A Refuge in Time on the Path of Return

Shoftim 5776/10 September 2016

Elul is well underway. We are about a week into the last month of the Hebrew calendar, a month dedicated to the work of teshuvah– of reflection, self-assessment, repentance and return to our best selves and highest ideals. It’s a month in which we are called to shake ourselves out of the lull of inertia and complacency; as Maimonides puts it, to awaken from our slumber.

The arrival of Elul can often usher in an eleventh-hour dread as we realize that our reckoning is looming. We know that we will soon be held accountable- to God and to ourselves- for the lives we’ve led this past year, for the persons we’ve become, and for the myriad decisions we made along the way. The remaining grains of sand in the hourglass are now so few we can count them. Despite the urgency, it’s easy to feel stuck and overwhelmed by the task at hand. One mitzvah from this morning’s parashah offers a helpful lens for teshuvah in the month of Elul.

As we do each year on the first Shabbat of Elul, this morning we read parashat Shoftim. Like the month of Elul the Book of Devarim occupies a liminal space, looking simultaneously backward and forward as Israel stands on the banks of the Jordan River. This week’s parashah covers a forward-looking section of Moshe’s desert discourse presenting laws for creating a system of governance and justice.

Before I continue, I’d like us to conduct a brief thought experiment. Imagine that you were setting up a new country. What institutions or infrastructure would you set up at the outset?

I think it’s fair to assume that no one considered a system to address the issue of blood vengeance. That’s what we see in the Shoftim, though. In Chapter 19, Moshe instructs the people to establish cities of refuge in the Promised Land to provide asylum for inadvertent manslayers who are fleeing blood-avengers. It’s a topic that also comes up in Numbers and in Exodus, in the context of the laws of homicide. There, the Torah states, “He who fatally strikes a man shall be put to death. If he did not do it by design, but it came about by an act of God, I will assign you a place to which he can flee.”^[1]

Here in our parashah, the Torah goes into more detail of the laws of someone who took a life bishgagah, in a preventable accident. According to the Torah, a relative of the deceased may legally take the life of the inadvertent manslayer. And the manslayer can seek asylum in any of the cities of refuge. They are to be spaced around the land in a way that limits the distance that any Israelite would have to travel to get there. The Torah says, “you shall prepare the way,”^[2] which the commentators, understand to mean making access to the arei miklat— to the cities of refuge– as easy as possible by building wide, paved roads^[3] and placing signs along the highways^[4] to ensure that anyone could get to an ir miklat quickly.

For a person suddenly confronting the harrowing reality that they’ve inadvertently taken a human life, the ir miklat serves as a refuge from fear of reprisal and condemnation. It is a space from which one might go to seek reconciliation, a space, as the 13th Century work, Sefer HaChinuch frames it, that fosters empathy among its residents and a renewed focus on the sanctity of all life.^[5] And it is a space in which one might find compassion and forgiveness for oneself.

Aside from the fact that we read about the ir miklat on this first Shabbat of Elul, our rabbis find another connection between this month and the city of refuge. Our holy books find in many Torah verses acronyms of the word Elul, seeing in those verses allusions to the service of the month. The most famous example is a verse from Song of Songs, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine,” “Ani,” aleph, “le-dodi,” lamed, “ve-dodi,” vav,“li,” lamed,^[6] spelling Elul (אֱלוּל). That verse alludes to the sense of open-heartedness and intimacy with the divine that comes as we approach the High Holy Days.

Another such verse is the one from Exodus about the ir miklat that I mentioned earlier– “If he did not do it by design,” “ve-Ha-Elohim inah le-yado vesamti lecha makom,” …I will assign you a place.” The words inah le-yado, vesamti lecha are also an acronym for Elul.

Elul is a refuge in time for us, a makom, a space set aside by God for us, for us messy, imperfect beings to begin the work of teshuvah. One of the most profound names we have for God is Ha-Makom, the place. It reflects that divine presence fills the world, that the Holy One is the ground of all being, providing a place for the world to exist, and that God’s love fills the whole world.

Elul offers an invitation of sanctuary for those willing to heed the call to awaken and begin the work of teshuvah. There are many reasons why we avoid that work. To witness ourselves as we are is very difficult. It can be painful to see all the ways in which we fall short of realizing our best selves. Many of us spend much of our time caught up in patterns of reactive and defensive behavior, committed to habits that don’t serve us, even though the might help us feel better and protected in the short-term. It may be resorting to anger to get your way, appearing a certain way to impress or attract others, or over-consuming to soothe. By acting in these ways we inadvertently cut ourselves off from our own vitality, limiting the expression of our life force in the world.

Elul offers the promise of safety to all who are willing to be vulnerable enough to see ourselves honestly. It provide a space of compassion in which to feel whatever emotions may arise when we begin to realize how we have become estranged from ourselves- be it sadness or shame. When we are willing to see ourselves clearly, as we are now, and to feel the accompanying feelings, without any judgment, a space clears in our hearts. We might notice in that space a sadness, a sense of loss, or grief for the parts of ourselves that are not finding expression. It might feel like a longing to be different, for connecting. Those feelings are a gift, they are the voice of your softening heart, inviting you to deepen your attention- to continue recognizing how cut off we are from our best selves, and allowing those feelings to just be there. When we get past our blocks and stand in the space of vulnerability, we have a powerful opportunity to investigate from a place of love and curiosity what’s going on underneath and to do some powerful work of change and transformation. It’s in that space of tender vulnerability that we can begin to hear the still small voice- call it your, intuition, your awakened loving heart, your evolved future self, your soul, God’s prayer for you, whatever language resonates for you. In that space of refuge we can open up to experience the truth that we are all worthy of love, and that we can provide that love for ourselves. In that space we are reminded that, no matter how many times we’ve broken our vows, no matter how stuck or shattered we may be, we can always change and grow and transform.  

The Reverend Naomi Leapheart, a local community organizer and UCC minister, wrote recently:

As I said earlier, the Torah calls on the Israelites to “prepare the way” to the cities of refuge- build wide, paved paths that can transport seekers easily to the cities of refuge. Elul is both the refuge and the path. If we allow Elul to be a space of refuge in which to do the hard work of teshuvah, it will be the path that leads us to a transformative High Holy Day season. So, let’s take the time we have left in Elul. Let’s settle into the refuge of this month and get to work.

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Tags: Elul, Miklat, Refuge, Teshuvah