Dear Friends,
What's next?
We've just completed the holiday of Shavuot, which celebrates our ancestors receiving Torah on Mount Sinai. At Beth Sholom, we didn't stay up all night learning, though we did have a lovely study session and dialogue with myself and Bishop Martin Holley, and cheesecake was served. Why do Jews eat cheesecake on Shavuot? As a way to remind ourselves that Torah is the mother's milk of the Jewish people. (One wonders what those of us who don't eat dairy can do instead - can Torah be the green smoothie of our people as well? To that I say: l'chayim!)
I've been wondering though - we have this wonderful holiday where we stay up late learning Torah, reminding ourselves that Torah is a source of wisdom and meaning and inspiration for us each day, we remember our ancestors and we read of their experience of revelation at Mount Sinai, and then what?
Given that for many people who stay up all night long, services are just after dawn, after they hear the 10 Commandments read and finish the service, everyone goes home to sleep...
The real question is, what do we do with the Torah we've received?
How are we changed by it? Who do we need to be to maintain what we've learned?
Simchat Torah, when we celebrate finishing the Torah and beginning it again, is considered to be like a wedding between God and Israel, with the Torah as our ketubah (marriage contract) and the 7 Hakafot like the 7 blessings and 7 circles the bride (Jewish people) makes around the groom (God). Shavuot has a similar feel to it, where we are encouraged to reconnect and come close (I suppose since Shavuot is nine months after Simchat Torah, one could call it a rebirthing experience if one wished to do so).
When I meet with couples to plan their weddings, I remind them that the wedding day is not the most important thing for them. How they treat each other the day after the wedding, and how they work to build and nurture their relationship is even more important than the wedding. It's easy to have a moment of peak experience on a wedding day, on Mount Sinai. The question is, what happens the day after? What happens next?
I remember the name of a book I came across years ago called After the Ecstasy, the Laundry. by mindfulness teacher Jack Kornfield. I haven't read it, though the name itself is enough to make me want to someday.
Too often, I think we chase after and yearn for the peak experiences, when it's the day-to-day learning that shapes who we are. We want the home runs every time we step to the plate, forgetting that a good baseball average is someone who gets a hit three out of every ten times they come to the plate.
What's next? Well, every day is next. Every moment is next. Every decision is next.
As always, the question is are we living our valued in the moment? Are we being present to the Torah we've received? If not, let us refocus ourselves and bring ourselves back to that which allows us to be the best of ourselves going forward.
Our ancestors had to leave Mount Sinai. They worried that if they got too close to God, they would die. Revelation wasn't the ultimate goal for them. Getting to Israel was the goal. Going to the holy land became the eternal goal of our people. The Torah we need today is that which helps us all get closer to our promised lands, whether that be the geographic State of Israel (which I'm looking forward to visiting next month), or a metaphorical journey towards completion of a goal.
What's next, then? Another day in the life, on the road to holiness, wherever the journey leads.
May we learn what we need to learn along the way.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Ilan
PS Tomorrow's Starbucks Shabbat will be about the power of leaders to transform energy. Can we all be energy healers? Join us tomorrow morning to find out! 9 am for Starbucks coffee and delicacies. 9:15 - 10 for learning and 10 am our service will begin.
I'll be in Maryland visiting Sherri from Sunday evening through Wednesday evening of this coming week.Feel free to email me or call in case of emergency.
Finally, it's dawning on me more and more each day that I don't have much time left as your rabbi. I'll have much more to say about that in the weeks ahead. For now, if you have any shul-related things you'd like my help with before I leave, please respond to this message and let me know. Want me to hang a mezuzzah in your house? Happy to do so! Need a yartzeit plaque? Let me know. Please don't be shy - I'm here for you and will appreciate any reminders of things that need to be on my to-do list before I go. After I get back from next week, I hope to begin touching base with all of you before I leave town. Let's make sure to do so while we can. Shabbat Shalom!
