Chukat 5772

Miriam, prophetess and celebrant, dies in the desert this week (Numbers 20:1).  The nation loses a leader.

Her community, we are told, pauses in its travels to mourn.  The rabbis understand this as observance of shiva—taking a week out of life’s flow to stop, gather, grieve, and remember.  This pause is a powerful acknowledgement of the reality of death—a reality that will not be suspended, that cannot be put on hold or avoided.  It must be acknowledged.  In our day, many people shrink shiva to a day or two, or ignore it all together.  Are our jobs—the ones we thrill to leave behind for the weekend, or to go on vacation—really so important that they cannot wait for the psyche to come to grips with its loss, sooth itself, and relax into the new reality?

In the verse immediately after Miriam’s death, the Torah reports that “there was no water for the congregation” (20:2).  Connecting these two episodes, the rabbis report that “from here [we learn that] all forty years they had the well in Miriam’s merit” (Rashi, citing Ta’anit 9a).  A spectacular well bubbled with water and life as they traveled, quenching the people’s thirst, due to Miriam’s virtue.

The life force is bountiful like a well—coursing, bubbling, giving.  It is constant, but ever-changing.  When someone dies, I imagine, the Well of Life pauses just slightly in its flow, then resumes.  When someone we love passes away, we are asked to do the same.

Have you observed shiva?  What was that experience like?  What did it teach you?

Parshat Sh'lachlcha 5772

Dusty from the road, the tribes of Israel arrive at the Promised Land.  They’ve crossed the sea, walked long and hard, known hunger, built the mishkan, and heard God’s own voice.  Having reached the border, their destination is in sight and they suppose their exodus is over.  They are mistaken.

The Promised Land is the Land of Promise—that is, the future:  limitless and bountiful.  It is that ideal tomorrow in which we each live up to our fullest potentials.  Flowing with milk and honey, laden with fruit, the Promised Land is a metaphor for abundance.  There, dreams are nourished and prayers are answered.  There, our best and highest selves find inspiration.

In Parashat Sh’lachlcha, the twelve scouts reconnoiter the Holy Land to ascertain “what kind of country it is” (Numbers 13:18).  In this way, the scouts are like all people.  Each one of us stands on the border of the future, perpetually on the brink of what’s-to-come.  We crane our necks to know what the future holds.  “What will happen?”  “Who will I meet?” “What should I do?” “Will I have enough?” each of us wonders.  “What kind of country is it?” Moses asks.  “Are the people who dwell in it strong or weak, few or many?  Is the country in which they dwell good or bad?  Are the towns they live in open or fortified?  Is the soil rich or poor?  Is it wooded or not?”  (Numbers 13:18-20).  It is very human to want to peer beyond the curtain of time, to know what tomorrow will bring.

When faced with the unknown, human beings react in different ways.  Some, like the ten, fear the enormity of the task.  Others, like the two, thrill to the possibility.

The ten fearful spies are like many of us.  Notice their report: “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers.  All the people that we saw in it are of great size … we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them” (13:32-33).  They are overwhelmed by what might befall them and so shrink back, threatened.  They do not prepare themselves.  They turn away.  The future happens to them—or worse, devours them.

Others, like Joshua and Caleb, see opportunity ahead.  They are excited to discover what the future holds, to take charge of their own lives.  “Let us by all means go up, and we shall gain possession of it, for we shall surely overcome it” (13:30).

The duo of spies in this week’s haftarah, Joshua 2:1-24, approach their task differently still.  They proceed with care, but still connect to the unknown.  They make the future an ally:  “we will deal kindly and truly with you,” they tell Rahab (2 Joshua 1:14).  They are cautious, but not afraid.

Whether we acknowledge it or not, each of us is hurtling into the future.  How will we face it?  It’s important that we know ourselves, understand how we behave when faced with the unknown.  Some people like to research to know what lies ahead.  Some make a plan to know what they are to do.  Some craft a model or a tool to help them visualize, to act.  Some improvise, believing in their ability to create to see them through.  No one system is better than others; each of us has our own style.  What’s important is to know how we anticipate best—what we need in order to be relaxed and enthused about moving forward.  If you know what you need to succeed, you are better equipped to do so.  And if you know what you lack, you are better able to find a partner who can help you process in a different way, to see what you are missing.

The future is only a breath away, and we are—each one of us—always arriving.  The Land of Promise beckons.  What would you like to accomplish?  Who would you like to become?  Those possibilities exist just across the river, if you would but cross and inhabit them.

In Our Grief

Where was God?  How did God allow this to happen?

In the wake of the deaths of the Butwin Family, lots of people are asking this question.  If God is good and God is all powerful, why didn’t God stop this from happening?  Why does God permit suffering?

Jews hold that God doesn’t work that way.  God does not interrupt the world to stop suffering.

This world of ours is, in fact, not fair.  Although we tell our children that it is (whether explicitly, through our words, or implicitly, by using reward and punishment to elicit the behavior we seek), this is not objective reality.  No adult can look at the world and honestly believe that only good happens to good people, and only bad happens to bad people—and always in proportion to their goodness and badness.  It is simply and patently not the case.  People do not always get what they deserve.

We use reward and punishment to teach our children, to encourage them to develop good behavior.  But that does not mean that God rewards for good behavior and punishes for bad behavior.  That’s what parents do, not what God does.

Human beings have free will.  We get to make choices in the world, some big, like where to live, and some small, like what to eat for breakfast.  This means that we sometimes make bad choices, and that accidents happen.  These are the prices we pay for our free will.

If God did not allow the mistakes—even out of goodness, out of benevolence—then our freedom would be false.  We would be like student drivers with an instructor at our side always ready to grab the wheel.  Our lives would not be our own; we would not be fully human.

God would have to stop me from driving off a cliff and also from choosing the sugary breakfast cereal, for they both have negative consequences.  If God controlled every action and response, there would be no consequence for our behavior.  And then we would cease to be human.  We would be mere robots, following our programming, completing tasks with no thought to the repercussions.

“That means that people are free to do some terrible things.  When they do, God will not stop them.  Because if God stops one crime, God must stop all of them.  God cannot reach down and save the victims of one tragedy and let others die” (David Wolpe, Teaching Your Children About God, 1993, 180).

Suffering is the price we pay for our humanity.

I do not believe that Jim made this choice.  As has been widely reported and was well known to his circle of friends, Jim suffered from a brain tumor.  I believe that this changed him.  Jim did not decide to end his family’s lives — his illness did.

Belief in absolute fairness is an important and positive developmental stage for children. For adults, however, the obligation is to pursue fairness -- justice.  “Tzedek tzedek tirdof,” we are commanded.  “Justice Justice you shall pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:20).  We seek fairness because we know it does not currently exist.

Although the world is not fair, neither is it cold.  Chesed, the “milk of human kindness” matters.  I have received a great outpouring of love from community members, fellow rabbis around the world, and complete strangers.  Jim and Yafit’s extended families have felt it.  I’m sure many of you have, too.

Tragedy is a challenge, an invitation for us to reach beyond ourselves, to reach up and out to others in need.  In this way we can use our free will for the good.

Parashat Naso 5772

Being a rabbi holds many blessings:  you connect with folk of all ages, children throw themselves into your arms for hugs, people invite you into their homes, stories and lives.  And you are often called upon to give blessings—so speak special words to people on sacred occasions, to convey in language love, tenderness, holiness, protection. 

Parashat Naso includes the famous words of Birkat HaKohanim, the Priestly Benediction:

May the Eternal bless and protect you.

May the Eternal deal kindly and graciously with you.

May the Eternal bestow divine favor upon you and grant you peace (Numbers 6:24-26).    

I am especially privileged to offer this blessing to a Bar or Bat Mitzvah each week, as he or she stands before the open ark, ready to embark on the great journey of Adulthood.

But as the blessing itself says, I am not the one doing the blessing.  I am merely the conduit for the shefa/flow of Divine grace.  Shefa is the abundance that abounds constantly in the Universe, the love that overflows any cup.  It is far too vast for me to create it or even add to it.  All I can seek to do is direct it—even slightly—towards the recipients of the blessing, so that they will be showered with protection, kindness, grace, and peace.

People often ask me to bless them, and it is an honor to do so.  But I never forget that I am not the Source of the Blessing, but only the channel.  For so God says in the verse that follows the Priestly Blessing:  “Thus they shall link My name with the people of Israel, and I will bless them” (Numbers 6:27).

“Ken y’hi ratzon,” as we say in response.  “So may it be.”