וְאַתֶּם֙ הַדְּבֵקִ֔ים בַּה’ אֱלֹקיכֶ֑ם חַיִּ֥ים כֻּלְּכֶ֖ם הַיּֽוֹם׃
While you who hold fast to Hashem your God are all alive today (Deuteronomy 4:4).
The two phrases in this verse are causally linked: What happens when you are davek bashem, when you attach yourself steadfastly to God? Chayim kulchem hayom. You become, today, in this very moment, fully alive
Attached, As If With Strings
The midrash (Bamidbar Rabbah 17:6) associates this verse with the wearing of tzitzit, the special fringes or strings worn on the corners of a garment to remind one of God. Tzitzit “render visible our invisible ties to God” (phrase coined by Ellie Schainker). To be davek, to be attached, to God is to feel that we are tied and tethered to God, as if with strings, and to know that it is through this connection that we receive our life force, become chayim, like an electrical cord plugged into an energy source.
Our Breath A Cord of Connection
Our breath is such a thread or cord that attaches us to the divine life source, creating a current of energy that enlivens us. We can first notice it passively, how the air enters on its own, life being breathed into us, a divine current of energy. And then we can add in an element of our own dveykut, our own attachment to God, further strengthening the sense of connection through our own desire for it. It is not just God reaching out to you, but you also reaching out to God, the current going both ways, like lovers meeting in an embrace, sparks of energy flying, the life force in us made stronger from the intensity of our joint longing and connectivity.
Becoming a Channel for Aliveness
Chayim kulkhem hayom. Through this attachment, you become fully alive, you become a channel for the divine life force to run through you, the breath spreading this life energy to every corner of your body. What becomes alive is kulkhem, “all of you,” your whole entire body, every single cell pulsing and vibrating with life energy. And it happens now, in this moment. Hayom, “today,” right now, is the only time that we can ever access this chayut, this aliveness, by dropping into mindful presence of our connection in this present moment.
Holding On During Difficult Times
The thing is, though, we have a hard time maintaining this sense of connection, a hard time maintaining it in daily life, and an even harder time maintaining it through the rough patches of our lives. Which is a shame because it is precisely in those difficult moments that it is most helpful to keep tethered to our source.
In relation to this verse, a mashal, a parable, is told about a person drowning in the sea. The captain of the ship leans over and throws the drowning person a lifeline and says to the person: tefos hevel zeh beyadekha ve’al tenikhehu, grab hold of this rope and whatever you do, don’t let go of it. Because as long as you hold on to it, you have life.
We do feel like we are drowning sometimes, like we are overwhelmed and it is hard to stay afloat in the ocean of life’s troubles and obligations. Or maybe it feels sometimes like falling into a pit. The verse right before this one talks about people who succumbed to an idolatry called Ba’al Peor, and pe’or means gap or hole or pit. The Torah is offering us the antidote to falling into such pits in our verse, the verse that follows – ve’atem – “but you,” but you who stay tethered to God, you are still alive. We are all prone to falling into pits or drowning in our troubles. What helps is, like the captain of the ship said, to hold on to the lifeline and not let go.
When we are drowning or falling into a pit, we can pause in the moment of collapse to notice the lifeline that is right here, see the buoy lying in the water, and choose to grasp it and hold on to it. Etz hayim hi lamahazkim bah – it is a tree of life, yes, but you must be mahazik bah, you most hold on to it hazak, strongly, steadfastly, with all your might, bekhol me’odekha. We can summon inside the great desire for this life force, for this connection to our source, and then reach out and hold on – not tightly, with tension – but confidently, strongly, with solidity and assurance, with conviction, courage and steadfastness, declaring to ourselves – to this I bind myself, to the great divine life force of the universe, Elokim chayim, to this I bind myself.
Feeling Buoyed
Maybe we can’t always do it with such great conviction. Maybe it is enough sometimes to just reach out and hold on to the life preserve and allow yourself to feel buoyed, to feel tethered, to feel the relief of someone who cares enough to hold on from the other side. Lo yarpekha. God will not let go of you (Deuteronomy 4:31). You are not alone. You are connected and tethered. Feel the pull of the lifeline on the other side. You will not drown. There is something to hold you afloat. There is a force in the universe that can see you through this difficulty. All you have to do is hold on and not let go, just like God is not letting go. Maybe you can feel yourself now floating in the water instead of drowning, secure enough in your connection to relax. Bind yourself to the life force and let yourself be held.
Lifeline Through Jewish History
On Tisha B’Av we remember all the tragedies of Jewish history. Perhaps this lifeline that connects us to the divine is the lifeline that has sustained the Jewish people through thousands of years of almost drowning, of difficult churning waters and great suffering; somehow through it all, we have had this connecting cord.
A Story About Crossing the Pit
A story is told of a Hasidic rebbe in the holocaust, Rabbi Israel Spira. One cold winter night in a concentration camp, a group of Jews was brought to a large open pit and told to jump over it, and that anyone who could not jump over it would be shot. The pit was very large and the Jews emaciated and weak, and so, many were falling in and being shot. Rabbi Spira stood with another man, a friend, who turned to him and said: I think it is better to just go straight into the pit and accept death rather than try the impossible jump. But Rabbi Spira said: No, we will jump. And so the two of them jumped together and miraculously ended up alive on the other side of the pit. The friend said to the rabbi: How did you make it over? Rabbi Spira said – I was holding on to the coattails of my ancestors. And what about you, asked the rabbi? The friend said: And I, I was holding on to your coattails (from Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust). When we hold on, when we bind ourselves in faith, are devekim, then sometimes, somehow, inexplicably, we do cross over the pit, alive, chayim.
Connection to Each Other
Maybe you can sense this possibility in you, the possibility of holding on to faith, to goodness, to God, to each other, as we face whatever pit lies before us – I know it’s not the same kind of pit, thank God, but in its own way, we each have our struggles – so sensing almost bodily how holding on to something larger can lift us, buoy us, carry us, floating, flying, to the other side alive. I’m not saying this is easy or certain. But just allowing the possibility that holding on to something helps. And sometimes, as in the story, it is other people that we hold on to, both from the past and the present, it is other people who help us feel tethered and connected to the divine, to goodness, to love, and it is this connectedness that sustains us through the pits of life. Chayim kulchem hayom, interpreting kulchem now as “all of you” meaning every one of you, all of us together. We feel our aliveness through our connection to one another, too, each a branch of the Etz Hayim, the Tree of Life, all of us connected through the tree to our joint roots in the sacred ground of the divine.
Returning to Yourself
We are jointly connected to the divine and also each connected on our own. Atem hadevekim bashem Elokeikhem. The verse doesn’t just speak of our attachment to God, the universal God, but to Hashem Elokeikhem, to Hashem your God, to the piece of the divine that resides inside each one of us. It is to this piece of yourself, too, that you attach yourself. Through the winds and vicissitudes of life, what we hold on to is not just God, but also the sacred piece of God planted inside us. It is like we are on a wild roller coaster of life, and God is riding along inside us. We don’t let that piece fly off in the wind or stuff it away and reject it, but stay attached and aware of the precious divine life force inside – we embody it, become a channel for it, a hospitable ground for it to take root and grow in us – and as we do that, maybe the roller coaster ride feels a little less scary, we go up and down, but we are secure and steadfast in ourselves, attached inside to the ultimate source, and therefore fully alive in this moment. .
Photo by Evelyn Chong at Pexels
