Let Love Be Our Banner
Rosh HaShanah 5786
This is all a lot. I want to acknowledge that the High Holidays are a lot. The liturgy is a lot. Our tradition throws so much at us over these few days, and you never know what’s going to stick. At least I don’t. That’s part of the surprise of this season: what prayers, what themes, what tunes, will jump out, grab hold and refuse to let go?
Sitting here on this night last year, it was something from the Hineni meditation, the opening of which Cantor sang earlier tonight. It’s a line so simple and yet so striking that I’ve been sitting with it ever since. Perhaps it struck you. וִיהִי נָא דִגְלֵנוּ עָלֶיךָ אַהֲבָה. Let love be our banner before You. I have this verse up here with me right now. When I ordered a new tallis for my ordination, this tallis, I had the words embroidered on the atarah, the neckline. וִיהִי נָא דִגְלֵנוּ עָלֶיךָ אַהֲבָה. Let love be our banner before You.
I’ve spent this past year thinking about this line, about love, and there’s a part of me that wants to be embarrassed by that, that wants to whisper it, because this past year has not felt very loving. In our world, in our country, among our own people, this has been a year filled with, seemingly defined by, hatred and violence, suffering and loss and fear. There’s a part of me that that thinks that it’s not only cliché to talk about love, but that it’s kind of ridiculous. There’s a voice in my head telling me that love cannot possibly hope to stand up to all that’s arrayed against it. And that might be why I’ve latched on to this line like a life raft, because it speaks of a love that can…
