Purim

A Purim Teaching from Cooperberg-Rittmaster Rabbinical Intern Alana Krivo-Kaufman

Dear CBST Community,

I revel in the possibilities of Purim. The costumes! The absurdity! The transformation! The invitation to appear as the most unexpected and even possibly unrecognizable version of myself. 

There’s something thrilling about the expectation to turn everything upside down and inside out. The anticipation of retelling a familiar story: an act of resistance, a feckless ruler, ruthless advisors, unexpected heroes, a foiled plot, our people saved and the steep revenge. Every year, part of me doubts that I will learn anything new or be able to turn the current world upside down and right side up and see it anew. But every year, something happens. In turning upside down and rightside up, some small space of possibility opens up within me. 

We learn in the Talmud, Megillah 7a, that it was never a given that the Purim story, our yearly portal to possibility, would reach us. We learn that Esther’s bravery did not stop with her strategic and righteous plea to the King – but that Esther herself had to ensure that her story was told to the generations to come. She channeled her grit and perseverance and new-found hero status into ensuring that not just her story, but the story of her people was told. 

Rav Shmuel Bar Yehudah said: “Esther sent a message to the Sages: ‘Place me in Jewish memory for all generations!’” 

But the sages replied “Your story would incite them against us.” However Esther replied: “[It’s too late for that.] My story is already recorded in the chronicles of Medean and Persian kings.”

Perhaps, this year, along with Esther’s call to the Sages: “Place me in Jewish memory for all generations” we can hear other calls, from within ourselves, from within our queer, Jewish and interconnected communities. We can hear the calls of so many Esthers, and Vashtis, and Mordechais. We can hear the call of those who have been, or live in fear, of being cast out: Place me in Jewish memory for all generations. We can hear the call of those who use their relationships and opportunities to interfere with lots cast to degrade human dignity to instead care for those they love and their communities. Place me in Jewish memory for all generations.

There is one line from the Book of Esther that has been so deeply woven into Jewish memory that we sing or recite it every week at Havdalah as Shabbat begins to slip away. La’yehudim ha’yetah orah ve’simcha ve’sasson viykar – The Jews had light, happiness, joy and honor.” (Esther 8:16). And we respond to these words from Esther, adding, Kein tihyeh lanu – May it be the same for us”. 

Why is the light, happiness, joy and honor what our Sages chose to take away from the Megillah and insert into our Havdalah? Why are these some of the last words we say before Shabbat ends and we are plunged back into the week? Perhaps we are taught to remember the resilience, the aliveness, the dignity of our ancestors in the forefront – not just what they went through.

Just as every year the Purim story serves as a foil for the absurdities of our world, so too every Shabbat we play out the gap between the world as it should be and the world as it is. And as we leap across that divide, we hear Esther’s call: Place me in the Jewish memory for all generations. And we answer that call in remembering that just as there was light, happiness, joy and honor for the Jews of Shushan, for this cast of characters living through total absurdity, so too is there light, happiness, joy and honor for us when we answer the call to remember, to revel and to turn everything upside-down and inside-out.

Kein tihyeh lanu – May it be the same for us. May we come through the absurd, on Purim, and in our world, surrounded by a resilient glittering and glimmering joy and may we honor our ancestors through our revelry.

Four Mitzvot of Purim

Mishloach Manot – Send a care package in the mail or (safely) give a gift basket. It is customary to give foods with two distinct blessings (e.g. fruit from a tree and food from the earth). It can be small—cookies and an orange, for example.

Matanot l’Evyonim – Gifts to the needy – this special kind of tzedakah occurs on Purim.  

Mikra Megillah – Hearing the Megillah, traditionally twice. We listen to Megillat Esther—the Purim story—read in its entirety. Join CBST services in-person or online. Details at the top of this message. 

Seudah – Eat a festive Purim Meal!