hen You Come In: Eyes, Ears, and a HeartParashat Ki Tavo · Elul 5786

Adapted from this week’s Hakhel at JCHS, where our all students and educators gather to begin each week together

When I first came to JCHS, the iPhone had just been introduced to the world. And it wasn’t until the iPhone 4, in 2010, that the “selfie” became a routine part of daily life. Hold onto that timeline — it will matter in a moment.

Last week I wrote about Parashat Ki Teitzei — “when you go out” — and the blessing Jews carry onto every journey. Here is what I love about the Torah’s timing: the very next parashah is its partner. Ki Tavo — “when you come in.” The Torah pairs the two verbs on purpose. Even the Psalmist blesses them together: Your "are guarded in your going out and your coming in” (Psalm 121:8). At school, the pairing is lived, not just read: our Opening Day Hakhel taught the going out, and this week — the first full week of classes — everyone has come in.

So Ki Tavo poses this week’s question: now that you’re in, how will you be here?

An Engineering Marvel

In 2009, the neuroscientist David Eagleman published a slim book called "Sum": forty short, imaginary tales about the afterlife. None of them are true. All of them tell the truth.

In one story, “Narcissus,” the narrator wakes after death to discover humanity was created by a race of Cartographers — map-makers — who placed us on Earth as their mapping devices. They gave us precision camera lenses: our eyes. Exquisite sound sensors: our ears. A profoundly curious computer — our mind — to carry us to every corner of the planet and record it.

But the story ends with the Cartographers in despair, scrolling through our lifetime of data. Instead of mapping the world, we spent our lives pointing the cameras at ourselves. The head engineer is fired for building — in Eagleman’s words — “an engineering marvel that only takes pictures of itself.”

Now remember the timeline. Eagleman wrote that in 2009 — after the iPhone existed, but before the selfie did. He saw us coming. Today every one of us carries that engineering marvel in a pocket, and we know exactly which direction its camera usually points.

What the Senses Are For

Which brings us to what Moshe tells the people in Ki Tavo — forty years into their journey, as they finally prepare to come in to the land:
וְלֹא־נָתַן יְהוָה לָכֶם לֵב לָדַעַת וְעֵינַיִם לִרְאוֹת וְאָזְנַיִם לִשְׁמֹעַ עַד הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה
“Until this day, God had not given you a heart to understand, eyes to see, and ears to hear” (Deuteronomy 29:3).

Until this day — after forty years of miracles. It takes that long, Moshe is saying, to learn what our eyes, ears, and heart are actually for. They were never meant to be instruments that only record ourselves.

They were given for a higher purpose: eyes to see the plight of others. Ears to hear the cries of others. A heart to understand the pain — and the joy — of others. Even the generation that watched the sea split needed forty years to grow eyes that truly see. That feels like a fitting thing to say to students in week one of a four-year journey — and to any of us, any year of ours.

So the charge I gave our students for this first full week was small and concrete, and I offer it to every reader: point the marvel outward. Use your eyes this week to see one person who seems unseen. Use your ears to hear one person who needs listening to. Use your heart to understand one person you don’t yet know.

The Alarm Clock

It is Elul, the month of preparation before the Days of Awe — and at JCHS, every Hakhel during Elul ends the same way: with the sound of the shofar. The Rambam (late 12th and early 13th century Spain, Morocco, Egypt) taught that the shofar’s cry is an alarm clock for the soul. This week I asked our students to receive its sound with the ears Moshe was talking about. Let its sound wake your eyes to see, your ears to hear, your heart to understand.

When you go out and when you come in — may all your steps be guarded, and may your eyes, your ears, and your heart be turned toward each other.

When You Go Out: A Blessing for the Journey (Parshat Ki Teitzei 5786, Opening Day of School at JCHS August 2026)

Every week at JCHS begins with Hakhel — a gathering of our entire community, all students and all faculty and staff, in one room, closed with a dvar Torah. We adopted that name from the Torah itself: in Deuteronomy 31, Moshe commands that the entire people assemble — men, women, children, newcomers — to hear Torah together at the start of a new cycle. That is what we do at the start of every week. And especially so at the first Hakhel of a new school year: everyone, from the newest ninth grader to the most seasoned educator teacher, gathered on Opening Day to begin again.

This year’s Opening Day Hakhel was different for me. It was my last one as Head of School. Next August, a new Head will stand on that stage to welcome our students. So I found myself thinking hard about journeys — and that Shabbat’s parashah met me exactly where I was standing. It opens: כִּי־תֵצֵא ki teitzei — “When you go out.”

Here is what amazes me about this parashah of going out: it contains more mitzvot than any other portion in the entire Torah — 74 of them. Not one giant commandment. Seventy-four small ones. Such as returning a lost object. Or showing kindness to a mother bird.

[At Hakhel, I could not resist — we are the JCHS Wolves — calling out that “wolframium” is the old name for the element tungsten, which is why its symbol on the periodic table is W. Tungsten is element number 74 on the periodic table. Seventy-four mitzvot; element 74. The wolves, it turns out, are everywhere.]

The Torah’s message: the journey is not the empty space between important destinations. The journey IS where life happens — one small act of goodness, one brief stumble that you rise from, one step at a time. As you go out, the opportunities multiply.

So it is with a school year. It is long. None of us can take it in one giant leap. We travel it in small steps — and we travel it together.

And this year at JCHS, “going out” is not an abstraction. Our newest students are stepping in. Our seniors are preparing to step out. And I am too. So this year, more than ever, I am not watching the journey from the side — I am on the road with our students, every step, all year long. Growth lives in transitions. That is what Ki Teitzei teaches: blessing comes when we go out.

A Prayer That Lives in Pockets

Jewish tradition has a blessing made for journeys: Tefillat Haderech, the Travelers' Prayer. It is ancient. In the Talmud (Berakhot 29b), Elijah the Prophet offers this advice: before you set out on any journey, pause, seek your Maker’s blessing — and then go.

Here is my favorite part: even when you travel completely alone, the prayer is always in the plural — lead us in peace, guide us in peace. Because, in the Jewish mindset, none of us ever journeys alone. We carry our community with us along the way. Kind of like a school: each of us on our own journey, all of us traveling together.

The prayer asks for four things — four verbs, in careful order:

תּוֹלִיכֵנוּ לְשָׁלוֹם · תַּצְעִידֵנוּ לְשָׁלוֹם · תַּדְרִיכֵנוּ לְשָׁלוֹם · תַּגִּיעֵנוּ לִמְחוֹז חֶפְצֵנוּ

Tolicheinu l’shalom — lead us toward peace. Tatz’ideinu l’shalom — direct our steps toward peace. Tadricheinu l’shalom — guide us toward peace. Tagi’einu limchoz cheftzeinu — bring us to our desired destination.

Four verbs. Four grades. At Hakhel, I blessed each class with one of them — echoes of that tefillah.

Four Verbs, Four Grades

To the Class of 2030, just stepping in: Tolicheinu l’shalom — during your journey through the next four years may your steps be blessed as you take your time, enjoy each step, learn to walk and then to run toward wholeness and peace.

To the Class of 2029: Tatz’ideinu l’shalom — may your steps over the next three years be blessed toward the direction of completeness and peace you seek — from Zion National Park this year to Zion, our national homeland, next year. Knowing that even when we stumble, we come closer to wholeness and peace.

To the Class of 2028: Tadricheinu l’shalom — may you be blessed to choose your steps wisely as you navigate a path this year bringing you ever closer to YOUR derech — the path of your life. It will be an intense year; treasure the journey toward wholeness and peace.

To the Class of 2027: Next August you will have moved along your path beyond JCHS — and so will I. You and I will walk this final JCHS year side by side, and in June we will go out together. So I am doubly grateful for this year to hold you a bit longer. Tagi’einu limchoz cheftzeinu — may you be blessed in the steps of your final year to be brought ever closer to fulfilling the wishes of your hearts.

And to our Professional Community — the educators and staff who guide, encourage, and applaud our students along this journey, and who, in this year of transition, carry the heart of this school forward: l’chaim, u’l’simcha, u’l’shalom — toward the fullness of life, toward joy, and toward wholeness and peace.

Working together to build community, we take the small steps every day — with courage and encouragement — that carry us to our most fulfilling destinations.

And when the moment comes for each of us to go out — ki teitzei — may we go out toward wholeness and peace.