Parshat Shoftim: Sword of Damocles - Sinai Over Our Heads

Shoftim 2011/5771

Sword of Damocles

Rabbi Neil A. Tow©

A tyrant named Dionysius was the ruler of a city called Syracuse in southern Italy in the 4^th century BCE.  He had people in his court whose job it was to inflate his ego, flatterers.  Damocles was one of these hired flatterers, and one day after Damocles praised his patron for his great wealth and luxury, Dionysius said to him, “If you think I’m fortunate, why don’t you try out my life?”

They arranged everything for Damocles to live the life of his patron and he was having a wonderful time until he noticed that a sharp sword was hovering over his head, a sword hanging from the ceiling by a horse hair.  His patron said, ‘this is what the life of a ruler was really like.’

Damocles was eager to return to the way things were, to his poorer life, but a safer life.(Thanks to N.S. Gill for explaining the passage from Cicero that tells this story.)

In Jewish tradition, the closest parallels I can think of are a source from the Mishnah (Chagigah 1,8), “The laws concerning Shabbat, feast-offerings, and misuse of holy property are like mountains hanging by a hair.”  And another, from the Talmud Shabbat 88a, “’They stood be’tachtit ha’har’”, the Rabbis explain this expression (Exodus 19:17) to mean, they stood literally tachat ha’har, under the mountain, and God held the mountain over their heads saying, in a very forceful way, that they really had no choice but to accept the Torah.

The sword of Damocles over his head, the mountain hanging by a hair, the mountain hanging above the heads of the people.

These are powerful and disturbing images that share in common a reality that responsibility and leadership are not easy for us to handle and may fill us with uncertainty and fear.  Responsibility and leadership are risks that make us vulnerable.

Shoftim ve’shotrim titen lecha bechol she’arecha, the parsha opens for this week opens, ‘Judge and officials you shall appoint them in all your cities.’   

To be a judge or an official of the court is to have the sword and the mountain hanging over our heads, as we wrestle with ideas and issues that are difficult to understand and apply to changing circumstances.

And so we find that taking on responsibility and leadership and implementing them are heavy tasks for anyone.  In the end, as much as the Torah teaches that the people must appoint leaders, we may not want to take those leadership roles due to the way they impact our lives and put us in difficult positions of supervision, decision making, and authority.

How many prophets tried to avoid the responsibility of being a prophet from Moses onwards?

It is essential that we remember the challenges of responsibility, the challenges of leadership and that there are moments when we can and should say ‘no’ when our judgment tells us that it is not the right moment for us to step forward. 

And there are other moments when it is time for us to step forward confidently whether the situation and path ahead is clear or whether there are obstacles in the path ahead.

The sword of Damocles and Mount Sinai hanging above our heads are as much about being humble and sensitive as they are about fear.

My prayer is that all our positions of responsibility, all our leadership will take us to new and meaningful places in our lives and give us the opportunity to step back and appreciate the challenge and blessing of leadership, and to celebrate and respect the power of leadership to bring order, meaning, and peace to others.  Shabbat Shalom.

Parshat Re'eh: Making Choices

A choice?

Rabbi Neil A. Tow©2011

Living in an Arab Spring world, I feel more than ever thankful that we have different types of choices we can make about our lives, about who represents us, in this country.

We live in a place where there are many choices open to us about how to use our time, what we buy and do not buy, the kind of life we want to make for ourselves.

And at the same time, I struggle with the idea of choice.  To have too much latitude to choose can sometimes be a curse instead of a blessing.  To stress that a wide array of choices is best can cause delay instead of advancement. 

From a spiritual point of view, the conflict between choice and varying levels of determination receives its best expression in the statement of Rabbi Akiva in the Mishnah, “Everything is foreseen, but freewill is granted.”

The question of choices and determination is the opening message of Parshat Re’eh.  “Take notice,”God says, “I put before you today blessing and curse.”  The blessing – if you follow God’s mitzvoth, the curse – if you do not.  The language of Devarim makes the issue black and white.  There appears here to be no gray area.

And we find ourselves asking difficult questions about choices today.  Many are questioning vaccinations for children and the processing of milk.  School districts ask questions about school uniforms versus free choice of what to wear.  The recession forces choices about our consumption and habits. 

Perhaps sometimes we’d prefer to receive specific advice and personal guidance through our struggles and questions.  Sometimes we might prefer to leave our options open and seek multiple opinions as we often do in our health care.

The voice of our tradition comes through as we contemplate our choices, or as we think about the limits we place on choices for ourselves or for others, or the limits that we experience – the decisions we are able to make even about limits are themselves choices!

What guides us in our lives is the litmus test of whether our choices reflect the best wisdom of our tradition as it is refracted through the teachings of the Torah, the later Rabbis, and the discussions and debates that we have within our community up through to today.

Often we find that when limits are placed that they actually open up new choices and opportunities we may not have previously thought to exist. 

And then there are the times like the weather situation we face this weekend, a situation determined for us by forces outside our own control.  We have the opportunity to make choices even when nature seems to rally against us.  After the major storm hit Glen Rock last year, we formed an Emergency Preparedness group and we’re now mobilized and ready, in the event it is safe, to turn our synagogue into a temporary shelter during the storm.

My prayer is that we will weather the storm with minimal damage and inconvenience, and that in the wake of the storms, that we will feel a renewed sense of opportunity to make choices in our lives that will continue to bring meaning, holiness, and beauty.

Seek and Ye Might Find - Vaetchanan, Shabbat Nachamu 2011

Parshat Vaetchanan-
Shabbat Nachamu:  Seek and Ye Might Find

Rabbi Neil A. Tow©2011

People in Arab nations, in Egypt in Syria are searching for something.

Japanese who live in the area of the Fukushima plant are also searching.

Those suffering from deprivation in the Horn of Africa are looking.

We think, wonder, watch and search ourselves.

Is it always clear what we are searching for?  Can we always spell out what we lack, what we want, what we need, what can be done?  Is it ever possible to be realistic in our expectations and to be hopeful at the same time?

The Torah this week teaches us a lesson about searching.

“You will seek Ado—nai, Your God, from there and you will find, if indeed you reach out/ki tidreshenu with all your heart and all your soul.”(Deut. 4:29)

“From there” from wherever we are, in time, in space, physically, emotionally, wherever we may be.

From that place we look around us and we look to the future. 

The words of the parsha tell us we will find God from any place.  But what does it mean to find something that we cannot see our touch? 

Finding God might be a sense that we feel in rhythm with creation, one with our spirits and ourselves.  It might mean that we feel part of a community, a history.

But finding God is by no means an exact search with a programmed destination or result.

And we are searching at a time when we no longer have the Temple, the Temple that was destroyed 4 days ago in the Jewish calendar.  Seforno shares that the selection from our parsha reminds us that we will find God even though the Temple no longer stands, even though its holy vessels are long gone. 

Today on Shabbat Nachamu, Shabbat of comfort after mourning the destruction, ki tidreshenu/if we reach out, if we seek, we still may find.

But it is a comfort that comes at a price, as we find in the case of all those searchings, yearnings, and strivings that we feel.  The price is the faith that we must discover, the motor that will power us through that search and keep us on the path when events threaten to steer us off the path.

The search for help in this world, the search for hope and meaning, for security, for nourishment is neither definite nor assured even at a time when we what we can do seems to only be limited by what we can dream.

And so let us take the leap of faith that our selection from the parsha asks of us.  Let us dream together.  Let us dream that if we put our full heart and soul into anything that we may, we just might, contribute to this world in a way that will bring more light where there is darkness. 

And if we fail, if it comes to that, God will still be with us, for God accompanies us on every journey and is especially present when our whole heart and soul are engaged.

For each of us, today, tomorrow, what will our search be?  Whose journey will we be able to make easier and lighter? 

Representative Gabrielle Giffords visits the Capitol

On January 8, 2011 we watched in horror as emergency vehicles gathered around the Safeway in Tucson, Arizona after a shooting spree in which Representative Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head.  We mourned with those families who lost loved ones in that shooting, we praised the courage of Daniel Hernandez - the 20 year old intern who tried to staunch the bloodflow from Rep. Giffords and rode with her in the ambulance to the hospital, and we waited with hope for reports from Giffords' doctors about her recovery.

Last night, my wife called me to show me on the computer that Rep. Giffords returned to the Capitol to participate in a vote.  It was a moment of joy and thankfulness to witness her strength and presence as the other members applauded and recognized her with warm words.  Her own sense of thanksgiving was clear as I watched her mouth form the words "Thank You" over and over again.  Such (bipartisan) support for her return can only be good medicine as she continues her recovery.

Her return to the Capitol coincides with the 9 days before Tisha Be'Av/The Ninth of Av, the day that commemorates the great tragedies of Jewish history, primarily the destruction of the Jerusalem Temples.

As I watched Rep. Giffords re-enter the House chamber I could see in her a symbol of the way Jerusalem has been rebuilt within the modern State of Israel.  The New City radiates out from the Old City in wider and wider concentric circles of neighborhoods, businesses, synagogues, parks, museums, roads and so much more.  Even as we remember suffering, exile, death and destruction we marvel at the way that Jerusalem continues to grow as a city. 

The Rabbis taught us that among the causes of the destruction of the Temple was sinat chinam/terrible hatred amongst the people of Israel.  It is my prayer that the strength of spirit Rep. Giffords has showed in her recovery and return will help pull us all up out of the spiritual low that we have experienced with all the terrible natural disasters and tragedies over the past many months.  It is my prayer that now we might feel a reason to have new hope and a reason to spread goodness and kindness into this world.  With God's blessings, we will be together next Shabbat to hear the words of Isaiah, "Nachamu, nachamu ami..." "Take comfort, take comfort My people..." 

Repetition - a reflection/dvar Torah on Parshat Devarim

Repetition

Devarim 2011/5771

©Rabbi Neil A. Tow

Deuteronomy – a name second only to Leviticus in its strange sound to today’s ear, means “The Repetition of the Law,” a second Torah.

And so we will hear over the next many weeks a repetition of what has come before.  A retelling of some keys points in the journey from Egypt toward the Promised Land, the 10 commandments later on. 

We’ll hear time and again about how we must root out idol worship from our midst and focus our attention on the central sanctuary in Jerusalem, how we must love God.

As Ramban-Nachmanides points out though in his introduction to the book, not everything we find in it is a repeat.  There are new mitzvoth mentioned here that were not previously recorded. 

Ramban also notes that we, the people, unlike the priests of old, require repetition in order to learn.  “pa’am achar pa’am” time after time we must hear and think about the meaning and practice of God’s teachings. 

Ramban underlines an important point when we think about repetition.  Repetition does not necessarily mean that what happens a second time will happen exactly the same as the first, nor that we will think about it in the same way. 

We also must be aware of how we respond to repetition.  Children can say the same thing, watch the same video, read the same book, wear the same clothing over and over again.  As adults, we may grow out of these patterns and look for more novelty.  We hear many messages over the course of a week about the ‘new thing’ as we have for so long.

I have noticed, though, the value of returning to words ideas, images, pieces of art, many times over.  Each time the message sinks deeper.  Each time the picture grows a bit clearer, especially if we engage with a teacher who helps us to see more effectively with each review. 

Return, repetition, is a mindset, a decision to re-engage in a serious way on many occasions with the goal of clarification and deeper connection.

The review of Deuteronomy then is not a sentimental journey backwards in time, nor a desperate reprise of past events with the hope of a last parting impression.  It is a moment when the review of past events and ideas will extend to a new generation that did not itself stand at Sinai.

And that reality extends through until today.  We may have been at Sinai in spirit, but we ourselves did not see the mountain on fire with God’s Presence.  Hearing the words again is as important as it ever was.

This week we will observe Tisha Be’Av, the ninth of Av, a holiday of repetition, repetition of the destruction of Jewish life and community over the centuries in different places on the globe—especially the Temples in Jerusalem.  We lament these losses and the suffering that they brought, and we re-enter those difficult worlds of experience to learn what we can from them, to search for meaning in the darkness once again. 

Our history is alive, a living, breathing phenomenon that must be dusted off, reviewed, replenished, and renewed through every generation.  Let us rededicate ourselves to cultivating an approach of openness and willingness to engage and re-engage.  Let us challenge ourselves to read and re-read the news and process it with others.  Let us find in the prayers of our tradition, in the words of the Torah the messages that carried our ancestors and carry us as we examine them through our own eyes-the messages of the past are ours too, may we hear them and hear them again, each day, each season, and one year into the next.