The Strength of Integrity - Gevurah

Sermon, Shabbat Shemini 5786, Rabbi Sam Cohon, Congregation Beit Simcha, Tucson, AZ

I must admit that my favorite Passover joke—perhaps not entirely appropriate from the bimah, but all those days of matzah have damaged my judgment—the story goes like this:

A rabbi brings his kosher for Pesach lunch to the park to eat, and he sits down on a bench.  Looking over, he realizes that the man on the other end of the bench is blind and apparently has no lunch to eat.  Feeling compassion for the blind man, the rabbi offers him a square of his matzah, which the guy accepts.  But a few minutes later the blind man reaches over, taps the rabbi on the shoulder and says, indignantly, “Who wrote this garbage?”

You see, the blind man tries to read the matzah, thinking it’s written in Braille… ah, never mind.

So, now that Passover is, well, past, and over, we are in the period of the Counting of the Omer, the time between the beginning of Passover and the holiday of Shavuot, the 7 weeks that extend from the 2nd night’s Seder of Pesach, the great festival of freedom, until the night of Shavu’ot, the holiday of receiving the Ten Commandments at Sinai.  As you know, each night of this period we perform the brief ritual, counting the Omer, reminding us of the ways our ancestors brought a special barley offering to the Temple in Jerusalem, connecting them especially closely with God in this period.  These subsequent seven weeks create a time for deepening the experience of freedom at Passover through the slow and steady work of self-exploration: examining the habits of thought and behavior that have kept us enslaved, seeking to jettison them and embrace liberation.

According to mystical tradition, each day of this seven-week period of the Omer is viewed as a time for spiritual and moral transformation.  Each of the 49 days is viewed as an opportunity to meditate on specific qualities through which we can refine ourselves during the journey back to Sinai, to prepare, if you will, to receive revelation once again.  It’s an opportunity for personal awareness and moral growth in this springtime period of the year.

The first week of the Sefirat Ha’Omer, the counting of the Omer, last week was focused on Hesed, love or kindness.  This week we are asked to focus on Gevurah, which is usually translated as strength, but which really reflects moral restraint and consistency in our good conduct.  Next week the quality we are to pay special attention to is Tiferet, harmony and beauty.  It’s a lovely way to seek greater human quality in your life, to reflect on how to improve your experience of those around you, and to make yourself a better person.

While this way of thinking about the period of the Counting of the Omer is usually called Kabbalistic, that is, mystical, and it certainly derives its ideas from the Sefirot, the spheres of divine energy in Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism, I believe it is in fact much more oriented towards Mussar, the Jewish practice of practical morality, individual ethics and self-improvement.  Whatever the origins of this Sefirat Ha’Omer practice, the concept of focusing on internal growth in the season of natural growth surely can be a beautiful and meaningful process.

Now, focusing on Hesed, love or compassion, is an easy sell.  Everyone can use more love, and certainly our world would benefit for a great deal more focus on compassion, and much less on resentment and hatred.  Love is something we all can relate to, and compassion is something we all need.

But Gevurah, strength or justice, even divine justice?  That seems much less appealing, and a lot harder to relate to.  So, how might we think about Gevurah, the element of Divine energy, or personal character, that we are asked to reflect on this week? 

Yes, Gevurah means strength or power, and in Kabbalah the Sefirah, the divine orb associated with Gevurah, is also called Din, or judgment.  In general, Jewish mysticism seeks to show balance between various divine attributes, and Gevurah, power or strength and judgment, is always balanced by Chesed, love or kindness or compassion.  Both are essential elements of character, as they are believed to be integral aspects of God’s identity; chesed is the core of all religion, love for humanity and compassion for all creatures.  It must be balanced by gevurah, justice, without which love cannot flourish in society, supported by moral and inner strength. 

Generally, we associate the positive aspects of religion with love and compassion, the chesed aspects, and the negative ones with strength and judgment, the gevurah aspects.  In fact, that’s not entirely correct.  Love, of course, is profoundly important.  But striving to act well in the world, conducting ourselves as good people in challenging environments, takes strength.  And, in particular, it takes self-control. 

In considering Gevurah this week, in this spirit of the Omer counting, we might consider ways that we can control our actions and our intentions towards positive ends in a more directed, focused way.  It is not enough to intend to do good; it is essential that we actually do good.  Judaism certainly wishes to see us feel good about acting ethically.  But it cares a great deal more about us actually acting ethically.  For example, it is not enough to intend to give Tzedakah, or even to feel the need to give Tzedakah; it is far more important to give Tzedakah, no matter how you feel about it or how grudgingly you give it, than it is to have a good attitude about intending to give Tzedakah and then, well, not do it.

If this Omer association with Kabbalah, or Mussar, seems a little preachy, well, it is.  But that is not always a bad thing.  For the journey from the celebration of freedom at Passover to the celebration of covenant at Shavu’ot can be one of true personal growth.  It can make us better Jews and better people.  And to accomplish that we must choose to reflect on just how we might best successfully change over this period.

We always say when we do the short blessing for the Counting of the Omer, “we count each day so that we might make each day count.”  Perhaps the best way to do that during this spring season is to focus on how to use Gevurah, personal strength and integrity, to improve.

May this be God’s will, but more importantly, may this be our will.