18 Iyar 5771:
1. Re-Surfacing
If you are reading these words it means I have finally re-surfaced from the bottom of that bottomless ocean otherwise known as a college semester, in which light does not truly dawn on the new day until the final final has been, well, finalized and handed in. This semester it was three major papers all dropped one after the other, plus presentations and debates, all following a heart-stopping computer crash thanks to a nasty virus.
During this academic drama I have managed to continue with my conversion - the learning, the questioning, the reading, and yes the celebrating.
2. Yes, the celebrating
Just a few weeks ago I was invited to my first Pesach, which at first I was sure would end up being some sort of a social disaster. Although I had read up on the holiday and went through the Maxwell House Haggadah twice (I am told it’s a classic) it still seemed so new and huge and therefore terribly complex. There are readings, there are songs, there are four sons (?) and four glasses of wine at appointed times and bitter herbs and charoset. The first night of Passover seemed fraught with a thousand different ways for me to surely embarrass myself and inadvertently switch the CONVERT light on my forehead to on. (Hmmm, maybe it’s
time to start leaving that at home?)
As you have probably already figured, in the end I had nothing to fear. (Note to self: Nothing. To Fear.) I had been invited to the sweet and friendly home of some friends whose table was adorned with all of the above, plus helpings of humor and melody (if you knew them neither of these adjectives would surprise.)
Yes, I did get a reading and yes, I did sing songs I only half knew, and no, I was not the only non-Jew (at the moment) in the room; no, I did not spill a single drop of wine (as far as I know) or talk out of turn or munch away on a matzo before I was supposed to. Yes, there was a Miriam’s Cup next to Elijah’s, hopping frogs and I believe an orange on the Seder plate. (If you don’t know its meaning check out its her-story via Susannah Herschel).
The story I knew. What I didn’t was this version of it, recited so richly, so sensuously, through food and drink and story and song. And community, always community. But then, what else should I expect in the home that is Judaism?
3. Parshat Bechukotai
It being 18 Iyar, 5771 the Torah study this week was all Parshat Bechukotai, the chapter which closes the Book of Leviticus. It was one of those challenging portions for me. Just like Terumah (in which Moses gets away with some unchallenged misogynist editorial license after descending Sinai), Ki Tisa (God wants to smite the fledging nation for the Golden Calf, but Moses says no, remember the covenant – but then he smites half of them anyway?) and Shemini (Avihu and Nadav take a hit for, er, um, what exactly again? Strange fire? Wait, isn’t that an Indigo Girls’ song? And Aaron says nothing as they are dragged away? Whoa, and I thought my father had issues ), this parshat left me initially unsettled with disturbing images. God decides to list for the new nation of Israel all the positives and negatives of remaining true to the covenant - follow the rules, your fields will yield such harvests that your stomachs will not know what hunger is. Great! Awesome! But wait, hold on there cowboy. Because if you stray from the covenant I will not only evict you from the land like a group of hung-over frat boys late on their rent but I will make things so miserable through famine, desolation, etc., that eating your own children will seem like the only alternative.
Like, really, HaShem? The threat of hunger and anguish and exile from the Your land isn’t frightening enough, so You just had to add cannibalism of children as extra incentive? Nice.
Every time I hit this kind of surprise (or at least a surprise to me) theological pothole I force myself to stop, climb out and re-examine what it is I have driven into. Because no one said this Torah business would be easy, linear, simple or even explainable. If all I wanted was a smooth trip I could always hop on the Orange Line. (Or not.) The Torah is a different kind of ride all together. It makes no promises of comfort, only to confound, contradict, challenge, confront and perhaps proffer contemplation. All of which is fine by me. Indisputable answers tend to end conversations and offer no growth in its solutions. Torah study fosters discussions and even debates and in the heat of those colliding thoughts and words something happens – sparks in the dark, real light and warmth, the energy that animates. I forgot who said it but things in this Universe grow only through some sort of friction. Welcome to Judaism.
In embracing this particular mission statement, I turn to an Introduction to Judaism class in which one of the rabbis reminded us that the Torah does not concern itself with a nation’s history but rather a people’s collective memory via myth and metaphor. (Add in that there were multiple authors over different time spans and all that implies.) I am also grateful for this Rosh Hashanah sermon during last year’s High Holy Days at Temple Israel.
All of this continues to make space for my questions as a Torah studier to be asked and subsequent ideas to expand, overlap, synthesize and develop. For me this is no small thing but rather the difference between stretching your limbs in a sun-steeped meadow up toward the clear blue, and banging those same limbs against the sides of a closed dark airless box.
May I continue to grow in that field.
