The week before last I made visits to two different shivah homes and officiated at a funeral. That sort of schedule is not typical but neither is it very unusual and I think most rabbis have experienced weeks that are filled with lifecycle events of one kind or another. And, of course, it is not only rabbis who can fill their weeks with communal lifecycle events. My grandmother, who was one of my earliest religious influences albeit not any kind of rabbi, was so involved in her community that she stocked her freezer with cakes and rolls that she collected at the seemingly endless schedule of weddings and sheva berachot and other simchas that she attended among her large Hassidic family. And, while happy occasions are more fun, “we should see one another at only simchas” is one of the top three lies that rabbis say.
It was unusual and notable, however, neither the funeral nor the shivah visits were for individuals affiliated with our shul. One mourner had been our student at Princeton more than fifteen years ago. His sister who lives in Kemp Mill hosted shivah. A man who retired and moved to our Chicago neighborhood where his son and daughter-in-law lived, was buried in a local Maryland cemetery next to his brother. And another man whom we know from Chicago returned to Rockville for his stepfather’s shivah.
Only in the aftermath of these three pastoral visits did I reflect and question how much time and energy I devoted to people with whom I no longer have a formal professional relationship. I was grateful that Sara was understanding about my absence from what would have been a family dinner. But I felt a bit sheepish when contemplating sharing with you that I had officiated at a funeral for non members. “Here is what I will tell them,” I thought, “I got to practice and hone my funeral officiating skills without the need for any Ohev member or your loved one being harmed in the process.” Seems like a win-win situation.
Serving as a congregational rabbi is a strange profession. I have a contractual obligation to treat each of you with love and to cultivate deep and sincere interest in the contours of your religious life. And you have a contractual obligation to give me the opportunity to share my understanding of what the Torah means with all of you at moments like this one. And while I think it is absolutely crucial that rabbis and congregations respect professional boundaries, it is challenging and sometimes unnatural for relationships that should exemplify love and care and respect and service to be defined by a contract.
And perhaps for this reason it has been important for me to maintain a rabbinic relationship with individuals who no longer employ me as their rabbi.
The Mishnah in Bava Batra describes a dynamic in which the owner of a field erected a fence on the three adjacent boundaries that surround a neighboring property.
הַמַּקִּיף אֶת חֲבֵרוֹ מִשְּׁלשׁ רוּחוֹתָיו, וְגָדַר אֶת הָרִאשׁוֹנָה וְאֶת הַשְּׁנִיָּה וְאֶת הַשְּׁלִישִׁית, אֵין מְחַיְּבִין אוֹתוֹ.
One who surrounds another on three sides, that is, she owns parcels of land on three sides of the other person’s field, and she built a fence on the first, the second, and the third sides, the court does not obligate the neighbor who owns the inner field to contribute to the construction of the partition if he does not wish to do so.
רַבִּי יוֹסֵי אוֹמֵר, אִם עָמַד וְגָדַר אֶת הָרְבִיעִית, מְגַלְגְּלִין עָלָיו אֶת הַכֹּל:
Rabbi Yossi says that if the owner of the inner field then goes and encloses the fourth side – the one remaining unenclosed perimeter of his field, he then has to pay for half of the costs of erecting the first three walls. His decision to voluntarily enclose his field demonstrates, to Rabbi Yossi, that, in retrospect, he was pretty happy to have the first three walls there.
The rabbinic interactions with those who no longer employ me demonstrate that the care and respect that we showed one another was genuine.
The eponymous Parashat Korach is mostly remembered for the dramatic confrontation between Korach and Moshe but a careful read indicates an entire coalition of rebels and agitators who all flock to Korach’s standard and there is not just one confrontation but several confrontations that play out over several stages.
Korach, as Moshe correctly intuits, is a Levi who wishes he were a Kohen (everyone can insert your favorite Kohen joke here). Datan and Aviram agitate against Moshe himself and claim that his leadership is not only a failure, but corrupt as well. There is On ben Pelet – his name appears once and then vanishes from the Torah. According to the Midrash, his wife understood the false populism of a demagogue like Korach. “You’ll either be subservient to Moshe or subservient to Korach,” she told him, “but you have nothing to gain from being included in these shenanigans.”
There are the two hundred and fifty men who wish to bring incense in firepans like the kohanim. According to Seforno, they may have been sincere in their desire to directly engage with the worship of God in the mishkan with their own hands. They certainly elicit more sympathy from the broader population because there are four stages to the confrontation that emerges from Korach’s rebellion.
First, Korach, Datan and Aviram are swallowed alive by the earth. (2) A fire descends from heaven and consumes the two hundred fifty men who bring incense in their firepans. (3) And the next day the people complain:
וַיִּלֹּ֜נוּ כׇּל־עֲדַ֤ת בְּנֵֽי־יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ מִֽמׇּחֳרָ֔ת עַל־מֹשֶׁ֥ה וְעַֽל־אַהֲרֹ֖ן לֵאמֹ֑ר אַתֶּ֥ם הֲמִתֶּ֖ם אֶת־עַ֥ם ה׃
Next day the whole Israelite community railed against Moses and Aaron, saying, “You two have brought death upon the LORD’s people!”
This new complaint is perhaps the most surprising thing of all – the people complain that those who rebelled against Moshe and Aharon’s leadership have been killed by divine miracle. I think this gives weight to Seforno’s understanding that the complaint was not in sympathy for Korach but for the two hundred and fifty men who may have inspired some respect among the people.
Be that as it may, this last rebellion sets up Moshe and Aharon to demonstrate the legitimacy of their leadership in a new and convincing way.
A plague breaks out and Aharon stands in the breach, protecting the people from the plague
וַיַּעֲמֹ֥ד בֵּֽין־הַמֵּתִ֖ים וּבֵ֣ין הַֽחַיִּ֑ים וַתֵּעָצַ֖ר הַמַּגֵּפָֽה׃
And he stood between the dead and the living and the plague was stopped.
And then God instructs Moshe to set up a final demonstration of Aharon’s leadership as the exclusive progenitor of the kohanim. Representatives of each family are told to bring a wooden staff to the mishkan. The wooden staffs are placed at the mishkan, each one labeled with the name of a family.
וַיְהִ֣י מִֽמׇּחֳרָ֗ת וַיָּבֹ֤א מֹשֶׁה֙ אֶל־אֹ֣הֶל הָעֵד֔וּת וְהִנֵּ֛ה פָּרַ֥ח מַטֵּֽה־אַהֲרֹ֖ן לְבֵ֣ית לֵוִ֑י וַיֹּ֤צֵֽא פֶ֙רַח֙ וַיָּ֣צֵֽץ צִ֔יץ וַיִּגְמֹ֖ל שְׁקֵדִֽים׃
The next day Moses entered the Ohel Moed, and there the staff of Aaron of the house of Levi had sprouted: it had brought forth sprouts, produced blossoms, and borne almonds.
And this concludes the complaining and this concludes the rebellions and this concludes the temptation to return to Egypt and the Torah records no political or religious tension for the next thirty eight years.
Moshe will face challenges, to be sure, from the next generation of Israelites, next week in Parashat Hukat. But the sprouting almond branch succeeds where a consuming fire from heaven fails.
This dynamic is so common. We fight fire with fire. When someone provokes us, pushes our buttons, offends us, questions our integrity, it is so easy to respond in kind. We also deploy power to reinforce our arguments and demonstrate that we are correct, but power can make someone submit but it does not have the capacity to convince.
Seeing Aharon’s staff sprout and grow flowers and give fruit is the opposite of a punishing fire. The staff of Aharon heals, ends plagues, and is – literally – fruitful. It saves and heals and nourishes. Leadership is established, not by power, but by love.
And that is why from time to time I am available to serve as a rabbi for people whose communities no longer employ me as their rabbi. I can only do this job through cultivating genuine care and concern for all of you. Those feelings are guided by professionalism and codified in a contract, but they cannot be shut off if and when one of us moves away.
Tuesday marks the beginning of my third year serving and guiding this community. Although I’ll be away for a bit, I will be reflecting on my good fortune to live among you, raise my children among you, and teach Torah within this unique and wonderful community. This community, like every community, is sustained by the sense of mutual obligations that we feel towards one another. Without a sense of obligation will a minyan convene on a cold winter morning or a hot summer evening? Without a sense of obligation will mourners be comforted and will the sick be visited? A sense of obligation motivates us to invest in our children’s Jewish education, and in our own continued Torah study.
But we also want to serve others out of love and want others to reach out to us in kindness and care out of genuine feelings. [This may be why there is no berakhah ordained for any interpersonal mitzvah. It would take away from the experience of being the recipient of someone else’s chesed if they paused to make a berakhah before offering us help and support]. We want our time in shul, both on Shabbat and on weekdays, to be experiences for transcendence and connection with God and not checking off a box on a list. And our Torah study should excite us, guide us, and inspire us as adults in ways that validate the time and money that was invested in our own Jewish education.
My family and I will never forget how welcoming you were when we moved here. But you had to be nice to us then. Your continued kindness and menchlichkeit that I see you extend towards my family and towards one another truly makes our community special.
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 