Torah for now

Posts tagged ‘faith’

Light within dark times.

Sometimes I feel like I’m surrounded by darkness. Now is such a time. There is lack of empathy for the most vulnerable among us, immorality at the highest level of government, and a populace which supports and (in some countries) has democratically chosen such leaders. There is blindness to climate change, which is damaging our life support system, and is affecting us all, but is more devastating those who already have the least among us. In this darkness, where is the light?

The Torah portion read this week, parashat Bo, includes the final three “signs and wonders” which afflict Egypt, all of which involve increasing darkness, culminating in the darkness of death. Focusing on the ninth sign “choshech/darkness”, it is no ordinary darkness, but one which is substantial, can be felt. It is described as so dark that you could not,,,,, How would you end that sentence, perhaps: “see your hand before your face”? Rather, it is described as one in which folks could not see “their brother” or sister. This is a moral blindness, a complete lack of empathy. This was not inflicted by G8d*, our Source of Life and Light, but rather The Holy One transformed the invisible into a sign that could be seen by the morally blind. The moment the Egyptians took part in Pharoah’s genocidal decree and helped throw newborn boys in the River, they sowed darkness: no wonder the Nile turned to blood! G8d simply made it apparent, they did not recognize their own brutality. These signs were needed to illustrate a story for the generations, “Who lives, who dies who tells your story..” as Lynn Manuel Miranda wrote – Signs and wonders were needed to open hearts to the pre-existing inhumanity: perhaps in their slave mindset, even the Israelite victims took it for “the way things just were” and the Egyptians so blind so as not to see/care about their fellow human being. This narrative with its signs and wonders was important enough to illustrate dramatically so it could be passed to the children at the seder table.

In seeing the light within the darkness, the parashah begins with “Bo” come, rather than “go” Awareness, daat, intimate knowledge of the laws of decency, of who we are in relation to nature and one another were in exile. See my source page in Sefaria Bo is spelled Bet, Aleph, and the word “bet” means “house” The Aleph, according to Meor Einayim represents the light of G8d, to bright to experience with out the comforting shield of “bet”. The light within the darkness is hidden within the very first word that G8d says in this parashah.

Need more light? Leonard Cohen famously wrote, “there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in” When we are in darkness, the cracks in ourselves and the world are places where light can enter. The pain we are feeling is a sign for where to apply the healing, and how urgently it is needed. And we don’t know with which broken parts of ourselves or our world we can help to liberate this light: so we must bring all we’ve got to bear upon it because we, and all nature is filled with G8d’s light. (See Mevo HaSh’arim on the source page)

There are “signs and wonders” today which point to injustice and lack of empathy. Rabbi Shai Held wrote, in 2017 book, (I had not yet read Naomi Klein’s This changes Everything, 2016″

“Imagine living in a world in which violating the laws of morality leads inexorably to consequences in the world of nature. .. the thought of living in such a universe can be frankly, terrifying.” ~ Rabbi Shai Held: The Heart of Torah, Volume 1:

Global climate change, rapid species extinctions viral plagues, are all signs in which nature herself is revealing the lack of care for nature, and lack of empathy for others, and blindness to own self interest! It’s not “the environment” but our own life support system, designed by G8d and infused with the Presence that we are harming. Yet, our hearts remain heavy, hard, and strong willed (my translation of the three adjectives describing Pharoah’s heart). What will it take for us to become aware?!

Perhaps awareness of the holiness in one another and in nature. I offer my setting of Shiviti,https://soundcloud.com/biomusicmm from psalm 16, which means we must set G8d before us always.

Shiviti Adonai L’negdi Tamid

G8d, I set you before me continually

I know you in the blessings that come to me each day

Sweetened by Gratitude, deepened by sharing them with You

I feel you in the spaces between me and the people I meet

Help me to know that it’s Your light that I see deep in their eyes, deep in their heart

And when I walk in wild places, my head reaching for the skies,

Help me to guard and to keep your garden green by and by

And oh in the darkness, help me be/see the light

And when You feel so far away,

Help me to know that the yearning’s OK,

The yearning can be a pathway.

*I use the 8 rather than the “o” to spell G8d out of respect for this name. The 8 is infinity and represents one step beyond the completion which is 7

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ESTHER, A Leap of Faith

A Purim Song:

Utzu Eitza b’tufar

Dabru Davar v’lo yakum  Ki Imanu El

Go ahead and make your evil plans, They will fail, they will not stand, for G8d is with us always

This is a beautiful Purim song, about the book of Esther. An ancient farce, political satire that turns all too frighteningly real sometimes. On Purim We actually have the chutzpah to laugh, the need to laugh, the obligation to laugh.  The interesting thing about this song is that it put the reason for our success, not into the hands of Esther or Mordechai but in the Holy One of Blessing, whose name never appears in the Megillah.  It is hidden, much like Esther herself is in hiding. It requires a leap of faith for us to find G8d in the story!

In the land of Shushan, Persia, many years following was a beautiful Jewish girl named Haddassah. But when the king’s men came to uncle Mordechai’s house looking for the most lovely to be queen, she was silenced, told not to reveal her true identity, and given a new name, Esther, from root as nistar, meaning hidden. After being made queen, she busies herself with queenly stuff. She hadn’t been paying attention to the happenings of the kingdom when she is told of Mordechai in sack cloth and ashes –”send him some new clothes”, she orders. She does not want to hear about trouble: hard to blame her, who wants trouble?!  Mordechai then delivers my favorite line of the whole Megillah

Chapter 4:6 “If you keep silent in this crisis, relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place, while you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows, perhaps you have risen royal position for just such a crisis.”

Esther is afraid, bc the punishment for one who approaches the king without being summoned  is death. And although Esther is scared she bravely, and with all her wits about her approaches the king: she takes a leap of faith.

In his book G8d in search of Man, Heschel says
The belief in “the hidden miracles” is the basis for the entire Torah.

What does it mean to take a leap of faith, that G8d/ love/ righteousness is with us when things seem hopeless, for Esther, and for us?

Reb Nahman of Breslov explains about a leap of faith, saying, there is a moment on the spiritual path (on the ladder of Return to the One), where one is suspended in space, caught between the rungs. Even if one stretches to full height, the gap is so large that one cannot both have feet on the rung below and your hands on the rung above. One can only jump into thin air, and hang for a moment between, where there is no Ground or sure hand-hold. Such is the practice of emunah, .. That leap of faith.

And perhaps just as we need faith, the Holy One needs our help, and it is Esther, a woman specifically who is G8d’s partner on earth.

Shechina, a feminine facet, or sphirah of the Divine is the indwelling presence, immanent, and all around us, yet hidden in the natural world, I invite to close your eyes, to breathe in. The oxygen is made by green living creatures: we are breathing one another in to existence. Know as you breathe in that Shechinah dwells in you as well as in every other creature, rock and tree of the natural world, you just must be aware. Perhaps you’ve experienced her presence in the magic of the Florida wetlands, or at the ocean, or on a mountaintop. The awful truth is and she is in trouble. We have treated this sacred garden, not as Divine gift, but as a killing field. We need to once serve the more-than-human world with love and care, to be G8d’s partners. The ancient fossil forests burn in a destructive fire, and their wastes fuel scorching, flooding, storms and extinctions. We need to love with our upper heart, to choose life.

And now you’re all tuning out, saying “we’ve heard all this before” You’re possibly saying , “this problem’s too big, there’s nothing we can do”  As Rabbi Marc says, that’s your lower heart, that wants to keep satifying its egoic desires, and not worry about the consequences.  We need to be Esther,  to take a leap of faith, and respond with love and smarts – a feminist approach. It’s so easy to be discouraged.

For me this song, by David Wilcox, tells of the leap of faith of the Esther story

You say you see no hope, you say you see no reason to believe,,

that the world will ever change, you say that Love is foolish to believe,

Cause there’ll always be some (thug) with their greed or with a knife, To take away your daydream, put the fear back in your life.

Look, if someone wrote a play to glorify what’s stronger than hate,

would they not arrange the stage to look as if the hero came too late.

It’s almost in defeat, feeling like the evil side will win,

on the edge of every seat from the moment this whole play begins,

It has been love that mixed the mortar, and it’s love that stacked these stones,

and it’s love that built the stage here, though it looks like we’re alone

In this world set all in shadows, like the night is here to stay,

there is evil cast around us but it’s love that wrote the play,

and in the darkness, love will show the way.

Now the stage is set
You can feel your own heart beating in your chest
This life’s not over yet
So we get up on our feet and do our best
We play against the fear
We play against the reasons not to try
We’re playing for the tears
Burning in the happy angel’s eyes

… For it’s love who mixed the mortar
And it’s love who stacked these stones
And it’s love who made the stage here
Though it feels like we’re alone
In this scene, set in shadows,
Like the night is here to stay
There is evil cast around us
But it’s love that wrote the play
For in this darkness love will show the way

Love/G8d can be hidden. That leap of faith is needed to see that it’s all G8d, that Shechina surrounds us all.

Dayenu is a Jewish climate change activist group. We’ve had enough.  Tonight we ask you to take a leap of faith, as TAO joins hands with Dayenu. Rebekah has some lit. And next week on Purim join us in Davey, and take the first step, write a postcard to show you care.  we do it all for L’Dor VaDor, for our children, and because as Jews we are commanded to choose life, take a leap of faith like Esther.

Or like Elphabah in Wicked

Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I’m through with playing by the rules
Of someone else’s game

Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It’s time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes and leap

It’s time to try defying gravity
I think I’ll try defying gravity
Kiss me goodbye, I’m defying gravity
And you won’t bring me down!

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CONSTRICTED THROATS: Moses, me and Esther

– Did you ever get emotional, so that there was a lump, a constriction in your throat, and you were temporarily unable to speak? When The Holy One asks Moses to go to Pharoah and demand “Let my people go” Moshe responds “NO, they won’t listen to me! I have a kabed peh, a heavy mouth u’chvad lashon What does it mean to have, like Moses, a heavy tongue?

G8d’s answer: Who but I give a mouth (and speech) to humans, and who makes those who are mute?

But G8d creates all through acts of speech (in what language I’m not sure: math, physics, music, love?) and creates we humans who are partly defined by speech and are Btzelem Elohim In the Divine Image, in that way. Is G8d also the power who creates those who are mute? Many things can make a person mute: being born without hearing, for example. With therapy sign language can be taught. The mind can make you mute: my eldest daughter, so brilliant and super sensitive would lose her voice whenever she became sick! But trauma can make a person mute as well, as the heart wrenching literature of the Shoah attests.  The Slonimer Rebbe speaks of slavery in Egypt as so crushing, that their minds were enslaved, not just their bodies. He explains when finally the slaves were able to get out a geshrei, a good primal cry, it was the first step in their deliverance. That was when G8d heard their voice, their cry and sends Moshe. He speaks of the tightness or constriction in the throat where the soul cannot get out or express itself.  Moshe, the Slonimer continues was actually as an avatar of the Israelite people. Therefore he was unable to speak fluently! The word ּכְבַ֥ד  The shoresh/root also means “honor” Perhaps “k’vad peh uchvod lashon” means a mouth and tongue that honors the people that Moshe serves. There are times when it is inappropriate to be verbose, such as entering a house of mourning.  Until the Israelites could move from the Narrow place of tzuros, Mitzrayim and be free and to SING at the sea, Moshe could not be the orator who would be the channel of Torah from Heaven to earth. I personally found my voice first through teaching, then through singing. I am still finding my voice.  Moshe’s life begins in a similar way. He is born into danger. Zipporah, his mother keeps him hidden and safely for three months. When he is no longer able to be silenced, she trusts him to G8d, fate and the Nile. Now he can cry and win the heart of the Pharoah’s daughter..

In the land of Shushan, Persia, many years following was a beautiful Jewish girl named Haddassah. But when the kings men came to uncle Mordechai’s house looking for the most lovely to be queen, she was silenced, not to reveal her true identity, and given a new name, Esther, from the same root as nistar, hidden.  She hasn’t been paying attention to the happenings of the kingdom when she is told of Mordie in sack cloth and ashes – send him some new clothes. She wants to remain deaf and mute to trouble, hard to blame her, who wants trouble?!  Mordechai then delivers my favorite line of the whole Megillah

Chapter 4:6 “If you keep silent in this crisis, relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place, while you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows, perhaps you have risen royal position for just such a crisis.”

And our unlikely heroine is born. She does not fight hatred with fists, but with seduction and revelation.

What is it in our lives that we’d like to ignore, issues we’d rather not think about. And what is your position of influence, what can YOU do? Moshe’s heavy mouth was a sign of his complete entanglement in the people he served. Esther’s hiddenness, the secret of her success. Perhaps it is your deepest flaw or disability which can actually be your superpower.

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