Sat, you are. Day/Night

 Ah the Shabbos. A time to refresh, reflect and eat too much. Mission accomplished!

The Shabbat preparations carried us through the afternoon with people dropping by to bring stuff and others coming to avail themselves of rooms and beds. Two girls were staying (Aliza and Rina, one from Toronto and one from Dallas, both learning at a mich-something, somewhere. Huzzah). Dinner was populated by (and no, don't say this in one breath):

Swidlers (N, D, R, Y, A, N, E)

a passel of girls studying in various seminaries. By passel, I say "10, at least." Dinner was delish and the Swidlers turned into Les Mis in that there was no dialogue unless it was sung. While the eating, laughing and singing were happening, we heard noise outside and we all went quiet. Suddenly there is a knock on the door. Thirty-seven yeshiva boys came in. Perfectly reasonable. They filled the house with good cheer and oppressive wild-boy hormones. I moved to the couch. At some point two of the boys saw me sitting there avoiding everyone, so they came over to have pity on an old man. It seems that the Yeshiva on this block is a large draw from Flatbush and Magen David. A little Jewish geography was played. After more singing, the boys left and invited me to Gan Sacher. Now, maybe they were inviting the seminary girls but I prefer to think that they wanted to hang out with me. I have very shapely legs. 

Sleep thought itself muktzah so it stayed away from me. Up on Shabbos morning and to shul. Then after a really nice davening, we return for lunch. Lunch was populated by

Swidlers (N, D, E, Y, R, A, N)

Swidler parents (S+S)

Eisenbergs (Ch and Mo)

Nava's friend

Violet and her two daughters

Some guy named "Daniel" (besides me -- 2 Daniels at the table. Hilarity did not ensue)

It was Taco Shabbos (chicken, ground beef, pulled beef, rice, string beans, other veggies and a bunch of other stuff, then chocolate torte, popcorn and cookies for dessert)

Some more singing (but no descent of locusts). And then we sat and schmoozed for a while. Then back to shul for mincha and then more schmoozing.

As a change of pace, I would like to close this post with an actual dvar Torah that I came up with after hearing the Friday night vort at Kol Rinah. During that discussion, Dayan and Rabbi Rubanowitz mentioned an interesting fact -- God's name doesn't appear in much of the first chapters of the book of Exodus.

So I checked and I found that, indeed, the name of God appears sparingly. Then I noticed a detail having to do with WHICH name of God is eventually used.

The midwives, it is said, were fearful of "Elokim." They acted as they did, saving the Hebrew children because they feared Elokim. They were rewarded by Elokim. The name then disappears until a new king shows up (2:23 ish) and the people cry out to Elokim. The name Elokim is then repeated 4 more times.

What is the significance of the specific and repeated use of the name Elokim? Why didn't they cry out to Hashem (the 4 letter name)?

Elokim signifies the trait of justice of God while the 4 letter name points to mercy. When the midwives acted, they weren't afraid of the God who is merciful. They knew right from wrong and ignored the king's command because ultimate justice comes from the King, not the king. They made a decision to rely on a transcendent right and wrong and not the edict of the human person and they were rewarded for doing the right thing.

And do we think that the whole time the Jews were being oppressed they didn't pray for redemption, for saving, for something? I think they did pray, but they prayed to Hashem, asking for mercy. Was it mercy for them, or for their oppressors? I don't know, but it took until the new king arose before they finally focused their prayers on asking for justice. It was justice that heard them and justice that acted. While it is important to recognize that we must ask for mercy, at a certain point, we have to look at things and say "this just isn't right" and ask for the strict measure of Hashem's justice to set things aright. I believe that the people shied away from this and used it as a last resort because we are always afraid that if we ask Hashem for justice he will apply that same standard to us, but in this case, we were blameless so appealing for justice had no blow back on the people.

We must do what is right and stand for what is right. Then we can be assured that we will be on the right side of things when the verdict comes down because the God of Justice will reward us as he did the midwives. Right now the world is full of challenges and violence. We must make sure we stand on the side of justice and Hashem's laws so when we need Him, we can appeal to the middah of justice.

Just a thought.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow. Maybe seeing some friends, maybe taking a walk, maybe getting some mac and cheese. Who knows? The future is wide open.

Ps. I ran into 2 former students this afternoon (Akiva Goldsmith and Bella Shatzkes) and they were fun to chat with and I wish them much success.