Numbers Cycle Six Behalotecha

Behalotecha

It's About Time

Time is a major concern this week. Time, the over-use of it, the organization of it, the consolidation of it, the honoring of it, the healing message behind it on one level and the way of life beyond it. This is what we are looking at carefully.

How do we look at time in a way that is healing and not burdensome? Useful? Complete? Day after day we chase time, run it over, follow it, escape it, record it, and practically kill ourselves with it as we race to get to work on time. How do we allow time to enter us gracefully and without endless fear and struggle? How do we age with grace? Heal with grace? Finally get beyond it?  

In this week’s parashah there are two time-related instances that are very worthy of our focus.

The first has to do with the cloud above the mishkan and the fire.  The Torah does not say on this day or on that day and at this time you will raise the mishkan and journey on. It is very specific that the raising of the cloud from the mishkan marks the day when a journey begins. And it is clear that when the cloud once again settles on the mishkan that the Israelites are to place their camp. What this means is that there isn’t any pre-planning. And in a way it makes perfect sense. Plan as we might, organize as we might, prepare as we might months in advance, change happens.  The only set times for us have to do with our holidays.  Otherwise we need to feel out our setting, feel the movement of God, follow instinctively the holy path. It isn’t always easy. Sometimes the cloud lifts and we see the way but we are not at all prepared for the next trip. Sometime the trip is lasting way too long and we’re exhausted. Death almost always comes too soon and life is too often cut off. We might have an expansive moment but can’t place our finger on the exact second.   Our holiest action is never marked on a calendar. It might be day or night, our holy work is to be aware beyond the hands of time and move with God, not a stuck organization of priorities. And how difficult this is, being open, being aware. Yet it’s holy work.  It’s a work of vision and longing, of dedication and direction. 

As we read between the two upside down nuns…..and they mark off a whole different book according to some sages….when we rise up we can scatter God’s enemies…and when we settle God will be with us and away from those who hate him.

This separate book is beyond the boundaries of time. The rising up and the settling is so in the path of God that time, so much a human focus, is not even considered. Thousands of years can be between those two upside nuns or one second. It’s all the same.

The next place where time…or non-time…is so important is in the healing of Miriam. After she comes down with leprosy she must leave the mishkan for seven days until she is healed.  While her illness is certainly horrific the truth is seven days…if we really see it as seven…is not all that long. Cancer patients struggle for decades sometimes.  People are incarcerated for even longer. If it is really seven days, what a blessing! To be ill and to return in that short period of time is actually a beautiful action from God. However, seven is more than just a work week. Seven is the amount of time God needed for creation. Seven also means infinity. Therefore, we might be seeing this amount of time as what Miriam needs to completely recreate herself.  Seven is a real time allotment. Seven is also whatever it takes for creation to happen. Seven is whatever it takes for the earth to be healed (if we look at the jubilee). Therefore even when we make a specific time-plan we need to be open to a transformation of it based on  a duration reflective of the depth of the action itself.

Is this easy? I don’t think so.

 This is all right.  In this day and age of fast appointments, alarm clocks, wake up calls, meetings and responsibilities…it’s hard to survive physically and be in holy time. The best we can do is to support each other and to make some time in the day when time doesn’t really matter. The best we can manage is to love each other beyond the demands of time.  After all, our ability to be flexible to holy time raises us to the greatest love possible..that between man and God...Beyond time, our God- love can be brought to the intimacy of human to human, a great way to age with grace.