Shabbat Shuvah 5786

I dedicate this d’var Torah to the memory of Carol Daniels, zt”l, my Mussar teacher who opened up to me a new way of understanding human nature and how best to live through the lens of the Jewish Mussar tradition. She passed away on the second day of Rosh Hashanah, but her legacy lives on through her students.

There are a number of texts that get repeated throughout the High Holiday liturgy that help frame for us the meaning of the days. Avinu Malkeinu with its several haunting melodies. The viduy with the alphabetical list of sins that we have committed. The solemn and terrifying words of the U’netaneh Tokef that remind us of our mortality.

One of my favorite texts that gets repeated is the last section, three verses, of the book of the prophet Micah. It is the final section of the Haftarah not only for Shabbat Shuvah but also of Yom Kippur Minchah, being added onto the end of the book of Jonah. Not only is it usually recited at Tashlich, the custom of reciting prayers near a body of water, usually on Rosh Hashanah but permitted through Hoshanah Rabba, but the word tashlich, “you shall cast,” is taken from these verses.

Here are the words, in the majestic language of the 1917 JPS translation, slightly altered:

“Who is a God like unto Thee, that pardoneth the iniquity, And passeth by the transgression of the remnant of G!d’s heritage? G!d retaineth not G!d’s anger for ever, Because G!d delighteth in mercy. G!d will again have compassion upon us; G!d will subdue our iniquities; And Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea. Thou wilt show faithfulness to Jacob, mercy to Abraham, As Thou hast sworn unto our ancestors from the days of old.”

Another text we recite multiple times during the High Holidays is the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy from Exodus 34. This text from Micah provides a higher version of them, the Thirteen Supernal Attributes of Mercy. The amazing work of Mussar and Kabbalah, Tomer Devorach, written by the sixteenth-century kabbalist from Tzfat, Rabbi Moshe Cordovero, the Ramak, expounds these Thirteen Supernal Attributes in its first chapter.

However, this exposition is not just theological speculation about the nature of G!d – rather, as he states in the introduction to the chapter,

“That it is fitting for a person to resemble their Creator: It is fitting for a person to resemble their Creator and then they will be [configured] in the secret of the Highest Form, [both] in image and likeness. As if they are alike in their body but not in their actions, they betray the Form; and others will say about them, "A lovely form, but ugly deeds." As behold, the essence of the Highest Image and Likeness is G!d’s actions. And what will it benefit them to have the structure of their limbs like the Highest Form, but not resemble their Creator in their actions? Therefore it is fitting that they should [make their actions] resemble the actions of the Crown (Keter), which are the thirteen highest traits of mercy. And they are hinted to in the secret of the verses (Michah 7:18-20), "Who is a power like You; G!d will again have mercy on us; You shall give truth." If so, it is fitting that these thirteen traits [also] be found in human beings. And now we will explain these thirteen actions that are fitting to be with them.”

Drawing on the teaching of the creation story in Genesis that we are made in the image and likeness of G!d, the Ramak connects G!d’s Supernal Attributes to the middot, the character traits, we are to develop within ourselves so that our deeds can resemble G!d’s.

But here’s the interesting things, when you go through the chapter – much of what he teaches is about developing inward shifts in how we see other people, so that we can see them with compassion and then act compassionately and mercifully toward them in ways that draw from this new way of seeing. In one place, he suggests that for those whose deeds are very wicked, we go back and see them as a baby, innocent, before they began their troubling behavior. In another place, he even suggests that G!d – and we – treat evildoers with mercy based on their ancestors’ merits.

What the Ramak is teaching us through his magnificent exposition of these verses is to try to see others in the way that G!d their creator sees them, which will then change how we interact with them. We will see them with love. With mercy. With compassion.

Now, this is not easy to do. People will continue to do bad things. Created as we are in the image and likeness of G!d, we are still frail humans with limits. And even G!d gets angry – as it says in Psalm 7, G!d is provoked every day. However, it says in Psalm 30, G!d’s anger lasts only for a moment, but G!d’s favor for life. This section of Micah says “You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” – and Psalm 51 says “Do not cast me away from your presence.” Tashlich – Al tashlicheni. We are called to separate our anger at bad deeds from our anger at a person.

Of course, we are also obligated to care for ourselves, and none of this – heaven forbid – should be taken as advice to stay in unhealthy and abusive situations.

Nevertheless, our job is to find a way to see the outline of G!d’s image and likeness in everyone, even those we cannot be around, even in those who hurt us, even in those who have done destructive deeds. We are angry and reject their deeds, but we continue to hope and pray that, just as we are afforded the opportunity for teshuvah, for repentance, so they will be afforded that opportunity – and will take it. It is difficult work – I have certainly not mastered this and it will be a work in progress for the rest of my life – but it is work we are called to do.

Carol Daniels embodied the attributes taught in Tomer Devorah, which the Center for Contemporary Mussar describes as Tikkun Middot – middot which repair and expand the Tov, the Good, in our broken world as we bear the burden of the Other. My life is much better for having known her and learned from her. It is my brachah – my blessing – that all of us, in the coming year, work to emulate these middot – and our Creator – to build a better version of our world in partnership with G!d. Shanah tovah.

Why I Mourn the Loss of the Temple

As we go through the Nine Days preparing to mourn the loss of the Beit HaMikdash, the Temple, on Tisha B’Av, the saddest day on the Jewish calendar, many are sharing what the loss means to them. I have decided to do so as well.

As a small child, I was fascinated by maps and floor plans (which I called “house maps”). My parents had subscribed to National Geographic for years and even before I could read, I would spread out the maps on the floor and pore over them – my mother said that instead of wall-to-wall carpeting, we had wall-to-wall maps. One place we lived, when I was in third and fourth grade, the Sunday paper featured a floor plan as part of a spotlight on a particular house and my mother would carefully cut out the floor plan for me once my parents were finished with the newspaper. I would spread them out in neighborhoods with my Matchbox cars in front of them.

I was raised evangelical – Southern Baptist and Assemblies of God. Evangelical Bibles usually have maps in the back, including floor plans of the Mishkan and Beit HaMikdash (Tabernacle and Temple as they call them) and I could draw the floor plan of the Mishkan with the altars, laver, table, candlestick, and Ark by the time I was nine. There was something about that holy floor plan that spoke very deeply to me. There was a neo-Pentecostal minister my father liked to listen to and he got his sermons on cassette tape. One series was about the Mishkan and there was an accompanying small booklet that I liked to look at. He saw the Mishkan as a model of the human soul.

It turns out that this idea was not original to him – kabbalistic and chasidish rabbis before him also see the Mishkan/Beit HaMikdash as the model of the human soul, the Jewish people’s collective soul, and indeed, the soul of all creation. I find this model very comforting and illuminative. The Ark with the tablets inside – both the broken pieces of the first set and the whole second set – this speaks to what is in the innermost depths of my own soul. The cherubim who face one another in times of harmony and face away from each other in times of strife.

The traditional understanding is that G!d has been exiled from the world after the destruction of the Temple, with the Jewish people then exiled from G!d as well. However, we know G!d is everywhere and, as Psalm 139 so beautifully teaches, G!d is closer to us that we are to ourselves. This has not changed – even if our perception of G!d’s presence is different.

The real exile is from our own souls. We no longer have the physical replica of our soul with us – it has been destroyed – and we are in exile, unable to understand who we are meant to be – unable to actualize our purpose, with the Ark of our covenant with G!d – both our collective Jewish covenant and the individual covenant each person has with Hashem – misplaced. The light of the seven-branched menorah illuminating our actions, the bread of the Presence sustaining us, the sweet incense bringing our prayers sweetly to the Divine – absent. The korbanos – the sacrifices of drawing near –to G!d and to ourselves and to one another– and the cleansing of the laver – we don’t have them and must find other ways to draw close.

It is this excruciating pain of being in exile from our own souls that is the real pain of Tisha B’Av. It is this journey back to our soul – the return – the teshuvah – that is the geulah we seek. But we cannot begin the journey until we feel this loss – this ultimate alienation – very deeply in our very bones. Until we come to desire the restoration of the Temple of our souls more deeply than any other desire.

May we feel this loss so keenly that we may set out on and complete this journey – with G!d and each other as our traveling companions – and experience geulah shleimah – complete redemption.

Pinchas and Beruriah

This past Shabbos, when Parshat Pinchas was read, I was walking to shul in the afternoon and realized that the gematria for Zimri, from the tribe of Shimon, murdered by Pinchas, has a gematria of 257 – 49 more than the gematria for Pinchas. My interpretation is that by this murder, Pinchas brought the people down 49 levels of the 50 levels of impurity – the same 49 levels of impurity the Jewish people had gone down in Egypt and had left behind in the redemption. Kozbi, the Midianite woman also murdered, has the gematria of 39 – the same number of categories of work, melachot, used in constructing the Mishkan and prohibited on Shabbat – thereby destroying the holiness of both the Mishkan and Shabbat. The command to keep Shabbat includes the command to work - what work are we commanded to do? - the 39 malachot that we don't do on Shabbat - the things we do to build the mishkan. I would argue that we are commanded implicitly to build a dwelling-place for Hashem on earth (the Alter Rebbe talks about this) - and any work that does this counts metaphorically. Pinchas, through killing them, rather than building/caring for/doing the service in the Mishkan, is in fact destroying it through a zealous act of killing.

To be clear, they were sinning – but murder was not the correct response but helping them to teshuvah – the murder was far, far, far worse. Pinchas destroyed two people created in the image of G!d. When Rabbi Meir was mugged by bandits, he prayed for G!d to cause them to die in retribution. His wife, the sage Beruriah, interpreting the last verse of Psalm 104 to read “Let SINS (rather than sinners, as it is commonly translated) cease from the earth, and the wicked will be no more [because they are now righteous, having repented]. Rabbi Meir did pray for their repentance – their teshuvah – instead, and indeed, they did!

The verse ends with “My soul bless Hashem, Hallelukah!” I would add to Beruriah’s interpretation that this part of the verse acknowledgess, by saying “my” soul, that all of us have also sinned and need to do teshuvah – and, not only need to do teshuvah, but are capable of doing teshuvah. This psalm is read on Rosh Chodesh, the new moon. The first commandment given to the Jewish people is to make the month of Nisan the first month of the year. The Jewish people are associated with the moon, as the rabbis have taught. One of the most fundamental aspects of being Jewish is the hope that, just as the moon that has waned will wax again, so when we do teshuvah, when we repent by turning from sin and returning to be the people G!d created us to be, G!d will forgive us and restore us even higher. As the rabbis teach, the sinner who repents is in a higher state than the one who never sinned. There is even a midrash that explains the curious commandment to bring a sin-offering FOR G!d on Rosh Chodesh by saying that after G!d created the two great lights, G!d then diminished the moon, and the sin-offering is to atone for this. G!d can do teshuvah, we are taught.

But Pinchas, in his zealotry, cannot place himself with the sinners – he cannot acknowledge his fallibility – he cannot add his “MY soul will bless Hashem” to the prayer for sins to leave the world so the sinners repent and become righteous. He cannot pray for their restoration. Instead, he kills two people made in the image of G!d, believing himself to be pure and perfect. If only he had followed in Beruriah’s footsteps and prayed for their repentance, rather than killing them, the story would have been so much more powerful.

In a world of Pinchases, may we be given strength by G!d to be Beruriahs instead.

The Broken Peace Pieces of Pinchas

At the end of Parshat Balak, Pinchas, in a fit of zealotry, thrusts a spear through an Israelite man making love to a Midianite woman. At the beginning of Parshat Pinchas, G!d seems to praise him and bestows upon him a covenant of shalom – of peace.

But – here’s the thing. As I learned from my wise friend Joey Eisman, the vav in shalom (the vav is a long mostly straight letter in Hebrew) is broken in the middle. It is not whole. The word shalom comes from the root for whole/complete – shleimut, a related word, is the Hebrew word for wholeness. So the brit shalom is not really shalom – not whole – it is broken. Some covenant to be given! 

The two most central parts of the Jewish liturgy are the Shema and the Amidah. The Shema proclaims that Hashem is our G!d and that Hashem is One. The blessing before the Shema proclaims G!d’s ahavah, love, for Israel – and the first paragraph of the Shema, after the first line, commands us to love G!d. The gematria for ahavah is 13 – and so is the gematria for echad, the word “one.” A broken peace – a peace that is pieces – cannot, therefore, be a peace that is from G!d. It lacks unity – it lacks love – and it is a false peace.

The Amidah, the central prayer, always ends with the blessing for peace. Our prayer must, to be kosher, end in a prayer for peace – for wholeness – for oneness. Again, the brit shalom is not this but the opposite. In effect, three times a day – four on Shabbat and chagim – five on Yom Kippur – we pray, ultimately, to NOT be like Pinchas. But perhaps we can pray that he found his way to teshuvah – that the vav was, at some point, completed as he repented of destroying the image of G!d in the two people he murdered.

Basar v'Cholov v'Pesach

The laws of kashrut for Pesach are very strict. It intrigues me that, both yesterday and today, the Torah reading ended with the admonition (the verses from Exodus being identical and coming after similar instructions about the festivals) against boiling a kid in its mother's milk, which appears once more in a verse in Deuteronomy where the first half is different but the second half the identical admonition. Rabbinic Judaism sees these three mentions as prohibiting not only cooking but also eating and deriving benefit from any mixture of meat and dairy (Karaite Jews interpret the prohibition more narrowly). The rabbis even extend the prohibition against eating (not the other two) to mixing poultry and dairy.

The laws of which animals are treyf are fairly easy - don't eat pork, shrimp, lobster, etc. The laws of kosher slaughter and kashering the meat through salting are complex, but if you're not doing it yourself, you just look for a hechsher on the package or in the store. But the complex laws of mixtures of meat and dairy are such that, to get basic smicha, rabbinic ordination, I spent most of the year, in two classes a week, learning specifically about these laws, which also gets into separate sets of dishes, etc. But this complexity very much falls on the household keeping kosher, not just rabbis, etc., in a way the laws of kosher slaughter and, these days, salting to kasher meat do not.

 I’ve already written about my views of basar v’cholov, meat and dairy, a link to which I will post in the comments. But I think that, because of the complexity of these laws and the way that complexity is similar to the complexities of the laws of chametz (leaven) for Pesach (and kitniyot if you were chosen to be Ashkenazi and zocheh to follow those minhagim – perhaps not the way most look at it, lol!), that there is a connection. I don’t yet have it figured out – but at the very least, I think that when we think about the laws of basar v’cholov, we should remember Pesach and the redemption from the narrow places of Egypt/Mitzrayim and see ourselves as if we ourselves were there.

One of first sections of the storytelling in the Haggadah for the Passover Seder is the story of five rabbis who stayed up all night at the Seder talking about the Exodus, until their disciples came to tell them it was time to recite the morning Shema, three paragraphs from the Torah that are recited twice a day as one of the two most essential parts of the liturgy. The second half of the third paragraph of the Shema also recounts the redemption from Egypt. Indeed, one is obligated to recall the Exodus every day. I think that, similarly, this story comes to teach us that while Pesach is the time we think about our redemption in a special way – but we must think about it every day. We observe certain dietary restrictions during Pesach, but the prohibition against mixing meat and dairy is meant to remind us of the prohibition against chametz and all it teaches.

 

 

Shabbos HaGadol 5785

Forty-four years ago this Shabbos, Shabbos HaGadol, I attended my first synagogue service at Beth Sholom Congregation, the Orthodox synagogue in Chattanooga, TN, which was the beginning of my Jewish journey, a journey that entered an exciting new phase forty-two years later when I finally converted to Judaism. Interestingly, my Orthodox conversion certificate is on the letterhead of another Congregation Beth Sholom, in Potomac, MD. The journey included many stops along the way, including majoring in Judaic studies with a minor in Hebrew in college, taking 11 of 27 courses in divinity school in Jewish studies, attending many Pesach seders along the way, and livestreaming and then attending live synagogue services and even teaching classes at one of the synagogues before finally deciding to convert. I once bought chametz from a panicked coworker before Pesach during my six and a half years working at Hadassah – and now I sell my chametz – I suspect I am one of only a few people to have been on both sides of that transaction. And as the rabbis were gathering for my Orthodox conversion, I was reminiscing about my first Pesach seder and three of the four rabbis informed me, far more cheerfully than was perhaps necessary, that they had not yet been born when that seder took place! 

I attended seven seders at the home of a friend when I was in divinity school and in the years after who had a daughter, only kindergarten age at my first seder at her table. I had the task each year of making sure the wine disappeared from Elijah’s cup, to convince her that Elijah had come. That task became more and more difficult each year as she grew! And I am thinking about Elijah as I read the haftarah for Shabbos HaGadol. The penultimate verse of the haftarah (and of the book of Malachi, the book of the twelve, and of the books of the prophets), repeated at the end, so that it ends on a good note, mentions him: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD.” 

Elijah is a complex character. He was thought by some rabbis to be the same person as Pinchas, both known as zealots for the one true G!d, Hashem. Pinchas famously (and quite disturbingly) thrusts a spear through a couple who were sinning. Elijah is known for challenging 450 prophets of the false idol Baal to a contest of sacrificing and seeing which deity sent down fire from heaven. They fail, Elijah succeeds, and he kills the false prophets (also quite disturbingly). 

Yet there is another incident that shows a very different side of this prophet of Hashem. He comes to the widow of Zaraphath and asks for something to eat. She sorrowfully explains that she only has enough flour and oil for a final meal with her son, having gathered sticks for the fire. Elijah promises her that the flour and oil will not fail until the drought ends and for three years, she has enough to feed herself, her son, and Elijah. During that time, her son falls ill and dies, and Elijah miraculously resurrects him. So there is both the zealous side to Elijah, ready to combat idolatry whenever it rears its ugly head – but also the compassionate side, ready to feed and give life to the needy.

Pesach is similar. The halachah is very strict. In the times of the Temple, one had to be in a state of ritual purity to partake of the Pesach sacrifice. During Pesach, when preparing food, a trace of chametz treyfs up the dish. Even if it is only 1,000^th of a mixture, the entire dish ceases to be kosher. This is in contrast to milk and meat – if there are 60 of one against the one of the other that inadvertently falls into the mixture, it is nullified – if a drop of milk mistakenly falls into meat cholent and the amount of cholent is at least 60 times the milk, the milk is nullified and the cholent remains kosher. There is a frenzy of cleaning before Pesach that leads to the sale or renunciation of any remaining chametz.

But then the Seder comes, and we say “Let all who are hungry come and eat.” There is even the mitzvah of Maot Chittin, tzedakah given to the needy so they will have the resources to celebrate Pesach. The Pesach seder is the most widely observed Jewish ritual. There is a welcoming, inclusive aspect to it that literally brings people to the table like no other ritual.

And that, I think, is one of the messages of Pesach – and of Shabbos HaGadol. Religious observance needs two sides to it – chesed, lovingkindness, the inclusive welcome of all who are hungry to the Seder table – and gevurah, strength, boundaries – the zealousness to rid ourselves of spiritual chametz and idolatry in service of the one G!d. Elijah teaches us to bring both – and the verse in Malachi teaches us that only in bringing both can we truly prepare for the geulah, redemption, the day of Hashem. May it come speedily and in our days.

Torah-True Babka and the Mitzvah to Blot Out the Memory of Amalek

One of the most important teachings in this week's parsha, Ki Tisa, is found in Shemot 30:23: וְאַתָּ֣ה קַח־לְךָ֮ בְּשָׂמִ֣ים רֹאשׁ֒ מׇר־דְּרוֹר֙ חֲמֵ֣שׁ מֵא֔וֹת וְקִנְּמׇן־בֶּ֥שֶׂם מַחֲצִית֖וֹ חֲמִשִּׁ֣ים וּמָאתָ֑יִם וּקְנֵה־בֹ֖שֶׂם חֲמִשִּׁ֥ים וּמָאתָֽיִם׃. This comes to teach us that cinnamon babka is Torah-true babka. Chocolate, halva, vanilla, caramel, lotus - these flavors do not appear in the Torah.

Furthermore, קִנְּמׇן has the same gematria as עֲמָלֵ֑ק - which comes to teach us that consuming delicious cinnamon babka so that there is not a single crumb left gives us the strength to similarly blot out the memory of Amalek. So don't forget to blot out the memory of Amalek by eating cinnamon babka!