Revising the Hebrew: In
a handful of places, the traditional text expresses ideas that many
modern Jews find difficult to accept. A good example is the
Shafoch Chamoscha prayer, which is read as the door is opened to Elijah.
The original, a compilation of four Bible verses, calls for the fiery annihilation
of the peoples who do not know God, because they have laid waste to Israel.
It troubles many of us who see endless cycles of vengeance and revenge-ance
as a primary source of human suffering: Here, the Hebrew is changed
from “Shafach Chamoscha” –“Pour your wrath upon” to “Shipaich Chamas” Spill
out the wrath of.” The prayer is reworked to one seeking God’s intervention,
not as an instrument of revenge, but as a Path out of the trap of repeated
anger and violence.
Changing Hebrew text seems a
much graver responsibility than writing translation. Paradoxically, what
makes it worthwhile is that so few changes are warranted. Once these few
are made, the Hebrew text can be translated accurately to an English one
that neither pushes us away nor “softens” or hides the meaning of the Hebrew.
Aside from a few changes like these,
the Hebrew is as in the original, but has been shortened somewhat.
This serves two purposes: It leaves time for additional material, so that
the pre-meal service takes no longer than usual; and the service after
the meal, which is beautiful and too often skipped, becomes more
manageable and easier to complete. Of course, all the traditional songs
that end the seder are here, including a rebus of "Chad Gadyoh."
Reexamining metaphors:
Nothing we say about God is literally true.God is neither king nor father,
soldier nor mirror. Our sages emphasized that God is far, far beyond our
capacity for language, and that, by definition, everything we say about
the divine falls short. The only Name God gives in the Bible is Ehyeh
— I AM/I WILL BE. That's the limit of our comprehension of
God -- God is real and eternal.
But our love for God, and God's
love for us, won't let us stay satisfied with abstractions. We have
to come closer, and to do that we have to think about God in ways we can
understand -- in metaphors and hints. But our sages strongly warn us not
to confuse these metaphors with far greater Reality.
"King" and "Lord" are the most
common metaphors in our tradition. We began using them long ago, when a
king was the rightful and expected head of society, and the personification
of his people. (Through Elizabethan times, it was common to refer to a
king simply by the name of his country.) “King of the Universe” was
a good choice of metaphor, reflecting God's indwelling relationship to
everything created. It also appropriately expressed God's power,
by referencing the highest and most fully recognized earthly power we knew.
The metaphor has an entirely
different meaning today. The connotation of identity and indwelling
is lost, except, perhaps, in reference to a figurehead with purely symbolic
function. The message of power remains, but the power is no longer
the expected, appropriate force that keeps society from falling into chaos.
Monarchy strikes us as anachronism or tyranny. To live under
a king and acknowledge God as the true King is liberating. To live
in a democracy and use king as a primary metaphor for God gives a very
different message. Even if this were an appropriate message, it is
a new message.It is not what the original metaphor meant.
Accordingly, translating this two-thousand-year-old
metaphor literally does not accurately reflect the original. Maimonides,
among others, rejected literal translation in favor of a true understanding
of the original, well-expressed in the language of the translation.
It may take time for us to find the metaphors appropriate for our age;
but neither accuracy nor the Third Commandment is served by mistaking the
old metaphor for the reality.