Places - November 11, 2010

Shabbat Shalom!
“There are places I remember all my life, though some have changed.
Some forever, not for better, some have gone and some remained.
All these places have their moments with lovers and friends I still can recall.
Some are dead and some are living - In my life, I’ve loved them all.”

These lyrics by John Lennon and Paul McCartney (mainly John Lennon) make an immediate connection between the places that are significant in our lives, the moments associated with those places, and the people with whom we experienced those moments.
In the Torah reading for this week, Vayaytzay, Jacob began to learn about how a particular place can be associated with a pivotal moment in life. In fact, the word for place, MAKOM, figures prominently in the narrative:
“Coming upon a certain PLACE, Jacob passed the night there…taking one of the stones of the MAKOM/PLACE, he made it his head-rest.” After Jacob dreamed of a ladder reaching to the sky, with angels going up and down on it, he proclaimed: “Truly, the Eternal was in this MAKOM/PLACE, and I did not know it!” Finally, the Torah states that “he named the MAKOM/PLACE Bayt El-Abode/House of God.”
The root word for MAKOM is KUF-VAV-MEM, a root that means to arise, endure, sustain (as in V’KIY’MANU in the SHEHECHEYANU prayer), establish, and be fulfilled or realized. In addition to place, the word MAKOM itself can mean spot, existence or substance. While Jacob himself linked God to a specific MAKOM/PLACE, there is a rabbinic interpretation that associates God with every place: “Why do we call God MAKOM/THE PLACE? Because God is the preserver/existence/place of the world, but God’s world is not God’s existence/place.” The divine presence cannot be confined to any one world or even any particular spot in space or moment in time. MAKOM has come to be the name refers to God as being “omnipresent,” pervading the entire universe. That means that, in any place, or in any moment, we can find an imprint of God and a sign of our connection to all of creation. Like Jacob, we can come to recognize how a place or a moment may be special when we open our eyes and heart to the possibility of encountering the sacred, anytime and anywhere.
While sitting with my music colleagues at the Hava Nashira workshop at Olin-Sang-Ruby Union Institute Camp in Wisconsin a number of years ago, Cantor Ellen Dreskin asked us all, “Think about the first place you went when you were away from your parents for an extended period of time.” As I sat in the main house/BAYIT, I looked around and realized, “It was here…this was the place.” I had attended that very camp a few months before becoming Bar Mitzvah, and Ellen’s question added a deeper dimension to my long-past experience at that camp from that moment on: this was the place where I first established my independence.
Each of us is like Jacob (and the Beatles as well!) in saying that “there are places I remember….all these places had their moments.” Think about the places and experiences that were pivotal for you – let them give you strength and hope for the future, and allow them to open your eyes to see a divine hand gently touching you, offering support, encouragement and love.
L’shalom,
Rabbi Larry