The One Who Sets Me Free

A bit of a long, somewhat rambly exploration of God’s nature, and the reason to be religious. What else is there to do on a Friday afternoon…?

Nehama Leibowitz was a 20th century Torah scholar — one of the greats of her generation. Her commentaries on the weekly Torah portion were some of the most interesting, challenging pieces we read in rabbinical school, and are remarkable (among other reasons) for their combination of traditional text-learning and modern, thoughtful approach. She’s worth checking out if you want a bit of a challenge.

Early in my career as a rabbi, I often used her teachings — sometimes for sermons, more often for adult education. Over the years, I’ve turned to her less and less, partially because I realized that her dense, esoteric teachings tend to appeal more to rabbinical types than to laypeople, and partly because I tend to overuse my favorite sources (as I’m sure that any of our regulars will attest to), and then, after a while, try to find other sources to keep things fresh. Anyway, I was studying with a new friend/colleague today, and we decided to look at some of her teachings.

She always finishes with “Questions for Further Study,” and one of those questions for this week’s Torah portion, Vaera, concerns a tiny linguistic variation, which might hint at a larger, philosophical idea. In Exodus 6:6, God says:

I am Adonai, Who is bringing you out from under the burdens of Egypt.

And then, in the very next verse, God says:

I am Adonai your God, the One who brings you out from under the burdens of Egypt.

There are two differences here. First of all, the second verse adds “your God” to God’s name. And, there’s a subtle shift in the Hebrew which I tried to (hopefully accurately) capture as the difference between “Who is bringing you out” and “the One who brings you out.” Why the difference?

The first version, “Who is bringing you out,” is using the phrase to talk about something which God is doing, at this very moment. But, it’s only at this moment. The second phrase has a bit more of a sense of God’s identity. “Bringing you out” isn’t just something which God does at some given moment. “Brings you out” is something which God does, regularly. Or, more to the point, it’s part of who God is. It’s like the difference between “I’m going to play baseball” and “I’m a baseball player.” The first describes an activity of the moment; the second says something about identity.

God is “bringing you out from Egypt” at this moment. But, more importantly, God is the God who, regularly and reliably, “brings you out from Egypt.” The first speaks only of the current moment; the second also hints at a future promise.

And, that might explain the other difference — the inclusion of “your God” in the second verse. Because, it’s only when we recognize God as the One who will, in some ongoing way, take us out of Egypt, that God becomes “our God.” We don’t follow God because God freed us once. We follow God because God frees us. Always.

I’m putting a (possibly too) fine point on this because it speaks to something fundamental about how I see Judaism, and (I guess) all religion.

Some people promote religion based on what it has done — you should be religious because of what God did for us. You should be religious because of what religion meant to your parents, or to theirs. You should be religious because of something which happened when you were young. And so on. I’m not going to argue the logic or morality of this. Instead, I’m going to argue the effectiveness of it. Or, to be more precise, the lack of effectiveness.

Look, I can give you all sorts of history-based reasons to be religious. I might even believe some of them (although, many would be hollow arguments coming from me, to be honest). But, I won’t bother, because I don’t expect that many of them would be particularly effective. People just don’t get involved in religion because of abstract arguments and “should’s,” which are just thinly masked guilt trips. People get involved in religion if religion brings something to their lives. Arguably it’s always been this way, but especially in our modern (postmodern, to be precise) world, this is the reality. People are not going to get deeply involved in and connected to their religion simply because someone tells them it’s a good idea, or because they have some historical, or genetic, or vestigial obligation to do so. People are going to get deeply involved in and connected to their religion if, and only if, it has a profound impact* on them. Only if they believe, even if it’s metaphorically, that God sets them free.

* EK—if you’re reading this, I changed that from “profoundly impacts them” for you…
Is this selfish? Is this just a religious version of “what have you done for me lately?” Maybe. Probably. Yet, I guess that it is. But, I think it’s fair, and it’s honest. The various versions of “you should” that people use to try to get other people involved religion just don’t work, at least not for most people I encounter (and, from the bit I read about it, not for those who are my age or younger, generally speaking). Either religion speaks to me in my situation in a deep and meaningful way, or it’s just not going to be compelling enough to me to spend my time and money on it.

Maybe I’m comfortable admitting all this because I do believe that religion, and God, have had an enormous, positive impact on me. And, that they can for many others, too. That, although I highly doubt that God literally set our people free from Egypt, I know that God has, metaphorically, but nonetheless transformatively, set me free in many ways.

My God is a God who sets me free. Yesterday, today and tomorrow.