Sukkot is a festival of striking beauty and contrasts. For one week each year, we abandon the stolid permanence of our homes and live, instead, in the fragile, temporary structure of sukkot (booths). These booths remind us that we do not truly own our possessions. Things that we hoard and accumulate we will one day pass on to others. They can be lost, or broken, or stolen. The only true possessions we own are deeds of care and service, mitzvot. In that light, this Festival presents an ideal opportunity to reflect on the life of service embodied by the Festival and offered through Torah.
The Western economic model possesses great power when it comes to generating economic energy. When it comes to creating new markets, stimulating demand for new products, creating new products to fill those demands, the free market is the world’s powerhouse. Many of us benefit from the rise in the level of material living, all of us who enjoy air conditioning, electricity, computers, indoor plumbing, saran wrap, all of these benefits come to us by virtue of this economic engine.
But this expanding circle of consumption and production comes at a very high price. Without going into the areas of inequity that the system also creates, I would like to focus on the mentality it requires – that we view the world through the eyes of consumers. In consumerism, every object, relationship, and person is reduced to a product and all is available to be purchased. Life is flattened to the level of a transaction. In this free exchange, the ultimate arbiter of any commodity is the buyer. People apply this consumerist attitude when they date: speed dating is nothing if not the application of a market mentality to romance, and the mystery of love submits to a cost/benefit analysis. We even act as consumers of religion at this time of year, as Jews explicitly shop for a synagogue, looking for the one that is the best deal or the best fit for them. Their faith and their houses of worship become commodities, to be traded and sold like any other. We bring that consumerism to our families, as even those who are married often keep alive the notion, “if this doesn’t work out, I can always find a better fit somewhere else.” Children now sue their parents for breach of contract, and we bring that attitude of consumerism to our learning as well.
Looking out for Number One has produced many benefits, and it is certainly true that one can be abused by the world if you don’t assert yourself and your own self-interest. But to the degree that we define ourselves as consumers and our interactions as commodities, we cheapen ourselves and we cheapen our interactions. We reduce every relationship into a mere transaction, as though all that life is about is an exchange.
There is only one alternative to being a consumer, and that is to be a servant. Jewish tradition stands and falls on our willingness to be not consumers of services, but servants of the Holy One: “Ana avda D’Kudsha Brikh Hu, I am a servant of the Holy Blessing One.” When consumers approach a transaction, they consider how it will benefit them – an exchange that will allow the least investment of resources, energy and time yet will provide the biggest bang for the buck, the best return. You can – as rabbinical students, and later as rabbis – approach your rabbinate in that way. There are plenty of people who live their lives in that mode. And you can be a consumer throughout your career, looking for where you get the biggest bang for your teaching dollar, where you are able to solve the most requirements with the least effort.
It is possible to go through life exclusively as a consumer, and I will tell you two things about what will be the outcome of that choice: The first is that you will move through life and career like everyone else, and the second consequence is that you will remain impoverished in your own eyes. To approach life and relationships for what immediate gains you derive will reduce your own spiritual and intellectual life to emptiness. Instead, Sukkot reminds us to reach for the outmoded and unpopular possibility of asking not what you can get out of your life, but what you can give through your life, what it is you are able to bring first to the world at large.
In Tiferet Ha-Yehudi we are told a wonderful story about Rabbi Hayyim Krasner, a Hasidic leader, who went with his followers to visit an acrobat in the town of Krasny who was going to balance himself on a very high tightrope walk across a river. Like the rest of the townsfolk, the Rebbi appeared to be fascinated and stared with great intensity as the man made his way across the river. The crowd was gaping below. When the tightrope walker was finished, the Hassidim asked their teacher, “Rebbi, why was this so interesting to you?” And Rebbi Hayyim responded, “You might think that the acrobat crossed the river because of the financial reward offered to the person who would do it. And indeed he might have started with that motivation. But once he was up on the tightrope, if he had thought about that reward for even an instant, he would have fallen. While he was on the tightrope, the only thing he could think about was the next step, and the step after that. And maintaining his balance on a very narrow perch.”
We also are crossing over on a very narrow strand. We also need to bring to the task the pure kavanah of the task itself – to think of the reward at the end of the task risks immediate peril and risks falling to our doom. Similarly, Justice Benjamin Cardozo (some have argued, one of the greatest jurists of the American system and a Supreme Court Justice interesting enough appointed by Herbert Hoover, of all people) wrote,
The submergence of self in the pursuit of an ideal, the readiness to spend oneself without measure, prodigally, almost ecstatically, for something intuitively apprehended as great and noble, spend oneself, one knows not why, - some of us like to believe that this is what religion means.
I’d like to build on that understanding of what religion means. Can we measure Jewish religiosity, not by whose home in which we won’t eat, not by which cheese we don’t touch, but by the measure of our servitude? Can we express our willingness to see ourselves as vessels for giving, able to make of our lives such a celebration?
Why submit to a life of servitude, a life of service of others?
First: because there is liberation to be found in not having to be the central focus of our own energy. Happiness is one of those paradoxical virtues that if pursued as a goal keeps receding into the distance. But make of your life the pursuit of meaning and the assistance of your fellow human beings, and happiness will – strangely enough – materialize as by-product that won’t dissipate. In discussing the implements that are used in the Holy Temple, the Talmud reminds us, “Scripture says, ‘The vessels with which they serve in the Holy Courtyard (Num 4:12).’ Scripture made their status dependent on service. (Shevuot 14a)” We too affirm our worthiness as human beings through a life of service. By allowing our minds to see beyond the infinitude of our own needs, but rather to look at the care and the love of others around us, to focus our vision to see how we can be helpful, what we can be doing to remake the world as a better fit for God’s vision, we are able to take on a task which can provide abiding satisfaction and radical freedom.
Two: another benefit of submitting to a life of service is that such a path offers far greater opportunity than a dead end of materialism. Relentlessly pursuing one’s own happiness, we become burdened by an oppressive taskmaster with a singleness of purpose, “If I only had this, I would be happy. If I only did that, I would be happy.” Our lust to possess always exceeds our contentment, our reach exceeds our grasp. The great thing about approaching life in a spirit of service is that we can serve in an infinite variety of ways and still accomplish what it is we are meant to be doing. The great Hassidic Rabbi, Abraham Joshua Heschel of Apt, taught,
A person should not choose the form in which he wishes to perform the service of the Lord, but he should perform it in any manner the opportunity affords. He should be like a vessel into which anything may be poured - wine, milk, or water.
If we greet the morning light with the resolve to be helpful to others, to bring healing, caring, and nurturance to others, then there will be infinite number of opportunities for us to express our best self. Approaching the day in a spirit of service allows far greater opportunities for self-expression.
Most important of all, there is a great intrinsic value to be found in a life of service. To plead for why we should submit to a life of service is itself a consumer argument. A consumer wants to know, “what is in it for me? Why should I do it?” But I want to proffer a servant’s answer for service: We should serve because the world needs our service, and because the Ribbono Shel Olam (Ruler of Spacetime) summons us to it. Let us not ask what is in it for us, but rather who can benefit from our help? Where is our service most needed?
For us, then, the key question is not, “why serve?” but “how to serve?” And here I would like to jump back and consider the model of the Kohen Gadol (the High Priest) and his avodah, (service) on the day of Yom Kippur. In a strikingly dramatic narrative, Mishnah Yoma recounts the day of Yom Kippur and the performance of its tasks from the perspective of the Kohen Gadol.
The first thing that the Kohen Gadol does to prepare himself for this coming together: of the most sacred moment, and the most sacred space, with the most sacred person. All three when they come together, create the name of God. Time and space and person – the mystery of their meeting articulates God’s name. To prepare for this moment/place/event, the Kohen Gadol immerses in a mikveh. This immersion into a body of living water reminds us that a life of service does not mean neglecting our own health. To the contrary, service to others must start with your own care. He begins by purifying his body because ours is a tradition that lives with the unfashionable thought that the soul and the body are fundamentally one. An earthly Torah is to be found in that union of carnality and spirituality. So the first thing the Kohen Gadol does is to cleanse his body. Then he celebrates by wearing some very nice clothing (with, perhaps, a little too much gold!)
Then he begins the liturgy – most tellingly with a confession for his own sins and the sins of his household. Rashi reminds us that his “household” means his wife. The Kohen Gadol begins by confessing his own shortcomings and those of his life partner because service has to begin with one’s most intimate circle first. If our care for the world, and our pursuit of justice comes at the expense of the people who love us and depend on us, then that service is really a masked form of careerism, carrying with it the seeds of its own undoing. Our family and loved ones cannot pay the price for our service. They must be the first recipients of our care, our love, and our devotion. Hold tight to that thought because in welter of careers, communal involvements, and service, it will serve as your lodestone.
After the Kohen Gadol confesses for himself and for his household, he then begins to prepare the scapegoat that will be sent out to the wilderness, to Azazel. Then the Kohen Gadol again makes confession, this time for a somewhat larger circle: for himself and for the entire priesthood. Here I will then say the next step in service is to care for your colleagues and community. After you care for your loved ones and your family, recognize that the nexus of your work and your life will be with the people you share work with, the people you build your community with. These are not people to be used, these are not objects with which to compete, or people who can advance your career, these are people who need to see God in your treatment of them, just as you do of them. You hold the ability to commit an act of hillul ha-Shem by the way you treat each other.
The Kohen Gadol understood that taking responsibility for his colleagues and community was part of his calling. And then and only then, does he offer the final confession for all the Yisrael. He takes upon himself responsibility for the entire people and the entire tradition. This responsibility is yours as well. And you need to approach our tradition, and our people with a spirit of service. Service does not mean acquiescence; service does not mean silence. You serve the Jewish people with your mind, and your heart, and your soul even when you speak critically of choices that the Jewish people have made or are making, provided that the criticism is a form of love. It is a mark of friendship if offered in a constructive way. You need not be silent in the face of Jewish sinfulness, but you must speak lovingly and constructively in its presence.
Only then, after the series of confessions, does the Kohen Gadol turn to the liturgical role that he has to play, sending out the goat, reading from the Torah, and having everyone over for a se’udah, a festive meal. His order of service ought to be ours as well. He makes confession first for himself, next for his colleagues, and finally for all Yisrael. We too can offer such a layered service, making sure that in our own lives and families we attend to our own balance through love, through play, through exercise, through health. These too are the tools necessary to serve. Only then can we extend our care to our colleagues and we offer them our service. You, each other, are your greatest resources. Cherish each other and treat each other with tenderness and dignity. And then we are in a position to assist Am Yisrael, our extended family across the world, and throughout the generations, the people who carry this covenant with God.
I would add two groups more to that list in Mishnah Yoma. It is ours also to affirm our humanity and to take on responsibility for all men and women and children everywhere: to be able to exult in their victories, to be able to cry at their tragedies and to feel their pain, and to feel motivated to minimize their pain. Judaism is our portal into humanity, not our ultimate destination. And so Judaism – our Torah, our life of service – has to extend beyond the boundaries of the Jewish people to encompass all mankind.
Yet even this reach falls short. Our service, to be complete must extend one step further – to the entire world and the cosmos beyond. To all living and non-living things with whom we share being, we owe them also responsibility and care.
In the face of limitless need, in the face of limitless desire and drive, we offer service without end. And I would like to close then with a poem by a poet I discovered for myself this summer. That is not to say we wasn’t known until then, I am merely confessing to you that learning goes on forever. Avraham Ben Yitzhak who published fourteen poems in his entire career. His poems were all published in beautiful Hebrew. Leah Goldberg, famous Israeli poet who’s PR was apparently better than his, commented that one poem of Ben Yitzhak’s is worth the entire canon of Hebrew poetry. Permit me to share with you his final poem:
Blessed are they who sow and do not reap -
they shall wander in extremity.
Blessed are the generous
whose glory in youth had enhanced the extravagant brightness of days –
who shed their accoutrements at the crossroads.
Blessed are the proud whose pride overflows the banks of their souls
to become the modesty of whiteness
in the wake of a rainbow’s ascent through a cloud.
Blessed are they who know
their hearts will cry out from the wilderness and that quiet will blossom from their lips.
Blessed are these for they will be gathered to the heart of the world,
wrapped in the mantle of oblivion
- their destiny’s offering unuttered to the end.
As you sit in your Sukkah, may you, too, be blessed with that fruitful oblivion.
May your deeds outnumber your reputation.
May your goodness outlive your finitude.
May the multiplicity of your acts of hesed to each other, to Am Yisrael, and to the world rejoin the Oneness from which they emerge, and may you derive from that reunion your true self, your true home – a Sukkat Shalom, a booth of peace, the knowledge of where you belong and Who you serve.
Hag Sameach and Shabbat Shalom!