7.11.2014 Weekly Torah Portion

[RabbiMark]

I am grateful for and to our Interns. All of the residents who take on the opportunity and responsibility of learning new skills and/or how to apply their skills in a Sober, Decent, and Pro-Social manner are shining examples of how well treatment of the whole person works. They are so engaged in learning and preparing themselves for their next steps. It is an honor to watch them transform themselves and transform the way we help people help themselves! Thank you to all of our interns past, present, and future.

This week’s Parsha is Pinchas. This is the name of the eldest son of Eleazer, the High Priest. At the end of last week’s Parsha, Pinchas killed an Israelite man and the woman he was having sex with in sight of the Mishkan.

What do you do when you see others acting wrong? Do you “kill” them? Do you just walk away? What is the best response?

These are troubling questions for me. My usual MO is to “kill” them with words of anger and, at times, rage. It happened to me this week. I didn’t “go off” on the person who brought up these experiences of anger and rage, rather, I took my anger and rage out on Harriet. I am questioning my way of reacting to “wrong-doing” right now and working on finding a different way. It is very interesting to me: I know that “punishment” isn’t really going to change anyone, it only makes bad/wrong behavior go underground and people become more covert, yet I get an immediate reaction that seems to come from nowhere and I explode. In no way am I “cleaning up” these bouts of total rage; I am, actually, understanding Pinchas’ experience in a different way this year. I can’t “stand idly by the blood of my brother” and I have to “rebuke your neighbor so no guilt is upon you” and do it in a manner that will have positive results. I am almost 63 years old and am still searching!

How are you “standing by the blood of your brother” by saying nothing because you don’t want to be involved? Do you do this out of fear of the reaction? How do you confront wrong doing in a healthy way, knowing that the results are out of your hands and yet, “we are not free to desist from the work?"

In the Parsha this week, Moses is again told by God that he is not going into the Land of Canaan. Moses is told to “take Joshua, the son of Nun, a man in whom there is Spirit and lay your hand upon him.” We learn here the importance of succession. The Hebrew word used here is Smicha. This is the word we used for Ordaining Clergy in our Tradition. As I sit here, in Starbucks, writing this Parsha, I realize how important it is for those of us in Leadership to “lay our hands” upon our successors. Many of us are too afraid to do this because we are worried about preserving our own legacy. This way is actually counter-productive to preserving our legacy, according to the way I understand this part of Torah this year. Beit T’Shuvah is in this process as I write this. Harriet and I are teaching and “laying our hands” on the next generation of leadership. It is humbling and exciting and scary.

As an educator and Rabbi, I am worried if I have taught by example and words what is important and Holy about our tradition. I am fearful that I haven’t explained and demonstrated how living a Jewish Life of T’Shuvah, Tzedakah, and T’Fillah (Return, Righteousness, and Prayer) makes our inner and exterior worlds so much better and that our being these ways makes the whole world better, one grain of sand each day.

Do you live your beliefs and principles? Do you live one grain of sand better each day? Are you aware of these phenomena?

As a Parent, Son, Brother, Uncle, Friend I am concerned that I haven’t passed down the driving principles of my living to those closest to me. And, I am afraid that I have put too much of a burden to live this way upon my daughter, Heather. It is such a delicate dance. I know how much this burden weighs on me and how often I find myself lacking. I know that I have to pass on to my daughter, my family, and my friends the wisdom and ways of my father, my mother, my grandparents, etc. Yet, I always wonder if I am. I am Blessed in that they have all of my writings to refer to and hold me accountable to.

What are the driving principles of your life? How do you live them? How are you transmitting them to your nearest and dearest? Are you leaving them an Ethical Will of your life lessons?

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Mark