Shemini Atzeret is a strange holiday. Unlike the other Biblical holidays, this one commemorates nothing in particular, and it has no outstanding ritual practices associated with it. After hearing the sound of the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah, fasting on Yom Kippur; and shaking the Lulav and Etrog on Sukkot, Shemini Atzeret seems anticlimactic.

There are only two practices associated with Shemini Atzeret. One is Geshem, the prayer for rain which we will recite in the Musaf service in a little while. And the other practice is Yizkor which we are about to recite now.

Geshem brings us back to the High Holy Days. As you can see, the cantor and I are dressed in our kittels once again and the cantor will soon chant the opening part of Musaf in the melody associated with the High Holy Days. According to the Talmud, Sukkot is the time of year when it is decided whether or not there will be sufficient water and rain in the coming year. In the Middle East this is a very real concern. I suspect that the anxiety about water and drought gave birth to many of our rituals during this season such as waving of the Lulav and Etrog, and chanting the Hoshanah service, (literally the “save us” service). This concern with water was also highlighted in the ancient Nisukh Hamayim ceremony, a second Temple rite which involved water libations.

It was not until the day after Sukkot, however, that a special prayer was said for rain and the words Mashiv Haruach umoreed hagashem (who causes the wind to blow and the rain to fall) were added to the Amidah. Why do we wait until the end of Sukkot to recite this prayer? The prayer for dew which we say on Pesach is recited on the first day of the holiday, while the prayer for rain is not said until the end of Sukkot. Shouldn’t the prayer for rain and dew be chanted beginning on the first day of each holiday?

There is a good reason why we wait to pray for rain. Rain can be both a blessing and a curse. If it rains during the festival of Sukkot we would not be able to fulfill the mitzvah of Yeshivat Sukkah, dwelling in the Sukkah – and this would most definitely be a curse. Therefore we delay the prayer for Geshem until we’ve fulfilled this mitzvah. Even then, our ancestors didn’t introduce a petitionery prayer for rain into the ninth blessing of the weekday Amida until after the seventh day of Heshvan or December 6th in the Diaspora. That way, people would have time to return home from Jerusalem before the heavy rains begin.

Heavy rain is an understatement. Anyone who has had the opportunity to spend time in Israel during the winter knows that when Israel is not suffering from a drought, it rains and rains and rains at this time of year. From mid-April until October hardly a drop of rain falls in the Promised Land. Shortly after Sukkot the rain begins and continues until Pesach. So you can understand why our ancestors would be so anxious about the coming of the rainy season each fall.

Geshem, then, is not just a prayer for rain; it is how we welcome the winter. In an agrarian society the winter rain was essential. Unlike the Egyptians and the Babylonians, the Israelites did not have a river that flooded and replenished the land each year. Israel was dependent on the blessings that came from above. Geshem is not so much a prayer for rain as it is a poem extolling the preciousness of rain and the coming of winter.

But, really, what’s so great about rain? While we know we can’t live without rain in its season we are also aware of how dreary it can be. During the winter we wake up and peek outside to see that it’s cold and rainy. We groan. Traffic will be impossible. We would be just as happy to pull the covers back over our head and stay in bed. We know that we have to bundle up and still the cold wet weather will get into our bones. That is just as true here as it is in Israel. So where is the blessing in Geshem, in rain? And then there’s snow….

Rain is a blessing in disguise. Of course we rain but we also know that too much rain can be disastrous. Just ask the people who are still rebuilding their lives after Hurricane Katrina or those who had to pump their basements out last year right here in Oceanside.

Maybe that’s why the prayer for Geshem ends as it does. We ask God to give us rain, “For a blessing and not a curse, for life and not for death, for abundance and not for famine.” Like so many things in life, our blessings can turn out to be less than a blessing. For instance:

Old age can be a blessing. But when we live too long and find that we are suffering the infirmities and indignities of old age, old age turns out to be torturous. I often hear older people say that the golden years aren’t so gold – they are tarnished.

Is wealth a blessing? How many of us can tell stories of families that seemingly have everything but land up fighting over the control of their material wealth? How many children have been spoiled by their families wealth?

Freedom is a blessing. But freedom comes with tremendous challenges and dilemmas. We would never give up our freedoms but we know that these very freedoms make Jewish life in America precarious and uncertain.

On the other hand the things that we consider to be a curse may not really be a curse at all. To paraphrase the words from Alice in Wonderland, we live in a world where nothing appears as it seems. What began as a curse might even serve some beneficial purpose in our lives.

Is poverty a curse? Some of us can remember living through the Great Depression when people had nothing and could barely get by. And yet families pulled together and helped one another and valued the blessings that they did have.

Is death a curse? Sometimes it is. But for some people death may be a relief from suffering and pain. It may be a release and a home coming for others.

Is having a disability a curse? Most definitely it is. But some manage to do extraordinary things by rising above their limitations and not taking the capacities they do have for granted.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not trying to romanticize the suffering and tribulations of others. It is just that we often fail to recognize that life’s blessings are only blessings if we transform them into blessings, and that life’s curses are also what we make of them. Life is what it is – it is up to us to make something out of it.

I recently read an amazing story about Itzhak Perlman. I’m not sure if it actually happened but I know that it’s true. Several years ago the great violinist gave a concert at Lincoln Center. If you’ve ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is no small achievement for him. He was stricken with polio as a child, and has braces on both legs and walks with the aid of crutches. To see him walk across the stage one step at a time, painfully and slowly, is an awesome sight.

On this particular night Perlman walked painfully, yet majestically, until he reached his chair. He sat down, put his crutches on the floor, undid the clamps on his legs, tucked one foot back and extended the other foot forward. Then he bent down and picked up his violin and began to play.
By now, the audience was used to this ritual. They would sit quietly while he made his way to his chair and began play. This time, however, something went wrong. Just as he finished the first few bars, one of the strings on his violin broke. You could hear it snap - it went off like gunfire across the room. There was no mistaking what that sound meant or what he had to do. People figured that he would have to get up, put on the clamps again, pick up the crutches and limp his way off stage - to either find another violin or else find another string for this one. But he didn't. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again.
The orchestra began, and Perlman played from where he had left off. He played with such passion and such power and such purity as they had never heard before. Of course, anyone knows that it should be impossible to play a symphonic work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, but that night Itzhak Perlman refused to know that. You could see him modulating, changing, and recomposing the piece in his head. When he finished, there was a moment silence and then there was an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium.
Perlman smiled, wiped the sweat from his brow, raised his bow to quiet us, and then he said - not boastfully, but in a quiet, pensive, reverent tone - "You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much music you can still make with what he has left."

I love this story. It goes to the heart of what I believe our faith can teach us. All of us will face challenges and tribulations in life. If we are lucky we will grow old, face infirmities and grow frail. Some of our blessings may turn out to be curses but if we’re lucky our curses will also become blessings. No one knows what the future will hold and no one can guarantee what will happen. What Judaism teaches us is to take ownership of each moment in our lives and to make “as much music as we can with what we have.”

That is what I like about the Geshem prayer. We pray to God for rain. But do we want it to rain? Do we want to face winter again? Maybe not, but we know that we must – that this is as much a part of life as the spring and the summer. The challenge is to find a way to make music out of the winter, to embrace and learn from the winter, to recognize that God did not promise us an eternal springtime in our lives.

We’re about to recite Yizkor. We come with broken hearts and sorrow. Four times a year, in moments of rejoicing and celebration we step out of the moment and remind ourselves what life is really all about. It is a broken violin string. It is a pair of crutches. It’s rain on a cold winter day. It is the tragic loss of one we have loved. These facts are as much a part of God’s world as the blessings and goodness that are all around us. And sometimes the music we make in those moments of darkness and loss can be just as beautiful, and maybe even more beautiful, than it is when things are going as they should.

When I pray to God I don’t ask God to make things good for me. I ask God to help me find the strength and the wisdom to make the most of every situation. I ask God to help me make music of life even when I have only three strings on which to play. I ask God to help me live without unreasonable expectations or demands – and to recognize that God gave me the world just as it is, even when it isn’t very perfect. Because in every situation, in every challenge I have been given the ability to respond, to find hope, to live a full life, or at least to make the most of what I have.

You know it is no accident that we have a special blessing that we say when we hear good news - Hatov v’hamaytiv – we thank God who is God and does God, and we also have a blessing we say when we hear bad news, God is a dayan emet – God is a true judge. The God in whom I believe is present in all moments in life, those that are dark and those that are full of light.

It is up to us to let God in.

It is up to us to sing even when it is raining outside.

Join me as we recite the Yizkor service.