This year, along with Moreh Alan continuing to write the weekly D’var Torah, he will be inviting faculty and staff to contribute as well. This will provide a wonderful opportunity for our community to hear from and get to know more of our team. We hope you enjoy this new addition to our communications and the diverse perspectives it will bring.
About Moreh Aiden:
This year, along with Moreh Alan continuing to write the weekly D’var Torah, he will be inviting faculty and staff to contribute as well. This will provide a wonderful opportunity for our community to hear from and get to know more of our team. We hope you enjoy this new addition to our communications and the diverse perspectives it will bring.
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This week’s Torah portion is Parshat Noach. This Parsha is a fitting follow up to the highs of creation which we read last week. We go from the creation of the world, this grand achievement by God, to God reconsidering His creation and starting the world anew. In his essay titled “The Meaning of This War (World War II)” Rabbi Heschel wrote of the evil and barbarity that had consumed the world in his time. Eerily, reading it, there are so many echoes to our lives today. Rabbi Heschel clearly decries violence. He writes, “Tanks and planes cannot redeem humanity. A man with a gun is like a beast without a gun. The killing of snakes will save us for the moment but not forever. The war will outlast the victory of arms if we fail to conquer the infamy of the soul: the indifference to crime, when committed against others. For evil is indivisible. It is the same in thought and in speech, in private and in social life. The greatest task of our time is to take the souls of men out of the pit.” We know from the story of Noach that God will not save us from the wicked people in our midst. There will be no divine “purification” where the evil people are washed away and only the righteous remain. It is our duty, as the embodiment of the divine, to seek to make peace. To stand up to injustice. To not let ourselves become like those who oppose us. To quote Rabbi Heschel once more, “We have failed to fight for right, for justice, for goodness; as a result we must fight against wrong, against injustice, against evil. We have failed to offer sacrifices on the altar of peace; now we must offer sacrifices on the altar of war.” Let us strive to offer sacrifices on the altar of peace. We have much work ahead of us, and the responsibility rests solely with us to partner with God in completing the work of creation, striving to make our world whole and bring peace to all humankind.
