There are moments that the words don’t reach
There is suffering too terrible to name
You hold your child as tight as you can
And push away the unimaginable
I first heard these words sung back in January, when a friend took me to see Hamilton for my 40th Birthday. I’m aware Hamilton isn’t everybody’s taste, and it took me a few songs to warm up to it in the theatre, but when we reached this song, I was already fully wrapped up in the narrative.
There are moments that the words don’t reach, There is suffering too terrible to name, You hold your child as tight as you can, And push away the unimaginable
I was in tears the first time I heard this sung, partly because I’m a sucker for a musical, and have been known to book tickets for tear jerkers like Blood Brothers for the catharsis of a good cry. But it was also because there have been so many moments in the rabbinate that the words don’t reach, when all one can do is be present, and to sit in the pain with the people before you.
This year there have been more of those moments than I can count.
Perhaps there are no words to reach through and comfort us. I know for many of us the isolation of these holidays is one of those moments, taking away our chance to support one another, to hold one another tight and push away the unimaginable.
But Judaism generally doesn’t do a lot of pushing away the unimaginable. Jewish ritual and time is structured to encourage us to really embrace and feel what we are experiencing, to allow ourselves the fullness of grief and sorrow, as well as making time for joy and laughter, so that we can maintain balance and live our lives well. We are not meant to push away the unimaginable, as inevitably this will lead to greater struggles down the road. And yet… this year those structures and modes were to some extent taken from us. We did a huge amount as a community to hold, to support, to be present with one another even if we were physically apart. But I know that for some, the unimaginable became very real.
In the moments that the words don’t reach, Rabbis inevitably turn to thousands of years of Jewish words, hoping to find some wisdom that may help.
Todays Torah portion, initially strikes me as a pretty barren place to turn for comfort. The family dynamics of all of the Avot and Imahot, the mothers and fathers who we call upon in our prayers, is not what we would call ideal today. Can you imagine them trying to get through lock down together? Then again my own coping in lockdown also left a lot to be desired. Sarah’s jealousy of Hagar is understandable. But it was also Sarah’s idea that Abraham take Hagar as a concubine when she wasn’t able to conceive. When Sarah orders Abraham to expel Hagar and Ishmael, with only a bottle of water and a loaf of bread, Abraham himself objects. Perhaps, then, the hardest part of this is that God takes Sarah’s side.
We can perhaps derive some comfort from the fact that while the exile and near death experience of Hagar and Ishmael seems cruel, brutal, and worst of all, avoidable, God ultimately looks after them. I am partially comforted by
Abraham’s objection to Sarah’s demand that they be thrown out of the camp. But as we will hear in tomorrow’s reading of the binding of Isaac, Abraham is known for his faith that in doing seemingly awful things, God will ultimately turn it all around, or in some way has a greater plan.
In hoping to find some words that can reach this moment, I am drawn into the world of Rabbinic writings. Midrash, the tradition of rabbinic storytelling, adding to and commenting on the Biblical text. It seems that one rabbinic midrash in particular, offered in the name of Rebbe Eliezer but probably a compilation of traditions, was also troubled by Abraham and Sarah’s treatment of Hagar and Ishmael. And so according to Pirke De Rebbe Eliezer, composed around the 9th century, when Hagar headed into the desert, she was sent off with a barrel of water tied to her waste. In part to sustain them as long as possible, but also so that Abraham might be able to trace the barrels tracks, and discover where is son had wandered to.
After 3 years, and with Sarah’s knowledge, Abraham can no longer wait, and he heads off to trace his son and Hagar, but promises Sarah he won’t get off his camel when he finds them. He finds their new home, but Ishmael and Hagar are off collecting dates, and instead Abraham finds himself chatting to Ishmaels wife. She claims to have no bread or water to share with him (and indeed this may be true), but Abraham is not impressed, and leaves her a coded message to pass on to Ishmael which essentially advises his son to find a new, improved wife. There’s nothing like an absent parent coming and meddling in your marriage!
Another wife is found, and another 3 years pass. Abraham once again decides it is time to see how Ishmael is faring, and leaves – still promising not to
descend from his camel when he arrives, which I imagine is worse than having to sit on your dining room chairs trying to work for 8 hours a day.
This time Ishmael and Hagar are out shepherding camels. But the meeting goes much better with Ishmael’s new wife, who is named as Fatimah (it’s often a good sign in Jewish texts if women are given names). She offers him the hospitality and refreshment he requests, and then he seems to disobey Sarah and get off the camel, as the text says ‘Abraham arose, and prayed before the Holy Blessed One for his son, and thereupon Ishmael’s house was filled with blessings.’
When Ishmael arrives home and his wife recounts what had happened, the midrash tells us that Ishmael understood that his father hadn’t forgotten him, and in fact held deep compassion for him.
I am fascinated by this rabbinic continuation of the Abraham, Hagar and Ishmael saga. They do seem to remain a fairly dysfunctional family, but the Rabbis who composed the midrash clearly didn’t want to portray Abraham as capable of casting his son and sons mother out into the desert with never a look back. He prepares them for the journey in a manner that means they can be found again. And he reaches out to them in a world in which journeying and contact were very different to our incredibly well connected society. He finds a way to remain engaged in Ishmael’s life, even though they don’t exactly manage to reunite. It feels like they have created a sequel to the story that allows for Abraham to sustain and bless his estranged family, not alienate his wife and second son, and follow God’s commands to listen to Sarah.
There are moments that the words don’t reach, There is suffering too terrible to name. So perhaps it isn’t about words when the unimaginable happens, as it did this year for us all, but does every year for someone. Although I have only
been here for 5 months, I have seen the incredible ways the community of EHRS have found ways to do when words were impossible to find. Individuals took it upon themselves to start feeding the NHS, over 100 people in the community volunteered to be Community Circle Coordinators, phoning people nearby to see if they needed help or support. Over the last few weeks’ members have baked more than 80 honey cakes for others to deliver to our Lunch Club members. We also have 45 telenet volunteers and 21 befrienders, volunteers run our Memory Way Café, and there is always more we could be doing. Volunteers like this rarely get to see the fruit of their efforts directly, just as Abraham didn’t actually have the pleasure of seeing Ishmael, but the blessings are spread nonetheless, a difference is made, and when we can’t find the words, being in community gives us the opportunity to at least find a way to support, and to spread blessings. Abraham couldn’t bear to do nothing, so he did what he could, balancing the conflicting needs of his wife at home, and the family he had sent into the wilderness with God’s blessing.
We have all had to balance more than it is fair to ask of us this year. Whether it has been enduring lock down alone, or balancing 2 full time jobs and homeschool, not being able to attend the funeral of a loved one, or cancelling a wedding. Everyone I have spoken to has had moments during lock down that were painful, low, stressful. Most have had moments that made it hard for words to reach or to be enough. But we have, on the whole, come through what this time last year would have been unimaginable. We are certainly not out of the tunnel yet, but travelling this train with all of you, even if only seeing most of you from the waste up, has made it so much more bearable.
Sherri Mandell, whose 13 year old son Koby was murdered in a terrorist incident in Israel in 2001, has said ‘Resilience is not about overcoming, but
about becoming’. The High Holidays invite us to become. They ask us to return to who we were created to be, to focus on what it would look like to be the best versions of ourselves in the year to come. Perhaps in embracing this process, and it’s recommended steps of Teshuva, return, Tefillah, prayer, and Tzedekah, righteous giving, we are offered a model to guide us through the good times and the bad times. When things seem impossibly awful, community and our tradition enable us to act, to care for one another, and to stay connected, as Abraham does with Ishmael, even if it isn’t the ideal.
As we begin a new year, we know we will have some more of the same, even though we wish it weren’t so. Plans can only be made tentatively, formerly safe spaces no longer feel so secure. But in facing the challenges together, we have found ways to not only express ourselves with or without words, but to come through the unimaginable, and be standing here today (or in your case hopefully sitting comfortably), with enough support, strength and optimism to welcome 5781, and whatever it may have in store for us.
There are moments that the words don’t reach
There is suffering too terrible to name
You hold your child as tight as you can
And push away the unimaginable
May the coming year allow us all to find ways to reach out to one another meaningfully, to mitigate the suffering with love, laughter and care for one another, many opportunities to hold one another tight, and the ability to weather the unimaginable together. Cain Yehi Ratzon, may this be God’s will, and let us say, Amen
