Rabbi Hannah Orden

A certain man from the house of Levi went and married a woman of Levi.  The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw how beautiful he was, she hid him for three months.  When she could hide him no longer, she got a wicker basket for him and caulked it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child into it and placed it in the reeds by the bank of the Nile.  And his sister stationed herself at a distance, to learn what would befall him.
The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe in the Nile, while her maidens walked along the Nile. She spied the basket among the reeds and sent her maidservant to fetch it.  When she opened it, she took pity on the child and said, “This must be a Hebrew child.” (Exodus 2:1-6)

[In the Torah Pharaoh’s daughter has no name, but later commentary refers to her as Bat Ya, the daughter of God. The commentary also imagines that rather than send her maidservant to retrieve the child in the basket, she sent forth her own arm, which miraculously became long enough to lift the child from the water.]

Bat Ya

I woke that morning as I had for so many mornings,
my limbs heavy with the weight of my father’s power.
Sun slanted through cracks in the stone walls.
I closed my eyes, preferring the darkness inside my head
to the harsh glare of Pharaoh’s world,
a world where babies drown
and the wails of mothers penetrate,
even here,
inside the walls of the palace,
inside my head.

Alarmed, my maidservants tried to rouse me,
draping my arms over their shoulders,
they lifted me to my feet.
Too weak to stand,
I leaned into their softness,
wishing for comfort.
Come to the river, they said,
sun sparkles on the water.
You will be refreshed.
Their voices were soothing,
but I saw in their eyes that
they too heard the wails.

Outside, light reflected off walls of stone,
built with the labor of slaves
burning my eyes.
When I tried to turn back,
my maids enticed me
with choice fruits and moist cakes,
but even the sweetest pastry
turned to dust in my mouth.

I had not yet reached the water’s edge
when I heard the cries.
Not the whimper of an infant,
but the outraged bellow
of one who has been wronged.

I knew at once it was an Israelite child.
Only a mother who had no other choice
would take a chance like that.

Such impudence
such genius
to place the child where she knew
the daughter of Pharaoh came to bathe.

My heart answered, burst wide open,
when I thought of the boy’s mother,
an Israelite,
living somewhere in our land,
a woman like me,
who dared to hope
that even the daughter of Pharaoh
could feel pity,
even the daughter of a tyrant
could feel love.

Looking back, I would like to say
that I saw arrayed before me
like a pageant on a stage,
how this Israelite child
who cried with the lusty lungs of an older youth
would one day free his people,
change the course of history.
But of this I cannot be certain.
I do know that I reached out,
and my hand, fair and delicate,
having never known toil,
became like steel.
Knowing my father might kill me,
knowing I would rather die
than keep silent while all around me wailed,
I drew the boy out of the water
and named him Moshe.

Some might say it was a sign,
the strength in my hand.
One of the many wonders performed
by the god of the Israelites.
And perhaps it is so.
Perhaps their god worked his will
through me.

It is not given to me to understand
the ways of their god.
But there are things I do understand:
I became a mother that day.
I joined the company of women —
midwives, mothers, sisters —
who believe it might be enough
to save one life.

Say, therefore, to the Israelite people: I am Adonai.  I will free you from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and through extraordinary chastisements. And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God.  And you shall know that I, Adonai, am your God who freed you from the labor of the Egyptians.  I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you for a possession, I Adonai .  But when Moses told this to the Israelites, they would not listen to Moses, their spirits crushed by cruel bondage. (Exodus 6:6-6:9)

Deflated

That must be what they felt,
our Israelite ancestors,
their lungs collapsed,
spirits crushed
under the weight
of a bondage
heavier than stone.

They managed to cry out
with their last gasp of breath
to a god who was perhaps
only a dim memory,
a dream passed down
through generations,
a whispered promise,
of a wide land
spacious
open
with room to move
air to breathe.

By the time God heard
they no longer remembered
what these words meant:
v’hotzeiti
I will bring you out
v’hitzalti
I will deliver you
v’ga’alti
I will redeem you
v’lakachti etchem li
I will take you
to be My people.

So we remember for them
year after year
we tell their story

All the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the blare of horn and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they fell back and stood at a distance. “You speak to us,” they said to Moses, “and we will obey; but let not God speak to us, lest we die.”  Moses answered the people, “Be not afraid; for God has come only in order to test you, and in order that the fear of God may ever be with you, so that you do not go astray.                           (Exodus 20:15-18)

Standing at Sinai

God came in fire
entered us
and made us burn.

We were afraid.

We fled until angels
coaxed us back,
whispering in our ears,
shivering words of consolation:
You will not die.
You will not be consumed.

We crept back
on hands and knees,
dragging ourselves
through the dirt,
suddenly
unbearably conscious
of the limits of being human.

Who wants to hear God’s voice
stark and brutal?
Who knew that words could burn
with rage at injustice
with love for all creation?
Who knew how much God would demand?

Who dares to step forward?

Adonai spoke to Moses saying: tell the Israelite people to bring Me gifts; you shall accept gifts for Me from every person whose heart is so moved. (Exodus 25:1)

Opening to God

The heart spoke to the hands.
Give, it said. Open.
Release the grip
on metal, cloth, wood, and stone.
Open.
Release.
Give.
Open.
Release.
Give.
And the hands obeyed.
They gave.
In joy?
That’s hard to say.
In abundance, certainly.
Gold, silver, and bronze.
Ram’s skins and acacia wood.
Fine oil and spices.
Onyx and lapis lazuli.
Stolen goods all of it.
How else to explain such riches
in the hands of former slaves?
The hands gave and gave.
One can only imagine the relief,
letting go of what was never theirs.
Dragging armloads,
while desert sun beat on sweat-soaked bodies,
until Moses said, Enough!
Only then,
when the hands let go,
only then
could the heart begin
the long, slow, patient process
of learning
what it means to be willing
to open
to release
to give
to God.

Va Yigash 5771

This week marked the beginning of the Hebrew month of Tevet.  I recently read that the Jews of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia used to celebrate the first day of Tevet as the Festival of Daughters, a day to honor Jewish heroines.  On that day mothers would give their daughters gifts, and old and young women would dance together.  I loved learning about that, because women’s stories have been much too often overlooked in our tradition.  So, in honor of the first of Tevet, I want to share an experience I had this week.  Monday evening I went to an event called “Raising up the Light,” sponsored by the Massachusetts Board of Rabbis.  All of the female rabbis who were present came up to symbolically light the candles for the six night of Hanukkah, and I was honored and thrilled to be among them.  We were called up by the decade in which we were ordained, beginning with the most recent.  First there were the women ordained in the 2000’s.  Then the 90s, then the 80s.  And there were none in New England from the 1970s.  It struck me very powerfully, just how recent a phenomenon this is – three decades.

The main attraction that evening was a panel of all the first female rabbis ordained by each of the movements of Judaism.

• Rabbi Sally Priesand – Reform 1972
• Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso – Reconstructionist 1974
• Rabbi Amy Eilberg – Conservative 1985
• Rabba Sara Hurwitz – Orthodox 2009

Alan Teperow, executive director of the Synagogue Council of Massachusetts, introduced the event by saying that in this season of miracles.  It was a miracle that all four women were available on this date!  Of course he got a laugh, but then the dean of our rabbinical school at Hebrew College, Rabbi Sharon Cohen Anisfeld, who was the moderator, introduced the four women with a deeper connection to the miracle of Hanukkah.  Rabbi Anisfeld related that there is a discussion in the Talmud asking what it is that we celebrate on Hanukkah.  The answer is that we celebrate the miracle that one flask of oil, only enough for one day, lasted eight days.  If so, ask our sages, what do we celebrate on the first day?  There was enough oil for one day, said what was the miracle of the first day?  And the Rabbis of the Talmud respond that the miracle of the first day was that there were people who lit the oil and believed that it would last until more oil could be made.  These four women, Rabbi Anisfeld suggested, each of these first female rabbis, are like the people who lit a candle on the first day.  They set out to become female rabbis when there was no reason to believe that there could be such a thing in the world.  As the women told their stories, both Rabbi Priesand and Rabbi Sasso related that they had decided as teenagers that they wanted to become rabbis, even though this was in the early 1960s, when none of the Jewish movements had yet decided to ordain women.

All of the women experienced great resistance in the early years.  Many of their male teachers and fellow classmates assumed that they came to find a husband and would give up this nonsense once they were married.  They were often ignored, discouraged, their talents and abilities not recognized.  I confess that I was surprised to hear this from Rabbi Priesand. In my bias toward Reform Judaism, I had assumed that that once the Reform movement decided to ordain women, everyone jumped on board.  But that was not so.

Rabba Hurwitz is still not recognized as a rabbi by much of the Orthodox world, although she was ordained by an Orthodox rabbi.  She acknowledged that in the Orthodox community there are necessarily differences between a male rabbi and a female rabbi.  Even if women are eventually accepted as Orthodox rabbis, Orthodox women still cannot sit on a Bet Din (a religious court), serve as a witness, or even count as part of a minyan.

I am sure you can imagine how thrilling it was for me to hear these women speak.  These four women were described as halutzot, which is the Hebrew word for ‘pioneers.’  They are the women who forged the path that I have followed.  And because they are pioneers, they were asked to address the question: What are the issues in the Jewish community today that urgently need pioneers?

I would like to share a few of their answers, and I’d also like to ask you the same question.  Rabbi Priesand said that many young people don’t have much interest in organized religion, and we need to find ways to show that everything we do is Jewish.  Rabbi Eilberg said that she thought we need to find ways to increase civil discourse in the Jewish community so that people with different opinions can communicate and learn from each other. She also said that it is wonderful that so many young people today have a global consciousness and we need to help them understand how to be a global citizen and a Jew.  Rabbi Sasso believes that we are not enough to a children’s spiritual why.  Our religious education focuses on: Was it fun? And what did you learn about Jewish history, holidays and traditions?  She would like us to be asking different questions: Did you learn to be grateful?  Did you learn to have courage in difficult times?  Did you learn respect? Rabba Hurwitz summed up her answer in one word: Justice.  She believes that too often the Orthodox community puts Jewish law/Halakhah over justice.  She wants Orthodox Jews to join other movements that have invested time and energy into Tikkun Olam, repairing the world, social justice.

Would anyone like to share what you think are the most pressing Jewish issues that are in need of pioneers to forge a path for all of us?

Rabba Hurwitz Conning said that the past few weeks we have been in the Torah portions, that have to do with dreams.  There were Jacob’s dreams about his brothers and parents bowing down to him, Pharaoh’s dreams about the skinny cows eating the fat cows, and now in this week’s portion Va Yigash we read about Joseph’s dreams coming to fruition.  He is a powerful leader in Egypt, and his brothers come to him because there is famine in the land of Canaan.  He is now more powerful than they are, and they do bow to him, but instead of it being an example of young Joseph’s arrogance, we see that now he is in a position to help his family.  Joseph was a dreamer, and his dreams brought him to a place where he could do great good.

These four women rabbis were dreamers, and many people also resented their dreams and thought they wanted too much power for themselves.  But now their dreams too have come to fruition, and they too are in a position to do good.  They have forged a path for many others, including myself, and the Jewish world is richer and fuller for their dreams.

May we all be dreamers.  And may our dreams lead us to do great good.