As easy as riding a bike?
Once decorated and acknowledged as one of the greatest athletes the world has even known, Lance Armstrong’s reputation now has an uncertain future given the mountain of evidence that implicates him in years of illegal performance enhancement. His fall from grace is juxtaposed dramatically with the fate of a fourteen-year-old Pakistani girl named Malala Yousufzai who is hanging on for dear life in a London Medical Center after having been ruthlessly gunned down by the Taliban ten days ago. Malala’s outspoken leadership has inspired a global generation of young girls to seek and pursue formal education, heretofore unattainable for young women. As our prayers go out to Malala (a true hero), and our disappointment collects around Lance Armstrong (a false one), we wonder what our tradition has to offer a world with fragile heroes.
I have always wondered why the Psalmist describes trees of the forest ‘singing joyous praises to God’ and the earth itself as being ‘gladdened that God will rule justly’. I used to think that, in order to subvert the pagan impulse to worship nature, the Psalms position nature alongside human beings in praise of God. But thanks to this week’s Torah portion, an additional lesson has emerged.
After the floodwaters recede and God savors the sweet smell of Noah’s offering, God covenants to never again destroy the world and living things because of the human wickedness. Embedded in the promise to human beings and to the earth (trees and all nature) are enduring lessons teaching the centrality of mercy and justice – core elements of ‘the moral way.’ An all-merciful God covenants security for the cosmos. This is closely followed by the chiasmic (ABC-CBA) verse asserting justice: “{A} Who sheds {B} the blood {C} of man {C} by man {B} shall his blood {A} be shed” (Gen. 9:6) in which God structures a verse that insists that what happens to us is a mirror image of what we do. This is the very essence of justice. So embedded into the new foundation of nature’s matter is a moral order.
This is why the trees and the earth rejoice and praise God’s justice. They are reassured that the earth is governed by the rule of right rather than the rule of force. The arc of the moral universe bends alongside reliable changes in the seasons. Malala’s assassin will not elude judgment forever. And that which comes to us as easily as riding a bike isn’t so simple when it’s counterfeit. Just like nature, we can feel reassured that how you ride the bike counts too.
A sweet Shabbat to you.
Rabbi William Hamilton
