Song in Our Hearts

Rabbi Melanie Aron

Saturday, June 3, 2006

Sometimes it is comforting to know exactly what is expected of us. If we are doing something unfamiliar or something where it is very important that it be done a certain way, the more explicit the instructions we get, the more confidence we have that we can succeed. Our Bar Mitzvah students, for example, often ask questions about our expectations because they really want to earn the respect of all those present and do honor to the Torah. They like knowing exactly what they are supposed to do and fulfilling the role that has been assigned to them.

This week's torah portion continues the description of the assignment of duties to the Levitical clans. Each family had a different responsibility in moving the tabernacle from place to place, and different items that they were to pack and carry. Each family had jurisdiction over a different set of ritual objects had had a different role in the dismantling and rebuilding of the altar. In this week's Torah portion we learn that the Gershonites and Merarites who were responsible for some of the heaviest equipment, did not carry their load themselves, but had oxcarts which they would load and unload. Now that in itself doesn't sound very important for us to know, and that bothered the rabbis.

Why would the Torah tell us about the oxcarts, unless we were to learn something from this- and what can we learn from the fact that the Levites used them? In the commentaries, this verse is tied to another verse in the Book of Samuel which also speaks about oxcarts. In Samuel, it is the oxcarts that were carrying the Ark as it came up to Jerusalem in the time of King David that are discussed. The verse tells us that the oxen went straight along the way. But in Hebrew the word for going straight, in the third person feminine, future tense with a reversing vav, vayisharnah, is the same as the word for singing, and so they interpreted this verse to mean that the oxen sang as they carried the ark to Jerusalem. Let me share with you a little of the commentary, Sefat Emet:

"Because they were carrying the Ark, they were given the awareness to sing. Thus the Zohar says: It was the Ark on their backs that enabled them to sing. The same is true of the Levites! It is the fact that they carry the Ark on their shoulders that gives them the power to lift their voices in song. This is true also of every person who serves God. True service fills a person with light and joy."

Rabbi Josh Minkin, a contemporary Reform rabbi, in a commentary written several years ago, contrasts the satisfaction of the Levites, in knowing what their task was, to our own challenge in having to discover what will be our holy work. Each of us has a particular role in doing God's work in the world and each of us has particular talents and gifts that make us uniquely suitable for our task, but unlike the Levites, our particular role is not assigned to us by families: we need to discover it. Often it takes years for us to discover God's job description for ourselves, and sometimes the way to apply for this position as God's partner in the world is not clear. But when we find that task that it is ours to do, when we stand up and take on our role in tikkun olam, then we feel that same satisfaction that the Levites felt, in doing what was theirs to do, the same satisfaction that we hope that Jon feels today, the same song in our hearts.