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[For Parshat Devarim - Saturday, August 8, 2008 - click here]
Shabbat Nachamu - Friday, August 15, 2008
Nachamu, Nachamu, Ami
How many of you heard that wonderful thunderstorm last night? And how many of you are like me, lying in bed, grinning at the dark ceiling, thrilling to the sound of thunder as it rolled and struck, delighted by the flashes of light outside behind the blinds, that came nearly simultaneously with the thunder? I loved every minute of it! Yet there was this mother-voice inside of my head that wanted to go check on the children—Hannah in particular- who when younger truly was afraid of lightning and thunder storms. How I remember camping as a family in Utah during summer thunderstorms, comforting my little one in the tent who was overwhelmed at the sounds. So I lay in bed last night, wondering, was she awake? Was she afraid? Would my appearing in the doorway of her bedroom in the dark be more of a fright than what was happening outside? Should I go curl up with her, or assume that she had outgrown her need to be comforted during a storm?
The haftarah for Va’etchanan, this week’s parasha, comes from Isaiah 40, and it begins with these beautiful words, “nachamu, nachamu, ami: Comfort, comfort, my people.” Why are the people in need of comfort? The author of Isaiah is speaking to the Jews who were living in exile in Babylon, in the sixth century BCE., after the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem. These are the people who had witnessed the sacking of their holy institution, who had been marched from their homeland, hundreds of miles, to live in a foreign land, a place of foreign culture and language. Their lives had been destroyed, but they, left alive, were challenged to create new livelihoods and community. We hold in our recent memory scenes of those in need of contemporary comfort. We have witnessed those whose lives have been destroyed by hurricane Katrina, or other natural disasters, or those who have become refugees of military aggression. We think of their pain and, we can imagine an inkling of what the upheaval of their lives—and our ancestors’ upheaval-- must have been like. What words of comfort would we speak if we were face to face with any of these disheartened souls? How to comfort a people that longs to go back to its homeland? To have one’s life, and livelihood, and home and community structures restored?
How do we comfort? Isaiah goes on to tell us how. We comfort God’s people: “Dabru al-lev Yerushalayim” by speak tenderly upon Jerusalem, speak upon her heart.” And here, permit me to read into the beauty of the Hebrew language. For we might say in Hebrew, “dabru et ha-lev- speak TO the heart of Jerusalem”; et is the word we would use to connote that a direct object is to follow. But poetically, it seems, Isaiah says, “dabru al—speak upon, the heart, as if our words aren’t conventional words that simply go from place a to place b, but words that fall upon a heart, the way rain falls upon the earth, or tears descend upon a cheek. That is the kind of tenderness that should be bound up in the words that we offer. Are we capable of such speech? Are we mindful enough of our speech, to let our words have such impact? In Hebrew the word for comfort is Menachem, If you know a man named Menachem or a woman named Nechama, this is the root of their name, to be one who brings comfort. But the root of the word, NeCHeM, comfort, midrashically speaking, is close to the word, ReCHeM, womb. Surely my desire to comfort my child from fear last night stemmed from my Rechem, that motherly place of nurture. But poetically, this is a place that all of us possess; that womb, that innermost place of greatest tenderness, where we nurture and care at our most basic level. ReCHeM—the root of Rachamim, the word for compassion. And midrashically, NeCHeM is close to the word LeCHeM; bread. When we offer comfort we are offering sustenance to one whose courage and faith and hope needs to be sustained. And so woven into the very root of the Hebrew word “comfort” is the message that we comfort when we offer sustenance to another from our most honest, vulnerable, and compassionate place.
And when does one need comfort? We think immediately of comforting the bereaved, those who have been face-to-face with the death of a loved one. But there are so many times in our lives that we need comfort from others. Some are life cycle moments, some are simply…moments. We bring comfort whenever someone is struggling, whenever someone is wrestling, whenever one feels emotional pain. We are in a position to comfort as friends wrestle with illness. We are able to comfort when friends divorce and experience the pain of ended relationships. We are in need of comfort ourselves when professional goals are not realized. And if it seems that comforting, then, is simply another word for being a good friend, it is…but more. To comfort asks more of us then to listen, and be present, To be a friend is to go to the place of depth our friend is at so they won’t be alone. To be a comfort means to go the place of depth our friend is at and strive to lift them up.
In the Plaut commentary in front of you, editor Rabbi Gunther Plaut says that we comfort by speaking words of hope. Our words are crucial to the act of comforting, precisely because the one to be comforted needs to hear the right words. So that means that we can’t say whatever comes to mind, to get us through a difficult moment. We need to say what comes from our heart, to get them- the one in need-- through a difficult moment. How many of us have been in the situation where we have disclosed to another a painful scenario—and the other person responds by talking about the time that something similar happened to them, or to someone else they know? Rather they had kept that moment about you, about your pain and challenge at the moment! But we shouldn’t be so overwhelmed at the pressure of offering exactly the right words at that instant that we are paralyzed. When people bring us their real pain their real need, we simply need to be real back at them.
What does it mean to offer hope? We can’t always try to paint a happy ending to every difficult life experience. It is not comfort to offer false hope. We can’t say in good conscience, I’m sure they will find a cure for your cancer…I know your son will overcome his drug addiction…your mom’s Alzheimers will certainly be reversed….we can’t offer those words. If comforting another is about lifting them up, then there are real words, and honest hope that we can give others. It does start with listening, and talking honestly with the other, comfort comes in part from letting people know that they are heard, that there are those who care about them and about their plight, that there are people with whom to honestly talk through a situation. It is great comfort to simply know that other people care. The phone call, the note in the mail, the flowers, the chicken soup—all bring comfort because they bring the promise of companionship that says, you do not walk through the tough stuff of life alone. The message that “I as your friend am here with you and for you” is the hope that one will make it through their difficulties.
Having said that, we can help people work through the challenges in their lives to find the most hopeful choices. At times our clear minds may be just what those in pain or turmoil can’t find within themselves. And of course there is the message too, that it is not just our friends, or family or dear companions who are with us to bring comfort, but God’s presence too brings us comfort, a sense that there is order and meaning in life and in the universe. Our pain is not visited upon us by God, but is a part of life, and with a sense of God’s presence we might find more courage to face our challenges.
There are times we comfort with words. When we enter a shivah house, our tradition tells us not to speak at all, until the mourner first greets us and speaks to us. We let them set the tone for whether they care to speak, or whether they are content in that moment to live in the world of memory, or whether their pain is at place that is beyond the comfort of words. At such a time we comfort in silence. But do not believe that this is an inferior method to speaking. Every one of us has probably experienced the comfort that comes from another person’s presence, their smile, or steadfast gaze, or their embrace. I recall a few months ago, following a very difficult meeting here at temple, a congregant who gave me a hug before I left the room. It was one of the most amazing hugs I am sure I have ever received. In the course of a long moment, that hug said so much and brought my soul so much comfort, that I literally thought about that hug for a number of days afterwards. In that case, words would never have been enough. It was the unspoken that centered me. (I’m pleased to say that it is a rare temple meeting that one needs a hug afterwards..)
Nachamu, Nachamu--- the words that Jews read on this Shabbat, the Shabbat after Tisha B’Av, the commemoration of the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem. We are reminded that all of us have days when we are I need of comfort, and all of us have days—hopefully many more days—when we can be the one offering comfort. Isaiah’s words remind us that the Eternal’s Presence shall be revealed and all shall see it. It seems to me that when we embrace the ability to comfort and be comforted, we truly do see God’s Presence in the faces and the actions of those who act godly by bring us comfort.
Shabbat shalom.
Parshat Devarim - Friday, August 8, 2008
Rootedness
A few months ago a gentleman appeared on a Friday night, just as Shabbat dinner was about to begin. He presented himself to me, but in truth, I did not recollect him at all. He looked at my quizzical face, and said, Rabbi, remember me? I met you at the Jewish Festival out at Channel Islands many years ago. And then he proceeded to tell me his name, and the circumstances of our meeting, and what he was wearing, and what we had spoken of. Recalling the details of our meeting brought the event back to me with clarity. Indeed, I did then remember having met him, and we invited him to join us for Shabbat dinner as we sat down that night.
As we turn to the opening chapters of the Book of Deuteronomy this Shabbat, parshat Devarim, which serves both as the name of the parasha and the name of the Book, Moses employs this same technique. The Israelites have stopped at the Jordan River, about to cross into the Promised Land from Moab. Moses is about to begin one of three expansive speeches to the people, the text of which will comprise the bulk of the eleven parshiot that are the Book of Deuteronomy. And while we might imagine that the people gathered there have first hand knowledge of the 40 years in the wilderness, we would be mistaken, for we are to understand that the generation of the Exodus has died, and those about to cross the Jordan were born in the wilderness. Moses is the historical memory of the Israelite people, and we know that he is very close to the end of his 120 years upon the earth. And so Moses begins to teach them, to repeat for them the sacred stories and events which have unfolded for the Israelites, on their journey to freedom and to people-hood. But Moses does more than just tell the events; he roots the events, by giving us the setting. We hear verses like this: “It was in the 40th year, on the first day of the 11th month, that Moses addressed the Israelites according to the instructions God gave him after he had defeated the King of the Amorites who lived in Heshbon…”or, “After you had remained at Kadesh, we marched back into the wilderness by way of the Sea of Reeds….” Or, “We moved on, away from our kin, the descendants of Esau who live in Seir, away from the road of the Arava, away from Eilat and Etzion-Geber; we marched in the direction of the wilderness of Moab.” What purpose do those details serve? Well, consider the way you tell your children family stories. Is there not a difference when we say: “remember when you fell out of the tree house?” And “remember at your 9th birthday when you fell out of the tree house in Grandma’s elm tree in the front yard?” What is added when we say, not “grandpa used to call on grandma when they were courting” but “during the Depression, grandpa used to call on grandma when they were courting, by taking the trolley up Biddle Street, spending a hard-earned nickel to see her.” It is those details that ground a story. First a story becomes all the more true , when we ground it with real places, real names, real independently verified facts. In the biblical account, when Moses references places that actually existed—and still exist today—we have more of a sense of the reality of a journey through the wilderness, with experiences that happened in real places. That is part of the goal that Moses, the storyteller, has in mind: I want you to know this really happened. Whether our ancestors truly wondered through those places or they were retrojected to have, the author of the biblical account knew that to ground the stories in a physical location would connect us to the authenticity of the story.
Secondly, to share those details helps us remember the story, for it has brought the story more to life for us. Think about the family stories you love to pass from generation to generation, and think about the details that are used to tell that story. The biblical tradition was an oral one for many generations, and the recollection of every kind of detail was an important device to ensure the faithful transmission of that story. Moses, in retelling the events that are delineated in Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy, is literally handing the family photo album over to the next generation. Here is our history; here is the story of our people. Do we not do the same, when we tell the stories of our Bar Mitzvah to our son when we were age 13? Or, here is how mom and dad met? Moses is, in effect, saying, I want you to know the details, so you will be able to faithfully transmit it to the next generation. We tell our own family stories, in the hope that they will get the details right in transmitting it to their children.
Lastly, we share those details so that the listener feels connected to the history. We do the same when we share our family stories; we are saying, my history is now your history. We want you to feel rooted in this family story, to feel an identity that links you to this story, to know that this is your family story, and even if you weren’t there, it is a part of who you are. How else to explain that my children, who are in St. Louis this week, went to a ball game rooting not for the Dodgers but for the St. Louis Cardinals, having been raised on the stories of my countless childhood trips to Busch Stadium? Our stories link the next generation to our history, our values, what we want them to take into their life experience as their own.
To recap, then, the details of a story serve to: 1) verify its veracity; 2) preserve its faithful oral transmission, and 3) help us feel more connected with it. And Moses, a master storyteller, employs great detail and indeed succeeds on all three measures.
So let me suggest what the text might sound like or feel like without the details; with teaching that is not rooted in place, or time, or who was there, or what the circumstances were of the event. Sketchy at best, imagine: standing at a mountain receiving the ten commandments without knowing the Mountain was called Sinai, (or Horeb), without knowing they were in the wilderness, that they had fled slavery just two months before, having crossed over a dangerous sea, escaping attacking armies as they fled? Imagine sitting down to seder knowing only that our people had been slaves long ago, and not knowing the name Pharaoh, Egypt, the intricacies and horrors of each of ten plagues? To know a part of the story is to feel only partially a part of the story, to know more of the story is to feel more as if one has a relationship to the story. The more we know, the more rooted we are. Certainly I can vouch for that in my recent experience of traveling to Eastern Europe. Was I versed in events of the Holocaust? Yes. Do I understand more deeply and feel connected to the horrors of the Shoah now that I have set foot on the land, added countless details of place, sight, sound, color, face? Indeed.
And so I ask us to consider: What are the stories that root us in our lives, which keep us grounded to who we are? What are the truths that exist for us, that have been transmitted to us by family, by Jewish tradition, by, profession, by community? What is it that we are sure we believe in, as we face our futures? What is that brings us a sense of belonging? What is it that brings us a sense of who we are and how we fit in the world?
The Israelites are about to face an uncertain future; being rooted in certain truths about who they are and how they are to conduct themselves in the world will bring them much personal and communal strength. We have the same resources at our disposal. Are we taking advantage of the rootedness that Jewish teachings offer us, that our families provide for us, that our rituals can give us? Or do we feel unrooted, our lives moving through time, with little to ground us to place?
Shabbat Shalom.
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