I walk slowly, because I’ve been in a hurry
I smile because I've cried too much
Today I feel stronger, happier, but who knows?
I'm just sure that I know very little,
Or even, I know nothing.
I think that fulfilling life is simply
To understand the march and move forward,
Like an old cowboy leading the herd
I go through the days
along the long road I go,
I am the road.
Everyone loves or cries one day,
One day we arrive, the next we leave
Each of us makes up our own story,
Each being carries the gift of being capable,
To be happy.
This poem is part of a Brazilian song, which I remember at important moments of change in my life. This Shabbat marks the beginning of my last year at Leo Baeck College as a rabbinic student, and LJS is the congregation that becomes woven into my life experience as my fifth-year internship.
In this week’s Torah Portion, we read parashiot Matot and Masei combined. Among the many stories and rules that they bring, parashat Masei begins with a recounting of the journey of the Israelites, from Ramses to the steppes of Moab, where they are encamped waiting for the time when they will be ready to enter the promised land. It is basically a list of the places where they stopped, with one or two remarks about important events that happened during the journey.
Rabbi Sharon Brous in her new book The Amen Effect remarks that: “After four hundred years of enslavement in Egypt, the Israelites travelled another forty years in the desert, taking the most circuitous route to the Promised Land, in what should have been a journey of eleven days”. It is only logical, then, that Torah wants the Israelites and their future generations to remember their travels.
Our sages question about the reasons for this listing at this point of the text. French Medieval commentator Rashi explains that it is for the people to remind of the miracles that happened during their time in the wilderness. While Sforno, Italian medieval commentator, suggests that it is so that the Israelites could be praised for their dedication and faith.
How many of us have in our lives a similar story to tell: we know where we are leaving and we know where we want to arrive, but the journey gets longer than planned, and different stories and lessons are added during the way. I can’t avoid making the connection between the longer way that the Israelites took to arrive in the Promised Land and my own journey to the rabbinate as I begin my final year.
When I began my studies, six years ago, I knew where I was beginning, and I knew where I wanted to go. I could never imagine all the turns that my journey would take, all the lessons that I would have to learn. I wasn’t aware of the losses, the achievements, the pain and the happiness that my journey would bring.
Like the diversity recounted in the stories in the Book of Bamidbar, Numbers, that we conclude this Shabbat, so too is my personal journey to this place and time. I will be the first Brazilian ordained at Leo Baeck College, a granddaughter of a native Brazilian woman on one side and from immigrant Jews from Germany who were founding members of the now largest Reform congregation in Latin America on the other. I am a wife, mother of three young adult children who has travelled through the studies and careers of law, business and Jewish education and leadership. Like the Israelites, this diverse baggage that I gathered during my own journeys is the material that I will draw upon as I serve you and learn from this community this coming year.
As teaches Jewish educator Abigail Dauber Sterne, in Parashat Masei “The Torah is emphasizing the value of travel. By repeating the Israelites’ itinerary, the text draws attention to all the places that the Israelites have been and to all the experiences they have had. In essence, the Torah is saying that there is inherent value to journeys, to life experiences. Whether these experiences are one’s great triumphs and miracles or whether they are one’s trials and failures, they are, in and of themselves, important. For every individual, every family, and every nation, our collected experiences create who we are and what is meaningful to us.”
I came to LJS to worship before my interview at Leo Baeck and was warmly welcomed by rabbi Alexandra. It made me feel at home. And now, I am back here honoured to serve this community and travel with you as each of us strives to learn on our journey.
I walk slowly, because I was in a hurry
And I smile, because I've cried too much,
Each one of us makes up our own story,
Each being carries the gift of being capable,
To be happy.
Tonight, I am very grateful for my own journey, that brought me here, to this special place and moment of my life. Therefore, I share with you the traditional blessing for a very special moment.
Baruch Atah, Adonai Eloheinu, Melech haolam shehecheyanu, v’kiy’manu v’higiyanu laz’man hazeh.
Tomorrow we finish another book of the Torah, and we say the traditional words:
Chazak Chazak veNitchazek – be strong, be strong, and fortify each other.
Shabbat Shalom.
(Poem: Almir Sater - Tocando Em Frente)
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