Shoftim: The Judge in You

It's been an interesting few weeks.

After a highly energetic spring to midsummer high, things have been slowing down. (To the point that I got physically sick and could do little else but rest and try to take care of myself.)

Bh I'm getting back to myself and I'm actually excited to delve into these last few parshas with you. There's something really special about them. Especially when read through feminine eyes.

They're all about return to truth.

To our essence and deep inner knowing.

Aligned, of course, with this time of year, as Elul leads us home.

So what of Shoftim? The Judges? 

 וַיֵּ֗לֶךְ וַיַּֽעֲבֹד֙ אֱלֹהִ֣ים אֲחֵרִ֔ים וַיִּשְׁתַּ֖חוּ לָהֶ֑ם וְלַשֶּׁ֣מֶשׁ א֣וֹ לַיָּרֵ֗חַ א֛וֹ לְכָל־צְבָ֥א הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם אֲשֶׁ֥ר לֹֽא־צִוִּֽיתִי

and who will go and worship other gods and prostrate himself before them, or to the sun, the moon, or any of the host of the heavens

(Devarim 17:3)

There are so many channels through which we can choose to reach G-d. Nature, cycles, creativity, even science and technology can be channeled towards this deeper connection with the ultimate Source above it all.

At the same time, bechirah is clearly real because so many people choose not to see it.

When I did my 2 year training to become a fertility awareness educator, we had a wilderness retreat. It was a very cool experience for a city girl like me. In those vast Northwestern mountains, I touched something so divine in nature. I felt Hashem's presence in the trees. There were no roads or buildings for miles around. It was just me and Him.

It was a oneness with nature and creation.

I wondered if this perhaps resembled – even in some small way – the experience in the Garden of Eden. 

Others in the group (this was a secular training) perhaps felt a similar sense of awe but fought to articulate it this way. They knew G-d as an abstract authority figure limited to religious ceremony – not as a Being to connect with through this felt experience within us and around us. Instead, they marveled at the sole power of Nature as if it were a god itself. They worshipped the channel rather than the Source.

So much of the work we do can be made into an end rather than the means.

Especially as we understand our cycles as our inner source of wisdom as women. The more you connect, the more you realize it's the vitality of G-d literally flowing through you.

How often do you look up in the night sky to marvel at the moon's striking radiance? When we're not conscious of a unifying Force at the root of all, guiding all, it's not unheard of to get stuck on the surface. On the external expression or symptom of a deeper essence. 

Nature can be a powerful channel. Our cycle is similar in that way. But don't get lost in the creation without meeting the Creator. That's the real gift that no one else – but your own embodied experience – can give you.

Just like Avraham recognized something beyond the sun, the moon, and the stars.

This is what Shoftim is really asking.

Can we judge what's real?

In a world that's full of distractions, can we hear the call of our heart? Of our soul?

Can we see Divinity through the veil of Creation?

Judgment came to mean something negative. But with less than a month to the Day of Judgment, perhaps we can we see it differently. What if it's discernment? Can you tap into the truth? What moves in your body when something feels right? Is it a flutter? A deep sense of calm and peace?

And when something feels wrong? Do you feel something tighten? Something stiff and closed up? A sense of weakening?

Listen to the wisdom inside of you. The inner judge.

It's the path to return. 

Wishing you a beautiful Shabbos!