Making Meaning of Our Past

When we recount difficulties that we have experienced in the past, we have the benefit of distance and perspective. Even when we are in the midst of a difficult period, remembering past challenges can strengthen us, teach us important lessons, and guide us through the current moment. We revisit painful events throughout our lives to assess how we have grown and changed, especially as we are going through this challenging period of the virus.

This is how Rashi’s teacher, Moshe ha-Darshan, explains the list of locations the Israelites traveled to throughout their journey from Mitzrayim (Numbers 33:1): “to show us God’s kindnesses, even though God had just decreed over them that they would wander and meander throughout the desert.” He goes on to explain that God didn’t have them wandering aimlessly from place to place in the desert without any rest. In fact, they only traveled to twenty places in the span of 38 years. This is to teach that God took care of them and comforted them throughout their wanderings in the desert.

The tradition is obviously invested in portraying God as a God of comfort, not of vengeance. This teaches us to look back on the perils and losses we experience along our own journeys with graciousness; to make meaning of our lives and our relationship with God.

During this acute period in the Jewish calendar of the three weeks leading up to the commemoration of our ultimate experiences of destruction on Tisha B’Av, I take comfort in the prayer we say on fast days, quoted from Isaiah 65:24: “Before they even cry out, I shall answer, while they are still speaking, I am listening.” When I look back at my own experiences of loss, I see how God had already planted the seeds of redemption that gave me the tools to cope and the supports to manage.

How are we going to look back on this long trek through the pain of the pandemic, the unknown journey and our losses through this protracted period? Let us learn from our ancestors’ example in the Torah and in recent generations who have looked backwards to affirm life and God’s love even in the midst of their losses. This is what we do when we recite the words of kaddish.

When we chant this section of Torah that recounts each of the stops along the journey, we use the same nusah, melody that we use to chant the Song of the Sea as the Israelites crossed the sea on dry land. This beautiful tradition again affirms that the trajectory of the Israelites’ travels through the desert were always directed towards redemption. How do we internalize such an optimistic outlook for our lives?

During the period of pandemic, let Beth El Congregation members look back, with faith in God’s love, at your individual lives and at our people’s history. Let us remember how our people has emerged from past destructions, and how we have faced our own vulnerability, as individuals, with incredible strength. May this strengthen you as a congregation as you continue traveling on this journey together, celebrating each other’s simchas, comforting one another, and always redirecting each other towards redemption.