Bracing for Impact: Cultivating Resilience in These High Holy Days

5778 Rosh Hashanah Serermon, Congregation Emanu El, Houston, Texas. September 21, 2017

Yaron makes Roses. He doesn’t grow roses -- he forges them.

Yaron lives in a tiny community in Israel called Yated (יָתֵד). The town is only about four-and-a-half miles from the border with Gaza. People who live in that part of Israel are under the constant threat of rockets fired from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Thankfully, rocket attacks in the last two years have dropped off precipitously, but at their height, there was a near constant barrage. A few times a day, residents in these border villages would hear the sirens telling them they had just 15 seconds to find shelter.

Yaron has had two close calls. Twice he’s found himself without shelter. Twice he has felt the ground shake and the dust cover him.

The second time that it happened, the rocket fell fifty feet from him. When the dust cleared, he could see the mangled metal body of the rocket sticking out of the ground.

Yaron is a blacksmith and a metal artist, and looking at that smoldering shell, he was overcome with an urge to make something beautiful. So he began taking the fallen rocket shells, melting them down, and hammering them into beautiful roses. He sells these roses and donates a portion of the proceeds to help build bomb shelters to protect his neighbors. To him these metal roses are sign that something both strong and beautiful can grow out of adversity, that violence cannot quench hope. Isaiah says we should beat swords into plowshares; Yaron hammers rockets into roses. It’s not always easy, but he is trying to turn terror into something more triumphant.

How do we hammer the hard parts of our lives into something beautiful? Or if not beautiful, maybe functional. Or if not functional, maybe we can at least soften the sharp edges. It is an art to move forward after tragedy or trauma. The field of positive psychology calls it “Resilience.” This past month, we’ve all been getting a crash course in the kinds of tragedies that require the art of resilience -- and it is an art we can learn through these High Holy Days.

Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg and her friend, psychologist Adam Grant, write about resilience in their provocative new book Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy. Sandberg learned about resilience firsthand when her husband, David Goldberg, died suddenly of a cardiac arrhythmia at the age of 47. In the book, she writes about her own descent into grief and despair, and how Adam’s research about resilience helped her and her children find their way out. For all of us struggling to make sense of tragedy, or supporting people who are, this book can be a powerful read.

Sandberg and Grant define resilience as “the strength and speed of our response to adversity.”[i] They see it, not as an innate ability, but as a skillset. And they conclude that after a trauma, or even before, it is possible to develop this skillset. We can learn to be more resilient.

Before we go any further, it is important to acknowledge[ii] that pain is a part of loss, and resilience does not diminish it. Resilience does not erase all suffering. All of us who have experienced loss, whether in recent days or years past, know this. Building resilience is not about denying pain. It’s about what we do with that pain, how we hold space for it, and how we eventually learn to live with it.

We must also recognize that growth does not give meaning to our pain. Sandberg experienced what psychologists call “post-traumatic growth” by developing more self-awareness and strength. But she says she would happily trade her new self-knowledge for a little more time with Dave. It’s a sentiment all of us who have suffered a loss know well. Finding strength in the face of hardship does not mean we should stop trying to diminish hardship in the world.[iii]

And finally, resilience in the face of tragedy is not simple. There are people in this room who are at this very moment experiencing great upheaval. Some of you have been displaced by the storm. Others of you are facing an illness in your life or the life of a loved one. Some of you have lost jobs, ended relationships, experienced violence, or seen abilities decline. For me to stand here and tell you to look for the silver lining would be cruel. All I, or anyone else can do is reach out our hand, and say “I’m here for a hug, or to help you pull yourself out. Whichever you most need.” This morning, as I speak about the possibility of resilience, I do so knowing that this may seem distant for some of you. But I hope today we might plant a seed that will sprout when it’s ready.

So, if resilience is the strength and speed of our response to adversity, how do we teach ourselves to be stronger and faster? Psychologists like Martin Seligman say we do this by learning to understand our natural responses to hardship. Seligman teaches that when tragedy strikes, we are susceptible to three myths. They try to take up residence in our brains like uninvited houseguests. Our resilience is found in our ability to recognize these uninvited visitors and help them find the door. The houseguests are:” Permanence, Pervasiveness, and Personalization.[iv]

Permanence is the belief that I will always feel the way I do right now. It is not just saying “life will never be the same” – for that is surely true. It is saying, “I’ll never be happy again.” Yes, our world will be irrevocably changed, but psychologically speaking we are actually pretty bad at predicting how we will feel in the future. Psychologists have studied this. They call it affective forecasting. When people are asked to predict how sad they will feel before an event occurs, they tend to overestimate relative to how they actually report feeling months after the event. Essentially, when things are going wrong, we are predisposed to think we will continue to suffer[v]. When we are stuck in the myth of Permanence it is harder to notice our progress.

The second houseguest is Pervasiveness, which says that all aspects of our life will be affected by the trauma. Pervasiveness is the thought that “I can’t find anything funny anymore.” It is the myth that says you’ve lost all havens in your life that could feel normal or even good. Pervasiveness includes the guilt we feel when we do start to feel happy. It is the way we convince ourselves that if we laugh, we are moving on too quickly and doing a disservice to the memory or the event. When we are stuck in the myth of pervasiveness, we expect our pain will permeate into all aspects of our lives.

The third houseguest is Personalization, the sense of guilt or responsibility we feel for tragedy that is not our fault. It is the “I could have’s.” The “if I’d only’s.” Learning from your mistakes is one thing, but blaming yourself for events outside of your control is another thing entirely.

After her husband's death, Sheryl Sandberg blamed herself for not finding him sooner. She later wondered if she should have pushed him to eat better when he was alive. But even when she could no longer think of any specific way to blame herself, she noticed that she was apologizing. She writes, “[I apologized] to my mom, who put her life on hold to stay with me for the first month. To my friends who dropped everything to travel to the funeral…. To my colleagues for losing focus when emotion overwhelmed me.”[vi] Apologizing had become a smokescreen for her feeling of personal responsibility for her husband’s death. When we are stuck in the myth of personalization, we make ourselves into the enemy.

When tragedy strikes, these three unwanted house guests invite themselves into our brains.  Permanence says, “you’ll always feel this bad”; Pervasiveness says, “every part of your life will feel this bad”’ and Personalization says, “you are to blame.” We cannot stop these guests from coming to visit. They are pain’s natural companions. But we can learn to recognize them for what they are and to know when to ask them to leave.

The themes of the High Holy Days can help us learn to recognize these three houseguests. Take for example the difficult and heart-wrenching words of Untaneh Tokef. Cantor Simmons so beautifully showed us this morning how the separate components of the Untaneh Tokef fit together into a unified whole. And each piece of this prayer contributes in its own way to the larger message of resilience. As we listen to these themes in this prayer, it can teach us how to find resilience in our own lives.

The first paragraph of the prayer speaks to Permanence and Pervasiveness. “Untaneh Tokef k’dushat hayom — ki hu nora v’ayom.” “Let us proclaim the holiness of this day, it is full of fright and dread.” These days are set apart. We feel as if the passage of time has stopped -- that is Permanence. We feel as if everything hangs in the balance -- that’s pervasiveness.  But these days will end. The book will close. The shofar will sound, the fast will get broken and life will go on. We will get back to normal. The Days of Awe are structured as if to say, “you cannot live in this kind of intensity of purpose every day, so live it fully for 10 days, and then move on.” When we pray these words, we say, “I know these feelings are intense, but I also know they have an expiration date.”

The next section of Untaneh Tokef teaches us to confront Personalization. We read the words, “B’Rosh HaShanah yikateivun; uvYom Tzom Kippur yeichateimun.” “On Rosh HaShanah it is written; on Yom Kippur it is sealed: who will live and who will die…” It reminds us that there are many things beyond our control. The disaster can strike at any time, for no reason at all. We storm-tossed Houstonians know this all too well. But, the prayer declares, “repentance, prayer and charity, these help us transcend the harshness of the decree.” Notice that they do not change the decree; rather, they help us to deal with it. When we pray these words, we say, “I know what I cannot control, so I will behave with intention in the places where I do have control – my actions towards myself, God, and others.”

We, who have seen the water rise, know from tragedy. We, who have had to tear out sheetrock, know from pain. Some among us have lost everything. Many among us have comforted friends who saw their lives washed away. There are those who know other traumas. We know the tragedy of a job lost, or a loved one’s illness. We know the pain of a marriage ending or an unexpected death. Tragedy is a tear in our lives, like the mourner who rends his clothes as a sign of his torn heart. There is an old story about a king who finds a scratch on his most prized ruby, and is distraught until someone comes and etches the ruby further, turning that scratch into the stem of a rose. Just as Yaron turns his rockets into Roses, this person knew that we cannot erase the crack. But over time we can learn to transform it.

Theologian and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankel wrote, “When we are no longer able to change a situation... we are challenged to change ourselves.”[vii] Untaneh Tokef has taught us taught us hard truths about the world. It can also teach us how to change ourselves in response. It has shown us how to recognize three houseguests. It can also teach us how to evict them.

Sheryl Sandberg describes one of her lowest moments, when the pain of her loss was unbearable. She turned once again to her friend Adam Grant for help. She thought he would say to think positive -- to look on the bright side. In fact, he told her the opposite. He asked her to imagine a way her situation could be even worse. “Are you kidding?” She asked him. “How could this be worse?” He answered: “Dave could have had that same cardiac arrhythmia driving your children.”[viii] Sandberg was instantly thrown into an unfamiliar feeling. She was sad for her loss, but she was suddenly so grateful for her two children and that sense of gratitude softened her pain.

Maybe this is how we make sense of the terror of the words of Untaneh Tokef. Who by fire? So far, not me. Who by water -- Thank God, my family survived. There is so much to fear in these dire words if we use it to look forward. But looking back at the past year, the words seem more like Adam Grant’s question of “how could it be worse?”

Every night at dinner, Annie and I start our meal by saying a thing we are grateful for. Some days it is big things, like when our daughter Ella does something for the first time. Most days it is something small, like finishing a project at work or getting a text message from a distant friend. There are days when thinking of something to be grateful for is incredibly easy. There are days when it’s incredibly hard. The days when it’s hardest are the days we push ourselves to think of two things, or three of five. Because those are the days when it’s most important, where it would be easiest to forget that we are blessed. People who keep a daily gratitude journal report both improved attitudes towards difficult events and improved health outcomes and wellbeing.[ix],[x] The practice of gratitude does not remove our burdens, but it does refocus our energy on our blessings. If, as I speak, resilience feels out of reach to you, then don’t worry about being resilient. Be the kind of person who writes down five things they are grateful for before bed. On the days where it’s especially hard, read back through the last week. I promise it will help.

In the final verses of Untaneh Tokef we declare that we are “broken vessels.” It is a declaration of immense vulnerability. After all the lofty talk of books of life, we stand before God in all our brokenness, asking for God to accept us. In the last month we have been learning how a community holds each other in our brokenness. Together, we are learning how to say more than “how are you doing?” even as we are learning how to respond with more than “fine.” We are learning to push past platitudes like “everything happens for a reason” and “what doesn't kill us makes us stronger” and “when life gives you lemons...”. These phrases do not hold someone in their brokenness; they just minimize their pain. Instead of offering advice, we can emulate God, and offer consolation. The Catholic priest Henri Nouwen teaches, “To console does not mean to take away the pain but rather to be there and say, ‘You are not alone, I am with you. Together we can carry the burden.’”

We will strive for this congregation to be a community of gratitude and consolation. This is the message of Untaneh Tokef for us, this year. In the face of the difficult realities of “who by fire and who by water” we can only offer words of consolation to each other and gratitude for blessings, even when they are hard to find. The final words of Untaneh Tokef praise God’s Holy Name, as if to say when life feels fragile, let it be a reminder of God’s abiding presence. When life feels dreadful, let it be a reminder of God’s glorious mystery. When our lives are like shattered vessels, let words of blessing never be far from our lips...

O Source of life and blessing,
We come to you on these High Holy Days
these days of fear and dread
these days of return and renewal.
We stand before you with all our burdens
with hearts as heavy as rockets rammed into the earth.
We come to you with hearts as hopeful
as shiny metal roses --
the promise of a new blossoming
after the dust has settled.

In the face of all that is temporary
and all that is terrifying,
we come to you in gratitude
for the blessings in our lives,
both the blessings we see
and the blessings that are hiding in plain sight.
We come with gratitude
for the many incredible ways
the members of this community
have offered strength and comfort to each other
in recent weeks.
We pray that you will remind us
that we are not alone,
that we are not to blame,
that we will not always feel
the way we feel now.
That pain,
and joy,
like life itself
are like grass that will fade,
a leaf that will wither.
We pray that these High Holy Days will be a reminder
that even though our fate is sealed
we can choose who we will be in the face of our fate.

God, whose name is holy,
help us through these Days of Awe
to live more gratefully,
to live more resiliently.
Help us to be your eyes
taking notice of the many blessings in your world,
and the suffering and injustice, too.
Help us to be your ears,
hearing and acknowledging the pain of our neighbors.
Help us to be your arms
reaching out to offer consolation
to all those who struggle and stumble.
Help us to be your partner
in the sacred work
of rebuilding this city and this world
as a more perfect expression
of your holy name.

L’shanah tovah

[i] Sandberg and Grant, p. 10

[ii] Many of these caveats were developed from this helpful article: https://ptgi.uncc.edu/what-is-ptg/

[iii] Sandberg and Grant, p. 11

[iv] http://www.businessinsider.com/sheryl-sandberg-martin-seligmans-3-ps-helped-me-cope-with-my-husbands-death-2016-5

[v] Sandberg and Grant, p. 21

[vi] Sandberg and Grant, p. 17

[vii] Frankl, Viktor E.. Man's Search for Meaning

[viii] Sandberg and Grant, p. 25

[ix] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2755263/

[x] http://www.spring.org.uk/2007/09/practicing-gratitude-can-increase.php

The Calf and the Chapel - What We Build With Our Gifts (Rosh Hashanah 5777)

Flickr: Jennifer C.

Shortly after we graduated from college, Annie and I joined a synagogue. The membership packet included a form for volunteer opportunities, with spaces for us each to write our skills and interests. Perhaps you've filled out something similar. My column contained skills like “great with kids” and “loves arts and crafts.” Annie was volunteering for Habitat for Humanity at the time, so her column said, “great with power tools” and “loves to hang cabinets.”

Clearly, building projects are not my area of expertise. So it’s a great irony that I’m going to speak this evening about not one but two building projects. Tonight I want to tell you two stories. A story about building a calf, and a story about building a chapel.

If this sounds familiar to some of you, it means you were kind enough to live-stream my senior sermon last year. I am thrilled to share a new version with our community tonight. I hope it’s even better the second time.

Let's begin with the building of the calf. Our ancestors trembled in terror at the foot of Mount Sinai. Moses had ascended the mountain 40 days before, and they started to worry that he would not come down. Panic reverberated across the community. “Moses has abandoned us. He took us out of Egypt. He showed us miracles. He led us here. And now he’s gone... and he’s taken God with him. Who are we without him?” In fear, they approach Aaron and demand, “Make a god for us, for Moses, our leader, has vanished.” [i]

Aaron, fearing for his life, tells the people to bring him gold, so the men and the women pile their golden earrings in front of him. Then they go back to their tents, proud of themselves for “doing something” and eager for Aaron to solve their problems. What Aaron builds is the infamous Golden Calf. When Moses returns the next day, he and God are furious. They burn the idol down and they punish the people for their faltering faith. The calf is the spiritual low point of our journey in the desert.

Now for the second building story: The chapel. At the exact moment that Aaron is forging the calf at the foot of the mountain, Moses is high above, talking with God and receiving the instructions for the Mishkahn – the portable sanctuary where the Israelites will worship in the desert. It was an elaborate tent, at the center of which was the Ark, the ornate golden box that housed the tablets of the commandments. The mishkahn will serve as the Israelites’ chapel – their spiritual center during their time in the wilderness. And building it will require the people to bring gifts. At first glance, these gifts are a strange echo of the golden calf. But unlike with the idol, when they complete the Mishkahn, God’s presence will come and fill it. [ii] It will be a dwelling place for God.

There’s a striking contrast between the mishkahn and the golden calf. At the top of the mountain the people are commanded to build a sanctuary. At the bottom, the people demand an idol. A chapel and a calf. One is sacred, the other is sacrilegious. One building project is a dwelling place for God, the other God finds detestable. So we are left to wonder, whenever we are building, how do we ensure that we build a chapel, and not a calf?

The story of the golden calf is just 35 verses, while the Torah spends whole chapters explaining the precise blueprints for building the sacred structure of the Mishkahn. “This wall should be this many cubits. That curtain should be that many cubits.” Like I said, I’m not a construction expert. That’s really Annie’s department. I can see her reaching for her phone to google the conversion of cubits to feet. But I read the blueprints as a metaphor – they are instructions for building sacred community.

God commands: 

וְעָ֥שׂוּ לִ֖י מִקְדָּ֑שׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּ֖י בְּתוֹכָֽם: [iii]

Build me a sanctuary and I will dwell among them. But even before that, Six verses before God tells us what to build, God tells us the spirit in which we should build:

דַּבֵּר֙ אֶל־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל וְיִקְחוּ־לִ֖י תְּרוּמָ֑ה מֵאֵ֤ת כָּל־אִישׁ֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר יִדְּבֶ֣נּוּ לִבּ֔וֹ...׃ [iv]

“Tell the children of Israel to bring me gifts from every person whose heart is so moved.” The Hebrew word for “gifts” is Trumot, or Trumah in the sigular. Before we can even imagine building the mishkahn, God inspires us to bring our trumot – our gifts. The difference between the calf and the chapel lies in how we build them. When we want to build the chapel, we bring the fullness of our gifts.

When we think of trumot, we tend to think of material gifts, of gold and silver, gemstones, and acacia wood. But the text implies that equally important are the offerings of people’s hearts. God calls for the participation of: “everyone who is wise of heart, whose spirit I have filled with wisdom.” [v] And later, God commands: “Let all among you who are skilled come and make all that I have commanded.” [vi] The gifts that the Israelites use to build the mishkahn are not just their gold and precious gems. It is their sacred skills and the wisdom of the hearts. Only with these trumot can they build a dwelling place for God.

This is the difference between the calf and the chapel. When the Israelites start to build an idol, they bring their gold. But when they start by thinking of the gifts each of them can offer, what they build is a sanctuary. 

And this is not just a story about an ancient construction project. Rashi, the 11th Century commentator, says that every generation has to build a mishkahn. [vii] In preparation for this sermon, I asked, but the board insisted that there is no line item in the budget for acacia wood. So we have to find another way to answer Rashi’s call: how will our community fulfill the commandment to build a dwelling place for God?

The answer is the trumot. Every person has a gift, a sacred talent to share.

Like Moses, Jewish leaders must ask people to bring their gifts, knowing that each is sacred material in the construction of a dwelling place for God. Our community is a vessel overflowing with abundant talent.

In his book, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Steven Covey describes dichotomous worldviews: a scarcity mentality and an abundance mentality. A person or organization with a scarcity mentality looks at the world and says, “I don’t have enough. How can I get more?” An abundance mentality says, “I have everything I need. How blessed am I?” Both mindsets look at the same data, but draw different conclusions. Covey challenges us to move from a mentality that sees only scarcity to one that appreciates abundance.

The golden calf is the kind of building project that comes out of scarcity – built out of the fear that Moses had left. Aaron tells the frightened people to drop off their gold and he builds the calf for them. They pay their dues and say, “Do this for us.” What Aaron builds is an empty vessel, instead of an invitation to holiness. The move from the calf to the chapel is a transition from a mindset of scarcity to a mindset of abundance. It’s the abundance that comes when we ask for people’s gifts, not simply their gold.

It is easy fall into the trap of scarcity, and see only what we do not have. But Jewish tradition reminds us that there is another, more abundant way of seeing the same circumstances. There is a midrash that even Moses up on the mountain had a moment of scarcity thinking. When God tells him about all the gifts that the Israelites are going to bring, Moses asks how these former slaves who escaped with only what they could carry, could possibly have all the precious items needed to complete the project. But before he can even finish the question, God interrupts and says, “Not only do the children of Israel collectively possess the necessary materials to build the mishkahn, but in fact, every Jew could do so singlehandedly.”[viii] If the Israelites only bring their gold, they can only build a single calf. But if they are willing to bring their gifts, their sacred wisdoms, then there’s no limit to what they can build.

Trumot can transform our community by enabling us to peer past perceived scarcity and see an abundance of talent dwelling here.

I learned to look for abundance, not from Covey, or the Torah, but from my mother. She was a non-profit consultant who specialized in volunteerism. But more importantly, my mother was a guru of gifts. If she were here, she would look out on this sanctuary and see an ocean of trumot. She believed that each of us has unique gifts to share, and that organizations need to be better at helping us share them. This was more than her vocation, it was her conviction. When she looked at people, she saw wellsprings of talent. When she met someone, on a plane or in line at the grocery store, it took barely a second before she got them talking about their passions. This was her gift: she was a diviner of talent. When I read the Torah’s description of the building of the mishkahn, it is her voice I hear whispering, “Imagine if each of us could develop skills to find and bring out the gifts in one another.”

My question for you is this: what gift could you can share with this sacred community? Maybe it’s a professional skill. Perhaps you are a marketing expert, or a teacher, or a finance person. Or maybe it’s a passion. Perhaps you love to write, or weave, or paint. Maybe your gift is that you have a big idea or time to spare on a day we need it. Maybe you are great with kids. Maybe you are great at baking. Whatever it is, that’s your trumah. It’s not just a donation, it’s not just a volunteer hour – it’s a gift you give in the construction of this sacred dwelling place for God. For the many, many of you who share your gifts here, we are grateful. Your gifts of time and talent not only make this place run, they make this place a sacred community.

And maybe others of you don’t even know what your gift is yet. And then it’s our job, as a community, to help you figure that out. Two weeks ago, I was sitting in my office before Kadimah, our Monday-night educational program, when a 10th grader named Julia walked in and asked me if I had minute. She said she didn’t understand why more of her classmates didn’t bring tzedakah to class, and she wanted me to make an announcement that everyone should bring more. As far as “things rabbis like to hear” go, this is pretty much as good as it gets. When I recovered from the realization that I’d peaked so early in my career, I realized I had a choice. There were two ways I could respond to Julia’s wonderful request. I could thank her for her passion and assure her that I’d say something to the students about bringing tzedakah. But that’s the calf model – a scarcity response – thanks for your gold. The second option was to see that something sacred was being offered. A trumah. She was offering a gift she didn’t even know she had. “You have a gift,” I told her. She looked at me skeptically, but I continued. “Not everyone has this passion, this commitment to tzedakah.” Then we talked about why she cared so much, and about all the strategies we could use to help other people learn to care, too. I told her I could not do it for her, that it would not have as much impact coming from me. But if she were willing to share that gift, I bet we could make a real difference. I suggested she come back the next week and to bring two friends who would offer their own, different gifts. I wasn’t sure she’d do it. I feared my rabbinic excitement had gotten away from me. But the very next week, three passionate teens showed up in my office. And now we are well on our way to building something truly sacred, something impactful. Not a calf, but a chapel.

We at Beth Haverim Shir Shalom want to know what your gifts are. And if you don’t know yet, we want to help you find out. In this year of building and rebuilding, we want to create new avenues for you to offer your gifts. We grateful to all those who already share their gifts, and we want to find new ways to sanctify your offerings. And, if you have not had a chance to share your gifts here before, or if you have not done so in a while, and you are willing to take a step, we want to take a step to meet you in return. We’ve put together a group of board members and committee chairs who want to meet you for coffee and learn about your life. We are not asking for a commitment. We are not even asking for you to know what your gift is yet. We are asking a cup of coffee and a conversation to get to know you better. As you leave tonight, the ushers will have blue cards. Fill out your name and phone number and return it to me, so that we can set up a one-on-one conversation to get to know you and your gifts in a new way. These blue post-cards are a request for your partnership in the work of building sacred community.

Now, since we are asking, we are going to do our best put your gifts to use. That’s on us. Some of us have been hurt before when we have offered gifts to organizations which were not ready to receive them. I won’t promise we will use every offered gift right away, and I won’t be so hubristic to say that we will be instantly good at this. But if you meet with one of us, we are going to do our best to find places where your gifts can be used in ways that are meaningful to you and the congregation. We know how difficult it can be when a congregation does not live up to this promise. As we navigate these years of transition in this congregation, we want to learn to be better stewards of each other’s gifts.

But you are busy people. And perhaps you already volunteer somewhere else. So what makes sharing your gifts here different? According to the Torah, when we build with our gifts, it’s not just our communities that we make into a sanctuary; it’s our own lives. The verse I read earlier hints at this sacred transformation:

וְעָ֥שׂוּ לִ֖י מִקְדָּ֑שׁ,

וְשָׁכַנְתִּ֖י בְּתוֹכָֽם

“Build me a sanctuary that I may dwell in them.” [ix]

That last word is not what you would expect. You’d think it should say “v’shachanti b’tocho” –so that I can dwell in it  in the sanctuary. But it says B’tocham – So I can dwell in THEM. The Divine presence came to rest in the hearts of the Israelites, and “not in the wood and metal of the mishkahn.”[x]

If we bring our gifts, if we put them to sacred use, God will dwell in us. Offering your gifts is not just a way you serve your community – it is part of a spiritual life, a way we seek the One who gave us gifts in the first place.

I think there are a lot of you here who, like me, are searching for meaning. We are eager to find purpose and encounter the mystery that we call God. We feel scarcity and crave abundance. Know then, that God has placed in us something special. A gift that only we can offer. If we let it, it can be an expression of the divine within us – a higher purpose to which we can aspire. Think of Julia, who came in with a question, and found that she had gift – a spark of the divine that had been hiding in her all along.

Rashi says we have a sacred obligation: To help each other find our trumot. And to build sanctuaries where those gifts can be shared. Let us build. Let us build out of abundance. Let us build a mishkahn that can stand the test of time. Let us build with our gifts of artistry and wisdom, which are the pathways for God to be present in our lives. Let us build for our community, places for God to dwell in our sanctuary and social hall - and in our homes and hearts. This is not a means to an end, but the essence of the call. Let us build together. Because when we do, we will discover God dwelling among us.

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[i] Exodus 32:1

[ii] Exodus 40:34

[iii] Exodus 25:8

[iv] Exodus 25:2

[v] Exodus 28:3

[vi] Exodus 35:10

[vii] Rashi, commenting on the seemingly superfluous phrase in Exodus 25:9, "וְכֵ֖ן תַּעֲשֽׂו"comments: "This is an additional commandment, extending the obligation of building the Tabernacle to future generations.”

[viii] Shemot Rabbah, as quoted in The Midrash Says (Exodus), p. 239

[ix] Exodus 25:8

[x] Language from Meam Loez on Exodus 25:8

Turning Forgiveness Inside Out: Lessons from Sarah, Hagar, and Pixar (Rosh Hashanah Day 1 Sermon, 5776)

Flickr: Cornelius Zane-Grey

We haven’t known each other very long, but already I’d guess it’s not going to shock you to learn that I was a talkative kid. I know... surprising. My parents like to say that I learned to talk, but I never learned to shut up. My father came to spend the High Holidays with me. Go ask him. I’m sure he’ll gladly share plenty of embarrassing stories.    

Being a good talker when you are a kid is great. But sometimes it got me into trouble and annoyed the kids around me. For instance, there was one kid, with whom I carpooled, and I think I drove him… batty. So one night in middle school, he and a friend snuck out and TP’ed our house. It’s a pretty normal middle school prank, except that they got carried away. TP’ed is an understatement. There were also eggs thrown. And some not terribly clever things written on the sidewalk… in mustard. So parents got involved, and the community police officer, and there were consequences. I remember my family was deeply hurt that someone we saw every day would act out at us so aggressively.

As part of his punishment, the kid had to write us a letter of apology. I have a memory of him reading it to us. I don’t know if he meant it, or if it was just one of those annoying apology letters you're forced to write when you mess up as a kid. I imagine I probably said, “I forgive you.” I know I didn’t mean it. For years afterwards, when I’d see him in the halls at school or had a class with him, I’d be anxious. It took a long time to let go of the hurt of that silly middle school prank taken a step too far.

I talk a lot. But if there are three words that are difficult to say and really mean, they are “I forgive you.”

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The theme of the High Holy Days is t’shuvah. It’s repentance and return. Not just to God, but also to each other. Many people make a spiritual practice of taking these ten days to seek out the people they have hurt and ask them for forgiveness. But there is a second half of that equation, one which we often overlook. We may be approached by friends and family asking for our forgiveness. How can we make a spiritual practice of forgiving? It can be difficult to forgive. But how can we ask God to forgive us if we are not prepared to do so for others?

Jewish tradition has an impressive amount to say about forgiveness. There are whole treatises on the how to apologize and when to grant forgiveness.¹ As I examined these texts, however, I discovered one topic which consistently gets glossed over. We read about if and when to forgive, but very little about how to forgive and really mean it. How do we convince our hearts to forgive? What should we do when we can’t let go of a hurt, even though we know that hanging on is causing us further pain. There is a Buddhist idea that holding on to anger is like holding a hot coal, waiting to throw it at the person who hurt you, and after while discovering that you are burning your own hand.² What I want to look at this morning is method for dropping the coal.

Now I’m not talking about acts that are unforgivable, where one person is abusive or where the pattern of behavior has not changed. Jewish tradition certainly does not compel forgiveness in those situations. But what I want to talk about today what happens when we know, intellectually, that there is something we want to forgive, but the hurt is still swirling around inside of us, and we cannot expel it. If we are going to make this season a season of true forgiveness, then we are going to need tools to turn forgiveness from an aspiration into a reality.

And this is where I have some good news. This past summer, after years of work, researchers in California have released a new tool that is going to revolutionize forgiveness. A famous and powerful collaborative of scientists, engineers, and artists have come together to develop a new framework for understanding people’s emotional lives. I’m speaking, of course, about the Pixar movie: Inside Out.

If you have not seen it yet, I have two things to say to you. First, don’t worry; I’m going to try not to spoil it. And second. Go see it! It’s terrific. It’s funny. It’s about an awesome teenage girl who isn’t a princess. And it’s an enlightening take on what is happening inside each of our minds.

So for those of you who haven’t seen it yet, let me sum up the basics. I promise, no spoilers beyond what was in the previews:

The movie takes place inside the mind of an 11 year old girl named Riley. We learn that inside Riley’s mind is a command center called “Headquarters” (get it?) and that the command center is run by 5 characters, each one a different emotion – they are Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust. These five emotions work at a Control Panel that drives Riley through her days. They all work together to make her who she is. None are bad or good. They are just the elements of her, and through the movie, all the emotions are trying hard, each in their own way, to help Riley traverse the difficulties of life. Sometimes one of the emotions seizes the Control Panel, and chaos ensues, but when the emotions are working together, Riley is a well-adjusted kid. Pixar based this on real science, particularly on the work of Dr. Paul Ekman, who found that each of us has 6 main emotions. (for the film, Surprise got combined with Fear).

And this realization, that we all have these characters in our heads, this Inside Out Thinking, helps us to understand the emotions behind other people’s actions. Because here’s what I think makes forgiveness so hard: Steven Covey teaches that we tend to “judge ourselves by our intentions, and others by their behavior.”³ We know about ourselves that we are complicated people. We look at our own actions, and we see that complexity. I know I cut that guy off in traffic, but I was late picking the kids up at school because a work meeting ran long. And I remember feeling bad about it afterwards and hoping that the person I cut off knew that I was sorry. But when someone cuts me off in traffic… They are self-centered, inconsiderate jerks. Or worse. We rarely think about the intentions and motivations of those around us. It’s the actions we hold on to. It’s the actions that are hard to forgive.

Inside Out Thinking gives us a path towards forgiveness. Robert Enright and Joanna North, in their research on forgiveness, show that an important phase of forgiveness is separating the wrongdoer from the wrong-deeds he has done.⁴ But this is difficult to do. Pixar has given us a tool to try and peer into the other person’s brain, and see the intentions behind their deeds. What drove them to do what they did? Was it Fear? Sadness? Anger? I think it does not even matter if the story we create about their intentions is correct. Just the thought process that asks what’s going on in their brains opens up huge possibilities for empathy and forgiveness. The second we start thinking this way, we see the complex people behind the actions. People are easier to forgive than actions.

Let me give you an example of how Inside Out Thinking works: I have a hard time forgiving Sarah’s actions in this morning’s Torah portion. I feel profoundly challenged to try and make sense of the way Sarah behaves, in particular, the way she convinces Abraham to banish Hagar and Ishmael. The ancient commentators struggled with this text, too. Nachmanides calls Sarah’s treatment of Hagar “her sin.”⁵ Radak said she violates both her moral obligation and basic expectations of human kindnes⁶ But Inside Out Thinking can help me see the complexity behind the actions. Here’s what I imagine:

Sarah is sitting at the party for Isaac’s weaning. She is exhausted. Remember, she’s a 90 year old, with a baby. She looks across the tent, past all the people mingling, she spies a teenage Ishmael, playing with her baby Isaac.

At headquarters, inside Sarah, the 5 emotions are also looking out on this scene. Isaac is the symbol of Sarah’s Joy. When he was born, she named him יִצְחַק – laughter. She says “God has brought me laughter; everyone who hears will laugh with me.”⁷ These have been long and difficult years. Sarah had traveled with Abraham and supported him though all his trials, through all their hardships. And all the time she hoped that God would keep the promise, that there would be a next generation. Now God had answered her prayers at last!

But Sadness also sees Ishmael with Isaac. She sees that he is part of her family, and yet separate. Sadness remembers that day, 15 years ago, when Sarah lost hope. When she felt like God was not keeping the promise to give Abraham an heir, and she took matters into her own hands. She remembers how she told Abraham to go to her handmaiden, Hagar. Ishmael is the constant reminder of that decision. Sadness looks out at him, the symbol of her pain, of her feelings of inadequacy, of her faltering faith. Then Sadness looks over at Disgust. Is this a decision we can live with, they wonder. Can we bear this daily reminder?

Then Fear speaks up. It’s the fear that all parents feel when they look at their babies. It is the fear for the future. How can Sarah best provide for her son? How can she help him to find his place in the world? She knows that as the second-born son he gets almost no inheritance. Fear asks, “How can I make sure my son has a chance to thrive?”

That’s when Anger steps in. “Why should Ishmael inherit?” Anger asks. Anger remembers how Hagar had teased Sarah during her pregnancy, how her own slave had embarrassed her, and how she had tolerated it so that Abraham could have an heir.⁸ Now, she has a son of her own. “This is his time,” Anger says.

Sadness tries to speak up. Sadness knows how much Abraham loves Ishmael, how he would be heartbroken to send the boy and his mother away. But Sadness’s objections get drowned out by Anger and Fear.

Together, they make a decision. It’s not a decision Sarah will be proud of. But it’s her decision, and it comes out of these emotions: Joy at the birth of her son. Sadness and Disgust at her faltering faith. Fear for the boy’s future, and Anger at the perceived injustice done to her by Hagar and maybe even by God. These are the emotions that are driving when Sarah approaches Abraham and asks him to banish Hagar and Ishmael. Like us, Sarah is human. Like us, her emotions drive her. Like us, her emotions help her to makes choices, not always the best choices, but choices she must live with.

Flickr: Celestine Chua

Reading the story with Inside Out Thinking enables me to try and move from judging Sarah’s actions, which seem so harsh and so cruel, to trying to understand and forgive her for what is happening inside that might lead her to those actions. It does not make the actions any less problematic, but it helps me to remember that there is a human being behind those actions, someone who is trying, and maybe failing, but someone who is making hard choices. Inside Out Thinking is not about excuse making. I am not giving Sarah a pass on her actions by saying, “Anger made her do it.” Rather, I am trying to acknowledge her in her complexity and humanity. And seeing Sarah this way helps me to forgive her.

This is the season of repentance. Today we begin 10 days of introspection, of taking an accounting of actions, and seeking forgiveness for the times we missed the mark. We are challenged to identify the people we have hurt, and to attempt to make things right. But it is also a season of granting forgiveness. Not for every wrong. Some acts cannot be forgiven. Or maybe it’s not yet time to let go. But often, we want to forgive, but we don’t know how. We want to let go, but we cannot loosen our grip. These are the situations where Inside Out Thinking comes in handy. Looking at the possible emotions behind the actions of others helps us to make sense of them. We could look at Sarah in today’s story and see only the heartless action of casting out Hagar and Ishmael. Or we can try and imagine what is going on in Headquarters, to see that she is struggling with so many competing loyalties – loyalties to her son, to her husband, to her stepson, and to God. We might not be right. We are making an educated guess, at best. But attempting to understand her feelings opens us up to empathy.

What would it have meant to my middle school self if, when I said, “I forgive you” to the kid that egged my house, I had actually meant it? I would have been able to see him in the hallway, without getting tense. I would have been able to work with him in class groups without picturing my parents cleaning the mustard off the sidewalk. What would I have had to have changed so that I could have let go sooner? Maybe Inside Out Thinking would have helped. Maybe, after the initial hurt and betrayal had passed, I could have considered which of the many emotional voices in his head had driven his actions. Was it Anger? Or Disgust? Or Fear? Could this thinking help me to see him as a whole person, and not just see his actions? Could I have stopped talking long enough to try and listen to the voices in his head, and see how his unique arrangement of Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust made him who he was? Just like mine made me who I was? That likely would have made it easier to forgive. That likely would have made it easier to let go.

My hope for us, these High Holy Days, is that we engage in three kinds of spiritual work. First, that we spend time taking an account of where we have missed the mark this year, and, as a result, who we might have hurt. Second, that we spend some time apologizing to those we have hurt, and to God. But third, let us not forget to also be forgiving in this holy season. When people ask us, to the extent that we are able, let us try to forgive them. And, let us spend some time thinking about the people who have yet to ask for forgiveness. Who are the people who hurt us and who are now living rent free in our brains? Is it time for us to kick them out? If we can think of those people and do everything in our power to forgive and let go, I think this will be a powerful 10 days. On Yom Kippur, we are going to call upon God to forgive us, to see that we are complicated people who do not always live up to our intentions or others expectations. How can we use that model to forgive others? How can we mimic the behavior we want to see in God? On Yom Kippur Afternoon we are going to read the powerful charge of Leviticus 19. God says, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” From this we learn that we are to try and emulate God and God’s holy acts. As we call on God to be compassionate and forgiving with us, let us be compassionate and forgiving with others. And in this way, may we all help each other to be sealed for a blessing, in the book of life. Shanah tovah.

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1 In particular, I would point people at this Article by Rabbi Margaret Moers Wenig: Jewish Laws of Repentance. The Living Pulpit, April-June 1994, p. 20-21 and this fantastic lecture on Forgiveness, sponsored by Machon Hadar featuring Rabbis Joseph Telushkin and Shai Held: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNa5rB2IzZk^↩
2 Some attribute this idea to the Buddhaghosa, a 5th century Buddhist commentator:http://fakebuddhaquotes.com/holding-on-to-anger-is-like-grasping-a-hot-coal-with-the-intent-of-harming-another-you-end-up-getting-burned/^↩
3 The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing that Changes Everything by Stephen M. R. Covey, p 13^↩
4 As explained by Professor Lews Newman: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scW51DpWsHM^↩
5 Nachmanides on Gen 16:6^↩
6 Radak on Gen 16:6. Note that both the Nachmanides and Radak commentaries are on the earlier part of the Sarah and Hagar saga in Genesis 16, not Genesis 21, but I think the sin extends from one incident to the other. If Sarah “dealt harshly” enough with Hagar to make her leave in Genesis 16, the banishing her in Genesis 21 is even more harsh.^↩
7 Gen 21:6^↩
8 See Gen 16:4 Hagar’s “mistress was lowered in her esteem”^↩

High Holy Day Sermon's 5775

Photo Credit: wikipedia.org

Here are quick links to all of my High Holy Day sermons for 5775:

• Rosh Hashanah:
• From the Yeshivah Shel Malah: The View from the Heavenly Academy: Erev Rosh Hashnah
• Oh How the Mothers are Weeping: Rosh Hashanah Day 1 
• My Midrash on the Akedah: Rosh Hashanah Day 2 
• Yom Kippur:
• Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude: Kol Nidre
• Two Goats and Two Wolves: Yom Kippur Morning

Two Goats and Two Wolves: Yom Kippur Morning Sermon 5775

I was paying close attention to the Torah reading today, because Yom Kippur has high stakes, and I want to make sure we do it right. Luckily the Torah portion gives us detailed instructions for how to observe Yom Kippur, or at least how the very first Yom Kippurs were observed.

So I was paying close attention, and I read that to do this right, I’m going to need two goats. The Torah says I should change into a white linen tunic, with linen pants, and a linen sash and a linen turban, and you all will bring me two goats, two identical goats. And then we’ll place them up here on the bimah, and we’ll draw lots to see which will be for Adonai and which for Azazel. The Goat for Adonai, we will keep here, on the bimah (Howard, you’d hold it, right?), and the one for Azazel, we’ll place our hands on his head, and confess our sins, and then we will open the door and send him away, to wander down Westchester Drive, carrying our sins on his back.

If this tradition sounds weird to you, you’re not alone. It sounds weird to me, too, and it’s no wonder why we no longer do it. Even our ancient commentators thought it sounded weird. Animal sacrifice was a normative part of Judaism during the periods of the First and Second Temples. The Talmud deals regularly with the minutia of the sacrificial cult even though sacrifice was no longer practiced by the time that text was written. Yet even in the Talmud and other texts, the custom puzzles the commentators. Who or what is Azazel and why does he, she, or it, need a goat?

Azazel is only mentioned here in the Torah, so it’s hard to say what it means. The Mishnah thinks that perhaps Azazel is a place. Rambam says it is a high mountain. The Septuagint translates it as “escape,” implying that the goat is set to free. Modern biblical scholars argue that Azazel was likely the name of a demon or a demigod, and we see references to him in early post-biblical literature and midrashim. Perhaps Ibn Ezra, the 12^th century commentator sums it up best when he cryptically says, “the truth is a matter of mystery.”

To all these commentators, the practice of the two goats on Yom Kippur stands out as strange and worthy of note. But regardless, it’s a powerfully evocative ceremony. The priest stands dressed all in white linen, ready for the Yom Kippur offerings. Two goats are brought before him. It’s made very clear in the Talmud that these goats must be identical. It must be impossible to distinguish one from the other. The High Priest produces an urn containing two lots. On one, the words “For Adonai” are written. On the other “For Azazel.” The priest puts both hands in the urn and pulls out the lots, indicating which goat will be offered up to God and which will be sent to Azazel. He ties a piece of crimson wool around the horn of Azazel’s goat and another around the neck of the one Adonai. The goat for Adonai becomes part of the sacrifice that the priest performs at the altar. He offers it up to God, the same as any other sacrifice. But after that, he returns to the other goat, he places his hands on its head, and confesses all of Israel’s sins. Then the animal is taken away without a blessing or any further ritual. It is sent off into the wilderness, escorted by another priest. What happens next is unclear. In some versions the goat is just sent out to wander in the wilderness. In other versions, it is taken to the top of a craggy mountain, and either the priest lets it fall or pushes it off. In any event, the goat is never seen or heard from again.

The ceremony is puzzling but haunting. There is grandeur and magic in it. It is dripping with symbolism, which is, I think, what makes me envious of it this morning. It seems like today we could use a striking ceremony like this to add meaning to our observance. But since we probably can’t get anyone to lend us their goats, let see if we can imagine what the function of the ceremony might be.

Today is the day of extremes. Life and death, good and evil. Everything hangs in the balance. And we feel this tension inside of us. If we were perfect, if we were people who never sinned, then we would not need a Yom Kippur. But nobody is perfect. Everyone misses the mark. And everyone arrives at this day and takes stock. We acknowledge what we have done wrong and strive to be better. We know that there is good in us, and that there is evil too, and we strive to aim for the good, to overpower our baser urges. A Native American elder described his inner struggle, saying, “Inside me there are two powerful wolves. One wolf is kind and good. The other is mean and evil. They fight each other in my heart all the time.” When asked which wolf wins, he responded, “The one that wins is the one that I feed.” This year, we pray that we will feed the kinder wolf.

There is a Jewish term for this. The Rabbis believed that within each of us live two inclinations, a yetzer harah – an inclination towards evil – and a yetzer hatov – an inclination towards good. Like the wolves, they battle inside of us and we choose which to listen too. We are like the classic cartoon of Donald Duck with an angel and a devil on our shoulders. And it’s an apt image, because in the cartoon, the angel is a tiny Donald, and the devil is a tiny Donald. Both are expressions of him, and he must choose which side of himself to listen to. He is both his yetzer harah and his yetzer hatov.

The two goats are like our yetzer harah and our yetzer hatov. First, they are identical. It’s impossible to tell them apart. And there are actions that we do where we cannot tell which inclination is driving us. What in one instance might be a mitzvah, might in another be a sin. Take for example gossip. Lashon Harah, or the evil tongue, is strictly forbidden in the Torah and rabbinic literature. The rabbis are clear: saying something about someone else – true or untrue – is a sin. Yet there are times when it is required. For instance, if someone is entering into a business relationship with someone you know to be untrustworthy, you are supposed to warn the person. And honest testimony in a court of law is a mitzvah. The same act can be a sin or a commandment. Let’s imagine I said, “He’s a crook.” If I say it to a friend, it’s Lashon Harah. If I say it to a potential client, it’s a warning. If I say it to a judge, it’s a mitzvah. The exact same words. The two inclinations inside of us are identical, just like the two goats, and we have to listen very carefully to know who is speaking. We have to carefully consider our intentions. Is what I’m saying for my benefit, or the listener’s? Will it harm someone if I say it? A friend has three questions she tells her children to think about before they speak: “Is it true? Is it necessary? Is it kind?” The two goats remind us that all of our actions are suspect on this day. All must be considered. Maybe there were sins we disguised as mitzvot. Maybe there were difficult decisions we had to make for which we are beating ourselves up but which we made for the right reasons. Just as we cannot tell at the start of the ceremony which goat is destined for God and which will be sent to Azazel, we do not always know how our actions will turn out. Situations we entered into with the best of intentions turned rotten. In dark places, we were able to do some good. The two goats call us to examine our actions deeply, for we know they can look the same.

The Hebrew word Yetzer – intention --- comes from the some root as yatzor – to create, to form. The priest stands before the goats and in the moment before he reaches his hands into the urn, either goat could take on either role. There is an infinite amount of creative potential in the moment. It’s like Schrödinger's famous thought experiment about the cat in the box: The moment before you open the box, the cat can be simultaneously alive or dead. What enormous potential. Every day, every decision, every moment, we get to choose. And before each choice, there is infinite creative potential. Will I choose to listen to my yetezer harah or my yetzer hatov, my kind wolf or my angry wolf? Judaism says that in every decision there is a reset, a chance to do good. Maybe yesterday we leaned a little too heavily on the yetzer harah. Today there is just as good a chance we could choose good. In every decision, we are Yatzor, re-created anew. Perhaps last year, the goat on the left went to Azazel. But this has no bearing on this year. Every year, we choose a new.

Rabbi Eli Schocet tells a story of his childhood. He grew up in Chicago, where his father and his grandfather were both rabbis. One Shabbat afternoon when he was a young boy at his grandfather's home, a big Cadillac pulled up. Three burly guards stepped out with a well-known Jewish gangster. The man walked in and laid an envelope on the rabbi's table filled with cash. "This is for my mother's yahrzeit.” Then he left.

It is a special mitzvah to give charity on a Yahrzeit in memory of the loved one. But Eli was angry at his grandfather. "How can you accept money from that man? And on the Sabbath of all times?"

His grandfather softly answered, "Don't you understand what happened? This man is a criminal who lives an ugly life. But for one brief moment he looked on a calendar and saw that it was his mother’s yahrzeit. He remembered his mother’s dreams for him, that he grow up to be a Jew, that he grow up to be a mentsch. For one brief moment, he wants her memory to live within. That was a sacred moment, and I did not want to take away from it."

The two goats stand there, reminding us of our immense creative potential, the yatzor in each of us. Perhaps last year we were not the people we wished to be. Today, as every day, God reminds us that we stand like the two pure goats, waiting to choose to be for Adonai.

                                                       

And then the lots are cast, the decision is made. One goat goes for Adonai, and the other for Azazel. And so it is with sin and mitzvah. When we listen to the yetzer harah, we are like the goat sent to Azazel. We wander in the wilderness alone and afraid. We are on a high mountain, and the rocks below are jagged and menacing. Maimonides says that the function of the goat for Azazel was symbolic, meant to “impress the mind of the sinner that sins must lead him to the wasteland.” In ancient times, on Yom Kippur, the whole Jewish world faced toward the Temple but their sins were sent away, out the back door, to wander through the treacherous wilderness alone. What a powerful, visual reminder that yetzer hatov draw us into Jewish life while our yetzer harah separates us from the community and puts us in moral, and sometimes mortal, danger. Perhaps this is the meaning of the Unataneh Tokef prayer, when we say that today is the day we decide who shall live and who shall die. Who shall be like the goat who lives for God and who shall live for Azazel, and walk the treacherous path alone for the rest of their days?

When we choose to listen to our yetzer hatov, we are like the goat for Adonai. We are drawn closer to God. Why would we want to leave? What can we do to stay this close to God? Pirke Avot says, “Mitzvah Goreret Mitzvah – One good deed leads to another.” When we feel the radiance of listening to our yetzer hatov, it makes us want to listen more, to feed that wolf more. We come to synagogue on this Yom Kippur, ready to feel that closeness. We are ready to be forgiven of the mistakes we made in the last year, the times we missed the mark, so we can be like the goat for Adonai, drawn close to God. This is the function of Yom Kippur, to let God wipe the slate clean, so we can draw back to God. The word for sin is “chet.” It literally means “to miss the mark.” When we sin, it pulls us away from God, and T’shuvah – repentance – is our opportunity to return. The high priest would only enter the Holy of Hollies, the innermost part of the Temple on one day a year – Yom Kippur. On this day, when he and Israel were forgiven for their sins, he would enter into God’s inner sanctum. At no time in the whole year is humanity closer to God than on the day of repentance. When we repent and are forgiven, we feel closer to God, and that nearness urges us to do better, to try harder, to feed to the good wolf more.

The goat that is sent to Azazel is called the scapegoat. He carries the sins of the people. This is actually the root of the term, but I think we misuse it today. Today, to scapegoat someone is to blame them for your problems, to offload responsibility on to them. It’s a negative. Anyone who has ever had someone at work who gets blamed for the team’s mistakes knows that this is not a position of respect. But in the Torah, there is honor in the ceremony. The community comes together to recognize the goat as a sacred vessel for their misdeeds. This is not an excuse or an easy-out. It is a necessary ritual, commanded by God, to relieve the Jewish community of the burden of their sins. And why would we need such a vessel? God knows we have a habit of holding on to things, of carrying them with us longer than we should. The scapegoat ritual allows us to let go. We watch our sins walk off into the sunset. We see them leave. We look at the goat, acknowledge what we need to let go of, and then we let it go. This is why I wish I had two goats here today. Yom Kippur needs a ritual like this. Rosh Hashanah has tashlich, but Yom Kippur does not. There is no visual symbol, no physical reminder that we need to let go. So our prayers will have to do. Our job over the next 8-or-so hours is to figure out what we need to let go of and figure out what how we are going to let go. The machzor reminds us that God remembers what we forget, and God also forgets what we remember. God has already let go. The slate is wiped clean. Our job today is to make sure we also let go, so that tonight, we can step forward into the new year, refreshed and rejuvenated, knowing that when we break the fast, we will resolve to start feeding the good wolf.

G’mar Chatimah Tovah – May we be sealed for a blessing in the book of life!

Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude: Kol Nidre Sermon 5775

One of my responsibilities as the educator at camp this past summer was to teach the youngest campers about prayer. We would begin by learning about blessings. I would teach them the traditional Jewish blessings for seeing the wonders of nature, figuring there’s no place in the world where they would have more opportunities to say these blessings than at summer camp.

There are two blessings for seeing a miracle in nature. The first is what you say when you see a big miracle, like mountains, seas, or even lightening. It goes:

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעולָם, עוֹשֶֹה מַעֲשֵֹה בְרֵאשִׁית.

We praise You, Eternal God, Sovereign of the universe, who makes the works of creation.

The second blessing is what you say when you see smaller miracles like beautiful trees and animals. It goes:

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעולָם, שֶׁכָּכָה לּוֹ בְּעוֹלָמוֹ.

We praise You, Eternal God, Sovereign of the universe, that such as these are in Your world.

This led me to a little game I played all summer. When I would see something beautiful in nature, I would ask myself, is this miracle big or small? Which blessing should I say here? Is that sunset a big miracle? Is the way the rain makes patterns in the reservoir a small miracle? What about this stunning vista or that gnarled, ancient tree? Even just asking the question tuned me in to the many miracles surrounding me. It didn’t matter which blessing I chose, because I had labeled what I was seeing as a miracle. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel writes: “Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement… [to] get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible. To be spiritual is to be amazed.” For me, these blessings were away to achieve “radical amazement.” They gave me a language to identify moments that seemed miraculous. Blessings are a way of expressing gratitude, and having the language helped me to find moments to be grateful.

Thinking Gratitude

I’ve had gratitude on my mind lately. It started with my blessings game, but it picked up in earnest when a classmate taught me a new prayer practice. During t’fillah at school each day, she pauses during the hodaah prayer and will not let herself sit down until she has listed 5 things for which she is grateful. I thought, I could do that. Here are some of the things for which I have expressed thanks in the past few weeks:

·       It is Thursday and the week is over

·       Being home for dinner every night this week

·       A group of peers to support me

·       Annie’s delicious Chicken Piccata

·       A terrific student pulpit

·       My favorite Korean restaurant re-opened

·       The fall TV line-up is back

·       A lunch without a meeting where I can just sit

·       A restful and productive weekend.

·       Comfortable shoes.

My gratitude ranges from the mundane to the profound. There are themes that continue to reappear. Mostly, food comes up a lot. And Annie. And my friends. It’s only been a few weeks but already I can feel a difference in my life. This 30 seconds of gratitude is one of the more spiritual parts of the prayer service for me. It is a moment to say thanks. What I am thinking about on this Kol Nidre evening is how I can spend the upcoming year continuing to cultivate an attitude of gratitude.

The science

The scientific literature on gratitude is unanimous – people who feel gratitude are happier, healthier, and more resilient. One study asked participants to keep a journal. A third of the participants wrote a list of five things for which they were grateful, a third listed hassles or frustrations, and a third wrote down something neutral. Those who kept the gratitude journals reported exercising more regularly, feeling better physically, and being more optimistic about the future than people in the other two groups.[1]

Gratitude also has an effect on personal goal attainment. Studies found that participants who kept gratitude journals were more likely to have made progress toward important personal goals, be they academic, interpersonal, or health-based.[2]

Expressing gratitude can also have a profound impact on children and adolescents. One study found a correlation between feelings of gratitude and avoidance of risky behaviors like using drugs.[3] Studies have also found an impact on test scores and performance in school.

In Judaism

But none of this is news for Jews. The Jews are a thankful people. In fact, the name Jew comes from the son of Jacob and Leah, Judah. When Leah had her fourth son, she was grateful and said, הַפַּעַם אוֹדֶה אֶת־יְהוָה (Gen 29:35 WTT), “This Time I will thank God,” and thus she named him Judah. From Ohdeh – I will thank. And so, from that moment on, the people of Judah, the Jews, became a people of gratitude. A people who knew how to say thanks.

And we have a very special tool for marking our gratitude: blessings. Rabbi Dov Heller, calls blessings the “technology for helping us develop gratitude.”[4] They encourage each of us to develop an “attitude of gratitude.” An attitude, which scientists confirm will make us happier, healthier people.

Gratitude is not something we only acknowledge a few times a year. Rather, according to the rabbis as well as scientists, it is a daily practice of self-improvement. The Talmud instructs us to say 100 blessings each day. If we are awake 16 hours of the day, that means we are saying a blessing about once every ten minutes. Can you imagine finding something to be grateful for every 10 minutes, something deserving of a blessing? Hard to imagine doing this for one day, let alone the rest of your life, but the attitude of gratitude developed by living in such a constant state of blessing would give you a new appreciation for the many miracles that surround you.

A story is told of a boy who had just eaten a delicious sandwich for lunch and said to his mother, "Thank you very much." But his mother said, "You should not thank me alone, for I only prepared the food." The boy wondered, "Whom should I thank?" He thought to himself, “The bread comes from the baker. I will thank him.” So the boy went to the bakery and said, "Mr. Baker, thank you for the wonderful bread that you bake.” The baker laughed and said, "I bake the bread, but it is good because it is made from fine flour, which comes from the miller who grinds it."

"Then I will thank the miller," said the boy, and he turned to leave.

"But the miller only grinds the wheat," the baker said. "It is the farmer who grows the grain."

So the boy went off in search of the farmer. He walked to the edge of the village, where he saw the farmer at work in the fields. "Thank you for the bread I eat every day."

But the farmer said, "Do not thank me alone. I only plant the seed, tend the field, and harvest the grain. It is sunshine and good rain and rich earth that make it grow."

"But who is left to thank?" asked the boy, and he was confused, tired, and hungry again, for he had walked a long way. The farmer said, "Come inside and have dinner with my family, and you will feel better."

So the boy went into the farmhouse and sat down to eat with the farmer's family. Each person took a piece of bread and then, all together, they said, "We thank You, O Eternal, our God, Ruler of the universe: You cause bread to spring forth from the earth."

Suddenly, the boy realized that it was God whom he had forgotten to thank. [5]

Bread does not just spring forth from the earth. So many hands go into making it. God’s hands and human hands. The process of saying blessings for the miracles in our lives helps to trace them to their sources, both immediate and distant. Our blessings reveal to us the many hidden hands that form the miracles of our lives.

Gratitude combats Insufficiency

Acknowledging miracles gives us a sense of contentment, and combats the insufficiency we all sometimes feel – the sense that we don’t have enough or that we are not enough. Pirke Avot says, “Who is rich? Those who rejoice in their own lot.”[6] There are two mindsets in the world: scarcity and abundance. Scarcity says “I do not have enough.” People who live with scarcity feel like there is an insatiable hole in their lives, and nothing they do will ever fully fill it. People who live with abundance look around and say “Look how blessed I am.” Whatever they have feels like enough. This is the message of Dayeinu on Passover – any one of the miracles listed would have been enough. How lucky are we to have experienced not one, but all of them. Each is part of a larger path to redemption, but when we separate them out, we can see them as a multitude of miracles, not just one. This is the value of a daily gratitude practice, breaking down the miracles of our daily lives into their component parts, until we can begin to move from a place of scarcity to a place of abundance. Bread is not just one miracle, it’s dozens of miracles baked into tiny loafs. How can anyone who thanks God for the miracle of bread not see the abundance in their life?

17 years ago my family was in a rough place. My grandfather had just been diagnosed with lung cancer. Neither of my parents was particularly happy at work. And I was in middle school (need I say more). The conversation at our dinner table each night had been reduced to a litany of complaints. My mother started to worry about the effect this was having on all of us. One day my Mom watched Oprah interview woman about how keeping a gratitude journal had helped her cope with cancer. “Some days,” she said, “all I can write is ‘I got up and got dressed today’ but those days even that can feel like a miracle.” This woman’s story touched my mother deeply and she saw it as a way to combat the scarcity we were all feeling. That night, at dinner, she announced that we would begin the meal by going around the table, each saying one thing that we were grateful for, something we have done at every meal since. I believe deeply that this practice of gratitude has transformed my family. I believe it has made us happier. I believe it has made us more resilient. In my mother’s own battle with cancer, this practice of gratitude has been one of the key powers that has kept her spirits up and her outlook positive, even on grim days. Cultivating an attitude of gratitude has helped my family weather seemly impossible storms.

Jewish Living is Grateful Living

The first words that a Jew utters upon waking are Modeh Ani l’fanecha – “I offer thanks before you.” From the very first moments of our day, we are grateful. Before we sit up, or put on our glasses, the lens through which we should see the world is one of gratitude.

And this mood carries us through our day. Nearly one third of our daily prayers are on the theme of gratitude. We experience gratitude at meal times – both before and after we eat. The Talmud says that someone who eats without blessing is like a thief. One must not take food without giving thought to how it came to be. In this way, every meal is an opportunity to cultivate an attitude of gratitude.

The Enemy of Gratitude is Habit

Yet despite the regularity of these blessing, we must not allow them to become rote, routine, and devoid of meaning. The enemy of gratitude is habit. It is easy to blindly say hamotzi without noticing the miracle that bread springs forth from the earth (with lots of help). The Medieval philosopher Bahya Ibn Paquda says that we are surrounded by such a “superabundance of divine favors” that it is easy to become accustomed to them and stop noticing them completely. We begin to see these divine favors as essential parts of our being, not miracles that exist outside of us. If I see the food I eat only as a necessity of my daily life, I fail to acknowledge it as miraculous gift that appears at my table. An attitude of gratitude reawakens us in to the superabundance of miracles that surround us. The blessings for nature, or the blessing over bread, or the blessing we say after we go to the bathroom are opportunities to remember that even in the ordinary, there is wonder. Blessings shake us from our complacency.

A Year of Living Gratefully

So what do we do with all this? How do we create a uniquely Jewish practice of gratitude? I propose on this Yom Kippur that we each resolve to make this a year of living gratefully. Just like in the scientific studies, we need ways to record our gratitude. To change our lives, gratitude has to be a daily practice. And from our Jewish tradition we know that ritual makes things permanent. The more we have a specific time or way to do something, the more likely it is to happen. Here are a few suggestions:

1. I invite your family to join mine in starting each meal with gratitude. It’s like an out-loud gratitude journal that you share with the people you love. Or try a keeping a journal. Or, I read about one woman who is keeping a “gratitude jar.” Each night she writes something she is grateful for on a slip of paper and puts it into the jar, and next year, at Rosh Hashanah, she will open it again, to relive all the gratitude she felt this year.
2. Set a number. Don’t just try to find one thing you are grateful for, find five. One may not be enough to tune us in to the superabundance of miracles. This is why my friend’s Amidah practice has been powerful for me, and I was fascinated to see the number five paralleled in the scientific literature. Our tradition encourages us to find 100 things to bless in a day. I bet we could each find five. I read about a woman who counts blessings instead of sheep. When she wakes up in the middle of the night and has trouble falling back asleep, she starts to think fondly about each of her children and then each of her grandchildren, one by one. She blesses them and sends them gratitude prayers. She says “I never make it through the whole list before I’m peacefully asleep again.”[7]
3. Be specific. As I said, habit is the enemy of gratitude. If we are to cultivate a sense of “radical amazement,” we are going to need more than just “thank you God for the food I ate today.” Maybe this is why there are so many different blessings in Judaism – a different blessing for apples and potatoes – so that in thinking about which blessing is required, we consider the miracle more closely. This was certainly the function of my “big miracle/small miracle” game. It was about more than just naming something as miraculous, it was about saying “What about this is miraculous?” As you keep your journal or jar, or share around the table, I encourage you to be specific. As one scientist put it:
1. While you might always be thankful for your great family, just writing “I’m grateful for my family” week after week doesn’t keep your brain on alert for fresh grateful moments. Get specific: “Today my husband gave me a shoulder rub when he knew I was really stressed." Opening your eyes to more of the world around you can deeply enhance your gratitude practice.
4. Relationships rely on gratitude. Scientists have found a high correlation between successful marriages and the amount that a couple expresses gratitude towards each other. Dr. John Gottman suggests that in successful relationships, positive expressions like smiles, compliments, laughter, and expressions of appreciation and gratitude outnumber negative expressions like complains and frowns by 5 to 1! Take an opportunity each day to tell your partner one thing you are grateful for that day, just to make sure you tip the scales in gratitude’s favor.
1. On that note, Annie, Thank you for being amazingly supportive these last 10 days. You are the biggest blessing in my life.

This Yom Kippur we ask God to seal us for a blessing in the book of life. If my research on gratitude has taught me anything, it’s that this work falls mainly on us. As my teacher, Sam Glaser puts it, “If you want more blessings, make more blessings.” Let this year be a year of blessing for all of us, but even more than that, may this year be a year when we notice the abundant blessings that surround us. Let it be a year when we take more time to say thank you to the people around us who are sources of blessing in our lives. Let it be a year when we notice miracles hidden in each day and thank God as their source. Let it be the year of abundance and not scarcity, of appreciation and not acquisition. So that, when we are here next Yom Kippur we will know that God sealed us for blessings in the book of life. Blessings which we noticed. Blessings for which we said thanks.

---

[1] http://gapsychology.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=309

[2] ibid

[3] http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014019711300105X>

[4] http://www.jewishjournal.com/religion/article/why_does_judaism_care_about_gratitude

[5] Rossel, When a Jew Prays

[6] Pirke Avot 4:1

[7] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joel-michelle-levey/understanding-gratitude_b_888208.html

My Midrash on the Akedah: Rosh Hashanah Day 2 Sermon, 5775

Intro:

Every Rosh Hashanah, I struggle with the Akedah, the story of the binding of Isaac. On first inspection, it seems to be about ideas that do not speak to my Jewish Identity: blind faith and ultimate sacrifice. Like Jacob wrestling with the angel, I must wrestle this text to the ground and hold it there until I can extract from it a blessing: some kind of meaning for the day.

The Akedah is a terse story with very little detail. So much is left unsaid. What was Abraham thinking? What was Isaac thinking? What was Sarah thinking? The spaces in the text are enormous. They are shadows that we must fill with light if we are to see our way through.

Midrash is the ancient tool for filling in these spaces. It’s an interpretive process for fleshing out the story, filling in the gaps between the words with the truths of our own lives.

One of my favorite examples of Midrash comes from Pirke Avot. The Rabbis believed firmly that all the disparate stories in the Torah were actually connected. So they imagine that in the twilight of the 6^th day of creation, in the hour before the first Shabbat, God made 10 mystical items that would serve the Jewish people later on. For instance, in that hour God created Moses’s staff, which he would use to split the sea, and Miriam’s well, which provided the Israelites with water in the desert. And, apropos for today, the ram, which would replace Isaac in the Akedah sacrifice. Thus, the Rabbis use the tool of midrash to weaved their own truth into the text.

Each year when I approach the Akedah, I write my own Midrash in my head to demystify the text. What I would like to do with you today, is share the story I’m telling myself this year. Some of it comes from traditional sources, and some comes from my own imagination. I will tell it as one coherent story, but I have placed an annotated version in the library, if you are interested to know the sources for these stories.   What I present from here is my own understanding of the Akedah – The binding of Isaac – that speaks to me on this Rosh Hashanah.

My Midrash:

Abraham sits alone outside his tent. His wife and son sleep inside but Abraham is restless. He thinks back over the last 25 years of his life, since first he was called by God. In the beginning, he had so much hope. The gods of the people around him were angry and vengeful, fickle and cold. They required constant devotion and sacrifice, sometimes even the sacrifice of children. [1] But God’s promise to Abraham was a different kind of relationship, a covenant, a ברית. Adonai would take Abraham and his descendants to be God’s people, and Adonai would be their God.[2] God would bless them and keep them.[3] This would not be a covenant of fear and trembling, but rather a covenant of אהבה רבה – of everlasting love on both sides.

But the last few years had seemed different. Abraham feels like he has been testing God, and God is barely passing. Abraham’s God had once again chosen to be a destroyer, leveling the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham had argued on their behalf. He had stood in front of the Divine and convinced God to choose mercy, to believe in the possibility of change. But when God could find nothing redeeming in those cities, God laid them to waste. Only Abraham’s nephew had escaped God’s wrath, but even his niece had died, when she turned to see her city one last time. Abraham still wept for her sudden end. Salty tears on his cheeks.

All his life, he had wanted a child, a son whom he could teach to love God as he did. And finally, when he had that son, a treasured child, God had allowed the boy to be exiled. The Eternal assured him that his younger son, Isaac, would carry on his name and his faith, and that Ishmael, too, would grow up to father his own nation. But still, Abraham was distressed.[4] Was this God’s reward for his faith?

After all these things, Abraham sits alone and thinks. What has become of the promise that God made to him? Was this the God who was forging a new path? Had Abraham smashed his father’s idols for this?

God watches Abraham curiously. He is God’s prophet, God's pride and joy. God had tried different types of relationships with humanity before, but they had all failed. Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden, Noah and the flood: examples of God’s inability to keep humanity from sin. So God tried a new approach. God set out to be a teacher, and not just a master, to lead the people towards a righteous life. And this began with Abraham, whose charisma was matched only by his kindness, who was gregarious and generous. Abraham embodied the spirit of the new way, the way of faith and hope that God desired. So God made a covenant with Abraham and the generations to follow him, to love them and care for them if they would love God in return.

And things had been going so well since then. Nine times, God gave Abraham tests. Not to prove anything to God, but to prove to Abraham, and to the rest of the families of the earth, that Abraham was a true prophet, and a man of faith. And Abraham had passed each of these tests with flying colors. When God told Abraham that God was going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, God was so proud to see Abraham argue back, to hear him say, “You told me that you were the God of Justice and Mercy, and if that is true, then have mercy here.” What a proud moment, to hear him stand and declare firmly what was right. And it had caused God great agony to find that there not even 10 righteous people in the cities. If only Abraham had argued for a lower number!

So now, it pains God to see Abraham acting so despondently, to see his faith and his hope wavering. A final test was needed, to prove once and for all that this lonely man of faith would start a people. God had always known that this test would come, and now it was time.

The Torah Says:

Chapter 22, Verse 1: Now after these events it was that God tested Abraham and said to him: “Abraham,” and he [Abraham] said, “Here I am.”[5]

Verse 2: [God] said, “Pray take your son, your only-one, whom you love, Isaac, and go forth to the land of Moriah. Bring him up there as an offering upon one of the mountains that I will show you.”

Abraham says nothing. Why doesn’t he argue for his son? What has become of the brilliant orator who defended Sodom and Gomorrah?[6]

This is it, Abraham thinks. My last test of God. I thought You were the God who would not demand such a thing. I thought you were the God who was more merciful than wrathful. I’ll do as you ask, this last time. Perhaps you have a plan, and my beloved son will survive. And if not, then your promise of a great nation will die with him. I will go to this place you send me, not as a test of my moral fiber, but of Yours.[7]

The Torah Says:

Verse 3: Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, he took his two serving-lads with him and Isaac his son… and set out towards the place that God had told him of.

They walk in silence. Abraham and his family were encamped in Hebron, and God sent them to Moriah, modern-day Jerusalem. It should only take about eight hours to walk there, but the Torah says it took three days.[8] Abraham is dragging his feet. He looks down at the sand, considering his situation carefully.

But as he walks, he makes a subtle choice. It happens gradually, over the course of those three days. He barely even notices it, but slowly, he decides to have faith. God will be what God had promised to be. His God would not be the kind of God to demand such a sacrifice. Abraham cannot imagine how it will work out, but slowly, surely, he becomes more certain that it will. Even in the face of unspeakable fear, the threat of unfathomable tragedy, Abraham has hope.

The Torah Says:

Verse 4: On the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place from afar.

On the third day, Abraham is feeling better, and moving faster. And for the first time, he lifts his eyes. In that moment, he sees before him the mountain, and at the top of the mountain, he sees the presence of the Eternal waiting for him.[9] When Abraham speaks to his servants, there is hope in his voice:

The Torah Says:

Verse 5: Abraham said to his servants, “You stay here, and I and the lad will go yonder. We will worship and we will return to you.”

He says, “We will return to you.” [10] I think Abraham is being honest. He really does believe that Isaac will return with him, that they will both survive this ordeal. Even in the face of all the evidence to the contrary, he believes that there is goodness and mercy to be found in God. Abraham and Isaac leave the group and ascend, together. They go up, to see what kind of God they will find there.

The Torah Says:

Verse 6: Abraham took the wood for the offering [and] the fire and the knife. And the two of them went together.

The two of them “went together.”[11] The time has come to talk. Abraham is nearing the end of his life. He wants to impart to his son his hopes and dreams for the future. He wants to pass on his relationship with God. But he does not know how to do it in a way that does not feel compulsory. How can he bestow his faith without Isaac feeling bound?

But it is Isaac who speaks first:

The Torah Says:

Verse 7: Isaac said to Abraham his father, “Father”, and he [Abraham] said, “Here I am, my son.” He said “Here is the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the offering?”

Verse 8: Abraham said, “God will see to the lamb for the offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.

Isaac is no fool. His father’s answer sounds evasive, and it leaves him troubled. Isaac starts to sense that he may be the lamb. To a younger generation, a parent’s faith can seem impossible, fanatical even. How can you worship a God who would ask such a thing of you?

But Abraham really means it. As he walked those three days, he decided to believe that an answer would come. And when he lifts up his eyes to the mountain and sees the presence of God, he knows that God will be his help and Isaac’s salvation.[12] Abraham says, “God will see to the lamb.”[13] He is growing more confident that God will see them and remember God’s promise to grant them life. As Isaac’s faith falters, Abraham’s resolve becomes strong.

The Torah Says:

Verse 9: They came to the place that God had told him of. There Abraham built the altar and arranged the wood and bound Isaac his son, and placed him on the altar on top of the wood.

Abraham finds there an Altar. It had fallen into disrepair. As Abraham rebuilds it, he thinks of the history of this place. Our tradition says it was the same altar on which Adam and Eve had made sacrifices when they were expelled from the Garden of Eden. It was the same altar on which Noah had made sacrifices after the flood.[14] This was a place where people worshipped a God who had taken from them everything. People had made sacrifices here after seeing God’s mighty and merciless hand. Now Abraham stands in front of the altar and wonders, will God again choose destruction, or will God choose faith in the future? Abraham’s resolve flickers. Will God keep faith in my family as I have kept faith in God? Or will God again make this a place where God demands ultimate sacrifices?

The Torah Says:

Verse 10: Abraham stretched out his hand, and he took the knife to slay his son.

Abraham moves slowly. He raises the knife. In each passing second, Abraham thinks he will hear God call out to him and say, “This has gone far enough,” but no voice comes. He looks down in to his beloved son’s eyes, tears streaming from his face and falling onto Isaac’s.[15] The whole world stands still. Life and death hang in the balance. He offers this prayer:

              מקור חיים וברכה – Oh Source of Life, and Blessing

              Master of all things.

              You, who sees all, and knows all,

          הִנֵּנִי – here I am.

              I am your faithful servant.

              I have given so much for you.

              I left my parent’s home and journeyed with you to a new land.

              I changed my name. I became a new person.

              I circumcised myself, and my sons.[16] 

              I offered them up. Not for a sacrifice, but for a covenant.

              A promise for our future.

But now, my beloved Ishmael is banished. My firstborn sent away.

              And Isaac, whom I love dearly, lays beneath the knife.

              I do not know what I have done to offend you,

That you would ask of me such a thing.

But I beg of you forgiveness, and that you will overturn your decree.

              I will do this awful thing, this unspeakable deed, if you ask.

              So I beg of you not to ask.

              Let the boy live!

              So that he can continue to build after I am gone.

              Let my children be a sign of my faith in you,

And a sign of your faith in me.

              Please, be the God of forgiveness.

              Be the God of life.

As Abraham offers his prayer, the angels in heaven also present themselves before God, weeping in a bitter voice. They say, “Master of the universe, You are called merciful and kindhearted. Have mercy. You promised Abraham that he would have many descendants through Isaac. What will be of the destined nation Israel? Who will accept Your commandments?”[17]

Abraham gazes into Isaac’s eyes. Isaac, however, looks upward and sees the angels as they beg God to invest in the future.[18] In that moment, as he sees the kingdom of heaven standing in his defense, Isaac’s faith grows. The seeds of faith that one generation plants for the next, blossom into new relationships with of God.

God responds to the angels: “When I created the world you begged me not to create human beings. You told me they would be sinners.[19] Would you have said this if you had you known then that there would be people like Abraham?

“I put Abraham through this ordeal to prove to the world, and to you, that man is more than just sin. Humans have free will, and look, they want to choose righteousness. Even in the face of certain death, they choose to hope for the future. And they demand of me the same, that I choose life, and allow them to turn from their evil ways.[20] From the very first moments of creation, I knew that people would choose life.[21] I have always known, and I will prove it to you!”

The Torah Says:

Verse 11: Then out of heaven, an Angel of the Eternal called to him, saying, “Abraham! Abraham!” He [Abraham] said, “Here I am.”

Verse 12: He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, or do anything to him! For now I know that you are in awe of God – You have not withheld your son, your only-one, from me.

At the last moment, the voice of an angel screams out of the heavens.[22] Abraham’s prayer is answered. God choses life. But in Abraham’s relief, there is also anger. “After all I have done, how could you have even asked for such a sacrifice? You are the God of promises. Now, I stand here, knife in hand and ask you for one final promise:

“There may come a time when Isaac’s descendants sin and are worthy of punishment. Promise me that at such times, you will recall this day. Remember that in this moment, we stayed our hands. You and I both. Just as you have released me from this sacrifice, promise that you will forgive them, on account of our faithfulness to each other today.” [23]

God says, “Let this day be known as Rosh Hashanah, the New Year. On this day I will judge everyone in the world, great and small alike. I will set a decree for each, depending on his or her deeds. If your descendants want me to seek out merit for them and recall the binding of Isaac, let them sound this shofar, and it will be benefit them greatly.”[24]

Abraham is confused. “What is this shofar?”

God answers him, “Turn around, and you will see it.”[25]

The Torah Says:

Verse 13: Abraham lifted his eyes and saw a ram caught behind the thicket by its horns! Abraham went, he took the ram and offered it up as an offering in place of his son.

Again, Abraham lifts his eyes, in hope and faith, and sees the ram caught in the thicket.

God continues, “There may come a time when your descendants are entangled in sin, just as the ram is entangled in the thicket. If they repent, I will forgive their sins on the merit of this moment, on the merit the Akedah.”[26]

God says, “I have known, since the very beginning that humanity would sin. But I have also known that humankind would return to me in repentance, and that I would forgive them. As the sun set on the 6^th day of creation, after I had created human beings, I created a symbol of this day, and of my eternal forgiveness. In that twilight, I created this ram.[27] I gave you this test Abraham because I always knew you would pass. That your faith, your hope, and your desire to return to me, would shine like a beacon, a sign to all the nations.”[28]

And Abraham takes the ram and sacrifices it on the altar in his son’s place.

The Torah Says:

Verse 14: Abraham called the place Adonai Sees. To this day, people say, “On the mountain of the Eternal, [God] will be seen.”

The place is called “Adonai will see” but also “Adonai will be seen.” This mountain is the place where God and humanity truly saw each other. Where each peered into the other’s soul, and saw reflected back, their own hopefulness, their own belief in the power to do better, not to destroy, but to create, to return and repent, and to forgive.

The Torah Says:

Verse 19: Abraham returned to his lads, they arose and went together to Beersheba, and Abraham stayed in Beersheba.

וַיָּשָׁב אַבְרָהָם – And Abraham returns. Yashav. From the same Hebrew root as T’shuvah – To return, to repent. After his crisis of faith. After he loses hope, and finds it again, Abraham returns, to walk again with God. That very first Rosh Hashanah ends with Abraham performing t’shuvah, repentance; returning to walk in his path with the Eternal.

The Akedah begins by saying that God tested Abraham. So what was Abraham’s test? Rabbi Bradley Artson suggests that “Abraham’s test was whether, in trying times, he would still insist on his Jewish identity, would still retain confidence that God’s promised covenant would survive. By refusing to abandon hope in the face of a bleak reality, Abraham remained true to the brit, to the covenant.”[29] In this last test, Abraham finally becomes the first Jew. A Jew chooses hope. A Jew chooses faith in the future. A Jew chooses life. Even in dark moments, a Jew believes in the power of T’shuvah, the power of our ability to return. A Jew believes in a God who believes in them. Not the God of blind faith, but the God of covenant. A God who wants us to stand up like Abraham did for Sodom and Gomorrah. And the God who will stand up for us when we cannot. The God who renews God’s faith in the covenant each year. The God who knows that however far we wander, the mighty sound of the shofar will bring us back.

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[1] Rabbi Joshua Heller in Rosh Hashanah Readings, edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p125

[2] Exodus 6:7

[3] Numbers 6:24

[4] Genesis 21:11

[5] Translation based on The Five Books of Moses, translated by Everett Fox and The Torah: A Modern Commentary, edited by Gunther Plaut

[6] Yalkhut Me’am Loez. P320

[7] Ed Levin in Rosh Hashanah Readings, edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins

[8] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p314

[9] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p325 (based on Pirkey Rabbi Eliezer)

[10] Yalkhut Me’am Loex, p314

[11] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p327 (based on Yafe Eynaim)

[12] Psalm 121

[13] Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson in Rosh Hashanah Readings, edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p141

[14] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p332 (based on Targum Yonatan)

[15] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p334 (based on Bereshith Rabbah)

[16] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p334 (based on Sanhedrin 89b, Bereshith Rabbah, and Targum Yonatan)

[17] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p334 (based on Pirkey Rebbi Eliezer and Yafe Toar p335)

[18] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p335 (based on Targum Yonatan)

[19] Bereishit Rabba 8

[20] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p335 (based on Tanchumah)

[21] Deuternonomy 30:19

[22] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p336 (based on Yafe Toar p335)

[23] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p339 (based on Tanchuma)

[24] ibid

[25] ibid

[26] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p340

[27] Yalkhut Me’am Loez, p340 (based on Yalchut Shimoni

[28] Concept of Maimonides as explained by Gunther Plaut in The Torah: A Modern Commentary, p142

[29] Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson in Rosh Hashanah Readings, edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p141

Oh How the Mothers are Weeping: Rosh Hashanah Day 1 Sermon, 5775

Shira spent her summer ordering pizzas. It was not what she planned for the summer, but this summer did not turn out how anyone expected. So she made the best of it. Shira’s children were supposed to go to summer camp, but camp was canceled. It was not safe to go outside, so they spent the summer with their mother, ordering pizzas. Shira, and her family live in southern Israel, not far from the Gaza Strip, and the threat of rocket fire kept them confined to their home for much of the summer. So they did a lot of ordering pizzas. But not for themselves. Or, at least, not only for themselves. Shira’s daughter volunteered for a project organized by their community where they would call women whose husbands and sons were on milluim – reserve service, and offer to have a pizza sent to their house for dinner. Judaism teaches us that when someone is having a hard time, friends and neighbors should bring them a meal, but if we can’t leave our house, then we order them a pizza. Shira and her daughters called women from all over the country, women who were losing, at the very least, sleep as the violence continued and their husband’s and son’s service stretched on. They sent dozens and dozens of pizzas. In an e-mail a few weeks ago, Shira told me that the remarkable thing was how the women responded. She wrote, “They were all so grateful, but they were also sure that there were other people more needy or deserving than they.” She was also awestruck at their determination and grit, and selflessness. Shira and her children didn’t take no for an answer. They sent pizzas.

Wassam lives in Canada, with her husband, and her three children. Wassam is a pharmacist and her husband is a pediatrician at a hospital in Ontario. This past spring, Wassam’s husband planned a trip to Gaza, where he grew up, to renew his medical license. He thought he would bring his youngest, his daughter, 8-year-old Salma, to meet her grandmother. They arrived in early June. When the hostilities broke out, the doctor volunteered in a hospital emergency room, helping children wounded in the airstrikes. Soon, he was working 24 hour shifts. Salma stayed with her grandmother.

Wassam sat at home in Ontario, watching the news and fearing the worst. Once the war started, travel out of the Gaza strip was next to impossible, even for foreign nationals. What’s more, Wassam’s husband felt like he could not miss even one shift at the hospital to transport Salma to the border. He was one of very few qualified pediatric emergency physicians in Gaza. There were children there who needed him. So Salma remained inside with her Grandmother, while Wassam, on the other side of the world, watched and prayed, and mobilized a network of supporters and government officials to help her get her daughter home.

When Israel and Hamas agreed to a short-term ceasefire for international aid workers to enter Gaza, Wassam’s network seized the opportunity. Canadian officials worked with the consulates in Tel Aviv, Ramallah, and Amman to extract her. Wassam’s husband drove her to a bus, where she joined other Canadians leaving Gaza. Then he returned to the hospital to continue to help the children there. Salma and the others were driven to Jordan, where they were safely put on a plane. On Friday, August 8, Salma was reunited with her mother, after more than a month away.

Two mothers. Shira and Wassam. A world apart. United by conflict, united by hope, united by care for others and fear for their children. Today, I think of them. But not just these two mothers. The mothers who Shira called, who prayed for their husbands and sons to be safe. The mothers of the children who lay injured in that Gaza hospital, while Wassam’s husband tried to heal them. Mothers praying, and mothers wailing, and mothers having, and losing, and finding hope again. Mothers calling out for their children.

The imagery of the Torah and Haftarah readings on Rosh Hashanah is all about mothers. Sarah and Hagar, Rachel, and Hannah. And not just about mothers in general, but about their pain and struggles, their prayers, hopes, and tears. So many mothers call out to us on this day.

Today we read from Genesis 21, the story of Sarah, and the birth of Isaac. When Sarah finally gave birth, she became jealous of her maidservant Hagar and the son that Hagar had borne to Abraham. She wanted her own son to have the birthright, the inheritance of God’s promise, so she asked Abraham to banish Hagar and Ishmael from their home.

Hagar and Ishmael were sent out into the wilderness. When their water and food ran out, and Hagar could not go on, she placed her son under some bushes and walked a bit further. She thought to herself “let me not look on as the child dies.” And the Torah says וַתִּשָּׂא אֶת־קֹלָהּ וַתֵּבְכְּ “And she raised her voice and wept” (Gen 21:16 WTT). Out in the wilderness, Hagar cries out for her son.

In our Haftarah, we read from the book of Samuel the story of Hannah. Hannah was married to a man named Elkanah. Elkanah had two wives, Hannah and Peninnah. Peninnah had several children, and Hannah had none. This distressed Hannah greatly, especially because Peninnah would tease her mercilessly. Yearly, Elkanan, his wives and children went to the alter at Shilo to make sacrifices and on this family outing, surrounded by Peninnah and her children, Hannah would become acutely aware of her situation. At the annual festive meal, the Haftarah saysוַתִּבְכֶּה וְלֹא תֹאכַל , she wept and did not eat (1Sa 1:7 WTT). Up in the shrine, Hannah cries out for a son.

For tomorrow’s Torah portion, we will read Genesis 22, the Akedah –the story of the binding of Isaac. God commands Abraham to take Isaac and offer him as a sacrifice on mount Moriah. The Torah tells us nothing about Sarah in this story, we have no idea how she felt. Did she know it was going to happen? Did she learn about it afterwards? Did she try and stop it?

Responding to Sarah’s silence, the rabbis wrote a number of midrashim, stories to fill in the gaps in the text. Many pick up on the fact is the next thing that we hear about Sarah, in the section that follows the Akedah, is that she has died. The Rabbis wonder if the news of what Abraham did, or almost did, caused her so much grief and agony that she actually let go of life. Alone in her tent, Sarah cries out for her son.

In tomorrow’s Haftarah, we will read from the book of Jeremiah, written at the beginning of the Babylonian Exile. In it, the prophet writes, “A cry is heard from Ramah – Wailing and bitter weeping” -- רָחֵל מְבַכָּה עַל־בָּנֶיהָ (Jer 31:15 WTT) “Rachel weeping for her children”. Our tradition imagines Rachel, buried near the road from Jerusalem generations before, could “see” as the Israelites went into exile, and she wept for them, praying to God to remember them. Even from beyond the grave, Rachel cries out for her children.

Two days, four readings, and four wailing mothers. Hagar, Sarah, Hannah, and Rachel. Three of the readings explicitly use the world לִבכּוֹת – to weep. The only outlier is the Akedah, where so much pain is implied that the rabbis created a whole library of midrashim. So many tears are shed in our text, on this great and awesome day. Too many mothers cry out for their sons.

It’s been a summer of too many tears. Too many mothers crying out for their sons. Like many Jews around the world, I spent my summer in a haze. When I turned on the news, I was inundated with images of war and destruction, pain and death. My Facebook feed was a constant barrage of posts about conflicts. But I did not see a lot of weeping mothers on the news. Not as many as you would think. I saw a lot of talking heads and pointing fingers. I saw a lot of analysis and punditry. Stories about people like Wassam and Shira were drowned about by the din of body counts and rocket tallies, by the noise of sirens and politicians.

And it was not just abroad. Here at home we had our own share of conflict. Watching the news from places like Ferguson, Missouri was painful, too, and there were so many moments that called on our conscience. I was struck by how quickly the conversation turned from one about a community grieving to a conversation about race in America, about police funding, about wealth and poverty and class. And somehow, in our quickness to put the events in Missouri into their broader context, I worry we lost sight of the pain and the needs of the people involved. Just like in our Torah cycle for today, there were wailing mothers in Missouri, mothers calling out for their children. Rosh Hashanah calls us to respond to them, and not just to the politics of the moment.

I'm not saying we don't need analysis. On the contrary. Clearly a conversation about context is crucial to creating the conditions for change. And perhaps it is also true that the wails of mothers can be overwhelming and hard to hear, and it is all too easy to block out the realities of their pain with the persistence of our rhetoric. Our instinct when we hear reports of suffering individuals on TV is to respond to their pain with analysis. How could this have happened? Who is right? Reports of the fighting in Gaza quickly turn into debates about Israel’s right to defend itself and about the morality of war. Conversations about Ferguson quickly evolved into conversations about race, and class, and privilege. But even as each of the mothers in our holiday readings was situated in a larger context, each one’s pain was real. Ironically, it’s easier to talk about the big picture than to listen to the stories of people in pain. Perhaps it is easier to see the context than to hold in our hearts the sometimes contradictory emotions that come with empathy. Empathy compels us to say, “Even if I don’t agree with you, I feel for you.” The annual reading of the stories of Sarah, Hagar, Hannah, and Rachel call us to check if our inclination to analyze makes us deaf to the wails of mothers.

In today’s Torah portion, God says to Hagar, even though I have chosen to side with Sarah and Isaac, this does not mean I will ignore you in this moment of need. God has chosen Isaac. By the God’s reckoning, Sarah is right to kick out Hagar and Ishmael so that Isaac can be guaranteed the birthright. And yet our tradition also focuses on Hagar’s pain. Even if Sarah is right, or justified, this does not mean that Hagar has to be wrong. In the story, God never speaks to Sarah, but God does speak to Hagar, saying, “Fear not, for I have heard the cry of the boy where he is. Come, lift him up… for I will make a great nation of him.” Hagar cries out for her son, and God answers her.

It always surprises me that the Torah and Haftarah we read on Rosh Hashanah are not about the big picture, about the rhetoric of the day. Today is the birthday of the world, we could read Genesis 1, the story of creation. Many Reform congregations do. But instead we spend these days reading deeply powerful stories of personal petition and divine intercession. We don’t read about the creation of the cosmos or the need for repentance, we read about the wailing of mothers.

Let’s look more closely at the story of Hannah for a minute. Hannah is wracked by pain. The pain of feeling incomplete, the pain of being teased by Peninnah. And so one night, she goes into the sanctuary at Shilo. The Torah says that with the bitterness of her soul she offered a prayer to God. She prays fervently, but silently. She rocks back and forth and weeps. She is alone in the building, though the Priest Eli sits just outside the door. Eli looks over at her and thinks that she is drunk. He approaches her and says, "How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Sober up!"

Eli cannot see Hannah. He sees her only in the context of the temple, for which he is responsible. It’s sacrilege to be drunk in this sacred space! He does not see her pain, he only sees how she appears in this context, as he perceives her to be defiling the house of God. He sits at the doorway of the shrine, literally he is outside, looking at the whole. He only sees Hannah as a small piece inside this larger puzzle. His concern for the integrity of this institution blinds him to the woman who sits before him in tears.

Hannah turns back to him and says "Oh no, my lord! I have drunk no wine… I have only been speaking all this time out of my great anguish and distress." Suddenly Eli sees her. She is not only a woman in his shine, she is a woman in pain. When he acknowledges her pain, she is no longer just an “other,” now he sees her as a mother, calling out for a son.

It’s not that Eli should not be concerned with his shrine. It is his job to sit at the gate. But until his concern for the bigger picture is balanced against empathy for the individual, he lacks the ability to hear Hannah’s story. We must all be like Eli, who balances a concern for the shrine with compassion for the people who sit within it.

Why do we read about so many wailing mothers on Rosh Hashanah? To remind us that these next ten days are not just about ideas like the birthday of the world, the nature of the universe, the power of repentance and forgiveness. Rather these stories of wailing mothers remind us that these ten days are about people. Sarah and Hagar, Hannah and Rebecca are crying out, begging us to remember them. And not just them, but the real people in our lives. Who are the people we have hurt this year? Who are the people who are crying out to us, who we do not hear? And when we see the people around us hurting, we must resist the urge to be right, and instead, we must be sensitive. Our job is not to justify our actions or react defensively, but instead to help them feel heard. Just like Sarah and Hagar and Hannah were heard. This is our call for the next ten days. To reach out to the people we might have hurt this year and begin to make peace. So when we stand here together at Yom Kippur, we can focus again on the big picture of our lives and our souls, having first heard the call to compassion for those around us.

The stories we read today are not just the stories of mothers who call out for their children, they are also the stories of mothers being answered by God. Sarah prays for a son and is answered. Hagar prays that she and her son be saved, and God hears them. Hannah calls out to God in pain, and God blesses her with a child. We are challenged to be like God, to hear the mournful call of the people around us and ask ourselves how we might answer them. Like Eli, we must first recognize that they are in pain. When we see a person’s agony on TV, we must resist the urge to change the channel or dial up the rhetoric. We must respond to them in their pain.

The Talmud says that the 100 blasts of the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah are related to the wails of the mother of Sisera, the Canaanite General, enemy of the Jews. According to the book of Judges, Sisera’s mother stood on her balcony and wailed at the news of the death of her son. The midrash says she cried out 101 times. Tradition says we blow the shofar to counteract any affect that her crying might have on the heavenly hosts, so that our T’shuvah might not be discredited on her account. Yet we don’t blow the shofar 101 times to cancel out every single tear. Instead we honor that fact that even the mother of our biggest enemy mourns for her son. When we hear the shofar today, let it be a call to hear the cries of pain that come from near and far. The sound of the shofar reminds us of the cries of mothers in pain, and calls us to hear their stories.

About a week after Michael Brown was shot to death in Ferguson, his mother Lesley and their family received a letter from a person who recognized her pain all too well, Sabrina Fulton, mother of Trayvon Martin. In this letter, Sabrina models for us balancing the need to have larger conversations with our obligation to acknowledge the individual. She speaks to Lesley as the leader of The Travon Martin Foundation, an organization whose mission is both to end violence that claims too many children in America, and also to provide support to the families effected by that violence. But she writes to Lesley primarily as a mother. A mother who recognizes her pain. She says:

Michael is much more than a police/gun violence case; Michael is your son. A son that barely had a chance to live. Our children are our future so whenever any of our children – black, white, brown, yellow, or red – are taken from us unnecessarily, it causes a never-ending pain that is unlike anything I could have imagined experiencing.

This Rosh Hashnah, let us be like these mothers. Let us balance the cosmic and the global against the human and the personal. Let us hear the blasts of shofar, not just as a call to action, but a call to listening. Let us be responsive to those around us and those on TV who cry out to us in pain, so that we can be better neighbors, better friends, and better citizens. Let us make this year a year of empathy and listening. A year when we take to heart the message of the Shema: Listen, Israel.

From the Yeshivah Shel Malah: The View from the Heavenly Academy: Erev Rosh Hashnah Sermon 5771

My Jewish Identity was formed two miles above sea level. Up where the air is thin, that’s where my identity took shape. Up in the clouds, I learned how Judaism works in the real world. My Jewish heart beats at 10,200 feet.

Let me explain. I owe my Jewish identity to so many things. When I was here a few weeks ago, I talked about the impact of weekly Shabbat dinners at my grandparents’ house in my hometown of Denver, Colorado. To this I would add a stimulating religious school experience, close relationships with a number of rabbis, and participation in youth group. I was also particularly influenced by my college experience at the University of Maryland, where I discovered a Jewish community that was larger and more diverse than anything I had encountered before. Hillel there was a lesson in Jewish pluralism and the myriad of ways that Jewish identity can be expressed. In particular, in my four years singing in a Jewish a cappella group, with people whose practiced ranged for Orthodox to secular, I learned the power of Jewish communities to create beautiful harmony together. Each of these environments played an important role in the formulation of my Jewish identity.

But one special place stands out as having had more of an impact on my Jewish identity than any other. One unique, magical place that made me the Jew I am today: Summer camp. Not just any summer camp, a Jewish camp, high in the mountains of Colorado, nearly two miles above sea level. A place called Shwayder Camp. There, in the woods, in rustic cabins and an aging dining hall, I first discovered a Judaism that spoke to me. If I were to point to one experience that led me on the path towards being a rabbi more than any other, it would be Shwayder camp.

I spent seven summers as a camper at Shwayder and two as a counselor. And this past summer, after exactly a decade away, now a “grown up,” I went back to summer camp, to serve as the senior educator. At 29, I was the second oldest person in camp. I got to be the veteran, coming home again after a long time doing battle in “the real world.” And it was an incredible blessing to be back. An opportunity to appreciate how much that place had meant and still means to me, and to try and build that experience for others. And I came to better understand how much my identity is informed by my time at Shwayder. The Jew I am today is a camp Jew, a Shwayder Jew, a mountain Jew. And I want to share this Judaism with you. We may not be able to pray at two miles above sea level, but I hope that my camp Judaism will rub off on you a little over the course of my time here in North Carolina. I’d like to bring some Rocky Mountain High to High Point. So tonight I thought I’d share with you the top seven things I learned when I went back to summer camp:

Number 7: What you say matters

When I got back to camp I had the terrifying realization that most of the rest of the staff were my campers 10 years ago. Nothing makes you feel old quite like seeing your former campers take your old job. A few days into camp, I was talking to a member of the senior staff who had been a camper of mine, and she told me that when she was a camper, she and I had had a conversation which had stuck with her all these years. She remembered exactly where it had happened. We had been walking on the path out to the ropes course, and I had told her that Jewish tradition says that if you ask someone for forgiveness three times and they do not forgive you, then you are considered forgiven and you don’t have to ask again. She said that she often thought about that conversation and the Jewish obligation to forgive others and to let go.

Now I have no recollection of this conversation. But it was meaningful to her, and hearing it relayed back to me stuck with me all summer. Not only is the message of what I taught her appropriate for this holiday season, but so too is the fact that she remembered it. Our words have a profound impact on others, even in moments that do not feel significant to us. Something you say to someone this week might be a thing they are still thinking about a decade from now. What an incredible power and responsibility. As we move through these days of repentance, as we make our apologies and rekindle old friendships, let us remember that our words have the power to hurt and to heal, and that they might be remembered, not just today, but in the weeks, years, and even decades that will follow.

Number 6: Prayer is more powerful in the woods.

We have a unique beit knesset, an outdoor sanctuary, at Shwayder. We sit on benches that are carved out of old trees, facing the forest, with a stone alter. The ark is carved from this hundred-year old tree. The creek that runs through camp passes just beyond the sanctuary, so when you close your eyes for Sh’ma, you can hear the gushing water. The roof of the sanctuary is just the blue sky, edged by the mountains that surround our valley. Each night, when I said the Ma’ariv Aravim in this sanctuary, and thanked God for the wonders of creation, it was easy to find meaning in the words. Prayer can be powerful and meaningful indoors, but there is something incredible about praising God while surrounded by the beauty of creation.

There is a Chasidic story about a girl who left the synagogue each morning during her daily prayers to go into the woods. One day her grandfather followed her and watched as his granddaughter prayed amid the trees.

“Why do you go outside to pray?” he asked.

“When I am in nature I feel closer to God,” the girl replied.

“Don’t you know that God is the same everywhere?”

“I know,” said the girl, “but I’m not.”

I know that God is everywhere, but I feel blessed to have places in my life where I am more attuned to God’s presence.

Number 5: The power of return: Or, why it’s not true that you can’t ever go back.

It was strange to go back to camp, to my old stomping grounds. But it was also wonderful. I got a unique chance to give back to a place that meant so much to me as a child. And in doing so, I got to examine who I am and how I came to be me.

The Hebrew word for repentance is T’shuvah, which literally means return. We are reminded that this time of year is an opportunity: not just to return to God, but also to return to ourselves. I have a teacher who each year during the עשרת ימי תשובה, the ten days of repentance, calls one person who has had an impact on his life and thanks them. Each year he picks someone new, and in doing so he gets to reflect on who has contributed to his development. In this way, the Ten Days become days not just of T’shuvah – repentance, but T’shuvah, return.

Today I scheduled a meeting to talk to my high school English teacher next week. She taught me more about writing in one year than anyone else, before or since. She was the hardest teacher I ever had, but only because she had high expectations of us. Expectations she knew we could live up to. And she also cared about us deeply. I remember that before the first weekend of the school year, she wrote her home phone number on the board and told us that if we ever got in trouble and didn’t want to call our parents, we should call her and she would come get us, no questions asked. I cannot wait to call Mrs. McInerney and tell her what a profound impact her teaching and her compassion had on me, both educationally and personally.

Who is a person who told you that you mattered? Have you ever thanked them? What about finding 10 minutes sometime in the next 10 days to track them down and say thank you. Maybe it was recently. Maybe it was long ago. But now’s the time to go back and say thank you. Think what it might mean to them to know what they mean to you.

Number 4: Shabbat comes alive

Shabbat at camp is intense. We sing and dance late into the night. Most of the songs are the same as when I was a camper, sung in the same order and with all the same hand motions. It’s like a giant, two hour choreographed dance number. One of the non-Jewish staff members told me it was like being in a real life Broadway musical. But Shabbat is not restricted to Friday night. The entire 25 hours feels different from the rest of the week. Our schedule changes, our meals are different, our services are more creative. Each week, we set aside a whole day to be different and full of joy.

Abraham Joshua Heschel described Shabbat as “a sanctuary in time.” Human beings feel compelled to mark time, to measure our lives in months and years, to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries. But we Jews also see the value in sanctifying time, in building sanctuaries in time where we and God can dwell, together. The thing I miss most about camp is this pervasive sense of Shabbat, not just as an evening for going to services or having a family meal, but a whole day set aside as a sanctuary to God. My new year’s resolution is to work hard in my own life to create a stronger sense of Shabbat this year, to do more to sanctify the time.

Number 3: Shutting off

When was the last time you spent more than a few hours in a place where there was no cell phone service and limited internet? The biggest blessing of Shwayder is that, because we are so high up and so secluded, we do not get reception. It’s a blessing in disguise. I found it as hard as anyone else to unplug. I had a few days of withdrawal. But its impact on the campers is profound. Other camps fight a constant battle with kids about when it’s appropriate to use their cell phones. But at Shwayder, the kids don’t even bother bringing them up to camp, because they know they will not work. And so, when the kids are outside playing, they are untethered (unless they are playing tetherball). When the staff are interacting with the campers, there are no screens to distract, no buzzes or jingles to call them away from the moment.

I am not on an anti-cell phone crusade. Far from it. I think that cell phones are a great tool for connection. They allow us to draw close to people who are far away. But sometimes, it comes as the expense of the relationships or the experiences around us, and this summer taught me to appreciate the experience of having places where you make it a rule to shut off. My challenge to myself, and to all of you is to think of one or two times and places where you choose to be untethered. A place where you decide to shut off, and disconnect, so that you can reconnect with the people and experiences you treasure most. Maybe it’s an hour every day, or at the dinner table, or even when you are in this building. What are the places and times when you choose to set aside the outside world so that you can be present for those around you?

Number 2: Dor L’dor

Shwayder camp taught me the power of the Jewish value of Dor L’dor, passing tradition from one generation to the next. When I was a camper at Shwayder I had a remarkable time. But I was also sometimes teased. I was a nerdy kid, and an easy target. One night, I had my fill of being taunted by one particularly difficult cabin mate, and I went out on the back porch to get away. One of my counselors, a guy named was Jason, was walking through camp, and he saw me. He came up and said, “Hey, you need to be in the cabin. It’s late.” But I said I couldn’t go inside. Not yet. He saw, in that moment, that I was in need, and he sat down on the steps with me. He told me I mattered, and he told me I was special, and he told me it would get better. And soon, I was able to go back in the cabin, knowing that there were people in the world besides my family who really got me and cared about me.

My first summer as a counselor, Jason was the Assistant Director. A few days into the summer I pulled him aside and told him what that moment meant to me. I told him that I hoped that I would be able to do for a camper what he did for me. “Don’t worry,” he said, “you’ll get your chance.”

One evening, a few weeks later, I was walking through camp when I saw a kid sitting on the steps of his cabin. I kid you not, it was the exact same cabin. I went over to him and he looked up at me with tears in his eyes. So I sat down next to him and told him that he mattered, and that he was special, and that it would get better. I told him all the things that Jason told me, until he was ready to go back inside. Afterwards, I ran to find Jason and tell him that I had just had my porch moment.

Being back this summer and being on senior staff like Jason, I had a lot of time to reflect on this moment, and how I might help counselors to have their own “porch moments.” It made me appreciate the great chain of tradition that we as Jews participate in in. Pirke Avot says, “From all those who taught me, I have gained understanding.” Each influential teacher in my life opened me up to new possibilities, and I feel luckiest in the moments when I get to share what they taught me with others. What is one important thing someone taught you or told you that changed your life? On the drive home, I encourage you to share that one thing with a loved one. Pass on that wisdom and understanding to the people you care about, and they will keep passing it forward long after you are gone. Someday, the young people who were comforted in times of need by the counselors this summer will themselves be counselors who comfort others. And so the chain will continue.

Number 1: Magic is real

At camp, we have something we call Shwayder Magic. It’s those little moments that you realize that you are in a special place. Maybe it’s the moment when everyone is singing together at services and the harmony sounds perfect. Maybe it’s when you are dancing and jumping so hard on Shabbat that pictures fall off the wall. Maybe it’s when a cabin full of middle school girls sneaks up behind you to smother you in handfuls shaving cream (two times!). Maybe it’s a quiet moment on a horseback ride, or a game of cards with your bunkmates. Maybe it’s a late night talk on the steps of your cabin. There is so much magic in every moment. When people tell me that Judaism is struggling in America or that the profession I have chosen is anachronistic, I just want to fly them up to 10,200 feet, to show them Shwayder magic. Call it magic, call it miracles, call it Jewish living, but something special is going on there, and it informs every Jewish decision I make. My dream is to create magical moments like these in as many ways and as many places as I can. That, more than anything, is why I want to be a rabbi. To share that magic with you.

On Kol Nidre, we will read a prayer that speaks of the Yeshivah Shel Malah and the Yeshivah Sel Matah – The heavenly academy and the earthly academy. Our rabbi likes to say that Shwayder Camp is the Yeshivah Shel Malah – The academy on high. There is so much to be learned in that sacred space. So many lessons for the Judaism I hope to live. And my job is to take what I learned up at that academy in the sky, and bring it back down to earth. To teach it here at the Yesivah Shel Matah, our academies back down on the ground, so that everyone can know a little bit of that incredible place that formed my Jewish identity. So that everyone can experience a little bit of that Shwayder Magic. On Yom Kippur we will pray that the Yeshivah Shel Malah and the Yeshivah Sel Matah be engaged in the same task.  My work this year is to bridge the gap, to bring a little bit more of the Yeshivah Shel Malah to you.