Page 11 - 2020 April Listen - 14-2

All of my life, I have been blessed with close Jewish

friends, who have taken me into their hearts, and

welcomed me into their homes. So I’ve been very

fortunate to celebrate Passover with them on numerous

occasions, most recently, and meaningfully, last week.

The Passover holiday has always resonated deeply

for me, with its powerful and penetrating look at

alienation and persecution, and with the resulting call

to “Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers

in the land of Egypt”(Deuteronomy 10:19).

As a Zen priest, I am particularly struck by the

notion of crying out to God from a narrow place, and

being answered with a wide expanse. Which is the

narrow place, and which the wide expanse, I wonder?

Particularly when in this case one leads directly to

the other? And what of the parallel of the immense

suffering of the Jewish people as they fled Egypt, to the

reward of God’s infinite embrace? Suffering and strife

are clearly the fertile ground for spiritual growth, and

yet the paradox is that we need one to “get” the other.

What do you think?

-Rev. Seifu

(click to respond)

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