Rabbi’s Message - July 29, 2025

Part of our deep, underlying purpose as a community is to be a garden of Jewish joy in our glorious gem of Creation. This past Shabbat, we embodied that particular and fantastic joy with our local community’s celebration of Caleb Yakar’s B’Mitzvah. Yet every time I open the national newspaper, I have been feeling apocalyptic. But I suppose, according to the Jewish calendar, ‘‘tis the season.”

This coming week marks the commemoration of Tisha B’Av. Tisha B’Av makes emotional space for disaster and destruction, for mourning our mistakes, for tending to our trauma, and honoring our grief. 

This tender day emerges from a real, lived tragedy for our people. Discussed in the book of Jeremiah and emotionally explored in the book of Lamenations, Tisha B’Av marks Nebuchadnezzar II’s military success in 586 BCE. 

Our holy books are not the only ruminations we have on this event. Uncovered at Tel Lachish between 1935 and 1938, the Lachish Letters consist of a collection of ostraca (ink on pottery). Dating from the 6th century BCE, this collection gives insight into the thoughts of those alive during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem, the war that led to the destruction of the First Temple and the fall of the Israelite state and Davidic dynasty. The Lachish Letters offer glimpses of their mood, including an anonymous prophet’s singular cautionary alarm: “Beware!”

While this holy day makes space for grief and fear — which if you know me, you know I think that this is vital for healthy emotional and spiritual growth — it doesn’t offer insight into how we can possibly maintain emotional and spiritual buoyancy during this season. 

However, this week’s Torah portion offers us a suggestion. 

Parashat Devarim opens the book of Deuteronomy, the final book of Torah. The Greeks renamed the book “Deuteronomy” because it acts as a summary of much of the Israelites’ story. It begins with Moses and the Israelites standing on the banks of the Jordan River. Before the people can enter the Land, Moses invites them into a kind of narrative therapy: a retelling of their collective trauma, growth, and identity. Moses doesn’t simply recount history—he reinterprets it. He transforms wandering into wisdom. What we see in this act is the Torah’s answer to our modern malaise:

Meaning is not given; it is made—through reflection, through relationship, and through remembrance.

Jewish wisdom has long understood this. The Sfat Emet, commenting on Devarim, teaches that Moses was not just giving a historical account, but awakening the inner voice of the people. In other words, he was not just speaking to them—but from within them. This is what true meaning does: it reconnects us to something timeless within ourselves.

Searching for deeper meaning within our lives and within the times in which we live is a fundamental part of the human experience. Particularly in times of difficulty and trauma. 

This Shabbat, as we enter Devarim—literally, “words”—I invite you to pause and ask:

• What is the story I’m telling about my life?

• Where do I find meaning—beyond the accolades of others, beyond the power and noise of technology, beyond the external?

• How might I become, like Moses, a narrator of purpose for myself and others?

• How can I protect my narrative within my own heart, without hardening my heart to others’ narratives?

We are not meant to sleepwalk into the Promised Land. We are meant to awaken into it—with courage, clarity, and a sense of sacred mission.

May we each find the words we need to speak, the stories we need to reclaim, and the meaning that can anchor us amidst the whirlwind of the world.