Sermons: High Holy Days

A few months ago, sunflowers were everywhere.  Sunflowers, the national flower of Ukraine, appeared on social media, in rallies, on t-shirts and even on yarmulkes.  Sunflowers became the symbol of solidarity with Ukrainians as they defended their country against Russia.

I loved sunflowers even before they became a symbol of Ukrainian resistance. Nothing grew easily in the desert soil where I grew up. Even with careful tending, our garden usually produced only a handful of bug-eaten radishes and a few wormy ears of corn.

But sunflowers defied the odds.  With great anticipation, my brother and I used to scratch shallow holes with our fingers.  We would drop in sunflower seeds, smooth over the holes and splash the dirt with water from an old coffee can. 

A few days later, green shoots pushed though the earth.  The shoots grew quickly into tall plants. Their leaves rustled in the dry wind, and soon vivid yellow flowers crowned their stalks.   When the flowers grew heavy with seeds, we coaxed the seeds from the flowers and spread them on baking sheets, toasting them with salt and oil.  We felt so accomplished eating the roasted sunflower seeds that we had grown and harvested ourselves, a rebuke to the grudging soil from which they grew.

Sunflowers have a special quality: their flowers turn to follow the movement of the sun. In the early dawn, the flowers face the east to catch the morning’s first light. Throughout the course of a day, the sunflowers gradually turn to follow the sun as it travels across the sky from east to west. With nightfall, the young sunflowers move again to face the east, ready for the dawn.   

Sunflowers follow the light, the first creation in the Torah portion we heard this morning:

God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.

Something is puzzling about this narrative.  In the Genesis story, God creates light on the first day, but God does not create the sun – the morning star that illuminates our planet – until the fourth day.   

If God does not create the sun until Day Four, what is the source of the light that God created on Day One? This question led Jewish commentators to suggest that the light of the first day of creation was something quite different than physical light.   

The discrepancy between the light of creation and physical light is reflected in language. We use the term “light” in so many ways.  For example, we call the era in which humans in the Western World turned away from ignorance and superstition towards knowledge and reason “The Age of Enlightenment.”  When we solve a problem, we might look for information that “sheds light” on the question at hand.  And we all know people who bring light into our lives by their very presence.

But the first light of creation has another, deeper connotation.  Our sages identify the original light of creation as a primal spiritual light that illuminated the cosmos.[1]  Humans were not yet worthy of this pure light, so it was hidden away for the righteous in future generations.  In the words of the Psalmist, Or zarua l’tzadik – Light is sown for the righteous.[2]

These days, this light seems elusive.  The world can feel like a place of shadows and darkness.  Collectively, we face devastating changes in our planet’s climate, threats to our nation’s democracy, the uncertainties of our economic future.  And individually, many struggle with loneliness, with grief, with anxiety and illness.  Too often, we face the future with fear.

We are not the first generation to live in a darkened world.  Centuries ago, our rabbis taught “ever since the destruction of the Temple, there is no day that does not include some kind of curse.”[3]  One rabbi extended that thought even further, saying that “each and every day is more cursed than the previous one.”  If everything is deteriorating, the rabbis asked:  Why does the world still exist? 

This is a profound question, a question that reminds us that ours is not the first generation striving to flourish in arid and rocky soil.  We are not the first to have to push towards the light. We are not the first to seek the light that can quiet our hearts and help us see the world with clearer eyes and renewed hope.

(PAUSE)

The first light of creation has a spiritual quality.  It does not illuminate with the flick of a switch. This light needs to be summoned through prayer or quiet reflection.  This light must be manifested through deeds of kindness.  This is the light that fuels hope, the hope that pushes us to get out of bed in the morning grateful for the new day, the hope gives us the courage to face life’s inevitable struggles and setbacks.  This hope, like the light of the sun, is vital to life.  

Just as the sun shines even when the earth is in shadow or when clouds obscure it from view, we can find hope even when it seems elusive or hidden.  We can turn ourselves towards hope, as young sunflowers turn themselves towards the light.  But to do this, we must consider hope itself in a new way.

Hope often takes the form of wishing for good things to happen in the future, whether that future is in the next few minutes or the next few years. We hope that we will recover from what ails our body or saps our spirit, or we hope for our good health to continue. We hope for a better job, for a better marriage.  We hope for an end to war and suffering.  

Yet these expressions of hope contain within them a shadow of fear. The hope for good health as we grow older reflects the fear that our bodies will break down.  The hope that humanity will finally mitigate the pace of climate change reflects the fear that we will continue our destructive course. The hope that our children and grandchildren will grow to lead fulfilling adult lives reflects the fear that they will not.  Both hope and fear are rooted in our human vulnerability. 

But what if we were to uncouple hope from fear?  What if we were to frame hope not as a wish for something good to happen in the future, but as faith that whatever happens, we have the power to overcome and to endure?

In those inevitable times when we question our power to overcome what we face, remember this:  there is light all around us even when it seems hidden. Amid terrible destruction and war, Ukrainians looked after each other, and the world reached out to help.  Countless people work every day to combat climate change, to safeguard democracy, to take care of the most vulnerable in our midst.  And many of us bring light to others, whether through a home-cooked meal, or a reassuring touch, or a friendly phone call.

Even when it seems hidden, there is light. It is up to us to discover it. We can be like sunflower sprouts that push through the desert earth. We can be like sunflowers who turn their faces towards the light as the sun travels across the sky.  We can nourish each other with seeds of goodness and hope, as we begin the New Year together.