(Sermon for 1st night of Rosh Hashanah 5785)
October 2, 2024
Those of you who were with us for Ari S_____’s bat mitzvah a week and a half ago may remember that the Torah portion that Shabbat, Parashat Ki Tavo, contained a long, sweeping list of terrifying curses. In that “TOCHACHA” or “REBUKE” passage in Deuteronomy Chapter 28, Moses warns the Israelites about the parade of horribles that they would suffer if they strayed from God’s commandments. The schedule of our yearly Torah readings didn’t get standardized until the Middle Ages, but, centuries earlier, the Talmud was already teaching that we should recite that cascade of curses shortly before Rosh Hashanah.
The Talmud, in Masechet Megillah, page 31b, teaches that Ezra enacted that the curses that are recorded in the Book of Deuteronomy should be read before Rosh Hashanah. The Gemara then asks – “Mai Tama?” - “What is the reason for this?” And the answer it gives is
כְּדֵי שֶׁתִּכְלֶה הַשָּׁנָה וְקִלְלוֹתֶיהָ
(kedey shetikhleh Hashanah vekileloteha)
“In order that the year may conclude together with its curses.”
To this day, in many Sephardic synagogues they open their Rosh Hashanah evening service with a 13th century poem that quotes that Talmudic teaching. It’s called “Achot Ketanah” (“Little sister”), with the little sister of the poem serving as a metaphor for the Jewish people.
It begins as follows:
אָחוֹת קְטַנָּה תְּפִלּוֹתֶיהָ. עוֹרְכָה וְעוֹנָה תְהִלּוֹתֶיהָ. אֵל נָא רְפָא נָא לְמַחֲלוֹתֶיהָ. תִּכְלֶה שָׁנָה וְקִלְלוֹתֶיהָ
“The little sister—her prayers
she arranges, and her praises she recites
Please, God, heal her illnesses now.
May the year and its curses come to an end!”
Each verse of that poem ends with the same refrain -- תִּכְלֶה שָׁנָה וְקִלְלוֹתֶיהָ /tichleh shanah vekileloteha/ May the year and its curses come to an end!
All that is except for the last verse:
חִזְקוּ וְגִילוּ כִּי שׁוֹד גָּמַר. לְצוּר הוֹחִילוּ בְּרִיתוֹ שָׁמַר, לָכֶם, וְתַעֲלוּ לְצִיּוֹן, וְאָמַר, סֹלּוּ סֹלּוּ מְסִלּוֹתֶיהָ. תָּחֵל שָׁנָה וּבִרְכוֹתֶיהָ
Be strong and rejoice
And you shall ascend to Zion
And [God] shall declare:
“Clear! Clear! Her paths.”
תָּחֵל שָׁנָה וּבִרְכוֹתֶיהָ/ tachel shanah uvirkhoteha
May the New Year and its blessings begin![1]
As I mentioned in an email message to all of you last month, most of the year 5784 has been a collective nightmare for all of us ever since the mass murder, mass rape and mass hostage taking perpetrated by the Hamas terrorist organization and its accomplices last October 7th. Of the year 5784 we may indeed exclaim:
תִּכְלֶה שָׁנָה וְקִלְלוֹתֶיהָ
May the year and its curses come to an end!
As we now enter the new year 5785, the hostages are still in captivity, Israelis and Palestinians are still ravaged by war and --- not to forget -- Other parts of the world – like Ukraine and Sudan remain in conflict as well. And yet we dare to hope and pray:
תָּחֵל שָׁנָה וּבִרְכוֹתֶיהָ
May the New Year and its blessings begin!
As we enter this season of spiritual renewal, I find my thoughts turning to a verse from psalms: Psalm 68, verse 20 to be specific:
The verse is part of a long string of verses that we find in the traditional weekday morning and Shabbat afternoon prayer services. It goes like this:
בָּ֤ר֣וּךְ אֲדֹנָי֮ י֤וֹם ׀ י֥֫וֹם יַעֲמׇס־לָ֗נוּ הָ֘אֵ֤ל יְֽשׁוּעָתֵ֬נוּ סֶֽלָה׃
Barukh Adonai.
Yom Yom ya’amas lanu
Ha’el yeshuateynu . Selah
Blessed is Adonai.
Day by day supporting us,
God, our deliverance. Selah.
Now that’s just a brief Biblical quotation tucked away in one of the concluding prayers that are often skipped over in many less traditional minyanim. And the verse doesn’t even make the final cut into any of the Reform or Reconstructionist prayer books that seek to make the prayer services shorter and more concise.
But I have loved this verse ever since I first encountered it when I was living in Philadelphia back in the late 1990’s and used to attend a daily morning minyan at a Conservative shul down the street from my Center City apartment.
Barukh Adonai, yom yom ya’amas lanu/ Blessed is Adonai, Day by Day supporting us.
That phrase “yom yom” meaning “daily” or “day by day” really resonates for me. For it has long seemed to me that faith in God is not about hoping for supernatural interventions in the law of nature. Rather, it’s about appreciating the daily miracles of being alive. It’s about developing the sensitivity to savor life’s joys. It’s about finding the strength to persevere amid life’s adversities. Those words from Psalm 68 sum it all up admirably: Barukh Adonai, yom yom ya’amas lanu/ Blessed is Adonai, day by day supporting us.
That’s generally how the verse is understood in the Jewish Publication Society translation of the Tanakh and in various Conservative movement siddurim.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the liturgy:
It turns out that the Hebrew phrase “ya’amas lanu” is ambiguous. Depending on the context it can have the opposite meaning. Instead of meaning “supporting us” it can mean “burdening us”!
The Brown-Driver-Briggs Lexicon of Biblical Hebrew summarizes the matter by explaining that the verb la’amos (לעמוס) – with those root letters ayin-mem-samech (ע-מ-ס), can mean either to carry a load” (i.e. to provide support) OR to load upon (i.e., to impose a burden)
That second definition is the way the verse is translated in various Orthodox siddurim which follow the interpretive lead of traditional commentators like David Kimchi (France, late 12th century to early 13th century) and Etz Yosef (19th century Poland). They understand the verse to be saying that God, in fact, burdens us or places a load upon us. But they go on to interpret that this burden is a good thing ---- that the “burden” or “load” being placed upon us consists of blessings.
Indeed, Judaism in general understands the mitzvot themselves to be blessings.
Well, which interpretative approach to Psalm 68 verse 20 rings truer for us? Does it feel truer to say that day by day God burdens us --- or to say that day by day God bears our burdens?
* * *
It seems to me that both interpretative approaches have merit. Jewish tradition teaches us to look to God not only as a commander but also as a helper. To look to God not only as the one who judges us but also as the one who advocates our cause.
These seemingly contradictory images appear throughout our High Holiday liturgy.
Indeed, if the God of the machzor were running for president, God would certainly face partisan attacks for flip flopping.
But it’s no flip flop. Our tradition teaches us that the world is not governed by midat ha-din/ the Divine quality of Justice alone. Nor is the world governed by midat ha-rachamim, the Divine quality of Mercy alone.
The rabbis derived this from the fact that Genesis 2:4 uses both of the traditional names of the Creator when it says
אֵ֣לֶּה תוֹלְד֧וֹת הַשָּׁמַ֛יִם וְהָאָ֖רֶץ בְּהִבָּֽרְאָ֑ם בְּי֗וֹם עֲשׂ֛וֹת יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶ֥רֶץ וְשָׁמָֽיִם׃
This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, on the day when ADONAI ELOHIM made earth and heaven.
In Jewish tradition, the name “Adonai” (typically translated as “Lord or Eternal One) symbolizes midat harachamim/ the attribute of mercy and the name “Elohim” (translated as “God”) represents midat hadin/ the attribute of justice. There is a classic midrash in the rabbinic collection Bereshit Rabbah that expresses it well:
“Adonai Elohim” made earth and heaven.” A parable of a king who had cups made of delicate glass. The king said: If I pour hot water into them, they will [expand and] burst; if I pour cold water they will contract [and break]. What did he do? He mixed hot water and cold water, and poured it into them, and so they remained unbroken. Likewise, the Holy One said: If I create the world with the attribute of mercy alone, its sins will be too many; if with justice alone, how could the world be expected to endure? So I will create it with both justice and mercy, and may it endure!”[2]
In the Talmud, in Masechet Berachot/ The Tractate on Blessings, we learn that just as we pray, God also prays. And what does God pray?
“May it be my will that my mercy overcome my anger that I might deal with my children with the quality of compassion and not merely strict justice." (Ber. 7a)
* * *
It’s not that God flip flops, or that God can’t stay the course. Rather, it’s that God, as it were, sees us for the imperfect, complex beings we are, and sees our world for the complex place it is.
* * *
Of course, to make faith statements like this is to use metaphorical, poetic language. When we affirm such things about God, we are also affirming our belief that we too should seek to understand the complexity and profundity of each person we encounter and each situation we face.
* * *
I find merit in both understandings of the words “ya’amas lanu:”
(1) Ya’amas lanu – God bears our burden – only laying upon us that which we have the capacity to handle – or, as we say in the Birchot Hashachar/ the Morning Blessings – Barukh.. she’asah li kawl tzarki/ “Blessed is the One who provides for all my needs.”
(2) Ya’amas lanu -- God places upon us the burden of living up to our ethical and religious values. And yet this burden is also a blessing because doing so gives us the opportunity to become closer to God and closer to one another.
* * *
In a certain sense, the traditional prayers of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur pivot around these two complementary views of God in Judaism -- burden reliever and burden placer – advocate and judge – loving parent and commanding sovereign --- adonai and eloheynu -- avinu and malkeinu.
And so we will pray tomorrow morning before the open ark: Avinu malkeinu/ Our parent and our sovereign – chaneinu v’aneynu – be gracious and answer us – ki eyn banu ma’asim – for we have too few good deeds to face a standard of strict justice. And so we implore -- Asey imanu tzedakah vachesed – act towards us with justice tempered by mercy, v’hoshieynu – and save us.
I hope and pray that our times together in shul during these Days of Awe, as well as the times we spend with our loved ones, and also the times that we spend alone --- will be times that are fruitful for the task of examining our lives. As we seek God’s forgiveness, may we be forgiving of our neighbors and may we be forgiving of our selves.
תִּכְלֶה שָׁנָה וְקִלְלוֹתֶיהָ / May the old year – 5784 -- and its curses come to an end!
תָּחֵל שָׁנָה וּבִרְכוֹתֶיהָ / May the New Year – 5785 -- and its blessings begin!
Amen.
© Rabbi David Steinberg
October 2024/ Rosh Hashanah 5785
[1] Here’s a link to a YouTube video of a rendition of those opening and closing verses of “Achot Ketanah”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTMbRxST34Y
[2] Bereshit Rabbah 12:15 as rendered in Bialik & Ravnitsky, The Book of Legends: Sefer Ha-Aggadah, William G. Braude, translator, Schocken Books, 1992.)
