The 10th of Av, the year
70. April 5, 1968. September 12, 2001. These are the days after the days that define
us. The days after a great wound. The days after a seemingly incomprehensible
act. The days when we feel we cannot go
on, because how could we, or why should we.
The truth is, the days after may define us even more than the days of
tragedy themselves. Everyone likes to
ask and talk about where they were on the day that the Towers came down, but do
we ever consider where we were the day after.
How many of us might have gone to donate blood? How many of us were glued to our television
sets, clutching at loved ones? How many
of us turned to the Temple to seek comfort, solace or some sense of
understanding, even though we knew that it would most likely be impossible to
come by?
How do we treat the day after an
important and defining day? How do we
live and survive in the aftermath of history?
How do we continue to live when it seems like our lives are turned
upside down? When everything we thought
we understood has been questioned and challenged?
Let me tell you about another day
after tragedy. The 8th of
Tishre, Year one of Creation. This was
just two days ago, a mere 5774 years ago.
The day after God ceased from the work of creation. The day after God rested. Everything is done, but things are not
necessarily as God intended. On the 6th
day, God created Adam; and from Adam, God created Eve. God placed them in the Garden of Eden to
live. But on that 6th day, in
the late afternoon, almost the evening, in fact, at twilight, bein
hashmashot, right before that first Shabbat, just before that first day of
rest, Adam and Eve eat from the fruit of the forbidden tree and are expelled
from Paradise. וַיְגָרֶשׁ, אֶת-הָאָדָם; וַיַּשְׁכֵּן מִקֶּדֶם לְגַן-עֵדֶן
אֶת-הַכְּרֻבִים, וְאֵת לַהַט הַחֶרֶב הַמִּתְהַפֶּכֶת, לִשְׁמֹר, אֶת-דֶּרֶךְ עֵץ
הַחַיִּים[1]
According to the Aggadic Midrash
Pirke De Rebbe Eliezer,[2] Adam spends the 7th day, that
first Shabbat on Mount Moriah, the future site of the Temple in Jerusalem, the
land just outside Eden. He touches the adamah,
the land, from which he, Adam, had been formed. The expulsion from Eden sends Adam to his
roots, rocks him to his core, looking for answers. The midrash goes on to teach that just as God
celebrated the first Shabbat on high, Adam did so below. And it is only by
grace of Shabbat that Adam is saved from harm outside the gates of Eden, on
that 7th day, on that first Shabbat.
On that Shabbat, Adam takes time to
reflect. He has the time and space to
consider this defining moment in his very young life and try to come to terms
with it. In a way, that is the purpose
of Shabbat for all of us b’nai adam, all of us children of Adam, we
human beings. We pause, we rest, we
reflect. Adam does; and the midrash
teaches that he is changed because of it.
Adam comes to understand what he did and tries to make up for it. Adam is experiencing Teshuvah, for the
tragedy that defines his lifetime is his fault.
Yet, he does not want the expulsion to define him. The time of Shabbat allows him to think about
where he is, how he got there and how he’s going to turn and move forward.
We all need time after a difficult
situation. We need time to acclimate to
our new reality. We need time to get
used to our new skin, our new clothes, our new status. We need time.
It is said that time heals all wounds.
Well, just ask Cain if that is true.
Time may not heal all wounds, but with time, our wounds become less
noticeable. They become a recognized
part of who we are. We carry them with
us. We grow accustomed to them. They no longer surprise us in the
mirror. But sometimes, they sneak back
up upon us, as if they were opened anew.
Adam can never go back to
Eden. This he will carry with him his
entire life. But with time, he starts a
family and the blemish of the past, though never fully washed away, blends into
who he is and what he is made of.
Adam’s first true test comes the
next day. The 8th day. The day after creation is completed. The day after Shabbat. The day after the wings of the Shechinah
shielded Adam from the evils outside the Garden. On the eve of that 8th day, as
darkness descends, Adam begins to worry.
His heart flutters as he has visions of the snake coming back and biting
at his heels. That snake, that advice, that
moment of awakening: all those memories, painful and prideful, come flooding
back to him at once. What is he to
do? Everything is different. Though he ate from the tree of knowledge, he
feels as if nothing is known.
Another Midrash, Bereishit Rabbah,
teaches that at this point, Adam uses two flint stones to create fire to keep
himself warm and bring some light into this foreign darkness. Pirke De Rebbe Eliezer, however, teaches that
it is a pillar of fire which is given to Adam by God. Rebbe Eliezer wants us to know that God is
with Adam, even in the darkness. In this
defining moment, his first moment of fear, his first sense of: “Oh My God, I
don’t know what to do!” God is with
him.
Adam recognizes this and so Adam
does what we have continued to do: Adam looks for the holiness in the divine
and in his surroundings. Adam creates
the Havdalah by blessing God for creating the fire. Adam then blesses the division of holy and
profane, using the knowledge he gained from that one bite of fruit to do what
only God had done before, and recognize distinction. And so, in a Godly act, Adam senses the
holiness of the moment and blesses his new situation. Adam joins with God in sanctifying, creating
blessing. As God blessed the Sabbath day
and declared it Holy, so, too does Adam bless the 8th day. On the 8th day of year one of
creation, Adam recognized that elements of the divine dwell within him. This is our heritage.
Over the last year, we have
experienced much together as a community.
Much joy and much tragedy. We
gained new family members and we lost loved ones. The terrors of violence and war ravaged our
hearts and our minds. The winds of
Sandy whipped at our homes and our neighborhoods. And what did our Temple community do, the day
after the storm? The day after Sandy
struck, as our refrigerators were struggling to keep the milk cold, and our
freezers thawing. As our televisions
remained dark and our computers and phones lost their charges, how did we
respond? We responded by displaying the
best of community and joining as one community. Our humble Temple may not have had phones or
internet, but we did have power, and we used it to recharge our devices alongside
ourselves. We gathered together as
individuals, information spreading by word of mouth and emails sent and
received by smartphone. The day after, we
came together as a Temple; we opened our doors and made coffee and put out
power strips. We came together as a
family, to our home, and we supported each other. We sat with each other. How good and pleasant it was to sit alongside
one another.
And then the most wonderful thing
happened, amidst the angst over when the LIPA trucks might come, and the
concern for our friends and neighbors, while we were hoping that our Temple
structure had not been severely damaged, seemingly out of nowhere someone
donated lunch for everyone. Their house
had been spared the brunt of the wind damage and they still had power, and so
they opened their hearts and their pockets like the synagogue opened its
doors. The truth is, this lunch did not
appear out of nowhere; it was out of a sincere generosity of spirit: a good
deed simply because it had to be done. And
when one person opened his heart, along came another person, buying dinner for
everyone. These may have been modest
gestures, but they prove the axiom that one mitzvah begets another one: Mitzvah
goreret mitzvah. And because we were
together in the presence of community on that day after the storm, it was all
the easier to see the good deeds, the gemilut chassadim, the acts of
lovingkindness, have such a profound effect.
It was as if a pillar of light from the Eternal had come down from
heaven to illuminate our community and our home.
Because Religion and being a part
of a religious community—yes, it is about tribe and it is about custom. It is about acting a certain way, eating a
certain way, not eating a certain way, dressing a certain way… But it is also about coming together. A synagogue has many different purposes and
many different names. On the one hand,
it is a Beit Tefillah, a house of prayer.
For many of us, this space and our sanctuary serve a primary purpose,
communing with God and trying to answer the seemingly unanswerable questions of
life and love and existence. A synagogue
is also a Beit Midrash: a house of study.
As we come together to learn words of Torah, in all their variations, we
create memories and connections as a cohort of Adult B’nei Mitzvah students or
confirmands or HS graduates. A Synagogue
is also Beit Kenesset: a house of gathering.
We come together to make ourselves a community. When God calls the people or speaks to them
through Moses, most often it is as a community.
Gather the people: Hakhel et ha’am.
A synagogue has one more name, a
Kehillah Kedoshah: a holy community.
What does it mean to be holy? The
Torah reading for Yom Kippur afternoon is known as the Holiness Code. It begins with God addressing Moses: “Speak
to the Israelite community and tell them: You shall be holy, for I the Eternal
your God am holy.”[3] Well, this doesn’t really explain what
holiness means. But the chapter
continues with more detail. Honor your
parents. Keep the Sabbath. Do not make false idols. Leave the corners of your field for the poor
and the stranger. Do not steal. Do not take the name of the Eternal in
vain. Do not rob. Treat your workers fairly. Treat people without prejudice. Do not hate your kinsman.
What it means to be holy is to
revere the past and recognize the holiness and the Godliness in everyone and
everything around. Holiness can mean set
aside, special. When we band together
the day after our community is rocked, or even after one of the members of our
community is shaken by a personal tragedy we transform this building into a
holy community. When we open our doors,
and open our hearts and look with kindness upon each other in our time of need,
we define what it means to be a holy community.
When we share in the joys of our friends, and comfort their sorrows, we
define holy community. When we come together
to learn and bring the spirit of God between us, we define our holy
community. When we reach outside our
walls to try and make the world a better place, we define holy community. Of all the different names, purposes and
attributes of this synagogue, the moniker of Kehillah Kedoshah is perhaps the
most important, and for sure the one which will leave the most lasting
impression. When we come together and
recognize the holiness in each other and in ourselves, we move to a new
spiritual level as individuals and as a group.
All of these: the study, the care, the comfort, the lovingkindness –
these are the benefit of being part of a synagogue community. We have somewhere to go the day after.
Like Adam, we have knowledge. Like Adam, we have the opportunity to mark
our defining moments, big and small, because, like Adam, we are people of
faith. Adam was not a Jew. There was no Judaism. But Adam knew God. We have the divine spark within us to see the
world: good, evil, hard, easy, paradise, exile, to see all these things and to recognize
the holiness inherent in them. Unlike
Adam, we are not alone. We can lean on
each other, confident in the holiness of togetherness and the holiness of
community.
We cannot think it will ever be as
easy for us as it was for Adam. None of
us awaits an actual pillar of fire to come from the heavens. We cannot expect to instantly sense God’s
presence in our pain and despair, in those days after. What Adam does is look for the holiness and
remember. It is up to us as well look
for God in our defining moments. To look
for God in the people around us. To see
the holiness in one another and in coming together, particularly in times of
distress.
Between this Yom Kippur and next,
let us strive to continue to see the holiness in our community. Let us make every effort to imbue our lives
and our Synagogue with the qualities of a true Kehillah Kedoshah. Let us celebrate with one another and grieve
with one another. Let us all be there
for the days after, the weeks after, the months after.
Surviving Yom Kippur is like making
it through a difficult ordeal. Not just
because of the fasting and the long hours at prayer. Not just because we remember our loved ones
most vividly, but because on this day, God’s judgment is passed. This evening, as the gates are closing, we
may all say that we have made it through the trial of Yom Kippur together. And as we light the twisted wicks of the
Havdallah candle as Adam did those 5774 years ago, and smell the sweet aromas
of the spices, may we all sense the holiness inherent in this day. And the day after.
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