Beth Tfiloh Congregation February-March 2021 Bulletin

RABBI’S CORNER

PURIM: WHEN THE MASK COMES OFF

By Rabbi Mitchell Wohlberg

For us as Jews, Purim came early this year. Indeed, we have been observing an aspect of Purim since last Purim itself!

A popular song describing Purim has the words: “Chag Purim, chag Purim, chag gadol layehudim masechot ra’ashanim shirim verikudim – Purim time, Purim time, a great festival for the Jewish people … masks, noise makers, songs and dances.” Maybe not the songs and dances, but the masks have been on our faces throughout the year. The masks, while absolutely necessary, have turned so much upside down. As someone put it: “Never in a million years could I have imagined I would go up to a bank teller wearing a mask and ask for money!”

With this in mind, it’s interesting to note that in the Torah, the holiest day of the year, the Day of Atonement, is always called Yom Kippurim. This name, Yom Kippurim, led the sages to make a very strange pun. They said that Yom Kippurim can be read as “Yom k’Purim – this day is like Purim.” What on earth do these two days have in common that our sages would make such a strange pun? A great rabbi once answered that the two days have one thing in common: the wearing of a mask. On Purim, we put one on. On Yom Kippurim, we take one off.

Yes, there has to be a time when we have to confront our real selves … the selves that nobody else knows.

Yet, as necessary as masks are these days, we pay a price for wearing them. The Wall Street Journal headlined an article: “Covid Facemasks are Disrupting a Key Tool of Human Communications.” What is it that is being disrupted? We can’t see each other’s facial expressions, “confusing our ability to distinguish disgust from anger, or happiness from indifference.” According to researchers, no other creature relies so much on facial expressions to communicate as a human being. With a mask on, it is impossible for others to know who you really are!

This year of the coronavirus has given us much time for thought and introspection. Have we used any of that time to take off our mask and look at ourselves? Do we like what we see? Is there anything that we can change? How do we look to others? These are all questions waiting for answers. Let’s not wait for Yom Kippur … hopefully by then, we will all have our masks off and people will really get to know us once again. Until then: “To thine own self be true.”