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                              Parshath Bo
       For the week ending 6 Shevat 5762 / January 18 & 19, 2002
     _____________________________________________________________
                             Boogie-Woogie
     "Stretch forth your hand toward the heavens, and there shall be
     a  darkness  on  the  land  of  Egypt, and the darkness will be
     tangible." (10:21)
   As  young  children, our last request at bed-time is "Daddy, don't
   close  the  door!" And what if the door accidentally closes and we
   find  ourselves  alone  and  in  the  dark? What fear lurks in the
   darkness?  Some vast and hideous monster two inches from our face?
   Some  huge slimy insect hiding under the bed? The remnants of last
   night's midnight feast?
   Even  when we grow to adulthood, we never completely lose our fear
   of  the  dark.  If  we  no  longer  fear it as we did when we were
   children, it's because we can get out of bed and flick the switch.
   But  if we were placed in a darkness over which we had no control,
   if  we  were  powerless to restore the light, all those primordial
   youthful fears would immediately take hold.
   Why is the dark so frightening?
   More  than  large furry spiders or the famous, but rarely-spotted,
   Boogie man, what really frightens us about the dark is that we are
   in a world where nothing exists outside ourselves. Nothing exists.
   Only  the  sound  of  our  own  breathing. The thump, thump of our
   heart.  And  after  a few minutes of silence, the low whistling of
   the blood flowing in our ears. The sound of nothing.
   In  Hebrew  the  word  for  darkness  is connected to the word "to
   withhold"  (see  Bereishet  22:12).  Darkness  is the absence, the
   withholding, of the world outside.
   In  this  week's  Torah  portion,  we  read about the ninth plague
   inflicted  on  the Egyptians - the plague of darkness. Ostensibly,
   this  was  a  very benign plague. No blood turned to water. No one
   suffered  excruciating  boils.  Just  darkness. A darkness that at
   first prevented you from seeing someone even if they were right in
   front  of your face, and then it became thicker until it literally
   froze people.
   How  can  darkness  freeze  someone?  In the dark, I perceive that
   there  is nowhere outside of me. I have nowhere to go. If I extend
   my  little  finger,  it  will  vanish.  There is nothing there. No
   place, no space outside.
   I  often  think  that  the  present plight of the Jewish People in
   Israel  is  rather like those Egyptians in the plague of darkness.
   We  feel  paralyzed,  incapable  of action. Our Boogie Man wears a
   kafiah  and has a permanent three-day stubble on his face. We feel
   that  if  we move at all, we will simply vanish into nothingness -
   like  some  medieval sailor's nightmare of sailing off the edge of
   the world.
   One  of  G-d's  name  is Hamakom, meaning "the Place." The mystics
   teach  that  G-d  doesn't exist in the world - The world exists in
   G-d. G-d is the place of the world and G-d causes existence.
   The  nations  of  the  world repeat the same message to the Jewish
   People  down the ages "You have no place in this world." You don't
   belong here. Your destiny is to wander.
   In  every  lie,  there is a grain of truth. It is true that in the
   natural  order  of  things  the Jewish People have no place in the
   world.  We  are  an  anti-historical  phenomenon:  By  all laws of
   history  and  probability,  we  should  have  faded  out long ago.
   Historical theory's biggest problem is our survival.
   The  truth  is  that  we  don't belong in a purely physical world,
   because   the   ultimate   expression   of   the  Jew  is  through
   spirituality.  But  in  a world devoid of spirituality, we have no
   place.
   Our  problems  begin  when  we  think  that our purpose is to be a
   nation just like any other nation. G-d didn't make us that way; we
   are  a  supernatural  people.  Our entire existence depends on our
   relationship to G-d. Only when we realize this will we emerge from
   our paralyzing darkness to a world of security and light.
     _____________________________________________________________
   Written  and  Compiled  by  [mailto:sinclair@ohr.israel.net] Rabbi
   Yaakov Asher Sinclair
    (C) 2001 [http://www.ohr.edu/] Ohr Somayach International - All
                            rights reserved.
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