by Ruth Abrams
If it were not for Havurat Shalom, I would never have recovered my Torah cantillation. From when I joined in 1996 until when I moved to Jamaica Plain in 2021, I was frequently the sole Torah checker. It brought me up to speed with the cantillation, though I was mainly there to check the Hebrew.
Checking for errors has been a part of my life in many roles. Sometimes mistakes can be fruitful, because they reveal hidden misunderstandings. It all sounds a bit mystical now that I am putting this together. Like the mitzvah that comes through a transgression, the understanding achieved through errors seems like it must necessarily be painful. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it’s funny. But mostly both. You can be more than one thing.
When my b’mitzvah student preparing Parashat Vayera found he couldn’t master every single aliyah in the triennial cycle reading, I decided I could prepare to read one. That way, he could correct me during our lessons. This could do for him what it’s done for me–create a sense of mastery.
Accepting the corrections to help him improve is a sneaky strategy. I want to work on being able to make mistakes without thinking I’m a terrible person. Torah reading is the model for me of being matter of fact about mistakes. Because it’s easy to get things wrong and obligatory to make corrections I take it as my model for every other type of correction.
Except I rarely read Torah anywhere, because of my trembling. I know at least some other Jewish people know how this is. It feels too important, and I go from reading (a thing I do all the time) to experiencing suddenly that shaky feeling of nerves. The act of reading, and especially of rereading stories I know well, gives me a feeling of calm. It’s nourishing and sustaining. Reading from the Torah in public lets me feel what a miracle being able to read actually is.
As I practiced chanting this passage for my student, I got more familiar with the text, including Genesis 21:33. It says something like, “And he planted a tamarisk (in Hebrew, “eshel”) in Be’er Shevah, and called there on the name of YHVH, El Olam.” This is a mysterious verse. It sounds like a sacred tree, which in other books of Tanakh is identified as idolatry. What does it mean to plant an “eshel”?
Also, “el olam” could mean “the forever God” or “the everlasting God,” or “the God of the World,” or even “the God of the Universe.”
The commentaries on this verse are interesting! Rashi quotes a discussion from the tractate Sotah in the Talmud about the meaning of “Eshel.” Some of the rabbis thought “eshel” was an orchard where Abraham could grow fruit for guests. Some thought “eshel” was an inn where Abraham fed guests. (They had to create a justification for the verb plant though!)
Either way, Rashi thinks Abraham caused guests to call on God because they were grateful for delicious food.”Through that tamarisk tree, the name of the Kadosh Baruch Hu was called the God of all the universe. After they ate and drank, Avraham said to them, Bless the One of whom you have eaten. Do you think that you ate my food? What you ate came from the one who spoke and the world was created.”
The actual tamarisk tree is not actually edible, which makes these identifications of the eshel with food confusing. The Torah itself is called a tree of life, and the poles that we use to wind the scrolls are called trees of life.
Torah cantillation, picking up the scroll by the handles of the trees of life, dancing with the scrolls–these are all physical acts. Even turning letters into spoken language is a mysteriously physical process. As we move into the month of Heshvan, after all the holy days,we bring the feelings of awe, trembling, mystery, generosity and hospitality into ordinary weeks of rereading a familiar text.
Checking for errors has been a part of my life in many roles. Sometimes mistakes can be fruitful, because they reveal hidden misunderstandings. It all sounds a bit mystical now that I am putting this together. Like the mitzvah that comes through a transgression, the understanding achieved through errors seems like it must necessarily be painful. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it’s funny. But mostly both. You can be more than one thing.
When my b’mitzvah student preparing Parashat Vayera found he couldn’t master every single aliyah in the triennial cycle reading, I decided I could prepare to read one. That way, he could correct me during our lessons. This could do for him what it’s done for me–create a sense of mastery.
Accepting the corrections to help him improve is a sneaky strategy. I want to work on being able to make mistakes without thinking I’m a terrible person. Torah reading is the model for me of being matter of fact about mistakes. Because it’s easy to get things wrong and obligatory to make corrections I take it as my model for every other type of correction.
Except I rarely read Torah anywhere, because of my trembling. I know at least some other Jewish people know how this is. It feels too important, and I go from reading (a thing I do all the time) to experiencing suddenly that shaky feeling of nerves. The act of reading, and especially of rereading stories I know well, gives me a feeling of calm. It’s nourishing and sustaining. Reading from the Torah in public lets me feel what a miracle being able to read actually is.
As I practiced chanting this passage for my student, I got more familiar with the text, including Genesis 21:33. It says something like, “And he planted a tamarisk (in Hebrew, “eshel”) in Be’er Shevah, and called there on the name of YHVH, El Olam.” This is a mysterious verse. It sounds like a sacred tree, which in other books of Tanakh is identified as idolatry. What does it mean to plant an “eshel”?
Also, “el olam” could mean “the forever God” or “the everlasting God,” or “the God of the World,” or even “the God of the Universe.”
The commentaries on this verse are interesting! Rashi quotes a discussion from the tractate Sotah in the Talmud about the meaning of “Eshel.” Some of the rabbis thought “eshel” was an orchard where Abraham could grow fruit for guests. Some thought “eshel” was an inn where Abraham fed guests. (They had to create a justification for the verb plant though!)
Either way, Rashi thinks Abraham caused guests to call on God because they were grateful for delicious food.”Through that tamarisk tree, the name of the Kadosh Baruch Hu was called the God of all the universe. After they ate and drank, Avraham said to them, Bless the One of whom you have eaten. Do you think that you ate my food? What you ate came from the one who spoke and the world was created.”
The actual tamarisk tree is not actually edible, which makes these identifications of the eshel with food confusing. The Torah itself is called a tree of life, and the poles that we use to wind the scrolls are called trees of life.
Torah cantillation, picking up the scroll by the handles of the trees of life, dancing with the scrolls–these are all physical acts. Even turning letters into spoken language is a mysteriously physical process. As we move into the month of Heshvan, after all the holy days,we bring the feelings of awe, trembling, mystery, generosity and hospitality into ordinary weeks of rereading a familiar text.
Ruth Abrams is a long-time member of Havurat Shalom.
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