TAZRIA METZORA YOM HA'ATZ'MAUT 5778
TRULY AN OLD NEW LAND
April 19, 2018
4 Iyar 5778 (Israel at 70)
Theodore Herzl in his 1902 book Alteneuland (Old New Land) heralded the return to Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel) was a return to the ancestral Jewish homeland where a new and modern nation would arise. New archaeological finds consistently reinforce Israel as an Alteneuland and the ancient Jewish connection to this strip of land on Mediterranean coast.
A visit to Beersheba establishes a physical connection to Abraham and Sarah. A day at to the Citadel of David links us to the great warrior king who our tradition celebrates as composer and singer of prayers and songs. Returning to the Kotel (Western Wall) is to trod on the path upon which our ancestors walked on their way to this holy site to worship God.
Israel is an amazing integration of past and present. It is an amalgam of the old and the new, of the timeless and the timely, of tradition and modernity. Great institutions of Torah exist side by side with outstanding modern universities.
Come Friday afternoon I literally sense the Shabbat Queen slowly descending into our midst. Traffic thins out as final preparations are made to celebrate Shabbat or to simply acknowledge our historic day of rest. Here Saturday, our Shabbat, is the official day of rest.
Tradition and modernity guide us as we end our way through life. Israel aptly named the Start Up Nation has brought us great innovations like WAZE, the amazing app that enables us to find our way as we travel about our cities and countryside worldwide. Tradition, on the other hand, is the moral compass that guides on the path to a moral and ethical life.
Israel puts its technological capacity in play as a first responder following a natural calamity in any part of the globe. At such time it employs the techniques and tools that are the products of modernity, but the motivation to extend a helping hand has its roots in our tradition that mandates taking action to help others in their time of need.
Israel's embrace of the old and the new is a paradigm of the challenge faced by every traditional Jew striving to make his/her way in our modern and ever-changing world. For me Israel is a model as I embrace the new while at the same time holding tight to the old. It's a tension that defines the drama of my life.
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From the holy city of Jerusalem, my best wishes for a Shabbat Shalom u'Mevorach, a Shabbat of peace and blessing.
* I look forward to my visit to the Congregation in two weeks. It's always a delight to see old friends and to meet new members of our wonderful Synagogue.
SHEMINI 6778
SILENCE OR TEARS?
April 12, 2018
27 Nisan 5778
For seven days Aaron and his four sons remain in isolation to be prepared by Moses to serve as the kohanim (priests) in the newly built mishkan (desert tabernacle.) On the eighth day Aaron was to be invested as the Kohen Gadol (High Priest), the recognized and accepted spiritual leader of the Israelites. It was to be a memorable day of celebration.
Yet in the blink of an eye Aaron's two eldest sons, Nadab and Abihu, were struck dead because they had brought "a strange fire before the Lord." The Torah is unclear as to the nature of this fire and why this act led to their immediate and fiery deaths.
The Midrash seeks to fill in this blank. According to one view, the sons were guilty of hubris. They were openly impatient to replace Moses and Aaron and assume their roles. A second view contends that they began to assume their duties while inebriated.
Aaron responded to this Indescribable tragedy with silence and total acceptance of God's will–a model of true faith. It is Job's initial response following the series of tragedies that stripped him of his wealth, bereaved him of his children and plagued him with boils and skin eruptions. Rather than curse God, Job said: "The Lord has given the Lord has taken blessed be His name."
Thus the Talmud exhorts us to bless God when afflicted with tragedy as we do for the happiness in our lives. To this day, the historic Jewish response to death is to rend a garment (or to cut a black ribbon) and to bless God as the Dayan ha'emet (the righteous Judge.) As people of faith we acknowledge that all is in God's hands and accept with silence even the most indescribable tragedies that darken our lives.
While Job's initial response is consistent with this traditional view, the book, however, continues with Job's defiant insistence that he has been unjustly treated. His three friends who have come to only console him but also to urge him to accept his fate. Despite his reputation as a righteous and compassionate man, he undoubtedly had sinned before God. It was incomprehensible to them that God would toy with Job or anyone. We are punished for our sins.
A defiant Job, on the other hand, insists that he has done nothing to justify being subjected to such divine wrath. In his friend's eyes, however, Job's adamant innocence is clear evidence of his moral and spiritual failure.
Whose response is more normal, Job's or his friends? Are we truly expected to remain silent, not to question, not to protest, not to moan when experiencing a loved one's death or the onset of a catastrophic illness? These sadly are all too common in our lives, in our families and in our communities.
God ultimately corroborates Job's righteousness and responds to his painful protest of why me? He points out even as we cannot fully understand all the patterns in the physical world, we cannot presume to comprehend the secrets in the moral universe.
God well understands and accepts that tears, wailing, questioning are normal human responses. The challenge posed by faith is not to remain silent, but rather to have the inner fortitude to rise before the congregation to recite the majestic words of the Kaddish that magnifies and sanctifies God in this world that He has created.
Was Aaron's silence evidence of unquestionable acceptance of God's decree? Perhaps. Was the silence due to shock that rendered him speechless? Perhaps.
There is a view that the root of the Hebrew word vayidom commonly translated as silence is damam (דמם). The root of vayidom can also be traced to damah (דמע') (tears), and thus when suddenly confronted with the lifeless bodies of his two sons Aaron wept. It was the natural and understandable human response to the pain of loss.
It is no small matter of faith to rise with tears in one's eye and recite Yitgadal, v'yitkadash sh'mai rabbah…
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From the holy city of Jerusalem, my best wishes for a Shabbat Shalom u'Mevorach, a Shabbat of peace and blessing.
Rabbi Arnold M. Goodman
