Making Our Shuls Great Again

One of very first participants of the MJE Shabbat Beginners Minyan was a young woman by the name of Deborah.  Raised on Long Island, Deborah’s family belonged to a local Reform Temple where they would attend services on the High Holidays.  Deborah shared that her experience at the synagogue, albeit limited, was primarily negative.  After college she moved to Manhattan and a friend convinced her to come to MJE by telling her that it wasn’t really a synagogue.  A bit skeptical, Deborah reluctantly came.  When she entered The Jewish Center building where MJE is based, Deborah asked someone passing by what the place was, and the stranger answered it was a synagogue. “A synagogue!” she exclaimed looking angrily at her friend for deceiving her, she turned around and headed for the door. The friend gently stopped her and said: “just give it a try, you’re here already”.  She brought Deborah to the 10^th Floor for the MJE Minyan and something clicked.  Deborah took a liking to the crowd, the singing and the sincerity of the other young people.  Deborah returned the next week and then the next.  She started attending my Basic Judaism class, came on our Spring Retreat and traveled with us to Israel for the first time.  Over the next two years Deborah became a ba’alat teshuva. She met a young man – an active member of The Jewish Center, and they got married. Today they and their children – who attend Yeshiva Day School, live in Westchester, where they are active in one of the local Modern Orthodox synagogues.

Although Deborah’s initial encounter with synagogue was negative, that changed when she was exposed to a different kind of shul experience. What is the purpose of a synagogue and are our shuls living up to their mission?

In this week’s Parshat Trumah we learn of that mission of the synagogue: Ve’asu li mikdash v’shachanti b’tocham: “Make for me a Sanctuary and I will dwell among them”.  Fast forward to the times of the prophets, after hearing God speak of the exile of the Jewish people, the prophet Yechezkel calls to God: Hashem Elokim, kalah ata oseh eit she’erit yisrael – “Lord, God are you bringing an end to the people of Israel”? To which God responds: ki hirchaktim bagoyim – “although I have distanced you among the nations, vechi hafitzotsim ba’aratzot – “and I have scattered you among the different lands”, Ve’ehi limikdash me’at – “and I will be a miniature sanctuary ba’aratzot are basham– “in the lands where they have come”. Rav Yitzchak in the Talmud on this verse teaches: Elu batei knessiyot ubatei midrashot shebebavel – “these are the synagogues and study halls of Bavel”. (Megillah 29a)

The Mishkan was intended to live on in within our synagogues and halls of study. But what was the purpose of the Mishkan and how was it meant to live on within our synagogues?

The Ramban wrote that the Mishkan was intended to be a makum menuchat hashechinah – a place where God’s presence would rest.  The secret of the Tabernacle, says the Ramban, is that the Shechinah, God’s presence, which was openly revealed at Sinai when the Torah was given, would continue to be revealed in the Mishkan, in a more concealed fashion.  Mt. Sinai was the first time the Jewish people heard God’s word, but it wasn’t the last. When Moshe would enter the Mishkan, he would hear God’s voice spoken to him from between the two keruvim – the two angelic forms sitting upon the Ark of the Covenant.  Through the Mishkan the people could continue to hear God’s instruction.  It served as a continuation of the Sinai experience – a mobile Sinai unit offering a perpetual revelation to Moshe and the Jewish people throughout their sojourn in the wilderness.

But something else took place at the Revelation.  Har Sinai was not just a powerful bein adam l’makom experience, but also an important bein adam l’chavero moment. Leading up to the revelation, the Torah tell us Vayachanu bamidbar – “and the Jews encamped in the wilderness, vayichan sham yisrael neged hahar – “and he encamped there, next to the mountain”.

Why, ask the commentaries, does the Torah say: vayichan sham – “and he encamped” – it should say vachanu  – “and they encamped”? Why the singular and not the plural?

Rashi famously answers: k’ish echad b’lev echad – “one person, one heart”- the Jewish people when receiving the Torah at Sinai were so unified, they were like one person with one heart – totally unified, unlike so many times before and after. That harmony represents the other aspect of the Sinai experience, the achdus of one Jew to the next.  If the Mishkan was to be a mini-Sinai experience, then its purpose was to not only bring the people to God, but also one Jew to the next.

Applying this model of the Mishkan to our time when we are without a Mishkan, when the Temple is no longer and when as Rav Yitzchak in the Gemara tells us: elu batei knessiyot – these are our synagogues reflecting both aspects of the Sinai experience.  Our synagogues must be both a makom menuchas hashchinah, a place where all Jews can have access to Torah spirituality, and a place of k’ish echad b’lev aechad – where people can experience a sense of unity and oneness. We may grow cynical of the big “scenes” that form at the Kiddush or our other shul events, but it is critical such a place exists for young people of all backgrounds to meet. Not everyone out there is a spiritual seeker, but I’ve never met anyone who didn’t want to belong.

Right now, Deborah is probably sitting with her kids in shul.  If she hadn’t found her spiritual place at MJE nearly 20 years ago, she and her family may not be where they are thankfully today. Our shuls can make a huge difference in inspiring today’s generation. Let us work together – ish echad b’lev echad – to make our synagogues the passionate and vibrant places our communities truly need.