Rabbi's Corner
From the January 2008 Temple Times
The Japanese are familiar with a haiku that translates roughly, "The roof over my head having collapsed, I can now look up and see the stars." The roof over our heads at Temple Emmanuel didn't actually collapse, but the haiku still serves as a life lesson for us regardless. And, like many a morsel of Jewish wisdom, has many facets of meaning.
Upon first hearing the news about the fuel leak at our synagogue, I couldn't help but see the hidden irony. Instead of celebrating our collective memory of a bleak time when there was not enough oil in the temple, now we are vexed with having far too much, or at least a great lot of oil not where it was supposed to have been.
We are now as a community facing some great challenges. The lost oil itself wasn't cheap, and the cleanup and structural repairs which will be necessary to make in our synagogue's foundations also will not be cheap. But we are fortunate on many accounts. We are extraordinarily lucky that this oil spill did not involve the loss of life. The building on Chestnut Street is damaged, but no one is in the hospital and the building still stands. We thank God for that. Would that our friends in Gloucester were so lucky.
The Temple is only a building made of stone. Its people are what make the community. That's you. You know, the great irony about the festival of Hanukkah is that even after the miracle of the oil, and even after throwing off the yoke of the Greco-Syrians, the revolt of Judah Maccabee eventually lead to ruin. The Hasmonean Dynasty which the Maccabee founded became corrupt and lead to communal strife and eventually the downfall of the independent Jewish state. That's what can happen when we make a building more important than people.
Yet the reality of making needed repairs to our home on Chestnut Street in the coming months and perhaps years, requires your help more than ever. Yes, there is a serious financial challenge. But the challenge to the community is much more than dollars and cents. It involves hearts and minds. Yours. We need your active support, input, and voice.
Barely a few months ago we celebrated the festival of Sukkot in which we built a fragile structure outside on the terrace which reminds us of the fragility of life itself. That very Sukkah is supposed to be built such that, like the Japanese haiku, we can look up and see the stars. There are those in our history of sages who state that the temple made of hewn stone atop Mount Moriah in Jerusalem HAD to be destroyed. If only so that we could look to ourselves and know that it is the people that make up the Jewish community, not the structures we build with brick and mortar. Indeed, I have seen for my own eyes what happens when we shift our priorities in this regard. In 1989 in Jerusalem I witnessed a torn Jewish community physically hurting one another at the foot of the Western Wall, beneath the Temple Mount, fighting over the right to pray at that Temple site made of stone. An irony that harkens all the way back to the Maccabees.
There is a calligraphic character in the Chinese language which means "disaster." But when you change just one brushstroke, it becomes the word "opportunity." We now have at hand the opportunity to breathe new life into our community. And it takes you to do that.
I don't like to play the numbers game but we need a critical mass of people to rebuild. If everyone on our membership brought just one new person into our community, our groundswell of participants could double overnight. Everyone has something personal to contribute. There is a beautiful Torah portion that describes the building of the Tabernacle in the desert where every single member of the Twelve Tribes brought something special and personal to build the worship site. And likewise today in Wakefield, whether it be providing funds, offering a skill, serving on a committee, participating in a study group, joining a Shabbat service -- there is a place for YOU in our community. Let us hear your voice.
It is said that a ship is safe in a harbor. But that's not what harbors are for. As we head towards that uncertain horizon, come join our new quest for communal growth.
And be glorious with us under sail.
B'shalom,
Rabbi Mark R. Newton