The Gift of Perspective
Rosh Hashanah Morning 5768
Rabbi Joseph R. Black
Congregation Albert -
Albuquerque, NM
My Dear Friends,
Earlier this morning, we heard the clarion call of the shofar - urging us to action; telling us to evaluate the degree to which our deeds and our ideals are in synch with each other - as individuals and as a community. One of the main goals of these Yamim Noraim - these Days of Awe - is to provide us with an opportunity to step back from the chaos of our daily existence and focus on how we are living our lives. Both Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur provide us with a sanctuary of time within which we are able to immerse ourselves in the vitally important work of introspection which accompanies these holiest days of the year. The sound of the shofar urges us evaluate who we are, where we are going, and where we want to be.
The Shofar calls us to do Teshuvah - a word that literally means "return". But in order to do true Teshuvah, we need to set aside time; we need to pause from our daily lives and gain perspective. This enables us to learn from our past mistakes and make corrections as we move on to the future. Facing our flaws is painful. We don't like to take the time to evaluate our deeds, thoughts and vision. True Teshuvah means that we need to take a long and hard look at our actions - even those in which we have invested a great deal of effort and energy. It is only after such periods of reflection that we can correct our mistakes and build on our strengths.
I recently heard a story about a pilot who is reported to have made following announcement to his passengers: "Folks," he said, "this is the Captain speaking. I have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that we are off course. The good news is: we are making excellent time."
Rings true doesn't it? How many times do we become so committed to a particular path that we fail to see that it is taking us far away from where we originally intended to go? How many of us have made the same mistakes, over and over again: in our relationships, in business decisions, in the way we treat others around us at work and at home. Change is hard. It is often painful. But it is essential as well. Human nature is such that once we have invested a great deal of energy into a particular path we don't like to turn around and make corrections - even if we are on the wrong course. There is no shortcut to Teshuvah. In order for us to grow as individuals, we need to acknowledge our present weaknesses and commit ourselves to improving in the future.
Each year, on Rosh Hashanah morning, I try to take a different perspective on the torah reading we just heard - The Akeydah - The Binding of Isaac. In previous years I have tried to make sense out of the horror of this story: How could God ask Abraham to sacrifice his son? How could Abraham have agreed?
This year, however, I want to focus on just a few key verses of our text in Genesis chapter 22. It says:
Commenting on this last verse, our rabbis ask the question: "How did Abraham know that he saw the right place?" Think about it: Abraham is given an impossible task. He is sent away to do the unthinkable - and he doesn't even know where he is going. Three days pass - without any dialogue in the text and suddenly, Abraham sees the place from "far away" - in Hebrew, Meyrachok.
What is going on here? I think the answer to this question can be found within the text itself. We read that Abraham saw the place "…from far away…" - from a distance - Me-rachok. Maybe the text is teaching us that distance is an essential aspect of seeing, understanding and accepting the challenges that lie before us.
Often, when I am counseling people in the midst of a crisis, one of the most important things that I can do is to give them permission to feel what they are feeling - in the moment. So many of us, in our rush to feel "normal," don't allow ourselves to experience the pain, the sorrow, the anger or the confusion that comes with trauma, or loss, or illness. We're uncomfortable with our inability to "move on" from our experience - we want to heal, instantly, and when we don't, we feel that something is wrong with us. The best thing that I can sometimes do in this situation is to help them understand that it takes time and distance to be able to heal - to understand, to evaluate and to appreciate all of the things that have happened. One of the ways that I sometimes try to demonstrate this is by asking a simple question: "Which is a better place to see the size and scope of the Sandia mountains: in the foothills or in Rio Rancho? The answer, of course, is Rio Rancho because the distance from the mountain gives us the proper perspective to take it all in. When we are standing in the foothills, all that we can see is a huge wall of rock that looms over our heads.
So too, when we face a challenge in our life, the enormity of the tasks that lie before us can sometimes be overwhelming. We need to be able to step back and evaluate what lies in front of us. If we dive in too soon without adequate planning and evaluation, oftentimes we end up worse off than when we began in the first place. Abraham was able to see where he was going - to get a sense of his mission - because he had the distance and perspective he needed - he saw the place Me-Rachok - from far away.
Perspective is not only an important part of healing - it also plays a vital role in almost every aspect of our lives. Last year, I was chosen to participate in a program called "Good to Great for Rabbis" that was sponsored by an organization called STAR - "Synagogue Transformation and Renewal." Over the course of the year a group of Rabbis from around the country met on an ongoing basis - in person, by telephone and using online resources - to study the key concepts in Jim Collins' bestselling business book, Good to Great. The idea behind this program was to help mid-career rabbis 'fine-tune' their Rabbinate.
In his book, Collins teaches that truly great companies share several characteristics that have enabled them to rise above their competition and achieve tremendous success. One key element of Collins' "Good to Great" paradigm is the willingness of companies to confront what he calls the "brutal facts" of their current reality. This means taking a step back in order to gain perspective and asking difficult questions - challenging cherished assumptions and looking carefully at both successes and failures with an eye to learning, growing and improving. What is true for businesses is also true for Rabbis, Synagogues and all of us here today who understand the importance of the process of Teshuvah. Collins writes that when we start with an honest and diligent effort to determine the truth of our situation - regardless of how painful or difficult that might be - the right decisions often become self-evident. Once we overcome our resistance to looking at things the way they really are - the path to change becomes clearer and less daunting than it was before.
Collins, Jim Good to Great - Chapter 4: "Confront the Brutal Facts (Yet Never Lose Faith)
It's amazing how Collins' paradigm for success in business also mirrors the process of Teshuvah that fill our hearts and minds during these Yamim Noraim. But these ideas are also particularly relevant for our congregation at this point in time because we have embarked on a vitally important process of self-evaluation that will determine the future direction of our education program at Congregation Albert.
It's no secret that the past few years have been tumultuous in our Education wing. We have had several personnel changes. There have been serious problems with curriculum, communication and organization. In the past, we have attempted to fix these problems as fast as we could and, unfortunately, instead of looking at the root causes of our mistakes we have often repeated them over and over. We are painfully aware that there is a great deal of work that needs to be done to improve the quality of the learning that takes place in our community. Luckily, we also have tremendous resources available to us in the form of our teachers, parents, students and dedicated volunteers on our education committee - under the dedicated leadership of Peggy Stroik and Gwenn Robinson. Over the past 7 months we have already instituted some change in our curriculum and schedule - but we also know that changing our programs is not the answer to our problems. We are committed to a process of Cheshbon Hanefesh - self evaluation. To that end, instead of immediately beginning a search for a new Director of Education we hired Dr. Sarah Koplik to serve as our interim Education Coordinator - and she is doing an outstanding job. Cantor Finn and I have also committed ourselves to taking on a much more active role in the daily running of our education program during this interim period. Finally, and most important, we have engaged the services of Rabbi Samuel Joseph - Professor of Jewish Education and Leadership Development at the Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio. Rabbi Joseph is an internationally recognized expert on Jewish Education and organizational development. (He was also my professor when I was a Rabbinic Student in Cincinnati.) Last night, our president introduced Rabbi Joseph- who is with us for Rosh Hashanah along with his wife Dori. Sam, we are honored to have you and Dori here with us and we look forward to hearing from you at our second day services in the mountains tomorrow.
Under Rabbi Joseph's direction, we have set up a Council for Life-long Learning at Congregation Albert. The council is made up of a diverse group of men and women from within our congregation. Their function is to help in the process of crafting a vision for Jewish Learning in our congregation. Over the next few weeks and months we will be setting up a series of community conversations that will take place in small groups in people's homes. While these gatherings are designed to be intimate, we also will be providing opportunities for the congregation at large to come together to discuss their concerns and dreams vis-à-vis our education Program. From these conversations and the work of the Life-Long-Learning Council, we will formulate a vision for what Jewish learning will look like at Congregation Albert in the future. Using this vision as a template, we will then design a job description for a Jewish professional who will work with us in creating a program of Jewish learning that will reflect both our values and our vision as a congregation.
It's important to understand that, while identifying the key elements of a job description is an important goal of the work of the Life Long Learning Council, it is not the most important goal. If we are to be successful, we will have identified the key values that will become the foundation of who we are and how we learn. We've never done that before. Perhaps it's because, like our airline pilot, we didn't want to acknowledge the fact that we may have been traveling off course.
Our congregation and its leadership have always been dedicated to the idea that we want to be a great congregation - we're not there yet, but we're working on it. Our Life Long Learning Council is a continuation of a process of evaluation that has been ongoing for several years. The most recent step in this process was the creation of a demographic profile of our membership. This was accomplished under the leadership of Marina Rabinowitz and Susan Keith two years ago. As an outgrowth of this process, we have worked to anticipate and respond to the challenges and opportunities that naturally occur in the face of both increased membership and a sophisticated population that expects excellence in every area of congregational life.
The Visioning process that Rabbi Joseph and the Lifelong Learning Council will create is the next step in moving towards our goal of greatness as a congregation.
I want to conclude my remarks this morning by returning to our text:
On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place from far away.
Bayom Ha-Sh'lee-shee, Vayissa Avraham et Eynav, Ya-yahr et Ha-Makom Mey-Rachok
The masters of the Kabbalah - of Jewish mysticism - saw a hidden meaning in this text. Instead of asking: "How did Abraham know that he saw the right place? they posed a different question: "What was it that Abraham saw when he lifted up his eyes from afar - meyrachok?"
The answer to their question is that Abraham saw God. Now this does not mean that he actually saw God in a physical sense - but somehow, Abraham understood that he was headed in the right direction. For the mystics, the word, "HaMakom" does not only mean 'the place'. It also is a name for God. In this light, the verse can be translated as: "On the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw Ha Makom - God - from far away."
If distance provides us with perspective, it also helps us to see that the most important tasks that we take on are almost always imbued with God's presence - if we allow ourselves to take the time to find it.
The work of Teshuvah is sacred. It brings us closer to God and to ourselves.
I believe that the work of our Life Long Learning Council is sacred as well. By creating the best possible program for Jewish learning in our congregation we are not only meeting our needs, but we are also ensuring our future - and the future of the Jewish People. Nothing is more important.
I look forward to sharing with all of you as we continue on our journey of perspective and allow ourselves to take the time and the distance to see God's presence.
Amen - L'Shanah Tovah.