Forty, a Riff for the Aquarian Minyan

This past Friday night, I co-led a Kabbalat Shabbat service for the Aquarian Minyan--the community that I served as spiritual leader from 2007-2009--in honor of their 40th anniversary. Flagship of the west coast Jewish Renewal communities, the Minyan was founded in the early 1970's by a band of hippy visionaries and spiritual seekers under the tutelage of R., Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. For this service honoring their 40th year, an exploration of the number 40, a potent number in Hebrew sacred and mystical texts, seemed in order. How does "40ness" manifest in your life?

Forty

            by R. Diane Elliot

            for the Aquarian Minyan on the occasion of its 40th anniversary

Four, the headwaters flowing down from Eden

the fourth day, completing Creation with sun, moon, and stars

the mothers four--Sarah, Rivkah, Rakhel and Leah--

         channeling Divine receptivity, nurturance, comfort

the fourth utterance at Sinai—Shabbat,

         eternal remembrance of the cycles

         of activity and rest

         that source and bound our lives

the four directions—east, west, north, south--

         brilliance, flow, depth, and passion--

         teaching us the fullness of our days,

         modeling the pattern

         of our encampment in the wilderness

         our groundedness amidst ongoing movement,       

         the dalet, doorway to our home.




And zero, efes, pure potentiality, eternity

Evolution, infinity.

HaMakom, the place, the point,

the sefirah from which all other numbers, all s’firot--

all emanations, all holiness, all stories, all beingness--

spring forth.

Essence of reality,

all and nothing,

seed,

womb,

egg.




Together, four and zero—40.

Or 4 times 10, if you prefer

dalet multiplied by yud,

a doorway for the One to enter;

a Way In that is also Way Far Out.

40, we are at home in G~d.

40, we are the door

through which Oneness enters.

40, the Hebrew letter mem,

the “ima,” mother letter,

giving birth through mayim,

water, sometimes flowing through

broad, open channels,

times of ease, of sailing smooth,

And sometimes squeezed and tortured

through the narrows,

rock-walled passages,

months of challenge, treacherous currents,

years of tears, uncertainty….




40 days and nights of deluge

while Noah’s family tends to all life in a cramped,

storm-tossed boat.

40 days and nights of fasting on the mountain,

while Moses communes with the Holy One,

only to crash and burn

in anger, disappointment,

only to trudge back up the rocky tor

of encounter and union

to do it all again.

40 days and nights reconnoitering

the land of promise and terror.

40 years of wandering, not-knowing,

in a wilderness of potential and of grave risk,

a midbar of creative chaos.

In Torah, the number 40 really means

 “a long, long time.”

Once-upon-a-forty-years-ago long time!

 


All this we celebrate tonight--

the long-timeness,

the seeds of creativity, the enwombment,

the challenge, the disappointment,

the bliss of sublime union and reunion,

the reconnoitering, the bickering, the wandering,

the standing at the very edge of

the Land of Promise

the land of myth and dream

whose borders shift constantly--

one moment within easy reach,

the next a distant desert mirage.

But milk and honey ooze up still

between our toes,

and a sweet, sweet manna taste

is in our mouths

drawing us ever onward.