October 26, 2024
Author(s):
Parashat Bereshit
Guest Speaker Rabbi Ravid Tilles
If Our Cup Feels Empty, Even When It Overflows
October 26, 2024 – 24 Tishrei 5785
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
Thank you, for inviting me to speak again this year. I continue to be grateful to our clergy for offering me an annual opportunity to share the pulpit. I have done enough of these now to know at least one thing to expect. I know, or at least this used to be the case, that my very astute colleague, our rabbis who I have so much respect for, are sitting and listening to my talk – soaking it all in while also preparing their closing blessing for this morning. They will listen, digest, consider, synthesize and then one of them will create a thoughtful, poetic, blessing in the image of my main message.
I have always really admired that skill. But today, as a sign of my admiration, I have decided to make it even easier for you. I am going to tell you the exact message from the start so that you don’t have to work on your closing words. Ok. Ready? The question always is, what’s next? And the answer is, let’s be together.
What’s next? This is a question that weighs on me in every facet of my life. My son Avishai, who many of you know well after his many years at Hebrew school here and around at services, for a long time would have the same question for us when we first woke up. “What’s for dinner?” And, truthfully, we hardly ever knew. It’s hard enough to keep of track of who is getting who to where they need to be when. So the thought of what any combination of us will be eating, 12 hours later, is impossibly daunting.
Despite our best efforts to have a routine for the five of us, we find ourselves taking it one day at a time, one hour at a time, one moment at a time.
My phone is constantly reminding me, what’s next. Meetings, appointments, commitments – I feel very busy. And when I speak to my friends in my age group and demographic, they also project as being very busy. We sometimes wear busy-ness as a badge of honor, proof that we are worthy of the blessings of life that we have been bestowed. And more often we use busy-ness as a shield, an excuse, for why we haven’t lived up to other commitments or why we haven’t stayed in touch.
“You know, the start of school is so busy, and then it’s so busy right before the holidays, then it’s really busy during the holidays, then it’s really busy right after the holidays then it’s really busy before break,” and so on. What’s next? I find that my contemporaries, and I would surmise, anecdotally, all people ever, are always keeping busy with the next thing. Asking, what’s next?
Imagine that you are on a deserted island. Any time that you need food, you just imagine it and it appears. Same with any sustenance you need. You can swim with the dolphins and there are butterflies gently landing on you. You are totally alone and don’t need to worry about what you do, how you act or what you wear – you could even wear nothing. Your time is yours, and you have no one asking you for anything. No work calls, no family commitments, no kids pulling at you. No worries. No stress. Nothing. Sounds pretty good right? Sounds like paradise. Sounds like, Gan Eden. Well that was what life was like for Adam Ha’rishon, the first human in the story of creation. He had everything he needed and, frankly, he didn’t need anything. He lacked nothing because he needed nothing.
And God said that this was not good. God had created each of the celestial creations and after each one God described them as good. The light, good. The dark, good. The waters, good. The land good. The fish, the birds, the mammals, good good good. And then when Adam is created, God looks at this creation – the creation that God had said would be in the divine image, and said “it is not good for man to be alone.”
So as amazing as an isolated vacation on a deserted island sounds magical and wonderful, for those of us who see ourselves as crazy busy, God saw this happening to the first human and declared that this was not good. And, because of this, God creates Hava, Eve, to be a partner. God looked at Adam and said – what’s next. And then God said, let’s have people be together.
When I thought that I was offering this drash on Shmeni Atzeret I started thinking about the significance of Shmeni. Of the number 8. So when our tradition asks what’s next, the answer is often – eight. Seven represents completion, wholeness, while eight represents what’s next. And the reason, of course, that I have been thinking so much about the number 8 is that we just celebrated Shmeni Atzeret.
The holiday of Sukkot was a seven day holiday, shivat yamim teshvu basukkot, for seven days we are commanded to dwell in the Sukkah and observe this special holiday. And then, the Torah asks, what’s next? An added day of being together with God.
In Parshat Shmeni, which we generally read in the spring, we learn what happens right after the mishkan is completed. It says that on the eighth day the Kohanim were set out to consecrate the Mishkan. It took more than seven days to build the Mishkan, it took nearly a year, but still it says that on the eighth day, because, literarily, it signals that it was time to finish construction and begin a new phase of Israelite peoplehood.
And the building of the Mishkan is meant to mirror God’s creation of the world – just as God created a world for us to live within, B’nai Yisrael created a dwelling place for the divine. And students will often ask me, “and what did God do on the 8th day? We know that on the seventh day God rested which, while it seems to be the absence of action is, in itself, an action step by God. But what about the 8th day? After God creates the world, what did God do next? Did God stop creating?” And, of course, there is no singular correct answer to that question but what is obvious is that the eighth day marked a new chapter – the world after creation.
Again, as I was preparing this talk I was thinking about Shmeni Atzeret and the Yizkor, and any of us who have known the sadness of the loss of a dear family member, have likely experienced shiva in some way. And whether you observed for seven full days, shiva marks an important chapter in the mourning process. But what about the eighth day. The first day up from shiva. The eighth day is the first day facing the real world, no longer as whole as you had been. A new you, facing a new reality, grappling with the loss. I am sure that some of us can go right back to that moment, of our eighth day after the funeral, and know the significance of that moment.
And one final 8, before I go on with my thoughts. The day that I was originally slated to give this talk was the yahrzeit on the Hebrew calendar of October 7th. While the other sevens and eights were intentional in various ways in our tradition, and October 7th was of course not, over the past year we have been recounting what life was like on October 6th and before, while grappling with everything that has happened since the 8th. When we think about the horror and tragedy of October 7th, it is unmatched as a day. But we all know that October 8th and beyond has represented a new reality for world Jewry that has also been uniquely challenging for us.
Whenever we find ourselves emerging from mourning, whether it be as personal as the loss of a loved one or as communal as a horrific terror attack, on the QUOTE eighth day, we ask ourselves, what’s next and the answer always is, let’s be together. Whenever there is a heartbreaking moment that rocks the Jewish consciousness, my first instinct is to call friends and colleagues to either arrange or find a vigil to attend. Because when my heart breaks the loneliness is the first thing to be expressed and I immediately try to combat it by seeking out others. God teaches us that answering the question, “what’s next?” with “let’s be together,” can be our guiding light in life’s darkest moments.
My beloved colleagues, over the past couple of years, have wanted me to speak about my take on the latest in Jewish education or engagement. Last year I spoke about authentic Jewish connection and in many ways it was a helpful calcification of our school’s philosophy on family programming for the past year. And now the question is, “what’s next?” What are the buzzwords and insights that can and should be driving Jewish organizations that are trying to engage families this year?
I know that you all have been paying attention for the last number of minutes. If I ask, what’s next in the world of engaging families in Jewish life? You know that the answer is, “let’s be together.” It’s as ancient as God commanding that Shmeni Atzeret be a thing. It’s simple, it’s elegant. It’s catchy. It’s so incredibly easy to say and it’s so incredibly hard to do.
And how can it be that the quote “next” big thing in Jewish life is being together if it’s so ancient? I often hear about low-barrier programming as the next big thing, or the current big thing, in the Jewish world. Free, convenient, inclusive, accessible, fun programming has been the wave of the future for my past 20 years as a Jewish professional – probably even longer. And I think that low-barrier programming makes a lot of sense. Low-barrier programming is great for busy people who ask themselves what’s next because whatever it is that’s next needs to be worth the time/money/childcare/personal satisfaction quotient that every adult is calculating in their heads all the time.
So here’s the secret sauce. Here’s the hiddush, as we say in the biz. It’s the novel idea. When we are looking to run a successful program we have a pyramid of needs that drive our decision making of what should and shouldn’t happen in our program. The pyramid of needs goes like this. At the bottom, schedule – does it work with my schedule because I am very otherwise busy (as we’ve said before). Then the next level up is price – just like there are a lot of ways that I can spend my time, there are a lot of pulls on the way that I spend my money and they all have some value. The next level up is child care – will this program get me closer to dinner with my sanity in tact. But the ultimate, the top of the pyramid, is that adults, and really all people, have to feel like it matters that they were there.
The reason that we wear busy-ness as a badge of honor, is the same reason that we are constantly moving from one thing to the next, is the same reason that attendance at certain programming is down, while attendance at other programming is up – people want to feel like it matters where they are.
So continuing to think about desiging programs that are convenient, cost effective, with solid child care is critical. But what’s next? Making sure that the adults know that it matters whether or not they are there. At Schechter programming, outside of the school day, we do our best to make sure that guests to our events feel like it matters that they were there and that the next event will be enriched if they return. We assign professionals or lay people to steward new or relatively new people in their experience.
In a genuine, not creepy way, we try to make sure that adults know that they offer more to the community than being a chauffeur for their children. And, not for nothing, having the entrenched members of the community attending as stewards helps the stewards to feel like their presence is important at the program as well. In this day and age, in the general population that we inhabit, people can be anywhere they want whenever they want to be. They typically choose to go where they feel they most matter.
And even though it sounds simple, and that if this was all it took to engage millennials and parents and really any demographic. If this was all it took, wouldn’t we have figured it out already? I think that a lot of people have figured out how to lower the barriers, but, for whatever reason, come up short on making sure that the person knows that it matters that they came.
So what is the next frontier for engaging parents, and really everyone? What’s next? It’s what was and has always been successful for communities – let’s be together. Let’s notice each other. Let’s be curious about each other. Let’s find meaningful ways for a person to contribute their insight. I was asked to be on an advisory committee for the Hebrew school by Ilana.
It worked well with my schedule, was free, and after bedtime so the kids were set. But that’s not why I joined the committee, I joined because Ilana made me feel like it mattered whether or not I was there and so I was willing to give of myself, and I am more invested in the religious school now even though I don’t have any current students in it.
And you might think that I’m particularly inclined to do something like that – and that’s probably true – but I share something in common with every adult. I have made myself busy with things that I think are important and will only make room in my life if I think that it matters whether or not I show up. I want to be seen enough to have people seek out my presence.
If we can let people know, in no uncertain terms, that it matters that they show up, they will then ask us – what’s next.
So friends, my prayer for all of us is that our next thing – the next place we go, the next decision we make, the next program we attend or the next opportunity for growth we find. My prayer is that our next thing not make us feel busy, but make us feel like we matter. Shabbat Shalom.