Nothing “Just Happens”

There exists in each of us a certain character trait, as understandable and pervasive as it is problematic, that inclines us to believe that things in this world “just happen.” We have a tendency to go about our business, seeing our laundry folded, the dishwasher emptied and dinner cooked and not to realize that all of that happens owing to efforts expended by someone else. Far too frequently we go through life, just like we go from services to Kiddush, so habituated to the patterns of our lives that we think the bagels and salad have simply appeared out of thin air, miraculously, like manna from Heaven. We forget that someone ordered that food, someone prepared the room and arranged the tables, someone paid for that Kiddush and yes, someone will clean it up once we have left the building.

And as much as I may fight this tendency, I know that I myself am as guilty as the next. When I walk in my door at night, my children are bathed, their homework is done, the tantrums have subsided and I get to rub backs and say the bedtime Sh'ma feeling oh so engaged as a parent, when the real heavy lifting happened in the hours prior. The other day, a congregant related to me a dialogue with her husband to whom she had to explain that there is no such thing as a “backpack fairy.” Yes, he may hand the backpacks to the kids as they walk out the door in the morning, but it is actually a person – she – and not some magical pixie who makes the lunches, checks the homework, and lines up the backpacks in the middle of the night.

This inclination, or better stated, disinclination, to identify and give credit to the people who give rise to our own circumstances and lives, is a tendency that has obvious negative consequences. For when we begin to believe that anything in this world “just happens,” we also lose our sense of appreciation and gratitude. The person who thinks this way forgets to say thank you, forgets to clean up after themselves, and deludes themselves into thinking that the universe was created not just for them, but by them. I know, it would be difficult to go through life hyper-sensitized to every single thing and every single person to whom we are indebted. But far more dangerous is the opposite, what we see far too often, those who have been born on third base and believe themselves to have hit a triple. Nothing in this world, we know, “just happens.” None of our circumstances are mere happenstance. All that we have, all that we are, is due to the efforts of those who came before.

Three times a year on festivals and on Yom Kippur we come together to recite Yizkor. Each time, our ability to recall our loved ones is triggered by the sense of gratitude the holidays are meant to engender. On Passover, for God’s liberation of our people; on Shavuot, for the divine gift of the Torah; and then on Sukkot, recalling the booths that sheltered our ancestors throughout their desert journeys. Unlike Passover or Shavuot, the gratitude of Sukkot is directed not only towards God, but also to people. As I mentioned briefly earlier in the holidays, this year I was struck by the famed debate between Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Akiva on the nature of the booths in which Israel dwelled. Rabbi Eliezer interprets the verse poetically, explaining that the sukkot represent the protective clouds of God’s glory. Rabbi Akiva, on the other hand, accepts the booths at face value, maintaining that these were actual structures that the Israelites built in their wanderings. All of which raises the question why Rabbi Akiva, who we know was not by nature averse to allegorical interpretations, couldn’t have left well enough alone. Why not let Eliezer have his poetic interpretation? Why insist on a “this worldly” understanding of the festival? My only answer is that in Akiva’s mind, to miss out on the blood, sweat and tears of the wilderness experience is to miss out on the point of the holiday. There is nothing wrong, in fact there is everything right in acknowledging God’s presence. But to do so at the expense of acknowledging the personal efforts and initiative of Israel, in Hebrew hishtadlut, is to miss the point that the sukkot of our lives, ancient and modern, literal and figurative, do not spring out of nowhere. God and only God is able to create ex nihilo. By insisting on a this-worldly interpretation of the desert booths, Akiva provides a countertext to the otherwise providential account of the wilderness experience – the parting of the sea, the manna, the Torah. The festival of Sukkot reminds us that as important as providence may be, so is hishtadlut, so are the efforts, initiatives and sacrifices of those who came before.

I’ll always remember, I once gave a sermon on the miracle of the State of Israel in my former congregation. As well-meant as my words may have been, one congregant, Israeli-born, pulled me aside after to tell me how jarring my reflection was to her. She had lost loved ones in ’48, ’67 and ’73. She had lived through the State being built. Glorious – yes; miraculous – no. Far too much human effort and human blood had been spilt by Israelis to attribute it all to God. Israel didn’t just happen by way of divine providence. We do our predecessors and ourselves a disservice to tell the story of our people without giving thanks to their heroic and altogether human efforts.

On a much more modest level, this is what this moment of Yizkor is all about. Every other day of the year, we may want to shout out the words of the psalmist, “By the fruits of our own labors.” Not today. We arrive at this moment filled with a profound sense that nothing in our lives “just happened.” Who we are and what we are is due to the infinite efforts, choices and sacrifices made by those who came before us. Blessed as I am with living parents, it is an “aha moment” of the first order to arrive at time when I can look at my own children, remembering where I was in relation to my parents when I was their age; when I can remember celebrating birthdays of my parents as they reached ages that I myself have passed. Who knew back then what I know now? The juggling of work, marriage, child rearing, life. The family decisions, the financial decisions. They seemed so sure of themselves. Is it possible that their lives back then were as improvised as mine is today? As one poet reflected:

Not until I became a mother did I understand how much my mother had sacrificed for me.
Not until I became a mother did I feel how hurt my mother was when I disobeyed.
Not until I became a mother did I know how proud my mother was when I achieved.
Not until I became a mother did I realize how much my mother loves me. 

 

The question of Yizkor is not so much whether we are more or less worthy than our predecessors. On this front I am inclined to believe that they, like us, had their strengths and weaknesses, faults and failures. Rather, the question of Yizkor is whether or not we are willing to acknowledge what we know year ’round to be true, but for some reason fail to embrace – that who we are is a reflection and extension of and a reaction to those whom we remember today.

We know that the question at Yizkor is ultimately not only about the past – those whom we remember today – but a gut check on the degree to which our own existence is presently infused by the high ideals of their lives. Ecclesiastes may be right that generations come and generations go, but this realization does not preclude us from embracing that here in this world, in our time, we have been given the smallest sliver of opportunity to shape the present and to build the future. Remember us or not, our values can ripple well beyond the length of our lives. This, if nothing else, is the promise embedded at the heart of Yizkor, that the divine cap on the human lifespan need not be the limit of the impact of our being.

The Maggid of Dubno told a story about a father who traveled for miles with his son in order to reach a castle. Whenever they encountered a river or a mountain, the father lifted his son on his shoulders and carried him. Finally, as they arrived at the castle, they discovered the gate was shut. There were only narrow windows along the sides. The father turned to his son and explained, “My son, up until now I have carried you. Now the only way to reach the destination is if you will climb through the windows and open the gate for us from within.”

So it is with this moment of Yizkor. Those loved ones we recall carried us throughout our journey. We did not arrive here on our own. They brought us through rivers and over mountains to this point and we are grateful. And yet it is not they, but we here today who are asked to take the next step forward, to enter the castle and unlock the gate. It will be our deeds – in their image but of our doing – that chart the path, that let them in, and that ultimately pave the way for others to follow.