Exodus-1/10/2012
This week we read the Ten Commandments
1 God spoke all these words, saying:
2 I the Lord am your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, the house of bondage:
3 You shall have no other gods besides Me.
4 You shall not make for yourself a sculptured image, or any likeness of what is in the heavens above, or on the earth below, or in the waters under the earth.
5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I the Lord your God am an impassioned God, visiting the guilt of the parents upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generations of those who reject Me,
6 but showing kindness to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
7 You shall not swear falsely by the name of the Lord your God; for the Lord will not clear one who swears falsely by His name.
8 Remember the sabbath day and keep it holy.
9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God: you shall not do any work — you, your son or daughter, your male or female slave, or your cattle, or the stranger who is within your settlements.
11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth and sea, and all that is in them, and He rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it.
12 Honor your father and your mother, that you may long endure on the land that the Lord your God is assigning to you.
13 You shall not murder.
You shall not commit adultery.
You shall not steal.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
14 You shall not covet your neighbor's house: you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male or female slave, or his ox or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.
15 All the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the blare of the horn and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they fell back and stood at a distance.
Based on what the people saw they immediately fell back and stood at a distance. They were awestruck and moved away from the display God put on.
Today many of us continue to feel a great divide between our daily lives and our spiritual lives. Today many religions and religious zealots push modern spiritualist away from organized religion due to their fixed belief system that believes only people like them can truly experience God and know God’s love.
Let me ask you a question - a short one, but I want you to answer it.
Have you experienced God’s love at one time or another in your lives?
Do you try to understand God in your life or in the world?
If you answered yes to either or both those questions then tell me how other humans can tell us that we don’t know God because of our belief system? It is one thing if the power and grandeur of God at Mt. Sinai causes the Israelites to distance themselves from the source of such power. It is another thing if people who call themselves believers cause other humans to distance themselves from religion and spirituality.
We call it zealotry for a reason. The display of excessive zeal or fanaticism. As reform Jews we’ve always tried to balance our faith and heritage with our desire to live and be included in the modern world as part of a modern society. We didn’t tear up our right to a spiritual core, or our need for something more in our life than just work and family. As reform Jews we’ve held onto our role as modern spiritualists who hold onto our love of God at the same time we actively participate in the modern world in hopes of helping to mend it. It is our job to fight “zealotry for bad causes” in the world so that no human can tell another that their belief in God is wrong or that their spiritual life is inadequate. It is our responsibility to nourish our own spiritual needs in communities that support our growth and help us build paths towards a higher understanding of God.
I talked briefly tonight about the V’Ahavtah being a perfect prayer. In a famous story where Rabbi Hillel is asked to teach a potential convert the entire Torah while he stands on one foot, Hillel boils the Torah down to “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
I believe our entire spiritual and moral lives can be boiled down to the words of the V’ahavtah.
And you shall love Adonai your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might. Set these words, which I command you this day, upon your heart. Give them to your children. Speak of them in your home and on your way, when you lie down and when you rise up. Bind them s a sign upon your hand; let them be a symbol before your eyes; inscribe them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Be mindful of my mitzvot and do them. so shall you sanctify yourselves to your God. I am your Eternal God who led you out of Egypt to be your God. I am your Eternal God.
Our entire lives encompassed in a paragraph. I know many put on tefillin, the leather boxes used as the signs upon the hand and the symbol before the eyes, but I see this metaphorically - let the teachings always be portrayed in the deeds of your hands and may the actions before your eyes embody the teachings of the way. Mezzuzot - The symbols that to this day remain as symbols upon on our doorposts and on our gates. The symbols are meant t show the rest of the world that if a mezzuzah marks a doorpost or gate one can be sure of the values of that family. If one seeks refuge or safety a Mezzuzah indicates the morals and values of the Jewish home one would find beyond all the marked doorposts and gates.
The Ten commandments and God’s display caused the Israelites to take a step back. The Vahavtah draws us in, imploring us to love God with all our heart, all our soul and all our might. And in doing so it commands us to love not only ourselves, but all of humanity with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our might. We read the Ten Commandments a few times a year from the Torah and are expected to know most of them. But the Vahavtah is included in almost every prayer service Jews read throughout the day.
It is up to us as reform Jew to create the most spiritual and meaningful life we can create. We don’t have blind faith pounded into us by zealots and fanatics. Rather we must pick up our faith and beliefs each day, turn them over and over in our hands and in our minds to glean a little more of the mystery of the life we live and the God we believe in. Each day we see the challenge of believing in the One God, creator of all, when countless humans treat each other as less than God, ignoring the spirit of the creator breathed into all of us.
So at the mountain we remember all standing, trembling, hearing and listening. Today we all pray together fearful and trembling, hoping that our prayers will be enough to someday remind all humans that if we truly loved God there would be no need to kill anyone in the name of God.
May we know peace in our lifetime. May all of faith find the courage to believe that their faith is enough for them just as my faith is enough for me. May we remember the commandments brought down from Mt. Sinai just as we take to heart the living words of the V’ahavtah.
Kayin yehi ratzon - May this be God’s will