In a few weeks I am going to spend the day in New York to attend the graduation ceremony of Yeshivat Maharat. Members of this community are graduating. Two women who interned with me are graduating. Another group of very old friends are graduating and I’m looking forward to seeing them there. Yeshivat Maharat itself as an institution is marking 100 graduates this June which is a very significant accomplishment in the field of women’s religious leadership in the Jewish community. Or maybe I should say “female religious leadership” to be more grammatically correct?
My Reform rabbinic colleague from Princeton Hillel, Rabbi Sara Rich, was insistent that the phrase “woman rabbi” or “women rabbis” was bad English (after all, she pointed out, you would never say “man rabbi”) and we should instead use the phrase “female rabbi” since adjectives modify nouns and the word “female” is an adjective!
Adjectives modify nouns and adverbs modify verbs. But, at least in Biblical Hebrew, it is not always obvious which word is being modified by another.
צַ֞ו אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל וְיִקְח֨וּ אֵלֶ֜יךָ שֶׁ֣מֶן זַ֥יִת זָ֛ךְ כָּתִ֖ית לַמָּא֑וֹר לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד׃
Towards the end of Parashat Emor we receive the command: bring you pure oil of beaten olives לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד to light the lamps “tamid.” What does it mean to לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד? Well, we have a ner tamid in our shul and so we think that the mitzvah is to light an eternal light – the beit hamikdash needed a ner tamid just like our shul.
But Rashi points out that “tamid” is modifying l’ha’alot – to light rather than modifying “ner” – lamp. It’s modifying a verb which makes it, not an adjective, but an adverb.
In Rashi’s words:
תמיד. מִלַּיְלָה לְלַיְלָה, כְּמוֹ עוֹלַת תָּמִיד, שֶׁאֵינָהּ אֶלָּא מִיּוֹם לְיוֹם
This is not the first time that the Torah makes a nearly identical command. At the beginning of Parashat Tetzaveh we read:
וְאַתָּ֞ה תְּצַוֶּ֣ה ׀ אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל וְיִקְח֨וּ אֵלֶ֜יךָ שֶׁ֣מֶן זַ֥יִת זָ֛ךְ כָּתִ֖ית לַמָּא֑וֹר לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד׃
You shall further instruct the Israelites to bring you clear oil of beaten olives for lighting, for kindling lamps לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד for lighting lamps tamid.
Here too Rashi explains that tamid is an adverb modifying “l’ha’alot” and not an adjective modifying “ner.”
תמיד. כָּל לַיְלָה וְלַיְלָה קָרוּי תָּמִיד, כְּמוֹ שֶׁאַתָּה אוֹמֵר עֹלַת תָּמִיד וְאֵינָהּ אֶלָּא מִיּוֹם לְיוֹם
If you want an additional piece of supporting evidence that buttresses Rashi’s understanding you can look to the ta’amei ha’mikra, the cantilation marks which link לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר to light the lamp, with a pause before the modifier “tamid.” – The mitzvah is to perpetually light a lamp, not to keep a lamp lit at all times. The beit hamikdash, the midrash tells us, had windows designed to spread light to the world outside its walls, but that illumination was not the product of a one-and-done lighting, but the outcome of someone coming each and every day and lighting it’s light.
And so it remains with any worthy endeavor. If we want to be a source of guidance and light and inspiration in the world, or we wish to expose ourselves to guidance, light, and inspiration, that requires a regular and recurring effort to create that light לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד.
We know this from the world of avodah, service of God. Rashi himself connects the perpetual / regular lighting of the lamp to the Olat HaTamid the every-day korban that was brought each morning and afternoon in the beit hamikdash. There was not a tamid offering at each moment, there was a tamid offering every morning and every afternoon. This, according to the Talmud, is the paradigm for our own daily prayers. Connecting to an ancient liturgy, allowing ourselves to give voice to our own vulnerability, expressing our deepest yearning and fears and hopes in prayer, is one of the most counter-cultural things we do and learning how to do it well takes daily effort. Personally, the struggle plays itself out in my life in two contradictory challenges: the struggle to recruit and convene a minyan each weekday morning and each weekday afternoon, and the struggle to avoid distractions from my phone while I should be focused on tefilah.
We also know it to be true from interpersonal relationships. There is a famous story that Rav Chaim of Brisk was once discussing the conceptual foundations of Jewish marriage with one of his rabbinic colleagues, probably R. Yoseph Rosen, the Rogatchover Gaon. The Rogatchover had a theory, backed up by several clever proofs mined from otherwise obscure details of Jewish marital law, that halakhic marriage was a sort of perpetually renewing set of mutual obligations. Rav Chaim thought this theory was a bit much and responded, “if you are correct, then I can wish you a Mazal Tov, and another Mazal Tov…and another Mazal Tov” on your perpetually renewed marriage.
But, bracketing the dispute between the two rabbis, every relationship requires continued and regular investment of time and energy and effort and affection. לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד.
Building a community in which the things we say about ourselves are experienced in the real world by those who live and visit takes ongoing effort. I experienced the Covid years as a devastating and demoralizing catastrophe, from a professional perspective. Thankfully, no shull members died, but the programs and communal infrastructure that had been built, one challenging step at a time, two steps forward, one step back, one step forward, two steps back, year after year – were all washed away like a sand castle when the tide comes in. I know many others experienced those years in similar ways. What choice do we have as a community? We light the lamps again לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד.
More recently, I’ve had the experience of visiting a beloved Holocaust survivor who now lives in Jerusalem, who relives the traumas of his childhood when he hears stories of starving and tortured hostages. There are nightmares from our past, and inherited traumas from our history that have recurred and that recurrence is a reminder that no victory is complete and no worthy task only has to be done once.
As the world has darkened in so many ways in recent years, and especially in the shadow of the war, I’ve had the terrible thought of relief that so many people I’ve known – both relatives and public figures – are no longer alive to see such suffering and pain and vulnerability. I’m glad my grandparents were spared the knowledge of the world as it is right now. I feel the same way about Elie Weisel. Rabbi Steinsaltz. Nechama Leibowitz and others (Mario Cuomo/ Scoop Jackson / A.M. Rosenthal / Bill Safire / Daniel Elsberg / Pete Seeger)
Those of us who are alive have a burden which is also a responsibility and is also a blessing. לְהַעֲלֹ֥ת נֵ֖ר תָּמִֽיד. The light has to be lit every day.
I don’t know who needs to hear this. Many of you bear hidden burdens and suffer secret sadness. But, even when things are going well, we need encouragement. Our shul board is turning over in a few weeks, I am in the home stretch of the end of my second year living here and serving this community. I hope that most of you, like me, experience living here and shaping this special community to be a joy and an honor. But even things that are great joys and great honors, can entail a great amount of work.
Let’s light our lamps: in our homes and households, in our shuls and schools. Let the light shed inspiration and guidance and illumination on a dark world. And tomorrow, we will do it all again.
Shabbat Shalom.
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 