Dear {{first_name}},
We’ve reached the fifth and final book of the Five Books of the Torah, Devarim (Deuteronomy). This book is mostly comprised of Moses’ final speeches to the Jewish people with his reflections, hopes and dreams for us. For this reason, many have considered the book of Deuteronomy as the original Ethical Will. An Ethical Will is comprised of values and stories a person can leave behind for their loved ones. We’re all used to the process of a Last Will and Testament where people bequeath their belongings to their loved ones but this will, an Ethical Will, leaves them with something less tangible and much more valuable: their essence.
Often when we’re drawn to the bedside of a loved one who’s dying, we reflect and recall who they were and what they lived for. We do so because it’s an opportunity to sit in our grief and to evoke the past. We do so because we sit powerless against the natural order of the world and need something to have power over. And we do so because it’s the appropriate thing to do at that awful moment.
We’ve witnessed so much awfulness over the millennia as a people. We’ve seen humankind at its worse. We’ve seen destruction, murder, expulsion and so much more. At the same time, we’ve managed to produce the gift of monotheism that birthed Judaism, Christianity and Islam. We’ve managed to contribute a disproportionate level to the world of science, mathematics and the humanities. We’ve created culinary traditions and music and art. We have such a glorious past filled with ups and downs.
As we embark on the final days of the Three Weeks and approach the commemoration of the Ninth of Av, we’re sitting and waiting and filled with grief. We can choose to look to the past and reflect and grow, or we can look to the past and long for that which is no more. The truth is Judaism has always been a forward-looking faith. While deeply rooted in the past, and eternally committed to the now, Judaism has always looked for a pathway forward. When our Temple laid in ruins and our people were scattered, we made the almost impossible choice to evolve our religion from a Temple based one into a home and synagogue centered one. This move permitted us to move forward. This move transformed us in a way that could never have been imagined. As I sit here grieving, I ask what we did then that brought us to now? The answer is we elevated non-temple-based rituals and our gift of learning. Judaism is a ritualized relationship with God and each other. That’s our inheritance and that’s what we leave for the future. It’s what Moses gave us through the generations.
We, here at OVS, need to do our own looking to the future while honoring the past and being present in the now. The most regular acts of gathering we have our services. It’s no secret we’ve had a large drop in attendance over the years. COVID was catastrophic for us and almost all houses of worship. We’ve arrived at a point where COVID is no longer holding us back from living our lives and we cannot allow it to hold us back from services either. We need to rebuild. We need to grow. We need to get to a place where our community assembles together in our sacred space. It’s our inheritance… it’s what was handed down to us.
This year, we lost a number of people who used to be regular attendees at services. One of the people we lost was Benson Habib who was always at services whenever we had them. OVS was his special place and he always came when it was available. I’ve been asking people to help us by being our “Benson.” It’ll take many of us committing to replace him, or better yet, fill his place. It’ll take each of us committing to our community and to ourselves. We can look back and see history, but now we need to act by looking forward towards a legacy.
Please join us in person on Saturday mornings at 8:45 am (feel free to arrive any time you’d like). Please join us for Mincha and Arvit on Shabbat (Saturday evenings), this week at 8:30 pm. Please join us for Sunday Morning Minyan at 8:30 am each week. This coming week we have two additional opportunities to be together for Tisha B’Av. Please join us on Wednesday night at 9:30 pm and Thursday morning at 9:00 am so we can seize our past and look to the future.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Hearshen
