As the week began on the Tuesday after Veteran's Day, we came to school with heavy concerns close to our hearts - in Israel - and close to our homes - in northern California.
Close to our homes, the Butte County Camp Fire already had destroyed more than 7,500 structures, devastated 125,000 acres (an area about four times the size of San Francisco), and 42 lives lost. [Sadly, the fire has continued destroying lives, homes, and property.]
Close to our hearts, there was death and destruction in Israel early this week when Hamas fired several hundred rockets into Israel from Gaza. Those rockets caused terrifying damage, many injuries, and one death. The rockets indiscriminately terrorized Israelis of all ages. In Ashkelon, on Israel's coast, a Hamas rocket killed a Palestinian man who was in Israel on a work permit that gave him permission to spend weeknights near his work in Israel.
Close to our homes and close to our hearts: an individual in each place is linked, it seems to me, to this week's Torah portion. Close to our homes, it's fire-survivor, James Betts. Close to our hearts, it's rocket-victim, Mahmoud Abu Asabeh.
In this week's Torah narrative, Jacob is running away from his brother, Esau. Racing with fear Jacob finds himself in the wilderness overnight. Under the dark sky, he sleeps and dreams. In Jacob's dream, he sees a ladder reaching heaven with messengers of God going up and coming down. (Genesis 28:12) Commentaries puzzle over why the angels are first going up then coming down instead of the other way around. Maimonides (12th century, Spain) suggested the angels were like prophets for first went up to heaven for divine inspiration, then returned to earth to transmit the messages to humanity.
In this sense, it seems to me, that divine messengers go up then come down, is meant as a model for humanity. We ascend in wisdom and awareness. But these are meaningful only if we come back down to earth to act on these. To make progress we must set higher and higher goals for ourselves, but we can be successful only if come down enough to pursue those goals in daily life. It is not sufficient to have high-minded principles if we do not bring that back down to how we treat others.
Close to our hearts, Mahmoud Abu Asabeh used Facebook to comment about the rockets being fired at Israel. Looking at the night sky he posted the video of a rocket intercepted above Israel. He wrote, "May God be gentle."
Close to our homes, James Betts was trapped by the fire destroying Paradise, California. Betts did not own a car, neither did the seven people he was with. They tried on foot to out-walk the fire racing to consume them. But a stranger in a pick-up truck pulled alongside them on the road. The stranger didn't know Betts or anyone walking with him. But the stranger shouted for them all to climb into the bed of his truck. He rescued them all. In the commotion, Betts never even got the stranger's name.
As we face dangers in the world, we often lift our eyes toward the heavens. As we set goals for ourselves and our community, we hope to set them high. We go up. But for any of those aspirations to become real it is not enough to aim high. We need to enact those dreams in a very grounded way. We have to be like the stranger in the pick-up truck -- willing to risk oneself to rescue others. Willing to do the hard work of lifting others on our shoulders to carry them to safety.
May we have the wisdom this week to keep setting our goals high. And the courage to enact those goals by being like the stranger in the pick-up truck.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comment Here