December 3, 2023|כ' כסלו ה' אלפים תשפ"ד The Secret to Am Yisrael: Sarita and Serarah
Print ArticleIn one of his novels, the late South African writer Alan Paton has one of his characters say: “When I shall ascend to heaven, which I certainly intend to do, I will be asked, ‘Where are your wounds?’
Rachel Sharansky Danziger was on a recent parsha podcast and she referred to her generation as the Yitzchak generation. What does that mean? Her father’s generation was the Avraham generation. It was a generation of doers, of revolutionaries. Her father, after all, was Natan Sharansky, who championed the cause of Soviet Jewry and that generation also helped create and build a Jewish state and that generation suffered a lot. They sacrificed a lot and they did amazing things for the Jewish nation. But she views herself with an important task, as well – continuity. Perhaps there may have been many Avraham’s in the history of the world, but you only achieve continuity if you are able to transmit your revolutionary values and goals to a Yitzchak. And we are, says Rachel Sharansky Danziger, a Yitzchak generation and we don’t want to fight anymore. We don’t want to struggle anymore. In Israel, we want to live in peace and in America we want to live in peace. And we hope and pray that we can live as the Yitzchak generation until messianic times, when, of course, we all know that is not true, and certainly after October 7, we all painfully know that that is not true. After all, Shmuel, the amoraic sage, stated that the only difference between this world and the messianic world is שיעבוד מלכויות, Israel’s servitude to foreign kingdoms. We know that we are in the messianic world when we are not reviled and harassed by the nations of the world and until then, unfortunately, we will be reviled and harassed by the nations of the world. Yes, until the messianic era, that old Jewish telegram joke will be true. You know the Jewish telegram joke – what’s the definition of a Jewish telegram: “Start worrying. Details to follow.” This is our present-day reality. It is a grim reality and it is something that we must accept.
But there is a silver lining. Sometimes you feel all alone and that is when you begin to struggle, but that is when you realize who you truly are. Am I talking about the Jewish people? Maybe, but I’m also talking about Yaakov Avinu. As Yaakov plans to meet Esav after being away from home for over twenty years, he decides to cross the Yaavok crossing with his family in the middle of the night and he finds himself all alone, ויאבק איש עמו עד עלות השחר. He struggles with an איש until the morning. We don’t know the identity of this איש. All we know he’s an איש. We find an איש in another context in Sefer Breishit, namely the איש, the man who tells Yosef where his brothers are when Yosef goes searching from them. In both instances, an unnamed man appears out of nowhere. In the Yosef story, the איש changes the trajectory of our founding family. Had the איש not told Yosef where his brothers were, then Yosef would never have gone there. Yosef would never have been sold and the brothers would never have gone down to Egypt, etc. The איש seems to have been planted by God to change the destiny of our ancestors. Perhaps then, the function of the איש in the Yaakov story, the wrestler in the middle of the night, is a plant by God, as well, to change the destiny of our nation. How so? Because the אישtells Yaakov the secret to עם ישראל.
Did you ever notice that Yaakov’s name is changed into Yisrael twice? When God appears to Yaakov and blesses him and tells him שִׁמְךָ֣ יַעֲקֹ֑ב לֹֽא־יִקָּרֵא֩ שִׁמְךָ֨ ע֜וֹד יַעֲקֹ֗ב כִּ֤י אִם־יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ יִהְיֶ֣ה שְׁמֶ֔ך – that you will no longer be called Yaakov but you will be called Yisrael - Yaakov probably should have said, “God, thank you very much. But the איש with whom I wrestled already changed my name when he said: לֹ֤א יַעֲקֹב֙ יֵאָמֵ֥ר עוֹד֙ שִׁמְךָ֔ כִּ֖י אִם־יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל כִּֽי־ שָׂרִ֧יתָ עִם־אֱלֹהִ֛ים וְעִם־אֲנָשִׁ֖ים וַתּוּכָֽל – your name will no longer be Yaakov but it will be Yisrael because you struggled with gods and with men and you were successful.” The same name change, but by different entities, and also for different reasons. The איש tells Yaakov that Yisrael signifies שרית – the fact that Yaakov struggled and wrestled, but why does God call Yaakov Yisrael? There is no mention of a struggle here. Rather, Rashi explains that it is similar to the word שררה or officer or leader. That’s a totally different meaning than the meaning that the איש gave. But maybe that’s the point. We are Bnei Yisrael. We are Am Yisrael. We are the nation not of Yaakov, but of Yisrael. Yisrael is the name of our nation, but what does that mean? It means that we will wrestle and struggle and it means that we will lead. Not one, not the other, but both. And, by the way, what happens when Yaakov struggles with the איש? וְה֥וּא צֹלֵ֖עַ עַל־יְרֵכֽוֹ – Yaakov gets injured. And the midrash has this cryptic line נגע בכל הצדיקים שעתידין להיות ממנו – that the אישtouched all the righteous people who were destined to come from Yaakov. Ramban interprets this midrash to refer to the persecutions of the Jews by the Romans before after the failed Bar Kochba revolt. We will struggle, we will suffer, but we will endure. But I think it’s more than simply a promise of what will happen. It is definitional to the essence of Am Yisrael. We are שרית. We struggle and we are injured. And we are שררה. And we lead, as well. That is Am Yisrael. The Yitzchak generation is necessary maybe for one generation, to keep the revolution of monotheism and the revolution of consciousness going. But to be an Am Yisrael, we will need to struggle at times and we may limp at times from these struggles.
I was thinking about this dichotomy of what it means to be an Am Yisrael when I read a beautiful post by Chana Wurtzel, who was Amy Entel when I was her NCSY chapter advisor and she was my chapter president in Plainview over thirty years ago. She currently lives in Israel and this is what she wrote. The post is entitled, “If you live here, you know.”
If you live here, you know what it is to wake up every morning carrying the collective exhaustion of an entire country in your heart, and to know that every man, woman, and child in the country is waking up feeling the same way.
If you live here, you know what it is to send your children off for the day with an extra hug and lingering look because the reminder that we never know when life could change in an instant became all too real overnight.
If you live here, you know what it is to have to force yourself to stop refreshing the morning news and start your day.
If you live here, you know what it is to need that second cup of coffee in order to even attempt to get to work.
If you live here, you know what it is to drive your kids to school and breathe a sigh of relief when you see the men in uniform guarding the school gate.
If you live here, you know what it is to feel the mixture of pride and worry as you drive through the streets of your neighborhood and see the flags hanging from the porches and the billboards proclaiming "together we will win!" and "am yisrael chai!" everywhere you go.
If you live here, you know what it is to feel disoriented at the grocery store because all of the usual staff has changed and you don't recognize the cashiers anymore.
If you live here, you know what it is to see shuttered businesses throughout town because the owners are off fighting a war.
If you live here, you know what it is to not be able to find the fruits and vegetables you are looking for, since there is nobody to work the fields so there is no supply.
If you live here, you know what it is to hesitate before planning any sort of personal celebration since you aren't sure if it's appropriate and your heart just isn't in it, but at the same time you know that life goes on and that we must appreciate it.
If you live here, you know what it is to have to reduce your work schedule because you simply don't have the brain space to be able to be productive for as many consecutive hours as you always did.
If you live here, you know what it is to hold pages of names of soldiers to pray for in your hands, and to recognize every family name on the list because they are all members of your immediate community.
If you live here, you know what it is to have to set aside a significant amount of time for prayer because the list of individuals that you are praying for takes so long to get through.
If you live here, you know what it is to have to rethink so much of what you had planned for the year, because there are so many reasons why those plans are no longer relevant.
If you live here, you know what it is to stand and line the streets in the pouring rain to support your neighbors as they drive to bury their son who died keeping us safe.
If you live here, you know what it is to be able to communicate with others, whether friends or strangers, with a sympathetic smile and slight nod, without saying a word.
If you live here, you know what it is to feel so connected to every other human being that you interact with... from the pizza delivery guy to the plumber to the telemarketer to your closest friend.
If you live here, you know what it is to see people from other countries posting on social media about travel plans and everyday events and wonder how their reality can be so different from yours.
If you live here, you know what it is to hold your breath collectively with the entire country waiting for the news update every night.
If you live here, you know what it is to know that you slept but to also remember being half awake all night and to feel like you didn't sleep at all.
If you live here, you know what it is to feel safer here than anywhere else in the world.
If you live here, you know what it feels like when everyone is looking out for each other and that you are part of one giant, national family.
If you live here, you know that it's the greatest privilege in the world.
If you live here, you know what it's like to be part of something so special that really.....there are simply no words to describe it.
What we are witnessing in Eretz Yisrael is the dichotomy of Yisrael – intense struggle and unbearable suffering and pain, coupled with unparalleled pride, unity, spirit, volunteerism and leadership. שרית coupled with שררה. We are not destined to be the Yitzchak generation. We are destined to be Am Yisrael.
The question that each one of us living in the diaspora needs to ask ourselves is whether we have the strength and the resolve to fully identify as a member of Am Yisrael. As I mentioned last Shabbat in my report on my rabbinic mission to Israel, one young Anglo mother who made aliya a few years ago told me to send my community the following message: “Give until it hurts and don’t stop.” They are hurting in Israel and we must hurt as well. Our brothers and sisters in Israel continue to struggle and continue to limp from the effects of the war, and we must be willing to do the same, whether that means continuing to provide much needed financial support until it hurts, continuing to volunteer until it hurts, continuing to pray or recite Tehillim and make additional mitzvah observance commitments until it hurts, continuing to write letters to politicians or posts on social media until it hurts. It is our commitment to be willing to sacrifice and struggle that ultimately defines us as Am Yisrael, not just in Israel, but in America as well.
In one of his novels, the late South African writer Alan Paton has one of his characters say: “When I shall ascend to heaven, which I certainly intend to do, I will be asked, ‘Where are your wounds?’ When I will say, ‘I haven’t any,’ I will be asked, ‘Was there nothing worth fighting for,’ and that is a question that I do not want to have to answer.”