Scrollers Preview - Vayeishev 2014

This week, even though we have 13 chapters to go in the book of Genesis, we start to see the end of the book coming into view. Joseph takes center stage, in his multi-colored coat, and as he stands there, we can already imagine our people in Egypt. The descent has begun.

Themes from the previous generations repeat themselves, but in a more symbolic and dramatic way. The older sons will serve the younger, as in the previous generation. But instead of a mother learning this from a consultation with God, as Rivka did regarding her sons, Joseph himself learns this prophecy through a series of dreams which he describes to his brothers. And his brothers know the meaning of the dreams immediately.

The younger child is favored again here, and it is symbolized outwardly by the multi-colored coat Jacob gives to Joseph. While Jacob’s aggrieved brother unsuccessfully ran after him to kill him, here the brothers seem much more bloodthirsty. In the end, they sell their brother into slavery and dramatize their brother’s death, showing their father a bloody tunic.

The theme of deception continues here – remember Jacob wearing animal skins to deceive his father Isaac? Now Tamar changes her clothes and poses as a prostitute to seduce her father-in-law Judah and bear a son to carry on the family line.

And speaking of clothes, this is a huge theme too – disguise, special clothes, and the stripping of those clothes. We already mentioned Joseph’s coat, and Tamar’s costume change. Joseph is stripped of his coat and thrown in a pit. Then, when Potiphar’s  wife seduces Joseph, she strips him, and then he runs away, leaving his garment in her hand.

This cycle of Joseph seems to be distinguished from what came before by this emphasis on the meaning of external things– clothes and symbols. Dreams happen inside characters’ heads, but they are interpreted as predicting concrete, external events. Previously, God brought messages to people in their dreams or spoke to them when they were awake. In these chapters, we know that “God is with Joseph” because of his outward success, first in Potiphar’s house and then in prison.

What do we make of this shift to a story related through symbols? Are we reading something more allegorical? Something more shallow? Less nuanced? Where is the depth in this story?

Scrollers Preview - Vayishlach 2014

Dear Scrollers –

For my preview of the parasha this week I thought I’d share a piece I wrote as part of my Jewish Mindfulness Teacher Training. Every participant is responsible for writing a Dvar Torah with meditation instructions for one parasha during the year, and this was my week. My piece focuses on Jacob’s wrestling with the “man” until dawn and how our minds deal with the “unpleasant.” You’ll see that at the end there are meditation instructions. If you practice meditation, you may want to try it out and see if it works for you!

Looking forward to studying this parasha with all of you,

Rabbi G.

. . . a mindfulness midrash

“We came to your brother Esau; he himself is coming to meet you, and there are four hundred men with him.  Jacob was greatly frightened. . . .” (32:7-8)

He is going to see his brother tomorrow – his brother whom he hasn’t seen in 21 years, who was pursuing him to kill him the last time they saw each other –the brother whom he had cheated out of the blessing.

And Jacob does what he typically does when he is frightened. He takes control of the situation,  dividing up his camp, sending wave after wave of gifts ahead to his brother, hoping that if he propitiates him ahead of time, Esau will let him off easy.

But Jacob can’t control this situation. He doesn’t know what he is going to face. He is scared. And for once in his life, he stays put, and he sits with the fear.

“. . . .Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the break of dawn.” (32:25)

All night long, he sits alone with the fear, and all night, Jacob tries to run away. But the man pulls him back again and again, pinning him to the ground. All night long, Jacob’s mind weaves stories – he reviews his past deceptions, his manipulations . So many stories. So unpleasant.  The man’s arms grip him, hold him still, so Jacob can feel the guilt sitting there at the bottom of his stomach, until slowly, it dissipates. All night long, anxious thoughts turn Jacob away from the moment and the man, drawing him towards the next morning . He pictures “what if” scenarios of blood and death and screams. But the man firmly turns Jacob back to face him, holding him, until he returns to the moment.

As the sun rises, Jacob’s hip is sore, but he feels a sense of release.

“I will not let you go unless you bless me,” Jacob says. (32:27)

And a strange thing happens. Warm fingers of compassion make their way around Jacob’s heart.

When the man leaves, Jacob realizes that he has looked the truth in its face, he is broken, and he has survived (32:31).

He limps towards Esau, his brother – his twin from whom he had separated. Esau runs to greet him, embraces him, kisses him and weeps.

The work has already been done. All that Jacob needed to do was to stay in one place and wrestle. Now his heart is open, and Esau can sense it. And they are connected again. And as Jacob leaves his brother, this time he is not running, he is no longer afraid. He is whole (33:18).

…some musings

Sitting with the unpleasant is a practice. It is an intentional wrestling that takes place internally, as we firmly an lovingly stay with whatever we want to flee from. The habitual response to the unpleasant is to run. Staying put feels dangerous. However, it is possible to feel the unpleasant and to feel safe while the unpleasant makes itself known in the body. The wrestling can become an embrace, as we come back to the body, back to sensation, whether pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. When we are feeling scared, like it’s time to run, we can bless ourselves with safety and strength so that we can continue to stay put. It is possible to emerge from that firm embrace feeling transformed, with a more open heart.

We see Jacob practicing staying with the unpleasant as he wrestles with “the man.” This is a new practice for Jacob, who has previously dealt with fear or conflict by running away or manipulating or deceiving. After his night of wrestling, Jacob encounters his brother in a new way, free from past habitual modes of response. He is able to receive his brother’s embrace, and he sees in his brother the face of the Divine. He is able to be whole with his brother, showing up with his strained hip – his place of vulnerability. And he leaves his brother “shalem,”  or “whole.” Even as they go their separate ways, they are no longer separate.

…instructions for practice

Sit in a relaxed, alert posture. Bring your attention to the breath – where it enters and leaves the body. Note sensation in the body and whether it is pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. Imagine strong arms holding you in a firm, loving embrace. You are safe, and you are rooted in this place. As thoughts and stories arise, feel the arms holding you, re-centering you. When unpleasant thoughts and feelings arise, bless yourself: “May I feel safe. May I feel strong. May I live with ease.” Return to sensation, to breath. Allow the feelings and sensations associated with the thoughts to make themselves known in the body. Feel those strong arms holding you. Bless yourself each time an unpleasant phenomenon arises. Note when the feelings dissipate. When you are ready, allow the arms to release you.

Scrollers Preview - Parashat Vayeitze 2014

When we read the story of Jacob we often ask ourselves, why Jacob? Why is this deceptive trickster the one chosen to give birth to our people and to give us our name, “Yisrael”? The following Hasidic commentary caught my attention this week as a response to these questions:

Toldot Yaakov Yoseph, Vayeshev #6

Regarding … the two names “Yaakov” and “Yisrael”: this reflects our descent

and ascent, whether physical or spiritual. It is impossible for us to stand on one

level all the time, and so we are referred to as “ascending and descending”. When

we go down we are called “Yaakov”, in the sense of “heel’ and lowliness; when

we go up we are called “Yisrael”, a prince and important person.

Jacob, like all of us, has times of physical and spiritual ascent as well as times of descent.

This week’s parasha is characterized by this tension between ascent and descent. Jacob has just received his father’s deepest blessing, and yet, he is at a low point in his life, as he flees his brother Esau who is intent on killing him for stealing that blessing.

On the road towards his uncle Laban’s home, Jacob dreams of angels ascending and descending a staircase that reaches from the ground towards the sky. God comes to him in the dream and promises Jacob that God will be with him and bring the promises of the covenant to fruition through him. When Jacob awakes, he recognizes that God had been there in that place with him, and he vows to devote himself to God – to something higher.

He then encounters Rachel at the well and experiences love at first sight. And yet, it is only after years of servitude to and deception by Laban that he is allowed to finally marry her. Eventually the covenantal promise is fulfilled – Jacob fathers many children and multiplies his wealth and flocks. But Laban struggles with him as he tries to leave with his new family and possessions.

Life is not easy for Jacob. Yes, there are moments of ascent. But there are many more moments of descent, disappointment, struggle and suffering.

What better character to carry the name of our people – those who wrestle with God and humans -  Those who are constantly on the move between “Ya’akov,” “lowliness” and “Yisra’el,” “princeliness.” Our task as a people is to note God’s presence in all of these places –at the top of the staircase and at the bottom.

Scrollers Preview - Lech L'cha 2014/5775

This preview is late today. I suppose the reason is that I’m having a very hard time focusing on tomorrow, knowing that I leave for our congregational Israel trip on Tuesday evening, and there are so many loose ends to tie up!! But as I finally got myself to sit down and write this, I realized that perhaps I’m feeling the way Avram felt at the beginning of our parasha.

Out of nowhere, it seems, God calls to him to get up and leave his native land, his birthplace, and his father’s house, to go to the land that God will show him. God promises that Avram will be a great nation, and that he will be a blessing. What loose ends must he have left hanging? Was this an abrupt break with his past, as so many commentators declare? Or is it a continuity of his father Terach’s journey, from a generation before?

These days, people get up and move pretty regularly. It is rare in my generation to find peers who have lived anywhere for more than 4 or 5 years at a time. When I tell people that my father served as a rabbi for the same congregation for 35 years, their jaws drop. But no matter how often some of us do it, getting up and leaving takes enormous effort and brings many risks.

Avram doesn’t even get to spend much time in Canaan at first. A famine strikes, and he immediately has to leave for Egypt. And then he eventually returns to the land. But even in the land, he moves around. What stays continuous is the relationship with God. God calls to him every few years and adds another layer to the covenantal promise with which their relationship began. Over the years, Avram is promised land, and then a child through Sarai, and then his and Sarai’s names are changed, and then he is given the mitzvah of circumcision as a sign of the covenant.

It seems that Avram’s trust needs to be, not in the stability of the actual place he is dwelling, but in something beyond that – in a God whom he can not see but who promises him blessing.

Scrollers Preview - Parashat Breishit 5775/2014

 After a whole month of endings and beginnings, this is our last beginning, as we finally begin the cycle of Torah reading in this new year of 5775!

The beginning of the Torah is a real puzzle. It starts, not with “alef,” the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, but with “bet,” the second letter. It has at least two if not more accounts woven together about how things started. In one, human beings seem to be the pinnacle of creation, being created last. In the second, a male human is created before any other animals, and then the female human is created out of his rib. One gives us a heavenly, harmonious view of creation while the other is more earthly and conflicted.  God comes across differently, and has different names, in the two different accounts.

We also seem to have two conflicting genealogies that lead from the first human being, Adam, to Noah, whose story we read next week. Did he descend from Cain ,the first murderer, or from Seth, who is born to replace the murdered brother Abel? Not clear…

So, “The Beginning” is not at all clear. Rather, it is quite murky and challenging. And by the end of the first parasha, God already regrets having created us in the first place, with the exception of Noah. Not so optimistic!!

As we begin again, I want us to wrestle with the question of why the redactors gave us THIS beginning? Why start with such poetic harmony and leave us with God being heartbroken over how corrupt humanity has become, to the point that God is ready to erase all of the work God had done? Why have us devolve so quickly into murder? And what does it say about God, and God’s relationship with humanity, that there is this tiny shred of hope in Noah?

Scrollers Preview - Parashat Nitzavim/Vayelech

This week we have two beautiful sections of Torah. The first, Nitzavim, consists of the ratification of the covenant with the people, before they enter the land. We read selections from this parasha on Yom Kippur morning as well, perhaps because the people are about to embark on a new beginning, and because they are given a path back to God if they stray.

God and Moses ratify the covenant even as they know that the people are prone to stray. In fact, Moses prophecies that the people will indeed follow other gods, once they have made it to the land and have prospered. The curses that we read last week will then take effect. However, we also are given a way back, and a choice to take that path or not. The words “fanah,” “too turn away” and “shav,” “to turn back,” both appear in this parasha. After we have turned away, if we turn back to God, God will restore us and take us back “b’ahavah,” “in love.” We are exhorted to make that choice – the choice of life and blessing over the choice of death and curse.

This theme of a new beginning continues into the next section, Vayelech. Here we face the reality that Moses’ end is near. Moses learns that he is about to die and will need to appoint Joshua in his stead. There is much anxiety again that the people will stray after other gods once they enter the land. One response to this eventuality is for God to compose a poem which will serve as a witness against the people. Another is for the book of “this Torah,” to be written down and kept next to the Ark, as evidence that Israel has accepted the terms of the covenant. “This Torah,” probably meaning the book of Deuteronomy, will also be read publicly once a year during the Festival of Sukkot.  In this new beginning, with a new leader in a new land, the power of the written word will have to suffice, to keep the people together and aligned with God.

As we study together, I hope we will explore the following questions, of course along with yours:

-          How do we feel about the fact that it is a given that we will stray, that God will curse us, and that we will turn back and be restored? Why not have a way to avoid this cycle altogether? What is this prediction meant to cause us to do, especially since it seems so inevitable?

Scrollers Preview - Parashat Eikev 2014

This week we continue our study of what Everett Fox calls Moses’ first exhortation in the Book of Deuteronomy. In his commentary, Fox describes the book of Deuteronomy as unique among the books of the Torah, with its urgent and lofty rhetoric, its pleading and warning tone, and it long elegant phrasing. Different from the other books, in this one the narrator is directly addressing a living audience, “not only of the ancient hearers portrayed in the text but also of contemporary listeners.” Similar to Greek historians who “paint a vivid picture” of the orator and the drama of the historical moment, this text is not based on eyewitness accounts, but aims to present what “would have been said on such an occasion.”

And what is the occasion? In the context of the text itself, the occasion is the moment just before Moses dies and the people finally enter the Promised Land. But it is possible that the context in which the book was written was the reign of King Josiah of Judah, who insisted on one God worshipped in one central location and who destroyed the high places of cultic worship that had proliferated in the land during the 7^th century BCE.

In this week’s installment, Moses warns the people of the danger that once they settle in the land, acquire wealth and become comfortable, they will forget the covenant. They are prone to look at the work of their hands and forget that it was God who gave them the power to produce their wealth. He reminds them of the incident of the Golden Calf and of how Moses intervened on their behalf.

Moses warns that they are not entering a land like Egypt, in which water flows abundantly. Rather, they will depend on the rainfall, and rainfall is dependent upon God. If the people do listen and follow the commandments, then God will bring forth the rain. But if they don’t, the rain will stop, the land will not produce, and they will perish. Similarly, if they obey God’s commandments, they will easily dispossess their enemies and expand their territory, but if they disobey, they will be defeated.

A theme that is woven throughout Deuteronomy and which appears in our parasha is that of love – “ahavah.” This is what God expects of us. According to Fox’s commentary, love here has the connotation of loyalty, as a vassal has for a lord. As we study together, I’d like for us to ask ourselves how love or loyalty operates in our own context, where the lord/vassal relationship no longer operates. Is this a helpful metaphor for our relationship with God? Is “ahavah” still a helpful way to think about what God expects of us?