Weekly Torah Portion

After growing up in big-city Chicago, my father accepted a volunteer opportunity at 19 years old. He went down south to Memphis, Tennessee for a summer program to help teach Torah and educate local Jewish kids about their rich heritage. While there, he fondly recalls, he happened to meet the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen!

He ended up marrying that girl a number of years later and building a beautiful family with her. My parents have been blessed to watch many of their grandchildren walk down the aisle and to hold their great grandchildren. That decision to spend a summer in Memphis was one of the most pivotal decisions of my father’s life and I, for one, am extremely grateful for it.

There are moments in our lives when we get to make a decision that could change the course of history. Whether it will affect many people or just make a big difference to ourselves, these moments are precious.

In this week’s Torah portion we see this concept in action on a major scale. In fact, without this particular decision, you and I would not exist. Moshe retells the fateful event of the Golden Calf and how the Jewish people miscalculated when Moshe would be returning from Mount Sinai with the Tablets. Because of this error the Jewish people panicked and feared they had lost their leader, so they built themselves the Golden Calf to lead in Moshe’s stead.

When God saw what was happening, He was so furious that He decided to destroy the Jewish people and rebuild a new nation through Moshe. God said to Moshe, “Release me, and I will destroy them and build a new nation from you”. The Talmud records that Moshe inferred from this statement that the fate of his people depended entirely on him. Although God had “decided” to destroy the nation and all hope seemed lost, still Moshe made one last attempt to plead on their behalf. These additional prayers ultimately penetrated God’s gates of mercy and He forgave the Jewish people.

Moshe’s decision at this particular moment, to argue on behalf of the people, required a great deal of courage and holy chutzpah. Yet Moshe realized that this was one of his pivotal moments where he could make a difference.

We all have moments in our life when we have an opportunity to tap into our inner courage and make decisions that can change the course of history or at least change someone’s life for the better. We may not even realize at the time how impactful the decision will be. Not all of these moments need to be as dramatic as the lesson above, however the impact can be extremely profound. Let’s learn from Moshe and seize those moments when they arise. We never know just how powerful the effects can be.

-Message based on Parsha Parables book by Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky