blogs/rabbi-huberman

Parashat Beshalach

The Moment Before We Sleep

Have you ever been on the verge of sleep, and—as your mind wanders—you sense things that are greater than the physical world? Indeed, as we enter the doorway to our slumber, surreal and mystical thoughts often come to mind.

Sleep experts call this the hypnagogic state. It refers to a transitional stage between wakefulness and sleep, where the most remarkable sensory perceptions can be experienced.

Our biblical tradition pays great attention to dreams. Joseph is recognized in the Torah as both a dreamer and an interpreter of dreams.

Perhaps the entire existence of the Jews became assured when Joseph interpreted two of Pharaoh’s dreams, gaining the king’s favor and securing the future of the Jewish people.

There is a version of this dream state that even carries to God.

As the sixth day of creation approached dusk, our mystics faced a puzzling question. They acknowledged that God had created the universe in six days (or periods.) But what about those miraculous things mentioned elsewhere in the Torah?

Surely, at some point, they must have been created. Pirkei Avot, our collection of ancient sayings and teachings, tries to solve this mystery, by speculating that as God prepared to enter a day of rest, amazing things were imagined and created.

Where do rainbows come from? How about the Aaron’s staff, which turned into a snake in front of Pharaoh and his magicians? What about Bilaam’s talking donkey?

Among those miraculous last-minute creations was something known as the “east wind.” 

We know how important that east wind was. According to our tradition, as the Israelites were pinned between the Sea of Reeds and the approaching Egyptians, a wind approached and parted the sea.

So, our Sages ask, where did that fateful wind come from?

The great Rabbi Levi Yizchak of Berdichev offered this explanation: The Torah refers to that wind as ru’ach kadi, which not only means “east wind,” but also “ancient wind.”

He explained, “God does not suspend the laws of nature in order to work miracles. The wind that divided the sea had been created for that purpose at the time of the creation of the world.”

As we ponder those words today, it calls to mind times where those winds we have created at some point return.

There have been times when we performed a good deed, or acted selflessly or engaged in a mitzvah, and later realized those results actually altered the universe.

Until recently, a dinner was held every year by an organization called the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous.

Those who sheltered Jews during the Holocaust continue to be provided with pensions, or other resources in gratitude for their acts of valor performed 80 years ago.

And each year, one of those righteous gentiles was flown from Poland or Russia to New York, and reunited with a now-grown child, whose family they had sheltered during the Holocaust.

As they were reunited in Manhattan, the survivor often held up a photo of their extended family—some with as many as 40 children, grandchildren or great grandchildren born because someone decided to, against the odds, commit an act of selflessness.

Some family members are now doctors or engineers, community workers or educators.

And for those brief moments, as the families were reunited with their Holocaust protectors, that east wind blew across the tearful faces of the hundreds gathered to pay tribute. For the east wind has come full circle.

There is a Jewish practice known as Musar. Founded in Lithuania during the 1800s, it holds that God had better things to do after creation than to create Noah’s ark, Daniel and the lions, or Jonah and the whale.

Rather, each was created to teach us a life lesson—based on faith, duty, care or compassion.

The Musar movement, currently enjoying a revival, holds that each of us, each day, attempts to balance 48 Midot—soul traits, and those midot combine in perfect balance. Then, with our souls aligned, miracles can occur.

The founders of the Musar movement posit that when the Israelites were pinned against the Sea of Reeds, Moses’ midot were so perfectly aligned, that he and the Jewish people were exactly where they needed to be as the “east wind” completed its journey and parted the sea.

This is a teaching that perhaps requires some faith, but let us also consider how many times in our lives we have performed a seemingly impossible mitzvah, and later learned that the good deed had saved even a single soul.

The Talmud reminds us that, “Whoever saves a single life, it is as if one saves an entire world.”

This week’s Torah portion, titled Beshalach (“And Pharaoh Let the people go”) inspires us to consider that each of us, each day possesses the capacity to create an east wind.

Its results or consequences may not be immediately felt, but its spirit and intent will eventually return to us.   Moreover, by performing mitzvoth, among other acts of kindness, each of us possesses the capacity to elevate a soul and, therefore, the universe.

Like the rainbow, Aaron’s rod, the talking donkey, or even an east wind, each of us can bring our dreams to life. The Zohar, our most respected Kabbalistic text, teaches that one sixtieth of all events to follow are revealed in dreams.

Let us, therefore, listen to those mysterious and creative visions that guide us into slumber.     Like the arrival of that long wandering “east wind,” created at dusk of creation, let us embrace our ability to change this world for the better. It is never too late.

Therefore, as our ancient Sages taught in their mystic teachings, let us dare to consider and embrace the unimaginable.

Let us commit to create our own east winds—for each shall eventually return for good under God's heaven.

Shabbat shalom, v’kol tuv.

Rabbi Irwin Huberman