Torah for now

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Vayetzei: A Ladder BETWEEN Heaven and Earth

There is a concept of Torah being written in black fire upon white fire. The black letters are limited, but in the spaces between the letters, there is unlimited meaning in connecting words and concepts to one another. An example of this white fire can be found in making meaning from Jacob’s ladder as a relationship between heaven and earth, and in the words, finding the relationship between twin brothers. In Genesis, Chapter 28, Jacob, in fleeing Canaan, finds G8d in a geographic place between Canaan and Haran. There is a ladder between Heaven and earth, and Jacob realizes G8d is in this liminal space. He later sees G8d in the face of his brother, and in re-establishing this relationship is able to return home to his fate and calling. Even his new name Yisrael is a relational one: Yisrael, meaning to wrestle with beings Divine and Human

SONG: BETWEEN, 2011

Linked on sound cloud above.

Written as commentary to the Biblical portion including Jacob’s Ladder: Between, 2013.

Take my hand and help me climb

I’ve been in the depths below

Why am I here among all these broken hearts

OK, it’s my own heart,

Has been so hollow, I’ll admit

How can I climb,

Help me see beyond

My own four walls

Chorus:

Life happens in the space between;

And there are Angels going up and going down.

You are that angel;

Helping me to see the way to climb free.

Every rung is made of love and gravity;

Helps me to return the favor done me;

Jacob, he ran to the wilderness

Leaving behind security

In the quest for superiority

He made his brother his enemy

But Jacob don’t you know, that it’s brothers that we need

 Maybe between is all we ever have:

Between heaven and earth, between death and birth;

Between you and me, G8d’s presence rests;

Helping us find our way in the wilderness.

Jacob never climbs the ladder in between

So did he miss the point of his great dream?

G8d was in this place though it did not seem

It would take struggling so supreme

To help him realize that dream

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If this is true, Why Do I Exist?

My favorite question asked by anyone in the Torah happens in this week’s Torah reading, and it’s asked by a woman, the matriarch Rivkah (Rebecca). Source page: Here In Genesis chapter 25, although Yitzhak (Isaac) truly loved Rivkah, she was barren. They pray together, and Rivkah conceives twins, amazing. The word for prayer in this verse is וַיֵּעָ֤תֶר Vayeatar meaning to plead. And then, trouble. Vayitrotzetzu, the babies were struggling, even crushing one another in the womb. On her own, without Yitzhak, perhaps because he can’t handle the truth due to the residue of the Akedah, she goes “lidrosh” et Havayah, to seek G8d. She asks the question: im kein, lama zeh anochi “if it’s like this, why do I exist?” The word “lidrosh” or seek, is the same as in Drash, or midrash, a true seeking. Because she is a woman, the biblical commentators suggest she is simply in pain, and it’s her first pregnancy, and she seeks an oracle. But Rivkah is the spiritual descendant of Avraham, choosing her pathway to follow Avraham’s G8d. The patriarchs are thought to have spoken to G8d directly. We now have Torah, the age of prophecy is supposedly dead.

Midrash b’reishit Rabba asks a similar question. G8d says “let us create humans in our image” speaking to the angels. They are arguing about it, and G8d hurls truth to the ground, and behind their backs creates humans in love and longing, but with free will. Around 2000 years ago, Hillel and Shamai debate whether humans should have been created. After three years of debate, their answer is no, but we’re here, so let’s do what we can. It was a brutal time, violence was pervasive, and human inhumanity gives makes us question whether.

I propose that Rivkah’s question is exactly what the plain sense says: If it’s like this, If I am to bring violence into the world, two brothers already trying to crush one another, what’s the purpose of my life? And also in the plain sense, that she directly sought out the Holy One, no intermediaries.

But what of G8d’s answer: “two nations are in your womb” and it’s unclear whether the older twin will serve or be served! That’s not answering the question! As Jack Nicholson’s character says in the movie “a Few Good Men” “my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives” and of course, “you can’t handle the truth”

I am studying Maimonides, preface to the Guide to the perplexed, where he says that G8d and truth are like a golden apple surrounded by a silver filigree. G8d and truth are so far beyond us, so powerful that we cannot view or understand it directly. Even in the Biblical times when humans talked directly to G8d, the Holy One answered in terms we could handle. For Maimonides, and many observant Jews, Torah and halachah are the silver filigree. For scientists, the process of experimentation is the silver filigree. If you are not spiritually inclined what’s your structure for finding the most important truths? What question would you ask? Is it possible to talk to G8d directly today? How do we receive answers? Shabbos blessings!

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The Binding of Isaac, cords of love?

“Take your son, your only one, whom you love, Isaac, and go with him to the land of vision, Moriah, and offer him up as a burnt offering” Gen 22:2 How could a father attempt murder of a longed-for, beloved child at the command of a loving G8d? This is a question many have tried to answer. One tradition sees Virtue in Avraham’s willingness to sacrifice his child in obedience. Another tradition, however, as Rashi quotes in midrash, says this last of ten “tests” that challenge Avraham is Satanic. The accuser, Satan, challenges Avraham’s love of G8d, who enacts the test. According to the Midrash, Satan then descends to earth trying to talk Avraham out of the sacrifice, using all the reasons we would argue today. Avraham in mystical tradition represents the sphirah of “chesed” loving-kindness. Why does Avraham listen to the command to offer up his “only” son as a burnt offering? Was it fear, pure faith?

I propose another interpretation: the binding of Isaac is a parable about the sacrifices we make to honor our parents, in obligations borne of love. This is more consistent with the themes of love and strength in Genesis, and bears powerful wisdom for our lives today. According to Maimonides, Abraham does everything for the love of G8d and humans, who are in the Divine image.

“Scripture says (Deut. 11:13): ‘To love the Lord
your God’-whatever you do, do it only out of love.”…
Abraham our Father achieved this level; he served God out of love. ~Maimonides’ Introduction to Perek Helek Introduction to Chapter ten of Mishna Sanhedrin

Avraham is the model of hospitality, his tent was always open, he interrupts an audience with the Divine to feed and wash the feet of three strangers, who reflect G8d’s image (when he is 90 and recovering from circumcision!) He plants an “eshel”, interpreted to mean an orchard or a hotel, to feed people, and teach them that bounty comes from G8d.

If Avraham is all about love, how can this be harmonized with attempted murder of Isaac? Consider this: love is the rope that binds his son. I have a newborn grandbaby, and it is stirring strong memories of motherhood. When that baby cries, you are bound to respond. A parents’ life is not their own. Mara Benjamin, in her article “The obligated Self: Maternal Subjectivity and Jewish Thought” brilliantly uses the experience of maternal obligation out of love to speak of religious obligation, a concept we are sometimes uncomfortable with. She writes

Maternal obligation, in both its practical and its existential dimensions, offers contemporary Western people’s most substantive experience with the meaning of obligation. …The care for an infant perfectly captures the pairing of command and love at the heart of rabbinic thought. If God is not only loving parent but demanding baby, we may find within ourselves the resolve to meet the demand.

But what of caring for aging parents (or other relatives), is that not also an obligation bound by cords of love? According to tradition, Isaac was 37 at the time of his near sacrifice. (Based on his mother Sara’s age at his conception, 90 and the timing of binding of Isaac immediately preceding her death at 127 years) Avraham was 137 years old. In my mind I halve all the ages in the Avraham saga to make it relatable, still he’s elderly, perhaps disabled. Somehow he makes a three day journey on to mount Moriah and climbs a mountain. Although the donkey may carry him to the foot of the mountain, how does he climb, when the donkey is left behind at the foot of the mountain: Does Isaac carry him? I have recently had to put my life on hold to care for a disabled relative, I did it out of obligation borne of love. It is difficult, and my actual identity at times seemed subsumed by the obligation. I propose that, as many adult children Isaac is a care-giver whose obligation to care for his father is the rope that binds him. This makes sense of the ages of Avraham and Yitzhak, of the love that Avraham is said to embody. What about Yitzhak, named for the laughter of his elderly parents? He represents “gevurah” or strength in tradition, and it takes so much strength to care for aging parents. These obligations bind us but should not slay us. Avrahram responds to G8d’s call, lifts up his eyes to see the miraculous ram, that takes the place of his son so that Isaac can be a link in the chain of generations.

Isaac embodies the fifth of the Ten “Commandments” at Sinai: Kabed et avicha v’et imecha… honor your father and your mother, that you may long endure on land. According to Sefer Hamitzvot command “honor” means to give them to eat and drink, bringing in and taking out” This sounds like being a caregiver to an elderly disabled parent! According to Ramban, to honor parents is to honor G8d.

Sources on Sefaria

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G8d is my dragon!

I have a bad habit: when I daven (pray), I look up, heavenwards. Apparently that is terrible for singing. How did I learn to look straight ahead? Here is the story.

When I was a younger person, I delighted in SciFi Fantasy novels, Ray Bradbury, JRR Tolkien, Ursula K LeGuin (Earthsea), and among my favorites, Anne McCaffrey’s “Dragonriders of Pern” Series. It has been decades since I have enjoyed these types of novels: tastes change, I told myself, and that was that… until last month. On vacation in Lenox, Mass. I stopped in to an independent bookstore. While my friend was browsing, I picked up a dragon novel and sat down in a big cozy chair to read, and when I left I bought the book: for the sake of supporting the author and the bookstore, I reasoned. But I discovered why I loved them. The book, by Naomi Novik, didn’t capture my imagination until the dragon hatchling and the reluctant rider bonded: fell in love, really.

G8d* is evoked with the powerful combination of love and awe in Jewish prayer and tradition. We prayer to “Yotzer Ohr”, fashioner of light, followed by Ahavah Rabba “great love” which leads us to Shema “Listen up, oh G8d wrestlers (Israel) Adonai, our G8d is ONE” followed by the command to LOVE! Here is this dragon tale carrying a human flying above the earth, bonded in a love that will motivate them to care for and protect one another. Now I have a new metaphor for G8d in my life: G8d is my dragon, bonded in love, the Holy One of Blessing takes me soaring on dragon’s wings in awe.

Now I don’t need to look upwards, I’m already there!

*G8d is God, with the center replaced by 8, a sideways infinity sign, and one more than the full perfection of Biblical seven! It indicates the extraordinary.

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Be a Song, on a Shofar

For the 15th day of Elul.

The 15th day of any Hebrew month is a full moon: it’s a lunar calendar. Each letter in the Hebrew alef-bet is also a number, and yud=10 and hey=5, so yud-hey would logically be used for the number 15. Yud-Hey (Yah) is also a name for G8d, (as in Hallel-ulYah (praise yah). so often 9+6 is used instead. Rabbi Arthur Waskow urges us to re-embrace G8d in the full moon, and full moon Holy Days. That is a powerful call! This is not just any month, it is Elul, whose hebrew letters are an acrostict for “Ani L’dodi v’dodi li (I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine) in which we seek G8d’s nearness, and the forgiveness of other humans.

The moon will begin to wane now, negating her “ego” becoming hollow, bittul (empty of herself) like the shofar. It is, according to the Zohar, the day in which, in the full moon, David sees Bathsheva bathing on the roof (did she know the king could see her?!) and summons and takes her. She becomes pregnant with Solomon, and in Second Samuel, David sends her husband, Uriah, whose name is linked with Ohr, light, to die on the front lines of a battle. Samuel approaches David, and David admits he was wrong, and he writes psalm 51 in his quest for forgiveness. King David was given credit for writing all the psalms. He was a musician, whose music calmed Saul’s troubled heart, and had a magical harp. In preparing for my High Holy Day pulpit, I am steeped in the melodies of these days, which are unique.

Rabbi Jill Hammer in her “Book of Days” ends this day with a blessing, that I adore:

As the High Holy Days approach, we find ourselves at a crossroads.

Carried by the music of the penitential season, we set off down the road,

following songs that will lead us to better lives

During these very difficult and heart-wrenching times, may we become hollow, and BECOME a song, and a shofar, to alert ourselves and others to the changes that must happen, for the sake of our children. “Hashkeit, ushema Yisrael” hush up and LISTEN commands Moses in this week’s Torah reading.

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Elul, the month before Rosh Hashanah is here!

Elul 1: Happy New Year!

Wait, what?

Let me explain: In the Mishna, which is the book of writings compiled in the year 200 of the common era, after the destruction and expulsion of the Jews in the year 70, in which the Rabbis both remembered, and adapted the traditions (oral law) to the exile, there are FOUR New Years in Jewish tradition: The New Year of Kings: the first of Nissan the first; The First of Tishrei: Rosh Hashanah, when the years were counted; TuB’Sh’vat – the new year of the Trees, and Today, Elul the first – new year of the Animals. The New Year of the trees was reconstituted by the Kabbalists in the 15 and 16th centuries, and again in modern times to become a Jewish “Earth day”. Let’s revive the New Year of the Animals, and celebrated and vow to protect animal life on this planet. If you were a (non-human) animal, what would you be?

Elul 2 – Two. Not only are there two stone tablets that Moshe (Moses) brings down from Mount Sinai, there are two sets of tablets. After seeing the golden calm, Moshe smashes them on the ground and they shatter. I was, for a long time angry at Moshe for doing this: how could you break such a precious gift? I thought, who are you to do that?! But the Israelites had made an idol of Moshe, this covenant needed rewriting. Kudos, says the midrash. G8d forbid our faith should become inflexible as stone. Famously the broken shards of the first set of tablets are placed in the ark.

Elul 3 -Three. On the third of Elul, we recognize the “threes” of the shofar sounds. There are three different kinds of blasts: Tekiyah, one log blast, which is three times the duration of the “sh’varim”/ three short blasts, and each of those are three times as longs at the staccato blasts of the “Teruah”! And there are at least three symbolic interpretations of the sounds of the shofar: 1. they are the sobs of Sarah when she found out that her husband was attempting to sacrifice their only child, or of Sisera’s mother when she found her son was dead. 2. They are an alarm clock waking us up to return to our core values and to G8d. 3. They can be our voices when we exhale, so that we can be a shofar, singing and calling out injustices.

Elul 4- Four: there are four matriarchs, four corners of the earth, Four elements, four worlds. We need to be out in nature and nourishing, like the mothers, grounded in the four directions, among the earth, air, fire and water. It is said that during Elul, the king is in the field, ie closer. Let us go out into nature and commit ourselves to healing our mother earth/Shechinah.

Join me for ten minutes a day on zoom, message me for the link

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Jealousy, Projection and Madness, the Sotah

How do we deal with parts of ourselves that are primal? This week’s reading in scripture includes the case of the Sotah, the suspected adulteress against whom there is no evidence. But the husband’s jealousy will not be assuaged. (This is a practice that only existed during Ancient biblical times). There is no court case, instead a magical ordeal which publically embarrasses the suspect ensues. Unbelievably, to save a marriage from a husband’s jealous rage, the Priest/Kohen, who first tries to get her to confess, is commanded to write a curse using G8d’s name YHVH on parchment, to mix it with water and dust. The water will dissolve the ink from the parchment and erase G8d’s name! The suspect then drinks the mixture. It is of course, exceedingly unfair that only the woman has to undergo an ordeal that it is so public: the priest undoes her hair removes her ornaments, and embarrasses her purposely. There are very pointed prohibitions on embarrassing someone! Commentator Rafael S’forno call the jealous man a fool. And drinking dust mixed with ink and water is not gonna hurt anybody unless of course you believe it will, and then anything is possible.

Rashi the medieval French commentator has a very interesting comment on the Sotah. With a word play on the root for the word Sotah, he writes “Adulterers do never sin until a spirit of madness enters into them”, as it written, of her Key tisteh “if she becomes mad”, taking Tisteh in the sense to become a Sotah. Wait, the husband is insanely jealous, and Rashi places the madness on the wife? Jealously is the true madness. It is a projection of madness, distortion of a taboo

I learned to recognize the thorough and primitive duality of man~ Robert Louis Stephenson,

It often men whose anger and lust are out of control. The Incredible Hulk is our myth of the uncontrollable side of our personality. Another myth is that of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, check out this trailer from the 1941 movie. I’ve only just noticed (I know, so lame on my part) the wordplay on Hyde/Hide. The movie was billed as a horror movie in ‘41. Jekyll tries to separate the repressed parts of himself, in a “scientific” (controlled) way. He liberates it by drinking an elixir and names the emerging part of himself Hyde. Spencer Tracey, who plays both, has said the elixir is not mystery, it’s alcohol, and the need for more and more of it, an addiction. He also becomes addicted to the transformation, and the sexuality it releases.

The illusion of Biblical control of men over women and what could be hidden from them by women, is an illusion, just as with Jekyll. Rashi suggests it is really a fear of madness – which is only controllable with the help of supernatural assistance. Imagine a universe out of control. Mystics say the universe was created with somewhat unequal doses of womb-like compassion and structural rigidity/judgement. An earlier world made with too much rigidity/judgement shattered! Just as at the start of the universe, there must have been an excess of matter over antimatter sparking into existence, more compassion than judgement was needed for the world to endure.

Some people find madness, the loss of their inner world with what they think is excessive compassion, not enough rules. I find madness in a world that is unkind due to the worship of money and power, and that breaks rules of decency and honesty. Yeats wrote this verse in response to world war 1.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre; The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

Faith and spirituality means feeling in your bones that G8d is with you, not “out there” somewhere. That all the earth and all you do is sacred if done with loving intention. Including sexuality, which is not “original sin” in Jewish theology, but a command to “be fruitful” There are three partners present in conceiving each child: the mother, the father, and the Presence or (Shechinah). The union found in a loving marriage is potent enough to heal the heavens, you will even allow G8d’s name to be erased and drink bitter waters, rather than giving in to the madness of love turned into jealousy.

The madness of breaking taboos of ethics and replacing them with old taboos on sexual expression is in the same was as the Sotah ordeal, a projection of madness, distortion of a taboo. Below: Edvard Munch 1885: Jealousy

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The power of Words: Emor

Language is one of the very few features that defines being Human. Certainly other creatures have language: Trees in the forest speak to one another chemically beneath the soil, (would that be amazing to hear and speak that language!), bees dance to tell one another where the good flowers are. Other great apes can be taught sign Language. But the brain space devoted to the motor and sensory parts of language in humans is enormous! (shaded in this diagram) When I was four years old, I learned about lying, from Michael, the four-year-old little boy next door, who just made up a lie in answer to my question. When I asked him why, he just shrugged. We have the full range of words and the power to abuse them or write poetry so true it makes the heart soar. What could it mean for the troubling times we’re in?

In Genesis, G8d speaks, and the world comes to be. This week’s reading Emor, begins “speak”(emor) to the Priests (Aaron’s sons, Kohanim), speaking…. Emor begins with the silent letter “Aleph”. Moses is instructing the Priests to avoid contact with the dead, except for their immediate relatives. The Hasidic masterpiece Mei Hashiloach explains this: A Kohen will see every harsh thing in the world as a purposeful act of the Holy One, and become really angry, so upset is he with the suffering. “as discussed in the holy Zohar. Therefore God commanded, “Emor el haKohanim – say to the Kohanim.” “Emor – say,” means speaking softly. God enjoins us to whisper into the ears of the servants of God that they should not hold grudges (against G8d) Source page linked Here (for Torah nerds!)

The end of the reading contains a narrative teaching more on the power of words: What does it mean to curse G8d’s name, and why does it matter? After all, it’s just words: sticks and stones can break my bones…. In the narrative, a fight breaks out when a man with an Egyptian father tries to camp in the area reserved for the tribe of Dan, which was his Israelite mother’s tribe. Apparently, you only get to camp according to Dad’s tribe. The midrash identifies the Egyptian father as the task master who was beating the slaves so severely, that Moses slew him, and had to flee Egypt. His mother was an Israelite woman (likely the child was born of rape, his mother being a slave at the time). During the scuffle, the man screams out the ineffable name of G8d (in Hebrew YHVH) whose meaning is existence itself, and curses it. This is the only form of “cursing G8d” which earns the death penalty! (Rash 24:16:1)

This seems harsh to a man in pain, ostracized, trying to defend his mother and his parentage, not to mention the fact that Moses killed his father. Like the Kohen he gets super angry. Moses is at a loss: it is one of the four times in Torah that G8d’s help is sought for judgment. (Moses’ kids do not have an Israelite Mother either) What sense can be made of it all?

The book of Job also has a dramatic discussion about using words to curse G8d. When he loses everything, Job still blesses G8d. When he’s covered in painful sores, he curses the day he’s born, but refuses to curse the Source of life itself. An angry response is understandable, but “mad” is a synonym for angry, and there can be psychological and physical chaos if we release our anger. The idea that words can create worlds has a corollary: words can destroy worlds.

There are two different words for “cursing” or blaspheming used here in Hebrew. The words used here are לקלל l’kallel and ונקב V’nikav, which mean both mean to puncture, to put a hole in something. I am reminded of a balloon suddenly pierced, it flies away and collapses as the air is released. The name for G8d YHVH is a mashup of past, present and future tenses of the verb “to be” and the “breath of life” according to Rabbi Arthur Waskow which, if it were to be pronounced, would sound like breathing. This reminds me of the ‘whispering” that is spoken to the Kohanim. To scream this name in anger and curse it is to curse existence itself . To mess with it is to question that there is meaning and goodness at the heart of life. All those who heard the curse were to place their hands upon his head and witness the punishment. In Hearing the curse, there is danger. Quoting Mei HaShiloach again “Zohar says (Vayikra, 106a), “He took the final Hei in God’s holy name and cursed him, in order to defend his mother.” This is because the final Hei hints at the world of Asiyah, the world of action. Though God desires that we fulfill His mitzvot with our actions, still He wanted to create an opening whereby He would bring about salvation even without the actions of man” This is a fascinating comment: there are no shortcuts, only by partnering with the Holy One of Blessing can we perfect the brokenness. For more on the blasphemer, see Aviva Gottleib Zornberg’s book on Leviticus: The Hidden order of Intimacy, Chapter Emor. Through her books on Torah, she has been a powerful teacher!

The air waves and print are full of screams, and lies. The Name of G8d is being used, as it has been during the Crusades and pogroms, to hurt people. Chaos, hatred and anger are being used for the power they bring. These are dangerous times. To witness all that we hold sacred, ideals such as “love the stranger” “love your neighbor as yourself” the imperative to care for the gift of creation, and that we should pursue justice, truth and peace upon which the world rests (Mishnah Avot) being threatened is profoundly disturbing. What life raft will keep us afloat? I am reminded of a story of a king who is told that his country’s wheat fields are almost completely contaminated by a fungus which causes insanity. They have enough of the old flour left to support one man – “shall it be for you, Majesty”? Ask the king’s advisors. The King thinks for a bit, and decides, “no, it must be reserved for my wisest, trusted advisor. That way when everyone has gone mad, I will have someone to look to whisper the truth in my ear and to guide me.” Can you hear the whispers, because it seems to me the world has gone made, from the abuse of words. What do you think?

Deflating balloon flies away flat cartoon vector illustration isolated on white background. Air balloon deflates with puffs of air. Kids rubber toy and decoration element.

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Passover 5785

In the middle of all the cooking and preparing for the Holiday this year, I recognize, this year is different. Mah nishtanah ha Pesach HaZeh: How is this Passover different from all the others? What part of today’s world can we let the world in to our seder that won’t ruin this cherished family tradition? This year we are torn by events of the times, as was Joseph’s cloak, torn and dipped into the blood of a goat. The song at seder’s end, Khad gadya, or “one little goat” reminds us of that cruelty.“Do you recognize this coat? A wild beast must have torn Joseph,” the brothers lie to their heartbroken father. Is this cloak the broken, bloody remnant of our hopes? The karpas on the seder plate, reminding us of the greenery of the field also means “a woven cloak” in the Persian-speak of Purim. The prequel of the Exodus story is the story of parental favoritism, unequal treatment and near fratricide: Exodus begins with that reminder: a new King arose who did not know Joseph. Things go very wrong from here on: slavery, abuse, and the murder of the first-born male infants. In other words – tough times, like those we are in now, make up the first part of the seder. This story of despotic, cruel dictators with delusions of G8d-hood collides with current reality of being terrorized by power run amok.

Then come the plagues: When you throw infants into the river, of course it turns to blood, it is already bloodied! When you pour ten million tons of carbon dioxide per day into the atmosphere, of course there will be karma/ Divine consequence. And without these consequences, the status quo could never change. The plagues, awful as they are, are the turning point toward redemption. as the pogroms, and Cossack conscription, drove my grandparents across an ocean.

As the group of refugees makes their way to the wilderness, they bring the memory of that torn coat, and the slaughtered goat, with them: Joseph’s bones are exhumed from the Nile, and carried with them.

This Shabbat is called Shabbat HaGadol the “Great Sabbath”. We read of a day of justice and judgment, in the finale of the prophet Malachi, culminating in a great healing: “I will send Elijah the prophet… he will turn the heart of the parents to the children and children to their parents. Some in the generation of potential young parents are wondering if it’s ok to even bring children into the world. How heartbreaking! The apples of the charoset on the seder plate remind us of the merit of women who seduced their reluctant enslaved husbands under the apple trees, that brought children into a world of genocide in Exodus. Shabbat ends, and immediately Passover begins. Perhaps this year at the seder we can once again honor our tears with salt water, dip our torn hearts into it, and acknowledge the transformative nature of the Blessed Divine One. Then we can envision that kinder world, keeping it in our sights, and keeping our hearts turned to one another.

Resource: Dayenu’s guide, an insert for the Haggadah, with Climate change in mind.

Arthur Waskov 50 years of the Freedom seder

Make your own Hagaddah, featuring Ellen Bernstein’s Promise of the Land

PS I am now in the afterglow (and exhaustion) of seder, and cleaning up. Thesa are my addenda to my family seder this year Lion King Passover

This first song was so much fun: used for the Maggid section, from 613’s music video

  1. Circle of life.                   Call out:

Mah nishtanah ha’layla hazeh, mikol halailot

(mah nishtanah, nishtanah ha’laya) repeat chant 4x

In the days we prepare for the seder

It seems like we’ll never be done

There’s more to clean than can ever be cleaned

Grab a candle and search for the crumbs

When the seder table is ready

And all the chametz has been found

Our family arrives, and the sun leaves the sky

At the table we’ll gather around

At the seder tonight, Passover retold

With our prayers of hope; .

And the seder plate; Helps us tell our story

At the seder , the seder tonight.

I JUST  CAN’T WAIT TO BE FREE

Now, Pharoah you’re a mighty king,

But I’m tellin’ you beware

(Pharoah) You’ve come into my palace making threats now don’t you dare

Your days of making us your slaves are done forever more

And if you challenge G8d, ten plagues will shake you to your core

I’m telling you, you’d best listen to me

It’s time to let my people go, you see

‘Cause we just can’t wait to be free!

From Rabbi Ebn Leider on Substack: As we witness the truly shocking events of our day: … the terrifying injustices coming from the highest levels of power, it is natural to be angry, fearful, shocked and devastated…. we can try to shift our perspective …Pesach is perhaps an opportunity to see a larger perspective and to vision together, not just a return to a more peaceful status quo, but a truly transformative change that is in the pangs of being born. ~R Ebn Leider             

This version of the four Children is by Rachel Barenblat’s, from the Bayit publication “The Broken Matzah”

All Four Children (are one)

Today the Four Children are a Zionist,

a Palestinian solidarity activist, a peacenik, and

one who doesn’t know what to even dream.

The Zionist, what does she say? Two thousand years

we dreamed of return. “Next year in Jerusalem”

is now, and hope is the beacon we steer by.

The solidarity activist, what do they say?

We know the heart of the stranger. To be oppressors

is unbearable. Uplift the downtrodden.

The peacenik, what does he say? We both love this land

and neither is leaving. We’re in this together.

Between the river and the sea two peoples must be free.

And the one who doesn’t know what to even dream:

feed that one sweet haroset, a reminder that

building a just future has always been our call.

All of us are wise. None of us is wicked….

We are one people, one family. Not only

because history’s flames never asked what kind

of Jew one might be, but because

the dream of collective liberation is our legacy.

We need each other in this wilderness.

Only together can we build redemption.

R. Rachel Barenblat

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Make a Mishkan today, for healing of the earth!

This week’s reading in Torah is “Pekudei” and is the end of the dramatic book of Exodus, which told of our redemption and revelation. We were freed to follow the Mysterious Forces of liberation, rather than a human ruler, and to follow pathways of “loving the stranger” because we were once strangers. Moses climbed a mountain, and was inspired to bring down, not just stone tablets, but the gorgeous Divinely inspired blueprints. With the help of inspired artists, we created a space to take G8d with us on our journeys. This inspired, beautiful, community-made space is the Mishkan. (see last week’s teaching)

Once upon a time we built a Mishkan in this country. We came together from all parts of the country to make the AIDS quilt*. The HIV/AIDS epidemic was terrifying, and we had come through a very narrow place (Mitzrayim/Egypt means narrow) with many souls lost. We who were alive then all knew someone who had died, it was a scary time. (the HIV pandemic is still happening, I know.) From their grief and memories, each family brought a square with the name of their lost loved one, filling the Washington mall. Then the squares were connected very much like the panels on the Mishkan, looping connections through the grommets. When it was completed, it was an enormous, portable, communal work of art. It travelled around the country, and folks added names to it. Last week in Vayakhel, we saw how the Mishkan could be the measurement of a human soul. The many connections between the end of Exodus and the first chapter of Genesis (source page here) show some of the parallels of the creation of the Mishkan to the creation of the universe: the human-made and G8d/nature-made are intertwined. In today’s fractured world, where fighting seems to be the default way of dealing with one another, what if we were to build another communal work of art? If the Mishkan represents creation, perhaps we can fashion squares with the images of creatures and features of this beautiful planet, alternating with the beautiful and diverse images of babies born this year who will inherit the land? This could be our travelling sanctuary to bring healing to our planetary one. (*gratitude to Rabbi Arthur Waskow, whose book “Freedom Journeys” p.99, reminded me of this quilt and the link to the Mishkan!)

Hazak, Hazak, v’nitchazek, is chanted as we complete a book of the Torah: Be very strong, and may we be strengthened!

Diverse babies sitting on the floorPetition · Save Threatened animals before its to late! - Ireland · Change.org

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