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September 9, 2023
Author(s): Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz,
Parshat Nitzavim-Vayeilech
The Lottery Ticket That Wins Every Time
September 9, 2023 — 23 Elul 5783
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
The story is told of a man named Harry whose business had fallen on hard times. He goes to shul and prays: God, I don’t often ask you for things, but my business is failing, and I need a miracle now. Please help me win the lottery. The lottery happens, and he doesn’t win. He is feeling the financial squeeze. If he doesn’t get help soon, he might lose his house. So off he goes to shul and prays: God, my business is going belly up, I don’t want to lose my house. Please help me win the lottery. The next week, the lottery happens again, and he doesn’t win. Off he goes to shul a third time and prays: God, my business has failed, it looks like we’re not going to keep our house, my health is deteriorating, my marriage is on the rocks. Please help me win the lottery. To his utter amazement, something happens right then and there that had never ever happened to Harry before: God answered back. From the heavens God thundered: Harry, I would like to help you win the lottery, I really would, but first you have to buy a ticket!
I thought about that old joke one day this summer when I read about a woman named Louise Levy who died this summer in Greenwich, Connecticut at the age of 112. She enjoyed remarkably good health until almost the very end of her life. She got to be 111, with no high cholesterol. No heart disease. No diabetes. No Alzheimer’s. Louise Levy enjoyed such extraordinary health and longevity that she was selected to be part of a study on aging. Seven hundred Ashkenazi Jews, all 95 years or older, were studied to learn more about the reasons for their unusual health and longevity.
Was her secret how she ate, a particular kind of diet? No.
Was her secret regular exercise? No.
Was her secret that she had a glass of red wine every night at dinner, or that she never drank? No.
Was her secret that she was an active member of a faith community? It would have been fabulous if that had been her secret, but no.
What then was the secret to her longevity? The answer is genes, very lucky genes. Some Ashkenazi Jews, including Louise Levy, are blessed with lucky genetics. The director of the study, Dr. Nir Barzilai, observes:
The biggest answer is genetics…Did they do what we know we should do—exercise, diet and sleep and have social connectivity? The answer is mostly no. Sixty percent were smoking. Less than 50 percent did much household activity or biking. Fifty percent were overweight or obese. Less than three percent were vegetarians.
Louise Levy won the genetic lottery.
As is the nature of lotteries, none of this is earned. All of this is random. It is not just genetics. There are so many other life-shaping lotteries. There is the zip code lottery. If you happen to have been born in the blessed zip codes of Chestnut Hill, Brookline, Newton, we tend to enjoy decades longer longevity than if we had been born into poorer zip codes. There is also the lottery of the parents and nuclear family to which we were born. There is also the lottery of the educational opportunities we had or did not have.
And yet, despite the lotteries we did or did not win at birth, is there a winning lottery ticket that every human being can obtain?
That is just the question of the High Holidays’ central prayer, Unetaneh Tokef, which tells us life is a series of lotteries, and there is no way to protect ourselves from the scary random stuff that could happen to any of us at any time. Just think about…Maui.
who will live and who will die;
who will live a long life and who will come to an untimely end;
who will perish by fire and who by water; who by sword and who by
beast; who by hunger and who by thirst; who by earthquake and who by plague.
This prayer puts the awe in the days of awe. If this is the human condition, where is our winning lottery ticket?
That is where the last line of Unetaneh Tokef comes in: u’teshuvah, u’tefilah u’tzedakah ma’avirin et roah hagezeirah, repentance, prayer and justice annul the severity of the decree.
In other words: We cannot control what happens to us. But we can control what we do about it.
The last line is about agency. We have it. Despite the lotteries that we win or did not win, we have agency to control what we do with the hand we have been dealt.
Teshuvah means return. Who do I want to be? What is the best version of me? I have agency to become that version of me.
Tefillah means prayer. I have agency to look to God for help as I try to become the best version of me.
Tzedakah means justice. I have agency to take action, to do deeds, that help me become the person I want to become.
Where is my agency now? How can I exercise my agency to create a better life? Let me give you a concrete example of what this looks like.
A woman named Florence Berger did not win the genetic lottery. She passed this summer in her early 80s from multiple sclerosis. But it’s what she did with the time she had that sparkled. Here is the first line in her narrative: “Florence Berger, who helped people find enduring love, dies at 83.” Her professional story was powerful in and of itself. She was a professor of hospitality at the Cornell school of hotel administration, the first woman to be elevated to full professor at the hotel administration school. She was also a beloved teacher who received the university’s highest award for teaching excellence. She retired at the age of 63, in 2003. Now what?
What she chose to do with her agency was beautiful.
One of the greatest blessings of her life was her marriage to her husband Toby. They were happily married for 66 years until he passed away. I know what a blessing it is to have a loving lifetime partner. And yet I see so much loneliness. The problem I want to solve is loneliness. I want to help make matches.
After retiring as a Cornell professor, Florence Berger became a matchmaker. In her 20 years as a matchmaker, she made 25 matches. She would never accept any payment for this mitzvah; the only payment was hearing about happily married couples, and the many birth announcements that ensued.
Florence Berger’s story was not: I had to retire, what am I going to do now.
Her story was not: I am widowed. I am lonely.
Her story was not: my best days are behind me.
Rather her story was: what am I going to do with this one precious day that I am living now? I want to fill it with love and impact. There are 25 married couples, and the children that they brought into this world, because Florence Berger exercised her agency to increase the quantum of love in our world.
The good news, and the intimidating news, is that we all have the same winning lottery ticket. Our life is what we make of it. May our upcoming High Holidays inspire us to make this greatest blessing called our life a thing of beauty and meaning. Shabbat shalom.