Devarim 1:12
Three rhetorical questions
“Where are you?” I asked myself as I emerged from a very deep slumber early this evening. I have done so much traveling these past couple of weeks, that for a few moments after a nap trying to recover from jetlag, I truly had no idea where I was! “Where are you?” Isn’t that the question Hashem asked Adam[1] after man’s first act of disobedience? And did that act not initiate sin and ultimately culminate in the destruction of the Batei Mikdash (Temples)? Was that act not the starting point of the journey on which we still find ourselves, the journey that will lead us to read Eichah (Book of Lamentations) in a few days, on Tish’a Be’Av?
“Eichah” is spelled in Hebrew with the same letters as Hashem’s question of Adam: “Ayeckah?” (Where are you?). And the same word appears in our Parsha, Devarim, always read on the Shabbat preceding Tish’a Be’Av: “Eichah essah levadi” – Moshe pleads: “How can I manage alone your (the Jewish People’s) troublesomeness, your cynicism and your argumentativeness?” The Book of Lamentations opens with exactly that same word as the Prophet Yirmiyahu exclaims in despair “Eichah yashvah vadad?” How does this city exist in utter desolation after being so vastly populated?
All three of these questions, G-d’s question of Adam, and Moshe’s and Yirmiyahu’s questions, are rhetorical. None of them expect an answer. All entail disappointment and are declarations rather than questions. And yet there are some insightful differences.
Pain about the past; worry about the future
Moshe’s declaration of despair is about the future. How can I continue, he asks. How can I manage to deal with your draining demands, your incessant skepticism, your lack of trust? He would have seen great achievement if he turned around and looked back. But as he looks forward, he sees hardship, fatigue and struggle. He is worried. He does not expect an answer. He knows that he is merely articulating the stuff of leadership. There are times when leaders feel disillusioned, disappointed, let down by the very people for whom they have sacrificed so much. There are often times when leaders would resign if they could, but they can’t and they don’t. They are driven by a higher purpose and are accountable to a higher force than the people they lead. Duty is core to their lives and while they sigh in lonely anguish, they persist in the mission they accepted.
Yirmiyahu’s exclamation is not worry about the future; it is pain about the past. Where Moshe asks “what is going to happen?” Yirmiyahu asks “What happened?” Moshe wonders how things will unfold. Yirmiyahu wonders how things have unfolded. Moshe the leader, the king, worries about the effectiveness of his leadership going forward. Yirmiyahu the prophet, worries about the past, about what happened and why and how to repair it and avoid its recurrence. Yirmiyahu is afflicted with pain; Moshe with worry.
Divine experience is neither in the past nor the future; it is in the present
Hashem’s question of Adam is rhetoric too; it is also an exclamation. However, His question is neither about the future nor about the past. It is not about “How did you come to this?” nor is it about “What will become of you?” G-d’s question is focused with laser-beam clarity on the present: “Where ARE you Adam, where ARE you?”
In both, Eichah questions the element of helplessness, of victimization. Moshe, unable to change his situation, feels like a victim of an ungrateful nation. Yirmiyahu feels like a victim of an epic tragedy. But in the “Where are you?” question there is no place for victim; the tone is not accusatory or controlling, it is caring and empathetic. And therein lies its force.
So often we feel pain about issues in the past that we can no longer control or change, things of which we have not yet let go. We feel like victims of other people’s actions and circumstances beyond our control. We poison ourselves with negative energy as we lament things that are not worthy of lamentation. We lament on Tish’a Be’Av for the very reason that in the desert we lamented for no valid reason. A lesson of Tish’a Be’Av is to limit the things we mourn and lament. We are commanded to mourn the loss of the Temple until its reconstruction (BMB”Y), but we are also commanded to heal ourselves from all other losses and to get over them.
Pain and bitterness of past resentment is not the only useless negative energy we generate. Sometimes we do it by worrying about a future that we can also not control. We allow ourselves to slide into victim mode. When we feel worry we should check in with ourselves: Is there something we can do right now to mitigate or eliminate the potential for future downside? If there is, then do it. If there isn’t anything we can do, then let go of fear and stop feeding our insecurities. We become stuck in the “how did I?” of the past and the “how will I?” of the future. Yet the really important question that we should be asking 24/7 is not “How will I?” or “How did I?”, but simply “Where am I?”; because that is the question G-d asks of us.
Where am I in relation to my spouse, children and parents? Where am I in relation to my family, friends and community? Where am I in my journey of life? Where am I with regard to my physical, spiritual, and emotional health? Where am I with respect to the objectives I have set for myself, and the commitments I have made to others? Where is my soul? Where am I in relation to Hashem? Is He looking for me as He looked for Adam, or am I clearly visible alongside Him all the time? Am I hiding from him or am I proudly standing before Him? We don’t even have to probe with the “why?” question: just the “where?” question. If we are asking the question, we will move forward into the answer.
I thought I was confused when I awoke so jetlagged this evening, but I wasn’t confused at all. In my semi-conscious, non-analytical frame of mind I asked myself the only question that really counts: Where are you?
Notes:
[1] Breishit 3:9
