The Circle That Is Simchat Torah

Every year on Simchat Torah, we march with scrolls and flags around the synagogue, read of Moses’ death, finish the Book of Deuteronomy, and then -- without pause -- start the Torah cycle over again with Bereshit and the Creation story.

This seamless segue can affect me in various ways, depending on my mood.

If my world is in balance, then the rhythmic progression from ending to beginning feels logical -- even comforting. If I’m hurting, this life-goes-on-in-spite-of-everything stuff strikes me as the Ultimate Cosmic Cliché. And if I’m bone weary, the unbroken circularity makes me ache for a time out.

But the world (thank you, Broadway) will not stop and let me get off. Still, when I look closely at the text we read on Simchat Torah, I realize there is a way to at least put things on hold.

Come with me.

* * * *

It is said that God created man in His image, yet none of us resemble any other. Furthermore, in one of the many midrashim based on the Creation story, we are told that while God was creating this world, He simultaneously created countless smaller worlds -- a metaphor (perhaps) for Mankind.

Imagine it! Zillions of people -- zillions of small worlds -- each spinning in separate orbits. Sometimes we spin out of control and collide. Sometimes we spin so far away we lose sight of one another, of God and the wonders He created for us.

Nachman of Bratslav commented on this. “Just as your hand, held before your eyes, can hide the tallest mountains -- so this earthly life can keep you from seeing the vast radiance that fills the universe.”

But even as our individual worlds keep spinning, we can find a way -- and the time -- to see the radiance of the universe. All we need do is take our hands from our eyes and read the opening verses of Bereshit.

From the text we learn -- as we learn every Simchat Torah -- that after God spent six days creating the heavens and earth and all they contained, He brought into being His crowning achievement -- the Shabbat. The day that He blessed and called holy, and on which He rested from all the work He had made.

Shabbat, says our tradition, is a gift from God. It is a day of sweetness, peace and delight -- when the cares and troubles of the past week are forgotten and we can rest, rejoice and be happy.

The prophet Jeremiah said, “Take heed of the Sabbath, for the sake of your souls.” If, during the year, we forget this teaching, we can thank Simchat Torah for reminding us that Shabbat is a taste of the world to come -- a quiet haven when this world is too much with us.

* * * *

Another Simchat Torah lesson.

According to the Psalms, in the Beginning, before He created any thing or any body, God created Wisdom. And this Wisdom, said the rabbis, was Torah. And, reasoned the rabbis, if God created the Torah before all else, He must have done so for a purpose. That purpose, they said, was so God could have a blueprint upon which to build the world.

A midrash teaches that the Torah itself declared, “A human king builds a palace not according to his own ideas but according to the ideas of an architect. And the architect needs parchment on which to draw the plans for the rooms and entrances. I am God’s architect,” said the Torah, “and so did God look into me and, accordingly, create the world.”

Now, if God looked into the Torah and followed its wisdom in the act of Creation, it seems logical that we -- cast in His image -- should do the same.

But how?

If the idea suits you, go march and dance and follow the scrolls around the synagogue in the Simchat Torah hakafot. Then, when the festival is over, continue to follow the wisdom of Torah. Make it the blueprint for building your personal world.

Sound too ambitious? Then let’s reframe the suggestion. During the coming year, treat your family, your friends, employees and pets with kindness. Be kind to the earth. (Be kind to yourself, too.) Visit the sick. Offer hospitality. During the coming year, stay close to your dear ones. Do no harm.

And when you can, stop (hello, Shabbat) to marvel, rejoice and be grateful for the radiant universe that God began for us -- Bereshit!


Copyright © 2007 Ozzie Nogg. All rights reserved.