Completion
Shmuel Herzfeld
Thanksgiving 2004
One of the most overused words in a book title is the word, “Complete.” Everywhere you look in a bookstore, you will see “Complete.” There is the “Complete Idiot’s Guide to being a Model,” there is the “Guide to being a Complete Obsessive,” Complete English Teacher,” “Complete Artist,” and “Complete Judaism.” There is even, “The Complete Nurf Warrior.”
However, I did not find a book called, “Being a Complete Person.” So, the list is a little incomplete.
Of course, we already have a book that teaches us how to be a complete person. It is called the Torah. This week’s Torah portion teaches us the secret to becoming a complete person.
In this week’s Torah portion, we are told, “Va-yavo yaakov shalem ir shechem, Jacob came shalem to the city of Shechem.” This means, he came complete. So, how did he do that? What was his secret?
The irony is that Jacob is called “complete” even though the entire story of Jacob leading up to this point is about Jacob’s total lack of completeness.
We are told that Jacob was scared that his family would be destroyed so, “va-yachatz et ha-am le-shnei machanot, he divided his people into two separate camps.” Then, Jacob divides his camp even further by sending a series of groups bearing gifts to Esav and, thus, giving away a lot of his money.
Then Jacob divides even from his family. His entire family crossed the river, while Jacob stayed behind in the camp for a solitary struggle: “Va—yivatter yaakov levado, va-yeavek ish immo, Jacob remained alone, and a man struggled with him.”
If we go back even earlier in the Jacob story (to last week’s portion), we see even more binary divisions. (As Robert Alter points out), the Jacob story has twin brothers struggling for a single blessing, two sisters fighting for a husband’s love, and two flocks divided into unicolored and parti-colored animals.
To top it all off, Jacob himself is hardly physically complete, in fact he is wounded. Va-takkah kaf yerekh yaakov,” the mysterious man/angel who struggled with Jacob struck his thigh. Indeed, the wound was so severe that to this day we consider that part of an animal—the gid ah-nasheh--the sciatic nerve-- to be non-kosher.
Only after Jacob goes through this long series of divisions is he called shalem--complete. Only after he offers his money to Esav is he called shalem. Only after he divides his family into two is he called shalem. Only after he separates from his family is he called shalem. Only after he is physically wounded is he called shalem. Why?
One approach of the rabbis is to say that he is called shalem because he has recovered all of his money and his wound has healed. As the Midrash says, Shalem begufo—his body had healed, shalem be-mamono—he had recovered his money.
But that is not the obvious way to read the text. The obvious reading is that Jacob is called complete precisely because he is so broken! Only the broken person can be called complete.
Only one who has experienced what it means to be broken can truly appreciate what it means to be shalem.
Only when Jacob truly felt brokenness in his life was he ready to be a Patriarch for the children of Israel. Only with his brokenness could he spread the light of God.
As a Synagogue, if we want to spread the light of God in this world, we have to strive to feel the brokenness that surrounds our world. Usually we are immune to it. Usually we dismiss it. Our challenge is to struggle with it internally to such a great degree that it actually wounds us…just like it wounded Jacob’s thigh.
We have to see the brokenness of people like Mary Lou who joined our congregation for Thanksgiving Dinner. Mary Lou told the local paper of her loneliness. She told how she showed up at a local community sponsored Thanksgiving Dinner which she had been going to for years only to discover that it had been cancelled. She told of how she craved a real invitation for dinner—not a charitable invitation, but an invitation of meaning.
Let’s really internalize the brokenness of someone like Jeffrey, who was also here for Thanksgiving Dinner. Jeffrey spoke in front of everyone at our service about what it means to walk around with a severe physical challenge. Or, as another person at the Dinner—one with MS—told me, “When I called my Synagogue and asked for help with my shopping, I was told to go get a maid.” Or, the brokenness of a person who called the Synagogue during the week because she heard about our program. She couldn’t make it. She was too far away. But she wept onto our answering machine as she told the machine of her lonely Thanksgiving. That’s brokenness.
We can only be complete as individuals and as a Synagogue once we begin to see with sensitivity all the brokenness that surrounds us.
The word we have been discussing is shalem. This word actually refers to Jerusalem—the city of shalem.
Jerusalem is our holy capital because it symbolizes the city of inclusivity—a city sensitive to everyone’s brokenness. Before King David was able to enter the city of Jerusalem he is told by the residents, “you cannot enter until you remove all the blind and the lame from the city, ki im he-sirkhah ha-ivrim va-hapischim.”
Maybe what this means is that David’s Jerusalem will not be shalem, will not be holy, until David and his people remove the brokenness from the city. Until the blind and the lame are embraced and loved, the city will not be sacred.
This is the real reason why we don’t eat the gid ha-nasheh. It is to remind us that we can’t be complete unless we see the brokenness around us! We can’t rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem until we help the blind see and the lame walk. We can’t spread the message of Jacob, unless we too, feel the wound of the gid ha-nasheh.
Let’s make this the message of our Synagogue. Let’s strive to become “The Complete Synagogue.” We won’t become complete by being the Synagogue with the most members or the richest members or the most famous members. There is only one way to be complete…by seeing the incompleteness. We become complete only by seeing the incomplete.