Rosh
Hashanah 5774 First Evening
My fellow congregants! Shanah tovah.
Good evening. Hinei ma tov u-manaim, shevet achim gam yachad – although this is
not our regular davening place (I miss the comfy environs of Beth Meier’s
sanctuary), nevertheless - how good and pleasant it is, to be sitting in this sukkat shalom, this dwelling of peace, in fellowship. It’s wonderful to be
with all of you.
The primary theme of this yom tov season is teshuvah, repentance. We are supposed to turn ourselves around - to
change. Change can be difficult. Change can cause anxiety. Change can weigh
heavily. It brings to mind the sign I saw over a jar by the cash register at
Starbucks. “If you can’t handle change, please leave it here.”
This little story I am about to tell you has been attributed to most of the
great rabbis of the 19th-20th centuries. I have read it
in reference to the following: the Chafetz Chaim, the Apter Rav, Rebbe Zusia,
Rebbe Simcha Bunem and Rabbi Chaim of Sens. You name him, he said it! Courtesy
of my colleague Rabbi Stephan Parnes, here goes! Rabbi Chaim of Sens used to
say, "When I was young I wanted to change the world. I tried, but the
world didn't change. Then I tried to change my town, but my town didn't change.
Then I tried to change the members of my family, but they didn't change. Then I
realized that first – I must change myself."
That is
the call of teshuvah, of tefillah and of tzedakah. This is what we promise in the Un’taneh Tokef prayer.
Repentance, prayer and charity – in truth, they change who we
are, and when God lives in and through us, He and we become partners in
perfecting – or at the very least, improving the world.
Friends, we humans think we are in command of everything. We think we can
control ourselves, our families, our people, our world, our destiny. And if we
can control others, we can change them. That is a false assumption.
In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, the late Viktor Frankl, a
neurologist and existential psychiatrist, and a survivor of the concentration
camps, knew that this belief in our power over others, over our world, was an
illusion. He was not even sure we could exercise significant control over our
own lives, let alone the lives of others. But what he was certain of was that
we could control our reactions to the things that happened to us, and thereby
find some meaning – even in suffering. Today we might call it coping
mechanisms. And that form of self-control that accepts the things that we cannot
change, that effects change when it can, creates a kind of dignity which
effects greater change not only in ourselves, but in those others with whom we
interact – perhaps even God.
Yes, it is through changing ourselves that we effect change in others. It’s
all relative – if I change my position (whether physical or intellectual or
otherwise) – if I change my position and move closer to you, the nature of our
relationship has changed, even if you have not moved your absolute position at
all. So it is – with people, with God, with the physical world around us. I
can’t control you, I can’t change you; but I can control my attitude and my
behavior toward you, and thus alter the relationship and my reaction to it….. I
NEED you – in order to have a
relationship with you; but, I don’t need you to change in order to have
that relationship.
When the lights go out, we can shout at the darkness or we can light a
candle. Only one of those reactions changes the world around us. When our lives
are not what we want them to be, we can rant and rave and scream and shout, or
we can work in even the smallest way to effect change in ourselves.
That is why we are here tonight. And for the next two weeks or so, we will
seek to change. We have to be able to manage and handle change. This isn’t
Starbucks, and there is no jar at the cash register.
I wish you and your families l’shanah
tovah u’metukah tikateivu v’tichateimu b’shalom ul’farnassah – may you be
written and sealed for a good and sweet year of peace and prosperity.
Shanah tovah.
