Perhaps it’s no coincidence that a primary source for the teaching that “Elul” is an anagram for “Ani L’dodi V’dodi Li” (I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine) is the Shulchan Aruch - The Set Table. This verse from Song of Songs is seen by the sages as a call for us to reconnect with the Divine (our “Beloved”) during this season of teshuvah - renewal and repentance. Yet as we stare at our own brimming tables (and across them), this Rosh Hashanah, I offer the following meditations on this verse’s spirit of reciprocity - not just with God, but with each other and the food that connects us:
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This article comes from Tuv Ha’Aretz’s weekly newsletter. Thanks Gary Rendsburg for the article which is especially relevant considering the upcoming holidays.
Ask anyone with a typical Jewish education today, and he or she will tell you that the three Jewish holidays of Pesah (Passover), Shavu‘ot (Weeks), and Sukkot (Booths) commemorate major events in Israel’s early history. Pesah, of course, recalls the exodus from Egypt; Shavu‘ot celebrates the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai; and Sukkot evokes the wandering in the desert. Naturally, this information is correct, but if we trace the historical origins of these festivals, we discover that all three began as agricultural observances.
Pesah is associated with the barley harvest, which occurs in the early spring; Shavu‘ot is associated with the wheat harvest and the ripening of the first fruits, both of which occur in the early summer; and Sukkot is the great fall harvest festival, celebrated after all produce has been gathered from the fields (note that many cultures in the world have such a holiday; witness, most familiarly, the Canadian and American Thanksgiving feasts). These three holidays, accordingly, were signposts for the ancient Israelite farmers, with their strong ties to the land – and let us recall that the vast majority of the people in ancient Israel was engaged in the growing of crops and the production of food.
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The New York Times reported this week that New York City’s oldest diner, Moondance, is moving…to Wyoming. While property values skyrocket throughout the five boroughs, La Barge, Wyoming residents, Cheryl and Vince Pierce, “stole” Moondance for a tag-sale rate of $7500. The diner, which features many of its original furnishings, will travel across the country on the back of a flat bed truck, before settling in its new home. That’s one less restaurant for New York City, and one (total) restaurant for La Barge.
The whole situation is sadly fitting. With Starbucks on every corner and $25 omelettes on brunch menus, Manhattan is no longer the kind of place for a place like Moondance. In last week’s parsha, Eikev, Moses lies on his deathbed as the Jewish people are about to cross into the land of milk and honey they’ve been wandering towards for forty years. He commands them to beware and avoid the belief that ”my power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth,” - in other words, to remain humble despite their new plentiful existence.
Hopefully, as Moondance makes its own journey towards a new home, New York - a city made beautiful by quirky diners and drab by each Frappucino - can take Moses’ message to heart.
Read the article here.
This shabbat is called “Shabbat Nachamu” (Shabbat of Comfort), named after this week’s haftarah which offers consolation following the devastating events of Tisha B’Av, commemorated last week.
Since my first visit to Jerusalem, prior to beginning cantorial school, I’ve been torn about the purpose and method for observing Tisha B’Av. On the one hand, I have no desire to see us return to a patriarchal system of priestly castes, with animal sacrifice as the primary form of Jewish spiritual expression, and on the other hand, we Jews can now rejoice in Jerusalem rebuilt in our own time. Read more »
On this day, we ask a lot of questions. Not like Passover, when we sit and eat, laugh and make jokes, and drink our wine. On Tisha B’av we mourn our loss, as Jews, and Humans, and as Pieces of an Ecosystem. This Holiday is not meant to prod us to ask questions, but yet, when we mourn we can do almost nothing but ask, “why?” I won’t try to answer any”why?” questions, but the next question that I heard today moved me. We were discussing what it means to be mourning for the human loss, and not just the loss, and asking what we can do. What can we do, to give our lamentation meaning that lasts beyond the day of official, enforced mourning.
To the question of “what can we do?”, the only answer that I can think of is to empower ourselves, and to empower those around us. Every day, we make choices in our live that impact our world, both close to home and far away. The things we do as we attempt to feed and clothes those dear to us have ramifications that go beyond the spiritual work of mourning and have the power to uplift lives everywhere. In our workplace, we can recognize the links that we play in a global or local chain of goods and services and seek to purchase true “economic goods.” I’m not talking about a washing machine that lasts for ten years, I’m talking about a washing machine that is good for me because it uses less water to wash my clothes, it’s good for the manufacturer because she uses recycled parts, it’s good for my brother in Bangladesh because it uses a fraction of the electricity that most machines use and doesn’t raise the sea level outside his field.
On a day when I choose not to eat (freeing up about 3 hours), I have time to reflect on the deep impact of my food choices on the world around me. Buy the tomato that’s really “good”. Food doesn’t have to be a commodity. Buy a tomato from a farmer who cares; it’s not just better for you, it really makes a difference.
Rabbi Ben Bag-Bag used to say of the Torah: “Turn it and turn it again, for everything is in it. Pore over it, and wax gray and old over it. Stir not from it for you can have no better rule than it” - Pirke Avot 14:25, Sayings of Our Fathers.
Whether we stir or not, though it definitely helps to stir, compost happens. We are all witness to the irrefutable process of decay in varying degrees of time, as benign as the gradual whither of a solitary banana left in the fruit bowl too long (alright already you know who you are: you cannot continue to ignore that mealy brown banana in your kitchen any longer…it’s bordering on neglect now…time to make a decision…turn brown ‘nanas into ‘nanabread!), or perhaps more tragically, the swift demise of those raspberries that hosted a mold convention—several different molds—within a day of being washed and refrigerated (I have a strict policy of having no “wounded soldiers” by eating any berries I buy on the way home).
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In less than three weeks we will celebrate our son Shlomo’s Bar Mitzva, G-d willing. Those of you who have had the privilege of meeting him know that underneath the black hat, fringes and payos (sidecurls) he is one cool kid – into farming, animals (he raised the first flock of laying hens for Isabella Freedman/ADAMAH), woodworking, sustainable building and even a bit of WalMart and corporate America bashing once he gets going! Read more »
In this month of Tammuz, we confront a great paradox. The sun is passing through its highest point in the sky. Flowers are blooming, tomatoes are just starting to burst from the vine, and berries – mmm, the berries – this is the time of greatest abundance. Dipping into cool waters at this time is one of life’s greatest joys.
Yet in our tradition, we are moving through a time of deep reflection and mourning for loss. On the 9th of Tammuz, the first exile of the Jews began as the Judean King abandoned the Temple and the Babylonians breached the outer walls of the Temple. (Babylonian Talmud, Ta’anit 26a-b.) Today, on the 17th of Tamuz, Jews traditionally fast from sun-up to sun-down, mourning the destruction of the Temple. This is also recognized as the day when Moses dashed the first set of Tablets from Sinai in response to our worship of the Golden calf. (Exodus 32:19.)
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These days, you can’t toss an organic pomegrante drink in New York City without hitting someone gushing about “farming.” People are joining CSAs, flocking to the farmer’s markets, and insisting that their restaurants and supermarkets carry free range eggs and meat. Heck, even Farm Aid is coming to NYC this year! (As someone who coordinates CSAs for a living, this makes me swoon a little.)
But even with our newfound city-folk expertise on all things sustainable agriculture, most New Yorkers would be surprised to meet a farmer like Farmer John.
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I recently heard an interview with Native artist Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun during which he made a comment about the nature of food. He asked “When a Haida is eating a hotdog When does the hotdog become Haida (referring to the first nations band)? When it’s in his hand? When it’s in his mouth? or after he’s had a bowel movement.” Yuxweluptun was using this image as a metaphor for many cultural dilemmas. I ended up stuck on the Koan-like statement for a while trying to grapple with what about the metaphor hit me. I think it stems from the possibility of thinking about it from a literal perspective and then approach food and culture differently. When does what we eat become who we are, if it even ever does.
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Like me, some of you may have pondered the significance of dairy on the festival of Shavuot. I have mixed feelings about the various explanations I have heard for this association:
- Since the rules about not mixing milk and meat had just been revealed at Sinai, there was no time for the Israelites to buy a second set of dishes so they had to have a dairy meal to celebrate the giving of the Law.
- Using gematria, the letters in the Hebrew word chalav (milk) add up to 40 - the amount of days the people waited at Sinai (or the number of years they wandered in the desert)
- As long as the Israelites followed the words of Torah, they would inherit the land flowing with milk (and honey)
- Just as Torah has been compared to water, so it has been compared to milk (i.e. “Milk and honey are under your tongue” (Song of Songs 4:11).
It’s this last idea on which I’d like to focus the remainder of this essay. When it comes to Torah as milk, the following Talmudic passages some up the values behind this metaphor nicely:
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“Do not wrong one another, and you shall fear your God; for I, The Eternal, am your God.” (Leviticus 25:17)
[This verse] forbids wronging others with words…And if you say: “Who knows if I had evil intentions?” For that reason the verse continues: “You shall fear your God”…[Regarding] anything which is a matter of conscience, known only to the person involved, [The Torah adds]: “You shall fear your G-d.” (Rashi on Lev. 25:17)
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue.” (Proverbs 28:21)
While researching for a d’var torah for this week’s parasha, I came across the following midrash, courtesy of a Union for Reform Judaism TableTalk by Barbara Binder Kadden:
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Of all the foods that play an important role in Jewish ritual life, perhaps the most overlooked in terms of its transformative symbolism is the lowly breadcrumb. Each Rosh Hashanah we loft these penitential panko into flowing waters, then stand at the ready with spoon, feather and candle as they mysteriously wash ashore six months later inside our toaster, behind our fridge, or surreptitiously planted, like the murder weapon from a bad episode of Law and Order, in an easy-to-reach corner of our home, waiting to be swept up, pronounced null and void, and burnt to a (inedible) crisp. Normally sitting innocently atop our mac & cheese, or (not so innocently) in our clams casino, why were these crumbs chosen to represent our most hidden sins, or (as the chasidim teach), our haughtiest arrogance? Why must we Jews endure this twice-yearly crouton crucible? Read more »
Sugaring season is conveniently “sandwiched” between Purim and Pesach. When the nights are still below freezing and the days sunny and warm, the sap begins to flow up and down, coursing through the veins of mature sugar maples ready to be tapped, the sap eager to be boiled down into sweet maple syrup. The mountains are a patchwork quilt of snow and clearing and streams - swollen with runoff - roar with a nervous energy as their waters seek the rivers below.
Actually, the juxtaposition of sugaring to Purim - Pesach is quite serendipitous. For just as Purim showed us the concealed face of Hashem, so too, the clear cool sap - containing 98% water – hides the true sweetness which is only revealed after “boiling off” the excess. By the time we get to Pesach – the ultimate in your face, Old Testament big ticket miracle kinda holiday – the water is a distant memory leaving us with only the rich syrups with such exotic monikers as “dark amber” – as much a revelation as a revolution! Read more »
