Vayera 5784 ~ Shalshelet - November 3, 2023

There is a musical note in our Torah reading for this Shabbat that is quite rarely used. It is called the shalshelet.  The implication of the note’s terminology is that the note is sung, shelosha, three times in a row on the one word. The note used is the pazer, which is one that begins low and goes up rather high and then goes down low to where it began. The note in our Torah reading is used when the angels turn to Lot, as fire and brimstone are about to rain down on the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, to destroy the evil people within its city limits. The word that the note is used in Hebrew is “vaytimameyha” which is translated as “Lot delayed” in heeding the order of the angels to take his wife and leave the city before he and she die, as do the evil inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah.

In my humble opinion, the note not only describes hesitation, it also suggests fear or anguish. In the Middle East, such a note is the sound of women who are letting out a cry or a sigh, either in celebration and or in pain and frustration.

The commentary Seikhel Tov is referenced in our Etz Hayim Chumash to provide us with why it was necessary for Lot not to delay, and yet he and his wife absolutely did. The commentary states that “Once destruction begins, it does not discriminate between the righteous and the wicked.”

So why did Lot delay? The same question can be asked by those in Gaza who chose not to move from the north to the south when instructed to by the Israeli government.

Why did Lot delay? Some say that he was more concerned about his property and his personal possessions than about his own personal wellbeing. Others suggest that Lot thought that if he stayed behind, that perhaps he might have an influence on G-d to not destroy the world he knew and called home. “If I stay then, since I am Abraham’s nephew, God will not destroy the cities and the people.” And yet others suggest that Lot was no better than the others in town. His saving grace was that he was related to Abraham. God didn’t need to save him; but it was only through the merit of Abraham that he was saved. There are those who say that his wife prodded him to stay and he was torn between what was right (what the angels were telling him) and what his wife demanded of him.

As one reads the narrative , one has to wonder whether Lot and his wife might have felt that their adult married children who remained were being used as shields by the evil people of Sodom.  In many ways, no different than that of some of the civilians in Gaza. They knew not only of God’s intent, but that if God proceeded to destroy the cities and their inhabitants, the morality of God might come into question.

If one reads through the narrative, one might also recognize that Lot was as complicit in the evil doings as were the others. I wonder whether Lot’s hesitation was no different than the parents of the Hamas terrorists who remained in the northern part of Gaza as shields to their terrorist children or evil children.

The fact is that Lot’s wife was unprepared for what she saw when she turned around. She was devastated by the destruction and she cried out with the shalshelet, blaming God for what had happened to the city she called home and what had happened to some of her children. But what she neglected to understand was how evil they all were, including herself and her husband. She was being given the opportunity to both escape the destruction and her evil ways. But she chose differently.

Unfortunately, whether held as pawns and shields by Hamas, or believed that they needed to be there as shields for their children who had become Hamas, the people who remained in Gaza are now going through a prolonged destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.  For the  truly innocent ones, the tragedy is multiplied. We sing the note of shalshelet for them as casualties of war; but as the commentary Seikhel Tov states, war does not discriminate.

But whom we truly sing the shalshelet for are the 1400 or more brutally murdered Israelis, the wounded Israelis, the Israelis still held hostage. We intone the shalshelet, a call of prayer to Hashem, to protect and provide a successful campaign for the men and women of the IDF who are now defending and protecting Israel as they fight in Gaza and on the border of Lebanon.  We sing the shalshelet for Jews around the world as we not only identify with the reality in Israel, but also cry out in pain as we witness the anti-Semitism that has embraced our world.  We intone the shalshelet for those in our world who are unable to read the true narrative - that the fault lies in the atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7^th. 

It is rather sad that the Torah reading for this Shabbat once again parallels the events in the world, our emotions of fear and sadness. Perhaps one day soon, the shalshelet can be used like the sh’varim, the triple sound of the shofar, to herald not only the end of this war, but an end to a world that misunderstands what, at this moment, is the true Jewish understanding of the shalshelet.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi K