Sass, Despair, Radical Hope, and Dancing

Here we are again. Distanced. Masked. Not where we thought we’d be. Here I am again, giving what feels like yet another one of far too many drashot that talk about COVID and the world we are living in. It’s the circle of life…. Don’t worry, I won’t actually be singing Lion King. Though I do want to talk about what comes short after in the song, despair and hope. Though if you prefer The Little Mermaid among the early 90s Disney movies, Sebastian’s got some great thoughts on it, too “The human world… it’s a mess.”

Last year I was able to participate in the rabbinic intensive with Beit Teshuvah. We immersed ourself in various aspects of the program and were invited to be part of the weekly Torah study. I found myself faced with a question that no one had ever asked me before: where do you find yourself in the parsha? What. A. Question. It’s been sitting on my heart ever since, and so often when I look for a chiddush, for something new in the parsha, I ask myself that same question. Sometimes the question feels stretchy and a reach. Some weeks, like this week, it feels easy.

I find myself, and I’m sure I’m not alone, in the Israelites standing at the edge. At the edge of the sea that looks impassable. But with behind me the Egyptian army bearing down.

הֲֽמִבְּלִ֤י אֵין־קְבָרִים֙ בְּמִצְרַ֔יִם לְקַחְתָּ֖נוּ לָמ֣וּת בַּמִּדְבָּ֑ר

They ask Moses. Is it for a lack of graves in Egypt that you brought us to die in the desert?! Very scared and very sassy. I. Am. There.

I feel that so deeply in my soul, as a human being, as a millennial, as someone who spends too much time scrolling the internet. The sass is real, I love a good pandemic meme as much as the next person who needs to get off the computer and back to school. But it covers something deeper. I’m scared. And I don’t think I’m alone.

Great, we’re scared. Now what? This is definitely not the Shabbat message that any of us need.

Thankfully, in this week’s parsha, we also find faith and hope. The first story of faith comes from the midrash. The rabbis tell the story of Nachson ben Aminadav. While all of Israel watches as the sea is not parting, he decides to take a leap of faith — quite literally. He begins to walk into the sea, slowly but assuredly, one step at a time. He goes deeper and deeper, having faith that something good will come of it. Finally, the midrash tells us, as he is about to open his mouth and swallow the sea water, it splits. Right at what seems like the last minute, his faith pays off and because of him the Israelites are able to cross through on dry land. We know what comes next. The Israelites cross, the Egyptians are drowned, and then, as we will read tomorrow, they sing a song.

And immediately after that we see a story of what hope really looks like. As made famous by Debbie Friedman, the first verse immediately after Shirat HaYam reads:

וַתִּקַּח֩ מִרְיָ֨ם הַנְּבִיאָ֜ה אֲח֧וֹת אַהֲרֹ֛ן אֶת־הַתֹּ֖ף בְּיָדָ֑הּ וַתֵּצֶ֤אןָ כׇֽל־הַנָּשִׁים֙ אַחֲרֶ֔יהָ בְּתֻפִּ֖ים וּבִמְחֹלֹֽת׃

And Miriam, the sister of Aaron, took the timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out with her with drums and dancing.

Okay. They danced. They were excited. So what? Here’s what. Remember how we eat matzah because there was no time for them to even bake bread before they left? Even in that sort of haste they looked at their timbrels and they said “We should probably take that with us.” Despite the rush, despite the fear, despite the unknown they were facing, in an incredible act of radical hope, Miriam and the women prepared themselves to dance and celebrate on the other side.

And that is where I would like to see myself in the parsha, and my hope for all of us where we can aspire to find ourselves in the parsha. We know we are in the midst of something big and scary and lifechanging like Yetziat Mitzrayim and crossing the sea. Something that if we are not careful will swallow us up. But we can be like Nachshon, we must be like Nachshon, and take one step at a time, as small and as cautious as it is — the only way out is through.

And more than that, here’s the even harder part. We can try to be like Miriam and the women. Through everything in our world, the news headlines, the doomscrolling, the constant openings and closings, we can try to have radical hope. To pack in our hearts something we’re holding onto, something big or small, something that we can hold and can hold us. Because, while it may be hard to imagine right now, there will be something worth busting it out and dancing for on the other side. Shabbat shalom.