May 16, 2009 Devar Torah: Parshat B'Hukkotai, Haftarah – Ari Goldstein, Bar Mitzvah Shabbat Shalom. The haftarah portion this week is from Jeremiah, for the torah portion B’hukkotai. In the haftarah, the prophet Jeremiah talks about the different curses and blessings that may befall someone. For example, he says that a person who practices idolatry will become a slave to their enemy, and a person who trusts in G-d will be like a tree planted by waters. One verse caught my attention. It said, ”O Hope of Israel! O Lord! All who forsake You shall be put to shame, those in the land who turn from You shall be doomed men, for they have forsaken the Lord, the Fount of living waters.” In that one verse, G-d is described in three different ways. He is called Hope of Israel, Lord, and Fount of living waters. G-d is also described as a rock, the Compassionate One, and the Creator of the world. How can G-d be a Fount of living waters AND a rock? How can a rock create the world? The reason G-d is described in so many ways is because G-d isn’t one thing and can’t be described in one word. We  experience G-d in so many different ways. What do these descriptions of G-d mean? I realized that water isn’t just one thing. Water can be calm and peaceful, or it can be rough and stormy. Water can freeze into hard ice, or it can evaporate into the air. We experience G-d in all these ways. We experience G-d as calm water when the world is peaceful. We experience G-d as rough and stormy water when there are troubles. What does the metaphor of a rock mean? Maybe we experience G-d as a rock when people are stubborn and hard and won’t change their opinion. God is like a rock because he is a strong, reliable foundation that you can rely on. Our image of G-d is constantly changing. When I was little, people always told me that G-d is everywhere. I thought that meant G-d was air. I thought that when we breathed in and out, we breathed G-d. When I got older, I thought G-d sat on a cloud in the sky and controlled what we did. But now I think that G-d isn’t up in the sky, and he’s not everywhere. G-d is more of a concept than a physical being. I hope that through life my image of G-d will grow and change. The Kotzker Rebbe once said, “If one’s concept of G-d today is exactly as it was yesterday, it is tantamount to worshipping idols.” I think he is right. We shouldn’t develop a fixed image of G-d, because it’s like worshipping an idol. But it is easy to accidentally create an idol. If you think of G-d as one thing, and you keep that image for a long time and start to believe it more and more, you are starting to create an idol of G-d. Maybe in the haftarah, Jeremiah is warning us about the threat of idolatry. Jeremiah not only preached against physical idols in his time, but the language that he used helps us today break the idols that we’ve created in our mind. Thank you, and Shabbat Shalom.