Blog

I was having a conversation with a friend the other night about senior quotes. In a high school yearbook, when students are in their final year, they are granted an opportunity to sum up their life, their story, their dreams, their future, their interests, how they are known… in a short, attributable quote. It has to be clever, it has to be somewhat original, and it has to be authentic. The pressure on, it is a pretty significant task, one which will be published and distributed far and wide. Unlike social media, on which you have the option to edit your posting, or repost, or even take down your post if it is not received as you intended, there is no turning back from this quote. It is a formidable task indeed.

This entire “senior quote selection” process got me thinking: what would be the senior quote for the Jewish people? Would we choose something creedal, such as our Deuteronomic quote: Shema, Yisrael, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad? “Here, O Israel, Adonai is your God, Adonai alone?” Would we choose something optimistic, giving voice to one who perished in the single greatest destructive act perpetrated against the Jewish people, the Holocaust? While there are many options to consider, I suggest, “Look at how a single candle can defy the darkness” by Anne Frank. Or maybe we would go with the clever and ironic: “Judaism is more about Seinfeld and bagels than guilt and God” offered by Beeban Kidron.

We have a contender in our Torah portion this week, Beshalach. Having experienced the ten plagues and an early-morning “Pack your bags, folks.” announcement that they were departing Egypt, having rushed through the desert for days only to find their path blocked by the sea, having an army pursue them intent on either killing or capturing them and believing that all was lost, only to have the sea part and the people cross on dry land and then watch the sea collapse on their pursuers and experience freedom for the first time…all in the span of 3 days…the people summed up their complex past, their unknown future, the tragedies they have endured and the victories of their ancestors, with these words: Mi Chamocha Baelim Adonai? Mi Kamocha nedar bakodesh? Norah tehilot, oseh fele? “Who is like You, Adonai, among all the gods that are worshipped? Who is like You, majestic in holiness, awesome in splendor, doing wonders?” It’s good, right? It captures where we have been and where we are going, it captures our context as a people in a unique relationship with our One God; it captures our role in a covenantal relationship with God. It is laden with optimism and tinged with a bitter reality that there are times when we need God’s help more than God gives to us. And it reflects a transformative moment in our history, almost like our graduation and launch to our next phase.

We are a people who believe that words matter. This week, when we recite those words, both in our Friday night and Saturday morning services, may we reflect not on our obligation to recite them but rather on what reciting them says about us. May we ponder how to apply those words and the sense of those words to our lives. And may we find ourselves experiencing in this week ahead awesome moments where the only words that pass our lips are words of praise.

Shabbat Shalom.