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Rabbi David Locketz
Prayer is Action
Erev Rosh Hashanah 5768
Bet Shalom Congregation
Unetanah tokef k'dushat hayom – Let
us proclaim the sacred power of this day, it
is awesome and full of dread…. On Rosh
Hashanah it is written, on Yom Kippur it is
sealed; how many will pass on, how many
shall come to be? Who shall live and who
shall die…and so it goes that each year we
gather here together in our sacred community
as Jews to celebrate another year. We gather
to mark the New Year by recounting our
deeds, trying to understand our actions, and
ourselves and to pray that if God will only
give us one more year, we will make it
right. We will be the people we were meant
to be, we will live in a way that is
meaningful, full of intent…holy…and we will
be written in the Book of Life…we pray that
we will be given that Divine consideration
just one more time.
It has been just under six weeks since
the Twin Cities caught the eye of the world
when the 35-W Mississippi River Bridge
collapsed…and for a short while we all
panicked. I had just walked in the door of
our home when Debbie told me the bridge had
fallen. Not long afterwards, the phone
started to ring. Friends and family from
around the globe called to check to see that
we were OK. And thank God we were OK and so
was everyone we knew directly. In the days
that followed, all of us heard hundreds of
miraculous close call stories. The stories
were unbelievable! My best friend’s father
passed over the bridge just moments before
it collapsed. A friend of a friend passed
the fated school bus to get off at her exit,
and as it turns out, just in time. Another
acquaintance was home sick or would have
been on the bridge at that very moment. A
member of this congregation was delayed on
campus and so he was saved. And even more
miraculous are the stories of those whose
cars went down…but the drivers and
passengers were unscathed. They hit river
bottom and swam out.
It is easy to think that God was with
these people. That God saved them. That
God’s hands were wrapped around them. But
what about those 13 who died? Were they not
written in the book of life? On Rosh
Hashanah it is written…On Yom Kippur it is
sealed.
Despite the traffic inconveniences life
in the Twin Cities quickly returned to
normal. But then late in August, Minnesota
was hit with a rash of natural disaster.
South Eastern Minnesota was under
floodwaters and we watched our television
screens and Internet feeds once more as more
people were victimized without warning.
Houses were destroyed and lives were altered
forever in the wake of a rising tide. Seven
people lost their lives and countless more
were injured. Was God not with them? Were
they not written in the Book of Life?
Unetanah tokef k'dushat hayom – Let us
proclaim the sacred power of this day, it is
awesome and full of dread.
We are left then with what to do. For me,
the High Holy Day liturgy…these prayers we
come together to pray each year are
beautiful and moving and emotional…and
sometimes very difficult. How can we
continue to pray when there is so much
tragedy in the world? What does this say
about our relationship with God…our
understanding of God? We do not have to look
hard to find examples of difficult times in
Jewish history to see how others, like us,
have responded.
There is a midrash that describes how the
Israelites reacted when they realized they
were sandwiched between Pharaoh’s army and
the Red Sea. It was an ugly and familiar
scene that we recall each year on Passover.
The Israelites left the death and darkness
of Egypt to be inscribed in the life
promised by God to Abraham. But as they
found themselves in the sweltering sun of
the desert, they were faced with such
uncertainty. Would they be slaughtered with
freedom just miles ahead? The midrash
recounts that the Israelites broke into four
factions. The first group shouted, “Let us
throw ourselves into the sea.” They had no
spirit left. They could see no way out of
the fear and horror and rather than wait to
be destroyed by the Egyptians, they chose to
end their lives on their own terms.
The second group turned their fear and
anger on Moses. These complainers shouted at
him, “How could you have taken us from the
security of Egypt into this unknown place
where we are surely to perish?” Rather than
seek a solution and move forward, this group
opted for the darkness, and security, of
servitude. They could not, and would not
take responsibility for themselves.
The third group turned their aggression
outward. Rather than wait for the attacking
Egyptians, they wanted to turn and attack
first. They sought to transform their awful
situation by fighting their enemies with
their own hands.
Finally the fourth group, the most pious
of the bunch, said, “let us bow down and
pray for God to deliver us.” They put their
destiny into God’s hands and hoped and
prayed and waited for God to carry them
onward to safety and the Promise of a new
day.
So which group was right? According to
this Midrash they were all wrong.
And the words of the Torah prove it.
Through Moses, God rebuked each faction. To
the first group, stuck in the grip of
suicidal despair, Moses says, “Do not be
afraid.” To the second group who lashed out
against Moses, he told, “The Egyptians you
see today, you shall never see again.” To
the third group who wanted to war against
the Egyptians, Moses assured them that, “God
would fight in their stead.” It was with the
final faction, the pious group who did
nothing but pray, that God seemed most
angry. He said to Moses, “Why do you cry out
to me? Speak to the Israelites, and tell
them to go forward.”
You see, it is in the moving forward that
we find God. We can wait, and sit in fear,
moping that God has forgotten us, but our
prayers are answered when we find the
strength to stand up and keep moving…when we
can see the other side of the sea and we
start to use our God given gifts to figure
out just how to get across.
A wise friend instructed me recently to
never pray for something we are not willing
to make happen for ourselves. So what is the
purpose of prayer anyway? Our own Shabbat
prayer book teaches us that, “Prayer invites
God to let the Divine Presence suffuse our
spirits, to let the Divine will prevail in
our lives. Prayer cannot bring water to a
parched field, nor mend a broken bridge, nor
rebuild a ruined city; but prayer can water
an arid soul, mend a broken heart, and
rebuild a weakened will.” Prayer is when we
find the strength to help others who lack
because of parched fields. Prayer happens
when we rebuild a broken bridge…when we
rebuild a ruined city. God is the strength
and the inspiration that helps us to move
forward.
We can understand prayer as action very
easily when we put it into context. Every
morning, and on Shabbat too, we recite the
words of the Eilu Devarim. It
contains familiar instructions reminding us
to, “honor father and mother, welcome the
stranger, and bikur cholim – visiting
the sick.” But is reciting these words
really prayer? Those words are there to
remind us. They are there to stir us out of
complacency in order to act. It is the
action that is truly prayer. When we get out
of our seats and go and hold the hand of
someone who is sick and comfort them…then we
are truly engaging in prayer.
Rabbi Yochanan, the Talmud, claims that
when God enters into a synagogue and does
not find at least a minyan of people in
prayer…God is angry. If God gets angry…I am
willing to bet it is when God finds people
ignoring what the prayers demand of us.
Does God really write us in a book of
life? Where is God in our lives? These seem
to be some of the questions that Rabbi
Abraham Joshua Heschel, one of the greatest
theologians of the last century, tried to
answer in many of his writings. He wrote,
“God answers with love our trembling awe.”
In other words, what do we get in return for
baring our souls in worship? What do we
receive in exchange for all that we pour out
from our hearts? Love. Heshel went on to
write, “To pray is take notice of the
wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery
that animates all beings…Prayer is our
humble answer to the surprise of living.” We
pray because we are thankful to be alive…not
to petition God for life.
“Prayer is our humble answer to the
surprise of living.” When folks who were on
that bridge and whose cars tumbled downward
realized that they were alive…prayer was
probably their response. It was a freak
accident, probably avoidable by human hands
–certainly not the fault of God…a tragic
accident. People were saved, but God did not
save them just as God cannot mend a broken
bridge once it falls…yet God was present.
God was present in the prayers of those who
found themselves surprised to be alive. Two
miracles happened that day. It was a miracle
that even amongst the tragic death of 13
individuals…so few people did die when so
many hundreds more were at risk. That was a
miracle. That tragedy was so narrowly
averted by so many should remind us of our
surprise of life…our own gifts of life.
The second miracle was in the response of
those who helped. The emergency workers had
to turn people away because so many people
were jumping in to help. When we get over
our “surprise of living,” and are able to
help to improve the condition of our fellow
humans…God is present. Those actions are
prayer. Prayer is not the recitation of
words on a page…it isn’t the saying of the
Eilu Devarim, it is living the Eilu Devarim.
Prayer is putting into action what those
words stir in our souls. “Prayer is our
humble response to the surprise of living,”
and the awesome responsibility that comes
with it.
So we return to the dilemma that our High
Day Prayer book provides for us each year.
Who shall live and who shall die? These
prayers demand of us that we render an
account of our deeds. Are we worthy? Did we
live in such a way that will force God’s
hand in writing us into the Book of Life for
the year to come? Rabbi Harold Kushner gives
us the modern insight so needed by us
Progressive Jews:
…When the Book of Life is opened, the
entries are in our own handwriting… some
of the things that will happen to us in
the coming year will be the result of
things we have no control over. We are
born with certain strengths and certain
vulnerabilities….but… a lot of what is
going to happen to us will be the result
of choices we make. The entries [in the
Book of Life] are in our handwriting. We
may not be able to choose the cards
we’re dealt, but we decide how we play
them….
We are not ships floating without a
rudder! We have a say in how we live. There
is so much we cannot control…we cannot
control disasters in our world…but we can
control how we respond to them. As an
ancient midrash teaches us, we do not choose
the day of our death. But we can choose how
we live during each of the days we are
given. The entries in the book of life are
written in our own handwriting.
As we have prayed together this evening
and as we will pray together in the days
ahead, let the words in these books be for
us reminders of how our lives can be holy.
Let these words be reminders of the
prayerful ways in which we can and should
live.
We cannot live in fear of living...we
must live in awe and surprise of every day
that is given to us. Living prayerfully, we
can make a difference in the world. Those
flood victims facing cold weather with no
furnaces need us. The hungry in our own city
need us. Our families need us. The day is
short and the task is difficult. But we can
live prayerful holy lives connected by Torah
and action. May our prayers help us to draw
closer to one another, to the holiness of
who we really are, and to realizing God’s
presence. May the year ahead be one of
prayerful action…may we each find the
strength to be the best people we can
be…making the world a better place…and in so
doing…may we inscribe ourselves in the book
of the Living.
Ken Yehi Razon. May this be God’s
will. |
