Parashat Shlach Lecha – Weekend Services
Chaverim/ Dear Friends,
We hope you can make services tonight, Friday June 13th at 7pm.
Tomorrow morning, Saturday June 14, starting at 9am, we have our Shabbat morning services. We will have a Torah reading at approximately 9:45 am and a children’s story time too. We are very grateful to Hal and Elaine Jacobs who are sponsoring a very special Father’s Day kidush in honor of their family Hannah, Jo and David. Please join us for a delicious kidush and weekend of inspiring services.
Sunday June 15, at 3:30pm, we continue our Intro to Judaism class at Beth El. This class is open to all in the community and it is not too late to join.
Cantor Ben-Moshe’s Weekly Message:
This week we read in Parshat Sh’lah L’kha of the major turning point of the narrative of the People of Israel in the desert-their condemnation to an us generation of wandering before reaching the Promised Land. To me, this parshah equals the conclusion of the Torah, with its tale of the death of Moses on the borders of the Land, within sight of his goal. To come so close, and to be so far away, is heartbreaking. Unfortunately, it seems that B’nei Yisrael weren’t spiritually equipped to enter the Land of Israel- sometimes, there needs to be a transitional generation between slavery and true freedom. The bodies of the Israelites were liberated, but slavery still had too strong a hold on their minds. We know that early trauma can have a lasting effect on a person’s psyche. It goes without saying that We should all be careful to avoid inflicting such harm, but we should also do everything within our power to help those who have so suffered, so that they can reach towards their full potential. Shabbat Shalom.
From Rabbi Peter Tarlow of Texas A&M Center for Crypto Judaism
This week’s Torah section is: “Sh’lach L’chah meaning: Send forth”. You will find it in the Book of Numbers 13:1-15:41. Reading this week’s parashah we cannot help but connect its name to an earlier section found in Genesis: “Lech L’chah meaning Go forth”. In Lech l’chah G’d tells Abraham to change the place where he lives and to change his life. In this week’s parashah, it is not G’d commanding Abraham to move but Moses who commands the Israelites to send forth twelve spies to scout out the land that generations back G’d had given to the people of Israel. In the case of Lech l’chah, Abraham obeys the command, successfully moves from Ur to Canaan and from moral darkness to spiritual light. In this week’s case, the twelve spies will fail. It is fear and lack of faith in themselves and in G’d that will turn success into failure.
Are not these two Torah portions different sides of the same coin? Both leaving Ur and Sinai required acts of courage and the need to leave the familiar and accept risk. Both Bible portions share a common theme: that without an optimistic sense of faith, we lack the courage to dream and thus become eternal slaves of fear.
In this week’s section the text teaches us that ten of the spies brought back a highly negative
and pessimistic report stating: the enemy is too strong, the land cannot be conquered. From their perspective Jewish history would die before it was born. As in the case of most pessimists they were excellent in presenting the problem, but offered no alternative solution. Pessimists, despite what they may claim, tend to become frozen in their fear of success.
Realistic optimists take a very different approach to life. Thus, two of the twelve spies take state: “Im chafetz banu ha’Shem v’hevi otanu el ha’aretz ha’zot utnah lanu eretz asher hi zavat chalav udvash/if the Lord so desires it, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us, for it is a land flowing with milk and honey.” (14:8). The two positive spikes knew the task would not be easy but with strength of faith and a sense of dedication G’d would not abandon them and they would succeed. These two spies, Caleb and Joshua, teach us an important lesson: Pessimism accomplishes nothing. Indeed, pessimists not only hold themselves back, but also destroy the spirit of those with whom they associate. Pessimists are not realists. Realists offer solutions, pessimists offer only fear but never alternative solutions.
Judaism is not a religion for pessimists. We Jews are commanded to be persons of faith; not to be deniers of faith. Judaism insists that we have faith in oneself and in G’d. Is not our history a 5,000 year journey of faith and optimism? Ours is the story of a small people refusing to give into “the reality of the pessimist.” It was only with faith that even as we faced the horrors of Nazi Europe, we were willing to rebuild a modern nation from the ashes of Europe’s bigotry.
To be an optimist is to sanctify the past and to embrace the future. As a people of faith we have no other choice then to remember the words of Joshua and Caleb “be strong and to be of good courage” for like our ancestors in Sinai we have no alternative. Are you a person of optimistic faith or negative pessimism?