Rabbi Freedman’s Shabbat Message

 וַיִּֽהְיוּ֙ חַיֵּ֣י שָׂרָ֔ה מֵאָ֥ה שָׁנָ֛ה וְעֶשְׂרִ֥ים שָׁנָ֖ה וְשֶׁ֣בַע שָׁנִ֑ים שְׁנֵ֖י חַיֵּ֥י שָׂרָֽה:

Sarah lived a hundred and twenty-seven years.

These were the years of the life of Sarah.

(Genesis 23:1)

Writing on the opening verse of this week’s sidra, the Medieval Spanish commentator, Abraham Ibn Ezra pointed out that the word ‘life’ in Hebrew is always encountered in the plural.  That is why the text does not state חַי שָׂרָה the life of Sarah but חַיֵּ֥י שָׂרָֽה the literal meaning of which is ‘the lives of Sarah’.

We find similar constructions throughout the Tanakh, for example when Abraham died – וְאֵלֶּה יְמֵי שְׁנֵי-חַיֵּי אַבְרָהָם (Genesis 25:7), when Ishmael died – וְאֵלֶּה שְׁנֵי חַיֵּי יִשְׁמָעֵאל (Genesis 25:17), and when Pharaoh asked Jacob his age – כַּמָּה יְמֵי שְׁנֵי חַיֶּיךָ – how many are the years of your lives? (Genesis 47:8)

Noting this, Rabbi Moishe Mayir Vogel wrote an article entitled The Many Lives of Sarah.  In it he remarked, following the commentary of Ibn Ezra, that the Hebrew word for ‘life’ חַיִים has no singular form and although often translated as if it were singular, really carries the meaning of many lives.  He then asked an interesting question, what is meant when Jews raise a glass and shout out לְחַיִים  L’chaim?  Most definitely, according to Vogel, it does not mean To Life, for this would be an incorrect translation.  Better, he suggested, would be to use a plural form – to the life of all those we wish to toast – our family, our community and our people.  At the very least, when we stand opposite a friend and exclaim rather enthusiastically לְחַיִים L’chaim, we are asking the Almighty to bless both our lives, his and mine, as we share a drink together. 

Perhaps there is an alternate explanation for the use of חַיִים in the plural, it being that each of us according to Jewish tradition, will in the fullness of time inhabit two worlds and thereby enjoy two lives – the first in Olam Hazeh, this world, and then in a second called Olam Haba, the world to come, the world of eternity.  This also helps to explain why the parasha which describes Sarah’s death is called Chayyeh Sarah, meaning the lives of Sarah.  For, in truth, Sarah is still very much alive.  Her legacy lives on and the people she gave birth to remain vital and resilient, vigorous and spirited.

The Torah in fact makes no clear reference to an afterlife at all.  It is said that Enoch “walked with God, and then he was not; for God took him” (Gen. 5:24); and that our forefathers not only expired but were also “gathered unto their people” (Genesis 25:8).  In later Biblical literature there are further allusions.  The Book of Kings describes Elijah being carried away to heaven in a chariot of fire (II Kings 2:11) and how the spirit of Samuel was raised from the dead by the Witch of Endor at the behest of Saul (1 Samuel 28).  From these passages and others, a belief in an afterlife developed and became embedded in Jewish theology.

 The Book of Psalms (37:18) most certainly seems to refer to an eternal existence when it states: יוֹדֵעַ ה’ יְמֵי תְמִימִם וְנַחֲלָתָם לְעוֹלָם תִהְיֶה The Lord knows the days of the innocent and their inheritance will be forever, on which Rashi comments: יודע ה’ ימי תמימים – מכיר את מעשי ימיהם ונחלתם וקבול שכרם מאתו לעולם תהיה The Lord will recognise the deeds they performed during their time on earth, and as a consequence they will receive an eternal reward.

 The first explicit reference however, occurs in the book of Daniel, which states, וְרַבִּים מִיְּשֵׁנֵי אַדְמַת-עָפָר יָקִיצוּ אֵלֶּה לְחַיֵּי עוֹלָם Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life. (Daniel 12:2) 

 But there was not total agreement among the sages in post-Biblical times.  The Pharisees for example believed in the resurrection of the dead and an afterlife, whereas the Sadducees did not believe in either of these.  During the Second Temple Period, the Sadducees denied life after death because it wasn’t written in the Torah; the Pharisees, by contrast, affirmed resurrection and immortality of the soul, most likely as a result of their acceptance of an oral tradition.

 What eternal life looks like is of course impossible to say.  But one idea came from the great twentieth century sage, Rabbi Yechezkel Abramsky, who before retiring to Israel in 1951, was the driving force behind the London Beth Din.  He taught an inspiring message based upon a verse in the book of Psalms.  “For in his death he will take nothing with him, (when he goes down into the grave) his honour will not follow him.” (Psalm 49:18)  The simple reading of this verse is that no human being, whatever possessions he may have accumulated, can take them with into the afterlife.  It is a sobering message for those who consider that amassing wealth is the single most important objective in life.

 Rav Abramsky however, saw something quite positive in this verse – that when a person goes to the grave knowing that he leaves everything behind, he should make certain to leave behind a legacy of good deeds, Torah values and humane ideals which would inspire those coming after him.  Leaving such rich possessions would inspire others and enable his spirit to live on even after death.

 One person who most certainly considered what he was leaving behind – what would be his real legacy and where his eternity – was none other than Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, who died in 2011 at the age of 56.  Jobs at the very end of his life, considering these higher thoughts, said most poignantly the following:

 “I have reached the pinnacle of success in business.  In other people’s eyes my life is a success.  However, aside from work I have had little joy.  At the end of the day, wealth is just a fact I’ve gotten used to.  Right now, lying on my hospital bed, reminiscing all my life, I realize that all the recognition and wealth I took so much pride in, has faded and become meaningless in the face of imminent death.  You can hire someone to drive your car or make money for you, but you can’t hire someone to stand sick and die for you.  Material things lost can be found again.  But there is one thing that can never be found when it is lost: Life.  Whatever stage of life we are currently at, in time we will face the day the curtain closes.  Love your family, spouse, children and friends.  Treat them right.  Cherish them.  Whether we have a $300 or $30 wallet or purse, the amount inside is the same.  Whether we drive a $150,000 car or a $30,000 car, the road and the distance are the same and we reach the same destination.  Whether we drink a $1000 or $10 bottle of wine, the hangover is the same.  Whether the house in which we live is 100 or 1000 square meters, loneliness is the same.

 You will realise that your true inner happiness does not come from material things of this world.  Therefore I hope you realise, when you have friends, brothers and sisters, with whom you discuss, laugh, talk, sing – this is the real happiness.  An indisputable fact of life: Don’t raise your children to be rich, instead educate them to be happy.  When they grow up, they will know the value of things and not the price.

 Steve Jobs died too young, but in leaving behind these words of advice, he achieved eternity.  So sadly, he learnt firsthand that death always comes at the wrong time, but he also learnt that possessions are of fleeting value and that wealth is limited in what it can achieve.  Yet feelings for another – gratitude, love and respect – these are never lost, not even in death.

 Human life, like all life is fragile and so we lose those closest and dearest to us.  Religious leaders, however saintly, cannot always offer prayers that will save their loved ones; doctors, however accomplished, cannot always find a cure to heal their spouse or child; and the wealthiest among us still become orphans, widows and widowers.  Today’s sidra may well contain depictions of death, first Sarah and then Abraham, but its titleחַיֵּ֣י שָׂרָ֔ה  reminds us that eternity is achieved by ennobling life and embracing it with the lofty values of our founding fathers and mothers – and if this is our legacy too, it will be our greatest achievement and give us eternal life in this world and the next.

 To conclude, I share with you, the thoughts of Rabbi Sacks on attending the funeral of a young man who died, like Steve Jobs, in the prime of life.  According to Rabbi Sacks, this young man was a person of the most profound religious belief and practice, who spent every spare moment of his crowded, short life helping others and bringing out the best in them, who by the sheer force of his example became a leader who transformed lives, whether as a youth leader, a student, a teacher or as a builder of communities.

 As he officiated at the funeral, he observed the many hundreds who had come to honour this young man and he said that through their tears he saw the difference this one person had made to their lives.  He recalled a film, Pay It Forward, in which the hero, a young schoolboy, is set a thought-provoking assignment by his social science teacher.  “Come up with a practical plan to change the world and improve humankind.”

 Moved by the plight of others dealing with hardship – a homeless man, his alcoholic mother, his badly scarred teacher – he suddenly envisages a way.  Normally, kindnesses are reciprocated.  They are “paid back.”  What if they were paid forward?  What if we made it a condition of doing someone some good, that they agreed in turn to do good to someone else in need?  Could you not make a virtue contagious, creating an epidemiology of generosity?

 Rabbi Sacks notes that the film ends on a note of tragedy but also of immense hope.  Despite what seemed to be a series of failures, the child does succeed in changing lives in ways no one could have foreseen.  Said Rabbi Sacks, “That is what I felt among the crowd of mourners at the funeral that day.  We had come to honour the memory of one, who without ever saying so, taught people to pay it forward, and he had left behind him a vast legacy of blessings.  And yes, he had died young and left a tidal wave of grief.  But he had also taught how never to let grief, or suffering, or sadness have the last word.  Before he died, he taught everyone how to live.”

 So we see, said Sacks, that mortality is written into the human condition, but so too is the possibility of immortality, in the good we do that continues, long after we are here, to beget further good.  There are lives that defeat death and redeem existence from tragedy and that is precisely what the rabbis meant when they spoke of Olam Haba – a world in which good will be remembered and appreciated long into the future – perhaps for all eternity.

 Shabbat Shalom

Rabbi David Freedman

The double sidra of Vayakhel-Pekudey brings to an end the Book of Shemot.  To be sure, the Book of Exodus is historic and majestic – it describes the slavery in Egypt, the Exodus, the Crossing of the Red Sea, the victory over the Amalekites and the giving of the Torah at Mt Sinai.  Yet the final sixteen chapters, virtually 40% of the book, becomes a rather technical manual describing the construction of the מִשְׁכָּן – the Holy Sanctuary, together with its various appurtenances.  On the surface, some might say that these chapters are repetitive, perhaps even, uninteresting – but as usual, dig deep into the text and there is so much waiting to be uncovered.

Let me take you on a journey into some of our Talmudic texts.  In Mishna Berachot 4:3 we find the following statement:

רַבָּן גַּמְלִיאֵל אוֹמֵר בְּכָל יוֹם מִתְפַּלֵּל אָדָם שְׁמֹנֶה עֶשְׂרֵה

Rabban Gamliel ruled that every day one should recite the Shemoneh Esreh, the prayer of the Eighteen Blessings.

This prayer has become the central feature of our synagogue services and although no form of it nowadays contains exactly eighteen blessings – on weekdays it has more and on holy days it has less – nonetheless we still call this prayer ‘The Shemoneh Esreh’ – The Prayer of the Eighteen Blessings.  Many of course use a different title, namely the Amidah – The Standing Prayer. 

The question the Talmud asks, is why ‘18’?

Many answers are advanced.  For example, one rabbi suggests that the number 18 was chosen to correspond to the eighteen occasions that God’s name is mentioned in Psalm 29, another view was that it matched the eighteen times that God’s name is found in the Shema, and yet a third idea is that it paralleled the eighteen vertebrae in the lower part of the spine – though I believe many surgeons might question the accuracy of this idea.  (Talmud Bavli Berachot 28b) 

The Talmud Yerushalmi brings two further proposals, one is that there are eighteen verses in the Torah where the names Abraham, Isaac and Jacob all appear together, and then finally an idea that links to this week’s portion of Pekudey, namely that there are eighteen separate commandments relating to the building of the Mishkan, and we find reference to each of these in the final two chapters of Exodus, where the text states eighteen times that the Israelites did exactly as God had commanded Moses. 

As to the significance of the number 18, of course it is well documented that it has the numerical value of חַי – meaning life.  (The letter ח is the 8^th letter of the Alphabet, the letter י being the 10^th)  With this in mind, the rabbis could argue that reciting the Shemoneh Esreh each day would enhance our life in this world and prepare for our eternal life in the world to come, or as Rabbi Sacks once wrote, “Making a blessing over life is the best way of turning life into a blessing.  Jewish prayer is about gratitude and resilience and forgiveness and love.  It’s about song and dance and exuberance and joy.  Go to a Jewish wedding and you’ll know what that means, and sometimes prayer should feel like a Jewish wedding.  It’s about celebrating life.” 

Others consider 18 to be highly significant because of its relationship to the number 72.  According to the mystics, God’s ineffable name is composed of 72 letters, a multiple of 18.  By reciting the Shemoneh Esreh multiple times we are able to connect with the Divine in all its forms and as a result live with faith and hope that our prayers will be heard and answered by Almighty God. 

What is Jewish prayer?

In his book on Jewish prayer, Rabbi Louis Jacobs quotes the former Chief Rabbi Joseph Hertz.  His words are moving and profound and bear repeating. 

“Prayer is a universal phenomenon in the soul-life of man.  It is the soul’s reaction to the terrors and joys, the uncertainties and dreams of life.  The reason we pray, says William James, is simply that we cannot help praying.  It is an instinct that springs eternally from man’s unquenchable faith in a living God, almighty and merciful, who hears prayer and answers those who call upon Him in truth; and it ranges from half-articulate petition for help in distress to highest adoration, from confession of sin to jubilant expression of joyful fellowship with God, from thanksgiving to the solemn resolve to do His will as if it were our will.  Prayer is a Jacob’s ladder joining earth to heaven; and, as nothing else, wakens in the children of men the sense of kinship with their Father on high.  It is an ‘ascent of the mind to God’; and in ecstasies of devotion, man is raised above all earthly cares and fears.  The Jewish mystics in the Zohar compare the action of prayer upon the human spirit to that of the flame on the coal:  As the flame clothes the black, sooty clod in a garment of fire, and releases the heat imprisoned therein, even so does prayer clothe a man in a garment of holiness, evoke the light and fire implanted within him by his Maker, illumine his whole being, and unite the Lower and the Higher worlds.” 

From this short extract, it is obvious that prayer takes a variety of forms. 

One interesting observation was made by Rabbi Sacks in an article he wrote in 2009.  He noted the custom to take three steps forward before beginning the Amidah, the “Standing Prayer.”  R. Eleazar ben Judah (c.1165-c.1230), author of the Sefer Rokeach, made the fascinating suggestion that these three steps correspond to the three times in the Hebrew Bible where the word וַיִּגַּשׁ “and he drew close,” is used in connection with prayer.

Three approaches – three prayers, but each one very different from the other. Abraham prays for justice; Judah prays for mercy; Elijah prays for God to reveal Himself. 

Abraham prays on behalf of strangers – the people of the plain.  They have done wrong, yet Abraham is concerned with their fate.  He pleads in their defence.  Abraham speaks out on behalf of the covenant of human solidarity. 

Judah pleads with Joseph for the sake of his brother Benjamin and his father Jacob who, he knows, will not be able to bear the loss of yet another beloved son.  He speaks on behalf of the family and its integrity, the bonds of emotion that bind those who share a common ancestry. 

Elijah speaks to God, as it were, for the sake of God.  He wants the people to renounce idolatry and return to their ancestral faith – to the one true God who rescued them from Egypt and took them to Himself in love.  His primary concern is for God’s sovereignty over the people. 

These three prayers, each an historic moment in the unfolding of the human spirit towards God, represent some of the emotions and concerns we bring to the act of prayer.  It is worth considering that perhaps the Talmudic explanations for the Eighteen Blessings also represent different types of prayer.

Those who pray spontaneously, as did the three patriarchs, who one by one, according to the Midrash, introduced Shacharit, Mincha and Maariv – view the Eighteen Blessings as arising from the eighteen occasions that the names Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are written within the same verse.

Those whose primary motivation for prayer is praise and thanksgiving – take their inspiration from the Psalms of David.  The Hebrew word for the Book of Psalms is Tehillim, similar to the word, Halleluyah – Praise Be to God.  To find God’s name 18 times in Psalm 29 is indicative of this idea – that before we entreat God for support or forgiveness – we should praise the Almighty.  In fact this is exactly the pattern of the Amidah which always opens with three paragraphs of praise before we ask for our basic needs such as knowledge, repentance, health, welfare and Jewish sovereignty. 

A third idea is that we should always enter prayer with humility as the penitent man, or as we would call this person in Judaism, the Baal Teshuvah.  As such we are expected to prostrate ourselves before the Almighty; this was in fact the original form of Jewish worship, now reserved for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, kneeling before God – bending our back, until our face touches the ground.  The rabbi who believed that this should be our first step to sincere supplication would have no difficulty in linking the Eighteen Blessings with the number of vertebrae in our spine. 

A fourth concept, widely held, is that prayer is the means by which we cause God to be immanent in this world.  Unlike Benedict Spinoza and other pantheists, we do not believe that God, though the author of this world, is part of it.  In Jewish theology God is above and beyond nature.  How then do we converse with God?  How do we draw God into our world to bring salvation and healing – if not through prayer.  To find God’s name eighteen times within the Shema – a text in which we are told to acknowledge the uniqueness of God, to worship Him and love Him with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our might – is the key to our devotions.  The Amidah is many things, but first and foremost it is communication between the finite and the Infinite, between man and his Maker.

Finally, there are those who pray simply because the Temple no longer exists.  Where we once had priests (kohanim) we now have sages (rabbis), where we once had a Beit Mikdash (a Holy Temple) we now have synagogues and houses of study, and where we once had korbanot (sacrifices) we now have tefillot (prayers).

In the eighteen phrases at the end of Parashat Pekudey describing Israel’s willingness to build the Sanctuary according to the word of God, we find the direct link with our current form of worship – the Beit Knesset, the siddur and mahzor, and of course the multitude of prayers composed through the ages by our greatest scholars and poets.

It is true that much of Shemot, most especially in its latter chapters, describes the detailed specifications for building a House of God, but as usual once we immerse ourselves in the rabbinic commentaries we unearth a wealth of information that gives us a much deeper understanding of what it means to be Jewish and how and why we observe Judaism.