Mina's Musings: Ha'azinu 2017

Ha’azinu 2017 – Making Heaven on Earth

Shabbat Shalom.  It is good to see all of you this Shabbat Shuvah.  It is a simple fact of Jewish life that the number of attendees at Shabbat Shuvah services is often smaller than a “regular” Shabbat.  People are simply tired of being in shul.  This is true all the more so on years like this, where Shabbat literally follows Rosh Hashanah the very next day.  So I  appreciate your steadfast devotion to the observance of Shabbat and your understanding of the fact that as far as the rabbis of the Talmud were concerned, Shabbat was even more holy than Rosh Hashanah.  The only day more holy than Shabbat is Yom Kippur which is called Shabbat Shabbaton – the Sabbath of Sabbaths.  So I truly mean I appreciate your presence this morning.

In any case, I want to tell you about a conversation I had with a college student last week.  You see, on a very regular basis the office receives phone calls from college students who are taking any number of classes on religion, multiculturalism, etc. who must go out from their own religion and/or culture and seek out a new religion or culture to learn about.  So last week I met for 45 minutes with a student from Lord Fairfax College and next week I am meeting with a group of young people from NOVA.  I try to never say no to these young people who are trying to improve the world by expanding their knowledge about other peoples.

So one of the very first questions this young woman from Lord Fairfax asked me was:  “What makes Judaism different than the other monotheistic religions?”  This question, or a variation of it, is one of the ones I am asked on a regular basis. 

I’d like to share with you part of what I told her.  I said, “Judaism is unique in its focus on the fact that we human beings are made b’tzelem Elohim – in God’s image.  Being made in God’s image means that we have to treat one another with kindness and decency or else we are in effect mistreating Go.  Moreover, we believe that human beings were made to be God’s partners in creation.  While others are taught not to ask questions or simply submit to God’s will, we as God’s partner see it as our right – if not obligation - to ask questions and demand justice from God, our leaders, etc.  Moreover of the three monotheistic faiths Jews are the least focused on the afterlife.  You see, Jews believe in an afterlife as a logical extension of the fact that we’re made in God’s image.  If God is eternal and God made us like God’s self, then we are too.  The Torah itself tells us that God breathed the breath of life into Adam, and the rabbis understood that to be a reference to our souls, which like God, are eternal.  BUT the big difference between Jews, Christians, and Muslims is that we don’t worry about the afterlife.  Our assumption is that God is full of mercy, compassionate, and forgiving, and we pretty much figure most people – Jewish and Christian – will go to some sort of heaven (pick how you want heaven to be) when they die.  The thing is, since we aren’t worried about eternal damnation we are able to focus on the here and now.  That is why Jews have always been involved in revolutions, social justice, etc.  Our job while on this planet is not to worry about believing a certain way in order to get to heaven after we leave this world, but to do acts of loving-kindness and help others so that we make this world a little bit more like we imagine heaven to be.  If we do that then we pretty much figure we’ve got heaven in our grasp when the time comes.” 

When I stopped speaking the young woman looked at me, a little stunned.  It was hard for her to fathom a religion that didn’t focus on the afterlife, and she was even more dumbfounded when I said, after a follow-up question, “Yes, Jews believe most non-Jews who are decent people and believe in God are DEFINITELY going to heaven just like us.”  When I told her it was actually EASIER for non-Jews to go to heaven – just the seven laws of Noah versus our 613 her jaw actually fell open.  She didn’t know what to say, so then she asked me a new question and the discussion moved along. 

I share this vignette with you today for two very different reasons.  The first is that I believe we need to be reminded again and again as Jews how in fact we ARE different and unique from other religions so that we can appreciate the difference and remember obligations as God’s partners. The second is because of the fact that there are some Jews who to this day deny that there is a Jewish believe in the afterlife – even though our liturgy references it multiple times each day.  However, there are two separate verses in this morning’s Torah portion Ha’azinu that the commentators have long seen as references to the afterlife.

The first is towards the very beginning of the portion.  We read:  “Ha-tzur tamim po’olo – The Rock! His deeds are perfect, Yea, all His ways are just; A faithful God, never false, true and upright is He. (Deut. 32:4)   

Concerning the words “A faithful God, never false, true and upright is He,” the great 11^th century French commentator Rashi writes:  “A faithful God – He can be relied on to reward the righteous for their righteousness in the World to Come.  Even if their recompense is delayed, in the end He will keep faith with them.  Never false.  He even gives the wicked whatever reward they earn for righteousness – but in this world.”

It is quite probable it is for this reason that we read that verse – hatzur tamim – at almost every Jewish funeral.

And then thirty-five verses later (Deut. 32:39) we read:  “See, then, that I, I am He; There is no god beside Me.  I deal death and give life.”  Concerning this verse the 12^th century Spanish commentator Ibn Ezra (of Calahorra) wrote:  “Many think that the doctrine of eternal life can be derived from this phrase, where “I deal death” comes first and “I give life” follows.”  Ibn Ezra continues by quoting another commentator, Hai Gaon, who taught that the reason the Torah doesn’t explicitly discuss the World to Come was simply because everyone knew about it from tradition!

And so my friends, on this Shabbat Shuvah, as we all wait anxiously to be written in the Book of Life, our portion comes to teach us that in the end all of us are written for life – some for life in this world, others for life in the next.  And our job is not to worry about it – our job is to make THIS life as heavenly as possible through all of the mitzvoth, through all the acts of loving-kindness we do for others each and every day.  Shabbat Shalom.