Joshua M. Davidson is the senior rabbi at Congregation Emanu-El in New York City. The views expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.
Like millions of other Americans, I am bewildered and frustrated by the inequities and abuses of freedom that have defined our current moment. Our collective brokenness, exemplified by the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse and the racism on display in the trial of the men convicted of killing Ahmaud Arbery, casts a darkness that at times has nearly overwhelmed me. Lately, when that happens, I look to my Hanukkah menorah standing on my bookshelf, awaiting its role in the upcoming holiday.
Joshua DavidsonThe Jewish mystics say that the world was created in a state not unlike the one we live in today: broken. The legend can be one of meaning for us all, Jews and non-Jews alike. The 16th-century rabbi, Isaac Luria, taught that God formed the universe by contracting the ubiquitous light of the Divine presence to make room for the physical world. But God's brightness was so overpowering, that the vessels into which it was gathered shattered in a blaze of Divine sparks.
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