Before Shabbat

Over a lifetime of Torah reading, different portions have spoken to me at various phases of my life, each revealing new layers of meaning as I’ve grown and changed. This evolution in understanding mirrors our own spiritual journeys as we wrestle with ancient texts that remain perpetually relevant to our modern lives.

In my younger years, I was drawn to The Akedah—the binding of Isaac, where Abraham prepares to sacrifice his son at God’s command. The story both fascinated and repelled me. I found something deeply outrageous about God’s command and was troubled by Abraham’s seeming passivity in the face of such a monstrous instruction. The Akedah became my prooftext of why the God of the Torah could not be the God I would worship. My conception of God centered on compassion and care, fundamentally incompatible with a deity who would demand the destruction of an innocent life as a test of faith.

As my anger toward God softened with age (a journey worthy of its own essay), I found myself drawn to a different passage in Exodus. In this profound moment, God and Moses recognize their unique bond of trust, leading to an intimate yet limited revelation: “There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove my hand, and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen” (Exodus 33:21-23).

This text captures the essential dilemma of all divine and human relationships. Whether with friends, family, or romantic partners, we face the same truth: no matter how close we become, how many years we share, or how much we reveal to each other, some part of another person’s inner experience remains forever inaccessible. We can see their “back”—their actions, words, and what they choose to share—but never fully their “face,” their complete inner world. This reality explains our occasional shock when someone we thought we knew well does something unexpected, whether gloriously good or terribly bad.

This is the great puzzlement about others. How often do we read stories or personally experience a moment when we exclaim, “I never imagined they were capable of doing that awful, or for that matter, glorious deed.” And it’s the mystery of God. So close, like Tevye’s God who seems to be as close to the Holy One as the buttons on his coat, and yet so unknowable, so inscrutable.

We juggle this infinitely complex truth about the people in our lives and how much we can ever know them. A corollary to this is a deeper mystery with which we struggle: we ask ourselves the question, who am I? What do I want and need? What is the yearning of my soul? Where do I belong? To enter into such reflection is in the deep waters of consciousness. But to avoid those central questions is to ignore the path to purposefulness and peace. As Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

In this week’s portion, Vayishlach, we encounter Jacob wrestling with an unknown assailant at night. The ambiguity of his opponent’s identity—God? An angel? His brother Esau? A nightmare?—mirrors our struggles with meaning and identity. Through this fierce encounter, Jacob is transformed, receiving the name Israel—”One who has struggled with man and God and is triumphant.”

Yet triumph comes at a cost. Jacob limps away from the encounter, forever marked by his vulnerability. This physical reminder speaks to our own human condition: We are mortal, fallible, and prone to regret. But we are also gloriously alive, capable of experiencing life’s simple pleasures—the warmth of sunlight, the taste of cold water, the whisper of wind through trees. We can enter into our deepest places and celebrate our goodness even as we limp on our failings.

Vayishlach offers an unparalleled platform for deep reflection. It reminds us that perfection is illusory and that self-knowledge, though sometimes a terrible struggle, is essential to understanding our purpose. For these reasons and more, this Torah portion will always remain in my top ten.

Last week, I had a chance to catch up with my friend, David. We’ve known each other for 55 years and like many of the same things: good music, singing, laughing, and engaging in conversation. We talk about family issues. We talk about common friends. We talk about Israel. We talk elections. We talk– about every and anything.

I could tell David was in a funk when he answered the phone. When you’ve known someone for most of your life, you quickly pick up the vocal cues. Despite all the good things in his life, he was overwhelmed by a sense of doom and despair. To be fair, this is not an aberrant response to the news these days.

There’s a reigniting of the Syrian civil war – what are they fighting about? And the Israel-Lebanon ceasefire; but is it really a ceasefire? And don’t get me – or David – started on the war with Hamas, the ineptitude of Bibi, the tragedy of the hostages, antisemitism worldwide, and on and on.

But wait – there’s more like the Russian satellite in high orbit with a mock nuclear warhead testing the potential to take out our satellites that make life with the Internet and AI possible. Or the latest “black plastic is bad” scare that has us eying the take-out containers with some trepidation. And then, of course, the current crop of proposed presidential advisors and their proposed plans to systematically take down what is and replace it with something utterly other, which thrills some folks – but not David or me.

Shall I go on? We were feeling crushed under the weight of these seemingly intractable dilemmas. How do we go on from here? David was really feeling the darkness of it all. He’s sworn off the news and all social media. He has the genuine fear of a man facing the Apocalypse. I’m not there altogether, though I’m leaning so far into hope I fear I may lose my balance…

And then, my wife, Liza, who knows what a total nut I am about things infinite and galactic as well as origin stories and historical oddities, said, “Do you know about 536?” At first, I thought she was messing with me; “536 what? The time? The address?” “No”, she said, “the year. 536 CE.” I know 586 BCE was the year the First Temple was destroyed. But 536? Nope.

She smiled: “Check it out.” And I did.

Ask medieval historian Michael McCormick what year was the worst to be alive, and he’s got an answer: “536.” Not 1349, when the Black Death wiped out half of Europe. Not 1918, when the flu killed 50 million to 100 million people, primarily young adults. But 536. In Europe, “It was the beginning of one of the worst periods to be alive if not the worst year,” says McCormick, a historian and archaeologist who chairs the Harvard University Initiative for the Science of the Human Past.

A mysterious fog plunged Europe, the Middle East, and parts of Asia into darkness, day and night—for 18 months. “For the sun gave forth its light without brightness, like the moon, during the whole year,” wrote Byzantine historian Procopius. Temperatures in the summer of 536 fell 1.5°C to 2.5°C, initiating the coldest decade in the past 2300 years. Snow fell that summer in China; crops failed; people starved. The Irish chronicles record “a failure of bread from the years 536–539.” Then, in 541, bubonic plague struck the Roman port of Pelusium, in Egypt. What came to be called the Plague of Justinian spread rapidly, wiping out one-third to one-half of the population of the eastern Roman Empire and hastening its collapse, McCormick says.

Does it help to know that, compared to 536, today is a party, a full-on celebration? Yes – and no. Yes, because this reminds us that everything is in context. Life may be hard now, but compared to what? The suffering of the 6^th century is unimaginable. But this? We can do this; we can make it work. Somehow. 536 was the worst year to be alive: this is a cakewalk.

And no. While it’s true that people suffered in the past, that does not make this a fun moment. There are ample reasons to justify a sense of dread. So, don’t bring me reasons to minimize my angst.

I’m going to call David soon and share my 536 knowledge. I hope that will make him feel good, or at least a little better. I’m hoping (there’s that hope again) to allay the sense of Apocalypse while respecting concerns about the dangers to the most vulnerable people in America, perhaps including Jews. In 536 and in 2024, the safest way through the fog is by joining hands and walking together.

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