As we enter this Shabbat and look forward to our Purim celebrations this year, the world’s darkness looms large. It feels disingenuous to speak of joy in tragic times. Our ambivalence is not novel. For generations, in ghettos and concentration camps — over and against all odds, even under oppressive regimes — Jews have triumphantly declared these words from the Megillah, “layehudim Hitah Orah v’Simcha v’Sason viykar,'' the
Jews had light and joy, happiness and honor.
Here we stand, hostages still held by Hamas, mourning the loss of lives in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, surrounded by the divisiveness of an ugly election year, fully feeling the weight of war that continues to drag us down.
Now, our tradition teaches, it is time to be joyful. Now? Really?
It is a human tendency to spiral in sorrow and wallow in the world’s dust and ashes. The Fast of Esther, commemorated by some this week, embraces this impulse. Rabbi Nachman of Bratzlav, who suffered mightily under oppression in the Pale of Settlement, taught, “it's a great mitzvah to be happy, to make every effort to keep depression and gloom at bay.” No matter how terrible our times, it is incumbent on each of us to seize the opportunity to warm ourselves by the light of the long-tended fires of our faith. Especially when the night feels cold and dark, especially when we could easily be enveloped by the world’s sorrow. For though weeping may tarry into the night, joy comes in the morning — if only we open our hearts and minds to the light. Happiness is not necessarily an invitation to lighthearted escapism. It is a complex emotion and a choice we can make in total awareness of life’s pain. When we do so, we fortify ourselves to live more fully and give ourselves permission to feel deeply and honestly the full technicolor spectrum of emotion that is the human experience.
This Purim, join us in joy. Let us kindle the warming fires of this community so that when the night comes our path forward is illuminated with visions of the world as it could be.
Shabbat Shalom v’Chag Purim Sameach, Rabbi Sarah Mack Rabbi Preston Neimeiser Cantor Judy Seplowin
