Sermons and Divrei Torah
Asking for Help
by Rabbi Elyse Goldstein
(Sermon - Yom Kippur 5761)
A Chasidic story is told of a boy and his father travelling together
up a hill in an old wagon. Suddenly, a large boulder appeared
on the road, which the wagon could not get around. The boy pondered
the situation, got out of the wagon, and tried to move the boulder.
He couldn't; it was simply too heavy. So next he went to a tree,
took off a large branch, and tried to pry the stone out. The branch
snapped under the effort. The boy then tried to roll the stone
downward, but to no avail. Exhausted, frustrated, the boy climbed
back into the wagon and said to his father, "I've tried everything.
I just can't do it." His father replied, "You haven't tried everything."
"But father" the boy protested, "I've rolled the stone, pried
the stone, pushed the stone. What didn't I do?" His father looked
tenderly at him and answered, "You didn't ask me for help."
Do we ask for help?
I learned a great deal about asking for help from my friend Shira
Shelley Duke, who died from cancer two years ago at the age of
forty two. Before she died, she organized an entire circle of
helpers around her, people who would shop for her, sit with her,
read to her, study with her, even sleep over at her house. I suppose
there is something about being that close to the edge which makes
us have the chutzpah to ask for what we need. I was inspired not
only by those who answered her call, but more by her self-confidence
in asking.
Most of the time, when I ask for a volunteer to do something at
Kolel, they tell me it was an honour to be asked. I'm always surprised,
I expect it to be a burden, a big favour. They usually tell me
they got as much from giving their time as we got from having
their help. And they usually end with, "Please ask me again."
Last week, a prospective donor ended our meeting by saying, "Thank
you for asking me." Maybe I should ask for money for often!
Wow. Thank you for asking. We wouldn't ever be ashamed to ask,
if we believed that it is an honour to be asked. We wouldn't hesitate
to ask if we understood how connective it is to ask, and how connective
it is to be asked. That's how a community is built; that's how
a village raises a child; that's how we feel useful and valuable
and productive.
There is a tradition that two people stand on either side of the
Torah when Kol Nidre is recited, which most of us saw here last
night. This is understood as forming a beit din, a court of three
necessary to pass judgment. But this tradition is linked with
the story in the Torah in the book of Exodus of when the Israelites
first fought with their enemy Amalek. During that battle, God
tells Moses to hold up his hands. When his hands are raised, Israel
wins the battle; when his hands are lowered, they lose. Soon,
Moses' hands grow heavy, and he turns to Aaron on the one side,
and Hur on the other. Each hold up a hand until the struggle is
over. The task of working for deliverance is too formidable for
any individual alone, no matter how great the person is. Even
Moses needs help, asks for it, and in getting it not only he but
the whole people of Israel are saved.
The Talmud relates how on Yom Kippur the Cohen Gadol, the high
priest, would go into the holy of holies in the temple to request
atonement for the children of Israel. He would be accompanied
by two assistants. Even the High Priest is not to go it alone.
Do we ask for help? No, we go it alone.
We are too embarrassed, too ashamed to admit that we are not totally
self-sufficient, that we cannot do it all, that there is no failure
inherent in the need for guidance. Have we bought so thoroughly
into the culture of narcissism that we really do believe we don't
need any assistance through this life? Afraid that others will
say no, sure they will disappoint us again, like the boy in the
story, we try all we can to do it alone. We push, we pull, we
pry, and then we re-enter the wagon, exhausted and frustrated.
With all our self-sufficiency its no wonder that when we find
a boulder in the road, we look inward, not outward, to move it.
Bernie Siegal and Louise Hays tell us we can heal ourselves. The
most popular section in most book stores is the self-help section
where you'll find self-help books, self-help videos, self-help
audio tapes. We look to the Internet to explain things to us.
Everything from curing yourself of back pain to solving your family's
conflicts to being a better school administrator to- my personal
favourite I found in a local book store-a self-help book for people
addicted to self-help books. We can do anything with just one
leading expert in just one easy ten-step program and if you order
now you get a knife that peels and slices and onions without tears
too!
So when we do turn outward, to whom do we turn? Sports figures.
They need moire help than they can possibly ever give. Oprah.
We go to intensive weekend seminars from every new pop psychology
group in the world promising self-knowledge together with full
kabbalistic insight in just 48 easy hours. We pick up the phone
and call in to a radio show where a so-called "doctor" gives us
advice by calling us names, berating us and chastising us. Deeprak
Chopra, John Gray, and all the other pop icons of our day keep
pointing us back to ourselves. We look to everyone in the secular
universe to cure us of what ails us. They have become our "rabbis".
Did we ever think to turn to the spiritual world, to Torah teachers,
and Torah, and God to help us?
Now I know that rabbis are not therapists. People should go to
therapists and social workers and psychologists and psychiatrists
for therapy that will result in the long and arduous process of
self-insight that leads to life-changing solutions. Very often
rabbis will turn away people who come to us for counselling not
because we don't want to help them, but because we feel what they
really need is psychology, not religion. Sometimes people want
to "meet with a rabbi" because its free, fast, and no obligation.
We rabbis could all save ourselves a lot of words if we'd only
remember that people rarely take advice unless they have to pay
for it.
But I wish that people would see rabbis more as mentors and less
as administrators or CEOs of large religious corporations. Rabbis
love to help people find spiritual answers to life's existential
questions. They want to do that much more than help you decide
what caterer to use for your wedding or whether Jason's Uncle
Henry can have the fifth aliyah at his Bar Mitzvah. They want
to do that much more than shuffle papers or give sound bites for
the local news or offer the research for term papers due tomorrow.
Today's rabbis are seen as lecturers on popular topics, book reviewers,
organizational managers, quick quotes for the newspaper; "professionals"
who can "do something" for you, a verse for a wedding invitation,
a paper on women in Judaism, a speaker for a group...and fast
answers to immediate questions.
We also want the really hard questions, the nice juicy Jewish
tradition kind of questions that we need to research and think
about and look up. Most rabbis want to give good advice. But the
trouble with good advice is that it usually interferes with your
plans. There's always an answer to your question, its just that
sometimes the answer is no, and most folks don't want to hear
"no", especially from a non-Orthodox source. People don't turn
to religious leaders for guidance because they want to hear what
they want, not what the religion might say. A true religious leader
won't always say what's popular. There's a Yiddish saying, "Any
Rabbi whose community isn't trying to run him out of town isn't
a real rabbi." Like the prophets of old, one of my jobs is to
comfort the afflicted; the other one is to afflict the comfortable.
So, disappointed in a Judaism that has ceased to take a leading
role in human affairs, modern Jews have begun to seek answers
in the general culture. But this culture has effectively "fired
" God and in God's place put the human and his or her needs at
its heart, and thus there is no "higher authority" to reveal our
r purpose, our role, our duty. Modern humanity cannot fill God's
role, though it certainly does try.
Elizabeth Elliot in A Slow and Certain Light tells of two adventurers
who stopped by to see her, all loaded with equipment for the rain
forest east of the Andes. They sought no advice, just a few phrases
to converse with the Indians. She writes: "...has it occurred
to us that with all our accumulation of stuff, something is missing?
We know what we need--a yes or no answer, please, to a simple
question. Or perhaps a road sign. Something quick and easy to
point the way. Maps, road signs, a few useful phrases are things,
but infinitely better is someone who knows the way to guide us."
Why do we think we can go on this bumpy and difficult road all
by ourselves, like the two adventurers, confident and, we think,
well-informed and well equipped, but missing the essential map?
It's not enough to have the quick and easy instructions, the "Life
for Dummies" software, because life is not easy and we humans
are not, no matter how we dumb ourselves down, really dummies.
We are complex and complicated creatures, and without a map and
a guide, we get easily disoriented and sometimes hopelessly lost.
We need strong, ethical, religious, compassionate, confident role
models to help us find our purpose, our role, our duty and our
mission in this life.
Finding your "mission" in life is the most valuable map you can
have. Only long range goals keep you from being frustrated by
short-term failures. So many of us feel confused and frenetic
so much of the time because our lives seem to be going in the
wrong order: a sort of "fire, ready, aim." We do without any idea
of why we do. We go, without any idea of where we are going, that
sometimes we just feel like, "I'll know where I'm going when I
get there." Without a mission in life we are like Alice in Wonderland.
When Alice comes to a junction in the road that leads in different
directions, she asks the Cheshire Cat, "Cheshire-Puss...would
you tell me please, which way I ought to go from here?" "That
depends a good deal on where you want to go to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where," replied Alice. "Then it doesn't matter
which way you go," replies the cat.
Stephen Covey, one of my personal role models, speaks of the importance
of creating a mission statement in his Seven Habits of Highly
Effective Families. Yes, my own family wrote a mission statement,
and yes, its embarrassing when people come in and read it on our
kitchen wall. But when we fall off track, the mission statement
helps remind us of who we what our family to be. He writes, "Creating
a Personal Mission Statement will be, without question, one of
the most powerful and significant things you will ever do to take
leadership of your life. In it you will identify the first, most
important roles, relationships, and things in your life--who you
want to be, what you want to do, to whom and what you want to
give your life, the principles you want to anchor your life to,
the legacy you want to leave. All the goals and decisions you
will make in the future will be based upon it. It's like deciding
first which wall you want to lean your ladder of life against,
and then beginning to climb. It will be a compass--a strong source
of guidance amid the stormy seas and pressing, pulling currents
of your life." The idea is that if you live by a statement of
what's really important to you, you can make better time-management
decisions. Covey asks, "Why worry about saving minutes when you
might be wasting years?"
It does matter which way we go, and who helps us get there, because
we waste an awful lot of life going in the wrong direction and
getting shoddy directions. Our tradition already has a road-map.
You can see it clearly and hold it in front of you. It would help
us aim first, shoot second. Its called the Torah. Not coincidentally,
the word "Torah" has the same root as "Yoreh", which means "to
shoot." And sin- which we talk about this day so intensely- is
called in Hebrew chet- which literally means shooting but "missing
the mark." If we need to aim better, the Torah can help us.
And we have a guide, "The Guide." God. We liberal Jews seem too
embarrassed to turn to God for spiritual direction. On Rosh Hashana
morning we read in the haftarah how when Hannah was barren and
desperate, she went to "inquire of God"- lidrosh et Adonai. All
throughout the Torah the children of Israel desire to know what
their role is in the world, and they "inquired of God" how to
navigate the path. Our ancestors found out that when they inquired
of God and were prepared to listen, answers were found. "If you
seek God, God will be available to you" King David says to his
son Solomon. This morning's haftarah from Isaiah, says, "Make
way, make way, prepare, lift the stumbling block from the path
of My people". On Yom Kippur, God comes forward to help us move
those boulders in the road. We can almost hear God's whisper,
"Clear the path."
Asking for help means using the tools with which Jews have always
inquired of God- the traditional texts, using the language they
use to probe our role in the world, and to think about our duties
in our personal, professional and social lives in the light of
this ancient language. It means to directly ask God: what is my
purpose and what are your commandments for me? Where will I find
my place? What have I received from you that I can give to others;
and what am I missing that I can get from others? What are my
sins, where do I flee from the tasks you have given me and what
is the price for my flight? What faith will enable me to return
to myself, and what are the false idols to which I turn that will
destroy me? Asking for help from spiritual sources takes the courage
to face those hard questions and the hard answers.
John Cochran tells the story of the fog-shrouded morning on July
4, 1952, when a young woman named Florence Chadwick waded into
the water off Catalina Island. She intended to swim the channel
from the island to the California coast. Long-distance swimming
was not new to her; she had been the first woman to swim the English
Channel in both directions. The water was numbingly cold that
day. The fog was so thick she could hardly see the boats in her
party. Several times sharks had to be driven away with rifle fire.
She swam more than 15 hours before she asked to be taken out of
the water. Her trainer tried to encourage her to swim on since
they were so close to land, but when Florence looked,and all she
saw was fog. So she quit. . . only one-mile from her goal. Later
she said, "I'm not excusing myself, but if I could have seen the
land I might have made it." It wasn't the cold or fear or exhaustion
that caused Florence Chadwick to fail. It was the fog. Many times
we too fail, not because we're afraid or because of the peer pressure
or because of anything other than the fact that we lose sight
of the goal. It is living in fog that keeps us from living our
mission.
Two months after her failure, Florence Chadwick walked off the
same beach into the same channel and swam the distance, setting
a new speed record, because she could see the land.
Asking for help would help us see the land more clearly. Seeing
the land more clearly would help us succeed in deeper ways. On
Rosh Hashana I asked for your help in widening the tent flaps
of the Jewish community in Toronto. Today, on Yom Kippur, it is
your turn to ask for help. Who will it be? What map will you use?
On Yom Kippur God invites us to use this service as a highlighter,
underscoring the directions for the year ahead. For sure, there
will be boulders in the road. What will you do- push, pull. pry,
--- ask?
Shana Tova.
Sermons and Divrei Torah
Additional Resources
Elul: Period of Preparation
Yamim Noraim: Days of Awe
Rosh Hashanah: Introduction
Shofar Symbolism
The Custom of Tashlich
Yom Kippur: Introduction
G'mar Chatima Tova...
