Mystery is not that which is unknowable, but that which is endlessly knowable. To live inside such endless knowability is a source of unrestricted love and eternal care. View the study sheet here. Watch the recording here.
Here in Portland the solar eclipse reached its peak at 11:25 a.m., when the moon covered about 23% of the sun’s diameter. The sky became slightly more shadowy. And then, as quickly as it had dimmed, light returned. Elsewhere, those in the path of totality experienced the moon entirely blocking out the sun. Darkness swallowed the light of day. A halo glowed white behind the moon, the sun’s corona.
The overwhelming shock among ancient people produced by a total solar eclipse was expressed by seventh century B.C.E Greek poet Archilochus: “Nothing can be surprising anymore, or impossible, or miraculous, now that Zeus, father of the Olympians, has made night out of noonday.”
Today, of course, we understand much about the science of atotal eclipse. The moon needs to reach a point in its orbit where it appears to line up perfectly with the center of the sun when viewed from a specific spot. And it must be close enough to Earth to block out the entire sun. Part of what makes the phenomenon possible is that while the moon is 400 times smaller than the sun, it is 400 times closer to Earth’s surface.
This ratio, and thus total solar eclipses, will not last forever. Scientists have observed that little by little the moon is drifting further from Earth. They estimate that in about 600 million years the moon will be too far away to produce a total eclipse.
Our increased scientific knowledge may have reduced the mystery about the cause of this celestial event, but it has not diminished the sense of wonder upon witnessing it. There remains the awe of being in the presence of a transcendent event. Brother Guy Consolmagno, the director of the Vatican Observatory, observed, “The universe is elegant, it is beautiful, and it’s beautiful in a way that surprises you.”
The Israelites experienced an awe-filled event at Mount Sinai. So stunning was it that the senses of hearing and seeing seemed to become jumbled (“they saw the thunder…and the sound of the horn”). Midrash describes the Israelites as being blown back a mile by a pressure wave caused by the divine voice. So powerful was it that the Israelites were rendered comatose for a moment.
The rest of Exodus focuses on the design of a structure, a Mishkan, that would provide a channel for that energy being a part of everyday Israelite communal life. The book of Leviticus describes in detail the rites to be performed in the Mishkan. The synaesthetic, concussive moment of Mount Sinai is to be transformed into a ritualized, regularized daily experience. Yet, Leviticus regularly undermines that enterprise of certainty and reassurance with texts that confound and mystify.
The opening verses of this week’s portion state that a woman who gives birth (tazria) shall be impure (tamei) for a certain period of time. She is not to touch any consecrated thing or enter the sanctuary until she has been purified. Yet, a form of the very same word used for giving birth is used in the Creation story: “the earth brought forth seed-bearing (mazria) plants and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed (zaro) in it. And God saw that this was good” (Genesis 1:12). Why is the fructifying act called good by God in Genesis but in Leviticus is deemed to produce impurity?
The mystery does not end there. Later in the portion verses discuss one who has a condition identified as tzara’at. Most translations render this as “scaly affection.” The person is considered tamei, and they are to live isolated from others until pronounced clean by a priest. Aside from the condition, the very word itself is a mystery. Its Hebrew etymology is unclear. There seems to be no origin for it. Where did it come from?
Torah’s project of creating a standardized way for human beings to cohere with the combustible force that is the source of life has engendered at least as much mystery as clarity. Is that such a bad thing?
Richard Rohr is a Franciscan priest and founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Through the Center and several books, Rohr has promoted a provocative form of spirituality, one which extends beyond the tenets and institutions of the Catholic Church specifically or Christianity in general. In his article “Paradox: Mystery is Endless Knowability” Rohr writes: “Mystery is not that which is unknowable but that which is endlessly knowable. Living inside such endless knowability is finally a comfort, a foundation of ultimate support, security, unrestricted love, and eternal care.”
For Rohr the term “mystery” refers to a “depth, an open future, immense freedom, a kind of beauty and truth that can’t be fully spoken or defined.” Where clear definitions fail, art often opens the way to insight.
Gustav Klimt was embedded in the heat of artistic life and experimentation in Vienna during the beginning of the twentieth century. He worked into his paintings symbols that expressed his sense about sexuality, eroticism, romance, and spirituality. The Jewish middle class of Vienna were among his greatest patrons and supporters.
Pictured here is his work Hope II. A pregnant woman bows her head and closes her eyes. Perhaps she is praying for the well-being of her child. Peeping out from behind her stomach is the head of death, an ever-present possibility. At her feet are three women with lowered heads and raised hands. Are they praying to celebrate a good birth, or are they mourning their anticipated death of the child?
It is all a mystery. In his painting, birth and death, celebration and mourning, pain and sensuality live side by side, suspended in the equilibrium of life. His pregnant woman is tazria, about to give birth. The anthropologist Mary Douglas in her book about Leviticus describes the condition of tazria as a boundary-breaking experience: “Childbirth is a process in which pleasure and pain, life and death, purity and impurity, are intermingled and become inextricable from each other.”
“Art evokes the mystery without which the world would not exist,” wrote the Surrealist artist René Magritte. In the midst of constructing a comprehensive system for drawing close to God, Torah intervenes to remind us that entering into mystery may be what really draws us deep into a relationship with the source of all that exists.
Join us here at 7:00 p.m. (PT) on Thursday April 11as we explore the mystery of it all.
