It's Birthright season again – when thousands of young Jews are busily bused though the country, getting an epic experiential intro to Israel.

We host group after group of Birthrighters for Shabbat meals at our home. Group after group I hear the same quintessential query from the females, “Umm, forgive me for asking, but why do you cover your hair like that?”

Underneath the cover of that question is a whole bevy of cultural constructs & assumptions.

Underneath the cover of that question is a genuinely perplexed young woman.

A young woman raised on the American white-bread of progressive ideals...quality ideals like women's empowerment, equality, self-expression.

A young woman who is probably herself full of her own questions of identity, body-image, self-worth.

A young woman who has been decidedly over-dosed on media's mixed messages about women...Where the Myley Cyruses of the world claim to be feminists as they strip and strut their most intimate parts on stage, making indelible impressions on impressionable minds. 

All the while concerned citizens may protest & criticize but can do little to undo this new multi-million-dollar image of what it means for a woman to be sought-after, successful, empowered...sexy, glitzy, untethered.

And then they come to Israel and eat matza-ball soup with me, this middle-aged mama with a shmata wrapped head.

Generally, the sub-text of this young woman's question is a bewildered post-feminist gasp, 'Don't you feel oppressed by having to tie that thing around your head?!'

I then - most gleefully - get the chance to bust out my own mixed message to an impressionable young mind. A mixed message of being both traditionally 'modest' as well as most thoroughly & modernly self-expressed. I loudly lay down my own spoken-word rendering of what it is to be an Observant Jerusalem Jewess crowned with this urban-turban of a head-dress.

Because, for me, this shmata is a statement; it symbolizes thousands of years worth of religious idealism & rich spiritual strivings. This shmata, for me, puts the Myley Cyruses of the world to shame not for their immodesty but for the shallowness of their engagement with reality, history, spirituality.

For I situate myself deep in the trenches of an irrefutably patriarchal Jewish tradition...honoring the breath-taking wisdom of this system all the while trying to bring progress from within the system. 

Trying to raise a family, build an organization and share a vision of Judaism & of life that best resonates with my deepest sense of what is right. And yes, my mix of messages takes the form of a shmata wrapped most decorously around my head as I bust out my own homemade riffs on the how's and why's of this here hair tie:

Urban Turban

I cover my head in protest
to Miley Cyrus
and a culture that
blinds us
to the true beauty of
a woman's sense of dignity.

Where decades of hard-won progress
is undone by a single
twerk
- a fatal twist
in what it truly means to be a feminist.

These are the many strands
of my stand against
a society possessed by a
quenchless quest
for 'sexiness'.

Where 12-year-old girls
try to fill the holes
in their souls
with high heels, halter-tops
& rhinestone-studded hose.

I throw my hat
into the ring
to state the obvious
fact
that female empowerment
is found within.

Judge me not by the color of my skin
and how much of it
I uncover
to win
your attention.

Judge me rather by the content of my character
- not the contours
of my figure.

*
For on this cotton
is written
a Manifesto
of a Kabalistic-feminist.

I enfold the mystic
into this fabric’s every twist.

This covering
comes to express the sacred covenant
of what it means to be married.

While all the while
marriage in the modern world
is but a crumbling institution
a house without beams
where our children suffer
for our indiscretions
divorces
& indecencies.

Please, don't get me wrong
I am not a prude
not a preacher
not a governess
but a mother
and a lover
who takes her sexuality seriously
- mystically -
for I have tasted ultimate Oneness
through the two-ness
known as marriage...

And like a treasured swaddled infant
this two-ness thrives best in containment
covering, commitment.

So, yes, please, let's talk about femininity
about what it really means to be a feminist
a woman, a wife, 
a mother, a builder
because when it comes 
to self-expression, my sister,
        - I got that one covered.

This week we meet Shifra and Puah – the Hebrew midwives who stand in defiance of Pharoah. Pharoah demands that they kill every male child born. They realize that were they to refuse Pharoah to his face not only would they themselves lose their lives, but he would find someone else to do his murderous bidding. Thus, they pretend to follow order, all the while saving the babies lives. When Pharoah calls them back to ask why they have disobeyed him they plead powerless, saying that the Hebrew women are lively and deliver the children before their arrival. Pharoah - apparently - believes them. It seems that these plucky midwives have simply talked their way out of trouble.

 Perhaps its no coincidence then that Puah's name, according to Rashi, comes from her keen ability to speak – most specifically, to speak to and pacify crying babies. She is a baby whisperer – one able to speak to those who themselves are in-fant – unable to speak. Puah, with her inherent ability to communicate with and calm children, stands as an archetypal force of what creates a tranquil home. It is no wonder then that in reward for their defiance, the text tells us that God rewards the midwives with houses. These gift houses, as enigmatic as they may be, make perfect symbolic sense - for midwives work is that of birthing through and sustaining households full of new lives.

Midrash Hagadol tells an illustrative story of Pharoah sending guards to capture the delinquent midwives. It says that God saves the women by turning them into the beams of a home. The guards search the house to no avail, for Shifra and Puah have become embedded in the house itself. They are the beams, the fortifying forces that uphold the entire structure.

 The midwives thus embody the home and all that it symbolizes – family, communication, and internality. For our homes are the internal spheres from which we impact the outer world. Indeed, in this episode, these internally-oriented women are called upon by Pharoah himself to become players in the external arena of power and politics. They rise to the task and become social activists on the national scene. They are the abolitionists that enable the redemption of an entire people and the righting of a massive social wrong.

 As Rabbi Jonathan Sachs points out so eloquently their story is “the first recorded instance of civil disobedience...(setting a precedent) that would eventually become the basis for the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. Shifra and Puah, by refusing to obey an immoral order, redefined the moral imagination of the world.” Histories proud line of social activists and conscientious objectors can trace their source back to these righteous midwives stand against the powers that be.

 In the poem below, Puah herself calls for a redefinition of what it means to be a freedom fighter. She reframes agitating for social justice in more internal terms. She is an activist who does not so much take to the streets, as she takes to the kitchen sink, maintaining that all great battles for justice have their locus in the living room.

 Puah

 Like freedom fighters
 who pray with their feet
 I protest for inner-peace

Though paraplegic in comparison
 to prodigious heels
 of powerful men

My prayerful wheels
 spin tales of inner-freedom
 and intone hymns of mindful treatment
 of children and kin

 I commit to calm the din of crying infants
 with the easy clicking of my teeth
 I speak for those who do not yet know how to speak

My freedom fighting is not political
 that task is for a hardier class
 of Jewish girl

For me - the Egyptian fiend
 is personal
 for the Pharoahs I dethrone
 rule the halls of each of our homes

In the inner-alcoves of a private despair
 that petrifies the children
 and paralyzes the parents
 that imprisons our finest hours
 of family commitment and contentment

 I prefer to pedal wares
 of wars-well-avoided
 where everyone wins
 through carefully worded
 apologies and the timely
 airing of grievances
 between friends

for cowering beneath the pyramids
 of needs – my fiends
 are the menacing insecurities of adolescents
 and the lethal bickerings of parents
 - the noisome whines of needy toddlers
 and the all-too-common-household-hollers
 that oppress our most precious commodities
 of family

My enemies crouch quietly beneath
 the crumbs on the living room carpet
 a beast between the sheets
 of a cold-shouldered bedroom
 where partners sleep
 unconscious
 and deeply out of tune
 with the exquisite call
 of their common dreams

My task is to counter the
 armor-clad offensive
 against love and friendship
 - to incite a protest against
 the enslavement of a trillion
 inner prophets of tranquility
 whose gentle-tongued souls
 are daily buried beneath
 straw burdens of poor communication
 and tossed out with the trashed
 afternoons of a mother's
 epic impatience

I come to play the Moses of relational redemption
 in the face of a sink-full of grimy resentments

 And so I call forth all fellow
 freedom fighters for inner-transformation
 midwives with wise hands
 toting torahs, toting infants, toting pens
 all prayer-footed-protesters
 come & herald in
 emotional freedom from the pharonic foe
 and let us birth our children
 into peaceable homes

For when our houses enshrine tranquility
 then outer-world will follow inner-lead
 and rock-hard hearts
 will soften grips
 and all that's enslaved
 will lithely slip
 into the soft of freedom found
 and take our shoes your off
 to walk around
 for our houses are the
 hallowed ground
 from which God speaks

 So call me Puah,
 who quiets the cries
 of children, slaves
 and the Pharoah
 inside

In last week's reading we witnessed the Biblical love-at-first-sight story of Jacob meeting Rachel. Heroically, Jacob rolls the massive stone from atop the well to water her flock. Romantically, he precedes to kiss her and then lifts up his voice in weeping.

  Though this is love at first sight, its consummation is vastly delayed. Jacob has to work 7 years for his deceptive Uncle Lavan before he is able to finally marry Rachel. A strenuous exercise in delayed gratification. And yet, their love is so great that the text tells us that the 7 years were but a few days for Jacob. Because of this morphing of time he was able to withstand the waiting period. And his commitment becomes a model for a love that transcends time and space. 

  Indeed, this sense of time transcendence takes us back to the moment of Jacob's weeping at the well. For the Midrash shares that Jacob wept because he saw with prophetic foreknowledge that he and Rachel would not be buried together.1 In this week's parsha we see his premonition fulfilled. Rachel tragically dies in childbirth and is buried “along the road to Efrat” as opposed to in the family burial site. At that moment of the kiss, the bonds of time were transcended and he was able to have a prophetic vision of the future. 

  Granted, it is a painful vision. But its not unlike the story of Rabbi Akiva who laughed when he beheld the tragic destruction of the Second Temple.2 He laughed because he realized that if the negative prophecy of destruction came true, then that would necessarily mean that all the positive prophecies of return and rebuilding would also come true for the Jewish people. 

  Indeed, we in our own days have had the enormous gift of witnessing the fulfillment, partial thought it may be, of the myriad prophecies of return to the Land of Israel. We are the living recipients of that prophetic fruit.

  In the poem below Rachel weeps for the fulfillment of the prophecy of her children's return to this land. She reminds us that just as Jacob love for her transcended time and allowed him to make it through those 7 years of work, so too if we beleaguered builders of Jerusalem can but access the vastness of our love for this land, then we can also weather through whatever waiting periods time may hold. 

May we merit to witness the fulfillment of a true and enduring peace in this holy land.

  The Wait 

 You wept
  As wet as wells
  Having spilled
  The crowning ton of stone
  Onto the sand

With withered hands
  but high romance

 Made the skinny shepherds 
  call the place
  - the wailing well -
  for generations to come
  
And seven years 
  grown old 
  between your gaze and mine 
  - was like a day -
  held between the gates 
  of withered hands 
  and weathered 
  wait

  And know that 
  I weep as well 
  when memories of 
  the future spill 
  into our tent
  and premonitions
  limp into our 
  lamp-lit den

 For if this ominous
  prophecy 
  must be then promise me 
  to plant your stones 
  on that baneful road
  where house my bones

And let memorial stand, 
  a somber marker
  in a severed land

  To mark the promise
  of prophecy
  of transcendence
  of time and of distance 
  with a mother's mad insistence
  that the exile of her children
  must end

  And when finally march 
  our children by
  from their battered walk 
  through genocide
  
I will be weeping3 
  loud with pleading
  at that corner-side
  
- where Jerusalem 
  meets Gush Etzion
  with her border guards
  and building zones

And I will lament with rage
  the historic parade
  through Europe, Arabia
  Aushchwitz, Asyria
  and back to my grave
  at Bethlehem's
  barricades 

  And with the force of my weeping
  and the form of your rocks4
  will our children return
  to the road to Efrat

And nineteen hundred years
  - will be like a day -
  held between the gates
  of withered hands
  and our children's 
  will to weather 
  the wait.


1Bereshit Rabbah 70:11

2 Talmud Makkot 24B

3 Foreseeing that the Jews on the way to exile would pass by the site, the Patriarch Yaacov buried her on the road on the way to Ephrath and not within the city so that she would sense their anguish and pray for them (Bereishit Rabbah 82:10). Add to this the quote from Jeremiah, “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are not.” (Jeremiah 31:15) Thus, Rachel stands as the archetype for the mother weeping for her children.

4It is interesting to note that Jacob in both of these stories is engaged in the moving of rocks. First he makes a stone altar (a matzava) at the site of his famous dream of the ladder. Then he moves the massive stone from atop the well for Rachel. And finally, in the story of her death, he again creates a matzeva, a stone memorial, upon Rachel's roadside grave.

The archetypal tale of Jacob's Ladder opens with a powerful verb that demands our attention. It reads, “Vayifga - Jacob arrived/ encountered the place.” 

This verb yifga carries with it a punch, quite literally. For much more than mere arrival or encounter, yifga connotes a sense of collision – of two objects striking each other. It is no mistake that this verb shares its root with the modern Hebrew term for terrorist attack, pegua, and for injured– nifga.  

Last year the war with Gaza coincided with this week's parsha. It had been a week of collisions, from the actual and awful exchange of explosives, to the more subtle yet still-insidious throng of words launched at us in the media and online.   
                                                                                         
I realized that that essential verb yifga colored my entire understanding of that week, that war, of the nature of the conflict that riddles this Land.  

For this is one of the Torah’s defining stories of relationship with the Land of Israel. First, “the place” that strikes Jacob is no less than Mt. Moriah, the historic site of the binding of Isaac and of the Temple itself. And what’s more, the core content of God’s message to Jacob is nothing less than the promise that this land is given to his seed. (See full text below.) This vision is at once a mystic glimpse of the corridor connecting heaven and earth, as well as the highly political promise of Jewish possession of the Land of Israel. 

As such, it is really no wonder that our current-day experience of “the place” is one so terribly fraught with violence, with awe and intensity. Just as Jacob collided with this spot, so too we do collide with this Land. Just as this was for Jacob the site of his father’s fearful binding, and also a place of holiness and prayer, so too for so many of us, to be in Israel is to be struck, to be flooded, by both a sense of prayerfulness and fear.

Jacob wakes up after his astounding dream and exclaims, “God is in this place and I did not know it.” He is filled with fear and adds, ‘Mah nora hamakom hazeh’. How awesome, how awful, is this place, the house of God…”

All too often we do not “know” that God is truly housed here. Certainly the evening news and trends of world-opinion would say the opposite. Even the uber-holy Jacob didn’t get it! Even Jacob admits he did not apprehend G!d here. That is, not until he was hit by it. Not until that pegua of Mt. Moriah had thoroughly struck him into a state of knowing.

And so perhaps it is with us too. That with each hit, with each pegua, we can access some otherwise inaccessible revelation of the God. I admit that it is arguably absurd to ask or expect that anyone could, or should, behold God in these horrific attacks. And yet, I must speak for myself and say that that week I found solace in this teaching. I found solace in the fact that we have a long religious tradition of mixing prayer and Jerusalem and fear. The violence that accompanies Israel, as unfortunate as it may be, is but a testimony to the fact that this place is full of God, fearsomely full of God.  

Yes, that week I could have easily seen myself as a victim of hateful attacks, or as a partaker in a national narrative of violence. Or I could stretch for significance in the face of all that violent absurdity. I could close my eyes and dream God into this place. I could envision the ladder connecting all this dross of worldliness to something so much higher. 

Yes, this place is awesome. Yes, like Jacob, my voice cracks with fear. And yes, like Jacob, I utter an affirmation that God is here.  Even with each fresh pegua, “God is here.” 

 
Collision

Count me as one who has 
collided
with this mountain,
with this gravelly amalgam 
of prayer and fear.

A place so revered 
for 3-thousand years
that I have no choice
but to stop in my tracks
and pay homage 
to the impact
of Moriah.

And though the truth
be hidden
in the conflict 
and her spinning dust 
yet I have glimpsed enough
to know that 
this is none other than 
the House of God.

And yes, 
she is replete with 
sonic booms
and safe rooms 
where huddled children
howl as sirens sound
and war looms.

But still 
this is our sacred ground.

Rattled and riddled
with bullets and shrapnel
with blood-let
and battle.

And yet 
for me
it is
ironically and eternally 
unruffled 
by the prattle 
of our enemies.

This place is our very own concoction 
of awful and awesome.

Of blessing and foreboding
All folded up
Beneath us 
As we sleep upon 
our rocky beds
and dream.

*
For we have been granted  
the vision of prophets
at this collision spot
of pain & promise.  

God has opened our eyes
to behold the ladder 
lapping sky
that we might exclaim,
“God was here all along
And I, I did not know.”

And so we find refuge
in this sacrament 
of dirge and dirt.
And pray
at this monument 
of faith
known as 
“The Place”
where heaven 
collides with earth.

*

Chapter 28

10. And Jacob left Beer sheba, and he went to Haran.

י. וַיֵּצֵא יַעֲקֹב מִבְּאֵר שָׁבַע וַיֵּלֶךְ חָרָנָה:

11. And he arrived at the place and lodged there because the sun had set, and he took some of the stones of the place and placed [them] at his head, and he lay down in that place.

יא. וַיִּפְגַּע בַּמָּקוֹם וַיָּלֶן שָׁם כִּי בָא הַשֶּׁמֶשׁ וַיִּקַּח מֵאַבְנֵי הַמָּקוֹם וַיָּשֶׂם מְרַאֲשֹׁתָיו וַיִּשְׁכַּב בַּמָּקוֹם הַהוּא:

12. And he dreamed, and behold! a ladder set up on the ground and its top reached to heaven; and behold, angels of God were ascending and descending upon it.

יב. וַיַּחֲלֹם וְהִנֵּה סֻלָּם מֻצָּב אַרְצָה וְרֹאשׁוֹ מַגִּיעַ הַשָּׁמָיְמָה וְהִנֵּה מַלְאֲכֵי אֱלֹהִים עֹלִים וְיֹרְדִים בּוֹ:

13. And behold, the Lord was standing over him, and He said, "I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father, and the God of Isaac; the land upon which you are lying to you I will give it and to your seed.

יג. וְהִנֵּה יְהֹוָה נִצָּב עָלָיו וַיֹּאמַר אֲנִי יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֵי אַבְרָהָם אָבִיךָ וֵאלֹהֵי יִצְחָק הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר אַתָּה שֹׁכֵב עָלֶיהָ לְךָ אֶתְּנֶנָּה וּלְזַרְעֶךָ:

14. And your seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and you shall gain strength westward and eastward and northward and southward; and through you shall be blessed all the families of the earth and through your seed.

יד. וְהָיָה זַרְעֲךָ כַּעֲפַר הָאָרֶץ וּפָרַצְתָּ יָמָּה וָקֵדְמָה וְצָפֹנָה וָנֶגְבָּה וְנִבְרְכוּ בְךָ כָּל מִשְׁפְּחֹת הָאֲדָמָה וּבְזַרְעֶךָ:

15. And behold, I am with you, and I will guard you wherever you go, and I will restore you to this land, for I will not forsake you until I have done what I have spoken concerning you."

טו. וְהִנֵּה אָנֹכִי עִמָּךְ וּשְׁמַרְתִּיךָ בְּכֹל אֲשֶׁר תֵּלֵךְ וַהֲשִׁבֹתִיךָ אֶל הָאֲדָמָה הַזֹּאת כִּי לֹא אֶעֱזָבְךָ עַד אֲשֶׁר אִם עָשִׂיתִי אֵת אֲשֶׁר דִּבַּרְתִּי לָךְ:

16. And Jacob awakened from his sleep, and he said, "Indeed, the Lord is in this place, and I did not know [it]."

טז. וַיִּיקַץ יַעֲקֹב מִשְּׁנָתוֹ וַיֹּאמֶר אָכֵן יֵשׁ יְהֹוָה בַּמָּקוֹם הַזֶּה וְאָנֹכִי לֹא יָדָעְתִּי:

17. And he was frightened, and he said, "How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven."

Abraham's journey is the supreme example of divine calling. His story models for us our own journeys of setting out on unmapped spiritual paths.  It is a compass for our own travels and travails.

The parsha opens, “Lech Lecha, go from your land (artzecha), your birth-place (moladatecha), your father's house (beit avicha), to a land that I will show you.” In Likutei Halachot, Rav Noson writes that this refers to 3 things that every spiritual journeyer must turn their back on in order to advance in his/her own path of calling. These are the inevitable impurities and falsities that come with each of the following: the cultural mores of society, the traumas involved with our very birth process, and the patterns and complexities of our family of origin. He teaches that these negative aspects must be brought to consciousness and left behind. He says, literally, 'turn your back on them'. He adds that when we are able to do this then we are on the path to attaining our true 'tachlit netzchi' – our eternal purpose. 

When we remove these negative aspects then what are we left with? We are left with our essential self, our truth, the soul that lies underneath. And thus our work is to remove the dross to reveal the gold of our soul. It is no wonder that the text spells out this formula so clearly in the parsha's first line, “Lech lecha”. Though it is commonly translated as, “You shall go”, that translation utterly flattens out the poetry and potency of the literal Hebrew. For this terse 2-word mantra Lech Lecha is read literally by the Kabbalists as - “Go to yourself!” And hence the biggest hint for all of us on our spiritual journeys. How to hear and follow God's command? How to extricate ourselves from the inevitable impurities of our past? By pursuing our own deepest self! That is the secret gift of the parsha. It persistently calls us – Lech – Go! Actively move in the direction of your deepest self. Leave behind family and familiarity and MOVE...to you. 

Taking Leave

I leave as sure as 
an out-breath
escapes the chest 
that heaves the next inhale
- for we all have to breathe.

For I have heard two terse words
that disperse even the sturdiest soils
of my place of birth.

They hold for me
an undeniable truth
ineffable 
yet indelible
impossible to prove or tell or yell
or weigh its value 
on a merchant's scale.

With pain and precision I have made this decision - to listen.

As if listening were an art
- a compulsion
to record Divine diction 
with the weight of earthly limbs.

This call 
is fluid & fanciful
and yet demanding. 
Unpredictable, 
poetic, astounding.

Pounding proof into sounds

which make no sound 

and yet deafen the ears of all around

who listen well to their own 

silence.

A still small voice with an unsettling lisp. 
A voice that to be heard, it must be lived. 

If belief is knowing that there stands a wall 
then faith is leaning on it -
- And so I fall.

I lunge in to this journey to an unknown land
God-shown, unsewn  
rock-strewn and sand-duned 
so foreign from everything I ever knew.

Faith is a wall 
and so I lean.

G!d is a journey
and so I leave.

In the jewelry box of the corner synagogue
We gathered our most precious gems together
to escort them to their first day of first grade.

Sitting sweet beneath the velvet and the tassels
of the Torah 
like princes & princesses in a castle... 
Like  empty vessels about to be filled
with the spill of a most sacred education 
in the Judean hills. 

The first drops into the goblet
were words of blessing from our local legend 
of a Rabbi - Reb Sholom Brodt

With a spark & spirit not unlike a 6 year olds
and yet the wisdom of the ages, well-told
with stories and brachas 
and coins for tzedaka 

Then a splash of song and instruments
and a donning of a tallis over them. 

Gleaming like an griffin's wing held up with prayers for sheltering.

And Now 
Make Way
for the Sound Parade
of drum-clad children
and their smile-smacking parents. 

With backpacks and timbrels, flutes and jangles.

Proving to all with eyes to see 
that the streets of Jerusalem are indeed 
as holy as G!d & history promised us they would be.

Winding through the Nachlaot cobbles. 

No need for carpools!

-- These scholars will strut to school!  -- Dance to school! -- Chant to school! 
And what a school!
The brand-new who-knew Mayanot Rebbe Hiya school!

Quick! 
Shlep in the palm frods ten-feet long 

Make an archway into the first day 
With flowers and song.

Trace the aleph-bet with honey-wet fingers
and don't forget yer brachas
over the honey cake
made with apple moon crescents 
and a thousand mothers blessings 
for the success of their children.

May our cups overflow.

May our children thrive.

May they be disciples of integrity.

Like the PUPILS 
of G!d’s Eye.

Here's to the day when sisters danced in vineyard circles wearing each other's finest white dresses. The day when matches were made and the tribes were allowed to intermarry, when Binyamin was forgiven for some serious sins, when those destined to die in the desert realized they could step outa their graves and LIVE!......Happiest Tu B'Av tu Alll!

Tu B'Av

When the month of the father
meets the moon of the mothers
and their merger 
makes for circles
in vineyards
of lovers

When ancient consciousness 
is called back in
to its rightful bliss
as the most joyous
of all days 

Then we will begin 
to wake from our graves
to inter-marry the tribes
to forgive the unforgivable 
And share our most enviable 

To dance unembarrassed
and share our abundance
and point incredulous
at the Divine Presence
that dances among us.

Yerushalayim means “Ir Shalom” - City of Peace. And yet, it has been destroyed twice, attacked 52 times, besieged 23 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times. How can this city, so beleaguered by conflict, be named for peace? Is it irony or paradox, or perhaps something more?  

It reminds me of another Biblical paradox – the burning bush. A symbol of the undoing of the natural order, where fire does not bring destruction...on the contrary, it brings revelation. The voice of God calls out from the impossible endurance of a shrub amidst flames. That which should logically be destroyed, endures. And not just endures, but initiates and ushers in what is to become history's greatest symbol of liberation, the Exodus from Egypt. The fiery shrub is the holy ground from which God speaks. 

This paradox of endurance amidst destruction is quite possibly one of the defining characteristics of the Jewish people. The State of Israel has been described as a phoenix, risen from the flames of the Holocaust. But not only is it a country that has risen from the flames, it is a country that thrives amidst the flames of continuing fires of attack from her neighbors. It is a country ensconced in conflict, yet somehow, at its best and highest, remains untouched. 

And so too with Jerusalem. Never before has a metropolis weathered such unending quarrels. And yet, amidst the conflagration, she endures as a city of peace, issuing a message of godliness and the promise of salvation. 

It is said that the burning bush was nothing extraordinary to most who looked upon it. A dozen others walked right past it. What proved Moses’ greatness is that he saw the miracle within it. He turned aside and wondered at it. He heard God’s voice in it. He removed his shoes. 
Sometimes that is how I experience Jerusalem. Usually it is just the mundane domain where I shop and shlep my bags and pay my bills. But sometimes, at the best of times, I turn aside from the mundane drone of my day and see the astounding miracle that is being worked beneath my very feet. 

This Yom Yerushalayim is an invitation to stop and acknowledge the utter miracle of this city. An invitation to hear the voice of God issuing from each alley, each corner store, each traffic jam. This Yom Yerushalayim, may we, and the whole world, see Yerushalayim as a city which sits serene and enduring, offering peace, even amidst the flames. 

The Burning Bush 

Jerusalem, my burning bush
A city so inflamed, 
and yet, endurance is your name.

Here roam my heart & mind
Where, walk me soft, 
and put my shoes aside

and let me admire more 
this site
which burns 
with no less bark
and no less branch
Eternal spark
within its stance

And blaze
My days with hers 
And let no less than all of her endure

And may she brighter burn 
that I may longer gaze and learn –
this mystery of Yours.

Why are there so many 4’s in the seder? 

First, dimensionality. You take a point, it has no dimension to it. You add another point and you have a line, the dimension of length. You add a 3rd point and you get length and height. But it’s not until you add that 4th point that you length, height, and finally width. 3 dimensions! And that is the world we live in. It’s not a flat world. Only with that 4th point do we get space as we know it. A vessel to receive.

So on our most basic level – we have a Place to exist, breathe, walk around, because of 4ness. That’s why it’s called the 4 corners of the earth.

Another reason I think were drawn to 4’s: stability. We all know you can’t make a table with 2 legs. 3 legs will make a table of sorts, yet 4 legs will make a much sturdier structure. 4 has more bulk, heaviness, plantedness. So 4s adds to our sense of safety, groundedness.

A square is organized, orderly. And that is the power of the seder, really. Seder literally means order. It touches on our deep deep need for order and stability in this world.

In the seder ritual, the 4s really are poured on thick. The 4 questions, 4 sons, 4 cups of wine. Not only do we see a plethora of 4s, but then, so many of the sources draw parallels and correspondences between the different groups of 4. The 4 cups correspond to the 4 mentions of redemption and to the 4 exiles and the 4 worlds, etc…

So not only do we have this question of why 4’s…but also a question of ‘Why so many correspondences’? Drawing parallels gives us a sense of cognitive Order. It makes sense of an otherwise senseless world. Correspondences create SEDER.

Sarah Yehudit Schneider shares a teaching from Rav Ginsburg who says that Kabbalah is the “science of correspondences”. Kabbalah is usually understood to mean ‘to receive’. But this meaning only appears in later prophets/biblical writings. In the Torah itself, its 3 letter root means “to parallel or correspond.” It refers to the corresponding loops on the Tabernacle’s curtains. (Exodus 26.5)

 

Kabbalah is all about making correspondences. Making deep sense of all that is.

So the fours that fill the seder create a wonderful experience of:

Dimensionality

Place

Stability

Sense

All of these elements create a structure, the paradoxical structure that allows us to feel free.

4s usher in our freedom.   

Sweet little Torah I just heard from R'Nissan Kaplan of the Mir Yeshiva. Why is it that we sing at the end of seder "Ehad mee yodeya?" "Who knows One?" Because all of our preparations and the entire seder should be training us to know immediately and automatically the answer to that question. Of course, G-d is ONE. G-d is Oneness! And I would add, not just to know the answer - but to experience the answer...to experience that oneness throughout our entire being!!