Filed under: Thoughts of the Week
Today is the 42nd anniversary of when I became a man – a bar mitzvah – son of the commandment. Forty-two years ago or so, given the variances of a lunar and solar calendar – this week’s Torah reading – Shelach Lecha (Numbers chapters XIII – XV)- “send to you” men who might spy out the land of Canaan – was read on the 24 of Sivan 5725, the 24th day of June 1965, St. John the Baptiste day for the Quebecois. The Bible reading (Joshua II, 1-24) describes two spies hiding on the roof-top in Jericho, saved by an “inn-keeper” named Rahav from the king’s men so that they might return to tell Joshua of their intel on the land.
Bar mitzvah boys in 1965 in Oceanside, NY did the Torah blessings and read the Bible reading (Haftorah). The day of my bar mitzvah celebration, there were two other boys with me. I did the Torah blessing and chanted the second half of the Haftorah (Joshua II, 13-24) and then led the singing of Adom Olam to the tune of Fernando’s Hideaway from the Broadway show, the Pajama Game. Before walking home for a family gathering, we joined in the synagogue kiddush.
My mother had died a bit more than two years before and we were a depressed family. My father organized a family gathering at our home and we enjoyed our backyard and being with family. This family gathering style of simple celebration was in contrast to the social hall receptions, with dancing to the Alley Cat, early Beatles music, and too much food, that was more common then and now. The family at home style we have used with our sons and probably will be much of the style for our celebration of Fay’s becoming a bat mitzvah next year. We might have an evening celebration at the synagogue. Fay has asked for desserts and some dancing and singing, but no DJ and games. Fay is a very sensible girl underneath her facade of being a “tween” – a teen-ager in training.
The story goes that a prince from each of the 12 tribes was sent by Joshua to go spy out the land of Canaan to “see the land, what it is, and the nation that lives on her, the strong the sick the few if bad”. The spies returned with a cluster of grapes that which is often illustrated being so large that it is carried by two men on a pole between them and used as a symbol of the Carmel winery, the winery started by the Rothschilds in Israel over 100 years ago, http://www.carmelwines.co.il/ .
Ten of the 12 spies were so fearful of the size and number of the people they saw in their tour that they recommended that it would be better to return to Egypt than try to enter the land. The other two – Caleb of the tribe of Judah and Joshua of the tribe of Ephraim – thought that they would be able to enter the land and possess it. The majority convinced the people to be fearful and the Lord wanted to destroy all of the people for their lack of trust. Moses convinced the Lord that the message of the people dying in the wilderness would not be a sign of the Lord’s strength. They compromised – this generation would die in the wilderness but their children and Caleb and Joshua would enter the promised land.
The haftorah (the additional reading from the Bible) tells the story of two unnamed spies who go back to the land about 40 years later. They enter Jericho and are hunted by the city’s king. They hide on the roof-top of an inn-keeper, Rahav, who misleads the soldiers that they had gone in the other direction. Rahav tells them that she had heard of the miracles of the travels of the Israelites in the desert and wanted them to “let live my father and my mother and my brothers and my sisters and all that is to them and deliver our souls from death” when the Israelites enter the land. They arranged a true sign - a line of scarlet thread in her window – that would warn the invaders that she and her family should be saved.
The boys and I joke about whether Rahav was an inn-keeper or a madam of a house on the wall of the city. Rahav comes from a Hebrew word that means broad. There is a legend that because of her belief in the Lord that she eventually marries Joshua.
Ten of the twelve spies convinced the people to not move forward. Two unnamed spies report that the time is right for action, after being helped by a woman of uncertain reputation, but of a great cleverness and foresight. Perhaps this is a lesson that one should have faith in the future, that all will turn out as planned. Perhaps one should accept “Don’t Panic” as a motto for moving into the world. And perhaps one must wait a generation for the path that leads a family forward.
Lately, I am finding that often things are unfolding as they should, and often in comical and pleasing ways. This last week, I heard from my Fulbright partner in Thailand that I might visit next December. I also heard that two state grants are promised – allowing us to continue with our summer institute for future teachers and to create an online network for future teachers. We studied how to develop a “dvar torah” in a small group meeting at the synagogue led by Rav Jeremy. At a fund-raising auction for the Windham Region Coordinating Council, Debbie and I obtained a week at a residential arts camp in Western Connecticut for Fay and I got a seminar in “speed reading people” for 20 of my friends. We are going to an aufruf, a declaration of an impending marriage, for the elder son of community friends and this intended at the mother’s home synagogue in Harrison, NY this morning and will spend time with Debbie’s family in the area. All seems to be going according to someone’s plan. Forty-two years later I am beginning to feel like a man.
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