Dear TBZ community:
Last Saturday night we marked one year since COVID hit our communities and we closed our physical doors. I was filled with tears, tears of sadness and yet also tears of joy.
Sadness when we listened to the words of TBZ members: one who had suffered from COVID, another who had lost a loved one to this illness and a third who as a nurse, had witnessed the pandemic’s wrath in the ICU where she labored to heal and comfort. I felt the pain of their journeys and the suffering of so many more throughout this past year. At the same time, I felt joy. Joy as we listened to our teen member reflect on how TBZ had been an anchor for her this year. Joy as we shared together as a community. Joy as Shabbat came to close, and we were reminded that although we have been physically apart, our community has grown closer in ways we didn’t even know were possible. Joy as we smelled the sweet spices and doused the Havdalah candle. Together we are strong enough to hold the widest of emotions: joy and sadness, hope and fear, blessing and pain, equanimity and anger for what this past year has been.
I imagine the people of Israel in the desert feeling somehow similar. Imagine with me for a moment: They left Egypt, slavery, bondage, opression. That is a reason to be joyful and grateful. They have a leader that speaks of a God that cares for them and loves them and will take care of them. That feels hopeful. But they are in the desert, exposed to the elements and to enemies on the road. I can imagine how afraid and painful this would be for them.
During this journey in the desert Moshe goes up to God, מֹשֶׁ֥ה עָלָ֖ה אֶל־הָאֱלֹהִ֑ים (Exodus 19:3) to receive God’s words. The people of Israel experience revelation with thunder and lightning, with smoke and a loud shofar blast. In that moment as we read in Parshat Yitro, the people of Israel are frightened, but I imagine perhaps they are also hopeful. The God who took them out of bonadge, who performed miracles in order to save them, is revealing God’s words to them, through Moshe, in the desert of Sinai.
But, as we return to the story in this week’s Parshat Ki Tisa. The people of Israel are waiting. Moshe is delayed:
וַיַּ֣רְא הָעָ֔ם כִּֽי־בֹשֵׁ֥שׁ מֹשֶׁ֖ה לָרֶ֣דֶת מִן־הָהָ֑ר
When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain (Exodus 32:1)
Rashi explains that this “delay” is actually confusion on how to count the time of Moses’ absence.
For when Moses ascended the mountain he said to them at the end of a period of forty days, I shall return during the first six hours of the day. They thought that the day on which he ascended the mountain (the seventh of Sivan) was to be included in this number (thus — Sivan having 30 days — he was expected back before noon on the sixteenth of Tammuz). In fact, however, he had said to them “after forty days” meaning complete days — forty days, each day together with its night that precedes it…..it follows therefore that the fortieth day really fell on the seventeenth of Tammuz and not as the people had believed on the sixteenth. (Rashi explaining Exodus 32:1)
Confusion makes the people panic and respond in ways that perhaps they would not have. They go to Aaron and they ask him to make them a god. Rabbinic interpretation adds to this story that before going to Aaron, Hur (who the Midrash also imagines him as the son of Caleb and Miriam) is killed for stepping forward and rebuking them for wanting to make the Golden Calf (Midrash Tanchuma Ki Tisa 19). Aaron, perhaps because of fear or as a strategy to mollify the people, agrees and helps them. The end of the Golden Calf story is one of broken tablets and also of death and pain. God punishes the people with a plague.
Confusion and lack of hope makes people panic. When we panic we are capable of acting in ways that can hurt ourselves and others. When we panic, we can lose our moral compass as fear can override our most central values. This is part of what being human is. We are imperfect beings who want to be our best selves at all times. And we are human beings who when in situations of danger, of confusion, of lack of clarity, of hopelessness, can respond in ways that are not our vision of our best selves, ways that, later once we are calm and safe we might look back with regret or amazement.
During these last few weeks I have been speaking with many of you about the vaccine. Some, including myself, have been blessed to be able to be vaccinated. Others are waiting. And the wait may be frustrating, frightening, and feel unfair. Why some and not others. Why them and not me? Why was I, as clergy, given the opportunity before teachers? The uncertainty can make us feel panic, fear, and the anguish that our turn may come too late. I have heard people use the term “vaccine jealousy” to describe this time. Jealousy and panic are very human emotions. Jealousy, panic, fear, anguish, can lead us away from our moral compass, from our best selves, but when we can step back and take a breath, we can turn away from our fears, and look forward and embrace our best selves.
Those who have been blessed to be vaccinated might quickly forget how others are feeling. We are also called to hold responsibility for the privilege of already being vaccinated. TBZ member, Dr. Rebecca Weintraub, reminded us at an Oped in the Globe in January that it is the moral compass of most people, even those of us accustomed to privilege and advantage that will point us in the right direction.
I have always had compassion for the people of Israel building the Golden Calf. Their actions remind us of their humanity and of how fear, confusion, and panic makes us do things that we know, in our calm states, we are not supposed to do. The story of the broken tablets ends with new tablets. The broken tablets are not discarded, rather they are carried in the tabernacle together with the whole ones. We carry our mistakes, our brokenness, our panic and our fears, alongside the strength of our moral compass and best selves. This is what being human is.
My blessing to all of us, is that when in panic we are able to do our best to be our best selves. To remind ourselves of the values that guide us. But also, let's be forgiving and not judgemental to the mistakes we make in our vulnerabilities and fears. Whether awaiting a vaccination or vaccinated, together we can look to the next few weeks, and the blossoming of spring with hope and gratitude for the gifts of science and with kindness and humanity for each other.
May this Shabbat bring renewal and blessings to all of you and your loved ones.
May we find strength, courage, and patience, and open our hearts with generosity.
May all those who are ill find healing.
May we have a joyful and restful Shabbat!
Shabbat Shalom,
