Now You See Him, Now You Don’t

When a relative is buried, we cannot see, hear, feel, or even touch them any longer. We are forced to build a relationship with them now by relating to who they were beforehand by telling and listening to stories about them.

It’s no different with HaShem. As a nation, we met HaShem 3,336 years ago. Now that we are not experiencing Him experientially, we must relate to him by relating to what He did beforehand, by telling and listening to the history about Him.

In fact, the mourning process can assist us to metaphorically understand what we need to do to draw closer to HaShem.

This week’s Torah portion speaks about how after the sin of Adam and Eve they were distanced by HaShem. Now they only heard His sound, and not Him Himself, and now their job and ours is to close that gap by talking about Him and doing mitzvoth to get closer to Him.

"HaShem G-d commanded the man, saying…" Genesis 1:15 "They heard the sound of Hashem G-d…" Genesis 3:8, from this week's Torah portion, Bereishit, Genesis 1:1-6:8

* Based on Rabbi Yosef Soloveitchik, Out of The Whirlwind