Farewell to Beth Shalom

             Three years ago, on a Friday night, I stood on Beth Shalom’s bimah and spoke to you for the first time as your rabbi.  I had three things to say, that night, but I only mentioned two of them.  I forgot the third one.

            The first thing, one of the two I remembered to say, was to explain why I wasn’t leading services that night, and why I sat in the kahal for the first several weeks I was here.  It was so that I would get to know how Beth Shalom does things, so that I could match you rather than requiring you to match me.

            In those first weeks, and in the years that have followed, I have learned how Beth Shalom does things:  beautifully.  Like no other congregation I’ve been part of or even heard about, the Jews of this community take responsibility for their own Judaism.  You cherish it.  You live it.  You do not take it for granted.  You do not cede it away to others.  You wrestle with communal matters like Jacob grappling with that angel-- until you get the proper outcome.  I admire you.

            In my first newsletter article, I mentioned my favourite verse in Torah.  Joseph, wandering the Judean hills in search of his brothers, comes across a nameless man.  “What do you seek?” he asks, pointing the youth in the right direction.  As a Jew, I see myself as Joseph, wandering, searching.  As a rabbi, I see myself as that man, guiding others on their journeys.  Now, at Beth Shalom, you get to become that unnamed man as well.  You get to accompany each other on your journeys—preparing services together, teaching each other, crafting the policies and destinies of this community together, performing Toharah side by side, all with the best interest of the Other at heart, always helping him--not to reach your goal, but his own.  Perhaps this is why the man in the hills has no name:  because he bears all our names.  How can you best guide your fellows?

            My teacher, Rabbi Larry Kushner, wrote:  “Rabbis should treat Jewish more like rabbis.  Jews should treat rabbis more like Jews.”  (“The Tent-Peg Business,” in Judaism, Spring 1988)

            I have endeavored to treat you, the members of this community, like rabbis—engaged, thoughtful Jews responsible for your own Judaism.  You get to do the same for each other.

            The second thing I remembered to say three years ago was that part of the reason I wanted to become a rabbi was to say Shehechiyanu more.  That is, I wanted to experience more important, joyful moments and to mark them not with a signature or handshake, but with a prayer, planting a flag in a moment of time.  In this, my cup has truly “runnedth” over here at Beth Shalom.  What an honour it has been to stand on this bimah and recite shehechiyanu as members of this community—adult and child—became bar and bat mitzvah.  What a pleasure to recite shehechiyanu at weddings—all four of them!—and at the start of the school year.  But more than these times, when we’ve actually stood up and said the words of the blessing, have been the countless times you’ve invited me as your rabbi, into your lives—the laughs, the late nights, the fist-fulls of challah, the sweaty brows, the glee of a small blond boy exploring the synagogue.  These have been shehechiyanu moments, too, and I’ve made the blessing to myself at some of them.  We’ve shared pinnacle moments—glad ones and sad ones—and also mundane moments.  These are how we’ve grown together, how we’ve come to share our lives with each other.  I treasure them all and for each of them, I say “Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech HaOlam—Shehechiyanu, v’kiy’manu, v’higiyanu lazman hazeh--Blessed are You, our God, Source of the Universe, who has given us life, sustained us, and allowed us to reach this moment.”

            There was the third point I forgot to make that night, and know I know why.

            I meant to tell you that it was it was here in Auckland, five years previous, that I became a rabbi.  What I mean is that Haim and I were visiting New Zealand in April, 2003, staying at the Quest Apartment at 62 Queen Street, where I checked my email to see that I had been accepted into Rabbinical School.  It felt so right to begin my rabbinic career in this place, where I had gotten that news.

            But I forgot to mention it that first service—not just because I hadn’t written it down, but also because it turns out it wasn’t true.  I did become a rabbi here in Auckland, but not when I was admitted to Hebrew Union College.  I became a rabbi here day by day, chat by chat, prayer by prayer, meeting by meeting, class by class, visit by visit, El Male Rachamim by El Male Rachamim, tear by tear, sip by sip, hug by hug, blessing by blessing, with each of you.

            Thank you for teaching me how to be a rabbi, and thank you for letting me be your rabbi.  I will treasure you always.