Omer 2024 Day 7

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Day 7: Malchut within Chesed, Leadership within Lovingkindness

Today, my four-year-old and I talked about leadership. She was very excited to tell me that she sometimes gets to be the line leader at preschool. It's the line leader's job to walk in front of everyone to lead the way to their next activity.

"Should you run far ahead of everyone when you're the line leader?" I asked.

"No!" she cried indignantly. She then patiently explained that line leaders have to stay with the class, so everyone knows where to go. The line leader sets an appropriate pace for the line, so that the whole class doesn't go running away from the teacher.

Leaders who lead with kindness, who don't leave others behind and respect others, are the embodiment of malchut within chesed.

Omer 2024 Day 6

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Day 6: Yesod within Chesed, Connection within Lovingkindness

In a discussion in my household earlier this week, we wondered why the seventh day (and eighth day outside of Israel) is a chag day (a holiday with no work). So, we looked it up and the reason is that the seventh day of Passover (which is the sixth day of the omer - hey, that's today!) is the day the Israelites escaped through the Red Sea. As Passover is ending, we celebrate our liberation in the most miraculous way - God suspending the laws of nature, the Israelites all walking into the unknown, and the Egyptians drowning behind them.

This story showcases our connections. Our connection to God, our connection to each other, our connection to the earth, and even our connection to Egypt and our enslavers. The Israelites' freedom was a collective endeavor, creating bonds of compassion and solidarity. As we commemorate this day, we're reminded to extend kindness and support to those around us.

Omer 2024 Day 5

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Day 5: Hod in Chesed, Humility in Lovingkindness

Feeling the warmth of lovingkindness is a humbling experience. It's a reminder of our interconnectedness, our shared humanity, and the profound impact that simple acts of kindness can have on both the giver and the receiver.

In a society that values the pursuit of success and recognition, humility allows us to acknowledge our own limitations and imperfections, recognizing that we are part of something larger than ourselves. Humility teaches us to approach life with an open heart and to embrace the diversity of perspectives that surround us. Lovingkindness enables humility by inviting us to set aside our ego and embrace vulnerability, secure in the knowledge that we will be loved and supported.

Acts of kindness, no matter how small, are powerful. One summer in high school, I read The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens, and took to heart the message of a paradigm shift. I worked hard that summer and into the following school year to be "highly effective" and one of my more memorable take-aways from the book was the desire to perform random acts of kindness. A smile offered to a stranger, picking up gum on the sidewalk before someone stepped in it and ruined their day, turning in a lost $20 bill found in the hall instead of pocketing it myself - I looked for ways to show compassion and kindness to those around me, with the warm, humble feeling of doing good as its own reward. I followed Hillel's golden rule, without knowing it was Hillel's, to treat others as I wanted to be treated. I showed the lovingkindness that I wanted to see in the world. And doing so without expectation of reciprocation was both powerful and humbling. It made me more empathetic, imagining that maybe my encouraging smile was just what that stranger needed, that a classmate would make it to class on time, instead of being delayed scraping gum off a shoe, or that the $20 I found would make its way back to its owner, a minor miracle.

Humility in lovingkindness helps us see the beauty of humanity and recognize that each person we encounter is navigating their own life with its ups and downs, and that, just as the kindness of others helps us get through our days, so too, we can support others. So let us strive to be humble and kind, to connect with others, and to make a difference in the world.

Omer 2024 Day 4

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Day 4: Netzach within Chesed, Eternity/Endurance within Lovingkindness

And just like that, we're more than halfway through Passover and halfway through the first week of the omer. It takes some endurance to get through these seven weeks of transformation. Some of the things I want to improve in myself won't stick. Some of the lessons I learn will fall by the wayside over time. Change, by its very nature, is an eternal process. But with love from others and kindness toward ourselves when we face setbacks, we can grow and change over these seven weeks and over the course of our lives.

Omer 2024 Day 3

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Day 3: Tiferet within Chesed, Balance within Lovingkindness

Think back a few days to your seders. I'll bet the table was beautifully set. I hope there was a balance of reading and questioning, thought-provoking discussion, and good food. I hope you were surrounded by the lovingkindness of family and friends. I don't know about your seder, but at my seders, the Four Children always prompt a lot of discussion. There is always a joke made about whoever is chosen to read the Wicked/Rebellious Child. Sometimes we remark on the difference between the Wise Child and the Wicked Child both using "you," instead of "us" in their questions. A new Haggadah at our table this year (The New American Haggadah by Jonathan Safran Foer) included a commentary about the Four Parents that was both insightful and hilarious. Are the children each different stages of life? Does each of the Four Children live in each of us, each a part of the whole that make us human? How do we balance the insatiable curiosity of the Wise Child with the seeming disengagement of the Child Who Does Not Know How to Ask, or the disrespect of the Wicked Child with the simplicity of the Simple Child?

On the third day of the omer, we look for balance within kindness. In thinking about and responding to each of the Four Children, we must balance our own responses to meet the child where they are. We might want to give a detailed history of our peoplehood and freedom to the Wise Child, eager to engage the interested child in our customs, but then the rest of our guests (and the other three children) would be bored and hungry. We might want to send the Wicked Child to time out for the disrespectful tone used in front of grandma, but instead, we give an answer that places the child still within the Exodus story of our Haggadah, so that even the rebuke teaches the story. The Haggadah reminds us to answer the Simple Child with simple language, and not to ignore the Child Who Does Not Know How to Ask just because the child isn't asking questions. It is this balance, rooted in a parent's love for their child (whether that child is meeting our expectations or not), that makes the Four Children such an interesting and engaging topic to discuss at the seder. The Four Children teach us how to balance those aspects within ourselves and how to respond with care when we see it in others.

Omer 2024 Day 2

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Day 2: Gevurah within Chesed, Strength within Lovingkindness

Strength and kindness are often presented as opposites. Kindness is soft and empathetic, while strength is powerful. We know, of course, that they are not opposed to each other, and today is a day to consider the interplay of these two attributes. How can we find strength in kindness?

Kindness strengthens the bonds between people. Sometimes, there is a misguided notion that strength is about being more powerful than those around you, and this can lead people to tear each other down in order to be "stronger," but this strength is merely illusory. Just as yesterday we discussed giving and receiving love as a two-way street, so too, is strength. We find strength in kindness, because when we are kind, we develop strong bonds that we can rely on when we need kindness in return. This strengthens each of us and our communities.

Omer 2024 Day 1

Omer Introduction

Omer Overview

The seven-week process of counting the omer prompts us to reflect on what the journey to freedom stirs in each of us. Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism) attaches seven sephirot (attributes of God) to each of the seven weeks of the omer, and one to each day, to facilitate our reflection and spiritual growth.

The first day of the omer is chesed within chesed, lovingkindness within lovingkindness.

Day 1: Chesed within Chesed, Lovingkindness within Lovingkindness

This morning, ​I asked my 6-year-old, "What is love?"
She gave me a quizzical look, but thought about it for a minute before answering, "You already know."

You already know. This who​le period of counting the omer is a study in thinking deeply about concepts we​ already know. We know lovingkindness when we feel it, just as we can feel the loneliness of its absence.

I tell my daughters I love them all the time. Sometimes I yell it loudly through the car window as they are walking into school (they are not yet old enough to be embarrassed by that), sometimes I say it quietly, or off-handedly, just a comfortable part of any sentence. Sometimes, I say "I have to tell you a secret" and then whisper it in their ear. That's my favorite, because they both look incredulously at me and respond with, "I know! That's not a secret." And, of course, they're right, but I like how closely they listen to my whisper in that moment, because what I have to say is very important and very personal, even if I sometimes also shout it for the whole schoolyard to hear.

This morning, I came back to my daughter to press her to think more deeply. Not just about what we already know about love, but about what it means. I urged her gently, "I want to know what you think."
She thought again for a moment. "You can't love anybody if you don't love yourself," she said.

It reminded me of the flight safety instructions at the beginning of every flight: if the cabin loses air pressure, oxygen masks will deploy in front of you. Put your own mask on before helping those around you.

Lovingkindness in lovingkindness requires us to love ourselves first. Showing ourselves lovingkindness means that we trust that we are deserving of the love and kindness that we receive from others. It is a measure of self-respect. But loving only ourselves would be selfish and narcissistic. We love ourselves so that we have a self-assured foundation from which to give love to others, just as we secure our own oxygen mask before helping others with theirs. Lovingkindness in lovingkindness is about being in relationship. Love is sometimes big and loud, and sometimes quiet. It is both directed inward, creating a sense of calm and worth within ourselves, and directed outward to the people for whom we care.

As we work our way through the days of the omer, we will need to look both internally to our own selves, and externally to our relationships with others and with God. We need to be kind to ourselves as we reflect on the ways we may not fully measure up to the omer's attributes of God, and show others kindness as they grow as well. To do that, we begin with a foundation of love for ourselves and for others.

Counting the Omer 2024

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Every seder looks a little different. Some are all in Hebrew, some are 15 minutes long, some use the Harry Potter Haggadah. But this week at every seder, we will all ask the Four Questions and we will all enumerate the Four Children.

On the second night, toward the end of Hallel after the meal, we will also recite the blessing for the first night of the omer. Keep an eye out for it in your Haggadah - it can be easy to miss at the end!

The omer is the seven-week period between Passover and Shavuot. Mystically, it is a time of reflection and introspection, as we move through time and space from the slavery of the Passover narrative to the covenantal relationship with God that we experience at Sinai. But we don't wait for the end of the second seder to begin self-reflecting, no! The reflection begins early in the first seder with the Four Questions and the Four Children.

The Four Questions prompt us to be aware of our circumstances. The questions all essentially ask: how does context us make us act differently? One morning, the Israelites woke up in bondage and the next morning we were free. How do the events happening around us change us?

The Four Children make us wonder: which child am I? How have I been wise or wicked? When have I been simple? What do I not even know enough to know? The Four Children are models for how to engage with the world and with the people around us.

Counting the omer places us at the seder, seeing ourselves as newly freed slaves, and asks us to reflect on what that journey to freedom and the journey to God will stir in each of us. Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism) attaches seven sephirot (attributes of God) to each of the seven weeks of the omer, to facilitate our reflection and spiritual growth.

The seven sephirot are:

1. Chesed (חסד): loving kindness

2. Gevurah (גבורה): strength, power, justice, bravery

3. Tiferet (תפארת): beauty, balance, compassion

4. Netzach (נצח‎): eternity, endurance, victory

5. Hod (הוד): splendor, majesty, glory, humility

6. Yesod (יסוד): foundation, connection

7. Malchut (מלכות): leadership

Each week and each day have an attribute. The first week is the week of chesed. The first day is chesed, the second is gevurah, and so on, so that each attribute will be paired as we count. You'll see it in action this week as we begin counting together.

Chag Kasher v'Sameach - Happy Passover!

Happy Anniversary to Me! 13 Years Since My Mikvah

On April 8, 2011, I sat before my beit din in Nashville and answered questions about why I wanted to be a Jew. What had drawn me to this religion? What was my favorite thing about Jewish life? About the holidays? Was I prepared to face antisemitism?

In celebration of my 13th year of Jewish life (happy bat mitzvah to my conversion!), I'd like to share an excerpt from my conversion essay:

My inexplicable connection to Judaism has developed over the past two years. It started with a simple convergence of beliefs - my values aligned with the principles of Judaism. The focus on family, community, learning, and curiosity are all values that I share with Judaism and that drew me to the religion. My connection felt more logical than spiritual, and I knew that I could only convert to a religion in which I could connect in every way that I needed. I would settle for nothing less than a religion that matched my values, encouraged my growth, and, most importantly, left me feeling closer to God. For a long time, Judaism fulfilled the first two requirements, but did not make me feel any closer to God.

That feeling I was looking for can only be described as awe. I wanted a religion that not only preached what I believed and challenged me to be a better person, but that also filled me with wonder and a sense of God’s presence. I thought that maybe it was too much to ask for all of these things to align for me in one religion, but for a year, that was all I asked of God. I went to temple every week and prayed that God would connect me with something in all the ways I wanted. “It doesn’t have to be Judaism,” I bargained with God, “as long as it holds the same principles and has songs as fun as V’shamru and as beautiful as Mi Chamocha. Please, God, just give me that connection.”

There were other barriers, like learning Hebrew and the fact that I struggled to comprehend the dual nature of Judaism as a religion and a culture, but with time I became more comfortable with those aspects. Eventually, everything else fell into place for me with Judaism and all I needed was the awe.

God answered my prayers without warning. It was a random weekday, not long after the High Holidays, a year and a half after I had become actively engaged with Judaism. It happened as an epiphany after an otherwise slow, methodical buildup of comfort and understanding. I think I needed that comfort before I could fully connect in the way I wanted and needed with Judaism and with God. There is a concept in Judaism that every Jew, whether Jewish by birth or conversion, is born with a Jewish soul. This sudden epiphany I experienced felt as though my Jewish soul was ignited. This is when I decided to convert.

Today, I also so clearly see na'aseh v'nishma (we will do and we will hear) in my epiphany moment. I "did" Judaism - davened and studied Torah weekly, taught in the Sunday School, kept kosher - and only then did I "hear" God, did I feel fully at home in Judaism and called to begin my conversion process. When I emerged from the mikvah 13 years ago, my rabbis marked it not as the end of my conversion process, but as the beginning of lifelong Jewish learning and growth. So, happy anniversary to me!