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“Girls on Fire,” Rabbi Zecher’s Shabbat Awakenings

January 21, 2022 | 19 Shvat 5782

Welcome to Shabbat Awakenings as we make our way toward Shabbat. You can listen to it as a podcast, or you can watch it as a video below.

Last Sunday, Reverend Gloria Hammond from Bethel AME Church in Jamaica Plain invited me to offer a shared sermon with her at their service honoring and remembering Dr. Martin Luther King. It was my honor. Below is what we said and below that is the video of our presentation that includes music, too. Enjoy.

[Reverend Gloria Hammond]: What a delight to come together this morning from so many different locations. We remain grateful for this precious relationship between Bethel and Temple Israel of Boston that started over 20 years ago, when our mutual friend, Nancy Kaufman, was heading the Jewish Community Relations Council. Our relationship as congregations deepened because of a wonderful book, “The Red Tent,” by Anita Diamant. “The Red Tent” spawned a study group between our congregations in 2003; a conference at Boston University on MLK Day in 2005; Shabbat/Saturday afternoon learning sessions for females of our broader communities; as well as other social justice initiatives our congregations have shared over the past two decades.

[Rabbi Zecher]: Our notes tell us that we started talking around 2002 and I guess we haven’t stopped. It has been an honor to be in conversation with one another.

As we begin, we have two texts to share:

Numbers 27:1-11

וַתִּקְרַ֜בְנָה בְּנ֣וֹת צְלׇפְחָ֗ד

The daughters of Zelophehad, of Manassite family—son of Hepher son of Gilead son of Machir son of Manasseh son of Joseph—came forward. The names of the daughters were Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

וַֽתַּעֲמֹ֜דְנָה

They stood before Moses, Eleazar the priest, the chieftains, and the whole assembly, at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, and they said,

[Reverend Hammond]: “Our father died in the wilderness. He was not one of the faction, Korah’s faction, which banded together against the ETERNAL God, but died for his own sin; and he has left no sons. Let not our father’s name be lost to his clan just because he had no son! Give us a holding among our father’s kinsmen!”

Moses brought their case before the ETERNAL God.

And the ETERNAL God said to Moses,

[Rabbi Zecher]:

כֵּ֗ן בְּנ֣וֹת צְלׇפְחָד֮ דֹּבְרֹת֒

“The plea of Zelophehad’s daughters is just: you should give them a hereditary holding among their father’s kinsmen; transfer their father’s share to them. “Further, speak to the Israelite people as follows: ‘If a man dies without leaving a son, you shall transfer his property to his daughter… This shall be the law of procedure for the Israelites, in accordance with the ETERNAL’s command to Moses.”

[Reverend Hammond]: Our second text is taken from the writings of the gospel according to R&B hitmaker, Alicia Keys. Sister Alicia introduced her Grammy-award winning album, “Girl On Fire,” with this comment: “Girl on Fire is about new beginnings, new perspectives and fresh starts. It’s about finding your own inner strength and channeling it in a way you’ve never tried before. To be ‘on fire’ is to allow yourself the freedom to take full control of who you are and how you want to live your life… It’s that moment you choose to claim your power and be extraordinary!”

On this Sunday as we celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, we also celebrate the lives and legacies of countless women who also refused to back up or shut down in the face of discrimination. As we consider the impact of the daughters of Zelophehad and the sisters of the civil rights movement, we invite you to reflect with us this morning on the topic, “These Girls are On Fire.”

[“Girl on Fire”– Sung by Cantor Alicia Stillman and Latracia Croxen, Interim Director of Worship Arts]:

Ooooh…We got our feet on the ground
And we’re burning it down
Oh, got our head in the clouds
And we’re not coming down.

This girl is on fire
This girl is on fire
She’s walking on fire
This girl is on fire!

[Rabbi Zecher]: Before we look at this text of the daughters of Zelophehad, let’s remember what brings us together this morning: the themes of redemption and resilience, the ideas of assertiveness and courage.

[Reverend Hammond]: In December 1955, 26-year-old Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, the newest preacher in Montgomery, Alabama, was thrust into leadership, to a large extent unwittingly, when the Women’s Political Council became the first group to call for a boycott of the bus system. The Council included women like Claudette Colvin and Rosa Parks, who were among several women recruits who refused to vacate their seats to accommodate white passengers. They were largely overlooked by the people who recorded the history, but today we call the names of women’s political council leaders, like Mary Fair Burks, Joanne Robinson, Irene West, Thelma Glass, and Uretta Adair, women who did the bulk of the leg work to launch the boycott, and organized the carpools for the bus boycotters who endured for 13 months before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregation on public buses was unconstitutional.

[Rabbi Zecher]: With Reverend Gloria’s urging, I’d like to share a personal story about meeting Rosa Parks, of blessed memory. In 1987, she received an honorary doctorate from Hebrew Union College where I was studying to be a rabbi. Following the ceremony, there was a reception to which I was invited. Those of us honored to attend had the chance to sit with her. She told us about her experiences and one idea that surprised us all. She said that day on the bus, for which she became famous, was just her turn. The day before someone had done the exact same act of defiance by not moving from her seat. There was someone assigned the day after too. She said, “It was just my turn. I was one of many.”

[Reverend Hammond]: Rosa Parks was one of many women who formed the backbone of the movement. While the leaders in full view were typically men, it was understood that no one could move the agenda without having the full engagement of the women. That we do not know their names is a familiar story throughout history. The marginalized people get so far marginalized that they are written out of the story.

We can now highlight the history and lift up those who were part of the movement but didn’t get full recognition. In Biblical study as well as throughout history, we find much more when we look more closely and discover how the story actually includes us all.

[Rabbi Zecher]: Why did we choose this Biblical text?

How were Zelophohad’s daughters feeling when we encounter them in this text as the Israelites are preparing to enter the land promised to their fathers and mothers when they were led out slavery in Egypt? God instructed them to make a plan to distribute the land to which they were going.

As we heard in the text, what would they receive as an inheritance as the daughters? Nothing! That was not going to work. So what did these Z girls do?

Something extraordinary happened.

They drew close.

They did it together, and

We know their names: We don’t always hear the names of the women, do we?

  • The first daughter, מחלה Machlah, the one who overcomes the sick feeling before speaking out
  • the second, נעה Noah, the one who is pleasant, lovely
  • the third, חגלה Choglah, the one who soars, yet is grounded like a partridge
  • the fourth, מלכה Milcah, the one who has a regal disposition
  • the fifth, תרצה Tirtzah, the one who expresses what she wants.

Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah.

[Reverend Hammond]:

  • 5 different girls,
  • 5 different personalities,
  • 5 different ways of working,
  • 5 different styles of coping,
  • BUT 1 sisterhood of GIRLS ON FIRE

5 sisters and 1 sisterhood

Every girl needs her sisters, her girls on fire because empowered women empower women.

We might expect that women, heirs to Egyptian slavery and then put under law that frequently favors men, might react by keeping silent, by accepting as natural the rule decreed for them to follow. We might expect women in those days to stay close to their tents, remain out of sight, and not go far from their families and friends.

BUT Zelophehad’s daughters were on fire. Because they spoke to injustice, where they claimed their rightful inheritance and changed their destiny and the destiny of subsequent generations.

Today we lift up the noble and righteous acts of those who stood up instead of backing down. And when we examine the daughters of Zelophehad, we see they weren’t alone. God was with them because God’s mercy is everlasting and applies to all of us. Humans have the proclivity and often the self-righteous indignation to cloud the clarity of God’s love, to focus on some and not on the others because of the color of their skin, their religion, their gender, their sexuality, their socio economic status and so much more.

[Rabbi Zecher]: But God knows. The midrash teaches that they drew their strength to step forward because they knew “The mercies of God are not like the mercies of people (because people can be so awful to one another)…God’s concern is for all, as it is said, ‘God gives sustenance to all flesh’ and “God is good to all and God’s mercy is upon all God’s works.” (SifreiBamidbar.133)

We learn from the actions in our Biblical text these 3 ways:

First, these brave women STEPPED FORWARD

How did they do it? The Hebrew informs us. Tikrevna — they drew closer. That word is the same as the word for an offering to God. They drew strength from each other, individually named but grouped together. They had a sacred mission, a righteous one to ensure justice not just for themselves but also for those who would come after them. They drew close to history and to the future. If they lost their inheritance, then everyone after them would as well.

They dared to “go out” from their living place, from their social space, from the destiny imposed on them. Right there in front of the tent of meeting, a sacred place of holiness and authority. They took their own authority.

  • Stepping forward is the boldest step.
  • Change doesn’t happen without it

[Reverend Hammond]: You need not be a meritorious woman in that generation. Every generation alters the trajectory by those willing to step forward and assert themselves, like the Z girls. The ones throughout history, those willing to step forward and assert their power, even when told to sit down, they rose up. The daughters of Zelophehad modeled for those who would follow. And so many followed with courage, bravery, tenacity, and chutzpah.

[Rabbi Zecher]: (That may be the Jewish way of saying “That girl is on fire!”)

[Reverend Hammond]: That’s not a bad image for facing life’s challenges. There may appear for a time to be no way forward. But, by God’s grace, there is such a way. It may not yet be revealed, but there is such a way.

SECOND: THEY STOOD UP

They ARRIVED at the entrance to the tent of meeting where the main authority figures, all of them men: Moses, the priest Eleazar, and the chieftains stood as well. Imagine the hush, the incredulous eyes, the disdain, and yet they stood up, the five girls on fire to claim their rights.

[Rabbi Zecher]: Today we celebrate sisters of the civil rights movement who like the daughters of Zelophehad stood up to claim their rights—women like Mamie Till-Mobley, who was the mother of 14 years old Emmett Till, who was murdered in Mississippi in August 1955, after allegedly whistling at a white woman. For her son’s funeral in Chicago, Mamie Till insisted that the casket containing his body be left open, because, in her words, “I wanted the world to see what they did to my boy.” Through the constant attention it received, the Till case became emblematic of the disparity of justice for blacks in the South and helped to catalyze the Montgomery bus boycott four months later. Like the daughters of Z, Mamie Till-Mobley was a girl on fire.

[Reverend Hammond]: And Jewish women like Carol Ruth Silver who responded to the call for freedom riders to challenge segregation on interstate buses. She was the only woman on her multiracial freedom-riding bus. Arrested in Jackson, Mississippi in 1961, Silver spent the next 40 days in jail at the infamous Parchman Prison. There, she along with other white imprisoned women collaborated with black women activists jailed in nearby (segregated) cells to develop the sensitivity and skills to be northern white allies in a black-led Southern movement. Carol was a girl on fire! (JWA — Jewish Women’s Archives)

So we learn: Be strong enough to step forward and to stand up.

[Rabbi Zecher]: THIRD: THEY SPEAK OUT

They spoke their truth.

THOSE GIRLS WERE ON FIRE!

They were clear and articulate, not whining, not about land for them, but their rights, their personhood, dignity, and the legacy of their father.

Their speaking out like those of the Civil Rights Movement to address injustice was rooted in the confidence that each one of us is awesomely and wonderfully made in God’s image. (Psalm 139)

Their eyes saw what Moses could not see. Fortunately, God could see it too. So Moses took it to God.

And how did God respond? With one word. Yes!

Its placement at the beginning of the sentence speaks volumes.

Yes, כֵּ֗ן to doing the right thing.

Yes, כֵּ֗ן to justice.

Yes, כֵּ֗ן to listening to the plea of the people.

Yes, כֵּ֗ן to joining power together to assert righteousness

כֵּ֗ן בְּנ֣וֹת צְלׇפְחָד֮

What does kein really mean? True and right and proper. That is what they sought.

[Reverend Hammond]: Rosa Parks said: “I was one of many.”

Emmett Till’s mother said: “I wanted the world to see what they did to my boy.”

Z’s girls are right.

The laws of inheritance changed into perpetuity.

Today we celebrate every woman who steps forward and gains strength from her sisters, who stands up even in the face of overwhelming authority, and whose collective voice speaks out and ignites redemption and resilience, assertiveness and courage.

Today we celebrate you becdause every girl is on fire!

[Song “Girl on Fire” performed by Cantor Alicia Stillman and Latracia Croxen]:

Looks like a girl, but she’s a flame
So bright, she can burn your eyes
Better look the other way
You can try but you’ll never forget her name

She’s on top of the world
Hottest of the hottest girls say oh
Ooooh…We got our feet on the ground
And we’re burning it down
Oh, got our head in the cloud
And we’re not coming down.

This girl is on fire
This girl is on fire
She’s walking on fire
This girl is on fire!

Connect with me here. I look forward to corresponding with you and to hearing your thoughts.

Shabbat Shalom!