Vayeitze 5782: We're Gonna Be Okay

About three years ago, during Pesach of 2019, Lizzie and I came to Ithaca. Not to live quite yet, but to look for a house to call our home, our Bayit, our Base. As all of you know, but we had not yet understood, trying to find a place in April to live the following September in Collegetown is...nearly impossible. Things book out a year in Collegetown, hence the perpetual “For Rent” signs all year long on every house. 

It was a grey April day, snow still dusting the ground and the trees still bare, when we started our search. I had set up some places for us to see from craigslist and facebook marketplace. One on Dryden, the building that looks like it could be owned and inhabited by Ronald McDonald himself, bright yellow with red trim. What had been advertised as a “three bedroom apartment” was a series of small rooms, joined together by a living room that could hold maybe four people comfortably. Looking around, Lizzie and I squeezed each other's hand. A perfect place for studying, for getting through college, but not a place to host raucous Shabbos meals. It’s okay, we thought, we have a few more places to see. The day was full of ups and downs, a roller coaster of emotions. One place was gorgeous, with an acre of land and a literal jacuzzi, but it was a mile and a half from campus. Nobody would ever walk that long to come to Shabbos in the cold, Ithaca winter. Another was clearly an abandoned frat house, with 7 bedrooms and two kitchens. The filth felt like it was generations deep, as if it would be wrong somehow to clean it, like we’d upset the ghosts of past tenants. Paint was peeling off the walls, and when asked if we could repaint the walls, we were met with a hearty “no.” At this point is when we decided to go back to the drawing board. We started driving around and calling the numbers on the “For Rent” signs all around Collegetown. Most were already taken for the fall, and in the midst of a moment of despair, we drove down Linden Ave.

In this week’s Parsha, Jacob leaves his hometown of Be’er Sheva and goes to Haran. There, in the night, he sleeps on a stone and dreams a magical dream. Angels ascend and descend a ladder, connecting heaven and earth. G!d appears to Jacob and tells him, essentially, that everything is going to be okay. That he and his descendants will be blessed. That he is not alone. That he’s gonna make it. He wakes up, literally and figuratively, and says, “Surely haShem is present in this place, and I did not know it!” 

Back in Ithaca in April 2019, Lizzie and I drove by our future home, and while on the phone with our now landlord Ezra Cornell, we headed to Fall Creek to the bottom of Cascadilla gorge. To say I was anxious at that moment is an understatement. I was about to graduate from Rabbinical School, move to the middle of nowhere (no offense, Ithaca), and we didn’t have a place to live. I couldn’t envision things going well, much less the kinds of epic parties, shabbos meals, havdalah, talent shows, and more that would fill our space. I walked up to the base of Cascadilla Gorge, full of anxiety, and looked up. The water flowing gracefully over the stones, the way the gorge seemed to twist and turn for eternity, the way the rock walls were decorated with brightly colored moss in all different shades of green, it woke me up. Like Jacob awoke from his dream and knew, I knew. I knew that we were going to be okay. That we were going to find a home, that Hashem would take care of us and that we would get to create a joyous community for so many Jewish students here at Cornell. 

When we are in moments of darkness, like now with the increasing darkness of winter, and feel scared or anxious, may we be blessed with moments like this. It doesn’t have to be as epic as a prophetic dream and vision of the Divine. It can be as small as hearing a bird sing or seeing the leaves illuminated by the sun. It can be laughing with a friend on your way to class, or getting a good night’s sleep. May we be blessed to hear the voice of Hashem in those moments, calling to us and reminding us that we are going to be okay. 

Shabbat Shalom.

Lech Lecha 5781: Why Pray?

I want to take you all back to one lonely night in November, 2004. It was the Presidential Election and the two candidates were George Bush (for a second term) and John Kerry. I was in high school, and in the height of my ”spiritual bender” days--studying the world’s religions and their esoteric and mystical practices, in desperation to feel connected to God at all times. I wasn’t so politically involved, but I knew which candidate I wanted to win, and I believed that the world’s existence depended on that candidate winning. The night of the election, I stayed up all night praying, learning Zohar, meditating, and trying to make an impact on our metaphysical reality which I thought, in turn, would impact the election. I was a chutzpadik kid, as is evident from what I wrote in my journal the night before, when I was organizing my plan for election night. I wrote, “I believe I am a warrior for peace, and that my prayers and actions Do (capital D) indeed make a difference.”

The election didn’t go the way I had been praying, and I remember thinking that perhaps I just hadn’t prayed hard enough, believed enough. Or, maybe if there had been more people praying and believing, it would have gone in my favor. This year, this election season, I noticed my resistance to praying for a particular outcome for the election. Scarred from my experience in 2004, I think deep down, for many of us, there is a question of why pray, when the Listener may not answer, or may not demonstrate listening in the way we would hope. 

In our JLF class, Lizzie and I explored with our students quotes from multiple writers on the question, “Why do you write?” One writer, Francis Picabia, answered, “I don’t really know and I hope I never know.” Perhaps the answer to why pray, why pray anyway when things may or may not turn out the way we are hoping is this. I don’t know, and I hope I never know. Because to know would mean to end the mystery, the questioning, the wrestling that is so core to our tradition. 

In this week’s Parsha, Lech Lecha, we meet our ancestor Avram, who is told by G!d to go--lech--lecha--to yourself, for yourself, from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, And I will bless you; I will make your name great, And you shall be a blessing. The Mei Hashiloach explains that, in addition to instructing Avram to leave his native land, he was also being instructed to look within himself for the answers. He explains that the “question in itself is enough of an answer.”

So, why pray? Why lech lecha--go within ourselves? I don’t know, and I hope I never find out. But, one thing I do know, is that by continuing to pray, to pour our souls out to G!d, we experience G!d’s promise to Avram. G!d doesn’t only say “I will bless you,” G!d says “and you will be a blessing.” Our very life, our day to day existence, will be a blessing through being in relationship to G!d. Through filling our mouths with prayer, through turning our attention to what is inherently good and beautiful in the world, and continuing to long for healing, justice, freedom, and peace, we bring blessing into our lives, we remember our resilience, and--regardless of what happens in the election--nobody can take that away from us. 

Shabbat Shalom.

Noach 5781: Vandalism and Healing

Raise your hand if you ever look at social media, read the news, or think about the political moment we are in and think, “let’s just….start over.” Let’s start humanity over again. Let’s return to more intelligent ways of being, of caring for the earth, of caring for one another. What we have now isn’t working, let’s throw the world as we know it in the garbage. If you’ve had these thoughts or feelings, you and G!d have something in common. In this week’s parsha, Noach, we read, “G!d saw how great human corruption was on earth, and how every plan devised by people was nothing but evil all of the time. And G!d regretted making humans on earth, and G!d’s heart was saddened.” Just one week ago, the world was created, now it is destined to be destroyed by a grieving G!d and a flood.

Personally, I have these feelings often. And, I felt them more acutely this past week when I learned of the anti-Semitic graffiti that defaced a sign downtown. The sign, outside of a chiropractic office, reads “End White Silence” a sign made by a Jewish woman as a call for white people to wake up and speak up in the face of racial injustice. Within the word silence was written a horribly four letters: k-i-k-e. A word that my father was called regularly having grown up in suburban Minnesota in the late 40s and 50s. A word that many of our parents and grandparents were called simply for being Jews. A word that symbolizes the ignorance and hatred that still so many people feel towards our people. An unwanted reminder of the flip side of our status as chosen people, that oftentimes it feels as if we are chosen to suffer.

With our history of suffering comes an enormous amount of resilience, often in the form of humor. Lizzie, the resident comedienne at Base, likes to say that every time you see a swastika spray painted somewhere, you’ll likely see 3 or 4 trial runs next to it. First it’s just an x, then it’s an x with the things pointing the wrong way, and then finally they get it right. I thought of this joke when I saw the defacement in downtown Ithaca this week. After my initial response of horror and disgust, I thought… “but what the f#$% is skikece?”

In this week’s parsha, after the flood destroys the world around Noach and his family (and the animals), a rainbow emerges in the sky. A reminder of the covenant between us and G!d. A reminder that we will not be destroyed again. And, a reminder of the color and life that fills the world. A reminder so needed in times like these, when things feel bleak and colorless. A reminder that in truth our world, regardless of it’s defacements, is beautiful and that reality is benign. On a walk on one of my favorite trails the other day, on a bench I saw another kind of graffiti. Unlike the one downtown, this one made my heart soar and my head tilt in curiosity of who this vandal might be and if I could befriend them. It was a poem by the Puerto Rican Jewish poet and activist, Aurora Levins Morales, titled “V’ahavta.” Here’s an excerpt:

Say these words when you lie down and when you rise up,

when you go out and when you return. In times of mourning

and in times of joy. Inscribe them on your doorposts,

embroider them on your garments, tattoo them on your shoulders,

teach them to your children, your neighbors, your enemies,

recite them in your sleep, here in the cruel shadow of empire:

Another world is possible.

Thus spoke the prophet Roque Dalton:

All together they have more death than we,

but all together, we have more life than they.

There is more bloody death in their hands

than we could ever wield, unless

we lay down our souls to become them,

and then we will lose everything. So instead,

imagine winning. This is your sacred task.

This is your power. Imagine

every detail of winning, the exact smell of the summer streets

in which no one has been shot, the muscles you have never

unclenched from worry, gone soft as newborn skin,

the sparkling taste of food when we know

that no one on earth is hungry, that the beggars are fed,

that the old man under the bridge and the woman

wrapping herself in thin sheets in the back seat of a car,

and the children who suck on stones,

nest under a flock of roofs that keep multiplying their shelter.

Lean with all your being towards that day

when the poor of the world shake down a rain of good fortune

out of the heavy clouds, and justice rolls down like waters.

Defend the world in which we win as if it were your child.

It is your child.

Defend it as if it were your lover.

It is your lover.

When you inhale and when you exhale

breathe the possibility of another world

into the 37.2 trillion cells of your body

until it shines with hope.

Then imagine more.

May we be blessed to find the rainbows in our lives, the glimmering reminders that there is beauty in this world, and that another world--the world of our dreams--is possible. Shabbat Shalom

Yom Kippur 5781: Benign Reality

I want to transport you to a time not so long ago, and a place not so far from here. About a week ago on the Black Diamond Trail here in Ithaca. I went on a bike ride on a beautiful fall day, the blue sky was somehow shimmering and the leaves rustled in the wind. As I biked on the shaded path, I looked to my right and saw the sun shining through the yellow-green leaves, illuminating patches of earth here and there. Gazing at this simple, golden beauty, I was seized with a rare and somewhat unbearable gratitude for being alive. Every morning I, and many Jews, say the words “Modah Ani lefanecha,” grateful am I before You, that you returned my soul to me, that you have entrusted me with another day of living. But, rarely do I feel those words resound in my entire being as I did just the other day, feeling for just a moment how incredible it is to be a human being, how much and how deeply I want to continue to live. This is what Yom Kippur is about. 

While this day of Yom Kippur is a day of looking within, of considering what we would like to shift or change in the way we relate to ourselves, one another, G!d, and the world, it is (perhaps more so) a day of celebrating our vulnerability as humans, and even celebrating being flawed.  This understanding of Yom Kippur isn’t a new one, and yet it is a big departure from Yom Kippur as many of us knew it growing up, a time of beating our chest, feeling bad about ourselves, and above all else guilt. For myself as a kid, the one thing I knew about Yom Kippur was that if I didn’t feel guilty for at least some of the day, I didn’t fulfill my obligation. I am here to tell you that accountability, responsibility and self reflection happens all year in our tradition (and particularly in the weeks and days leading up to Yom Kippur) and that this is a day of celebrating our vulnerability and our humanity, not about furthering the spirals of shame and guilt. While many of our holidays could be seen as a celebration of human vulnerability, there is one holiday in particular where this celebration of vulnerability is as raw and visible as it is today, and that is Purim. 

It is no mistake that the Hasidic masters considered this day of Yom haKippurim to be the day (Yom) like (ki) Purim. Purim, the day of costumes, banquets and drunkenness, is when we read the story of Queen Esther, the only book in all of our tradition that doesn’t mention G!d even once. On the surface, these days couldn’t be more different. On Yom Kippur, we take off our costumes, wearing only a white shroud, we fast, we pray and mention G!d’s name more than any other day of the year. When we look a little deeper, the connections start to become more visible. On Purim, we celebrate that for a moment the world turned upside down, that due to the actions of a heroic woman and divine intervention, Haman’s evil plan to murder us didn’t go through. On Yom Kippur, we similarly acknowledge that any number of our plans in life may not go through, a message that rings particularly true this year. On both days, we celebrate in the face of that uncertainty. We celebrate in the face of our extreme vulnerability. On Yom Kippur, we celebrate that we are not ever alone in that vulnerability, constantly praying in the we throughout the day. And we declare that, even or especially in times of deep uncertainty, tefilah (prayer), teshuva (return), and tzedaka (justice), lessen the harshness of our experience of that uncertainty, bring meaning to our lives, no matter what plans do or don’t go through.

I would like to transport you to another time not so long ago and yet an eternity away. March 10th, 2020 in this very room, with jewel toned fabrics lining the walls and string lights covering the ceiling. As people started to arrive at our Purim party, an email also arrived in all our inboxes. This initial email announced that after spring break, all learning would go virtual due to the coronavirus. Students in their senior year, especially,  having just learned that their final semester of college would not be how they envisioned it, were tearful, angry, confused. As were we all. What do you do in the face of such uncertainty, in the face of such a literal expression of v’nafoch hu, a flipping of the world on its head? I think I can speak for all of us present that night and say that we were seized with a rare and somewhat unbearable gratitude for being alive. That we felt for just a moment, or an evening, how incredible it is to be a human being, how much and how deeply we want to continue to live. Looking back at that night, the last night we gathered in this home, where we laughed, sang karaoke, danced, and even davvened neilah (the closing prayers of Yom Kippur), I am carried forward into this perpetual uncertainty of our new normal, remembering our fervent prayer that night that, even as we mourn the way things were, we want to live. To feel joy, and even to center joy and pleasure in the face of uncertainty is an act of resistance. 

Just as we are vulnerable human beings, we are resilient, we are creative, we are hopeful and we are joyful. May we be blessed this Yom haKippurim, this day like Purim, to tap into that perhaps unbearable gratitude for being alive. On this day and throughout this new (and strange) year, may we be blessed to (more regularly) tap into just how incredible, how beautiful it is to be human.

Gmar Chatima Tova.

Rosh Hashanah 5781: The Torah of Shit

The other day, when I was walking and beginning my annual Elul freak out process (which came much later than expected this year), I had my antennas up for signs. As I was walking and pondering, I quite literally stumbled across a snake. Bigger than any I had seen in the wild before, but thankfully harmless, it scurried away as I jumped back in surprise, thinking “of course, this is the symbol I’ve been looking for. Like a snake sheds its skin, so is teshuva (return or repentance) about shedding our skin and growing into a new version of ourselves.” I kept on walking, sure that I had found the sign I needed to inspire my High Holiday preparations and this very drash. I dipped in the water and saw the fish gathered together without any social distance, “oh..” I realized, “this was in fact the sign I was looking for.” It is only natural for living beings to congregate, look at the fish, how they instinctively gather. And, how unnatural these High Holidays feel, when we can’t gather in person. Walking back from the water, feeling certain of what I was going to write about and say, I quite literally stumbled across something else. Not something as glamorous as a snake or a congregation of fish. In fact, what I stumbled upon was none other than an enormous pile of crap. How I didn’t see it or smell it until it was so close is unbeknownst to me, except that I was likely on my phone thinking of who to call and discuss my previous epiphanies with. But there it was, in all its glory, the true sign I had been looking for, 2020 summed up in a single pile. 

COVID, police brutality, the California sky ablaze, and remember murder hornets? This year has been one of isolation, grief, and for many of us a sense of powerlessness. What can we do when the world is on fire, when grief and pain fill our streets and our hospitals? Who am I, and what impact can I have? It reminds me of the famous Chassidic tale of Simcha Bunim of Peshischa, who said:

“Every person should have two pockets. In one pocket should be a piece of paper saying: ‘I am only dust and ashes." When one is feeling too proud, reach into this pocket and take out this paper and read it. In the other pocket, should be a piece of paper saying: ‘For my sake was the world created.’ When one is feeling disheartened and lowly, reach into this pocket and take this paper out and read it. We are each the joining of two worlds. We are fashioned from clay, but our spirit is the breath of Hashem.”

COVID has humbled us all, bringing us face to face with the fact that we as well as our plans are flimsy, temporary, and fleeting. And yet, sitting with that piece of paper alone can lead to despair, which is why we have another pocket. In that other pocket is where many of us heard another call. A call to action. The deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Elijah McClain and too many others killed by Police brutality and senseless hatred, have inspired many of us to look at the power we do have, to step into the streets, to protest, to make phone calls, to feel our power like never before. To feel that indeed, just as we are but dust and ash, the world was created for us and we can create the world we want to see. 

May this year bless us an ability to make real teshuva, not as it’s traditionally known as repentance, but in the lesser known teaching of Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, who teaches that teshuva is declaring our readiness to exist. May we fully exist in both worlds, knowing all of our power,  and also knowing that we are but dust. 

Shanah Tovah

Rosh Hashanah 5780: The Torah of Boredom

There I was, standing in the back of a hotel ballroom, completely mesmerized as the Pastor in his grey suit and thick rimmed glasses yelled passionately into the microphone. The music was blaring and people were dancing and singing. And, I, a rabbi, stood there in awe with tears streaming down my face. We were at the Rosen Plaza hotel in Orlando, Florida. I was there for the Hillel New Professionals Institute, and they were there (in the ballroom next to ours) for the 20th anniversary of their Pentacostal Church. For days, while in various sessions and meetings, I could hear them rocking out during their many services throughout the day, and I (not so secretly) had been longing to partake. I found another Rabbi who seemed interested and we ventured in through the double doors, the music pouring out into the hallway with intense force.

What we witnessed can hardly be explained with words. There were choreographed dances performed by young people in beautiful attire, there were people dancing and singing spontaneously, with their eyes closed and hands in the air. People brought their entire selves. And they brought it HARD. The floor was shaking with the sounds of the music and the dancing, and the room was filled with joy. “I want you to look at your neighbor and say 10 things you’re grateful for!” the Pastor yelled, “‘One, that God got me up this morning. Two, that God got me up this morning. Three, God got me up this morning.” He continued to 10 and people laughed and nodded their heads with the truth that he was speaking. Simply being alive is reason enough to dance, to sing, to bring our full selves to everything we do. Simply being alive is a miracle, a gift.

As I looked at the children in the room, I thought about my religious upbringing. My earliest and most formative Jewish memory did not involve dancing, ecstatic prayer, or a deep connection to community. But, it did involved Doritos and excruciating boredom. After savoring every bite of my nacho cheese flavored corn chips during our snack break at Hebrew School, I would gently tear open the seam of the bag and lick the inside, making sure to ingest every crumb. In Hebrew school on Mondays and Wednesdays (and sometimes even Sundays), we learned the same things every year in a stale old building until the sun had set. Our 10 minute break, my Doritos time, was truly sacred. I remember the exact taste, sound, and feel of the chips as I ingested them. In Hebrew school, and beyond, my Jewish life was saturated with boredom and the smell of Chanel number 5 perfume from the elderly women who filled the pews of my synagogue. It was far from inspiring, spiritual, or engaging. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I found Jewish environments that were spiritual and even ecstatic. And yet, these experiences can seem few and far between, which makes me wonder: Without a little bit of boredom, would it even feel like a Jewish experience?

During these Days of Awe, we recite slichot, prayers of supplication and forgiveness, some even at midnight or sunrise. They are prayers meant to inspire the soul-work of this time, to inspire us to dig deep into ourselves and our lives. In it are the words,

בן אדם מה לך נרדם

Humankind! Why do you sleep?

These words, and the call of the Shofar, act as an alarm clock to our souls. A reminder to be present in our lives and fight the desire to stay stuck, bored, or small. Similarly, Rebbe Nachman, 18th century Hasidic master from Ukraine, says that true teshuva, return to ourselves which we are aspiring to in this time, is declaring your readiness to exist. The work of this time, then, is deeper and at the same time more simplistic than repentance and asking forgiveness. It’s about waking up and declaring our readiness to fully be in the world.

Back in the hotel ballroom, the charismatic Pastor called out into the microphone, “Clap your hands if you love Jesus!” There was a sudden uproar of applause, a standing ovation even, from African American men and women dressed to the nines. In my complete and utter awe and gratitude of my surroundings, I looked down to realize that I, a rabbi, had accidentally clapped when prompted by the charismatic Pastor. (oops!)

May we be blessed to bring our full selves into this space. To shed the security blanket that is boredom, to wrestle with powerful and difficult things you may read in the machzor, and the beautiful and painful things that may come up in ourselves. Whatever it is, may we be blessed with the courage to bring it into this space...hard, stepping into what it means to be truly alive.

Shanah Tovah.

Kol Nidrei 5780: The Torah of Shame

About a year and a half ago, I went on vacation to Ukraine. Well, not really vacation, unless your idea of vacation involves five to seven hours of being in a bumpy van in on and off snowstorms. I was there to visit the graves of Rabbis who had long passed away, Rabbis who formed the tradition I have dedicated my life to, and Rabbis who’s words, many generations later, inspire me. I was there for a trip I later coined #gravehop2018, with 5 other women from all different backgrounds. On the list were famous names like the Baal Shem Tov--the founder of the Hasidic movement, Yitzhak Levi of Berdichev, the Ohev Yisrael, the Baal haTanya, the forefather of Chabad, and finally Rebbe Nachman of Breslov. You might have heard of Rebbe Nachman, or at least have seen Youtube footage of his followers in white beanies disrupting the streets of Jerusalem regularly with dancing and techno music. He is now known for sayings like “It’s a great mitzvah to always be happy.” Or, even more well known, kol haOlam kulo… the whole world is a very narrow bridge, and the main thing is to not be afraid. As a person who struggled immensely with depression himself, he became, in a sense, a Rebbe for the depressed. A Rebbe of emotions, but particularly the emotions that we don’t really want to look at. He wasn’t afraid of the dark parts of the soul, and in fact many of his writings are about the value of our darker sides, the sparks hidden within them and how to bring them out.

A word about grave hopping, before I tell you what happened. When beginning a grave hop, a person is entering into a mythical and mystical reality. They pay attention to every sensation, sound, part of the experience as if they were looking for a “sign” or something from the soul of the Rebbe. One needs to enter an almost childlike state of magical thinking to truly experience a holy person’s grave. So, I know what I’m about to share might sound crazy. And, maybe it is crazy. I guess you kind of had to be there.

When I walked into the synagogue that houses Rebbe Nachman’s grave, I felt a potency in the room. Unlike the other graves we had visited, before his death, Nachman gave instructions to his disciples for what to do at his grave. Give a coin to tzedaka in his name, say 10 special psalms that he prescribed, and pray. So, I gave a coin to tzedaka, started saying the psalms, and before I could finish, I felt something welling up within me and started to cry. As tears were falling onto the plastic cover on top of Rebbe Nachman’s grave, I had a conversation with myself and for the first time in my life was face to face with the biggest block in my life. The thing preventing me from being the person I really want to be in the world--Shame.

Shame, as one of my teachers puts it, is the dark matter of the soul. Like the dark matter of the universe which is amorphous and difficult to understand and yet permeates everything, shame is difficult to pinpoint and define. Brene Brown, renowned shame researcher known for her TED talk on Vulnerability, defines shame as “the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing we are flawed and therefore unworthy of acceptance and belonging...Shame creates feelings of fear, blame, and disconnection.” She differentiates it from guilt, which she views as a motivating, even positive emotion that helps us confront our actions and wrongdoings and change our ways. Shame, on the other hand, is always destructive. It creates a cycle, a downward spiral, keeping us stuck and isolated.

Yom Kippur is a day that many of us associate with feeling bad about ourselves and our actions, perhaps a day we even associate with shame. But, I’m not just being lovey-dovey when I say that it’s truly the opposite. We dress in all white to remember that at our core we are good--even angelic. During the vidui, confessions that we recite tonight and throughout the day, we say ashamnu, badagnu, dibarnu dofi, we have betrayed, we have stolen, we have scorned. Our tradition understands innately what Brene Brown and Rebbe Nachman taught, which is that in order to really make teshuva, return to ourselves, we need to be connected to one another. True change cannot happen in a shame spiral. Since shame thrives in isolation and disconnection, the we that we evoke helps us stay on track, remember that the true purpose of this day is to celebrate our humanness, to remember our innate goodness, and to know that we have a G!d that is loving and forgives. This day is not about proving our goodness to G!d, it’s about proving it to ourselves.

Back by Rebbe Nachman’s grave, tears streaming down my face, I followed the advice of both Rebbe Nachman and Brene Brown; I spoke out loud about one of the things I had the most shame about. I spoke to G!d (in English) saying, “I’m almost a Rabbi and I don’t even pray every day.” Back in this mythical and mystical reality, I heard a voice respond with instructions, saying (almost with a shrug), “Yeah, maybe you should pray every day. But, try showing that to G!d. Try every morning to say over and over again that you don’t want to davven.” The essence of what I heard is that shame thrives in isolation, it thrives when it is unspeakable and unspoken. All throughout our liturgy tonight and tomorrow we read that G!d is our parent who loves us unconditionally. This Yom Kippur, may we be blessed to truly hear that. May we be blessed with the trust to speak our shame, to bring G!d into the dark parts of our soul and shine a light there. May we be blessed, over these next 25 hours and throughout our lives, to celebrate being human in spite of, not despite, our flaws.

Parshat Bechukotai 5779: Beards and Belonging

There are many experience I have had here at Nehar Shalom that have changed my life. Bustling Souly Shabboses, teaching children with Rabbi Victor at Family Learning Circle, running a SVARA-style Beit Midrash in this very room. I have been changed by all of these, forever. There is one small moment, in addition to these bigger more obvious ones, that shook me up in a way that was completely unexpected and totally life altering. I walked in the shtibl one Friday night in the fall as the monthly children’s service was ending. A mom and her little boy (around 4 years old) were getting their coats on in the foyer as I was taking mine off. I waved hello and as I made my way into the shtibl, he looked up at his mom and said, “Is she a Rabbi?” Such a sweet and earnest question that made me pause and realize that such a question had seldom been asked of me. All of a sudden, countless memories flashed before my eyes, in Lyft or Uber rides, on the T, or on a bus in Jerusalem (all somehow in various modes of transportation) when some form of the question, “Women can do that?” or the comment, “You don’t look like a Rabbi,” has been presented to me like a heavy gift that I never wanted, being passed from generation to generation. It got so bad that I had a standard comeback. “Don’t worry,” I’d say, “At our ordination ceremony, once they put the prayer shawl on our backs, we sprout an instant full-length beard.  Kind of like a chia pet!”

Obviously, I didn’t make up this joke. Or the image of a Rabbi with a beard. The Hebrew word for beard, zakan, is almost identical to the word zaken, elder or wise person (let’s be real, wise man). And, there is the famous story of Rabbi Elazar ben Azaria who, at the age of 18, grew a full beard over night and was finally taken seriously by his colleagues. It almost need not be said that if I were to ask a random person on the street to close their eyes and envision a Rabbi, a beard would likely be involved. My chia-pet beard joke, and the defensiveness that lay underneath it, showed me that these images had gotten to me. And there was and still is a part of me that doesn’t believe that a Rabbi can really look like me. I’m embarrassed that this is still a struggle for me, that the echoes of history still ring in my mind.

The other day, Lizzie and I were sitting on the couch to plan our upcoming move when she looked at me with a particular curiosity. “What is that?” she said. I reached and found a two inch white hair growing right out of my neck. If I had been hoping for a beard, this would have been awesome. But, in that moment I worried that all the time spent joking about the chia pet beard had created a reality that I wasn’t ready for.

In this week’s parsha, Bechukotai, G!d says to the Israelites:

אִם־בְּחֻקֹּתַ֖י תֵּלֵ֑כוּ וְאֶת־מִצְוֺתַ֣י תִּשְׁמְר֔וּ וַעֲשִׂיתֶ֖ם אֹתָֽם׃

If you follow My laws and faithfully observe My commandments

How does a law differ from a commandment? The word for law, chok, can also mean engraving. Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi explains, “There is an aspect of Torah that is ‘inked’ on our soul: we understand it, our emotions are roused by it; it becomes our lifestyle or even our personality; but it remains something additional to ourselves. But there is a dimension of Torah that is chok, engraved in our being.” The pieces of Torah that are engraved within our souls transcend gender. And, the particular pieces that we carry with us determine how the Torah is carried forward. The Torah changes in our hands. But first, we need to claim it as ours.

The Talmud in Kiddushin 32b tries to figure out what happens if a Rabbi says to their students, “You know what?  I don’t want to be honored anymore.” Does it take effect? In order to find the answer, they ask: הכא תורה דיליה היא? Does the Torah really belong to him (the Rabbi)? I realize the irony in bringing a highly gendered Talmud passage to a dvar torah about gender and the rabbinate, but just try to bear with me as I translate it as it’s written (with all male pronouns) and feel free to change them in your head as we go. Why does it matter if the Torah belongs to the Rabbi? If the Torah belongs only to God and the rabbi doesn’t really own any piece of it, then the obligation to honor the Rabbi would be akin to honoring the Torah or God, which the Rabbi can’t renounce with words or actions. But, does the Torah actually belong to the Rabbi? Rava chimes in with a resounding “אין” “yes!” The Torah does belong to the Rabbi. Bringing the verse from psalms, ובתורתו יהגה יומם ולילה, and in his Torah he meditates day and night. The object of the word torato, his Torah, is usually assumed to be God. Here, Rava is making a radical jump, proving that the Torah does belong to the Rabbi with this verse--in his (the Rabbi’s) Torah, he meditates day and night. But, at what point does it become his or her or their Torah? Our buddy Rashi helps us understand this by explaining:

בתחילה היא נקראת תורת השם ומשלמדה וגרסה היא נקראת תורתו

At the beginning, she (the Torah) is called God’s Torah. And when one learns it and integrates it into oneself, it is then called his (their own) Torah.

It’s up to all of us, not just Rabbis, to claim and integrate Torah into ourselves. To engrave it into our souls, to carry it with us wherever we walk. In this way, the Torah is transformed in our hands.

Back in the shtibl that autumn Shabbos with the little boy and his mom, I realized that something was changing. It turned out that during the service, when Rabbi Victor introduced himself, the same boy spoke up saying, “Boys can be Rabbis too!?”

I may have a beard eventually, given the TMI story I shared earlier, and I am okay with that. But, it gives me extreme comfort to know that I may not need one in order to be recognizable as a Rabbi. It gives me comfort to know that our tradition is changing, and it’s changing in our hands.

May we be blessed with the knowledge that the Torah truly belongs to us and that we belong to her.

Parshat Kedoshim 5779: How to Write a Drash

Have you ever wondered what goes into writing a Dvar Torah? This is a rare window into the life of an (almost) rabbi, a window into the artistic process. Sometimes it looks like you’d imagine: taking my Tanakh and a commentary from the shelf, opening it up, reading it and talking to myself while sipping a steaming cup of coffee. Or learning with Rabbi Victor or a hevruta and having a flash of inspiration, jotting it down in a well-worn (leather) notebook. And, sometimes it looks a little different. Like frantically googling “kedoshim dvar torah” and coming across a Bat Mitzvah girl’s drash from 2012, in which she writes, “Holiness can be in all of our lives, if we know how to open up to it...I personally open myself up to higher experiences whenever I have profound feelings, like being sad about important things, or being truly content.” I know, right? Very deep. Then the artistic process takes a turn. The darshan deletes it all and meanders down streets, rides buses and trains, and eventually stumbles upon something beautiful. Like a newborn baby in the NICU on the Upper East Side of New York.

After two and a half days of wrestling, this beautiful baby was born to my two friends this past Sunday. Because of a mild infection, he’s under supervision in the NICU, and he’s just perfect. A full head of black hair, expressive eyebrows, and beautiful grey-blue eyes. From his little NICU box and all swaddled up, this little one scanned the room with his eyes. Searching for human connection, which he knows so instinctively is absolutely vital for existence.

In this week’s parsha, Kedoshim, G!d speaks to Moshe, saying:

דַּבֵּ֞ר אֶל־כָּל־עֲדַ֧ת בְּנֵי־יִשְׂרָאֵ֛ל וְאָמַרְתָּ֥ אֲלֵהֶ֖ם קְדֹשִׁ֣ים תִּהְי֑וּ כִּ֣י קָד֔וֹשׁ אֲנִ֖י יְהוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶֽם׃

Speak to the whole Israelite community and say to them: You shall be holy, for I, Adonai your God, am holy.

Why does G!d emphasize that Moshe speak to the whole community, instead of each person individually? Additionally, why is the commandment to be holy, קְדֹשִׁ֣ים, written in the plural? The Netivot Shalom (which I did learn with Rabbi Victor, incidentally) explains that this verse hints to the idea that we cannot truly be holy without unity. We need one another in order to fulfill the mitzvah of קְדֹשִׁ֣ים תִּהְי֑וּ. It’s no mistake that the mitzvot that follow this opening line are bein adam l’chavero, instructions on how to be good to one another. In order to be holy, it needs to be in the plural. Our connection to one another is vital.

The baby and I locked eyes, and one of his mom’s and I sang a favorite Shabbos melody as I caressed his soft head. He is so vulnerable, and so good. He does not need to open Sefer Netivot Shalom to understand the interconnectedness of all human beings.

Sometimes us adults, however, need a reminder.

Two weeks ago, on the last night of Pesach, there was an attack on Am Yisrael. As I watched the video of the Rabbi of Chabad of Poway speak after the attack, wearing a hospital gown and his hands bandaged up, two things struck me. The first was that, just like him, my name will soon be Rabbi Goldstein.  In that way we are connected. The second was the horrifying and awe-inspiring image of him standing on the steps outside his shul, people gathered around him after the attack. With his hands bleeding profusely, wrapped in tallesim, he gave a drash. “Am Yisrael Chai! Nothing is going to take us down...we are going to stand tall, we are going to stand proud of who we are, our heritage. We are going to get through this.” The paramedics tried to stop him, but he needed to finish his drash, he needed to leave his people with the feeling of connectedness amidst disaster.

Rabbi Goldstein’s words acted as a wake up call for me, the other (almost) Rabbi Goldstein. It made me realize how, before this attack, I would not have considered the Chabad of Poway a part of my immediate Jewish family. With our difference in politics, practice, and priorities, I didn’t see us as part of the same Jewish body, so to speak. But when I saw Rabbi Goldstein’s hands wrapped, and heard his impassioned words “Am Yisrael Chai,” tears welled up in my eyes. I realized that of course, we are part of the same Jewish body, a part of Am Yisrael. And, we need one another.

Sometimes drashot don’t go exactly as the darshan or darshanit planned. Sometimes the darshan looks into the Torah and tries to find the world, and sometimes, perhaps much more often she looks at the world and sees the Torah reflected in a newborn’s searching eyes, or a Rabbis bleeding hands.

May we be blessed to remember our interconnectedness not only in our most vulnerable times, but daily. In this way may we fulfill the commandment קְדֹשִׁ֣ים תִּהְי֑וּ, and be holy together.

Shabbat Shalom.

Parshat Metzora 5779: #justiceforglitter

Last week I got to fulfill a childhood dream. As I entered the Wang theater downtown, my heart was racing. The beautiful interiors glimmered, and as I looked around I saw people of all ages and genders. Many of them wearing various shades of pink. We were there to see the one and only Mariah Carey. Famous for her notes so high only dogs can hear them, Mariah’s music and her unabashed femininity spoke to my neshama, and I’m sure some of your neshamas, as a tween in a big way. For my pre-bat mitzvah photoshoot, when I was instructed to bring along something that showed what I love and who I am, I knew exactly what to bring. My friends had pictures of themselves with soccer balls, or an instrument of some sort, but all I needed was a fully pink outfit, microphone, and CD. I still remember so vividly the moment I realized, microphone in hand, that I was not going to be able to lip synch to Mariah as freely in front of this photographer as I had in my bedroom with the door closed. All of that is to say, I loved--and love--Mariah. Last week, waiting for her to arrive on stage, almost 20 years after my bat mitzvah photo shoot was magical. As the lights dimmed and the music started playing, as if in preparation to receive the shabbos bride, everyone stood up. Mariah emerged in her glittery silver halter top dress. She sang all the classics, delivered those high pitched notes, we danced, it was amazing.

As we were leaving the theater, exhilarated from an amazing performance, we passed the merch table, and I noticed something peculiar. Alongside Mariah swag and her new album were shirts and bags and stickers with the hashtag #justiceforglitter. Justice for glitter is a campaign started by Mariah’s fans to save her reputation, after her 2001 film “Glitter” was voted one of the worst movies of all time. Not only did it get a 7% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, The Village Voice called it “Infinitely mockable.” The Chicago Tribune: “A vehicle that tarnishes as you watch it, leaving this troubled chart-topper lost in a sea of drunken, maudlin cliches.” Fans were worried, rightfully so, that this movie would be the end of Mariah’s long and vibrant career. So, they started a campaign to bring #justiceforglitter.

In this week’s parsha, Metzora, we find ourselves smack in the middle of the book of Vayikra which deals with the laws of the Temple, sacrifices, and various afflictions of skin, body, and home and their spiritual remedies. Through these seemingly strange parshiot we see a word over and over again that is commonly misunderstood: tahor, usually translated as pure. As we know, every translation is a commentary in itself. When we translate tahor as pure or clean, we do two things: without the temple, we make it irrelevant to our lives today, and secondly, we add on a level of judgement that need not be there. I was very excited to find out, thanks to my teacher Laynie Solomon at SVARA, that when you take a closer look at the root tet, hey, resh in the dictionary you’ll notice that, in addition to pure it can also mean...wait for it… glitter.

This past Wednesday here at Nehar Shalom we completed the 6th and final week of our Talmud as Spiritual Practice Beit Midrash. In our sugya, from Eruvin 13b, we learn about Rebbe Meir. The Talmud starts by saying that it is known before the one who spoke the world into being (AKA G!d) how special and unique Rebbe Meir was. “So then, why did we not establish halacha like him?” The Talmud asks. Because, on the tahor, on the glittery, he could declare tamei, not glittery, and on the tamei he could declare tahor. And for each of them, it says, he could mareh lo panim, show for it faces or aspects. Meaning that, Rebbe Meir was such a radical character because he could hold the complexity and multifaceted nature of every situation, knowing that it’s never as simple as tahor or tamei, and that usually (if not always) thing carry aspects of both.

I guess this is my personal #justiceforglitter campaign, which has nothing (or everything) to do with Mariah Carey. If we read any of the number of things in the Torah deemed “impure” with this translation of it’s opposite, tahor, in mind, we understand it differently.  And these parshiot in Leviticus might feel a little less judgmental and distant.

The actual #justiceforglitter campaign worked, by the way. Through a lot of devotion and hard work, Mariah’s fans got the album for the movie rated #1 on iTunes, 17 years after its release. If Mariah’s fans can do that for Glitter, than I think as fans of the Torah, we can too.

In a world absent of priestly rituals, we are considered to be in the deepest levels of tamei/unglittery that there ever was. If we look through the lens of Rebbe Meir, then we can see that even within that there are aspects that are glittery. As we look in ourselves and in the world, may we be blessed to find the aspects of glitter that are difficult to see.