I God, in My grace, have summoned you,

And I have grasped you by the hand.

I created you, and appointed you

A covenant people, a light of the nations —

Opening eyes deprived of light,

Rescuing prisoners from confinement,

From the dungeons those who sit in darkness.

Sometimes an idea is so outrageous, so counter-intuitive, and yet so substantive and undeniable that it needs to be written down or spoken aloud in order for it to gain the appearance of reality even when it is has already achieved it. Because without a corresponding articulation, reality is just…reality, the thing itself. And what could be more boring to most people today than objective reality? After all, most people today prefer whenever possible to interact with “real life” through the tiny, digital screen in the palm of their hands. It’s hard to edit objective reality. It’s hard to pair objective reality with the right clip from the right song, overlaid with the right slogan or graphic or sound bite. Objective reality is unwieldy, complex, rarely cute or meme-worthy; it is morally and ethically ambiguous, and thus fraught. In other words, real life seldom conforms to our expectations of it. We may be co-creators of the world in which we live, but we are not reality’s Executive Producer, in charge of every last detail, nor should we aspire to be its target audience, docile, expectant, and easily entertained.

All of which is to say that reality, or creation as we traditionally understand it, is constantly being created, uncreated, and recreated all around us at all times. And one of our most significant obligations as Jews—of any, all, or no denomination—is to participate in its eternal, ongoing process and to articulate its ever-fluid meaning. This articulation of creation is called theology. It is not a word many people use anymore, and it’s a discipline that long-ago fell into disuse, even, I’m sad to say, in many of our rabbinical schools and theological seminaries. But when we, Emancipated Jews, abandoned theology we also unwittingly abandoned ourselves—first to philosophy, then to Natural Science, then to Modern Science, and the Modern or Postmodern or Post-post- or Hyper- or Mega-modern worldview in which we now live, and remain, to a certain extent, ensnared.

This is an oversimplified narrative, of course, but our tradition frequently reminds us of the necessity of teaching to the level of our ability to know. The Torah is, after all, the word of God composed in a manner we human beings may comprehend.  What form our comprehension of God’s word takes—whether it be literal, rabbinic, or some manifestation of modern Biblical criticism—is another matter entirely.  Some interpretations are, needless to say, better than others. But the point is, when we decoupled theology from our self-understanding as a chosen people, we greatly diminished our ability to see the world with any clarity; we depressed our potential for reflecting God’s will into the world, for ourselves, and for the nations; and we undermined the value of our greatest cultural riches, thereby making it all the more difficult to regain our proper perspective with regards to creation and our place in it.

And yet, despite everything, the light still shines. Agnon asked: “Has light a voice?  Can it speak or sing?” The answer has to be, must be, yes. Light does have a voice, light speaks, light sings. The voice is light and the light is voice. There is no darkness dark enough to blot out God’s first words, “Let there be light” (Gen. 1:3).  Before the Song of Songs, this simple command was the song of songs of songs of songs, and it is a song still everywhere singing today. And it just so happens that Israel—the nation, the people, the promise—is, right now, singing. Despite all of its many acute internal political struggles; despite the threat of continued war on multiple fronts, from peoples who publicly declare their desire to “destroy Israel,” to “wipe Israel off the map”, to kill Jews wherever and whenever possible; and despite the majority global opinion against Israel, a global opinion that denies not only Israel’s right to defend itself, and not only Israel’s legitimacy as a nation, but it’s very right to exist, Israel is, right now, the very or goyim, light of the nations, as described by the prophet Isaiah. Only the nations— the US, Canada, Australia, Britain, France, etc.—don’t realize it. The nations look at Israel, they see the light, but they think the light is darkness. They can only see reality through the tiny screens in the palm of their hands. This is the upside-down, backwards world we live in at the moment. Which is why it is important to write the words down, to speak them aloud: Israel is the light of the world. And we honor our ancestors, our tradition, and ourselves when we recognize the gravity of the moment, this moment, the opportunity before us, and the obligations and responsibilities that come with it.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)