What does loneliness offer?
i
There was famine in Canaan and there was no bread
but in Egypt there was bread
so Jacob’s sons came to Egypt
and came to stay.
In Egypt,
where their grandchildren become enslaved.
*
Israel rose from Egypt
baking matzoh:
bread that would not rise,
bread that is not bread.
*
And Manna was the bread from God
that Israel ate in the Desert.
ii
Israel eats the bread of Egypt,
and then of God.
Israel belongs to Egypt,
and then to God.
You belong to the one
who gives you bread.
iii
But what of matzoh—
no-man’s-land,
bread and not bread,
not of Egypt, not from God?
Matzo is the bread of growing up.
*
When you grow up
you come to someone
not as a child
not as a slave
but as a partner,
a groom,
a bride.
*
Before this
you must learn two things:
that you can bake your own bread;
that the bread you feed yourself
is no bread at all.
*
So you need a time alone,
in-between.
You need matzoh.
iv
(This is a lesson for those who seek others,
and for a nation coming to God.)
_____
Shabbat shalom,
Abe
Please pray for Ayelet Yakira bat Chaya Hinda Matel Nechama, Esther Chaya bat Yael Miriam, and for Neshama Emunah bat Batya
www.TorahParsha.com / @TorahParsha
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