Rosh Hashanah Sermon 5777
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Sermons
Rosh Hashanah 5777 |
It is two o’clock in the morning. I am restlessly dreaming, encountering a haze of past events and future days, when a definitive wail cuts through the fog and startles me back to consciousness. Five days post-partum and still adjusting to the “new normal” that has transformed my reality, it takes me a second to ascribe the piercing wails to the baby in the bassinet a few feet away. Upon this realization, I, too, want to cry. It has only been two hours since the last waking and my body aches from exhaustion. I lie, motionless, for a few more moments, praying for a reprieve, and I contemplate passing the buck this time. But I know, at this moment, I am the one who can nourish and soothe. And so with every ounce of strength I have, I pull myself up, stumble out of bed and reach for my daughter, bringing her tiny, pulsating body close to my mine. I rock her in my arms and stroke her head, while whispering in her ear, “It’s ok. I’m here.”
As parents, grandparents, relatives and friends, we know that the moments of our lives that are the most challenging, and yet the most magnificent, are the moments in which our loved ones cry out to us from the depths of disorientation and vulnerability, needing the comfort that we are uniquely equipped to give. “I am here,” we say to our children, upon the shock that accompanies the first head clunk…upon the apprehension on the eve of the first day of kindergarten…and upon the pain of the first heartache. “I am here,” we say to the friend who calls with the news that the cancer has spread…or to the family member experiencing a painful divorce. Indeed our lives are punctuated by the moments in which our loved ones call out to us, seeking our attention and our presence. Yet it is what we say in such moments that determines the nature of our relationships…and defines who we are. Abraham learned this lesson when God called out to him early one morning. “Abraham!” God cried out from the heavens. “Hineini – I am here” – Abraham replied. “Abraham - take your son, Isaac, the one who you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as an offering on one of the heights that I will show you.” Trusting in his relationship with the divine, committed to performing God’s will, Abraham silently prepared to fulfill God’s unfathomable request. The next morning, he saddled his donkey and gathered his servants and his son, Isaac. He split the wood for the offering, and set out for the place of which God had told him. He did not speak, and did not need to. His one word reply – “Hineini” - spoke volumes: “Hineini” - I am here, and I am on my way.” And yet although Abraham responded to God’s call with “Hineini – I am here” – we wonder - was Abraham really and truly there? As Jews, the instinct to question and challenge and engage is part of our kishkes – part of our DNA. We are Israel, derived from the Hebrew root “to wrestle.” Being truly and fully present with ourselves, and with the one standing before us, requires a degree of engagement. By blindly following God’s command to do the unthinkable – the sacrifice his beloved son - Abraham failed to live up to his potential as a father, and as a Jew. And so as parents, grandparents, and teachers and friends, we struggle, year after year, with the disturbing lessons and implications of this text, seeking and demanding answers for God’s horrific request, and Abraham’s troubling complacency. One possible answer does not excuse Abraham’s actions. It does, however, shed light upon God’s command, and upon Abraham’s response. It is an answer that reflects the challenges of interpersonal relationships, and illuminates a way in which we can be fully present with those around us, upon hearing their call and answering with “Hineini – I am here.” In short, it is an answer that can be summed up in three words: “Tell me more.” Tell me more. This is how Rashi, the 11th century French Biblical commentator, explains how Isaac ended up on the altar in the first place. Rather than trying to understand how God could command such a terrible deed, Rashi teaches, the answer to all our problems lies in the command itself, and Abraham’s failure to clarify what God was really asking of him. “V’ha’aleyhu sham” – God commands Abraham – “and offer him there, as an offering.” It is true that the Hebrew word used in this story for “offering” – olah - can denote a burnt offering – a sacrifice to God. But it is also true that this same word – olah - can simply mean “to raise up.” You might be familiar with the notion of “aliyah,” which is derived from the same Hebrew root as “olah.” When one has moved to Israel, we say that they have “made aliyah” because moving to the holy land involves a spiritual ascension, or “going up” of sorts. Likewise, when one blesses the Torah before it is read, he or she is called forth for an “aliyah,” because one ascends the steps of the bima in order to bless the Torah. In short, the story of the binding of Isaac is perhaps the greatest misunderstanding in Jewish history. If Rashi were to re-write the final, climactic scene of the binding of Isaac, I imagine it would go something like this: Abraham lifts the knife to sacrifice Isaac. Just as he is about to draw blood, an angel of God appears and yells, “Stop! I never said slaughter your son! I just said raise him up! Bring him up the mountain, and show him the magnitude of my creation! Let him experience what is means to be an olah – an individual who has achieved spiritual ascension.” I, too, can’t help but wonder how the story might have played out differently had Abraham had responded to God’s command with, “Hineini…I am here…now, tell me more?” Three years ago, I served as an inter-faith chaplain at two New York City hospitals, where I experienced the tremendous power and potential of “tell me more.” Though I responded to my pager and to the needs of my patients with “Hineini, I am here” - I often found myself at a loss for words while sitting with patients undergoing unimaginable pain and suffering. Indeed, it can be so difficult to know what to say when sitting by the hospital bed, when making a shiva call, or when we hear the pain in the voice of a friend’s over the phone. In her book, “How to Be a Friend to a Friend Who’s Sick,” Letty Cottin Pogrebin relates a conversation she once had with a friend who was dying from cancer. Looking to extend her Christmas greetings, Letty called Geraldine’s home one evening, expecting to speak to Geraldine’s husband. When Geraldine answered, instead, Letty realized that this would be their last conversation. And so rather than engaging in trivial questions and pleasantries, Letty cut to the chase, and asked Geraldine to share her thoughts about dying, her fears about the future. “Tell me…what do you think about when you think about your own death?” She asked her. With that question, the floodgates opened. Geraldine was so clearly craving to engage in the questions that no one had been courageous enough to ask. And so she gave answers that were painfully honest. She told Letty how she’d been preparing her family for life without her, and that she’d told her children which personal items she wanted each of them to have. She told Letty that she left instructions about where she wanted to be buried, about who should speak at her funeral. And then her voiced cracked: “I want you to know that it’s ok with me if I die now. I’ve led a blessed life. I’m ready to go.” Letty writes how grateful she was that they were on the phone, so that Geraldine couldn’t see the tears that were streaming down her cheeks. The lesson that Letty learned that day is the same lesson I learned from my chaplaincy supervisor, who taught me to be fully and truly present with the individual across from me in the hospital bed with three simple words, “Tell me more.” “Tell me more – she would remind me, over and over again. These three words are your greatest tool. We live in an egocentric world. How often does someone say to you, tell me more? How often does someone truly demonstrate the desire to hear and understand your innermost thoughts, fears and aspirations? Those three words are the greatest gift you can give to someone who is suffering.” And, indeed, I was awestruck each time these three simple words invited and enabled profound expressions of sorrow, fear, and grief, necessary for the journey towards wholeness, healing, and peace. Our lives are fraught with so much uncertainty and fragility. When a loved one dies, we mourn the loss of past and future intimacy, the loss of a relationship that was and that could have been. But, then again, how often do we wait until it’s too late? How often do we let the minutiae of our everyday lives impede our chances and opportunities for moments of deep understanding and connection with those we encounter in our everyday lives? “We can sometimes be so involved in our own worlds,” Rabbi Rick Jacobs teaches, “that we cannot see or hear when our child or spouse or parent or friend is in process of becoming bound up on the altar – crying out to us outwardly, or even silently.”[1] The story of the Binding of Isaac implores us to consider what might be sacrificed when we miss an opportunity to be fully present and engaged with those around us. We can only imagine how much richer, deeper, more healthy and more fulfilling our lives and our relationships might be if questions and expressions of “tell me more” invaded our everyday vocabularies. From when I was twelve to about seventeen, my mom and I would have the same conversation when I got home from school. You might recognize it – it went something like this: Hi Sarah, how was school today? Good. What did you do? Nothing. Of course, engaging deeply with one another takes a measure of vulnerability that is challenging both for children and adults. And yet there were so many moments during my adolescence in which something did happen at school – something that an adult should have known about; something that, if encouraged, I might have shared. Heather was fourteen when she realized she was gay. When Luke, a peer at school, realized this, too, he began tormenting her, chasing her down the hallway screaming offensive slurs, stealing her lunch money, and pushing her into lockers. Heather’s parents were the only ones who noticed that something was wrong. When she began coming home and trudging wordlessly from the front door to her bedroom, her mother knew something was up. Though her silence and her apathy, Heather was crying out for help. Of course, she was initially irritated by her mother’s concern and constant questioning – and she remained adamant at first, as most 14 year olds would, that nothing was wrong. But, ultimately, her mother’s persistence was critically impactful. In a book that chronicles the lives and experiences of gay teens, Heather writes, “My mother must have asked me what was going on a school a hundred times before I ever answered. I was afraid to tell her what was happening, because I felt so ashamed. I was gay. I had a bully. Still, it meant so much to me that she cared to ask, and ask a lot. Nagging has a bad reputation, but if my mother had never nagged me, I probably never would have told her. And once she knew, we began to discuss strategy…she came into school and formed a coalition of parents who were concerned about harassment. I’m not sure what they did besides meet twice a month and scream at the principal about the terrible kids in the school. I do, however, remember the feeling of seeing those moms walk past security and storm into his office, demanding attention and justice. I made me proud. And not only that – something about what my mother did inspired me to action. I refused to give Luke my lunch money. I told other teacher’s that he upset me. I knew my mom was watching.”[2] And so as parents, spouses, and friends…we might just learn a thing or two if we put down the grocery bag, stopped the car, turned around and looked at our child, our parent, our spouse, our friend and said, over and over and over again, I’m here. Really, I’m here. Tell me more. When we hold a baby in our arms, we envision the relationship that we might create with this new, tiny being that has entered our world and our lives. Rosh Hashanah, too, provides the opportunity to establish a new beginning with another person. On Rosh Hashanah we have the opportunity to revise and reimagine how, in the coming year, we can become more engaged and more present with those around us and with the ones we love. Indeed, with each call from a loved one, acquaintance or friend, and with each response of “hineini,” we have the opportunity to begin a new chapter in the unfolding stories of our lives and our relationships with one another. In this New Year, 5777, may we be moved and inspired to share with one another our ongoing stories about who we are, and who we hope to be. May our ability to listen and our ability to share help us to live lives of greater fullness, depth and meaning. And may the new books and chapters that arise from the stories that we hear, and the stories we share, guarantee us a seal in the greatest book of all – The Book of Life – and together, let us say, Amen. [1] Rabbi Rick Jacobs, “Being Accessible to the Other in our Lives,” in Hineini in Our Lives by Norman Cohen, pgs. 133-139. [2] This is a Book for Parents of Gay Kids by Danielle Owens-Reed and Kristin Russo, pgs 193-195. |