Shabbat Balak 2024
“I came across a poem by Fortessa Latifi that stopped me in my tracks just this past week, and it reads thus: ‘All my grief says the same thing. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. And the world laughs, holds me, holds my hope by the throat, says, “But this is how it is.”‘
This isn’t how it’s supposed to be: that’s the essence of grief. I would imagine that for many this sense of communal, world-based grief has been even more activated recently.”
Rabbi Yael Werber shared this at the beginning of her drashah this Shabbat. She went on to explore the upcoming minor fast day of Shiva Asar B’Tamuz, which marks the beginning of what’s known as the three weeks until Tisha B’Av. During these weeks many practice mourning and grief in more intense ways, marking the hardships that historically have occurred during this period of time, from Moses breaking the first tablets of the ten commandments to the destruction of the temple, among others.
This time of grief and sadness speaks in many ways to our moment, which Rabbi Werber addressed, and to the larger work of accepting the hardships, the way things are, and dreaming up how it’s supposed to be for the future.