Psalm 4

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In a tight spot, you gave me room to expand. (4:2)

Feeling squeezed? Feeling constricted? Having trouble breathing, coping or keeping up with change? When you feel under pressure, you may make unwise decisions. You might make decisions out of fear or panic. You might fail to make a decision when one is needed … a non-decision is also a decision.

The essential root meaning of the Hebrew word for Egypt, Mitzrayim, is the word tzar, a place of narrowness. Mitzrayim is what happens when you live your life in a narrow box, unable or unwilling to try new things or seriously examine the way you live your life. When you repeat the same mistakes over and over again or continually find yourself experiencing the same frustrations, chances are you could do something about it but are stuck in a rut of stimulus and response.

The opposite of Mitzrayim is expansiveness. The first behavior of a meditation or yoga practice is to learn how to breathe, to expand your lungs and body. Rather than being a slave to a stimulus, you learn how to expand yourself and take time to evaluate why your instinct is to jump to a particular response. What’s going on inside your head? What positive or negative experiences have you had in the past that are influencing the way you make decisions? Next, examine the stimulus again, and allow yourself to objectively decide on a wise response. Move from narrowness, in which your responses are predetermined, to expansiveness, in which you have the room to choose a response from a wide range of options.

Psalm 3

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Adonai, my foes are so many! Many are those who attack me. (3:2)

Foes can be both those things which attack us on the outside, such as difficult bosses, co-workers, and customers, and the things that attack us on the inside, such as the demons that pick away at our self-confidence and self-worth. They might be the demons whispering in your ear that no one cares about you, no one listens to you —  not your children, your wife, or your so-called friends.

When the foes, external and internal, are attacking and things are going wrong, it seems like there is no solution. Creditors are calling, bills are due, the car needs unexpected and expensive repairs, a puddle appears under the refrigerator. We are stuck in a downward spiral and it doesn’t matter what we do, because no matter what, something else goes wrong. Every choice seems to lead to the same disastrous consequences.

How many people react to difficult situations by sticking their head in the sand and pretending that the problems don’t exist? Just as running away from signs of physical problems and refusing to see a doctor usually doesn’t make the problem heal itself, running away from other problems rarely works. Seeking medical attention and undergoing proper treatment earlier rather than later might cause short term suffering but relieve long term problems. The solution is to face the challenges and make decisions from strength and wisdom rather than fear and impulse. Not all immediate consequences will be positive, but in the long term, making wise decisions will lead to stable consequences.

The only guarantee in life is that there are no guarantees. There will always be problems and challenges, and it is a guarantee that something will go wrong. If you know this, however, you can take the ups and downs with equanimity, not letting the low points distort your wisdom.

Psalm 2

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Serve Adonai in fear/awe; rejoice with trembling. (2:11)

Fear and Trembling is an important work of philosophy by Soren Kierkegaard, using the model of the binding of Isaac to explore the meaning of faith. It is fundamentally a Christian look at the role of faith above all.

Judaism, which places action above faith, approaches this verse as instruction to serve God by observing mitzvot with fear and trembling, lest God withhold reward and send suffering upon the world. I’d rather focus on the second verb in the sentence which casts a different light on awe and trembling.

Picture a small child fully engaged by a movie, a storyteller, a performer of any kind – the wide open eyes, the open mouth. Such a child is fully open to anything that might happen. Her senses are totally focused on what is happening before her. At the climactic moment, her arms might begin to shake, her body might bounce up and down in her seat, giggles of laughter or shrieks of joy emerge from that open mouth, she might hug herself as if to keep herself from flying out her body!

That’s how I understand this verse – as a challenge to reach the highest level of focus, excitement, and joy while engaged in mitzvah. Could I reach that level of kavanah, intention, while shaking a lulav and etrog, while making Kiddush, while wrapping myself in tefillin, while delivering Purim baskets or doing some other act of gemilut hasadim? What an opportunity!

Psalm 1

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My bulletin series this year will focus on my attempt to read the book of Psalms as a devotional practice. Psalms were written to reflect an individual’s or a communal struggle with the joys and sorrows of life. When life is good, the Psalmist reaches out to God in gratitude. When life is troubled, the Psalmist reaches out to God for help. When life is sweet, the Psalmist reaches out to God with gentleness. When life is frightening, the Psalmist reaches out to God in despair. When life is cruel, the Psalmist reaches out to God in anger.

My goal is to post weekly Psalm reflections on my blog and on the Ahavas Israel website, ahavasisraelgr.org. Each week, I’ll have chosen one phrase or verse from the Psalm of that week and use it to create a brief 200-250 word meditation on how the torah of that verse might help us embody a positive approach to life. That’s the goal, anyway – we’ll see how the project plays itself out over time.

A blog is a two-way conversation – please post comments and reactions. Share with me and others how you understand the verse I’ve selected. Join me in creating a devotional practice, creating personal meaning within our sacred texts.

Happy is the man who has not walked in counsel of the wicked, or stood along with the path of sinners, or sat in the company of the insolent; rather, the teaching of Adonai is his delight, and he studies that teaching day and night. (1:1)

Walk, Stand, and Sit. It is easy to fall into undesirable habits. We can travel down a meaningless path in an unfulfilling job, we can stand around with people we dislike whose values and habits do not reinforce good behavior, we can sit around complaining that nothing ever goes our way.

Walking, Standing, and Sitting. We might try to escape a mindless life by stopping what we are doing and practicing stillness; we might try to can escape the exhaustion of endless standing and waiting by sitting down and searching for distraction on our electronic devices; we try to enliven our life by getting off the couch and doing something, anything to get us moving again.

The truth is that the path to a meaningful life is not determined solely by our habit of walking, standing, or sitting — it is determined by our inner life. What’s going on while we are walking, standing, and sitting? To what extent have we internalized a path of Torah so that we are carrying its values with us when we are at work and at play, while shopping and while out with friends, with our parents, children, spouse, or siblings.

Divre Harav/Words from the Rabbi – Summer, 2013

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You’ll notice that Rosh Hashanah begins just two days after Labor day. You will recall that Pesah began very early. You’re probably wondering … what about Hanukkah?

The article is adapted from an article by Jonathan Mizrahi, which can be found here:

sites.google.com/site/mizrahijonathan/home/ThanksgivingAndHanukkah

This year features an anomaly for American Jews – The first day of Hanukkah coincides with Thanksgiving, on 11/28/2013. Hanukkah and Thanksgiving have only coincided once before, in 1888 … and it will never happen again. [Note: Prior to 1942, Thanksgiving was the LAST Thursday in November, and thus could occur on November 29 or 30. In 1888, Hanukkah began on November 29, which was also Thanksgiving.]

Thanksgiving is the fourth Thursday in November, meaning the latest it can be is November 28. November 28 is also the earliest date on which Hanukkah can fall. The Jewish calendar repeats on a 19 year cycle, and Thanksgiving repeats on a 7 year cycle. You would therefore expect them to coincide roughly every 19 x 7 = 133 years. Why won’t it ever happen again?

The reason is because the Jewish calendar is very slowly getting out of sync with the solar calendar, at a rate of 3 days per 1000 years (not bad for a many centuries old calendar!). The Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar modified by the addition of leap months to adjust for the length of the solar year. However, the assumption it makes about the length of the solar year corresponds to the Julian calendar. In 1582, Pope Gregory introduced a calendar reform (known as the Gregorian calendar) when it was recognized that the spring equinox was slowly drifting later at the rate of about 3 days per 1000 years. The solution was to reduce the number of leap years – century years divisible by 100 (but not divisible by 400) are not leap years. Thus, 2000 was a leap year, but 2100, 2200, and 2300 will not be.

This means that while presently Hanukkah can be as early as November 28, in the year 2200 the Jewish calendar will drift forward so that the earliest Hanukkah will be November 29. The last time Hanukkah falls on 11/28 is 2146 (which happens to be a Monday).

Of course, if the Jewish calendar is never modified in any way, then it will slowly move forward through the Gregorian calendar, until it loops all the way back to where it is now. So, Hanukkah will again fall on Thursday, November 28 … in the year 79,811! Of course, Jewish law  and the guidelines for determining the Jewish calendar require Passover to be in the spring.  Therefore, the Jewish calendar will have to be adjusted long before it loops all the way around. Of course, the messiah will have come long before then to sort out these kinds of sticky problems!

Remember that “day” in the Jewish calendar starts at night. This means that although this year the first day of Hanukkah falls on Thanksgiving, candles will be lit for the first NIGHT of Hanukkah the night BEFORE Thanksgiving. When the first day of Hanukkah falls the day after Thanksgiving, the first night’s candles are lit the night OF Thanksgiving.  This will happen two more times, in 2070 and 2165.

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I do a variety of things in addition to writing sermons and bulletin articles, answering questions by phone or email, going to Board and Committee meetings, teaching religious school classes, leading study groups, and visiting members of the congregation. Here are some of my additional activities of the past month:

  • • I am one of the co-founders of the Coalition for Small Conservative Congregations (CSCC) and one of the planners of the Rabbinic conference sponsored by the CSCC. I have been working on our 3rd annual conference, taking place in Chicago June 2-4.
  • • The weekly Torah study group that has been meeting for about 15 years (for the last 10, at Schuler Books and Music on 28th St.) will shift focus this fall to begin reading a chapter a week from the classical prophets. I have been researching books and commentaries on Isaiah.