If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.
[Emily Dickinson]
We’re a few minutes away from the centerpiece of the Musaf service, the stirring and dramatic prayer called U’n’taneh tokef.
“On Rosh Hashanah it is written, and on Yom Kippur it is sealed: who will live and who will die…who will be at peace and who will be troubled…who will be brought low and who will be raised up…”
Our lives are fragile and not just today. The words that follow U’n’taneh tokef’s dramatic middle expand on the idea. In what our Mahzor calls “a poetic cascade of imagery” the poet compares human beings – us, that is – to:
a broken shard
withering grass
a shriveled flower
a passing shadow
a fading cloud
a fleeting breeze
scattered dust
a vanishing dream
Perhaps you remember an old Sesame Street routine called ‘One of these things is not like the others’? Well, one of THESE things is not like the others. Grass, flowers, shadows, not to mention clouds, breeze, dust, and yes dreams, are all natural phenomena used as similes both here and in the Biblical passages from which each phrase comes.
But a broken shard, a fragment of an earthenware vessel, is human made, and in its Biblical appearance in the book of Leviticus it’s anything but a metaphor! So what could it possibly mean to say that we – fragile, impermanent humans – are akin to the bits and pieces of a shattered clay pot?!?
The Torah’s rules for purity and impurity, as understood by the early rabbis, provide an answer.
וּכְלִי־חֶ֛רֶשׂ אֲשֶׁ֥ר תְּבֻשַּׁל־בּ֖וֹ יִשָּׁבֵ֑ר says Leviticus 6:21 – Now a vessel of earthenware in which it was boiled is to be broken. The ‘it’ is the sin offering, the very same חטאת brought by the high priest in this morning’s Torah reading. Its contact with the clay pot in which it is boiled renders the vessel impure; and perhaps because earthenware is porous, it can only be purified by breaking it.
The Tosefta – one of the founding books of the rabbinic tradition – spells it out explicitly: אין טהרה לכלי חרס אלא שבירתו – shattering is the only means of purification for a clay pot. You may be wondering, what is one meant to do with a pile of now newly purified shards? Says the Mishnah – the other founding book of the rabbinic tradition – put the pieces back together and rebuild or reassemble the vessel.
Another key piece to this puzzle: the original earthenware vessel, according to the Torah, is the first human whom God brought into being עפר מן האדמה – from the dust of the earth.
And take one more step with me. Perhaps the broken shards of U’n’taneh tokef are our hearts: shattered, fragmented, in pieces.
Our tradition has much to say about broken-heartedness; we Jews, it seems, have had our hearts broken for a very long time. We kind of specialize in it!
The Psalmist especially loves the image, calling God ‘the healer of shattered hearts’/ הרופא לשבורי לב; the One who is ‘close to the broken-hearted/קרוב לנשברי לב; the One who will never turn away an individual with a broken and crushed heart/לב נשבר ונדכה אלהים לא נבזה.
My teacher and mentor Rabbi Gordon Tucker beautifully reassembles all of these pieces for us:
“We humans are made from the dust of the earth, it is true, and because of that, we readily take in and absorb into ourselves all sorts of impurities: values that distort us and drive out values that sustain us, addictions to the impermanent things of this world, and neglect of our souls and our sacred relationships. But because our hearts have the capacity to break when we acknowledge our existential errors, we have hope. When our hearts in fact break within us with remorse, the earthenware becomes pure again and can be re-fused into a pure and worthy vessel.”
Rabbi Sharon Brous’s beautiful new book, The Amen Effect, powerfully retells a story from the Mishnah about entering into the Temple:
Imagine: pilgrimage to Jerusalem has been a lifelong dream. You’ve planned, prepared, and saved for years. Maybe you’ve traveled from the northern or southern tip of the Land, perhaps from Babylonia or Egypt or some other corner of the diaspora. You arrive to a bustling Jerusalem, alive with feasting and celebration. You immerse yourself in the ritual bath and then make your way to the Temple Mount, the holiest site in the holiest city. You ascend a grand staircase and walk through the arched entrance to immense, elaborately decorated, high-ceilinged porticoes. You burst into tears, overcome by emotion to be surrounded by pilgrims from the farthest reaches, all gathering in common cause. You begin to process around the Courtyard, in rhythm with the masses. Body and spirit transcend time and space.
Can you feel it? Thanks to Rabbi Brous’s brilliant description, I definitely can. But then something shifts:
There’s a stranger coming toward you, making her way against the flow of the crowd. Her stride is slow. She seems impervious to the festive spirit of the day. She is clearly suffering. You want to avert your eyes like you’re on some NYC subway platform, but you’re not allowed to. You stop and greet her with a simple, openhearted question: “What’s your story? Why does your heart ache?”
And this grief-stricken person answers: “I am broken.” You offer words of comfort. “I see you…You are not alone.” You continue to walk, until the next distressed person approaches.
Rabbi Brous notes the ‘timeless wisdom in entering this sacred circle’ — “Today you walk from left to right. Tomorrow, it will be me. I hold you now, knowing that eventually, you’ll hold me.”
Movingly, Rabbi Brous articulates the meaning and inner dynamics of community. We’re here to take care of one another, especially in times of need; in the language of the Mishnah – in a moment שֶׁאֵרְעוֹ דָבָר – when something has happened to someone else. In the Mishnah’s story, those who circle in the opposite direction are mourners and those who have been previously expelled from the community. At least in this moment, they are outside the camp – חוץ למחנה – in distress, heart-broken.
What happens, I wonder, when all of us are in distress, when the camp itself feels shattered?
The prophet Jeremiah speaks to such a moment:
Because my people is shattered I am shattered;
עַל־שֶׁ֥בֶר בַּת־עַמִּ֖י הָשְׁבָּ֑רְתִּי
I am dejected, seized by desolation.
Is there no balm in Gilead? Can no physician be found?
הַצֳרִי֙ אֵ֣ין בְּגִלְעָ֔ד אִם־רֹפֵ֖א אֵ֣ין שָׁ֑ם
Why has healing not yet come to my poor people?
That striking phrase – שבר בת עמי/my shattered people – resonates for me and powerfully. My people, the Jewish people, our people, is shattered. All of us are the ones circling to the left in the Temple courtyard, if we’re there at all. All of us are in distress and the camp itself feels shattered. Jeremiah’s questions are mine and ours – Is there no balm in Gilead?
One source of that balm, it turns out, is the very broken heart we aim to heal.
“One time the Baal Shem Tov commanded his disciple Reb Zev-Wolf to prepare himself and learn the mental intentions of the shofar blowing, because he would blow the shofar for the Baal Shem Tov. Reb Wolf studied all the proper intentions (“kavanot”) and wrote them down on a piece of paper so that he would be able to look at it while blowing the shofar. He hid the paper in his pocket. Reb Wolf didn’t know that the Baal Shem Tov made sure that the paper would be lost. When he rose up to blow the shofar he looked for the paper everywhere, but he could not find it. Reb Wolf was so upset that he blew the shofar with a very heavy and broken heart, without any special intentions.
“Afterwards, the Baal Shem Tov said to him: In the Palace of the King there are many rooms and halls, and each door to a room or a hall has a different key. But there is a better way to enter than to use the key, and this is to use an ax, which can open the locks of all the doors. The same is true of proper intentions. They are the keys to each and every gate, and every opening has the proper intention for it. However, the broken heart is an axe. It allows every person to enter all the gates and the halls of the King of Kings, the Holy One of Blessing.”
Summoning his inner Baal Shem Tov, Leonard Cohen teaches us that:
You can add up the parts
But you won’t have the sum
You can strike up the march
There is no drum
Every heart, every heart
To love will come
But like a refugee
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in
That’s how the light gets in
That’s how the light gets in
Minutes ago we heard the prophet Isaiah’s shattering words chanted beautifully by Adam Wishkofsky.
מָר֥וֹם וְקָד֖וֹשׁ אֶשְׁכּ֑וֹן וְאֶת־דַּכָּא֙ וּשְׁפַל־ר֔וּחַ לְהַחֲיוֹת֙ ר֣וּחַ שְׁפָלִ֔ים וּֽלְהַחֲי֖וֹת לֵ֥ב נִדְכָּאִֽים׃
I dwell on high, in holiness;
Yet with the contrite and the lowly in spirit—
Reviving the spirits of the lowly, Reviving the hearts of the contrite.
כִּ֣י לֹ֤א לְעוֹלָם֙ אָרִ֔יב וְלֹ֥א לָנֶ֖צַח אֶקְצ֑וֹף כִּי־ר֙וּחַ֙ מִלְּפָנַ֣י יַעֲט֔וֹף וּנְשָׁמ֖וֹת אֲנִ֥י עָשִֽׂיתִי:
For I will not always contend, I will not be angry forever;
Nay, I who make spirits flag, also create the breath of life.
We really are that broken shard longing, hoping, needing to reassemble ourselves, our people, our world. May this be the year of rebuilding, of purification, of renewed wholeness for us and for all of humanity.
So let us ring the bells that still can ring
And let us forget our perfect offerings
And let us take comfort in knowing that
there is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in
That’s how the light gets in
That’s how the light gets in
