There is a story about a famous travelling maggid - literally a storyteller, but really a guest sermonizer. One day, in one of the many towns that the maggid visited, they asked him how, with so many different parshiyot in the Torah, it was possible to deliver such a great sermon every time. The maggid smiled and said: I’ll tell you my secret. When I get up to speak, I take off my glasses and start to clean them. As they fall from my hands to the ground, I say, “May the earth open up and swallow you, like Korach! And speaking of Korach…” and then I give my sermon.
I cannot tell you how many colleagues have said to me: What a joy it must be to be an interim rabbi. After all, instead of writing new sermons for the High HolyDays, all you have to do is reach into your copious files and refresh an old one. At this point in my sermon last year, I told the congregation that therefore, I was bringing back a classic sermon series of mine entitled, “The Stained Glass Windows of Temple Beth Miriam.” The joke, which I acknowledge is not as funny since I have to explain it, was that my interim congregation last year WAS Temple Beth Miriam and so, the sermon could not be from any year prior. Anyway, since the sermon went over so well last year, I decided to repeat it again this year - I hope you will appreciate the subject of my High HolyDay sermons - the Stained Glass Windows of Congregation Berith Sholom. Admittedly, these windows are both similar and different from those windows, but I was encouraged by the fact that what a congregation chooses to illuminate its worship is space is, well, a window on the congregation and its values.
At Temple Beth Miriam, the congregation was in its second building, and the windows were closely contemporaneous with the building’s construction. Here, the windows were imagined, designed, and installed for the congregation’s centennial in its original building. Glass is fragile. The building surrounding framing those windows is more permanent and unchanging. Installing new windows did not change the structure, but it did change the view. As we stand at this moment of transition for Berith Sholom, we can both value the structure, and also look again with new eyes, and a different perspective. As Rabbi Gordon spoke about from this bimah, at this time last year - a moment to stand in the present and look back as well as forward.
A word about perspective, and memory. For many of us, this date on the calendar - not the first of Tishri, but rather 9/11, has become more than a numerical position in the year, but the cauldron that holds painful memories and which marked a shift in how our country saw itself, in how we balanced safety and freedom. In 2001, twenty-five years ago, we were shell-shocked in disbelief. We waited, holding our breath, seeing cars in train parking lots, and wondering if their drivers would return. Out our windows, or on our screens, we saw the plumes of smoke. We lost friends, family, and, quite literally, Windows on the World. In shock, members of my congregation asked if we could still celebrate Rosh haShanah - the birthday of the world, while we were still in mourning. The lesson that I learned that year, I revisit at each wedding chuppah. We break a glass at a time of great joy, to remember sorrow. In doing so, we give ourselves the ability and permission to remember joy, even in a time of great sorrow. Here we stand, twenty-five years later, and the perspective that we have looking back is different now than it was then. The events, the facts, the structure, remains the same, but we have changed, and our understanding is differently colored.
Throughout the rest of this anniversary year, we will be inviting speakers to come share with us pieces of our shared history - of Jews in Troy and the Capital Region; of our proud history of women rabbis, of treasures and mementos found in the storage spaces of this building. But let us take a moment know to imagine how that generation - at the centennial - was trying to lift up the structure and change the perspective of our congregation.
Windows are a crucial part of a Jewish sanctuary. The Babylonion Talmud, in B’rachot 34b, it says:
רַבִּי חִיָּיא בַּר אַבָּא אָמַר רַבִּי יוֹחָנָן: אַל יִתְפַּלֵּל אָדָם אֶלָּא בְּבַיִת שֶׁיֵּשׁ שָׁם חַלּוֹנוֹת. שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: ״וְכַוִּין פְּתִיחָן לֵיהּ בְּעִלִּיתֵהּ (לָקֳבֵל) [נֶגֶד] יְרוּשְׁלֶם״.
Rabbi Chiya bar Abba said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan, “A person prays only in a building with windows.” As it is written, “and he [Daniel] had open windows in the attic [where he prayed] facing Jerusalem”
But are the windows to let us see out, or to let the light (and perhaps God) in? Looking up, it seems that these windows are a bit high to help us see much outside. Originally, these windows were just colored glass, so we can imagine that that previous generation wanted our eyes to be drawn to the messages of the art they created. They chose three different themes - around the sanctuary are the words of various prophets and symbols of their prophecy - we’ll spend more time on those on Yom Kippur. Over the door to the street, each of the twelve sections of the circular window represents one of the twelve biblical tribes. To either side of that window, again facing the street, are similar windows depicting the lifted hands of the priestly benediction (framing the arch of the door, which reads – zeh sha’ar l’Adonai, tzaddikim yavo’u vam This is the Adonai’s gate, the righteous enter here.). Back in the sanctuary, the circular window over the Ark contains eight images of Shabbat. (The four panels obscured by the Ark retain the colored glass design of the original.) The shorter double-paneled windows represent the Biblical holydays.
To face the public, our congregation chose to both identify as a people, with the window of the twelve tribes, but also to bring out the destiny which was given to those descendants when God blessed Abraham to be a blessing to other nations. This is a very Reform understanding. Traditionally, the priestly benediction was a privilege of the descendants of Aaron, who, in Orthodox congregations to this day, ascend to the bimah, drape themselves in tallitot, and bless the congregation. According to the book of Numbers, when the blessing is introduced, God says that it is for the priests to use when it is fitting to place God’s name on the people. Our Reform ancestors turned those hands outward, and reimagined us as the hands that created (often physically) the blessing for other nations.
Back in the sanctuary, reminding us of our heritage, are the holyday windows, somewhat mistitled. The double panel signifying the High HolyDays - Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur and the soon to follow Sukkot, is titled yamim nora’im - the days of awe. The window signifying the other two pilgrimage festivals - Pesach and Shavuot - is titled shalosh regalim - the three festivals. The Pesach window is decorated with a square of matzah (Thank you, Manischewitz for the modern boxable design.) and a kiddush cup - which represents not just the food available on the seder table, but our miraculous exodus, and the joy of our celebration. The other panel is the Torah scroll (in its Ashkenazic form) symbolizing the loving relationship with God that our people entered into at that moment at the foot of Mount Sinai. Interestingly, neither window reflects the agricultural significance of these holydays, which was primary for our Biblical ancestors, but less so for us less likely to be agrarian moderns. Instead, we focus on our shared history - our remembrance of slavery and our commitment to be in Divine relationship.
The Tishri window, we’ll call it, has the shofar and a machzor. Those are not just the things that we will see in the sanctuary today and tomorrow, but our guides as well. The blast of the shofar calls us together, to take notice of what time it is; the machzor is our map through the journey of t’shuvah, of repentance. The second panel of this window contains the lulav and etrog - again symbols that we will see in two weeks as we celebrate Sukkot, but also a metaphor that the Sages lifted up about how to live a good life - with the firm backbone of the palm branch, the open eyes of the myrtle, the truthful lips of the willow, and beautiful heart of the etrog. This window uses the symbols of worship to remind us that we are called to aim for a life that is good, although we need to remember to pause for self-reflection and redirection from time to time.
Finally, we reach the centerpiece of our sanctuary, rising grandly over our Ark, the eight panels representing Shabbat - both the most common holiday and the most important. Seven panels would have been easy - one for each day of the week, or of the first creation story in Genesis. Our Berith Sholom forbears took two paths - the context of history and the implements of celebration. The windows start with three contextual representations followed by the ceremonial objects, which go in (almost) chronological order. First, the two candles that spark the beginning of our day of rest. Next the kiddush cup, which begins our joyous celebration. Next is the challah, a bread a little bit more special than we eat every day, to show the effort we put into our celebration. Then, the multi-wicked twisted candle of havdalah, bookending our sabbath with light. Finally, the spice box, a reminder of the tastes and smells that made our Sabbat special. Each object, not only an opportunity to make the moments of Shabbat more special, but also symbols in their own right of the meaning of this celebration.
Back to the first three panels. The end result of creation is the day of rest. God provided us with a period, a moment to stop and reflect; without which day flows into day without end, without rest. The pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud were the GPS of our Israelite ancestors. Resting on the Holy of Holies, they always knew their center, and when the time came to move on, the pillar would lift, and they would follow. Where it rested, they would camp - and on Shabbat, there was no moving, but the light remained to protect them. Finally, the crown of the Sabbath queen. Our ancestors imagined Shabbat as an intimate partner to our people, our Sabbath bride, and each Shabbat as a wedding celebration.
So each week, as we enter the sanctuary to rest and recuperate, we are reminded by the light that flows over our Torah scrolls of our history and Divine connection - that creation has a purpose. That the cycle of the year is not just the progression of the seasons, but a reminder of our history, and that we are called by our tradition to act in the world, to be a people who bring blessing to others - if we want to be the tzaddikim who are invited inside.
As we stand in this moment of transition, we look up to the walls provided by the first generation of this congregation, and how those walls were transformed by the vision of those who came a century after. We, too, have our part in this history and this transformation. In these High HolyDays, let us not only consider how we can make ourselves better, but how we can act together as a community to make the world better - to take simple colored glass and reforge it into messages of transformation and hope, of connection and of blessing.
What can we do, in this moment, to strengthen the structure of our congregation - not only the physical building, but also the structures of our community; the pillars and struts which are our volunteers? What can we do to shed new light on our old traditions? What is the voice that we each uniquely bring to the Torah we read again and again each year? The synagogue is empty without our presence. The light of the windows shines on empty seats. We are the artisans who create our Jewish legacy.
L’shanah tovah - let us craft for ourselves a good year of blessing.
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