GODISNOWHERE; By Student Rabbi Eleanor Steinman

Shanah tovah.
God is nowhere. Our world is filled with uncertainty these days, and so many things in our lives pull at our faith strings. Some proclaim, ‘God is nowhere’ and they know The Secret, which must be true if it’s at the top of the New York Times bestseller list. The secret they say is the law of attraction. “Everything that’s coming into your life you are attracting into your life. And it’s attracted to you by virtue of the images you’re holding in your mind. It’s what you’re thinking.” Doesn’t it sound warm and fuzzy? Each of us responsible for our own destiny, going about our lives trapped in our own self-absorbed universe. But then something inexplicable happens—a hurricane, an illness, an earthquake, a dip in the stock market, a death. What happens when there is no one to blame but ourselves, we have no community, we have no relationship with God?

This secret is another attempt to explain the things that happen in our society by justifying and legitimating them. If you do not follow this law of attraction whatever happens is your fault. You must have done something wrong. It is a wonderful way to explain things have they have happened. Hindsight after all is always 20-20.
So let’s live in this moment. For some of us, God is nowhere. We still show up at services, though we’re not necessarily certain why, and we struggle with the metaphoric image of God as Parent and Ruler. Our explanations for things that happen in the world vary. A stroke of bad luck, riding a lucky streak, we still know that we do not need to believe in a God present in our lives to participate in Jewish community. Sometimes it is just about showing up.
Others here find comfort in a directly present God. The image of a man or woman sitting before a Book of Life inscribing our names is deeply personal and deeply meaningful throughout these awesome days. When we pray to the God of our ancestors, the faces of our children and grandchildren, our parents and grandparents all the way back to Abraham and Sarah are present. We add our voice to the cacophony of our tradition that declares faith in One God.
In a few minutes we will read from the Torah about Hagar and Ishmael’s banishment. Our dear matriarch Sarah does not want Ishmael around to interfere with Isaac’s inheritance. So Abraham, every the obedient partner, sends Hagar and Ishmael with bread and a skin of water into the wilderness. Hagar runs out of water and leaves Ishmael under some brush. God hears Ishmael’s parched cry, v’yiftach Elohim et eyneha v’tereh mayim—God opened Hagar’s eyes and she saw a well of water. The well of water was always before her, Hagar just couldn’t see it. In a moment when she felt forgotten to the universe she and her son had a basic need. Hagar’s perspective changed. In a moment, the world once full of futility and suffering wasn’t so bleak and barren. God who was nowhere revealed Godself to Hagar and she and Ishmael had water.
Perspective is the way objects appear to our eyes. A glass can be half empty or half full. I’m suggesting that this either/or doesn’t have to be. We need to model Hagar who looked at the world with different eyes, with spectacles of faith. Hagar saw that the skin was running low but her faith enabled her to see resources in the world capable of refilling her skin, quenching her thirst.
Today we must change our perspective. [Unroll poster]. This world jumble says ‘God is nowhere.” When we go about our world and see things as they are this is our framework. This birth of a baby is a regular, everyday scientific phenomenon; the sunset is simply the earth rotating on her axis. Today is the same as any other day.
It doesn’t have to be this way. I am going to tell you a secret. This sign says something else, ‘God is now here!’ God is now here--in your heart, in the faces of the people near you. God is now here! With glasses focusing us on the potential for Divine around us we look at everything with radical amazement. The birth of a baby is something miraculous, worthy of celebration, filled with potential. Parts of the natural world take our breath away. When we see a rainbow, we recite the blessing—Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha’olam zocheir ha’brit v’neeman bivreto v’kayam b’ma’amaro. Today is no ordinary day, it is Rosh Hashanah, the birthday of the world. A time for celebration, for apples and honey.
Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik was a 20th century philosopher responsible for what is known as modern Orthodoxy today. In his essay, “The Lonely Man of Faith” Soloveitchik attempts to grapple with his isolation as a person that believes in God. Unsure of the cause of his loneliness, he suspects it might be living as a man of faith and a Western man. In order to understand his own situation Soloveitchik defines two types of human being, Adam 1 and Adam 2.
Adam 1 is given the task to subdue nature and transform the world into a domain for his power. Adam 1 is fascinated by the question, “How does the cosmos function?” His quest is, “to harness and dominate the elemental natural forces and put them at his disposal.” His motto, success. He engages in creative work, in imitation Dei, imitating his Maker.
Adam 2 does not subdue the world, he tills and preserves it. He asks questions of the cosmos such as, “Why did the world in its totality come into being?” “Who is God who trails me steadily, uninvited and unwanted, like an everlasting shadow, and vanishes into the recesses of transcendence the very instant I turn around to confront this numinous, awesome, and mysterious One?” Adam 2 doesn’t encounter the world conceptually and mathematically: he stumbles across the universe in all its splendor and grandeur. He never loses his sense of naiveté, awe and admiration. Adam 2 is searching for a covenantal community, one where he can join with other souls where not only hands are joined but experiences, hearts.
Each of us walks the precipice between Adam 1 and Adam 2, between total isolation and membership in a covenantal community. Between the ordered universe and utter chaos. We each define faith for ourselves. No two definitions are the same.
There is a story—a woman received a telegram that a relative died and left her something valuable. She was instructed to go see the local rabbi for further details. She set up her appointment, anxious to know just how much ‘value’ she was to receive. She sat in front of the rabbi and was told her relative was Moses and her valuable property was the Jewish tradition. We too inherit this same multi-vocal tradition and must build our faith in God from it not in lieu of it.
It is for this reason that we fill our liturgy with images and metaphors for God. Today in the liturgy we said God’s 13 attributes, “O Eternal! O Eternal! A God compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in kindness and faithfulness, extending kindness to the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin…” We atone to Avinu Malkeinu, our Parent our Ruler, beseech the Sovereign who sits upon the high and lofty throne, exalt the God who hears Hannah’s prayer, and find comfort in the Source of Life. God is now here.
Call God the Source, your Higher Power. See God in the face of the people around you. Hear God in the laughter of a child. The heavenly voices of our cantor and choir, the touch of someone you love. The still small voice deep inside, God is now here!
In this New Year may we notice God’s presence in our lives. May our actions and prayers these awesome days strengthen the Godidea of ourselves and our neighbors, and may we train our eyes to see the Godliness in every moment. L’shanah tovah tikateivu—may this New Year be one filled with sweetness, goodness, and may we all be inscribed in the Book of Life.
Ken y’hi ratzon—May this be God’s