This
week’s Torah portion, Tetzaveh (Ex. 27:20 – 30:10) begins with the description
of the ner tamid, the perpetual, or
regular, light that burned in the Mishkan, the tabernacle in the wilderness. In
the Torah’s instruction, the light is to burn “from evening to morning” (Ex.
27:21). In modern day synagogues, the ner
tamid is an eternal light and it is kept burning all the time.
In his
reflection on this passage in the Etz Chaim Torah Commentary, Rabbi Harold
Kushner muses upon the frequent use of fire as a symbol for God. He writes, “…fire
is not an object. It is the process of liberating
the energy hidden in a log or wood or a lump of coal, even as God becomes real
in our lives in the process of liberating the potential energy in each of us to
be good, generous and self-controlled”. Kushner does not dwell upon what fire does
when it is out of control. When controlled, fire can provide light and
warmth. When fire exceeds the boundaries
of safety, it destroys and it kills.
We
watch the nightly news with horror as the self-proclaimed Islamic State in
Syria beheads foreign journalists, abducts Syrian Christians from their homes
and kills them, and destroys irreplaceable ancient Mesopotamian statues. These murderers claim to represent Islam in
its purest form. Rather, they are what
happens when we allow the holy fire that God placed within us to burn unchecked.
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