May 13, 2011-Parshat Behar

"What's that got to do with the price of tea in china?" Did you know we Jews have an equivalent quip? The beginning of this week's Torah portion, Behar, inspired it; Mah inyan Shmittah etzel Har Sinai (what's the connection between Shmittah - the sabbatical year - and mt. Sinai)? This question comes as a response to the Torah portion's opening sequence where the intricate laws of the Sabbatical year are introduced with the prelude that God spoke to Moses on Mt. Sinai. Why is this point singled out here? The classic response teaches that not only were the broad outlines of God's will revealed at Mt. Sinai, but all the details of ALL the laws were articulated there as well, even if they are taught much later in the Torah.

As a very important side note, this commandment requires that the entire country lie fallow for one full year, and that God will provide three years worth of produce in the sixth year to cover year six, seven, and the first of the next cycle since no work was done during the seventh. This would be a preposterous claim for a human author to make if the Torah were not of Diving origin. In addition, there are no records of historical famine or breach of this remarkable unnatural occurrence that recurred every seven years for close to 1000 years of living in the land of Israel. Think about it.

As Penn segues into Graduation mode and the tents are staked securely into the earth (in anticipation of some heavy rains), there is a lesson here in the Torah that may shed some light on the deeper meaning of this colligate ceremony . The laws of Shmittah apply when we as Jews enter the land of Israel. And yet the Torah teaches us that their details were enumerated at Mt. Sinai. A time of information, gestation, and then practice. Graduation is really a transition from the theory to the practice, not merely a completion of one separate stage and the beginning of another. We'll sing tonight in Lecha Dodi, written in Tzfat by R' Shlomo Alkebitz some 500 years ago, sof maase v'machsheva techilah (God's action is the end, His thought/vision the beginning). We're meant to have thought, learned, contemplated and prepared. And now we celebrate the transition that makes those theoretics practical. Bringing things into the world of action is what makes us most Divine, what fuels our spiritual uniqueness of creativity.

But Shmittah teaches us something far more valuable. In the world of hard work - tilling the proverbial soil of life - it becomes very easy to forget God and His blessing and rely on our own might for sustenance. Shmittah reminds us that every 7 years, everything we have is a gift. A gift from God. We're His partner and do our share for 6 years, but on the 7th the relationship moves to a whole new level. As we enter into the 'real world', we cannot forget from where we come, why we're here, and Who is truly guiding our existence and rooting for our success. We Jews have been called the conscious of the world for this very reason. To be anchored in right vs. wrong, God's will, spiritual sanity and humility - these are the traits we stand for even amidst the deception and gruel of hard work.

To our graduates - we wish you spiritual success in life (with the requisite material grace you need to succeed).

Good Shabbos,

Rabbi Lynn

May 6, 2011- Parshat Emor

"To everything, turn turn turn, there is a season, turn turn turn, and a time for every purpose under heaven."

One thing's for sure, when the Byrds wrote it, they didn't have Forest Gump in mind. And they most certainly didn't take their cue from this week's Torah portion either. But, as a fitting note to school's end and the very rare instance where the English language gets it right - commencement - the lessons gleaned from the Torah here are priceless. "These are the moadim..." Sorry, but I can't translate it. There's a word in Hebrew for time - zman, and festival - chag. But this one, moadim, is elusive (I've seen it translated as appointed festivals - whatever that means). Suffice it to say, this passage begins the detailed list of all the stations along the Main Line of the Jewish year. Come to think of it, "stations" is not a bad stab at what's really going on. A time for this, a time for that - no station repeats itself, and each is fundamentally necessary for the journey. Pesach, Shavous, Rosh HaShanah, Yom Kippur, Succos and some of the more "local" stops, Hannukah, Purim, Tu B'Shvat, Tu B'Av, Lag B'Omer, Tisha B'av and back again and again, turn turn turn.

Every end is always a beginning. Every measure of time is only that moment which necessarily connects the previous moment to the next. But there exists the option of steering each moment in any number of directions creating a continuum of either good or evil, right or wrong. "Time" means that it once began, and as certainly as it began, it mush finish. There is a goal to its creation, or it loses all reason to exist. Each moment along the way is either calibrated towards Time's intended end, or by definition most callously diverted. But there are stops along the way - stations and pit stops to "freshen up" - priceless opportunities to tap into the regiment of the human condition and well the depths of the spirit. No station's the same, and none is superfluous. Each has its own language, culture, nuance and message and is inextricably connected to the whole system which proudly presents itself a year later for revisitation. These are the "stations" that God gave the Jews - festivals of time and spirit and Divine awakenings.

Through a year, and back again, in and out of weeks, and back again... Some years we're at Penn, others not. But the "stations" are consistent and it's there where we'll measure up the muscle and maturity we garner through life. The Almighty created many different components of time - hours, days, weeks, months, seasons, years, generations - all which require understanding, definition, appreciation and dexterity. We progress in concentric circles, spiraling through life revisiting each and every station, but as a different being each and every time. May we all continue to grow and reach the milestones we're meant to reach, and may we have the good sense and fortune to recognize when we've actually met them.

A blessed beginning to all and a good summer,

Rabbi Lynn

April 16, 2011- Parshat Acharei Mot/Shabbat Hagadol

It's always a remarkable image: little Jewish children sitting around the Passover table cheering on the devastation and destruction of the Egyptians through methodical, step by step torturous and murderous plagues. One by one, blood, frogs, lice, beasts, pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness and finally death. Yippee! Isn't Passover so much fun?! As if that wasn't enough, Moshe taunts Pharoh (at God's urging of course) with debilitating psychological warfare, pretending to ask for a mere 3 days "vacation" to fatten and slaughter a few sheep (doubly insulting because sheep were the Egyptian god). Pharaoh knew it was an escape plan, but politics were politics even back then. Granted, the Egyptians had deceived the Jews into becoming "servants" of Pharoh through careful manipulation, and then maintained 120 years of brutal slavery and sadistic decrees - their demise was well deserved and who could fault the Jews for gawking. I mean, we're still at it millennium later.

Really, the plagues were as much for them as they were - and are - for us. Each plague serves a distinct purpose. Each plague elucidates a specific attribute of the Hebrew God that no other nation could possibly fathom: One singular entity whose existence encompasses all of creation leaving nothing to chance, save the free-will autonomy of man. No grain of sand, no gigabyte too small to be rendered insignificant; nay, the entire universe is one giant stage of almost infinite significance upon which the story of the human soul will unfold. The 10 plagues correspond to the 10 statements of creation, the 10 commandments, the 10 Sephirot (for you kabalists), the 10 catagories of joy (for you romantics), and even your 10 fingers and toes. The world was de-created, re-created and shaken and stirred until every morsel of God's attainable glory was highlighted, and the Jewish people lifted to the status of a Nation - an entity far greater than the sum total of its parts, a new dimension where we as individuals cease to exist, yet where we coalesce into a creation much more God-like, and hence much closer.

Egypt was the world super-power in everything, including magic. So much so that the Jews couldn't fully 100% believe in the plague or Moshe's signs. 99% maybe, but not 100%. Even though the Egyptians couldn't reproduce more than the first two plagues, Jews always deep down harbored a sense of superiority and maybe figured Moshe could best the best. (Sinai eventually cleared up any doubts). During the third plague of lice, the Torah teaches that the Egyptian magicians tried, but were unsuccessful and headed to, at least, the "finger of God". Why couldn't they compete? Our Sages teach that lice were too small. Really? Rivers into blood, millions of miraculous frogs, but lice were too small?!?

The power of magic has no dominion over something with no substantive size - less than a mustard seed. The Maharal of Prague explains that magic is a manipulation of all the negative forces in creation, or more accurately, a utilization of the forces of creation negatively (much like love can be guided or misguided, ire, wealth, gravity...). Yet again, it begs the question, "why? Why can't magic rule over things smaller than a mustard seed?" If this is the most you've ever heard about a mustard seed, herein lies the answer. This is not some random comparison. The yardstick of something of substance, something of its own girth, so to speak, is a mustard seed. Anything less has no legal status, doesn't exist as its own entity. Magic, or utilitarian forces for evil, can only dominate over something that otherwise boasts of its own identity, its own self-perpetuating existence. One's ego, or self-inflation, is by definition an affront to the very concept of the Jewish God. It is here that evil takes root. But when the Jewish people humble themselves and no longer consider their own existence outside of God and the Jewish nation, magic has no recourse. When we're unified, we're only unified because we ignore the petty, the physical, the ego. This is the goal. This is one of the great consequences of experiencing the plagues - for a few moments in history we had our sights set on perfection, on oneness of purpose. These moments are precious. So precious we celebrate them year after year. We revisit and recreate anew this sublime sense of unity and belonging.

We'll sing next week Dayenu, and each stage of that treasured tune has remarkable merit - plagues, sea splitting, etc. But one line is troubling. "If you only brought us to Mt Sinai and not given us the Torah, it would have been enough." Really? What's the big deal of getting to Mt. Sinai if nothing were to happen? To this question I heard a wonderful answer. The Torah intimates that when we finally arrived at Mt. Sinai, we were so unified that we're described as "one being with one heart". Even without receiving the Torah, for the Jewish people to experience such unity and love, that too would have been enough.

Have a Chag Kasher v'Sameach - a beautiful holiday to all.

Rabbi Lynn