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This past Shabbat afternoon, my closest friend’s son celebrated becoming a bar mitzvah. I named this child at his brit milah and was honored both to teach him for this occasion and to call him up to the Torah. There was much kvelling to be sure. In his thoughtful d’var Torah on Parashat Ki Teitzei, he spoke about the importance of rules, reflecting on the massive number of rules that make up this week’s Torah reading.
Rules challenge us, he explained, because as human beings with our own desires and needs, we want to have more agency in making choices about how we behave. We chafe against the rigidity of needing to adhere to rules. At the same time, rules provide structure to our lives, accountability for our actions, and predictability in our interactions with others. It was a great d’var - perfect for a bar mitzvah child contemplating his relationship with the Jewish tradition and totally authentic to his personality. While many of the rules of Parashat Ki Teitzei do exactly what my friend’s son said, providing a framework for our lives and helping us create safe and caring communities, other rules in this week’s Torah reading perplex us - not because of how much they constrain our free choice, but because their underlying values do not mesh with our own. One example of such a rule is the case of the stubborn and rebellious son, ben sorer u’moreh (Deuteronomy 21:18-21). According to this passage, a family that has a stubborn, wayward son, a gluttonous drunkard who does not listen to his parents, should bring him to the elders of the town. His parents should accuse their son before the council of elders and he will be stoned to death. The horror of this scenario led the Sages of the Talmud in the eighth chapter of Masekhet Sanhedrin to limit the application of this ruling to the point that the punishment essentially can never be imposed. After this feat of legal gymnastics, the Talmud concludes: “There has never been a stubborn and rebellious son and there will never be one in the future. And why, then, was it written in the Torah? So that you may expound upon it and receive reward for your learning.” (BT Sanhedrin 71a) Problem solved, so it would seem. The Torah’s rule for stubborn and rebellious children is now understood as purely academic, a textual conundrum meant to spark debate and in-depth interpretation. What would be an ethical challenge becomes an intellectual one instead. There are some benefits to this approach. Reading the case of the ben sorer u’moreh as basically a metaphor solves the moral and emotional problems of the text. We no longer need to wonder about the troubling family dynamics, the disproportionate punishments, or the messages this text sends about the acceptability of violence. At the same time, making this text into a thought experiment and excising it from the realm of applicable law opens the door to doing so with any other rules in our Torah that we find problematic. When we take a piece of our tradition and say that the Torah never really meant for it to be enacted, we weaken our system of sacred rules. Religious practices can become entirely subjective and we lose the cohesiveness of being part of a community in pursuit of holiness. The Talmud, I would argue, had a similar problem with the case of the stubborn and rebellious child being understood in this way. Immediately after the Talmud declares ben sorer u’moreh to be merely an intellectual exercise, Rabbi Yonatan speaks up and says: “I saw him and I sat on his grave.” (BT Sanhedrin 71a) For Rabbi Yonatan, the rules of the Torah, even the ones that horrify us or challenge our ethical values, must be applicable. Nothing in the Torah can exist merely for the sake of argument. This approach may preserve the enforceability of the Torah’s rules, but it is not without its own problems. Upholding a practice with such obviously negative moral ramifications goes against the essence of what it is to live a life of religious meaning. I find it helpful here to look back at what my friend’s son said on the bimah this past weekend. The rules and laws of our tradition are there to provide structure for our lives, to help us nurture safe and caring communities. When the rules stand in the way of those aims, when they challenge us as ben sorer u’moreh does, we first must sit with the discomfort of that challenge, acknowledging the parts of our tradition that reflect values and worldviews we cannot condone. And then we turn to the rules and practices that do move us toward those aims. By prioritizing them, we bend the arc of our tradition toward justice, fairness, and holiness. Shabbat shalom.
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I woke up this morning, I imagine like many of us, with a heavy heart. The Whatsapp messages from my friends in Israel, sharing images of Hersh Goldberg-Polin’s funeral procession, the Facebook posts, the innumerable articles detailing the unthinkable killing of six hostages (one of whom, Carmel Gat, I spoke about from our bimah on Shavuot). This is a painful, heartbreaking loss for us as part of the global a Jewish community.
And I also woke up this morning looking forward to attending the bat mitzvah of the daughter of dear friends. Toward the beginning of the service, we opened to the passages of Torah study that accompany the first parts of birkhot hashaḥar, the earliest part of the service. I was listening along as the rabbi read the text from the bimah and recognized the passage immediately. We learn in the Talmud, Sotah 14a, that we are to model our lives after God’s attributes. As God clothed the naked, so should we. As God visited the sick, we should also visit the sick. As the rabbi read on in the text, I knew what was coming next, but I wasn’t prepared to hear it out loud. As God comforted the mourners, we too must comfort those who mourn. “The Holy One buried the dead,” she read, her voice catching, “you should bury the dead.” Over the course of these few days, we are indeed burying the dead. We are burying six innocent people who spent the last almost 11 months in unimaginable conditions, six people whom we hoped and prayed to bring safely back to their families. At Hersh’s funeral today, his mother, Rachel, whose voice has been steadfast and persistent in seeking a path to have all of the hostages released, said the following: “At this time, I ask your forgiveness. If ever I was impatient or insensitive to you during your life, or neglected you in some way, I deeply and sincerely request your forgiveness, Hersh. If there was something we could have done to save you, and we didn’t think of it, I beg your forgiveness. We tried so very hard, so deeply and desperately. I’m sorry.” The Torah study portion of our morning service ends with this prayer: “May we be disciples of Aaron, the kohen, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving our fellow people and drawing them near to the Torah." In the wake of this devastating weekend, may our pursuit of peace grow stronger. May our love for our fellow people, not least among them those who remain held as hostages, motivate us and those in power to seek their immediate release. Kein yehi ratzon - so may it be God’s will. May the memories of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Eden Yerushalmi, Ori Danino, Alex Lobanov, Carmel Gat, and Almog Sarusi be an eternal blessing. With wishes for healing and peace, Rabbi Jacobs It’s a new school year, with new students to begin getting to know and new ways to look at material that I’ve been teaching for years. Just yesterday afternoon, in my sixth grade Tefillah Workshop class, we were discussing how the physical location of a prayer experience might impact our participation in or emotional response to the service. The students surprised me - a number of them said that if they were participating in a service outside of a synagogue, it would feel less special, as the synagogue is the place where we feel God’s presence most acutely, the place where we are able to be most focused and connect with ourselves and with the Divine most easily.
This surprised me for a couple of reasons. First, middle schoolers are not known for their adherence to traditional norms. They are iconoclasts, often looking for ways to challenge the established tradition and create their own new ways of engaging. I was surprised by what seemed to me, as someone who doesn’t know them that well yet, to be a higher than typical level of reverence. I’m accustomed to my students looking for meaning outside the framework of a traditional synagogue service, to them feeling uncomfortable with the formality and rigid structure of prayer as it’s often conducted in shul. Second, in previous iterations of this course, my students have reflected on special prayer experiences they’ve had in beautiful natural environments at camp, at home with their families, or on school trips to interesting places. In my past experience, my students have tended to find deeper meaning in these less “regular” prayer spaces than in the synagogue. This viewpoint also squares with my own perspective. While I am *definitely* a shul person, I am much more likely to feel spiritually inspired when surrounded by the beauty of the natural world, or in intimate, casual spaces when friends come together for tefillah. And yet, my new students’ affinity for prayer in the synagogue speaks to something important about the power of shul. In our Torah reading this week, Parashat Re’eh, Moshe instructs the people about the way they are to worship when they come to settle in the Land. No longer should they practice as they had been in the desert, with each person finding their own personal path to God, but they should “...look only to the site that the LORD your God will choose…to establish the divine name there. There you are to go, and there you are to bring your burnt offerings and other sacrifices, your tithes and contributions, your votive and freewill offerings…” (Deuteronomy 12:5-6) The book of Devarim is distinguished by its focus on centralized worship; this text, among others in the book, is part of what cements the vital role of the Jerusalem Temple in ancient Judaism. Meaningful prayer and personal connection, in the eyes of our Torah reading, live in the functions of the Temple - because that is where God’s presence also resides. We do not worship in a Temple; indeed, Judaism has evolved and developed immeasurably since the days when the Temple stood. And our synagogues have emerged as the spaces that center our communities. They too are holy, not because they are the sites where God has chosen to reside, but because they are the places where we have chosen to make God’s presence felt. We bring God’s presence into shul when we lift our voices in song and prayer together, when we take a moment of quiet meditation in silent prayer, when we look in awe as the sefer Torah is lifted up and shown to the congregation. We bring God’s presence into shul when we celebrate each other's milestones and successes and when we hold each other through grief and personal challenges. We bring God’s presence into shul when we welcome newcomers and when we feel the joy of seeing old friends. The new school year is here and the new Jewish year is not far behind - I hope I’ll see you in shul soon! Shabbat shalom. This past Sunday, I went to church. This is not my way of dropping any surprising news - I attended services at Grace Episcopal Church in Silver Spring to hear my dear friend, the Reverend Aaron Dunn, offer the sermon for the congregation. Aaron is an old friend of mine from my days teaching in Rockville; he left the school to go to seminary and was recently ordained as an Episcopal priest.
In his sermon, Aaron spoke about the eucharist (the ritual of communion) - not a topic with which I’m extremely familiar nor one that I would ever have the need to discuss homiletically. However, I found Aaron’s exploration of the core texts and rituals of the eucharist both fascinating and relevant to my own Jewish understanding of our core texts and practices. In the course of his teaching, Aaron suggested several lenses through which to view this important part of the church’s liturgy and tradition, two of which are lacking in some way and one of which has the potential to help practitioners find meaning and truth. One possible way to view the eucharist, and indeed any ritual, is through the lens of “Moment,” meaning that it reflects a moment in history that happened and that can be replicated. In this view, taking communion is reliving an event that took place during the life of Jesus. Since the wafer and wine used in this ritual are not factually the body and blood of Jesus (nor were they ever), it’s difficult to see the eucharist through this lens. Another way to look at the eucharist is through the lens of “Metaphor.” From this perspective, the significance of the ritual lies in the symbolic meaning underlying the objects themselves. While understanding the eucharist through this lens is more comfortable for the contemporary intellectual outlook, it ultimately robs the ritual itself of the power of a real connection to its biblical origins. The lens Aaron proposed as one that might be more successful for us is the lens of “Mystery.” Mystery accepts a certain amount of agnosticism when it comes to the historic understanding of the eucharist ritual. And it also accepts that the ritual itself may have symbolic resonance beyond the actions and words that make it up. But it challenges us to suspend our disbelief and participate in the ritual without trying to intellectualize it, without trying to define it or understand it. The aim is to experience the ritual, opening ourselves up to its power and helping forge a connection to the theological (if not historical) truths it contains. It was a great sermon. Listening to my friend preach, I was both interested to hear his interpretation of his sacred text and inspired to consider how this framework might be helpful in looking at my own sacred texts. This week, in Parashat Ekev, Moshe, in the opening verses, offers promises of abundant blessings for following God’s ways and moving forward with entering the Land of Israel. Acknowledging that the task ahead is daunting, he presents the people with something to counteract their fear: they should “...bear in mind what the LORD your God did to Pharaoh and all the Egyptians: the wondrous acts that you saw with your own eyes…the mighty hand, and the outstretched arm by which the LORD your God liberated you.” (Deuteronomy 7:18-19) Here we see a phrase we know well, both from the Torah itself and from our Passover rituals: God’s mighty hand and outstretched arm rescuing the Israelites from Egypt. It’s a powerful image, but one that isn’t necessarily easy to understand. Applying Aaron’s framework, we see that “Moment” doesn’t add to our grasp of this idea - God, as we know, does not have hands and arms in a literal sense. Taking this verse literally presents some real theological problems. “Metaphor” seems more promising. God’s hand symbolizes infinite strength; God’s outstretched arm represents the Divine ability to reach us no matter how far away we might be, as well as a desire for closeness. While these ideas help us understand what we may seek in our relationship with God today, they lose some power when applied back to the story of the exodus from Egypt. This leaves us with “Mystery.” This lens leaves open the possibility that something truly beyond our understanding happened to our ancestors and that we capture some of it in our own lives. It invites us to imagine that experience, both in the time of the Torah and for ourselves. What might it have been like for the Israelites to be moved safely out of enslavement by God’s mighty hand? Or to be reached from far away by God’s outstretched arm? When would we most want to be held in the palm of God’s hand? What would that feel like? From how far away can God reach us and bring us close? It seems impossible to answer these questions, but when seeking a relationship with the Divine, it also feels impossible not to ask them. Shabbat shalom. “But if you search there, you will find the LORD your God, if only you seek with all your heart and soul” (Deuteronomy 4:29)
For the past two weeks, I have been sharing my reflections with us about my experiences at Camp Ramah in the Poconos. This week, having just settled in back at home, I want to look back at my time there and recount a few of the hidden wonders of my time spent at camp. First, though, a note about the verse from Parashat VaEtḥanan above. This verse is also part of the special Torah reading for Tisha b’Av. An interesting fact of the Jewish calendar - the 9th of Av always falls during the week of Parashat VaEtḥanan. Each year, we read this passage as part of our Tisha b’Av observance and as part of our yearly cycle of Torah study, both within the span of a few days. In its context in Parashat VaEtḥanan, this verse is part of Moshe’s greater exhortation to the people to follow God’s laws, a reminder that if they stray, they will be punished, but that a return to following God’s ways will rekindle their relationship with God. As part of the Tisha b’Av liturgy, it serves as a promise that God’s presence abides, even in our darkest times, if only we have the fortitude to seek it out. I was not alone in coming to camp this summer in a pretty dark place. One of the unique features of Camp Ramah is the Mishlaḥat program, which brings dozens of young Israelis to work at camp as counselors and in all of the programmatic areas of the institution. For some of our Mishlaḥat members, coming to Ramah for the summer is not just something to do after serving in the army, a stopover on the way to time spent traveling around the world before entering university or the workforce. A significant number of our Mishlaḥat come back to camp year after year, making it their home for the summer. They’re not simply visitors to the camp community - they’re deeply valued members of the camp family. And this summer was different. “Bring Them Home” banners hung on the deck of the Sifriya (library) and on a number of bunks. Posters with hostages’ names and faces were in constant rotation in the staff lounge. I had colleagues who came to Lakewood, PA almost straight from months spent in milu’im, reserve service, colleagues whose children are serving in the army, whose family members are still held in captivity, colleagues who were devastated by their government’s actions and both needed a break from the constant news cycle and couldn’t seem to take one. The weight of the past 10 months hung heavily on all of us. The magic of camp was going to be more difficult to access this year, but it was still there. We just had to attune ourselves to seeing and feeling it. So despite all the darkness, I want to share a few magical camp moments from this summer, moments that helped me come out of the darkness.
On one of the nights when I was assigned shmirah, sitting by a bunk making sure all was quiet so that the counselors could get some time off, I walked back to my cabin at midnight after finishing my shift. It had rained much of the day, and I wanted to avoid the mud as much as possible on my way home. I found myself walking a slightly different route, taking me through a tree-lined path that was hung with lights. The beauty of it surprised me; it was something I had never noticed before. This was the magic of time spent at camp - moments of connecting and reconnecting with each other, finding our way together through the darkness. Shabbat shalom. Most mornings here at Ramah, I start my day before most of camp has woken up with yoga on the new meditation platform overlooking the agam (lake). One of our fellow staff members teaches the class and about 10 of us regularly gather to breathe, stretch, and challenge ourselves both physically and mentally. Even if I’ve been up late the night before, our 7 AM yoga sessions always leave me with a sense of calm energy that I carry with me for the rest of my day.
We end each class seated, with our eyes closed. We inhale together, and exhale on “Om.” I’m always a little surprised by the strength of our collective “Om,” the way our voices blend together in unison, expressing our rootedness to the universe and to each other. Over the past few days, I’ve noticed something different for me in hearing our “Om.” I can almost no longer tell whose voice is whose. What’s more, I feel everyone’s voice coming from my own. This phenomenon has me thinking about what it means to speak for another person. As a parent, I do think quite a bit, speaking on behalf of my children in a number of settings. When I call our health insurance company, I even have to identify myself as whichever kid I’m calling about in order to get through their voice prompts or they won’t talk to me. I also do this as a rabbi. The words I share in this forum and in others are how many people learn about our community, what we stand for, what we care about. I represent our interests in local and national organizations. When I speak in this way, I have to maintain an awareness that my words are not only my own; they belong to our entire community. We open the book of Devarim this week, reaching the final book of the Torah in our yearly cycle of reading. Devarim is well-known as Moshe’s final speech to the Israelites, his retelling of their story and review of the mitzvot that distinguish them as a people. And while Moshe speaks throughout the book of Devarim in the first person, his opening words in our parashah tell us that he does not see these words as his own. Rewinding the story of the people to Sinai, he says: “Our God spoke to us at Horeb, saying: You have stayed long enough at this mountain.” (Devarim 1:6) In this, his most consequential speech to the people, he is repeating God’s words, speaking for God, not for himself. Moshe’s retelling, however, doesn’t always match the original. In some cases, there are significant differences between the words as they appear in the earlier parts of the Torah and the words here in Devarim. There are multiple ways to approach these textual inconsistencies, but rather than looking at them through the lens of a literary analysis or a historical-critical reading, I want to take the text as it presents itself and think about how, even when speaking for God, Moshe inserts himself into the story. In Moshe’s retelling of the story of the Israelites, his review of mitzvot and laws, we see his emotions: his anger, his frustration, his anguish. We see an increased focus on justice and the rule of law. We see Shabbat take on a new dimension, requiring not a recollection of the grandeur of creation, but fair treatment of those who serve us, inspired by ourselves having been liberated from servitude. When we read these opening chapters of Devarim, this week and over the next few Shabbatot, we cannot help but see that what purports to be an unfiltered recounting of God’s word is not that at all. Moshe’s “Om,” as it were, is not a channeling of God’s “Om;” it is not God’s voice coming through Moshe’s mouth. Moshe’s “Om” is fully his own, the expression of a leader who has touched divinity, but is, in his final moments, unquestionably human. Shabbat shalom. Hello, friends, from Camp Ramah in the Poconos! One of the things I love most about camp is the sense of curiosity and playfulness that permeates so much of what we do here. We give ourselves permission not to get stuck in our ways and regularly seek out opportunities to experiment and try out different angles, new approaches to the activities and routines of the camp day.
This holds true even (and especially) with the traditions we value most. At camp, daily tefillah (prayer) is part of our routine. Our campers know how important it is to our community - we start each day with Shaḥarit (the morning service). Each age group has curricular aims for tefillah, parts of the service we want them to know and understand, core dispositions and skills we help them to develop. And of course, we hope they care about tefillah and value it just as we do. With such significant goals, it would make sense for tefillah to be the most serious part of the camp day. However, our approach, as I mentioned above, is one that is motivated by curiosity and playfulness. With that in mind, I want to share with you a few of the tefillah activities I was privileged to participate in over this past week and a half of camp. I should also mention that I daven each morning with Tze’irim, the group of campers who are entering sixth grade. The campers usually lead tefillot, together with one of two of their excellent counselors. It’s a smaller edah of campers, which gives us the opportunity to create more intimate, participatory experiences during our tefillah periods. Last week, we were fortunate to have an artist in residence at camp, here to work with campers on a songwriting elective. One morning, he came to Tze’irim tefillah, where he helped the campers unpack Birkhot HaShaḥar, the morning blessings near the beginning of the service. Understanding the expressions of gratitude at the center of these blessing, the campers then split up into groups, with each group composing lyrics describing the things at camp for which they are grateful each morning. Coming back together, the groups shared their compositions and our artist in residence helped them weave together the lyrics and add in a melody. In the span of 35 or so minutes, we had composed an original tefillah, complete with its own catchy tune! Earlier this week, I walked into tefillah to find the campers sitting on the floor in small groups, legs crossed and eyes closed. They were meditating, with calming music playing to help enhance their focus. At the end of the meditation session, the counselor in charge played One Day, by Matisyahu. One by one, the campers began to perk up and return to their more typical energetic mood, most of them singing along as they returned to their normal seats. The shortened service that followed was one filled with joy and participation - everyone could see and feel the difference that the meditation time had made. Yesterday, instead of regular Shaḥarit, we had “Yom Boy Band.” (I’m not making this up.) Each bunk was assigned a part of the service. Their job was to pick a popular boy band song and figure out how to sing their assigned tefillah part in that melody. The service that followed was full of joy and laughter, if not decorum and kavanah. Tomorrow, our Rosh Musikah (Head of Music) will be joining Tze’irim with his guitar to help introduce the campers to some different kinds of melodies that have been composed specifically for tefillah. This is (as many of you know), one of my favorite ways to engage with our prayer services, so I’m looking forward to collaborating with him both on the service tomorrow and on helping continue to integrate these melodies into Tze’irim’s services for the remainder of camp. I would be remiss if I didn’t try to make even a tiny connection to our weekly parashah. Matot-Masei opens with a full chapter discussing the consequential business of taking vows. The message is clear: our words have weight in the world and are most often binding. We show our respect for the power of words by being careful and cautious with how we use them. Our seriousness is an expression of our values. However, not every situation demands that same level of gravity. We can also express our values through joy and playfulness. Our approach to tefillah at camp, suffused as it is with these lighter emotions, nonetheless demonstrates the weight we give to the words of our prayers. By engaging with tefillah in these experiential and experimental ways, we are teaching the campers, as well as ourselves, to weave the words of our traditional tefillot into the fabric of who we are. Shabbat shalom. This past week, I was honored, along with other members of the Baltimore Board of Rabbis, to meet with Angela Alsobrooks, the Democratic candidate for Maryland’s open Senate seat. The stated goal of the meeting was for County Executive Alsobrooks to get to know Jewish leaders in the area, to help us get to know her, and to discuss issues that were of importance to us as members of the Jewish community. Our conversation was a lively and meaningful one, with us sharing personal anecdotes and speaking frankly of the concerns that keep us up at night.
One anecdote in particular has stayed with me. County Executive Alsobrooks made frequent mention of her father’s influence on her worldview. With the love and respect she feels for him evident in her words and her demeanor, she shared that he has often said to her: “Do you know what’s wrong with people, Angela? They know more than they understand.” Hearing her share that story around our meeting table, I was immediately struck by the truth that it conveyed. Over the course of the past week, that idea has come up again and again for me, especially when thinking about the difficult and painful events that have marked this time. We also see this truth in Parashat Balak. Balak seeks to engage Bil’am to curse the Israelites because he “know[s] that whomever you bless is blessed indeed, and whomever you curse is cursed.” (Numbers 22:6) Bil’am, for his part, knows that God does not want him to curse the Israelites, placing obstacle upon obstacle in his way. And yet, neither of these two seems to discern the deeper messages in what they see before them. From the Torah’s perspective, this is a very good thing, as these powerful people who were bent on cursing Israel are thwarted. However, their lack of understanding made them dangerous. They were unable to properly assess the situation in which they found themselves, and acted based on their knowledge, rather than any true understanding, attempting over and over to cause grave harm to the Israelites. The horrible events of this past weekend and the constant news updates that have continued unabated since then highlight for me the distinction between knowing and understanding. Inundated as we all are with information and new information and still more new information, we certainly know a lot about the assassination attempt against Donald Trump. And every time we refresh our apps or turn on the television, we know more. Especially when major events like these are unexpected or frightening, it is natural to want to know what’s going on, to have all the details. Knowing things is how we begin to make sense of our experiences. The 24-hour news cycle tells us that it is knowing, being informed, that is the goal. Reconnecting to the story about County Executive Alsobrooks’s father, so many of us know things. But knowing is only the beginning; it is understanding that is the real goal. Personally, I have struggled this week with understanding the state of our nation, of our politics and the hyperbolic rhetoric that accompanies our political discourse. While I know how we got here, I do not understand what holds us here, in a place where violence is seen as a tool of expression. I do not understand the perspectives of those whose viewpoints are diametrically opposed to my own. I cannot fathom the humility, deep listening, and hard work it will take to move us toward a place of healing, which we so desperately need. I do not yet understand. Thankfully, I know that knowing is not enough. Shabbat shalom. I’ve been thinking this week about the experience of being alone. I see it in many ways throughout Parashat Hukkat - the dual losses of Miriam and Aaron leaving the people without much of the leadership that grounded their time in the wilderness; the desperation that comes from their lack of water and the sense of being without help; Edom rejecting the Israelites’ request to walk through their land, leaving them alone to figure out the next steps of their journey. We see in the parashah some of the darker shades of being and feeling alone. Even the Haftarah, the story of Yiftah and his terrible vow, demonstrates the tragic side of feeling and acting alone.
Being alone can indeed be a challenging and painful experience. I’ve certainly been feeling some of that this week. With my summer custody schedule - the kids alternating weeks between me and their father - I’ve had to become accustomed to an emptier house than I’m used to. Everything is too quiet and the lack of parenting-related structure to my days has made it hard for me to feel as productive as I usually do. The brutal heat has kept me indoors where it’s air conditioned more than I usually would be. Even when I have been with others, I’ve wanted to keep my distance in order to allow my body to cool off as much as possible. A couple of months ago I heard a story on NPR about the epidemic of loneliness in America. I had turned on my car in the middle of the story, so I didn’t catch everything, but I do remember being intrigued by the idea that was shared about alone-ness and loneliness not necessarily being the same thing. The reporter explained that it is the quality of people’s connections to each other that matters most. One can be surrounded by people and feel deeply lonely. While I agree with the story’s message that forging meaningful relationships with others can have both psychological and physical health benefits, I want to take a moment to flip that idea around and connect to the blessings of being alone. Reflecting on my experience of being alone, especially on “off weeks” like this one, I appreciate the opportunity to focus on myself a little bit more. I’ve been sleeping longer and better, listening to my body’s needs and attending to them, taking a break from my usual hustle and bustle, getting lost in a few different books, even daydreaming a little. The little bit of freedom from some of my typical responsibilities has made room for me to be more mindful and enjoy my solitude. This is a time of year when many of us take breaks from our usual routines and obligations. We go on vacations, take time off from work (and even from shul - I missed us being together last week!). Whether meaning to or not, we retreat from each other. But being alone doesn’t have to be lonely. My wish for us is that our times of aloneness provide us with the break we need to be with ourselves, care for ourselves, and renew ourselves. Enriched in this way, our reunions will be that much sweeter. Shabbat shalom. Synchronicity is the idea that coincidences can have greater significance, not be coincidences at all. Many of us experience these kinds of things - thinking of a person right before they call us, talking about a particular subject and then seeing it come up over and over in multiple other settings, etc. When things happen once and then keep happening, we often seek out deeper meaning.
This past week was a week of synchronicity for me. It started early in the week, when I heard from an old friend, someone I used to teach with. He left our former school to pursue theological studies and is about to be ordained as an Episcopal priest. He sent me a text message inviting me to his ordination ceremony. We hadn’t been in contact in months, but it was delightful to hear from him. The timing of his message was also a lovely coincidence. I’ve been working this summer with another former colleague and mutual friend from the same school who has a personal training business. The message came in right in the middle of a training session. We were both tickled to see it and learn about the upcoming celebration. One of the things I had been discussing with my trainer friend in between circuits was my plans to spend this Shabbat with another former colleague and mutual friend. With my connections and friendships from this former position on the brain, it wasn’t really all that surprising that more and more reminders of those connections kept bubbling up. Later that day, an old friend who lives in Israel messaged me out of the blue to ask about something happening in her former community here in the States. She’s a close friend, someone I’ve known since college, but we don’t have the chance to speak that often, so it was a joyful surprise to hear from her. Our conversation naturally turned toward catching up on our own lives and checking in on other friends from our college circle. Not even 24 hours later, I met someone new to me - or so I thought. This person looked sort of familiar, but I couldn’t quite place him, so we played a game of Jewish geography. We quickly figured out that we had both lived in the Boston area around the same time 15+ years ago and shared a friend in common from that time, which meant that we certainly ran into each other socially and at shul during those years. The common friend - one of the people from my college circle that my Israeli friend and I had been discussing. Synchronicities are all in the eye of the beholder. Certainly they can simply be explained as coincidences, with no causal relationship whatsoever. The meanings we choose to ascribe to them are what give them deeper meaning. What I see in my synchronous experiences from this past week is the inevitability of connections between people. We can never not be in relationship with each other. The threads of our lives are always tied together at some point. I see the same phenomenon when we gather together as a minyan for tefillah. People are sometimes surprised to learn that the rabbinic explanation for why we need a minyan of 10 people derives from this week’s parashah. The Talmud (Megillah 23b) connects the idea of a community (עדה - edah) to the description of the community of 10 spies (also called עדה - edah) who cast aspersions on the Land of Israel and lead the people astray in Parashat Shelah. 10 spies, 10 people for a minyan. A minyan is an edah, a community. Coming together as such connects us to each other and in that connection is power. In our parashah this week, that power was used to sow chaos and discontent. Thankfully, our experience of minyan is quite the opposite. When we gather together in a minyan, we prioritize the way that the threads of our lives are tied together. We utilize those connections to nurture spaces of song and yearning. We hold each other during tender times and lift each other up during moments of celebration. We enable those among us who know grief to say Kaddish, and allow us to teach and hear Torah in the fullest way possible. Over the past few weeks, I have noticed in shul the power of our minyan, of our community. I will miss being with us this Shabbat and look forward to reconnecting when we next gather for services. Shabbat shalom. |
Shabbat MessageA message from Rabbi Jacobs to the Congregation each Shabbat. Archives
September 2024
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