The figure of the Jewish mother has always been rather sacrosanct in traditional Jewish life and lore. Even in ages of transition, during and after the Emancipation, when all that was sacred was held up to criticism and analysis, the Jewish mother somehow remained above the din of battle and emerged unscathed. In recent years, however, the classical type which comes to mind when we speak of the Jewish mother, has become more and more replaced by a new and competing sort of mother. Furthermore, there has been a trend in English literature, both in this country and in England, subjecting the Jewish mother to withering criticism and attempting to debunk her value and influence.We shall leave this contemporary reaction against the Jewish mother to our next sermon. This morning we shall make some remarks about a universal aspect of motherhood, namely, motherhood as creativity.There can be little question that childbearing is the most immediately, directly, and obviously creative act known to mankind, even if it is not deliberate, but unconscious and perhaps even involuntary. By the act of giving birth, a woman performs the creative act of perpetuating the species, of adding another link in the chain of generations.But is this act purely biological, or does it have any religious value? Is it an ordinary, natural process, devoid of special spiritual significance, or does it, even as a natural act, participate in a higher order of meaning?Our question is intensified by what appears to be a decidedly negative answer. In reading of the phenomenon of childbirth, at the very beginning of this morning’s Sidra, we learn that it occasions a period of tum’ah or uncleanliness, for a period of seven days for the birth of a boy and fourteen for a girl. Does this not indicate that the religious significance, if any, of childbirth is negative, that perhaps the Torah rejects its animality, its primitiveness, its thorough and exclusive naturalness, as opposed to any transcendent signific…

The Haftorah offers us a fascinating view of life in ancient Israel of over 2800 years ago. It takes us back to an era when there flourished in Israel a King and a Prophet. It is a time when the Kingdom of Israel was in essence a satellite of Aram or Syria, and the Israelites’ King was a vassal of the King of Syria. The Prophet was Elisha, disciple of Elijah. The Haftorah’s narrative may be summarized as follows: Naaman, the General of Syria, was a leper. A captured Israelite girl, who was taken as a handmaid for Naaman’s wife, told Naaman that he could find relief by consulting the Prophet. The King of Syria thereupon sent his General to the King of Israel asking that the latter provide for his cure from his leprosy. The King of Israel panicked, for he had no idea on how to cure lepers, and suspected that the Syrian King was using this as a pretext for destroying him. When Elisha heard about that, he sent word to the King that he, the Prophet, will effect the cure: וידע כי יש נביא בישראל, “and let him know that there is a Prophet in Israel.” Elisha then sent a messenger to Naaman telling him to dip into the Jordan seven times and he will be cured. Naaman was offended, because the Prophet did not personally greet him at the door, and because the prescription he offered seemed so ridiculous. I thought, the General said, that the Prophet would wave his hand and cure me magically. Furthermore, I have much better rivers in Syria than this little rivulet called the Jordan! Nevertheless, his advisors prevailed upon him to follow the Prophet’s advice, which he did, whereupon he was healed. The Haftorah then reaches its climax in the words of Naaman: הנה נא ידעתי כי אין אלקים בכל הארץ כי אם בישראל, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world save in Israel.” It is the act of Kiddush Hashem, the glorification or sanctification of God’s Name.Now, this is more than just a flashback to a fascinating piece of ancient history. As we say in our blessings over the Haftorah, …