Parashat Pekudei 5784
Four years ago this week, our lives changed forever. There are few moments in our lives and in history where we all knew “where we were when…” We all knew where we were when the COVID lockdown happened. I was six months into my first job out of Rabbinical school, at Cornell. My home was decked out with fabrics and crazy lights, the food was ready, the drinks were ready, my costume (Moshe Rabeinu) was ready. It was Purim. Some students were already in my home helping set up, getting their first rounds of food and drinks, when they got the email, which said that they weren’t going to come back after Spring Break in a few weeks. We didn’t know then, that within just a few days, not weeks, they would all be gone, Collegetown would be a ghost town, and many of them wouldn’t know a normal college experience ever again. We didn’t know then that there would be over a million deaths from COVID in the US alone, and even now–four years later–we would still be thinking about this virus in our day to day lives, protecting the most vulnerable among us.
One beautiful thing about college students is that, for many of them at least, nothing will get in the way of a good party. So, even with phones in hand, tears in eyes, they wandered through the door costumed and ready. The polarities of Purim were on full display. And we partied and danced like the world was ending, because in a way it was. In a way, the world as we knew it did end that day.
In the weeks surrounding Purim, we have parshiot all about garments, clothing, and apparel. This week, the apron, breastplate, cloak, crown, hat, tunic, sash and breeches of the Kohanim are made. There are some who say that it’s no mistake that we have these parshiot in the weeks preceding the donning of our own costumes on Purim.
The custom (or as some rabbis like me like to understand it, very serious law) of dressing up on Purim, like many aspects of Purim, has mysterious origins. The first explicit mention of Purim costumes was by Rabbi Yehuda Minz, a 15th-century Italian rabbi who said that costume wearing, and specifically cross-dressing, was permissible on Purim because it creates joy. (And, can we just note how interesting it is that a 15th century Rabbi is proclaiming cross-dressing as joyful!?) Others say it coincides with the medieval Catholic tradition of dressing up on mardi gras, our pseudo-sister holiday during this time. And, others simply point to Megillat Esther itself, saying that the amount of hiding and revealing in the story–and the way that the Divine, though never mentioned, is hiding throughout the story–lends itself to dressing up, to hiding ourselves, or perhaps revealing our true selves that lay beneath the day-to-day costumes we have to put on in order to function in our world.
For those of us who have never fit easily into the mold of our modern, capitalist society, Purim can be a healing balm to the soul. A time to show our true colors, to take off the costumes and constraints of conformity and allow our weirdness and our humanness to shine.
In our Parsha, the Mishkan is called by a new name, מִשְׁכַּ֣ן הָעֵדֻ֔ת, the Mishkan of Witness. Why did the Israelites need a witness in the desert? The Sfat Emet explains that, after the Golden Calf, the Israelites did not believe they were worthy of closeness with G!d. The Mishkan acted as a witness to their true nature, their true goodness. It acted as a reminder to them and all of us, as he explains, “not to fall too low in [your] own eyes, for by teshuva we really are restored to what we were before.” The Mishkan, like a good therapist, bore witness to the Israelites when they felt the lowest about themselves, not forcing them to feel otherwise, but simply existing as a reminder that their actions did not define them.
On Purim, and on this fourth anniversary of the pandemic, how can we bear witness to one another? How can we act as reminders to our loved ones and community that we are good and deserving of love and closeness? Bearing witness, as well, to all the ways in which we have struggled individually and collectively. The personal and global traumas we have experienced.
And, as we choose our costumes this Purim, I invite us to consider digging deep. What aspects of yourself do you need to hide in order to conform to our world? In what way can you embody those parts on Purim? My Purim costumes have spanned mostly the world of my alter egos or things I was personally grappling with. Moshe Rabbeinu, my first year out of Rabbinical school, is somewhat obvious. A reluctant spiritual leader who doesn’t always have the right words to say. In other years, I channeled my inner Chabad Rebbetzin and pressured people to come to my home for Shabbat all day. Last year, when I was teaching at Luria, I was a traditional hippie (crystals, incense and all), and was asked blank-faced by one of my students if I was dressed up or not.
May we be blessed with many witnesses, human and otherwise, to remind us of who we are. To remind us that we are good. To remind us that as human beings we deserve connection, no matter how we may have messed up. And, as Purim approaches, may we serve as witnesses to one another, holding our humanness tenderly, allowing our masks to come off as another goes on.
Shabbat Shalom
