“Elijah's Cup”
A Passover Sermon by Reverend Charles Blustein Ortman
April 20, 2008
READINGS ANCIENT AND MODERN:
Modern and Drawn from Ancient Sources. (Adapted to be read aloud by two readers: Introduction: Our reading this morning is an adaptation of the Passover story told in the novel, The Fifth Sacred Thing, by the popular neo-pagan theologian, Starhawk ( born Miriam Simos). The novel is placed in a futuristic setting in which an evil empire ruled by Millenialists has rendered the earth nearly to extinction. A band of earth loving, pagan adventurers, including Maya, Aviva, Sam, Bird and others, are on a quest to make sure that this cannot happen. As the scene opens, they have gathered together on the first night of Passover, for something a traditional Seder dinner. As the meal comes to an end…
READER I: Finally they settled back for the closing. A full cup of wine, traditionally reserved for the prophet Elijah, stood in the center of the table. Sam, said, “Let's open the door for Elijah and sing his song."
READER II: Maya had remained relatively quiet throughout the evening, but at this she had to speak up. "Oh, no! You're not really going to invoke that old religious fanatic, are you? I protest!"
READER I: "Why? What's wrong with Elijah?"
READER II: "He slaughtered the priests of Baal, the consorts of the Goddess, for no other reason than that they held to the traditions of their own land. He's the Junipero Serra of the Bible, your typical racist imperialist bigot. Why the hell should we feed him? Better we should invoke the spirit of Jezebel!"
READER I: "I just want to sing the song. I'm not proposing we raise his ghost."
READER II: "You're talking about singing an invocation, opening a door to a spirit and feeding him. I'm sorry; to me that's an act of magic.
READER I: "Do you know what the song means?"
READER II: "It means Elijah the Prophet, Elijah the Tishbite, Elijah the Giladite. Place names. It's talking about where he's from,"
READER I: "But what about the second verse? I'll translate it for you; it says, 'Swiftly, in our days, will come our Lord, the Messiah, son of David.'"
READER II: "Yeah, what about that, Sam? You, the secularist, calling for the Messiah to deliver us?"
READER I: "I just like the song. Is that a crime? It brings back happy memories of my childhood. The whole family sitting around the Seder table, fighting like we are now. Can I suggest a compromise? We'll sing the song, but with the door closed. Then we'll open the door and call in the spirits of all those who have been murdered throughout history because of religious intolerance, and we'll feed them."
READER II: "There isn't food enough in all the granaries of the world to feed all those ghosts!"
READER I: "Symbolically, we'll feed them. And ask them to help us withstand the coming times."
READER II: "I can live with that."
READER I: "I just want to sing the song. I don't care if we invoke Elijah, Jezebel, Santa Claus, or the Easter Bunny. Once a year, I like to hear this, song." Then, with the door closed, they sang. Eliyahu HaNavi; Eliyahu HaTishbi Eliyahu, Eliyahu, Eliyahu HaGiladi. . . .
READER II: The minor strains filled the room, seeped out over the threshold into the night. Then Aviva opened the door, and the spirits of the dead rushed in. Maya thought she could see them, still faintly aglow with the light of the full moon, and hungry. For a moment the air was thick with their presence; then as the door swung shut they slipped out, back into the moonlit night where the tattered rags of old roads glinted like threads of a web. Far to the south, armies gathered. In the hills and dry canyons, the moon made mirrors out of shallow traces of water.
READER I: That night Maya dreamed of the prophet Elijah. He came and sat at the foot of her bed. Much to her surprise, she realized he was a redheaded man.
READER II: "What do you want, you old bigot? I know you and I know your story. You're nothing but a murderer with an inflated reputation."
READER I: "I want you."
READER II: "Forget it."
READER I: "I want to help you."
READER II: "And what help have you ever been? Did you help the four hundred priests of Baal that you slaughtered in Jezebel's time? Did you help the hundreds of generations who starved and sweated and suffered and, instead of raising a hand to better their own lot, waited on you to herald the Messiah? And what about women? Have you ever raised a finger of your hallowed and prophetic hand to help a single Jewish woman escape from an unhappy marriage, or learn to read the sacred books, or express her own thoughts and have them heard by the congregation? For hundreds of generations, Jewish women have invited you in each year to eat the sacred foods prepared by their own hands, the egg and the greens, the salt water of tears and the sweet charoset, the unleavened matzoh – bread of affliction, we call it – yet when have you ever lightened so much as a crumb of our affliction? And I'll tell you something else – those foods are the real carriers of the tradition, the sacred mysteries. Not what comes out of your men's mouths, the words and the stories and the endless arguments and explanations, but what we women provide to put into your mouth, the taste of pain, the taste of spring, the taste of hope and new beginnings."
READER I: Maya was sitting up in bed now. The room was filled with a faint light that seemed to emanate from the prophet's body, and this made her angrier still.
READER II: "What in hell are you doing here in my bedroom, you old fraud? Get out! I'm not opening any doors for you or leaving you any offerings. In my book, you are the enemy."
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READER I: "Are you finished? Can I get a word in?"
READER II: “I say to you what my grandmother would say-feh!"
READER I: "Maya, since that's what you choose to call yourself, let me just ask you this. What happens to the enemy who is invited to share in the feast? Does the enemy not transform?"
READER II: "What are you trying to tell me? That you've gone over to the side of the Goddess?"
READER I: "You'll never know if you don't stop yelling at me."
READER II: "I'm not yelling! But you barge into my bedroom uninvited, refuse to leave, invade my space, as we used to say, so don't be surprised if I get a little testy."
READER I: "I'm only here to do my job."
READER II: "Which is what?"
READER I: "You know what. I'm the herald of the Messiah. I am the forerunner of deliverance, the harbinger of redemption."
READER II: "Did I send out for a Messiah? I'm sorry, I don't remember. Look, Elijah, this one's been done already, and not done well. The last Messiah gave us two thousand years of grief. Crusades, pogroms, missionaries, holy wars. Now the Millenialists! Do we really need another round?"
READER I: "Maya, you're an old woman, but I'm even older than you. Hasn't it occurred to you that redemption might have changed its form in the last few millennia? How could it not? Is not God change?"
READER II: "Jehovah? Doesn't sound like him."
READER I: "Goddess, then. Does the name matter so much, or the form of the mythical divine genitalia? Maya, for year after year, generation after generation, I have been fed each spring by women. I have tasted the spring and the tears and the blood until something in me wanted to rise up and dance, to roll in the mud. I'm a changed man, Maya. Can't you see? The Messiah I herald has become the redemption of the earth.”
READER II: He was gazing at her with eyes that glowed softly, like water mirroring clouds. Oh, this is my problem, Maya thought, I always fall for them, the wounded men. Wouldn't you think that at my age I would have outgrown it? Nevertheless, she could feel his appeal. "How can I trust you?"
READER I: "Touch me."
READER II: She reached a tentative finger forward, and he clasped her hand in his big freckled hand, the red hairs on its back glinting in the lamplight. Something moved through her, like a great unfolding tear wringing itself loose and flooding her, washing her clean, clean, so that all her empty, hurting spaces shone with light. The room filled with light, golden and silver and palest green, like tender new leaves budding off an old shoot, and a fragrance like the flowers in the morning.
READER I: "Listen to me, Maya. Tell your enemies this: 'There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us.' "
READER II: Then he was gone. She sank into a dreamless, silver sleep. In the morning, when Bird brought in her tea, he sniffed the air curiously.
READER I: "Why does your room smell like roses?" he asked.
SERMON:
Elijah said, "Tell your enemies this: There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us."
I'm intrigued by Elijah's message of reconciliation. More than intrigued, I'm beginning to believe that, if there is any hope of peace and justice in this world – that hope exists within the possibilities of such a reconciliation offered so graciously. "Tell your enemies this: There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us."
Who was Elijah anyway? Within the Passover tradition, Elijah becomes an almost comical super-character, much like Santa Claus at Christmas. Elijah steals about in the darkness of the night. Unseen, he goes in and out of so many homes, drinking glass, after glass, after uncountable glass of wine. Santa Claus is known as a jolly old elf. I hope that Elijah, the cranky old prophet, at least gets some cheerful pleasure from all those Dionysian offerings. Better than milk and cookies, I think. Like Santa, he too is bewildering to so many children. How does he do it? How does he perform this magic, all in one night? How can he be the unseen guest at so many tables? How can he drink that much wine and still have any idea where he is going?
Beyond Passover, Elijah was an ancient prophet who may or may not have ever really existed. The stories of Elijah tell us that he was a mighty warrior among the Israelites. He had no misgivings about the hundreds or perhaps even thousands that he had slaughtered, simply because they might be blocking the path upon which one day the Messiah would arrive. He was an old prophet, who harshly pushed the children of Israel to amend their lives and their ways so that one day the Savior would come to them.
He was the patriarchal, master prophet that that the children of Israel needed in those rugged days in the wilderness, in order to feel that they were doing what it was they thought they should be doing, in order to feel secure. The new version of Elijah, the one we just met in Starhawk's story, is one that has had time to mature. He is much more compassionate. He is the kind of prophet much more needed in the age we live in – in order for us to see that we are doing what it is we think we should be doing, in order for us to feel secure. There is no longer any good reason for humankind to feel that security can come from military might. Only destruction can come from that. The Messiah we must herald is the redemption of the earth itself.
Many of us bring at least some of our spirit from childhood into our adulthood. And so, if we allow it, perhaps there is still some magic in Elijah's message for all of us. Mythological characters have a way of becoming a part of the still small voice that we each carry inside ourselves.
Have you ever stopped to think that you aren't the only one to be affected by that still small voice? It may sound different to each of us, but we all hear it. We’re all subject to its prophetic instruction: the haunting voice telling us to attempt the impossible for the sake of that which may yet be possible. In the capacity of the Prophet, this internal voice tells us, "Tell your enemies this: There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us."
The message of Passover is about freedom, freedom from whatever are our greatest monsters, from whatever are the greatest monsters in the world. Passover is about living our lives free from the bondage of fear. It is about living in the hope of peace and justice, for ourselves and for our world. It is about freeing us from the fear of our enemies; changing us; changing them.
Like the internalized voice of the Prophet, fear is also something which comes from inside ourselves. It's not really something that someone else can impose upon us. Someone else can threaten us, but fear is our response to that threat. It’s our response to the threats from the world around us. Others can threaten us and hurt and injure us. We can be unjustly treated. But the fear, the fear is our own doing.
I'm not saying that fear is such a bad thing. We all know that it's a useful defense that does a pretty good job at keeping us alert and alive. Author and Rabbi Harold Kushner wrote, "Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are a good person is like expecting the bull not to charge because you are a vegetarian." We don't have to be undone by our fear of the bull, but we sure better be respectful of him when we're in his arena.
But fear can too easily go further than protecting us. It can become our master and enslave us to the meaninglessness experiences of insulation and isolation. Fear can encourage us to shut out the world and live busy lives that are removed from the very values which would have us recognize that we are only as strong, only as secure, as are the most vulnerable members of our society, and today even of our world. How many times have we seen in the last decade that fear can erode even the highest democratic principles? How many times have we experienced ourselves that fear can lure us personally to act in ways that are contrary to our religious principles, principles that would encourage us to recognize that we are all a part of the larger whole?
The message of Passover, brought to us by the crusty old prophet, is to live our lives free of fear. That doesn't mean that we can live without it. It does mean that the challenge is to learn to live with our fear and yet free of its bondage. "Tell your enemies this: There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us." We might be afraid, but we do not have to be the immobilized slave of our fears.
Several years ago I had the opportunity to attend a speech given by then State Legislator, Tammy Baldwin of Madison, Wisconsin. Over the years I've had the opportunity to follow her career. She was so incredible that I knew she would do well. She's been a member of the U.S. Congress representing Wisconsin for the past 10 years. About a year ago I had an opportunity to hear her speak again at a dinner here in Maplewood. On that first occasion, this openly lesbian, modern-day prophet delivered one of the best sermons that I've ever had the good fortune to hear. She understood this message of the new Elijah very well.
Tammy talked about the frustrating and futile struggle of trying to penetrate the fortress of the patriarchal hierarchy. The walls are so impenetrable and there is so little room within that fortress for gays and lesbians, like me. There is so little room for the likes of so many minorities, which are typically left out of the power structures by our culture, left outside the walls of power.
She said that after years of striving, she and the movement had finally begun to realize that there just isn't enough room for everyone inside the fortress. It's too small. In effect, there's no place set at the table, for her or others like her. They are too different, too much a threat, for those who are already seated.
And so she told us, "We recognize that what we really wanted was something much greater than the fortress, which we were being denied, anyway. And so we are choosing instead to live outside of the fortress, openly and unconfined by its limitations. We will call our own shots. We will say who we are. We will live our lives honestly, and we won't be constrained by the false sense of righteousness imposed on us by others with more narrow views. We will not be overwhelmed by their fears. We will open the way. And we will invite them to participate with us in a more meaningful exchange within the process of human discourse." There is a place set for them at our table, she was saying. And they're welcome if they will choose to join us.
We can't make the world be a safe place. Any attempt at that is merely an attempt at being in control of our lives. We're not in control. Some may think that God is in control and others of us might hold faith in the laws of nature or in the Spirit of Life. But we are not in control.
Security is not about being in control. As much as it can be accomplished, safety is about connecting and caring. It is about freedom on one hand, and responsibility on the other. We cannot make the world be a safe place, but we can help it to be that way. A step in that direction, Elijah would tell us, is to learn to live with our fears, and not to be controlled by them. A step in that direction, the voice of Elijah would say, is to trust in the power of compassion, through the fear; to trust in the possibility of change, through the fear; to hold onto our dreams, through whatever nightmares might occur.
He is saying that, despite the hardships imposed by others, we are responsible for our own integrity. He is saying that we can be more fully human when we recognize that same humanity in others. However it may be disguised; however it may have been beaten down in them, we are more fully human when we recognize our humanity in others. "There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us."
Who do we need to be mindful about inviting to our table? For whom should we be setting out Elijah’s cup? For some of us, it may be our Islamic brothers and sisters. For some it might be those of other religious traditions; it might be the children in the projects of Newark's inner-city. For some of us, it may be gay and lesbian couples who want no more than the rights granted by the state to any other families in New Jersey. For some, it may be the elderly and for others it may be the youth.
And the list goes on. For some of us, it might be the conservative members of the Republican Party, or even those who support Hillary Clinton, or those who support Barack Obama. For some, it may be our neighbor down the way, or our postal carrier, or a stranger on the street.
There is no such thing as, "God's Chosen People," that excludes anyone on this planet. Fantasies and theologies to the contrary are about isolation and death. Pathways that lead to connection though, are about opening doors; they are about changing ourselves and in the process changing our enemies. They are about attempting the impossible for the sake of that which may yet be possible – before, as the Prophet might say, it is too late to change anything.
There is no longer any good reason for humankind to feel that security can come from military might and the quest to conquer. For sure, only destruction can come from that. We would do well to listen to the voice of this new Elijah. We live in an age where fear abounds and the only real antidote to that fear is faith and trust and hope. The struggle for freedom is really between the heart and heartlessness, between thought and thoughtlessness, between the soul and nothingness.
Elijah said, "Tell your enemies this: There is a place set for you at our table, if you will choose to join us."
So may we be trusting and faithful to the mystery that brought us here and holds us here in being. May we be so daring, as to dream of making such an invitation. And then may we be so bold as to extend it. And may we find our lives to be made more whole for the reaching.
Let us be the forerunners of deliverance, the harbingers of redemption. Let the Messiah we Harold be nothing less than in the redemption of the earth.
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