On Potential - Inspiration of Abraham and Sarah

Potential

October 2015/5776

While I’m not a scientist, I’ve found that basic lessons in science can open the door to truths in spiritual world as much as in the physical world.  The law of conservation of energy, Occam’s razor, Newton’s laws of motion…

What do a stretched bow and arrow, a stretched rubber band, a wrecking ball held by its vehicle…

They all have potential energy – energy stored up in the object by virtue of its position, by virtue of gravity.

As we begin to tell the stories of Abraham and Sarah, their children, grandchildren, and our beginnings, we look at our early ancestors as full of potential.  Only souls full of potential energy can hear God’s voice and react by setting out on a long journey toward an unknown, unfamiliar Land.

What contributes to this potential energy for them?  What pushes them out of comfort and into the wilderness?

The most famous of the stories comes from Rabbi Chiya (Midrash Rabbah):

Terah was an idol manufacturer who once went away and left Abraham in charge of the store. A man walked in and wished to buy an idol. Abraham asked him how old he was and the man responded “fifty years old.” Abraham then said, “You are fifty years old and would worship a day old statue!” At this point the man left ashamed.

Later, a woman walked in to the store and wanted to make an offering to the idols. So Abraham took a stick, smashed the idols and placed the stick in the hand of the largest idol. When Terah returned he asked Abraham what happened to all the idols. Abraham told him that a woman came in to make an offering to the idols. Then the idols argued about which one should eat the offering first. Then the largest idol took the stick and smashed the other idols.

Terah responded by saying that they are only statues and have no knowledge. Whereupon Abraham responded by saying that you deny their knowledge, yet you worship them! At which point Terah took Abraham to Nimrod.

Nimrod proclaims to Abraham that we should worship fire. Abraham responds that water puts out fire. So Nimrod declares they worship water. Abraham responds that clouds hold water. So Nimrod declares they worship clouds. Abraham responds that wind pushes clouds. So Nimrod declares they worship wind. Abraham responds that people withstand wind.

Nimrod becomes angry with Abraham and declares that Abraham shall be cast into the fire, and if Abraham is correct that there is a real God, that God will save him. Then Abraham is cast into the fire and is saved by God.

Here we find Abraham as an idol breaker, someone who is already sensitive and on a search for truth – this story is one way of showing potential energy for hearing and responding to God.

Potential energy also is a tool for injustice as well, as we see incitement continuing in Israel over the past week, more attacks, more suffering, a terror and fear campaign that is tragically ongoing – and unlike Abraham and Sarah, common ancestors for us, for Christians, and Muslims,

Abraham and Sarah who teach a message of inclusion, welcoming, of a journey together, incitement from pulpits and Hamas leaders has fanned the flames of hatred and violence.

For us, the message of Shabbat could not be more different, and transformative for the good; for us, we have this gift of Shabbat when we can imagine the world as it could be, when we let go of externals – knowledge, position, status and the like -  that define us, when we have the opportunity to dream about who we could be…on Shabbat we’re reminded that we’re all children of God, all priests of a holy nation, all students of Torah…

This is also potential energy – as our ancestors teach us, Shabbat is a taste of the world to come, ma’ayn olam ha’ba, in the words of Nahmanides, the Ramban.  A time when, over and over, we pray for shalom, not necessarily the absence of conflict, rather, the presence of wholeness despite conflict – respect, communication, as well as strength and force when necessary to protect and extend life.

Many have written the recent violence suggests that the enemies of Israel harbor and preach hatred for Israel, for the State that came into being in ’48, not only for the results of the war in ’67.  And we counter back in the spirit of Shabbat as a moment of potential and vision that the Jewish people and the State of Israel have a role to play in this world, a role to play that is significant – with respect to Shabbat, to remind us that we are finite, fragile, and need renewal, recharging to be fully present to ourselves, our loved ones, and to God.  The State of Israel, to teach that to live in an area that has been the epicenter of conflict and conquest for millennia does not doom the people of the region necessarily to dictatorship and suffering, that if deserts can bloom and people can live and raise their families, whether Arab or Jewish, then this just might be possible in other parts of the same region.

What will we do with our potential energy this Shabbat?  How will we envision our lives for the next week – imagine them in the most realized and fulfilled vision of what we hope they could be.