Packing for the Road

Nowadays, I am continually amazed by how much stuff I take with me when leaving the house. In the past, I used to take my purse and go. Now especially if I go somewhere with the kids (even for just a few hours), I have to pack a bag with a change of clothes for each child, sweaters in case it gets cold, snacks etc. I also bring a water bottle and a book in case the kids fall asleep in the car. My two-year old daughter invariably packs a bag with snacks and toys “for the road.” Not to mention the stroller, the car seats, and well, you get the picture.

As it turns out, I’m not the only one with trouble getting out of the house. In this week’s Torah portion, the people embarked on their Exodus from Egypt. In last week’s parasha, during the darkness Plague, Pharaoh agreed to let the people go but asked them to leave behind their flocks and herds. Moses refused to leave without all the livestock, explaining they were needed to offer sacrifices to God in the desert, “and we won’t know with what we are to worship God until we get there.” Pharaoh refused, and another plague was leashed before Pharaoh relented and let the people go with all their belongings.

In this week’s parasha, after the Israelites crossed through the split sea, we learn that they didn’t need their flocks to worship God after all. What they needed were timbrels – as Miriam led the women in song and dancing with timbrels and flutes in praise to God. Good thing that the women had remembered to pack their instruments!

Indeed, the Mekhilta teaches that the women’s packing demonstrated their righteousness. The women were so confident that God would make miracles for them that they packed timbrels and flutes to celebrate.

The people’s packing was a statement both of faith in God, as well as openness to adapt to whatever would be needed in the future. We normally like to pretend that we know the future, and that we have our plans all mapped out. However, Moses’ statement reflects humility – admitting that he didn’t really know what he needed until he got there. Like Moses, we too may need to keep our options open and have faith that we’ll discover what God wants of us when we reach the next chapter of our life.

For me, having children forced me to shift my thinking to Moses’ approach. Before having kids, I had plans and goals and engaged in lots of long-term planning. Now that I have kids, some of those plans worked out and some didn’t. I realized that I had to examine my life in smaller chunks. I had to admit that much of the time, I don’t know how to proceed until I reach the next stage. Like the Israelite women, I had to learn to trust God to help me figure out what to do once I got there.

On life’s spiritual journey, don’t forget to pack your courage, confidence, compassion, and especially hope. You’ll never know when you might need them.

When the Plague Subsides

This past week, I was sick with the stomach flu, and then when I started to feel better, my two-year-old daughter came down with pink-eye. And I know I’m not alone. Lots of our friends and their kids have been sick recently with various ailments in this wet, dreary January.

Illness is jarring. One moment you’re totally fine and then the next minute, you’re out of commission. The experience reminds us how vulnerable our bodies really are. We like to think that we can plan and get tasks accomplished but our sickness (or that of our kids) demonstrate how tentative our plans actually are. As the Yiddish phrase goes: Mann traoch, Gott lauch Man plans, God laughs.

However, I don’t even feel entitled to write that I had a lousy week – given the earthquake in Haiti. One minute everything in Haiti was fine, and then the next minute witnessed devastation of catastrophic proportions.

How fitting then that this week, we read about the plagues. Like illness or an earthquake, the plagues came on suddenly and threw everything out of whack with drastic, debilitating physical maladies. After a few days, the plagues passed, just as suddenly as they had come.

Moses and Aaron had appeared before Pharaoh and asked that he “let my people go,” which he refused. So God brought successive plagues of increasing severity. For the first plague, Pharaoh was not overly impressed. However during each of the subsequent plagues, Pharaoh relented, but once the plague was over, Pharaoh changed his mind and refused to free the slaves.

This week, I thought of Pharaoh and identified with him a little. My first day of feeling well after being sick felt like a miracle. Nothing exciting happened; I just took Hannah to the doctor for her pink eye and took care of her at home. But still, I was so grateful that I could function and wasn’t in pain that I couldn’t be upset about anything. But after a few days, I again became stressed (about all that I hadn’t accomplished in the days that I was sick) and forgot the wonder of just feeling physically okay.

The story of Pharaoh reveals something fundamental about human psychology. Often, we’re compassionate in a crisis but less so thereafter. For example, in the immediate aftermath of an earthquake or tsunami, people from all over the world give generously – which is absolutely essential. But once the coverage dies down, we forget about people in need, day in and day out.

Pharaoh’s example leaves me with the question: How can we hold on to the gratitude and compassion we feel during a crisis once it has passed?

I once saw a woman wearing a shirt that said: “Too blessed to be stressed.” I imagined wearing that phrase on a bracelet as a daily to keep things in perspective. Likewise, the prayer that is traditionally said each morning after going to the bathroom acknowledges the vulnerability of our bodies, that if one of our intricate parts was “blocked or opened, then it would be impossible to exist.” This prayer thanks God, who “heals all flesh and works wonders.”

For me, most often, the daily reminders come from watching my children. When my daughter was home with pink-eye, my husband Tal called to check how she was doing. We were having a boring morning at home. She was playing with a puzzle while I put away the laundry. When Tal asked her how she was, she said, “I’m having a fun time at home.” My children remind me that even the most mundane moments of life are miracles.

What's in a name?

The other day, while sitting on my lap, my two-year old daughter Hannah asked: “What’s your name, Mommy?”

“Ilana,” I answered.

She looked surprised and said, “My teacher’s name is Ilana.”

I had to reassure my daughter that my name really was Ilana and that her preschool teacher and I have the same name. How strange, I thought. I love this child more than anything in the world. I would give my life for her, and yet she doesn’t even know my name!

In this week’s Torah portion, Va’era (and I appeared), God had a similarly puzzling encounter with Moses. Moses had appeared before Pharaoh and asked him to free the people but Pharaoh refused. Moses was terrified that his mission would fail, so God appeared to him and said, “I am YHVH. I appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai, but I didn’t tell them my name YHVH.” God then reassured Moses that the people would be redeemed.

What is the meaning of this description of God’s names?

This moment can be understood as a change in God’s relationship with the biblical figures, like the shift in relationship between a parent and child over time. The name El Shaddai is related to the word Shadayim which means breasts. To Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, God appeared as a nurturing figure, but like infants, they didn’t know God’s name. When Moses learned God’s name, he matured and became God’s partner in freeing the people.

For infants, the mom is typically central to their world. However, their vision broadens to include a whole range of relationships as they develop into preschoolers – from their teachers, their friends, and family members. As a preschooler learns their mother’s name, they learn that she has other relationships too – and they comprehend their place within this broader picture.

This shift is parallel to the change that takes place between the book of Bereshit and Sh’mot. The book of Genesis focuses primarily on the story of a family, that of the patriarchs and matriarchs. In Exodus, the purview broadens to a nation and their epic struggle for freedom.

How fitting that we read this text as we honor Martin Luther King Jr., for whom these biblical tales were such a source of inspiration. In Exodus, we read of the first acts of civil disobedience – from the Hebrew midwives, Shifra and Puah, who disobeyed Pharaoh’s orders to kill the Hebrew babies to Moses and Aaron, who demanded that Pharaoh “let my people go.” Dr. King followed in that great tradition, as did Miep Gies, who risked her life to hide Anne Frank and her family from the Nazis, and died this past week at age 100.

On the night before he was assassinated in 1968, King echoed Moses when he said: “And I've looked over, and I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. So I'm happy tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man.” Likewise, Miep Gies recalled, “I had no time to occupy myself with fear. There was work to be done.”

Like Moses, Martin and Miep understood that people were created to be God’s partners in the work of liberation. When we comprehend this truth, then we know our Parent’s name.

Bumps in the Road

Recently, my kids and I walked from our home to the park a few blocks away. My son Jeremy decided to roller-skate there, even though he’s still learning how. He’s at the point where he can skate on his own on the smooth stretches of sidewalk, but needs help to keep from falling over bumps. We progressed at the pace of snails with my letting go whenever the sidewalk was even and holding his hand whenever he encountered a bump. (It took us almost half an hour to reach the park only a few blocks away!)

As we moved along, repeatedly letting go and grabbing hands again, I felt that this pattern was intrinsic to human nature. When everything’s fine, we coast. We feel independent and self-sufficient; we can go it alone. However, when we reach bumps in the road, we feel the need to hold to one another.

In this week’s Torah portion, the Jewish people hit a bumpy part of the road – to say the least. This parsha, Sh’mot (names), which begins the book of Exodus, recounts how we became enslaved in Egypt. In this excruciating time, the portion is filled with stories of people reaching out to one another. The Hebrew midwives risk their lives to save babies (who Pharaoh has commanded to be killed). Pharaoh’s daughter rescues baby Moses from the river, and his sister Miriam steps in to ensure that he is reunited with his mother. When he grows up, Moses intervenes three times to help a person in need – twice to help an Israelite who was being beaten, and once to assist a Midianite women harassed by shepherds. And throughout, lots of couples are having children: “But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and grew…”

As a nation, we too hit a tough stretch this past year. In commencing a new book of the Torah, we also begin a new secular year. Both in listening to the coverage of the New Year and speaking with people, I sensed a collective sigh of relief that 2009 was over. How refreshing to have a clean slate – to begin not only a new year, but a new decade too! Hope for a new start was mingled with lingering uncertainty about whether the difficulties of this past year would continue.

In reflecting back, perhaps the only good thing that can be said about bad times is that they have a way of bringing people together. I know personally that almost all my closest friendships were forged in the two worst periods of my life. Most of my closest friends to this day are from the year my parents divorced when I was 17. Another of my closest friendships began this past year as I grappled with my grief after my mother’s death. (My remaining close friends are either from trips or when first moving to a new school. All of these instances were times when I was pushed out of my comfort zone.)

Somehow, in the tough times, you find yourself unable to lie and pretend that everything is okay, and that you don’t need anyone else. In those moments, some of the strongest connections are forged.

This week’s portion recounts that “God saw the Israelites” and was moved to redeem them. What did God see? According to one commentator, “God saw that the Israelites had compassion upon one another. When one of them finished his quota of bricks, he would help his friend.”

Each year, we read the story of the Exodus not merely as descriptive of past events, but as prescriptive for the future. Sometimes, the most profound truths in life are also the simplest. When you reach bumps in the road, hold hands.

My New Year's Resolution

Recently, my son’s kindergarten class put on a special show for Hanukkah. For weeks leading up to the big day, the kids rehearsed the songs and practiced their lines with excitement — anticipating the big performance. On the day of the show, my son’s best friend, Jonah, came down with a fever and had to stay home.

Jonah’s parents were disappointed to miss the show. Jonah, too, was initially upset when his parents told him that he couldn’t go. But he soon comforted himself, saying “Well, I am glad I got to sing in the rehearsals. That was fun.”

Jonah’s mom noted that she and her husband were more upset about missing the performance than Jonah was. She mused: “If only adults could enjoy the journey as much as children do.”

This week’s Torah portion, called Vayehi (and he lived), recounts the final days of Jacob’s life. Since Jacob was ill and knew he was near death, he gathered his children and grandchildren to bless them and impart the wisdom that he accumulated during his lifetime. When blessing his grandchildren, Jacob said that all future sons would be blessed with the same words: “May God make you like Ephraim and Menasseh” — a custom that is followed to this day.

Why are all boys blessed to be like Jacob’s grandsons? Perhaps as Rabbi David Lieber of blessed memory suggested, because Ephraim and Menasseh are the first brothers in the Torah to get along. Therefore, they represent the resolution of past conflicts and new hope for the future.

With all this emphasis on parents blessing children, I wonder: What are the blessings that children give their parents? For as much as parents teach children, kids can teach us so much more. I am continually amazed by the wise words that come out of the mouths of babes.

Last week, I took my children to the aquarium with another family. While we ate lunch in the cafeteria, Jeremy’s friend Emmett and his sister Hannah Mathilda each ate a cookie for dessert. Jeremy commented: “Emmett, you won because you ate your cookie faster than your sister.” Emmett replied, “No, Hannah Mathilda won because she enjoyed it more.”

As adults, so many of us rush around, trying to accomplish myriad tasks, as though the winner in life is the one who gets the most done first. Yet, in time, we begin to suspect that the real winners in life are the ones who enjoy it most — who are able to be fully present in each moment rather than always thinking about what needs to be done next. Children are masters of this art.

This season is popular for making resolutions. We typically promise to start exercising or lose 10 pounds — vows that somehow slip away within a few weeks. This year, my New Year’s blessing is: “May God make us like Jonah and Emmett.” My resolution for 2010 is to enjoy living, rather than racing toward the finish line. Because for all we know, life itself may only be a rehearsal