Shabbat Parashat Bo Creativity Is A Plus January 7, 2022 – 6 Shevat 5782

Dear Friends,

A stand out piece of our weekly Torah portion, to my mind, is what Moses says to Pharaoh in Exodus 10:25-26:

And Moses said: “You too shall give sacrifices and burnt offerings into our hands…And also our cattle will go with us; not a hoof will remain, for we will take from it to worship the Lord our God, and we do not know how we will worship the Lord until we arrive there.”

Especially in this most confusing time, when everything seems to change from day to day and sometimes from minute to minute, I find this passage most inspiring.  We cannot rely on rote.  Especially in prayer.  Yes, our prayerbook is our prayerbook, but, if we listen deeply, our souls infuse our prayer with new and relevant meaning each and every time we pick up our prayerbook.  We do not know, until the moment of prayer arrives, how we will experience the meeting of our minds and our souls with the words that are printed on the page of the prayerbook.  Each time we pray, we pray through the lens of our present moment.

It seems that even in prayer, even with a “fixed” prayerbook, creativity is a plus!

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Gilah Dror