Celebrating the Present
Thoughts on Yom HaAssmaut 2020
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Many have argued
that it is inappropriate to celebrate the establishment of the State of Israel
prior to its “final redemption” by Mashiah. Indeed, even we who celebrate Yom
HaAssmaut rejoice only the athalta de-ge’ulah – “the beginning of
redemption,” as we admit that there is actually more to come. Imagine a
prisoner celebrating their freedom before leaving the grounds of captivity. How
premature! Since anything might still happen, everyone would agree that the
prisoner should only rejoice once out and away from the prison gates. Why,
then, do we celebrate a state of independence which is still incomplete?
Several thousand
years ago, Am Yisrael sang shirat ha-yam as they left Egypt. When
exactly did they sing? Owing to the pesukim’s ambiguity, the Hakhamim
disagreed about whether the people sang as they traversed the sea or only
afterwards.[1]
It is easy to understand why they may have sung only after crossing the
sea. It was, after all, a song of thankfulness to God for His redemption from
their oppressors. Singing during the splitting of the sea, however, is
hard to comprehend. Why would the people sing before experiencing a complete
and final salvation?
Avivah Gottlieb
Zornberg suggested that the fear and anxiety felt by Am Yisrael as they
crossed the sea, with their sense of fate hanging in balance, underwrote the
song that they then sang. “The meeting of terror and joy, destruction and
birth, takes the people beyond the normal places of speech,” she wrote, “It
takes them…into silence.” And it is from that emotional constriction upon
ordinary speech that the song was then conceived.[2]
While singing after keriat yam suf is a rational decision, singing during
the crossing is emotionally charged.
In 1954, Ezriel
Carlebach, the legendary editor of the Israel newspaper Maariv, traveled
to India. He later summed up the difference between Western and Eastern
mindsets, recalling a brief conversation with the prime minister of India at
that time. As the two discussed the diplomatic complications of the time, which
seemed difficult to overcome, Carlebach remarked, “Well, the question is what
to do.” The prime minister gazed at him for a while, and then said, “You see?
That is a typical question for a European.” “How so?” Carlebach asked. “Well,”
he replied, “an Indian would have asked ‘What to be?’”[3]
If shirat ha-yam
was sung after splitting the sea, it answered “What to do?” If it
was sung during the crossing, however, it addressed “What to be?”
We tend to live our
lives focused upon the past and future, in total neglect of the present. The
“past” and “future” are easy to wrap our heads around. We can remember history
and reflect upon its various lessons. And we can speculate about the future and
prepare for its arrival. Appreciating the present, however, is a daunting
challenge. It is difficult to seize a time that fleetingly shifts from one
moment to the next.
Instead, we plan.
We focus on how achievements at school will affect our future, how success at
work will build income, and how proper investments will support retirement. And
in so doing, we neglect the experience of life itself. Avoiding the emotions of
fear, excitement, anguish and joy which make up “the present,” we hand over our
most basic expressions of humanity to the stable and stoic states of
predictability and complacency.
Medinat Yisrael has a long road ahead to its
“final redemption.” The concerns regarding its state of politics, religion and
security abound. But Yom HaAssmaut doesn’t celebrate the past, nor does it
rejoice over the future. Instead, it embraces the present. We gather together
as a nation on this day, ignoring “What to do?” and asking instead “What to
be?” We celebrate the current reality, tapping into its wellspring of emotions
and using them to draw closer to God.
[1] See Sotah 30a and Mekhilta:
Beshalah 82. See R. Meshulam Dovid Soloveitchik, Meorei HaMoadim vol.
1 (Jerusalem, IS, 1997), pg. 75-76 and Meorei HaMoadim vol. 2
(Jerusalem, IS, 2001), pg. 52-54. And cf. R. Barukh Epstein, Torah Temimah:
Shemot 14:22.
[2] Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, The
Particulars of Rapture: Reflections on Exodus (New York, NY, 2001), pg.
216-218.
[3] Ezriel Carlebach, India:
Account of a Voyage [Hebrew] (Tel Aviv, IS, 1986), pg. 266. Cited by R.
Yaakov Nagen, Be, Become Bless: Jewish Spirituality between East and West
(New Milford, CT, 2019), pg. 1-2.