This week’s Torah portion has a special resonance with our congregation, because it has within it our Temple’s namesake.
Jacob, on his journey from the mistakes of his youth to maturing into a leader of a family, stopped one night to sleep. He had a dream of a stairway or a ladder reaching into the heavens, with messengers of God climbing and descending it. God, standing beside him, blesses Jacob, that he will inherit this land, and that his offspring will be as numerous as the dust of the earth, protected by God’s blessing wherever they should go.
When he awoke from that powerful dream, he named that site BeitEl, in English BethEl – House of God.
As the early members of our congregation, originally the “Boca Raton Hebrew Congregation,” sought a name infused with Jewish tradition, they turned to this story for inspiration. The words themselves, House of God, are a certainly fitting name for a spiritual congregation, but the story of Jacob’s journey to that place and his inspiration for naming it add so much to our congregation’s purpose and culture.
The Baal Shem Tov (Besht), the founder of Chasidism, taught a beautiful story about Jacob’s site BeitEl. He pointed out something peculiar in the story. When Jacob awoke from his dream, he exclaimed “Surely God is present in this place, and I did not know it!” What is peculiar about that? “Who was he talking to?!” The Besht wondered. Why would he raise the idea that God was there, inviting someone to wonder whether or not it was true. If Jacob’s point was to recognize God’s presence, why not just say, “This is surely God’s house!”?
The rabbis tell a few stories about Jacob that lead the Besht to the answer. The first is that earlier in his journey he has spent years studying Torah at the Study Hall of Shem and Even (Yes, the rabbis imagine that our biblical ancestors spent their time studying a Torah that was not yet complete. They invite us to suspend our disbelief, so let’s!). But in all those years of studying Torah, Jacob had not developed the awe and reverence for God that the rabbis expect Torah to bring. It took that fateful night and that visceral dream for the awe to overcome Jacob. The surprise, then, that he expressed, when he said, “God was in this place and I did not know it!” was not only about that physical place. It was also about the feeling of comfort, safety, and spiritual peace that a home wrapped in Torah and Judaism could bring. He knew he was supposed to have felt that during his years of study; now he finally had.
So, he named that place Beth El, House of God.
What I love about this story, and the Besht’s interpretation, is that it turns things – places, sites, and buildings – static structures and locations – into dynamic opportunities, both temporal and spatial, in our spiritual development. The location where Jacob had his dream, the altar he made to offer a sacrifice to God, and even our welcoming synagogue buildings in east and west Boca Raton, are all very important. But what is more important is the learning, the community- building, the spiritual growth, and the love of one another that has developed in our congregation. Inspired by the stories and teachings in our Torah, especially this one of Jacob’s own journey of development, for nearly 60 years our congregation has gathered under the name Beth El, and welcomes people to start or advance their own journeys.
Our children in our Early Learning Center and Religious School start their studies of Torah, all while feeling the warmth of their teachers and classmates, the flickering of the Shabbat candles, the resonance of songs and prayers at T’filah, and the camaraderie of their classmates. We mark transformational moments like b’nai mitzvah, weddings, and funerals with spiritual awareness, feeling the embrace of the community around us. We ponder questions of our humanity and our place in Jewish history, and we challenge ourselves to meet the moment and try to repair the brokenness we see in the world. We do all of this under the umbrella of our congregation, be it in our edifices or in the hearts we carry with us.
From BeitEl, Jacob’s journey led him to a large family, and to become the ancestor of our people. For us, our journeys are still in development, and hopefully made better and deeper because of his inspiration.
As we enter Shabbat, may we be inspired by Jacob’s openness and awareness to wonder where God may be, and may we have some of his ability to feel and know it when it is.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Greg Weisman
