a miraculous escape from destruction. The special Torah reading evokes the ancestor of the bad guy of Purim (we’re supposed to blot our his name so I won’t say it here): Amalek.

Shrouded in the mists of history, once upon a very long time ago, something horrifying happened to our people at the hands of a murderer we remember by the name Amalek. The Torah recalls how a band we knew as the Amalekites attacked the weakest and most vulnerable among us. As we mourned the terrible loss of innocents unable to defend themselves, we resolved never to forget what happened, and to “blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven.” 

It’s interesting to consider how our traditional Jewish stories resonate less, or more, at different times in our history. Fifty years ago the story of Purim was deracinated down to a children’s tale (albeit with wildly inappropriate music invoking how we happily hanged the enemy); today the more frightening messages that Purim brings to mind require our adult attention. Closer to us in the U.S. we resonate to the idea of the foolish king and the close advisor who is bent on evil for personal enrichment, and, farther away, we face the awful reality that we ourselves, as the Jewish state, seem to be capable of the same kind of massacre as has been visited upon us.

It’s an ancient truth, and we’re not immune, as the Megillah demonstrates. Purim conveys the disturbing message that when they’re coming to kill you, if you can get the upper hand, use it to kill them first. And thus we read in chapter nine:

וּבִשְׁנֵים֩ עָשָׂ֨ר חֹ֜דֶשׁ הוּא־חֹ֣דֶשׁ אֲדָ֗ר בִּשְׁלוֹשָׁ֨ה עָשָׂ֥ר יוֹם֙ בּ֔וֹ אֲשֶׁ֨ר הִגִּ֧יעַ דְּבַר־הַמֶּ֛לֶךְ וְדָת֖וֹ לְהֵעָשׂ֑וֹת בַּיּ֗וֹם אֲשֶׁ֨ר שִׂבְּר֜וּ אֹיְבֵ֤י הַיְּהוּדִים֙ לִשְׁל֣וֹט בָּהֶ֔ם וְנַהֲפ֣וֹךְ ה֔וּא אֲשֶׁ֨ר יִשְׁלְט֧וּ הַיְּהוּדִ֛ים הֵ֖מָּה בְּשֹׂנְאֵיהֶֽם

And so, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month—that is, the month of Adar—when the king’s command and decree were to be executed, the very day on which the enemies of the Jews had expected to get them in their power, the opposite happened, and the Jews got their enemies in their power. (Esther 9.1)

The haftarah chosen for this Shabbat repeats the command:

עַתָּה֩ לֵ֨ךְ וְהִכִּיתָ֜ה אֶת־עֲמָלֵ֗ק וְהַֽחֲרַמְתֶּם֙ אֶת־כׇּל־אֲשֶׁר־ל֔וֹ וְלֹ֥א תַחְמֹ֖ל עָלָ֑יו וְהֵמַתָּ֞ה מֵאִ֣ישׁ עַד־אִשָּׁ֗ה מֵֽעֹלֵל֙ וְעַד־יוֹנֵ֔ק מִשּׁ֣וֹר וְעַד־שֶׂ֔ה מִגָּמָ֖ל וְעַד־חֲמֽוֹר׃

Now go, attack Amalek, and proscribe all that belongs to him. Spare no one, but kill alike men and women, infants and sucklings, oxen and sheep, camels and asses!” (I Samuel 15.3)

Right now, in Israel, there are those who invoke this ancient command as justification for the murder of so many human beings in Gaza. Using ancient words to justify a modern horror is not unknown: preachers in the south of the U.S. justified slavery similarly. It’s a great comfort to discover that our rabbis of the Talmud unhesitatingly denounced this evil:

The Sages taught in a baraita…Among the descendants of Haman were those who studied Torah in Bnei Brak. And even among the descendants of that wicked person, Nebuchadnezzar, were those whom the Holy Blessed One sought to bring beneath the wings of the Divine Presence. (Mishnah Yadayim 4.4)

What an amazing idea. The prophet Samuel, the Megillah, and even HaShem all command that we eradicate not only the people but even the memory of the people of Amalek, and a couple of rabbis of the Talmudic era, not even prominent enough to be mentioned by name, nix the idea completely. They observe that because of a verse in Isaiah, we can no longer be certain of the identity of any of our neighbors: Sanheriv, king of Assyria, already arose and blended all the nations, as it is said, “I have removed the borders of nations.” (Isaiah 10.13)

Many commentaries since then have upheld this same idea: 

How do we know that we can make peace with Amalek?…should they [the Amalekites] repent and accept upon themselves the seven commandments, it is clear that they are not holding onto the deeds of their forefathers, and thus they cannot be punished for the sins of their fathers. (R Avraham Borenstein, Avnei Netzer: Orakh Hayim 2.508)

Consider the great compassionate strength of these ancestors of our people, beaten down so hard by so much of our Exile experience, yet able to insist that the old idea of Retribution Forever was not applicable. Especially when we see Jewish thugs cloaking themselves in religious texts soundbitten out of all context and recognition, we need to remember this: when “religion” seems to be telling you to do something that doesn’t seem very much in line with religious teachings like “give the benefit of the doubt” or “respect the other as you wish to be respected”, it may be that there is a grievous misunderstanding.

It is perfectly understandable when a people under attack and helpless remembers Amalek as we try to make sense of what is happening to us. It is perfectly indefensible when we use the same story to do to others that which is hateful to us (the original formulation of the “golden rule”, attributed to the great Rabbi Hillel). 

One of the most insightful interpretations of the Amalek story invites us to remember that Amalek lives inside each of us, and that the command to blot out the memory of Amalek under heaven is meant to be understood as the urging to eradicate that Amalek within us. We can understand that inner Amalek as the temptation to betray others:

  1. Not acting because I’m not directly affected
  2. Withdrawing from a community to protect myself alone
  3. Separating myself because I feel unappreciated 
  4. Shutting off from the outside due to feeling overwhelmed 
  5. Taking care only of my own loved ones

“Devil take the hindmost”, another name for Amalek, preys on weakness and fear. We are called upon in these days of all too much awareness of our weakness and our fear to remember to forget. Forget Amalek. Blot it out. 

Shabbat Terumah: The Gift of Kindness

אֵין צְדָקָה מִשְׁתַּלֶּמֶת אֶלָּא לְפִי חֶסֶד שֶׁבָּהּ, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: ״זִרְעוּ לָכֶם לִצְדָקָה וְקִצְרוּ לְפִי חֶסֶד״

The extent to which the tzedakah you do takes root depends entirely upon the extent of the kindness in it, for it is said, “Sow to yourselves according to tzedakah, but reap according to the kindness.” – BT Sukkah 49b

This Shabbat we mark the beginning of the month of Adar, that month when we are taught 

מִשֶּׁנִּכְנַס אֲדָר מַרְבִּין בְּשִׂמְחָה mi shenikhnas Adar, marbim b’simkha, “when the month of Adar begins, one increases rejoicing.” (BT Ta’anit 29b) To be told to be happy may strike you as absurd given the reality of our days right now in the United States, but consider Jewish tradition: there is nothing more powerful than joy. It dispels despair, even if only for a moment. Think of the hallowed stories of our people dancing and singing in the face of death. If Jews rounded up in a field outside Lublin by Nazis could sing defiance in those moments, what can we learn from that courage? (Read the full story HERE.) 

Like anything else in life, it cannot be anticipated: this is the courage you didn’t know you were ever going to need. No one rehearses for a moment like that. So the lesson is not that we can practice our way to joy. One cannot control emotions, much less summon them at will. That’s not how we humans are.

So what can we do, when challenged by the question of how to “be happy, because it’s Adar”? One truth seems well-founded: you will not become happy by working at becoming happy. When we become preoccupied with our own happiness, it becomes, if anything, more elusive. Instead, why not help each other feel joy? If we all do it, then no one will be left out. The question is how? 

Our parashat hashavua this week is named terumah, “gift” or “donation.” It’s worth noting that two of the four mitvot associated with Purim are about making other people happy through giving them something (matanot l’evyonim, to those in need, and gifts to friends just because). Jewish ethics holds that gifts given grudgingly are still better than not given at all, but that the best gift is one that is given in kindness, as explained in this Talmudic source:

תָּנוּ רַבָּנַן: בִּשְׁלֹשָׁה דְּבָרִים גְּדוֹלָה גְּמִילוּת חֲסָדִים יוֹתֵר מִן הַצְּדָקָה. צְדָקָה — בְּמָמוֹנוֹ; גְּמִילוּת חֲסָדִים — בֵּין בְּגוּפוֹ, בֵּין בְּמָמוֹנוֹ. צְדָקָה — לָעֲנִיִּים; גְּמִילוּת חֲסָדִים — בֵּין לָעֲנִיִּים בֵּין לָעֲשִׁירִים. צְדָקָה — לַחַיִּים; גְּמִילוּת חֲסָדִים — בֵּין לַחַיִּים בֵּין לַמֵּתִים

Our rabbis taught: In three respects gemilut hasadim is superior to tzedakah: tzedakah can be done only with one’s money, but gemilut hasadim can be done with one’s person and one’s money. Tzedakah can be given only to the poor, but gemilut hasadim both to the rich and the poor. Tzedakah can be given to the living only, gemilut hasadim can be done both to the living and to the dead (BT Sukkah 49b)

Rabbi Elazar follows up in the next paragraph:

 אֵין צְדָקָה מִשְׁתַּלֶּמֶת אֶלָּא לְפִי חֶסֶד שֶׁבָּהּ, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: ״זִרְעוּ לָכֶם לִצְדָקָה וְקִצְרוּ לְפִי חֶסֶד״

The extent to which the tzedakah you do takes root depends entirely upon the extent of the kindness in it, for it is said, “Sow to yourselves according to tzedakah, but reap according to the kindness.” – BT Sukkah 49b

Commenting hundreds of years later, the great Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki (better known as Rashi, the famous acronym of his title and name) sharpens the point :

“Only according to the hesed in it” — The giving is the tzedakah and the effort [of giving] is the hesed. For instance, delivering it to the other’s house, or making an effort to ensure that it will be worth more to the recipient, such as giving baked bread; or clothes to wear; or coins when produce is readily available so the latter will not waste the money; that is, a person applies their heart and mind to the benefit of the [other] person. 

It may seem that getting caught up in just how to be kind to one other person in your community is not going to do much to save the world, but in truth, it is all that is within our power. If in so doing you are able to bring a little bit of joy to someone who knows they are not forgotten, that they are cared about, that mitzvah will do more than all the worry and planning in the world to lighten your own heart for a moment. You cannot save the world; but you can, maybe, for a moment, lighten someone else’s burden, and in so doing relieve your own. Be happy; it’s Adar.

Shabbat Mishpatim: Narrow Bridge

וְדַע, שֶׁהָאָדָם צָרִיךְ לַעֲבֹר עַל גֶּשֶׁר צַר מְאֹד מְאֹד, וְהַכְּלָל וְהָעִקָּר – שֶׁלֹּא יִתְפַּחֵד כְּלָל

Know that a person needs to cross a very very narrow bridge, and the rule, the essence, is to not give in to fear at all. Rebbe Nahman of Bratslav, Likkutei Mohoran II.48

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר יְהוֹשֻׁ֜עַ אֶל־הָעָ֗ם לֹ֤א תֽוּכְלוּ֙ לַעֲבֹ֣ד אֶת־יְהֹוָ֔ה כִּֽי־אֱלֹהִ֥ים קְדֹשִׁ֖ים ה֑וּא אֵל־קַנּ֣וֹא ה֔וּא לֹא־יִשָּׂ֥א לְפִשְׁעֲכֶ֖ם וּלְחַטֹּאותֵיכֶֽם

Joshua, however, said to the people, “You will not be able to serve the ETERNAL—who is a holy God, a jealous one – and who will not abide your transgressions and your sins.” (Joshua 24.19)

In 1920 a play was presented by the writer and playwright Shalom Aleichem at the Second Avenue Yiddish Art Theatre in New York City; it was called Shver Tsu Zayn a Yid, “it’s hard to be a Jew.” That hasn’t changed since the people of Israel first arrived in what was supposed to be a safe haven in the land of Canaan, according to the alternate haftarah for this week’s parashat Mishpatim from the Book of Joshua. 

A particularly compassionate modern midrash (created by former journalist and current Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid) about the death of Moshe Rabbenu in the wilderness suggests that it was not so much a punishment for the legendary leader not to complete the journey, but rather a way to keep him from having to witness the less than dreamy reality. The chaos and confusion, the falling short of expectations, the reversals, defeats and self-doubts fell to Joshua, his successor, to handle.

Last week, we read of the moment when our people (including us ourselves as well) stood at Sinai and encountered a Place where they were all One; with a single mind and a whole heart they, for their sake and ours, committed to the spiritual path we call Judaism. This week, we get the “fine print”: not ten Words but more than fifty mitzvot are presented to us in parashat Mishpatim, and they range from kashrut and treatment of animals to business ethics. 

It’s clear: the Jewish path, called halakhah, “going”, is a path of a distinct and carefully thought out morality. From the beginning, ideals were applied to human situations, and each application, messy and inexact as it would have to be, was to be weighed in the scales of both justice and mercy. 

It sounds lovely. Why, in one of the haftarah readings for this Shabbat, did Joshua warn us that we wouldn’t be able to carry out our intention to follow this path? Is it because we are basically selfish, weak and ornery, as the prophets remind us regularly?

Or is it possible that we might not be able to cling to the path of justice and mercy, Jewish-style, because of fear? What if, on either side of this carefully delineated path, there is nothing but darkness, nothing but endless abyss? What if there is no justification for our days, no security as a reward for our good behavior? 

In these days when we watch as what might have been called normal social expectations of the rule of law and the pursuit of justice in U.S. courts and legislatures are undermined, we become painfully aware of the tenuousness of the social contract that undergirds and defines our lives. We can see that it is a construction, and that it depends on the common belief of all those participating to have meaning.

O the irony: we are watching a breakdown in what we thought we could rely upon in society which echoes the great breakdown of religious belief in the early modern era. In truth, we all need a common belief in something in order to function, and whatever the belief in U.S. law and justice was, for those who held it, they are now reduced to protesting “this is the United States of America, you can’t do that here.” Yet we are, and they do.

How shall a Jew act in these days of uncertainty and growing fear? In one of readings assigned as haftarah for this Shabbat, Joshua outlines the choices: you can go “back” to what your ancestors believed – that is, you can seek out an “originalism” to save you from the moral work of making just judgements where you now find yourself. Or you can follow the ways of the people among whom you now live, and go along with deportations, and harassments, and segregations, and opressions. Or, as Joshua declares in conclusion of his address: וְאָנֹכִ֣י וּבֵיתִ֔י נַעֲבֹ֖ד אֶת־ה “I and my household will serve the Eternal.” (Joshua 24.15)

To “serve the Eternal” is not a free pass to Eden. It is a self-willed determination to keep one’s eyes on the Jewish ethical through line, even as it is revealed to be a swaying tightrope through a darkness that you cannot define or tame. It is to know fear without letting it rule you; to seek meaning with no guarantee of success; it is to hold on to this path, this halakhah, which demands that we do justice because it is just. Not because we will win, but because it is our path, and for us it is the right thing to do.

Shabbat Yitro: Silence

The Still, Small Voice

This week our parashat hashavua narrates a – literally – peak moment in the Israelite story: the revelation at Mt Sinai. It’s a moment that our ancestors assumed was full of intensity and the resultant stress. One midrash goes so far as to aver that our ancestors died when they heard the voice of HaShem, and had to be revived by a phalanx of angels that hurriedly bopped each of us on the nose to bring us back to life (or whatever angels do). The roots of the apprehension sensed by the midrash derive from this Torah verse:

וַיֹּֽאמְרוּ֙ אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֔ה דַּבֵּר־אַתָּ֥ה עִמָּ֖נוּ וְנִשְׁמָ֑עָה וְאַל־יְדַבֵּ֥ר עִמָּ֛נוּ אֱלֹהִ֖ים פֶּן־נָמֽוּת׃ 

“You speak to us,” they said to Moses, “and we will obey; but let not God speak to us, lest we die.” (Ex. 20.16)

Jewish mystics have long disagreed on the impact on a human being of actually encountering the Holy. The 20th century scholar Rudolph Otto called the sense of being in HaShem’s presence the mysterium tremendum, an overwhelm that cannot be expressed in human terms by human senses. The mystics describe it as if you are a drop of water, and HaShem is an endless watery abyss; you are a reflection of HaShem, yes, as a drop of water is to all drops of water, yet once submerged in the ocean, you cease to exist as a separate entity. Thus, they came to the same conclusion; contact between human and HaShem would mean only the end of the human’s consciousness, and even, perhaps, actual physical death. For (maybe only the most meshugge) the mystics, that is an end to be awaited with great anticipation.

At the other end of the same spectrum, another midrash speculates upon what we experienced at Sinai wonders about the content of the revelation: what did our ancestors hear? Was it all ten of the Aseret HaDibrot (“ten utterances”)? Or was that really necessary, since we ought to be able to extrapolate from principles, just as we do in halakhah. Suggesting that the key is in another Torah verse, some (mystically inclined, of course) went so far as to say that we heard nothing at all:

“It is possible that at Sinai we heard nothing from the mouth of G*d other than the letter alef of the first utterance ‘Anochi Ad-nai Elo-echem, I am HaShem your G*d.’ As we read in Exodus 20:15, “And all of the people saw the thunder.” In other words, they saw what is normally heard! At Sinai we saw the letter אevoking the name and presence of G*d…” (Zera Hakodesh – Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Horowitz 19th Cent)

A third approach reminds us that at times, it is silence itself which is most loud for us; a pregnant silence, perhaps, or the silence which descends with a thick blanket of snow. It is within that silence, perhaps, that the most important things can be heard:

Said Rabbi Abbahu in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: When the Holy One gave the Torah, no bird screeched, no fowl flew, no ox mooed, none of the ophanim (angels) flapped a wing, nor did the seraphim (burning celestial beings) chant “Kadosh Kadosh Kadosh (Holy, Holy, Holy!)” The sea did not roar, and none of the creatures uttered a sound. Throughout the entire world there was only a deafening silence as the Divine Voice went forth speaking: Anochi Ad-nai Elo-echa (I am HaShem your G*d)” (Midrash Exodus Rabbah)

What to do with this snow, how to manage the interruptions to normal routines and expectations that it brings? In the midst of the scramble to adjust and adapt, don’t forget to notice it, and to listen. What does this sudden change – this current blast of overwhelm, either in decibels or creepily quiet – what might it allow us to hear, if rather than avoiding, anticipating, or dreading, we stop. And pay attention to it. 

May this Shabbat remind you that we all need a regular moment of quiet, and that we are created with this need, and that to respect that, in defiance of the business of the current cultural moment, is the most important, most subversive message Shabbat can offer.