Dear Brandeis community,

 

I have been thinking this week about the choices we live and make, the roads that diverge in our woods as we walk them. Partly this reflective space has been thrust upon me, as it has upon the world, by the terrible violence in Paris and elsewhere this past week. Partly it has come of reflecting on the actions of our children, seeing them struggle (as kids do) to make kind choices and treat each other well. Partly too it has come of the news that reached me early Tuesday morning that a former student of mine, a bright and creative young man who struggled mightily to choose wisely, was killed crossing a street Sunday evening. I have been aching for his family as I have ached for our kids and our world.

 

In my study with Rabbi Batshir Torchio this week, we spent much of our time discussing the concept of bechira, often translated as “free will.” We talked about the idea of fate, sharing our various senses of the ways in which the individual extends beyond the boundaries of our bodies. Rabbi Torchio suggested that we spend the month ahead reflecting on the “bechira points,” or choice points, in our lives: those moments of inflection that set the course of a day, or a week, or a life.

 

In having that conversation, I was reminded of a moment in John Steinbeck’s incomparable East of Eden, in which the Chinese-American servant Lee offers his exegesis of the Cain and Abel story. When God is speaking to Cain, God says that if Cain does not act well, it will be a sin. Lee offers three different translations of what comes next: God either says that in killing Abel, Cain will have what belongs to him and “thou shalt rule over him,” in the King James version, or “do thou rule over him” in the Standard American version, or “thou mayest rule over him,” in the Hebrew. From that text study comes a very famous line in the book:

 

But the Hebrew word, the word timshel—‘Thou mayest’— that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’—it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’ Don’t you see?

 

We may, and we may not. The British band Mumford and Sons quotes this precise passage, and tunes it beautifully, in their song “Timshel”:

 

 

We cannot move the mountains for each other. But nor are we alone. What has been true in my experience of being a person, and belonging to a community and to a people, is that we cannot understand the boundaries of our bodies as the lines around our choices. We carry our ancestors and our neighbors and our families with us, as surely as we carry our children. As Steinbeck puts it, later in the same passage:

 

I feel that I am a man. And I feel that a man is a very important thing—maybe more important than a star. This is not theology. I have no bent toward gods. But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed— because ‘Thou mayest.’

 

May your bechira points be thoughtful ones, and may your instruments glitter in your choices and those of your children, my friends.

 

Warmly,

 

Dan

 

In memory of Jack Phoenix (2000-2015).