Holiness Begins with Change

Holiness Begins with Change

December 27, 2013

Parashat Vaera

Rabbi Mark H. Levin, DHL

There’s a reason the Torah is also called The Five Books of Moses, even though Moses is not even mentioned in the first of the books:  Moses is the preeminent figure in Jewish history.  If God redeems the Jewish people, Moses is God’s agent.

But Moses lived a long life, not all of it either exciting or even extraordinary.  Certainly at the beginning, being born and adopted in the midst of persecution and the murder by drowning of boy babies, the danger of the moment created great anxiety and a spellbinding story. The trajectory for Moses’ life was set by that transition of birth and adoption. But then, 40 years followed of which we know nothing. During those years assumedly Moses lived the daily life of the son of Pharaoh in the lap of luxury.  But then there came a change. 

Perhaps Moses could no longer suffer watching the inhumanity foisted upon his people.  Perhaps his sense of justice overcame his station in life. For whatever reason, Moses slew the Egyptian taskmaster and fled for his life into the wilderness.  Here again, a great change story, as Moses completely alters everything about his daily expectations. No longer the child of riches and power, he becomes a lowly shepherd, and for 40 years, according to tradition, lives quietly and without complaint, herding his sheep at the foot of the Mount of God, Mt. Sinai.  But without this change, Moses never could have achieved holiness.

Again, we know nearly nothing of the intervening years’ events.  Moses married into a priestly, Midianite family, and assumedly was introduced to the God of the mountain by his wife’s father, Jethro. And that’s about all we know, until again another 40 years pass.  Moses confronts God in the burning bush, and once again he dramatically changes his life.  But the burning bush proves nothing without Moses’ actions after.

Now, of course, Moses assumes the prophetic role of redeemer.  He even leaves behind his wife and family in order to bring God’s people out of Egypt.  Once again we know a great amount about the change, and almost nothing of the events of the next 40 years of leading the people in the wilderness. 

What conclusions might we discover from this week’s Torah portion, and indeed, the entire story of the Five Books of Moses?

We discover holiness embedded in moments of change, followed by long years of the new normal as the holiness in change develops and grows.

Most of our lives, things are headed in a definite direction, like a car headed down a superhighway for a set destination.  It’s what Woody Allen meant when he said that 90% of living is just showing up.  Sometimes such long stretches, like driving across Kansas on I-70, are actually boring in retrospect, because we always know what’s coming. There are no highs, no lows, and no surprises.  Time, the greatest commodity, slides away like a ribbon of highway in the rear view mirror. Indeed, we sometimes even forget where we have been.

But there are moments of change filled with excitement, filled with possibility, and often underscored with the dread of change.  Moses left Egypt to face the barren wilderness. I always remember that scene in the movie The Ten Commandments when Charlton Heston struggles to cross the Sinai on foot, and arrives half dead and bedraggled at Zippora’s well.  Dread must have overcome him facing that barren parched stretch of Sinai’s strewn desert. Yet, despite the very human dread of change and the prospect of a desert, Moses did not look back. He plunged into the future to discover the as yet unknown holy moments that would take him to greater unimagined heights.  Not only would Moses find invigorating challenge, but he would be offered choices to build freedom and encounters with God for himself and his people. At the moment of crisis, he had no way to know this. He just had to have faith in 3 things:

His background and training, his decision making ability, and the God who would lead him forward.

Our Rabbis say, Maaseh avot siman l’banim:  the actions of the ancestors are a sign for their descendants. 

Congregation Beth Torah is reaching an inflection point, a moment to grow forward and meet a challenge, or choose to moan and return to Egypt.  Do we have the training, the ability, and the God who will lead us into future holiness?

I am proud of the dynamic Beth Torah we have built. We are truly a community of believers, building a holy community.  It’s not perfect. We don’t respond to one another perfectly every single time.  But you know what:  strangers visit our worship, and members of other Jewish congregations, and tell me without being solicited, “This is a very special place. I am not sure what it is. It seems so human and warm. I instantly felt welcomed here, as soon as I came through the doors.”

People tell me all of the time, “Rabbi, you have built a wonderful place.” They are wrong.  And they are wrong for this reason: I didn’t build it, I just get the credit.  I set out to build it for sure. I thought it would be my obligation and responsibility to build it. But I soon found out building a community is an impossible dream.   Every person in this community decides every single time he or she comes through those doors, or even when he or she makes the decision to attend worship, “I want to be a part of that community.”  The Board makes decisions that determine our direction. Volunteers construct programs. But most important: the atmosphere of Beth Torah, that which makes us the community we are, is all of us together.  If any one of us is not here, we feel the difference in some small way. And to prove the point:  think of how wonderful our 25^th anniversary celebration was with a full sanctuary of people who just came to celebrate Shabbat together. No special program at the worship. Just Beth Torah members celebrating Shabbat together.  That is Beth Torah.  Not a rabbi; not a music director; not an Executive Director, not an educator.  Together we are the community we need.

We truly have engaging worship here.  There are worship leaders, that’s for sure. This congregation has had a series of music leaders:  David Harris, Gene Naron, Rabbi Steve Burnstein, Amy Pierron, Cantor Barbara Finn, and for the last decade, Linda Sweenie.  And after July 1^st there will still be somewhat different worship leaders.  I’ll be here sometimes.  Rabbi Reice and the new interim Rabbi, Rabbi Shapiro, whom you will adore, will be here most of the time.  And Linda Sweenie will go on to another pulpit as the much beloved Cantor Finn did before her. But the community of warm and welcoming Jewish souls will remain the same because that is YOU.  The community will still support one another because you support one another.  God is shaking things up as God shook up Moses because he needed to learn something in order to fulfill God’s mission for him in life.  The community will still sit together, visit with one another, and share our lives.  We are not here to listen. We come to pray and be a community to celebrate our lives together.  That community is the reason and justification for our existence.  There will be beautiful and meaningful worship, I assure you.  But community is the essence, and you make all of the difference.

We have the background: together we have built an historic community over 25 years. 

We have the ability: to reach out to one another, to demonstrate concern for one another as, to offer a warm and welcoming atmosphere with great worship.

And what about the God who leads us forward?  Is God with us?  Well, here’s what I believe.  As God shook up Moses’ life at birth; 40 years later on leaving Pharaoh’s house opposing injustice; and 40 years after that to return to liberate his people, so God shakes up our lives to compel us to examine who we are really, to get off the highway, and redirect our lives toward God.  We don’t yet know the lesson in this change.  But I do know this:  I am not this community.  Linda Sweenie’s music is not this community.  Jack Feldman is not this community.  You and your connections to one another: these are Beth Torah.  Your worship; your attendance; your participation: that is Beth Torah.  Beth Torah took one year and replaced me.  We love Linda Sweenie and now we will replace her. But God is present in our lives right here and right now telling us:  you make this community happen; you be this community; you pave the road into the future.  It is for the holiness of this moment that we have built these 25 years, to actually BE the community we claim to be.  Together we have the background; together we have the skills; and God is with us as God has been with you these 25 years. Now together let us make this holy community happen.

When I read in today's NYTimes what people have suffered in the current health care environment, I know how very fortunate I have been. How does a person develop empathy for people we don't know and whose depth of pain we cannot adequately imagine? How do we feel empathy for the Syrian refugees if we have never been refugees, or are we only capable of sympathy? I am not even sure what to do about Syria. Does one help an enemy who has fallen on hard times? Israel is quietly providing medical care for some injured. It's a very complex moral and emotional question. Where are you on the Syrian question?

I notice in many people an inability to confess they were wrong or to see the right in the other person's position. The world is not made up of black and white. It is shades of gray. I believe it is important to stake out your position clearly so that people will know on what principles you base your conclusions, and to hold firm to your convictions. But without the ability to appreciate the forthright spirit and correct points held by the opposition, there can be little hope for arriving at healthy coexistence. I fear failure to see the flaws in our own position and the strengths in the opposition reflects a personal inability to admit fault, as though to err is to diminish ourselves. The religious perspective, as I understand it, is that we are all flawed and therefore we sin. What's more: the position of wholeness is expected to be the flawed self, that to adhere to absolute correctness is an indication of failure to perceive correctly, because few if any truths are absolute. But through self-examination we find our way back to God and truth. It is said of Rabbi Meir, a major second century mind, that he could take both sides in a debate with equal accuracy. And indeed, talmudic learning assumes that we distinguish the truth in both sides of the argument. 
The correlate is that when we fail to find truth in the position of a worthy opponent, or find that we experience negative emotions about admitting that the other may be partially correct, then we must examine our stubborn disregard for the image of God in the other, and the hubris of inability to admit the variety of truths -- even those that offend or damage us.

I received the following email:
Dear Mark,
I am your Menorah. Actually, I see that I am not exactly your only menorah, since you have a few. But I am the large, silver one. I’d like to think I speak for all of us, waiting patiently here on your shelf all year long, looking out over the living room, minding our own business and saying nothing. Now comes our week to shine, and I thought I’d let you know a few of my thoughts.
Wednesday night you are going to lift me off of this display shelf, where I sit and observe your comings and goings all year long, and give me a place of honor in the window of your home. You’ll put one candle in a candle slot the first night, along with the shamash; and each night you will light another candle until all eight candles will be lit a week from Wednesday night. I know how much you enjoy that, Mark, all the menorah candles flickering happily at once. I like it too; it fills me with pride. You might say “it’s the reason I exist.” But I want you to know, I am not just some beautifully crafted hunk of silver sitting around all year collecting wax and dust. No, I exist for a higher purpose, and I thought you might want to know my thoughts on this holiday that you will stretch out over eight nights and days.
You know, Mark, you’re going to start with just one candle Wednesday night, and end eight nights later with all eight candles blazing. But it wasn’t always that way. No, no. Everyone didn’t think about it the same way: adding one candle each night. Two thousand years ago there was another school of thought, from a teacher named Shammai, whose students lit 8 lights the first night, 7 the second night, until they lit just one light on the eighth night. It’s as though Shammai were saying, “We have 8 nights remaining; we have 7 nights remaining; we have 6 nights remaining…,” until the last night. But Hillel viewed it differently. With each light he was counting the miracle. First night, the cruse of oil is burning as they expected. Then the second night, “Whoa, we thought it was going to go out after the first day. What’s going on here?” Then another miracle, a third day, a second miracle. Then a fourth day. And each day, each candle adds to the miracles, until finally the eighth night, and a full week of miracles, and the oil still burns brightly. Each day we feel better and better, our spirit soars, our spirituality grows. Each day we add more and more light. It’s almost like when Moses watched the burning bush, and a miracle happened. Although the presence of God burned in the bush, the bush remained the same, unconsumed. Moses saw the fire of God’s presence contained in a bush. We witness God’s presence with each new miracle, and we add a candle.
I know; I know what you’re thinking. Someone made up that story of the 8 days of miracles. Maybe it didn’t happen at all. So what miracle are we remembering in the candles? Maybe there’s no miracle at all? Well, Mark, that’s why I am telling you this story. That’s why I am so proud: Because the miracle is everyone who lights a menorah. You, and everyone with you, are the miracle!
King Pharaoh of Egypt tried to put God out of the world by killing all the boys when they were born. But he failed, and Moses brought us out of Egypt. King Antiochus of Syria tried to put God out of the world by ending Shabbat and worship and Torah study. But the Maccabees revolted? And why? Because both Pharaoh in Egypt and Antiochus in Syria were saying, “You can’t be you!!!” They were not just denying our right to worship in our own way. They demanded that we be just like them, that we deny who we are. Antiochus and Pharaoh said, “Live a lie. You cannot study Torah. You cannot keep Shabbat. Do not embrace God and do not be real. Just live the way I live and everything will be ok.” But we knew better. We knew everything would not be ok. Many times kings have told us, “Just be like me.” But you know what? Pharaoh, Antiochus, Vespasian, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in Spain, Czar Alexander II in Russia, Stalin in the Soviet Union, Hitler in Germany – they are all dead and gone. But the miracle is: YOU ARE THE CANDLE. YOU ARE LIT AS A SIGN OF GOD’S MIRACLES AND PRESENCE. AND YOU ARE STILL HERE AFTER 3,000 YEARS!”
So, Mark, Rabbi, that’s why I am writing you this letter: because I may be a symbol of the miracle long ago, but you – and everyone celebrating with you tonight – you are the miracle. The Maccabees refused to worship like Syrians; and you, in Overland Park, Kansas, you light your candles and insist on being Jewish. Other religions, even some people in government, may insist that they worship in God’s way; and your way is wrong. But you take me off the shelf; you dust me off; you light candles in every Jewish home all over the country, all over the world, and you recite blessings: Praised are You, Lord our God, King of the universe, who did miracles for our ancestors at that time in this season of the year.” This is who we are: we are the people who see God in our lives, the people who have survived to teach “Love you neighbor as yourself,” and “Shema Yisrael,” to the entire world. They tried to kill you; and failing they tried to make laws against you. But you, like God’s seed in the world, blossomed in each new spring. I am your menorah. But you are my light!

Parashat VaYetzei

Rabbi Mark H. Levin, DHL

November 8, 2013

“Jacob left Beer Sheva and set out for Haran.  Alighting upon a certain place, he passed the night there, for the sun was setting…”

So begins one of the most famous stories in the entirety of the Torah: the episode of Jacob’s ladder. 

The parashah continues, “He dreamed, and lo – a ladder was set on the ground, with its top reaching to heaven, and lo—angels of God going up and coming down on it.  And lo – Adonai stood upon it…”

God blesses Jacob, and when Jacob awakens he marvels, “Truly, Adonai is in this place and I did not know it.”  He was awestruck and said, “How awesome is this place!  This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gateway to heaven.”  The emotion of awe often is the human reaction to the overwhelming and beautiful.

The Rabbis have debated the meaning of the words translated as “He alighted upon this place,” for at least 2,000 years.  They are special because the place is termed “the gateway to heaven,” and “the house of God.” 

In the classic interpretation, Jacob arrives in Haran, and realizes that he bypassed a place where his fathers, Abraham and Isaac, prayed.  He returns immediately to that place, transported immediately and magically by God.  He transcends time and space, arriving at Beth El, the house of God, which the Rabbi interpret not as the city of Beth El, today’s Ramallah, but Mt. Moriah where Abraham nearly sacrificed Isaac and the site of the First and Second Temples. In other words: “this is the house of God” refers to an Axis Mundi, a world axis, the place around which the entire world revolves, which for Jews is clearly the Temple Mount.  In Jewish lore the Foundation Stone of the World lies deep beneath the Temple Mount, and the location of the Holy of Holies in the Temple was always, from the creation of the world, the holiest place in the entire world. There God’s presence is manifest in no uncertain terms.  No wonder Jacob was upset at having bypassed it on the way to Haran. You would be, too.  God causes the sun to set early, and Jacob dreams this epiphany of God’s presence.

But Reform Jews reject the rabbinic idea that different places in the world possess different levels of holiness, with the Land of Israel possessing 9 out of 10 parts.  Yet, many of us have had holy experiences in different places, and people will tell me that they can return to a particular place and that will evoke the holy experience they had there years earlier. 

Reform Jews focus for holiness more on the idea that, as Psalm 24 says, “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and they who live therein.” So if the entire world is equally holy, what was Jacob’s revelation, “Behold, the Lord was in this place and I did not know it?”

Jacob suddenly experienced deep inside a revelation: the holiness of the place.  He had placed himself in the position to experience something entirely new, by praying where his ancestors prayed.  But it transformed his reality, “Behold, God is in this place and I did not know it.”  Suddenly the experience is no longer about Jacob, now it’s about God.  In other words, the holiness Jacob experienced occurred because Jacob altered his orientation to the world, feeling God’s presence in a place.  It’s not simply the place that changed, it’s Jacob.

Last week many people in the congregation had just such a change in their lives.  With the experience of writing in the Torah, many people said that they experienced something wonderful that they could not quite put into words.  As Jacob put it, “How awesome is this place and I did not know it; this is none other than the gateway to heaven and the House of God.”  We can put ourselves into an experience in which we discover levels to reality.  The world is not as we had previously imagined it to be. But an experience uncovers a new awareness.  God is in this place means, “I experienced God in this place because I opened myself up to the experience of God, even if it took me by surprise.”

I can’t describe someone else’s experience; I can only listen. But I heard wonder in many voices: the wonder and awe of a holy encounter that lifted individuals to a higher level of existence, a more meaningful level, something they had not anticipated and could not explain.  In other words, the experience of the holy is often without content.  It’s filled with meaning, and the hint of purpose; but often without an explicit direction of where to go from that moment, other than to know that life has been forever altered by the encounter.

Jacob had the same thing occur. Having recognized, “How awesome is this place, and this is none other than the gateway to heaven,” he attempted, as we do, to fill the moment with content, perhaps to hang onto or perpetuate the experience.  Jacob makes a vow to the God he had just encountered, “If God is with me and watches over me on this path that I am taking and give me bread to eat and clothes to wear, and if I return safely to my father’s house, then will Adonai be my God, and this stone that I have set up will be a house of God. And of all that you give me, I will dedicate a tenth to you.” 

In other words, Jacob interprets the divine encounter, his moment of epiphany, as God’s concern for his well-being, but then sets out to test it. If God will provide for him, then will Jacob be loyal to God.  Encountering God, Jacob interprets the experience very much as we would, in terms of our own lives, time and place.  If God is concerned with Jacob, then Jacob will pay attention. Gods in the Middle East were considered to be powerful if they positively affected the lives of believers. If they delivered rain, crops and health at the right time, then they were powerful and deserving of worship.  Jacob will not be Yisrael, one who struggles with God and triumphs, for another 20 years. He will not be spiritually prepared to lead until he has suffered more and discovered what the presence of God in his life actually means.  It’s not to be narrowly defined.  The reality of God teaches us that existence is not as we have known it to be up until that time. We’d been wrong in interpreting our own lives.  Rather, God breaking through in time and place, this divine incursion into his life, is a symptom of God’s presence, not defining of God’s presence. And so it is with all of us today.  Having felt God’s presence at a given time and place, in the Torah writing for instance, we should become aware that the experience of God’s presence is constantly available, and can change our perspective on life.

Let me give you an example:  I am reading Michael Pollan’s book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma.  In it Pollan argues, convincingly I believe, that all animals and the earth that supports us have evolved naturally into a complex whole that fits together perfectly.  We are part of a natural, highly sophisticated system that fits together perfectly, and do much better in nature when we realize our harmony and live accordingly.  He demonstrates, convincingly I believe, that industrial agriculture, the feeds lots in western Kansas for instance, are poisoning us.  Pollan is not arguing religiously, but I am reading it religiously. What do I mean? God created the world as a perfect and closed system, and the world has evolved as God has meant it to be. Therefore, realizing God’s presence in all things demonstrates that living in harmony with this world, in terms of everything I do and everything I eat, maximizes not only my health but also my encounters with God and every person around me.  Each morsel of food and each moment becomes more satisfying and enlightening.  The one moment encounter with God is not to be exploited for all its earthly rewards.  It is to be seen as a sign, an indication of how the world actually works so that we can alter the entirety of our lives accordingly.

God is in this place, and we did not know it.  It’s perhaps true of every time and every place.  The question is not God’s presence, but our awareness of that presence.  May our search be rewarded with a renewed satisfaction of life in both place and time.

I have decided that marketing determines more people's thinking than reason and logic. We are no longer a society based on rational thought, if ever we were. Now we are so used to being marketed that we don't know how to discriminate between marketing and fact based decision making. Ted Cruz is not espousing a political philosophy. He is marketing himself to his followers. That's demagoguery.

We used to say, "You're only as well as your worst off child." But what happens when you have 200 to 300 children? You form a community of concern for the welfare of every child and their families. You reach out and extend a caring hand. You thank educators and all those whose job and personality it is to take care of our children. You withdraw from this culture of narcissism that corrodes and erodes our common humanity, the image of God within each and every person. And you hug your children, thanking God for the gifts of health we are granted everyday. "May God who blessed our ancestors, bless this child (insert name) and grand her/him full healing. May the Holy One preserve him/her from all harm. Praised are you, O Lord, Who heals the sick of God's people."

This weekend we celebrate 25 years of Beth Torah. Anniversaries mean renewal. On the first night of Passover Jews renew the exodus; we free ourselves once again from our personal slavery.  On our birthdays we renew our commitments to our core values: at least I do.  What might this anniversary of Beth Torah mean?
In the last 25 years communication has changed more than at any time since the invention of the printing press. I don't know that anyone can currently appreciate precisely where we are headed while the revolution continues.  I only know that Jewish core values: God's unity, gemilut hasadim (acts of loving-kindness), all humans being created in God's image, and love your neighbor as yourself will remain the same. But the methods of communicating them will change dramatically.
My 20 month old granddaughter uses an iPad. She will compare all activities with the games on her iPad.  What will we offer her that will be nearly as entertaining and involve her so completely that she seeks out the Jewish community?
This I know: in an age in which allegiances to old social groupings are totally fluid, in which people change religions for convenience, in which many people are not interested in spending 10,000 hours to learn Jewish core texts: Hebrew, Aramaic, siddur (prayer book) Tanakh (Bible), midrash, Talmud, Bible commentators like Rashi, it's going to be very difficult to transmit the depth of spiritual understanding contained in Judaism. It's not an easy religion.  It's a way of life, and it does not compete well with instantaneous cultures (think Monday night football games, the Super Bowl, even high production synagogue High Holy Day worship live-streamed.)
What will become of the Jewish community?  It will depend, it seems to me, on our voluntary allegiances to one another, on our reaching out to help those in our congregation who are in need, and are willing to give back.  The core of the synagogue, the synagogue community, will need to exemplify what community can mean in a world of anonymity.
You see: that's the enemy, and that's the plague for which Judaism is the antidote:  Anonymity.  The religious community that recognizes, validates and reaches out to help individuals in their difficult times in life: that is the community that will survive.  That is what I hope Beth Torah is, and what it will develop increasingly in the future.
In this vision of community there is continuity.  We did not stay in touch with our members by tweeting, by email, or by website and Facebook. But we started out as a community of people excited to rely upon one another.  The intimacy among members, the spirit and energy that enlivened all of us, that can be renewed in each generation.
We pass the baton to a new generation, conversant in the tools of the new world.  Moses did the same when the people entered Canaan. So it is in every generation.  Now is the time for renewal; and watching a new leadership grasp the mantle of leadership to cross the Jordan to a renewed Promised Land.

I am taking the unusual step of posting the outline of my sermon tonight in advance.
Here goes:

Torah Writing Project Launch Shabbat

October 4, 2013

Rabbi Mark H. Levin, DHL

 I don’t know exactly what Sinai was. 

·      Orthodox Jews contend it was a one-time event in history:  God revealed the Torah to Moses.

·      I believe Sinai is a metaphor for a process:

o   When the people of Israel, the Jewish people, focus on God for divine purposes, we tend to discern God’s will for us in history.

o   The result of that we call commandments, mitzvot.

o   In other words:  commandments are the action results of the interaction between God and the Jewish people.

One of the books we received as a result of Sinai, the encounter between the Jewish people and God, is the Book of Deuteronomy.

·      Since the second century rabbis have agreed that there are 613 of the these action statements, these mitzvot, in the Torah

·      The very last one in order, from the 31^st chapter of the fifth book of the Torah, is this:  once every 7 years, you have to read this book out loud where all of the people are assembled to hear.

In other words:  these encounters with God, and their results, are special to us: they are holy or sacred.  It’s not that they constitute our obligation. They are our responsibility. But that’s like you have a responsibility to your  birthday, or the day someone special died; or to pursue a challenge you relish in your life.

·      Mitzvot are embedded in, originate from, the Jewish people’s encounter with the sacred.

·      Let’s take Shabbat:  the Jewish people were the first to realize that if we are to bring the sacred into our lives, we must have certain techniques and devote time to it.

o   So on Shabbat we pray, study, rest and enjoy sacred pleasures:  all of them gifts from God to raise our material bodies to a higher, more spiritual level.

o   Embedded in each mitzvah, each commandment, lies a spiritual spark that we can harvest with the right motivation and intention. 

·      Our ancestors knew this, and that’s the answer to the question of why or how we are here today:  we’re here because they used this commandments, these embodiments of the experience of the holy, to bring holy actions into the world and into their lives.

o   So, as we are discovering today, it’s important what you eat, because that’s what you become physical.

o   Similarly, what you take in spiritually is important, because that’s what you become spiritually.

§  If you live among truth sayers all of the time, you live in a world of trust

§  If you live among liars all of the time: you live with constant doubt and trepidation.

§  Your spiritual values determine much of your life.

§  They result from our encounters with the holy.

So what did we Jews do?

o   We took those encounters with God, and we strung them together in a story, and we put that story of the spiritual encounters with God in a book that we call the Torah.

o   It’s not only our spiritual history:  when we unpack those embodiments of spiritual encounter in our lives: when we ask how God wants us to live in this world: how to encounter others, how to determine what we eat, whether to be cruel in order to gain politically or in prestige, then we again bring that holiness of the encounter with God embedded in the mitzvah into existence again in our own lives.

o   When we tell the story of the exodus at the Passover seder, we can really experience our emergence from slavery, but then we can also live as the Torah commands: with the lessons of slavery as part of our experience, even though we, ourselves, we never actually physically slaves.

So this book of Torah, containing our narrative history with its embodied mitzvot, the sparks of our encounters with God, can bring holiness into our lives because each experience records that encounter with holiness.

o   And so we call the book sacred.

o   And when we write those words, when we observe the final, the last commandment in the Torah: we are doing what our ancestors did thousands of years ago:  encountering the divine in our lives.

o   We must pause when we write in Torah, and make a particular story, or a mitzvah, something embodying holiness for us, a part of our personal lives.

o   As a result, we find a small portion of God enters our lives.

o   It’s not possible to take all of God into our lives.

o   We must encounter God where we find God.

o   But then we pause, consider, and make the experience part of the body and soul that is us.  We become Torah.

We cannot be at Sinai, but we can BE Sinai.

o   When we inscribe Torah

o   When we find the divine spark at the center of a mitzvah, we bring the Jewish people’s past encounter with God into the present and make it part of our own lives.

o   We stand at the foot of Sinai; we write Torah with Moses; we discover the eternality of God, and ongoing revelation of God’s mitzvot to the Jewish people.

When one of my daughters was 2 years old we dreaded taking her places because of the following incident.  Visiting friends in Boston, we stopped and strolled the Hancock Tower area downtown. Having rented a 2-door car, we stored the baby-stroller in the trunk and the kid in the child seat in the rear, having to push forward the front seat to manipulate her body into the back while placing her gently in the baby seat. You get the idea.  There's considerable twisting of the body required, which, being in our mid-thirties didn't phase us at all.
Until, the universally adored, model beautiful, blond child inexplicably determined she wasn't going anywhere.  She preferred her current location, regardless of the plans of the majority. On the grass lawn surrounding the Hancock Insurance Tower the little darling commenced to scream bloody murder, globular tears cascading down her seemingly innocent cheeks, while holding her 3-foot body so rigidly straight she could have been suspended plank-like between the backs of two metal folding chairs.
Around this time there had been several nationally publicized kidnappings of toddlers, and people were on the lookout for marauders snatching cute, Gerber-Baby children.  Consider my dilemma: attempt to cram said screaming child headfirst through the driver's side of a two door car, door ajar to hinge squeaking lengths, pushing the driver's seat forward with my extended butt while attempting to force her rigor mortis like body into a bent position, or remonstrate with a two year old.  I caved.  Sitting on the grass, ignoring the stares of passers-by, a grown man attempted futilely to rationally argue with this two-year old terrorist that she needed to stop screaming and obey daddy, all the while hearing in my ear a fantasy cop vociferously arguing, "If you're her father why is she so blond?"
And you ask why I am recounting this?  It is because the T-Party has decided to shut down the United States government in their self-absorbed, anti-democratic, economically destructive attempt to portray their fury at the Affordable Care Act, and the story somehow just came back to me.

I have always worried about my intellectual acumen. But I figure I couldn't sound dumber than Ted Cruz, and he gets lots of press.  And isn't that the goal?  I couldn't be a bigger liar than ....  Well, I'll leave that out.  But you get the idea.  Clearly facts no longer matter, and I figure the time must be ripe for me to express my opinions: the grapes of truth have ripened on the vine of self-adulation.  So I am ready for prime-time.  After all, who better to engage in truthiness than one who occupies a pulpit!
Standing on the brink of retirement as I do, seems to me I should get a running start on wasting time, mine and others'. I don't know that I can ever achieve the demagogue status Cruz aspires to.  I figure it's not just inborn talent. It must require practice.  So if I'm going to expand my influence beyond 1, I'd better start honing my skills.  I'm getting out my whetting stone and sharpening my obfuscations. Now there's a mixed metaphor; but that's exactly what I mean! No one any longer cares about clarity of thought or language use.  So the world is finally ready for me.
So here it goes: my launch.  Criticize away, who cares. As long as you read what I write.  I'll stand 21 hours on the floor of the Senate reciting inanities if the press will just cover every exhalation. As for impact: Let us not forget that sage Ecclesiastes' opening gambit, "Nothing matters anyway," or something close to that; I forget precisely; but you get the idea.