Before we get to the d’var Torah, the sermon, I just want to say, what a fabulous weekend at CKI. From First Friday Family Shabbat with our little ones learning about chesed, acts of loving kindness and making heart cookies, one to eat and one to donate, to Larry Kushner’s Book about the Hands of G-d, to Shira’s haftarah, just WOW! and Nikki’s palm tree cookies, and Nina’s brunch, and Nikki’s Tu B’shevat challah baking with the kids, to my Alef Bet who sang Dayenu by reading it! What a weekend! This is what I live for.
Today is called Shabbat Shira, the Sabbath of Song. We mark it by reading, singing, chanting the Song at the Sea and the haftarah’s Song of Deborah. How perfect that we have Shira chanting haftarah for the first time. We are grateful to her and to Rabbi Gordon for teaching her. To quote Talmud, “Much I have learned from my teachers, even more from my colleagues and the most from my students.”
This is a remarkable moment at CKI, and yet not. Let’s think about this for a moment. I am a woman rabbi. Rabbi Gordon is a woman rabbi. Shira is a woman. We have a woman who is our cantorial soloist. We had women who have been CKI presidents. This doesn’t always happen everywhere in the Jewish community.
Historically, women didn’t count in a minyan, the required group of 10 adults to hold a full service. Congregation Kneseth Israel has counted women since the 50s. Women and men have sat together for generations, since Walter Kohlhagen told his wife he wouldn’t join CKI unless he could sit with her, something they had done for years in West Hartford, CT. So she said come sit with me and he did. My husband calls her the original Rosa Parks. We have had Bat Mitzvah ceremonies here since before Barbara Simon Njus and Sue Sharf Johnson had theirs. Women have had aliyot here since the 50s. Blossom Wohl was the first. I am not the first woman rabbi. Rabbi Debra Eisenman was the first and was written up in the Chicago Trib: https://www.chicagotribune.com/1992/12/04/rabbi-creates-stir-in-congregation/ Then there was Reb Deb Greene.
And yet, this nonsensical notion of Kol Isha, the voice of a woman as an almost evil thing is still contested in parts of the Jewish community and in Israel itself.
I stand here proudly wearing my Woman of the Wall tallit. Women of the Wall has stood at the Western Wall since Chanukah 1988 arguing and demonstrating for equal access to this most holy of sites. Every month they are subjected to men and yes women screaming at them, whistling and even worse. Assaulting them for carrying or possessing a Torah or putting on tefilin. Both of which are not prohibited by Jewish law, yet some people think are.
Why is this so complicated? So fraught?
Historically, our codes, written by men, warn that a woman’s voice may be too alluring. (If you need me to spell that out I will at the Kiddush) Historically, women are exempt (but not prevented or prohibited) from time bound mitzvot.
I remember working at an assisted living facility in Boston. A woman came up to me after services and said that it was a lovely kiddush, but now could a man do it, so it would count. Even here we had someone argue that HE would do a better Kol Nidre rather that our cantorial soloist Stephanie because he was a male and it would count. Kol Nidre is a legal declaration, and back in the day women could not be witnesses. Therefore, a woman couldn’t chant Kol Nidre.
Once when the Men’s Club was hosting a regional event a former member of CKI walked in and praised the breakfast that the women must have made. It wasn’t the Men’s Club breakfast. The men had done that themselves and it was in the library. Then he said something about only counting men for the minyan. I quipped something like, “Here we count men and women. But if you are only counting men, I am sure there will be enough today.” Welcoming but clear.
This is a congregation that embraces diversity in religious observance, so if you come from a more traditional background and only count men in a minyan, yes, I as your rabbi have arranged for that. For funerals. For shivas. For other events. If I work with Rabbi Shem Tov at Chabad, I understand our ground rules. I can speak or tell stories but not sing. And I appreciate his respect.
It doesn’t always happen that way. Especially in Israel. Depending on governmental coalitions, women are not allowed to say Kaddish at a graveside. Women’s voices are not on the radio. And tragically, women intelligence officers were not believed before October 7th.
And yet, here we are at today’s texts. Miriam and Deborah. Two women we revere. Two women of seven granted the designation of prophetess. Sarah, Miriam, Deborah, Hannah, Huldah, Abigail, and Esther.
Today’s text about Miriam begins:
“Then Miriam the prophetess, Aaron’s sister took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dancing. And Miriam chanted for them, “Sing to the Lord, who has triumphed gloriously. Horse and rider were thrown into the sea.”
Such relief at escaping such danger. The gratitude is palpable and physical. They danced. They sang. They played their timbrels. Often, I play a game with children—sometimes even adults at the Passover seder or recently when people were forced to flee the California fires. If you were leaving Egypt in haste—what would you take with you. I get the usual answers—food, water, sunscreen. It is the desert after all. My family, my stuffed animals, my dog, my GameBoy, camera, photos, books. No one has ever said timbrel—or frankly any musical instrument. But somehow these women knew, they took food, lamb and matzah baked in haste, their neighbors’ gold and their timbrels. They knew that out there in that desert there would be opportunities to celebrate, to rejoice, to be grateful. How did they know?
Read Sandy Sasso’s book here:
This singing and dancing, her singing and dancing, is emblematic of her deep gratitude. They are her prophesy. She chooses life over death, gratitude over bitterness, joy of the moment over fear.
However, she is not alone in this. Biblical scholars believe that Miriam’s song maybe a fragment of a larger poem that has been lost. However, we do have its parallel—Moses’s song which has made its way into our daily liturgy—both in its entirety as Az yashir in the morning service and as Michamocha, asking “Who is like You, O Lord”. He and the Israelites are grateful too.
The full text includes two verses that I want to comment on both of which are personal expressions of gratitude to God.
Ozi v’zimrat Yah, vayahi li yeshua
The Lord is my strength and my might. And He was my salvation (or deliverer). Zimrat can either be read as my might which Rashi does or as my song, Either way it is an expression of deep gratitude, and I suspect the double entendre was intentional. Perfect for this morning with members of Shabbat Zimrah, The Sabbath of Song here to support Shira.
Zeh eli
This is my God. Zeh as the demonstrative pronoun is seen as a finger pointing to what is seen, what is real, not just a vision. Usually when we pray in Judaism, the words of our liturgy are written in the plural. Notice that here, in the midst of great communal redemption that this prayer is written in the singular—The Lord is MY strength and MY might, MY salvation, MY God. Why?
In the Michamocha itself, we say, Zeh Eli anu v’amru—This is MY God, THEY answered and said.
Mekhilta teaches us that while Ezekiel and Isaiah had visions of the Divine, “even a slave woman at the shore of the sea, saw directly the power of the Almighty in splitting the sea All recognized in that instant their personal redemption and therefore all of them opened their mouths to sing in unison.
Think about the setting. The Israelites have just crossed the sea. They are finally free. How would you feel? Relieved? Joyous? Tired? Anxious? You might think, “Wow!” Or maybe as our Hebrew School kids said, “That was cool!” “That was amazing!” “That was awesome.” “Do it again!” “How did You do that?” “What just happened here?” “What happened to the Egyptians?” “We are safe now.” “We are free.” “Thank you G-d.” “Hallelujah.” One girl said she would have fainted. They got the awesomeness of this moment. Just like Moses when he first sang Mi Chamocha. And we echoed it. And that is what real prayer is–the prompting our hearts to what is going on around us.
And our text proclaims, “Ze Eli! This is my G-d!” They said. Together as one. An entry point into spirituality. One each of us needs to find for ourselves. Today. Not just historically. So that when we sing, “Ze Eli,” we mean it for ourselves. Each of us individually.
Moses wasn’t the only one who sang. Miriam took a tof, a timbrel, a tambourine, a drum in her hand and led the women in song.
I learned recently that in the Dead Sea Scrolls, in the Qumran text there is an addition to the Biblical text. Preserved in the feminine imperative are half the lines of Miriam’s song. It was thrilling to learn about this and the link between this song and other women’s songs, such as Deborah’s song, which we will also read this morning, Hannah’s prayer, and Judith’s. These pieces of poetry, song are amongst the oldest in scripture.
http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1096&context=classicsfacpub
https://rabbisylviarothschild.com/tag/meaning-of-the-name-miriam/
And for me as a woman rabbi, it makes modern day arguments about why some Jews misquote Jewish texts to make women’s voices in prayer not kosher. Those arguments seem less and less valid. Women have always prayed. Women have always sung. Women will continue to do so.