What a lovely Shabbat we spent this past weekend as we celebrated Talia’s Bat Mitzvah. Talia’s Torah portion was Bo, the third portion in the Book of Exodus, which picks up in the midst of the ten plagues with God telling Moses “Bo el Paroah,” meaning, essentially, “Go before Pharaoh,” so that Moses would once again proclaim those bold words before Pharaoh, which forever ring out through the generations, “Let my people go.”
Only, we know plague after plague comes and Pharaoh does not let the people for, as God says to Moses, “I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his courtiers, in order that I may display these My signs among them.”
Of course this wrinkle has struck many theologians as perplexing: why, if God can apparently control the will of Pharaoh, would God harden Pharaoh’s heart rather than soften it, subjecting the people and Pharaoh to further oppression and pain in the form of the plagues.
Talia, too, found this to be an intriguing question, and chose to approach it not literally but metaphorically. Pharaoh’s heart being hardened by God, she suggested, is representative of when we allow ourselves to be too easily persuaded—when we allow our friends or our peers to divert us from the path we know we would want to pursue. She cited examples like when a friend or peer tells us we shouldn’t ask the question we want to ask, or shouldn’t hang out with another friend we want to.
It was a humble statement of all of our susceptibility to that sort of pressure. Her awareness of its influence suggested an openness to respond in the future with strength and integrity.
It was a D’var Torah marked by maturity and sincerity.
Thank you, Talia.
Meanwhile, I write this not from my usual perch at my desk at Society Hill Synagogue but from my couch in my home, sidled up next to my two-year old daughter Lila as we watch a movie. This is because we’ve both come down with Covid and are isolating from the world and, most relevantly, from my wife/her mom, Caroline, who, being pregnant, was advised by doctors to stay away from us for a week or so. I say this not to raise the alarm—we’re all fine, mild symptoms at worst—but to embody something I’ve been experiencing over the course of the pandemic: inviting others in to understand what we’re going through can be a profoundly spiritual act, even if there isn’t a need for concrete physical or material support of any kind.
I’m reminded of when the pandemic first started and a congregant emailed me wondering aloud, tongue only partially in cheek, whether the virus was divine intervention for helping people realize the full extent of our interconnection.
Inclining our hearts, making space for the fact of that interconnection can, I think, be a salve for the soul. We live in an increasingly individualized world, but reconciling ourselves to how truly connected we are can help us feel the full force of Divine energy as manifest through one another’s support and love. It doesn’t even have to be about expressions of tangible support (though in some cases that is certainly necessary) but rather simply about the admission that we can’t, and shouldn’t, try to do it all on our own. Making space, exhaling, and feeling a sense that our burdens are shared can be a profoundly sacred act.