A mixture of an article that I read about this week's parasha and my own commentary mixed in to make it relevant to us. My stuff is mainly translating the message of the original article into Habo terms, not some great and original idea.
for the unharmed version of this article go to:
http://www.myjewishlearning.com/texts/Weekly_Torah_Commentary/vayechi_socialaction5762_Prn.htm
PARASHAT VAYECHI
Carrying On After The Golden Age
It's all coming to an end. That must have been Jacob's thought as his life and the book of Genesis drew to a close. In Egypt, far from the land of God's promises. Wondering about his children and their future. Would they preserve the covenant passed down since his grandparents, Abraham and Sarah? Which of his children could be the one who would take hold of the torch? Jacob knew very well that with his children, things would now be different--not Joseph, not Reuben, not Judah, none of them individually would be in their generation what Jacob had been in his--the one.
A golden age was coming to an end, and all Jacob knew for certain was that the future of a unique set of values and principles would be entrusted to the likes of Menasheh and Ephraim, his very Egyptian grandchildren, whom he was about to bless.
I have often wondered if we missed the most revolutionary years. We didn't get the chance to go to Palestine/Israel and build up the first kibbutzim (would we have anyway?). We didn't fight in any of the wars. We didn't get a chance to support Russian refuseniks. Politics on campus seemed to be more exciting and useful in the past. Most of us have thought at one stage or another that just being alive in the 60s would have been cooler than being children of the 80's (cringe) or 90's.
What is today's cause? To make aliyah and live a socialist/culturally Jewish lifestyle in Israel? What is the cause that we can be involved in that we will tell our granchildren about? Today, there is no single cause to rivet our attention. Environment, globalization, voting rights, equality in education, economic justice, racism; each seems like its own world sometimes. There is no central address, and no moral and spiritual leader who is the voice for our age. Often the causes feel more like organizations than ideals sparkling in purity.
We live after the golden age, apparently. But rather than moan, we have to find a perspective, and a way to act.
Jacob and his children teach me that the end of a golden age does not mean the end of ideals. Golden ages are important, and they inspire--but they are the exceptional periods. Genesis, after all, is only one of the five books of the Torah.
The rest of the Torah tells of life lived after the first great ones, and in fact much of the remaining story centers on a generation once more removed, not only from the patriarchs and matriarchs but from the Exodus from Egypt, the great liberation experience.
Are those generations inferior because they did not speak individually with God, leave family and homeland on a mere promise, or debate justice with God over Sodom? Of course not. They had in many ways a more difficult task: to make manifest principles that their ancestors had only just discovered.
Dramatic as first steps might be, the tenth and hundredth present their own challenges. Exciting as it may be to meet the charismatic founder, the true test of a vision is whether people in general can sustain it, propound it, and live it.
So we choose to be a part of Habonim Dror. I remember at the end of shnat listening to James Grant-Rosenhead talk about the start of urban-kibbutzim and thinking amongst other things that it must feel great to be a part of the start of something. And this year our movement work tzevet pioneered a new way for Habo UK to celebrate cultural Judaism - and it didn't feel incredible, even though I would consider it 'revolutionary' on a very very small scale. Probably because it is hard to see the forest for the trees. Whether you want whatever you do to be a part of the history books, surely the best way to go about life is to do what you believe in - and history might surprise you by agreeing with your cause.
I'll recognize myself as one of the unnamed great-great-grandchildren of Jacob, an heir doing his part to further the visions of the golden age.
There is an old story that traces the Sh'ma, arguably the most central Jewish prayer, to Jacob's deathbed. According to the legend, Jacob let his children know his doubts and fears about whether they would continue in his path. They answered him: Sh'ma, Yisrael--"Listen, Israel," addressing Jacob by his God-given name--"the Lord our God, the Lord is One." We will carry on your vision, they say. And in the process, the first "ungolden" generation writes the words that have unified Jews ever since.
Maybe we, the children born too late to integrate the lunch counters, can be like Jacob's children--the ones to write the powerful new words that make the visions of the past reverberate through all time to come.
Shabbat shalom
Benji
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