Ki Tavo:
Deuteronomy 26:1-29:8
Isaiah 60:1-22:
Just before the start of the month of Elul, when spiritual preparations for the Days of Awe begin in earnest, my husband and I left for a week of vacation. For many months we had looked forward to this week of special time together, in a beautiful place, without our children. Riding in the car toward the airport, my husband told me that one document was missing from his file of confirmation letters for the travel plans that he had made for us. One crucial piece of vacation planning had somehow been left undone.
I felt anger rising in me. My husband had volunteered to make all the arrangements, and now, our vacation could be seriously compromised by his oversight. In the course of a brief moment, I imagined all the angry things I could say.
But a moment later, I saw clearly that if I made a fuss about his mistake, we would both feel worse, and the gap in our travel plans would still not be filled. I was able to sit quietly until my anger dissipated, rather than complicating an already challenging situation with useless fuming.
Surely, this was not rocket science, nor even a triumph of moral clarity on my part. The insight was such a familiar one: An unkind word can deepen the hurt in an unavoidably difficult situation. Yet the incident made me wonder why it is that I so often forget to act on this simple insight.
This week’s parashah contains the following familiar verse: “Now, if you hear the Lord your God, faithfully observing God’s commandments which I enjoin upon you this day…” (Deut. 28:1). In a striking departure from the plain meaning of the verse in its original context, Rebbe Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev writes that the “voice of God” to which we are to listen is the one described in the following rabbinic image: “Every day a heavenly voice goes forth from Har Horev (Mount Sinai), saying, ‘Return, you wayward children'”(Talmud Hagigah 15b).
The rabbis of the Talmud ask us to imagine that the voice of God did not cease to speak after the Torah was revealed at Mount Sinai. Rather, the voice of the divine continues to speak to each of us every day. The voice calls us to do tshuvah/repentance, to make amends for the wrongs we have committed, and seek to turn our lives toward The Holy. Each one of us, teaches the rebbe, hears this voice in our own unique way.
One may well ask: Look around the world! Does it look like a heavenly voice is actively speaking every day, asking us to mend our ways? Perhaps such a call is audible in the universe, but only to those who are willing to listen.
But then again, what of all of the good people who genuinely want to live the best lives they can? What about us, who labor again and again each High Holy Day season to reach a higher level of holiness in our lives? How is it that once again we must admit that we have committed many of the same wrongs that we forswore last year? Why is it that sometimes we are able to live up to our ideals, and at other times, we fall so terribly short?
Rebbe Yitzhak tells us that the tshuvah process includes two components. One is the part that lies in our own hands: our own genuine longing, the fearless, hard work of honest self-examination, and our effort to raise our lives to a higher level. But then, there is the part that lies beyond our control. Call it a heavenly voice. Call it mystery, call it grace. Call it whatever you choose to call it. Know that beyond our own effort, we need to be open to help from beyond or deep within us, if we are to live the lives to which we aspire.
During this penitential season, we bring great energy to our part in the process. But the rabbis ask us also to remember that every day of the year we are to attend to the other part as well: to listen, to attend to possibilites, to be ready for those graced moments when we will somehow “get it,” when we will be able to make those steps toward becoming the people we hope to be.
May these Days of Awe inspire us to examine our souls, repent for our misdeeds, and cultivate qualities of righteousness and piety in our lives. And may these holy days also inspire us to listen more deeply to that mysterious voice that may sometimes guide us imperceptibly closer to being the people we were created to be.