Summers are full of stories. From vacation travels to family gatherings, we often leave home and visit other places and people. Sometimes these trips become their own traditions like time at the beach or the ballpark, and sometimes it’s more simply time at the pool or the ice cream parlor. The result of our summer experiences is that we have stories, rich in depth and detail.
I have often marveled at the way in which Jewish tradition helps me understand time; summer is no exception. As the years go by, I see just how beautifully summer mixes things that stay the same with new variations. Jewish tradition does more than encourage ritual returns to seasonal stories; it reminds us to tell and retell those stories. Reenactment and renewal is not enough, Jewishly; the telling has its own purpose.
In a neat coincidence, this week Jews will finish reading the Book of Numbers before taking up the Book of Deuteronomy. Numbers is filled with journeys that mark the 40 years of wilderness wandering and encampment of the Israelites. Deuteronomy, though, has very little new action. Mostly, Deuteronomy consists of Moses retelling those journeys from Numbers (and also Exodus). In the retelling, Moses changes the tone and meaning, sometimes dropping details and other times emphasizing them. Moses is not editing history so much as he is distilling memories.
If you have ever tried to tell a story from one particular summer where the details blend into other summers, you can appreciate Moses’s challenge. Should he go back through whatever records he had to get the details just right or should he make sure we get the gist of it? Is it okay if the gist has a bias here or there? Is it so bad to dwell on a particular trial or tribulation endured or to highlight a favorite moment or experience? Deuteronomy does not judge Moses’s choices. Quite the opposite, the existence of the book in our liturgical cycle means that we ourselves repeat Moses’s repetition. We end up distilling his stories, too!
So what can we learn from Moses and from repeating his retellings? First and foremost, we learn that it is important to tell the stories. Share with others your adventures large and small. Then, I think, we learn to create family lore. Retelling our stories gives us a chance to make the story relevant to the moment we tell it more than when we lived it. The listener then inhabits the story as much as we who lived it. Lastly, I think, we are invited to focus on the spirit (pun intended) of the story. Play up the aspects that have a greater impact, blur the details to attend to the feelings, and lift up the joys.
Distillation may seem a bit dishonest. Perhaps it lacks the fullness of what was. On the other hand, it may just give us more to hold onto for years to come. May we all have summers full of stories, and may we tell and retell them. They will get better with age.
About Rabbi Jeremy Winaker
Rabbi Jeremy Winaker is the executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Hillel Network, responsible for West Chester University, Haverford, Bryn Mawr, and other area colleges. He is the former head of school at the Albert Einstein Academy in Wilmington and was the senior Jewish educator at the Kristol Hillel Center at the University of Delaware for four years. Rabbi Winaker lives in Delaware with his wife and three children.
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