Ha’azinu
Deuteronomy 32:1-32:52
II Samuel 22:1-22:51
Leaving Yom Kippur behind, we are influenced by the season of soul-searching and thoughts of change. The Torah portion Ha’azinu consists almost entirely of poetry, and is Moses’ valedictory song. The stammerer whom we first encountered in the Book of Exodus has become the people’s poet laureate. Hope and renewal are themes in the verses we will read this Shabbat. They reflect how Moses was changed by the trials of his life and those of the Jewish people whom he led on a journey measured in miles and in spirit.
In chapter 52 of Deuteronomy, Moses prays:
Give ear, O heavens, let me speak;
Let the earth hear the words I utter!
May my discourse come down as the rain,
My speech distill as the dew,
Like showers on young growth,
Like droplets on the grass.
We can understand how much the earth, the young trees and the grass yearn for moisture. Here, water is a metaphor for cleansing, for renewal, for change, and for salvation. Moses wants the people of Israel to receive his instructions as thirstily as the land of Israel receives rain. The earth needs water for nourishment just as we need Torah to nourish us.
Here is a story about the power of water to bring change.
A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She wanted to give up. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose. Her mother took her to the kitchen and filled three pots with water.
In the first, she placed carrots; in the second, she placed an egg; in the last, she placed ground coffee beans.
She let them sit and boil without saying a word. In about 20 minutes, she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. Same with the egg and coffee.
Turning to her daughter, she asked, “Tell me what you see.”
“Carrots and egg and coffee,” the daughter replied.
The mother brought her daughter closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. She then asked her to take the egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, the daughter observed the hard-boiled egg. Finally, the mother asked her daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled, as she smelled its rich aroma and tasted its delicious flavor.
The daughter then asked, “What’s the point, Mother?”
Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity — boiling water — but each reacted differently. The carrot went into the water strong, hard, and unrelenting, but it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile, but, after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.
“Which are you?” she asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?”
We would do well to ask ourselves the same questions at this time of the year.
Am I like the carrot? Am I strong when things go well but wilt when faced with pain or adversity?
Am I like the egg? Was my heart once open to life and love? Do I look the same on the outside but have I become hard and unyielding on the inside?
Or am I like the coffee bean? Can I respond to challenges and change? Can I use the heat of life — with its worries, sorrows, regrets, the hard-won knowledge that comes from experience — and transform that understanding into something fragrant, meaningful, life-enhancing?
Martin Luther King Jr. wrote that we must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope. So, for all of us in this season of reflection, let us change rather than be changed, let us fill the future with passion, with courage, with hope.
Rabbi Larry Raphael is the senior rabbi of Congregation Sherith Israel in San Francisco.