A Guided Meditation About The Events Around Parashat Ki Tisa

In Parashat ki Tisa (Exodus 20:11 -34:35), the events surrounding the receipt of the ten commandments, including the construction of the golden calf, and the subsequent response by Moses and the Levites are recounted. In the interpretation found in the following guided meditation, parallels are made between the wild chaos that existed prior to creation and the wild chaos in the minds of the Israelite people prior to receipt of the law. Just as God’s creative act tamed the wild chaos of the physical world, the giving of the law (another kind of creative act) tamed the wild chaos of people’s minds. The meditation illuminates this process by putting participants in the minds of those who witnessed the events portrayed in this Parshat.

Let’s start with intentional breathing to quiet the mind and create a separation for this meditation. Please shut your eyes. Start by breathing in for a count of four, hold for a count of four, breath out for a count of four, then rest for a count of four. Now repeat, breathe in for a count of four, hold for a count of four, breath out for a count of four, then rest for a count of four. Continue to breathe like this for a little bit. Letting go of whatever tensions, whatever problems, whatever distractions might be going on inside of you right now. Each breath is a gift, not asked for, not earned, just given. Each breath is an act of grace, each breath is a prayer.

The story begins like this. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was unformed and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the spirit of God was hovering over the face of the water. Reflect on these words, unformed and void. Tohu va-vohu. There are various interpretations of this ancient expression, but many of them suggest that the true meaning of these words is that the world was in a state of wild chaos. Before God’s creative act, there was wild chaos. What is it like to live in a state of wild chaos? Well, you can imagine that this was the state of affairs for the two million people who left Egypt and walked into the Sinai during the Exodus.

Sand is everywhere. It invades your nostrils, and lodges in the creases of your skin. You taste it in your mouth and feel it laced into your hair. It is in your food and water. When you sleep at night, it presses against your skin and it lodges under your fingernails. The sand and your sweat form crusty patches on your skin. After days in the desert you begin to wonder where you end and the sand begins.

It is hot and suffocating. The heat wraps you like a heavy blanket and it comes not only from the sun but also from the crowds of people that cram into any open space around you, a quivering, seething, stinking, flatulent, coughing, itching, spitting mass of humanity that presses into you with every step, with every turn. These people are not like you, their customs are strange. They call the high God different names, El Shaddai, Eloheim, Adonai. Their stories about the beginning of the world are different from yours, their customs are not the same. There is frequent conflict. Fights break out daily, over the gathering of manna and water, over where your animals can graze, over where you can make camp for the night.

You lose track of the days. Your life loses its purpose. There is just the walk, one foot, stop, one foot, stop. With each stop, you count your animals. Are they still all there? You count your children, are they still all there? You look in the face of your spouse and see in the face of that person, a reflection of your own suffering. Unrelenting misery, unrelenting worry, unrelenting alienation. You wonder about the decision to leave Egypt. At least there you had cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. Now there is nothing, nothing but manna.

For forty four days you traveled from Goshen across the Red Sea, through the wilderness of Shur, through the wilderness of Sin, to Dophkah, to Alush, to Rephidim where the prophet performed the miracle of the rock.and where you were attacked by the Amaleks. Arriving finally to Har Horeb, the holy mountain.

And now the prophet has left you. He has gone up the mountain to commune with the high God and he has been gone a long time. You feel alone, you feel abandoned. The one constant presence during this time of transition, during this time of turmoil, gone and you are filled with dread.

The heretics among you, their minds aflame with panic and wild confusion, approach the prophet’s brother Aaron. The high God is too remote, and his prophet is gone. Let us make a God who we can see who we can touch. Aaron relents, fearful of the mob. They make an idol, a golden calf, the Egyptian bull God, Apis. And though you know this to be apostasy, you cannot help but to be sympathetic to these heretics. For surely they feel what you feel, a sense of loss, a sense of worry.

After forty days on the mountain, the prophet returns with the words of the high-God etched on two tablets and he sees what the heretics have done. His anger is palpable. He erupts with rage and hurls the tablets to the ground, smashing them, and the meaning is clear. The covenant that the high God made with the old ones is broken.

The golden idol is destroyed and ground up into powder and mixed with water and some are made to drink this slurry. Why was the prophet doing this? It seems cruel and you retreat to your tent and stay quiet with your family beside you. And then the horror begins. The Levites, fearsome and zealot in their devotion to the prophet roam the camp and slaughter thousands. You are terrified and in shock. The world has fallen apart. It feels like the end, the wild chaos of the beginning of the world has returned.

The prophet reclimbs the holy mountain. Another 40 days goes by and he returns. But this time, the mountain has changed him. He is radiant, he has been touched by the High God. And he has brought the holy law. There are new rules to follow. There are so many of them. How to treat slaves, and the punishments for murder, kidnapping and showing disrespect for your mother and father. Rules about compensation when oxen do damage and rules about compensation when damage is done to oxen. Rules about the punishment for theft and rules about the treatment of virgins. Rules about the treatment of the stranger and rules about lending money. Rules about how to talk about the High-God and rules about festivals in that God’s honor. You, with intention, follow the rules. What choice do you have? The memory of the Levites’ terrible retribution still sears your consciousness.

But then, slowly, you find yourself emerging from the darkness. The wild chaos recedes and in its place you find the glimmerings of divine light. The rules provide order to your life and with the knowledge that those around you are following the same rules, you discover your common humanity and in that recognition, you find that the high God is not so remote. The divine is in all of us.