Prayer-as-Protest, in this Hard Week

As we approach this Shabbat, the world feels crushingly broken to me.

Here in the U.S., each new day this week -- with its accompanying executive orders, confirmations of unfit appointees, slashing of departments and firings of government employees, and direct attacks on minority groups and on diversity itself -- has pulled our society further and further from America's vision of democratic and just ideals. (It's all happening so terrifyingly fast, too!) Separately, for Jews everywhere, yesterday was a particularly gut-wrenching day -- even on top of almost a year and a half of a gut-wrenching baseline -- as two red-headed babes were returned to Israel in coffins by their Hamas murderers.* (*Yes, I know it was even worse than that, as Shiri Bibas's body was not returned and she is still considered missing; Hamas's sadism and cruelty is breathtaking. And yes, I also believe that our care absolutely extends to all, including the thousands upon thousands of Palestinian children killed by Israel's zealous bombings during this last year of war. Still, this is where my own focus is landing today... I just can't stop thinking about Ariel and Kfir.)

This week, our Torah portion, Parashat Mishpatim, contains a huge range of laws: laws that prohibit striking a parent, homicide, and kidnapping; laws about assault and damage to property; laws of business ethics, judicial integrity, and the fair treatment of an enemy; laws mandating care for the disadvantaged, prohibiting oppressing the stranger, instituting the Sabbatical year and holidays, and more. 

Stepping back and looking at this Torah portion in total, one key takeaway from Mishpatim is that laws matter. Having a system of laws, rooted in a moral framework, is necessary in order to build the kind of society we would all want to live in. Laws help us regulate society, protect people's rights, ensure stability and equality, and resolve conflicts. But laws work only when they are applied fairly and equitably, and when they can be enforced. Although the situations here and there are different ("l'havdil," as they say in Hebrew!), this week I've felt like whatever direction I look, it's easy to spot almost cartoonishly-evil supervillains, who operate with cruelty and utterly outside of the framework of law.

What do we do when lawlessness and chaos replace law and order, when the world around us simply doesn't work as we know it should? We protest, of course! Sometimes this means taking to the streets, and sometimes this means resisting through other means. In addition, one of the tools we Jews possess in our spiritual toolbox is prayer-as-protest!

Perhaps the best example of prayer-as-protest is Mourner's Kaddish. Growing up, I remember learning that Mourner's Kaddish was a prayer of praise to God, recited by a mourner as an act of faith: that even at a time of loss, the right thing to do was to praise God. In more recent years, I have learned this prayer anew, from my friend and colleague Rabbi Elie Kaunfer (of Hadar). His reading of Mourner's Kaddish flips this prevailing interpretation on its head; he re-defines the prayer as "a prompt that reminds God of the brokenness of the world." 

Kaunfer grounds his re-reading of Kaddish in two specific lines of the prayer (and if you're interested in reading about this in more detail, I invite you to click here to read his whole article entitled "The Mourner's Kaddish is Misunderstood"). The opening line "Yitgadal ve'yitkadash shemei rabbah," he argues, must be read in light of its biblical reference text (Ezekiel 38:23). He writes: "In a world of death and mourning, it is clear that God is not fully holy, great, or even king. This prayer -- put in the mouth of the mourner -- begs God to speed the day when God is, in fact, great and holy. But it acknowledges that we aren't there yet."

Second, he points to the congregational response of "yehei shmei rabbah...," noting that Kaddish is one of the few prayers in which God isn't actually mentioned or addressed (only "God's name"). Kaunfer argues: "This is a prayer that is acting out the reality we live in: a world in which God's name is diminished. And while we want God's name to be great and blessed, and ask for that in this prayer, we still live in a world where that hasn't happened fully. Exhibit A? The death we are mourning, the death that brought us to this prayer."

Re-read in this way, Mourner's Kaddish becomes a radical prayer: one that laments the state of the world and reminds us of God's absence, a prayer of woe and grief, for both the mourner and for God. As Kaunfer concludes:

"The Kaddish is not a stoic praise of an unfeeling God who for reasons we can't know let our loved ones die without remorse. Rather it is a plea for a better world in which God is more fully holy, and the presence of God more completely experienced. We are not living in that world, and the Kaddish knows it; but it offers us a path to imagine a world beyond our current one. And critically, God is in league with us in begging for that world to come soon."

As I said above, this week, the world feels so very broken, so dis-ordered. A world of lawlessness and evil is a world in which God's name is diminished; all is not as it should be.

I hope many of you can join us tonight for a Kabbalat Shabbat service -- led by Rabbi Jay and with musical accompaniment by Kohenet Traci Marx. I will be there too, and together, we can join in prayer-as-protest,lamenting the injustice of the world and reciting the words of Mourner's Kaddish together for the victims of such cruelty.

Wishing all of us a Shabbat that offers some degree of shalom (peace) and respite from the chaos and cruelty. At hard times, especially, I'm grateful for the company of this community of fellow-travelers. 

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

A Desert of Harshness and Hope

Here we are again. I’m writing as Tu Bishvat approaches, and you are no doubt reading it hot on the heels of the holiday that acknowledges trees and the first blossoming towards spring. But when I say “here we are again,” you know what I mean - and it has nothing to do with the turn of the seasons. 

This time around everything feels heavier, harder, and hazier. To quote the wise and thoughtful Anne Lamott in a recent editorial, “I think we need and are taking a good, long rest. Along with half of America, I have been feeling doomed, exhausted and quiet. A few of us, approximately 75 million people, see the future as a desert of harshness. The new land looks inhospitable.”

A long time ago, in a desert where past, present, and future met on a modest mountain peak called Sinai, a bedraggled and exhausted people received Torah for the first time. They heard the words of God, words that told them exactly how the world should be and what they needed to do to get there. And then, they panicked.

וַיַּרְא הָעָם וַיָּנֻעוּ וַיַּעַמְדוּ מֵרָחֹק 

The people saw, they wavered, and they stood off in the distance. (Exodus 20:15)

In the Talmud (Shabbat 88b), we learn two teachings from Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi that capture the intricate dynamics at play in these few short words. 

And Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: From each and every utterance (i.e. one of the Ten Commandments) that emerged from the mouth of the Holy Blessed One, the souls of the Jewish people left [their bodies], as it is stated: “My soul departed when he spoke” (Song of Songs 5:6). And since their souls left [their bodies] from the first utterance, how did they receive the second utterance? God rained the dew upon them that, in the future, will revive the dead, and God revived them, as it is stated: “You, God, poured down a bountiful rain; when Your inheritance was weary You sustained it” (Psalms 68:10). 

And Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: With each and every utterance that emerged from the mouth of the Holy One, Blessed be He, the Jewish people retreated in fear twelve miles, and the ministering angels walked them [back toward the mountain], as it is stated: “The hosts of angels will scatter [yidodun]” (Psalms 68:13). Do not read the word as yidodun, meaning scattered; rather, read it asyedadun, they walked them.

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi is trying to capture something about the inner life of the people through two different yet equally striking images. 

First, when the people hear God speak, they die and then God has to resurrect them with special dew in order to give them the next law, which upon hearing it the people die again, God drips dew on them again, and so on. 

And second, that the people don’t just “waver, tremble, falter”, but actually move to “stand off in the distance” every time God speaks. Slightly better than dying every time, but still exhausting. Luckily in this second image, angels arrive to meet the people where they are at, and gently - ever so gently - move them back towards the holy mountain and their sacred task. Rashi adds that the angels “assisted them to come close a little at a time, as they were weak. This is like a [parent] who walks their child at the beginning of their walking.” 

Take a moment to just absorb these scenes. Imagine yourself as one character, then another: human, God, angel, Torah, Moses, parent, child, dew…

On any given day, some of us feel like the Israelites. Confronted with the enormity of what we should be doing, or simply overwhelmed by everything going on right now, our vital force feels like it has left for a while. We need to move back from the action. 

Some of us might feel the clarity of how things should be, and what we could be doing. Like God or Torah itself, we burn with moral purpose and urgency. If only enough people would listen and act together! Of course, burning with purpose and urgency might burn out friends and scorch would-be allies, so we need to balance passion with nourishment, adding in some dew-drops of relational nurture so we don’t live lonely at the top of the mountain.

Some of us might not have perfect moral clarity or strategic insight, but we do have love and patience like the angels. Our job is to connect to those who are overwhelmed, find the leaders who inspire us, and gently - ever so gently - move us all a bit closer to the action. 

And of course all of these roles exist within each one of us.

Anne Lamott adds to her previous grim assessment: “The new land looks inhospitable. But if we stay alert, we’ll notice that the stark desert is dotted with growing things. In the pitiless heat and scarcity, we also see shrubs and conviction. Lacking obvious flash and vigor might make it seem as if there is no resistance. But it is everywhere you look.”

Wishing you a Shabbat of angels, dew, rest, and resistance.

Rabbi Jay LeVine

Holding Up Moses's Hands!

This week, as I re-read Parashat Beshalach, the post-exodus twists and turns have particularly aroused my sympathy for the Israelites! As this Torah portion begins, the people of Israel have already endured hundreds of years of enslavement, lived through ten plagues, and survived an especially harrowing final night in Egypt. Now, they experience one new roller coaster after another: they are trapped by the sea, and then jubilant when they cross to the other side; they grumble with hunger, and then find themselves overwhelmed by an abundance of quail and manna; they thirst for water, until Moses is instructed to strike a rock to bring forth water. Each and every moment seems to throw up a new challenge for the people, so it's no wonder they feel tired and weary.

It's in the wake of these many trials and tribulations that our already-exhausted ancestors encounter their first true enemy in the wilderness. As Exodus 17:8 explains: "Amalek* came and fought with Israel at Rephidim." (*In case you aren't already familiar with the concept of Amalek, there's a more detailed account in Deuteronomy 25:17-19, as well as lots of midrashim and commentaries about this group. In a nutshell, the Amalekites are known for being evil and cruel: for ambushing the stragglers as the Israelites leave Egypt -- the elderly, children, and those who are weak and infirm -- and for attacking without cause. In the rabbinic imagination, the concept of Amalek is extended throughout history, to those people in every generation who revel in hatred and cruelty.)

Here's how the battle between the Israelites and the Amalekites is described, in Exodus 17:9-11:

"Moses said to Joshua, 'Pick some men for us, and go out and do battle with Amalek. Tomorrow I will station myself on the top of the hill, with the rod of God in my hand.' Joshua did as Moses told him and fought with Amalek, while Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. Then, whenever Moses held up his hand, Israel prevailed; but whenever he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed."

The Talmud takes up this last verse, expressing skepticism that Moses's hands could, in fact, have been the key to the Israelites' victory over the Amalekites. As Rosh Hashanah 29a says: 

"Did the hands of Moses make war (when he raised them) or break war (when he lowered them)? Rather, the verse comes to teach us that as long as the Jewish people turned their eyes upward and subjected their hearts to God in Heaven, they prevailed, but if not, they fell." 

In the Talmud's reading, Moses's hands become important symbolic indicators, pointing towards the heavens, keeping the Israelites focused on the true purpose of their battle. In addition, Moses's upraised arm feels like an intentional echo of other famous biblical hands and arms: God's "zeroah netuyah" / "outstretched arm" that we read about in our Passover seders (Deuteronomy 26:8), the Israelites' "yad ramah"/ "arm raised high" as they cross through the split sea (Exodus 14:18), and Moses's arm and rod lifted over the sea in order to split it (Exodus 14:21). Together, the Talmud's explanation of the hands-pointing-upwards image, coupled with these inter-textual references, all add dimension and depth to the role Moses's hands play in this dramatic battle scene.

That said, the Torah knows well that Moses is only human. Like the rest of the Israelites -- and like all of us -- his stamina is not infinite. As the text of our parasha goes on to explain in Exodus 17:12-13:

"But Moses's hands grew heavy; so they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it, while Aaron and Hur, one on each side, supported his hands; thus his hands remained steady until the sun set. And Joshua overwhelmed the people of Amalek with the sword."

It is this final image, from the final challenge of Parashat Beshalach, that feels most potent to me this week in particular. Even Moses -- God's chosen servant/leader -- cannot do it all! When his strength falters and his arms grow too heavy for him to hold them up any longer, Aaron and Hur gently move in to offer support. They bring him a rock to serve as his chair, and the two of them stand on each side of Moses, physically holding his hands aloft. 

The Hebrew phrase translated above as "his hands remained steady" reads: "vayehi yadav emunah ad bo ha-shamesh." Commentator Abraham Ibn Ezra (from 11th century Spain) zeroes in the language of emunah, which means "steady" or "faithful," in two ways in his explication of this verse. He writes: 1) Emunah is a noun meaning something lasting and permanent. 2) Emunah comes from the word omen (to nurse, or to bring up) as in Esther 2:7 ("and he [Mordecai] brought up Hadassah"), indicating that Aaron and Hur were like nursemaids who lifted up Moses's hands. Both of Ibn Ezra's explanations resonate for me. I love the idea that a steady-state can be achieved only when we humans bolster one another's strength and lift each other up, and I also relate to the care-giving impulse that motivates us to lean in and support one another.

As our entire community is well aware, we are living through an extraordinary chapter in American history. Over the last few weeks, every single day has been filled with new challenges, twists and turns, and even battles for the people of this country and for its soul. The volume and pace of all of this feels overwhelming. In addition, for most of us, what's transpiring also feels far beyond our control. 

Our parasha's final scene strikes me as precisely the Torah that we need this week! In the battles that are unfolding before our eyes, none of us have the power of a Moses figure to control the outcome, to completely stop what's happening through the positioning of our own hands. However, all of us can play the role of Aaron and Hur in some way, offering the kind of support that props up the hands of others and, in doing so, making a substantive difference.

There are a zillion possible examples of what this might look like, and I leave it to you to give some thought this week to what support role(s) you are best suited to play in this moment. How can you support and steady the hands of others? Where does your care-giving impulse lead you? How can you uphold your core values and maintain alignment?

I am keenly aware that within our own Kavana community, some people have come under attack more directly and feel more vulnerable than others. Here, I'm thinking specifically of those in our community who are trans, non-binary and queer; who are native Spanish speakers; who are federal employees; who work in global health or other fields that are being gutted. If there are ways that the Kavana staff and I can prop any of you up -- or support you in supporting one another -- please know that we are here for you! 

On a personal level, I'll share that as a rabbi, I was particularly taken with the Episcopal Bishop, Mariann Edgar Budde, who drew ire a couple weeks ago after addressing the president directly and calling on him to "have mercy" on immigrants. This week, I took the time to drop a note of appreciation in the mail to her... a small gesture of support for her raised hand.

In Kavana's politically-engaged community of voters, I've been inspired by the many of you who have been meeting with elected officials regularly, making calls to legislative offices to ask that specific actions be taken, and making additional calls to express gratitude when our elected officials stick their necks out in protest or dissent. Lots of you have also been reaching out to family members and friends in other locations, encouraging them to make harder calls to elected officials who don't share the same set of core values. Let's keep that up! 

The free press and the courts are both key to preserving freedom and democracy, and of course both have been under attack. Now is the time to subscribe to quality news publications and pay to get beyond the paywalls for the individual journalists whose research and voices you value. This is also a great time to donateto the organizations that are filing lawsuits you care about. These are examples of how even small acts of financial support can meaningfully bolster the hands of important power levers.

And finally, many of you are already volunteering in substantive ways or registering for trainings in preparation for stepping into new volunteer roles. Finding active ways to make a difference keeps our hands pointed upwards towards our highest collective values -- in support of immigrants and immigrant justice, reproductive rights, LGBTQ+ equality, environmental justice, combatting racism, human rights, and more. (And the more we do this work together, too, the more we can strengthen our own community ties and experience enjoyment along the way, while making a difference.)

Keep in mind that no one of us has to do it all -- after all, we are all merely human and we all have limited capacity (just like Moses!). Collectively, though, we have the power to keep each other's hands uplifted! As Amalek approaches, we Jews have the muscle memory to know how to circle around the most vulnerable members of our community, offering shields of protection. We know how to notice when someone else needs a chair or a support for their tired arm... and when we act on these observations, we can keep each other feeling supported and cared for. Together, we can remind ourselves who we are and what we believe in, aligning our values heaven-ward, even in the face of a broader society around us that's having a hard time remembering who we want to be.

Parashat Beshalach leads us through the sea, along our wilderness journey, and even into battle together. Along the way, may we each find tenderness and care, empowerment and strength, joy and song. Let's join forces and hold up Moses's hands, as we march onward together.

Shabbat shalom,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

The Tzaddik Next Door

Do you want to share a sheep with me? 

That is an actual question a great-great-great-etc.-ancestor might have asked a neighbor in Egypt, following the sage advice of Moses himself. 

The Israelites are on the verge of freedom, and the very first Pesach (Passover) is about to happen. As you may recall, one of the gorier elements of the story involves the Israelites smearing blood on the doorposts of their houses so that God’s angel of destruction doesn’t slaughter their firstborn along with those of the Egyptians. That smeared blood comes from a lamb, and one of the less-remembered elements of the story is that each household is supposed to eat the entire lamb that night (Exodus 12:10). If any is left over they have to burn it, but Moses tells the people not to waste their sheep:

“But if the household (bayit) is too small for a lamb, let it share one with a neighbor who dwells nearby (sh’cheno ha-karov), in proportion to the number of persons: you shall contribute for the lamb according to what each household will eat” (Exodus 12:4).

On one level, this is purely pragmatic. Too much sheep for one family? Split it between two families!

On another level, this ritual has a side purpose - to build community. On an eerie night and on the precipice of the unknown, having an excuse to connect through sharing food (and purpose) will help the Israelites be courageous and committed to each other. 

On yet a deeper level, the chassidic master Yisrael Hopstein, the Maggid of Kozhnitz, transforms the text into a spiritual lesson (I learned this from Rabbi Sam Feinsmith’s text study through the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. This is his translation):

“The [spiritual] intent of our verse: someone who is not on the level where they can draw holiness upon themselves, ‘Then he and his neighbor (sh’cheno)...shall take”, suggesting that we should attach ourselves (yitchaber) to the righteous. For [the word] neighbor (shachen) points to a righteous person, as it is written: “Better a close neighbor than a distant brother” (Proverbs 27:10). Here “neighbor” refers to the righteous individual because they are close to the blessed Creator and dwell (shochen) with God.”

There are two key ideas in the Maggid’s teaching. 

First, sometimes we find that our bayit, our inner house / temple, is not large enough for a full metaphorical sheep (that is, to draw down holiness, which in turn means something like spiritual mastery). In other words, we are still spiritual seekers, growing and aspiring but not yet quite there yet. 

This brings us to the Maggid’s second key idea. If you don’t have full mastery of your spiritual life, find someone closer to that goal than you. For the Maggid, that is the tzaddik (righteous person), who is like ashachen (neighbor, but also related to the word shechinah - Presence of God). They are fully at home with God and God’s presence dwells with them. 

The tzaddik in chassidic thought and practice is a charismatic spiritual leader through whom the average Jew can connect to the divine, and who is able to see the proper path of spiritual growth for each person they encounter. How comforting in scary times to turn to the wise ones, to join ourselves to them and let them point out the best way to move forward!

And yet, how easy it is for abuse to happen within a hierarchical religious model like this. Or at the very least, some surrendering of self-direction to one person holding the keys to wisdom.

In a community like Kavana, I interpret the Maggid’s teaching more democratically, in keeping with our cooperative spirit. He uses the word “yitchaber” to mean “join to the tzaddik”, but you could read it as “befriend”, to become a chaver. 

We come to community seeking spiritual friendship, where we can learn from those who have wisdom we don’t (yet) have, and offer our insights and gifts to others along the way as well. In this way we are all seekers, and we are all tzaddikim - perhaps of art or ethics, of community organizing or meditation, of pop culture or holding pain tenderly…

May you join yourselves in fruitful friendship to those you can learn from, and share generously from your own strengths and wisdom. 

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

The Antidote to Kotzer Ruach

It's a little hard for me to believe that a presidential inauguration took place only four days ago, as so much has happened since and the news cycle has been so unrelenting that it's felt like a month at least! In talking to many of you this week, I'm hearing a good deal of weariness and exhaustion already. I get it -- and I'm certainly feeling some of that too. This week's Torah portion may be helpful to us -- at least in the sense of offering us a cautionary tale -- and commentators on this week's parasha may have some insightful and relevant suggestions to offer.

Parashat Va'era opens with God speaking to Moses. This is a beautiful and compelling speech, in which God says (and here I paraphrase, but do feel free to check out the full text of Exodus 6:2-8): "I've had a long-standing relationship with your ancestors and established a covenant with them. Now I have heard the moaning of the Israelites in bondage, and I will free you from slavery, redeem you, and bring you into the promised land."

This seems like a wonderful offer: God is paying attention to the suffering of the Israelites enslaved in Egypt, and is prepared to do something about it! Unfortunately, the verse that comes next takes the wind out of both God and Moses's sails. Exodus 6:9 reads: "But when Moses told this to the Israelites, they would not listen to him, because of their crushed spirit from cruel bondage."

The Israelites' "crushed spirit" -- in Hebrew, "kotzer ruach" -- is a tremendous problem! Not only does Moses need to convince Pharaoh to release his Israelite slaves, but he now also has the unenviable task of trying to convince the Israelites themselves to be willing to leave Egypt with him! From later in the Torah, we know that although Moses does eventually succeed in leading the Israelites out, their "challenged spirit" will remain with them, so much so that -- according to midrashic interpretation -- a majority of Israelites ultimately choose to stay in Egypt. Among those who do leave to pursue freedom in the wilderness, the Torah's Book of Numbers chronicles their constant complaints, their lack of gratitude, and even their nostalgia for the period of their enslavement back in Egypt. Kotzer ruach, in other words, not only represents a spirit that is crushed in the short-term, but also a state of being crushed that doesn't dissipate quickly! 

What exactly is kotzer ruach, though? Rashi explains this phrase in his comment on our verse, taking "ruach" in its literal sense, to mean "breath"; he writes: "If one is in anguish his breath comes in short gasps and he cannot draw long breaths." In his understanding, kotzer ruach is quite literally the inability to catch one's breath... which could imply extreme exhaustion and overwhelm, or perhaps a panic attack. Ibn Ezra deepens our understanding of the phrase by focusing on the fact that kotzer ruach renders it impossible for the Israelites to hearken and pay attention to Moses's words... in other words, when we are in this kind of perpetually panicked state, we lose our ability to take in information and react appropriately.

In today's parlance, we might translate the concept of kotzer ruach as a "lack of spiritual well-being" or even "despair." This week, I've read and heard a number of political analysts point out that driving people towards exhaustion and despair is a deliberate strategy of the new administration in DC: that by bombarding the American people with extreme executive orders and extremist appointees, terrifying hand gestures and insulting tweets, all at a frantic and unrelenting pace and volume, our country's new leaders are hoping that we will become overwhelmed and feel ourselves to be constrained, such that we do not resist. 

Fortunately, our tradition has been dealing with kotzer ruach for millenia, and we have much wisdom about how to combat and guard against it. Playing off of a commentary by the chassidic master Sefat Emet, for example, contemporary Torah scholar Rabbi Erin Leib Smokler writes about this same verse:

Exile is not a place. It is a condition of being in which we are closed down, shut off, unable to receive, unable to activate our faculties of imagination. It is the state of being stuck, folded into ourselves, unable to open to the presence of another. To exit exile, then, we must render ourselves vulnerable, capacious, receptive. Redemption and revelation demand radical openness, an inner quieting so that we might hear the sounds of the others who call to us. Such an emptying, the Sefat Emet assures us, will return us to deep breath (neshima) and to our expansive souls (neshama). In humbly listening for the whispers of revelation, we simultaneously attune ourselves to intimations of the Divine.

Hers is a beautiful image: that in the face of constraint and stuck-ness, we must actively pursue radical openness, quiet, and deep breath. These, she associates with vulnerability, capaciousness, and receptivity... all signs of spiritual alive-ness and readiness.

Along similar lines, Rabbi Yael Shai -- in a Torah commentary for the Institute for Jewish Spirituality -- writes:

How do we emerge out of this place of extreme narrowness? One clue comes from Ramban. He argues that kotzer ruach indicates the Israelites’ impatience of spirit, “as a person whose soul is grieved on account of his misery and does not want to live another moment in his suffering even though he knows that he will be relieved later.” If impatience leads to despair, practicing patience and trust is our path out of it. In the Torah, God backs off of the Israelites. God does not demand anything of them at that moment. They can’t hear the declaration of commitment and love that God is promising, so God starts the process of offering signs and signals that slowly peel away the layers of doubt and closed-off-ness on the part of the Israelites. Trust slowly emerges in the place of doubt, melting the despair and hopelessness.

(Both of these beautiful commentaries on kotzer ruach, together with quite a few others, can be found on this Sefaria source-sheet on the topic, compiled by Rabbi Amy Bernstein.)

All of these sound to me, too, like precisely the aims of an intentional spiritual community like ours. This weekend, Kavana will be celebrating its 18th birthday! For the past 18 years -- a whole lifetime ("chai") -- this very special Jewish community has been cultivating space for radical openness and for inner quiet, for Shabbat prayer and meaningful dialogue, for the receptivity of revelation that comes through shared Torah study and the capaciousness of "both/and" thinking, for building patience and trust in a community context.

Over the coming years -- which are sure to continue to move at a frenzied pace -- Kavana will aim to be intentional, as always. At times, we'll be consciously trying to slow things down, in order to provide a space where those of us who are feeling short of breath and crushed in spirit can come to catch our breaths. We will aim to be a sanctuary of calm in the midst of the storm. And there will be other times, without a doubt, when we will need to be ready to stick together and spring into action quickly. In order to preserve the energy we will need for such times, we must cultivate regular spiritual practices to help guard against the kind of cumulative overwhelm that is kotzer ruach.

This Shabbat also happens to be the one on which Jewish people everywhere will announce the coming of the new moon of Shevat (which begins next Thursday). Shevat -- the month that contains the holiday of Tu BiShevat -- hints that renewal is on the way and spring is just around the corner. Already, our days are already getting longer (in fact, last night was the last pre-5pm sunset we here in Seattle will see for many many months -- hurray!). It's helpful to have this reminder of hope as we move into what's sure to be a challenging slog of a next chapter for our country.

And so, on this Shabbat of Parashat Va'era, I call on all of us recommit to the spiritual community we've already been building together over the past 18 years... the one that has the capacity to serve as an antidote to kotzer ruach, to weariness, despair, and crushed spirits. I have no illusions that the coming days, weeks, months and years will be simple to navigate, but I do believe that together, we have the capacity to lift each other up. Together, we can prevail against the constrained spirit that plagued our ancestors. Slow and intentional spiritual practices -- deep breaths, openness and listening, song and quiet, the joy of community and our ability to mourn together -- will give us the fuel we need to remain in our real-world struggles for the long haul. Together, we can buoy one another and take turns accelerating and resting to prevent burn-out and embitterment. Together, there are many ways we can join together to advance that which is good and block that which is hateful, to protect the most vulnerable and mitigate damage to our society. 

Parashat Va'era promises that someday, opportunities will arise for us to move forward out of the constraints of our modern-day mitzrayim, and it cautions against succumbing to the crushed spirit and despair of kotzer ruach. Now is precisely the time for us to invest in strengthening our spirits to ensure that when that day comes, we will be ready to move forward! In this moment, we need spiritual community more than ever.

Shabbat Shalom, 
Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum 

Simple Lessons

The book of Shemot (Exodus) begins the story proper of the Jewish people whose roots were traced in Bereshit (Genesis). And immediately, we are thrust into a realm of strange inclinations. The enslaved Israelites seem to resist redemption at every step; the supposed hero, Moses, keeps rejecting the call to leadership; and the obvious antagonist, Pharaoh, is ultimately maneuvered into that role by God’s own will. The first lesson to learn is that there are no simple lessons here! Perhaps the second lesson is that - if we are to see ourselves in these characters - we can recognize our own swirl of capacities and resistances, freedoms and limitations. 

My heart aches this week for all those impacted by the fires in southern California. And as I write, there is hope but not full confidence that a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas will be in place by Sunday. A new presidential administration will be in place by the start of next week. How do we act? How do we hope? How best to engage with this world of sweetness and sorrow? How do we wisely engage our capacities and resistances? There are no simple lessons here. But let’s turn to a significant moment in Moses’s story for a few suggestions…

Moses is out shepherding when he notices the burning bush. This act of noticing somehow merits God commissioning him to lead the Israelites to freedom. “Moses said: I must turn (asura) to look at this marvelous sight; why doesn’t the bush burn up?” (Exodus 3:3)

Ibn Ezra (12th century) wonders about the verb asura, to turn. It usually appears with the preposition “from” and means to turn aside and distancefrom something, or it appears with the preposition “to” and naturally means toturn towards something. Here it has neither preposition, and so Ibn Ezra gifts us a grammar lesson, suggesting that both are implied. “Moses wanted to turn aside from where he was and to then draw near to the bush.” In other words, what Moses does right is lean in (one midrash says he merely turned his neck to see the bush better). That small gesture of attention and engagement is enough to change the fate of an entire people. 

Kli Yakar (16th century) takes exactly the opposite approach. “The matter of turning is to distance oneself from that place because the eye can better grasp it from a distance. Go and learn from the light of the sun, that as long as you get too close to it you can’t see it, but when the sun is in the east or in the west (sunrise and sunset), everyone looks at it from a great distance. So too the light of this bush. Moses couldn’t look at it or comprehend what it was because of how great the light was.”

For Kli Yakar, then, what Moses does right is get a critical distance so he can understand the bigger picture. This is a necessary attribute of wise leadership.

Midrash Shemot Rabbah adds a third ingredient: “Rabbi Yitzchak said: What is “that he had turned [sar] to see?” The Holy One of Blessing said: This one is sorrowful and upset [sar veza’ef] over seeing Israel’s suffering in Egypt; therefore, he is suitable to be their shepherd.”

What makes Moses the right leader is that he empathizes with his people. 

May each of us lean on one or more of these practices as we move through the weeks ahead: 

• to get a little closer and pay attention to what might be overlooked; 

• to step back and get a bigger perspective; 

• and to allow ourselves to be moved by suffering. 

May all of these practices support the work of liberation and the pursuit of justice and peace.

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

Remaining Steadfast in the Winds of Change

I can't sit down to write this week without starting from what's happening in L.A. County. The scale of destruction there is so vast that it's hard to comprehend. Friends and family members there have shared that it feels like being in a war zone or inside a dystopian hell-scape; worst of all, the danger is not over yet. I am praying for the safety of everyone there, for the well-being and success of firefighters and emergency personnel, and for the homes and businesses still standing to be spared. 

The wildfires that have blazed out of control this week are an awful and stark reminder of the raw power of nature, and that as human beings, we are a part of it, but not at all in control of it. Although the images out of Pacific Palisades, Pasadena and more may feel shocking, the truth is that these particular fires aren't unprecedented in their size and scale -- only in that they have torn through urban areas where so many human structures stand in their way. But, watching these fires from afar absolutely pushes us to carefully consider what we value most (what would you grab if you had only a few minutes to leave your home forever?), how we can show up for other human beings in the wake of such large-scale catastrophe and destruction, and how we are to move through life given its precariousness. These are questions of ultimate purpose... always relevant, but felt most palpably in the wake of crisis and destabilization.

This week's Torah portion, Parashat Vayechi, is the final portion of the Book of Genesis. In it, we find the death-bed scenes for both our patriarch Jacob and his son Joseph. While this is a very different context from the Southern California fires, this story, too, sets life and death in relief with one another, raising fundamental questions about how people should aspire to live lives of ethics and meaning. 

Like the wildfires this week, Parashat Vayechi especially forces engagement with the question of what it means to live in a world characterized by instability. In Vayechi, circumstances beyond human control have resulted in the whole family now residing in Egypt. Steadfastness emerges quickly as a key theme and an answer to this question, as we can see from the opening verses:

"Jacob lived seventeen years in the land of Egypt, so that the span of Jacob's life came to one hundred and forty-seven years. And when the time approached for Israel to die, he summoned his son Joseph and said to him, 'Do me this favor, place your hand under my thigh as a pledge of your steadfast loyalty: please do not bury me in Egypt. When I lie down with my fathers, take me up from Egypt and bury me in their burial place.' He replied, 'I will do as you have spoken.' And he said, 'Swear to me.' And he swore to him. Then Israel bowed at the head of the bed." (Gen. 47:28-31)

The Hebrew words I've bolded above and translated as "steadfast loyalty" are "chesed ve'emet." Some of us might recognize this phrase from the list of the "13 Attributes" that we chant on holidays ("Adonai, adonai, El rachum v'chanun..."); human beings can endeavor to embody these Godly qualities through our actions. "Chesed ve'emet," in particular, pairs "chesed" -- meaning kindness, compassion or loyalty -- with "emet" -- truth, faithfulness, constancy. Together, they add up to steadfastness, a positive quality that can be relied upon to remain steady over time.

As I read through the parasha this week with these big questions in mind, I noticed that steadfastness comes up again in the scene where Jacob offers words of blessing to each of his children. Online, I found a beautiful Dvar Torah by Rabbi Devin Maimon Villarreal that draws attention to the commentary of Isaac Lindo Mocatta, "one of the great voices of England's Sephardic community in the 19th century." Mocatta notes that as Jacob speaks to his firstborn, Reuben, he declares him to be "unstable as water" (see Gen. 49:4), but to Joseph, Jacob states: "Archers bitterly assailed him; They shot at him and harried him. Yet his bow stayed taut, and his arms were made firm by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob" (Gen. 49:23-24). Mocatta explains: "Free to choose, let us take example from Joseph and warning from Reuben; let us be courageous and earnest in good... ever firm as strong whereby we may secure the approval of our conscience..."

Rabbi Villarreal draws out Mocatta's lesson and builds on it, writing:

"I’d like to focus on something that might escape our attention: Mocatta’s understanding of Jacob’s archer as a symbol of steadfastness in purpose. Mocatta calls to our mind how an archer behaves, taking into consideration the wind, the landscape, light and distance, all of which are constantly changing. The archer adjusts in response, but their focus on the target does not waiver. This analogy makes a claim about change and steadfastness. Some would argue that the way to maintain steadfastness is to force the world back into some imagined stasis, into a box with definite boundaries that make our choices feel clearer and safer. The archer asks us to recognize that that is not how the world operates. Change surrounds us all the time, but that doesn’t require us to abandon steadfastness of purpose. We can accept that things change and still be committed to our ideals. We can learn to understand these changes and how to pursue our ideals in their midst. In fact, Mocatta tells us, we must do this if we hope to 'secure the approval of our own conscience.'"

Villarreal's Torah speaks deeply to me this particular week, as winds blow all around us... and I'm thinking here of both nature's Santa Ana winds and also more metaphoric political winds and other winds of change in our lives. If we are to be like the archer of Jacob's vision, we must know that the world around us will not be static, and we cannot operate as though it will. Our "target" is to achieve the kind of steadfastness that Jacob sees in his son Joseph: to be a constant and reliable source of goodness and compassion. In order to do this, our aim and focus must remain true, while we constantly tweak our stance in response to the changing conditions around us.

This lesson works on both an individual and a collective level. In the wake of the overwhelmingly huge disaster we are witnessing in California, we will aim to remain true to who we are, faithful to our values, steady and steadfast. If you have family members or friends in the L.A. area who have been impacted by the fires, please reach out to them and keep reaching out; the impact of these fires in Southern California will last far beyond the time that this story fades from news headlines, and we have the capacity to be steadfast and in it for the long-haul with our loved ones. (Meanwhile, please let me or Rabbi Jay know if you need pastoral support as well -- we, too, will be in it for the long-haul.) If you are looking for a place to donate funds to relief efforts, our sister community IKAR has compiled a list and is keeping it up to date -- please give! And lastly, we will join together in a special prayer tomorrow morning at our Shabbat Minyan -- click here if you haven't registered yet but would like to join us.

In the face of an unstable and precarious world, Parashat Vayechi helps to center us on the quality of steadfastness. May this Shabbat bring respite from destruction, and give us a chance to center ourselves so that we can continue showing up consistently for others and putting one foot in front of the other, slowly and steadily, as we pursue our highest aspirations and visions.

In steadfastness,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

When the Sun Sets

In the month before Rosh Hashanah, there is a tradition of doing cheshbon ha-nefesh, an accounting of the soul. The idea is that as a new Jewish year starts, we should be aware of where we have failed and where we have succeeded, so that we can continue to grow wisely in spiritual and interpersonal matters.

In the month before the Gregorian new year, I have a tradition of looking back at the music I’ve listened to in the past year, doing a cheshbon ha-nefesh that is less about goal setting and more about revisiting with love some of the songs that have delighted, comforted, or otherwise moved me. 

I wanted to share with you one song from 2024 that I hope to hold close through the darkness and let its sweetness and possibility infuse the year ahead. This is a song by the Israeli musicians Shavit Noy and Inbar Hatz Roni.

Watch on YouTubeListen on Spotify

Kshe’ha-shemesh Shoka’at / When the Sun Sets

כְּשֶׁהַשֶּׁמֶשׁ שׁוֹקַעַת נוֹלָדִים כּוֹכָבִים

בִּכְדֵי לַעֲזֹר לָהּ לִזְרֹחַ שֵׁנִית,

וּבְתֹם לֵילָם יְנַצְנְצוּ נִצְנוּץ אַחֲרוֹן;

כְּשֶׁנִּתְעוֹרֵר יִשָּׁאֵר זִכָּרוֹן. 

אַתְּ בָּאָה הַבַּיְתָה, הַיָּם בְּשֶׁעָרַךְ,

הַכֹּל מַתְחִיל עַכְשָׁו, כְּלוּם לֹא הִסְתַּבֵּךְ.

אַתְּ בָּאָה הַבַּיְתָה, הַכֹּל כָּאן בִּשְׁבִילֵךְ

.חִכִּיתִי שֶׁתָּבוֹאִי – בּוֹאִי נֵלֵךְ.

עַל הַדֶּרֶךְ לְיָפוֹ רָאִיתָ אֲנָשִׁים

שֶׁכְּבָר הֵרִימוּ יָדַיִם בְּצִדֵּי הַכְּבִישִׁים

.תֵּן לָהֶם מַשֶּׁהוּ, אָמַרְתָּ, לֹא חָשׁוּב כְּבָר מָה

...בְּכָל דָּבָר קָטָן יֵשׁ אַהֲבָה.

When the sun sets stars are born
in order to help her shine a second time,and at the end of their night they'll sparkle a last sparkle;
when we awaken, a memory will remain.

You came home, the sea in your hair,
everything starts now, nothing got messed up.You came home, everything here is for you.I waited for you to come - come, let's go.

On the way to Jaffa you saw people
on the sides of the road that threw their hands up [gave up].Give them something, you said, it doesn't matter what - In every small thing there is love.

Shavit Noy recorded this album live last January, three months after being rescued from his home in Kfar Aza on October 7. The whole album grapples with hope and despair, tragedy and beauty, and ultimately with the healing possibility of compassion. 

Threaded through this song is the motif of second chances. The first stanza could simply be timeless nature poetry, evoking second chances through the stars letting the sun shine again even after it has set. (Obviously, the moon would be a better literal choice than stars, but imagine the night sky as full of shattered sun-sparks, broken, isolated, yet still there and gleaming through the dark.) 

The second stanza shifts to a human focus. What could be a simple love poem evokes as well the haunting dream of hostages returning home, nothing messed up, a new start and relationship restored. 

The third stanza broadens. The first time I read about the people on the side of the road with their hands raised, I imagined beggars, but after a second attempt at translation I realized that the idiom is one of despair, not pleading. This is not a simple stanza about being kind and giving charity, but about an existential need for loving each other back into hope. Bechol davar katan - in every small thing; yesh ahavah - there is love.

When it feels like the sun is setting, each act of kindness and hope can sparkle with new light. May each small act in this new year bring you beauty, possibility, love, and connection.

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

The Silver Goblet: Learning from Our Past Experiences

I'm writing to you in advance of the final Shabbat of 2024. I'm enjoying Chanukah so far and hope you are too. It's a holiday of hope and resilience, bravery, and illumination.

That said, I'll admit that as this secular New Year approaches, I have a "here we go again" feeling as we inch closer to next month's presidential inauguration. Bracing for tough times ahead has me thinking back to late 2016/early 2017, when we were in a similar place. Back then, I remember feeling like Kavana had spent our first decade figuring out how to build an intentional Jewish community, and that we were ready to pivot to being more outward-facing and striving for justice, equality, peace, and fairness in the world around us as so many of our core values came under attack during the first Trump administration. I wonder: what did we learn from the last time around that might inform how we tackle the present? 

Ecclesiastes / Kohelet is partially right when he says, "There is nothing new under the sun!" (Kohelet 1:9). In so many ways, human civilization does seem to move in cycles, with ebbs and flows of ideas, patterns, and ideologies, like the waves of the ocean or swings of a pendulum. It's certainly true that if we look, we can find not only one but many historical antecedents for this moment in time.

Our sacred texts often do the same, with new stories echoing the ones that have come before. But, there is typically some twist or salient difference through which we can feel forward motion. Meaning comes not only through the repetition of events and motifs, but also through the change and growth we can perceive in the differences.

One interesting example of a text that works this way appears in this week's parasha, Miketz, which brings us a continuation of the Joseph narrative. Left in a pit by his jealous brothers, Joseph ended up enslaved in Egypt; through his divine gift of dream interpretation, he worked his way up to the position of Pharaoh’s right-hand man. Then, ten of his brothers come down to Egypt during a famine to procure food, and Joseph toys with them. First, he insists that they are spies and forces them to bring the youngest one, Benjamin*, along to prove that they are not. (*Benjamin is also the only brother with whom Joseph shares two parents; the rest are technically his half-brothers, all sons of Jacob.) And now, after dining with the eleven brothers and giving them a large quantity of the grain they were seeking, Joseph also instructs his house steward:

“Fill the men’s bags with food, as much as they can carry, and put each one’s money in the mouth of his bag. Put my silver goblet in the mouth of the bag of the youngest one, together with his money for the rations.” (Genesis 44:1-2)

It is this part of the story -- Joseph's planting of his silver goblet in Benjamin's bag, and then sending his guards after the brothers -- that I want to zoom in on.

As my colleague Rabbi Elliott Cosgrove points out, this story has an “internal rhyme” with an earlier Torah story about Rachel (Joseph and Benjamin’s mother). In that story from one generation prior, found in Genesis 31, Rachel actually does steal the household idols of her father Laban as she flees with her husband Jacob and the rest of his entourage. They are pursued by Laban, who doesn't find the idols hidden under her skirts; still, Jacob's pronouncement that "Anyone with whom the idols shall be found shall not live in the presence of our brothers" comes true, and in a tragic coda, Rachel dies soon after on the road. Cosgrove compares and contrasts the two stories, writing about both:

"The children of Jacob are on the move, and they are pursued by their former host. There is an accusation of stolen goods, and in response, a declaration that whosoever is found to be in possession of said objects, that person shall be punished. The parallels in literary structure, thematics, and even word choice are striking... Like mother, like son, the key difference of course being that Benjamin got caught and lived, while Rachel did not and died." (See his 2018 sermon "Hidden Goblets.")

Cosgrove goes on to argue that in setting Benjamin up with the silver goblet in his bag, Joseph was consciously drawing on this previous family story as a way of giving his brothers subtle clues to his identity. 

The same story -- of Joseph having his silver goblet and money hidden inside Benjamin's bag -- also refers back to another closer antecedent: a previous moment in Joseph's own personal story when his brothers abandoned him, throwing him into a pit. Many commentators take note, but Torah scholar and translator Everett Fox articulates the pattern particularly crisply when he writes: “Only by recreating something of the original situation — the brothers are again in control of the life and death of a son of Rachel — can Joseph be sure that they have changed” (The Five Books of Moses, 202). Here, the purpose of the repetition is clear: Joseph's framing of Benjamin sets up a test, to determine whether his brothers are truly repentant for the wrong they have done to him. 

If our story from Parashat Miketz is indeed a test, the brothers pass it: faced with a similar situation, they behave differently this time around. This week's Torah portion ends in medias res, on a cliff-hanger, but already it is clear from the end of this week's parasha that they plan to protect Benjamin. The final verses of the Torah portion, Gen. 44:13-17, read:

"He searched, beginning with the oldest and ending with the youngest; and the goblet turned up in Benjamin’s bag. At this they rent their clothes. Each reloaded his pack animal, and they returned to the city. When Judah and his brothers re-entered the house of Joseph, who was still there, they threw themselves on the ground before him. Joseph said to them, 'What is this deed that you have done? Do you not know that a man like me practices divination?' Judah replied, 'What can we say to my lord? How can we plead, how can we prove our innocence? God has uncovered the crime of your servants. Here we are, then, slaves of my lord, the rest of us as much as he in whose possession the goblet was found.' But he replied, 'Far be it from me to act thus! Only the one in whose possession the goblet was found shall be my slave; the rest of you go back in peace to your father.'"

Once the silver goblet is discovered in Benjamin's bag, the brothers act in unison this time around -- all rending their clothes (a sign of grief or distress), all returning to the city, asserting that they are all standing together with -- and in defense of -- Benjamin. It seems that they have successfully incorporated the lessons of their family's past events into their present.

Today, we can find countless scholarly articles and podcasts about resilience. So many of them make the point that one important key to resilience comes from reflecting on our past experiences, and asking questions such as: When have we experienced similar challenges in the past? In those situations, what has worked well for us / what have we done to make it through? What have we learned from our past experiences that might help us in the future?

These seem like great questions for us to mull over during the week of Chanukah! This holiday recalls a time when our Jewish ancestors lived through a regime that felt oppressive. They did not forget who they were or what they believed in. Even though they were small in number, by banding together, they found the power to stand up to the forces of the Syrian-Greek king Antiochus and the mighty Hellenized worldthat he represented. In their story, there is so much wisdom worth drawing on in our present moment in time. What might we learn from the Maccabees this year? And what lessons can we derive from our own past experiences of fighting for what we believe in, even against great odds?

Tonight, as we move into the Shabbat of Chanukah, the menorah should be lit first followed by the Shabbat candles, and then kiddush recited over a cup of wine. As I write, I'm imagining the image of a glowing menorah in the background, and a silver goblet / kiddush cup in the foreground, both reminding us of sacred stories from our history that emphasized the power of standing together. That certainly seems like a fitting image for the final Shabbat of this calendar year, and a powerful way to set ourselves up for 2025 to be a year of resilience.

Shabbat Shalom, Chag Urim Sameach (wishing us all a joyous Chanukah), and I look forward to seeing you in 2025!

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

The Ger: Zionism, Immigrant Justice, and Chrismukkah

This week’s parashah is called Vayeishev, after the first word of the portion. “And he [Jacob] settled…” (Genesis 37:1)

The root word is yashav, most literally “to sit”, and from there the secondary meanings of dwelling or settling down. It has the flavor of stability, an intent to ground oneself in place. In the context of our parashah, Jacob’s settling sets the context for the beginning of the Joseph story. 

But Ramban (13th century Spain) reads the whole verse closely and looks backward to the previous verse which concluded last week’s reading, about Esau choosing to dwell away from Jacob, in the land of Edom:

Now Jacob was settled in the land where his father had sojourned (root: ger), the land of Canaan (Genesis 37:1).

The meaning of the verse is that since Scripture had said that the chiefs of Esau dwelt in the land of their possessions (Genesis 36:43) — that is to say, the land which they took to themselves as a possession forever — it now says that Jacob, however, dwelt as his father had, as a stranger (ger) in a land which was not their own but which belonged to the Canaanites. The purport is to relate that they elected to dwell in the Chosen Land, and that God’s words to Abraham, That your seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs (Genesis 15:13), were fulfilled in them but not in Esau, for Jacob alone shall be called their progeny.

There are two startling interpretations Ramban offers here. 

First, when he quotes God’s words to Abraham, he is calling back to the original covenant. God promises a lot to Abraham’s descendents, but warns him that before fully inhabiting the Promised Land they will be strangers in a strange land, and fall into servitude for centuries. Most readings assume that the strange land is Egypt, where the Israelites will indeed be enslaved. But Ramban instead claims that the strange land is the Promised Land itself. Canaan is the location where Abraham’s descendents will live as the ger.

What is a ger? Rabbi Shai Held summarizes it this way: The “ger, commonly rendered as ‘stranger,’ ‘sojourner,’ ‘alien,’ or ‘foreigner,’ refers to a resident of the land who has no family or clan to look after him, and who is therefore vulnerable to social and economic exploitation” (Judaism is about Love). 

Or as Abraham ibn Ezra put it a thousand years earlier: 

In Hebrew a person who has a family is likened to a branch attached to its source. Therefore such an individual is called an ezrach, for the meaning of ezrach is a branch, as in a sprouting tree with many branches (ke-ezrach ra’anan) (Psalms 37:35). On the other hand, a stranger is termed ger in Hebrew from the word gargir (berry), for he is like a berry plucked from a branch. There are some unintelligent people who find this explanation farfetched. However, if they knew the meaning of each letter and its form then they would recognize the truth.

The second startling interpretation from Ramban, then, is saying that the way Jacob and his family inherit the covenant, in contrast to Esau, is by living without an outsized sense of possessiveness regarding the land. Even at a later time, when the Israelites are told to dispossess the Canaanites and possess the land fully themselves (Numbers 33:53), their own relationship to the land is qualified by their relationship to God. “The Land is Mine; you are but strangers (gerim) and residents with Me” (Leviticus 25:23). 

As Shai Held says, “Being a stranger is not just a historical memory from the past; it is an existential reality that is always also true in the present.”

~~~

There are at least three ways to apply these ideas to our moment in time. 

1. Settlers in modern Israel

It is hard for me to read Ramban’s comment and not immediately think about contemporary settlers in the West Bank and those who are pushing to resettle Gaza. This ideology of absolute claim to any land once promised by God feels like land-worship and not God-worship (remember, “the Land is Mine; you are but strangers with Me”). This excess of possessiveness belongs to the archetype of Esau, not of Jacob/Israel. 

What I find most interesting, though, is that Ramban himself is sometimes described as the “first Zionist”. After being forced into a disputation about the truth of Judaism versus Christianity in Spain, his safety was increasingly in question. Aware of the peril of being Jewish in hostile Christian Spain, he started to articulate a return to the land of Israel as a mitzvah. Eventually he himself left for Jerusalem at an old age, where he finished his Torah commentaries and helped build a synagogue that - although moved, rebuilt, destroyed, and rebuilt again - still exists today. 

Ramban embodies the complexity of diasporic vulnerability with a yearning for a real homeland. And embedded in his thought is a safeguard against the rabid idolatry of extreme nationalism. 

2. Immigrants in modern America

To speak of the ger is to be sensitive to the experience of immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in our country. It is a given Jewishly that we cultivate empathy for anyone in a vulnerable situation. We may debate about the best policies but we do not demonize, dehumanize, or deny responsibility towards others. 

In a spiritual sense, we are all gerim. To be human is to be on the move (even if your family has been rooted in a place for generations). To be human is to yearn for solid ground in a world of impermanence. Kavana partner - and my thought partner in mussar and ethics -  Bruce Kochis pointed out to me that when we follow the value of “welcoming the stranger” (a trait exemplified by Abraham), we risk dividing the world into “us and them”, even with positive intent. Imagine working for immigrant justice with the humility of our own existential condition as a ger, and attunement to directing care and resources to those who are most materially vulnerable right now to that shared human experience. 

(If you are so moved to direct some end-of-year donations to refugee resettlement, Jewish Family Services of Seattle is a great choice!)

3. Jews in America

Finally, if there is anywhere that Jews have felt settled in Diaspora, it is the United States of America. And yet, the last year has more of us remembering our existential condition of being gerim. Do we belong here? Are we safe here? Where can we fully express ourselves? Feeling like a ger sometimes isn’t a failure of belonging, but a spiritual opportunity to remember deeper truths about Judaism, humanity, the world and its Creator. 

Hanukkah is nearly here - a holiday which originated in the land of Israel as a defiant attempt at cultural “purity” from Hellenistic Greek influence, and which today ironically derives a lot of its presence (and presents) from its proximity to Christmas. 

This year in particular, as Christmas and Hanukkah coincide (Chrismukkah), we will go through the intricate American Jewish dance of rejecting, embracing, and intertwining our heritage with larger cultural and religious rituals. It is a season where as an American Jew I feel the most fascinating, uncomfortable, and occasionally charming feelings of belonging and estrangement, of familiarity and wonder. 

May the winter season enlighten your own sense of belonging, and your own sense of sojourning. 

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

A Particular Concern (or, Concentric Circles of Care)

Last week, inspiration (in the form of a philosophical quandary) landed right in my inbox! Rabbi Jay sent an event reminder out to Kavana's Mussar group, which has been slowly working through Rabbi Shai Held's new and acclaimed book Judaism is About Love this fall. In the reminder email, Rabbi Jay wrote:

Here's your juicy quote from elsewhere in the chapter: "Morality, it is commonly held, is meant to be free of bias or prejudice; under most circumstances, 'playing favorites' is considered immoral... [Others] reject this kind of thinking out of hand, allowing that 'it is (not merely psychologically understandable but) morally correct to favor one's own,' those with whom we have personal ties of some kind." (p. 139)

These lines resonated with me, because I have already been mulling over this philosophical question for some time, without exactly being able to give voice to it. The topic had sprung to my mind just the previous week, in fact, when it was declared that Omer Neutra -- an American-Israeli previously thought to have been taken as a hostage on October 7th -- had died on that day. The six-degrees-of-separation concept simply does not apply when it comes to Jewish geography; I did not know Omer Neutra personally, but we were separated by only a single degree of separation in multiple directions (and for some within the Kavana community, there are no degrees of separation whatsoever!). I listened to the funeral service that was held for him on Long Island, feeling like I had lost a member of my own extended family... which in a way, I had.

Our Torah portion this week, Vayishlach, puts a spotlight on familial relationships and the ways that they stir us to emotion and action. Right in the middle of the parasha, we find the story that's often titled "the rape of Dinah." In it, Dinah, the daughter of Jacob, "goes out" and is promptly snatched and seemingly forced into a sexual relationship with Shechem, son of the local chieftain, Hamor. Shechem is smitten with Dinah and sends his father to try to negotiate a marriage. Hamor approaches Jacob and his sons, Dinah's father and brothers, who express their willingness to make this union happen, but insist that Hamor and all of the men of his tribe must first become circumcised. Surprisingly, Hamor agrees to the condition, and a mass circumcision of all the men of Hamor's town takes place. (If this story is new to you, I highly recommend reading it in its entirety in Genesis chapter 34. As an aside, I also feel the need to note that this story takes place in a society that is problematically patriarchal. There's lots of great feminist commentary on Dinah's story too; I recommend this article from the Jewish Women's Archive as a good starting point with a great bibliography for further exploration.)

Picking up inside the story, the text of Gen 34:25-26 then recounts: 

"On the third day, when they were in pain, Shimon and Levi, two of Jacob’s sons, brothers of Dinah, took each his sword, came upon the city unmolested, and slew all the males. They put Hamor and his son Shechem to the sword, took Dinah out of Shechem’s house, and went away."

The Torah text as it unfolds from here and many rabbinic commentaries on this story are highly critical of Shimon and Levi's behavior, raising serious questions about the ethics of their violent and vengeful actions. (That is not my topic for this email, but I do think it's important to note that these critiques of their overzealousness come from within our tradition and are taken quite seriously. If you're interested to hear more about this, please join us tomorrow at Kavana's Shabbat Morning Minyan, where I know Chuck Cowan will be addressing this in his Dvar Torah.) 

Returning to the theme I began addressing above, though, this week I am especially struck by the familial relationships, the circle of concern, and the "favoring one's own" that we see emerge so clearly in Shimon and Levi's actions. Family ties and lines of connection are absolutely stressed throughout the entire Dinah narrative. (This is true of all the characters; it's never "Hamor and Shechem," but rather "Hamor and his son Shechem.") With regard to the verse I've cited above, Rashi notices a "problem" in the text: Shimon and Levi are called "Dinah's brothers," and yet they are only two of twelve brothers. Rashi's commentary on this verse cites an ancient midrash which addresses this issue:

“Dina's brothers” – was she only the sister of the two of them? Was she not the sister of all the tribes? It is, rather, because they endangered their lives on her behalf, that she is called by their name. (Genesis Rabbah 80:10)

Despite all the many critiques of Shimon and Levi's behavior that we find elsewhere, Rashi's note feels like a positive comment, reading the fact that Shimon and Levi jump to action and are willing to put themselves on the line on their sister's behalf as an act of loyalty and love that merits them being described through their relationship with one another.

In Chapter 6 of Judaism is About Love (the same chapter Kavana's Mussar group was reading together last week), Rabbi Shai Held explores the pulls in Jewish ethical thought between partiality and universal concern. He argues that ultimately, Jews are obligated to love both the "near" and the "distant" -- that is, to care for one's own people and for humanity as a whole. He is unequivocal in arguing that a "family first" approach must not be allowed to devolve into "family only" (see page 134). And yet, he asserts that "family first" is an ethical Jewish stance, writing (for example):

"If love is essential to the good life -- and it hardly needs arguing that it is -- and part of what it means to love someone is to be partial toward them, then some degree of special concern for those we love seems permissible and even required" (142).

This line of reasoning very much resonates for me, as I try to unpack my own emotional response to the events unfolding in the world around me. I am interested in and care about so many of the events unfolding worldwide and the fate of the individuals involved, but it's also a fact that some events strike me more deeply and personally than others. So, for example, when I read reports last week of an arson attack on a synagogue in Melbourne, Australia, the incident felt far closer than the miles of physical distance might suggest they should. And, I continue to feel my own heartstrings tied up in the fate of the hostages and their loved ones.

Next month, two Israeli/American clinical social workers who are part of the Kavana community, Michal Inspektor and Michal Goldring Keidar, will be offering a workshop for members of our community interested in exploring some of these themes and interconnections. They write: "The traumatic conditions faced by approximately 100 hostages held captive in Gaza extend beyond the individuals and their families, affecting our entire community. While many may not have a direct connection to them, the mental health consequences ripple outward, impacting our collective well-being." I am very much looking forward to this opportunity to further probe the familial ties that bind us to Jews elsewhere, and how we can transform our distress into meaningful action and advocacy. (If these topics sound meaningful to you as well, please save the date for Sunday evening, 1/26, and stay tuned for further details about this workshop in next week's newsletter.)

Meanwhile, may this Shabbat draw us into closer connection... with Torah, with one another, with the Jewish people, and with all of humanity. In the words of Rabbi Shai Held once again, may our love grow in "expanding concentric circles," "in and from the particular," such that we can "love our own, and everyone else too." 

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

Luz, of Lore and Lure

“The deeper our faith, the more doubt we must endure; 
the deeper our hope, the more prone we are to despair; 
the deeper our love, the more pain its loss will bring: 
these are a few of the paradoxes we must hold as human beings.”
― Parker J. Palmer, A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life

When I think of all biblical characters, the one I most associate with paradox is Jacob: “A situation, person, or thing that combines contradictory features or qualities” (Oxford English Dictionary). A “simple” man who is always scheming; the “good” brother who manipulates, lies, and tricks his way into blessing. He is the patriarch with two names that evoke struggle: Yaakov, “one who holds the heel” trying to emerge first from the womb; and Yisrael, “one who wrestles with God”. 

In the opening of our parashah, Vayeitzei, Jacob flees from his brother’s wrath. He finds a spot to sleep in some unnamed place. There he has a dream with a ladder to heaven and angels, and God speaks to him, promising him the covenant that God had made with Abraham and Isaac before him. He wakes up startled and in awe. “And he called the name of the place: Bet-El/House of God— however, Luz was the name of the city in former times” (Bereshit / Genesis 28:19).

This unnamed place all of a sudden gets two names, just like Jacob eventually will. 

Rabbeinu Bachya (1255–1340, Spain) asks a basic question here: “Why did the Torah bother to tell us that at a still earlier point in history the town had been known as Luz? What benefit do we derive from such information?” 

An ancient Jewish myth (Bereishit Rabbah 69:8) tells us that the name luzmeans an almond (or perhaps hazelnut) tree. And the sages spin a wild story about this city:

This is Luz, in which they dye sky blue wool. This is Luz that Sennacherib attacked but did not transfer its population; [that] Nebuchadnezzar [attacked], but he did not destroy it. 
This is Luz, over which the angel of death never had dominion. What would the elderly among them do? When they would become very old [and tired of life], they would take them outside the walls and they would die. 
Rabbi Abba bar Kahana said: Why is it called Luz? Anyone who would enter it would proliferate mitzvot and good deeds like an almond tree [luz]. 
The Rabbis say: Just as a luz has no opening, so, too, no man could ascertain the location of the city entrance. 
Rabbi Elazar said in the name of Rabbi Pinḥas bar Ḥama: Luz was located at the entrance of a cave. There was a hollow almond tree and they would enter the cave through the almond tree and through the cave to the city.

Now this is a city I would like to visit! The only problem is that the rabbis have told us how amazing Luz is, and yet Jacob sleeps nearby having no idea that it exists. In the apparent wilderness, with some stones and an old almond tree nearby, Jacob rests and has a vision of God. Then he builds an altar and goes on his way. The midrash introduces another paradox - an incredible city that is hidden from those would most benefit from it. 

So why does the Torah mention Luz?

Rabbeinu Bachya gives us another legend. He suggests that “perhaps the Torah wanted to hint by using the name Luz that this spot had been the starting point of the earth rejuvenating itself. It was the site at which earth first started to develop into the globe as we know it. The word luz in the midrash (Vayikra Rabbah 18:1) means the place in the spine [imagined to be a nut-shaped bone] from which the tissue is able to regenerate itself at the time of the resurrection.”

We’ve stumbled into even stranger territory here! According to Jewish imagination, in the messianic age humans who have died will be reconstituted into living bodies, and the process starts with an indestructible mythical luzbone near the top of the spine. 

I think of Jacob’s dream here as a hinge-point, a moment of transformation that divides his life into a before and an after. He will have more hinge-points. So do we. And at the hinge-point, there are at least two possibilities for how we react. The first, represented by the magical city of Luz, is the desire to escape the paradoxes of life, a yearning for the ultimate sanctuary where death itself (what Yehuda Amichai calls “Change’s prophet”) has no dominion. Change is hard, even positive transformational change. We all want to live in Luz sometimes, cocooned within stability.

But Jacob doesn’t enter the city. In my imagination, he spies it through the hollow almond tree and recognizes it as a utopian distraction from his purpose in life. Instead, he harnesses the generative energy of the luz bone. Instead of entering into a context where nothing has to change, he taps into that kernel of continuity within him. That indestructible, ever-renewing something within that allows us to grow with courage, to embrace change gently, and to keep moving forward on our journeys into the unknown.

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

Abundance!

This week's Torah portion, Parashat Toledot, prominently features the foundational stories of Jacob and Esau. From their wrestling in the womb to the intense sibling rivalry and parental favoritism that feature prominently, it's no wonder that their tale culminates in estrangement! The family dynamics between parents Isaac and Rebecca and children Esau and Jacob are certainly not models of family relationships that we want to emulate (in fact, some of our Kavana Moadon Yeladim students recently put Rebecca "on trial" to evaluate whether or not she was a good parent!).

At the peak of this Torah portion's narrative, we find the most famous scene, where Isaac blesses each of his two sons in succession. First, Jacob goes to his father disguised as his older brother Esau -- with hair on his arms and a goat dish that his mother has helped him prepare -- and receives what should have been the blessing for the first-born child. Then, Esau approaches his father with a dish he has prepared from the game of his hunt. Isaac realizes that he has been tricked, but manages to come up with a second blessing.

The two blessings that Jacob and Esau receive are substantively different. Jacob is promised that other nations will bow to him and his brother will serve him (see Gen. 27:29), whereas Esau's blessing says that he will live by the sword and serve his brother (Gen. 27:40). 

Given how opposite these messages are, it is striking that the blessings also overlap so significantly. The commonality between the two blessings is the language of abundance. To Jacob (in disguise), Isaac says: “May God give you of the dew of heaven and the fat of the earth, abundance of new grain and wine" (Gen. 27:28), and to Esau, Isaac says: “See, your abode shall enjoy the fat of the earth and the dew of heaven above" (Gen. 27:39). 

At the time of receiving these blessings, Jacob must have felt triumphant (if also somewhat guilty), and Esau must have felt like he had just lost everything. And yet, Isaac communicates to both of them that they will have plenty; they will receive what they need from above and below.

These feel like especially powerful lines to highlight this week, in light of Thanksgiving. The roots of this American holiday are actually somewhat complex, but the tradition that has come down to us has everything to do with acknowledging and giving thanks for the bounty and abundance that is ours.

Although some Thanksgivings happened earlier, our American tradition of celebrating a national Thanksgiving Day each year on the final Thursday of November began with a proclamation made by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863, in the midst of the Civil War. Lincoln's proclamation reads, in part:

"The year that is drawing towards its close has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, the order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict...Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Highest God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy..."

The underlines above are mine: I am struck by the way the "blessings of fruitful fields and beautiful skies" mirrors the "fat of the earth and the dew of heaven above" in Isaac's blessings. In addition, in Lincoln's Thanksgiving proclamation, much as in the blessing to Esau, there is an acknowledgement that circumstances are not ideal, and yet, still, there is an abundance of good that must be acknowledged: "gracious gifts of the Highest God," given in "mercy."

This Thanksgiving, it may not feel to us like all is well in the world: not in America, and not as Jews nor as humans. And yet, our lives are filled with abundant blessings, each and every day. Most of us have what we need and so much more! Let us acknowledge our abundant blessings with gratitude. And may our gratitude, in turn, motivate us towards deeds of kindness and acts of generosity, as we seek to pass on the blessings and the bounty which we have received.

Wishing you a happy Thanksgiving and a Shabbat Shalom (in advance),

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

Wise Aging

Inside you, boy,
There’s an old man sleepin’,
Dreamin’ waitin’ for his chance.
Shel Silverstein, “The Folks Inside”

Avraham demanded aging… The Holy One of Blessing said to him: “As you live, you have demanded a good thing, and it will begin with you.”Rabbi Yehuda bar Simon, Bereishit Rabbah 65:9

Now Avraham was old, advanced in days (ba bayamim),and God had blessed Avraham in everything.Bereishit/Genesis 24:1

Avraham occupies a unique position in Jewish history, as the very first Jew (along with his wife Sarah). According to the midrash, he is also the very first person to become old! What the midrash goes on to explain, however, is that people had been getting old since, well, the beginning of time, but people’s appearances didn’t change. Visitors would confuse father and son, daughter and mother, because they weren’t visibly generationally distinct. (This would pose all sorts of interesting problems for “young adult” or “senior” groups today!) 

What Avraham demands from God is that he not only be old, but that he alsolook old. “Gray hair is a crown of glory” (Proverbs 16:31). So Avraham is the first person to go gray, and therefore to gain the dignity and distinction of being an elder. 

What sets this midrash in motion is the doubled phrasing in the Torah: Avraham was (1) old; and (2) advanced in days. We don’t need both phrases to get the idea, and so the midrash clarifies that he was old both in duration of time and in appearance, and that he desired this. 

The 18th century Chassidic master Rebbe Nachman goes in a different direction (Likutei Moharan, Part II 59:1:3). The phrase “advanced in days” in Hebrew reads ba bayamim, literally “coming in the days”. Another close English idiom is “getting up in years”, but Nachman takes the phrase literally as capturing the active energy of Avraham as he moves day by day through his life. 

“Avraham reached his level through the days for he recognized his Maker at the age of three (Talmud Bavli, Nedarim 32a) and progressed constantly, from level to level.”

In other words, Avraham’s age is a reflection of his spiritual development. He has used his days well, pursuing opportunities to clarify his understanding of the world, God, and self so that he can act righteously. 

The poet Mary Oliver captures a version of this energy in her poem “Halleluiah”:

Everyone should be born into this world happyand loving everything.
But in truth it rarely works that way.
For myself, I have spent my life clamoring toward it.
Halleluiah, anyway I’m not where I started!

Avraham is the epitome of a spiritual savant whose every day brings him closer to God. Mary Oliver reminds us that even when we clamor towards a happy, loving, holy life we cannot skip steps and we must grow in these qualities, day by day, even if not quite at the pace of Avraham our ancestor.

But Nachman uses Avraham’s excellent example not as an aspiration, but rather as a caution:

“Such a person suffers loss as a result of acting quickly. For when he is very quick and quickly runs from mitzvah to mitzvah, he thereby loses the element of holiness, that which is between mitzvah and mitzvah. On account of this quickness he bypasses and skips over this element. This is because the mitzvah itself is coming toward him, since it is being pulled and dragged in his direction by the first mitzvah, which drags the second one. Thus, when he also runs quickly toward the mitzvah, he might skip over and bypass the aforementioned element—i.e., that which is between the mitzvot. He is therefore one who acts quickly and suffers loss. But if he waits a bit, he can in the meantime attain also the element between the mitzvot, as mentioned above.”

Nachman’s kabbalistic ideas are dense and I confess I don’t fully understand what he is getting at in his theory of mitzvot, but I was struck by his insistence that a certain speedy spiritual striving can actually end up missing something really important - the space between the mitzvot. According to Nachman, in between each good and important deed we do, there’s an additional element of holiness that we only encounter if we move a little slower. There’s a cadence to how we strive to good in the world. With each outbreath of activity, we also need an inbreath of pause. Perhaps, even in a life saturated with sacred action, we need the lull in which we can return to intention, consider alternatives, make conscious choices, and only then do the next right thing. Even Avraham may have aged prematurely through constantly seeking the next mitzvah without pause!

There will be many opportunities to pursue mitzvot - through Jewish practice, community activities, and in building a kind and just society. When you find yourself in a between-space, remember that is holy too. Wishing you a warm and well-lit Shabbat.

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

Minyan of Resistance

Sometimes the Torah is so "on point" that it's almost scary. This week, in Parashat Vayera, we encounter the story of the city of Sodom. I invite you to read the whole text if you like (Genesis 18:16-19:29), with all of its sordid twists and turns, or here's a quick synopsis of the most relevant bits:

God tells Abraham, "The outrage of Sodom and Gomorrah are so great, and their sin so grave!," and then sends two angels/messengers to investigate further. As these angels proceed on towards Sodom, Abraham understands that the city's future is at stake, and argues with God that Sodom should not be destroyed if enough innocent people can be found in it to make it worth saving. Abraham starts his bargaining at 50, then moves to 45, 40 and so on...until God agrees to save Sodom if as few as 10 righteous people can be found.

But then, the angelic guests arrive in Sodom and take refuge for the night in the house of Lot, Abraham's nephew. A mob amasses outside Lot's door, demanding that he send the guests out into the streets so that the mob can have their way with them. When Lot refuses and tries to protect his guests, the throng threatens to deal even more harshly with him, and they press harder against his door. With the support of a minor miracle (a blinding light that confounds the mob), Lot and his guests are able to survive until dawn, at which point the angels help to spring Lot and his family free from the city.

Even taken at face value, the Torah's tale of Sodom portrays a radically inhospitable and violent society. As if the biblical story itself isn't bad enough, though, the rabbinic tradition piles it on, building on the portrayal of Sodom as the least hospitable, least generous, most rotten, and most corrupt society imaginable!

Pirke DeRabbi Eliezer is one midrashic collection where this kind of extrapolation happens; it retells and expands upon the biblical narrative, from the beginning of Genesis through the middle of the Book of Numbers. Most scholars date this work to sometime around the 8th Century, in the Geonic period. Nearly an entire chapter of the collection depicts a group of rabbis sitting around and telling one another tales about the horrors of life in Sodom. Again, you're welcome to explore this text directly -- see Pirke DeRabbi Eliezer 25 -- but here are some key examples from it:

• Rabbi Ze'era describes Sodom as an area unusually rich with natural resources: gold, silver, precious stones, pearls, sapphire. However, he says, the people of the city hoard that wealth. The punchline of his story is: "But they did not trust in the shadow of their Creator, rather (they trusted) in the multitude of their wealth, for wealth thrusts aside its owners from the fear of Heaven, as it is said, 'They that trust in their wealth' (Ps. 49:6)." 
  

• Rabbi Natan recounts that the people of Sodom dishonored the Creator by not distributing food to the wayfarer and the stranger, as Jewish law prescribes. To top it off, "they (even) fenced in all the trees on top above their fruit so that they should not be seized; (not) even by the bird of heaven." 
  

• Rabbi Joshua, son of Ḳorchah, says: "They appointed over themselves judges who were lying judges, and they oppressed every wayfarer and stranger who entered Sodom by their perverse judgment, and they sent them forth naked, as it is said, 'They have oppressed the stranger without judgment' (Ezek. 22:29)."
  

• Rabbi Yehudah tells what I think is perhaps the most incriminating story of all: that the city even outlawed assisting the needy or feeding the poor. Peletith, Lot's daughter, was compassionate and would secretly sneak bread into her empty water pitcher to carry it out to a poor man in the street. When the men of Sodom realized that she was feeding the man, in violation of the law, they brought her forth to be burnt with fire. As she was being tortured to death, her cries reached the heavens, prompting God's investigation and the angels' visit.

These rabbinic midrashim come in quick succession, one after another, and each adds a new dimension to our understanding of Sodom's wickedness and cruelty. While these are far from the only midrashim about the depravity of Sodom, even just in these few texts, we see the hoarding of wealth, the stinginess and ungenerous spirit of the city's residents, their willingness to follow unethical rules even in defiance of God's commandments, the corruption of lying judges, and brutal heartlessness towards the stranger and traveler. Sodom has so descended into darkness that it sentences to death the only human who acts with compassion and decency. Together, these stories paint a scathing picture of a society characterized by a degree of inhumanity and cruelty that knows no bounds!

I'm guessing it's abundantly clear why these rabbinic stories about Sodom are resonating for me at this particular time. In a different moment, I might have read these texts as cartoonishly awful depictions but merely a fictitious fever-dream; however, this week, they feel horrifyingly real: both prescient and possible in our day.

The truth is that none of us knows what will happen next, or exactly what we have in store for us here in the United States in the months and years to come. If Trump's campaign speeches are to be taken seriously, though, and if the first wave of political appointments we've seen over the past week are an indicator of where things are headed, it is not at all silly for us to be shocked, dismayed, disgusted, angry and/or fearful. The last thing we want is for the rabbinic vision of Sodom to come to life in modern-day America!

Returning to the end of this story in Parashat Vayera, Sodom ends up destroyed because -- despite all of Abraham's best efforts to save it -- in the end, not even a minyan of righteous people could be found within its limits.  God rains down sulfurous fire on both Sodom and the neighboring city of Gomorrah, completely annihilating both cities and all of their inhabitants (see Gen. 19:23-25). Sodom is so "toxic" that even in its ruined state, Lot's wife can't turn back to gaze upon it without turning into a pillar of salt herself.

Here in our society, it feels like things are moving fast, on many fronts at once, and towards some of the same types of corruption, inhumanity, and cruelty we see in these tales of Sodom. Here, however, we don't yet know how this story will end; here we have a choice. The story of Sodom is, of course, a cautionary tale, but it is not only this; it is also a story of positive promise: that even in the most awful of times and places, all it takes is a minyan, a group of 10 righteous people, willing to stand together in defiance of societal norms in order to change the story.

This week, as we read Parashat Vayera, let's take the story of Sodom to heart, and steel ourselves for some difficult days ahead. If our society becomes inhospitable to the stranger and the poor, let us resolve that we will maintain a posture of generosity and compassion. If our justice system becomes corrupt, and rife with bribery or lies, let us resolve that we will raise our voices for truth and fairness. If laws are made that are grounded in heartlessness and evil, we may even need to act in defiance of unjust laws to do what we know in our hearts to be right. 

Had there been but ten righteous people in Sodom, Abraham and God both agree, the city would have been worth saving. In the face of whatever is to come here, let us pledge that we will stand together in that minyan. Together, we have the power to defy a society careening out of control, and to write a different ending to our story. 

Shabbat shalom,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

To Dwell Together

“Hinei mah tov u’mah na’im, shevet achim gam yachad. How good and how pleasant it is when siblings shevet yachad, dwell together” (Psalm 133).

You probably know this line, or if you don’t you’ll no doubt hear it at a Jewish gathering soon. We often sing it as a way of beginning prayer services, life cycle ceremonies, and communal gatherings of all sorts. How wonderful it is to be together!

Except when “being together” feels fraught with division, disappointment, dread, and demonization. A national election foregrounds differences between candidates and parties and their vision of the future, and between those of us who vote one way or another. At the same time, our collective process of voting reminds us that we are bound together, responsible for each other, and vulnerable to each other’s choices. 

In the Torah this week, Avram (later named Avraham) journeys forth, formally beginning the Jewish story. With him comes his nephew Lot, whose father had died young. The two seem to share a special bond, because Lot could have stayed back with the rest of his extended family yet chooses to accompany Avram on his new path to Canaan. 

Once there, though, troubles arise. Both Avram and Lot have sheep and shepherds, and as their flocks grow it seems that space gets scarce. “And the land could not support them to settle together (shevet yachdav), for their property was so great that they were not able to settle together (shevet yachdav)” (Bereshit 13:6). 

Twice the verse emphasizes that they couldn’t shevet yachdav - their togetherness was getting tougher to navigate. The commentator Ha’amek Davar (19th century) teaches:

This is doubled language. It comes to teach us that it is not that the pasturage was insufficient for their flocks, like it says later in Bereshit 36:7: “For [Jacob and Esau’s] possessions were too many for them to dwell together (shevet yachdav), and the land where they sojourned could not support them because of their livestock.” Rather, it is because their natures were distant and Lot couldn’t be joined to Avraham except at a distance. But together they were not able to settle. 

Only once Lot leaves do they mend the relationship enough for Avram to keep looking out for his nephew from a distance, rescuing Lot from a war and later from God’s wrath at his new home of Sodom. But they never again liveyachdav.

Ibn Ezra (12th century) notes: “Yachdav is not synonymous with yachad(together). Yachdav means acting like one person.” 

Or as Rabbi Rachel suggested to me, yachdav is a form of mission alignment. It’s not two or more people sharing space, but rather sharing a worldview, ideology, purpose, sensibility. The word shows up later in Avraham’s life in the story of the Binding of Yitzchak. Avraham and Yitzchak walk yachdav(repeated twice) up the mountain where father will plan to sacrifice son. We do not know if Yitzchak knows what is about to happen or not. The sages imagine he does and is a willing participant. Total mission alignment. Or maybe he just trusted his father blindly, a tragic togetherness. But after the near sacrifice, Avraham walks down with his servants yachdav, with no mention of Yitzchak. Avraham remains dedicated to following God’s instructions, no matter how perplexing, but in upholding that relationship to the divine, he seems to have severed his relationship with his son. Ideological purity risks sacrificing loved ones, at least on the relational level. 

In our political climate, the viewpoint of the “other side” seems not just different, and often not just wrong, but existentially catastrophic. We are not able to shevet yachdav; we cannot dwell together with such distant natures from each other. Already over the past year, family and friend connections have been strained and severed over perspectives on Israel/Palestine. We are again at a moment in the United States where we can choose, as Ezra Klein comments, to react to those who voted differently than us with contempt or with curiosity. 

In other words, we can choose yachdav or yachad. 

Yachdav - the sort of ideological comfort zone that keeps us close to those like us and far away from those who are not like us. 

Or yachad - an awareness that we are together for better and for worse, that we are as citizen-siblings bound to one another no matter how similar or alike we are. 

I don’t have answers. But I’ll leave you with these questions:

• Where is your yachdav - what groups hold ideas, values, and commitments that align with your own? Finding the pastoral refuge of like-minded people doing work that matters is essential!

• How do you relate to people who think and vote differently than you? If you don’t cut all ties, what adds some pleasantness to dwelling yachadwith our fellow Americans? 

Wishing you a Shabbat of restfulness and respite as we gear up with renewed vigor for building a world of kindness, justice, and belonging.

Shabbat shalom!

Rabbi Jay LeVine

A Pre-Election Note: Taking Our Cue from Shem & Japheth

Rainbow or not, it can't have been easy for Noah to move on after the flood. He found himself in a stressful and unstable moment. All of humanity beyond his own family had been wiped out; he must have been overwhelmed by the daunting prospect of needing to rebuild a destroyed world from scratch. After the waters recede and Noah's family emerges from the ark, the text of Parashat Noach relays the sad story of what happens next quite succinctly: 

"Noah, the tiller of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk, and he uncovered himself within his tent" (Genesis 9:20-21). 

The midrash notices the quick action of these verses. "Rabbi Hiyya bar Abba remarked: 'On the same day he planted, on the same day he drank, on the same day he was humiliated' (Bereishit Rabbah 36:4). Faced with a new and overwhelming reality, Noah's reaction is instinctive and impulsive: he attempts to "self-medicate" with alcohol, and gets himself so drunk that he passes out naked inside his tent.

Now, Noah's sons enter the picture: 

"Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness and told his two brothers outside. But Shem and Japheth took a cloth, placed it against both their backs and, walking backward, they covered their father’s nakedness; their faces were turned the other way, so that they did not see their father’s nakedness" (Gen. 9:22-23). 

Noah's three sons react in very different ways to his inability to function in this traumatic moment. Ham takes advantage of his father's vulnerability, making the situation worse by amplifying his shame. (Based on the harsh curse Ham receives from Noah a few verses later, many commentators assume that what Ham actually did was far more reprehensible than merely looking on his father's nakedness.) The other two brothers have an opposite impulse. Just as instinctively as Noah sought to escape reality through wine, Shem and Japheth turn their faces away from Noah as they cover him, in a sensitive and compassionate attempt to preserve their father's dignity. The two of them consequently receive blessings from Noah, and the genealogy at the end of the parasha makes it clear that we (descendants of Abraham) trace our lineage through Shem.

This week, we too find ourselves in a stressful moment. Ours is obviously quite different than the post-flood moment in which Noah, Ham, Shem and Japheth found themselves, but as we head into the final days of the 2024 election season and enter what is likely to be a difficult post-election period, this time may feel scary and overwhelming in its own right. (As a Jew, I can't help but feel particularly triggered by the Trumpist political rally this past week, held in Madison Square Garden, filled with crude racist screed, and patterned off a literal Nazi rally at the same location in 1939.)

The four-verse tale about Noah and his sons navigating an unstable time showcases for us three very different possibilities for how we might react in a hard moment such as this:

1. Noah is avoidant and seeks to escape from reality.

2. Ham builds on a bad situation, actively amplifying harm and making things worse.

3. Shem and Japheth aim to improve the situation. Their response is calm, is collaborative (they work together), feels kind, values modesty, and demonstrates a sensitivity to avoiding humiliation.

Without a doubt, the Torah is holding up a moral model for us here in Shem and Japheth's behavior... so clear a lesson that it almost feels like we're being hit over the head with the message. When faced with challenge or human instability, as we so often are, it is up to each of us to choose the path of minimal harm and maximal good. We must return to the most basic and core of our human values, employing them as we seek to do the next right thing.

In this moment, here are some thoughts about what it might look like for us to try to put this Shem and Japheth energy into action right now:

1. Let's cast our ballots for the candidates and policies we believe are most aligned with the principles of kindness, human dignity, modesty and care. I assume that many of us have already done so in this vote-by-mail state, but in case you or any members of your household haven't voted yet, please consider this a rabbinic public service announcement to VOTE and to encourage others to do the same!
   

2. If you possibly can, please TAKE ACTION this weekend: make a final financial contribution or volunteer by helping to "cure" ballots, knocking on doors or otherwise participating in get-out-the-vote efforts. Whatever you do and whoever you speak with, let's try to ground every action and conversation in the values of Shem and Japheth, extending the same sort of kindness, compassion, and humility they employed. 
   

3. A belief in democracy is an extension of our religious conviction that every human being is created, equally, in the Divine image. Here at Kavana, we have been taking cues from A More Perfect Union: The Jewish Partnership for Democracy, an org that works to mobilize the American Jewish community to protect and strengthen American democracy. Their main message for the days before, during and after the 2024 election is this: Various actors may try to distract and divide us, but our election process here in the United States is strong, accurate, and it works -- even if we don't get results on election day. You can help by sharing this message in the days ahead, if and when it feels necessary.

Human history is, of course, filled with ups and downs, twists and turns. There is no way for us to avoid moments of stress, uncertainty, and instability -- this was true in Noah's day, and it is equally true in ours. All we can do is stay grounded in our most basic values, encourage and support one another, and do what we can to "spread a blanket" like Shem and Japheth did... the kind that prevents humiliation and extends calm, compassion, and kindness far and wide.

May the coming week be one in which democracy and peace will prevail! Shabbat shalom,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

Dancing with Torah

The last Jewish holiday of the season arrives Thursday night, with the wonderful name “The Joy of Torah”, Simchat Torah. It is a celebration of the strands of ancient teaching that twine through each Jewish community like spiritual DNA, expressed in so many different ways yet reminding us of our shared heritage. 

Although Torah appears to contain history, and although the interpretation of Torah and reception of Torah can be viewed through the lens of history, Torah is not history. It is a wellspring of collective ancestral memory, and an instrument through which we might hear ruach elohim, God’s wind-voice whispering instruction for how to live a holy life. 

Through mitzvot (sacred Jewish practices), through teshuva (repair and return), through am yisrael (building just and loving connections with each other), Torah promises that we can transcend the limitations of past experience so that history doesn’t become destiny. The deep joy of Torah comes from imbuing us with moral agency - with what Shai Held calls a stance of “possibilism” that although change is hard, we are in fact capable of it.

But this holiday of celebration of Torah became entangled with historic tragedy last year on October 7, when Hamas launched a brutal attack on Israelis during Simchat Torah. The joy of Torah is now caught up in great pain, anger, fear, and desire for vengeance. How are we to make sense of the liberatory joy of Torah colliding with the experience of trauma, and the ongoing fear that we are stuck in the cycle of violence - history becoming destiny? Should we refrain from joy? Should we double down on the possibilities of Torah precisely because despair is so easy? 

At our Kavana observance of Simchat Torah this year, we plan to dance with the Torah scroll, holding it close and feeling held by our tradition. 

The Chassidic master Rebbe Nachman once taught: 

Sometimes, when people are happy and dance, they grab someone standing outside [the circle] who is depressed and gloomy. Against his will they bring him into the circle of dancers; against his will, they force him to be happy along with them. 

It is the same with happiness. When a person is happy, gloom and suffering stand aside.Yet greater still is to gather courage to actually pursue gloom, and to introduce it into the joy, such that the gloom itself turns into joy. 

A person should transform gloom and all suffering into joy. It is like a person who comes to a celebration. The abundant joy and happiness then transforms all his worries, depression and gloom into joy. We find that he has grabbed the gloom and introduced it, against its will, into the joy.

I do not care for Nachman’s nonconsensual dance metaphor - I think too often when we are in the midst of grief or depression, the feeling of being forced into a “happy space” just strengthens the emotional state instead and adds to it a burden of loneliness as well. 

But I do appreciate the insight that real joy is complex. It isn’t a shallow happiness where suffering is ignored or from which sadness is exiled. Real joy involves intentionally moving towards suffering, and reintegrating it into our larger emotional lives. In the heart-dance of the human condition, it all belongs. The experience of transformation isn’t simply that of “mourning into dancing” (Psalm 30), where mourning disappears, but the type of vital fullness we experience when the mourning enters into the dancing alongside joy. 

During our hakafot (dancing with the Torah), we will invite all who attend - people, emotions, gratitude and despair - into the sacred circle. And maybe, just maybe, some seed of new possibility might be planted, for trust and connection, for safety and for peace. 

Chag sameach,

Rabbi Jay LeVine

Heading into a Rainy Sukkot

Tonight at sunset, we enter into the week-long festival of Sukkot. This holiday always brings together many themes: harvest and hospitality, sensory pleasures and vulnerability, exile and in-gathering, impermanence and joy. The central mitzvot of Sukkot include: 

• building and "dwelling in" a sukkah -- a temporary hut reminiscent of our ancestors' period of wandering in the wilderness. 

• gathering together the four species of plants commanded by the Torah -- a palm branch (lulav), two willow branches (arava), three myrtle branches (hadas), and one large yellow citrus fruit (etrog) -- which are then bundled and waved together in all directions on each day of the festival except for Shabbat.

• inviting guests in, including real friends and family who might share meals with us in the sukkah, and also ushpizin -- spiritual ancestors or other symbolic guests whose presence would enrich our celebration.

• reciting Hallel -- extra Psalms that serve as prayers of thanksgiving.

• rejoicing/experiencing simcha, a deep feeling of contentment stemming from gratitude, purpose, and connection.

I built my sukkah this past Sunday morning, the day after Yom Kippur, with the help of family members. It was a beautiful sunny day and the sukkah looked great: frame, decorations, walls, schach on top. By Monday, however, the weather started to turn, and some huge gusts of wind blew the bamboo mats off of the roof! Now it's looking like the weather forecast for Seattle over the coming week will be iffy at best, with rain almost daily and plenty more wind to come.

The laws of Sukkot suggest that in general, we should try to maximize the time we spend in the sukkah during the week of the holiday. And yet, Sukkot falls at a time of year when, in many parts of the world, rain is likely. According to the Mishnah (Sukkah 2:9), it is permissible to leave the sukkah when it's raining hard enough that the water falling through the schach roof could ruin the food you are trying to eat. Later Jewish legal experts expand on this concept: for example, Rabbi Moshe Isserles ("the Rema") comments in the Shulhan Arukh, Orach Hayim 639:2 that it's also not necessary to remain in the sukkah if it's uncomfortably cold outside. The big idea behind these rules is that Sukkot is supposed to feel joyous, and too much physical discomfort might prevent us from being able to experience the requisite joy of the holiday. It's actually pretty remarkable that Jewish law permits each individual to determine for themselves, subjectively, when the weather is extreme enough that it should exempt us from mitzvah of dwelling in the sukkah. 

In many ways, it feels right to me that we are headed into a potentially rainy and windy week of Sukkot here in Seattle, where we will have the opportunity to hold discomfort and joy side-by-side. I can imagine that over the coming week, there will be moments when it will be wet enough out that eating inside will feel necessary, and other moments when my family will try to squeeze an outdoor sukkah meal into a sun-break, wiping off chairs so we don't have to sit in puddles. I'm guessing that this toggling may make for a more muted Sukkot celebration overall, which feels like an honest reflection of my mood heading into the holiday. To me, the Jewish togetherness that Sukkot promises cannot feel complete with some 100 hostages, several of whom have direct ties to members of our Kavana community, still being held in tunnels underneath Gaza. (I do love the idea of inviting all of the hostages into the sukkah symbolically as ushpizin.) In addition, the thought of celebrating in soggy conditions this year already has me considering who is more vulnerable and has even less shelter than a sukkah in the Pacific Northwest might provide. This year, for me, this holiday certainly points us towards empathy for the nearly two million(!) Gazans who have been displaced by war, the tens of thousands of residents of northern Israel who have been living away from home for the past year, and the many civilians in Lebanon who have fled bombardment in recent weeks. As I think about those who do not have shelter this year, Jewish or not, I can't help but wonder whether there is more we could be doing to feed and shelter the displaced, to help bring hostages home and bring this war to an end, and to help bring everyone in the region to greater safety.

In the book This is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared, Rabbi Alan Lew reflects: "[The sukkah] exposes the idea of a house as an illusion. The idea of a house is that it gives us security, shelter, haven from the storm. But no house can really offer us this. No building of wood and stone can ever afford us protection from the disorder that is always lurking all around us. No shell we put between us and the world can ever really keep us secure from it. And we know this. We never really believed in this illusion..."

And yet, despite this truth -- that as human beings, our homes cannot truly protect us, there are no guarantees in life, and security is an illusion -- we are still meant to experience joy on this holiday! The joy of Sukkot comes in small increments and in tangible units. Simcha is found in picking up an etrog and breathing in its sweet fragrance, in waving the branches of the lulav in all the directions, in singing songs in community, in sharing a cup of tea with a friend, in getting outside (whatever the weather!). This Sukkot, I need every ounce of that joy I can find, and I'm inclined to try to make the most of the holiday this year, even if this means I'll be bundling up in a sweater and a jacket, or eating a bowl of soup in the sukkah with some raindrops mixed in.

I wish our entire community a chag sameach (a joy-filled holiday), whatever the weather. My fervent prayer this Sukkot is for a "sukkat shalom" -- that is, that all the hostages and all who are displaced by war can find their way home, to places that are secure and peaceful.

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum

Final Shabbat of the Year: Reflect, Synthesize & Prepare

With Selichot this Saturday night and Rosh Hashanah less than a week away, we are now entering the home-stretch of 5784. Our task, as we move through these final days of the year, is to reflect on the year that's drawing to a close and prepare to welcome in a new one. We engage in this work of taking stock on many levels at once: as individuals, as a Jewish community, as members of a broader society and world. On the Jewish communal level, at least, I can't remember any other year in my lifetime that has felt as fraught, heavy and complex as this one has been. Truly, it feels like we have our work cut out for us this year as we try to wade through it all and center ourselves in preparation for change, growth and newness.

This week's Torah reading, fortunately, provides us with many prompts and lessons to aid in this work. This Shabbat, we read a double parasha: Nitzavim-Vayeilech. In both of these Torah portions, which appear towards the end of the final book of the Torah (Deuteronomy), Moses is giving a farewell speech to the Israelites, trying to impart wisdom before he dies and before they cross the Jordan River to inhabit the land God has promised to them. Moses urges the Israelites to uphold the covenant in Nitzavim, and then in Vayeilech, concludes his speech, blessing his successor Joshua and instructing the Israelites to gather every seven years to publicly read from the Torah. These two short Torah portions are jam packed with language, imagery and themes, many of which have the capacity to be helpful to us in this season of review. Here are some examples that jumped out at me this week:

1) The very names of these two Torah portions stand in tension to one another. Nitzavim means "standing" -- it comes from the opening verse of that parasha, which begins "Atem nitzavim hayom kulchem," "You stand this day, all of you, before the Lord your God...." (Deut. 29:9). Vayeilech, on the other hand, means "going" -- as in "Vayeilech moshe vayidaber et had'varim ha'eileh el kol yisrael," "Moses went and spoke these things to all Israel" (Deut. 31:1). The contrast between standing statically and firmly, on the one hand, and going (that is, moving and changing position), on the other, is an animating tension that leads to productive questions for this season. We might ask ourselves: What has stayed the same for us this year? In what ways are we feeling solid and prepared to continue standing right where we are? What has shifted? In what ways are we experiencing movement, and how are we ourselves changing?

2) Both Nitzavim and Vayeilech are grounded in a keen awareness of life and death, generational change, meaning and legacy. In Nitzavim, Moses says: "I make this covenant, with its sanctions, not with you alone, but both with those who are standing here with us this day before the Lord our God and with those who are not with us here this day" (Deut. 29:13-14). Just a few verses later, the text says that "later generations will ask -- the children who succeed you" how the world came to be in the state it is in. The text seems to know that the our actions matter not only for our own generation but also for future generations -- precisely the kind of heightened awareness we strive to achieve at this time of year as we reflect on our lives. In addition, in Vayeilech, God says to Moses explicitly, "The time is drawing near for you to die. Call Joshua and present yourselves in the Tent of Meeting, that I may instruct him" (Deut. 31:14). Similarly, this time of year, we are drawn into awareness of our own mortality. With increased cognizance of our own impermanence, a perspective that includes the generations to come, and the ability to view our lives within the context of a broader sweep of history and continuity, we are encouraged to make the most of our lives and imbue them with goodness and purpose. 

3) These Torah portions contain beautiful words of encouragement, serving as a spiritual pep talk. Transitions are inherently difficult; this is true for Moses as he faces his own impending death, for the Israelites, as they prepare to enter into the land, and also for us today, as we stand on the brink of a new year of life. Nitzavim states that Torah is not beyond reach -- "It is not in the heavens... nor is it beyond the sea... No, the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it" (Deut. 30:12-14) -- promising the Israelites that they already have access to everything they will need to be successful in their new place. Vayeilech offers the kind of advice a coach might before a big game: "Be strong and resolute" (Deut 31:6) and "Fear not and be not dismayed!" (Deut. 31:8). In doing so, the text of the Torah acknowledges how overwhelming life can be and how daunting change can feel, how easy it is to slip into doubt, fear, and despair. Through its language, these Torah portions lay down a permanent record of reassurance and support, so that we might return to these words every year and feel it possible to hang in there, even as we move through hard transitional moments.

4) Finally, Vayeilech ends with mention of a special gathering called Hakhel that was supposed to take place every seven years: "Gather the people -- men, women, children, and the strangers in your communities -- that they may hear and so learn to revere the Lord your God and to observe faithfully every word of this Teaching" (Deut. 31:12). The world must have felt particularly frightening for the Israelites as they contemplated moving forward without Moses as their leader; here, Moses emphasizes the importance of gathering, and being in it together. Only together will they be able to achieve everything they must: come to terms with mortality, face uncertainty, make the giant leap (both physically and mentally) from one place to another. So too should it be for us! It is our tradition to come together -- to gather in community -- for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, so that we can do the important spiritual work of the season in good company, with all the support we need in place.

As we head into this final Shabbat before the New Year, I hope we can each take some time to reflect, to synthesize and to prepare. It feels like there is more work to do than ever, if we are to ground ourselves against the backdrop of a world that is so in flux. And yet, the Torah portions of Nitzavim and Vayeilech come at just the right time to offer us the support and scaffolding we need to do this work: to stand firm and to move, to gain perspective on our lives, to feel encouraged through transition, and to join together in community.

I look forward to seeing many of you next week as we celebrate Rosh Hashanah together. May our work of the season pave the way for the renewal and change that we and the world so desperately need!

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rachel Nussbaum