Sometimes life feels dark. I’m guessing that everyone goes through occasions when they feel like life’s walls are closing in and all doors of escape are closed. It’s difficult to hope for a ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ when you feel that you’ve reached a dead end, and there’s no escape in sight.
Historically, we’ve gone through many periods of profound darkness. Thousands of years ago, barbarians came to Jerusalem to destroy our Holy Temple. They sacked our commonwealth, demolished our central place of worship and brought darkness to our lives.
After the Destruction, the great Rabbi Akiva visited the desolate Temple Mount with some Rabbinic colleagues. Seeing an animal running through the area that had previously been the Holy of Holies, they broke down and cried. All of them but Rabbi Akiva, who smiled.
Rabbi Akiva explained to his bewildered colleagues that the Torah forecasts a world where we will experience ruin and redemption, pain and pleasure, horror and happiness. The prophets, he explained, had clearly forecast the Temple’s destruction and the acute darkness they were all feeling. Yet those same prophets, he pointed out, had also forecast the beautiful light of redemption.
They foretold darkness and they foretold sunrise. Now that I see the darkness, I’m confident there will be a sunrise.
Thinking Jewish means recognizing that, until the universe experiences a Messianic shift to permanent goodness, there will always be a flux between two poles. Sadness and Happiness. Night and day.
In the Torah’s depiction of Creation’s six days, each day concludes with the language “it was evening and it was morning….” Following that rhythm, our calendar day actually begins in the evening and progresses to the morning, ending with sunset. We begin by accepting the night, but only as a first step; we go to bed with confidence in the sun rising. This is also reflected in our lunar (moon-based) calendar, which reflects life itself. Waxing, waning, darkness and fullness.
Last night, the moon was dark, not even a sliver of light. Our world was dark. Yet, somewhat paradoxically, we call that the BIRTH of the new moon (launching the Jewish month of Kislev). We have confidence that G-d gave us a world where this is just the beginning. The sun will yet rise and the moon will yet shine at its fullest.
Life will again feel bright.