Like the Stars

(The following is adapted from my remarks at our May 14 service, which honored our congregants who have been members for 25 years or more.)

This week, Fiddler on the Roof comes to town at the Walnut Street Theater. One of my favorite lines from the show occurs when the townspeople ask the rabbi if there is a proper blessing for the czar. The rabbi responds: “Of course. ‘May God bless and keep the czar… far away from us!’”

Apart from demonstrating the rabbi’s wisdom (which I always appreciate seeing!), the line reminds us that Judaism has blessings for all sorts of occasions — positive, painful, or just peculiar. There is even a special blessing that is only to be said when one sees 600,000 Jews together. Why that number? This week’s Torah portion, at the beginning of the book of Numbers, relates that the Israelites took a census of their community, and that is how many males over the age of 20 there were. Actually, we were told this number earlier, in Exodus, when the Israelites were engaged in building the Tabernacle, a portable dwelling-place for God, a symbol of God’s presence in their midst. What is the point of the Torah telling us how many Israelites built the Tabernacle? It teaches us that it takes a community to build their sacred place. In other words, their sacred place would not have been built without that substantial community to do it.

This week’s portion doesn’t just tell us the size of the Israelite community; it also gives us a map, showing us how the Israelites camped in the wilderness. They were arranged roughly in concentric circles, by their tribes. At the center of the circles was the Tabernacle, their sacred place, the heart of their communal and religious lives. They literally put their Jewish home at the center.

Tonight we honor our members who have supported our synagogue for 25 years or more. There may not be 600,000 of them, but I count 88 households in this category, and that is no less a remarkable number. Synagogues across the country bemoan the number of members who join as a 4-year commitment, simply to get a child educated through a Bar Mitzvah service. But tonight we celebrate a better model of membership. We honor 88 households who belong to our congregation throughout the life cycle, not just Bar Mitzvah but weddings, baby namings, and, God forbid, funerals. We honor 88 households who belong to our congregation because it is their community, where they can see their long-time friends and where they can make new friends. We honor 88 households who belong to our congregation to support a Jewish presence in the wider community, to teach the non-Jewish world about Jews and to speak up on issues of Jewish concern. We honor 88 households who belong to our congregation because they know it is impossible to be Jewish in a vacuum, without a community to celebrate together and, when necessary, mourn together. We honor 88 households who belong to our congregation because without them the Jewish community would wither away. We honor 88 households who, like the Israelites of the Torah portion, have put their Jewish home at the center. For 25 years or more you all have been our support and our strength, and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

In Hebrew, letters also have numerical values. The letters that make the number 25 are kaf and heh: kaf is 20 and heh is 5. When we put the letters together, we get the word koh, which means “so.” In chapter 15 of Genesis, God makes a famous promise to Abraham. God says “look to the heavens and count the stars if you can count them; koh yihyeh zarecha—so shall your descendants be.” Several generations later, 600,000 of Abraham’s descendants came to Mount Sinai, entered into covenant with God, built a Tabernacle, and formed a community that still thrives today. Here at Congregation Or Amias well, “koh yihyeh zarecha;” because of “koh,” because of those of you who have remained part of our family for 25 years or more, you and your descendants, we and our descendants, continue to shine like the stars. May we all be blessed with 25 or more years of continued life and health, of strength as a congregational community, and with many more opportunities to celebrate together.