This week,
one of the great names in Conservative Judaism died at age 89. Rabbi Harold Schulweis, the long-time spiritual
leader of Congregation Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, California, was indeed one
of the great spiritual leaders of our time.
Although I never had the opportunity to meet him, I am aware of one of
his books that had a profound impact upon me.
It is called, “For Those Who Can’t Believe, Overcoming the Obstacles to
Faith.”
In that
book, there is a discussion of the word “nes”, miracle, a word which we use
every evening while lighting the Chanukah candles…. “she-asah nisim la-avotaynu
bayamim ha-hem baz’man hazeh” “Who created miracles for our ancestors in those
days and in these days.” The word nes, a
Biblical term, actually refers to a sign….something of sign-ificance, that
makes an important difference in the life of the individual or in the life of
the community. According to Schulweiss,
“the sign-miracle does not refer to something beyond or contrary to logic or
nature. It refers to events and
experiences that take notice of the extra-ordinary in the ordinary, the wonder
in the everyday, the marvel in the routine.”
We speak of
hidden miracles each time we recite the Amidah.
Let’s take a look at the shacharit Amidah. Notice how we thank G-d for the wonders and
miracles which are daily with us evening, morning, and noon? “The signs of transcendence are discovered
within the ordinary course of living….To see the divine in the natural and the
rational, in the application of human intelligence and goodness, is a major
insight of the Jewish tradition.”
Have you
ever thought about the healing process of your body? Schulweiss suggested that we think about what
happens when we cut ourselves. We most
likely cleanse the wound, apply antiseptic, and cover the wound with a
bandage. Natural healing then kicks in
and a scab is formed over time. Without
our part in the process, the wound might become infected, without the healing
process which has nothing to do with us, we might not heal. The miracle of healing points to “human as
well as to that which is beyond human powers,” or as Schulweiss explained, “a
collaboration between potentiality and actualization.”
There is a
wonderful story that illustrates the ability to perceive a miracle that I have
told in the past on the High Holydays. (It is also mentioned in Shulweiss' book).
It is the story of an individual whose house is surrounded by flooding
waters. He goes to the top of his roof
praying to G-d to be saved. First a
rowboat comes his way and offers him safety.
He does not accept its offer because he is waiting for G-d to rescue
him. Then a helicopter pilot arrives and
urges him to climb the helicopter’s ladder to safety. Once again, he refuses to do so. He knows without a doubt that G-d will save
him. When the waters continue to rise,
he cries out to G-d. “I am a believing man and have always trusted in you. Why have you, Lord, forsaken me?” Do you remember the response from the
Heavens? “I sent you the men in the
rowboat and you dismissed them. I sent
you the pilot and you refused his help.
Why have you forsaken Me?”
Sign-miracles
do not exclude human “actions and reactions to events.” When we look at the
story of Chanukah, the sign-miracles also involved the interaction of humans
and the divine. There were victories in
battles won by the Maccabees over the more powerful Syrian-Greek army but the
battles were not solely about political freedom. If they had been, Chanukah would have surely become
a non-event when the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in the year 70 c.e. and
we went into exile. The sign-miracle of
Chanukah lies in the fact that not only the few rose above the many, but that
the desire to be able to study and observe Torah was not destroyed and to this
day has not been wiped out no matter which culture has hosted our journey as
Jews over the centuries.
The original
menorah that stood in the Temple which was rededicated by the Macabees, was
actually a seven-branched candelabra created out of a single piece of gold with all wicks on the 6 branches
facing the ner tamid in the center.
According to an interpretation I learned this summer while studying Rav
Kook, the six branches represented wisdom and the central stem represented the
Torah. Torah as the center of wisdom is designed to help us as Jews find a way
of life that allows us to be good and just, to increase the positive-energy in
the world, and to bring about a world in which there will ultimately be cosmic
unity. Our Jewish definition of religion,
is that if religion makes you an agent of evil, then it is avodah zarah,
strange worship. Torah is designed to
help us Jews be us….so we can then relate to the rest of the world! The message of Judaism unlike other religions
is not that I can only be “me by denying you”….it is that “I have to be me in order to relate to
you!” I see the true miracle of our
Jewish experience as our desire to be ourselves even against the greatest of
odds when the world has often desired to see our non-existence. May such miracles continue to bring light to
a world that is often clouded by darkness.
Shabbat
Shalom and Chag Chanukah Sameach.
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