This week I had the privilege of sitting, and learning, and meditating, and celebrating, with some of my favorite teachers, as part of an IJS Hevraya (Alumni) Retreat. Melila Hellner-Eshed walked us through a series of texts focused on two key moments in Moses’s biography – his encounter with the burning bush and his striking the rock to bring forth water for the people of Israel. We struggled to make sense of the big symbols of the Torah’s dense narratives – the bush (which burns but is not consumed), the staff (which is also a serpent), the rock, the water – and found ways to read our own experiences and lives into our tradition’s powerful texts. This Shabbat, I share with you my midrash/poem, an effort to see and understand the events described in Exodus and Numbers through the eyes of the rock. Enjoy, and Shabbat Shalom.
The Rock’s Lament
Trust, you say. Have faith.
Things develop at their own pace.
Sit, watch. You’ll see it yourself.
Sitting I can handle. Watching too.
I watched a bush on fire once
It was quite a sight – big, miraculous
Burned for an hour, maybe more
And still, it stood.
Strange, I thought. A sign? A fluke?
Maybe a test. Or perhaps a hoax.
How long must one sit and watch and wait
To learn what happens in the end.
Maybe nothing happens.
Trust, you say. Have faith.
You should listen to your own advice.
You with the staff, striking not once but twice.
And I, who watched and waited and sat.
In the end, I gave you water.
Despite your fire, despite your rage.
Clear, sweet, cool water
From a well deep below, at the desert’s edge
A relief for parched throats and thirsty hearts.
Trust, I say. Have faith.
Things develop at their own pace.
[Jan Steen, Moses Striking the Rock, 1660-1661, Philadelphia Museum of Art]
