March 14, 2025
Chag Purim Sameach and Shabbat Shalom! It was wonderful to gather last night to hear the reading of Megillat Estaba…I mean Esther. Thanks so much to Robin Brenneman and Julie Sapper for coordinating and directing our excellent Purim Spiel Defying Tragedy, and to all the cast and crew – adults and kids – who gave us such a joyful Purim celebration.
As Purim continues throughout the day until sunset, it is interesting to note, as I did in my Tikvah Topics article that the name Esther means hidden. God’s name is “hidden” in the book of Esther. It does not appear even once. In fact, the closest we get to even thinking about God is when Esther sent a message to Mordecai asking him to organize the entire Jewish community to pray and fast for three days on her behalf. The idea that God is hidden might make this sacred text a perfect book for us to understand contemporary Jewish life. Now, 80 years after the liberation of Auschwitz and the end of the Holocaust, the big question we have thought about is where is God in such awful times? Where was God on October 7th? Where was God in the gas chambers, the crematorium, and on the trains? Where was God on that fateful Shabbat morning of October 27th, 2018, when Robert Bowers walked into the Tree of life Synagogue in Pittsburgh and murdered eleven Jews, wounding six others?
We grow up reading the stories of the Torah and become most familiar with a God who destroys the earth with a flood or calls out to Abraham telling him not to sacrifice his son, or God speaking to Moses from the burning bush and parting the waters of the Sea of Reeds so the Israelites could march to freedom. Such stories teach us that in the Bible God is an active God, one whose mighty hand saved the Israelites from slavery and is an active force in the world. And yet, when we turn to God today to end terror, heal cancer, or lift someone up from poverty, we wonder why God doesn’t respond. This is the central post-Holocaust question. Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, a modern-day Orthodox Rabbi, theologian and Jewish thinker, explains to us that we have entered a new time in history, it is a third era, in which God is completely hidden. God has withdrawn Godself from the world. This does not mean that God is inactive. Quite the contrary, God is quite active, but through us. God speaks to us when we study Torah. As members of the Jewish community, we uphold our end of the covenant which is to say that we partner with God and help bring God’s vision to life. The covenant has two sides, God is on one and we are on the other. God’s voice speaks to us through study and prayer and requires that we bring God’s presence to life in the world.
This is where the story of Esther comes in. Esther and Mordecai could have certainly called out asking God to intervene when Haman wanted to destroy the Jews of Shushan. Instead of waiting for God to act with a mighty hand, Esther and Mordecai realize they have agency; they take their future in their own hands and act. This is what it means to fulfill the covenant to take the lessons of our sacred texts, what we might refer to as God’s voice teaching us and guiding us, fulfilling God’s side of the covenant, and bringing those teachings in the world. Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, perhaps inspired by the book of Esther, teaches us that God has hidden Godself in order that we would act. God’s contraction is meant to empower us. As this Purim day continues, let us remember we have agency; we can act; we can bring light and joy to the people around us who most need it.
Chag Purim Sameach and Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Rick Kellner