The Broken Heart

Just having learned of President John Kennedy’s assassination, Daniel Patrick Moynihan exclaimed, "When you’re Irish, one of the first things you learn is that sooner or later the world will break your heart."

Coping with pain is the great trial we confront time and again. It is no simple matter to deal with the pains of life an adult, well-adjusted manner. We want to scream, curse, cry, or ball up into a tight cocoon where no one can touch us. The older we get the more the same patterns of behavior repeat themselves in our lives. We do the same thing over and over. The source and kind of pain changes but not our reaction to it. 

There is a discussion among the sages in the Talmud about right and wrong blessings. In the midst of one long conversation a rabbi comments that it would be a sin to approach your home, see smoke rising in the distance and pray, "I hope that is not my home." Such a prayer implicitly asks that it be someone else’s home.

A minister was giving an impassioned sermon to his congregation and said, "Everyone in this church is going to die."

The preacher then noticed a man in the front row who was smiling broadly. "Why are you so happy?" the minister asked. 

"I’m not from here. I am just visiting my brother for a couple of days."

We know what pain is like. We are familiar with its taste, texture, how we react to it. For most of us, we are far too intimate with the way it feels. We all know that Moynihan was correct: the world will and does break our heart.

A strong Jewish current of thought is that we are supposed be familiar with a broken heart. That kind of woundedness gives us empathy for others who suffer. It makes us better friends and spouses, better parents and leaders. Above all, it makes us better Jews. Our job is to help people, not be personal consumers for our own welfare. That is why it is a sin to be unconcerned with those who suffer - whether we know them or not.

In the aftermath of the Great Liberation from slavery the Jews threw themselves on the shore of the Sea as the waters rushed to engulf the Egyptians coming to capture them. As the languid waters suddenly gushed over the helpless bodies of the slave-masters, hosts of Angels began to sing in heaven. Praising God’s might and sovereignty they cascaded into a massive chorus of praise. "Stop," said the Holy One. "My children are downing and you sing?" 

Shir HaShirim Rabah 5

Waiting for Elijah

 Opening the door for Elijah was a highlight of our Seder evening, an experience we treasured ever since childhood. That full goblet waited for the prophet, and we couldn’t see him, but somehow the level of the wine seemed to drop. Just a little, didn’t it? Eliyahu hanavi, we sang happily. We dramatized the tradition that told us he was here to announce that the Messiah, son of David, was coming.

This year when we enter the closing days of Passover, when that same tradition predicts that when the long-awaited deliverer does arrive, it will be on one of these days.

And what will happen then? 

The Jerusalem Talmud in the tractate Sanhedrin presents rabbinic teachings about the week when the Son of David will arrive, and what disaster will take place each day of that week. Deluge, earthquake, etc. Nature, too, will do its worst to bring the Messiah.

The Tzemah Tzedek, was asked why David’s song is read on the Seventh day of Pesach, rather than the Song of Deborah, since the women rejoiced more than the men when the Red Sea split. He answered: “The Haftarah is the Song of David because on the final days of Pesach there is a revelation of Mashiach, who is a descendant of David. Thus, it is to honor Mashiach that we recite the Song of David.”

What he will do, that no one else could do, would be to cure this planet of its trouble, its corruption and its wars.  

We need this now. more than ever.

Pesach’s Meaning

 Pathos is understanding feelings, particularly disease (think pathology) and  the root causes of sadness.  Empathy is related to pathos but is more about feeling what other people feel, understanding them on an emotional level.  Both are commands on Pesach.

 

-On the holy day we open ourselves to understanding the pathology of hatred, the superiority of one people, or class, over another.  Were our ancestors slaves in a distant land?  Yes, historians have located the time and name of this people from ancient Egyptian documents.  These are your ancestors.  They were untermenschen, subhuman, ignored and abused.  Our concerned God heard the pitiful cries and sent His deliverance releasing them from the lash of their overlords.  

The pathology of understanding the past should lead us back to God and knowledgeable enough to recognize those same signs of raw discrimination emanating from hatred in our day.  And those signs are present now.

-We are commanded to feel as if we were personally liberated from bondage.  This is empathy.  We need to feel the empathy of being on the side of the oppressed.  Everyone understands pain.  We have all felt oppressed and abused at some point(s) in our lives.  We used those reference points to feel the prize of liberation.  It is a great gift that we should not take for granted.  We are free here.  We have a Jewish homeland.

Virtually every day we learn of some group in the world that is being oppressed.  We have to make a decision to be on the side of the victim or victimizer.  Who would dare to stand with the victimizer?  Every time we are silent we are providing fuel for the victimizer to carry on their path of hatred.

Empathy is two sided.  As Hillel pointed out millennia ago, “If I am not for myself who will be for me?  And if I am only for myself what am I?”  

We are not fulfilling our mandate if we do not stand up for ourselves, our people.   And we are woefully inadequate when we do not stand in solidarity with the other. 

Support Your Shul

 When God gave His holy Torah to the people there was thunder shattering the air already thick with smoke.  The earth convulsed, as it was about to give birth to a new universe of order and justice and hesed.

 

And yet as we come to the next book of the Torah we are perplexed.  God speaks to the people through the Ohel Mo’ed, the Tent of Meeting.  In there, God spoke directly to His servant, Moshe.  When the Divine Voice spoke Moshe heard clearly, the ancient ones tell us.  Those outside the Ohel Mo’ed heard God’s Voice indistinctly.  They had to try to listen to hear the words being spoken.

 

Many of the sages wonder why the change.  Why was God’s Voice so thunderous at one time and barely discernable the next?

 

An answer: God was preparing us for a time when His diminished Voice would have to be sought.  That is why we come to the sanctuaries of today; it is where the Voice is most keenly felt.

 

That is why synagogue has been the central hub of all things Jewish for millennia.  From that place we feed the hungry; it is where we learn Torah.  Synagogues are places where children are educated; babies are named, brises are conducted, weddings performed and mourners encouraged.  From this cornerstone of Judaism cemeteries were purchased, news about Israel was gathered, and Federations were born.

 

When something goes wrong where do we gather for mutual support and strength?  Where can we pour out our heart without fear of ridicule or judgment?  It has always been the same whether in France, Poland, Russia or Yemen.

 

That is why support for the Synagogue remains the first and most critical arena for our ongoing care.  Without this what would remain?  Most of us know from our personal experience growing up in small hamlets around the south that when a synagogue closes in town there is no Jewish life left.  It is dead.

 

Consider either a gift to the synagogue of whatever amount you can afford….or even better….think of leaving a legacy grant to the synagogue in your will.  Imagine the great good that can be done in preserving and enhancing Jewish life in  for years to come!  The power of extending the gift to the next generation – as it was gifted to us – lies within our hands.

 

Remember all Jewish events and program are extensions of what we teach and promulgate.

 

Yet. Don’t wait to be asked.

Torah Truth

 There are many Torah passages which could raise eyebrows well into the nether regions of the forehead.  Among them are the age of the universe versus our almost six thousand year calculation, manna feeding at least 1 1/2 million freed slaves for forty years, burning bushes and parted seas to name a few.

The question actually runs yet deeper:  If the Torah cannot be read at face value, if we cannot trust it to tell the truth all the time, how can we depend on it for truth any time?

No one who reads Torah with any degree of seriousness will fail to notice these and other incongruities.  In fact, it is probably the most frequent question asked of rabbis today.  What do I tell people?  Even more, how can anyone, including a rabbi, have faith with such unbelievable tales and inconsistencies?

I am fond of telling the story of the grandfather who greets his little one at the door.  

“So how was Hebrew School today, Yaacov?”

“Oh great!  We learned about how General Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt.  Cornered by the Egyptians with their troops, General Moses fired bazookas and strafed the advancing army while the Israeli navy placed pontoons across the Sea.  The people narrowly escaped!”
“Oy,” said the grandfather. “Is this what they taught you??”

“Grandpa, if I told you what they said, you’d never believe it.”

On a primary level, the Torah is filled with stories.  The tales we tell are human, full of adventure, achievements, falls, and recoveries.  They are great stories that we know well and retell through generations.  Think of Adam and Eve.  They tell the story of reward and punishment; listening to God and the penalty of disobedience.  Think of Noah, the savior of a world.  What about Abraham, the one who discovered and was discovered by God?  The narrative then follows Abraham through his trials and triumphs.  This is story-telling at its finest.  These are well worn tales that have traveled the world many times over, through millennia.

On a secondary level, each story contains kernels of knowledge and philosophy that we often miss (because we stop in step 1).  For example, the depiction of Adam and Eve serves the purpose of telling us we are free.  God rewards and punishes but the real lesson is about personal control and responsibility.  And Noah?  It is all about choosing your destiny regardless of what the outside world does and thinks.  Consider that Noah’s righteousness was singular in a world gone bad.

On a tertiary level, we are guided by the Zohar which states, “If the Torah were mere tales I could tell better stories myself.”  We learn through metaphor.  In Eden, we understand the trappings of Paradise.  We are not meant for utopia.  Our lives are only validated through struggle.  We are Adam and Eve.  We choose banishment because there lays our greatest hope.  Abraham is the paragon if self-discovery.  We must pass through walls of flames, become scarred before we can contemplate wholeness.  We must travel far in our youth to find what is most close, so close that it cannot be seen; only perceived.

Is there more?  Yes, there is always more.  That is why it continues to feed our souls after a ll this time.

 

Kaddish

The kaddish is not Hebrew, it is Aramaic.  It was put into that language because it was the spoken tongue at the time.  That places it in the post-biblical era.  It was crafted at a time when many Jews no longer fully understood Hebrew despite the fact that they still prayed in that language and  the fact that Aramaic is a very close relative to Hebrew.

Parts of the prayer are mere renderings of Hebrew into Aramaic.  For example, Yehi Shmay (the refrain after the first paragraph) is a direct translation of Baruch Shem (the line after the Shma).   Originally Baruch Shem, or Yehi Shmay, was the response by the people to hearing the Holy Name of God fully and only pronounced on Yom Kippur.  Hearing the name was so powerful that the people fell on their faces as they shouted this phrase. That is, by the way, why we only say Baruch Shem to this day out loud only on Yom Kippur.  In any event, the Yehi Shmay response is as if we have just beheld the Face of God.  It is a powerful phrase that indicates something far more intimate than most prayers.  It is, by the way, also the line that we state when we use God’s name inappropriately, i.e. when saying the wrong prayer.

There are several kaddishes.  Some of them are sung and some are recited like the mourner’s kaddish and a few others.  The two kaddishes that are most alike are the kaddish shalem (full Kaddish) and the mourner’s kaddish.  The difference between them is a single line that begins with “titkabel…”    Titkabel means “receive.” In a state of mourning we do not ask anything of God but accept our prayer.  We do not decry God’s decree, ask that death be reversed or anything else of God when we are mourning.  Our tradition asks us to simply accept the judgment.  That is the essence of the mourner’s kaddish.  

It is probable that the mourner’s kaddish takes its theology from the book of Job.  Job, the man who lost everything, is urged by his companions to atone, consider how he offended God and even repudiate the One that took away all that he loved.  In the end, God speaks to Job stilling his queries by indicating that he will never know the ways of God.  In a rhetorical query, God asks Job, “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundations?”  In other words, humankind can never fathom God’s ways.

The mourner’s kaddish is then an acceptance of God’s will, knowing that we will never comprehend His ways or understand why death has taken someone we love away.

Implicit in Job’s quandary and explicated by the Talmud is the idea that physical life is finite but life itself is not.  We believe in a life that goes beyond death. That is the underpinning of the mourner’s kaddish: it is the ultimate belief that death is not the end, it is an end.  The soul survives.  For this we thank God for both the life that we shared and the one that endures beyond the physical realm.

We recite the kaddish, as opposed to singing it, because we cannot ignore that fact that we are wounded as we publicly proclaim when we utter the words of the mourner’s kaddish that our faith in God remains firm, unshaken.

Most of the other kaddishes are sung because they extol God’s glory and justice.  Yet when a person is in mourning it is hard to sing, it is enough just to say the words.

Aside from these considerations there is also the sacred notion of continuity.  “Just as my father did for his parent, so I will do for him.”  This idea of traditional passing on what one generation has done to the next takes on a power of its own.  The strength that we gain from saying these holy words alongside others who have suffered similarly is also a comfort.  We are never alone in our pain.

High Holy Days

 Praying for some comes easy.  For others it is arduous.

On the High Holy Days we do a lot of it.  For those who find it easy to pray, time flies.  For those who find prayer difficult, time is inexorable; it could not pass any slower.  This column is dedicated to those in the second category, the ones who find it hard to pray.

There are essentially two ways to come to synagogue, in need or on empty.  

Need: Need means you walk in the doors of Beth Shalom wanting healing.  We are all broken.  Some are afflicted with physical ailments, some are psychically torn, some are scarred by loss of a job, some feel just worthless, some are wrestling with dark demons that take the form of abuse, and some are looking for their direction.  Most everyone suffers from all of these in varying degrees.

Healing begins when we acknowledge our brokenness.  We come to the Synagogue with open wounds and ask God to help us get through them.

Idea: On Rosh Hashanna we do not wish one another a “Happy New Year.”  We say Shana Tova, which means “A good year.”  What is the difference?  It is already here, so it is “new.”  What we have come to find is not just an acknowledgement that another year has passed, but we seek a cleansing of the self, a purging of the negative parts of our person.  We seek a “good” year not a “new” one.

Take time before the Holy Days and search for exactly what part of us needs healing.  Then bring it to God.

Empty: Expectations can be terrible.  An expectation indicates that we know what is about to happen.  If we go to a fine restaurant, for example, and expect to have the same quality service and food that we had last time, the evening may be a let down.   We anticipate the night out with our new friend will be as spontaneous and joyful as the last one.  We are disappointed when they are in a pensive mood.

The same principle applies with the service.  Before coming into the Synagogue, it may help to verbally acknowledge that we want to “hear” whatever God has planned for us.  This means emptying ourselves of all else.

This is an ancient poem translated by Robert Bly:

“Listen, friend, this body is his dulcimer,

He draws the string tight, and out of it comes

The music of the inner universe.

If the strings break and the bridge falls,

Then this dulcimer of dust goes back to dust.”

Like the dulcimer we sit.  Turning the pages of the mahzor we look to find and sing the song of our redemption.

God does not disappoint.  At times a single word or phrase jumps out of page to arrest our vision and communicate something vital.  Other times, it is a word spoken or a seemingly random thought that emerges from the inner emptiness.

In one old story, a rabbi sings loudly and forcefully exhorting the congregation to follow his example.  He says, “The moment you begin to sing your soul becomes one with everyone before you.”  

Without out preconception just sing, read, and sway.

 

Thought: If you have a setback, don’t throw in the towel.  Even if you need to take one step back before taking two forward, it is one step toward success.