Dear CBO Family,
Ever since I was a boy, I have felt my emotions strongly, including compassion, empathy, and even anger. As teens we all learn techniques to channel and express our inner lives in healthy ways. I found peace and strength in sports like football and boxing. With time, a desire to change and help from others, I was able to learn how to tap into my emotions as strengths for the work I wanted to do.
In Parshat Hukkat, God tells Moses and Aaron to take his staff and gather the community together and speak to the rock and it will produce water for everyone. What does Moses Do instead? He took his staff and said to the people gathered, “Listen you rebels, shall we get water for you out of this rock?” He then hits the rock twice and water does flow forth from it. At first this may not seem that severe and God’s response of not letting Moses go into the Promised Land may seem like an overreaction.
The danger of Moses’s anger makes him short sighted in his response to the issue of getting water for the Israelites. First he embarrasses the people by calling them rebels, second his language about getting the water implies that he and Aaron are the source of the miracle not God, third he hits the rock twice and Aaron does nothing to stop him making him guilty by association. Finally, the last and most important, he did not listen to God who said to speak to the rock, rather than striking the rock like he did in Exodus chapter 17 verse 6.
Moses’s Anger and rage at the Israelites, overtakes his rational faculties. He is so overwhelmed at this point and loses all control. The Babylonian Talmud says, “When a prophet loses his temper, his gift of prophecy abandons him.”
(BT Pes. 66b)
In this current state of our country it is easy to let our anger control us. We are frustrated with how we have lost control over the normalcy of our lives. We are tired of the same patterns of racial injustice and therefore we are angry. Anger is a normal emotion, what we do with it is what matters.
By no means do I always manage my anger the way I would like to, however I do my best to learn from my past struggles and mistakes and take steps to prevent them from happening again so I can be controlling my emotions and not the other way around. By doing this I can be a better person than I was yesterday.
May we learn to control our anger so we can use it as a tool to navigate our emotions to become the best versions of ourselves.
Shabbat Shalom,
Cantor Kowitz
Affiliated with United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism