Tag: Rabbi Efrat Zarren-Zohar

There’s an idea I return to often: the word “Torah” comes from the root for the Hebrew word hora’ah, which means instruction or teaching. In other words, the Torah isn’t only a story we read - it’s something meant to teach us, again and again, in every generation. There is always something to learn, if we’re willing to listen closely. In this week’s parsha, Va’era, we are still at the very beginning of the Exodus story. The Israelites are enslaved in Egypt. Their labor is relentless. Their lives are tightly controlled. And Moshe has only just stepped into his role as a leader. Hashem sends Moshe back to Pharaoh with a message we all recognize: “Let My people go.” But at this point in the story, nothing dramatic happens. There is no sea splitting. There is no mass exodus. In fact, things don’t improve at all. Pharaoh refuses. The system tightens. The people remain trapped.

This week, as we conclude the book of Bereshit (Genesis) and turn the page to begin Shemot (Exodus), we experience a profound shift in the narrative of the Jewish people. There is a natural tinge of sadness in leaving the intimate, personal dramas of our ancestors—Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—whose lives, full of both soaring faith and relational mistakes, have shaped our identity. Yet, this transition is more than just a change of books; it is a fundamental transformation in our collective identity: the move from being a large, extended, complicated family to becoming a small, yet complicated nation.

There is a heart-wrenching story that took place in a DP camp, on erev Yom Kippur with the Klausenberger Rebbe. He was about to do some internal preps for the coming holiday, when he heard a knock on his door. He opened it to a young girl. With tears in her eyes, she said, ‘Please Rebbe, I am part of the orphans here. I remembered that my father used to bless me right before Yom Kippur, but now I am all alone and am wondering if you could give me the traditional blessing that a father is supposed to give his daughter.’ The Rebbe, much moved, said, ‘I will be your father. He took out a kerchief and placed it on the girl’s grateful head, and recited the blessing. She left, very appreciative. A few minutes later there was another knock, and this time, a whole slew of little girls appeared.

About a decade ago, I encountered what I believe to be one of the most challenging and powerful nuggets of wisdom in our Jewish tradition. This is a midrash that tells the story of how Joseph returns to the pit his brothers threw him into when he was 17. He returns to the location of the worst moment of his life and recites the prayer that one says over a miracle. This is an extraordinary act! Joseph turns the hardest part of his life into a blessing. When I first heard this, I didn’t think this was relevant to me. Why would I want to turn the worst moments of my life into blessings? Aren’t some things just really hard and we should leave it at that? I initially responded negatively to this message, but it stayed with me in the years to come. It somehow became my spiritual work. I didn’t know how to do it, but I knew this was my task. I had to find a way to think of the worst moments of my life as blessings. I thought about Joseph.

Some Torah portions reassure you that things will work out. Miketz says, ‘not so fast.’ Dreams collide. Families disappoint. Plans fall apart. Years pass with no resolution. If your life has ever taken a turn you didn’t order, Miketz is speaking directly to you. Joseph’s story works on me because it isn’t tidy. He dreams big, gets misunderstood, disappears for a while, reinvents himself, and then has to figure out who he actually is once people finally start listening. It’s not a success story. It’s a “how did I end up here and what do I do now” story. I used to think Miketz was about achievement. Look, he made it. Now I realize it’s about preparation. Joseph doesn’t rise because he’s lucky. He rises because when things get complicated, he does something very Jewish. He plans…

Quick, who found the cruse of oil that lasted eight days? On Chanukah we celebrate two miracles: our military victory over the Greeks and the one small cruse of oil that kept the menorah in the Temple lit for eight days. Between the two miracles, our tradition holds that finding the oil is more important. The re-dedication of the Temple capped by the eight days of menorah light is the real Chanukah miracle. That’s why the holiday is called Chanukah, which means “dedication,” and why we light a menorah to commemorate the events. If I started with the question of who led the victory over the Greeks, everyone would know that the answer is Judah, the Maccabee. But the hero who brought about the critical miracle goes un-named. Why is that? This is one of Chanukah’s lessons. Who the hero was isn’t important; it’s what they did that matters. And to appreciate what they did, let’s look at what they didn’t do…

Let’s set the scene. Jacob is on his way home after twenty years with his trickster father-in-law, Laban.The exile is over. Jacob has wealth, wives, children, and — perhaps for the first time — a sense that life might finally be settling into something like normalcy. And then, reality intrudes. Jacob remembers that he has unfinished business. Namely: Esau — the brother he cheated, the brother who vowed to kill him, the brother whose anger has echoed in Jacob’s mind for two decades. Jacob sends his entire family across the Jabbok River. He is left alone on the far bank — a man with nothing but the night and his thoughts.

This topic is challenging because when we are facing trials, especially trials in which we experience pain, it feels almost like gaslighting to connect gratitude to that experience. That’s why I very intentionally put the words “trying to find” before the word “gratitude.” The author Haruki Murakami once wrote: "Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional." Along with death and taxes, another life experience we will not be able to avoid is… pain. Everyone alive will experience pain of one sort or another. How we process and experience that pain is what differs from person to person, which we all know just by observing ourselves & others. And that is what makes “Trying to Find Gratitude” so necessary.

As we head into Shabbat and read Parashat Toldot, I have found myself thinking about the premiere of Wicked: Part Two – For Good. Many of you know that the world of Oz has been part of my thinking for a long time. My graduate thesis focused on The Wizard of Oz and its presence throughout American culture, and last year I wrote aboutChanukah, light, and the lessons we draw from Wicked and “defying gravity.” With part two of the Wicked phenomenon being released this week, the timing feels especially fitting to circle back to the narrative and its misunderstood main character. Parashat Toldot tells the story of Jacob and Esau, two brothers who grow up in the same home yet experience the world in very different ways.

“Chessed (kindness) begins at home.” This saying has begun making its way around Jewish schools and seminaries over the past decade or two. I remember vividly hearing it after many years of studying in Yeshiva, at the time I had begun dating. Out with a young lady who had studied in the finest of seminaries in Israel, I was told: “chessed begins at home.” Since then, I have heard it several times, and it struck me as odd every time I heard it. No one argues that one should make sure to be responsible for those around them before seeking other opportunities for kindness. The problems begin when “chessed begins at home”, becomes chessed also ends at home. Why is it a problem? Because if chessed began and ended at home, the Jewish people would never come into being.

An Israeli friend and teacher tells the following story: He was about to make a sandwich for his young daughter – using a well-known luncheon meat. When he told her what he would be serving her, she asked him: “What’s a post-trauma sandwich?” You get it, of course. Israelis, even young children, know what it means to live in a post-trauma time. So, let’s talk about post-trauma. Jews have been living that way since the very beginning. It was on the morning when Isaac awoke and sensed something was different. The camp was too still, the air too empty. Someone was missing.

When asked about the foundations of a Torah-observant life, most of us would likely point to Shabbat, the laws of kashrut (Jewish dietary practice), regular prayer, and Torah study. These, indeed, have stood at the heart of Jewish life for centuries. Yet, they do not fully capture the broader vision that the Torah first sets forth in this week’s parasha, Lech Lecha. “Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and curse those who curse you; and all the families of the earth shall bless themselves by you.” (Genesis 12:1-3). Here, God calls upon Abram (later Abraham) to leave the comfort and familiarity of his home—to uproot himself from his country, his birthplace, and his family—and embark upon a journey to an unknown land.

I went to Jewish day school from pre-kindergarten through high school — the kind where we sang Hatikvah before math, debated Torah before lunch, and learned to spell “chutzpah” before “committee.” And every October, without fail, the famous Halloween memo would arrive —reminding families that Halloween was a pagan holiday and that Jewish kids should skip the costumes and candy. At the time, it felt a little extreme. What was so wrong with one night of fun — sugar, masks, and pretending to be someone else? It took me years to understand that it wasn’t about the candy. It was about the costume. About whether we wear our Jewishness like a mask — something we take on and off — or like a mission, something we live every day. And that question — of identity, conviction, and courage — is at the heart of Parashat Noach.

When I read the news that the hostages had indeed been released as planned, I shed tears of relief, tears of joy, tears of sorrow for those who were lost, so many tears filled with such a mix of intense emotions. The co-mingling of joy and sorrow is a leitmotif in Jewish life. From breaking a glass under the chuppah to Monday’s release of the hostages, we Jews live with a mix of complex emotions at the heights of our happiness and the depths of our despair. Hagai Luber, whose son made the ultimate sacrifice for the Jewish people, in the poem he wrote "With Unmixed Feelings," invites us to reflect on a complex reality where joy and grief coexist, and each moment presents emotional and ethical choices. May this be a new beginning (a kind of Bereisheet or Genesis) for the hostages and their families, the people of Israel, and the Jewish people around the world.

On Oct. 14, 1663, the English civil servant Samuel Pepys decided to pay a visit to the Jewish synagogue in London’s Creechurch Lane. Jews were a novelty in Restoration England. They had been expelled from the realm nearly four centuries earlier, and it was only in 1656 that they had once again been permitted to live on English soil. Pepys, knowing nothing of Judaism, wasn’t aware that his excursion happened to coincide with the most euphoric day in the Jewish calendar – the festival of Simchat Torah, or “rejoicing with the Law.” What he saw bewildered him.

One of the privileges and responsibilities that I have as a congregational professional is serving on the faculty of the Union for Reform Judaism's summer camps. Imagine my surprise when three summers ago, my first serving in the unit at Olin-Sang-Ruby Union Institute (OSRUI) that focuses on the arts for students in the seventh through tenth grades-that our topic was Kohelet, the Book of Ecclesiastes. My immediate reaction was: "It's so dark. This is summer camp where they are supposed to have fun! What are they going to get out of the ramblings of an older person reviewing and lamenting on life?" Three summers later, the staff members-and even some of the campers-are still talking about the session. The mere mention of the word Kohelet evokes a nod, a knowing utterance, of something that was deep yet accessible, provocative yet distressing, memorable and powerful.

Parashat Ha’azinu, which we read this Shabbat, is almost entirely poetry: Moses’ farewell song to the people. At the end of his life, he does not leave them with laws or lectures, but with words to be sung. Moses understood that songs linger. A melody can echo in our minds for years, touching the heart as much as the mind. He wanted his message to endure not only as teaching but as music — something that could be carried in memory and spirit. Commenting on a verse that could sound quite bleak - “See now that I, I am He… I put to death and I bring to life” (Deut. 32:39) - Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, z”l, explained that it reveals the rhythm of covenantal life: brokenness and renewal are always intertwined. As we have just emerged from the Ten Days of Repentance, we know this rhythm well. We faced our flaws, our brokenness, and then celebrated the possibility of renewal.

The sound of the shofar is primal & ancient. It produces a strange sense of awe and reverence. Think back to that moment before the first blast is sounded; a hushed expectancy fills the synagogue. At the moment we hear the first piercing note, we are struck with an almost childlike wonderment. And for most of us, it is one of our earliest childhood memories. The notes of the shofar are not beautiful by any musical standard, but somehow, we find in their thin piercing blasts something that calls to us. We feel connected to the shepherds and kings, the prophets and prophetesses, who first heard these same notes in the land of Israel more than 3000 years ago. But what is the call of the shofar?