August 17, 2024
Author(s): Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz,
Parashat Va’etchanan
A Balm for the Unredeemed
August 17, 2024 — 13 Av 5784
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
Every Friday Shira calls her brother and sister-in-love in Jerusalem, Ari and Tziporit, to check in, to hear about their Shabbat plans, to hear about their children who are serving in Gaza or up north, and to wish them a Shabbat shalom. Two weeks ago they had a particularly evocative conversation. That week Ari and Tziporit had been blessed with a new grandson, and that very Friday night they were hosting what is called a Shalom Zachor, a festive gathering the first Friday night after the birth of a boy. Since the baby’s father had been on miluim up north for 8 months, and had gotten home only a few weeks before the baby was born, this would be an especially joyful Shalom Zachor. The conversation was about the delicious food they were serving, the gorgeous flowers and flower arrangements that we could see with FaceTime, and the many family and friends who would show up to share the simcha. So far, so good. And then Tziporit added: We are setting up the dining room, the living room, and the outdoor garden. And we are also setting up the safe room just in case there is a siren and everyone has to go downstairs to the bomb shelter.
Prepare for a gorgeous simcha full of love and joy and food and singing. Prepare for missile attacks. At the same time.
A few days after that conversation, and after the thank God peaceful and uneventful Shalom Zachor, I read a piece by Danny Gordis about the new normalcy in Israel—normalcy in the sense that that Israelis are getting used to doing what Ari and Tziporit did that Shabbat: live life, don’t get thrown off your game, but also prepare your safe room in case the bombs start falling and the sirens start blaring. Danny writes:
Have we actually gotten used to thinking that it’s ‘normal’ that a country has to gird
for an attack from another sovereign state sworn on its destruction—a likely second
attack in less than four months?
Danny cites the motto of Israel when the war began—be-yachad nenatze’ach: Together we are going to win. He continues:
It’s become sort of quaint these days, that phrase. Refer to it, and people kind
of smile. ‘Yeah, I remember the days when we actually thought that.’
This new Israel, the Israel hunkered down waiting for Iran to attack us once
again, is a very different country from the “little engine that could” Israel that
many of us fell in love with years ago. Is this Israel—the Israel that can be
attacked at will by foreign countries, leaving the Jewish state entirely dependent
on the US President (whoever she or he may be at the moment) to put together
a coalition of countries to defend it—the kind of Israel our kids’ generation is
going to keep flocking back to?
One would have to be very naïve not to be worried about that.
How do we think about Danny’s critique? How do we think about this new Israeli normalcy? Is getting used to bad things a good thing or a bad thing? Is getting used to the surreal realities that Israelis are living with—their 20, 30 and 40 somethings in the army 10 months later and counting, the perpetual missiles that burn up the north and kill innocents randomly like the 12 children and teens on the soccer field and the two 40-something parents who were killed while driving their car in the Golan Heights leaving three orphaned children, and the deep pit in their stomachs, and the deep pit in our stomachs, about what Iran and Hezbollah and the Houthis might do, and when they might do it—is getting used to all this surreal horribleness and going about their lives a sign of incredible resilience and strength, or is it the troubling departure from the little engine that could as Danny argues?
Jewish tradition offers us two very different paradigms for how to understand the serious challenges of Jewish history. One paradigm, the one that we would all pick off the menu if we could pick off the menu, is geulah, redemption. Geulah means we had a problem, and we solved it. We had a problem, and we no longer have that problem. We had a problem, and it is now in the rear-view mirror.
Geulah is the category of Pesach. Geulah is the category of the seders, which celebrate yetziah mitzrayim, the Exodus from Egypt, that we got out of Egypt. That we got to enjoy a happy and definitive trajectory: from slavery to freedom, from sorrow to joy, from mourning to festivity, from thick darkness to a great light, from enslavement to redemption.
This paradigm of geulah, of redemption, suggests that there is something off about planning a festive Shalom Zachor and preparing for a missile attack at the same time.
And yet, while we would all pick geulah if we could, the reality is that unredeemed suffering is also a part of the Jewish story.
Yes, we received geulah at the moment of the Exodus. But what about the 430 years of slavery that was unredeemed.
Yes, we received geulah in 1948. But what about 2,000 years of wandering and expulsion before 1948? What about 1941-1945?
We need another category for those not fortunate enough to live in redeemed time.
That brings us to today: Shabbat Nachamu, the Shabbat of consolation, which draws its name from the first words of the Haftarah of Isaiah, chanted after Tisha B’av. As you know, Tisha B’av commemorates the many disasters of Jewish history. In response to all this suffering, Isaiah offers the Jewish people three magical words: nachamu, nachamu ami. Comfort, oh comfort, My people.
There is the category of geulah, of redemption. And the category of nechamah, of consolation. What is the heart of consolation?
The dictionary definition of consolation is that it is comfort a person receives in a time of suffering, grief and disappointment. There is pain, significant pain, in the ecosystem, and that pain is ongoing. Consolation is a balm while the person is experiencing that pain, not when the pain is over and done with.
What is the essence of that solace?
It is simply this: that the present reality will not last forever. This will pass. The future will be better than the present. Have faith.
We would all love the happy trajectory of the seders, but what we get is Isaiah. Planning a simcha and planning for a visit to a bomb shelter at the same time is unredeemed time. But the consolation is that we will not always be living in this reality. This war will not last forever. This will pass. Have faith.
Here is the one thing Isaiah asks of us, the one thing we need to do in the meantime: do not give up. Do not give up living. Do not give up celebrating new births. Do not give up on weddings. Do not give up on hope. Do not make the mistake of thinking that life will always be this way. That is what it means to have faith in the future, that we do not give up on the present, because life can change, and change dramatically—and quickly.
This is true for Israel. We have all seen a version of this movie before—and relatively recently. We were all here during the Second Intifadah from 2000 to 2005 when more than a thousand Israelis were murdered by terrorist suicide bombers. During the Second Intifadah people were afraid to go to cafes, go to restaurants, to leave their home. There were the bombings at the pizzerias and at the cafes that were unspeakably tragic and heartbreaking. And yet, that suffering did not last forever. The future was different. Cafes and restaurants in Jerusalem and throughout Israel are filled again—and have been for many years.
Isaiah’s essential message, have faith, this will not last forever, this will pass, the future will be better, do not give up on life, that message also applies to our own lives. When we are in a down period, and we worry that it’s going to last forever, that we are never going to get to a better place, hear the words of Isaiah. Have faith. Things can change. Things will change.
I remember so vividly being with a close friend at a major milestone birthday. We know how hard birthdays, and major milestone birthdays, the one with a zero attached, can be when life is not going well. My friend was disconsolate. My career is not what I want it to be. I don’t have a partner. I don’t feel good about myself. This friend happens to spend a lot of time in Israel, I happened to have been in Israel at the time, and I spent the day with him and a few other close friends. But the ground rule was we could not talk about anything of substance. He was too down.
It was a hard, somber birthday. But sure enough, Isaiah was right. One month after that very hard birthday, he went on to meet the love of his life; they began a beautiful relationship that is thriving; his career took off; only one year later, he has never been happier. Have faith. This will not last forever. This will pass. Better days, brighter days, are coming for those who do not give up on this exquisite gift called life. Nachamu, nachamu ami. Shabbat shalom.