Rabbi Marc: Sadly reflecting on artistry of life
and the music of pauses between the notes

I buried my older brother Thursday.

David was my best friend for the 51 years that I have walked this earth. I owe a lot to my brother. If it were not for him, I might not have graduated college and would not have survived losing a spouse as competently as I did.

At the same time, I joined organizations, worked on engines, played football and threw the discus because they were things that David had never done.  David was a dinosaur. He ran a solo OB-GYN practice in Beverly Hills, working 24 hours a day, caring for his patients as partners in the sacred quest for healing. He cared for his family as if there were no other obligations to be considered in life. It is said of David, that his patients always came first and still his family was never second.

Ultimately for my brother, the drive to succeed and the compulsion to love, should teach the world a great deal about what it means to fill our days with value. What killed my brother was that he was perhaps too driven. He would be at the hospital all night and the office all day … and still be at everything in which his children involved themselves.

When they moved on to college he filled that void with more work, most unselfishly, he just gave more and more. Giving is a gift and blessing, but one has to remember to give to himself, too.

This week, we learn of this admonition in Torah, as Moses’ father-in-law (Jethro) comes to bring Moses’ family to him after the Exodus. He watches as Moses leads the people on the journey into the wilderness, takes time to sit as judge and settle all disputes between the people, takes more time to continue to meet with God in the Tent of Meeting … all of this after having just taken on Pharaoh and faced his own demons returning to Egypt not as the prince destined to reign over all, but as the slave leading the revolution.

Jethro admonishes Moses that one man cannot do it all.

There are places in text where Moses will hear from people that he took too much authority and that he erred by being a control freak, but in this case, the concern is absolutely and only for his well being. How will he be able to continue serving the people and God, if his is not well?

What will follow is an interesting comment from God. The text will read that at the very same time that the people enter the wilderness and that Jethro gives this admonition to Moses, God will choose the people who had the faith to go on the journey, and remind them that on this journey they are all equally a kingdom of priests. Each has the obligation to lead and to serve, and there is no difference in our status, one from the other. This included Moses.

There are two sides to this command from God. Certainly it means that everyone has his/her share of work to do, but it also means that each person has an obligation to renew his/her self, as does the priest, so that they are healthy to serve.

The Torah will give us lengthy instructions on how the priest must dress and anoint, separating him/her self from the daily life he/she leads, to prepare to serve in the capacity of priest as the community need arises. Simply put, this means that when not in the role of service, there has to be time to simply celebrate being. Given the admonition from Jethro to Moses, this means that every priest – everyone has to find time to just be.

There is a story about a man who made the most beautiful music. People kept trying to replicate his music, working day and night to learn the melodies and mimic the tones. The music was most definitely well played, but it still lacked something. After years of frustration in failing to be able to play as beautifully as did the man, several approached him. They were stuck in an earnest quandary as to how he could do so easily what they could not come close to accomplishing. He told them that they were all fine musicians, but that the true artistry of music was not found in how one plays the notes, but in how one plays the pauses between the notes.

Such is the artistry of living. I love my brother. He lived a brilliant life. He loved and cared more deeply than most anyone I have ever known. He gave with his heart and his soul.

I only pray that he had celebrated the beautiful pauses between the notes that would have allowed him to still be here to love, to lead, and to celebrate living. Shabbat Shalom.

Rabbi Marc Aaron Kline serves the Temple Adath Israel. Ordained in 1995 from Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, he earned a B.A. from Tulane University, a J.D. from the University of Arkansas, and a Masters from Hebrew Union College. He has taught ethics, philosophy, religion and government in high schools, college and graduate schools and regularly runs a diverse adult education program. He has served as chair of the LFCUG Human Rights Commission and is very active in the greater community.

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