A couple of anniversaries. This is the 27th time that I’ve spent the Shabbat of Parashat Para in Palo Alto. It was on this Parasha that I first visited Palo Alto in the Spring of 1995.
But another anniversary looms larger. Last year, my streak of consecutive years speaking about this Parasha in Shul ended at 25. As we are all acutely aware, it’s been a year since we closed the Shul for the first time. It was this Parasha, Ki Tisa (which was also Parashat Para), a few days after Purim.
Last week, a researcher from the East Coast interviewed me as his group gathered data about Covid and its effect on Shuls. Perhaps because he once lived in Berkeley, and has visited EB often, he wanted to include the Bay Area in his data. It was the first time I had recounted at some length the decision to close the Shul first for a Shabbat and then, a day later, indefinitely. (The county ordered all places of worship to close another day after that).
Re-telling the story brought back the surreal quality of that time. In the haste that was forced upon us, there were so many things we could not foresee at that point of the pandemic. The list makes one dizzy. Certainly, it was too fast to notice the echoes of what was happening in the Parasha. For example, one occurrence in the Parasha definitely went unnoticed: Moshe Rabenu’s mask. In mid-March, there was only a smattering of people who walked the streets in masks. Nobody would have foreseen how sensitive we would become to Moshe’s use of the mask at the end of the Parasha.
Another coincidence in the Parasha. In the aftermath of the Golden Calf, Hashem tells Moshe that He could destroy the nation in an instant. On that verse, Rashi quotes a statement from the prophet Yishayahu (26:20) regarding an instant (a Rega) of wrath. That statement in full asks that the people “hide in their rooms for an instant, until the wrath passes.” As we went into lockdown, hiding in the isolation of our homes, we could pray that it would be just an instant of wrath.
It has, of course, lasted much longer than a moment. And the reckoning has been steep. This country has been battered by a drastic death toll, economic destruction, a disruption to school that leaves children bereft and bewildered, and a political polarization so deep that even public health measures become fodder for partisan fury. Focused on the consuming question of when (or whether) the economy will recover, other acute threats to the social fabric go unaddressed.
The instant of wrath at Har Sinai did take a toll. Those who participated most directly in the Golden Calf, and those who abetted them, were severely punished. Their mistake was a loss of perspective about authority. They separated Moshe’s role from that of Hashem, like a CEO versus the Chairman of the Board, and then thought of him as manipulable. The Golden Calf becomes a viable substitute: It looks bold and strong but it is the product of human hands. Again, manipulable. This is a mistake the timely delivery of the tablets could have addressed. The tablets are a missive directly from Hashem and make clear that Moshe is nothing more than an emissary.
There are times that I think of the rancor over public health directives is a similar type of mistake. For many months, the virus has been the ultimate authority. That’s non-negotiable; no type of manipulation can change that. So instead people focus on what they sense they can manipulate. The anger about not being in control is directed instead onto the various mitigation measures and their advocates, which are far more manipulable than the virus.
In the Parasha, the ultimate lesson about that moment of threatened wrath is not about those who fell. The deeper lesson revealed by the Golden Calf is the bottomless quality of Hashem’s graciousness. The thirteen attributes of mercy are revealed in the aftermath. So it is not the moment of wrath but the millennia of mercy that shine on after the Golden Calf is over. A moment of wrath -- a year of wrath, perhaps at last beginning to wane -- should not distract us from that.
Shabbat Shalom
