Sermon on Shabbat Nachamu

Parashat Va’etchanan

By Rabbi Anne Persin

Nachamu, nachamu ami, yomar Eloheichem

Comfort, oh, comfort My people, says your God.  (Isaiah 40:1)

It isn’t always easy—life comes at us from so many different directions and while at times it feels exciting and exhilarating, at other times it simply feels exhausting.  The Chinese call it a curse that one might live during interesting times;  as if interesting by its very nature must be dangerous and difficult and demanding.  But we like interesting;  we appreciate some excitement;  we, as a people, are drawn to drama.  It’s true.  And, for the most part, we love it.   But then there are those days or weeks or months or even years when the drama is too much—there has been too much excitement and it no longer feels so interesting—on the contrary, it feels scary and hard.  And we understand the words of Lamentations a little too well:

Alas!  Lonely sits the city once great with people!

She that was great among the nations is become like a widow.

(Lamentations 1:1)

Thus began the text that we read this past Tuesday for Tisha B’Av—a day of mourning for the many dangerous and difficult and demanding events that have befallen the Jewish people throughout our history.  According to the rabbis it was on Tisha B’Av (the ninth day of the month of Av) that both of the great Temples in Jerusalem fell.  It was also on that day that the decrees were signed to expel the Jews from England in 1290 and from Spain in 1492.  There have been a number of other tragic events from our history that have been tied in some way, shape or form to Tisha B’Av from the oppressive rule of the Romans to the Crusades to even the Holocaust.  For centuries upon centuries we have taken Tisha B’Av as a day to lay ourselves down by the waters to weep.  This day evokes images of destruction and pain.  Traditionally, Tisha B’Av is a major fast day just like Yom Kippur that through depriving ourselves we might better understand the sadness that has riddled our history.  But then what?  Judaism is not a religion that takes us into the depths of despair and then leaves us there.  That is simply not our way.

Comfort, oh, comfort My people, says your God.

Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and tell her that it’s over, her tour of duty,

that her iniquity is forgiven;  for she has received by the hand of the Eternal double for all her sins.

(Isaiah 40:1-2)

Tisha B’Av has passed and it is Shabbat again but not just any Shabbat.  Rather, tonight is Shabbat Nachamu, the Shabbat of Comfort.  Therefore we read as our Haftarah words of comfort from Isaiah, chapter 40.  We read that we have been forgiven, the war is over, and God is with us.  And one word echoes throughout our torah portion constantly bringing us assurance, reassurance, and comfort.  Found in a multitude of forms, we read: ohavei (5:10)—those who love Me, v’ahavtah (6:5)—and you shall love, mai’ahavat (7:8)—from out of love, and ohavav (7:9)—those who love God.  The words that have comforted our people for thousands of years have been words of love.  This idea of loving and being loved is one of the few concepts strong enough to propel us out of the darkness of Tisha B’Av.  But before we get to ecstatic in this idea of loving God and God loving us—we should all understand what it means to love in a Jewish context.

Although love may be unconditional, we are given very clear guidelines on how we are to show our love for God.  We are given rituals to enact, prayers to recite, and laws and precepts to follow.  We are asked, no, we are commanded to share our traditions and mitzvot with our children and our children’s children, throughout the generations, that they may continue this love of ours.  Everywhere we go, we are expected to create reminders of this relationship—mezuzot, tzitzit, the ner tamid.  Our active participation in Judaism is, in and of itself, an act of love.  For love is not merely an emotion—it is a decision, a commitment, and an action that we take.  And this is what God expects from us if we are to be in relationship together.

Take heart, this relationship is not built to be one-sided.  On the contrary, both God and Moses tell us over and over again, that as long as we are being true to our end of the relationship, God will be true to God’s side.  As Moses tells us in our Torah portion:

It is not because you are the grandest people that the Eternal has set His heart on you and has chosen you.  Actually, you are the smallest of all of the peoples.  Rather, it was mai’ahavat Adonai—out of the love of God that He has kept the oath that He made with your ancestors, that the Eternal freed you with a mighty hand and rescued you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.

(Deut. 7:7-8)

It’s really easy to get how this love was two-sided for the Israelites: God brought them out of slavery, nourished them throughout forty years of wandering through the wilderness and spoke directly to them.  All they had to do was learn some laws and pass them on.  I don’t know about you, but I sometimes wonder how God is staying active in this relationship today.  Our relationship with God reminds me of a marriage in which the honeymoon period is what’s recorded in the Torah.  But now it’s been a number of years and we, as a couple, don’t really talk so much anymore—is it possible for us as men and women to grow in such a different direction from God that we lose our sense of relationship?  It is possible that God has grown away from us?  If we are the cause of the rift, is there anything that we can do?  Is there anything that we want to do?  If God is the cause of the rift, how can we do anything?  

Comfort, take comfort, My people, God is not the reason for this rift.  God stands ever present, waiting, hoping, praying we will turn back towards our divine partner.  After all of these years, God has not changed—God is still as active or as inactive as ever.  No, after all of these years, it is we who have changed.  Whether these changes have been for good or for naught we still have a divine partner awaiting our return, hoping we will rejoin the conversation, praying for our love.  Shabbat Nachamu is not merely a time for consolation after the mourning of our losses throughout history—it is also the first Shabbat of seven leading up to the High Holy Days.  Shabbat Nachamu marks the beginning of our yearly re-evaluation of ourselves as well as of our relationship with God.  Shabbat Nachamu commences yet another season for God to be waiting, hoping, praying that this year we might find our way to return and reconnect.

On a side note, of sorts, this Shabbat sets up yet one more possibility for reconnection with regards to love.  This Monday, is a little known Jewish holiday called Tu B’Av—tu meaning fifteen, it refers to the fifteenth of the month of Av.  Tu B’Av is first mentioned in the Talmud where the rabbis explain:

There are no days as festive to Israel as those of Yom Kippur and the fifteenth of Av.  The daughters of Israel used to dress in white and go out to the fields to dance and the young men would follow after them.              (Ta’anit 4:8)

We have very little other clear information regarding this festive holiday other than interpretations of this statement.  But the general idea is thus—Tu B’Av is a lover’s day.  It is a day when people get together to dance.  It is a day when women, traditionally, approach men.  And it is a particularly fabulous day to get married.  For those of you who aren’t married this is a good week to go a courtin’.  For those of you who are already married or courting, dancing is still wide open as a possibility.  But even if you don’t have dancing feet, take this week as a time to reconnect with your partner—go on a picnic, go see a show, just do something together.  It is interesting to note that, according to the Talmud, Yom Kippur was a festive occasion made for dancing and Tu B’Av was on par with it.  Maybe this teaches us that not only should love and joy play into our reconnecting with God, but also in the reconnecting with our loved ones we just might find a spark of the divine.

Life isn’t always easy—it comes at us from so many different directions.  But every now and then we find that to live in an interesting time doesn’t have to be scary or even hard—because there is comfort and there is love.  By the love of God, may we all begin our re-evaluation for good in the week to come, in the months to come.  And may we all find return and reconnection with ourselves, with each other, and with God.  

Ken y’hi ratzon: May it be God’s will!