D’var Torah From the Partnership for Jewish Life and...

February 28, 2013 • Washington Jewish Week30

D’varTorah From the Partnership for Jewish Life and Learning

by Luisa Moss

is week’s Torah reading is Ki Tisa, Exodus30:11-34:35

Talking about God is not an easy topic.Every person has a personal idea of

whom and what God is and if God even ex-ists. is year as my 3rd though 6th gradersgather for tefillah on Monday nights we havebeen discussing God. I have been amazed bymy students’ ability to articulate their beliefsand discuss their struggles to find a relation-ship with God.

One of my students’ greatest challenges istheir inability to see God. Similarly, in thisweek’s Torah reading, the Israelites who justa few weeks earlier had been living in Egyptand witnessed idolatry, are told that they mustnow believe in only one God. e idea that aphysical God did not exist was incomprehen-sible to them. In parshat, Ki Tisa we experi-ence the building of the golden calf. eIsraelites built the golden calf to provide a vis-ible symbol of God’s presence. Moses, theirconduit to God, has been up on a mountainand they do not have anyone to turn to forguidance. According to Samson RaphaelHirsch, “the people did not understand thatGod had taken the initiative in reachingdown to them, believing that Moses had thepower to summon God. Without Moses, howwould they ever be able to experience God’spresence again?”

In today’s hands- on world, God’s lack of aphysical presence makes belief even more dif-ficult. While we are not alone in the desertlike the Israelites, life presents itself with mo-ments of vulnerability. e Torah does notoffer us a physical description of God but itdoes offer us a myriad of descriptions thathelp us personify God. In this parsha, we havea striking example of God as a parent. God isangry at the Israelites for building the goldencalf and punishes them, but God still lovesthem and will always take care of and protectthem. Parents find at times that they mustscold or punish their children for doingwrong but the love for their children runsmuch deeper. God punished the Israelites sothat they would learn what they did waswrong and so they would modify their behav-ior. Parents oen feel the same way and wantto help their children learn from experience.God may serve as a role model for us on howto respond to inappropriate behavior; the rep-rimand immediately follows the misstep, anexplanation helps us and guides others tomake a better decision in the future, and the“covenant of love/loyalty” remains intact.

As a Jewish educator, I try and help my stu-dents bridge the gap between not being ableto see God and yet visualizing God by en-

couraging them to see themselves as God’spartner. e Jewish people made a covenantto work as partners with God to help makethe world a better place. I ask my students tothink about different ways that they can be apartner with God. God withdraws fromdoing everything (tzimtzum) to make spacefor us to do our share. What in this worldneeds our help to make it a better place? Areyou frustrated with global warming? Canyour individual act to recycle or do a water-shed cleanup make a difference? Perhaps youare heartbroken about the hunger and home-less issues that afflict our neighbors. Collectfood for the hungry or bring games to playwith children in a shelter. Each step we taketo help one another allows us to come closerto God and make the world we live in a betterplace. Our actions reflect God’s ways. As thekabbalists explain, we come into a shatteredworld and our responsibility is to help put thebroken shards back together and restore theworld to a place of wholeness and comple-tion. In this way we become partners withGod in the ongoing work of creation.

On this Shabbat, Ki Tisa, may we be blessedwith the wisdom to accept challenges, a senseof patience, and the ability to connect to theDivine as we work towards a more completeworld.

Family discussionquestions:

1. Role play, you areGod and you see the Is-raelites building agolden calf how wouldyou have responded? Ifyou were Moses?

2. Does your familyhave a brit (covenant) ofhouse rules? If not, con-sider creating one to-gether. How would itaddress behaviors inpublic spaces? Would itcover behavior in “pri-vate spaces?”

3. Are there incen-tives/ consequences?What is the motivationbehind stipulatingthem?

4. While we cannotsee God’s likeness, howcan we feel God’s pres-ence?

5. How can we create a relationship withGod? How can we be a partner with God?

Luisa Moss is Education Director at Congre-gation Adat Reyim, Springfield, Virginia. Our

weekly d’vrei Torah are written under the guid-ance of the Partnership for Jewish Life andLearning. ey are intended to inspire discus-sion at your Shabbat table. To learn moreabout the Partnership go to pjll.org.

God: perceived in partnership