Dear TBZ Community,
My hevrutah (study partner) and dear friend, Rabbi Sharon Brous, wrote an op-ed in the New York Times this week, urging us to see humanity amid the horror at Bondi Beach. Her words feel especially necessary during a week in which each day has carried more pain, more destruction, and more violence (you can read the op-ed here, with a gift article).
Rabbi Brous writes about our need to look for light in the midst of darkness:
“I need the hints of humanity that remind us that what is is not what must be. The quiet insistence that there is more light than darkness in this world, that tenderness and love can prevail over even the most virulent hatred. Give me the counterfactual that makes it impossible to fall into despair, that will keep me from slipping into the self-defeating certainty of our impending doom.”
I imagine many of us felt this week how hard it has been not to fall into despair.
On Sunday morning, we woke to the news of the horrific terrorist attack at Bondi Beach in Australia, during a Hanukkah celebration. As geographically far away as Bondi Beach is, Jews murdered while celebrating Hanukkah felt painfully close.
That very day, here at TBZ, we gathered for our annual community Hanukkah party. The room was packed with children and adults of all ages learning, playing, joyfully singing, and eating together. As I shared during candle lighting (briefly, because there were so many little ones with us): in times of darkness, our response, our commitment, is to bring more light; to believe and trust that we have the capacity to increase light.
This came just one day after the shooting at Brown University. Closer not only geographically, but because many of us know students and faculty there. It forces us to ask how it is possible that in America we send our children to college carrying the fear of such tragedy.
Only days earlier, we had sent twenty-five Hanukkah packages to TBZ college students. I had the honor of writing a personal card to each of these “kids,” wishing them Hanukkah sameach (happy Hanukkah). Over the weekend, I thought of each of them and what this moment must feel like. Many reached out to say how much the gifts meant, how connected they felt to our community.
And then, only days later, we learned of the homicide of a Brookline resident, someone who lived near TBZ members, connected to families in the Brookline schools. We still do not know much, but this tragedy feels painfully close and reminds us that the culture of guns in this country is too real, and too near.
How do we hold all of this?
How do we counter so much darkness?
How do we see, and trust, that the light we are increasing each night, as we light our Hanukkah candles at home with loved ones and in community, is real, present, and possible?
The Hasidic master Sefat Emet (Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter), teaching on this week’s Torah portion and on Hanukkah, quotes Midrash Rabbah:
במדרש קץ שם לחושך כי לכאורה נראה כי החושך רק אפיסת אור
“God placed an end to the darkness. At first glance, darkness seems to be simply the absence of light.”
But the Sefat Emet teaches something different: darkness is not permanent. It exists for a time, and then it passes.
God’s light, he says, is actually everywhere, all the time:
אבל החושך הוא כסוי לאור
Darkness is not the absence of light; it is a covering over it.
When the world is not ready to fully receive God’s presence, that light is hidden.
This idea is reflected in Pharaoh’s dreams in this week’s Torah portion, Miketz. Pharaoh dreams of years of abundance followed by years of famine: years so harsh that they seem to swallow and erase the good that came before. Joseph insists, in Genesis 41:25,
חֲלוֹם פַּרְעֹה אֶחָד הוּא
“…the dream of Pharaoh is one.”
The famine does not destroy the years of plenty; it covers them. The goodness is still there, beneath the surface.
When the Torah says,
וַיִּפְתַּח יוֹסֵף אֶת-כָּל-אֲשֶׁר בָּהֶם
Joseph opened all that was in them
the Sefat Emet reads this spiritually: Joseph knew how to open up the hidden goodness within reality itself.
There is a spark of good in every place and every moment. The Sefat Emet calls this spark “kol”– an inner fullness that connects everything. Even when it is concealed, it remains.
This teaching reminds us: That goodness is still there. It is hidden, and it will be revealed again. That, perhaps, is the work and the message of Hanukkah, and the work of every day.
This image of darkness as something that covers light, rather than replaces it, feels hopeful to me. If we can hold onto the idea that light is always present, even when it is hidden, perhaps we can keep walking forward.
I know I need that.
Rabbi Brous ends her op-ed by writing:
“I will remember that light is born from the midst of the deepest, most impenetrable darkness. That has always been true, and it is today, too.”
Or perhaps we can say: the light is already there, even when it is hard to see or feel it. And together, in community, we can remind one another that beneath the darkness, the light is shining.
May we find strength, courage, and patience.
May all who are ill or suffering find healing.
May the brokenhearted be comforted.
May we stay open-hearted in a world that teaches us to close.
And may we continue to seek, in prayer and in action, a path that honors all life.
Shabbat Shalom & Hag Ha’Urim Sameach (Happy Holiday of Light),
Rav Claudia