Ha'azinu: Who Shall Listen?

This week’s parsha, parshat Ha’azinu, falls on Shabbat T’shuvah, the Shabbat between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Reading the parsha earlier in the week, I was so excited to think that I had finished the Torah, that everything had happened and I had completed a year of reading each parsha, and writing a drash on it. However, when I went to look at the Torah to look something up for Torah study, I was surprised! There is a whole extra parsha after this one. Needless to say, I was slightly disappointed. But alas, in all the shuffle of the High Holidays, something had to get confused and forgotten. This is a small thing and I’ll take it.

In thinking that this is the last parsha of the Torah, I was intrigued to find that it ends with Moses going up on the mountain and dying. God tells him to do like Aaron, go up the mountain and be gathered to his kin. Moses knows, and is reminded, that Moses broke faith with God and is therefore able to see the land from a distance, but not from up close. In my world, that was how the Torah ended. A rather apex-like ending, but an incomplete one (stay tuned for next week, where the parsha is actually the last parsha in the Torah and I get to experience my excitement all over again!).

Instead, we have the continuation of an epic story. God told us last week to write down God’s words in a poem, as a reminder to the people. The words should serve as a witness to what will happen to the people if they go astray. In that song, we get four parts. The first past is God establishing God’s loving relationship with the people. The second sees the people rejecting God in favor of other deities, with other peoples. Next, God decides to decimate the people. Lastly, God relents, recognizing that if God did destroy the people Israel, other people’s might feel they were the cause of that destruction. God is humanized. In this poem, meant to guide us away from joining to the deities of other people, God in fact becomes more benevolent. Yes, God’s anger is apparent and fear is instilled in one’s heart from reading this epic poem. But God is showed as being caring, as considerate, as aware of the place of the people in the greater scheme of things. In short, God still cares about us, about the Jewish people.

As we find ourselves in the Days of Awe, the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we are made aware of our place in history. We are made aware that God can choose to not care, to destroy us anyway (if God destroyed us, we wouldn’t be around to worry about who destroyed us!). We know that God’s hand is powerful and that God is our rock. Yet we see that God, like a benevolent parent, sees that we will slip up, that we will go astray, that we will miss the mark, whether in large or small ways. But God will not leave us completely. God will not abandon us to walk on our own, nor will God completely forget about us as God’s people.

A midrash on the parsha reflects God’s attitude.

The Holy Blessed One at times appears, and at times does not appear;
at times hears, and at times does not want to hear;
at times responds, and at times does not respond;
at times may be addressed, and at times may not be addressed;
at times may be found, and at times may not be found;
at times is near, and at times is not near.(Midrash Tanhuma, Ha’azinu 4)

I would like to argue that God is, at this time, at God’s most apparent, most able to listen and respond, most patient and ready to be addressed, most present and most near. At this time, may we discover a way to demonstrate to God that we appreciate God’s presence in our lives, and find ways to come closer to God, to not warrant the harsh punishment or decree that God does discuss in this parsha. “God avenges the blood of God’s servants,” our Torah writes in Deuteronomy 32:43. Let us warrant that God avenge us, let us warrant that God listens to us.

Shabbat shalom!

We remember

A reading before Kaddish Yatom (Mourners Kaddish)

They are gone, but their memories live on.
We remember, we cannot blink them away.
Today we see your souls, your light a blaze.
Encouraged, we move forward.
Whether 8 months or 80 years, we remember.
We acknowledge your life and bless your presence.

Monday, 19 November 2012; 14:06

Judgement day

 

Reading Vidui, or the confession part of the service, I was struck by the words in the Machzor, the prayer book. The following is the poem that emerged from that:

Each year we repent

Ask forgiveness, apologizing, lamenting, beseeching—

The potential we are bestowed with, that inwardly we possess, we did not fulfill.

The אחריות, responsibility, to our fellow man is still incombent upon us

And yet, we’ve reached this day

The most holy day, שבת שבתון, the day of judgement.

Here we stand,

Before you—

            Incomplete

            Unwhole

            Unsure.

But here.

We are indeed present,

accepting you,

            struggling with the past

looking with open heart to the new year.

Hear our prayer;

Accept our prayer

Listen.

We are ready.

This year, we will try to do better.

This year, we will not stand idly by our neighbor.

This year we will deal honestly.

This year, we will act in love justly.

I have done wrong, an entire alphabet of woes,

But so too have I done right.

Help me, guide me, encourage me, O God.

Today I stand before you in judgement

Prepared for repentence

Prepared for understanding,

Knowing I have failed.

But in that, I know I can do better.

I WILL do better

On this Yom Kippur day

I pledge to do better—

            on myself

            to my friend

            my neighbor

            my community

            to my world

סלח לנו, מחל לנו, כפר לנו.

Forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement.

Amen.

HU C U as I AM!

We were asked to write reflections about the beginning of our time here at HUC and what that means to us. Mine is more of a prescriptive poem, about what is happening now/may occur in the future than what has happened or what I feel about coming here. Just some thoughts on a previously black and white screen.
Watch, wander, wonder.
Listen, learn, love.
Explore, Expand, Expound (upon)
Feel, fear, free.
We  step into each day,
Putting on our faces, our masks of safety
Walking into the doors of HUC,
Watching others to see their sure step.
Listening to voices, droning on about nought
Waiting to feel at home and at peace.
Exploring each option, weighing pro and con
Accepting that time is the surest scale.
Israeli connections, Hebrew tests too,
Learning abounds here, whatever you do!
Nothing is solid, not written in stone,
Forge your own path, wander alone!
Or even with someone else close by your side,
The love of this place already in your eye.
Fear and trepidation, our natural foes,
They keep us in check (along with the crows).
However you see them, don't let them overwhelm,
Look forward with wonder, you're there at the helm.
So therefore keep going,
Watch the sun set today.
You've started a journey
A process away.
Not far will you go,
But to glimpse a distant shore.
That place is your future,
Holding all that and more.
Grab hold of your heart,
Make sure it beats strong.
As surely you'll need it,
The days may grow long.
Adventure awaits us,
T'fillot, tiyulim and more,
Today holds the promise,
Of tomorrow and those days of yore.