Congregation Emanu-El of Westchester: Sermon Archives

EREV ROSH HASHANAH - October 3, 2005

The English poet William Blake wrote:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour

A world in a grain of sand; heaven in a wildflower. In this age of Hummers and 30,000 square foot homes I remain intrigued by the mysteries tucked away in small phenomenon, like a grain of sand, a wild flower and, to those items of minutiae I would add, a third: the seed of a date palm tree. Not just any date seed. The saga of this particular date palm pit began 2,000 years ago at the Cliffside fortress of Masada n the wilderness of Judaea. A perfectly innocent beginning. Perhaps the main character in the tale, aside from the seed, was Eleazar ben Yair the leader of the Jewish Zealots who battled the strength of Rome. In the Jews final hours at Masada, before they took their lives by their own hands, ben Yair summoned the 960 survivors: "Let us go out of this world together with our children and our wives in a state of freedom --- let us leave the Romans an example which shall at once cause their astonishment at our death and their admiration of our hardiness."

Then, if you will permit me poetic license, ben Yair discarded his heavy battle gear, drank water from a clay pitcher and, as a final meal, ate a handful of dates. I can even see him flicking the pits into a cistern --- where they lay for 2,000 years until the Israeli archeologist, Yigael Yadin, excavated the ruins of Masada and uncovered the date seeds. Since archeologists save every remnant of antiquity the seeds journeyed to Jerusalem and were buried, for a second time, in the back of a drawer in a storeroom.

A year ago, a team of Israeli doctors and botanists redeemed the seeds, planted them and to their amazement one seed, aptly nicknamed Methuselah, sprouted. A 2,000 year old seed had given birth to a slender green sapling, now measuring a foot in height. And that is the truth. A 2,000 year old seed. Not a 2,000 year old man. Not a Mel Brooks fantasy. This is the real thing!

For those of you not intimately acquainted with the growth pattern of date palms there are several facts. If that date pit from Masada originally came from a female date palm the new tree will bear fruit in 30 years. If the tree is male? Nothing will happen. In the world of date palms the male is just a curiosity. What a wonderful case for feminism. But please don't spread this among men. It is not good for our ego.

Thus ends the saga of the 2,000 year old date palm tree, and at first hearing, the story seems miraculous. Whoever heard of a dried seed, discarded for 2,000 years, being born again? Rejuvenating? Miraculous. But not really. The date palm traditionally symbolizes ancient Israel. It even appears on the Israeli currency the Shekel and, by extension it is a fitting symbol of the Jew. How many times throughout our history have there been those who would bury us, turn us into artifacts - without success. The theologian Arnold Toynbee wrote that centuries ago we should have been fossils and there are many who would have been pleased if we had passed out of existence. From Romans, to Crusaders to Grand Inquisitors, to Hitlers. And all have failed. With our indomitable will we always sprout anew. Rising from the rubble of history. In spite of everything. And in the words of the Hebrew folk tune, "Am Yisrael Chai." The people of Israel live.

Elie Wiesel relates a moving tale of the resurgence of the Jew. It began when Wiesel, on a tour of Spain, was in the town of Saragossa visiting sites of Jewish interest.

When the tour ended Wiesel's guide asked the author to visit his apartment. There the guide showed Wiesel a faded Hebrew scroll.

"Read it. Please read it."

Wiesel read the scroll aloud. A scroll signed by a man named Avraham. Then he stared at the guide. "This scroll says that your family was originally Jewish. They converted to Catholicism in the days of the Inquisition."

The guide clearly agitated, even angry, at Wiesel's words led him back to the tour bus.

Years passed. Then, one day, on a public bus in Jerusalem Wiesel was roused by a tap on his shoulder: A man spoke.

"Do you remember me?"

Wiesel did not.

"Saragasso. Saragasso."

Wiesel remembered.

"I live in Jerusalem now. Please, come to my apartment." Wiesel followed to an apartment off the main square and once again he saw the scroll from Saragasso with the familiar signature. "Avraham. Abraham."

Wiesel's companion asked. "Would you like to know my name?"

Wiesel nodded.

"Avraham ben Avraham. Abraham son of Abraham." He was the next generation, born 500 years later. For all those years that scroll had remained rolled tightly in an apartment in Saragasso, a seed waiting to be planted anew.

Our journey as Jews has not been easy, never easy, but no one has ever extinguished our identity, our hope. The knowledge that we will be here. That we will thrive always. Our world desperately needs this gift of the Jew; the eternal faith in tomorrow. These are disquieting times. As Jews, as Americans, as citizens of the world our problems seem immense. I hear the echo of despondency in fortress Israel, in New Orleans still inundated with despair if not with water, in the morass called Iraq. The list is endless and it is so easy to be cynical. So easy. But I can not be a Jew unless, with optimism, I remember the date palm seed, and the words of the poet Tchernokowsky: "Laugh at all my dreams my darling, laugh but I repeat anew, that I still believe in man and I still believe in you."

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina a psychologist was asked how she counseled the bereft in New Orleans. She answered "I give them permission to hope." What a sad comment. Who needs permission to hope? It is indigenous to the nature of humanity and, once it vanishes we are doomed. No one ever gave permission to the Jew to hope --- we simply have. To be a Jew means to hope. To be a Jew means to trust in the future. To be a Jew means to say ani ma'amin, I believe. That is how it has been. Since the beginning. There is always renewal within the Jew, as there was within the seed from Masada.

But there is a caveat. If those seeds of the date palm had remained abandoned in an archeologist's drawer they might have lain dormant for another 2,000 years. Instead they were carefully nurtured by scientists who soaked them in hot water to soften the coat, then placed them in acid rich in hormones, and in an enzymatic fertilizer made of seaweed; finally they were planted in potting soil, plugged into drip irrigation. Carefully nurtured. Tended to.

Judaism will never disappear because of outside forces of hatred and anti-semitism. We will perservere. We always have. Only apathy, neglect, indifference can destroy us. We will perish if we fail to tend to our legacy. We will perish if we permit knowledge of our heritage to remain a closed scroll waiting to be unrolled. And in this nation, this great nation, only indifference can mark the end of America. Indifference of a population to the ills of our society. Indifference in our response to those who govern. The blossom of rejuvenation always exists but it needs careful nurturing.

The poet Langston Hughes asked:

What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?

Dreams never dry up. The dreams of the Jew. The dreams of America and the dreams of the individual. Yes, the dreams of the individual. You and I. For each one of us has dreams. And I believe each of us, in brutally honest moments, wonders whether we are living fully. What seeds, long ago forgotten, or pushed aside, exist within you. Of paths not yet walked. Dreams deferred until it is too late. Or do I speak only for myself?

Not long ago I visited a middle aged lawyer who had suffered a severe heart attack. When I left his hospital room, I felt drained. Completely drained. Not by his heart attack. He would recover. No, I was disturbed by something he said - his parting words. "Dan, when I leave this hospital I intend to reinvent myself. You don't know this - few people do. They would only laugh at me. But I have always wished to be a writer. A mystery writer. Always. For years I have felt the seeds germinating. Waiting to escape. But you know, the pressures of society, the need to live a certain life style - after all, isn't that how success is measured? Yet deep inside I am a mystery writer.

He sighed, "I had a grandmother, and, of course, grandmothers are the wisest people in the world. She once said to me "When the time comes, and you need to decide how to live your life remember these words 'If I will be he, then who will be me.' Find yourself."

He paused. "I am ready. Ready to re-invent myself. Ready to write mystery books and, perhaps, reveal the mystery of who I am."

Why, for so many of us, do we need a crisis to change? How do you wish to live the years granted to you? How ever many they may be. William Sloane Coffin, Chaplain at Yale, wrote, "Clearly the trick in life is to die young as late as possible." To die young as late as possible, by constantly re-inventing yourself. At any age. We only have one life. But who we can be will never be discovered if the potential is left abandoned, instead of being soaked in the water of desire, planted in the soil of commitment. The ability to feel more deeply, to embrace your own life and the life of others more fully ---- This is the mystery that dwells within.

As some of you know, one of my favorite passages in literature is found at the conclusion of Henry David Thoreau's Walden. He writes

Every one has heard the story which has gone the rounds of New England, of a strong and beautiful bug which came out of the dry leaf of an old table of apple-tree wood, - from an egg deposited in the living tree many years earlier still, as appeared by counting the annual layers beyond it. (The bug) was heard gnawing out for several weeks, hatched perchance by the heat of an urn. Who does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality strengthened by hearing of this?

Then Thoreau concludes The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.

"An egg, buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodness --- may unexpectedly come forth - to enjoy its perfect summer life at last."

I often think of that beautiful bug. Trapped for over a century. And I imagine that bug becoming more and more frustrated buried in the apple wood. Days pass. Months. Years. Then, one morning the bug awakens and says to itself "Enough! Let me out of here!" With that, the bug started gnawing and never looked back. There is more light to dawn for each of us. Light obscured in some darkened drawer of the self. Perhaps this is the year to emerge. This New Year.

Perhaps. If so I extend my best wishes for a year of renewal, a year of growth --- and in your exploration may you take with you the image of a venerable 2,000 year old seed from a date palm tree that once grew near the fortress of Masada.