Shabbat Nachamu

Va-et'chanan Deuteronomy 3:23–7:11

This week's commentary was written by Rabbi Mychal B. Springer, director of the Center for Pastoral Education and the Helen Fried Kirshblum Goldstein Chair in Professional and Pastoral Skills, JTS.

The dreaded has happened. The inconceivable has come to pass. The Temple has been destroyed. Our center is no more. Our sense of safety is shattered. The world is no longer familiar. We are in a place of disorientation. So this Shabbat we begin the hard work of consolation: Nachamu, nachamu ami ("Comfort, oh, comfort My people, Says your God" [Isa. 40:1]). These are the opening words of this week's haftarah portion. Each week, for seven weeks, we will receive another haftarah of consolation, until we reach Rosh Hashanah. The number seven conveys completeness, like the seven days of the week. Like the seven days of shiv'ah. Consolation cannot happen in one brief moment. It is a process, a journey. How is it that consolation does happen?

There are three verses in the haftarah that stand out as offering great insight into the dynamics of consolation:

A voice rings out: "Proclaim!"
Another asks, "What shall I proclaim?"
"All flesh is grass,
All its goodness like flowers of the field:
Grass withers, flowers fade
When the breath of the Lord blows on them.
Indeed man is but grass:
Grass withers, flowers fade—
But the word of our God is always fulfilled!" (Isa. 40:6-8)

These verses contain a dialogue between two voices. They can be understood as the voices of the Prophet and God, the voices of two angels, the voices of two people, or the conflicting voices inside a single individual.

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Shabbat Hazon

Devarim, Deuteronomy 1:1–3:22

This week’s commentary was written by Rabbi Daniel Nevins, Pearl Resnick Dean of The Rabbinical School and dean of the Division of Religious Leadership, JTS.

What is your vision of a righteous city? This is an important question, because this week is known as Shabbat Hazon, the Sabbath of Vision, and the vision offered by our prophets is that of a city that has gone astray, abandoning the path of righteousness. In our haftarah, the book of Isaiah opens with the chilling depiction of a “faithful city” (kiryah ne’emanah) that has become distorted into harlotry. What sins does Isaiah associate with such faithlessness? It is not ritual error but ethical failure that he decries. If so, then what would a righteous city look like? Is such a vision within our grasp?

Shabbat Hazon leads into the black fast of Tish’ah Be’Av in various ways. The opening chapters of Deuteronomy and Isaiah, which we read this week, set the stage for the calamity that will be described in horrific detail by the book of Lamentations. In Midrash Eikhah Rabbah, we read that three prophets used the language of Eikhah (how?!) to describe the sorrows of Israel. Moses, who saw the people in its glory, asked, “How can I bear their burden alone?” Isaiah, who saw Israel in its fallen state asked, “How did the faithful city become a harlot?” And the book of Lamentations, traditionally attributed to the prophet Jeremiah, saw Jerusalem destroyed and asked, “How did the great city become like a widow?”

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Mattot-Mas'ei

Numbers 30:2-36:13


This week's commentary was written by Dr. Alan Mintz, Chana Kekst Professor of Hebrew Literature in the Department of Jewish Literature, JTS

The Torah is replete with lists of every kind: the generations before and after Noah, the enumeration of the tribes and their chieftains in the desert, the catalogs of forbidden foods, the inventories of priestly garments. The book of Numbers, which begins with a census, is especially true to its name. The beginning of chapter 33, which opens Parashat Mas'ei (the second of the double portions read in the synagogue this week), presents one of the grandest lists of all: the forty-two stations of Israel's wandering from Ramses in Egypt to the steppes of Moab on the eve of the entry into the Promised Land. Although we may feel that we have heard all of these place names in earlier weekly readings, the fact is that a significant number of these stations (verses 19–30) are mentioned here for the first time. The uniqueness of this list is indicated by the fact that Moses is specifically instructed to record the names in writing. In many synagogues, a special singsong melody used by the Torah reader also makes this passage unique.

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Pinchas

Numbers 25:10−30:1

Pinhas in America?

The Torah portion deals with intermarriage, a problem we know all too well today.

By Rabbi Ismar Schorsch; reprinted with permission of the Jewish Theological Seminary for MyJewishLearning.com.

In 1962 I graduated rabbinical school and entered the army for a two-year stint as a chaplain. Such national service was then still required of all JTS graduates before they could take a pulpit. After completing chaplaincy school in New York, I drove to my first assignment at Fort Dix, New Jersey. I arrived in the late afternoon and decided to visit the Jewish chapel where I would preside without delay. That was my first mistake.

Outside the door paced an agitated, well-dressed gentleman in civilian clothes looking for a Jewish chaplain. I revealed my identity all too quickly and smugly, my second mistake. In the office I would occupy for less than a year (the army would reward my stellar work at Fort Dix by sending me to Korea), he unloaded on me an impassioned account about his daughter who was going to marry a young Greek in basic training at Fort Dix. I couldn’t tell exactly whether the father, a wealthy man from Connecticut, was furious because the kid was Christian or poor and uneducated. In fact, the father suspected him of seeking to marry his daughter for her money. He insisted that I call in the kid to disabuse him of his folly, and I, by now floundering in my inexperience, reluctantly agreed. To my surprise, the young man came when I summoned him and turned out to be good-looking and charming. Despite great discomfort, I carried out my futile task and never heard from him or his nemesis again.

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