Reflections Two Years after Pittsburgh

Today is the second anniversary of the terrorist murder of 11 Jewish people at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh.

At that point, apart from High Holiday services, I was only attending synagogue by livestreaming - and I did watch the service that morning from Central Synagogue. I was horrified by what happened, and made a small donation to Tree of Life.

A couple of months afterward, I visited Central Synagogue in person while in New York, and it was wonderful - and I decided to seek out more in-person synagogue experiences, so I started attending fairly regularly. No long after I began attending, the Poway Chabad murder happened. In October or so, at Simchat Torah, I attended Society Hill Synagogue for the first time and soon became a regular - and was in attendance on a Friday night after the brutal terrorist attack and murders on the Jewish community in Jersey City - I don't think there was a dry eye in the house as the rabbi read the names of those murdered. Since the pandemic started, in addition to continuing to participate very actively at Society Hill Synagogue, I have also started participating in learning and services at South Philadelphia Shtiebel - some of which are in-person (outdoors, masked, socially distanced).

I participate in synagogue life, even though I am not Jewish, because I find it spiritually nourishing, because I find it helps me to be a better person, because it is fun, and because I have made a number of new friendships with some really awesome people. I especially love the soulful music and the wrestling with Jewish texts (the Tanach being familiar to me already from my Christian background, but which I have learned a lot about in Jewish contexts).

I don't specifically attend as a response to anti-Semitism, but if there is any way that my synagogue participation can be seen as a gesture of deep contempt toward those people who have repudiated the image of God in which they were made to show hatred toward the Jewish people and faith even to the extent of engaging in violence and murder, good - I am delighted to express deep contempt for this ideology and its adherents.

The First Altar and Our Altar

After leaving the ark, it is recorded that “Then Noah built an altar to the LORD” (Genesis 8:20). This is the first recorded building of an altar – or, indeed, of any religious structure – in the Bible. (The 13^th century French biblical commentator Chizkuni suggests it was the same altar used by Cain and Abel, although no altar is mentioned in that account, found in Genesis 4. The 13^th-14^th century Spanish commentator Rabbeinu Bahya offers a beautiful mystical interpretation of Noah’s building of the altar that is well worth checking out.)

Noah and his family and the animals had been on the ark over a year by this point. This was an experience with very few parallels. They were quarantined far more strictly than we have been during this COVID-19 pandemic – and with no internet, Netflix, Zoom, and probably not much in the way of books! But they had to weather the quite literal storm and subsequent flooding until such time as the land was dry and they were able to leave the ark.

Although it is clearly stated that Noah offered a sacrifice from the clean animals that were on the ark, I wonder if he might also have been offering the spiritual gifts arising out of his time in the ark. There might have been some sort of spiritual transformation that occurred in Noah during this time – perhaps the sacrifice is also an offering of his transformed soul. It is interesting to note that the LORD does not command Noah to offer a sacrifice in the text – but Noah is moved to do so, and the LORD is pleased and is moved to vow not to destroy humankind again.

I wonder, as we continue in this quarantine, what gifts we may discover, what spiritual transformations may renew our souls, what new wisdom we might find? Or perhaps we will have pain and devastation and anger and sorrow to offer – and that is also an offering we can make. After this pandemic comes to an end (please LORD may it be soon!), what altar or other spiritual structure will we be moved to build, and what offerings will we make?

Tractate Berachot: God's Prayer Book

I. May It Be Thy Will

It was time to offer incense to God. As he placed the incense on the altar, Ishmael remembered the names of those who had begged for his prayers.

No fragrance Ishmael had ever encountered smelled as good as the incense, and as he watched the smoke rise he reveled in the sweet aroma.

A bright light that almost blinded him appeared, right next to the curtain in front of the Holy of Holies. As Ishmael adjusted his eyes to the painful light, he saw God – the Lord of Hosts – seated on a high and exalted throne. He startled to tremble, afraid for his life.

And then God spoke.

“My son, bless me!”

Ishmael trembled even more. What could he say to the Creator and Judge of all the universe? He raised his hands in the ancient priestly blessing gesture and opened his mouth to offer praise . . .

. . .  and nothing came out.  

Anger rose up within him. And yet gratitude also welled up.

So he opened his mouth again, “May it be Thy will that Thy mercy . . . may suppress Thy anger . . . “ he swallowed, having not yet been reduced by a thunderbolt to a pile of dust, “and Thy mercy may prevail over Thy other attributes, so that Thou mayest deal with Thy children according to the attribute of mercy and mayest, on their behalf, stop short of the limit of strict justice!”

Still expecting to be struck dead, he was startled to see God smile and nod the Divine Head before fading back to the heavens.

II. May It Be My Will

Many years later, a tall lecturer started a school in Babylon. He was concerned that his students pray the best prayers they could, and he started collecting all the prayers and prayerbooks he could get his hands on. He remembered the strange teaching he had heard that God prayed prayers as well.

He feverishly looked through all his books and manuscripts to find the text of God’s prayers – and he came up empty.

But one day, as he was taking a walk, he looked up at the sky, and a page of parchment floated down. Curious, he picked it up – and at the top of the page was written, “God’s Prayer Book” and he read this prayer – which God had taken from Ishmael’s prayer.

“May it be My will that My mercy may suppress My anger, and that My mercy may prevail over My other attributes, so that I may deal with My children in the attribute of mercy and, on their behalf, stop short of the limit of strict justice.”

III. Aleinu 

It is our duty to praise the Master of all. To exalt the Creator of the universe.

And which of our prayers will God put in the next edition of “God’s Prayer Book”?

(Based on a story in Berachot 7a in the Babylonian Talmud)

Tohu Va-Vohu

Was it Adam and Eve’s fault that they ate the fruit of the tree? 

The red delicious apple – or some say a pomegranate – or maybe it was a banana.

The snake was hungry and tired of having to climb the tree to get to it, and thought if Eve ate it and liked it, she’d share with him ever after in gratitude for the scrumptiousness.

So maybe it was really the scheming snake’s fault?

Or maybe it’s the earth’s fault for bringing forth – not a fruit tree bearing fruit, as God said to do – but a mere tree, made of wood – bearing fruit? If the entire tree was fruit, bearing fruit of its kind with its seed in it, then the snake wouldn’t have needed to slither up the trunk and entice an accomplice.

But maybe the earth hadn’t recovered from being without form and void? It was only the third day when it had to bring forth the fruit trees bearing fruit – and after having to get used to all that light gathered in one place, and day and night, and having its own dry land and water separated. Maybe if it had been the third week, or the third month, or the third year – then it would have been possible?

And how DID the earth become without form and void? I guess we’ll have to wait for the prequel to find that out.

Lifneireishit.

Beer-Lahai-Roi

Beer-Lahai-Roi – the well where God found Hagar – and near which Isaac settled after Abraham died – the well of living water where those fleeing the wrath and neglect and abuse of Sarah and Abraham could drink and settle and be healed and renewed.

Maybe . . . this is the source of the rain and the dew prayed for in the Mechayeh Metim prayer. The water that enables one to spring to life.

Maybe . . . it is the source of a mikveh as well, where one can be born anew, washing away the harsh words and the rope burns and the fear and the terror and the abandonment.

Some find God on Mount Moriah – some flee Mount Moriah and find God at Beer-Lahai-Roi.

The Angel’s Mistake

Ten things were created at twilight on the first Shabbat. Or maybe it was thirteen things. Or maybe fourteen.

God definitely created Balaam’s donkey’s mouth then (was the rest of the donkey created before twilight? or at the same time as her mouth?). God may also have created the ram that Abraham sacrificed at that time – or maybe not.

I think Balaam’s donkey and Abraham’s ram studied together and were best friends for the hundreds of years before the ram’s time came. God taught them how to create with their words, and the donkey and the ram were better at creating than any human that has ever lived.

The donkey and the ram could teach people how to bless with such powerful blessings that they forgot how to curse.

But the angel of the Lord botched things with the ram. He stopped Abraham from killing Isaac before the Lord had a chance to open the ram’s mouth – and Abraham killed the ram before the ram could speak. Had Abraham listened to the ram, he would have offered branches from the thicket the ram was caught in – a thicket of palm, myrtle, willow, and citron – and his heart would have opened and he would have given Isaac such a great blessing that we would be reciting it instead of the priestly blessing. But the ram got sacrificed – and so did Isaac’s blessing – and God had to give Isaac the blessing of his father after his father died.

The angel learned from his mistake. The Lord opened the mouth of Balaam’s donkey to talk to him before Balaam opened his mouth to curse Israel – an open mouth out of which blessings came, not curses. The donkey’s words were so powerful that Balaam gave a blessing they sing in the synagogue every morning. I think the donkey taught Balaam those words.

But because the angel botched things, we will never in this world know the blessing Abraham was supposed to give to Isaac.

The Blessing of Balaam the Bad and the [Missing] Blessing of Abraham the Awesome

In the fifth chapter of Pirkei Avot, there is a mishnah that describes the traits of the disciples of Abraham as opposed to the traits of the disciples of Balaam. The traits of the former are good, those of the latter bad. The disciples of Abraham enjoy this world and inherit the world to come – the disciples of Balaam inherit Gehinnom and go down to the pit of destruction. Clearly, we are meant to see Abraham as awesome and Balaam as bad, striving to emulate the former and avoid the traits of the latter at all costs.

And yet.

In Genesis 25:11, we read that “after the death of Abraham, God blessed his son” – and Chizkuni points out that although God gave Abraham the power to bless – which he used – he never blessed his son Isaac – so that God had to bless him instead. This does not seem praiseworthy of Abraham to me. His near-murder of Isaac in the Akedah – after which Isaac went his separate way from Abraham (Genesis 22:19) – and the description by Isaac’s son Jacob of “the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac” suggests that Abraham’s doing so because of his understanding that God commanded him to do so permanently damaged not only Isaac’s relationship with Abraham but with God as well. (It is my theology that Abraham failed the test – he should have spoken up and objected to God’s request – as he did for the wicked men of Sodom! – rather than blindly obeying the command – and I take as evidence of my view that the angel of HaShem ordered him to stop and that God never spoke directly to him again in Genesis – I realize there are other interpretations, but that is the only one that resonates with my understanding of any God worth serving.)

Meanwhile, the mercenary prophet Balaam, when asked – and paid! – to curse the people of Israel instead gave a blessing so powerful that it has been put in a prominent place in the liturgy – to celebrate with joy entrance into the synagogue in the morning (and non-Orthodox movements often sing it at other services as well, there being many beautiful arrangements). Mah tovu ohaleicha Ya’akov, mishkenoteicha Yisrael. How lovely are your tents O Jacob, your tabernacles O Israel. There is even a teaching that I heard (don’t remember the rabbi who taught it – or whether the rabbi was Talmudic, Midrashic, or Hasidic – if anyone knows, please let me know!) interpreting the parallel structure to suggest that transforming one’s daily dwelling, ohel, into the Mishkan, the Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting where God dwells in the midst of God’s people, elevates one spiritually from one’s natural self, Jacob, into one’s higher spiritual self, Israel – the one who wrestles with God.

How can it be that Abraham is awesome while failing to bless – and, indeed, abusing and even damaging his son – while Balaam the bad provides such a profoundly insightful blessing that contains within it a template for spiritual growth?

I don’t have the answer. But I would suggest that we very carefully look at our own words and actions – in serving God, are we inadvertently abusing and damaging others? And we should be open to learning from even those we see as wicked, who may inadvertently provide us with profound blessings and roadmaps to spiritual growth.

What lessons do you draw from this?