Sermon Delivered Parshat Zachor 5782
(very lightly modified)
by Rabbi Avi Billet
“The best advice you’ve ever received,” an article by David Pogue, started as a query on Twitter when he asked (in a different context) “What’s your greatest regret?” And @susanchamplin replied that regret was her only regret. The response to it was “Wise advice: You made the best decision you could with the information you had at the time.”
He went on to ask what is the best advice you’ve received, which garnered a number of responses, one of which was “Don’t pickle things.” That line, brought to you by reader Sam Singer’s mother, means: If you have something special, use it now. “Serve daily meals on your good china. Wash your hands with the luxurious soap you received as a housewarming gift. Drink that bottle of amazing wine right away. Don’t save things for future use — because who knows what the future looks like?”
It dawned on me as we were to be reading Parshat Zachor this week, that the concept of not pickling is one that is appropo to this Shabbos. I remember as a child, whenever we went sneakers shopping, I was almost never allowed to wear them out of the store. They had to go back in the box, and I’d bring them home and wear them when I was allowed to. I still do this now! I have to remind myself that when it’s time to get new it’s because the old is done and I am allowed – I have to give myself permission – to throw out the old ones and wear the new ones.
Sometimes we live too much in the past, and we forget that there is a whole future ahead of us. Isn’t that what Zachor is all about? We have to remember the past. That’s Zachor. But the last words of the section are לא תשכח. You’ve remembered – you’ve done your Zachor. Move onward, with that memory in the rear view mirror. Don’t forget. But also don’t let that memory hold you back from moving on.
Viktor Frankl wrote in “Man’s Search for Meaning” of a survey conducted of both the patients and nurses in a hospital in Vienna in which it was discovered that over 55% of the respondents showed a more marked degree of existential vacuum, meaning they had lost the feeling that life is meaningful.
In his view this existential vacuum manifests itself mainly in a state of boredom.
He gives as an example “Sunday neurosis,” that kind of depression which afflicts people who become aware of the lack of content in their lives when the rush of the busy week is over and the void within themselves becomes manifest.
He writes, “Not a few cases of suicide can be traced back to this existential vacuum. Such widespread phenomena as alcoholism and juvenile delinquency are not understandable unless we recognize the existential vacuum underlying them. This is also the true crises of pensioners and aging people.”
So Frankl goes on to challenge each person to find meaning in one’s own life – a purpose for living and a reason to get up every morning. What gives each person the will to live, in essence, a meaningful life?
Every person can easily look back at a time in life when there was something about the life being lived that is so nostalgic, if we had the chance to go back to that time and place, we’d go in a heartbeat. Not only that, we might even experience it differently, appreciating it on a level we didn’t appreciate then. Maybe we’d appreciate the opportunity to simply revisit because it was so fleeting, as moments often are.
Would we have regrets? We’re not allowed to have regrets – we were supposed to have done the best we could with the information we had at the time.
That’s what Zachor means – remember what happened. It was a moment in time. Or perhaps a window in time.
But the real lesson is לא תשכח. What did you learn from that which you remember?
[A brief reference was made to the fact that Parshat Zachor was the last normal Shabbos before lockdowns in 2020.]
As Parshas Zachor has a unique quality of bringing people out to shul, all I want to do is bring to mind that we have all been through a lot in the last two years, and we have each hopefully reevaluated what is most important and meaningful to us in life.
When I aim to Zachor what things were like beforehand, I remember a kehillah that was so special, so engaged, so blessedly overwhelmed by the events, classes and programs that were going on in our building almost every day.
ZACHOR. If we imagine those times, and if we see that we can make an effort to be here today, then we can also לא תשכח. Don’t forget what it could be again. Baruch Hashem our minyanim are well attended, some lectures get nice attendance.
But I can tell you there are a lot of new members who are having a harder time meeting people than in previous times because it’s still not the same. Some of our longer time members come to shul and feel they don’t know anyone anymore.
I don’t have a specific solution for how that changes, but one easy way is, when you see someone whose name you don’t know, say “Hi. My name is ______. I don’t believe I know your name.” Then repeat the person’s name 3 or 4 times. I think most of us can take it from there.
But more than that, I think we can take a double lesson from President Kennedy in answering Viktor Frankl’s question.
Every one of us came to this neighborhood for our own reasons. Some stories may share similarities, but in the end, each is unique. Each journey is part of a different life with different stops along the road.
And while I think it’s great to ask what you can do for your shul, I won’t suggest that we “ask not what your shul can do for you.” Because the fact that each of us is here on this day shows that shul has a value to us in our religious lives, and I like to think it can have a tremendous value in our social lives as well, if we don’t forget – לא תשכח – what it means to have a community and to be part of one.
One of the reasons we remember Amalek at this time is to remind us, on the Shabbos before the actualization of wiping out Amalek in Haman’s plan, that we have a mitzvah to do so.
Which boils down to a simple formula. We have a mitzvah, a commandment, a responsibility, and so we make a plan, and then we carry it to fruition.
Much of the last two years got in the way, in many of our minds, of living life to the max, and having as Viktor Frankl put it, the most meaningful life we could be living.
To use the advice of Sam Singer’s mother, let us not pickle ourselves. We aren’t meant to be stagnant, waiting for the special moment when we will once again reach our potential. And like Susan Champlin put it, we should hope to minimize our regrets.
Zachor – remember what our focus was. לא תשכח – don’t forget what our goals could be moving forward. Just as this mindset brought about a salvation in the time of Purim, this mindset can bring us a salvation from living a life without the kind of focus it could have.
• For those for whom it could include more friends, let it be so.
• For those for whom it could mean more volunteering, let it be so.
• For those for whom it could mean a more meaningful Tefillah experience, let it be so.
• For those for whom it could mean more Torah study, and more seeking opportunities to grow in learning, let it be so.
• For those for whom it is getting over the final hump that allows us to enjoy life again in the same manner we did pre Pandemic, let it be so.
Remember, we have one life to live. Don’t forget that we are a product of ALL of our experiences. Where we go from the last two years is up to us.
We should be blessed to take the steps we need to take to enhance the meaning we aim to find out of life, based in the efforts we put into finding that meaning.
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