Parashat Bereshit in Light of this Past week
October 12, 2023
Rabbi Harry Pell, Associate Head of School
When we read Parashat Bereshit in shul this Shabbat, we will likely focus on the end results of each day of creation, and I think that makes sense on many levels. There is the comfortably familiar repetition of “vayehi erev, vayehi voker” – there was evening and there was morning – at the end of each day; it is at the end of nearly all of the days that God examine’s God’s work and finds it to be good; and the clear thrust of the action on each day of creation is toward that which is created by day’s end. It’s logical that our attention would be drawn to the outcome of each day, but what if we focused for a moment instead on what already exists each day before that day’s act of creation?
In a way, each day’s act of creation is a fix, or in kabbalistic language a tikkun, for what God had already created, but which was nevertheless imperfect. A few examples working backwards: On the fourth day of creation, light had already been created, but God needed to create the sun and moon – the great lights of the sky – to better divide the light from the darkness and perfect it. On the third day, dry land already existed and was revealed once God drew back the water, but it was barren until God created vegetation to blanket the land. On the second day there was already water everywhere, but God needed to create the expanse of the sky to separate the water above from the water below.
What about the first day of creation? On the first day of creation, God created light because God needed to fix the “tohu va’vohu v’choshech” – the unformed chaos and darkness that pre-existed the light. At the risk of stating the obvious, light is the answer to darkness and chaos. Except, this is actually only obvious when one is sitting in the light. When we are enveloped by unformed chaos and darkness, it’s easy to think there is no answer, no fix, no tikkun. And this past week, I have felt deeply that we are sitting in darkness, enveloped by chaos.
In a midrash related in the Talmud about our parashah (Bavli, Avodah Zarah 8a), when Adam was created there was light his entire first Shabbat in Gan Eden. But after Shabbat, as he approached the end of his first regular day, the end of the first regular day of human existence, when the light began to fade, Adam became terrified. He was becoming surrounded by darkness, and Adam had no reason to believe that the light would return. Indeed, there have been moments this week when I have felt terrified, wondering whether the light would return to push away the unformed chaos and darkness. And yet, it must.
Each morning when we daven Shacharit, as we approach the Shema we reflect back on this week’s parashah and remind ourselves that God renews creation on a daily basis. To be more specific, we remind ourselves that God renews the great lights in the sky every day. To be even more specific, the siddur tells us that “or chadash al tzion tair” – that a new light will shine upon Zion.
As we go into Shabbat, this is my tefilah. As we read this Shabbat about God creating light to banish the tohu va’vohu on the first day of creation, may the light God created in Bereshit and which God renews daily replace the tohu va’vohu of this unbearably painful past week. While I know the darkness is not yet behind us, I pray that, in time, a new light will indeed shine upon Zion, and may we all soon merit to enjoy its brightness.
אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר וְנִזְכֶּה כֻלָּֽנוּ מְהֵרָה לְאוֹרוֹ
These words of Torah are dedicated to the memory of the seemingly innumerable victims of the Hamas terror attack on Simchat Torah, and for the safe return of the captives being held even now.