The Holy Days come upon us slowly but once they arrive they pounce with incredible intensity. We begin with Selichot, segue to Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot with the etrog and lulav, Simchat Torah, Shmini Atzeret, all within three short weeks! We sing and weep, we hope and pray, we dance and reflect upon what once was. Just writing all that is exhausting!
Why do we have this maelstrom of dynamic sacred days in quick succession? Because we are urged to think, reflect deeply and insistently on the meaning of our lives. The Holy Days with their variant emphases move us to think differently about our priorities, the places we visit, our friends and relatives, the self-improvements and the ways (the positive or negative) in which we influence others and impact the world.
Then comes Heshvan, the next Hebrew month. It is often called mar-Heshvan, or the bitter Heshvan because after the onslaught of all the holidays we now have none. Not a one. So why is it called mar, bitter? Because it is life as usual - up early, off to work, time to eat, make dinner, sleep and repeat.
Now that life returns to its familiar rhythms, what has changed? Have we moved from where we stood last year? Of course, we are older but are there things that we can point to that have made us better people? Have we been truer friends? Engaged in less gossip? Done more tzedaka work? Learned more Torah? Stopped “using”? Observed more mitzvot? Davenned more frequently to become a more humble and thankful person?
When Abraham passed from this world he was eulogized, “Woe to the ship that has lost its captain.” (Baba Batra 91b)
The loss of the holidays can easily move us back into old habits. That is the essence of this Talmudic statement. Once the opportunity to be change has passed, do we revert to old patterns of behavior or learn new ones? Does the ship revert back to its old familiar course? The easiest, simplest path is regression. Change is hard. The harder path is the one that involves personal evolution and development. The lessons learned from our parents are still with us, if we mindfully and willingly take them into our selves. Or, as the Talmud articulates, Abraham has died but his teachings are immortal if we follow his direction.
A certain bishop was scheduled to speak at a Town Hall in Philadelphia. He set out to walk but quickly became disoriented and lost. So he asked a little boy how to find the Town Hall. The boy asked, “What are you going to do there? “I am going to give a lecture,” he answered. “About what?” “About how to get to Heaven. Do you want to come?’ “Are you kidding?” said the boy. “You don’t even know how to get to the Town Hall!”
This is the meaning of Heshvan. We received directions and were asked to consider the consequences of our present life’s course; the object being to become a better person. What happens now? Will this New Year, this new beginning be bitter because we fall back into old ways because the directionals have ended? Or have we accepted the truths of the fragility of life, the infinite value of time and our unique place in the universe to bring about real change?
Surprise yourself by charting the course plotted by your forbearers. They believed in it. Why not you?
