by Dovid Lewis

Vayakhel-Pekudei, #HASHTAGS and the Westminster Attack

#HASHTAGS!!

POST WESTMINSTER ATTACK

 

We had just finished saying a Psalm and a special Refuah Shleima for those injured in the Westminster attack when my phone pinged telling me that the death toll had risen to three. With that message came the now ubiquitous sign of the times: #PrayForLondon was trending on social media!

 

There are as ever those who criticise such hashtags and question their value, but I wonder whether they are in fact missing the point. We live in such a cosmopolitan society and with the ever-increasing march of technology the world has simultaneously become much smaller and paradoxically ever larger. We are instantly connected to events transpiring half-way across the globe whilst having less and less real face time with those living within our own group. The mobile phone, the ultimate symbol of connectivity and communication, is now the biggest cause of disconnect. It’s a sign of the times, but the least commonly used feature on the mobile is now the actual call button!

 

A main strap-line for ShabbatUK was ‘disconnect to reconnect’, as we were all told to put away our mobile phones (and all other electronical devices!), to disconnect from the digital world and reconnect with the real world. But whilst the Mitzvah of Shabbat is the first paragraph of the week’s Sedra, it is not where I draw inspiration from this week, but rather from the names of the double Sedra themselves: Vayakhel and Pekudei.

 

Vayakhel means to gather together. This was the day after the original Yom Kippur when Moshe gathered the entire Jewish Nation together as one group in order to give us the commandment to build the Mishkan (which was prefaced by the Mitzvah of Shabbat to remind us that even the building of the ‘Home for Hashem’ did not override Shabbat).

 

Pekudei means to count, and this was the obligation to count each individual donation given to the building fund.

 

These two words, thrown together as a double Sedra are seemingly contradictory; to gather everyone together as one large mass and to count them individually! But that is precisely the message and entire ethos of the Torah and Judaism. We are our strongest when we are united as one, and that combined strength comes specifically from our own individual strength. It’s not just the ‘sum of its parts is greater than the whole’, it’s that there is no whole without the individual parts. When the farmer took his Ma’aser – the annual tithe, he couldn’t just take one tenth of his flock from the herd, but was obligated to count each animal individually and to set aside every tenth one that went by. It’s a central line in the Unesaneh Tokef prayer from Rosh Hashannah and Yom Kippur; that although we are gathered in Shul as one large Minyan, nevertheless we are all passing under the Almighty’s staff individually to get judged.

 

We ride on the flow of the communal current, but we must all swim ourselves.

 

In an age when we can with minimum effort be part of a global crowd, when with one click of a button we can join an international movement, it’s all too easy for us to think that we have now fulfilled our duty. “I’ve signed up. I’m on the inside.” I see the hashtag as a reminder that we can’t just ‘click to like’, but we must do our individual bit as well. Be part of the crowd, but play your part within that crowd.

As I write this message, pictures are coming in of the vigil held in Central London and the masses gathered there. A show of unity and defiance. A mark of respect and courage. Everyone there was and is part of the ‘community of strength’ but they also had to each individually turn up and play their individual part.

 

May the Almighty heal all those injured in the attack and grant comfort to those bereft of loved ones and shelter the souls of those so cruelly murdered.

 

Shabbat Shalom,

 

Rabbi Dovid

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 by Dovid Lewis

Frogs growing on apple trees. Beshalach 5777

Frogs growing on apple trees

What’s a Miracle?

A cornerstone of Orthodox Judaism is that the entire Torah was written by and is the absolute Divine word of the Almighty. Yet in this week’s Sedra we have an entire section that is anything but; the Shirah – Song of the Sea, is undeniably the word of humans! It was composed by Miriam and Moshe and then sung by the Israelites. Nonetheless it is still incorporated in the Torah and accorded the same honour as an integral part of ‘Torah Min Ha’Shamayim’.

 

This song though, together with a number of other such passages (such as Yaackov’s deathbed blessings for example) bring to light a beautiful idea; we are in partnership with the Almighty. This idea is in fact merely highlighting what Hashem said to Moshe after he complained that he was unable to speak to Pharaoh due to a speech impediment: “Who gives a man a mouth? Is it not I, G-d?” (Ex 4:11)

 

Our lives are in truth the script of the Torah, both then and now. Which causes us to question why the immediate aftermath of the splitting of the sea and our song in praise was the lack of water to drink in Marah and our subsequent complaints to Hashem. How do we go from co-authoring the Torah to complaining bitterly (Marah = bitter) in a matter of days?

 

Anton Chekov in his short story ‘The Bet’ writes of a man who after spending 15 years in solitary confinement expressed bewilderment at mankind: “You would marvel if, owing to strange events of some sorts, frogs and lizards suddenly grew on apple and orange trees instead of fruit, or if roses began to smell like a sweating horse; so I marvel at you who exchange heaven for earth. I don’t want to understand you.” {Read the full story here}

 

Our problem was that we praised Hashem for the miraculous splitting of the sea, whilst ignoring the equally miraculous flowing of the sea both prior to and after its ‘miraculous’ split! We become so inured to ‘nature’ that we fail to see the Hand of Hashem in its daily occurrence.

 

To counter this Hashem took away a basic necessity; water to drink, forcing us to recognise that providing drinking water is as much a Divine act as was the splitting of the sea.

 

Our human lives are the very letters of the divine Torah and nothing is left out. The divine is to be found in our daily activities just as much as it is in our prayers and Torah studies. We don’t need miracles to partner with Hashem, all we need to do is live a life and remember that together we write the Divine and Eternal Scroll.

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 by Dovid Lewis

To Choose A Nation…And to live with that choice – Va’era 5777

To Choose A Nation

And to live with that choice

Va’era 5777

What came first, the chicken or the egg?

 

According to Jewish thought it was definitely the chicken; for everything was created in a complete form. Adam wasn’t created as an embryo, or indeed a twinkle in his father’s eye, but was rather a fully formed adult. Diamonds which take billions of years to form, were already inbuilt into the lava of the earth. Stars which are light years away from our planet, were immediately visible to Adam.

 

Thus it was definitely the chicken which came first. But, what came first in our relationship with Hashem; us being His people or Him being our G-d?

 

Incidentally, the Talmud poses a similar question about who is to return first; us to Hashem in Teshuvah or Him to us in redemption?

 

However, in Hashem’s discussion with Moshe at the start of this week’s Sedra, He seems to imply, twice over, that He comes first: “I will take you for Me as a Nation, and act as a G-d for you”, only after that does the verse continue: “you will recognize that it is I your G-d who is freeing you.” (Va’era 6:7)

 

Hashem takes the obligation towards us before we accept His Kingship over us!

 

That Talmud also takes that view, and rules (in an ingenious Talmudical argument – for another time) that the Almighty is obligated to return to us even before we return to Him!

 

It isn’t though all a one-way street. The verse continues; “and you will know that I am Hashem who is taking you out of Egypt.”

 

We have an obligation to know Hashem.

 

We struggle to know what came first, the chicken or the egg, but we are commanded to know Hashem! And knowing doesn’t just mean to be aware of, it requires us to know. To inquire and ascertain the truth, to delve into the questions of life and come to a conclusion.

 

But it doesn’t even stop there, for that knowledge isn’t just of a time gone by, it’s not just to be aware that once-upon-a-time this G-d took us out of Egypt. But rather He demands of us to know that He is taking us now, in the present tense not in the distant past!

 

I don’t know about you, but at times I find that hard. It’s not always easy. But there again, no one said it was supposed to be or was going to be. However I do take courage from the fact that we have been doing this for so long, that no matter what the world (and G-d) has thrown at us, we have still continued. Maybe it’s because He chose us first, maybe it’s because we have nowhere else to turn, or maybe because it’s just the truth; but as the world prepares to stand still and commemorate the International Holocaust Memorial Day, I take courage from our tenacity and also from G-d’s promise to constantly free us and also from His commitment to adopt us as His nation.

 

Wishing you all a Shabbat Shalom,

 

Rabbi Dovid

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