Hey Rabbi, who is drinking that wine?
Congregation Rodeph Shalom is located on the Upper West Side in New York City. Every year during Passover, the synagogue partners with Harlem’s Memorial Baptist Church for what they call a Third Seder. During this seder, these two communities gather together and share stories of slavery and redemption.
One year, a young girl from the church noticed an un-used cup of wine on the seder table. She saw that many glasses of wine were drunk throughout the evening, and was curious about this one silver cup that was untouched. She asked the rabbi about it. Hey Rabbi, who is drinking that wine?
Rabbi Levine told her, We leave that cup hoping that Elijah the prophet will come down from the heavens, visit our seder, and drink the wine.
She then asked: Why do you want Elijah to come?
We believe that when Elijah comes, he will announce the coming of the Messiah to make the world a better place
Ok ... But why are you still waiting? Why don’t you just do it yourself?
Rabbi Robert Levine recounts this story in the introduction to a book that is titled: There is no Messiah and you’re it.
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Judaism has what I will call a Messiah complex. The Torah doesn’t mention a word about the Messiah, but Rabbinic Judaism managed to make the Messiah a foundational part of Jewish belief.
Maimonides’ 12th entry in his 13 Principles of Belief states this succinctly and unequivocally: The Messiah will come.
Reform Jews often express surprise to find out that Judaism does indeed have beliefs about a Messiah. Our movement has taken much of messianic theology out of our prayer books and rituals. For example, we changed the second blessing of the Amidah. It is a blessing which extolls God’s power, and it traditionally ends with what might be the ultimate expression of power: בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה', מְחַיֵּה הַמֵּתִים, Praised are you God, who resurrects the dead. The Reform movement, troubled by this theology, changed just one Hebrew word at the end of the prayer, and this one word changes the meaning completely: ברוך אתה יי מחיה הכל, Praised are you God, who gives life to all. Further along in the Amidah is another example, this time found in one of the daily petitionary prayers. It asks God to send the Messiah in order to rebuild what will become the Third Temple in Jerusalem. Observant Jews recite these blessings three times a day. This is not a part of any extreme or fringe belief ... it is normative Judaism.
And this Messiah complex is so ingrained that even us rational Jews can not get rid of it. I’ve already mentioned the cup of Elijah that is dramatically showcased during our Passover seders. The occasion of a baby naming is another time that we invoke Elijah’s name as the harbinger of the Messiah. And lastly, we sing Elliyahu HaNavi on Saturday evenings, as the holiness of Shabbat ends, and the regular week begins. The melody of this Havdallah text is intentionally slow and dirge-like because we are meant to be sad that the Messiah hasn’t come. And how do we know? Because if the Messiah had come, it would still be Shabbat, and there would not be a separation, a Havdallah, between holy and profane.
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Jews have tried time and again to clarify the preconditions for the coming of the Messiah. Tractate Sanhedrin lists a few possibilities: The Messiah will not come until there are no conceited men in Israel ... The Messiah will not come until even the most powerful kingdom ceases to hold power over Israel ... This is one of my favorites: The Messiah will not come until a fish is sought for an invalid and cannot be procured.
We want the Messiah to come and save us. And as we start a new year, this new year, the Messiah can’t come a moment too soon.
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But here's the thing; the world isn’t going to get better waiting for the smartest, strongest, selfless, perfect person that is the embodiment of some kind of messianic hero. You have the power to make the world better. There is no Messiah and you’re it.
You. You are a Messiah. One important note, however: You are not The Messiah ... You are a Messiah. Rabbi Tarfon expresses this beautifully and simply: לֹא עָלֶיךָ הַמְּלָאכָה לִגְמֹר, וְלֹא אַתָּה בֶן חוֹרִין לִבָּטֵל מִמֶּנָּה, It is not your responsibility to finish the work, but neither are you free to desist from it. ^1 You can’t do everything, but you must fulfill your role as God’s partner and do something.
Each of us is created B’tzelem Elohim, in the divine image. You and I have the responsibility to take that partnership seriously. God began creation by saying Let there be light, but it is our light that continues creation. God created the world in six days. What have you done?
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This past summer, I watched a good deal of superhero movies. After watching Avengers: Endgame at a movie theater, I decided to start the Marvel Cinematic Universe from the beginning, starting with the breakout movie from 2008, Iron Man.
These superheroes are special. They are imbued with powers that are literally super; they are beyond human capabilities. Dr. Strange can manipulate time, Spider-Man can stick to walls and fling himself around a city, the Hulk is unbelievably strong.
After these High Holidays, I hope to get back to watching all of the Marvel movies in chronological order. But as much as I like the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe), it ain’t Star Wars.
The Star Wars franchise was rebooted in 2015 with the excellent Force Awakens. It’s main character is an unknown young lady named Rey. We don’t know who her parents are, but the movie leads us to suggest that there is something very special about her ancestry. Social media helped to spread fan theories that Rey is related to Luke Skywalker, the legend, or possibly even Obi-Wan Kenobi.
But in its sequel, The Last Jedi, we find out a surprising truth. Her parents are nobody. There is nothing special about her.
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I grew up thinking that Moses was special because God decided to talk to him at the burning bush. But now, I like to think that it was Moses who decided to talk to God. It was Moses who decided to fight for justice when he saw the Egyptian taskmaster beating a slave. It was Moses who decided to run away from the comforts of Pharoah’s palace into the unknown desert. And it was Moses who had the perception to see the miracle of the burning bush when everyone else just saw a tree on fire.
Moses, too, was a nobody.
He never wanted to lead. He had a bad temper. And the Torah tells us that he had some sort of heaviness of tongue, commonly translated as a stutter.
Moses wasn’t chosen despite these imperfections. He was chosen precisely because of them.
The entire Exodus story teaches us that we do not need the perfection of those that are deemed sepcial. We need the goodness of everyday nobodies.
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It is not your duty to complete the work, but you must do something.
Moses was minding his own business when he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. According to the Torah, Moses turned this way and that, and seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
It seems fairly obvious, that Moses was being cautious. It’s the look around for police cars before you speed approach ... Moses surreptitiously looks around, makes sure that he won’t get caught, and then takes action. But it can be thought of another way.
Isn’t it possible that Moses didn’t care about getting caught? Perhaps, Moses was looking around this way and that way to see if anyone else was coming to do the right thing, to take action, to be a messiah. He saw that no one was coming, and so he took the righteous action himself.
This is the Jewish New Year challenge: Don’t be a bystander, be an upstander. If you look around and no one is doing the right thing, you can do the right thing.
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Many of you know this famous story: Zusya was found crying in his study. His wife what was wrong, and he said: I just realized that when I die, God will not ask why I wasn’t as courageous as Abraham, or as strong as Judah Macabbee. Instead, God will ask why I was not Zuzya.
Like Zusya, we sometimes compare ourselves to those super-heroes that once lived amongst us.
You don’t need to be a JFK, or a Mother Theresa, or a Martin Luther King. VERY few of us can be. And if we keep looking up for someone else to be the hero, it’s possible that no one will. It is up to us - not to be perfect but to be good … not to be super-human, but to be beautifully human.
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Tonight celebrates the renewal of the world, of creation. God created the world in six days. What have you done?
A famous midrash says that if you are planting a tree and the Messiah comes, you must finish planting the tree before going out to meet the Messiah.
We must tend to the world as it is. This is our priority. It’s not the hope of redemption, or the rebuilding of the Temple, or the bringing about of the Messiah. We have been given the garden of creation. It’s a beautiful garden. The challenge, the doable, holy challenge is that each of us needs to till the soil.
Real heroes don’t wait for a miracle that may or may not come. Real heroes are the miracle. They are regular people like you and me, trying to do just a little bit more. Doing the work.
The work of bringing about the Messiah is more important than the actual Messiah. There is no Messiah, and you’re it.
So starting today, I ask that we take up the challenge to be a Messiah, to do the work that we are here to do. So when God says, I created the world in six days, what have you done? You can say, I’m right here, planting a tree. And so is he, and so is she.
^1: Pirke Avot 2:16
