The Experience of Divine Presence
Here is the scene: After a long period of building the mishkan, and after seven intense days of practicing, the day of the mishkan’s consecration has finally arrived, yom hashemini, the eighth day. All the people are assembled and watching as Aharon goes through the sacrificial rituals. They are waiting for the moment they have been promised, when God’s presence will finally appear in the mishkan and they will know that all is well, that God has forgiven them for the golden calf and consented to dwell in their midst. How they have yearned for this moment!
And yet at first it is slow in coming. Aharon finishes up the sacrifices and blesses the people and nothing happens. Something is not quite right. Then Moshe joins him, they go into the tent of meeting and emerge and bless the people again, and this time, finally – vayera kevod Hashem el kol ha’am (Leviticus 9:23). The glory of God appears to all of the people. Can you feel into this experience – first, the intense anticipation, and then – ahh, here it is, the glory of God fills the mihskan, divine light filling your space, the room you are in and the body you are in, all filled with this glorious golden presence. Let yourself sense that presence inside and outside you, as if you are there in that moment of glory, because in a way you are, in a way you are always there, always in the glow of divine presence.
What happens next is that a fire comes out from before God and consumes the sacrifices on the altar. This is not a human made fire but a divine one that appears miraculously as a sign of God’s presence, favor and love for the people and their offerings. The Torah says – vayar kol ha’am. All the people saw (9:24) They see and perceive and understand that this fire is a manifestation of God and of God’s acceptance of and love for them. Again, imagine yourself there and let that sink in – God loves you and your offerings, your gifts to the world. They are acceptable and desired. You are acceptable and desired.
The People’s Response: Singing and Bowing
Vayaronu vayiplu al pneihem (9:24). The people respond in two ways. First with rinah, with joyful grateful singing, like the Song at the Red Sea. They burst into spontaneous song. Maybe you can feel your heart lifting up and a song in your throat, too, for this joyous, awesome moment of revelation and connection to God. And then, after the song, the people fall on their faces. Vayiplu al pneihem. Can you feel that, too, in your body, the surrender, the gratitude, the letting go of control, the acknowledgement of the divine in our midst, the act of opening ourselves to receive, completely relinquishing bodily motion, lying prostrate and still on the ground? After the intensity of the seeing and the singing, simply falling flat on your face and letting yourself take in the divine nourishment without any further motion, without doing anything, just acknowledging the receiving. Can you rest in that position for a moment?
Enter Nadav and Avihu: We Need More!
Now into this moment of rest and receptiveness comes a different energy, the energy of Nadav and Avihu. They take action. They grab their pans and fill them with fire, human made fire, placing incense into them and bringing them forward into the presence of God (10:1). I don’t want to demonize this energy. I think we all have it. It is the energy of non-contentment, the energy of restlessness that cannot sit still with a precious moment of presence but must instead search for more, always more. It is the energy that makes us go, go, go, do, do, do instead of stopping to smell the flowers and enjoy this gifted moment of divine glory. It is the energy that makes us never fully content, always sensing that – whatever is happening – it is not enough, we want to fix it, make it better.
Perhaps Nadav and Avihu thought – wait, what about the incense? Ketoret, incense, is considered the most sacred of the offerings, given on the golden altar that is in the inner section of the mishkan, unlike the outer copper altar used for animal sacrifices. So perhaps Nadav and Avihu thought – well, this is great, this experience of divine glory that we are getting from the animal sacrifices, but imagine how much better it could be from the incense?
Does that kind of thinking resonate for you? Can you bring to mind of a situation where things are lovely – you are having a lovely experience – and instead of leaning into it, you think – hey, wouldn’t it be even better if I did this, added this element? It is a subtle dissatisfaction, the sense that maybe if we act, if we do this other thing, we can make things even better.
Maybe, too, Nadav and Avihu looked at the elderly statesmen, their father and uncle, Aharon and Moshe, and saw their failures, their incompetencies, their mistakes and imperfections; the whole ceremony had not gone so smoothly, so maybe they looked at that older generation and thought – hey, we can do better than that. Do you recognize that urge in yourself, the urge to fix the way someone else has done something, the sense of knowing, sometimes rightly, that you could have done it better, and the urge to make that happen, not to just rest in what is, but to take it into your own hands and fix it?
Consumed By Our Consuming
This urge is not bad, of course – it helps us sometimes – and yet we should also be aware that it has the capacity to eat us up alive, to consume us as Nadav and Avihu were consumed. They brought their esh zarah, their alien very human fire before God, they brought this restless search for more, this discontent, they brought that before God and the divine fire mirrored that energy back to them and consumed them because that is the nature of this restless search for more; it consumes us. It takes over our minds and hearts until there is nothing left but wanting, discontent, the urgent drive to acquire more – more experiences, more accolades, more friends, whatever it is. We become driven by this consumptive hunger, consumed by our need to consume.
The culture of consumerism works this way, too. It’s not just that it entices us to consume more and more, but that we ourselves end up getting consumed by the consumptive urge, consumed by the terrible insatiable fire of this hunger for more, this dissatisfaction with what is.
Ironically, in our constant quest for betterment and improvement, we lose the very thing that would ultimately sate our thirst: being present with ourselves. We run every which way trying to get what we need, when the very thing that would help us is to not run, but to stay.
What is Enough?
What is enough? Was the moment of divine glory in the mishkan enough? Is this moment enough? If you pause right now and connect to yourself, to your body, to God, to the people and sights and sounds around you – really bring your attention to any of these things and stay present and connected – is that enough? Do you need to do anything to make it better? Is there anything better than such a moment of presence and connection? Can we say dayenu – it is enough – to each moment of the day?
Becoming Prostrate Again
Maybe we can return now to that prostrate position the Israelites were in when they first felt and saw God’s presence among them. They fell down on their faces, like we do when we bow down fully on Yom Kippur or like an extended child’s pose in yoga, your knees on the floor and your arms and head stretched out in front of you. This is a position of release of control, trust and surrender. We are not making anything happen in this position. We are allowing this moment to be received as it is, we are allowing God’s energy – God’s own fire – to enter us rather than making our own. You can invite in your Nadav Avihu never enough parts to relax and rest with you in this position, to rest and be present in this precious moment as it is. This is enough. You are enough as you are, right here, right now. No incense, no bringing more fire, nothing more needed.
Less Is Enough
A lot of times in life, it turns out that so much less than we thought is actually enough, that we can be filled up by the smallest of moments if we pause and take them in, by a flower or by a stranger’s friendly greeting or by a single delicious food instead of a thousand options and courses. When we pause, what is before us turns out to be enough.
This is the theme of Chanukah as well, a holiday related to our story through the number eight as well as through fire and temple consecration. On Chanukah, the Maccabees discovered that a single jug of oil was enough. What we have in front of us is enough if we trust it and lean into it. Just this jug of oil turns out to be miraculous when we let it take up our full consciousness. Just this moment, just this idea,this word, this insight, just this person in front of us, just ourselves. Everything we need is right here. Let your Nadav Avihu impulses slow down and rest.
How much is enough? How many ideas and words are enough in an essay? Is time too short or are we trying to fit too much into it because we want more and more? What if this moment was truly enough for us?
Photo by mododeolhar at Pexels
