"Out of three or four people in a room,
One always stands at the window..." ~ Yehuda Amichai
Sometimes, the universe just wants to be acknowledged. I wonder whether you've had those moments when there are too many signs to ignore and too many dots that have been connected. In many ways, my time here in Israel has brought to the forefront ideas that I've been exploring and considering for a long time in a way that's made them difficult to ignore.
I became a Bat Mitzvah exactly nine years ago in the Hebrew calander. As I stood in front of my family, my friends, and my community, I chanted Parashat Shofetim and took my first steps on the road to assuming my responsibilities as a member of the Jewish people. Since that day, each time I put on my tallit (prayer shawl) and when I look at the mirror in the morning, I can see an inscription of the line that most resonated with me as a twelve year old as it still does today as an (almost) twenty-two year old: Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof. Justice, justice, shall you pursue.
This Shabbat is a special one not only because we will be reading my parasha, but also because it is the first in the month of Elul, my personal favorite month, and one that begins the preparation for the High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur - the days of Judgement and of Awe. It is a time of holiness, reflection, and action. We are commanded to re-examine ourselves and our deeds in order to better ourselves and those whose lives we have touched in the past year. Tradition begs that we consider and question who we have wronged and who we have praised and who we have ignored. To me, it makes perfect sense that the anniversary of my becoming a Bat Mitzvah coincides with the beginning of Elul, and it is only too interesting and wonderful for me to be in Israel to celebrate.
For the past two weeks, I have felt very much like the one person in a group of three or four that stands at the window, as in the poem of Yehuda Amichai. This trip to Israel is different, and I knew that going in. Instead of floating in the Dead Sea, my friends and I spent the day in South Tel Aviv, one of the poorest and most diverse (ethnically, religiously) in Israel learning about the plight of migrant workers and asylum seekers trying to gain legal residency and talked with incredible children and teens with cerebral palsy in Rishon L'Tzion. Instead of staying at a tourist Bedouin tent in the Negev, we spent the morning hearing community activists at urban gardens speaking about sustainable ecology and the struggle to ultilize the very limited natural resources. We went to the Kotel (the Western Wall), and then we met with Women of the Wall about the challenge of gender equality at the most sacred site of the Jewish people. In the same way that it is challenging to confront a loved one about their problems or your relationship, so too is it difficult to engage in conversations that reveal flaws in a place that you love. Meeting with activists and community members and hearing about the struggles for justice and equality in Israel necessarily begs the question: am I doing enough to make the world a better place? Whether in San Francisco, at Stanford, or in Israel - what needs can I meet, and for whom, and why, and how?
While I don't have the answers to these questions, the coincidence of me being in Israel on Shabbat Shofetim after having spent a few weeks delving in to the notions of social justice, leadership, and community, is not lost on me. I keep looking at my "favorites" tab on my computer - the one I created two years ago that's open to the School of Social Work at UC Berkeley and wonder what it would be like to devote my life to this. Would I be happy or fulfilled? Is that how I can best impact my commuity? It's tempting... I would love to share with you stories of the people I've met and learned from and I hope that you'll share similar stories with me of places or people who beg that we examine our privilege and dig deeper than the surface -- that we look out the window at the world around us, rather than inward at the three people just like us in a room.
Tonight, I'll be welcoming Shabbat at a Turkish syngagoge in the Negev with my cohort of Diller Teen Fellows and over 100 other young adults from over ten countries. I hope that wherever you are when you're reading this that you are enjoying a restful, contemplative Shabbat (or weekend) and that we all continue to search for and ask questions that provoke and stir us to awaken all our senses and act with passion and conviction.
With love,
Doria
