Dear Friends,
Boy, do we need to turn the page, or to roll the scroll! Perhaps, never more than this year!
You see, the Hamas attack on Israel, October 7, known in Hebrew as Shabbat Shachar – the Dark/Black Sabbath, occurred not only on a Saturday/Shabbat morning, but it happened on Simchat Torah. It was perpetrated not only on the State of Israel, and on the 1200 murdered and the 240 kidnapped and the millions who care and worry, but the attack also was an attack on Jewish Time. It desecrated a festival, just as, 50 years earlier in 1973 the Yom Kippur War sullied that sacred day.
Thus, this Shabbat offers either a reprieve, or a reminder. This Shabbat we commence reading the Torah’s second book, the Book of Exodus. On October 7, Simchat Torah, we had commenced reading Genesis, the Torah’s opening volume. Hence, we have spent an entire book in the cycle of Torah time enduring the terrible hostage crisis and broken-spirited over the deaths in Israel and Gaza.
It is time to turn the page, or roll the scroll.
And, this is a gift which Torah and Torah time gives us five Shabbatot in each year: concluding a book and commencing the next one. It seems blatantly simple. Of course, we must begin reading the next section or chapter once we conclude the present one! But our ancient sages elevated the moment from the simple, timely or banal to the sacred and timeless. They inserted a ritual of recognition and renewal in the moment when we utter the last word of each book, so that we can experience transition and renewal as we roll to the following section.
”Chazak, chazak v’nitchazeik,” ‘Be strong, be strong, and strengthen one another,” they deemed that we declare. Most days, it is a modest, minor pronouncement. We say it by rote, perhaps with an exclamation or small rejoicing, and then we get on to the next book. This year however, we offer these words with deepest sincerity. We need the gifts of strengthening one another. We need to mark this moment in time, however, disturbing and mindful of the weeks which have overturned our peace and equilibrium. We need to dig deeper in the wells of self to sustain ourselves and one another.
Thus, as we end Genesis and look to Exodus, we heed the sages: ”Chazak, chazak v’nitchazeik.”
May it be so,
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Douglas Kohn
Boy, do we need to turn the page, or to roll the scroll! Perhaps, never more than this year!
You see, the Hamas attack on Israel, October 7, known in Hebrew as Shabbat Shachar – the Dark/Black Sabbath, occurred not only on a Saturday/Shabbat morning, but it happened on Simchat Torah. It was perpetrated not only on the State of Israel, and on the 1200 murdered and the 240 kidnapped and the millions who care and worry, but the attack also was an attack on Jewish Time. It desecrated a festival, just as, 50 years earlier in 1973 the Yom Kippur War sullied that sacred day.
Thus, this Shabbat offers either a reprieve, or a reminder. This Shabbat we commence reading the Torah’s second book, the Book of Exodus. On October 7, Simchat Torah, we had commenced reading Genesis, the Torah’s opening volume. Hence, we have spent an entire book in the cycle of Torah time enduring the terrible hostage crisis and broken-spirited over the deaths in Israel and Gaza.
It is time to turn the page, or roll the scroll.
And, this is a gift which Torah and Torah time gives us five Shabbatot in each year: concluding a book and commencing the next one. It seems blatantly simple. Of course, we must begin reading the next section or chapter once we conclude the present one! But our ancient sages elevated the moment from the simple, timely or banal to the sacred and timeless. They inserted a ritual of recognition and renewal in the moment when we utter the last word of each book, so that we can experience transition and renewal as we roll to the following section.
”Chazak, chazak v’nitchazeik,” ‘Be strong, be strong, and strengthen one another,” they deemed that we declare. Most days, it is a modest, minor pronouncement. We say it by rote, perhaps with an exclamation or small rejoicing, and then we get on to the next book. This year however, we offer these words with deepest sincerity. We need the gifts of strengthening one another. We need to mark this moment in time, however, disturbing and mindful of the weeks which have overturned our peace and equilibrium. We need to dig deeper in the wells of self to sustain ourselves and one another.
Thus, as we end Genesis and look to Exodus, we heed the sages: ”Chazak, chazak v’nitchazeik.”
May it be so,
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Douglas Kohn