Minyan Replay with Rabbi Lizzi — Parashat Tzav

Every weekday at 8:00 am, Mishkan Chicago holds a virtual Morning Minyan.  You can join in yourself, or listen to all the prayer, music, and inspiration right here on Contact Chai.

https://www.mishkanchicago.org/series/morning-minyan-spring-2024/

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Produced by Mishkan Chicago. Music composed, produced, and performed by Kalman Strauss.

Transcript

Transcript

Good morning everybody

invite us to be in whatever position you're in. If you're sitting great if you're lying down, that's fine. If you're walking that's also fine. But just to take like three breaths consciously relaxing your shoulders breathing into your belly and exhaling you can when you inhale like hold it for three or four count and then exhale slowly also on a three or four count

and just feel the specialness of being alive in this moment being able to do that what a gift that is

more than

Okay

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baby beach

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Hi

moda I Neely finesse grateful am I as I stand before you as I said before

you as I am in your presence in your face literally in the finesse if you look at that, such a good word because we often talk about being in God's presence. Lift Vanessa literally means in your face. And that's how you describe being in somebody's presence. But mana Hi Vic, I am Arua hyva Cayambe the Master of the Universe eternal enduring. You returned my soul to me become law in In tenderness and love, in mercy Rabba and Mona Tessa abundant is your faith. But okay, so your faith, God, God's fit. That's a weird thing, right? We often talk about how faith is like a we have faith, we're supposed to be faithful, we're supposed to believe. But actually, we wake up in the morning. And the first thing we say about God is that God returned our soul to us in tenderness. Because God has faith in us. If we woke up this morning, it's because like, someone up there out there, has faith in our ability to live another day, do the right thing, make the right choices, make a different choice than we made yesterday, whatever it is that we may feel like we need help to do or encouragement. That encouragement is is is given us by waking up in the morning because like, that's an expression of God's faith in us. And here we are, anytime you need to remember, like or ask, I don't know, Where is God in this? There's, like, we are live phonexa We are in God's face. God's in our face, which is actually kind of a funny thing to think about when you wake up in the morning, because that's the time I least like my face. You know, like, wake up in the morning are like, oh, man, I gotta get my face ready to see the world. Nobody knew. Nobody can see me like this. You know who can and who loves you? Hashem. All right, we're gonna keep we're gonna keep going. All right, I kinda want to just get into some highly loose, I'm ready to get into the Hallelu section of our morning. Oh, no, too far. Here we go. Yeah, let's just get in here. The Miriam Margolyes version of this, which she she discovered this or I don't know, if she discovered this setting, maybe the rabbi's have been a gesture and discovered the setting. This tune was inspired by Brazilian Capoeira tune. And then they set it to this Hallelu. And I guess, my invitation for thinking this morning, as we are entering the, you know, partially out of the book of Leviticus. And so much of the Book of Leviticus in order to make it meaningful is like basically like reappropriating the ideas in order to bring them into some context, that is not ancient sacrifice, but that is something modern, so that we can make sense of them so that we can actually like wrestle with the ideas and make them meaningful. So my question is, we sing through this as we sing through this Brazilian Capoeira to and that's been reset to a an ancient song that we're singing here on zoom in the year 5784 2024 Is what's something that that you've seen like composted, recycled, remade, made new, so that it could be so that it could be appreciated and loved again in a different way? And I'm going to turn my chat on in case something occurs to you because I want to see it

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah

l bed kutcho Halle

Vicki Helene

big Helen Keller oh good Hello Hallelujah

to take cash and buy Hallelujah Hallelujah hello

hello Kohana Shama Shama?

Hallelujah Hallelujah

I'm gonna read what Ellen road here she wrote it there's a Tel Aviv organization that cleans up cigarette filters from the beach and makes bracelets And then Julia upcycling vintage clothing garments into modern accessories. Yes, inspired by my grandmother. Love him. lay our ears kowski and our house we've sort of reconfigured NIDA from a practice of containing the ritual contamination of menstruation into a practice of pampering the person menstruating so reorienting from you can't touch me to let me do that for you. Whoo I love that and if anybody has questions about what that is about and referring to I'm sure later I would be happy to tell you about it later renovating old buildings yes

hallelujah

invite you to stand if you're able and if that's available to you

very who at I don't I am abora

I don't know. Hi, Mara. En very Jota. I don't know man. Damn yo taro Rovereto, Chef Jose Shalom. We're at a call here the Sheraton I don't even they have me move to that I'm excited ah berkelium to meet Matt savory. She you light up the world and a heaven with kindness every day you renew every day you renew them, making them good. These works of creation or a huddle shuts you into any scheduled data. Mahira little raw, viral ka ta da na VI, your ser Hemi oro?

Before I have that, Rebecca, I feel like this whole the whole first section of the morning actually is really like the the taking in of God's faith, God's love. That's what this one is. That first one was faith. The second this one here is love. I have that rebuffed I know. And I'm, I'm just I'm conscious this morning, I'm thinking a lot about this like awful, awful thing that happened in Maryland with this, you know, the dolly boat hitting this bridge and the construction workers that haven't been found and probably won't be found at this point and and how for, you know, every single day there are there are moments in people's lives that take people's lives. Where the family's surrounding whoever that was go. I don't I'm sorry. It's a little bit hard for me to believe there's a loving God when this kind of thing happens. Right? I don't know. For those of you who are watching our poram Spiel the other night, there was a family feud question what are God's worst qualities? And it was meant to be you know, kind of funny and people said things like vengeful Can I have vengeful, and you know, see it a pop up on the board? Can I have dyno misogynist and patriarchal, you know, shows up on the board. But then someone said, basically theodicy, you know, or why does evil happen in a world where God's supposed to be Why do bad things happen? Can I see why do bad things happen? And you know, yes, indeed, you know, one of God's worst qualities is God can't prevent bad things from happening in our world, apparently. And so, and yet, like here we are every single morning affirming the presence of a loving presence. So I want to invite everybody right now to think of who it is that you're praying for. You now like all of the people who need to be reminded of someone's presence, the presence of Love, the presence of a friend, the presence of somebody who cares about them, and is thinking about them. No go ahead and put the names in the chat of the people who you want to be reminded that they are loved. That they are known they are seen they are valued or appreciated. They are being thought about and as we do I have a rub ah can maybe think to yourself, you know how are you going to how are you going to let any of those people know later today that you thought about them and sent them love and had your community pray for them? I have a couple lists I have a couple of names on my list as well.

See insha Allah and Ben ever Marinova sorry meno had dasa buchheim Vahana.

Just prior les Ariella about Devorah L.

Cheryl, yeah Michela that Malka lavish Ben moisture Mark Wayne HGTs. Dahlia, Erica Chuck Christian myself. Gotcha. And for ISRAEL PALESTINE for this whole up and down world for all the tortured animals. Rachel Megan Cindy Roberta, Lauren Jesper. Felicia, Felicia Miriam J Morris and all the minion relatives and friends in need of healing and you're really really

beautiful so many more names than I can read out loud

as I'm singing I hope that maybe you'll read all of them out loud and every time somebody's name gets said their angel goes out got it check. I'll go check I'm gonna send them a little love dust

Oh Hey kiddo love you Tara hamata

been my cane

Shabbat Shabbat bien que that damn who cares can telefone Nanos?

Harassing family the 10 the vein they have a high skellies.

dish so okay Mackel de bourree Talmud Torah earring damn back to the vein mitzvah test

he Shake Shack

you love it nice not you love me Smith's army shoe

I refresh your mind to every single person whose name you thought of this morning who you mentioned all the people holding on to their own pain who haven't told the soul that they're in pain somehow sending a little bit of love their way strength their way a sense of being enveloped in love we gather the four corners of our Tsetse together

this shallow from my hair back and for Tyrell it's totally sane. Oh, come on me wound it Chiappa well, you shoot at vighnaharta Mechoulam volition picker I've titled this Szimpla haggadot seller and that the whole Dada who the head ha the I have

to be grateful to somehow find gratitude in this world to bring you together Hashem all of the all of the disparate pieces that don't seem to fit together that we're told can't fit together but somehow must fit together but I have in love

baroka tattoo and I have a Claire of Emily's throw away the I have

shimmer he stressed

Hello he knew I'm gonna die

there are hafta eight I don't I know haha, the whole of aapke home nappsa Hamada the HeyYou who had very high a the share I know he emits other ha ha ha yo malaba Vichy Nantahala gonna have rebar to bomb there's you've just have a big data over last acaba Dara who shot for five comesa look sharp tablet Oh Alia Dhaka there how you a little tougher Oh, it's been a NASA will cut off to I'm on the Zuzo back Tessa movie Shara hair

okay, pause this morning for a little bit of learning. Compare powershot sav. I was going to I was going to read from this book that might even be out of print, tour, a commentary for our times. I really liked this one is by Rabbi Hart, Rabbi Hart Harvey fields who may his memory be a blessing. But basically, he goes through every parsha in the Torah. This is one of three books there's a Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. And, and goes through all the main like commentary writers and gives you you know, this is what nahama Leibovitz says about this, this is what Rashi says about this, and he organizes it into two or three kind of thematic explorations that are really, really good. I was gonna do that this morning. But then I just came across a Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, you know, and he kind of does the same thing except he he does it differently and what can I say? I don't know. I'm attracted to headlines like this. Why civilizations die? And it's like, Oh, poor shots of that is so not what the Parsha is talking about. I want to know how Rabbi Sachs gets from poor shots of which starts like this hang on, which starts like this. Vader bear out and I almost surely more savvy, it's a heroic vet by novelty more command errand and his sons thus this is the ritual of the burnt offering. The burnt offering shall remain where it is burned on the altar all night until morning, and where the fire is kept going on it. Okay, this is the whole parsha is about you know how Aaron and his sons do ritual. How do we get from a parsha about how Aaron and his sons are told to do ritual As to why civilizations die. So okay, that's that's kind of what I wanted to look at this morning, if that's okay with you. And for the benefit of folks that are listening to this later, I'm just going to read out loud. And we're going to see how Rabbi Sacks gets from the Parsha to his conclusion here to his exploration, and then for those of you who want to stick around a little bit after minion, we'll talk about what you think. And of course, we'll do Kenzi Chateau mourners Kaddish All right, he writes, In the watchman's read. And I'm just I'm sorry, I don't have his British accent and I'm not going to imitate his British accent but just imagine his, you know, chocolatey British accent as I'm reading this. In the watchman's rattle. Subtitled thinking our way out of extinction. Rebecca Kosta delivers a fascinating account of how civilizations die. When their problems become too complex societies reach what she calls a cognitive threshold. They simply can't chart a path from the present to the future. The example she gives is the Mayans for a period of three and a half 1000 years between 2600 BCE and 900 C, they developed an extraordinary civilization spreading over what is today Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and believe with it believes with an estimated population of 15 million people. Not only were they expert potters, weavers, architects and farmers, they also developed an intricate, cylindrical, cylindrical calendric calendar system, with its with celestial charts to track the movements of the stars and predict the weather patterns. They had their own unique form of writing as well as an advanced mathematical system. Most impressively, they developed a water supply infrastructure involving a complex network of reservoirs, canals, dams and levees. Then suddenly, for reasons we still don't fully understand, the entire system collapsed. Sometime between the middle of the eighth and ninth century, the majority of the Mayan people simply disappeared. There have been many theories as to why it happened. It may have been a prolonged drought, overpopulation. internecine wars, a devastating epidemic, food shortages are a combination of those and other factors. One way or another, having survived 35 centuries, Mayan civilization failed and became extinct. Rebecca Costas argument is that whatever the causes the Mayan collapse, like the fall of the Roman Empire, the Khmer, the calmer empire of the 13th century in Cambodia, occurred because the problems became too many and complicated for the people of that time to solve. There was cognitive overload and the systems broke down. It can happen to any civilization. It may she says, be happening two hours. The first sign of breakdown is gridlock. Instead of dealing with what everyone can see are the major problems. People continue as usual and simply pass their problems on to the next generation. A second sign is retreat into irrationality. Some people can no longer cope with the facts they take, and so they take refuge in religious constellations. The Mayans took to offering sacrifices, archaeologists have uncovered gruesome evidence of human sacrifice on a vast scale. It seems that unable to solve their problems rationally, the Mayans focused on placating the gods by maniacally making offerings to them. So apparently did the American Cambodia which makes the case of Jews and Judaism fascinating. They faced two centuries of crisis under Roman rule between Pompeii is conquest in 30 in 63 BCE, and the collapse of the Bar Kochba rebellion rebellion in 135. C, they were hopelessly factionalized. Long before the great rebellion against Rome and the destruction of the Second Temple, Jews were expecting some major cataclysmic cataclysm. What is remarkable is that they did not focus obsessively on sacrifices, like the Mayans and the calmer when the temple was destroyed, instead of focusing on finding substitutes for oh, excuse me, when their temple was destroyed, or with their temple destroyed, they instead focused on finding substitutes for sacrifice. One was gimme loot Casa Diem acts of kindness. Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai comforted Rabbi Yehoshua Joshua, who wondered how Israel could possibly atone for its sins without sacrifice. He wrote the words, my son we have another atonement as effective as this acts of kindness as it is written in the prophet who Shia, I desire kindness and not sacrifice. That's from a vote directly not on another was Torah study, the sages interpreted Mousies words in every place offerings are presented to my name to refer to scholars who study the laws of sacrifice, not do sacrifices, but who study the laws of sacrifice quick sleight of hand there, and also from the Talmud to on the 27th. One who recites the orders, the order of sacrifices is as if he had brought them. Another was prayer who che said, take words with you and return to the Lord. We will offer our our lips, we will offer our lips as sacrifices of bowls implying that words could take the place of sacrifice. He who prays in the house of prayer is as if he brought a pure ablation. Yet another was chuva. Psalm 51 says The sacrifices of God are a contrite spirit. From this, the sage has inferred that if a person repents, it is accounted to him as if he had gone up to Jerusalem, and built the temple and the altar and offered on it all the sacrifices ordained in the Torah. Wow. I'm just going to read that one more time, because that's very radical for them from the sages. From this, the sages inferred that if a person repents, it is accounted to him as if he had gone up to Jerusalem, built the entire temple and the altar and offered on it all the sacrifices ordained in the Torah. Okay, and a fifth approach was fasting. Since going without food diminished a person's blood and fat, it is counted as a substitute for the fat and blood of sacrifice that's in Bravo. It's a six substitute was hospitality, as long as the temple stood at the altar atone for Israel, but now a person's table atones for him. What is striking in hindsight is how rather than clinging obsessively to the past, leaders like Rabbi Yohanan, ben Zakkai, thought forward to a worst case scenario future. The Great question raised by powershot SEV, which is all about different kinds of sacrifice is not why were sacrifices commanded in the first place, but rather, given how central they were to the religious life of Israel in temple times. How did Judaism survive without them? The short answer is that overwhelmingly, the prophets, sages and the Jewish thinkers of the Middle Ages realize that sacrifices were symbolic enactments of the processes of mind, heart and deed that could be expressed in other ways as well. We can encounter the will of God by Torah study, engaging in the service of God by prayer, making financial sacrifice by charity, creating sacred fellowship, by hospitality, and so on. Jews did not abandon the past, we still refer constantly to the sacrifices in our prayers, but they did not cling to the past. Nor did they take refuge in irrationality. They thought that the future they thought through the future and created institutions like the synagogue, the house of study and school, these could be built anywhere and would sustain Jewish identity, even in the most adverse conditions. That is no small achievement. The World's Greatest civilizations have all in time, become extinct. Well, Judaism has always survived, in one sense, that was surely divine providence.

In another, it was the foresight of people like Rabban Yohanan, ben Zakkai, who resisted cognitive breakdown, and created solutions today for the problems of tomorrow, who did not seek refuge in the irrational and who quietly built the Jewish future. Surely there is a lesson here for Jewish people today, plan generations ahead, think at least 25 years into the future, contemplate worst case scenarios. Ask what would we do if dot dot dot? What saved the Jewish people was their ability despite deep and abiding faith to never let go of rational thought despite their loyalty to the past, to keep planning for the future? And then there are these little questions to ponder around the Shabbat table. I'll read these questions out loud. We'll do qadisiya tome because we're already five minutes over. We'll stick around to discuss a little do you think society has now evolved to the point where it could survive indefinitely? I don't. Do you think finding alternatives to CORBA notes sacrifices was in fact key to the survival of the Jewish people. I do. What is something in your life that motivates you to continue striving for a great future? My children thinking about all of you, but also be in like 25 or 30 years. All right. Let us do Kedzie Chateau both for the learning we did and also for all of the folks in your life. whose memories you want to honor this morning. Who this morning are we remembering and honoring?

My colleague, Elaine hoist, good who died 10 years ago, and I still miss her. We used to have a lot of fun laughing at CPAs and you never would have known that she used to be the head of department of revenue for Vermont. She was just Such a nice modest person. Thanks.

May her memory be a blessing

remembering my father in law, Bob Newman, who is such a wonderful human being and an amazing father in law, and he he had a zest for life that will survive in me, for sure. And Cheryl, Thanks,

Michael Yan send her love to Cheryl. May his memory be a blessing? And I'm saying, Go ahead. I'm

remembering my mother Muriel kornblut.

He's the finale Raha seeing more more to hi Smith Luke and Eileen Dell zone. Anyone else for Khadija Tom this morning?

All right. Glenn, would you would you lead us this morning again? Sure. Thank you.

Heat got all the heat crash to may Raba a man Yamaji Rafi retail young lease mouth lotay The higher tone of your megaphone of the IEA does all beat you straight out Israel by below these mon carry the Maru name yeah as may rob them of a roughly along the LA me on my youth Barbara. They used to be part of a youth Romane VPSA Ito dar Vita lady to Laos she made a pretty sharp shop are used to lay a lawn mean called beer setup is Shirota to spell flattop and Emma Tom Dami Ron being a mom being rude, man. Yeah, hey Slama Robert I mean some I have a Hyeme Elena we'll call you sir owl. The Maru on a man says Shalom be Mammadov Who ya says Shalom Elaine OB I'll call you sir I'll call yo straight a bell beam ru Amin.

Man, men. May their memories be blessings All right.

Stop recording.