I would like to begin with a very personal and intimate story about myself. About 18 years ago (when I was 19), I was studying in a Chareidi Yeshiva. I was very religious and had deep faith. My goal in life was to stay in the Yeshiva, get married, and study and teach Torah my entire life. I was not even planning on going to college for, at that time, I didn’t believe in secular studies.
But even as a devout Yeshiva student, I was always plagued by questions. How do we know G-d exists? Where was G-d during the Holocaust? How do we know the Torah is Divine? And for some reason, as a yeshiva student living in Jerusalem just a few miles from where terrorists were killing people in the name of Islam, I was obsessed with the thought that had I believed G-d wanted me to kill innocent people, I would have done it.
I remember going to the Mashgiach Ruchani (Spiritual Mentor) of the yeshiva with my questions. I was not satisfied with his answers and I kept challenging. Finally, he looked at me and said, “Nissan, do you want to believe?” I said, “Yes, very much.” He told me to stop thinking about G-d. I told him this was impossible because every time I studied Bible or Jewish thought, the questions would come back. So he put me on a course of study where I would only study Talmudic Tractates that dealt with tort law (Baba Kama, Baba Metziah) all about what happens if my ox gores your cow or if we someone is negligent when watching someone else’s property. I buried myself in these Talmudic discussions for about 6 months and thereby buried my questions.
Until….one day I got sick. It was nothing serious but I was running a high fever and could no longer study Talmud. I laid in bed for three days and all I could think about were my questions. My mind was about to explode. After three days, my fever broke and I went to Ben Yehuda street because I heard that there were some used book stores. I needed to find answers to my questions.
I found a bookstore. The first floor only had the “kosher” books and I was not interested in that. But upstairs is where they had the “heretical books.” I walked up the old rickety wooden staircase. I found the shelf that had books on Academic bible, comparative religion and philosophy. I had never before in my life read anything unsanctioned by the yeshiva. With great trepidation, I took some of the books off the shelf, went over to a bench in the corner and started reading. 3 hours later, I realized something changed inside me. I had completely lost my faith. I no longer believed the Torah was divine. I was no longer sure that G-d existed. 12 plus years of wonderful day school education, hundreds of thousands of dollars of day school tuition, countless hours of praying with real tears and devotion, all of it gone. All of it was lost, in 3 hours, on a bench, on the second floor of a used bookstore in the holiest city in the world.
I share this deeply personal moment with all of your (my 500 best friends!) because I have had conversations with so many of you who are struggling with your faith. I hope that my own story (which includes loss of faith but then an intense long process of rebuilding my faith) can serve as a model for you wherever you are on your faith journey.
I have been rereading Elie Wiesel's books in the three months since his death. For many people, Wiesel's writings (especially “Night”) are a glimpse into the horrors of the Shoah. But for me, when I read “Night” as a 19 year old, the Holocaust was just the backdrop. Almost every page of the book was like an arrow piercing into my heart of faith. Let me give one example.
At one point, Wiesel’s foot was frozen and infected. He almost lost it. He was in the infirmary talking to his neighbor in the next bed. They hear bombing and shooting coming from the Allied forces and Wiesel had hope that the nightmare would end. His neighbor said:
“Don’t let yourself be fooled with illusions. Hitler has made it very clear that he will annihilate all the Jews before the clock strikes twelve…
Weisel bursts out:
“What does it matter to you? Do we have to regard Hitler as a prophet?”
The neighbor’s glazed eyes look at Wiesel. At last he says in a weary voice:
“I’ve got more faith in Hitler that in anyone else. He’s the only one who’s kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people.” (“Night” page 87)
As a 19 year old, passages like these crushed my faith in the G-d who controls the world and who answers prayers. It was a very scary time for me because my entire anchor and foundation was faith and it was all coming crashing down.
So how did I get from that very scary place to here? How am I now a rabbi with a rebuilt faith that in many ways is stronger and more enduring than before?
For this I turn to one of the names of Rosh Hashana, Yom Harat Olam (anniversary of the creation of the world). It is not really the anniversary of the creation of the world. That happened 6 days ago on the 25th of Elul but today is the anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve. G-d could only be coronated as King of the Universe once there were people. So how did this coronation take place 5,777 years ago on the first Rosh Hashana. Well there were no synagogues, no minyan, and no shofar. All they had was G-d, Adam and Eve, and the snake. G-d told Adam (who then told Eve) not to eat from the tree of Knowledge. In other words, the entire Torah was this one commandment. They were told that if they eat, they will die.
In comes the snake and tempts Eve with the fruit. At first she says she will not eat because she does not want to die.
(I remember this feeling. As a teenager, as much as I would have loved to have a cheeseburger, I was convinced that I wouldn't be able to even finish it before lighting would strike me dead!)
The snake convinces her that she won’t die so she and Adam eat the fruit. Now here is the schocker. Whose prediction was correct, the snake or G-d? The snake was correct. They did not die!
(This is like the rebellious teenager who starts to lose faith and eats the cheeseburger and….no lightning….G-d is not going to do anything).
So Adam and Eve are probably in a pretty bad place (from a faith perspective at this point). They have just violated the only commandment and G-d’s threat did not materialize.
But that is not the end of the story. I think there is a shofar in the story. It is a question. The first question in the Bible. Ayeka - Where are you? They hear G-d’s existential question. What is the point of being here. Who are they? This question which is deeper than any faith proposition draws them back.
I think that what saved me when I was 19 is that I always heard that question. I always heard the sound of the shofar. I always wanted to reconnect as my connection it was something much deeper than any article of faith and I held onto it and built on it.
This is not the place or time to go through the theological underpinnings of my reconstructed faith. My questions took me to Kabbalah and Chasidut, to Maimonides’ “Guide for the Perplexed” and many other works. I would be happy to go into more detail at other opportunities. But for now, I have one message:
Don’t give up on faith! Don’t give up on Torah and our amazing jewish values and teachings. Even if you feel like you are struggling with (or have even completely lost) your faith, ask yourself if you hear the call of “Ayeka” (Where are you). When you will hear the shofar in just a few minutes, will it just be a sound or will it reach some place deep inside of you? If you don’t hear it, try to listen even harder. If it reaches that place, grab onto it and if you want it, I promise you, you can build on it.
Let me return to Elie Wiesel. I just finished rereading “Night.” Now, in reading the book that originally shattered my faith, I found G-d on almost every page. An example:
When Wiesel and his family first arrived in Auschwitz, they heard the SS Officer say those fateful 8 words:
“Men to the left. Women to the right.”
“For a part of a second, I glimpsed my mother and my sisters moving away to the right. Tzipora held mother’s hand. I saw them disappear into the distance; my mother was stroking my sister’s fair hair, as though to protect her, while I walked on with my father. I did not know that in that place, at that moment, I was parting from my mother and Tzipora forever. I went on walking. My father held onto my hand.” (“Night” page 39).
As heartbreaking as this passage is, I see G-d all over it. I see G-d in Wiesel’s mother’s hand as she stroked her daughter’s hair. I see G-d in that holy space between father and son as they walked together hand in hand.
Later in the book, when Wiesel sees another son who abandons his father for the sake of his own survival, Wiesel offers a prayer “to the G-d I no longer believe in” that he should be able to take care of his father. I see G-d and faith in their beautiful relationship throughout the book. In recent years, I have also become very taken by Holocaust responsa and I see G-d in every Jew’s attempts during the Shoah to keep the holidays or kosher or in attempts to share a piece of bread or even a smile with their fellow.
I want to underscore that this sermon is not a theological treatise on the question of “where was G-d during the shoah?”. It is also not a description of my personal theology (nor should it be analyzed as such). It is just my way of showing that if you continue to hear the sound of the shofar, if you continue to hear the question, Ayeka, you can grab onto it and pull yourself back.
We just observed the 15th anniversary of 9/11. 9/11 happened at the time when I was working on reconstructing my faith. The images of the twin towers and the pentagon became a prominent metaphor for me. I started to think of my old faith like the World Trade Center Towers. My faith, like the towers, was soaring and majestic. It reached the heavens. But as soon as it was hit with a severe blow, it all came crashing down. My new faith is more like the Pentagon. It is lower to the ground. It is spread out. It takes a long time to navigate and understand. But when and if it receives a blow, it will continue to stand. It can be rebuilt. I am told that the pentagon has many underground floors and rooms. In other words, while it might not soar to heaven it has deep roots. A great part of my rabbinate is helping people build their pentagon faith.
This past summer, I was in Israel. I have visited Israel many times since but have never returned to that bookstore. This time, I had a burning desire to return to the place (אל המקום) that impacted me so much.
So I started looking for the bookstore. I went in one bookstore, not the right one. A second, not it either, but I was given directions to a third. I walked into a narrow alley. Found the bookstore and walked inside. This was it. I climbed those rickety wooden stairs to the second floor. I went to the shelf. I swear that some of those books on the shelf were the same ones from 18 years ago! I took a book off the shelf and walked over to the bench but instead of reading, I started to weep. It was a deep cry. I don't know where it came from but I couldn't stop for at least 5 minutes.
I had never mourned my lost faith. I never mourned my world trade center tower which soared to the heaven and now I was weeping for that loss.
After 5 minutes the tears dried up and in its place came a great sense of happiness. I looked around the shelves with the knowledge that I could read any of these books and while I might get challenged and have to rethink things, no book could shatter my faith. My new faith is strong and enduring and comes from the deepest part of my being.
So I decided I had to buy a book but not from the second floor!. I walked downstairs to the “kosher” section and I found a Yom Ha’atzmaut Machzor (prayerbook). This was particularly exciting for me because my first faith did not have room in it to celebrate Zionism and the miracle of the modern state of Israel. Today, with my new faith, Yom Ha’atzmaut is a day I celebrate the “Hand” of G-d acting in this world through human initiative.
So I ask all of you as you hear the sound of the shofar, listen for that question, Ayeka - where are you and where do you want to go? When you hear the shofar does it touch you some place inside of you? If so, grab onto it and allow it to propel you into a wonderfully fulfilling and deeply meaningful 5777.
Shana Tova!
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